okay I had a thought! pls consider Peter (omega maybe?) who’s a ballerina w a benefactor, maybe Steve? Who’s an artist and sees Peter as his muse, or even Tony, who likes collecting pretty things, anyways! The sponsor, benefactor alpha slowly shows up more and more, makes sure Peter’s classes are paid for, that his supplies are provided, unlimited pointe shoes, the works - des
OMG BALLERINA PETER PLEASE YES PLEASE
Steve doesn’t go to this ballet with the intention of picking an omega, just to capture some of the poses on paper for the latest art piece he’s stuck on
the moment Peter comes on stage though, Steve’s not thinking about working at all. He’s completely enraptured watching Peter’s graceful form. It isn’t until it’s over that Steve comes back to himself and is madly scribbling notes and quick loses as the crush of people decide to leave.
And Steve’s tardiness turns out to be to his benefit because there near bus stop is the omega, now in a hoodie and leggings and Steve almost can’t breathe, is just like “You were an amazing sleeping beauty” completely sounding like a fan boy
Peter accepts the compliment and they make benign small talk about the show until the bus pulls up and Peter makes to get on it
and Steve knows it’s the twenty-first century but he was raised with a sense of chivalry and is like “You can’t take the drunk bus by yourself!”
Peter shrugs and is like “It’s not fun, but it’s free with my student ID and I’m definitely not walking all the way back to the performing arts campus”
“I can give you a ride there,” Steve blurts out without thinking.
Peter gives him a raised eyebrow. “At least there are witnesses on the bus,” he says and Steve goes beet red.
“Yeah, no, I get it-don’t get into cars with strange alphas,” Steve rubs the back of his neck awkwardly. “I was just hoping to talk to you more about some things.”
Peter sighs, opens up his phone and asks Steve for his number. “There. I’ll text you later this week when we can meet up again.”
Steve goes back to his apartment and maybe online shops for anything and everything ballet related despite thinking he’s been ghosted
So when his phone buzzes with a text from an unknown number in class and it says it’s Peter, he just about faints
About this: ballerina!peter and mobster!tony. Starker. Physical and emotional between established quentin beck/peter parker.
THIS IS UNFINISHED. Anyone is welcome to continue it.
-
“FRIDAY, baby? Do you have the shot?”
-
It’s a celebration, which does nothing to explain why the room gets quiet as soon as Tony enters it. Around the table are four of his best and brightest, the handful of underlings that were instrumental in helping Tony execute his vision of how to repay Adrian Toomes for encroaching upon his weapons market. For a job well done, he’d invited them up to the penthouse to have at his expensive collection of spirits.
He’d left them alone for only a half hour to make a few calls, but now upon his return they were shifty eyed and babbling about something inconsequential, a sure sign that they had hastily changed the subject.
“Alright,” Tony says, pouring himself a glass of scotch. “Out with it. I’m a paranoid bastard at best. At worst?—well. Ask Toomes.”
“It’s nothing bad, Tony,” Rogers says. If the fact that Rogers hadn’t told a lie his entire life didn’t put Tony at ease, then his clear eyes and voice did. Rogers was his number two, and they got on thick as thieves. He’s about as likely to lie to Tony as the sun is not to rise.
“Then I’m not angry,” Tony says, taking the empty seat. “But now I’m curious. Which is worse?”
“Angry,” Wilson says in that deadpan way that Tony just adores.
“Come on, don’t leave me in suspense,” Tony says, finishing his scotch with a single gulp. He pours himself another.
It’s Romanov who—doesn’t break, per say. Tony isn’t convinced that there’s anything that could break Natasha, though if they were on opposite sides, he might have a few places he’d be willing to start. She must weigh the pros and cons and decide that letting Tony in on their little secret is the best move. Whether it’s best for her, for them, or for someone else, Tony can’t say.
She shifts and pulls out a piece of paper folded in half and tosses it across the table. Barnes and Rogers groan.
“Nat, you rat,” Barnes says.
“Wow,” she says, eyes glittering. “That rhymed, Bucky. It was beautiful.”
