A.N – So sorry for not updating. Life got hectic and I became quite unwell. Please leave a review to let me know what you think though.

Disclaimer – I do not own anything you recognise. The Avengers and the characters therein, belong to Marvel.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Steve watched over Dot while Nadia poured herself into reading all the files that Tony, Natasha and Clint had seized. After running all the tests she could think of, Nadia had declared that there was nothing out of the ordinary about Dot and had immediately jumped into the research. Steve had taken over looking after the infant, with strict instructions from his girlfriend on exactly what to do.

Clint had gone to catch up on some sleep somewhere in the building, whilst Tony was using JARVIS to try and locate Dot's family. Natasha was on the other side of Nadia, typing away furiously on the laptop they'd stolen. Dot was guzzling formula down happily, while Steve sat on the ground next to her, smiling softly. He glanced over at his girlfriend and studied her intently.

Her glasses perched on her nose, hair up in a messy bun, reading highly classified documents and glancing over at Dot every now and again to check on her. Earlier, Nadia had looked so maternal with Dot in her arms, so natural. Something had sparked in Steve's chest at the sight, and he found himself fantasising about having a family with Nadia someday. Wondering if they would have his eyes, or her hair. It had all come to the forefront of his mind, he had painted the pretty picture so easily that it scared him a little. It wasn't that he was afraid of commitment, quite the opposite, really. But that didn't mean that it was time for him to start thinking about things like babies and….and marriage.

'Find anything interesting?' He asked the doctor, dropping his gaze to look down at Dot. The baby was staring at him intensely as she drank.

'Loads.' Nadia replied, not looking up from the pages. 'There are dozens of files on just the subjects themselves. Detailed records of their families, the types of experiments each were subject to, and then there are the formulas, the equipment designs, the results…these guys were thorough.'

'Try not to sound so impressed.' Natasha droned.

'I'm not. I'm disgusted.' Nadia replied sitting back in her chair and taking her glasses off to rub her eyes tiredly. 'How people could do this to kids…'

'It makes sense. If the tests are successful and they create enhanced people, then it'd be easier to train them from infancy than from adulthood.'

Nadia crossed her arms. 'Who's admiring whom, now?'

'I'm not. It's just the most rational thing to do. It's what I'd do.'

'Well,' Steve cut in, 'I'm glad you're not in charge of an illegal child experimentation and trafficking ring, Natasha.'

'We should destroy these notes.' Nadia said, gesturing to the mess on the table. 'That way nobody can try to recreate the experiments.'

'And there's nothing in there that can lead us to Dot's parents.' Natasha added with a sad frown. Steve took the now empty bottle from the infant and wiped her chin with a cloth.

'Hopefully Tony has found something.'

'That would be a negative on that, Captain.' Tony swaggered into the room, hands in his pockets. He pointed at Dot. 'Don't let that soil the rug. Pepper would kill me.'

'That, has a name.' Nadia glared at the billionaire. 'It's Dot.'

'What? You couldn't name her something like Gigi? Or Spot? Personally, I like Rover.'

'She's not a dog, Stark.' Steve scowled.

'You should have thought of that before you nicknamed her Dot.'

'Did you find anything, Tony?' Natasha drawled with a lazy smirk, sitting back in her chair with her arms folded. 'Or did you just come out here to insult someone who has a higher IQ than you do?'

Steve chuckled at Tony's indignant face. Nadia pushed her chair back and jumped over the back of the couch and landed next to Steve. She sat beside him and picked the baby up, smiling at the delighted grin on Dot's little face.

'The only thing I could find on her was a birth certificate, but the names of the birth parents aren't listed.'

'Who signed the certificate?' Steve asked, leaning back on his hands.

'Doctor Lance Oxford. But he was murdered six months ago.'

Nadia frowned, letting Dot fiddle with the necklace Steve had given her. The doctor and captain glanced at each other, sharing a look that communicated their unease. Dot squirmed in Nadia's arms and the doctor let go, letting the baby hover in mid-air, crossing her now free arms in front of her.

'This doesn't feel right,' She said, 'Whoever took her, wherever she came from…this is something dark.'

'You mentioned you had contacts in human trafficking rings.' Natasha said, brushing her red hair out of her eyes. 'How?'

'I poked around in a lot of things I shouldn't have trying to find some trace of my family. I made some friends along the way. You'd be surprised what a diamond or a little chip of Vibranium will go for in the right circles.'

'How did you get your hands on Vibranium?' Steve speculated. He was beginning to wonder just how much he didn't know about the girl he was in love with.

'I know people.' She waved an indifferent hand in the air. Dot flew gently around the coffee table, not so rough as to make her sick, but enough to entertain her for the time being.

'Did you contact them?' Steve wondered.

Nadia shook her head. 'I tried one. Line was disconnected. People like that won't want to associate with me now that I've joined the Avengers. Not to mention, the people that run these sorts of rings are ruthless. They'll want payback because we shut down one of their facilities.'

'So how do we find the little stinker's family?' Tony asked, glancing at Dot who was giggling as she zoomed around the room.

Nadia shrugged, defeated. She leaned against Steve, who put an arm around her instinctively. 'I have no idea.'

'What should we do?' Steve asked Natasha. The spy shrugged.

'We should turn the case over to SHIELD. They can find Dot a temporary home with one of the agents until someone can find out where she came from.'

