Is This Love? (UNDER EDIT)

Chapter 1 - The Mission

Hey, author here!

Just a few things to keep in mind before you read this book. To avoid confusion, all author's notes will be in bold. Let me know what you think of the book, and as always, constructive criticism is welcome, but please, no hate.

Enjoy!

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The rays of morning sunshine streamed in from the window of the Avenger's Tower. The first to wake up that morning was the Black Widow herself. Her eyes fluttered open, and she let out a small groan, blinking a few times to clear her vision. The clock read 5:32 am.

She listened for any other noise in the tower,  but hearing nothing other than gentle birdsong out her window, she knew the rest of the building was yet to rise. Typical. 

She had always been an early riser, courtesy of the Red Room, but the rest of the tower put most to shame. In fact, Tony often made the point that he didn't 'believe' in mornings. 

Deciding that lying awake in bed and reminiscing about her past was never a good idea, she sat up. Gracefully flipping out of bed, she stretched her arms above her head, followed by a quick leg stretch. Flexibility was something Natasha put great emphasis on, as had the Red Room; it was the key to her lethal abilities. 

She walked over to her wardrobe and riffled through her cupboards, finally deciding on matching black activewear. One icy cold shower later, Natasha was ready to take on the world. 

Taking a short moment to style her red locks in the vanity mirror, she smiled. For all the things that Tony was when Natasha first met him, she never would've added generous to that list. Yet, he had excitedly invited the Avengers to stay in the tower, in typical Tony fashion, of course; nothing lacked luxury and extravagance. 

Her apartment, for example, followed that same style. Her bedroom was the size of her entire old apartment, with a king-size bed, walk-in wardrobe, sitting area with a cinema-style TV, and a bathroom complete with a heavenly spa. 

The attention to detail was extraordinary. It suited all of her needs, including a removable ballet bar and punching bag and a hidden weapons store that was like an assassin's candy store. The whole room was amazing, and Natasha was immensely grateful for it. 

She made her way out of her apartment, locking the door behind her. At the end of the long corridor, an elevator led to the other floors. The elevator dinged, and Natasha stepped in, pressing the button that would take her to the middle floor between all of the living quarters—' the Common Room' as they liked to call it.

The Common Room had an oversized kitchen, dining, and living area. When she arrived, she had to quickly hide her smile. Steve was making pancakes, and Tony was sitting on the other side of the bench, discussing—no, ranting—about his latest invention. Nat could immediately see that Steve was making his best effort to be interested, but he clearly didn't have the slightest clue what any of the conversation was about.

"Morning, Red", Tony spun around, realising that he had a new target to rant to.

"Morning, boys," She replied, sending an exasperated look at Tony, never liking his nicknames for all of them. Natasha was cut off as she was about to make a snarky remark to Tony. 

"The usual?" Steve asked, visibly relieved to have a distraction. 

"You know it," Nat smoothly replied and smiled as Steve dumped an unholy amount of maple syrup and honey on the top of her pancake stack. Cooking breakfast for the team had become Steve's thing, and they all secretly knew that it was his mother-hen way of making sure his team all had breakfast, and they'd be lying if they didn't appreciate his gesture. 

"Agent Romanoff, Director Fury wants to see you in his office." FRIDAY's robotic voice interrupted. She rolled her eyes. Fury always had the worst timing.

"I better run. See you, round." She swiftly bid them goodbye, grabbing her plate to take with her. She'd be damned if she was going to miss breakfast as well for Fury.

"Agent Romanoff, you have a mission." Fury gruffly instructed her as she walked into his office, brushing the last crumbs from her shirt. 

"Morning to you, too." Natasha snarkily remarked as she glanced with mild interest at the file Fury pushed across the desk to her. Briefly scanning it, she concluded it was a relatively simple mission, nothing the Black Widow couldn't handle. 

Nothing more than a routine bust, take out a bad guy or three, who, according to the limited information in the file, were stealing valuable minerals from docks. Allegedly, they had a storage warehouse on the edge of a forest, roughly a 2-hour flight from the Tower.  

"Well, it's not like I didn't have anything better to do with my Sunday," Nat sarcastically sighed but grabbed the case file and walked out of his office as swiftly as she came in. 

If nothing else, she'd finally be able to try out her new hair-pull takedown that she'd been dying to have an excuse to use.