Chapter Text
The Tower is filled with people for once, the common areas alive and bustling because it’s one of the rare days where everyone is home at the same time and relaxing. They’re all enjoying the peace and quiet in their own ways, basking in the calm and warmth of the Tower and the family they’ve built within it.
Clint’s eating cereal out of a glass while watching Toddlers in Tiaras, Natasha curled up peacefully beside him on the couch reading a book. He can’t help but smile a little bit every once in a while because she’s utterly relaxed against his side. He knows it’s because she can let her guard down where she is and she knows it. They’re safe here in this Tower, with these people, with their new family.
Thor’s sprawled out on the other couch, large headphones in place as he listens to music. There are many differences between his home and this world but music is one difference that he deeply enjoys. The minstrels of Asgard are far different from those of Midgard and here they sing of so many subjects. It always helps to ease the ache for Asgard that lives in his breast, as does the company of his shield-brothers and sisters of course.
Sam’s browsing new cameras on his tablet because he’s thinking about getting back into photography. It’s something he hasn’t done since he lost Riley, because it had been Riley who’d gotten him into it in the first place. He hadn’t had the heart to touch a camera after the day he lost him but he thinks it’s time now. He thinks he’s ready, thinks that Riley would have wanted him to be ready.
Bruce is sitting near one of the large windows, science journal in hand and a cup of steaming tea at his elbow. He’s out of the lab for the day and he’s calm and relaxed and happy because Toni’s given him a place to be those things, a place to live without fear of the world or himself.
She gave that to all of them really. Had extended her hands in their directions for longer than most people would have ever dreamed of.
It hadn’t been easy at first but eventually they'd all managed to come together.
They'd taken Toni's hands, had taken what she'd offered and built a family as well as a team on the foundation she'd provided.
And it’s been so goddamn good ever since.
For all of them
~~~
A floor down Steve’s in the art studio Toni had built for him.
It’s a wide open space with lots of natural light and it's been done in clean lines and warm hues.
It’s beautiful and comfortable and his in a way he hadn’t been able to accept two years ago when Toni had first shown it to him.
He still regrets the way he’d acted then, regrets the memory of watching the light slowly dim in her bright eyes at his lack of enthusiasm. He’d thought ... well his thoughts hadn’t been nice, hadn’t been kind. Hadn’t been worthy of a woman as classy and deeply kind as Toni could be.
He’d been too hurt and too raw, too caught up in all he’d lost and blind to all he stood to gain, to accept her gift then, to accept her.
He knows they’ve moved past that by now, knows they’ve built a family here with the others and moved beyond the anger and hurt of those first months. He knows it because Toni smiles for him now. She grins at him in that way she’d once only smiled for Rhodes or Ms. Potts and Hogan. It’s an expression so bright and true, so beautiful, that he can barely breathe sometimes when he sees it.
Steve loves her.
He’s never told her, maybe never will. But he knows it’s true.
He’d never thought he’d love like this but he does, and the hurt of it is sweet and thick like honey on his tongue.
Steve savors the flavor though, cherishes the ache of it even if he’s sure he’d ruined his chances with Toni all the way back in the beginning.
It’s okay though.
Loving someone isn’t always about being loved back after all.
Real love doesn't demand love in return as its price.
He’ll take the joy he finds in his life now, in Toni, and he’ll hold it close. He’ll hoard the warmth her smile brings him close to his heart. He’ll cherish the joy of her laughter, the shiver of lust he gets from seeing her messy and disheveled after a night in the workshop or sleep warm and tousled in the morning. He'll bask in the spark of awe that seeing her dressed to the nines with a smirk on her crimson lips always brings to life inside of him.
He'll keep a tight grip on that surge of need that always rocks him to his core every time he finds an excuse to touch her.
He’ll savor those things and he’ll keep his love to himself just like he always has.
He still likes to say it to himself sometimes though. Likes to mouth the words to the dark of his bedroom, likes to hear them in the air and taste them in his mouth when he knows he’s alone and the others can’t hear or see him do it.
