Chapter Text
Pepper always checked out her potential lovers before she got too invested. When you have as many connections as she does it comes in handy to make sure that there aren't any unpleasant skeletons in their closet before she trusted them fully. But the likes of this... this was something she never expected to see.
"JARVIS, call Natasha", Pepper said with a sigh as she put her head in her hands.
Natasha's beautiful face appeared on screen, seeming cold but holding a special warmth for Pepper.
"Hey Sergeant Pepper what's up?", Natasha asked.
"Hey Nat, can you come over? There's something serious I need to talk to you about and it's best done in person"
Nat's face looked flush with some sign of dread. "Alright Pepper, I'll be right over."
God Pepper hoped she was wrong. She'd hate to lose Nat.
"Alright Pepper, what is it?" Natasha said, nervously glancing around the room, avoiding eye contact with Pepper.
"Well I... did some digging," she said, then quickly moved to defend herself; "I always do it for anyone I'm considering getting serious with don't worry but I found some... unpleasant things."
She pulled up the file on the Avenger's Tower monitors. News articles flashed up, from suspicious explosions in foreign nations where the only eyewitness reports was of a redheaded spy, or some assassinations of foreign leaders.
"Nat it's just... did you really do this?"
Natasha looked slightly shocked, then started laughing. "Clint I'm going to get you for this. Pepper check the dates of those articles."
Pepper read them then joined Natasha in laughing. All of them were dated to April 1st. Upon closer inspection they all showed signs of heavy editing.
"Clint was probably trying to get me into a meeting with Fury as a prank, but I have a feeling he saw past that and decided Clint needed a meeting of his own."
Pepper looked relieved, and kissed Natasha on her forehead. "I'm glad I was wrong and asked you about this, because I love you so much and I don't want to lose you."