a/n: time jumpppppppppppp.
this chapter is brought to you in part by Matilda by Harry Styles and This Year's Love by David Gray.
Breaking News: Inflation Reaches New High as Recession Continues into the New Year
The holidays were supposed to be happy time to reunite with family and celebrate the year coming to an end as a new one was rung in with fireworks, champagne and presents.
This year, the holidays were just another excuse for Jamie's grandparents to guilt trip her into taking the train to Boston and staying at her childhood home surrounded by her Dad's side of the family.
Growing up, Jamie never really minded her Dad's side of the family since her Mom's side hadn't ever really been too involved, save for a Christmas here and there and the occasional birthday card being sent a few days too early. But as she grew older, it became more clear why her Dad had been all too eager to escape his hometown the more the Archers began to take up space within their life.
The family dynamic shifted after Jamie's Mom had left. It was like her and her Dad were suddenly viewed as these down on their luck pair of misfits their family wanted to take in and bring back beneath their wings. Her Dad had put his foot down after years of always being attached to his family as the black sheep of the family, but without him here now to be the buffer between his parents, siblings, aunts, uncles and nieces of nephews... Jamie was left to fend for herself.
"You look pale. Moving to New York has made you as white as paper, Jamie Elizabeth," her Grandmother chided for what felt like the millionth time this holiday. Jamie was already ready to swat away the hands that followed in suit to attempt to pull at her auburn curls she'd pinned back into a braid. "Are you planning on moving back anytime soon now that you've left the Globe?"
Jamie shook her head. Since her Dad's passing, her Grandma had been more clingy than ever, insistent on Jamie moving back the way her Dad had. This was also prevalent when her Mom had left and her Grandma had been the sole person trying to get her and her Dad to move back in with her and Grandpa while attempting to take Ciara's place as her Mom. Going so far as to addressing Jamie as Elizabeth, the name of her Dad's older sister who'd passed a few years prior to Jamie's birth that he'd passed her name onto Jamie as her middle name.
It was clear that the family unit was important to Grandma Imogen Archer, but Jamie knew she was really just a stand-in for two children now lost.
"Uh, my lease is still valid until August next year, Gran," Jamie shook of her Grandma's touch as she tried to make herself busy by folding the silver utensils into scarlet napkin cloths. This was a bullshit lie, she was renting her room at the Loft, but Jamie would rather drop off the Metro platform in front of the A Train than have to move back to Boston to be smothered by her family some more.
Imogen was an insistent woman, a trait she'd passed down to her son who'd passed it down to his daughter. "Your Pa and I can help you buy out of it, honey. How much money do you need?" Always about money...
"Gran," Jamie dropped the folded utensils with a clatter and turned to try and reason with her Grandma. But it was already too late.
Once Imogen Archer wrapped her head around an idea, there was no unwrapping her her. She was like a python... or at least that's what her Dad used to call her. Sucking the life out of things for the Hell of it. Jamie never fully understood her Dad's reluctance to spending time with his mom until she herself was having to suffer through it.
"I don't need your money," Jamie insisted. Making sure to use 'your.' She needed money, just not theirs.
"Nonsense," her Gran insisted, signing the last of her signature with the engraved pen she carried around because- of course she had a fucking engrained pen. The older Archer ripping the check from the book and slapping it into Jamie's palm, closing it on her behalf before she could shove it back to her. "You need the money so you can move home, okay?"
"Gra-"
"Okay!" she beamed, turning swiftly away and heading back to where the rest of the family was in the living room. And by her family's definition living room, what it actually meant was a large expanse of interior decorating and overpriced furniture.
After her Gran had left her alone to her own devices, Jamie unfolded the crinkled check in her hand and read the total... A whopping six grand.
"Jesus Christ," she huffed out in disbelief. Before returning to her task at hand- rolling expensive silverware into pressed red napkins that she'd receive dirty looks for actually using- Jamie made sure to smack the check onto the parlor counter with a resounding slap that echoed down the nearby hallways.
She didn't care who heard. She didn't care who would consider her ungrateful for not taking her Grandma's money. She didn't care about anything at all much anymore, if she was being honest.
Jamie tried to distract herself by folding the rest of the cutlery neatly and nicely. There'd be without a doubt at least one or two comments on it. Jamie was going on 23 in a few months, yet she still felt like a ten-year-old still needing to receive petty and passive aggressive praise from assholes who graduated from Harvard and BU and MIT and every other pretentious fucking institution in Cambridge.
