He hesitated, but only for the briefest of moments.

"It's Peter," she said, smiling. "You need to answer."

"I know." He let her hand go, but only after he squeezed it. "Put him through, JARVIS. Visual, as well."

The almost invisible display closest to the table lit up, and the two saw Sam's head and shoulders come on, and next to him, looking excited, was Peter.

"Hey, Tony," Wilson said. "Sorry to interrupt."

"It's fine." He couldn't help the deadpan tone, though. "Is everything alright?"

It almost certainly was, to judge from Peter's expression. He didn't look sick, or injured.

"Yeah. We want to run an experiment on Peter, and Nat and Steve said we should ask for your permission, first."

"I thought you were going to do that, tomorrow?"

"Not the stomach thing," Sam said, shaking his head. "We are doing that tomorrow. This is a different one."

Stark frowned.

"What?"

"They're paying poker, tonight," Peter said, clearly unable to hold himself still – or keep from speaking up. "Can I play, too?"

"You know how to play poker?" Tony asked.

"He's good at it," Pepper confirmed, surprising Tony – and Sam. "We played, once."

Tony had seen them playing Go Fish in the office, once.

"You played poker with him?"

"Yes. While you were gone one night, at my place."

"Can I play?" Peter asked. "Please?"

"What does Natasha say?" Tony asked. "She's your Valentine. Will she feel abandoned?"

"She can play, too," Sam told them both. "It's not exclusive. Just a once in a while game that Fury likes to have. Team building, that kind of thing."

"Can I play?" Peter asked, again, too eager and hopeful to be polite about waiting for the adults to discuss it. "I won't ask for anything, ever again. Honest."

"You don't ask for anything, now," Tony pointed out. He shrugged, though, and wished that he were there to hug the boy. "Yes. As long as they don't allow anyone to smoke around you, and they don't teach you any bad habits – and Natasha is fine with it – I don't have a problem with it."

"Yay!" Peter vanished from the display, and Sam smiled.

"No smoking, and no drinking," Stark told the other man.

"Right. I'll make sure of it."

The display went dark, and vanished, again, and Tony reached for Pepper's hand, again.

"What did he mean when he said they were going to experiment on Peter, tomorrow?" Pepper asked, giving him her hand, but obviously distracted.

"They're going to try and test the stomachache theory."

"That he knows something is going to happen because his stomach hurts?"

"Correct."

"How are they going to do that?" She asked. "Do I even want to know?"

"They're not going to do anything crazy. Fury has it set up. Some kind of simulator with people hiding in the corridors or something. Just to see if he can feel that they're there, or something."

"And if he can…?"

"Then he's even more amazing than before. But still a little kid and not an Avenger."

"You'll make sure of that?"

"Yes." Tony looked down at her hand. "But back to our previous topic… before we were interrupted…"

Pepper smiled.

"You mean when you were telling me that you liked me? Very much?"

"Right. I do. If you saw the conversation, then you know that I'm interested in pursuing a relationship with you – as long as we could do it without making it awkward. Or ruining this new relationship that we have, because I like being so relaxed with you."

"I do, too," she admitted.

"And you like me…?" he asked.

"Yes."

The billionaire smiled, looking just a little relieved. And then his expression changed, and his thumb rubbed against hers.

"Enough to let me kiss you?"

She nodded, and he didn't give her a chance to change her mind. Tony leaned in and pressed his lips, tenderly, against hers. He held still for a moment, and now he was giving her the opportunity to cut the kiss short. She didn't, though, and when he pulled back, finally, watching her for any indication that she was uncomfortable, she simply smiled.

"That was nice."

"Yes. It was." He smiled, too, feeling a little relieved, and backing off to take his own chair, once more. "Your dinner's getting cold, Pep. Eat."

They had all night, after all, even if there was only a good night kiss when he took her home. It was still a win, as far as he was concerned, and he was pleased that they were both relaxed when they started eating, again, and Pepper started questioning him on how they were going to experiment with Peter the next day.

OOOOOOOOO

There was some good-natured grumbling when the poker players arrived in the lounge and were informed by Nick Fury that they were going to have another player join them that evening. Peter was sitting in his chair, the books under him allowing him to see over the table, easier, and looked so excited that even if Natasha hadn't been sitting beside him absently sharpening a knife while she kept watch over her young charge, they still wouldn't have complained too loudly.

Instead they traded the cash that they'd all brought (and it wasn't high-stakes, by any means) into chips and settled at the table. Peter was given a stack of chips, as well; three different colors, representing peanut m&ms, plain m&ms, and the high value peanut butter m&ms. The little boy grinned at the others, easily, which made sense because he knew all the players that were there.

