Vogue | Tony Stark

FORTY EIGHT - A RED CARPET

The sky was pitch black in London as Tony Stark walked the red carpet in Leicester Square, the bright lights shining down on him while he smiled and waved, posed for photographs and signed his name on pictures of himself, the backs of mobile phones and even people's skin.

Leonardo DiCaprio's newest film was premiering in England's capital that weekend and after striking up a friendship over a few drinks at Estélla's birthday party the month before, Tony had made it onto the guest list.

He didn't feel out of place in the slightest, in fact, he couldn't remember the last time he'd felt so comfortable and confident. Tony knew deep down that it was because of the stability and happiness that Estélla brought into his life, but he accepted the feeling all the same, marvelling in the spotlight and callings of his name.

He wasn't alone on the carpet, countless other celebrities littering the area that evening, some he didn't know and some that he did. It didn't matter however, since everybody he looked at instantly approached him with a huge smile on their face and an eagerness to shake his hand and kiss his cheek, which only added to the normality Tony felt now his life seemed to be back on track.

His relationship with Esté was still a secret to those outside of their family and friends, and neither of them had any intention of taking things public anytime soon. It hadn't necessarily been a mistake to let the world know about their relationship last time, but the couple had mutually decided to keep things private for as long as they could.

So far, it had been a breeze. They were both wrapped up in work most of the time in the day and in the evenings where Esté wasn't having dinner with fashion designers or walking a runway somewhere in Europe, she and Tony were always together, never sleeping alone if they could avoid it.

They continued on with their date nights in private rooms of exclusive restaurants and bars in New York City and escaped to the Hamptons for a little more freedom. If they ever were spotted together out in a group or leaving the same building, it became second nature to deny, deny, deny.

While Tony had become used to insisting he and Estélla Goldwyn were just friends, it was simply impossible for him to mask the way he looked at her when she stepped out of a car onto the red carpet that evening.

Suddenly none of the attention was on him or on anybody around him. As soon as one of the red-soled high heels hit the floor, nobody cared about a billionaire superhero or the actors and musicians that were conversing about what wine they'd share a bottle of later on that evening, people only cared about her.

And rightly so.

Estélla turned heads effortlessly as she raised a slender hand to wave at the young girls shouting her name from behind barricades, flashing a dazzling smile with a flutter of delicate fingers and a single diamond ring.

In a floor length golden gown, Esté lifted the hem up by pinching the satin at the middle of her thigh, flicking her blown out hair over her shoulder and batting her black lashes for the cameras that went into a frenzy of flashes, every single one pointed in her direction.

She was breathtaking, elegance and class radiating from her lifted cheekbones and bright eyes. Her lips were a dark red and her nails done in a Russian manicure, every inch of her tailored to perfection that looked so simple, so easy, like she hadn't even had to try at all.

Tony wasn't the only one to stop and stare, but he was the only one to swallow a lump in his throat when he looked at her. He was the only one to feel his eyes glaze over with a thin veil of tears, the only one to have his heart start to beat faster and his muscles tense up, to have his soul melt into his bones and the only one to be able to think about nothing besides the way her voice sounded when she told him that she loved him.