A/N- Sorry for the wait, I had finals and I moved out of my dorm.. So it was a busy few weeks.. So stoked for May 7th! Enjoy!

Chapter Three

Tony and Pepper had remained rather civil while packing until Tony had tried to blame them getting married directly on her.

"All I'm saying is the last thing I remember was you calling the front desk and asking where the best wedding chapel in Vegas was" Pepper looked absolutely appalled.

She huffed, "Pft! My fault? You're the one who kept handing me dirty martinis like they were going out of style"

Tony shrugged, "It's not my fault every bar had a special two for one deal, Pepper" Pepper rolled her eyes.

"You're unbelievable, you know that?"

Tony nodded his head, "Yup"

"And you're the one that started this" She glanced at their clasped hands.

"This?"

"Yes, this! You took me to that Club and then you felt me up" Tony let go of her hand and ran it through his hair, smiling.

"Felt you up? Are we sixteen?"

"The meaning doesn't change depending on your age Tony"

He laughed again, "Right, well I don't exactly remember feeling you up," Pepper glared at him, "fine! Maybe I did, but I distinctly remember that you started it. You're the one that put my hands on your ass"

"I did no such thing!" Pepper threw him an offended glare.

"So I guess I just shoved my own hands down my pants at the club?" Pepper's mouth opened and closed but now words came out. Tony retook her hand squeezing her fingers.

"Did I just render you speechless, Potts?" Pepper glared at him, again.

"In your dreams, Stark" Tony's eyes sparkled. He loved getting her all riled up. It was part of the game that they had played for the past six years. Now it seemed that it was simply foreplay.

"Not exactly a dream anymore, babe" Pepper flushed. It was going to take a while for Pepper to get used to Tony calling her pet names. The elevator dinged and the doors opened. Tony momentarily dropped her hand so that he could grab her bag.

"Wow, Tony Stark, a gentleman? Never thought I'd see the day" Tony smirked as he followed her out of the elevator. They both decided to ignore the stares and pointing of some of the hotel guests.

"You know how I like to surprise you, babe"

"Don't call me that" Tony looked a bit disappointed.

"Can I call you my wifey?" Pepper's head whipped around. How loud had he said that? Had any of the guests in the Lobby heard?

"No! Please stop talking so loudly"

"Yes Ma'am" he muttered as he followed her to the front desk. He wasn't going to bother her while she checked out for them. Well, eventually he got bored. He started slow, simply tracing his fingers on a few of the freckles that he found on her arm. When she didn't respond to that, Tony put his hand on her lower back. He let his hand drift lower until it rested on her ass; he squeezed a little. Pepper jumped slightly.

"Mr. Stark, do you need to wait in the car?" He nodded his head, smirking.

"I'm fine here" she rolled her eyes, "really"

"Sign this" he sighed, and removed his hand from where it was currently resting. He scrawled his name on the bill and grabbed Pepper's hand.

"We will definitely be back, thank you!" the concierge blushed at being talked to directly by Iron Man.

Tony placed their bags on the sidewalk as the pair waited for Happy.

"I thought you said Happy was going to be here?"

"Well, we both had to shower, and I told him to go grab some lunch before he picked us up. We are two hours late. I told him we'd be here at 10. It's just after 12 right now"

"Oh, gotcha. Sorry to ruin your schedule, Pepper"

"It's fine, Tony. We need some time to talk before he gets here anyways" Tony inwardly groaned. Everyman knew that when a woman said they needed to talk, shit was going down.

"What'd I do now?" Pepper looked mildly confused.

"Nothing. You're not in trouble, yet" Tony waggled his eyebrows at her.

"Well that's good. What'd you wanna talk about then?"

"Our marriage" she whispered, looking up to make sure that no people passing heard.

"Oh, right" he smirked, "well we already consummated it, so what else is there to talk about?" Pepper's face flushed.

"I wasn't thinking straight early. We need to have a serious talk about annulling it. We can get it taken care of quietly"

"Quietly? I have seen the Hangover, you know" Tony seemed to be laughing to himself as he remembered some of the funnier scenes from his favorite movie.

"Tony, I'm not being funny. When the press gets a hold of this…"

"So the easiest way to make this go away is to simply annul it?"

Pepper nodded, "Yes. Let's get it annulled"

"No" Pepper stopped cold.

"No?" Pepper grounded out, Tony simply shrugged. He grabbed his favorite pair of light blue sunglasses out of his bag and put them on.

"Listen, we don't even know where we got married last night anyways. And obviously, you have feeling for me other wise you wouldn't have jumped my bones in the kitchen this morning" He cleared his throat which allowed Pepper to jump in.

