"Karen, convince Jarvis not to send any footage to Dad for the last ten minutes," you called to your computer system. Tony had made Jarvis. You had made Karen, years after you'd hacked into Jarvis. That's what had drawn Tony's attention to you in the first place. He'd wanted to meet the hacker who could hack his system. You'd done it on a dare when you were 8. He was so impressed he took you home with him that day, leaving poor Pepper to figure out the paperwork.

You didn't want Tony to find out about your kiss with Loki before he had to. He wouldn't be pleased.

"Yes, Miss," she replied pleasantly.

You made your way to your bathroom, still grinning idiotically at all of the roses. Your room would smell like them for ages. You found the steaming hot bubble bath waiting for you as promised. You stripped quickly and soaked for a long time in the water that seemed to never cool from the perfect temperature. It was perfect for relieving the last of the stress from the exams that day. Maybe on Sunday you'd splurge and go to the spa. That was laughable. You'd more likely spend the day in your lab, finally getting back to your own projects once your exams were over.

*

You made your way back down to the living room after your bubble bath in your pajamas, a tank top and summer-weight long pajama pants. It didn't concern you that you were alone in the tower with Loki in your pajamas. He'd seen you in pajamas or less (including the bikini incident) so many times over the last year, it didn't matter anymore. You also had the textbook you were supposed to be reviewing for the next day's exam. You were glad tomorrow's was the last exam.

"Feeling better?" Loki greeted you when you entered the room.

"That was perfect," you purred, still unable to stop grinning like an idiot. You curled up on the couch, intending the study. You really, really intended to study.

Somehow studying became kissing Loki.

You had absolutely no idea how that happened.

Or how you ended up in his lap.

Or how your fingers were curled perfectly in his hair as you kissed him.

Or how perfectly his arms wrapped around you.

"Darling, fun as this is, don't you have another exam tomorrow?" Loki asked softly between kisses. He didn't want to stop, but he didn't want to risk your exams either. Or whatever fun he was planning for Saturday.

You laughed in reply. "It's AP computer science. If I can't pass that after I built Karen from scratch, I deserve to fail," you replied with a grin.

"That is fair enough," he replied and gave you yet another kiss.

"Miss, Peter is calling you," Karen's voice announced from the phone in your pocket. You sighed and dug the phone out of the pocket of your pajama pants. Loki pouted.

"I have to answer," you reminded him. "Hey, Pete, what's up?" you asked when you answered the phone. Loki ran his fingers through your hair and rubbed the muscles in your back where you tended to hold stress, while you talked. It was rather distracting. You didn't move from his lap, though, enjoying his distracting touches.

"Hey, Y/N, I'm having some issues with my suit. Can you take a look after school tomorrow?"

"Is Karen giving you trouble?" you asked in reply. You'd programmed Karen into his Spiderman suit and it was the first use of Karen outside of your own personal systems.

"A bit, but I'm sure it's my own fault."

You rolled your eyes. "You and your computer friend were playing with the software again, weren't you?"

"She went into instant kill mode!" he whined

"After you played with the software," you accused. He hesitated too long. "I can come by after school and fix her," you told him. Loki was bored and stopped rubbing your back to braid a lock of your hair. He could be such a child when he was bored. You poked his nose while he was working, which just made him grin at you.

"Can I swing by there?"

"Fine..." you grumbled "but you have to have me over for one of Aunt May's homemade dinners soon." You loved going over there since Aunt May made the best food. Tony didn't cook and Pepper was always too busy. Hell, both of them were too busy, so unless you made food, one of the other Avengers were around, or you ordered in, dinner didn't happen. Everyone ate, eventually, but it was usually takeout or delivery. Jarvis knew your order for every restaurant around that would deliver to the Avenger's tower. It was nice to have a sit-down dinner for once and Aunt May adopted all of Peter's friends, including you.

"Fine, but can you stress to her that we're not dating?" he asked sounding put upon.

"Sure. I can bring my boyfriend if that'll help," you offered. Loki hugged you tighter when you said that. You had to fight hard not to squeak when he did. He kissed your forehead in reply. Peter laughed.

"I'm not sure she'd appreciate that,"

You laughed in reply. "I'll see you tomorrow, then. I've gotta get going, I have an AP exam in the morning." He said goodbye and you hung up the phone. "You are incorrigible," you told Loki, who had somehow french-braided your hair perfectly, even though you were still sitting on his lap facing him.

"Whatever are you going to do about it?" he asked with a grin.

"This," you replied and kissed him again.

*

"WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?" Tony's voice boomed, interrupting your kisses. You and Loki both swung your heads to the elevator at the same time. All of the Avengers were there. Tony was still in his ironman suit too.

You were so dead.

Loki was probably more dead.

