I Thought You Were Different: Part 3

Suits

Tony's hand slipped very slowly back into his pocket, appearing as if he were just resting it there as he listened to this man who had so purposefully stopped him, but his fingers were dancing over the screen with adept muscle memory of where the letters would be on the pad so that he could text you.

"Yes," he coughed nervously, "we take a lot of pride in how the team has pulled together to help raise the triplets. They're the most loved kids in the world, and I know that any of us would do whatever it takes to protect them."

"I'm sure. But tell me, Mr. Stark, what would you do? How far would you go if meant that you could keep them from harm's way?"

"I don't think you want to find out."

"Oh, but I do," Schmidt pressed, taking a few calculated steps forward, making Tony recoil back. "I want to see for myself what your limits are. You see, even their own parents couldn't hold their end of the agreement when I told them specifically that all they had to do was to fall in line and do what they were told. If they could do that, then I would leave these little miracles of theirs alone. Instead, they ran and hoped for the best. I thought you would have raised your own daughter to be smarter than that, Tony."

"Don't even think about touching my grandchildren. You won't live long enough to regret it."

"I like this side of you, I must admit. This ease in finding your rage. You would rise to the top of our ranks quickly."

"I would rather die."

"Patience, Tony. All in good time."

~~~

"I understand why you feel scared, (Y/N). It's not that I don't, okay?" Steve asked, grabbing the two pints of rapidly melting ice cream from the table to follow you into the kitchen. "I guess I just thought that with things going so well again, it would be...nice...I suppose."

"It would be nice," you sighed, opening the freezer for him with a cold blast of air chilling you, "and I'm sure that we'd make it work, just like we always do."

"Of course we would," he continued more urgently, seeing his opportunity, "and you know that the team would be all over helping out again. Tony even said how much he would love to have more around."

You quickly held up a hand to stop him, your other one slamming the freezer door closed with a resounding bang through the room, "hold on just a damn minute there, Spangles. Did you talk to my dad before you talked to me about this?"

"It...might have come up..."

"Oh, my god! You two are the worst! What's next? If I say no, are you going to send him in with his big sad eyes and his 'but I always get what I want' voice? You both know that it doesn't work, right? If it did, he would have installed that stupid potato gun into his suit by now."

"No, he won't...wait...he what?"

"Listen-" you stopped, feeling the buzz of your phone in your pocket; you grabbed it just as Steve had at the same time, both of you seeing a text from Tony, but dismissing it until you could finish your conversation. "We're getting off track-"

Another alert came in, followed immediately by another, setting off alarms in your mind that something was wrong and to stop ignoring it. Before you could open the message to read what it said, the compound filled with blaring alarms and a flood of red lights.

"Steve-"

He held up his phone, having had opened the messages despite the frantic activity around him, "(Y/N), it's him." You squinted slightly and grabbed the device from his hand; it was the face of the man that Steve had taken you to that night four years ago. It was the man who promised that if you didn't follow his command, you wouldn't be the last member of your family that he came after. At the corner of the screen just past Schmidt's head, you could see the faint outline of a group of letters, quickly identifying them as the name of the kids' school.