Chapter 1
''Honestly, Bella. You're not making things easy for yourself. Just wait till your father hears about this latest stunt of yours'' Pepper warned as she exited the conference room with the family lawyer.
Bella rolled her eyes and stood up from the uncomfortable plastic chair she'd been sat in for five hours until they'd finally gotten hold of her dad's girlfriend. Pepper thanked the mousy little man who was her family's lawyer before they went their own separate ways.
''Oh wow, no media coverage? Guess in some way, it has to pay off being a Stark'' Bella sarcastically retorted, clicking her tongue until Pepper shot her a look over her shoulder.
Pepper opened the door to a waiting car, frowning disapprovingly before following Bella into the car and slamming the door shut. ''You are walking on a very fine line, Bella'' Pepper warned, re-iterating what her dad had repeatedly drilled into her before he'd shipped her off.
''What's he doing to do, Pepper? Send me to another boarding school or actually try and be a parent?'' Bella snapped, turning and looking out the window at the fleeting landscape while their car raced through the city.
Pepper merely shook her head and turned back to her PDA, resuming the work that she'd been in the middle of until she'd received a phone call that Tony's wayward, rebellious and headstrong daughter had been arrested yet again. Tony Stark was a brilliant man; no-one could deny that but his way of parenting his only child simply wasn't working. The parenting of Isabella came down to a simple approach. Either she listened to Pepper or Tony sent her to yet another European boarding skill.
Pepper could see it, as clear as day, that Isabella had grown to resent her father along with everyone and everything that was linked to him over the years.
It made her heart sore to know such things. Tony loved his daughter; he'd loved her fiercely from the moment he'd laid eyes on her but he simply didn't know how to be her parent.
The fault didn't fully lie with Tony. Pepper hated to speak ill of the dead but equal blame had to be laid on the actions of the deceased Sara Rothing and Anna Ross-Rothing, Isabella's mother and grandmother. Sara had only been 18 years old when she'd found herself pregnant with the only Stark heir which had immediately set her mother, Anna at odds with Maria and Howard Stark. Tony and Sara had done their best in keeping the peace between their warring parents until Sara had given birth on a hot June day. From the moment they'd seen her, both Stark men had been wrapped around Isabella's tiny finger.
Sadly it wasn't to last.
In December, a mere 6 months after Isabella was born, Howard and Maria Stark lost their lives in a car crash that sent shockwaves through an entire nation and thrust Tony Stark into the limelight as CEO of Stark Industries. With the responsibilities of managing and running such a huge company such as Stark Industries within months of his parents' passing, Tony had become distant and aloof towards both Sara and Isabella.
Just after Isabella's 1st birthday that her father hadn't attended as he'd had to be present as part of a press conference for Stark Industries, Sara had packed her bags and those of her daughter's before leaving to start afresh with her daughter. For those next couple of vital months and years, Tony Stark found himself absent from his daughter's life as she grew up away from the hype of Stark Industries and her father.
It wasn't until disaster struck on a warm April day that Isabella was thrust back into her father's life. On April 20th 2006, Sara and Anna Rothing lost their lives in a tragic collision on the highway with a lorry whereupon on arrival at the hospital, both were pronounced dead.
At the tender age of 6, Isabella found herself back in the care of a father who'd been a distant figure in her life over the years, always left standing on the sidelines as his ex and her mother raised his child without his input.
Tony's reaction to the death of Sara had been to pour himself into his work and partying harder than ever, leaving a heart-broken Isabella to the care of Pepper and various nannies.
