Thank you xKirixKurox, for betaing.

Chloe had been working at a small café when she had first met Tony Stark, and like most men she served he was charming and flirtatious as he tried to pick her up. Chloe would have never imagined that only a few months later she would be somewhat happily married to the man. Her relationship with Tony was not only shaky, but at times seemed to be completely public.

If Tony were to be hanging out with models, the papers knew. The papers seemed to know everything, and it didn't take long of rumours of divorce, adultery, and phantom pregnancies to circle around.

Then it happened; a year after their marriage, Chloe could no longer take it, and slowly she started to drift from him. She hated herself for being so stupid to care about someone as selfish as Tony, and Tony didn't seem to notice anything was wrong.

Like most important business meetings, Chloe was present for only one reason and that reason was, men liked seeing Tony Stark's wife. She made him seem less intimidating, and more down to earth.

Her long blond hair was pulled back tightly in a ponytail and hung sharply down to her waist. She, of course, wore expensive clothing thanks to her husband and jewels that would make any normal house wife cry in jealously. She never cared much for the expensive clothing, make-up and jewels Tony bought for her because like their relationship, they didn't make her feel any happier.

There was never a doubt in her mind that one of the only reason Tony married her was because she was pretty. With long golden locks, and stunning blue eyes, she was very aware that she could never compare to the fake models that Tony liked to hang around with, but she was pretty in the sense that people liked her, teens admired her, and magazines talked about her.

Afghanistan was hot, and Chloe was feeling sick and tired under the sun. She wanted nothing more then Tony to stop showing off so she could go home and relax, even if relaxing around her husband proved to be even more frustrating than not.

"Chloe? Are you all right?" a soft hand was pressed on the small of her back as Rhodey examined her face. She knew she probably looked flustered under the sun, but no one blamed her because everyone was hot.

"I'm fine James, but thank you." She said softly, a few soldiers had looked back to catch a quick glance of the conversation they were having but retuned their eyes back to Tony after Jericho's after shock threw a powerful wall of hot air and dirt into their faces.

Wiping sand off her suite Chloe walked away from Rhodey before he could question her more and jumped into the closest hummer she could find, which happened to be the exact one Tony had jumped into and denied Rhodey entrance.

Silence hung over the car as soldiers outside tried to figure out who was going where, and for the moment they were alone. Chloe had found herself softly panting in the heat and running her hand along her upset stomach, a small bead of sweat rolled down her temple and off her eye-brow.

"Chloe, are you okay?" Tony asked softly, tilting his glass of rum towards his mouth and taking a drink of the cooling liquid. He attempted to pass her his glass but the words that poured from her mouth were not what he would ever expect.

"I want a divorce."

The awkward silence that hung between them was almost unbearable, as was the look across Tony's face. Chloe stomach started to churn because she had never seen such a look on her husband's face. She had opened her mouth to say anything to him but was interrupted by a small cluster of soldiers climbing into the hummer and turning on their shitty CD player.

The silence stayed until Tony had started to ramble, at which point Chloe's mind had begun to wander outside the windows. Like always the people in the car asked Tony an assortment of questions. Tony loved the curious nature people held for him, and Chloe knew very well that fame was a disease, in which people needed to know everything about you, so together they worked well.

"Is it true you went 12 for 12 with last year's Maxim cover models?" One of the male solders had asked, He paused after he had asked the question, realizing that Tony's wife was sitting right beside him, and that the question was inappropriate to ask.

"That is an excellent question. Yes and no. March and I had a scheduling conflict, but fortunately, the Christmas cover was twins." The words had swiftly left Tony's mouth, and as much as she didn't care to admit it hurt Chloe. She could feel the sting of tears in the corner of her eyes.

"You're a real bastard you know that?" she snapped, Tony had glanced at her before ignoring what she had said. The tension in the hummer was thicker than ever before. Angrily, Chloe ran her fingers under the rim of her eyes to get rid of the tears she could feel oncoming. Without warning, the Hummer in front of them exploded, and Chloe was knocked to the ground as the solders around her started screaming. People flew out of the vehicle and Tony shouted for them to leave him a gun.

Bullets hit the side of the hummer and Tony looked around dazed for a second, but was brought back to the world when Chloe screamed and covered her ears. He didn't think about his next actions as he grabbed her left hand and pulled her from the Hummer. He had found a rock to hide behind and with great difficulty stuffed his wife to the side of it, before he started to madly press buttons on his phone.

His attention had suddenly turned to a large shell that was dropped a few feet away from him, in a panic he attempted to move out of its way only to be hit in the chest with shrapnel. The pain was excruciating, he could feel his hot blood pour over his flesh. Stunned, he tugged at the clothing, rolling his head back when he had seen the amount of blood on his chest. The sudden fear of death had started to settle in and the panic, panic of dying alone.

"Tony? Tony!" The voice of his wife echoed through his mind and the warming feeling of Chloe's small hands pressing on his bleeding chest, only drawing back when shrapnel priced her hand. The last thing Tony could hear before he blacked out was Chloe's cries of terror.

Panic was Tony's first initial reaction when he had woken up in a cave with a car battery attached to his chest. He tried to remember how he had gotten into the cave but his brain wouldn't allow him to remember much of anything. He had remembered Chloe's demand for divorce, making her cry, the explosion, and shoving his wife by a rock. After that it was a mixed blur of emotions and pain in his chest.

