seriousfic

Title: I Remember I Told You ‘I Love You’ (but it might’ve just been a dream)
Fandom: Spider-Man BND
Rating: R
Word Count: 4,706
Author’s Note: Betaed by lurkslikefox
Previous Part: Chapter 2
Next Part: Chapter 4
Characters/Pairings: Peter/Felicia, Heroes for Hire, references to Peter/MJ
Summary: Felicia loves everything about her life with Peter. Except that Mary-Jane’s still part of it.

"Hello?"

"Spider?"

"Speaking."

"Where are you? I'm getting some crap reception…"

"Oh, just swinging around. I got tired of having to use pay-phones, so I rigged up a little headset thing for my costume. Fits right under the mask."

"Cool. What gave you the idea?"

"I was waiting for you to call me."

"Aww. Can you pick some clothes up from the dry-cleaner's for me?"

"…this is not what I had in mind when I invented the spider-phone."

"It's a Bluetooth, Peter."

***

The dry-cleaner had probably thought he was a cross-dresser, but Peter had faithfully retrieved Felicia's costume and lugged it to her apartment.

A lesser man might've found Felicia in a state of undress… predictable. Peter found it reassuring, with the 'oh, you just caught me exercising' combo of sports bra and cut-off jogging pants to be novel. And the way she was covered in sweat, tonguing her bottled water… predictable, maybe, but a rut worth getting into.

"Subtle," he said, holding up her costume. He gestured to that famous zipper, which now ran from crotch to neck.

"It'll make bathroom breaks a helluva lot easier. And since I'll be spending more time in the suit, as your partner…" She smirked and took the dry-cleaning bag from Peter, then expertly rended it with her nails. "I can't wait to try it on. Feel the leather…"

"Maybe later," Peter demurred politely. Don't rush into things, don't rush into things, don't rush into things.

Felicia pouted like a girl who'd just been told she couldn't open a single present until Christmas morning. But the smile she had hidden under it showed it was all in good fun. "Later, then." She grabbed a hanger from the door and worked it into her catsuit. There were a few minor cosmetic upgrades – by the sheen, the Initiative had made it unstable molecule armor – but so far Felicia hadn't followed through on her threat to give it a tail.

"I don't know why you keep tampering with perfection."

Felicia raised a protesting hand to her chest. "Spider, you should know from hands-on experience that I've never had any work done."

"I meant the suit, smartass." He gave the offending body part a slap. "Look at it. It's timeless!"

"No such word in fashion, lover. You should know. When was the last time you wore black?"

"Last year. Can't remember why, actually… guess I just felt like a change…" He rubbed the back of his head. "Anyhoo, I prefer the tried and true."

"Well, I'm definitely tried." She laid down across from the hanging suit, pulled her mask out from its super-secret hiding place under her couch. Held it in front of her face. "Don't know about true, though."

"You're one of the truest people I've ever met."

Panic put Felicia's guts in a blender and hit Puree. Was Mary-Jane the truest? Not that Felicia laid claim to the title after that foolishness with the Foreigner… and Flash… and Silver Sable that one time… maybe it was Gwen. Yes, much easier to compete with a dead blonde than a live redhead. Not that it was much of a competition, with him looking at her like that…

Peter made up his mind, took the catsuit and laid it across her like a blanket. "Maybe you should try it on, just to make sure it fits."

"Oh, I know it fits." She slapped her stomach. "All muscle."

"Then… for me."

Not much of a competition at all.

Peter might've blushed to his ears if he had another second. "Unless, you don't want to, or you'd rather…"

She silenced him with a kiss. "Give me a minute. And… would you be offended if I asked you to wear the costume?"

"I thought we talked about polygamy…"

Felicia smiled. "Ooh, this is gonna be good. For the record, I have no problem sharing you with Johnny Storm. Or Daredevil. But not Harry Osborn, the guy's skanky and that's coming from me."

"I was going to say you can't love Spider-Man but not Peter Parker. We're a package deal."

