Chapter 22: Dress You Up
Hammer graciously gave Tony the use of his bathroom while he went to talk to Legal.
"I'll make sure I'm gone at least an hour. That'll be enough time to shave your legs, right?" he'd said on his way out the door. A whole hour. Thanks, buddy.
Tony sat naked in the empty bathtub and turned on the tap, shaving supplies marching along the porcelain edge beside him. He eyed them with distaste: Hammer had given him a half-used tube of Chanel shave cream and what was almost certainly Hammer's own razor with a fresh blade. It was too intimate; shaving cream and razors were things he shared with Steve, usually when Steve wasn't looking. (Well, it's not hygienic, he could hear Steve chide. Yeah? Neither is sticking your dick in my ass, Steve.) Steve. He could not, under any circumstances, continue thinking about Steve. His frantic little bird heart couldn't take it; it would drop lifeless to the floor of its cage.
Sucking in air through his nose, Tony took up the shaving cream and coated his wet legs. The Hammer-associated smell on his body made him gag, and so he started to shave as fast as possible. Too fast, as it turned out. He nicked his ankle bone and bled freely into the bath water, tinging it pink. Lesson learned, he was more careful under his arms. He briefly considered shaving his pubic hair, but then decided Hammer could fuck right off if he didn't like it. If Hammer complained, Tony would go shopping in the stud binder, take his chance with the psychos.
Sweat-free and reasonably hairless, Tony toweled off and went into the bedroom. The lights were out, and Tony decided to keep them that way. The only illumination was the winter light struggling through a slim window set high in one wall. The pair of Harrods bags stood waiting in the middle of the king-size bed, a set of evil twins: Hello, Tony. Come play with us.
The first contained lingerie: a red lace slip and a matching lace panty. Even as he pulled them out of the tissue, Tony wanted to rip them to shreds and light them on fire. But what would Miss Congeniality do? he reminded himself, gritting his teeth as he dressed. Lingerie, Tony now recognized as he looked at himself in Hammer's full-length mirror, was the absolute, number one, stupidest thing ever created by man. What even was the fucking point of it? To make women itch? Lace, he had just learned, was actually not that comfortable a fabric.
The slip left nothing to the imagination: Tony's breasts strained against the mesh and tatted roses, his dark pink nipples clearly visible. Ditto the panties: there was his bush, plain for all to see. Why even wear the stuff? It wasn't comfortable and served no practical purpose. He consoled himself that at least he probably wouldn't have to wear it long. Lingerie, in Tony's experience, stayed on women about as long as gift wrap stayed on birthday presents at a kid's party. And yes, of course, Tony knew that was the point of lingerie. It was sexy wrapping paper: a thin, useless, tantalizing, little nothing that heightened the anticipation for what was underneath. You could even rip it off if you wanted; Tony had ripped it off some packages himself, but right now, the very existence of lingerie made him angry, as if the universe at large had designed it with his humiliation in mind.
Cursing under his breath, he pulled out the contents of the second bag: a shoe box with a pair of black patent Louboutins and a Dior lipstick in the exact same shade of red as the lingerie. Uncapping the lipstick, Tony felt an almost overwhelming urge to tag a wall, but he fought it back. Impulsivity was not his friend, not today. He leaned towards the mirror, applying it meticulously before turning his attention to the shoes.
As it turned out, he'd only thought lingerie was the stupidest thing in the history of the world. How young he'd been, then. Now naïf. In reality, the stupidest thing was unquestionably the stiletto heel. If you snapped them off the shoes, you could use them as chopsticks. Why were women trusting their weight to chopsticks? Wobbling his way experimentally back and forth across the room a few times, Tony contemplated the madness of wearing shoes you could fall off of. How does Pepper do this everyday? he wondered as he tottered. For you, said the little voice in his head, she does it for you and every other chopstick-obsessed dickbrain with whom she interacts. She has to, because part of her power is her appearance.
Feeling like some twig-legged baby deer, Tony went to the mirror to assess the power (or lack thereof) in his own appearance. His skin was very white in the cold light from the little window, and the lingerie was shockingly red. Gazing at his reflection, he metaphorically threw up his hands. Who the fuck even knew? He felt like he was wearing a clown costume. Nothing about his appearance pleased him; he hated it, every last inch of it. There was no objective way he could evaluate the effect.
