AN: Thank you so much for all the love that this story and this series has gotten. I also would like to thank you for your patience. Since I'm essentially writing 4 fics at once on top of my other stand alone fics things can move a little slow since I like to update this series all at the same time. I hope you enjoy this next chapter and I can't wait to hear what you think!

They moved into the living room after they finished their dinner, having finished the pizza between the both of them. The coffee table was covered with papers from the file that Natasha had given him. The file consisted not only of information on Bucky's time as the Winter Soldier but also all of the work Hydra had done to change history. Some of the deaths were confirmed Winter Soldier hits, others were just labeled as completed missions. Peggy assumed that it was so that in case this information ever got out, no one would be able to find their favorite weapon. She still couldn't believe that she had been so close. Her old case notes were the start of the whole file which luckily provided her with a refresher of all the connections. Peggy glanced through her old notes to get a refresher on what she had uncovered and to her surprise, they were the beginning of the file.

She moved through major historical events, Steve filling her in on the details she needed to fully understand the severity of each kill, and then she got to 1991. Howard's aged face stared back at her as she read through the report. When she was done, she gently laid the page back on the table.

Steve watched her closely, waiting to see her reaction to know how best to comfort her. Right now she was just staring out into space. Her face, a blank canvas, not showing anything that she might be thinking after reading that a dear friend lost his life to a Hydra mission. His file was one of the ones they didn't label clearly if the Winter Soldier had been involved or not.

He went to reach out for her when she didn't move for a while but it seemed like his movement stirred her to move. She let out an excruciating scream as tears became to stream down her face. As she let out her scream her fists tightened and she brought her knees up to her chest where she then promptly hid her face as sobs wracked her body.

Wrapping an arm around her, he pulled her to his side, before situating her to sit across his lap. He held her tight letting her get out everything. She would tell him things when she was ready. Periodically he would place kisses to the top of her head as he rubbed her back.

Slowly, Peggy's sobs finally started to become sniffles. When she felt like she could finally talk, she lifted her head. Steve reached behind him to grab the tissue box and handed it to her. She took one gratefully and dabbed at her eyes before wiping at her nose.

"After I realized that I had injected myself with a version of the serum, I made Howard destroy everything and promise that he would never try to recreate it again. He clearly broke that promise and it cost him his life." She sniffled, voice breaking at the end. She didn't know what to feel truth be told. She was mad, hurt, sad, just overall upset.

"I'm sorry, Peggy." Steve kissed her forehead.

"You have nothing to be sorry for. He made his decision. I just hate that it also took Maria away from Tony. Howard must have known something. And yet he still…" Her voice cracked once more as she shook her head. She was going to have to get it together if she were to spend time with Tony tomorrow. "Does Tony know?"

Steve shook his head. "I haven't figured out how to tell him yet to be honest. There're too many people I'm trying to protect with this one."

Peggy nodded. "He needs to know. Not yet but soon especially if we're going to bring Barnes back home."

"I'll tell him. I promise."

"Good." She wiped at her eyes once again. "Where are we at in the search?"

"The last time we heard anything he was in Brussels. Natasha is currently there trying to see if she can confirm the sighting but you know as well as I do that if Bucky doesn't want to be found, he isn't."

"He wasn't our best marksman for nothing." Peggy then moved off his lap to pick up the last of the notes. "Have you recognized a pattern?"

Steve shook his head. "It's only been about a week since we last saw him. I mean I basically just got out of the hospital myself."

Peggy whipped her head around. "You what?"

"I crashed into the Potomac from a helicarrier. Bucky dragged me out. I was only in there for a couple of days.

"Steve!" She didn't know what a helicarrier was but the fact that Bucky had to pull him out and that he had to stay in the hospital for two days said a lot about the damage he sustained.

He reached out and took her hand in his. "I'm okay, Pegs." He placed a kiss across her knuckles and she let out a small huff, pretending to not be placated so easy as she turned back to the notes on the coffee table.

Smirking, Steve moved to slide behind her so that she now sat in between her legs. He kissed her shoulder first and then moved to the other one, repeating the action. His arms then slid around her waist, pulling her close as he kissed the crook of her neck. "Glad to see you still worry about me."

She leaned her head back against his shoulder so she could better look at him. "I never really stopped."

Steve dipped down and kissed her, deeply. Peggy twisted around so that she could better kiss him back, wrapping her arms around his shoulders, her fingers delving into his hair. He let out a soft moan at the feeling of her nails against his scalp. His hands at her waist moved down to her hips to twist her around fully so that she could straddle his lap.