"You know, if you roll those utensils any angrier, I may begin to think you're at risk of stabbing one of us."
Jamie didn't have to look up to know who was speaking to her.
It turns out smacking the counter did wake someone up down the hall: her Dad's second older sister, Aunt Ruthie. Aunt Ruthie was what her Dad liked to call a 'Classy Alcoholic.' A Classy Alcoholic was basically just an alcoholic who only drank expensive wines in fancy glasses. And despite what many others suspected in the family, Ruthie wasn't actually the family disappointment because Ruthie didn't run away to Northwestern the second she walked across the stage with her diploma and fucked off for a handful of years. Her Dad had, though.
Jamie barely spared her a brief glance up through her eyelashes, her hands never stopping her quick work with the napkin rolling. "It'd go by faster if someone offered to help," Jamie quipped.
"Your Dad never liked getting any of our help," her Aunt Ruthie retorted, padding over to the parlor and walking past the table, her orange hair tied up into messy bunch behind her head held up with a clip. "Figured since you're your father's daughter and all..." she trailed off, her hands shuffling around through the cabinets, her head finally popping up over the counter with a bottle of wine in hand.
Jamie rolled her eyes. "Drunk before..." she checked the time on her small Target watch. "11am. New record for you, Aunt Ruth. You know, normally people drink when the ball drops, but thirty seven hours before is pushing it."
"Smart like your Daddy too," Aunt Ruthie chuckled, not even bothering to get a glass before she started to drink the Red straight from the twist-top bottle. Classy. Jamie shook her head. "This check on the counter yours?" She snatched it up with her free hand. "Ooh! Six G's. Could buy out that snazzy loft you're living in up the coast."
"Pretty sure that's almost the exact reason Gran wrote it for me," the younger auburn-haired woman muttered. She glanced up just in time to notice Ruth shove the check into her pocket. "What, they don't give you enough already?"
"I'm not the kid they're trying to bribe to come back beneath their thumb," Ruth remarked, taking another swig of wine without making a sour face. "The most they'll shell out for me these days is to order the groceries to be delivered."
Jamie hummed in amusement. She wasn't surprised by that considering the story she heard from her other aunt- Aunt Patty- that her grandparents had spent a small fortune covering her rehab bill when Jamie was fifteen. They'd lied to her at the time and told her Aunt Ruthie had gone away on a cruise.
"So, you gonna do it?"
Jamie paused.
"Do what?"
"Move back," Ruth clarified, dropping into the seat across the table from Jamie.
"Probably not anytime soon," Jamie replied truthfully. She knew Ruthie liked to play the middle man, claiming she wasn't a snitch or a gossip, but within a month that little statement would be the talk of the family golf trip in Mar-A-Lago in a few months.
Aunt Ruthie ran a hand through her red curls. "Your family misses you. Can't you see that?"
"OH!"
A chorus of cheers and whoops rang out from the living room. It seemed that the family was celebrating the Patriots getting a touchdown. Jamie knew it was the Patriots only because that was the only sports team they'd go that batshit crazy over. They didn't even go this crazy when she got a full ride to NYU or got her job with the Globe fresh out of college or even when she crossed the stage at seventeen.
"Oh yeah," Jamie smiled wryly. "I can see that bright and clear. Hear it, too."
Ruthie took another swig of wine. If she didn't slow down, at her pace she wouldn't make it to the 4th Quarter. When she put the bottle back down, she gave Jamie a more stern look. Like she was trying to be serious.
Jamie only shook her head and glanced back down at the rolled silverware. "They want me back in Boston because they want to sculpt my life for me like I'm a wet clump of clay. Pay for my mortgage. Set me up with a husband of their choice they bribed with a million dollar dowry. Tell me which pre-school to enroll my kids in and which church to baptize them at. Bail me out of jail when I get a DUI during my mid-life crisis so they can hold it over my head until they make me put them in an expensive nursing home across the street from the country club ..." she listed off in a peppy voice, pushing herself from her seat and gathering up the utensils in her hands to start laying them out beside each plate at the table.
Aunt Ruthie whistled, "Damn, kid. You're more dramatic than Mikey ever was." Another swig. A burp. "He was more quiet, bottled everything up."
Jamie wanted so badly to smash that fucking bottle of wine and stain this overpriced white table cloth at her fingertips. She grew closer to her Aunt with every roll of utensils she set down at each plate. "They don't miss me," Jamie reiterated. "They miss controlling me. Big difference."
