Work Text:
The computer's monitor suddenly turned black and the word NSFW appeared, replacing Tony's reading material with that warning instead.
Tony blinked, hands flying up. The story was just getting juicy! "Friday, what the he—"
"Daddy!"
Tony jumped in his seat, whipping his head around to look at his daughter. "Oh, honey, you scared me!" he said and then murmured, "Thanks, Fri," under his breath because the AI had enacted the Not Safe for Morgan protocol which automatically shielded the four year-old from anything that was inappropriate for her small eyes and ears as soon as she walked in a room containing said material.
"Why you scared?" she asked, climbing up Tony's lap.
"Because I was reading something scary." He was, in fact, reading something erotic but she didn't need to know that.
"Read? I know how to read!" She pointed at the big red letters on the screen and said, "N-S-F-W. See? I know how!"
Tony was caught between a feeling of horror (because NSFW was now part of his four year-old's vocabulary and Pepper was going to kill him) and a feeling of pride (because she did know how to read, never mind that the word she read was an acronym and did not require any sound blending).
In the end, he settled for amused. "Yep, you sure read that right, honey."
Morgan fixed her brown eyes at him and asked, worried, "Is NSFW scary?"
Tony dug this hole himself. Might as well commit. "Uh-huh."
"Then you have to stop reading it, Daddy," she told him seriously. "Or you'll have nightmares."
On the contrary, Tony thought he'd get a good night's sleep after reading that story. "As always, you give such great advice. I don't know what I'd do without them. Now, what are you doing up?"
"Mommy said to call you. It's bed time!"
"Right." Tony rose to his feet, hands on Morgan's butt while she locked her legs around his waist. "Speaking of Mommy, let's keep that little word out of your vocabulary today, huh?"
"Okay."
Tony walked up the stairs and passed Pepper who was about to get inside the master bedroom. She paused at the doorway. "There you two are. What took you so long?"
"I was helping daddy read," said Morgan, thankfully leaving out what it was Tony was reading.
"She was!" Tony nodded. "She helped me. Read some letters. Just letters."
Pepper arched a suspicious brow at Tony. He shouldn't have repeated the word 'letters.'
"What were you reading?" Pepper asked.
"Just something scary," Tony answered for Morgan at the same time the little girl said, "NSFW."
Tony flashed Morgan a surprised look. "Morgan! I told you to keep it a secret!"
Morgan put her hand over her mouth and sheepishly said, "Oops." She giggled.
Pepper gave Tony a look, one that told him he was in big trouble and the only thing saving him was having Morgan in his arms. "NSFW, huh? Daddy's right. That is scary." Tony sent his wife an apologetic look. It wasn't his fault their kid could read letters!
Pepper dropped the look and smiled at him instead which made Tony uncomfortable because what the hell did that smile mean?
"Tuck her in, please."
Tony nodded curtly. "You got it."
"And let's stick to appropriate bedtime stories tonight."
"Totally."
Tony took his time telling Morgan a story; he was in no hurry to get back to the lecture Pepper undoubtedly had planned for him. But every story had an ending, and when his storytelling was over, he walked back to his own bedroom, already rehearsing the apology in his head.
The light in the bathroom was on, which told him where his wife happened to be. Figuring he might as well get it over with, Tony walked in, finding Pepper sitting in their bathtub, the bath bubbles just beyond her chest. She was holding a glass of wine in one hand and was looking at him.
Tony stood by the doorway, waiting for her to complain about the fact that Morgan was probably going to repeat NSFW at school and what was he thinking letting her even see that word, what would the teachers think—
"Are you just gonna stand there," Pepper said, interrupting Tony's train of thought, "or are you gonna join me?"
That was not the lecture Tony expected but he was not going to complain. "The latter. Absolutely." He stripped off his clothes, aware that Pepper's eyes hadn't left him at all. Maybe she had forgotten all about the NSFW slip. Maybe she wanted bath sex now.
After, he stepped inside the tub and sat opposite her, extending his legs beside hers underneath the water.
"Are you going to tell me what you were watching when Morgan called you?" she asked, eyes ruthlessly telling Tony that no, she hadn't forgotten that little detail at all.
"I wasn't watching anything," Tony pointed out. "I was reading."
"Erotic fiction?" Pepper raised a brow. She had known him for almost twenty years and she hadn't pegged him to be a reader. Watcher, yes. Reader, no.
"More like erotic fan fiction," Tony admitted with a sheepish smile.
"What?"
"Erotic fan fiction," Tony repeated, "About us."
