The newest members of Stark Industries were settling well to the best of Peppers knowledge, now she knew of Natasha and Bobbi's existence she'd stopped trusting her own workers. For the millionth time that day she found herself looking behind her. They wouldn't have followed you here, she reasoned with her own mind, sitting down on the edge of their bed, kicking off her shoes. This is your bedroom, honestly Virginia, you'll drive yourself insane.

In all honesty she hated knowing they were there, and she hated the thought of SHIELD interfering again, every time they did things went wrong. And after that blonde idiot's outburst it was all too obvious they suspected her, what would they do if she told them? Probably want to take the baby from her in the name of science or in case something was wrong with it, after all, it would be the child of a so-called superhero. Protectively she wrapped her arms around her stomach as she fell back on the bed, gazing up at the celling.

There were so many memories associated with this position, the strawberry blond mused, running her free hand thorough her hair, all those nights spent in his arms, through everything they'd been through together, right back to when their messy relationship was nothing more than casual sex, initiated by her when she needed it.

The kiss on the roof had been the very first time he'd moved on her, the very first time he'd ever swept her into his arms and loved her. Pepper had never quite been able to work out if that had been a spur of the moment thing or if he'd been planning on that kiss for weeks, even the fact that they'd been caught hadn't bothered her for the very first time.

After that they'd become almost serious, he'd remembered her birthday for the very first time, she'd stopped cleaning away the trash from his room every morning and he'd started to notice her. It hadn't been anything massive to start with, bringing her caramel latté on a morning and signing off the paperwork before she'd asked him to. It was all the little things she'd always wished he would do. But over time it became more and more, the offers of dinner when they finished late at work, massaging her shoulders and the ballroom lessons for the two of them to make her feel less stupid when they had parties to attended.

They'd fallen into a relationship without really meaning to, their eyes were for each other and nobody else, kisses for each other and the day that he'd started joking about marrying her, Pepper had known he'd meant it. Without another thought she'd crawled up the bed, yanking one of the bedside drawers open and pulling another letter from it. She'd never managed to say it so she'd written it; she'd written to ask him to date her a little over a year before today, hiding the note in his birthday card before she'd left on a business trip to England.

Secretly she'd always wish she could have seen his face the day he opened that letter, but to her complete delight he'd written back to her within the day.

And she'd kept it.

Pepper pressed her love letter from Tony Stark to her lips, closing her eyes for a second to thank him for it again, gazing down at the handwritten words she held; it was strange to even possess this much of his handwriting. For once the stomach pains settled, seeming to lull as she ran her fingers over the page, reading it for the millionth time since his accident:

'In regards to your latest letter and my card I couldn't have been more surprised. For the last 12 years you have been a most reliable assistant I have ever hired and you truly know me like no other, not even JARVIS. I'm not one to write love letters either so I suppose this suits us really, this is a Tony-Stark-attempts-to-explain-himself sort of letter.'

The first few lines always brought a smile to her lips as she settled back down, letting herself imagine he was reading it to her, his voice was always so clear in her head. Her free hand resting on the bump as she forced herself not to cry, the letter in her hands was the most honest thing she'd ever heard him say to anyone, and it had all been to her.

'I could go on forever about how much you nagged me to do stuff and everything that makes you, you but in all honesty I want to say that I want to accept your offer , I was never going to say no. I guess it was the case that I could never really ask you because I never knew how to. I can talk to reporters, I can talk to the board of directors but I just couldn't talk to you about me loving you.

I'm sorry it's taken 12 years to tell you this but…Pepper Potts, will you be the girlfriend of Anthony Howard Stark?

Your hopeless boss and hopeless lover,

Tony Stark'

His last word were the ones that meant the most, it was the first time he'd ever called himself hers. Pepper couldn't help but love hearing him say that, after all those years of him belonging to everyone else and he'd finally become hers and hers alone.

Carefully folding the letter up again she pressed it to her lips, prolonging the contact and making the same wish she'd been making for weeks on end. It seemed like the more time he was away the more she was falling in love with him all over again, and it hurt. Right now she'd have given anything to throw her arms around his neck and hold him close to her for the rest of her life, she didn't want to let go of the most fantastic thing in her life.

Before the tears could swell and ruin the love letter Pepper crawled over to hide it away again, reaching for the drawer she caught sight of a brown backed file sitting on the top of it, the SHIELD logo emblazed across it like a badge of honour.

That didn't belong there.

As soon as her letter was hidden away safely she reached for it, trying to ignore the sinking feeling inside her and the violent protest from her stomach. Biting her lip she flicked it open, eyes widening in horror when she realised what it was.

….

Usually Clint Barton was too busy with his social life and his newfound group of friends, as well as the more interesting SHIELD missions to actually attempt to do what he was trained for.

Getting the files into her room hadn't exactly been difficult, especially since Pepper had been staying in Avengers Tower for the past few weeks. Despite the fact Agent Coulson had almost insisted he should hand over the file in person he hadn't had the heart to do it, one read through of the classified documents whilst the women had been busy and they'd almost confirmed everyone's worst nightmares.

Virginia Potts had been the distraction that had caused Anthony Stark's accident.

The mission SHIELD had sent Tony on really hadn't been anything important, and the last thing anyone had expected was the attack. Clint had only been following him out of pure boredom. Even now they couldn't work out exactly where that monster had appeared from, throwing itself from seemingly nowhere into Iron Man's path, Hawkeye hadn't even bothered to panic, knowing that shooting it away would have relived his presence and alerted SHIELD to the fact he'd wondered off again.

On any normal day Tony would have just blasted it out of the way and taken all the credit for saving New York from an evil creature in delight, but just as he'd looked ready to attack suddenly he'd stopped still.

Clint had just presumed it was some kind of stupid Stark attack plan.

He'd never expected the thing to land a direct hit on Iron Man, knocking him clean out of the sky and crashing into the building opposite. Within seconds the encounter had become a complete disaster, and his cover was blown before he'd pulled the first arrow from behind his back.

But that report made it all make sense; He'd stopped for her phone call.

Stopped for her.

Love really was a dangerous, childish game if it could reduce even the great Tony Stark to that, Natasha had pointed out to him when she'd been informed of what really happened.

Hawkeye had just looked over at his Mockingbird with rather an embarrassed smile.

But right now he was hiding in the bottom of the wardrobe, the door open just enough so that he could watch Pepper's reaction to the file in her hands. He'd had every intention to get the hell out of there before she could find it, but the ginger had come back earlier than he thought, and the last place he'd ever want her to catch him was in her bedroom.

The sight almost broke his heart.