You'll have to excuse me, I'm not at my best
I've been gone for a week, I've been drunk since I left
These so-called vacations will soon be my death
I'm so sick from the drink, I need home for a rest

Spirit of the West, "Home for a Rest"

Content: Mild violence/abuse warning. Also misogyny and attempts at slut-shaming.

oOoOoOo

New York, April 20, 2004

The last thing Toni wants to do is give the eulogy at her father's funeral. She hasn't spoken to him in years, not since he called her on New Year's Eve in 1999 and lambasted her for attending a party in Bern instead of trotting home like a dutiful daughter for the annual Stark New Year's Gala. She has always been his greatest disappointment, so his anger hadn't come as a surprise, nor had his declaration that he was washing his hands of her. She had the gall to be born with a vagina instead of a penis, and that lessened her worth in his eyes. That knowledge still stings a little, but has long since lost the majority of its power to hurt her. She's over it.

It's raining, the morning of the burial, and it seems fitting somehow. Not that Toni believes in poetic and maudlin bullshit like the city is crying for him, more that he made almost everyone around him utterly miserable at every waking moment. The old bastard gets one more day in which he's the cause of discomfort and suffering, however minor it might be. Toni imagines he's staring up from his VIP box seats in Satan's amphitheater, smirking at the mourners with their umbrellas and rain bonnets and dripping jackets.

Toni's heels echo forlornly from the walls as she paces along the corridors of her childhood home. She idly runs the fingertips of her right hand along the wall, skipping over the portraits of her ancestors dead and buried, brushing lightly across the tops of tables, drifting them past knick-knacks her mother placed and Howard apparently never removed. She doesn't even know what she's doing here. She doesn't know why Howard instructed his executor to make sure she was in New York for the funeral.

She knows why Obadiah is insisting on her giving some sort of speech, though. It looks good for the paparazzi. There'll be a way for him to spin it in order to generate positive PR for the company. She knows, as sure as she knows every line of her soulmarks, that Obie is going to want her to settle down, marry someone - probably Clint who, despite all the tabloids' wild guesses, is practically her husband after all this time together - and start popping out babies to carry on the Stark dynasty.

She can't wait to see the look on his face when she tells him she doesn't plan on having any kids anytime soon, if she has them at all.

She's too busy: Star Solutions Inc. is approaching its fifth year in business, and business is booming . Between the new designs she sends down the pipeline into prototyping, and the long hours spent with Pepper planning the expansion into three new states, Toni doesn't have time to take off to have a kid. She doesn't have time to spend with a kid. She doesn't even know if she wants to have one at all, let alone now, when her star is climbing and her company about to launch into overdrive.

Obie's old-school, though. Toni's pretty sure that, if Obie and her father had had it their way, she would have gone to study liberal arts or music or philosophy or some other utterly pointless and boring waste of education. There was more than one reason she'd been glad to move to Boston at 15, even with Rhodey ostensibly paid to report her every twitch, sneeze and fart to Howard.

Without conscious decision, she finds herself making her way down the dark, paneled hall to Howard's office. This was his kingdom, the seat of power of his technocratic plutocracy. Toni as a child was never allowed through the doors unless summoned. It's more than a little unsettling to learn that, at least for the time being, she is the Stark in charge of everything.

"Winter is coming, and there must always be a Stark in Manhattan," she says with a humorless little chuckle, and pushes the double doors open.

Howard's office still holds a scent of cigar smoke, those ridiculously vain King of Denmark sticks he had personalized in diamonds and gold foil with his name. Toni can never smell that brand without thinking of Howard, telling a four-year-old girl that she would never be an engineer because girls are stupid. It always smells like fresh hurt and hidden jealousy to Toni.

She leans on her fingertips on Howard's desktop, like she's looming over an invisible, cowering minion. She smooths her palms over the scarred cherry wood, sighs low and quiet through her nose, and sits down in Howard's chair like she's ascending a throne.

And because she's her, she immediately assumes her favorite CEO position: slouched comfortably, hands folded across her stomach, feet up on the corner of the desk. It's not as comfortable as it usually is, because Toni isn't a CEO that comes to work in a suit and skirts and high heels - she's more of a jeans and tee-shirt kind of girl, only wears a suit jacket over it to satisfy Pepper's constant, fond nagging to for god's sake, Toni, at least try to appear like you're a professional? - and the skirt of her black dress slides up her thigh. But there's no one here, no one to impress, and she doesn't care how much leg she's showing to an empty room.

