Chapter Text
Three days.
She had been seeing the same stranger for three days. Following her, not close enough to be careless, but close enough to be noticed.
She caught the stranger’s reflection in a dirty window. A face she had never seen before.
Curious. She filed it in her mental filing cabinet.
The second time was outside a café.
As she waited for her coffee, she glanced outside.
There he was across the street, standing in front of a bakery, buying pastries. Interesting.
The third time was the confirmation.
Natasha stirred her coffee while watching rain slide down the window.
The man sat across the street beneath the awning of a closed bookstore.
American. Military posture.
He looked too disciplined to be local law enforcement. Too patient to be a bounty hunter.
Definitely not Red Room. Different problem. New unknown.
That narrowed the possibilities considerably. She wondered if he knew she had spotted him.
Probably.
People capable of tracking her rarely made that particular mistake.
A small part of her respected him for it. A larger part was calculating how difficult it would be to kill him.
The answer was inconvenient. Very.
The waitress approached. Natasha smiled politely and paid her bill.
The smile disappeared the moment she stepped outside. Cold rain greeted her. She slipped her hands into the pockets of her coat and walked. At her normal pace.
No rush. No sudden movements. She knew better than to startle her prey. After all, Professionals waited.
The city moved around her in a blur of headlights and umbrellas. The man followed. Not too close. Just close enough.
Natasha turned down a narrow side street.
Then another.
Then another.
The footsteps behind her never changed pace.
Most people would have hesitated. Most people would have realized they were being led somewhere. But this one continued, deliberately. Confidently. She reached the dead end first.
Brick walls. A rusted gate. No civilians. No witnesses. Perfect.
Natasha turned.
The man stopped several meters away. Rain dripped from the brim of his cap.
For a long moment neither spoke. Neither reached for a weapon. But neither looked away.
Finally, the man spoke. “You’re hard to find.”
Definitely American.
Natasha tilted her head. “If you’ve found me, perhaps not hard enough.”
The corner of his mouth twitched. Not quite a smile. Not quite anything.
“You know who I am?”
“No.” Definitely a lie. She already had several theories.
“Clint Barton.”
Not a threat. Not even a codename. Just that. A name.
That was unexpected. Natasha filed the information away.
“And why is Clint Barton following me?”
As the rain intensified, something shifted in his expression. There still was no hesitation. But there was something different.
As though he were making a decision. Consideration?
His expression shifted again, as if he finally made up his mind. “I was sent here to kill you.”
Natasha felt her heartbeat steady.
There it was. Confirmation. At least that mystery was solved.
She studied him carefully. The way he stood. The way his hands remained visible. There was no sign of immediate aggression. Curious.
Because if Clint Barton had truly come to kill her— she suspected she would already be dead.
“And yet,” she said softly.
“Here we are,” he said in return.
The silence stretched between them.
Barton reached into his jacket. Natasha’s weight shifted instinctively. Ready. Prepared. Instead of a weapon, though, he produced a small photograph. He held it out.
Natasha did not take it. “What’s this?”
“A way out,” he said simply.
A way out.
Natasha almost laughed. People offered assignments. People offered deals. People made threats. No one offered freedom.
Not in all the years she had spent becoming whatever others needed her to be.
Natasha looked at the photograph. Then at the man holding it.
And for the first time in a very long while, she didn’t know what came next.