Sometimes, when he can’t sleep, he’ll bury his face in his pillow, wrap a hand around his cock, and say it like a mantra.
I love you, Toni.
Saying it, acknowledging it, helps somehow.
Besides Steve knows JARVIS will hold his secret as long as it doesn’t endanger Toni.
And it doesn’t.
Steve won’t let it.
He’d never hurt her like that. Doesn’t want to hurt her ever again even if he knows he will. She twists him up inside sometimes to the point where he doesn’t always think before he speaks, to the point that he gets angry at himself as much as he might be angry at her or something else entirely.
He’s never been good with the dames Steve admits ruefully. That’d always been Bucky’s area of expertise. Or at least it used to. Now they both kind of flounder in their own ways when it comes to women. It doesn’t help that Toni, like Peggy and Natasha, is one of a kind in a way that’s almost hard to believe.
Speaking of Bucky, that’s part of the problem too. Because Steve loves Toni but he also knows he’s not the only one.
Bucky loves her too.
They’ve talked about it, made peace with it, but Steve knows he’ll never make a move now. Not even if he thought he had a chance with her still despite how badly he'd messed up in the past.
Knowing that Bucky loves her ... well Steve would feel like he was stealing a future from Bucky if he tried to make a move on Toni now. Even if Bucky himself has no intentions of trying to get closer to Toni than they both already are.
He won’t, can’t, do that for a number of reasons.
Steve sighs, looks down at his drafting desk, and traces the tip of a finger over the curve of Toni’s smile, careful not to accidentally smudge the drawing. He likes to do Toni in inks, likes the wet, sharp look of them, the bright popping colors and sharp lines they can give him.
Those, he thinks, are what capture her the best.
So Steve smiles, picks up a new pen, and bends back to his work.
Everything will work out one way or another.
And for now this is enough.
~~~
Bucky’s in the gym because, outside of the quiet of the roof or the mesmerizing chaos of Toni’s lab, it’s the place he likes best in the entire Tower.
There’s a comfort in the familiarity of the equipment, in the function of the room itself. The gym reminds him of the few ... not good days with HYDRA but the ones that were less horrible in some ways.
Physical conditioning days had been as freeing in their own way as they’d often been painful. As much of a puppet as he’d been under HYDRA's control Bucky had been aware enough to know that he’d preferred physical conditioning days above things like arm maintenance. That had been a different kind of agony all together.
But physical conditioning, the freedom to hit and kick and punch? The glory of using his body just to use it, pushing himself to the limits of his enhanced system just to see how far he could go? He’d craved that as the Winter Soldier even if he hadn’t understood what it was to truly want anything then.
So the gym is a reminder, a good and a painful one all at the same time.
He hasn’t told Steve that of course because the mook always gets sad or pissed about that kind of thing and Bucky can always tell no matter how hard he tries to hide it.
Toni knows though.
The thought stops Bucky cold.
Toni knows.
Bucky sighs, leans forward until his sweaty forehead can rest against the punching bag, and just breathes.
Toni.
God she’s something else.
Bucky would have never thought he’d be where he is now.
In control.
Free.
Living in a tower full of superheroes with Steve and Natalia both.
Hopelessly in love with Toni Stark.
And it is hopeless he knows.
He doesn’t ... there’s no place for him in her life like that.
And it’s not that Steve loves her too, because Bucky knows he does, they’ve talked about it, made peace with the two of them loving the same woman.
So that isn’t the issue, or at least isn’t all of it.
It’s so much more than that.
It’s his past and what he’d done in it, what he’d been forced to do. It’s him now, still a little more than half broken on his best days, still mending from decades of hurt.
He’s not the Bucky he used to be. He knows that, sees it in the sadness that creeps over Steve sometimes.
He’s not charming and smooth like he used to be. There’s been too much to happen to him between then and now. Too much pain, too much blood, just ... too much. Parts of him had been murdered years ago to make room for something new. For the creature he is now.
