Chapter 5:

Pepper walked through the Stark mansion that day as if it was another day at work. Only that it was Sunday, her day off. Richard was away on a business trip and he would return on Tuesday. Since she had nothing better to do, Pepper had decided to start some work that she had left for Monday.

As she entered the mansion, dressed in a light blue business suit, almost blue as her eyes, she met Rhodey, Tony and a black woman. Tony seemed genuinely surprised and happy to see her.

"Pepper! Even on your day off… you can't stay away from me, can you?" he said, meeting her half way in the room.

She gave him a shy smile, already used to his flirting. "Not here because of you. Contrary to your belief you're not the center of my world". She teased him.

Tony gave her a hurt and playful look as the other woman laughed.

"I like her! She is everything you guys told me!" said the woman and Pepper looked at them curiously.

"Told you," said Rhodes then he turned to Pepper. "Potts, this is my little sister Martha. Sis, this is Virginia 'Pepper' Potts, Tony's new assistant!"

"Not that new anymore," said Pepper to the woman. "It's been almost six months."

"Six months?!" Martha said, then continued teasing: "And you still haven't gone crazy?! I spent half a day with him, and I already wanted to kill him!"

"Hey!" shouted Tony, pretending to be offended. "I'm a delightful person!" He gave them his best puppy dog eyes.

"We don't buy that, Stark," responded Martha.

Tony ignored her.

"What happened to JARVIS? I missed his greeting as I entered?" asked Pepper

"He is offline. I'm updating him," answered Tony. "So what brings you here Pep? If it's not to see me?"

"I had some work that needs to be done."

There was a small silence until Martha said: "You kidding me right? It's Sunday."

"Now you are getting to know the famous Pepper Potts," said Rhodes.

"Famous?!" said Pepper, intrigued.

"Oh yeah, you are quite famous."

Martha interrupted him.

"Do you like football? We came here to watch the game. Stay with us."

"I don't think that would be appropriate."

"Why not?" she asked.

"Mr. Stark is my boss and-" Pepper started.

"Come on Pep, you are also my friend. At least I consider you to be. Or not?" He gave her those puppy dog eyes again and for some reason this time it was almost working.

"Yes. I also consider you a friend Tony, but-"

"Then come on! Stay with us!" urged Rhodes.

"Yeah don't let me be the only girl here!"

This little argument started and Rhodey and Martha spent the next 10 minutes trying to convince Pepper to stay with them, have a beer and watch the game. At the end she decided to accept it as there was no one around that could judge her by this interaction with her boss. The only witness would be his best friend which Pepper was trusting each day even more, and besides a day off wouldn't be so bad.

When Tony heard Pepper's intentions to stay he announced that he was the one who was going to cook French fries so they could eat while drinking their beers. When his friends tried to stop him, Tony had shooed everyone from the kitchen, saying that he was more than capable to heat some oil and cook the fries. And that was 20 minutes ago!

Pepper was almost finishing her beer and starting to worry about what Mr. Stark was doing in the kitchen when the man arrived. And to everyone's surprise the fries were looking edible.

"I can't believe!" said Rhodes. '"You made it! Oh man, you were finally able to cook something and not get us killed!"

"Congratulations Mr. Stark," said Pepper.

Tony's smile grew and he looked at her feeling very proud of himself.

"Told you guys I could do it… it wasn't so bad."

He said it with such a confidence that Pepper let a little laugh escape.

"I still have my doubts," said Martha joking. "Let me taste it."

She grabbed some fries and looked at it with worry but Pepper could tell that she was teasing Tony who looked really annoyed by it. As Martha ate, her eyes grew in surprise.

"It's actually good!"

"See? I told you I could do it!" He mocked her a bit before taking his seat on the couch.

"I can't believe that I lived to see the day where Tony Stark would cook and not try to murderer anyone!" Martha kept teasing him.

".. ha, ha. Grab a beer guys… Let's watch the game and eat my fries. …that sounds a little weird."

Some minutes passed as they watched the game, had some small talk and laughed a little. As hard as it was to believe, Pepper was having a nice time. Who ever thought that spending a weekend with your boss and his friends could be so entertaining? She almost forgot that Richard was out of town.

Speaking of him, I should call him and see how he is doing.

Last time she spoke to him was the night before. She had tried calling him this morning but he hadn't picked up. As Pepper grabbed her phone, Martha got up and started to walk for the kitchen.

