They leave them alone, for the most part.
She's not sure how long they've been there. Nora tries to store up little details, to figure out where they are to report to Tony when he does finally rescue them, but so far, nothing is working. She thinks they're underground, and Peter is somehow convinced that they're just outside of New York (apparently he was awake after they got abducted), and thanks to one of the guards taking pity on them, they know for sure that MJ is safe.
They're catching scraps of information they aren't supposed to know, like how they're really just playing a waiting game to see if Tony and the Avengers will take the bait. Or how the only end game for these people is that the Avengers end, preferably in a painful fashion, and they'll be happy with whatever consequences they have to face because of it.
"We might die," She says, around a time that they think if lunch but could be in the middle of the night. "They might kill us, and no one will ever know what happened to us."
"I'm not scared." They've taken to holding hands any chance they get, even if the guards come along and kick them apart any time they notice. He's got steel in his voice now, a kind of resolve that she hadn't yet heard from him. "I'll get you out of here, I promise."
She doesn't ask him how he planned to do it.
They take her out of her cage ten hours later.
She can keep track of time through the changing of the guards, counting the number of times they pace up and down the long hallway, hearing the door squeak open when one replaces the other. Time blurs together after a while, but for now, she learns to know when night turns into day.
Right now is definitely night, when the door swings open and a leather gloved hand reaches down to yank her out of sleep, holding her upright as she catches her bearings. "Get up now, love." This is the nice one, the one she can count on for a bit of news and a scrap of the food his wife packs him in his lunch. "The boss wants to see you."
That's what they call Evangeline's mom. The boss.
"Why?" She blinks against the harsh light, still surprising even after however long she'd been here. "why does she want to see me?"
"I don't ask questions." His hands are heavy on her shoulders, but gentle, and it doesn't take much prompting before she turns toward him and lets him put on the blindfold. There's always a blindfold. "I just do what I'm told."
She sighs, and thinks about calling out a good bye to Peter, but at the sight of him sleeping in the corner of his room, she thinks better of it. "Let's get this over it."
She's always blindfolded when they take her places, led through hallways full of twists and turns, then up elevators and down steps. Nora thinks she could be able to make it out, at least to the upper levels, but from there, she'd have no idea where to turn. She supposes that that is the point of the blindfold.
When she enters the room, there is no bucket of ice cold water, just a long oak table covered in food, one bare lightbulb hanging down over it. Evangeline's mother sat at one end of it, and after staring for a moment, Nora took a seat at the other.
"Sit." Margot (Evangeline's mom) waved a hand out in front of her. Her ring glinted in the light, sparkles shining off the diamonds. "Eat. Drink with me."
It's a proper dinner, the sort of fancy she had been expecting to be forced to have every night when she first moved in with Tony. She doesn't make a move for any of the food, not trusting it enough to put her guard down even a moment, but she does bring the crystal wine glass to her lips, just to play the part. She doesn't swallow anything. "What's this for?"
"Do I need a reason to entertain my guest?" Margot tried for a smile, but it cracked and wavered pretty fast, and she sighed. Somehow, Nora thinks that Margot actually likes her, would have admired her, maybe, in different circumstances. "Just eat, Nora. I promise we won't hurt you."
At the moment, Nora thinks, but its been so long since she got to relax, when she just got to sit and eat, that she gave in. She took small mouthfuls of everything, chewing slowly, eyes dancing around the room like it could all be taken away any moment. And it could, replaced with a sudden shove down into ice water or a hand cracking across her face, the kind of gifts they give her to try and force complacency. It hadn't worked well so far- maybe this is her new approach.
"You're father isn't cooperating." The rbeak in the scrape of silverware is so sudden that it catches her off guard, and just for a moment Nora is confused, about to point out that her father is dead, before she remembers Tony. "It's quite frustrating."
"Weapons of mass destruction don't respond very well to blackmail." She raises the glass to her lips again, mouth pressed closed around the rim to keep from drinking any of it. That's one thing she won't do. "You should have known that going in."
"Maybe. But the rules change, when a child is involved." She raises a hand to the chain on her neck, fingers tipping down to hold the locket. Nora imagines there's a picture of her son in there, and whenever her resolve starts to melt, all Margot has to do is touch that and be ready for anything it takes. "But now we're at a predicament."
