Disclaimer- Nope, still not mine.

Summary - In which a simple handshake leads to much more.

A/N- Wow, I just looked at the number of reviews I've received, and I must admit that I'm shocked and honored at the response this little fic of mine has gotten. I haven't been enjoying writing this much in quite a long time, and I'm very grateful for the support.

I'm not sure if it shows up, but if those of you with author or story alerts see something that says I've edited the first two chapters, don't panic. There was a typo in the Hot Rod and I wanted to take the 'fin' off of the Golden Knight because that is, obviously, no longer the end. If those changes didn't show up, please ignore my mindless babble :)


The Handshake

It doesn't happen the way they expected it to - because they knew it was going to happen, even if they didn't talk about it because talking about it would cause it to happen. They expected it to happen because someone catches them out on a date, or taking a cruise on his yacht, or because one of the personnel on his jet blabs about that time he was trying to persuade her to join in the Mile High Club with him. Tony has even caught Pepper drafting various responses to the ways it could happen.

"I just want to be ready," She replies defensively when she realizes she hasn't closed the laptop in time. "When this happens, I want the damage to us to be minimal. The world is full of incredibly stupid people who'd look at this as a weakness, and they aren't going to exploit it if I can help it."

In another time he might have made fun of her for being so anal, but this time he just sits behind her on the bed, his arms around her waist, and presses a kiss into her hair.

"You're my own little superhero, Pepper Potts." He says, and she melts.

They're definitely surprised that no one notices the way they melt frequently in each other's presence, but they both have excellent poker faces (they once played a legendary game together when someone else was late to a vital meeting). There are rules, of course, to prevent these faces from slipping. No undue touching around the office - especially no kissing. Kisses leave both of them in a mindless puddle on the floor and they don't want the janitors to be the first ones to find out.

Because of that rule there's a whole new level to what they do at the office. When she brings him his hot coffee it's with an even warmer smile. When he finishes his reports on time, before she's even asked for them, and sets them on her desk he does it without a single complaint. The light touch of her fingertips on his wrist when he's bent over a blueprint in his office doesn't just get his attention, it says that she misses him, the him she has back at the mansion. And when he comes to tell her that he's on his way home, the tired look in his eyes isn't just because he's bored and he needs to do something with his hands, it's because he's sick of the bullshit of the world and he needs to sit down with her and her honesty around the dinner table.

There are days when she's convinced that they're both just going crazy.

When she gets back to the mansion, a careful hour or so after he's already left, it always takes them a moment to debunk the programming that won't let them acknowledge their feelings - but then every day since the retreat has been an exercise in that. Tony especially has a hard time with it. There are days when he spends most of his time looking at her from across the room, just looking at her, and then all of the sudden he'll walk over to her and put his arms around her and hold her so tight she can't breathe and tell her he loves her. They startled Pepper, at first, these random outbreaks of affection, but now she looks forward to them. There's one night in particular when she's standing over the stove making spaghetti and meatballs (it's the night before the incident, but they don't know that yet) and he walks over to her and wraps his arms around her from behind and actually lifts her off the ground for a moment.

"Tony, the sauce - "

"It'll be fine. Just let me hold you."

She turns around in his arms so that her head is against his chest and they just stand there in the kitchen with the sauce burning quietly behind them.

"I'm probably not supposed to be doing this, huh?" He murmurs. "I'm probably supposed to behave like a civilized ape and leave you alone until you're done cooking."

"Does it seem like I mind?"

He takes her point. The sauce is nearly lost but she salvages it in the nick of time, and he stands behind her while she does, watching her silently, marveling that she is in his kitchen at all. When they sit down on the couch and eat their spaghetti together she can feel their newness like a mist on the air. She knows exactly what he meant when he said he felt like a virgin again; at first the effect of his words had been cheapened a little by the sound of Madonna's voice in her head but now she feels it too, all over her skin, the sense of newness and chance and fragility.

Even though he still asks if they can order out for a pizza after the spaghetti is gone and she still rolls her eyes and lets him, everything about them is different than before. She's never seen him so openly unsure, but now that she's finally convinced him to take off the mask she sees the play of emotions over his face like the reflections of fireworks on the Pacific. And he's never seen her so tender before, but now that he's finally letting her take care of him she doesn't have to fight for every inch anymore. There are times when they lay silently, chastely (well, for the most part) beside each other and the sound of their fear fills up the bedroom. She dreads the intrusion of the real world's cynical laughter on their paradise. He fears the harm his own weapons can do in the hands of others. They steel themselves, because they know it's coming.

And it happens because of a handshake, of all things.


Fall is coming on and with it the start of the fiscal year. It's a little sad, really, how excited everyone around here gets, as if it really is a new year celebration. But they let themselves get swept up in it anyway, working even harder than usual to finish proposals and negotiate contracts and put the finishing touches on the latest designs.