He can’t ... he couldn’t give her what she deserves even if she was to want him to try. He knows that. Stevie would be better for her all the way around if the jerk could get his head out of his ass long enough to ask her out. Or talk to her without tripping over his own mouth half the time.
But god that doesn’t stop Bucky from wanting her. He knows, with a dark curl of something that feels almost like shame, that he would still want her even if she was with Steve. Even if he didn’t have the right to want her anymore he still would.
He can’t, won’t, stop.
She’s the first thing, the first person, he’s wanted for himself in so long now.
In some ways being around her had taught him how to want anything at all again.
It had started slow, a small flicker of awareness that had soon burst into a raging flame.
The heat of that want, the dark, possessive snarl of it, is what truly stops him though.
It’s not ... he wants her too much he thinks sometimes.
He wants her so bad he aches with it. Wants to crawl inside her skin, wants to put his mouth on her and bite down, wants to suck hard and harsh at her skin until she wears his marks. Wants to rut against her like an animal until she stinks of him. Wants to press her down into that big bed of hers and make her take it, make her scream and moan and beg him for more.
Bucky shudders cause he’s already half hard at just the thought.
That darkness is the real reason he doesn’t do anything.
The real reason he hasn’t tried, hasn’t even let himself think about it too much.
He can’t ... she doesn’t ... he’s done enough to her.
He won’t do that too.
He’ll stick to fucking his own hand and jerking his dick raw on the nights he’s too antsy to take it anymore. He'll stick to their late night meets where he gets to see her soft and quieter and just a bit vulnerable. He’ll stick to his longing from a distance and the pain of waking up from dreams of her.
He’ll stick to fantasies of her warm and soft at his side, smiling up at him with those big blue eyes bright with laughter. He’ll stick to imagining her hot and wet around his cock as he fucks her, his mouth biting at her throat and his hands buried in that luscious hair of hers that he longs to touch.
He’ll tuck away the dark, delicious thought of pressing up against her back and watching Stevie as he presses against her front. Will hoard the dreams of sharing her with Steve away like they’re something precious but secret.
Because they are.
So he loves Toni Stark.
But love doesn’t always mean getting what you want.
Bucky knows that all too well.
He’s used to hiding what he wants by now anyways. This is just one more thing to add to the pile. One more ache to endure and bury.
He sighs, straightens up, and goes back to working the bag with a steady, bruising rhythm.
He’ll dream of her tonight he knows.
He dreams of her most nights to be honest.
It’s both a blessing and a curse.
~~~
Down in her workshop Toni’s busy singing along absently to the music JARVIS is playing for her as she works.
She’s currently in the middle of adjusting a water-filtration system that she’s had on backlog for the past few months. It’s a part of SI’s Green Initiative and thankfully the adjustments are flowing smoothly.
As a matter of fact most things in her life are at the moment.
Things have been going so good lately that Toni’s almost convinced she’s in a dream half the time.
She’d never have imagined her life would turn out like this. Living in her own Tower, sharing space with superheroes, fighting evil and saving the city and the world on a regular basis. Having a family outside of the small, guarded circle of people she’s has called her entire world for so long now.
But here she is, living the dream as it were.
Living side by side with Steve and Bucky.
Steve who is all golden warmth and strength. Steve who smiles and fights and laughs with and around her. Steve who comes down to the workshop on a regular basis to sketch Mother in her habitat or to play with the bots. Steve who has managed to move past his initial dislike for her, has managed to take the time to get to know her enough not to hate her anymore. Steve who gets mad when the press slanders her, who puts himself between her and paparazzi in a way only Rhodey or Happy ever has. Steve who she still loves, who she’s always loved on one level or another it seems. Steve who makes her heart race and her stomach clench.
Steve who makes her ache.
And then there’s Bucky too.