"Did they bring a woman here?" Tony softly asked, He didn't know if he wanted to know the answer, but his brain was nagging at him. He felt the need to at least ask. Yinsen looked over at Tony; the light from the fire pit gave them little light, but a lot of warmth.

"No they did not." Yinsen spoke softly, Tony sighed and with his large hand he roughly ran his fingers over his eyes, obscuring Yinsen from a view of his face. Tony could feel the pain growing in his chest, he had felt it once before when his parents had died, but he would have never expected to feel it again, grief.

He had no idea what had happened to Chloe, but he was sure she was either badly hurt, or dead. Even if Chloe had asked for a divorce, he still loved her; he would never want her to be hurt.

"Tony, are you alright?" Yinsen asked, after the long silence between the two. Tony removed his hand from his face, and blinked away what he feared was oncoming tears. The cave was not a place of any kind of emotion that could prevent his escape. He had to bottle it; he could not allow his pain to continue.

A loud bang echoed from the doors, and Yinsen jumped up from his position. "Just do as I do." Yinsen commanded motioning for Tony to stand up, a look of pure terror was etched onto Yinsen's face and Tony had yet to understand the seriousness of the situation, for it would be only moments before he learned what happened to his wife, as well as the Ten Rings were using his weapons.

Chloe hadn't slept in days, and she could slowly feel the sleep deprivation slowly taking an effect on her. She would find herself starting to doze off but would jerk awake as soon as she realized what she was doing. How her body could even consider sleeping in a dog kennel meant for large dogs baffled her.

But she did know one thing; she was terrified, and alone. Often, the men who had kidnapped her would shake the cage; throw things at her like garbage, water, and even food. She even had the unpleasant misfortune of a large man pissing on her while he watched her one night. He had since yet to return, and she was glad the next morning that they had hosed her down.

But the thing that terrified her most was the location of her husband. She remembered trying to stop the bleeding and pulling her hands back in pain. She was unsure of the amount of blood he had lost; there was a large pool of blood permanently stained on her clothing.

She was curled up in the small corner of her crate; watching the foreign men chat as they watched a small set of surveillance televisions when a loud commotion was heard from outside of the room. Terrified of who was about to enter the room she pressed herself deeper into the corner. Her eyes wildly watched the metal door that swung open harshly and slammed against the rock walls. A man carrying a car battery was thrown a few feet away from her cage and she screamed in fright hiding her face from what was going to happen.

"Chloe, is that you?" his voice was soft and caring. She didn't believe it was her husband until she pulled her hands away from her face to study him sitting in front of the cage, dirty, wet and holding a car battery. Why he was carrying a car battery bewildered her greatly.

"Tony? Oh my god Tony! Where are we?" Chloe cried, pressing herself awkwardly against the cage bars and reaching out for him. He gently grabbed her small hand and pressed her knuckles to his lips before weaving his fingers through her other hand which was still somewhat in her cage.

He ignored her pleas for answers and studied her, making sure she was okay. Like him, she was dirty, wet, covered in blood, scratched, and had a large bruise on the side of her face. Her expensive clothing was covered in mud, tattered, torn; she smelt like damp clothing and piss. She had an overwhelming look of fear in her eyes that broke his heart. He knew women in hostage situations were less likely to survive, and Chloe, being the only women present, made their hungry lustful stairs more intensified.

Chloe's tearful eyes drifted to Tony's chest and he watched as she made the connection that he was in fact not okay. She gasped and her lips trembled, she was trying to form words in her mouth. He stopped her before she could, "Lo," he said softly placing a hand on her unwounded cheek; his fingers caught the tears rolling down her cheeks. "I'm going to get us out of here, I promise!"

Chloe could feel more tears running down her face, she knew he was lying. He wanted to make her feel better, she was well aware that they were going to die in this cave, and the more time they spent there the closer they came to their deaths. Chloe closed her eyes and for a second enjoyed the feeling of his warmth on her cold cheek. Softly, she nodded her head; Tony let out a large breath of air that he was holding in his chest.

A large man with a mustache behind Tony started speaking in his tongue, and soon after he had finished talking a much smaller man studded out a translation. "He says if you don't build him your missile he will kill your wife." A horrible twisting pain filled Tony's gut as he looked at his wife; she had started to shake in fear by this point and helplessly looked at Tony for help. She didn't want him to build the missile, but he didn't have much of a choice.

"Tell him I'll do it, only on one condition." Tony said seriously, his mind was wheeling with thoughts.

"Tony no, don't do it, don't build them the missile." Chloe begged him, grabbing his hand with her much smaller one and pulling it away from her face. The room watched to two in silence, as they waited for Tony's answer. Tony squeezed her hand, before completely ignoring her outburst.

"I will only build the missile if they don't harm my wife; she is to stay with me at all times." Chloe had jerked back at his request and gave him a cold look, which was not what he was expecting. "Are you an idiot, you can't build them anything, do you know what will happen if you do!" Chloe's words stung, he was trying everything to keep her safe and she wasn't helping. Yinsen translated Tony's request as Tony harshly yanked his hands away from Chloe, picking up his car battery he stood up.

"He says that it's a deal and after you make him his missile he will set you both free." Yinsen's face was serious, and as Tony shook his captor's hand, "No he won't." Tony said softly as their captor happily shook Tony's hand unaware of the words that were passed.

Please review...It makes me want to write more.