She closes her eyes and lets her head sink back against the rich Corinthian leather of Howard's chair. She just wants this day to be done with. She wants to shake the dust of New York off her shoes and fly back to Malibu, lie in the sun for a bit to recharge her batteries, get together with Pepper and keep their plans for world domination rolling.

And she will. But first, Howard's funeral.

Fuck Howard anyway.

There's a heavy tread at the entrance of the office, too heavy to be Clint. The reek of fresh cigar smoke assaults her nose, and opens her eyes. Obadiah is walking towards the desk, burning cigar held negligently in his right hand. "Didn't expect to find you here, Toni," he says. There's something in his smile that reminds Toni of her formless nightmares of the drowning dark, dangerous and deadly and hungry. "Trying out the big seat, huh?"

"Nah," she says, waving a hand. She has to force the cheer, but not the underscore of tiredness. She has curated the hell out of her personal life in Malibu, she's created a space where she can relax and build and argue with Pepper about business plans and chew out her overpaid chief engineer when he tells her a design simply can't be done when her blueprints show it clearly can. Here… Here, there is no safe space. She has to be on every moment of the day, waking or sleeping. It's fucking exhausting, but she's almost done. One more day. "It looked comfy, and it is. It'll be Morgan's soon enough, and I wish him much joy in it."

Obadiah chuckles and moves further into the room, setting his cigar down in one of the several monogrammed ashtrays Howard kept in easy reach. "You're not upset Howard's giving the company to your cousin then?"

She shrugs, spins the chair back and forth with her hips, and gives him the lazy, playgirl smile that's second nature to her now. "What would I do with a conglomerate, Uncle Obie?" she asks, and is proud of herself for not choking on the absolute lie. She knows exactly what she would do with Stark Industries. "Besides, I'd have to move back to Manhattan, and I'd much rather get a massage on my private beach in Malibu than sit in some stuffy old boardroom with a bunch of stuck-up old guys and argue about stocks and, like, quarterly reports."

Well, okay. Not everything is a lie.

She doesn't miss how Obadiah relaxes at that, but she pretends not to notice. The subject changes rather quickly. He moves to the wet bar, opens the brandy, fetches himself a glass. "How're you and, what's his name, Clint getting along?" he asks as ice cubes clink into the glass.

"We're soulmates, Uncle Obie. We get along just fine."

"How long have you two been together now?"

She can tell him down to the hour, the minute, the second, because her mind seizes on numbers and doesn't easily let go, but she makes a show of counting. "God, let's see… it's April so… five and a half years? Six and a half years?" She flashes him a self-deprecating smile. "We don't really pay so much attention to anniversaries and dates and stuff like that. We just celebrate life in general."

"I know," Obadiah says as he recaps the snifter, the crystal chiming with the movements. "The tabloids always have a field day when you and your boytoy hit the party circuit. I read something about you skinny-dipping in the Trevi Fountain last month." He shakes his head and sips his drink as he approaches. "Not exactly the image you should be creating for your father's legacy."

Toni's smile is tight. "My father fucked anyone with a vagina and a heartbeat who gave him even the vaguest hint of interest, Uncle Obie," she says pleasantly. "I hardly think he cared if I had a hot tub party in Rome, if I skied naked down Mount Everest, or let both the Windsor princes tag team me in the ballroom of Buckingham Palace."

She doesn't see the blow coming, but she feels it. Her head snaps to the side, cheek stinging. She raises a hand to her cheek, and doesn't have to fake either the wide, shocked eyes or the tremor in her fingers as she turns to look up at Obadiah. "What the hell, Uncle Obie?" The tinge of fear in her voice, now that she has to fake. She doesn't get scared, she just gets angry, but Obadiah doesn't know that.

He's leaning against the side of the desk with one hip, absently swirling the ice around his glass, and watching her with hooded eyes. His posture screams of long familiarity with using his size to intimidate people, and she takes the cue, hunching back into the chair.

"Why did you hit me?" she asks again, voice small.

