When morning came, Pepper rolled around in bed, unconsciously looking for Tony's warm body. When she slid onto his side of the bed, she realized that it had been cold for a while. Popping her eyes open, she squinted at the light coming in through the windows and closed them right back. She pressed her palms over her face and yawned softly, before slowly climbing out of the bed. She headed into the shower and washed herself quickly before walking downstairs to find Tony.

When she reached the terrace, she was surprised to see him sitting at the table, enjoying breakfast without her. He wore a pair of shorts and a green polo t-shirt, and had his eyes covered by a dark pair of sunglasses. Pepper narrowed her eyes at him before taking a seat next to him at the table.

"Morning." He mumbled, mouth full of omelet. Pepper could tell by the sound of his voice that he was still sulking, and that annoyed her. She reached out and removed his sunglasses, wanting to see his brown eyes that she loved so much. When she did that, Tony picked up his napkin and dabbed away at his mouth, refusing to look at her.

"Tony." She whispered and touched his face with her fingertips.

"Yeah, sorry for starting breakfast without you, but I was starving, and this guy, Pierre, showed up with breakfast like an hour ago, and I—"

"You don't have to apologize." She said, wanting to smack him upside his head for not looking at her.

"Oh, ok. Well… enjoy your breakfast. I'm going to go make a quick call." Tony grinned at her and jumped out of his seat, knowing he acted like a child, but honestly, he didn't give a damn. He was hurting and he was hurting bad. He barely slept the previous night and being next to her made it a thousand times worse. That's what you get for opening up, you asshole. Let that be a lesson for whenever you want to act all gooey like.

Tony spent the next thirty minutes lounging on a chair on the other side of the villa, phone in his hand. He hadn't lied to Pepper about having to make a call. Shield had been bugging him about a potential threat coming from outer-space. Aliens. Right. I want to see that. Agent Coulson had said something about a Norse God or something along those lines, but that wasn't really his domain to start with, so he couldn't care any less at that point.

"That wasn't a quick call." Pepper's voice interrupted his line of thought. He turned around and watched her make her way towards him. He held his breath when she sat in his lap and wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him close to her. "I miss you."

"Right." Tony murmured and reluctantly pulled her closer.

Pepper threaded her fingers through his hair and kissed him deeply, sucking on his lower lip tenderly. Tony groaned at that and pulled away, giving her a look.

"How's the company?" Tony asked, trying his best to avoid their current issue. "Do you want a new office? Maybe a new car? Cause we can browse the online catalog and pick you a nicer one."

"I don't want a new car." Pepper answered sincerely and blinked slowly at him, noticing how cold he was acting around her. "And the company is fine, Tony. We've established a new line of buildings, six more exactly. One in New York, another one in DC, here in Paris, in London… Hong Kong and Sydney."

Tony raised his eyebrows at that.

"Buildings for what exactly?"

"R&D use but it's more extensive than that. We're going to call them Stark Towers, because, even though I'm the CEO, your name is still written over every single thing."

Tony laughed at that and shrugged.

"Well, the perks of being the rich guy." Pepper smacked his shoulder and cupped the back of his head.

"You're being an ass." She pointed out and felt him cringe slightly beneath her.

"Oh, am I?" Tony bit back sourly and cleared his throat. "Why is that?"

"Because ever since last night you've been avoiding me."

"I have not!" Tony protested, even though that was perfectly true.

"Yes, you have and you're driving me crazy. I thought this trip was a perfect getaway for sex, but now I'm having doubts."

Tony chuckled and shrugged once again.

"If you want to use me as a sex toy, that's fine, but don't expect me to give a damn afterwards."

His words stung. And Pepper pulled back from him, heart beating fast in her chest.

"And why is that?" She inquired firmly and slid off his lap, eyes turning to ice.

"Well, for starters, you only want sex from me, which is totally fine in a weird way because it doesn't imply intimacy, but god dammit, Pepper, I opened up to you last night and you totally ignored everything I said."

"That's not true, Tony." She cut him off and sighed. "I'm just having doubts, that's all. You're not expecting me to fall for everything you say, are you?"

Tony looked at her as if she'd just stabbed him with her stilettos.

"Of course not." He admitted bitterly. "I get it. I really do. It's me we're talking about here."

"You're not going to play the innocent card, are you?"

Tony sighed deeply and sat up, putting his sunglasses on.

"I'm not." With that said, he turned away from her and headed back inside the villa, heart breaking inside his ribcage.

A/N: More angst?