“What the fuck is this?” Tony wonders out loud as he unfolds the paper. It turns out to be nothing extraordinary. It’s a program for the New York City Ballet. The ballet is something new by Ratmansky, with principal dancers MAXIMOFF/PARKER. “Ballet? Taking up a new hobby, Barnes?”
“I thought I’d look great in the tights,” is all Barnes says. A deflection if Tony’s ever heard one.
“Their boy toy is the lead,” Romanov admits (to fresh groaning from around the table).
Tony’s eyebrows raise. “Boy toy? All three of you?”
“We are in the process of wooing him, so to speak,” Wilson admits, taking a swig from the bottle in front of him. “Barnes and Rogers might be willing to tag team him, but I want him all for myself.”
Rogers’s eyes flash, cold steel in the overhead lights. “Watch the way you’re talking about Peter. He’s not a piece of meat to be shared.”
“This is a goddamn episode of the Bachelor,” Tony laughs. “Which one is Peter: Maximoff or Parker?”
“Parker,” all four chime together.
“I feel like a father whose kids are going out on their first date. Are you buying him flowers? Are you opening the car door for him? Are you being safe?” Tony jests. He leans back in his chair feeling the warm thrum of the scotch in his stomach, glancing from one besotted man to the next.
“All that and more,” Barnes says. Then, with more than a little bitterness: “It’s the way he deserves to be treated.”
Tony lifts his brows. Natasha slides him the deck of cards so that he can shuffle. He’ll lose, especially once he’s as drunk as he hopes to be, but there’s no amount of money he could lose to them that wouldn’t amount to pocket change in his book. Consider it their bonus. As he deals, he asks, “Trouble in paradise?”
“You could say that,” Wilson mutters. “He’s not exactly on the market.”
“Never took you for a homewrecker, Rogers. Barnes maybe—“
“Hardly a home to wreck,” Barnes admits. “Not a happy one, at least. Pete’s boyfriend is a perverted, abusive low life.”
Tony goes stiff. The buzzing in his gut transfers to his brain, raw as the sizzle of electricity. In his mind, he sees himself as a young boy sitting cross-legged by the vanity in his mother’s room watching her apply creams and powders to disguise Howard’s abuse. All the heinous crimes Tony commits, that one is not among them. He doesn’t prey on the weak. It’s the only promise to his mother that he’s never broken.
“So, take care of him,” Tony says lowly. “Do you or do you not have certain skills and the balls to use them? You could kill this boyfriend and have it look like a hundred different accidents. What’s the problem here? Do you need daddy’s permission or something? Well, here, I’m giving it.”
Rogers scowls darkly at his hand. “You wouldn’t understand.”
“Wouldn’t I? Regale me, then! Because it sounds to me like I’m sitting around the table with a bunch of pussies.”
“Peter asked us not to,” Barnes says.
Tony blinks. “Is—is that it? Good God. Definitely a bunch of pussies. Kill the bastard anyway. If you can’t stomach it; if you don’t want your boy toy mad at you, give me a name and I’ll do it. It can be done before we’re four rounds into poker, for fuck’s sake.”
“It’s not like we don’t have the stomach for it,” Wilson says. He’s the newest of their crew, but Tony appreciates his fearlessness, the open, unabashed expression he gives Tony when calling him out on perceived bullshit. “It’s about respect, man. We respect Peter’s wishes, and he trusts us because of it.”
The form of respect Tony is most acquainted with is fear. This softness he sees in his men right now translates to nothing short of weakness. Tony has never lived in a fairytale: the world is hard, and it makes hard people.
The rest, it kills.
“It’s complicated,” Rogers says to soothe Tony’s hackles. “If you knew the kid, you’d understand I think.”
“Now you’ve gone and done it,” Barnes mutters. There’s movement underneath the table: one person kicking another, everyone jolting to get their legs out of the way. Barnes looks like he’s sucked on a lemon, or taken a shot of Nat’s imported whiskey. “Now he’s gonna go see Pete for himself and none of us will have a chance.”
-
As it is, Tony doesn’t have to lift a finger to meet Peter because Peter comes to him.
