Chapter Text
- - -
It starts, as these nights always do, with Clint’s leftovers.
There is a kitchen—because where else would Tony be at three o’ clock in the morning after a gala where the only offerings were inscrutable fish tarts (greasy, possibly made with fake crab) and stuffed mushroom canapés (sodium bombs waiting to go off), neither of which he ate—a tuxedo jacket draped over a chair, an open takeaway carton of cold pork fried rice, a glass of water Tony wishes was something stronger, and Steve.
Tony stands at the island, elbows on white marble, rubbing his tired eyes until little white lights start to sparkle in the black. The pressure is fantastic, and the sheer relief of it is enough to pull a quiet, pitiful groan from deep in his chest.
“I’d ask how it went,” Steve says softly from the doorway, resting his shoulder against the jamb, “but I know that groan.”
If it weren’t so late, Tony would make a joke out of that, something clever and just this side of lewd, because he’d feel like it and it would make his night to see Steve blush. Those lips and those cheekbones that fair skin are so criminally attractive in their own right, but a flush of rosy pink to top it all off? Fuck.
As it is, though, the only response to that perfect setup of a comment Tony can muster is a distressed whimper of exhaustion, which he muffles against his palms. He knows he should wash them, given the number of other people’s hands he shook tonight, and he’d meant to the moment he’d trudged into the kitchen, but at the first sight of the doublewide refrigerator, Tony’s mind was hyper-focused on acquiring and inhaling Clint’s food.
“That bad, huh?”
Tony grunts, nodding his heavy head.
This doesn’t happen much, anymore—Tony coming home late from an event he didn’t want to go to in the first place—but it does still happen, often enough that he and Steve have made something of a routine of it. Nothing elaborate: Steve welcomes him home dressed for bed in sweatpants and a mercifully loose T-shirt, leaning in the doorway or standing on the other side of the kitchen island from Tony, and Tony, still dressed head to toe in Ford or Gabbana or McQueen, tells him stories from the night over (Clint’s) leftovers.
But tonight Tony is dead on his feet, eyes bloodshot from strain and fatigue and very likely a minor panic attack, and instead of giving Steve a rundown of his evening (he had a great story about a famous actor falling headfirst into a fountain and everything), Tony finds himself slipping into thoughts he usually saves for when he’s alone, of a timeline in which the island disappears and in its place is Steve, and he is as desperately in love with Tony as Tony is with him.
It’s a gut-wrenchingly unlikely scenario that Tony has nonetheless run and re-run in his mind a thousand times, like HUD footage after a battle to calculate his own weak spots.
On nights like this, as Tony drives himself back to the Tower after having talked and schmoozed and flirted his way through a hundred different people for the sake of a little good Avengers PR, he imagines walking off the elevator onto the common floor and being met with a soft but meaningful I missed you while you were gone kiss, followed by a warm and lingering let me take care of you now kiss in the bedroom while Steve slowly undoes his tie and the buttons of his dress shirt.
Sometimes it’s the only thing that gets him through it. Coming home and talking to Steve in hushed tones over leftovers and water, sometimes tea, with Steve none the wiser that all the while Tony is fantasizing the most mundane things: sickening little domesticities like Steve undoing Tony’s cufflinks and massaging his shoulders before carrying him to bed, or even just wrapping him up in a hug for a few minutes, whispering—fuck—sweet nothings in Tony’s ear as he skims his big, warm hands lovingly up and down Tony’s back, over his shoulders to his neck, cupping his jaw and stooping a little to kiss him on the forehead…
Tony’s throat constricts around nothing, tight and sharp and warm and oh god please don’t cry you’re not that tired—
“Tony?”
Because of course Steve can see his pinched expression, even in this dim light. Steve sees almost everything. Key word: almost. But Tony is so wrung out, if he so much as glances at Steve right now, he knows he’ll give something away. Steve will see one of Tony’s little fantasies playing out behind his eyes and that’ll be it for this witching hour rendezvous routine Tony’s come to enjoy too much for his own good.
Because that’s his whole modus operandi in a nutshell, isn’t it? He wants too much, and in his wanting he loses everything, every fucking time.
The thought of losing Steve freezes the air in Tony’s lungs.
Time to rein it in, Iron Man. “You really don’t have to keep doing this,” Tony mutters, closing his eyes. “It’s late.” He hears the soft brush of Steve’s sweats and bare feet on warmed tile. When Steve speaks again, he’s only an arm’s length away.