Once settled, he moved a hand up to cup her cheek as his arm wrapped around her waist to keep her in place. She gripped onto his shoulders, a bit of desperation between them both as they sought out each other. They both needed to make sure the other was truly there. That this wasn't just some dream that they would wake up from lonely and alone.

His hand around her waist slid under her shirt and she arched into his touch as she began to tug at his shirt. The faintest tease of feeling his skin against hers made her want more. She needed more. Feeling his t-shirt slowly raise up his back as Peggy pulled at it caused him to smirk especially when she let out a small growl of frustration when he made no move to let her take it off him.

"You know we can take our time, right?" He teased her as he pulled away so he could remove his shirt.

"So sorry if I want to show you just how much I've missed you." She quipped while taking off her own shirt, missing how Steve's expression softened.

His hands returned to her now bare waist and pulled her close. "I missed you too." He leaned in, kissing her slowly, longingly as he brought her arms back to wrap around his shoulders. "Hold on." He whispered against her lips.

Steve brought his legs up and made sure Peggy was secure against him before he used the couch to help him stand. He immediately brought his hands to the back of her thighs to support her as he walked back to his bedroom.

"Am I supposed to be impressed?" She quipped.

He shrugged, smirking a bit. "A little." He captured her lips with his, following her down as he laid her on the bed to show her just how much he missed her too.

Peggy wandered down the hall while JARVIS directed her where she needed to go. As she got closer and closer to Tony's workshop, nerves started to build up in her stomach. She thought it odd that she was so nervous to reconnect with her godson. Then again she hadn't seen him since he was a kindergartener. Did he even remember her? He clearly felt some way about her based on what JARVIS had told her the day before.

Tony noticed her first. He was hidden behind his latest suit upgrade while she was taking in the older models. She didn't look any different than what he remembered. He still grappled with the decision his father made about hiding her away. He had missed her so much, not understanding why one of the only people who wanted him around suddenly decided to not come around anymore. When his parents died, he tried looking for her, hoping if he found her that maybe he could convince her to stay. He always found it strange that she seemed to have vanished into thin air. Now here she was, the same awe expression on her face that he remembered her having when he showed her the first thing he had ever built.

"What do you think?" He asked her, standing up from behind his workstation.

Her head whipped around at the sound of his voice but soon relaxed when she saw that it was him. "What are these? It looks like some kind of armor."

Tony chuckled. "Nothing ever gets past you, Aunt Peg. It is. It's the Iron Man armor that I wear when the world needs Iron Man."

"You're a hero?"

"Don't sound so surprised." He teased her. It hurt a little bit that she hadn't expected it but he needed to remind himself that she was used to working with his father who only supplied the gadgets and barely did the work required on the sidelines.

"No, it's just…"

Tony smirked. "Relax, Aunt Peg, I'm just messing with ya. I know what Stark you're used to working with." He reached over and grabbed a tablet, pulling up the letter he had scanned in for the file he started putting together when he got home from finding her. "Which reminds me, he left you this."

Peggy took the tablet from him and noticed that a part of the letter was cut off at the bottom. Her brows furrowed. "It's cut off at the bottom." She pointed out, handing the tablet back to him to show him. The technology intrigued her but she would need a little help to get used to it. Even earlier that morning she still jumped slightly when JARVIS spoke to her.

Chuckling, he handed the tablet back to Peggy and came to stand next to her. "You have to scroll." He told her while showing her how by touching the screen and moving the letter up and down.

Nodding she took over, testing it out for herself. "Is this common? Steve still had physical documents."

"It's about half and half but people are working towards becoming more digital. I have the physical letter if you want it but not in the lab so this is the next best thing."

"Seems I have much to learn then." She commented before looking back at the tablet to begin reading Howard's letter.

Peggy,

You know I'm not the most sentimental man but if I didn't write you an explanation of things I'd feel like I wronged you somehow. As you also know Project English Rose is going well. Even with your slight variation to the serum, it's very promising that Steve is out there in the Arctic somewhere waiting for us to find him. Which we will but the search is taking longer than I had hoped. I'm not giving up though. I'm gonna keep looking, it's just that something's going on, Pegs.

I've got to put the search on hold for right now and I've made the decision to move you to a hidden location. I think you'll recognize the location. I bought the antique store in Brooklyn and made it a Stark Industries office but most of the original specks are still there. I thought it'd be the best place to hide you for now.

