Title: In from the Cold (2/3)
Rating/Warnings: M - some swearing and mature situations.
Wordcount: ~14500 (total all three parts)
Summary: Hawkeye is given the order to kill the Black Widow, but he makes a different call.


*~*

Natasha ran hard from the hospital, zigzagging her way around the grounds in order to avoid and hopefully confuse whomever had shot at her after her mission had gone sideways. She didn't know who had taken the shot, but she had a feeling she knew the organization behind the attempt: SHIELD. She'd heard they had a marksman archer, a former circus performer no less, but she'd thought it was some sort of joke. Obviously not, although she questioned the marksmanship considering he'd entirely missed her body.

She hadn't been about to stand around though to confirm who it was, just waiting for them to try again. She just knew she was damned lucky that they'd missed.

She finally got out of the well-lit section of the grounds to the barely used path still – thankfully – swathed in darkness. Now she needed to get to her escape route out the disused entrance.

Even from nearly a mile away she could hear the screams and sounds of destruction that she'd left behind. She did her best to block it all out, trying to stay focused on getting herself to safety.

Her lungs and legs burned with her efforts as she barreled down the path in the dark. She felt relief wash over her when she stumbled into the open gate, not having seen it coming up. She felt her way around the fence and made her way off the hospital grounds, continuing down the path in the direction of the shack again.

As she got closer to her destination, she made herself slow down to a more normal gait, feeling a bit more confident that no one was chasing her.

She entered the shack and closed the door, leaning against it and then sliding down until she sat on the floor, catching her breath. She tried to not let the memories of what she'd left behind get to her; it would do her no good. There was nothing she could do for those children now, she thought grimly.

She let out one last deep breath and then removed the backpack, searching for her cell phone. She pulled it out of a padded pocket and pushed the power button. The display screen lit up and she punched in her pass code to bring up the main screen.

She was surprised to see that she had a text message waiting for her. The only person who had this number was her contact and ride back to Moscow, and the plan had been for her to communicate with him once she was done. If he was writing to her then it didn't bode well in her mind.

Natasha pushed on the icon for messaging and read his text:

No go for return. Too hot to handle. Try alternatives.

She swore and felt like throwing the phone across the one room house, but forced herself to calm down before she did. Word must have already spread about the fire at the hospital. But she thought he'd at least be a bit more loyal than that, considering all the work she threw the son of a bitch's way. Just further proof that she shouldn't rely too much on others and was better off on her own.

She did her best to collect her thoughts and refocus on what she needed to do next. First, change back into her travel clothes and boots. Second, find a place to stay that didn't ask questions; lucky for her she knew the exact place from a previous mission. Lastly, find a bar to drown out the feelings of sadness that ebbed and flowed in her, threatening to overtake her if she allowed them; also an easy find for her. Tomorrow when things hopefully calmed down she would be able to get out of this city and back to the relative safety of Moscow.

Her plan in place, she stood and stripped out of the nurse’s uniform and shoes, and then pulled out her clothes from the backpack. She made quick work of slipping on her travel clothes and boots, shoving the uniform and shoes into the backpack before closing it up again. She'd find a way to get rid of them on the way into the city.

Natasha slipped on the jacket and threw the backpack over her shoulders, and then listened at the door. Nothing out of the ordinary caught her attention, so she opened the door and left the shack. She made her way out to the road and headed for the city, keeping her senses on alert just in case she had been wrong about no one
pursuing her from the hospital.

*~*

An hour later, Clint was at the rendezvous point near the water, talking on comms with Fury.

“It's done?” Fury asked.

Hawkeye felt a mild surge of nerves as he answered. “No, sir, it's not.” He waited for the swearing, but only heard silence, which worried him more.

“You missed?” the director finally questioned, his tone making it obvious he found it hard to believe.

He coughed before responding. “Well, I wouldn't say 'missed,' sir.”

“Then what exactly would you say, considering that woman is still alive?” Fury responded sarcastically.

“I made a different call,” he replied.

“You sure as hell did,” the older man stated. “And why exactly did you go against orders?”

“I believe that she isn't entirely who we think she is.”

There was a longer pause this time on the other end. “Son, we've got a whole dossier on this woman, which you read by the way. We know exactly who she is: a cold-blooded murderer,” Fury said matter-of-factly.

“I have to disagree on that assessment. I don't think we know Romanoff's whole story. I believe she's worth bringing in.”

Again a long pause from the director. “Why don't you come in and we'll discuss this further,” Fury replied, his tone measured and calm.

Clint recognized the other man's reasoning tone from previous missions when they'd had to bring in a compromised agent. But unlike those other agents, he wasn't compromised, and he wasn't going to give in, despite what Fury wanted.