This time it's especially busy, especially exciting, because October 1st will mark the beginning of the first full year of Stark Industries' new lease on life. When Tony stuck to his guns about his new policies and set in motion plans to work on more defensive technology and phase out weapons, he gave notice that anyone who felt they fundamentally disagreed with the company's new direction could leave with no hard feelings. Some of them did, but for the most part his characteristic passion has already precipitated a change in everyone around him, as it always does, and they are taking to his new ideas with zeal. His engineers haven't had such a hard time keeping up with him in years, and they love it.

It's a challenging time for Pepper too, because suddenly there are new contacts to be made, new feelers to be sent out in search of like-minded individuals to help Tony on his latest quest. There are many new people to woo and impress, and they're putting on their most dazzling smiles to do so, and it helps that they're filled to the brim with secret happiness inside.

It doesn't help that a lot of people might disapprove of that happiness, should it ever become un-secret.

There's a point in late August when Tony's new policies and Pepper's new contacts cross paths in one of the boardrooms at Stark Industries' HQ. She's managed to contact another engineer who recently wrote a theoretical treatise on the applications of technologies similar to Tony's arc reactors, and now she's sitting in a room watching as they pour over equations and books and blueprints, and wishing she could understand half of what's flying between them. They're more similar than she expected - neither of them can stop moving for longer than thirty seconds, and the same breathless air of constant excitement and discovery follows them like a signature cologne. Tony is still the better looking of the two by several leagues, and Pepper takes her own quiet joy in that.

He's shining today, her Tony, and when he looks up to her from the blueprints and asks if she could go and get a folder for him from his office, a normal enough task for his assistant, he says it with that brilliant smile that she knows is really meant for his girlfriend. When she brings back said folder, he takes it from her and then reaches out and shakes her hand, putting his free hand on her elbow and smiling again.

"Thanks so much, Pepper, and I know I'm running into the time you allotted for the interview with the Wall Street Journal but if you could just tell the reporter I'll get there as soon as I can - "

She loves it when she's flying high, and it shows in her face and she squeezes his hand once more before letting go.

"Of course. I'm sure he'll understand."

Meanwhile, the other engineer has paused and stands there looking at the picture the two of them make. A slow smile spreads across his face.

"So the two of you are more than just boss and assistant, huh?"

He doesn't say it lewdly - in fact his tone seems more playful than anything else. Both of them still freeze in their places, a surer giveaway than even the handshake had been, and Pepper quickly leaves to check on that reporter while Tony goes over some of the finer points in his argument a few more times, weaving a mental minefield a mile wide in hopes of distracting his new colleague from what he's just divined. Pepper, for her part, is relieved that the reporter is from the Wall Street Journal and will confine his questions to the coming fiscal year.

But both of them know that the game is up.


Within a week of that fateful handshake, it's everywhere. The other Stark Industries employees have their act down pat - they've seriously considered making a motivational poster lauding the virtues of the phrase 'no comment' - but that doesn't stop their internal gossip. When did it happen? How long has it been going on?

Pepper is ready to send the email the day it happens, but Tony won't let her until he sees the article in the National Enquirer claiming that they've been casual lovers since she started working for him, and that she threatened to quit if he didn't give up his other playthings. Then he helps her write a carefully worded press release confirming that Tony Stark has indeed been romantically involved with Virginia Potts for six weeks now, that they are very happy, and that they respectfully ask to keep that happiness private. He knows that Pepper wants to deny it, because that's what they instinctively teach people at Stark industries - but a long series of denials and 'no comment's is exactly what kept them apart for so long, and that's why he won't let her deny it now.

"We have nothing to be ashamed of, love." He says. "I want the world to know that."

"You're right. I should have every right to flaunt the fact that I've caught the most eligible bachelor in the world."

"Speaking of flaunting, shall we finally go on a date in our own backyard instead of driving through half of California in search of privacy?"

"I don't see why not."

They find a nice restaurant in Malibu, one Pepper always wanted to visit. She looks ravishing in red and he looks sharp in his business clothes, and when he catches sight of them in the mirror of his car he can't really blame the world for its fascination. They are one damn fine looking couple.

It's less understandable when the outdoor garden where they choose to eat is quickly surrounded by snapping cameras and even one or two brazen shouts for attention. They both try to ignore them, but within minutes what was once a comfortable evening is now only forcedly so, because battling to remain comfortable means that you're not. Finally, Tony pushes back from the table and stands to face the uninvited cameramen, an action that only whips them into a further frenzy.

"I get that you guys are some of my biggest fans," he says. "And as such, I take it I don't need to remind you what my night job is. If you're a big enough fan to know what that means, you'll leave now out of respect."