Bucky who’s darker, a bit more openly feral than Steve is. Bucky who has a thread of ruthlessness in him that Toni both covets and admires despite its origins. Bucky with his crooked grin and the hair he keeps tied up in a bun. Bucky with the sadness in his eyes and guilt weighing on his shoulders. Bucky who calls her doll and who seems to watch her back in battle just as easily as he watches Steve’s. Bucky who slides into the workshop and endures the bots and their fascination with his arm alongside their insistence on handing him things like oil and socket wrenches. Bucky who whispers secrets to her in the night, when the rest of the Tower is asleep and it’s just the two of them, plagued by their nightmares and their pasts both hidden and known. Bucky who’d begged for her forgiveness even when she’d been vicious and snarling and too wounded to realize that he didn’t need it in the first place.
Bucky who she also loves.
Bucky who makes her burn.
And she has both of them her with her now, living in her Tower, sharing meals and movies and space with her and this strange family she’s somehow found herself a part of.
Toni had never thought she’d … this is …it’s … it’s more than she’d ever thought possible.
More than she could have dreamed of.
Toni is happy now. Happy in a way she’s never been.
Even with the constant ache of knowing that she loves Steve and Bucky both but that she’s not the right kind of woman for either of them.
She’s too broken for either of them, too jagged and mixed up and unable to change, unable to fix herself no matter how hard she tries.
They deserve better and better is the one thing Toni knows she’ll never be.
Still, even despite that now familiar ache, she’s so goddamn happy.
And that scares her in a lot of ways. Fills her with anxiety and dread. She’s constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop as the saying goes. Waiting for something to happen to snatch those feelings away from her.
Because nothing this good can ever last.
Not for her.
Something or someone always crops up and does their best to steal this kind of peace away from her.
It’s only a matter of time.
~~~
“Miss,” JARVIS’ voice grabs her attention a few hours later.
“Yeah J?”
“Director Hill has put out a call Miss,” JARVIS tells her and Toni immediately focuses on his voice fully.
“We assembling?” She’s up on her feet before he can answer, already moving towards the Iron Gallery and the armor.
“Not as such Miss,” JARVIS denies and Toni stops, narrows her eyes, and waits. “I’m afraid that Director Hill is requesting the Avengers make their way to her headquarters for a non-combat related issue. She refused to provide further details expect that it was a matter of most urgency and discretion.”
Toni’s mind whirls because Hill’s not normally so cryptic. Unlike Fury, who still delights in being vague and a pain in Toni’s ass on occasion, Hill is refreshingly upfront for a spy.
“Alright J,” Toni finally agrees even as she moves toward the bathroom. “Tell the others to head off without me, I’ll meet them there in a few.”
“Of course Miss.”
~~~
Toni heels click against the tiled floor as she struts into the conference room a half hour or so later. The rest of the team’s already there of course, standing around in their civilian clothes and looking relatively normal but Toni knows that doesn’t really matter.
Natasha, Bucky, Bruce and Thor are never really unarmed. None of them really are to be honest. Steve has the shield in the portfolio case at his feet, Clint’s bow is slung over his shoulder in the special cylindrical drop case she made for him and Sam’s wings are in a case similar to Toni’s old Mark V suitcase armor. Toni of course has JARVIS in her ear and the armor ready to tear its way through to her at a split seconds notice.
That’s one of the first things she’d handled once they’d all come together as a team and then as a family. Toni had found a way to make sure all of them could be armed to the teeth in seconds no matter where they were.
“Stark, how nice of you to join us.” Hill gives her a dour frown but doesn’t say anything else because no one’s even sat down yet so Toni’s not technically late.
She’s just made a bit of a dramatic entrance as always.
“You know me Hill,” Toni slants her a grin as she moves to take her usual place between Steve and Bucky at the table, “I always aim to please.”
“That’s what she said,” Clint mutters only to whine when Natasha reaches back and smacks him in the back of the head. “Aww, jokes.”
On either side of her Steve shakes his head and rolls his eyes as Bucky huffs out a little exasperated sigh.
Toni waits until Clint looks up at her again and then she winks at him and raises her hands up to bop out a quick “right on” in his direction.
“Don’t encourage him Toni.” Bruce chides from a bit further down.
Clint just grins, leans back in his seat, and props his feet up on the table.