Margot stands and walks around the table, sits down again right beside her. "We told the whole world we were going to kill you, you know." She studies the table instead of looking at Nora, like this ashamed her. "That we would kill you and broadcast it if Mr. Stark didn't come through. The public was properly horrified. But now we're in a bit of a mess, you see. I didn't intend to kill you, I thought I could let you walk out of here a little bruised but no worse for wear, but now I'll have to show everyone I'm a woman of my word." She rubbed at her temples, like the prospect of Nora's immenent exuection was giving her a headache. Maybe it was. Murders had to be stressful. "But we don't have to do that."
"Of course we don't." Nora was angry, angrier than she had been the whole time she was here, angry at this woman who fought for war and called it peace. "We just need Tony to spill some government secrets."
"No. We just need you to tell us some of his." It took Nora a moment to understand, but when she did, it wasn't unresaonable- she knew passcodes, and personal information, and files, and had had acess to every single avenger. Information on Vision alone would be a gold mine. "Join us, Nora, and you can live. We don't have to tell anyone. We can pretend you escaped, saved yourself and Peter, and you can be the girl who walked away all over again."
Her voice was soft, seductive with its promise. Nora thought about saying yes, how easy that would be, how she wouldn't ever have to tell anyone what she had done. But then she thought of Bucky holding her that night of the party, and Tony raising his glass in a toast as he told everyone she was officially part of the family, and Pepper's smile when she had said yes, and knew she couldn't do that to them. "I can't." She didn't cry, and her voice didn't waver.
"Why?" It was the voice of a woman in over her head, who couldn't understand how she got there. "Why won't you?"
"They're my family. What wouldn't you do for family?"
There's a beat of silence, where Margot and Nora stared at each other, and for once, Nora was sure that Margot envied her, just a little. "Get her out of here." This wasn't directed at nora, but the next sentance was. "The next time you leave that room, you'll be coming here to die. I hope you reconsider by then."
She gets thrown back in her cell, so hard that she stumbles and falls to her knees, just more bruises to add to her growing collection. It was the mean guard this time, the one that liked to kick at her and Peter. She had been personally escorted back by Margot, who waits by the cell as the bars slam shut. Nora scrambles to her feet and runs to the bars.
"Let Peter go." She searches her face, for the person she saw back in that room, the one who didn't want to kill a child. "If you have to kill me, just let him go."
Margot studied her face for a moment, then nods. "Of course." He rests her hand on Nora's cheek for a moment, just like Evangeline had, a comfort. "He won't be harmed."
She was lying. Nora had been here long enough to tell that much, at least.
They come for her sooner than she thought they would.
She's ripped out of her cell, dragged by her hair and arms out into the hallway. Peter is up in an instant, yanking at the bars, and even though she knew it couldn't be true, in her head Nora imagined them bending, molding to his touch. "Nora!" He pounds his fist against the wall, and then throws himself at the door, tries to break it open. "Don't touch her! Let her go!"
"Peter!" She breaks free, just for a moment, and runs to him. He grabs at her, and even though its stupid, even thoguh its pointless, they clutch at each other, his hands cradling her face and her arms wrapping around as much of him as she could reach. "Peter, I'm sorry. I'm sorry- I'm so sorry."
"What's going on?" She never did tell him what they were going to do, couldn't bring herself to tsay the words and ruin their last night of peace. "What are they going to do to you?"
"Nothing, nothing Peter, everything's going to be fine, okay, I promise." She kisses him, which didn't really work but was the thing she wanted at the moment, and she would remember that when they killed her, the tears warm on their faces and the metal of the bars cold where it brushed their skin. "It's going to be alright."
She got ripped away from him then, down the hall into that elevator. They didn't bother with the blindfold, which is how she knew that Margot wasn't kidding this time, that this was the end, and she kicked and screamed and punched with everything she had left, even though she had promised herself that when the time came, she would meet it with her head held high, dignity still intact.
"You're a liar, little girl." It was the mean one, the one that hit her as hard as he could and always held her underwater long than the others, the one with the sour breath and the tobacco teeth. "You're not going back to him anytime soon."