“I was awake,” he says. It shouldn’t sting, but it does. ‘I was awake’ is a far cry from the lines Tony’s fed himself to fill the deep, aching emptiness in his heart: I want to always be there when you come home or I stayed up for you or I never want you to feel alone or on one memorable occasion Next time I should just tie you to the bed so you can’t leave.
Tony opens his eyes but keeps them fixed on the backs of his hands, palms flat against the marble countertop.
“Thanks,” he says, scraping the word like so much sand off his tongue. “No need to stay up any longer for my sake. I’m just gonna polish off my ill-gotten dinner and head to bed.” Tony picks up his fork and pokes around inside the carton of fried rice but doesn’t dish any of it into his mouth. Just thinking about Steve and all the ways he can’t have him, plus the shit that happened earlier tonight, and his appetite is all but gone.
Out of the corner of his eye he sees Steve lean a hip against the edge of the island. It must be painful, having hard marble jammed up against bone like that, but then Steve’s a supersoldier—it probably doesn’t register as anything more than a firm, vaguely uncomfortable press to him. Tony tries to keep his mind on that train of thought and not on the way Steve’s threadbare T-shirt has ridden up a little to expose a narrow V of perfect skin.
“Sorry, that came out wrong,” Steve says quietly, now leaning slightly into Tony’s space. Attempting to ignore the fact (and failing) that he can feel the warmth coming off of the other man at this distance, Tony blinks at Steve with all the wherewithal of a deer caught in the headlights. Sorry—? That word has never appeared in any of his fantasy scenarios, except the one in which Steve apologizes for taking so long to realize that Tony’s madly in love with him (because that would be so much easier than having to actually say the fucking words).
“What did?”
“I was asleep—”
“It is normal-people sleeping hours, to be fair.” The neon green microwave clock over Tony’s shoulder can testify to that.
“—but I have a…” and, oh, is that a blush starting to creep its way up Steve’s neck? Forget fried rice, this is far more interesting.
Maybe tonight won’t be a wash after all.
Tony sets the clean fork back down on the counter. “…an arrangement with JARVIS,” Steve finishes, which isn’t what Tony was hoping he would say there, but it’s also not a variation on the theme of I had nothing better to do, he tells himself hopefully.
So, that’s something.
“’An arrangement’?” The air quotes, Tony thinks, are implied.
Steve ducks his chin a little and folds his arms across his chest, which, dirty move, Rogers. Tony tries to look anywhere but at the long, protruding veins in Steve’s forearms and gives up after two seconds. “After the second time I bumped into you out here, I asked JARVIS to notify me whenever you come home from one of these things,” he says, hurrying through the statement like something’s chasing him. “That’s—shit, that sounds a lot creepier when I say it out loud.”
They’ve known each other long enough, been in enough battles together, played enough Mario Kart together, that Tony doesn’t even register Steve cursing. He’s too caught up in that blush, and the push and pull of Steve’s muscles under his T-shirt, and all the other words coming out of Steve’s mouth.
“Why?”
Steve shrugs, and immediately the little white bubble of hope in Tony’s chest—ballooning somewhere behind the arc reactor—deflates with a pathetic, droning pfffffft.
“Just want to make sure you get home okay.” Steve looks at him when he says it, but his eyes are shadowed, his expression suddenly remote.
A headcount. Steve “Mother Hen” Rogers making sure all his chicks are present and accounted for, and Tony is just one more bird in the nest. Not special, not even a little bit. Not to Steve. And he wants—god, how badly he wants to be special to Steve. That’s what’s horrible.
He’s not wearing the armor, but he might as well be for how heavy he feels all of a sudden, fatigue calcifying the marrow in his bones. Tony’s knees start to give. Exhausted by a working day spent at SI, an evening spent kowtowing with people he’d sooner jettison off the tower than invite in, and now thoroughly beaten back into his sad little corner of unrequited love, Tony shakes his head, wobbling slightly when he pushes himself away from the island. He sets his eyes on the still-open doorway and definitely not on Steve, who stays perfectly still while Tony shuffles past him.
He’ll worry about the scuff marks on his dress shoes tomorrow.
