2013-11-11 - Please...

The room's lights are off. Natasha lays curled up on the bed, dozing, a blanket tucked up around her.

It was a decent plan as plans go. Sneak into the mansion by the cover of night, when Tony would be sleeping (hey, it could happen) or more likely in his lab trying to get through his feelings by working (far more likely). It worked too, mostly. Jarvis saw Clint sneaking up the stairs but other than giving him a vaguely exasperated look he didn't do anything about it. Flushed with his apparent victory Clint quietly turns the knob of his bedroom door and slips inside closing the door behind him. He moves to his desk and flicks on the desk lamp without looking towards the bed, he might be tempted to nap. "Where did I leave those cards," he mutters to himself as he begins riffling the drawers.

"Mmph..." a soft voice makes from the bed. A single blue eye opens, and the sound a body tensing on the bed can be heard in the silence.

"...Clint, is that you?" Natasha's voice says quietly.

There is a sudden movement on the bed as her hand shoots out to the bedside table, retrieving a piece of paper and yanking it under the pillow.

Clint jumps dumping a box of greeting cards all over the floor. He turns and raises an eyebrow at Natasha "Jeez Nat, should I be talking to She-Hulk about filing a restraining order?" he asks. He caught the movement of the paper, Nat not being as quick as she used to be and the eyebrow arches higher "And what's with the paper? I thought you usually slept with a gun under your pillow," he remarks as he bends down to gather the cards up and put them back in the box.

Natasha rolls her eyes, ignoring the question about the paper. "Sawyer is next door in the guest room. I'm staying here for a few nights to help take care of her-- this is where I'm staying so I can hear her." She gives him a look. "Blame Tony and Jarvis."

She actually looks hurt for a few moments, before sinking back into the bed. "Believe me, this was not my first choice."

"Hm," Clint says as he finishes picking up the cards and putting them back into the box. He sets them on the desk. "I'd talk to them but I am pretty sure Tony will kill me and Jarvis will hold me down," he remarks and sits down at the desk finding a pen he scribbles on a scrap of paper to see if it's working. "So, what's on the paper that you didn't want me to see Nat?"

Natasha eyes him. "It's private," she says stubbornly. "What are you doing here, anyway? I figured you'd be avoiding this place like it was ground zero of gamma radiation fallout."

"So is my room," Clint counters when she objects on grounds of privacy. He takes out a card and then drums his pen against his chin staring at it while he thinks of what to write. "Running low of my good arrowheads and rather than make them or go to my place and risk the neighbours being blown up, I came here. Also, I wanted to give Sawyer a card to welcome her back to the world of the living."

"Blame Tony," she repeats, ice in her tone. Hell, for all either of them know, it was Tony's sick sense of retribution for Clint's slip the other day.

She rises from the bed, mostly undressed--only in a tank top and underwear-- grabbing her pants off the back of the chair, sliding them on. "I'll leave-- go make sure Sawyer's sedatives are still working." She moves to grab the paper from under the pillow.

Clint looks over his shoulder at Nat "I would if I had a leg to stand on with him," when she gets up Clint takes a moment to stare then forces his eyes back to the card. "You can stay, I won't be long."

He does glance back, though if that's to sneak a peek at Nat or the paper it's hard to say.

"No, it's fine. You probably don't want me undressed in your bed anyway," Natasha says coldly. "I'll leave before you need to contact Jen-- wouldn't want to cause you any more problems."

She starts towards the door, folding the paper as she goes.

"You know the wanting is not the problem," Clint says a bit sharply letting the pen drop and turning his chair to face her. "As for not causing me problems, seems a little late to start worrying about that now."

"Is that so?" Natasha says, dropping into a rather seductive pose-- and it would be very much so, except that her gaze is glittering with anger and hurt-- and is that? No, not from her, she has far too much control. "Well, if you want me so much, then I suppose I should just fall right back into your bed." Her body language is well-trained, but she cannot keep the fury from her face. She is shaking ever-so-slightly.

The body-language, her curves, and all the rest fools his body well enough and he shifts uncomfortably in the chair. His mind though for the moment seems to be mostly clear and he knows her well enough to know he has her more pissed off than normal "I am trying to be good Nat," he says firmly but not without difficulty. "You're not making it easy."

Anger and a vague maliciousness that comes from the hurt his earlier comments bit into her sense. Natasha moves across the room towards him, her hips swaying with every step. "I'm not?" she asks in /that/ tone... slightly teasing, slightly playful, curious.

"But if I recall, you're /very/ good," she continues, dropping on the edge of the bed closest to him, leaning back on her hands, her curves very obvious from the way she settles back.

His eyes watch her move but pulls a face anyhow as he turns away from her trying to collect the card and the pen presumably in a prelude to his exit. "Screw you, Natasha," he bites back, despite the unfortunate word choice. "You know what I mean. I am trying not to add me fucking you to my list of problems."

"It wouldn't have to be a problem." The words are out of her lips before she can bite them back. Dammit. She manages to look at least somewhat sheepish.

She stands up, shaking a little bit. "...you're right. You're... dammit, Clint. I... will just leave-- it's best for both of us."

She turns slightly, taking a step forward, but her bare foot catches on the sheet, and it twists under her. She stumbles, catching herself on the arm of the chair Clint is on, her hand brushing his arm.

Planned? Not even a little bit, from the wide look of surprise she has as she relies on agility that just isn't there right now to no avail.

