#25 - "We can never be together" Kiss

Tony walked down the hallway of Stark Industries whistling as he went. He greeted everyone he passed. For the first time in a long time...maybe the first time ever...he was happy. He paused in front of the metal elevator doors, fixing his hair and straightening his tie. The tie had been a gift from Pepper on their latest trip to Paris. The very thought of Paris made him smile. They had just returned the day before from a romantic week in France where, after years of unresolved sexual tension, he and Pepper finally consummated their relationship. After all these years, he finally had a real relationship. Tony was still smiling when the elevator dinged. He held the doors open for the workmen carrying an armload of boxes, knowing the sooner they were out of his way, the sooner he could get to Pepper. Above his objections, she insisted on staying at her apartment the night before. After their week together, he was already used to waking up next to her and he'd missed Pepper more than he would ever admit.

Three more workmen were waiting when the car reached the floor that housed the executive offices. They were carrying lamps, various office equipment, and a rolled up area rug like the one Pepper had in her CEO's office. That made him pause, but, then again, Tony had never paid much attention to the other offices on the floor. Maybe they were all decorated the same. Further down the hall, he passed two men carrying a couch. It, too, was like Pepper's. Tony went from puzzled to concerned when he saw the next man carrying a box with a silver Ferris Wheel desk perpetual motion machine sticking out the top. He quickened his steps, not pausing for anything until he was standing at Pepper's door.

The office door was opened and he could hear her talking. When he entered the room, Tony saw Pepper was on the phone...standing in the middle of a near-empty office. All of the furniture was gone. The art had been taken down, leaving only empty nails in the wall. There was a folding chair and a filing cabinet for the desk phone to sit on, but, everything else had been cleared out. "What's going on?" he asked the moment she ended her call.

Pepper took a deep breath before turning around. "Tony, we need to talk."

Every scrap of happiness he'd felt all morning rushed out of him at once. "We need to talk" never meant anything good. In his experience, it always prefaced something catastrophic. He cleared his throat. "I'm not sure I want to hear what you have to say."

"I don't want to say it but it has to be said." She looked at the phone in her hand before looking at him in the face. "It's not going to work."

"What's not going to work?" He swallowed the panic rising, but there was a trace of confusion on his face.

"This," she said with a wave of her hand.

He looked around the room. "Has someone offered you another job? If they have, I will match whatever they offered you and then some."

"No. I'm staying with the company, but, I'm leaving."

Tony was completely lost. "You just said..."

"I said I'm not leaving the company."

"Okay. Back up. You're not leaving the company?"

"No."

"But, you're leaving?"

"Yes."

"And you're going to..."

"New York."

"Okay. I have been thinking about going back, especially since all the plans for the new Tower are in the works and..."

"You're not going."

"What?"

"I am going to New York, to run S.I. You are going to stay here, in California."

"What about...us?"

"That's what I meant when I said it's not going to work."

"That's why you wanted to be alone last night isn't it?"

"Yes. No. A little of both, I guess."

"Is it because you don't love me?"

"No. I do love you. I will always love you."

"Is there someone else?"

"No."

"Then why?"

"Because."

"Oh, 'because.' Why didn't you say so?" Tony scoffed. "'Because' is always a valid reason."

"Tony, don't." Pepper did nothing to hide her annoyance.

"Don't what? Don't question why you think you can just up and walk away without saying anything to me? Don't try to find out an explanation why the best thing that ever happened to me is moving clear across the country? Don't try to talk you out of it? Don't act like this is the worst news I've ever heard, because, let me tell you...it is."

"Don't make this harder than it has to be," she said sharply.

Tony looked for a hint of anything familiar. He didn't know the woman that was speaking to him. "So...I'm just supposed to pretend last week didn't happen like you did?"

"I could never forget last week. That's...that's one of the reasons I have to leave now."

"It's that easy, huh? Walking away?"

"Who said it was easy?" Tears welled in her eyes. "I didn't, because walking away is the hardest thing I've ever done."

"Then why?"

"Because, I have to." Pepper took both of his hands. "You have changed so much and I am very proud of the man you've become. The world needs this man. It needs you, Tony and you would never think about that first as long as I'm here."

He couldn't understand the sudden change in her mood. He didn't understand anything about this entire conversation."But...I love you."

"I love you, too, more than you will ever know."

"And, because you love me so much, you never want to see me again?"

"We can see each other. We will see each other. I will be coming back here to check on things. You will need to make trips to New York. We can spend time together then. Eventually, we can even take the occasional getaway trip."