It didn't matter anyway, because there was no time to change it.
Feeling a prickle down his spine, Tony peered over his shoulder. Hammer was back; he'd crept in so quietly, Tony hadn't heard him, just like the slinking ferret he was. He was leaning on the doorframe with his arms crossed, eyes sliding over Tony's curved figure.
"Well, you clean up," Hammer observed. If there was any sarcasm, Tony couldn't detect it. His seriousness unnerved Tony; there was a lean, hungry look to him that Tony hadn't expected and wasn't prepared for. "Legal drew up some paperwork," he said, pushing himself off the doorframe and into the bedroom. He walked to a small writing desk and set down a thin folder. "You wanna come sign it?" He didn't move away from the desk, but stood beside it expectantly, hands in his pockets, waiting for the show.
Willing himself not to wobble, Tony turned from the mirror and crossed the room, one deliberate step at a time. Hammer's gaze ate him up, devouring him from neck down, scraping like teeth from Tony's throat to his breasts and down to his thighs.
"Got a pen?" Tony asked, keeping his tone as neutral as possible.
"Why don't you read it first? You should never sign anything you don't read. You know better than that." Hammer switched on the desk's reading lamp, casting the folder in a circle of warm light. "There. Now you'll be able to see it."
"Kinda got my own reading light. Thanks," Tony said coolly, nodding down at the glow from the arc reactor. But when he reached to pick up the folder, Hammer set a deliberate hand on top of it.
"Leave it."
It was a test; Tony had always been good at tests, and he recognized one when he saw it. But was this a test he wanted to pass? He could tank it, snatch the papers from under Hammer's hand, let Hammer know he wasn't going to play any fucking games—
Reading Tony's mind, Hammer said quietly, "Full and enthusiastic consent, Anthony. That's what you sold me, and that's what I want delivered. Or would you rather take another look at the guys in the binder?" It was clearly meant as a threat.
Tony's eyes snapped from Hammer's hand on the paperwork and up to his face.
Hammer chuckled at Tony's obvious shock, "You know, you underestimate me. I'm not nearly as stupid as you want me to be. I know you don't want to fuck me because I'm good in bed, though, y'know, I am. You want to fuck me because you know I won't put you through a wall."
Tony's heart plunged into his stomach, his whole body going cold. It was true: the Justin Hammer Tony kept in his head was nice and dim, but that was just Tony's vanity clouding the truth. In reality, Tony had been outmaneuvered by Hammer any number of times, that night in Dallas being one.
"Pom poms, Tony. That's what you promised," Hammer reminded, lifting his hand from the folder. "Now lemme see that team spirit."
"Rah, rah, rah," Tony muttered as he finally, inevitably, bent over the top of the desk. He flipped open the folder, then rested his forearms on the smooth wood to either side of the paperwork. He had to lean in close for the small print, nose inches from the paper. He'd gotten where he really needed readers, but, just like at home, he didn't have a pair to hand when he needed them.
Behind him, Hammer was smoothing his hands luxuriously over Tony's small waist, over the curves of his ass, making the words swim in front of Tony's eyes. He'd never be able to read the agreement, but so what? He'd never planned to anyway; it was just a bunch of words that amounted to Tony dropping his legal drawers. He knew what he was signing. He flipped to the next page, not having read the first one.
"Shouldn't we be filming this?" Tony asked, struggling to keep his voice steady. Hammer had hiked up the slip and was kissing the small of Tony's back, running his hand along Tony's spine. Like the shaving cream, it was too intimate; it felt too close to something real, like something Steve would do to him, and the last person in the world he wanted to think about now was Steve.
"Page three," Hammer directed, pulling his mouth from Tony's skin. "You'll see the paragraph about a non-filmed trial. As project manager, I'm only appearing on camera in a starring role if the film is going to be a success, you know what I mean? You can understand. After yesterday." His hand crept between Tony's thighs.
Still doubled over the desk, Tony shut his eyes, trying not to tremble as the adrenaline hit. He couldn't get the shakes again; the humiliation would kill him. "Give me a pen," he insisted, and flipped straight to the last page, desperate to end this part of the encounter at least.