"It's something you've needed for a long time," Obadiah says, spinning the ring on his pinkie with his thumb. "Howie might have been too much of a pussy to discipline you, Toni, but I'm not your father. I'm not going to tolerate your smart mouth or your disrespect. You're a Stark, and you will start acting like a Stark." The corner of his mouth curls down, the Stane mark of dismissive disdain. "Or you'll find your monthly allowance cut off pretty damn quick. Howie might have indulged you, Toni, but I'm not paying for your whoring yourself across the world."

"I thought Morgan was going to get the inheritance," she says, and flinches back when he raises his hand again.

He keeps going, scratches his cheek, looks smugly satisfied with her reaction. "Morgan knows how to listen to and take the advice of someone who's been with the business for twenty years, Toni," he says, as if explaining to a child. "He'll do what I tell him to do. Now fix yourself up and get outside. The ceremony is going to start soon."

"Yes, Uncle Obie," she murmurs, and is glad when he turns his back and walks away, because she isn't able to hold back the steel-eyed glare she levels at his back. "Asshole," she breathes, and starts finger-combing her hair to straighten it back out. "Fucking pig."

"I love you too, honey," Clint says from above her, and she glances up to see him sliding back the cover of the vent. She doesn't even ask, because she's long since learned that if there is a vent, Client will explore it. His head disappears, to be replaced by his feet, and he drops down on top of the desk, and hops to the floor. He bends down to kiss her, then pulls a lint roller out of his pocket and starts running it over his sober, black jacket. His eyes never leave hers, and his contented little smile never drops.

It's kinda creepy.

She turns her jaw towards him. "How's it look?" she asks. "Am I going to need my concealer?"

He reaches out to turn her head more fully, and she feels his thumb brush over her cheek. "Nah," he says, and his mouth is warm and damp, kissing it gently better. "You should be okay."

She arches an eyebrow, and relaxes back in the chair, swinging it from side to side. "How much of that did you see and/or overhear?"

"Pretty much all of it." He shrugs out of the jacket, stretches it over the desk, and starts brushing the lint off the back. "Why?"

"You just seem a little… happy for someone who just watched his girlfriend get smacked in the face. I would have thought you'd be pretty pissed."

"Oh, I am," he says cheerfully. "I'm so fucking angry, I want to track him down, slice off his cowardly fucking balls, and ram them down his goddamn throat. But I know you. You could have taken him apart if you wanted to. So I'm just a raging fucking tower of pissed off, but I'm taking your lead here."

"And… this makes you happy?" Six years together, and there are days Toni despairs of ever figuring him out.

"Well, no. Like I said, balls, throat. That's my plan. But you don't like it when I get possessive and caveman on you." He grins, pulls her up and slides his arms around her waist. "So I'm comforting myself with picturing all the ways you're going to end up utterly destroying him, because you are cold and ruthless and a fucking sadist when someone crosses you. And those are happy thoughts I could take to Neverland."

oOoOoOo

Stark Manor, New York 2012

Toni swims back to consciousness and immediately regrets it. The lights are dim, but still stab into her eyes like devil's pitchforks, and her head has that tender feeling, like someone scooped out parts of her brain and overstuffed her skull with cotton. Her throat is screaming for water, and her mouth is dry and gummy, tongue thick and clumsy.

"Ow," she whimpers, squeezing her eyes shut. "Please let me be dead."

Something stirs beside her, weight shifting, rearranging. A cool hand touches her forehead, and then presses against her cheeks. "Nope, sorry, still alive," Nat says, from above and slightly to the left. "How are you feeling?"

"Like I played chicken with a tank and lost," she says, and cracks open an eye. Natasha's face is schooled to neutrality, but the corner of her mouth is tugging up. "Just so you know, I will be writing a scathing Yelp review of your home country, Tash. Terrible hospitality, no care for foreign visitors. Zero stars. Will not recommend to anyone."

"That's because spoiled, pampered Americans can't handle how hard we Russians party," Natasha says, sliding her legs under her and pressing two fingers to the inside of Toni's wrist, head bent in concentration over the watch on her other wrist. "Not our fault you're a wuss. Next time, go to France. I hear even their neofascist secret Nazi bases have feather mattresses and bidets."

"I'm instituting a new personal policy. From now on, I am never going to storm the ramparts of any dungeon that doesn't have a valet, hot towel service and a full wet bar." Toni squeezes her eyes closed and tries to sit up. Her arms don't tremble as much as she's afraid they would, but she's panting and her forehead is beading with sweat by the time she gets only halfway up. "Ow, ow, fucking Jesus Christ …"

Natasha clucks, and her arm goes around Toni's shoulders to help her, sliding pillows under Toni's back to prop her up. "тупица," she says, disapproving."I have no idea how you've managed to survive for over thirty years without someone putting you in a padded room for your own safety. Have you ever gone more than a few days without injuring yourself?"