"So, what? You planning on staying away forever? Comin' back when you wanna settle down and get married?" Ruth chuckled, her Boston accent popping out in her voice. "Like that'll ever happen."
"Why not...?" Jamie pondered. She hadn't meant to ask it aloud, to make herself sound desperate for the approval of a woman barely worth the six thousand dollar check she'd stolen and stuffed in her jegging pocket. But she was curious to why her Aunt would sound so in disbelief at the concept of Jamie settling down and starting a family one day. Probably not anytime soon, but... someday. Maybe.
Her Aunt Ruthie shrugged. "'Cause contrary to popular belief, sugar," she winced as she stretched, rising to her feet. "You're more like your Mom than your Daddy. You've got that free spirit that never wants to be caged."
Jamie tensed up at the mention of her Mom. Her skin crawled at the thought of being compared to her, let alone to be told she was like her.
The young woman opened her mouth, tempted to make a scene when there was a collective gasp from the living room.
On a whim, Jamie turned to glance into the living room, thinking all eyes would be on her about to slap or strangle her Aunt Ruthie and finding all eyes glued to the TV screen instead. She thought maybe a player had been injured or a celebrity had died, so she craned her neck slightly to read the screen.
The headline had made Jamie's heart stop, her hand falling limp as a roll of utensils dropped to the ground with a clatter. No one reacted, their attention too focused on the news anchor breaking the news.
"This just in: the US Department of Defense is reporting that Tony Stark has been found, alive and with minimal injury," the anchor man read off, a bright smile on his face beside a projected image of the billionaire from a photoshoot he probably did before he had gotten abducted. "The US Army in the area had managed to locate after three months of searching following his abduction during a trip to the Middle-East for a military weapons demonstration. But after so long, we are happy to report that Stark Industries CEO Tony Stark has been found. I repeat, Tony Stark has been found. "
Jamie's hand came up to touch her mouth as she whispered against her fingertips, "Holy shit..."
"Kid."
Holy shit.
"Kid."
Holy fucking shit.
"Jamie!"
"What?!" Jamie turned to her Aunt Ruthie, finally snapping back to reality.
Aunt Ruthie reeled back from her niece's abruptness. "Your phone is ringing..."
Jamie turned to the where the buzzing sound was coming from. Sure enough, her phone sat screen-down next to a china plate, buzzing and buzzing.
"Shit," she cursed, quickly snatching it up to read the caller ID. She answered hit 'answer' before trudging into the kitchen, away from any eavesdropping Archers. "Logan? ...Yeah, I just saw the news. What time are you looking at for LAX?"
She wasn't sure what the plan was. Most of the time her 'plan' consisted of just running on luck, chance and sneaky tricks. But this time, it looked like Logan had had time to concoct a plan.
They flew in at separate times. Logan arrived an hour before Jamie and managed to get them a rental car and a hotel room a few blocks from Stark Industries Headquarters. Jamie was starting to understand why Parker was adamant on calling her intern a robot.
Jamie had barely switched Airplane Mode off of her cell when she got the texts from him asking what gate she was at. She sent it back and by the time she'd managed to grab her carry-on bags and maneuver herself out of the plane, Logan was waiting in the middle of the walkway with his press pass around his neck.
"What'd you got for me?" Jamie prompted him, her lively photographer falling in step with her.
"Well," he took a deep breath before beginning. "We're making good time. The Army is transferring Stark here to LAX. As of an hour ago, Stark Industries is giving a press conference to give an official statement on their CEO's return. No confirmation of whether Stark himself is gonna make it there himself-"
"Doubtful."
"-But there's still a few hours before that plane lands," Logan continued. "We've got a set up at the Renaissance a few blocks South of the HQ and a silver Chevy Malibu fresh from the rental lot for us to use."
Jamie chuckled as Logan handed her a set of keys she caught in her hand that wasn't clutching the handle of her suitcase. "Hehe, you have my itinerary, too?"
Her intern rolled his eyes as they continued through the crowds of the bustling airport.
The drive out from the airport wasn't as terrible as Jamie thought it would've been. She wasn't used to driving after leaving Boston, she'd never even needed a car in the Big Apple. In Los Angeles, however, having a car was kind of a necessity unless they planned on taking a cab down to Long Beach which would've cost them an arm and a leg at this time of day.
They had just merged onto the 405 when Logan sat up in his seat beside Jamie.