“Sir, if I leave here, we'll lose her. I have a tracker on her and it shows she's still in the city, but it won’t be long until she finds the tracker and gets rid of it. Then she'll be gone and who knows how much more damage she'll cause if I don't move now,” he told the director.

The older man sighed on the other end. Hawkeye knew he was wearing Fury down.

“You really think she's worth going to the wall for?”

“Yes, I do. And if I'm wrong, I'm sure I'll find out damn fast,” he responded half-jokingly.

“Well let's try to avoid that, shall we? We have a trusted stringer nearby that we'll send in to back you up.”

“Sir, I'd prefer to approach her alone. If she even gets a whiff of being tailed, she'll bolt.”

“And what exactly do you propose?” Fury questioned, his voice betraying a bemused curiosity.

“A cold approach. She's vulnerable right now and she'll be on her guard. If I were her, I'd be lying low in some motel until I could move out of danger, which I think she's doing right now. But she'll have to eat at some point, so I can check out some of the restaurants and bars nearby. I was thinking I could get her attention as a hapless tourist backpacking around Russia, find a way to get her alone and talk.”

“We may make you a full field agent yet,” the older man stated with a chuckle.

“Let's not get ahead of ourselves, sir. I have to get through this alive,” Clint responded with a cautioning tone.

“Well, I don't intend to lose you, Hawkeye, so I'm still sending in our stringer to meet up with you at the rendezvous point. He can provide you with a change of clothes and some funds, and we'll get a wire on you as well. Unfortunately the wire won't be as sophisticated as what we're used to, but it'll do what we need it to.”

“No, no wire. We can't risk her finding it on me.”

“I'm not sending you in without something to keep tabs on you,” the director stated. He stopped talking into his mike, but Clint could hear him talking to someone else before he spoke again into the mike. “How about a tracker then in the backpack, and a burner phone with an alarm set to go around every half hour. If you don't turn it off within thirty seconds, the phone will auto-dial to the stringer who will contact the chopper team. You can explain that the phone is faulty, which is a viable excuse to anyone who knows the particular brand we'll give you.”

“Okay, I can handle that.”

“Good. Sit tight and good luck.”

“Thank you, sir,” he said with more confidence than he was actually feeling.

[I'm going to need it,] he thought.

*~*

A couple of hours after her escape from the hospital, Natasha sat at a back corner table in Karl's, a small out of the way bar in the old part of Sochi that most people walked past because it looked like a dive from the outside, and really, on the inside as well. But for the redhead it was exactly the kind of place she needed right now: it was open until very early in the morning, she could get drunk and be left alone.

Her senses still alert to any possible danger, she momentarily distracted herself by spinning the half-full tumbler of vodka on the well-varnished table. She watched the clear liquid slosh about to see how close she could get without actually spilling it. No use wasting even perfectly crappy vodka since she'd need more of it to get as drunk as she wanted.

She stopped the spinning and picked up the glass, bringing it to her lips and tipping it back to allow the vodka to slide across her tongue and down her throat, burning as it went. She sighed; she wasn't quite to the point of drunkenness that would help her forget the evening's trials, but the slight buzz she was getting from this, her third tumbler-full of vodka, was helping.

Natasha's attention was drawn to the opening of the front door of the bar. She placed her glass back down on the table as she observed a good-looking young man with slightly disheveled short, dirty blond hair saunter in. He had on well-worn hiking boots, jeans that clung to his nicely shaped ass, a black t-shirt that hugged his well-muscled chest, and a dark brown leather jacket with a beat up backpack slung across his right shoulder. He didn't appear to be the type to come to a place like this, so either he was lost or he was coming to kill her. Until she knew which it was, she would watch him carefully and be prepared for a fight, if necessary.

He sat down at the bar, slipping the pack off his shoulder and placing it on the stool next to him. The bartender, an older man who looked like he'd seen his fair share of fights, appeared from the back room and approached the younger man.

The bartender asked in Russian, “What do you want?”

The other man gazed at him with a puzzled expression. “I'm sorry, my Russian's a little basic,” the young man stated a little louder than necessary in English. His American accent made Natasha sober up some, putting her all the more on the alert.

The bartender gave the supposed American tourist an annoyed look.

“What. Do. You. Want?” he once again asked the other man, this time more slowly, but still in Russian.