-
Tony knows the benefit of giving his men a nice long leash.
He doesn’t have to. With them living in the Tower, it’s within his rights to keep surveillance on all of them; except he knows that distrust breeds distrust. Wilson, Romanov, Rogers, and Barnes have earned his trust. For that reason alone, he removed the wiretaps and cameras in their rooms upon their arrivals.
But it’s still his home, and he watches it. Closely. Tony has just poured his third glass of scotch when FRIDAY alerts him that there’s an unauthorized presence in the Tower.
“Unescorted?” Tony asks. His blood thrums—this is the most exciting thing to happen all day.
“Mr. Rogers and Mr. Barnes are the ones who granted him entrance using Mr. Roger’s passcode, and they appear to be returning to Mr. Rogers apartment, judging by the floor number selected in the private elevator.”
Tony rolls his eyes, relaxing back in his chair. “A fuck, baby?”
Tony has asked them not to entertain guests at the Tower without his authorization, but Tony was young once. He knew the thrill of breaking rules, how good forbidden, casual sex could feel. He wouldn’t put it past Rogers and Barnes to have grown bored, considering they’ve been dicking each other down since they were teens. Just thinking about twenty years of monogamy has his cock shriveling. If they’re just bringing home someone to bend between them and spitroast, Tony’s not going to bother abandoning his scotch.
“Judging by the young man’s level of inebriation, I would hope not.”
Groaning, Tony sets his scotch aside. He gives it a mournful glance while he steps into a pair of jeans and straps up. “I’m coming back for you, baby,” he whispers. “Wait for me. Take no other lover. Fuck, I hate wasting my humor on an empty room.”
“I’m here, boss,” FRI offers.
Tony rolls his eyes.
-
When he knocks on Steve’s (Steve and Bucky’s apartment, considering how much time Bucky spends there) at fifteen minutes ‘til midnight on a Thursday, he would usually expect a bleary-eyed blonde to crack the door open, a dark apartment the backdrop behind him. Instead, the door opens and light floods out into the hallway. Steve is dressed in his pajamas, that is to say that he’s wearing only a pair of pajama pants that cling to his hipbones for dear fucking life.
“FRI said there’s someone in my building and they’re drunker than I am. Don’t you know that’s a crime?” Tony asks, leaning against the doorframe. The cock of his hip emphasizes where his gun rests, but Steve’s eyes don’t even flicker to it.
Nonplussed, Steve just steps aside to give Tony room to enter.
Slumped on the sofa, bundled underneath a large blanket is a young man. Handsome, his face is a testament to masculinity: cut jaw, straight nose, flat brows and thin lips. The only hint of estrogen is the clear, smooth skin that looks like he’s never grown facial hair in his life. Right away, Tony places his bets that he knows who this kid is.
Peter Parker is resplendent, large brown eyes that blink sluggishly, dragging all over Tony’s figure like his eyes can’t decide where to rest. Sitting up, the blanket falls away and reveals his naked chest which Tony eyes with appreciation. He has the optimal figure for a ballerino, obvious strength that is lean and not bulky.
One of the thin lips is split, bruise blooming like the most tender flower beside his mouth. The wound opens when the kid’s mouth falls open.
“Ohmygod,” he slurs, elbows shaking from lack of strength. He collapses back onto the comfortable couch. “Tony Stark is here.”
Were he not so sobered by the kid’s appearance, the bruises and blood and the red-rimmed eyes and raw mouth, he might be charmed. Bucky appears dressed no more than Steve and Tony, a glass of water in his hand. He helps Peter sit up and coaxes him to drink from the glass. Every other sip, Peter gets distracted, gaping from naked chest to naked chest. At one point, he falls asleep propped up on Bucky’s shoulder.
“He’s not drunk,” Tony says, standing back with Steve while they watch Bucky try to coax the kid into consciousness. “Drugged?”
Steve hums. A muscle in his jaw jumps from how he’s grinding it. “It’s not the first time. Beck and Peter have different tastes in the bedroom. Peter has mentioned before that sometimes after their date nights, he wakes up sore.”