"Well," Toni says, gasping in relief as she leans back. She closes her eyes and wipes her forehead with a shaking hand. "There was that one time Clint tied me to the bed for three days. I didn't get a single scratch."

"You had rope burns on your wrists, Clint had a black eye, and you slept for twelve hours after that. It doesn't count." Natasha fiddles with something on the side table and then holds a glass of water with a straw out.

Toni wants to cry in relief, but settles for sipping the water. It goes down cool and wet, and some of that terrible, cottony pressure disappears. "Then no," she says, and already her voice sounds much better. "I'm just accident-prone, I guess. Do I even want to know how badly I fucked myself up?"

"Probably not." Natasha brushes Toni's hair out of her eyes, tucking the loose strands behind her ear, and Toni's head tilts in the direction of the gesture automatically. Natasha isn't usually so open with her touches; it must have been bad. "You miraculously managed to avoid needing stitches this time, but you pulled a few muscles, managed to collect an impressive array of bruises." She pulls her hand back. "Bruised your ribs on the left side. They're going to hurt like hell for a few days."

"Just bruised?" Something about that seems wrong, because she's pretty sure that there was an entirely different, sharper pain in her side in that dark Russian hellhole. Toni gingerly presses a hand into her left side, feeling the tight bandage under her shirt, but the ache is dull. "You sure?"

Natasha frowns unhappily. "We first thought your ribs were broken, actually. You were coughing blood, and you were struggling for breath. I was afraid you'd punctured your lung. But the scans JARVIS took didn't show any fractures. You bit your lip pretty badly, though, so it was likely just blood you'd swallowed. Still. You scared us pretty badly, Toni."

Toni runs her tongue over her lips, guilt surging unpleasantly in her stomach. "I seem to be okay now, though," she says tentatively, though how that's possible, she has no earthly idea. She looks around, squinting through the unhappy throb of her eyeballs and the dark of the room. "I mean, this is my room in the manor, so it can't be that bad, or you'd have me in the hospital."

Natasha jabs her hand, snakelike, and fingers pinch around Toni's chin, holding her firm and steady. Toni's eyes widen until they hurt, but she can't pull away without pain, and Natasha's grip keeps her mouth closed.

Natasha leans forward, until their foreheads are almost touching. "Your heart stopped beating," she says, calm and clear and lethal. "Your arc reactor was dark for two minutes. Two minutes, Toni. Clint nearly had a complete mental breakdown. I had to pry you away from a panicking assassin in order to get your spare reactor into the dock. Two minutes in which I had to argue with your overprotective, unstable soulmate to even begin to get your spare reactor into the dock."

Toni flinches away, but Natasha holds her firmly in place.

"You may think you were justified, and perhaps you were," Natasha continues in that slow, deadly cadence, "but you did not have backup, you almost died, because you did not think of me, or Clint or JARVIS or Pepper or even yourself. In the future, you will remember you are not an independent operator. In the future, you will remember you have people who love you enough to march into hell. And this will not happen again. Nod if you understand what I'm saying."

Mutely, Toni nods. She has the urge to shrink into the pillows, would if Natasha wasn't holding her still. She remembers suddenly why she prefers to never, ever piss Natasha off.

"Good." Natasha pulls her head down, kisses her forehead, presses her nose into Toni's hair. "я рад вам жить," she breathes, then lets Toni's jaw go with an apologetic brush of her fingers. "Though Clint may still murder you. He's undecided."

Toni rubs her jaw grumpily, but says nothing about the bruises she's sure to develop, because Natasha is right. "What happened, anyway? I'm a little fuzzy on…" She trails off as memories surface, then blinks and scrabbles at her shirt until she pulls it clear of her chest.

The red star is now nestled inside a blue circle, with the hollow white triangle inside its points. "Oh hell…" she says, staring at the complete soulmark. "That really fucking happened."

"I was wondering when you'd get around to that," Natasha says. "He's fine. He's been sitting there for two days." She nods at a chair Toni hadn't noticed, pushed a little away from the bed. "With a knife in hand. I'm not sure if he was guarding you, or just couldn't bear to be unarmed."

