Scenarios

A/N: (Avenger's End Game spoiler alert): As a Steggy fan, I was happy to see that at least in one timeline Peggy and Steve got their happy ending. As Cartson fan and writer, I am grateful for fanfiction, so that I can write about all the other possible story lines.

Anywho, this scenario was prompted by an anonymous Guest's request 'to read Angie's reaction to Peggy being a agent at the SSR. Or something along those lines.' It was more like 'something along those lines'. I could not help myself ; )

Angie the All-Knowing

"You should go for it."

The blond Director of Strategic Scientific Reserve turned on his barstool to coolly stare at her with a raised questioning eyebrow, and then in case she misinterpreted his expression, he asked with deceptive mildness, "Go for what?"

Angie had to give it to the man that was English's almost equal – he didn't play dumb.

In her opinion, there was nothing more annoying than when a man discounted her intelligence by condescendingly trying to play her off with such an obvious ploy.

But Blondie had apparently learned his lesson with her and had her measure, so instead his crystalline blues eyed her challengingly, daring her to spell out exactly what she meant.

Never one to back down from a dare, she tilted her head in the decided direction of a certain curvaceous brunette agent, who was chatting and drinking under the table a young Happy Commando and a big, burly, mustachioed Dopey Commando, while Howard Stark laughed and probably placed bets with yummy Agent Rick Ramirez as to who was going to pass out first.

Hers was on the young guy. English could probably take the big fella too, judging by the goofy grins on both of the males' very red faces.

When Blondie was able to finally tear his gaze away from English's dazzling, but still demurely cunning smile, she replied exasperatedly, "I meant, that you should go and throw your hat into the ring. That scientist bloke did, and all the saints know that dear Danny-boy did before you ever got the gumption. And if you're not careful, Director, someone else is going to try, possibly succeed, and you'll miss your chance – again."

She had thought that her reminding him about his rivals for English's affection would have goaded him into action or revealed why he was continuing to gaze at Peggy Carter from afar rather than getting off his ass and doing something about it.

If it was the latter, she fully expected him to protest that he wasn't good enough for her – never realizing that English wasn't some dame to be placed on a pedestal (and didn't want to be) but was a human being who put her pants on the same way that they do (but was just better at kicking ass and taking names than they were). That was the first mistake poor Agent Sousa had made, and sadly, it hadn't been the last before her friend had called it quits and returned to New York permanently.

But no, Blondie's ever-expressive eyebrow (that she really wanted to shave off right about now) just arched a little more, as he verbally parried, drawling sardonically:

"What I want to know is, how does a sweet young actress like you end up at a shindig like this?"

Blondie had a point. Even though this party was being hosted by the infamous starlet skirt-chaser Howard Stark, it wasn't really her kind of scene.

Her landlord had bought out a speak-easy club for the night and invited both the Howling Commandos and those S.S.R. agents who had earned their trust to celebrate the successful completion of some 'joint-op' or other. The only other civilians that had been there this evening had been the Jarvises, but they had left an hour ago.

Well, he might think his best-defense-is-a-good-offense tactics were intimidating, but she hadn't been raised by Sofia Vero-Martinelli for nothing. Now, that was a woman who could have you spilling out all your secrets with just a Look.

With a casual shrug of her shoulder, she sipped her Southside and replied indifferently, "I was invited."

Looking just like he did when he seemed to want to murder Mrs. Fry all those months ago (Holy moly, English was right, winding him up was a gas), he practically growled:

"And why were you invited to a S.S.R. and Howling Commando only shindig?"

And then before she could answer, his eyes narrowed suspiciously, "And for that matter how long have you known about Peggy being a S.S.R. agent?"

Doing her very best not to sag in relief that he had asked her a second question, which allowed her to avoid the first (and her very best was dang fine, thank you very much), she replied with a sly smirk:

"Oh, since about that time you idiots all thought she was a traitor and stormed the gates of the Griffith Hotel."

"She told you?"