You'd have to live under or a rock or very, very far underground not to know that Tony Stark has a suit at home that takes out tanks. The brave (read: very stupid) ones stay to snap one or two more pictures before they, too, make themselves scarce. Tony sits back down and rubs his forehead with his fingers for a moment before Pepper takes his hand.

"You've always been my superhero, too, you know."

"I know," he smiles, but it's not the smile that lights up all of Malibu.

The days that follow are by no means unpleasant, but they are not as carefree and open as the ones preceding the handshake were. He doesn't hold her just for the sake of holding her anymore; he holds her because he knows the lions are at his door.

Then the board calls a meeting.

Ostensibly, it's about the coming fiscal year, but they crunched the numbers together, and they know that the figures are high enough to make even the crotchetiest of the members happy. They should be receiving flowers and bottles of Moet, not an invitation to a beheading.

They go together, because she always goes with him to the board meetings (mostly so she can pinch his thigh when he gets out of line or allows his attention to wander), but when they reach the door she's turned away as gently as possible. They tell her that the board wishes to speak to Tony in private and her cheeks nearly match her hair as rage fills her from toe to crown. She'd once fancied that the board might respect her a little more than they even respected Tony, and now that it's out that they're 'romantically involved' she's little more than his whore. She could choke on the irony that they haven't even made it past second base yet.

"For the sake of not making a scene, I'm going to go along with this." He says. "But rest assured that whatever they say inside that boardroom is making it back to Pepper anyway."

He kisses her on the cheek and then he goes inside.


He's in there for too long and she can't bear to wait, so she goes back to his office and tries to get things done. Half an hour later, she gets a text message from him asking her to meet him back at the mansion as soon as she can. She's a big girl, so she doesn't let the fear get to her. She calmly finishes a few more things before she gets in the car and goes to hear the news.

She finds him sitting on his bed - on what she thinks of as their bed, now - surrounded by magazines. At first she assumes they're all from the recent weeks, but a closer examination reveals that they span a period of time going back to when they first met. He doesn't own them out of vanity - although he takes pride in one or two of the stories being true - but out of the necessity to know what others are saying about him. He's always dealt well with the pressure before. Then again, he never had so much to lose before.

She sits down next to him without saying anything, and he puts his hand on the small of her back. His touch is a kind of relief she's never known, and she makes sure to return it, so he knows that he'll never have to deal with the pressure alone again.

"The board questioned our professionalism." He says without warning. "They said that you were an integral part of Stark Industries and that they 'wish to express a concern' that our relationship would be bad for business. Basically they wanted to make sure that I wasn't going to bang you and then leave before sunrise like I did to everyone else, so that their precious stocks wouldn't dip when you left me high and dry."

"Oh, Tony…" And here she'd been worrying that she'd lost their respect. She realizes now that they just lost hers.

He trails his hands over the spread of magazines in front of him. They rumor his trysts with every celebrity from Oprah to Catherine Coulter from the time he was sixteen to even now, and the ones following his captivity in Afghanistan whisper that he may have become gay, because he hadn't taken a single woman home since. They have bright colors and full-page photos, but they're the ugliest things either of them has ever seen.

"Pepper, did you love me before I was taken?" He asks.

"Of course I did."

"What the hell did you see in me?"

She hates them - the board and the gossip rags - for unearthing everything she's been working so hard to get him past. "Your ingenuity. Your capacity for good. Your - do I really have to run through some laundry list, Tony? Is that what it's going to take for you to see that it doesn't matter what they think?" With one clean motion she swipes all of them off of the bed and onto the floor.

"That's not what upsets me. I don't give a shit about what they think of us - you know me, I don't give a shit about anyone's opinion except for yours and mine and Rhodey's and Jarvis's. What upsets me is that we had this great thing going and now it's got to be exposed to all of this." He makes a vague gesture in the direction of all of the poison surrounding them.

"What do you mean we had a great thing going? We still do." She stands up and leads him off the bed, making sure to step on the colorful lies with her four inch heels. "Come on. I think you need some spaghetti."

"And then a pizza? With the works?"

"And then a pizza with the works."

They go to the kitchen, the couple that's just captured the world's attention, but that's not what they're thinking about while they're there. She goes to the stove and starts boiling water and searching for a can of sauce, and he finds the ground turkey and starts shaping them into meatballs. They work together in a silent dance whose steps they know well, until suddenly Tony pulls her away from the sauce and into his arms.

"I love you," He says. "So very much."

"I love you too." She turns around to turn off the flame and then returns to his embrace and demands: "Don't let go."

He doesn't.


A/N- Well, I know it's not the best installment so far, but I felt it was a necessary one for the plot, and it didn't come out half bad. I really excited for the next chapter, which I'll get up as soon as humanly possible. Until then, drop me a line to let me know how it was!