"Did you read it?" Hammer began to stroke Tony over the lace panties, his touch feather light. To his chagrin, Tony felt his body begin to respond, melting a little under the gentle touch, but the repulsion was just as strong as the pleasure. Almost immediately, he could feel his muscles begin to tense. Don't, Tony told himself, willing his body to remain soft. It was gross, but he had to let it feel good. He had to. The only way out of this was through, and Hammer, he reminded himself, was the least bad option given the circumstances. He was your average, everyday rattlesnake in the pit of black mambas.
"Every word," Tony lied. "Now give me a pen, Hammer."
With his free hand, Hammer pulled a heavy gold pen from his breast pocket. Leaning over Tony's back, he set it on the desktop with a click, his erection pressing against Tony's ass. "Then sign on the dotted line," he whispered, mouth to Tony's ear.
A shiver ran down Tony's spine as he lifted the pen; he was struggling to make his fingers do his bidding. Hammer kept stroking him slowly and gently, and the sensation was making it hard to think. Hammer's body was warm against his back, and he could smell his aftershave. Anthony, Tony wrote, followed by the Edward—
"Make sure you sign your legal name. I don't want funny business down the line over technicalities," Hammer said, mouth still close enough to Tony's ear that Tony could feel Hammer's breath.
—Rogers. Tony let the pen drop heavily against the desktop, panting as he leaned over the signature. Writing the name had wounded him somehow, like he'd inked it in his own arterial blood.
"Alright, Mrs. Rogers," Hammer said with a smile, straightening, and pulling his hand from between Tony's legs, "now that you're legal, let's have some fun. Why don't you hop on that bed, and I'll—" A discrete little walkie-talkie squawked from its place on Hammer's belt. "Hold that thought," Hammer said, finally stepping away from Tony as he snatched the walkie-talkie from its clip.
"Hammer, here," he said. "Over."
Knees too weak to manage a confident stride on the high heels, Tony teetered over to the bed. Collapsing on his back, he stared hopelessly at the ceiling. Steve, he thought, unable to push the unwelcome thought away, where are you? Somewhere in the world, at that very second, Steve was looking for him. And someday, Steve would find him, but when? Not soon enough to avoid this fucking catastrophe. Not soon enough for a happy ending. He shut his eyes, praying for spontaneous combustion as he listened to the replying squawk of Hammer's walkie-talkie.
"Mr. Hammer," came the reply, "I have D.C. on sat phone. They're sending two officers our way with a package—"
"Hey," Hammer said over the radio chatter, swatting at Tony's thigh, "keep the engine running."
"What does that mean?" Tony sighed, not bothering to open his eyes.
"Means you should touch yourself while I take this call." When Tony didn't move, Hammer reminded him, "Let's see those pom poms, Tony."
"Am I a car or a cheerleader?"
"Huh?" Hammer was half-listening to Tony, half-listening to the walkie-talkie
"You're mixing metaphors, you illiterate dickwad."
"Whatever. Consider yourself a coupe with pigtails. You know what I mean." Hammer pressed the button to speak into the mic, "Receiving a package. Roger that. Now I'm kind of busy. I'm working on something time sensitive here—" Stepping into the adjoining room, he closed the door to conduct his conversation out of Tony's hearing.
Tony's hand drifted reluctantly to his panties; the lace was damp under his fingertips as he began to stroke, but he could feel that small initial wave of unwilling arousal fading. But no, he reminded himself, not unwilling. Hammer (ugh) was right for once in his stupid life; Tony had to drum up some kind of enthusiasm for this enterprise. He didn't have to be at the top of the human pyramid, but he did have to join in the cheer, or it wouldn't work, and then he'd have fucked Justin Hammer for nothing.
Maybe, Tony reflected bitterly, he should have gone with one of the binder guys, let himself get knocked around, treated rough. Any abuse he suffered would be earned: he'd willfully put a torch to his life and then dragged everyone he loved into the smoldering ruins. He deserved to be punished. Hell, he wanted to be. He wanted to be scourged, dressed in a hairshirt, branded with a hot iron, anything to make him feel like he was atoning somehow.
What Tony couldn't take, what he couldn't possibly stand, was any kind of tenderness, not from Justin Hammer. Tenderness belonged to Steve Rogers, and Tony wasn't allowed to have it, not unless Steve deemed him worthy. The only thing he could accept from Hammer, he now realized, was to be hate-fucked, and even Hammer, who hated Tony more than anyone, didn't hate him enough to do it properly.
Tony could change that.