"Puh-lease, like English would admit to anything directly like that," she scoffed. With a dismissive wave of her near empty glass, she explained, "You all were so hot under the collar to catch her. It was obvious that you all felt personally betrayed, so she had to be working for you and not just that phone company."

And geez, had she been relieved to have that theory of hers confirmed. Her friend would have been totally wasted as some telephone operator. Those curves that could beguile any man to spill his secrets, those keen eyes, sharp wit, steely backbone, and ballsy guts wrapped all in one package? That woman was born to be an Agent. And damn was she proud of her friend for breaking into the boys-only club - even if she was a little terrified at the kind of risks Peggy had to be taking.

At his dubious expression, she admitted, "Okay, alright, that was just the confirmation I needed. I suspected she was in some kind of investigative agency before that, and then everything I have seen since then has only confirmed it."

"Oh?"

Wanting him to realize that she was smart and could be trusted, she honestly shared, "I thought – at first – when I saw her sneaking around with a tall fellow Brit chap, that she was having an affair with a married man. But then …"

She paused dramatically and took another savoring sip of her drink, partly for the sake of artful storytelling and partly to torture the man, but mostly to hide her smirk at the fact that instead of doing what Peggy had done and laugh at the very idea that Edwin Jarvis had eyes for any woman but his Anna, Blondie's lips had pursed as the green-eyed monster of jealousy briefly made an appearance, before he bit out impatiently, "But then what?"

With another casual shrug, she asserted, "There was no spark between them."

"No 'spark'?"

"Yes, no spark. There were none of the tell-tale signs of secret paramours – no longing glances, no surreptitious touches or caresses. They acted exactly like what they were – business colleagues of the clandestine nature."

With a snort of disbelief, Blondie scoffed, "That could not have been your only clue. This is Carter we're talking about – the Ice Queen. She wouldn't be obvious about her affections. You had to have known that about her by then."

"True," Angie admitted, "But as an actress I am a student of human nature, and not even the reserved Margaret Carter can put something past me like that. Never has, never will."

That startled the man. He sat up straighter and looked as if he was about to demand that she tell him who had managed to win the heart of the reserved Brit to the point her affections had leaked beyond her carefully guarded walls, but then he sagged and grumbled, "Oh right, you must have had front row seats to the budding romance of Sousa and Carter."

This time, it was her turn to snort. "Ha! As if." At his questioning glance, she willingly elaborated, "Sure, Danny-boy gazed longingly at her as they shared luncheons, before he went off to L.A., but English, while interested and flattered by his less than discreet admiration, she never looked at him like she wanted to either slap off or kiss off his smirk. Or slap it off and then kiss and make it better. Take your pick."

"Wha – Who?"

At Blondie's completely bamboozled expression, she rolled her eyes. For a supposedly 'conceited wanker of the S.S.R.' that both Jarvis and Stark utterly loathed and English grudgingly admired, he was frustratingly clueless.

"Who do you think I am talking about? Do you know anyone, aside from Steve Rogers, who has ever had Agent Peggy Carter lose her cool with?"

When his eyes widened in shock and she could see that the penny dropped, she smirked, downed the last of her drink, and added, "And that's what I mean by 'spark'."

~A~

Jack couldn't believe his ears. He almost wanted to not believe his ears.

Because if he did, and Martinelli was wrong? His hopes would not only be dashed to the ground but they would be crushed by German tank. And he didn't think his heart could take that kind of disillusionment again.

'But what if she's right?' his traitorous inner-voice of optimism niggled at him.

He automatically denied the possibility, because Peggy Carter deserved someone better than an ambitious coward like him, and she had to know it too.

But then it argued: 'But she said that you were a good man, didn't she?'

And then before he could argue with that memories of Peggy flooded his mind.

Her sitting in his hospital room waiting for him to wake up, looking haggard, frazzled, and deadly, as she ordered, "Buck up, soldier. I need you in this fight, and I am not going to waste my time avenging another dead good man."