“Jesus fucking Christ. And you haven’t killed this guy, yet?”
Steve looks downright tortured. He does it well; Tony’s always thought of him as a bit of a melodramatic. “Peter would never see us again if we did. We have to decide between being around to support and protect him or not being around at all.”
“If Beck was dead,” Tony says coldly. “There’d be nothing to protect him from.”
“James,” Peter groans, losing and finding purpose again during the middle of the word. “Tony Stark is here!”
“In the flesh, kid,” Tony says, stepping forward. Peter’s eyes trace down Tony’s chest, tracing the matting of scars over his sternum before dipping over his abs (nowhere near as pronounced as Barnes or Rogers’s, but Tony does alright). The kid licks his lips. He can’t help but preen a little, winking at Bucky who is rolling his eyes. “
The curiosity has been planted like a seed deep inside Tony’s mind. It sprouts, soaking up thoughts until it’s the only thing he can think about, Peter Parker, principal dancer, owner of three of his best-men’s hearts.
It leads Tony here, to the best seats money can’t even buy at the Lincoln Center in Manhattan, dressed in his best tuxedo, dark eyes focused on the curtain that glows gold. His heart pounds when it withdraws on a dark, empty stage, though he hardly knows why.
By the end, he has a better idea.
There’s no hiding a single sharp line or sensual curve in the outfits they wear onstage, the pale tights and leotards. There is nothing soft about him save for his curls, but still he leaps and lands silent on his canvas-clad feet. The dance is obviously based around Maximoff’s character with Peter there as her supporting love interest, but even when the red-head bewitches the audience with her fouettés, Tony can’t take his eyes off of Peter’s figure, bowed at the edge of the stage and watching her with the sweetest supplication. When it is time for his own variation, he leaps and bows with a boneless grace that does more than take Tony’s breath away. It makes him hard. It makes him think about those long, strong legs wrapped around his waist while he gives the boy his cock. It makes him think about peeling those tights off and wrapping them around the dainty, pale wrists. It’s a good thing no one can see his erection behind the wall of his box seat when they all stand to give their ovation.
Peter bows and flushes, hand in hand with Maximoff before standing behind her sweetly while the entire place howls for her.
Tony thinks that maybe he’s starting to understand.
-
No one bothers him where he leans against the wall beside Peter’s dressing room door. Whether it is his reputation or his thunderous expression, he knows not, but he’s grateful for the lack of distractions while he eavesdrops on the conversation taking place inside the dressing room between Peter and a man Peter calls Quent.
—work harder in the gym. Have you been tracking your calories on the app we downloaded together?
Yes, Quent, Peter mumbles, barely audible through the walls.
All of them?
I said yes.
Don’t get defensive, babe. I had three different audience members come to talk to me about your figure tonight. It pisses me off too! If you’re ready to leave the industry—
You know I’m not.
Quentin sighs, the long-suffering sigh of an argument that has been often visited. I know. This is your dream. Poor baby. It must be so tough, loving a job that hurts you so much. But I’m so proud of you for pushing through, Peter, you know that, right? I just wish you were a little more grateful to me for trying to keep you on the right track. You treat me like the bad guy.
Peter doesn’t respond.
Is there anything you need before I go? How’s your back feeling? Your lifts looked a little strained towards the end.
Feels okay. I’ve got everything I need back at my apartment. I’ll go home and put my feet up.
You deserve it. Just don’t forget to use that app okay? There’s a rustle, a struggle, maybe Peter trying to pull away. But Tony’s always had an overactive imagination. Hey. Don’t be like that. I love you.
You too.
Peter. Say it right.
Tony slips away from the door before Quentin can come out. From his place around the corner, Tony still has decent vantage to put eyes on this man for himself. Average height, average weight. Fit enough—for a civilian. Tony’s hands positively ache for a gun. Though he’s carrying, he’s no fool. Now isn’t the time, nor the place.
Once he’s sure the man is gone and not returning, Tony makes his way back to the door. It’s time to meet this young talent from Queens (yeah, Tony read the brochure) for himself. But when Tony goes to lift his hand to knock, the door swings open.