“Well. Mission accomplished, Rogers,” Tony says over his shoulder, telling himself his eyes are stinging from the buildup of oil on his eyelids, not from tears. He’s just so fucking tired. If he dreams tonight, it’ll be a miracle. “Sleep tight.”
Tony’s almost through the door when Steve wraps a hand around his trailing wrist.
For some reason, the first thing that pops into Tony’s mind is Robin Williams, of all people, standing on a stage in front of a giggling James Lipton, wearing a pink scarf like a prayer shawl and asking, ‘Why is tonight different than all other nights?’
Tony’s not sure how the rest of it goes, traditionally, but he’s pretty sure a Jewish Seder ritual doesn’t involve a six-foot Irish Catholic man with a face carved by angels turning the faithful in place to look him in the eye.
“Tony.”
Tony’s slightly hysterical, religion-hopping thoughts immediately hush. He’s always been weak for the way Steve says his name, with its soft T and deep, rounded O and gentle N and smiling Y…
Nope, he’s definitely still a bit hysterical, but Steve hasn’t let go of his wrist. His expression is mostly concerned, possibly even a little bit hurt. Tony’s heart sinks against the side of the arc reactor casing: is that hurt his fault? Of course it is. It always is. How could it not be?
Steve squeezes his wrist, a hint of pressure against delicate skin. Tony watches the gears turning over in Steve’s mind, a sure sign that he has more than a few questions he wants to ask Tony and is struggling to narrow it down to just one.
“Are you okay?”
It had to be that one.
In another scenario, Steve skips the question entirely because he already knows, the perceptive bastard, he knows Tony’s not okay unless Steve is with him, because Steve challenges him, Steve inspires him, Steve builds him up and makes Tony want to be the good man Steve somehow sees him as. In this scenario, he skips the question and kisses Tony breathless, instead, reminding him with his plush, pink mouth and a little bit of teeth that Tony will be okay if Steve has anything to say about—or do with—it.
In reality, however, Tony swallows back tears of frustration and exhaustion and struggles to swallow down his increasingly frantic need to run away. It doesn’t matter, though, since Steve won’t let go of his wrist, and if Tony thinks he can out-stubborn Steve Rogers while operating on fumes, he’s an even bigger idiot than Clint so often claims he is.
“I’m fine,” he says. He looks at Steve when he says it and everything. Wills him to believe it so Tony can get away from the softening look in Steve’s eyes and Jesus Fucking H. Christ the gentle touch of Steve’s thumb against his pulse, which is currently tapping out a foxtrot.
“Are you?”
Like a dog with a bone, this guy. That’s why he won’t let go of Tony’s wrist—it’s not an affectionate touch at all, Tony realizes despairingly, but a way to keep Tony in place, rooted to the spot until he tells Steve the truth.
Tony’s breath leaves him all at once. He hates how wet it sounds, shuddering on the way out and hanging in the empty air between their bodies. Steve cares—Tony wouldn’t be standing in the kitchen with him at three o’ clock in the morning if he didn’t—but Steve’s care is universal when it comes to the Avengers. He’s vigilant in his need to know his people are safe. He’s the man who checks in over comms moments after the bad guy goes down to make sure they’re whole (Natasha), who texts the hardest hit two days after the battle to ask if they need more ibuprofen (Clint), who boils enough water for two pots of tea without having to be asked (Bruce), who volunteers himself to spar when the clear blue sky outside the tower suddenly goes dark (Thor).
It’s Steve’s nature to care. Tony can be cruel when he’s in pain, he knows, but even he’s not so cruel as to tell the man in front of him he doesn’t care enough. Just imagining Steve’s reaction to that is enough to make Tony’s still-empty stomach flip unhappily.
“It’s nothing,” he mutters after a long pause, staring at the floor. Don’t be a burden, Stark. Steve’s toes are nicely filed, he notes; not too long, not too short—perfect, just like the rest of him.
And his hand is still wrapped around Tony’s wrist.
The words come out in a rush. “Hammer decided to crash the party tonight—” Steve’s breath hitches in his throat, fingers flexing around Tony’s wrist “—and managed to corner me for a minute. Started talking about ‘taking another shot’ at reactor tech and I kind of—well.” Tony scrunches his face up and places his free hand over the bright blue circle shining out from the middle of his chest. He shrugs. “You know the drill. Guy gets under my skin even worse than you do.”