"Oh shit," he muttered, staring at his phone screen. "Drive faster."
"What? Why?"
"Just drive faster."
"Just tell me what the Hell is going on or I'll stop the car," Jamie snapped back. "Now, talk."
Logan readjusted himself in the passenger's seat to be fully facing the reporter driving, "Confirmed by Pepper Potts and the SI media relations people that Stark is heading the conference and making his own statement."
Jamie nearly swerved into another lane the way her heart jumped out of her chest. "He's gonna be at that press conference?"
Logan shrugged, "The conference starts in fifteen minutes. Who knows how quickly his driver is gonna make it from LAX to Long Beach so that's why I'm telling you you should- OOF!" The photographer was thrown back into his seat by the shear will power of Jamie stomping her foot down hard onto the accelerating pedal.
She wasn't going to miss this shot. Not after what had happened with Stane a few months ago.
She'd never felt so isolated, alone and in fear of her life after what had happened in the desolate Atlanta airport parking garage. So she'd done as he'd told her and dropped the lead. She shoved those photos her Dad sent to her deep beneath her bed back in Boston and kept her head down. Weeks past, the news about Tony Stark getting kidnapped slowly faded off of headlines as the next new tragedy took it's place and the holidays rolled in... Jamie had been so preoccupied by her Hellish family that she hadn't had much time to herself to worry about the story.
Until now.
The Chevy screeched to a halt as Jamie haphazardly threw it in park and rushed out of her seat. Logan tossed her the extra press pass he had on him and attempted to fix her hair as well as she could without it looking like she'd just gotten off a plane an hour prior.
"I don't look like shit, right?" Jamie prompted her intern, her hands coming up to try and flatten out her blazer and slightly wrinkly dark jeggings. Fuck if she was going to wear actual skinny jeans on a six hour flight in the economy class of Spirit Airlines.
Logan glanced down at her briefly, shrugging. "You look fine to me."
"Yeah, to you," she replied, shaking out her matted hair a bit to fake the effect of curls... somewhat. It wasn't working out so well. "We're about to be standing in a room full of people from CNN, NYT, ABC, WNBC, all the fucking Posts." Oh, she probably looked like a blogger among all these fancy actually employed professional reporters.
"Hey," Logan nudged her.
"Not now," she whimpered, trying to rub the stain off the bottom of her navy blue t-shirt. "I probably look like some Buzzfeed writer. God!"
"Hey," he nudged her a bit harder this time.
This time, she turned to face him this time, following his gaze towards the front of the complex where a black Rolls Royce seemed to be approaching. Jamie's blood froze in her veins. He was here.
"Oh! There he is!"
A chill ran up Jamie's spin, her head spinning in the opposite direction towards where the SI front doors were. None other than Obadiah Stane, clad in a grey suit and gaudy black sunglasses with a beaming smile on his face, came rushing out as the car approached.
Reporters and SI employees alike began whooping, cheering and clapping as the car pulled up to the sidewalk. Through the ruckus, Jamie shrank back behind Logan. Her intern glanced down at her with an odd look, unsure of where this sudden tension came from, but wrote it off as nerves to be facing Tony Stark after months of just giving up on the story out of nowhere.
Jamie felt bad for not having told Logan why she'd abruptly dropped the leads, but standing there in front of SI headquarters only a few people away from the man who threatened her in a state where he'd personally tracked her down to... Jamie was terrified.
But even this fear couldn't keep her away from the truth. And with Tony Stark back from captivity in the same country that her Dad had been killed in, she knew he had some semblance of answers she needed.
"Look at this!" Obadiah exclaimed in great joy as he triumphantly opened the door of the Rolls Royce.
Shocking everyone on the sidewalk, Tony Stark exited... with a bruise around his left eye, a scrape on his right cheek and his right arm in a sling. Still, even injured the billionaire still managed to look stylish in some kind of off-brand suit the Army must have pulled together before sticking him on the first plane home.
As Stark began to clamber out, Jamie followed him and Obadiah with her eyes as they made their way inside. Jamie and Logan were some of the first in the sea of workers and reporters outside to push through the front doors to get into the press conference without security noticing them slip by. The Daily Globe press passes were still working miracles, despite them not having been employed by the paper since late October after they'd both walked out.
Inside the open area just off to the side of the main entrance, a bigger array of press with gaudy cameras and flashing lights were already waiting anxiously for the man of the hour to appear. The reporters who'd apparently been present since Stark Industries first announced their statement release were on a first come, first serve basis in terms of seating, so Jamie and her photographer hung back.
