poison | parker | book one

CHAPTER SIX

[MAGIC MEDS]

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Tony dialed the number Natasha had sent him. He pressed the 'call' button and put the phone to his ear. He held the railing with his other hand and look out on the city. A gust a wind hit him when the line picked up.

"Stark?" a husky voice asked.

"Let's cut out all that tough guy stuff. You're wasting my time and yours. I'll pay whatever it is you want, I just want the family back."

The man laughed into the phone.

"What?" Tony hissed. Impatience was clawing at his skin.

When the laughing subsided, the man said pointedly, "Go to the front door of our building within the hour. We'll talk it all out, little man. Bring the girl, too."

"She's a sniper. If I were you, I wouldn't want her there."

"Not her," a grumbling chuckle, "The kid."

Mari.

Tony hung up. He looked at the city, then he thought about Mari. Such unfortunate circumstances.

He looked at the street, far below.

"You good?"

He looked back at Mari. Deep frown lines were prominent on his forehead. "Yeah, I'm good. They want you to come with when we go."

"We'd better figure out if those magic meds work," Vee stated. She was implying the mixture he had asked an intern from the lab to start on. In the hour they'd been home, they'd decided on chemicals and had begun processing it.

"Come on." Tony led her back the way they, separately, came.

"Who all is coming to the little rendezvous?" Mari asked as they reached the elevator.

Tony pressed the penthouse office's number and settled back. He adjusted his cufflinks. "If the medication works, then you, me, Natasha, Peter — if he can get out of school, and Vision."

"What're the odds the mob knows about my power?" Mari asked him.

"Not sure. Does your brother share it?"

"No. He and Nina have invisibility."

"Really?"

"Yes. I told you. I have a different dad then them. Their dad must've had the invisibility gene, skipped his generation, and they got it. Whoever mom was paid to sleep with had this shit-show of a power."

The doors opened and she stepped into his office. He entered and sat behind his desk and picked up the medication.

He popped the top off of the syringe and flicked the cylinder, filled with a clear liquid. "Let's make it less of a shit-show, then. It's a power, not a curse."

She rolled up her sleeve and stuck out her right forearm. He held it with one hand and injected the medication.

It was cold and didn't feel like much of anything at any one time.