Chapter 29 – After Party

No one is overly surprised when Tony gets up on stage as the gala draws to a close and announces the start of the 'after-party', immediately the music picks up in pace. Around half the guests had already left at this point, so there is now more space on the floor for the guests who apparently still have plenty of energy to head to the middle of the room and start dancing to the more upbeat music.

Steve decided to take pity on Peter earlier and took it upon himself to monitor his childhood friend. They'd gone to stand near the bar, even though neither of them could get drunk it was entertaining seeing the reactions to the amount they were managing to drink between them from the bar staff.

Out of the corner of his eye, Steve notices Tony leaving the party through one of the sets of French doors that lead out onto terraces. Then he sees Bucky's shit-eating grin. 'What?' he asks.

Bucky shakes his head, the grin still on his face. 'You going or what?'

'I don't know what you mean,' Steve huffs, trying to fight off a blush he can feel rising.

'Course not,' Bucky says, downing his whiskey. 'Now go speak to Tony while I find Peter and see how long it takes for him to snap.'

Steve frowns at him. 'Bucky-' he says in warning, but his friend ignores him and walks off. With a quick glance around the room Steve shrugs and downs the last of his drink, vaguely wondering why he's nervous and wishing he could actually get drunk, and as no one seems to be paying particular attention to him he follows Tony out of the door.

He finds the billionaire leaning against the railing, looking along the streets of New York. 'I thought you always preferred the after parties to the main event?'

Tony turns slightly to watch his approach and huffs a laugh. 'Just needed a break from people.'

'Oh,' Steve pauses, suddenly feeling awkward. 'Um… do you want me to go?'

'Do what you want, Rogers.'

Steve is about to turn on his heel and walk back into the party when he makes himself stop. 'Tony I… thank you.'

'What for?' the genius sounds genuinely confused.

'For making sure that Pepper was going to have the dance with me,' he clarifies. 'And I'm sorry for what I said before.'

Tony's quiet for so long that Steve sighs and turns to walk back inside. 'Why do we keep doing this to each other, Steve?' the inventor's quiet question stops him. 'Ever since the Accords we just seem to find an argument in everything.'

Steve sighs, feeling himself deflate slightly, and goes to join the other man at the railing. 'I don't know, Tony; and I get the feeling you like it about as much as I do.'

'Well you're not wrong, Spangles.'

'You know what I think?' he muses after a couple of moments. 'They say the people closest to you are the ones that hurt you most, because they know how to. You're one of my best friends, Tony, and I'd like to think I know you pretty well too. But that means we also know how to push each other's buttons, so when we start having a small disagreement it just spirals.'

'You know, Cap,' Tony says, pushing back against the railing, 'I think you might be on to something there.'

Steve hears the tempo of the music changing from inside the venue and pushes away from the railing. Before he can give himself time to consider he extends a hand towards Tony. The billionaire raises an eyebrow. 'I thought it seemed a shame for you not to get to appreciate some of the fruits of your labour,' he answers with a shrug. 'I promise not to step on your toes. Well as much as before.'

Tony laughs and shakes his head, looking between Steve's outstretched hand and the door to the venue. Steve begins to lower his hand, thinking the billionaire is going to refuse the dance, when he hears a soft 'oh screw it' and there's a warm, callused hand in his own. He doesn't give the other man time to reconsider and pulls him closer, moving them in time to the music.

'Letting me lead this time, Iron Man?' he teases softly.

'Just this once, Captain America. I need to make sure you were paying attention during my lesson.'

They don't say anything else as they continue to move around the outside area, and thankfully no one comes out to disturb them. As the song continues, Steve notices they draw slowly closer together until Tony's head is resting on his chest, and Steve's arm is wrapped around his waist. When the song changes they stop moving, but neither moves away. Tony doesn't move his head from where it's resting against his chest, looking to one side.

'Tony?' Steve's voice is soft. 'You alright?'

Tony pulls away slightly so he can look up at him; his face is more relaxed than Steve has seen it in a while. 'Yeah,' he replies, voice just as soft and sounding a little surprised. 'Yeah, I'm…'

Tony doesn't finish his sentence, and his face is getting closer to Steve's; the soldier can feel his heart hammering in his chest, and his breath catches slightly as Tony's eyes start to close. Just as Steve begins to close his own he feels Tony tense in his arms and pull away.

'We should- we should get back before they send out a search party,' Tony says, clearing his throat as he takes a few steps back.

'Yeah- yeah we should,' Steve's brain is still trying to catch up with what just happened. As Tony heads towards the door he calls out to him. 'Tony? You know we're probably going to fight again but… I just want you to know I'm not going to be afraid to say sorry anymore.'

The dark haired man turns and there's a soft smile on his face. 'Me neither, Cap.'

Left alone Steve's brain finally catches up with him. Oh god I nearly kissed Tony, he thinks, leaning heavily back against the railing. 'I'm so screwed,' he groans and runs his hands over his face.


The after party has wound down enough now that there's only really the team, the staff and some really dedicated drinkers and dancers left hanging around; even they are starting to trickle out. Steve notices Peter saying goodbye to a group of three adults, one of them holding onto a stick so he assumes it's the blind lawyer he'd helped earlier. The man hangs back a little longer to speak to the teenager and they seem to part on good terms.

'You make a new friend?' he asks the youngster as he joins him where he's leaning against the bar.

'Yeah he's cool,' Peter says, taking off his tie and undoing his top button. 'Man that feels so much better! Did they make these things to be torture devices or something?'

Steve, who has already taken off his tie and suit jacket, and undone his top two buttons just laughs at the teen. 'Wouldn't surprise me kid.'