The guy who took over for Phillips is kinda pushy about why we're searching for Rogers and keeps asking about you. I don't know what's going on but I'll figure it out. It's nothing to bring you out of your cryostasis for. I'll handle it but until I do, I'm keeping you protected. I couldn't protect him for you and well, I'm certainly not going to not protect one of the few people in my life that I trust.

If you do see this letter, this is why things didn't exactly go as originally discussed with Project English Rose. Oh, which by the way is what I've called our little experiment. I'm hoping that you'll never even have to see this letter, though.

Howard

Peggy looked up from the tablet and let out a shaky breath. Howard had known something was going on and clearly, after what she had learned last night, he hadn't figured it out. Hydra still won and while it wasn't confirmed in the non-redacted file on the crash that took the Starks' life, Hydra clearly was involved. But it didn't make sense to her that he would still try to replicate the serum if he thought something fishy was going on. Unless they got him to forget about it. Which honestly wasn't probably very hard to do.

"Do you think he knew his hunch was about Hydra?" She finally asked.

Tony shrugged. "I honestly couldn't tell ya. He kept his SHIELD work away from me. I just found out a few years ago now, actually."

She sighed and handed him the tablet back. "I wish he would have woken me up instead of hidden me but I guess what's done has been done and I can only help with the rebuilding efforts."

"You really want to rebuild? I don't know if they'll even allow that. Romanoff's got a court appearance soon with the Senate and Mr. Star Spangled Man With A Plan doesn't seem too keen on doing that. He was the one that tore it all down after all."

"You may have only known this world for a few years now but if there is anything that I have learned in my line of work, the world will always need an organization like SHIELD. The intelligence agencies across the globe can't handle the bizarre that SHIELD handled. That's why the SSR was created during the war in the first place."

"Well, if anyone can bring it back, it's you. Or you could just join the Avengers. Rogers leads the group. I support it financially. It's a win-win really. We go take down the bad guys, save the day then come back here until the next thing."

"You've really sold me." She laughed. "How about I just get caught up on what all I've missed before doing anything? While it's clear you all could have used my help long before now, you've been doing alright without me for this long."

"You'll learn real soon just how disappointing dear ol' dad was." He quipped. "But I can help you with the catching up bit. I started to put together a file and JARVIS is available anytime. If you come across something you need further explanation on then all you have to do is ask."

She smiled softly. "Thank you. Now, tell me what you're working on and why Iron Man?" She asked as she approached his workstation to get a closer look at the latest version of his suit.

A large grin lit up his features before he joined her, launching into the updates he was working on and how he earned the name Iron Man. It may have been a long time but it was nice that it felt so easy between them like the nearly 40 years since they saw each other last didn't happen. She still seemed just as intrigued, asked questions to show that she really was paying attention and trying to understand, and then of course her continual encouragement.

"Impressive as always." She smiled up at him, giving his arm a supportive squeeze. She felt as though he didn't tell her the full story of how he became the armored hero and she hated that she wasn't there for him then. "I might have to give you a list of the gadgets I use to have to see if there're any updates that could happen."

"Or I could just make you a suit. C'mon you know you wanna give it a try." He smirked.

Peggy shook her head. "No, thank you. You can keep that. I prefer my feet on the ground, thank you. I'll just wear whatever is standard for agents I suppose."

Tony rolled his eyes. "I will not stand for it. Give me a few days and I'll have something ready for you maybe even have a fresh tube of your favorite shade of lipstick. 102 I believe it was."

"How do you know about Sweet Dreams?" She asked, brows furrowed.

"Dad also left a letter for whoever would find you with very detailed instructions. I believe he started it out by saying so that you're as prepared as you can be for who you will be working with."

"I'm sorry, he did what?"

"You heard right." Tony laughed.

Peggy rolled her eyes with a small huff. "Insufferable wanker."

That only made Tony laugh harder. "Day made."

"Glad I could provide some entertainment. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm headed to go meet Miss Potts and hope that today's fashions for women aren't horrendous."

"I think you'll like it. Tell Pepper I said hi."

Peggy nodded before hugging him. "Thank you for finding me. I've missed you."

The hug took him by surprise but soon he wrapped his arms around her, burying his face into his neck much how he did when he was a child. "Missed you too, Aunt Peg." He gave her one final squeeze before letting go. "You better get going. Pepper likes punctuality."

"Lunch tomorrow?"

Tony gave her a small smile. "I know just the spot. If you need anything or get tired of lover boy just have JARVIS give me a call. I'll work on getting you a phone and brought back into the world."

"Thank you, Tony." She smiled as she headed out of the workshop. "Alright JARVIS," she said as she got a little further down the hallway, "can you get me to Miss Potts' office?"