Work Text:
Chapter 1
“Get up Mr Stark, you have a meeting in 15 minutes… and don’t fall back asleep or I will bring in the ice bucket.”
Tony heard the feminine voice and was sure that this woman was definitely not Pepper Potts. So he tucked the blankets tighter around him and snoozed for another few minutes. It did not last long… “WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK!!” tony yelled as ice cold water hit him on the bed.
“I told you Mr Stark you have a meeting which is now in less than 10 minutes, you can’t afford to fall back asleep. Now get up and get ready and I might just let you know where I hid one of your bottles of Scotch.”
“Wait… I think I just heard you say that you HID my Scotch, that’s impossible.”
“You think Mr Stark, I have every bottle you own in my possession and I control every account you have, so you can’t make any purchases from a liquor store, nor is JARVIS authorised to. Oh and you can’t override the code on JARVIS.”
“Who are you?”
“I’m your new assistant Mr Stark, you have T-minus 5 minutes for your meeting I suggest you skip the shower and just change, and your suit is hanging by the door.”
“You know stating what you do, does not tell me who you are…”
“My name is Leila. Now finish up, Pepper Potts waits for no man.”
As Leila made her way out of his bedroom, tony stared transfixed at the beautiful yet dangerous woman that apparently now worked for him.
Where is her office? Why is she my assistant and not working for Pepper? Does she know about the Avengers? Obviously she knows that. Wait why didn’t Potts tell me about this?
Chapter 2
As Leila made her way through the penthouse she silently thanked her stars for not completely losing her marbles at seeing THE Tony Stark aka Iron Man. Taking a calming breath she went to the kitchen to start up the coffee machine, Pepper would be there any minute for her meeting with tony, all the paper work had already been laid out in the office for the meeting.
“Miss Salvia, Miss Potts is here for her meeting with Mr Stark. To which room shall I direct her?”
“Oh, you can send her to the office thank you JARVIS. I’ll go check on Mr Stark’s progress.”
“He appears to be finished ma’am”
“Good, please tell him to make his way to the office then, I’ll take the coffee there.”
“Of course ma’am”
She put two cups in a tray along with milk and sugar and the freshly brewed pot of coffee and made her way to the office that Pepper Potts and Tony Stark now occupied.
“Coffee… please refrain of putting your feet on the table in the office sir, that’s why you have the workshop. I’ll be in my office if you need anything. Just tell JARVIS to call me if you need anything.”
“Wait, before you go… 2 things” tony said as he held up two fingers towards his so called new assistant “1 – where is this co called office of yours? And 2 – what the fuck Pepper why do I have an assistant?”
“I can answer the first question sir. My office is in your workshop where you work, since it is my job to ensure that you have everything you need. But I do believe the second question is something that you and Miss Potts might want to discuss without my presence”
Leila made her way out of the office and down to Tony’s workshop, she had moved a small crate close to Tony’s work bench and as well as one of the small chairs and that was her office until Pepper and Tony finished in his office and she could put the call in to get the movers to bring in her actual office table and chair.
It wasn’t that bad, she didn’t have a lot of work to begin with so the little paperwork that needed to be completed was done within a matter of minutes and after that she only had to put in calls to a few priority clients of Stark industries to ensure that they sent Tony the needed blue prints for what they wanted.
“Pepper what the hell? Do you realise that she took all my booze and hid it from me? I have not had a single drop Pepper Potts, I am pissed.”
“Calm down Tony, I will talk to her about that, but she really is a great person. Just please promise to give her a chance, she’s only going to be with us for a while anyway. And then your actual real assistant will be starting… Leila is a temporary stand in, and NO that does not mean you can flirt your way into her skirt.”
“Well Pepper, I’m hurt that you would even begin to think that I Tony Stark would do such a low thing. I mean really, obviously it’s going to be her flirting with me.”
“No tony it’s not. She… you know what, just read her file. And try to be polite to her. She’s young; she doesn’t need some rich ass to make her life any harder.”
After that part of the conversation was over Tony drowned out the sound of Peppers’ voice as he pulled up Leilas’ file on his laptop and read through it. He totally hated what the girl had been put through, he also understood why Pepper said to be nice to her and that she didn’t need some rich ass making her life hard.
It was almost two hours later when tony walked into his lab to find this assistant asleep on the floor… or more like passed out. “JARVIS what happened?”
“Well sire it would appear that Miss Salvia passed out.”
“Thank you genius, do a vital scan, I want to know what’s wrong with her immediately.”
“Sire… she has… it appears that Miss Salvia has stage 4 leukaemia sir. I can draw up the footage of the time she passed out to see if there is anything specific that happened.”
“…Thank you JARVIS.”
Cancer… how much more shit was life going to throw at this woman.