That’s dangerous. That’s inching toward a line he wouldn’t go anywhere near if he were in his right mind. But it’s late, and Tony is tired, and strung out, and in love with this man who doesn’t love him back, and he’s trying so hard to compartmentalize that along with everything else, but Steve won’t let go of his fucking wrist and it’s dissolving what’s left of Tony’s nerves.
But Steve doesn’t balk at the comment. He doesn’t pull away and give Tony that look, the one that screams I hate it when you say shit like that, and that’s fine, Tony hates himself plenty enough for both of them, but neither does Steve wrap Tony in a hug like Tony wishes he would. Instead, Steve just laughs quietly, the sound puffing out of his nose in a short burst, lips turning up at the corners. He looks ten years younger.
“I know he does.” Steve expression turns dour, then, a complete one-eighty from the face Tony had been looking at a second ago. “I’m sorry,” he says. “Did anything else happen? With Hammer?”
Tony waves the question away. “No, no. I called LifeAlert and Happy came and took care of him. All fine.” Tony can’t muster a full press smile right now, but he manages enough of one to convince himself, at least. Steve, not so much. His concerned frown deepens, eyes focused and bright with so much goddamn caring.
“You must be exhausted.”
Tony hiccups half a sob before he can clap a hand over his mouth and stifle it. That…that’s not fair. That shouldn’t be the thing that does him in. The words are too pedestrian, too fucking simple to make a tear spring from Tony’s eye, the traitor, but there, he’s watching it roll off the tip of his nose and land right smack dab on the top of Steve’s infuriatingly perfect left foot. Even in the low light of the kitchen, it glitters noticeably against Steve’s pale skin as it rolls off the slope and onto the floor.
Fuck.
He should be stronger than this. He should be past having panic attacks that leave him winded and jittery whenever someone mentions taking the reactor from his chest, and he should be able to talk to Steve about it without breaking down. But between the stress, and the hunger, and the fatigue, and the whole loving-but-not-being-loved thing, and Steve’s sheer proximity, Tony can’t help it. One tear becomes two, then three, and now he’s shielding his eyes and whispering apologies and a panicked goodnight as he tries to pull away.
From Steve, whose hand tightens around Tony’s wrist—the opposite of what Tony anticipated, but everything he needs and knows he can’t have. He wants it and doesn’t deserve it.
Steve will give him what he can, because Steve cares, but it won’t be enough.
“Steve, it’s okay, I’m just—it’s been a long day, it’s late, I don’t know what this is about, ignore me.”
Steve makes that little huff-laugh sound again, softer this time. “Tony,” he says warmly, and so close: “I couldn’t ignore you if I tried. Hugging you now.”
“It just takes practice, would probably only take you a we—wait, what—”
Before he can finish that sentence, Steve’s arms are coming around him, biceps pressing in on either side of Tony’s ribcage, warm hands splaying out against the middle of his back, and his chin is being tucked against the spot where Steve’s long, beautiful neck meets his mountainous traps.
Tony is too stunned by this development to reciprocate past raising his arms to hover around Steve’s shoulders like useless parentheses.
Steve hauls him in closer until they’re chest to chest. Steve is a wall of warmth and soft cotton and the unmistakable smell of what Tony’s logical brain knows is a combination of dish soap and laundry detergent and leftover Chinese food and leather and aftershave and gasoline and whatever pomade Steve uses and that fancy lavender-and-amber oil diffuser that Natasha gave Steve for his birthday a couple months ago, but what his emotional brain, his hindbrain, his I love Steve Rogers brain knows simply as home.
Tony surrenders to the hug. Wraps his arms around Steve’s neck and hangs there, letting the tears fall as they may. He knows Steve can smell the salt, can probably feel the skipping rhythm of Tony’s heart against his own chest, but hopefully Steve will chalk it up to Tony’s exhaustion running its course and not the fact that Tony is so happy here in Steve’s arms he never wants to leave.
Shifting in place, Tony notes that the pressure of Steve’s hug is forcing the outer ring of the arc reactor casing into Steve’s sternum. Just like the edge of the marble countertop, Steve probably doesn’t even register that it’s there, leaving a deep imprint in his skin that would bruise if it weren’t for his healing factor; whereas Tony is used to the constant, digging pain, the ache of it holding his chest apart. His heart is constantly exposed, yes, but that’s no reason to hurt Steve with it, even in theory. And that, he knows, is exactly what will happen if he lets this continue.