Peter blinks in surprise. He’s dressed in gray leggings that look soft as cashmere, a NYDC hoodie on, sneakers on his feet. Spilling from the sneakers’ tops are black fuzzy socks, meant to keep his toes warm from the cold New York weather.
He’s limping.
And gaping. It never gets old, seeing the way his reputation precedes him. He loves the way the crowds part for him on the street, loves the way waiters and waitresses stammer and struggle to serve him, the way eyes grow wide like Tony is a god in the flesh.
Tony extends a hand. “I’m Tony Stark. It’s a pleasure to meet you; you’re a very talented dancer.”
“Hi,” Peter breathes, taking Tony’s hand. Tony grips gently, feeling like he’s liable to break bones, the kid’s so fucking delicate. And cold. But Tony knows the saying: cold hands, warm heart. He wonders what that makes him. Peter works to regain himself, saying, “Trust me, I know who you are. It’s so nice to meet you. Thank you—they didn’t tell me that anyone important was going to be in the audience.”
“They who?” Tony asks. “Your managers, or my men?”
Peter swallows, face draining of blood. As much as Tony likes these games, they aren’t as enjoyable when the worm on his hook is as pretty and polite as Peter is. He puts on his most charming (softest) smile and makes sure to ask, gesturing to the messy dressing room behind him, may I come in?
Nodding, Peter opens the door wider. They both ignore how he was clearly on his way out, a backpack in his hands. He sits it down carefully by the vanity where he applied his stage makeup and seats himself on the chair, nudging his shoes off. When he stretches the arches of his feet, he winces. Tony gives him a moment to settle, stepping around the tiny room and taking in the smells and sights. On one wall is a picture of Peter and Quentin, arms around each other, beaming.
“Mr. Stark?” Peter asks, voice quiet. Tony glances over at him. “Are your—men in trouble?”
“No,” Tony admits. “If they were, I certainly wouldn’t be here watching ballet; I’d be...busy.”
Peter sags in relief. The way his shoulders hunch throw his collar bones into sharp prominence where they peek out from the neck of his sweatshirt. “Oh thank God. They’re so nice, Mr. Stark, and I promise they don’t tell me anything about their—your work. James still insists that he works for some guy named Potts in New Jersey. Who’s Tony Stank, he asked me when I brought you up.”
Tony lets his lips twitch. “James’s middle name is Buchanan. Some call him Bucky. Tell him I said: now we’re even.”
Peter grins and it’s radiant. Tony feels an unsteadiness in his gut, like missing a step on the stairs or hearing a gunshot go off when he’s not been the one to pull the trigger. There’s just the gentlest stirring of jealousy when Peter mouths the name, Bucky, testing the way it tastes and wrinkling his nose in laughter.
“I can’t wait to see the look on his face,” Peter says. “Thank you, Mr. Stark.”
Now might be the time to offer to let the kid use his given name but—Tony’s kind of into it. A few more instances of Mr. Stark rolling off that polished tongue might have Tony hardening in his tux. “Take a picture for me,” Tony suggests, sitting down on the cozy loveseat that is opposite of Peter’s vanity.
“You said—you enjoyed the show?” Peter asks, demure. The sleeves of his sweatshirt pass his wrists and most of his palms, turning his hands into adorable little sweater-paws. When he reaches up to bite at a nail, the sleeve slips down past his tiny wrist. Tony could surely wrap an entire hand around that wrist and have more to spare.
“It was incredible,” Tony admits. “I don’t usually have the attention span to sit through longer shows, but I was hooked from curtain rise to curtain fall, kid.”
Peter flushes, not so much in embarrassment as he does from the pleasure of being complimented. The flush of the drunk, though it seems Peter’s poison of choice is praise. Tony can’t help but want to spread him out on the sheets in his bedroom and say the sweetest, filthiest things to see if he can get the kid hard with just his voice. “I’m so glad. There hasn’t been as much press; new shows are always a little slow to take off. Wanda really is something special, though. She spent a season overseas and came back with so much more grace and growth—”
“Did she do well tonight?” Tony asks, unbuttoning the top button on his jacket to reveal the trim waist and vest beneath. He realizes what he’s doing just as the words are coming out of his mouth. Tony is flirting with Peter, and his flirtation is a force of nature. “I barely noticed her. Couldn’t take my eyes off of you, kid. How the hell you manage to dance that way, I can’t fathom.”