The younger man still didn't appear to understand and seemed to be getting frustrated by the bartender not speaking to him in English. He reached for his backpack and she thought he was going to leave, but instead he reached into the bag and she tensed, reaching into her jacket pocket where she'd placed the sheathed knife she'd previously had in her leg holster. When he pulled out a Russian-English phrase book, she relaxed again, releasing her grip on the weapon and placing her hand on her lap while she watched the young American. He flipped through the book, whispering the bartender's words to himself as if to remember what had been said as he tried to find it.

Natasha couldn't help but be amused by what could quickly become something of a pissing contest between these two, if allowed to continue. She glanced around the room, and the couple of other patrons who were also watching what was going on didn't seem eager to provide any help to the struggling stranger, not that she knew if any of them actually knew English.

She returned her gaze to the two men at the bar, the bartender smirking and the American muttering to himself now while reading through one particular page. From the behaviour of the younger man, she was starting to think that she had overreacted to his arrival. No agent of a secret organization or contract killer worth their salt would draw that much attention to themselves. Not to say that it couldn't be a ruse, but she was getting the impression that he really was what he appeared to be: a tourist who chose the wrong bar to walk into.

She decided to have a little fun with the American herself; he was cute and could prove to be the kind of distraction the alcohol was not.

Natasha lowered the zipper on her sweater top just enough to draw attention to the swell of her breasts, but not too much to be obvious about what she was doing. She pushed her chair back from the table and stood, walking over to the bar where the American had started to flip through his book once more. She stopped behind the stool beside him where his bag sat and leaned against the chair, striking what some might call a seductive pose. This seemed to capture his attention and he turned his blue-eyed gaze upon her. His eyes widened and his mouth hung open slightly in an all-too-familiar gawking expression she'd seen on plenty of men before him; on him, though, it was adorable.

He appeared to realize what he was doing and flushed a little red. He closed his mouth and then glanced down at the book in his hands. He started flipping through it again, looking for something, but stopped when she put her left hand on his left arm. He looked at her hand and then up at her, his mildly nervous expression mixed with desire.

Natasha gave him a smile as she said to him in English, putting on a heavier than usual Russian accent, “You don't need your book with me.”

He visibly relaxed, his expression turning grateful. “Oh, thank god! I was starting to wonder if I was going to be here the rest of the night trying to ask for directions to a motel.”

She couldn't hide her amusement. “You came to Sochi without a reservation?”

“I did place a reservation, but I hadn't been able to call since my stupid cell wasn't working right where I was traveling and I got to the place
late and they'd already given away my room and nowhere else nearby had anything either so I started wandering around to try to find some place that was open that might be able to tell me where there was a room available and that's how I ended up here,” he explained all in one excited breath.

She had to admit she was impressed by his breath control in getting that all out somewhat intelligibly.

[If this goes the way I want it to, we'll need to test out that control,] she thought, feeling a delicious tingle of anticipation in her lips.

She involuntarily licked her lips and she noticed that his eyes flicked to them, his beautiful lashes lowered slightly as he mimicked her movement and licking his own lips. The tingle traveled through her body to her groin and she resisted the urge to drag him out of there right now to the closest private spot where she could fuck him up against a wall. As fun as that would be, she still felt a certain amount of caution when it came to this man, and so she'd play with him a little longer to be absolutely sure he hadn't actually been sent to kill her.

“That's too bad. I'm not sure you'll find much of anything available for the next couple of days because of the Unity Day celebrations.”

He frowned at her words, and she continued before he said anything.

“Why don't we have a drink, to pass the time?” she suggested.

His face brightened and he gave her a radiant smile. “Sure. Oh, you want to sit here?” he asked, suddenly realizing that his bag was in the way.

She nodded and he moved it down next to his stool. She slid in between the stools, brushing her thighs against his knees as she went to sit on the one vacated. She bit her lower lip in order to stop herself laughing aloud at the way his eyes widened slightly at the contact, although she couldn't deny that she too enjoyed the feeling.

They were momentarily distracted when something buzzed from inside the bag on the floor, and she tensed, her old paranoia of him being there to kill her surging up once more. He apologized as he leaned down to pick up the bag. He pulled out a cell phone from a side pocket and punched in something, making the annoying buzzing stop.

“My stupid phone,” he explained, showing it to her before he tossed it back in the pack. “I set the alarm last week and the damn thing won't stop going off every once in a while. Last time I'll buy one of these.” She relaxed again following his explanation.

He dropped the pack back on the floor and returned his attention to her. “So what are we drinking?”

“Well, you're in Russia, so you must have vodka,” she told him.

He grinned and she turned to the bartender who'd wandered away from them, signaling for the older man to come back. He walked over, smiling slightly at Natasha.

“My friend here wants to buy us shots of the best vodka you have,” she told him in Russian, smiling pleasantly. Her words made the older man smile wider, showing off the gaps in his teeth.