Tony tries to pull away. He does. But when he gives Steve the universal squeeze for “Hug over,” Steve responds by tightening his hold around Tony’s middle and breathing out a long, warm, humming sigh that goes right down the back of Tony’s neck.
Tony can’t help it—he melts.
Right into Steve, who takes Tony’s weight like it’s nothing, but not like Tony is nothing. There’s a scenario here, a variation of this exact moment in which hugging leads to kissing leads to I love you leads to enthusiastic, mind-blowing sex, but Steve doesn’t care that much.
He does care, though. That will have to be enough.
“Next time,” Steve says, close and deep in Tony’s ear (oh, god), “You take me with you. I’ll watch out for you.”
This is enough. Tony knows if he repeats that over and over, he’ll eventually be able to live with it. Mostly. He holds Steve close because he can, squeezing for one more beat and nodding, his three o’ clock shadow scratching the other man’s cheek.
“Aye aye, Cap’n,” he whispers, laughing wetly against Steve’s shoulder before pulling away from the indulgence of Steve’s embrace. Tony even manages a fraction of a real smile as he wipes his eyes with the back of his hand, breathing through the residual tremors until he’s mostly settled in his own skin again.
“Alright. Bedtime for me. Crying means I’ve officially turned into a pumpkin, and it’s not even October yet.”
It takes Tony a moment to realize that Steve’s hands are still on him. Holding him, palms pressed flat and fingers fanned out on either side of Tony’s spine, low enough to suggest but high enough to maintain his innocence, if need be. The hold keeps their hips aligned and their chests apart, a gap of plausible deniability wedged firmly between their bodies.
As much as Steve’s lingering touch thrills him to the core (and isn’t that the understatement of the year), Tony tries not to read into it, because that way madness lies and he’s already more than halfway gone as it is.
“Tony.”
“Yeah, Cap?”
Dry-eyed at last, Tony looks up at Steve and almost swallows his tongue. Steve is looking at him—really looking, like Tony is a jigsaw puzzle and Steve’s just found the missing piece. It’s an unnerving look, piercing through and exposing parts of Tony he’s spent years hiding under layers and layers of false confidence and sarcasm and armor, so much armor—shiny, pretty tricks to draw people in and keep them at a safe distance at the same time.
That look, Tony thinks, is dangerously close to knowing.
Then Tony realizes his own hands have come back up to rest on Steve’s shoulders of their own volition, and one of Steve’s hands has drifted down ever so slightly. It presses and Tony goes, stumbling forward until they’re chest to chest again.
Steve’s heart is racing.
“Steve?”
The man is too busy looking for something in Tony’s eyes to respond. Whatever it is, when Steve finds it, he smiles bright as the sun, grinning like Tony has given him something infinitely precious.
Then he starts to lean in.
Oh. Oh. This isn’t a scenario Tony’s ever imagined, not once. Of the many thousands of fantasies he’s cried himself to sleep or jerked off or woken up or daydreamed in a team meeting to, this one is wholly new, and it might even be real, because those are Steve’s eyes falling to Tony’s lips, bright with realization and hope, blue as fire, blue as the light of Tony’s exposed heart—
Seconds away from getting what he’s always wanted, Tony stops Steve with a hand to the chest. Ever the gentleman, Steve goes perfectly still, head bent forward, waiting for Tony’s next move. Word. Whatever it is—Tony’s still working that one out. In the meantime, Tony counts Steve’s absurdly long eyelashes, can almost see his own harried expression reflected in the deep black of Steve’s dilated pupils.
The air around and between them is charged—Tony can feel every hair on his arms standing on end. He can’t look away, held rapt by Steve’s hands on his body and Steve’s eyes on his mouth. Tony doesn’t know what the right thing is to say here, but he has to say something, because if Steve kisses him now and regrets it, Tony will never recover.
He can only build so many replacement hearts.
“Please,” he whispers, hand softening on Steve’s chest. He never wants this moment to end, being held in the soft safe circle of Steve’s powerful arms, never wants Steve to stop looking at him like that, like this is everything Steve wants. Tony didn’t even know Steve’s face was capable of that look. “Don’t—”
As soon as he says it, Steve starts to pull back, flushed cheeks blanching so fast Tony worries he might faint. It’s worrying, but a good sign, too, Tony has to imagine, his own head still spinning from the fact that Steve Rogers was about to kiss him just now, which. Holy shit. But now Steve is moving in the opposite direction Tony wants him to, taking all of the warmth and glow of the moment with him.