With his new goal in mind, he sat up and pulled off his heels. Hammer was still preoccupied: Tony could hear him indistinctly through the door. Silent on his bare feet, he retrieved the lipstick from a bedside table, and then went to one of Hammer's tastefully off-white walls. The lipstick was satisfyingly smooth to write with as he drew the giant dick, going up on his tiptoes to make it as big as possible. And then, underneath, he signed it for good measure: Tony Rogers.
So much for Miss Congeniality. He'd taken his sash and used it as a fuse in a Molotov cocktail.
"Go team," he murmured, stepping back to admire his handiwork. He didn't even bother to recap the lipstick, just dropped it to the carpet like a spent spray can. Right on time, the bedroom door opened behind him.
"Sorry," Hammer said as he came in, "Had to take that. Told D.C. I'd call them back when—" He stopped, taking in his newly decorated bedroom wall.
"It's a portrait," Tony explained. "Of you."
Hammer blinked, incomprehension slowly morphing into anger. He barked a laugh and shook his head, "Why would you do that?" His voice was shimmering with contained rage. Tony felt a thrill down his spine; the danger was literally making his mouth water. It was turning him on in some terrible, warped way. He was going to get what was coming to him, and he was eager for it.
"Because," Tony answered, approaching him purposefully, "you hate me, Hammer. And I hate me. And I want us both to fucking act like it."
"What's that mean, Tony?" Hammer was rigid, hands stuffed deep in his pockets, like he was trying to keep them from wringing Tony's neck. "You want me to hit you or something? Is that it?"
"That's exactly what I want. Go ahead," he said, borrowing Hammer's own line for the occasion. "Try it. I dare ya'."
"Come on, Tony, I'm not going to—"
Tony slapped him, open-handed but hard. The responding backhand was viper-quick; Hammer's ring caught Tony on the cheek, drawing a line of blood, but Tony barely had time to register the sting before Hammer grabbed him roughly by the hair, forcing him backwards. Tony felt the lipstick, forgotten on the floor, crush beneath his bare toes. His body smacked against the graffitied wall hard enough to hurt, knocking a little of the air from his lungs, and he didn't have time to get it back before Hammer kissed him with bruising force.
"This what you want?" Hammer hissed when he wrenched away. "Is it, Tony? Huh?"
"No, dickhead," Tony spit. "I said I wanted you to hit me, not give me a pat on the cheek."
Hammer laughed bitterly and hit Tony again, a loud slap across the cheek that left Tony's ears ringing as Hammer's mouth began a frantic exploration of Tony's throat, kissing and biting until Tony cried out. But the pain was delicious, because pain was all this body was good for, all it could feel, all it deserved to feel. This body excelled at pain, constantly dazzling Tony with new, terrible torments, both physical and psychological. It turned even pleasure into pain, maddening and disastrous pain that left Tony wishing he'd never known pleasure in the first place.
Hammer, fist still viciously gripped in Tony's hair, dragged him off the wall, throwing him down on the bed. Tony's lipstick-caked foot left a smeary red trail across the carpet. Almost as soon as Tony hit the mattress, Hammer had the slip hiked up to Tony's waist and was ripping the panties down Tony's legs.
"Suck 'em," Hammer said, thrusting two fingers in Tony's face. Obediently, Tony opened his mouth, sucking and licking them when Hammer thrust them inside. Hammer pulled them from Tony's mouth with a soft, wet pop, then began rubbing at Tony's clit, hard and fast. It hurt, but Tony didn't care, and neither did his traitorous body; he was so wet he was practically dripping. Just like when he was strapped to the table, the fear and brutality trapped him in his current corporal form. There was nowhere to retreat. He could feel every nerve firing and hated himself for it.
The walkie-talkie chirped again, but Hammer didn't answer this time, just switched it off, and then began to undress, ripping off his suit jacket and vest. "You know," he said, nodding towards Tony's graffiti wall as he popped shirt buttons, "I bet you're sorry you took his name, now. Am I right?" Hammer added the shirt to the pile, and started on his belt buckle. "I mean, Rogers must be absolute shit in bed—"
"Don't talk about him, Hammer," Tony warned flatly. "I mean it."
"I'm just saying," Hammer said, peeling off his pants, revealing the silk paisley shorts beneath, "if Captain America had fucked you like I'm about fuck you, then—"
Tony sat up, angry, "Shut up." His hand flew up, ready to slap Steve's name out of Hammer's mouth, but Hammer anticipated him this time, grabbing his wrist like a vise.
