Surprise
December 24,1991
Tony Stark sat numb in his parents house. Aunt Peggy next to him refusing to leave her godson's side for the immediate future. He had buried his parents the day before and while he could have honestly cared less about his father, he was distraught over his mother. He was still trying to come to grips with having to take control of a multi-billion dollar company at the age of 21 and the fact that he would never again hear his mothers voice.
Peggy was rubbing circles in her nephew's back thinking about all that had happened over the last week. While people across the world feared the director of Shield, she made sure that Tony was never one of them. She knew that Tony’s relationship with his father was horrible at its best so she made sure to always provide him with an escape whenever he needed one. When she had heard that the Starks were killed in a car accident she immediately rushed to Tony only to find him black out drunk with his friend James or Rhodey as Tony liked to call him trying to both console him and keep any more scotch bottles away from him.
Over the next week the two of them worked in tandem to keep Tony sober and make sure he knew he wasn’t alone. That morning Peggy practically had to throw Rhodey out of the house so he could spend Christmas with his parents before he had to report back to the Air Force.
She was disrupted from her thoughts by the door bell. Before she could stand to answer it she could hear Jarvis heading to do so so she kept her focus on Tony. After a few minutes, Jarvis came into the room with a worried look on his face.
“Ms. Carter, may I request that you join me outside please?” The butler asked quietly.
“What is it Jarvis?” She asked as she stood from her spot next to Tony. After a few quiet words to her nephew that she would be right back, she followed the butler out of the room towards the front door.
“I’m not sure Ma’am. There is a woman outside and she is demanding to be allowed in to speak with sir.” He said as they made their way to the door.
Once they reached the door, Peggy looked at the woman that was demanding to speak to the Stark heir and began making observations. The woman had on an incredibly expensive dress and jacket with matching shoes and bag to match. Her choice of jewelry was also incredibly expensive and was lacking a wedding ring.
However, the one thing that caught her eye was the sight of a young girl hiding behind the woman. Unlike the woman, the child appeared to be in little more than hand-me-downs. When the child looked up at Peggy, the spy had to hold in a gasp at the child's eyes. The same eyes she had only ever seen in two people, one of which was now resting six feet under a headstone that bore his name. Quickly she looked back to the older woman and noted similarities between her and what she could safely assume was her child.
“Can I help you?” Peggy asked politely.
“I told the butler that I need to speak to Anthony.” The woman said with an air of superiority about her.
“I’m sorry but he is currently unavailable at the moment, dealing with the loss of his parents has taken a heavy toll on him but I am able to deal with any issue on his behalf.” Peggy said using all of her years of training to keep both a polite tone and the desire to slam the door in this woman's face at bay.
“Fine then. I’m here to make sure that I will still receive my monthly $75,000 checks even though Howard is dead.” The mystery woman spat out.
“I think that perhaps you should come in Ms…” Peggy trailed off as she moved to the side to allow the woman entrance to the house.
“Hill. Linda Hill.” The woman provided as she stepped inside with the child following after.
“Well Ms. Hill, I’m afraid that I am not aware of what checks you would be referring to.” Peggy said, fear over what would come next began to spread.
“The checks to stay quiet about Howard's daughter.” Linda said with a vicious smile as she pushed her daughter forward.
Before Peggy could respond a voice from behind shouted out in shock “Daughter!”
Peggy quickly turned around and saw her shocked nephew staring wide eyed at the little girl.
After Peggy had left him, Tony had begun to look for any alcohol left in the mansion after Aunt Peggy and Rhodey had gone through the place and had either hid it or just dumped the bottles down the drain; he wasn’t sure which. As he was making his way from room to room in his quest he could hear Aunt Peggy and another voice coming from the front of the house. With curiosity getting the better of him, he made his way to the entrance way to see what was going on.
As he approached the door he could see Aunt Peggy talking to a woman but what really caught his eye was the kid behind her. When the kid looked at Tony, he immediately felt some sort of connection with her. Tony and the girl just stared at one another until he heard the woman say “stay quiet about Howard's daughter.”
Tony could only say the first thing that came to his mind “Daughter!”
Tony looked at Peggy who was now looking at him and for the first time that he could remember, Peggy looked speechless. He turned his attention back to the girl that was apparently his sister and slowly made his way over to the group.
“You’re telling me that she is my sister.” Tony said to no one specifically. All he could do was just stare at the girl who stared right back at him.
Linda then began to explain everything. The girl in question was revealed to be named Maria Hill and was 9 almost 10. Tony, Jarvis, and Peggy all exchanged a look at how disgusting it was that Howard's daughter with his mistress had the same name as his wife. Linda explained that she was an aspiring actress when she had met Howard and after a few encounters she fell pregnant with his child. After Maria was born, she approached Howard with the threat to go public with news of his bastard, the mothers words, unless he paid for her silence. Thus the $75,000 a month deposits for the mothers silence began.
The more that Linda spoke the more Tony hated his father. Both for cheating on his mother and abandoning Maria with this woman that clearly never cared for her own daughter.
Peggy meanwhile lost what little respect that she still had for her friend Howard. With how he had treated Tony growing up and now this, Howard was lucky that he was already dead because she would have killed him herself.
“I’ll give you 10 million.” Tony said quietly after Linda was done speaking. All eyes went to him in confusion.
“10 million for what boy?” Linda asked rudely.
“I’ll give you 10 million and you sign away all rights you have to Maria over to me and sign an NDA that you will never speak about this to anyone. All that I need is a DNA test to prove she is my sister.” Tony said, taking his eyes off of Maria and looking at Linda. Howard may have ruined his entire childhood and now part of Maria’s but he would be damned if he let his fathers mistakes ruin his daughters entire childhood.
Peggy could only stare at her nephew with a mix of pride and fear. The pride was due to him stepping up to fix his fathers mistake and the fear because she didn’t know if Tony knew what he was getting himself into with raising a child.
Maria on the other hand felt something that rarely felt in her young life, hope. Maria was never abused by her mother but she was severely neglected. Linda had always spent the bulk of the money on clothes and jewelry for herself and purchased the bulk of Maria’s possessions from thrift stores. Maria would often wake up to an empty apartment because her mother was often out partying.
After a couple moments of silence, Linda finally croaked out a stunned, “De..De.. Deal.”
Tony simply nodded and said “I’ll have my lawyers draw up paperwork for you to sign and arrange for the DNA test. In the meantime, Maria will stay here. Once everything is finalized, I’ll have people go to collect her things.” He then turned his attention to Jarvis “Can you take Ms. Hill and get her information for the lawyers?”
Jarvis nodded his agreement and led Linda out of the room, leaving Tony, Peggy, and Maria alone in silence.
“Why?” Maria’s quiet voice cut through drawing the attention to her.
“Why what?” Tony asked his sister.
“Why are you doing this?” Maria asked her brother, “You don’t know me.”
“Because Howard fucked up enough peoples lives.” He said as he took her hand and led her into the house to find her a room, leaving Peggy to watch the new siblings walk away with tears in her eyes.