Her glaring daggers at him after he told a minion of the Arena Club that he should answer his politely-phrased questions because "otherwise, I will turn you over to Carter's tender mercies and I won't stop her because I find her stapler thrashings downright sexy."

Her throwing him up against a wall and getting in his face because he had nearly gotten shot again shoving her out of the way of the real "M. Carter".

Her giving his shoulder a squeeze after a long night of staring at the evidence board.

Her straightening his tie and giving him an encouraging pat before he went before a cantankerous judge for a warrant.

Her snatching his glass of whiskey out of his hand and then downing it, all the while glaring down whatever protest he might make, before continuing to argue her point that he should let her go off and do her latest hair-brained scheme because it will get results.

Her gob-smacked expression after he said for the first time that she could do whatever she wanted as long as it didn't get their case tossed out in court and she checked in with him in the morning. And then her look of outrage when he said she could express her thanks with "a kiss or breakfast, or I don't know, maybe both".

Her exasperated yet affectionate eye rolls when he said this for the fourth, fifth, or whatever time after that.

There were countless memories like those. As closely as they had worked on finding his shooter and "M. Carter" and shutting down the East Coast branch of the Arena Club, that was to be expected.

And his inner-optimistic-voice could not help but point out the fact that if Angie Martinelli was right and he didn't act on it, he would miss out on a lifetime more.

So…

He would quit being a coward. As soon as Sam Sawyer and Dum Dum Dugan gave into the inevitable, he was going to go over and ask Peggy Carter out for breakfast for real and not as a smartass joke.

Or maybe he would just start with coffee, and in her case, breakfast tea.

~A~

After her friend and her recently acquired beau had left and as soon as she saw that most of the S.S.R. agents and Howling Commandos were handing over money to the multi-millionaire, Angie walked over to her landlord and expectantly asked:

"My cut?"

"Your 'cut'?!" Ramirez asked in outrage, as Stark plopped a stack of bills into her waiting hand.

It was her turn to arch an eyebrow, as she asked drolly, "You all didn't think that I was invited to this just for my effervescent personality, did you?"

Some looked sheepish and looked away. Some glanced at her bountiful assets and then back at her as if to say 'and them too, duh'. And some looked just plain confused. Possibly at her use of the word 'effervescent'.

But one of the Commandos who had been smart enough to not challenge English to a drinking game answered honestly and flatteringly, "No, Stark really isn't known for caring about personalities none too much. We just figured he wanted to look at least one pretty face among our ugly mugs that wasn't someone that he viewed as a sister. Your charming personality was just a bonus."

Another one added, "That and a friend of Peggy's is a friend of ours."

"Speak for yourself," muttered a S.S.R. agent. "She was Howard's inside girl all along and rigged the game. I saw her talking with Thompson earlier."

She thought about defending herself, sharing that she had just been tired of her friend and the man who could potentially make her happy, beyond a resurrected Steve Rogers, going circles around each other. And if she was going to meddle anyways, what did it matter if a struggling aspiring actress got rewarded for her efforts?

But then she realized defending her honor wasn't in hers or English's best interest either so…

"It's all about who you know, you know," she asserted with a waggle of her eyebrows, "And when do you boys think their going to have their first kiss? Introduce each other to their parents? Who do you think will pop the question first?"

When they all just stared at her, she held her hand out as if she was examining her nails, before slyly asking, "You do want to recoup your losses, don't you?"

And with that, the poor but scrumptious-looking resident S.S.R. bookie Ricky Ramirez got inundated with wagers.

And she was going to get inundated with all sorts of bribes and juicy intel about the flirtatious office shenanigans between her favorite couple, that English would no doubt be too stingy to share.

All the world's a stage, and if she didn't make it on stage, she should totally look into what it would take to be a casting agent.

She could spot chemistry anywhere.

A/N: I hope you enjoyed. Thoughts, questions, comments? Cartson cookies? As always, thanks for reading : )