"Not as much fun as I'd've thought. Unless there are clones involved."

"Don't even go there."

"Just put the costume on. And relax, Peter." Felicia flounced her way to her bedroom, deliberately leaving the door open a sliver as she began to strip. "I'll get you out of it soon enough."

***

Felicia had read in a journal once, while she waited irritatedly for a doctor's appointment—(she'd cut her arm on a window and sewn it up herself. The wound kept bleeding until she'd made an appointment. There, she'd calmly waited with a random magazine as others gaped at the soggy mess of linen on her arm.)—about Leonard Samson's foray into superheroic mindset. He'd often found that his subjects felt a rush, a righteousness high as he'd called it, from simply suiting up. Felicia hadn't met Peter yet, had been a mere cat burglar (albeit a fashionable one). She'd decided that if she ever started feeling that rush, it was time to get out. But she'd never felt it.

With Peter's eyes on her, she felt it. And now she could see how he took her in, eyes first widening, then narrowing. And to think she'd once preferred those blank lenses. What an idiot she'd been!

She felt the rush, let it carry her out the window. Peter—Spider burst into the room just in time to see her do up her zipper. "Was it getting hot in there or was it just me?"

"What're you doing?"

'Running." She fired off a grappling line. "Chase me."

Before he could accept her challenge, but knowing he would, she swung.

Felicia finally got what all those noir-vigilantes were on about. If the city were alive, it had turned over and bared its throat to her. The air smelled sweet, like it had just rained, and each rooftop cradled her as she hurdled the skyline.

She stopped under a radio tower, wondering if she'd lost him. But her luck had permanently changed. As she crouched down and watched the skyline for that red and blue, a slight wiiiiip sound made her ears prickle. She turned. Spider-Man was upside-down, hanging from a webline beside her.

"Spider. Hey." She shrugged. "I'm not running anymore…"

He pulled his mask off, tucked it into a compartment on her utility belt. He was going to kiss her. She kissed him first, then slowly stood, going up his flesh to the nape of his neck and then over the embroidery of the suit over his chest. She felt his lips travelling across her cleavage, heard her catsuit being unzipped. There was a blissful tightening; she clung to him as the zipper went as low as it could go. Then she subtly pulled him off the webline. There was a moment of harried, wild motion as they playfully sorted themselves out, then they were in each other's arms.

Felicia reached down and found he didn't need much help getting started.

"You know, if we do this, there'll be no going back. Are you sure a beautiful woman like you really wants anything to do with someone like me, someone without a cent to their name who—"

"Yes."

They really would have to work at that consideration thing. Peter's problem was, he was too polite. He needed to be more assertive. He said what was on his mind as Spider-Man, he needed to do the same thing as Peter Parker.

Of course, they could always work on that later.

He paused, his lips on her ear, the heel of his hand rubbing insistently at her crotch. Quasar was passing overhead. It didn’t stop Peter from tweaking her sex.

“How about someplace a little more private?”

“I wouldn’t mind,” Felicia said, remembering to extricate her claws from the concrete.

He zipped her catsuit up. She put his mask back on. But she took a sly pleasure smoothing it over his lips and he didn’t zip the catsuit very high.

“I know a place,” Peter said.

***

The top floor of the Stark-Fujikawa Building was dedicated to the Top Of The World restaurant, an eatery renowned for the floor-to-ceiling windows that let diners get a bird’s eye view of New York. It was closed for the night, but Felicia was easily able to get the door. Unfortunately, it appeared as if two other superheroes had had the same idea.

“This is the Initiative! Come out with your hands up!” Felicia shouted with her hands cupped around her mouth.

In short order, two of the Young Avengers were fleeing the scene.

“You’re mean,” Peter said.

“You love it.”

“Yeah. I do.” Peter’s arms wrapped around her, working at the zipper. Felicia watched it go down in the reflection of one of those famous windows. His hand slid under the catsuit, cupping her breast, and she moaned as she drifted back against him.