Clint drops the pen when Nat says, well what she says but he grabs it up and turns the chair just in time for her to fall into his lap. Well if she couldn't guess he was interested she can now, and he just stares for a moment, their faces close enough to feel each other's breath. He moves back slowly, but he moves back his pulse clearly racing at his throat "Nat, please," he pleads hoarsely.

Natasha can't tell if he's pleading for her to leave... or to stay.

Honestly? He probably doesn't know either. Or rather, than a part of him wants both.

Her arms, holding her mostly upright against the chair, shake slightly, her eyes looking into his, dilated with obvious desire. She doesn't move for a few moments. She barely breathes.

"Clint... I..." A thousand things rush through her mind at once. Their first kiss in Montreal. The slam of the door of the bathroom yesterday. Every time they'd ever curled up on the couch or hotel beds. Stolen moments on missions. The last time they had been together.

The crack of a single gunshot.

She closes her eyes. "I'm sorry," she says, more emotion behind those two words than Clint had ever heard from her.

And her lips press to his, gently, hesitantly.

He is corpse still when her lips press to his, but then with agonizing slowness he begins to return the kiss. "Damn you, Nat," he breathes against her lips before he continues the kiss. His hands don't move from the arms of the chair though, a lingering sign of the battle going on between his brain and other brain even as he kisses her.

Natasha murmurs something softly in Russian, kissing him slowly, but not pushing any further. The words may be strange to Clint, but the tone-- well, the tone is the same in any language. And like the apology, utterly sincere.

Still, she does not back away, but she doesn't try and move the kisses further-- her body language, the slight hesitancy and gentle pressure of her lips to his... everything shows that she is submitting to his desire here, if he chooses.

The tone of her words startles Clint and he breaks away from Nat's lips suddenly, the chair rocking back against the desk. He grabs her then to keep her from falling. When they settle back on the floor he looks at her breathing heavy "Nat I..." he leans forward, his lips brushing hers before he pulls back again. "Nat, I should go," he whispers hoarsely.

"Da, you should," Natasha agrees softly, almost too softly to be heard, kissing him again, gently. Then another kiss, a little more firmly. Her hands move, one resting on his chest, the other around his neck. "We should both..." and before she can finish that thought, she catches his lips with hers again, deepening her kiss, her lips parted and her tongue teasing at his lips, almost pleading for entrance.

The kiss comes as a surprise, one moment he had the lead the next it's Nat. That sort of unpredictability was fun when they were a couple but now... well at least one part of him was enjoying it. Maybe two his lips open a little in response but he shakes his head. "/Nat/," he says keeping his lips turned away from her. "I've got to go. I can't..." he tries to shift her off of his lap.

"Can't what?" Natasha breathes in a soft whisper. "Make love to me again?" Her lips press against his jaw and she drops a half a dozen soft, gentle, teasing kisses down the side of his neck.

She slowly turns, putting her feet on the ground and beginning to stand, still leaning over to kiss back up his neck, her breath warm. A few strands of her hair tickle his face. Her heart was pounding, her breathing quickening. This was not the calm, sensual ice queen-- no. There was a fire there, a passion that he had only barely glimpsed before.

She pulls away, though it seems to be with effort. She sits back on the edge of the bed, watching him.

Clint squeezes his eyes closed. "Damn it, Nat," he says for the second time tonight. That warmth, the simmering passion is intoxicating. He lets her kiss his neck his fingers toying with her hair as he drapes across his chest. "No," he tells himself and when she extricates herself from his lap he stands with difficulty almost stumbling over the chair. He steadies himself and moves towards the door.

"Nat," he breathes. "It's not about you, it's me," yeah, he went there. He takes a breath "I can't... I can't be that guy," he says and turns to open the door and make his escape.

"Clint."

Her voice is pleading as he moves to go, a small quaver at the end of his name. "I..."

She breathes. Her hair is mussed. Her cheeks are flushed. She looks almost vulnerable. Natasha Romanov does not beg. She does not show weakness. She does not--

"Please... don't." Her plea is quiet, low and honest. "Please."

Clint hears those words, hears the tone, and he freezes with his hand on the doorknob turning slowly towards Nat. He looks at her there, vulnerable, /her/, vulnerable Natasha Romanov the Black Widow, /needing/ him. His face betrays his emotions plainly, there's genuine fear there the sort he usually hides behind stuttered excuses or stupid jokes.

He realizes it too and so he turns and with a quick turn of his wrist the door is open and he's gone, his feet falling quickly in the corridor beyond as the door swings closed behind him.

Natasha stares at the closed door for a time in silence. A few moments? An hour? She cannot tell. But finally, at a sharp cry of terror from the room next door, she manages to move, to draw herself to her feet, and one step, then another, towards the door.

Woodenly, she twists the knob, and steps out into the hall-- hair still mussed, lips slightly puffy from the kisses, a strap of her tank top tumbling off her shoulder. Bare feet pad across the hallway floor to Sawyer's door, and she opens it.

A few steps bring her across the room, though her eyes are unfocused, lost. She grabs the syringe of sedative from the bedside table, and, almost unfeelingly, injects Sawyer. Natasha crawls into the bed with her friend, patting Sawyer's arm and murmuring soothingly in Russian. The other woman calms, falling back into a deep sleep.

It is only then the Widow allows herself to roll over, curling into a ball.

In the hallway, a soft cry of anguish can be heard. Sawyer's nightmares-- they must be back again. Of course.