Toni swallows the lump in her throat. "Where is he?" she asks, and hates how small she sounds.

"I sent him to take a shower. He smelled like the swamp. Clint is digging him out clothes that aren't covered in the blood of his enemies. He refused to go anywhere until I told him you were waking up, and you wouldn't appreciate a filthy man hovering over you. Then he was more than agreeable about bathing."

Toni swallows again, doesn't want to ask but knows Natasha will give her a blunt answer. "How is he?"

Natasha sighs faintly, and stares off for a moment, gaze unfocused and distant. "In some ways, not as bad as I was when Clint brought me home," she says finally. "In others, he's worse. The bond seems to have broken through most of the programming, but it's not a magic cure-all, and there's still a lot of work to do. Memories and experiences to sort through. To learn to deal with. It will be rough." She squeezes Toni's hand tightly, smiles in reassurance. "We'll get through it."

Toni's vision shimmers with sudden tears, and she wonders when she ever did the miraculous thing that rewarded her life with the presence Natasha and Clint. She turns her hand under Natasha's, laces their fingers together, lets her hair fall over her eyes. "I don't know what I would do without the two of you," she says quietly.

"Die, I imagine," Natasha replies easily. "Your first workshop binge alone would do you in without Clint or I bringing you food you don't brew in a pot." She gives Toni's hand a final squeeze, then gently untangles their fingers and stands up. "I'm going to go run you a bath, solnyshko. I'd say a shower, but I doubt your legs are up to standing for very long." Her nose wrinkles. "Barnes isn't the only one who smells like a swamp. And the heat will do those bruises good."

Just the thought of standing up is exhausting enough. Toni groans and sinks into the pillows. "No," she mutters, and pulls the sheet over her head. "I'm happy stinking. Go away and let me sleep, Tash. I'm injured. I need rest."

The blanket is yanked away. Toni whines and scrabbles for it, but Natasha has her determined face on, and she keeps it from Toni's fingers. "The first time you go to bed with your soulmate, Antonia," she says, "you will not smell like you fell into a sewer. And there will be only sleep," she adds when Toni opens her mouth, flint-eyed, "because he is exhausted and you are a trainwreck. There will be only sleep, or we'll have words. Nod if you understand me."

Toni snaps her mouth shut and nods.

"Good," Natasha says, pleased. "I'll go run the bath, and then I'll come back and help you out of bed. Try not to injure yourself in the five minutes I'll be gone."

"Fuck you," Toni mutters, and pulls a pillow over her face to muffle Natasha's fond, but mocking, laugh.

oOoOoOo

Stark Manor, April 21 2004

Toni has spent a large chunk of her life making sure she avoids spending time with Morgan Stark. Her cousin, the son of one of Howard's aunts, is shallow and vain, concerned with himself first and no one else second. He has the dark charm of the Starks, slick black hair and carefully shaped vandyke, sharp blue eyes and expensive, tailor-fit clothing, but he lacks intelligence, cleverness and any actual personality. He is, in Toni's opinion, an utter waste of oxygen.

To think that this is the man who's going to be dictating the future of the Stark legacy makes Toni want to break something. Preferably his smug, insufferable face.

She's only on her second cup of coffee, sitting on Clint's lap on a chair in the kitchen, when he saunters into the manor, eyes raking greedily over the fixtures and furnishings. He's mid-conversation with a cell phone to his ear, and it sounds to Toni like he's talking to an interior decorator. " - the kitchen is an utter nightmare," he says, and oh god, that nasally whine of his voice… Toni only realizes she's squeezing her coffee cup so tightly the ceramic creaks Clint soothingly rubs his palms over her biceps.

"Easy," he murmurs into her hair. "The maids aren't paid enough to scrub blood off the tiles."

"I'll give them a raise," she mutters, and drains the last mouthfuls of coffee in a long swallow.

"I have to go, Cecil. I'll call you back when I have a definite time for the reno consult. Ciao, baby." Toni rolls her eyes as Morgan snaps the phone closed with an exaggerated gesture. He grins toothily at her. "Toni, babe. You're looking good."

"Morgan," she says, not even remotely in the ballpark of pleasant and not giving a shit. "Why are you here? There isn't even a will-reading. You could have stayed home and waited for the courier to deliver your copy."