“This is our city, Peter.” She brought his other hand to her lips, pulled off the glove with her teeth, and led it down to her lower belly. “Ours. Yours and mine.” She pushed his hand down.

Felicia could only take a minute of looking past her wanton reflection at the city, feeling his fingers inside her, before she spun around and began scratching at his costume. “Off, off, off!” she chanted. Finally he shoved her against the window and held her there, one-armed, as he pulled what was left of his costume off. Felicia smiled, licked and kissed at his forearm. She’d cut a little too deeply in places and he groaned when his blood hit her tongue.

“You just don’t take ‘wait’ for an answer, do you?”

“If I did, how would I ever get what I wanted?” Felicia asked innocently.

He kissed her without fear or doubt, and that was almost better than being kissed. He was pure hunger, wanting, demanding, and Felicia could already feel the tremors of a truly spectacular orgasm gathering. She was pulled against him, a little more aggressive than she remembered him being (no, thank you, Mary-Plain), and became very aware of his nudity. His musculature felt harder and he had a few new scars, but otherwise it was like she had travelled back in time. This time, she wouldn’t make the same mistake.

“What do you want, Spider?” She managed to collar his lips with her own, hoping he was aware of how… important this moment was. Finally, after all this time… Stars aligned.

She pulled the zipper down all the way, loving how his eyes pulled greedily at her flesh. Then she opened up her catsuit like she was unveiling herself, exposing little tastes of bare skin as slowly as possible. Peter’s teeth were clenched and his entire body was tense.

“You know I’d give you anything.” The catsuit hit the ground. She stepped back, all the way out of it, and her back hit the cool glass.

He towered over her, his sheer presence cornering her. She was looking into his eyes as his fingers skimmed the underside of her breasts, the sides of her thigh. Felicia put one arm up on his shoulder, then the other, so that her fingers laced together lazily behind his neck.

“Anything,” she repeated.

His fingers sparked her wetness and she remembered how fun sex could be, when it was more than a repetitive procession of sports stars and underwear models. Peter had heart, passion. And she loved him. That made a bit of a difference.

“Anything?” he asked, voice overflowing with possibilities. One finger danced impossibly close to her clit without actually touching it.

All she could do was nod.

In a flash his hands were on her thighs, fingers digging in, legs worked open, body interspersing itself until he had her against the glass, he had her suspended over open space, and he was in her. God. Worth that wait.

“I want you to call me Peter.”

They slid together, and Felicia’s legs locked behind his back because she damn sure wasn’t letting him go again. If she turned her head, which she had to do to let him get at that pulse point on the side of her neck, the glass would fog up with her breath. And stay like that.

She laughed and pushed back, letting him know she wasn’t one of those little bitcas who would lie there and take it. No, when he finished with her (not for a good long time, oh God yes), he would know he’d been fucking.

Felicia forced his face up and kissed him. Shoved it down and made him tend to her breasts. She bit his neck, leaving her mark, and raked his back with her nails and did things with her tongue and his ear that would make lesser men come in their pants. But he could take all that and more.

He bore her away from the window and swept the stacked chairs off a table, slammed her down on it because he knew she could take it. Perfect. She was still wearing the bra and panties–stupid, stupid to put them on—if wearing was the proper term for how they’d been pushed aside, but the point became academic when Peter ripped them away.

“Yeah, c’mon, Peter.” She liked the way his name fell off her tongue, the power it had over him. Like a magic spell. “Fuck me, Peter.”

He dove between her legs instead, and even with the death-grip she put on the rim of the table, she couldn’t stop a loud “FUCK!” that half the city must’ve heard. He hadn’t lost any of his enthusiasm for that. But she couldn’t let that stand. She pushed him back with her foot on his shoulder and lunged on him. They hit the ground. She could still take him in a fight, oh yeah (just so long as she had the element of surprise).

He let himself be ridden, not that she would’ve given him much say in the matter, and for the next five minutes, she gave what she would proudly call the best fucking of her life. By the tenth minute, he had rolled them over and she was pretty sure she was having the best sex of her life. By the eleventh, she was absolutely sure.