Tony fists the front of Steve’s shirt (warm, so warm) in both hands and tries to collect himself. “Wait, just…wait,” he breathes, thumping the man’s sternum gently for emphasis. When he finally looks up, Steve’s face is inches from his, lips wet and parted and waiting, but that’s not what gives Tony pause.
Steve’s blue, blue eyes are fathomless and full of want, tracking Tony’s face, yes, but also taking in the loosened bow tie around his neck, the starchy, upturned cuffs of his shirtsleeves, the tiny mother-of-pearl buttons resting at the base of Tony’s throat; Steve is cataloguing the smallest details of him like he knows exactly where he wants to look and what he’ll find when he gets there. Tony wonders how many times Steve has looked at him like this—he wonders how he ever missed it.
Sleep is the furthest thing from Tony’s mind now, his Hammer-induced mini panic attack from earlier so far in his memory’s rearview, it’s not even a dot on the glass. This—Steve holding him, Steve looking at him, Steve wanting him, Steve—is all that matters.
But he has to know.
It’s a short distance for his hands to travel, up from Steve’s heaving chest to his neck. For all that Tony was the one crying a minute ago (and he might very well be on the verge of tears again—jury’s out), Steve looks like he’s not far off, himself, bright eyes noticeably wet.
“Tony…”
“Not if you don’t mean it,” Tony whispers, inches away from the long swooping bow of Steve’s mouth, hands bracing the hard column of Steve’s neck where he can feel the man’s pulse leap under his palm. Their foreheads tip forward and connect, breaths comingling in the half-dark. Voice thick, Tony says, “I can’t—I can’t, if you don’t mean it,” and he’s tired, so tired of waiting, tired of touches with no meaning, tired of holding his breath when Steve’s in the room, tired of keeping this love to himself. But Steve’s right in front of him, standing tall and broad and looking for all the world like a man on a mission.
Only later will Tony be able to recall how the next few seconds unfolded: how Steve moved a hand from the deep curve of Tony’s lower back and used it to cradle his jaw; how he notched the thumb of that hand under Tony’s chin to tilt his face up mere centimeters to meet his; how Steve’s long, long lashes flashed gold in the low light as his eyes fluttered shut. Tony might even watch the Tower’s security footage to confirm that’s how it went.
In the moment, the only thing Tony knows is Steve, and Steve’s kiss. It’s soft at first, warm and dry and chaste, their lips only slightly parted, but the hand on Tony’s jaw is firm, molding around its shape and holding him in place while Steve works.
He doesn’t usually go in for words like magic and fireworks and the other usual clichés, but one kiss from Steve has Tony ready to list all kinds of superlatives. Steve kisses steady, and Steve kisses kind; he waits for cues from Tony before adjusting the pace, or his position, or the pressure. He gives and gives and doesn’t take.
It’s so good and so sweet, Tony could cry all over again, but after a minute of delightful, closed-mouthed kissing, he desperately wants to know what Steve kisses like—not how Steve thinks Tony wants to be kissed. So Tony works his own magic, dropping his head back with a soft moan, trusting Steve to keep the hand on his jaw steady, and then arches forward, rolling his body against Steve’s in a long, sinuous wave.
He needs to see what happens when Steve lets himself want.
And oh, does Steve ever want. Mindful of his strength, Steve tightens his hold on Tony’s jaw and moves him where Steve likes, tilting Tony’s head back further so Steve can press his advantage and finally start to take.
Tony never could have imagined Steve kissing him this much, this deep, this good. No scenario could have prepared Tony for the way Steve is holding and kissing him like he’s just come in from wandering the desert and Tony is a reservoir of cold, clear water. Steve pulls at him until there’s no air between their bodies, plundering Tony’s mouth with precision, opening him up with tongue and lips and teeth, licking and sucking and biting and fuck.
Tony is warm from Steve, and Steve is everywhere, big and sturdy and so fucking strong, hard up against him and exerting just enough force through the hand now plastered on Tony’s ass to keep their hips joined as they move together. Steve uses his whole body to kiss, rocking them every time he darts the tip of his tongue fleetingly across Tony’s lower lip so Tony gasps, adjusting Tony into new positions with little nudges of his dexterous fingers, and Tony is absolutely blissed the fuck out on how helpless he is in the face of Steve’s desire, riding the wave that is Steve’s thick thigh being nudged between his legs, the breath-stealing pressure of Steve’s lips, and the hot, wet curl of Steve’s tongue against his.