"No," Hammer said grimly, "I'm done with that."
"Then don't talk about Steve," Tony said through gritted teeth.
"Tony," Hammer said, climbing onto the bed, forcing Tony's wrist down to the mattress and Tony along with it, "I'm going to talk about whatever I want." He straddled Tony's lap, pouring his weight against Tony's body. Tony, furious, tried to shove him off with his free hand, but Hammer grabbed that one, too.
"Get off me," Tony shrieked, bucking against Hammer's intentionally crushing weight, but that only made Hammer force him down harder into the mattress. "Get off!" Tony screamed again, spitting and thrashing. "Get off of me, you fucking asshole!"
Faintly, just over the sound of Tony's screams, there was knocking at the door.
Hammer rolled his eyes, as if supremely inconvenienced. He awkwardly maneuvered both of Tony's fragile wrists into one hand, then used his newly freed second to cover Tony's mouth. Tony continued to scream, but it was effectively muffled behind Hammer's bruising fingers.
"What? I'm busy," Hammer hollered towards the door.
"Mr. Hammer, the package is here," came the distant reply.
"Put it on my desk!"
Tony managed to get one hand free of Hammer's grip, scrabbling towards Hammer's face with his nails.
"Mr. Hammer, we need you immediately. It's—"
"Alright! Alright! Give me a minute!" Hammer gave Tony a dirty look as he pushed himself off of Tony's lap, releasing Tony's wrist only after one last, bone-grinding squeeze. He went to the closet, ripped a silk dressing gown from a hanger, and stalked out of the bedroom. "Tony," he snarled on his way out the door, "when I get back, you and I are going to come to an understanding. Otherwise, I'm picking a binder guy, and it won't be one of the hot ones."
Tony lay on the bed, panting, trying to catch his breath following the struggle. Gingerly, he rubbed at his sore wrist, then put a hand to his face, feeling the cut across his right cheek. It was still oozing, and Tony rubbed away the blood from his fingers on the comforter. So much for his brief, inglorious reign as Miss Congeniality.
Through the open door, he could hear Hammer and some other man talking, voices agitated.
"But, but—" Hammer was sputtering, "why didn't you tell me the package was, y'know, him?"
Tony's ears pricked up. Something was going on.
"I wasn't privy to that information, Mr. Hammer. 'Package' was as specific as Central would be in a message. I'm sure if you'd spoken to them directly—"
"Hey," Hammer said defensively, "I was busy, and it was time sensitive. I can't drop everything just for some D.C. phone call. Shit. Why didn't they ask me before they sent him?"
"He came voluntarily, Mr. Hammer, and with very little notice—"
"Voluntarily ? Since when do black sites take volunteers? For Chrissake, we're not the animal shelter. And just what does he think he's going to do? Socialize the puppies?"
"I don't know, sir. He could–"
"That was rhetorical, idiot. But what am I supposed to do with him? I mean, I knew what to do with him before, but now…?"
"He came with a directive file, sir. It's in your office."
Hammer said, agitated, "Well, alright. Give me five minutes. I'll get dressed and head down. Go ahead and get me D.C. on the phone. Where is he? I assume he's been outfitted with an ankle monitor?"
"Yes, sir, and he's in the hospital wing. Dr. Banner is removing his staples—"
Tony stopped breathing. One eternal heartbeat passed, and then another as he tried to make sense of what he'd just heard. It was wishful thinking. It couldn't possibly— But his feet didn't let his brain finish the thought before they had him jumping off the bed like he'd heard the starting gun. Dashing to the desk, Tony rifled through the papers until he found the one with his signature. He ripped it to confetti, then threw the pieces on the floor and ground them into the carpet with his lipstick-smeared foot.
And then Tony was running, feet moving so fast they were barely touching the floor. He half-registered the shocked faces of Hammer and his secretary as he shoved past them, sprinting flat-out down the hall. There was yelling, someone running behind him, but he didn't stop. He didn't think he'd ever run so fast in his life; corridors flickered past him in a blur.
"Tony!" He heard his name and stopped so suddenly, he skidded right past the doorway, bare feet sliding on the linoleum. There were men heading towards him, yelling at him, but Tony pelted into the room, too quick to catch, and crashed straight into the arms of Captain America.