Morgan shoves his hands in his pockets and rocks back on his heels. "Nah," he says breezily. "No point in waiting. I'm moving in here as soon as possible, so I have to have the renos started immediately." He grins and actually rubs his hands together. "I can't wait. Neither can Mother. She thinks it's finally time the house came to the proper side of the family."

Toni scoffs into her mug, realizes it's empty, grumpily slides off Clint's lap to go get a fresh cup. "Aunt Anna and Howard didn't get along," she says over her shoulder as she drains the pot into her mug. "In the way that a falling nuclear warhead and the ground don't get along."

"Charming," Clint says, grabbing an orange out of the bowl on the counter. "Christmases must've been a hoot."

"Oh, just fucking hilarious," she says, stirring milk and sugar into the cup and licking the spoon clean. "Raging alcoholics make for sterling entertainment when they're screeching about who deserves what portion of Great-Granddad's estate, and what consists of an appropriate lifestyle expenditure. Hint: a gold-plated doggie fountain is not an appropriate lifestyle expenditure."

"Sorry to have missed it," Clint says, peeling and sectioning the orange with his fingers.

"With any luck, there are home videos around. After all, why should I have to suffer alone with that memory?" Toni slides back onto his lap, wrapping an arm around his back to secure her seat and resting her head against his shoulder.

Morgan looks between them. "I'm sorry, who are you again? The poolboy? Jesus, Toni. Sleep with the help, but don't bring them into the house."

"Soulmate," Toni mutters into her cup, swallows scalding caffeine so she doesn't do something pointless like drive Morgan's teeth down his throat. He has an excellent dentist, after all.

"What?"

"She said fuck off," Clint says pleasantly. His arm curves around her back, and the muscles of his forearm are tight against her shoulder blades. "I speak fluent Undercaffeinated Genius. Let me know if you need anything else translated."

"You wouldn't clean a pool even if we had one," Toni says, after a moment of thinking about it. "You're the laziest kept man ever. It's a wonder you haven't grown into the couch yet."

"Hey, I'm working on it. It's trickier than it seems."

Morgan tries to interject with more annoying questions and snide observations, but Toni is ignoring him like there's a gold medal for it at stake. She checks the clock, then closes her eyes and leans her head against Clint's shoulder again. Fifteen more minutes, and then she can flip New York the bird and fly back to Malibu and her real life. She's already packed.

Eventually, the lawyer shows up with a briefcase and a legal aide carrying a filing box. Toni flings herself carelessly in a seat, already more than halfway caught up in making mental amendments for the new Star Solutions facilities opening next year in Oregon. She's passed an envelope, and she absently tears it open with her thumb as she runs the cost projection for a new, state-of-the-art nanotech lab versus expanding her current Culver City location. She's trying to decide if centralizing her most cutting-edge of research departments is the better option, or diversifying for better talent and data preservation, when Morgan shrieks.

She jerks into the present, hands rising by instinct to block or deflect an incoming blow. But it's just Morgan, staring in agitated disbelief at the document in his hand.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" he howls, furiously flipping pages. "A trust fund? That's it?"

Toni stares at him, then looks at the lawyer, then looks at Clint. Clint has an eyebrow raised. Frowning, Toni unfolds her copy of the will, licks her thumb and begins to speed-read. Within a few minutes, the will is falling from her numb fingers. "What?" she says softly, raising her gaze to eye the lawyer. "I don't… understand. He left me everything?"

"He what?" Lightning-quick, Clint's hand snatches the will off the table. "Holy shit!"

"Except minor assets slated for other parties," the lawyer - she didn't even catch his name - affirms with a nod. "If I may say so, madam, Mr. Stark was quite proud of your accomplishments. He talked about you quite a lot over the last two years, said you were making a name for yourself from the ground up. He respected that, quite a bit. I'm sorry for your loss."

"Thanks," she says mechanically, but has already stopped really paying attention because the bulk of her formidable brain power is occupied trying to wrap itself around the notion that Howard left her everything. The business, the title, the cushy penthouse office. The properties in Europe. The manor. His workshop. Everything.