Five minutes later, she knew that sex was like a puddle next to an ocean when compared with how good it had gotten. Five minutes after that, she knew there was no comparison.

"You think we should… finish up?" Peter whispered in her ear, as lights started to wink on across the street.

“Yeah, finish me,” Felicia agreed readily.

Peter must've been a sadist. He waited until another orgasm detonated her body before he let himself come.

***

Sex in the restaurant was like a puddle-that-turned-into-an-ocean next to a really big ocean once they got back to the apartment. It had soundproofing.

After the fireworks, a few moments passed breathlessly. Felicia rolled off Peter, then glanced at the clock on the bedstand. Time apparently did fly when you were having fun. Thankfully, she'd remembered to Tivo everything.

"Was that it?" she asked Peter.

"Well, we could cuddle…"

"Cuddle, hell! All those times you've lifted a hundred tons to save your family or fought fifty supervillains in a row, and now you're all tuckered out from our little 'lovemaking'?" She crawled over him on all fours. "I've waited six years for this. Don't make me wait any longer."

***

Peter rolled off Felicia, reaching for the Perrier Felicia had thoughtfully left on the bedstand. "That was it."

"Thirteen… always was my lucky number." She put an arm around him and had the mercy to let him catch his breath before, "One for the road?"

Peter glanced at the block on the bedstand. "Felicia, it's three in the AM."

"Don't tell me you have school in the morning."

"Job interview. Front Line." He turned off the lamp that Felicia had turned on once the sun had set. Something about wanting to see him. It had made him feel all warm and gooey.

"Mmm? Oh, that's nice. In the morning, wake me before you shower."

"Were you in a convent those six years?"

"Just as long as you get clean, I don't see why you mind," Felicia said, snuggling up to him. "Really, Front Line. Good on you."

"Yeah, well… you're a good influence."

"Huh?"

"I don't want you to be… embarrassed or anything, dating someone with no job, no prospects. I could do better, but if it was just me… you deserve better. I just want to make you proud."

"You're my friendly neighborhood Spider-Man. How could I not be proud?"

***

Peter had spent a whole minute debating with himself when the news came in. Superhero battle, evacuate Brighton Beach, Heroes For Hire and an unknown assailant. It came in all the time and usually a hero could handle it. If it were something big, or the hero was out of their league, he and others would step in. There was no reason to step in on this one. If it were the Fantastic Four or Daredevil, he wouldn't. But this was Felicia. And he couldn't do anything else while she was in danger.

"Wait, this isn't where I parked my car!" Spider-Man quipped as he knocked the baddie off its feet. It was Juggernaut-big and metallic, either a robot or power armor But its exterior dented when 200 pounds of muscle hit it at 90 MPH.

Misty probably didn't mean to sound ungrateful, but "This party's invitation only, webhead—"

"Thanks for the assist, Spider-Man," Black Cat cut in.

"Any time, Black Cat."

"It's amazing how much sex they're clearly not having," Tarantula commented.

Cool thing about full-face masks, no one could tell you were blushing.

The robot began to get up. Peter reflexively hopped upward onto a street light. The For-Hires took up a byzantine attack formation apropos of Misty shouting an order in Mandarin.

"Wallcrawler, you want to roll with us, you have to follow orders. I don't need a loose cannon on my battlefield.

"Don't worry. Spider's real good at taking directions from a woman," Cat assured her.

Tarantula slapped her forehead.

The robot finally climbed back onto its hydraulic legs. Spider-Man's muscles tensed waiting for Misty to give the signal, but before she could, an EMP grenade zoomed into the robot's chest and electrocuted it.

"Heil heil, the gang's all here," Faux-Paladin snapped as he zip-lined down to the street. He loaded another round into his grenade launcher.

"Paladin. Didn't know there was any money in saving innocent people."

