Authoress Note: Welcome to Chapter 2 of Iron Maiden. I want to thank those who have left reviews for this story. It means a lot to me that you guys are enjoying this story. I can't wait to see what you guys think of this next part of the story. Without further ado Chapter 2. ENJOY!

Chapter 2

Gambling

Rhodey and Abigail slowly walked up to the table that Tony was at. The two of them were rather irritated with him.

Tony looked up at the two of them seeing the look of frustration on their faces. "My God, what are you, they roped you into this thing too?" Tony said looking at Rhodey knowing that he wasn't there when he had arrived earlier.

Abigail let out a scoff as she looked at her older brother with a sour look on her face. She couldn't believe that he would do this to his best friend and including his sister leaving them to scramble and figure out what to do if he hadn't shown up.

"Yeah. They said you'd be deeply honored if I presented." Rhodey said, looking at his friend.

"Okay, let's do it."

Rhodey plopped the ARES statue down on the felt in front of him.

"That was quick. Thought there'd be more of, you know, a ceremony. Maybe a highlight reel -" Tony shook karma into the dice and rolled again, crapping out. "Colore me up." He turned to the others. "My chaperone has just arrived with my -" He picked up the ARES trophy. "Degenerate of the Year Award. Judging from his look, I may have just peed in the kiddie pool."

The Boxman racked up Tony's chips.

"I must now take my leave, along with the House's funds." He is handed racks of chips and then tipped the table operators and headed off with Rhodey and Abigail. Two security guards fell behind them following them.

"A lot of people would kill to have their name on that award." Rhodey pointed as they walked as people snapped photos on their cell phones.

"It belongs to my old man. They should have given it to him." Tony said with a roll of his eyes not liking the idea that he had gotten this award in the place of the man that had started the company.

"Tony," Abigail warned, knowing that there was no way to give the trophy to their dead father. After all, Tony took over the company and made it even better than what their father had done. She hated it when Tony spoke ill of their father even though she didn't have a lot of memories of them compared to him.

"What's wrong with you? A thousand people came here tonight to honor you, and you leave them with an egg on their face. This award means something, Tony, it's bigger than you -"

"Hold that thought a sec," Tony said as he stopped at the roulette wheel. He put his chips down and nodded to the wheel operator.

Abigail let out a breath pinching the bridge of her nose. Of course, Tony wanted to gamble some more and it wasn't fair to her or Rhodey for how he was acting.

"Put it all on black. Don't worry - it's approved."

The Wheel operator spun it and it settled on red. The dealer scooped away Tony's chips.

"...you just blew three million."

Abigail groaned and shook her head. "Of course he did."

"Yeah. Don't know what was more exciting - winning it...or the fact that I don't care I just lost it."

"Everything's funny to you. " Rhodey said, shaking his head.

"No. You're not funny."

"We've got a hell of a day tomorrow. Can we get out of here now?"

"One more stop."

Abigail let out a breath as they followed Tony. She should've known that her big brother wasn't going to take this seriously enough to get out of there and catch his flight with Rhodey to go overseas to the troops.

Tony went into the bathroom and Rhodey followed him inside of it.

Abigail let out a breath and shook her head lightly as she crossed her arms waiting outside of the bathroom, but she could hear their conversation with one another. Her foot nervously bounced up and down as she waited her heel clicking on the floor every time her foot hit the floor.

"Of course, I respect your opinion," Tony told his friend, causing Alexia to roll her eyes. He didn't respect anyone's opinion.

"This is no joke. You're going into a hot zone. We should be doing this test here in Nevada." Rhodey told Tony, causing Abigail's heart to race knowing that her brother and Rhodey were going into a red hot zone and she wasn't allowed to go due to her brother's orders of staying here and helping run the company with Obadiah.

"This system has to be demonstrated in true field conditions."

Pepper came up to Abigail seeing that the young woman was rather upset. "He's in there isn't he?"

Abigail nodded her head and Pepper went into the bathroom.

"Tony, it's the President. Wants to congratulate you personally. Heads up."

Abigail let out a breath as they came out of the bathroom talking more than usual. She knew that whatever Pepper needed it was important for Tony to deal with it before he left.

"You're leaving the country for a week. I need five minutes -" Pepper said as they walked towards the exit.

"Okay - shoot," Tony said as he headed towards his limo that he would be riding with Alexia.

Pepper checked her PC tablet. "The Board meeting is on the eleventh. Should I tell them to expect an appearance-?"

"Mr. Stark!" A woman's voice ran out causing Tony to turn and spot a hot young reporter holding a recorder. Security kept her at bay. "Christine Everhart, Vanity Fair Magazine. Can I ask you a few questions?"

Tony's brows raised slightly as he looked at her. "Can I ask a few back?"

She gave him a disarming smile.

Tony waved at Security to let her through.

Pepper shook her head lightly and took a call.

Abigail crossed her arms in irritation letting out a breath knowing that this probably wasn't going to end well.

"You've been described as a Da Vinci for our times. What do you say to that?"

"Ridiculous. I don't paint."

"And what do you say to your other nickname: "The Merchant of Death?"

"That's not bad - "

Her gaze suddenly went cold.

"Let me guess. Berkeley?"

"Brown."

"Well Miss Brown, it's an imperfect world and I assure you, the day weapons are no longer needed to keep the peace, I'll start manufacturing bricks and beams to make baby hospitals."

"Rehearse that much, Mr. Stark?"

"Every night in front of the mirror. Call me Tony."

"I'm sorry, "Tony", I was hoping for a serious answer."

"Here's serious: my old man had a philosophy: peace means having a bigger stick than the other guy."

"Good line, coming from the guy selling the sticks."

"My father helped defeat Hitler. He was on the Manhattan Project. A lot of people - including your professors at Brown - might call that being a hero."

"Others might call it war profiteering."

Tony smiled, this girl was relentless.

Abigail rolled her eyes, shaking her head lightly.

"Tell me: do you plan to report on the millions we've saved by advancing medical technology? Or

kept from starving with our intercrops? All were breakthroughs spawned from, that's right,

military funding."

"Wow. You ever lose an hour of sleep your whole life?"

He regarded her in earnest, then off her drop-dead looks, he decided right away what he wanted to do. "I'm prepared to lose a few moments with you."

Alexia shook her head and moved to where Pepper was as Tony and Christine got into the limo.

Pepper looked up and saw the young woman looking rather irritated. "He went with the reporter."

"Yeah," Abigail said, shaking her head. "He can never think right when there is a pretty woman." She let out a soft breath pinching her nose. "Can you give me a ride back to my apartment?" She hated the fact that needed to ask Pepper to take her home since Tony was too busy screwing around to even give his sister a ride home.

Pepper nodded her head slowly knowing that she was rather upset and she didn't blame her for being upset. "No, of course not, I don't mind," Pepper said, offering the young woman a small smile.

Abigail gave Pepper a look of thanks. She knew that later she was going to have to give Tony what for, for what he had done. She was family to him and he didn't need to go screwing around like he had been.

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This is the end of Chapter 2. I hope that you all enjoyed it. I hope to have more updates for this story out as quickly as I can without overdoing it. I have many fics that I am working on at this time. Please leave a review and let me know what you think. Reviews keep me going and I'm excited to see what you all think. I haven't quite picked out a pairing for my OC yet, but who do you think she should go with? Until next time.