She blinks furiously at the table as if it will provide answers. Something occurs to her then, a random thought that instantly makes her blood go cold and her eyes go wide with fright. "Oh fucking hell," she says, turning to stare at Clint. "This throws everything off. I can't just drop another company into her lap right now! Pepper's going to literally kill me."

oOoOoOo

Stark Manor, 2012

By the time Natasha helps her back out of the tub, Toni's hair is clean and her skin is pink and the heat from the water has seeped all the way down to her bones. She's practically asleep already as Natasha braids her wet hair and ties it away from her face, but manages to rouse herself enough to dress in an oversized t-shirt and a pair of comfortable pajama pants.

She's stable enough to shuffle back down the hall by herself, as long as she uses the wall, so she bids Natasha goodnight and makes her way back to her room. She doesn't turn around to look, but she knows Natasha's watching her from the door of the bathroom. She's also pretty sure that Clint's lurking in the ventilation system somewhere, also keeping an eye on her.

She waves over her shoulder as she rounds the corner and walks into her room. And stops dead, because James Barnes is sitting on the edge of her bed. He's clean, and in Clint's sweatpants and a black tank top, barefoot and hair tied back, and looks hellaciously stiff and uncomfortable.

The blue circle on his chest is half-hidden by the hem of the tank top, but there's a red point, like the top of her star, visible. It's a measure of how tired Toni is - and how terrified of Natasha's promise of "words" - that she doesn't spend more than ten seconds debating whether or not to just jump him where he sits. Twenty seconds, tops.

"Toni." He's on his feet as soon as he sees her, and it's actually painful to watch his face close off, defensive and dark, hands warding off anything she might say or do. "This wasn't my idea, okay? I can go."

She yawns. "I don't really care who's idea it was," she says. "I just want to sleep for like, a month. I'm the laziest invalid you'll ever meet. I linger in bed for hangnails and stubbed toes. These bruises should be good for at least thirty days. I'm claiming suffering and damage."

She doesn't miss the violent flinch at the mention of her injuries, and the mental bulb clicks on. Ah. Right. "I'm too tired to have the conversation about who's at fault for us slugging the shit out of each other," she says, and crawls onto the mattress, burrowing under the sheets. "But suffice to say it's not you, it's Hydra. But we'll talk about that in the morning, okay?"

There's a long pause.

"Stop arguing with me," she says, even though he hasn't said a word, "and get your ass under the covers before I crawl back out there and make you."

Another long pause. Then, rough and raw: "I don't want to hurt you again."

She rolls back towards him, looking up from her nest of pillows. He's standing at the edge of the bed, arms folded loosely, watching her. His expression isn't exactly an open book, but he's clearly miserable and worried. She sighs softly, and lifts a hand from the warmth of the bed and holds it out to him. "You're not gonna hurt me," she says. "You haven't even tried since you saw my face, and I'm still sure you were brainwashed then."

He edges closer to the bed, slowly reaching out for her hand. "You're too goddamn trusting," he says gruffly. "I'm dangerous."

"Yeah, hi. I'm Toni and I fly around in what is essentially a flashy and sleek weapon of mass destruction. Danger isn't really a turnoff for me." She wiggles her fingers at him invitingly. "C'mon, James," she says softly. "I've been looking for you for literal years. Are you really gonna make me wait longer?" She drops her voice half an octave, to where she knows it's huskiest. "Come to bed, Bucky."

A shiver jerks through his body, rocking him towards her. "Jesus Christ," he says helplessly. "That's really fuckin' not fair." With the movements of a man doing something against his better judgement, he slides under the covers and lays on his back, tense and staring at the ceiling.

"S'alright if I touch you?" Toni asks around another yawn. At his nod, she nudges his arm under her pillow, tucks her head near his shoulder, and settles her hand on his chest, right over his soulmark. "S'okay," she mumbles, and her eyes slip closed. "Y'won hurt me. S'okay, Buck…" She slips into slumber, still murmuring reassurances.

Some time later, she stirs from sleep. She's not awake enough to really know where she is or what woke her, but she's warm and content, and has a man wrapped around her. Her nose is buried in the crook of his neck, breathing his scent. His cheek is against her temple, his breath in her ear. Her legs are tangled with his, and there's an arm curled around her hips She makes a contented noise, burrows back into the warmth of his neck, and descends back into sleep.

oOoOoOo

My tumblr is mystillyoungself-ficlicious.

Russian in this chapter: (via Google Translate)
тупица - dumbass
я рад вам жить - I'm happy you live
solnyshko - little sun, sunshine