9. Two Years Later

Francis (Frank) Booker had a reputation. It was a good one, in the right circles, and while it kept him on the road more often than not it paid really fucking well. Money could buy you anything, and for the right price, Frank Booker could take care of problems no one else was able to solve.

Which was how, against all fucking odds in the world, he came to be standing in fucking Iron Man's garage. With Iron Man. Who had just kidnapped him.

"You kidnapped me!"

"You're Frank Booker, the Car Guy, right?" Iron Man stomped around the garage.

"I was fucking asleep you asshole!"

"Yeah, sorry about that. Look, can you help or not?"

"What the hell are you talking about?" Frank kept yelling, because it seemed to have some effect on the big lunking metal guy.

"The car! The car!" Iron Man yelled back.

"You're Tony Fucking Stark! Fix your own goddamn car!"

"I can't get the parts! How's it supposed to be original if I have to machine half the damn thing myself?" Stark flipped the face plate up. "You're the 'Car Guy'." The finger quotes looked ridiculous when done by huge metal hands. "A friend of a friend told Happy—my driver—who told me: you can get the parts. Any part. Even, and especially even, if they are not for sale. And I need these parts."

"Seriously? Tony Stark wants me to steal the car parts he can't buy?"

"Yes! Exactly! Finally we are on the same page. Here's the car—"

"Whoa there. It's not like…holy fuck, that's a Super Bee 426." Frank stopped in front of the violently purple muscle car, a Dodge rarity from 1968.

Stark grinned. "Hemi."

"Oh holy fuck." Frank sat on his ass and the floor, uncaring of dignity. "No. Impossible. All 125 are accounted for."

"No, they aren't. The one everyone thinks is #98 is a composite. THIS is the body, frame and most of the engine for #98. But it won't be #98 until I get the rest of it."

"Let me guess: the asshole who has them can't sell them to you without revealing his own fraud, and you won't sell to him."

"Bingo." Stark looked really pleased by that.

"Fuck." Frank stood up, shaking his head. This was a bad idea all the way around, and that was saying something when Tony Stark was willing to foot the bill.

Stark sighed heavily. "Look, I'm a damn superhero. I can't go steal the parts myself. The organization I don't actually work for kind of frowns on that shit anyway, and my so-called 'handler' would taze me and spend the week watching Supernanny while I drool on the carpet. Direct quote, by the way."

"Hey, I like Supernanny."

"Jesus, don't be such a freak. Can you do the job?"

"Sure." Frank shrugged. "It's not the job that bothers me, it's the fallout."

"What fallout? You steal the fake, strip the parts I need, deliver the goods and get paid three times their street value."

"Five times their value as appraised by my guy at Sotheby's, motherfucker."

"What? Highway robbery!"

"You're a billionaire. Bite me."

Stark shrugged. "Fine. What's the fallout you're worried about?"

"This is a high-profile job. People would find out. People would know and I don't need that kind of attention."

"Seriously? That's it? Consider it taken care of. Part of the deal: I'll strip your history."

Frank blinked. "What?"

"You want a fresh start? Take the money from this job and retire? Give me a ten percent discount, and I'll throw in wiping your existence off the face the earth."

"It's not this existence I'm really worried about," Frank hedged, but Stark was as smart as the tabloids claimed he wasn't.

"Gotcha. Alias of an alias. Whatever, just give me the identity you want gone and it's done."

"How?"

"What is this, a fucking job interview? Look, trust me, it will be gone—birth certificate, tax records, arrest records, speeding tickets, library fines. Gone. So take the damn deal before I ask for 15% off."

Frank knew that even with a 15% discount, the money from the job would get him a nice piece of beach in Thailand, while the rest of his money stashed in off-shore accounts would set him up for life as a beach bum with no history and nothing to run from ever again. Clint Barton stuck out his hand and took the deal.