Before you could even try to think of some explanation that would have any effect, the group had fallen upon the two of you. You were ripped off of Loki's lap and held in a chair on the other side of the room with Nat's hands on your shoulders and Cap standing in front of you as a human shield.

Thor was standing in front of Loki, staring down Tony, who looked ready to kill Loki. You saw when you peered around Cap that Loki had Mjolnir in his lap. "Is this really necessary?" Loki demanded of Thor grumpily. He was stuck there until Thor removed the hammer.

"Quiet, brother," Thor snapped, turning his attention back to Tony to try to cool Tony's temper.

"He's enchanted her somehow!" Tony exclaimed.

"I have done no such thing," Loki replied calmly.

"Shut up, brother," Thor snapped again. "You are not helping."

"I'm not enchanted!" you protested. You knew better than to struggle against Nat's grip. "Dad!"

"How do we break the enchantment?" Tony demanded of Loki with a snarl.

"Dad, you know perfectly well the way to break a mind control enchantment is cognitive re-calibration, which one, you won't do, and two, would be ineffective since I'm not enchanted," you told Tony perfectly reasonably. Cognitive re-calibration meant hitting in the head really hard.

"Stark, I don't think she's enchanted," Nat said, loosening her grip on your shoulders. Apparently she was convinced by your reasonable argument.

"Brother, have you enchanted Y/N?" Thor asked reasonably.

Loki rolled his eyes. "Of course not. I would do no such thing." Thor seemed to believe that and removed Mjolnir from Loki's lap. Loki stood and came over to you.

"They did not hurt you, did they, darling?" he asked after he had managed to get passed the others.

You shook your head. "No, I'm fine," you reassured him softly.

"Then why was she kissing you?" Tony demanded, still upset, but he was losing and he knew it. Everyone had seen how Loki was around you, and just because the two of you had taken your sweet time about acknowledging there was a relationship, didn't mean one hadn't been building for a year, or that the others hadn't seen it. You were both each other's best friends. Even Tony had seen it, though he hadn't wanted to admit it.

"Because I wanted to?" you asked grumpily. Tony just spluttered. He was obviously still angry. He really didn't like Loki. It had something to do with defenestration.

"Tony..." Pepper said calmly from the elevator, seeming to have understood the events from just walking into the room. "This has been coming for awhile. Let them be,"

After the situation diffused, you had to actually study and stop pretending or avoiding it. Loki returned to playing his new game system on his end of the couch while you placed your cold toes on him as usual. The Avengers kept walking through or finding reasons to hang out in the living room that night, but nothing had changed except that they had caught you kissing earlier.

"Y/N, shouldn't you be getting to bed?" Tony asked later, though not at late as you usually went to bed.

"Dad..." you started, but he just gave you a look. You rolled your eyes, having an idea what he was up to. "I should get some sleep. I do have an exam in the morning. Oh, I forgot to mention, Pete's coming over tomorrow. He wants me to take a look at his suit. I think he and his friend were messing with Karen's code again." Tony nodded distractedly. Loki moved to stand, to escort you to your room, but you stopped him. "Dad wants to read you the riot act or go over the rules for dating his daughter or some such nonsense. I'll see you in the morning," you told him. You leaned down to give him a very chaste kiss.

Thor stood and offered you his arm. You laughed as you took it. "I will escort your lady safely, brother," he announced in his normal booming tone. He seemed pleased with the development. Tony was the only one who was unhappy, but he was a dad, it was to be expected. Loki inclined his head, allowing his brother to do the job that was usually his. Loki didn't seem pleased, but seemed to accept that this was important. Thor walked you to your room and checked the inside, just as Loki always did. "I am glad you and my brother have finally started your courtship. You have been good for him already," Thor told you before he bowed over your hand, kissing your knuckles.

"Thanks, Thor," you replied kindly and slipped into your room, closing the door behind you. The room was still covered in roses. "Karen, let me know if Dad tries to kill Loki," you told her before you settled in bed to read until it was actually time to get some sleep.

*

Loki appeared as an illusion next to your bed some time later. You knew it was an illusion when you threw a stuffed animal at it and it went right through. The throw wasn't malicious, you had just needed to know whether it was an illusion or not, and touching an illusion was the only surefire way to know if it was an illusion. An illusion in your room this late at night was one thing, him actually being here would be a different story.

"How'd the riot act go?" you asked him.

"Apparently if I hurt you or break your heart he will kill me. And he informed me quite firmly that he does not like me," Loki replied dryly.

"That's the standard riot act," you informed him. He nodded.

"I figured as much. Was my brother polite?" he asked, sounding worried.

"He always is, silly trickster," you laughed.

"Then I shall see you in the morning,"

"Night, Loki," you told him softly.

"Goodnight, darling," he replied with a soft, warm smile before the illusion vanished.