"I will grab another beer, anyone? Pepper, do you need a refill?"

Pepper looked at her bottle. "No, I'm fine for now. Thanks."

She smiled at Martha as Richard's phone started to ring.

"Potts?" Tony called. "What are you doing?"

When Pepper didn't answer he continued: "No work related calls. That's the rule!"

"I'm allowed to call my fiancé," she answered him with a flat face.

"You're engaged?" asked Rhodey, surprised.

"Yes," she confirmed, with a warm smile on her face.

"Congratulations!"

"Thanks Rhodes." She ended the call when Richard didn't pick up.

"Yep. Lucky guy!" Tony completed, making Pepper blush and smile nervously.

"Thank you, Mr. Stark". She looked at him and saw his warm smile for her. A few seconds passed as they were staring at each other, when Martha came back and called Tony's attention.

"Uhn.. Stark, what do you know about combustion?" she asked with a very calm and patient voice.

Tony looked at her with a confident look on his face.

"I know everything that there is to know about it. That what I do for living.. Blow things up… in case you didn't know that."

"Uhn okay…"

"What do you wanna know?" asked Tony, still with a confident pose that made Pepper roll her eyes.

"No… it's just that… the pan is on fire," she said, with such a calm voice as she sat on the couch.

"What?" Pepper asked.

"The pan that Tony used to do the fries is on fire," she explained again as she drinks her beer.

Tony, Pepper and Rhodes went running to the kitchen. When they arrived there, they saw the pan that Tony had used all black and on fire. It was so high that the fire was almost reaching the ceiling.

"uhn… should we throw some water on it?" asked Martha again with such a calm voice which was making Pepper nervous.

The three of them answered in a choir: "No!"

Tony looked at her and smiled as if thinking the whole situation was a funny thing.

"If you throw water on fire with oil you will cause a huge explosion!"

"Okay, I will turn the gas off," said Rhodes.

"Good." Tony started to run in the opposite direction. "I will get the fire extinguisher!"

For a few seconds Pepper stood there alone looking at the fire…

How did this happen? Nobody realized it! There was no smell or anything…

If JARVIS was online it was sure that he would have told Tony that he had forgot to turn the fire off when he took the fries.

"Hey, you okay?" Pepper looked at her side and Rhodey had already returned.

"Yeah."

"I turned the gas off."

She nodded. "Where's Tony?"

"Tony is right here," the man answered, showing the fire extinguisher. "I had to fight with DUM-E to get this, he didn't wanted to give me. I swear one day I will donate him-"

"Tony!" Pepper interrupted him. "Could you just…?"

"Oh right. Fire!" He reacted as if he just remembered that his house was on fire.

He prepared the extinguisher, aimed it and pressed it. As he pushed the lever, a white powder with a very strong smell came out directed at the pan putting out the fire. But it also spread through the whole kitchen, covering not just the pan but also everything in white powder, falling a little on Tony, Rhodes and Pepper.

After Tony used the extinguisher he droped it on the ground, also covered in white, and looked at the scenario. There was a few seconds of completely silence between them.

"Of all the fire extinguishers that you have in your house, you grab the one for chemical fire, Tony?" said Rhodes as he looked at the covered white powered kitchen.

"I guess…" Tony said also looking at the white mess. "That's why DUM-E didn't want to give it me" Then he turned with a relaxed smile on his face. "Well at least the fire is out, good thing right?"

Pepper let out an asperse sigh. "I will call for a cleaning crew. And you," she turned to Tony, "never, ever again come close to the kitchen, especially when JARVIS is offline."

Tony was visibly hurt. "Hey, you said the fries were good!"

Pepper rolled her eyes and grabbed her phone with Tony following her like a lost puppy and kept on talking. "Besides it's not my fault that the oil caught fire!"

"Ahn… yes it is" said Rhodes. "You were responsible for turning it off."

"You guys are missing the point here…" They looked at Tony with flat faces, waiting for him to continue. "The fries were good. You said so…."

"Never again, Tony. I'm serious." Pepper walked away as the Cleaning Crew answered the phone.

"I couldn't agree with her more, Tony."

The genius opened his mouth to answer his friend but Rhodes didn't let him. "If the fire had reached the gas, your house would have exploded with everyone inside. Never again come close to the kitchen oil."

Tony was left pouting.

-o-

It took the rest of the day for the Crew to clean the kitchen. Everything needed to be washed again. And even after everything was in its place and free of the white powder, the smell remained. Rhodes and Martha had already left the house leaving Tony and Pepper alone.