If Tony dies of happiness or asphyxiation (or both) here, so be it. There are worse ways to go, and none of them involve Steve Rogers making throaty sounds of bone-deep pleasure whenever Tony dares drive his hips forward to grind against Steve’s dick.
There’s a give and take to it, just like everything they do together, on the battlefield and off. Giddily Tony reminds himself they don’t call him an expert tactician for nothing as Steve plants his massive hands under Tony’s thighs and lifts at the same time Tony hops, walking them back over to the island and dropping Tony with a soft bounce on the marble counter. Stepping between Tony’s spread thighs, Steve drags him forward with a low growl and kisses him openmouthed.
It’s so hot, but when the corners of Tony’s lips turn up in a smile at his own private joke, Steve’s do too. Probably knows exactly what Tony is laughing about, the clever bastard. Steve breaks the flow for a moment to grin at Tony and comb his fingers through his hair. He’s panting hard and heavy like a thoroughbred at the end of a race, but the look in his eyes tells Tony they’ve barely rounded the first turn and oh, god, yes.
Steve nods once and steps in close to cradle Tony’s head in his hands. The touch is so sweet; the look on Steve’s face is not. It’s hungry and burning and Tony’s blood is singing. He tugs on Steve’s narrow hips with a whine, bracing his head against Steve’s hands as the man dives in for another kiss that steals the breath right out from Tony’s lungs.
Tony flings his arms around Steve’s shoulders, gasping hotly every time Steve pulls away to reorient himself and moaning every time he returns, mouth falling open further to let him in deeper, longer. When Steve buries his fingers in Tony’s hair and tugs, Tony shivers and his legs—which had wandered up around Steve’s hips at some point in the proceedings—go slack. His moans turn high and strained until he’s all but keening wetly against Steve’s soft, gentling lips, a heady contrast to the fingers dug in against his scalp. Steve tugs again, rumbling approvingly when Tony whimpers, and then keeps going. He buries one hand in Tony’s hair, plants the other on his ass, and kisses him until Tony’s mouth is slick and tender and open, swallowing every last one of his increasingly desperate little noises with encouraging groans that vibrate against Tony’s ribs.
How Tony ever thought he could live without this—how life could ever be enough without this—he’ll never know. Denial, rivers, Egypt, yadda yadda yadda.
It’s a few more minutes of Steve blowing Tony’s mind with kitten licks to his soft palate and firm, intermittent thrusts of his hips before Tony has to pull away with a gasp of “God, Steve—“ and catch his breath before this man puts him in the hospital.
Tony feels lightheaded; his thoughts are sluggish, and he probably looks like he just went ten rounds with an angry leaf blower, but he can’t bring himself to care. He can’t do much of anything except blink dumbly at Steve and stroke the broad planes of his back through his T-shirt, but Steve seems okay with that. He seems happy, standing there in the kitchen at—Tony glances over Steve’s shoulder at the microwave—three thirty in the morning, arms full of a blushing and bewildered Tony Stark, who may or may not be hallucinating all of this.
Steve, having caught his own breath, tips his head forward with a sigh. Expecting-slash-hoping for another window-fogging kiss, Tony closes his eyes. He huffs a high, breathless moan and opens up for it, arms around Steve’s neck, panting humidly against his mouth.
Instead of a kiss, Steve wraps an arm around Tony’s back and pulls him in close, mirroring the hug he’d given him before…all of that happened.
After spending a couple of minutes in each other's arms coming down from the high, Steve presses a trembling thumb against Tony’s chin, scratching the pad against his beard with tiny back-and-forth motions. He whispers Tony’s name softly, intimately, like it’s a promise he is determined to keep.
Tony opens his eyes to a radiant world full of Steve, who holds his gaze.
“I mean it,” he says. He’s never looked so certain.
Tony’s throat clicks wordlessly. Sensing his distress, Steve brushes Tony’s mouth gently with his thumb and bumps their noses together with a playful nudge, offering up a small, private smile that’s all Tony’s.
This, Tony thinks, this is enough.
He reaches for Steve’s hands. “So do I,” he replies, and holds on tight.