"It all depends on which innocent people. A good touchstone is exactly how innocent they are. Someone of the not-so-innocent variety is paying me a… how would you put it, Cat?... an obscene amount of money to return this little asset intact, hence the EMP-"

"Watch out! It's still moving!" Peter hit the robot with a stop sign. A lot. Paladin glared at him angrily as nuts and bolts flew.

"Okay, think that got it."

Paladin stopped gritting his teeth long enough to open his mouth…

"No it didn't!" Peter renewed the assault on the robot.

"You know, the bounty on you is almost as high as what Oscorp was willing to pay for that robot."

Peter gestured for the Heroes For Hire to hold back. "Go for it. Please. Pretty please. With sugar on top."

Paladin went for his gun. Peter webbed his hand to the holster. Lesson learnt, Paladin fired the wrist blaster on his other glove. Peter leapt over him. A second blast aimed to land him in two pieces. Peter fired a webline behind Paladin and pulled himself out of the way. The ground shook with his landing. In an instant, Peter had Paladin's free hand webbed to the back of his underwear. Then he slapped a glob of sticky webbing to Paladin's shoulder.

"Oh, I can't watch," Humbug said, peeking through his fingers.

Peter jerked Paladin's hand up, taking Paladin's underwear with it, until he had securely affixed it to Paladin's shoulder. "Melvined."

"You just made the biggest mistake of your life. And over a woman!"

"Dude, you sound like you just huffed a Hinderberg's worth of helium."

"Think because you've been crawling up her waterspout…"

Black Cat kicked Paladin in the groin and kissed Peter, in that order.

"My hero," she whispered, forehead resting against his. "Got time for us to grab coffee?"

"No can do," he suddenly remembered. "Job interview! Wish me luck!"

She held onto him for a moment. "Remember, don't think about the Parker Luck! Don't even think the words!" She gave him another kiss, one that made the first kiss look like a sisterly peck.

"Cat, there are cameras."

"Who do you think's gonna care?"

***

Mary-Jane knew it would hurt when Peter moved on, but not as much as it did. Maybe it would be easier if she could move on too.

***

Felicia was waiting for him when he got back to his apartment, eager to help him take off his tie and shoes. Peter thought it was probably desperately unfeminist to enjoy being manhandled into his Laz-E-Boy, then handed a bottle of milk. Felicia did have her own, though, which she clinked against his. So it probably balanced out.

"You got the job?"

Peter smiled. "I got the job."

"Great!" Felicia pulled a paper towel off a plate on the coffee table. "Then these are celebratory cupcakes rather than condolence cupcakes."

"You cooked?"

"There were instructions on the side of the box. But you're right, it does seem a little paltry." Carrying the plate, she sat down on his lap. "What else can we reward you with?"

***

Peter had forgotten how much he liked sharing a bed with someone, how much he hated being alone. Mary-Jane tended to get giggly after sex, but Felicia went to a serene place of semi-sleep, hum/purring contentedly with the rise and fall of her chest. Peter watched her, eyes following the bars of light that escaped the closed blinds and painted her body. A couple of them highlighted scars, but most touched upon the clean line of a rigorously-exercised muscle. She was surprisingly Amazonian under the fetish suit.

"Not much for pillow talk anymore?" he asked, holding locks of her silver hair loosely and letting it seep through his fingers. It felt different than it had before; she must've changed shampoos.

"I think we just said all that needed to be said." With distaste, she plucked a red hair off her pillow and dropped it to the side. "What say we stay in bed all day, go out to fight crime at night, and in the meantime order in?"

"You're a genius."

Felicia relaxed into her pillow. "I know."

The phone rang. Felicia groaned in aggravation and buried herself in the pillow to block out the noise. Peter answered before it could ring twice. "Hello?"

"Peter. You sound tired. Sleeping in?"

Peter sat up, shifting the phone closer to his ear. "Mary-Jane."

Felicia peeked out from the pillow she was smothering herself with. She grabbed Peter's free hand and squeezed it like it was the only thing keeping her from falling.