Now the flush hints at being flustered. He soaks in the way Peter’s face darkens, the way he hides behind one of his hands as the praise makes his posture go soft and waxy. His voice is remarkably even when he says, “Lots and lots of practice.”
“Your hard work pays off. I was captivated. I could tell that my men were the same.”
That topic sobers Peter, who sits up straighter. His pretty face twists, the question mark clear, the confusion too genuine for Tony to take it disrespectfully. On the contrary, Tony finds his forthrightness attractive when he asks, “Why did you come tonight, Mr. Stark?”
“I came to see what it was about you that has my men so enthralled,” Tony admits. With the kind of power he has comes the freedom to be honest, even painfully, brutally honest, because repercussions are either minimal or nonexistent.
“Did you figure it out?” Peter asks. Tony can’t help but feel like the kid is asking him for the both of them: what is it so special about me? Yes, this boy is fragile. That can’t be overlooked. But inside of him there’s still a spark of spirit ready to alight at any moment, grateful for any tinder that it’s given. He’s not Maria Stark. Not yet.
“Yes,” Tony says, standing. He rebuttons his jacket. “And I’d like very much to get to know you better, if you’re agreeable.”
“Me?” Peter’s head cocks, squinting up at Tony like he’s trying to see through him, to see what is really being said. “Why?”
Tony is used to letting his baser instincts guide him. He fucks who he wants, goes where he wants, says what he wants, and he owes no one alive an explanation for it. Many people have stopped asking Tony questions like why? Certainly none of Toomes’s men asked Tony why when he was torturing them forty-eight hours ago.
“Because I want to,” Tony says. He reaches down and picks up Peter’s backpack, putting it over his shoulder, the canvas bag downright gauche against his Givenchy tuxedo. “So what do you say, kid? You look dead on your feet, but would you like to be dead on your feet somewhere more private?”
Peter takes a long moment to think about it before tucking his toes into his shoes.
-
He belongs there amongst the backdrop of Tony’s penthouse. Peter glances around with all the coltish wonder of a newborn, running his fingers across the genuine leather of the sofa, leaning forward to look at the smart-glass table that Tony likes to prop his feet up on at night. Upon entering, Tony removes his tuxedo jacket and takes Peter’s hastily-removed sweatshirt. He appreciates the four inches of skin that appear when his shirt rides up, sticking to his outerwear.
He doesn’t appreciate the yellowing bruises dotting the kid’s biceps. Fingertips, he knows. His mother wore them round her neck like pearls.
“Is it okay if I take my shoes off?” Peter asks. He limped from the theater to the car, from the car to the elevator, and from the elevator to the couch where he collapsed with a sigh of relief. When Tony encourages him to, Peter nudges off his comfortable shoes and brings one foot up into his lap where he firmly presses his knuckles into the sole.
Peter asks for a drink. Tony gives him access to his wine, and the kid chooses for himself: a red, Chateau Margaux that smells of rose petals and hints at citrus and turns Peter’s cheeks pink. He doesn’t ask for a second glass, and Tony doesn’t offer it; the last thing he wants is the kid to think that Tony invited him here to take advantage of him.
“Tell me,” Tony asks, watching with rapt attention the faces Peter makes, like he’s dancing on the knife’s edge between pleasure and pain. “Tell me how you met my men. They aren’t exactly patrons of the arts.”
Peter’s face smoothes and he smiles. “It was Natalie, actually. She comes to shows every so often; I think her and one of the instructors know each other. Sometimes, she sponsors promising dancers.”
Romanov. Her and this instructor must truly know each other for her to be using a cover name around them. He files all this away in the darkest parts of his mind, should she ever become a problem someday. Tony has places reserved in his brain for all of his closest allies; already, he is making one for Peter too. Trust is earned but ever ephemeral.