Steve looked over at Dot, who flew back into Nadia's outstretched arms and nestled there happily, turning her little head to gaze at Steve. He was going to miss Dot. They'd only been around the little girl for a few hours, but he had grown attached to the child. Turning her over to SHIELD custody would be difficult, but they could ensure that she was safe and looked after.

Nadia looked about as happy with this new arrangement as he felt, but they both agreed to the plan. Steve got up to follow Tony to make the arrangements and Natasha came over to sit with Nadia on the rug.

'She's cute.' Steve heard the spy say.

'Want to hold her?'

'Uh…sure.' Natasha replied after a moment of hesitation.

'Who would have thought?' Tony said with a raised eyebrow. 'Black Widow…scared of a baby.'

Steve didn't fail to see the hilarity in the situation. His eyes fixed on his girlfriend as she played with the child, a bright, radiant smile on her face. Steve couldn't quite believe that she was dating him. A dame like her, with him. She was so beautiful and she didn't even try, her smiles were enough to get his heart racing and his mind whirring. Seeing her playing with a baby, so happy and making the whole thing look so normal, made his chest feel like it was expanding to accommodate his swelling heart.

'You ever think about having kids?' Steve asked and Tony shifted away uncomfortably.

'Cap, I'm flattered and all, but I'm just not interested in you that way.'

Steve rolled his eyes. 'I meant you and Pepper.'

Tony sighed. 'I don't think the world needs another Stark running around and neither Pepper or I are exactly parental in nature. I can barely keep my relationship with her on stable grounds. Adding a kid to the mix doesn't seem like the most responsible thing in the world.'

'Tony Stark thinking responsibly…what is the world coming to?'

'Don't get used to it.'

Saying goodbye to Dot had been harder than Steve thought. Especially for Nadia. She'd fussed over the child for a good ten minutes before allowing the Agent to take Dot away. Fury had promised she'd be safe and well cared for until their team could find her family, but Nadia had still let a few tears slip out. Steve's heart had hurt at seeing Nadia so upset, and watching Dot go had hurt him more deeply than he thought. They'd both agreed to stay in the Avengers Tower for the time being, mostly because they were both so tired that moving to either of their apartments was out of the question.

He watched her stumble around the room a bit, dragging herself into the bathroom to change and brush her teeth before falling into bed, snuggling into the covers. He followed her example, sliding into the bed and laying on his back, the softness of the mattress a constant surprise for him.

'What is it?' Nadia mumbled, her face buried in a pillow and her eyes closed. He turned his head towards her, a small frown marring his forehead.

'Pardon?'

'What's bothering you?' she said and hurried on, 'And don't say it's nothing, because I can tell. Your body is all tense and your breathing is irregular…so tell me what's wrong.'

Steve sighed, running a hand over his face. He didn't know how to say it, where to begin? 'You never told me all of that.'

'All of what?'

'The child trafficking and all the work you did to find your family.' Steve said, looking down at her. Nadia's grey eyes stared up at him, unblinking and stormy. 'There is so much about your past that I don't know.'

Nadia huffed out a breath and shifted, surprising Steve when she got up and straddled his hips, taking his face in her hands gently. 'My past doesn't matter. It's in the past for a reason.'

'It does matter. It made you who you are.'

Her eyes scanned his face and Steve tried not to think about how beautiful she was. He couldn't afford to get distracted. 'What do you want to know?'

'Everything.' His reply was instantaneous and honest. Nadia sat back she pursed her lips, as if unsure where to start. Steve watched the way she tucked her hair behind her ears and wrinkled her nose like a rabbit.

'When I was eighteen I had access to my foster care file. There wasn't much in there, things that I already knew. So, I hired a private investigator. Saved all the money I could from a waitressing job I'd gotten to pay for it, but she didn't find anything either. So, I started looking in less than savory places. I met people in the drug business, thinking my parents may have been caught up in that…but nothing. Then I started looking in illegal child experimentation and child trafficking. I found a few leads, but nothing solid. I managed to save loads of kids from terrible lives, but I didn't find anything out about myself. So, after two years of looking, travelling all over the world and following what must have been dozens of leads…I gave up.'

'You gave up?' Steve replied, eyebrows rising.

'Yes. I decided it wasn't worth spending my life chasing after people who didn't want me.' Nadia took his hand. 'I decided the delving into dangerous things just to find answers was not worth my life. I focussed on getting my medical degree and helping people who really needed it. I focussed on building some kind of life for myself. Even though I never had friends or someone close, I felt better. Lighter. Like I could finally crawl out of this hole I'd fallen into trying to find out who I was.'

'So, you didn't find anything?'

She hesitated. 'I…I did find something. One lead. Someone who was so deep in world affairs and covert operations that nobody knew who it was. Somebody who was so elite that they called him the Ghost. I thought if I could find this person, they could give me answers.'

'Did you find this Ghost?'

Nadia nodded. 'I did.'

'Was he helpful?'

'Not in the way I expected.' Steve noticed that she was being vague and decided not to push it. He ran his hands up her arms and noticed her shiver.

'Come on. Get in before you freeze.'

With a grateful smile, Nadia slipped in the covers and cuddled up to Steve. This was the only way he could sleep in a bed; when she was next to him. Otherwise he would just sleep on the floor with a pillow and blanket.

'You're not mad that I kept that all from you, are you?'

'Of course not.' Steve said. 'Like you said, it's in the past.'

'I guess…I'd like to know more about your childhood too, you know.'

Steve smiled, breathing in the scent of her shampoo. 'We can talk in the morning.'

'Okay. Goodnight Steve.'

'Sweet dreams doll.'