"I can try and get us more towards the front if we-" Logan attempted to scheme, but was interrupted by Jamie shaking her head.
"It's fine," she insisted. "We're good here."
Logan furrowed his eyebrows. "We'd never be able to get a word in from all the way back here."
Jamie shook her head, "Just drop it. We're staying back here." A twinge of guilt spread throughout her chest at her snappy attitude towards her intern. He'd understand eventually why she didn't want to risk being seen. If Obadiah saw her...
Jamie shivered slightly.
"You cold?" Logan prompted.
Obadiah clapped his hand on Stark's back. It felt like a slap to the face for Jamie. "I'm fine."
Her jaw clenched, watching the older man take the podium, that sick smile still plastered on his face. She wondered if she'd been the first person he made threats to with a smile still on his face. She wondered if he was all talk and no bite. She wondered who kept a leash on him or vice versa.
But while her eyes were on Obadiah, everyone else was focused on the newly returned billionaire slouched at the bottom of the podium, a wrapped cheeseburger all but materializing into his injured hand. "Hey, would it be all right if everyone sat down?" Stark could be heard calling out to the crowd of people standing around him. "Why don't you just sit down? That way you can see me, and I can... A little less formal and..." he trailed off as the wrapping for his burger came off with ease and the reporters in the room began to fall to their knees.
Almost everyone was on the ground and by the time the wave got to them, Jamie and Logan had no choice but to duck. Jamie practically dropping to the floor before Obadiah could make her face out in the crowd.
Obadiah, in the meantime, dropped down to sit beside Stark at the edge of the stage. That same goofy smile still on his face as he exchanged a few soft words with the younger man, his hand on his shoulder. Jamie wondered why Stane was so adamant to always be touching the billionaire. Maybe he was his ward. Or maybe that was how he controlled him, steered him with a firm grip.
A second later, whatever Stark had been saying to Stane he turned and repeated to the crowd. "I never got to say goodbye to my father..."
Jamie's eyebrows rose. This was a new tune the billionaire was playing. The usually smug, sassy and sarcastic demeanor was no where to be heard or seen in Stark's words or facial expressions. That's when Jamie looked into Stark's eyes from across the room and realized just how much he'd changed from the last time she'd seen him at that night in Caesar's Palace.
"There's questions that I would have asked him. I would have asked him how he felt about what this company did. If he was conflicted, if he ever had doubts. Or maybe he was every inch the man we all remember from the newsreels," Stark continued his speech, pausing for a moment to gather his thoughts before coming back up again for air. "I saw young Americans killed by the very weapons I created to defend them and protect them."
Jamie's breath caught in her throat.
Bye, Dad!
Bye, Bean!
"And I saw... that I had become part of a system that is comfortable with zero accountability..."
Jamie felt something tug on her hand as reporters began to raise their hands to ask questions. She glanced down to find Logan squeezing her hand in support. She gave him a small nod before turning her attention back to the conference.
"What happened over there?" A soft voice asked from the front of the crowd.
"I- I had my eyes opened," Stark stated, his voice raising as he himself rose to his feet up at the stage and made his way around the podium. "I came to realize that I have more to offer this world than just making things that blow up. And that is why, effective immediately, I am shutting down the weapons manufacturing division of Stark International-"
Jamie audibly gasped as every body in the room jumped up with questions and flashing cameras.
"-until such a time as I can decide what the future of this company will be. And what direction it should take, one that I am comfortable with and is consistent with the highest good for this country, as well-" Stark tried to get more words out when Stane quickly pushed him from the microphone.
The last thing Jamie could hear was Logan calling her name as he tried to shake her back to reality, but everything was fuzzy. Her ears were ringing, her eyes were tearing up and her lungs felt empty. It was like some kind of force pushed her back up to her feet and lulled her forward until she found herself pushing past a line of reporters to stand a few yards ahead of Stark as he made his way through the sea of reporters.
Stane had taken the stage, spouting "Tony's back!" but Jamie didn't care.
As soon as Stark had made it up to the point where she was standing, a little out of place in a blazer, jeans and dirty checkered Vans, he stopped for a second upon seeing the look of awe on her face.
"I was right." Those were the first words out of Jamie's mouth. "About Stark industries weapons in the Middle-East, I was right." It wasn't a question.