Sam played, and Happy, and Phil. Nick played, as did Steve. Normally Clint would play, the boy was told, but he was married and had Valentine's day duties with his wife – not to mention he was enjoying the first real weekend home with his family since they'd come back from Europe. The other two players were SHIELD agents, and they were familiar to Peter, as well.

"You're not playing?" Peter asked Natasha.

"I'm going to watch," she told him, putting the knife down and resting her hand, lightly, on the back of his chair. "And make sure no one starts cheating."

"You know how to play five card draw?" Fury asked Peter.

The boy nodded.

"Sure."

"Texas Hold 'em?"

"Anything," the little boy assured him.

"Deal, Nick," Sam suggested. "We'll see how he does."

OOOOOOOO

They both cleaned the kitchen when they were done eating, and then Pepper suggested that she wouldn't mind relaxing in front of the gas fireplace watching a movie.

"A grown up movie," she added. "Nothing animated, or with talking animals, or princesses."

Tony smiled, leading her over to the sofa.

"That can probably be arranged. JARVIS? An adult movie, please?"

"Not a porno," Pepper said, quickly, well aware that the AI might take the verbiage literally. "Something like a romantic comedy."

The billionaire smirked, settling on the couch, first, to allow her to decide how close she wanted to sit beside him. To his delight, she took her shoes off and curled up beside him, leaning against him easily, and obviously relaxed. Tony put an arm around her.

"Are you warm enough?"

"I'm good, thank you." She rested her head on his shoulder, and the movie started. "I wonder how Peter's doing."

"He's fine," Tony assured her, kicking his shoes off and propping his feet up on the coffee table.

"You sound fairly certain of that…"

"Because JARVIS is at the compound," he reminded her, stealing a quick kiss. "If something happens, I'll know before anyone even calls to tell me."

OOOOOOOO

"You realize we don't have that many m&ms in the compound, right?"

Peter smiled, hugely, as he raked in the small pile of chips from the center of the table, adding them to his impressive pile. Not all of the chips were his m&m chips, either. He had a fair amount of the chips that the others had used, too, and had already been told that he didn't actually get to keep any money. Peter had been fine with that. He didn't need money, after all.

"I don't mind. It's for fun, really."

Besides, even though they weren't marshmallows, Peter had learned his lesson about gorging on candy and it wasn't going to happen again, any time soon.

"Who taught you how to play poker?" Steve asked, his own stacks of chips about where they had started at the beginning of the evening.

He was a fairly conservative player, after all.

"My aunt May," was the response. "And one of her boyfriends. They played online. A lot."

"Which explains why you can't bluff for anything," Sam pointed out.

It was one of the many tells that the little boy had – and the reason that the others still had any chips, at all, really. When Peter was dealt a good hand, he wriggled, happily, or smiled, or his eyes grew wide and excited. That was when the others knew that it was time to fold unless they had a good hand, too.

"Yeah." He wasn't concerned. Like he'd said; the game was all in fun for him – and it was fun for him to play with the grown ups. "I still have stuff to learn."

"You're pretty good, though," Fury had to admit.

"I use math."

He'd tried to explain it once, already, when Sam had commented on Peter guessing that Wilson didn't catch the straight that he'd tried to draw on. The adults around the table weren't stupid, by any means, but they also weren't ready for a lecture on statistics and probability, either. They were there to relax and enjoy team time. And time with Peter, too, since he was there.

That was an added bonus – and it was fun for them, as well.

"We're going to call it a night," Natasha said. "It's bedtime for one card shark."

"Awwww…" Peter didn't have any trouble figuring out that she wasn't talking about Nick. "Do I have to…?"

She smiled at the question – and at the way the men around the table were watching, clearly amused at seeing the eight-year-old square off against the deadliest woman in the world.

"Yes. Tell everyone goodnight."

"Awww… Natasha… five more minutes?"

The assassin crossed her arms over her breasts, but she wasn't completely immune to those big brown eyes.

"One more hand," she said. "Then you're going to bed, young man."

"Okay."

"You're supposed to negotiate, Peter," Phil told him. "She says one hand, and you say five. Then she says two, and you say four and you meet in the middle and get three hands instead of one."

The boy stared at Coulson for a long moment, shocked, and then looked up at her.

"Ten hands!"

Romanoff rolled her eyes.

"We're not negotiating. Two hands, or I'm eating all your m&ms."

Peter smiled.

"Deal."