“So Nat introduced you?”
“Yes. She sponsored me for a while, so we got to know each other pretty well. Once I mixed up my days and showed up at her condo when I wasn’t supposed to, and I met the others. Sometimes they would come to shows or send me gifts backstage.” Peter frowns. “I asked them to stop though because—Quent would just throw them all away.”
“Quentin Beck.”
“How’d you know?”
Tony just smiles and changes the subject. “You must know that the three of my men are half in love with you.”
Peter groans, pressing both his palms flat to his heated cheeks. “I had a feeling they were...interested. I hope they don’t feel that I’ve led them on, Mr. Stark. Nothing untoward happens at all when we’re together; sometimes I, I meet Steve and James for dinner, or other times Sam comes over to my apartment and we just talk, I promise. They’re so kind and it’s—it’s nice to have people to talk to.”
Peter stops talking abruptly, mouth open. He lets it fall closed with a click. When Tony prods him gently, he admits, “The attention is nice, too. It feels good, feeling wanted. Does that make me bad?”
Tony wonders what kind of miserable asshole would have Peter in his bed at night and not show the kid attention. It takes a special fuck-up to come home to a lover like Peter and not make him feel wanted. “Wanting attention? Not at all, kid. It’s the least of what you deserve.”
“You sound like them,” Peter says, smiling. “James and Steve and Sam. They’re always doing and saying nice things and telling me that I deserve them.”
“Good,” says Tony, one side of his mouth curling upwards. “I feel like a proud father; I’ve taught them well. Should you have those elevated?”
“Sorry?”
“Your feet. Elevation will keep down the swelling.” Tony places one of the expensive throw pillows on his lap and pats it invitingly. Peter stretches out without anymore prompting, toes flexing as his joints pop before curling in. The kid makes for an indecent picture, all long lines, absolutely nothing hidden by the leggings he wears.
“I asked them if I could meet you, you know,” Peter admits. He’s red from far more than the wine, now, judging by the way he has one hand pressed over his eyes to shield him from Tony’s gaze. As if it’s possible to. Peter peaks through his fingers. “Don’t take this the wrong way, Mr. Stark, but I’ve had a crush on you for ages.”
A crush. God. Tony doesn’t know what’s more hilarious, the sweet naivete of this boy or how it makes his cold heart flutter. Tony’s eyebrows raise. “Is that so? I’m not exactly crush material for the mentally stable.”
Peter hums. “When I was a kid, I had a lot of bullies. I started dancing when I was four years old, and not a lot of other boys understood. Sometimes, I used to daydream about you coming to protect me from them. To put them all in their place and then whisk me off to that house you gave a tour of on TV once, the one in Malibu.”
“Good taste,” Tony says. “You know, I used to do the same thing when I was young. I dreamed about someone coming to protect me and my mother, to take us both away somewhere where no one could ever hurt us.”
Sitting up on his elbows, Peter fixes Tony with a serious, solemn stare. “Really?”
“Really.”
“Is that what happened?”
“No. I became that someone. What happened to you?”
“I guess I gave up on the idea,” says Peter.
“Look. Maybe you don’t have your crush on me anymore, but I’m not the kind of man who can look away from innocent human suffering. My men told me about your boyfriend.” Peter sags back onto the couch and puts his face in his hands. He shakes his head from side to side, though no words come out. “This is my offer, kid. Let me take care of the problem. Let me be that knight in shining armor you wanted when you were younger.
Anthony Stark is a rich ex-militaire that spends his money in investigating and creating wonderful machines that leave everyone around him astonished.
Pietro di Dio is the most beautiful ballerina in Venezia, not long ago a poor boy with little chances but now, the princess of the city.
Maybe it's because Pietro is one of the few that can follow his line of thought. Maybe it's because his eyes surrounded by eyelashes make Anthony weak.
Maybe it's because Anthony actually listens to him and sees him as an actual person, not just a pretty object. Maybe its because his calloused hands and firm stance give Pietro oh so many ideas.
At the end, does it really matter why, as long as they're together?