When Leila came to she was in a bed… “JARVIS what time is it?” “9pm” piped Tony’s voice from a chair in the corner. “You remember what happened before you passed out?” “Uhm… I was… nyet, I don’t know.” Leila knew exactly what was wrong and why she passed out but she was not going to tell someone she just started working for that she had terminal cancer.
She also realised that her one tell for lying had just slipped past her lips… reverting to Russian, not her home language but a way to gossip with her best friend that turned into a home language when they moved into the apartment together.
“You speak Russian?”
“Only a little, it used to be a way to gossip without someone knowing. If they were in the same room as my friend and I.”
“I’m not gonna pretend that I don’t know why you passed out, ‘cause I know you didn’t mention it in your file for very obvious reasons. How much is your treatment?”
“…I’m not gonna do treatment, been there… and that whole rhyme. The money is for the people I’ll be leaving behind. There is no saving from this, no miracle recovery. I’ve made my peace Mr Stark; please just allow me to do my job until that time comes…”
“Sure, but I refuse to have you work at that horrifying table and desk I found you at. You’ll have a proper desk and chair as soon as you walk in tomorrow morning.”
Leila moved to get out of the bed when Tony stopped her with his hand on her shoulder. “Stay, I’m gonna work in the lab anyway. Can’t sleep without drinking myself into oblivion… and some young assistant of mine took my booze.” Tony said this with a small smile and left the room.
Chapter 3
Two weeks went by without incident and Leila was actually a better assistant then Pepper, not that Tony would ever say that to her… Leila would wake him in the morning with a cup of coffee, waiting until he was showered and dressed in clothes she put out for him what the day was going to be like. Since Pepper had become CEO that meant he had less meetings to attend and could spend most of his time in the workshop tinkering.
She also made sure that he had blueprints galore, every single project being attempted by Stark Industries. Tony would see every single blueprint and adjust it as needed before Leila would send them along to Pepper saying they were Tony Genius Approved. Yes he had hacked her email account and also knew that they just used TGA instead of spelling it out anymore.
Leila was sitting at her desk working when he came in. “any new prints today?”
“Mmmm nyet, not today. You still have six projects that need to be checked before being sent into manufacturing. Also… you have a fundraiser tonight you said you’d go last week when they called.”
“Shit… I don’t have a date, or maybe I do? Is Gemma gonna need you tonight… what am I thinking of course she is-“ “tony she’s out of town visiting her mom and brother” “great do you have something nice to wear? ‘Cause you’re my date tonight.”
“I do have something nice. I’ll be ready at 6:30pm… party starts at 7:00pm.”
“Yes Miss Salvia you can go home to change… leaves me more than enough time to look for the booze.”
“smirk all you like boss, you’re not going to find it… but I will give you this, stop looking for it and you might just earn yourself a glass a day.”
Chapter 4
The fundraiser was boring and tony ended up taking Leila and going back to Stark tower within thirty minutes already having drank most of the bar in that time. As they stumbled out of the elevator Tony moved towards the bedroom still leaning on Leila for support… she was the only thing keeping him up.
“Tony… straight to bed okay, you shouldn’t have had so much to drink. Come on”
As soon as they entered Tonys’ bedroom Leila stumbled towards the bed intent on leaving tony there until morning came, her boss had other ideas.
“Stay please; let me have one night of perfect rest with someone by my side?”
“I can’t boss… don’t want you getting too attached.”
And with that she left the room
Chapter 5
The months passed without any further accidents, Leila allowed Tony two glasses of scotch per day and as her last day drew near she wrote her goodbye letter to her boss. Stating in that letter where his alcohol had been hid all this time along with instructions to keep to his current two glass a day regime even when she was no longer around to police it.
Somehow they had become best friends and Leila knew Tony well enough not to mention any emotional things in the letter. When the day arrived Tony wasn’t even there the day so she just left the letter in his M-15 Iron Man suit and made her way home.
The call to Tony was made at 1:45am directly from the hospital, she had known he would be furious if he knew her plans but it was never his decision to make… what she left behind for him was the most precious thing she had to give and even Gemma was going to hate her for this one but it was too late. The testament was signed and the instructions absolute.
The lawyers spent weeks finalising everything before Tony was even notified of what was coming his way… same thing went for Gemma when they removed the last reminder of her friend and everything that belonged to the little boy out of her apartment.
“whats your name son?”
“neill sir.”
“call me Tony, come on let me show you to your room…”
“do I have to sleep there… I have night terrors and mom always let me sleep with her, it’s the only way they stay away.”
“well then we’ll need to move your things into my room”
He remembered the night of the fundraiser and what he had said to her, and somehow she took care of both him and her son. Ensuring that neither man nor boy had another bad dream ever again.