"Basically, you're saying you just want me for sex?" Nothing was making sense.

"What if I am? We are both adults."

"So, we can be together, but never be together?" Tony stared at her in disbelief. Now, the cold and unfeeling Pepper was back? He was in shock, almost to the point of not knowing what to say. He didn't know this woman standing across from him. "What happened to you, Pepper?"

She ran her hands through his hair. "How I feel about you will never change and we will always be connected. Nothing or no one will ever change that." She put her hands on his cheeks and pulled him in for a kiss. It was bittersweet, full of more emotions than they could name, tender and passionate at the same time. When it ended, he brushed away the tear that appeared on her face. "Goodbye, Tony."

He watched her walk away. He should have called her name. He should have chased after her. He should have hauled her back and given her all the reasons she couldn't leave him. Tony did none of these, though. His tongue remained mute. His feet, rooted where he stood. He could do nothing but stare at the door long after Pepper had walked through it.

Pepper stretched her tired back and rubbed her eyes. She'd been answering E-mail for what seemed like an eternity and, frankly, she was tired of looking at her computer screen. This was after all of the other things she'd done that day. She needed sleep. Closing her laptop, she propelled herself off the couch, headed for her bedroom. Pepper was almost there when a pounding on her door made her jump.

"Pepper, open up," a very familiar voice said loudly before another round of knocking. "Please. I...I need to come in."

"Dear God," she said under her breath. "Tony." The knocking persisted As quickly as she could, she crossed the room and began working the lock and latch. She flung open the door and glared at the panicky Tony standing on the other side. "Stop before you wake the entire building!"

"Virginia, is everything alright?"

Pepper looked up and saw her neighbor across the hall looking out her door at the commotion. Her anger was replaced momentarily by embarrassment. "Yes, Mrs. Peterson," she said with pink cheeks. "Everything is fine. I'm sorry for the disturbance."

"Are you sure?" She eyed Tony with suspicion.

"I'm sure. It won't happen again." When the older woman retreated back into her apartment, Pepper took Tony by the arm. "Get in here," she growled, dragging him into the room. She closed the door and turned all her attention to her visitor. She folded her arms across her chest. "I cannot believe you."

"Thank God you're here," Tony stated with a relieved smile. He was oblivious to the frustration she radiated.

"It's two a.m. Where else would I be?"

He was preparing to answer when his eyes fell on the packed bag sitting with her briefcase. His blood ran cold. For a long minute, he couldn't speak, only stare. "That...that bag. You didn't have that on the trip last week."

"No, I didn't"

Tony licked his dry lips. "Wh-when did you pack it?"

"Tonight. Tony, I don't understand..."

Without waiting for her to say anything else, Tony grabbed the bag. "I'm not gonna let you do this," he declared.

"Do what?" Pepper asked, completely puzzled by his actions. "Give me that, please."

"No!" he said defiantly. "You're not doing this! Not until we talk about it first."

"What is there to talk about?"

"Plenty."

"Okay, we can talk if you want. I didn't know it was such a big deal. I thought you would be okay with..."

"Why in God's name would I be okay with letting you leave?"

"Who said I was leaving?"

"You did?"

"Where am I going?"

"New York."

"Why am I going to New York?"

"Because...all you want me for is sex."

"Says who?" She was beginning to lose her patience with him.

"You!" he said emphatically. Tony clutched the bag closer. "I'm not letting you go. Not without a fight."

"You're not making any sense." Pepper saw the look on his face. She saw the sweat forming on his brow and the slight tremor in his hands. For a minute, she let her mind go to the one place she knew she did not want to go. The last time she remembered him being so irrational was after a party in Dubai when he'd mixed together alcohol and some pills given to him by a fellow reveler. She watched as he paced a few feet. "Tony," she said, taking his arm to still him, "did you take anything?" She hoped she sounded calmer than she felt. "Have you been..."

"No. I promise. Not even a baby aspirin and no nightcap either," he assured her. Pepper ushered Tony to the sofa and sat beside him. "I was at home," he began without prompting. "I guess the jet lag caught up with me or something. I...had this dream, a nightmare actually."

"Where I left?"

"Yeah." His answer was so quiet she barely heard him.

"Tell me," Pepper said. She saw the uncertainty. "If it has you this out of sorts, I want to know. I need to know. Tell me everything."

Tony repeated every excruciating detail, subconsciously tightening his grip on the overnight bag as he went. "I was so out of it when I woke up, I had to come here and be sure it was a dream. Then, when I got here I saw you had packed and...I wasn't so sure any more."

