#a reply for queue

“Look, man, I don’t know. I mean, I do know, but---” He exhales, hand dragging through the top of his hair and a groan follows. Call it curiosity, maybe he just wanted a change for a night, and then there was that part of him that wondered if Steve missed that.

They were doing well. It was all new, and they were still learning. Still they did well. It was as if they had simply taken their friendship and turned it up a few notches. He made her laugh. He infuriated her, but he also made her heart skip a beat with every touch and kiss.

Trust, however, it didn’t come easy. Pepper wanted to believe he would never stray. Unfortunately, years of experience told her that Tony had a high libido and very little attention span.

He had changed. She knew it, but that voice in the back or her head nagged at her. That reminder that it wasn’t so long ago that he was bouncing from woman to woman.

She shouldn’t have asked him, but she couldn’t help it. He couldn’t mask his dissapiontment, and she couldn’t deny feeling like a total ass, “I know you wouldn’t. I do.” She insisted, holding on to his arm to keep him from walking away, “I just… need a reminder, okay? I’ll try not to question you so often, but I need the reminder. Can you understand that? Especially since you did sleep with Jill once?” The last part was mostly a joke? And a smile pulled at the corners of her mouth to prove it.

He knew she was teasing, damn well knew it and it still felt like a blow to the gut. Probably because Tony was sure he had in fact slept with Jill from PR, remembering a stray thought that he was glad she didn’t work in HR. But he was pretty sure most of the women he had slept with that were Stark Industries employees were long gone. He hoped. He also still really wanted that drink, more than he had that night when he left Pepper on the roof top. 

“Yeah- yeah, I understand. No, I get it I do.” One hand fidgiting at the back of his neck, the other went in his pocket and began wringing the hell out of some benefactors business card. Squeezing and squeezing until he couldn’t feel the cardstock anymore, just the small indents of his fingers in his palms. Tony didn’t jerk away, might have wanted to, but decided he was going to try to be somewhat of an adult about this. For once. 

He was quiet for a moment, the man with a thousand words rendered speechless and his lips stuck in a purse. Tony swallowed, adams apple bobbing in his throat and his eyes made a dart for the bar. Just one. Just one and he was sure they could go back to their usual selves for the night. “I’m just gonna--” a quick point and nod to the bartender, thankfully male, and he started away again.

Killian could tell when she was thinking about Bae. It was a part of her past that he knew often weighed heavy on her heart. It was something he knew all too well. There were plenty of parts of his past that he wished he could change, or regretted. “There is nothing we can do about the past, love…what’s done is done. All we are able to do now is look to the future.”

He did hope wherever Bae ended up after Neverland he managed to find himself a happy life. The last he had heard the boy found a way out of the dreaded land, which meant he had a chance. “Come, love… why don’t I help you.”

He was right, there was nothing she could do about it now, but it still didn’t mean she thought of it often. Wondered how she could be a good mother to her children now, knowing and living with what she had done to their elder half-brother. Such thoughts never failed to but her into a sour mood and Milah would find herself alone on their back porch, staring out into the sea and wondering if perhaps she did deserve what Rumple had done to her.

Arms slid over his, leaning back into his chest but keepingher eyes on the water as best as she could. She loved their house on the beach,loved her children, but it didn’t mean that her actions of her former life didn’tweigh heavy on her heart. How she had left her poor sweet Baelfire, how heractions eventually led to him being essentially an orphan and his eventualdeath. “I’m fine,” murmured as she turned to meet his eyes; a small smiletugging on her lips. Far from pure, but it would do for now.

“I know. I just…got caught up in the moment. I got the ring and I didn’t want anyone else in the family tipping her off before I could ask. I wanted to surprise her…“ and yes, he was aware of how stupid it could have been to surprise the girl with a heart condition. Maybe he should have talked to his father first, let him know but all he thought about was worrying that the answer might have been no. And it nearly had been.

“But I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner.“ There was a smile when Tony mentioned what his new fiance had done to try to make it up to him. “Did it work?“

“Anyone else? Your mom…well, I honestly don’t know if she would have spilled, but your sister…okay, I can see that. But, really, EJ, I’m a steel trap when it comes to family secrets.” He was glad that EJ had found someone that made him happy, who could give him a happy life, a family. And it helped that she was Steve and Bex’s kid, none of that worrying if the girl that was stealing his kid from under him was good enough.

Cool air caught his skin as he felt the material of his shirt being pulled up before he felt the warmth of lips and the quick, sharp sting of teeth against the small patch of skin she had uncovered. Jefferson stilled at the sensation, startled and just a bit intrigued, before he smirked despite knowing she wouldn’t be able to see it.

The bite she’d given him was rewarded with another light swat to her backside and a quick pinch to her cheek. “It’s also bad form to go around biting young men unless you warn them first.”

“Young man?” Jolly mumbled from behind his back, attempting to swat his hand away, but no, it still came down and this time it was followed by a pinch and she gave a small yelp of surprise before laughing. “You are nothing of the sort! You might appear as such, but you’re nearly as old as Neptune himself.” He wasn’t, of course, but the sentiment was the same. Both of them a good few centuries old, and she had to admit, they looked damn good for being around so long. Especially considering Jolly, for one, had spent most of her life being constructed of planks and sails.

“Did you pick it out?”

Of course he did, he had a thing for dressing his woman in the finest attire. Even if it was for a simple lunch meeting, that didn’t stop Illya from placing the dress on the bed while she was in the shower. 

buyxwarxbonds​

[text: stark naked]: God that sounds good though.

[text: stark naked]:  I’ve never really done that, you know.  I mean, we’d go out to the beach some when I was a kid, but lemme tell you how my pale and scrawny ass was not cut out for extended sun exposure.

[text: stark naked]: I’d get the most erratic sunburns you’ve ever seen in your life.  I’m talking abstract art patterns, it was insane.

[text: stark naked]: It’s not a pen I’m gonna be sticking in my mouth once we get out of here. 

[text:stevie bear] I will make it my mission to sit atop your ass and make sure you are properly layered in sun-screen. And should you burn, I will give you the aloe rub down.

[text:stevie bear] I bet you were cute as a button.