“Of course, my friends! I'll be right back,” he replied with a twinkle in his eyes, then headed off to the back room. He knew a sucker when he saw one.

Natasha turned back and told the American, “He's getting a new bottle from the back.”

He nodded in understanding, and then he frowned as if realizing something. “I can't believe how rude I've been,” he stated. She gave him a puzzled look and he explained, “I haven't introduced myself. I'm Clint.”

The young man held out his hand and she took it, smiling with amusement. As they shook hands, she said, “I'm Natalya.”

They held hands for longer than necessary, keeping eye contact. Natasha felt the far too infrequent ache of desire in her groin at his penetrating gaze and couldn’t resist rubbing her thumb caressingly across the back of his hand. She didn’t miss the change in his breathing as he shifted slightly in his seat. She felt a certain amount of smug pleasure at how easily he reacted to her; she looked forward to provoking even more out of him.

They were taken out of the intense moment when the bartender returned with the bottle of vodka, practically slamming it on the bar before he went in search of the shot glasses. She reluctantly slipped her hand from Clint’s, it still tingling and warm from the prolonged contact.

The older man placed the shot glasses on the bar and poured the vodka. When Natasha went to grab the glasses, the bartender held onto them and shook his head.

“Pay up, then you drink,” he stated gruffly.

She arched an eyebrow at the older man and then faced Clint, telling him, “He won’t give us our drinks if we don't pay first.”

He gave her a small smile. “No worries, this is on me.”

He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a wallet, sliding out a few Rubles and showing them to the bartender. The older man indicated with a wave of his hand that he needed more, so the younger man foolishly believed him and pulled out more money. When the bartender appeared satisfied, Clint placed the money in the other man’s hand. The older man quickly closed his hand around the cash and left for the back room before the younger man could change his mind and take back his money. Natasha shook her head at how much the old bastard had got out of the American; it was easily enough for several bottles of the decent vodka he carried.

She picked up the shot glasses and handed one to Clint, enjoying the momentary brush of her fingers against his skin before she brought her hand back to her lap.

“Cheers!” he exclaimed, clinking his glass with hers.

She grinned at his enthusiasm, and then tossed back her drink, reveling in the delicious burn rushing down her throat. He mimicked her movements and she tried really hard not to start laughing when he began to cough, slapping on his chest.

“Smooth,” he stated hoarsely once he'd stopped coughing.

This time she didn't hold back on her laughter, and he joined her.

“I need to teach you how to build up your tolerance to good Russian alcohol,” she teased, placing her left hand on his right knee, giving it a squeeze before leaning the arm on the bar. He squirmed a bit again in his seat and she bit on her upper light to stop herself from grinning with glee at his latest reaction. She didn't want to appear too obvious after all.

“I bet there's a lot you can teach me,” Clint stated huskily, running the tip of his tongue across his lips teasingly.

Natasha's mouth fell open briefly at his insinuating tone and she felt a rush of desire through her body that pooled in her groin, making the ever-present ache even stronger.

[Oh the things I could teach you.]

“Another drink?” he asked suddenly.

She blinked and shook her head, refocusing on him and not on where she was going mentally. “Sorry, yes, another,” she replied.

Her body hummed all the more when Clint's hand brushed her knee as he turned toward the bar to pour them both another shot of vodka. Right now she wasn’t caring too much if this man was here to kill her; all she wanted more than anything was to take him back to her room and fuck this delicious man until they were both senseless. Maybe it was the vodka finally kicking in, or his impossibly blue eyes, or his seemingly giddy nature, but if she was honest with herself, she didn't give a fuck what it was. She really wanted him. NOW.

He swiveled back around to face her, handing her a shot, which she threw back quickly and placed the glass back on the bar. He quickly followed suit, making less of a face this time as he swallowed.

The redhead smiled seductively and leaned toward him, making sure he got a decent view of her cleavage peeking through the zippered opening of her top. "This has been fun, but how about we go back to my room?" she suggested, her voice low. She tried not to laugh at the nervous gulp her question elicited from him, or the way his bright eyes flitted briefly to her exposed chest and then back to her eyes.

"Sure," he stated, sounding calmer than he appeared.

Natasha slid off her stool, and she ended up standing so close to him she was practically sitting on his lap.

[Now there's a lovely image; I'll have to see if I can work that in somewhere,] she thought lasciviously.

"Come with me," she stated, chuckling internally at the double entendre in the invite. At this close proximity, she couldn't miss the way his eyes dilated. He definitely didn't miss her meanings in the invite.

She slid past him and walked out of the bar, hearing him quickly following after her.

End of part two


part three