"Tony, look at me." She waited until she had his undivided attention. "If I were only interested in sex with you, I can think of about a dozen times over the past decade I could have scratched that particular itch and just walked away. Why would I wait until we are both at the place we've been trying to get to only to leave?"

"So, no regrets?"

"Nope and nothing I would change either. It makes what we managed to find now all the better."

"Why did you want to stay apart tonight?" There was still a trace of concern in his voice.

"Because there were some things I needed to do."

"You couldn't do them from the house?"

"Not unless you know how to telepathically clean out my refrigerator," Pepper retorted.

"Why would you do that?"

"We were gone for over a week, Tony. Things spoil. It can get really nasty if you don't throw them out."

"I've been on a million trips and I've never had to do that," he said with a disbelieving smirk.

"That would be because I have always done it."

"Oh." He paused for just moment. "What else?"

"There was mail to pick up," she began, ticking the list off on her fingers. "I had to buy food to replace what I tossed out. There were about 700 E-mails to answer, not to mention half that many phone calls. I had to unpack, and..."

"If you were unpacking, then what's this?" Tony asked gesturing to the overnight bag he still held.

Pepper sighed. "It was just a dream," she reiterated. "However, if you must know, I thought that, since I would be spending the night with you at the mansion now on a fairly regular basis, I needed to leave a few things there."

"You've had clothes in the spare bedroom for years," he countered.

"Those were just a few extra skirts and blouses," Pepper said, blushing slightly. "These are more, um, personal items."

A sly smile crept across Tony's face as he realized what she meant. "You mean, I have been sitting here this entire time holding your underwear?"

"Not just that. There are...other things."

"Uh-huh." Tony sat the bag in his lap and grasped the zipper.

"Give me that," Pepper said, reaching for her luggage. Tony tried to move it out of reach, but Pepper was too quick. She lunged, knocking him over onto the couch, landing on top of him and pinning the bag between them. They continued their little tug-of-war until they both began laughing. They lay there for a minute while the giggling subsided. He brushed the hair out of her face that had fallen there during their tussle. Pepper leaned in and kissed him.

"Guess this means you think we can be together?" he said when the kiss ended.

"For a long, long time," she answered. Pepper sat up quickly. "Just not tonight." She took his hand and pulled him upright.

"Aww, Pep."

"We have that 8 a.m. conference call with London, in case you've forgotten and I need my beauty sleep."

"You're beautiful already," he flirted.

"Nice try, but, seriously, I'm tired. We both know if you stay, we will neither one get any rest."

He scooted closer and dropped his voice to a more intimate tone. "You say that like it was a bad thing."

"Normally, it's a very good thing, but, not tonight."

"Fine," he conceded. "But, I'm taking your underwear with me."

"Go ahead. I won't need it tonight anyway."

"You're killing me, Potts," he growled. Pepper kissed him again before standing and then offering him a hand up. Tony rose reluctantly and followed her to the door. He decided on one last-ditch effort. "You might as well let me stay. People already know I'm here."

"They know some yelling lunatic was here, not my otherwise sedate, loving boyfriend." Tony stood frozen in the doorway and stared. "What?"

"That's the first time I've heard you call me your boyfriend."

Pepper smiled and gave him a final kiss. "Good night, Boyfriend. I will see you at the office."

"Good night," he said. Pepper closed the door and he stayed in place until he heard her turn the locks. Tony looked at the door and then to the bag he carried. It was just a dream. He would be alright. No matter what scary images his mind may conjure up, it couldn't change the truth. Behind that door, Pepper was preparing not to leave, but to stay. She wasn't just staying with the company or in California, but with him. He smiled and turned to walk down the hallway. They were taking the first steps into their new life together and that was the stuff that dreams were made of.

Author's Note: Sorry this update took so long. However, it looks like my Pepperony muse has returned. :D The dream in the first part was a challenge, but, I realized it was okay, because dreams don't always have to make *perfect* sense. My eternal gratitude to lilnomdeplume for invaluable assistance. I may not be the best angst writer in the world, but I can at least say I tried. :D Thanks to my BFF for keeping on me, saying things like "Do you know how long it's been since you posted anything?" and "When are you going to finish that new chapter?" Thanks for not letting me give up. Please let me know how you like it. I must admit, it turned out better than I thought. Feedback is greatly appreciated. Reviews are awesome. Hopefully, I will get back on track with this fanfic and get more chapter done sooner than later. Happy reading. PEPPERONY FOREVER!