After months of being discouraged and told not to challenge one of the biggest weapons manufacturers in the world, Jamie finally had the confirmation she'd wanted... that the evidence her Dad had sent her was real and she hadn't thrown away a portion of her life for nothing. That she hadn't been threatened for nothing.
She was right.
Stark didn't say anything at first. But before she could get another word out, he grabbed her arm with his uninjured one and pulled her out of the bustling crowd of shouting reporters until they were a decent distance away from the hoards of flashing lights and onslaught of urgent questions.
"What's your name?" Stark prompted her.
Jamie forgot her name for a split second. "Uh, Jamie... Archer. Jamie Archer. Sorry," she winced.
"You a writer?"
Jamie opened her mouth, clamping it back shut a second later. She could've lied. Told him she was a writer for the Times or the Bugle. But she found there was no point for that. She didn't want him lying to her anymore, so she was going to be as honest as she could with him. "Right now I'm just a girl looking for answers about what happened to my Dad."
Stark nodded firmly. "And I want answers about my Dad's legacy."
Jamie nodded right back. They were at level with one another. This wasn't like Vegas, Jamie could see it already. Something happened in that desert, there was no denying that. The Tony Stark Jamie briefly interacted with at Caesar's Palace was not the same man she was glancing up at right now.
"Where do we start?" she prompted the billionaire.
Stark leaned down to keep his voice low, "How did you find out about these weapon shipments?"
Jamie pursed her lips. "It's a long story..."
"I'm gonna need a better answer than that," Stark chastised with a pointed look, his sharp eyebrows furrowing as he looked down his nose at her.
A wave of skepticism flooded through her chest at the brief thought of her Dad's photos. Flashes of memories of Obadiah with his hand patting or holding Tony's arm and shoulder came to mind. How could she trust this after the man he'd named as his mentor was the same man who threatened Jamie's life.
Jamie leaned in closer, looking Stark straight in the eyes as she told it as it was. "And I was threatened by your company, so I'm gonna need a better reason to trust you."
A flash of surprise flashed across Stark's face. "Who-" his question died in his throat when a large hand slapped against his uninjured shoulder. Jamie flinched which went unnoticed by Stark who turned to face the owner of the hand on him. Jamie took an involuntary step back as Obadiah Stane towered over the pair in conversation. The safe bubble of protection Jamie thought she had suddenly evaporated into thin air as that same wicked smile spread across Stane's lips.
"Excuse us, but any further questions you have you can forward to Tony's assistant, Miss Pepper Potts," Stane explained, patting Stark's arm. Jamie couldn't breath for a moment, all she could do was try not to let the open windows of the SI conference room melt away into the concrete walls and pillars of the airport parking garage. "Tony, it's time to go-"
"Uh, I was in the middle of a conversation, actually-" Stark attempted to lighten the mood with his snarky argument.
"I'm sure this lovely reporter can manage to get into contact with Stark Industries excellent information officer and public relations advisor," Stane insisted, tugging Stark along with his hand still clutched at his arm. "Can't you, Miss Archer?"
Jamie minutely nodded, not daring to speak a word. But it was no use. Jamie could see the chaos in his eyes and knew that no matter what she'd been discussing with Stark or whether or not Stark even gave a rat's ass about what Jamie knew enough to gain protection from him.
Then again, if what Jamie and Logan suspected about Stane getting rid of Tony Stark after Vegas was to be believed... whether Stark was back or not, if Stane could get to the most powerful man on Earth, there was no place Jamie could hide now.
"What did you tell Stark?" Logan prompted, practically materializing from the crowd of rampant journalists and reporters.
Jamie felt her world collapse around her. She blinked and before she knew it, Stane had already ushered Stark out along with a boatload of security and a redhead Pepper Potts not far behind them. "This was a mistake..." she spoke in a voice barely above a faint whisper.
Logan sat in silence on the edge of his bed back at the hotel room.
He wasn't really sure what to say after Jamie had completely broken down and explained what had happened back in Atlanta that made her abruptly drop her leads and fly back to Boston for the holidays without little to no explanation. And now that he had that explanation... he still had so many questions.
"What are you we going to do?" was the first one out of his mouth.
Jamie scoffed, "'We'? Logan, you're catching the first flight out before you get roped into this crap with me."
Logan shook his head. "No way. James, you're not gonna do this alone."
Jamie leaned forward from her seat on the coffee table in front of him. "No," she told him firmly. "Okay, this is my mess. My shit. Not yours. And I'm not about to have you getting roped into it and possibly hurt or killed because you got involved in my mess, Logan."