'Peter! Come here!' Wanda runs up, having discarded her shoes earlier in the evening, and drags the boy over to join her, Vision and Natasha on the dance floor. Steve can't help the chuckle as the boy's wide eyed expression slowly morphs into a relaxed smile as the four team mates goof around on the emptying dance floor.

'Not joining them, Cap?' Rhodes asks, leaning up against the bar next to Steve, his tie hanging loose around his neck and his suit jacket open.

'Not much of a dancer I'm afraid,' he replies, asking the bar man for a top up on his and Rhodes' drinks. 'Besides I doubt there'll be many more songs left to go.'

'Yeah Pepper's starting to get the last of the guests into taxis,' the soldier says, 'then it'll just be us. I think I heard Tony bribing the DJ to play a couple more songs after everyone else has gone for the team. Knowing Tony we could still be going by the time the sun rises.' Steve simply chuckles in agreement, which rapidly turns into a full blown laugh as they watch Peter attempting to teach Vision a dance move Steve is certain is called 'the robot'.

'Please tell me you have a way to record this,' Steve smirks at Rhodes, who he now notices has his phone out.

'Already on it, Cap.'

'You two ladies not joining us for the last few songs?' Bucky asks, throwing his jacket on top of Steve's where it's resting on the bar and unbuttoning his cuffs.

'Sorry, Buck, but you know you're just not the right partner,' Steve grins at his friend.

'Yeah, yeah, whatever, Rogers. Come on Rhodey don't be a boring bastard like this one.'

'No man, my dance routines are limited to the robot from now on,' Rhodes laughs, putting his phone away.

'Suit yourself losers,' he shrugs as he goes to join the others, pulling Natasha into a fast paced dance that has the red head laughing; Sam joins them a few second later and the two men keep stealing the assassin from each other.

'He always been like that?' Rhodes asks.

'I haven't known him this carefree since we were kids,' Steve admits. 'It's nice to see his smile back.'

'I know what you mean,' the other man says as they watch Tony join the group, wrapping his arms around Wanda's waist from behind and spinning her round, making the young girl laugh and kick out her feet.

'Maybe we should have a few more team parties,' Steve muses, seeing how happy they all look. 'Add a couple of our closer circle to it next time rather than half of New York.'

Rhodes chuckles. 'Just as long as I can DJ so I don't get pulled onto the dancefloor I'd say I agree with that suggestion.'

All too soon for the group on the dancefloor, Pepper calls an end to the music.

'Aww come on Pep!' Tony whines. 'We're having fun!'

'Yes and the staff need to clean up your mess, Tony,' Pepper rolls her eyes. 'Besides everyone's about ready to drop, we can't all keep up with the party-boy extraordinaire you know.'

'Fine,' the inventor huffs. 'One more song?'

Pepper looks over at Steve and Rhodes with pleading eyes, 'Please take your team home.'

Rhodes laughs. 'Come on, Tones, time to break it up. Unless you want me to run off with another suit of course?'

'You're such a party killer,' Tony mock-glares at his friend. 'Fine! Let's go get in the car. Make sure you've got all your stuff, kiddies.'

Rhodes leads the way down to where Happy is waiting to take them all back to the facility, Steve decides to bring up the rear and hurry along any stragglers. And by 'hurry along' he promises Pepper to bodily carry them out of the building if necessary. He and Tony are the last ones down, staying behind just long enough to get reassurances from Pepper that they are fine to leave and she'll be leaving ten minutes after them once she's made sure everything is taken care of. When they enter the car most of the team is already half-asleep.

'Let's get home, Happy,' Tony says, as he and Steve take a seat either side of Peter at the back.

Barely ten minutes into the drive and most everyone has dozed off. Wanda is curled up against Vision, his arm around her as he watches the streets of New York go by, seemingly not needing any sleep; Sam and Rhodes have found their own windows to lean up against, and Steve is sure he can hear faint snores coming from the Colonel. Natasha is sleeping up against Bucky, the soldier's normal arm over her shoulders as he dozes off himself.

Glancing to his left Steve can't help but smile. Peter is out for the count, curled up against Tony's side, the genius has one arm around him, hand reaching up to trace absent-mindedly through the boy's unruly hair. The inventor looks up and rolls his eyes. 'Not a word, Rogers.'

'Wouldn't dream of it,' is his soft reply, and he stretches out his arm along the back of the seat, his fingers just brushing the hair at the top of Tony's neck. The other man says nothing, simply leans his head back and closes his eyes.

You got it bad, Rogers, Steve sighs, unable to get the smile to leave his face.


A/N: Hi everyone! Well I hope you've enjoyed the last of the double updates, and the start of the proper Stony action. Everything will really start picking up now so be prepared for a couple of ups and downs coming your way!

Thank you so much to everyone who has left reviews and who is still sticking with this story. And special thanks to those of you who are only just starting to read it! It's a bit of a beast to take on from the start so I feel very special that you are actually taking the time to catch up with all of these chapters. Let me know what you think of these last two - a little bit lighter than the previous ones. And I'd be interested to hear what you all think of Peter meeting Daredevil again.

Hope you all enjoyed these chapters and thank you so much for your continued support. I honestly can't say it enough.

L x

As always here's your sneak peek:

'I don't know,' he admits, eyes scanning every car he can see; he reaches into his pocket for his phone to give Sam a call. He knows what's coming before it happens, but he can't stop it without being too fast for a normal kid. As the boys come closer he nudges Ned out the way and takes the full force of the shove from both of the boys; he doesn't catch himself, falling to the floor and wincing at the pain in his knees and hands.

'Pete!' Ned says, trying to reach his friend to help him up.

'Not got your buddies Captain America or the Winter Soldier to help you this time?' one of the boys scoffs.