“If you’re all finished?” Hill calls their attention to the front of the room where she’s standing, arms crossed and feet set firmly apart.
“Don’t mind us Hill.” Toni waves a hand magnanimously in the air in front of her. “You go ahead and tell us what it is that’s got you looking so cheerful.”
“Cute.” The way Hill says the word makes it sound like a curse instead. Apparently she and Fury are more alike than Toni had figured earlier. “At approximately 15:00 yesterday one of Reed Richards experiments went critical. The Baxter building is relatively unharmed but the experiment he was working on had … unexpected results.”
Toni immediately growls, low and displeased, in the back of her throat. Steve and Bucky both shift on either side of her at the sound but for once she ignores them.
“Of fucking course it did.” Toni snarls. Further down the table Bruce already has his face buried in his hands. “It’s Richards. The man can’t twitch without setting off something dangerous and unstable in that trash heap he calls a building.”
“Stark’s prolonged pissing contest with Richards aside,” Hill cuts in with a glower as she turns her back to them and moves over towards the darkened monitors mounted on the wall, “that’s the reason why I called you in. Richard’s portals didn’t produce anything dangerous before they went critical and collapsed but they did produced someone. Two someone’s you could say.” Hill turns back to face them then and Toni can see the way stress has pulled the corners of her mouth down just a bit. “I need you to handle this until Reed gets his systems back up and running enough to fix this.”
“Please be a dinosaur, please be a dinosaur,” Clint has his fingers crossed and isn’t even attempting to keep his voice down.
“What part of not dangerous didn’t you understand Barton?” Hill snaps in his direction.
“The part where you turned your back on the deaf guy who has his hearing aids turned down `cause he was hoping to nap through this.” Clint tells her sunnily.
“Barton.” Hill grits out and Toni’s sure her hand twitches toward her gun just a bit.
“Just who is it that you’re wanting us to keep an eye on?” Steve cuts in then before things can spiral any further out of control. “Wouldn’t it be better to keep these people here, isolated and secure?”
“Normally yes. We currently have them both locked down separately in secure rooms and normally we’d keep them there for the duration.” Hill agrees with a nod in Steve’s direction. “If this was a relatively normal situation that is. But it’s not. Their identities have already been confirmed and that’s where things get a little bit more complicated. Given the circumstances I thought it’d be best to call you in. Stark especially.”
Toni feels a shiver of foreboding trace down her spine when Hill turns her gaze in her direction.
“Don’t keep us in suspense Hill.” Toni makes sure her face is blank and her smile is cutting.
“I,” Hill falters a moment, a split second of hesitation that’s out of character for her, “I actually think it’d be best if you saw for yourselves. It’s a bit of a shock.” Hill warns them even as she reaches out and flicks on the monitor.
For a long moment Toni thinks she’s dreaming.
For a long moment Toni’s sure she’s dreaming.
Because this … this can’t be real.
The universe can’t be this cruel.
“Miss,” JARVIS’ voice is soft and concerned in her ear but Toni can barely hear him over the pounding of her own heart. It’s racing beside the reactor, trying its hardest to pound its way out of her chest. “Miss your heart rate has increased dramatically. I will send the armor to your location if you do not calm down.”
Toni doesn’t really register the words, can’t.
All of her focus is turned toward that monitor, towards the two people it’s showing her on the split screen.
There, staring up at the cameras trained on them are two versions of the same man. One’s older, face stern and hair going a steely grey, he’s staring at the camera with narrowed eyes and a heavy frown. The other man is younger, ink black hair swept away from his face and skin still rosy with youth. He’s looking around the room with interest, curiosity bright in his eyes.
There’s a world of difference between the two, so much so that it’s almost hard to tell they’re the same person. Most people wouldn’t be willing to believe they are.
But Toni’s not most people and she knows exactly who’s in that room. Would recognize him anywhere, through anything, no matter how old he is.
“Howard.” Toni whispers the name, disbelief mingling with denial as her world shifts and slides off its axis.
Oh God.
He’s back.