"Me!" she was just getting started, "You started it… With your nakendness, and with the touching" she was making awkward hand gestures that Tony found quite amusing. He was having a hard time keeping a straight face.

She took a deep breath and looked like she was going to continue, but broke off as soon as she saw Happy pull up. Tony breathed a sigh of relief. Happy took the bags from Tony and put them in the trunk.

"Let's talk about this inside" Tony said as he opened the door for Pepper. She nodded and made her way in the backseat.

"Thanks"

Tony was halfway into the car when—

"Mr. Stark! Mr. Stark!" oh shit. He froze. It was his favorite Vanity Fair reporter, Christine Everhart. Pepper was going to kill him.

"Can't talk, Charlotte" Christine grabbed the door, prohibiting Tony from slamming it. Pepper inwardly groaned when she saw one of Tony's conquests from before Afghanistan. Christine and Tony both stared at her awkwardly.. Maybe she hadn't groaned inwardly…

"It's Christine. Can I ask you to comment on some photos? Ah, the famous Pepper Potts. Tony took you to Vegas? Step up from laundry duty, huh?"

"Do they pay you overtime for being a bitch 24/7?" Pepper retorted. Tony's eyes widened. He'd never seen Pepper so feisty. He liked it. A lot.

"Take a look at these, Potts" Christine thrust a pamphlet into Pepper's lap, purposefully shoving her cleavage into Tony's face.

"Tony!" Pepper glared at him for staring at Christine's assets.

"What?" Tony put his hands up, feigning innocence.

"Why are you wasting out time, Everhart?" Pepper gasped as she opened the envelope, "how did you get these?"

Tony grabbed the photos out of Pepper's hand, and once he held them in his hand he felt his heart stop. Somehow Christine had taken pictures of Pepper and him last night. The first three were harmless pictures of them talking outside of the club. But it was the fourth and the fifth pictures that had even Tony blushing. The fourth picture was of the two of them at the club. Pepper was grinding into Tony. His hands were on her chest, cupping her breasts. The fifth was a kissing shot. Her hands were making a mess of his usually perfect hair, and his hands were on her ass. Why couldn't he keep his hands to himself?

The last picture was of them leaving the club, holding hands. He glanced to Pepper and saw that she was avoiding eye contact. Christine cleared her throat.

"You bitch—" Pepper put a hand on his leg, instantly calming him down.

"No comment on any of these, Ms. Everhart" she took the pictures out of Tony's hands and handed them back to Christine, "I only ask that you think of what this is going to do to both mine and Tony's personal lives if you print these"

Christine huffed, "that was very touching, but I'm still going to have to print it, with or without your permission"

"Get out of my car" Christine threw the pictures at Pepper, still smiling.

"Those are for you, Ms. Potts. I'm sure you want the one of Tony feeling you up displayed in your office" Tony slammed the door not daring himself to look at Pepper.

"Happy to the airport please"

The silence was eating Tony alive. He glanced at his watch. They hadn't spoken in fifteen minutes. Happy kept giving him what he thought were supportive looks from the front. The nerve of that reporter to take pictures of him and Pepper! Those moments were meant to be private, not sprayed across every magazine in the country. He was drumming his fingers on his arc reactor absentmindedly when suddenly Pepper grabbed his hand, stopping him.

"Sorry" he muttered. She still hadn't looked at him since he had slammed the door in the reporters face. "Pepper, please, talk to me"

"So now you want to talk? Not when I wanted to talk about our marriage," Happy coughed in the front seat, Tony offered him a weak smile, "Before the awful woman came and threw those pictures in our face. If she found us at that club, then she has to know about the marriage, Tony!" He put a hand on her thigh, trying to calm her down.

"I don't think she knew, Pepper. I'm pretty sure that would have been the first thing she asked us about if she had known. Plus, we don't even know where we got married, how is she going to find out?"

She finally turned to face him, "She's a reporter Tony. It's her job to dig up dirt on you. And so far she's doing a pretty damn good job"

"We should release a statement then"

"About what, Tony" Tony shrugged.

"Us. That way she can't release the story she wants"

Pepper waited a moment before asking, almost as if she was afraid to hear his response, "And what would this statement say?"

"Simple. I came to my senses and finally married you. And you realized that your boss was far to good looking and incredible for you to leave on the market" That got a small smile out of Pepper.

"You want to tell them we got married? In Vegas?" Tony frowned. He wasn't sure what she wanted to hear.

"Ummm.. Yes!" She simply stared at him. How could she go that long without blinking?, "No"

"Well, which is it? Yes or no?"