"Hey," he nudged her ankle with his leg, bringing her attention back up to him from where she'd previously been staring holes into the floor. "Our mess. You're my reporter and I'm your photographer. We're in this shit together. So whatever that Bald Asshole throws at us, we take it together."
Jamie felt the tension release when a laugh escaped her mouth. "'Take it'? Please, rephrase that," she grimaced.
"No."
"No?" she guffawed.
"No," her intern reiterated. "We're gonna take his shit... Right up the ass-"
"Pfft-!" Jamie broke out into loud laughs and giggles. "Oh- God!" she wheezed.
Logan joining in on the laughs but mostly at Jamie's expense. "Did you just wheeze?"
Jamie could barely nod through her wheezing and full belly laughs, "Y-Yes." Logan fell into even louder laughter, falling onto his back on the bed as Jamie knelt down on the floor off the coffee table.
Once the laughing session was over, Jamie and Logan spent their time hashing out a potential plan to get back in touch with the billionaire that expressed interest in Jamie's evidence. Logan had thrown out email, Jamie shot it down, citing her reason as "when do you think the last time Tony Stark ever checked his fucking email?" Jamie suggested just showing up at his mansion, but was shot down by Logan who was afraid of the rumored Stark security system that contained missiles and lasers.
"Pepper Potts? We could contact her," Jamie suggested, glancing up from her Dad's journal.
Logan wrinkled his nose, "Who?"
While Logan pushed his nose back down to type away at his laptop, Jamie explained. "Pepper Potts is Tony Stark's famous personal assistant. Curator of the Stark modern art collection, Strawberry Blonde Badass as referred to in Forbes and all around American heroine for the years upon years that she's been doubling as Stark's nanny and handler."
Logan scoffed after skimming Potts' Wikipedia page. "What, did you memorize that from her memoir?"
Jamie shrugged, "Pfft- no. I just... I just look up to her."
Logan gave her a fake pout with wide eyes. "Aw," he crossed his legs. "You've got a crush?"
The redhead rolled her eyes, "Shut up. It's not a crush."
"What is it? An obsession?"
"What? No!" Jamie gaped. "It's a mutual respect amongst badass ginger women."
"I wouldn't consider you a ginger," Logan frowned, setting his laptop aside and leaning his head against his bed headboard.
Jamie matched his position on her own bed, her Dad's journal still laid open page-first in her lap. "My hair is red-"
"Yeah, but it's a darker red, almost brown," Logan insisted. "You're not a ginger. You're just... Autumn?"
Jamie tilted her head in confusion, "Autumn? The season?"
"It's a hair color... according to a beauty company somewhere that names fake hair colors," her intern attempted to explain, but Jamie could only shake her head.
"I think we need a break," the reporter state, closing her Dad's journal and setting it on the nightstand and kicking herself off the bed. With only her socks on, Jamie trekked high and low for her shoes.
Logan watched her struggle until eventually throwing her a bone. "The Vans are beneath the table."
Jamie snatched them up and pulled them onto her feet with a quick 'thanks.' Eventually, she was also able to find the rental keys and her wallet. She made do with a quick rake of her fingers through her hair and spray of perfume. She'd been sweating like a pig after what happened at SI earlier that day and the brief crying intermission she had with Logan didn't help with how clammy her appearance looked.
But fuck it, it was LA.
"Del Taco order?" she prompted her intern, pocketing her cell.
"Ooh- the Macho Combo Burrito. Extra salsa on the side with a root beer would kill, too."
Jamie chuckled, making sure to take note of that order in her cell, texting it to herself. "Got it. I'll be back soon."
And with that, the young woman rushed out of the safety of her hotel room and trekked down to the Chevy waiting for her at the curb. Jamie was all too grateful for the in-car GPS system since she wasn't all too familiar with Long Beach and where to find the closest Del Taco. They didn't even have Del Taco's in New York- at least Jamie had never seen of one there. But her and Logan had been to the West Coast enough to both have developed a small appreciation for the fast food joint any time they were out on assignment out here.
The GPS dinged on a location.
"Ooh- four miles. Nice." The small victory had Jamie beaming as she threw the car in reverse and high-tailed it out of the lot.
Logan was right, they were in this mess together. Jamie was grateful she didn't have to face all this shit on her own. The smile slowly faded from her face upon realizing who she wished had been facing this mess with her... Margot.