"I saw the newscast, so you don't have to…"

"I didn't want you to find out like that," Peter said as Felicia's nails bit into his hand.

"No, I was… glad to see you back out there, as Spider-Man. Even if it was with her. Not knowing you were out there, protecting people… it was like I'd lost you. Become a widow." Peter had never heard speech slogging so slowly out of Mary-Jane. Like she was bleeding. "But… I didn't think it would hurt. I've seen other people, you've seen other people… she's a lucky girl. You were always such a gentleman."

The light burned across Felicia's skin as she receded under the covers. Peter felt her hot breath on the skin covering his hipbone. She was still holding his hand, but now he could feel the pebbled flesh of her areola on the back as she held it to her breast.

"MJ, you can understand how it's weird for you to be calling me here."

"I'll understand if you hang up."

A furnace-hot exhale drifted across his thigh.

"No."

Teeth worried at the edge of his hip. Peter reached down to stop her and felt the frenzied quicksilver of her soft hair, than a moist suction at his fingers, a tongue laving across his knuckles.

"I'm calling because I've been having these dreams. Well, they're more like nightmares. It's like a part of myself has been stolen. Without it I'm cold and alone and… screaming."

Felicia's muggy breath moved across his anatomy, making Peter wonder for a moment if Felicia had ever gotten someone off without touching them.

"I think I've had that same dream." Peter made another grab for Felicia's hair and this time he got a firm grip. She mewled in a combination of outrage and arousal as he wrenched her head back. "Listen, why don't you go see Dr. Strange in the morning? He's a friend of mine and a specialist in these kinds of things."

"In the morning? Peter, it's the middle of the afternoon."

Peter's strategy for holding Felicia off hit a snag: Her hands were free. And very, very soft. "Guhhh… I meant tomorrow morning. Hold on, MJ, I have a call on the other line." He pressed what he hoped was HOLD and jammed the phone into the mattress as he dragged Felicia up for a kiss that would hopefully prove whatever she was trying to prove. When they broke, a bar of light shined on her Cheshire cat smile. She lovingly, territorially, settled her head on his chest. Peter picked up the phone and depressed what did actually turn out to be HOLD. "Sorry to keep you waiting. Telemarketer."

"How annoying."

"You have no idea." Peter returned to petting Felicia's hair. "Anything else I can do for you?"

"Peter." Even across the phone line, Peter could feel her gathering her courage. "Do you ever miss us?"

Peter's mouth went dry. He knew the truth; he knew what she wanted to hear. Of course I do. Come back to me. If only he had a few moments to breathe in her question, to breathe out an answer that wouldn't hurt either of the two women he'd been lucky enough to love. But Felicia grabbed the phone from him.

"You tell me how much he misses you, Mary-Plain."

Peter felt like he would die during every moment of the long, shocked silence that followed. When the line finally went dead, it was both relief and agony. "That was uncalled for."

"She just happens to phone you after our little tryst goes public? Come off it, Peter. Mary-Jane had her chance. Now you're with me. All these years, I never made a play for you. Not even during your separation. Not even when you thought she was dead. Because I knew that the man I fell in love with would never cheat on anyone. Not even on her memory. If that's the way I got you, you wouldn't be worth having. But now we're together, the right way. Finally. Don't let her come between us again."

Peter rolled out of bed. "I should get moving. I have work tomorrow, and staying in bed all day with my girlfriend won't make for a very good first impression."

Felicia was up as well. She opened the blinds and Peter's breath took a leave of absence. As good as she looked in the dark, she looked even better in the light. Felicia grabbed up their discarded clothes, angrily throwing his into a pile in the corner, slinging hers over her shoulder. By the time he was dressed in fresh clothes, she had gathered up everything but her left sandal and calmed considerably. Her bra and panties were on, the catch of her bra hanging down her shoulder blades.

"Call me that again."

"You're my girlfriend."

She kissed him before she goosed him. "And don't you forget it, lover."