"I don't know! Obviously I'm just making you mad, and I don't want that. I mean you are my wife"

"Tony, I appreciate you wanting to tell the truth to the public, but I just don't think you need to make a statement. Especially one about our apparent marriage in Vegas. I mean, it's not like you're a celebrity…"

"Wow wow wow" Tony put his hands up, and looked genuinely offended at the thought of him not being a celebrity, "your ass married the biggest celebrity superhero of all time, sweetheart" His phone rang, "It's Rhodey"

Pepper nodded and used the time to start reading one of Tony's unread emails.

"Helllo?" Tony laughed loudly, "Hell ya I made Pepper take Patron Vegas shots with me, didn't I?" He thrust the phone in her face. She rolled her eyes and took the phone from him.

"Hey Rhodey, yes. Of course Tony showed me a great time" Tony wiggled his eyebrows at her suggestifly; she slapped his thigh, "We're on our way back. You got it" She hung up and dropped the phone into Tony's lap.

"What'd he want?" Tony asked, loosening his tie that for some reason Pepper had insisted he wear this morning. Pepper swatted his hands away.

"It looks better like that" he glared at her. His tie was hangin loosely around his neck. The top button of his shirt was undone and Tony could see a little light coming out from the arc reactor.

"Boy, if I had known this was going to turn you on so much, "he drummed his fingers against the arc reactor, he could tell she was staring, "I would have gotten myself kidnapped a long time ago"

Pepper rolled her eyes, "It doesn't turn me on, Tony.

"Right" Tony said in a completely unconvinced tone, so if I were to do this…" He unbuttoned the next few buttons on his shirt; Pepper openly stared at his reactor.

"Tony…" Pepper whimpered. Why the hell was she whimpering? Oh, right, because her boss had a piece of metal in him that was keeping him alive. She wasn't crazy for getting aroused while looking at it, right?

He was speaking to her, but she was too busy studying the arc reactor. She'd always stared at it when she would come down to the workshop to make him sign various forms and such. Tap tap tap.

Pepper eyes snapped up from Tony's arc reactor to his face. He was still drumming his fingers against the reactor, which Pepper was starting to find very cute. Their eyes met and the next thing Pepper knew she had grabbed Tony and crashed his lips to hers. It took Tony only milliseconds to recover before his hands grabbed her ass and pulled her onto his lap. Pepper let one of her hands wander in Tony's hair while she let the other one rest on his arc reactor. His hands ventured under her dress and moaned into her mouth at what he found.

"No panties?" She only smirked and kissed him slowly. He let himself get lost in her lips for a few more minutes. She was unbuckling his belt when he spoke, "I don't think we should do this"

Pepper frowned, "You don't want to?" was he turning her down?

"No, no. I really do, but is this what you want? For us to do the deed in the back of a limo?"

"Well, I'm pretty sure we 'did the deed' in the wedding chapel bathroom. Twice" Tony smiled at the memory.

"Oh yeah.." Pepper rested her forehead against his, "The point is, you deserve better than this. It's like you said before, if we want to try this for real we should start taking this together thing seriously"

Pepper nodded her head in agreement, "Never thought I'd see the day that Tony Stark said no to sex"

"I'm a new man, babe" She rolled her eyes at him. He protested when she slid off his lap and into the seat next to him.

"I didn't say we couldn't go to like 3rd base" he shrugged his shoulders in question.

"3rd base? Are you in high school?" Tony nodded his head vigorously.

"Pepper, I didn't know you were into role-playing… Any other kinks you into? Bondage, spanking?" Tony's eyes got bigger. Pepper felt her face flush to the same color as her hair, yet she still managed to stare down Tony.

Their stare down lasted for quite a while, neither one of them seemed to be blinking, or breathing. Tony finally gave in.

"You win," he put his hands up in defeat, "Guess I'll have to figure out about the bondage thing myself"

Pepper huffed, "You're unbelievable"

"Thanks," he smirked again, "I don't like it when you're mad at me, so why don't we talk about something you like? Perhaps you'd like me to buy you some more of those heels you wear to work everyday?"

"That won't be necessary, Tony" her Blackberry beeped.

"Well your opinion doesn't exactly matter, Pepper. My wife gets whatever her beautiful legs require"

"I am your wife"

"Irrelevant" Pepper rolled her eyes.

"Tony, you really have to stop with this wife stuff" Tony grabbed the phone out of her hand.

"Then stop with this phone stuff" Pepper made a grab for the phone.

"Well, this phone stuff is my work, Tony"

"I understand that, but can you just stop for a minute?"

"Fine"

"Fine"

Silence. Tony was getting uncomfortable, "What's bothering you? Is it that reporter?"

"No"

"No?" Pepper nodded, "What then?"

"I—" the car came to a halt and Tony realized they were at the airport. Tony helped Pepper out of the car and followed Happy to the Stark Jet.

"Thanks, Happy. Let's get out of here"