At a stop light, Jamie pulled her cell from her back pocket.
Margot, true to her word, hadn't sent a text or spared her a single call in the past three and a half months since Jamie had walked out of the loft. She was still paying her part of the rent, not compltely lying to her Gran about the lease contract not being up, but Jamie still felt like a flakey asshole.
The redhead glanced up at the crosswalk light. She had seventeen seconds and counting to send this message to Margot without sounding like a complete idiot.
J: Hey... just wanna let you know that I'm okay.
She paused, glanced up again.
Nine seconds.
J: I miss you, Go.
She hit send with four seconds to spare. The second that light turned green, Jamie tossed her cell into the cup holder between the seats and lightly tapped the gas to lurch forward. She had been so preoccupied with the satisfied feeling of attempting to reunite with her best friend that she hadn't bothered to look both ways as she continued across the intersection...
She was almost to the end when a large SUV barreled into the driver's side of the Chevy with a loud crash...
The last thing Jamie remembered was the smell of burnt rubber and smoke, the sound of screeching tires and sirens, and the taste of metal in her mouth and clogging up her nostrils.
The California sun reflected off the silver dented metal on the Chevy's hood, the broken glass on the dashboard refracting tiny colorful rainbows onto Jamie's bruised and bloody face. And all Jamie could think of was what drink she was going to have to get Logan from Del Taco since she knew they didn't carry root beer.
Inside the cup holder, her phone buzzed.
M: I miss you too, Jay. Call me when you get the chance.
Obadiah Stane clasped his fingers together in front of his mouth as he leaned forward in his reclining office chair.
He was busy trying to talk down at least half the Board members from ripping him a new one after Tony's abrupt and crazed announcement back at HQ. He was seizing the perfect opportunity to lock the brat out in all of his PTSD mess he was hoping Colonel Rhodes and Potts would fix in time.
As he was attempting to clean up the mess Stark created- the constant state of his life and profession- he hadn't been paying attention to the door of his large office. He had been sitting in the dark, the natural light dying out after the sun went down. The light from his computer was starting to burn his eyes and he'd been rubbing them when someone entered the room.
They were quiet, didn't speak at first.
Stane didn't need to look up to know what this impromptu meeting was about.
"She's dealt with?" he asked aloud, not directing the question directly to the man standing at the end of the office. "That reporter... what's her name?" He knew her name. It burnt his tongue to speak it.
"Jamie Elizabeth Archer," the man stated, hands behind his back and his suit freshly pressed despite him having just completing a hit. "Yes, she's been dealt with. The trace can't be followed back to you, sir."
"Good," he nodded, satisfied. "Great. This is great! One less prick in my ass... She go down quickly?"
The man shrugged, "She looked bloody enough. Didn't stick around for the cops to catch me, but the plates are registered under a fake name if anyone goes poking around."
The smile on Obadiah's face fell upon hearing these words. "You mean you didn't check to make sure that ginger reporter was dead?"
The man reeled slightly. "Sir, the car was practically crushed. I've killed fully grown men double her size with hits like this-"
"I don't give a damn if you killed JFK himself by ramming a truck into the side of his convertible!" Stane roared, the man jumping slightly. "This woman, no matter how small and slick she is, is as big as a problem as the other over-privileged brat on my hands!"
"What, uh, what would you have me do, sir?"
"Go back to that crash site, find out which hospital the EMT's took her lifeless body to and check the corpse!" he exclaimed, stalking towards the man and towering over him with his height. He leaned in real close, face to face with his employee. "I don't give a shit if she's on death's door in the world's deepest coma, if there's a heartbeat... eliminate it."
The man swallowed. "...yes, sir."
"Go."
The man nodded, turning on his heel and rushing out of the office before he was the next hit on Obadiah Stane's list.
Stane stood taller, straightening out his button up and tightening his rolled up sleeves around his arms.
God, if he knew how much of a pain in the ass this Archer girl was going to be, he should've taken the hit out on her Dad long before he had the chance to go spilling all his secrets to her. Bastard. Even dead Michael Archer was still a fucking problem in his life.
"Damn it..." he cursed beneath his breath, his large hand rubbing the top of his head. "Damn it!"
a/n: i'm having way too much fun writing this stuff. that's why i'm updating so much. take advantage while you can because summer is giving me so much inspo rn. leave reviews if you can, too. i know there's like five followers but i really hope you guys like this one.
