Scared To Be Lonely

Chapter 6: AC/DC

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When Pepper walked into the house the next morning, her feet stopped when she saw Tony and Nick asleep on the couch, looking like they had fallen asleep to whatever was playing on Tony's laptop that was set up on the coffee table. The two were asleep, a wall of pillows between them, which they were both using as a pillow while their slight sitting up sleeping position allowed Nick to put her legs on the couch, while Tony's legs were placed on the coffee table next to his laptop. 

Pepper smiled and took a quick picture on her phone before she left the room and headed to the kitchen for coffee, hiding a little chuckle. She poured herself a cup and drank it as she sat down at the counter. She wanted to leave them alone until she actually had to wake Tony up so that they could get to a meeting. 

And by the time she finished her second cup of coffee, the woman let out a breath and finally went to go wake up Tony, only to stop once again. She watched with a small smile as Tony carefully moved from his spot, before picking a blanket off the floor and gently covering Nick with it, before carefully brushing a strand of her hair out of the little girl's face.

Pepper quietly backed up into the kitchen and went over to get Tony a cup of coffee, and when he entered the room, she pretended she hadn't seen it, as he seemed a bit surprised to see her. But shaking off the surprise, Tony scratched the back of his neck with a breath. "Kid couldn't fall asleep last night. Took two Disney movies." He then shuddered, "I never want to see a musical again."

Pepper hid her smile, passing him the coffee. "We've got to leave in ten minutes. Go get cleaned up. James said that he'll be on his way in an hour, hopefully she'll sleep in til then."

"Got it, boss." Tony does a sarcastic solute, before going to get changed.

By the time they left, it was nearing 8 in the morning. And even though they had stayed up late, Nick ended up getting woken up by the door closing. She jumped a bit because of the nightmare she had been having, but then sat up when she saw that she was in the living room of the mansion. The girl's wide chocolate brown eyes looked around, before she got up and went into the kitchen, seeing one empty coffee mug, and after seeing that there was lipstick on the rim, the girl went back into the living room, calling out. "Pepper?"

When there wasn't a response, Nick shrugged it off and went up to the guest bedroom, changing into the second change of clothes that Pepper had gotten her in the past day. She changed into the jean skirt (since she was short even for her age, Pepper decided not to get her anymore jeans since she didn't know the girl's size)  and dark red hoodie, putting that over her white tanktop that was actually from her school uniform, which was now clean and folded up on the chair.

Nick pulled on a pair of yellow socks before pulling on her shoes and headed downstairs, she looked around the first floor again, before heading down the stairs and heading into the basement. But after making it to the basement, she finally registered the keypad next to the glass door and glass wall. She looked in through the glass, before letting out a breath. "JARVIS?"