Pepper sat her wine down on the side and closed her eyes. "I'm convinced I heard that wrong."
"Nope."
Pepper opened her eyes and asked him a little hesitantly, "There are stories—"
"Fan fiction," Tony corrected her because it was important to specify what kind of stories.
"—fan fiction… about us?"
Tony nodded, grinning. "It's called Pepperony Fan Fiction." Pepperony was an amalgamation of their names and Tony found it adorable.
"Oh, my God," Pepper covered her face with her hands. "Is it as bad and cringey as I think it is?"
Tony thought back to the stories he'd read. "Well, most are inaccurate."
Pepper's hands dropped back down to the water. "Why am I not surprised?"
"But the entertainment factor is spot on. Especially the NSFW ones."
"You enjoy reading them, don't you?"
"Absolutely. Did you know that we apparently do a lot of office sex?" His eyebrows danced and Pepper's jaw dropped.
She kicked him softly, the water sloshing around them. "I would never!" Tony might not respect the work place, but Pepper did. She never allowed more than a kiss in her office.
"There are a lot of stories with us doing it over your table, you giving me a blowjob during a meeting—"
"DURING A MEETING?" Pepper almost shrieked and Tony enjoyed seeing how red in the face she was getting. "How would I even manage that?"
"You hide under the table," Tony explained. He's lost count of how many fan fictions end up with either her or him hiding under a table.
"Oh, my God. That is not only so disrespectful but—"
"—but not totally out of the realm of possibility," Tony gave her a look that said, Come on. We should try it. "You could hold a meeting tomorrow and I could come over and—" He felt her move her leg and he held out his hands to stop her. "Please don't kick me in the crown jewels."
She glared at him half-heartedly. "Then stop entertaining the thought that I would even have sex with you in the office where I happen to have glass walls."
"Done. I'll just move on to the other tropes." Pepper relaxed her leg again and Tony continued, "There are fan fiction where we also do it a lot in the garage."
That one didn't get as much of a reaction from her. "Well, they're not wrong. We did do that once or twice."
"There's another one where we do it while I'm in the suit."
"IN THE SUIT? Do those writers even know how dangerous having sex with you in the suit could be? You could burn me or hit me with your blasters." Not once had she even considered having sex with him in the Iron Man suit. Sure, there were times when she was extremely horny and the suit made him look all the more desirable, but she wasn't going to do it while he was wearing the suit!
"Well, to be honest, they're very creative in how they make it happen. Like there is this one story where the suit holds me up and—"
She waved her hands at him to stop. "I don't want to know. God, I can't believe that there are stories out there about us! I feel so violated and embarrassed and—"
Tony rubbed her calf under the water. "Hey, don't get yourself so worked up. Come here."
Pepper sighed but moved to him, sitting on his lap, her back to his chest. Tony hugged her from behind, wrapping his hands around her waist and resting his chin on the space between her neck and shoulder.
"It's not as awful as you think it is."
She snorted. "Of course you would like it."
"Of course I like it! It was frankly about time someone wrote legendary stories about my sexual prowess."
Pepper almost laughed but remembered that out there, a lot of people were thinking about her sex life, writing about her in that intimate, personal way. She wasn't a prude but she also wanted to be taken seriously. What would happen if word got out that there were fictional fan-written sex scandals of her online?
"Easy for you to say. People still take you seriously despite the fact that you have videos on YouTube with your 'crown jewels' on display. But with something as fictional as these stories, I'm gonna be a laughing stock if those ever get out." Why didn't Thanos get rid of sexism instead?
"They won't," Tony promised her.
"How are you so sure?"
"Because only Pepperony fans read those stories and I doubt Chinese investors are going to go digging through the NSFW tag online." Tony squeezed her shoulders and kissed her cheek. "It's not so bad, you know, I think you'd like them."
Pepper doubted that. Reading erotic fiction was nothing, but erotic fiction about herself? That was all kinds of weird. "Tell me one good thing about these fan fiction."
"Well," Tony moved his mouth from her cheek down to her neck, and started to suck on that particularly sensitive spot. Pepper couldn't resist laughing now. Of course he had something like this in mind. "The fanfic writers did give me a couple of ideas."
Pepper hummed. "Did they?"
"Uh-huh. I now have new ways to make you screa—"
"Morgan's asleep." Pepper reminded him. Screaming was absolutely out of the question.
"Satisfied," Tony rephrased. "Let's stick with satisfied."
"As long as we keep it in the bedroom—"
"How about here?"
"Bathroom's good too."