"I guess it will take a while for this smell to go away," muttered Tony to himself.

Pepper gave him a sympathetic smile. "Well I'm going home. Please, until JARVIS is back online…-"

"Yeah, yeah yeah, I know… I won't mess with the kitchen unless it's to grab some water or something." He looked in to her eyes and smiled at her. "But the fries were good, right?" He gave her his best charming smile and part of her thought that he was really handsome, especially when the smile reached his chocolate eyes.

"Yes, they were really good Mr. Stark." His smile grew. "I will see you tomorrow."

"Okay."

As she grabbed her purse to leave the house, she could feel his eyes on her.

-o-

The next day when Pepper came to work she could still smell the powder. JARVIS was now back online and told Pepper that Tony was in the workshop and had been since early that morning.

She decided to work in the living room. As usual, there were so many things to do, that she lost track of the time. It was already lunchtime when she came back to reality and a sweet voice interrupted her thoughts.

"You hungry?"

She looked in the direction of the voice and Tony was sitting on the couch in front of her.

How long has he been there?! she thought.

"A little, yes," she answered his question. "What do you want me to order?"

For a moment she could swear that he looked insecure. "I… I thought we could do something here."

"Here?"

"I wanna test something."

"Please, please don't tell me you were messing in the kitchen again." Her mind was already imagining all the chaos that she was going to find there.

"No, nothing like that!" He got up. "Come on, I wanna show you something. Grab some frozen fries."

Still unsure Pepper went to the kitchen and grabbed the frozen fries then met Tony. He had something in his hand and as soon as he saw her he opened it revealing a basket that was inside it.

"What is that?"

"It's a pan that I just created."

"You created a pan?" she asked, unbelieving.

"Well.. you said that I couldn't get close to the kitchen anymore especially if there was oil involved, and let me be frank that's in pretty much everything that involves cooking. So I thought: 'what if I could cook without using oil?'"

"That's impossible, you need it to create the heat and to prevent the food to stick."

"Well it was…" He took the frozen fries from her hand. "Until I created this. It will cook using the heat in the air."

"What?!" Pepper looked at him as if he was crazy.

"Just look." Tony threw the fries into the pan, closed it and set the pan. It started to work as they waited. A couple minutes later the pan whistled and Tony opened it, grabbing the basket inside. Pepper saw the fries that were frozen were now ready to eat.

"Try one," encouraged Tony.

Unsure, Pepper did as he said and ate it. To her surprise, it was very good. "This is good!"

"Told you!" he said, obviously proud of himself. Tony explained to her how it worked.

"You were working on this all morning?"

"Since last night. After you left I had nothing better to do so…"

Pepper looked at him amazed. Working with him on a daily basis it was easy to forget how smart he was, how much of a genius he was. He used a terrible situation and created something really nice and safe…

…and marketable!

"We should sell this!" she said.

"What?" asked Tony, surprised.

"Think about it…"

They spent hours talking about the pros and cons, looking at the market. By the time they finished, Tony gave Pepper his notes and she was going to S.I so they could initiate the safety tests and everything else.

-o-

Months later, the Air Fryer pan of S.I was already on the market and was a huge sales success.

Pepper was looking at the results of it until something caught her eyes. She went to her account to check her suspicions and there it was.

What is this? People on financial had to have made a huge mistake.

Her confusion was clear on her face. So much that when Tony passed by her he had to ask.

"What's up?"

Pepper grabbed the phone and was already dialing for the S.I.

"The Financial made a mistake. They put the percentage for the Air Fryer sales of this month on my account."

"No, that's accurate.

"No.. What?!... you?!"

"Me!" he smiled at her.

"Why would you do that?" she asked, already getting nervous.

"Well it was your idea to sell it. I created it just for my use, but you saw an opportunity on this. And I knew that you wouldn't accept all the profits of it. So I asked them that the profits for this month should go to you, for your good work and vision. Don't worry, next month it goes back to me."

She was speechless.

"Think of this as a bonus. Huge bonus, you can use it for your wedding day, you're saving money for it right?" he said, with a smile.

She had no idea how he knew that.

"Thank you Mr. Stark." She gave him a sweet smile and he returned a smile she had never seen him use before. Pepper looked at the man in front of her. He was infuriating, making her go crazy and become stressed, but he was also very caring and thoughtful when he wanted to be.

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