"Where are we going?" Natasha asked as she pulled her seatbelt across her body to fasten it. She'd let Rumlow open the passenger door of his Challenger for her and now she watched as he started the engine and put the car into gear.

"A little place I know in Queens. Hope you like Italian."

The grin he offered her was meant to be flirty, but Natasha felt a hint of the nerves behind it. That was only fair, she supposed - she was nervous, too. Or she assumed the fluttery feeling in the pit of her stomach was nerves. She didn't remember ever feeling it before.

"I like Italian," she said when she realized he was waiting for an answer.

"It won't be as fancy as what you get at Stark's place, but it's good food."

Natasha had to chuckle. "You think we eat fancy every night?"

"I think Stark's known for over-indulgence."

"True enough, but since Bruce moved in, they've been over-indulging in science more than anything else. The rest of us make do with whatever's there, except for Sunday dinner."

"Sunday dinner?" Rumlow looked skeptical, and Natasha couldn't blame him.

"It was Steve's idea. Any of us who aren't on mission are invited to come." She gave invited the barest of emphasis, and Rumlow chuckled.

"Just a normal family dinner," he quipped.

"If anything about us is ordinary, Sunday dinner is. Even the scientists are dragged from their labs - by force if necessary - for it."

"Suddenly I'm seeing Rogers dragging Stark out by his hair. Not sure you'd want to risk that with Banner, though."

"What about you?" Natasha asked. "Any odd traditions?"

"SHIELD wasn't big on company picnics."

Neither, Natasha would bet, was Hydra. "And your family?"

"Big, loud, and Italian on my mom's side. Slightly smaller, slightly quieter, and WASP-y on my father's. Not that he stayed around long enough for me to meet most of them."

"Is that why you ended up in Hydra? Daddy issues?"

Rumlow shot an amused glance at her before turning into the Tunnel. "I thought you were a subtle interrogator, your marks don't even realize it's an interrogation until it's too late."

"This isn't an interrogation. Or I don't mean it to be," Natasha corrected herself.

"What is it?"

"Trying to figure out why the universe thinks we're soulmates."

"Fair enough." Brock hesitated as he guided the car through pre-rush-hour traffic, and for a moment Natasha thought he wasn't going to answer her question. Then he said, "I wasn't clear. Pop wasn't around because he was Army. First Special Forces Operational Detachment."

Natasha recognized the designation. "Delta Force."

"Always on mission, or preparing for one, or getting back from one. I probably only spent a year total with him before I turned eighteen."

"That would be a disaster for most families."

"Mom liked the stability."

"That doesn't sound stable."

"For her, marriage was the stability. It was something, someone, she could count on. Sacred vow before God, and all that. And she knew Dad would do right by her." Brock shrugged as he took a turn onto less-busy street. "It worked for them."

"What did you do when you turned eighteen?"

Brock gave her a grin that was equal parts malicious and mischievous. "Joined the Navy."

Natasha had to laugh, despite the pain that lurked just beneath the surface of his words. Then she sobered and, following some instinct she'd thought long buried and decomposed, rested a hand on his forearm. "I'm sorry."

Brock shrugged again and pulled into a parking space. "It worked for Mom. Didn't work for me."

Rumlow opened the door for her, and Natasha took the hand he offered. Rogers and Barnes are corrupting me.

That thought faded before the onslaught of scents coming from the small house where he'd parked. Garlic, tomatoes, and other aromas Natasha couldn't immediately identify surrounded her and she inhaled deeply, anticipating the meal to come.

"Smells like we're in the right place," she observed, and Rumlow chuckled.

"I'll tell Nana you said so."

"Nana?" The truth followed immediately on the question. "Your grandmother's restaurant."

"I thought you'd appreciate the privacy. You aren't as anonymous as you used to be."

He didn't seem to be lying. Of course, he was STRIKE, which meant he'd had more training than the average person in concealing his motives. So she laid out the rest of it. "And it gives you a home field advantage."

Rumlow grinned, teeth white in his olive complexion. "Going up against the Black Widow, I'll take any advantage I can get."

Despite her reservations, Natasha laughed. Was it just a result of their soul-bond that she laughed so easily, so genuinely, with him?

She pondered the question while he led her inside to be greeted warmly by the staff – most of whom were relatives, he said as he introduced them. Natasha responded automatically, slipping into the persona she wore most often, while she considered what was happening.

They were, she realized, getting along. More, she was actually enjoying Rumlow's company. How was that possible, when they were enemies? Or they had been. What were they now?

Soulmates, if their words could be believed.

Then he was holding her chair for her, and she focused on him once more.

"You're good," he said as he took the chair opposite her. Natasha tried not to think of it as an adversarial position. "They didn't even realize you weren't paying attention."

"I was," Natasha corrected. "Just not only to them."

"Uh-huh."

"That's your cousin Gianna at the register. She's in graduate school studying to be a social worker. Your uncle Joey's the chef, and he and your Nana have been arguing about whether or not anchovies truly belong in puttanesca. Shall I continue?"

"All right, I'm impressed." Rumlow paused while their server – Leanne, not one of the family – brought a bottle of red wine and opened it. Rumlow tasted it and nodded, and Leanne poured a glass for each of them, then left them alone.

Natasha took a sip, savored the complexity of flavors, and decided that at least her soulmate had good taste in wine.

"What else were you paying attention to?" Rumlow asked.

Natasha took another sip, then set her glass aside and sat back, studying him. "I was thinking that you hadn't answered my question."

He studied her in return. "What do you think the answer is?"

Natasha raised an eyebrow at his tactic. "Why does my opinion matter?"

"I'd like to see how you think. And what you think of me at this point."

Natasha smiled. This was the kind of challenge she enjoyed. "All right." She took another sip of wine, was interrupted by Leanne's return.

"Your usual?" she asked Rumlow.

"Yes, please," he said.

"What's your usual?" Natasha asked.

"Trust me enough to have it, too?" Rumlow countered.

"Well, it's unlikely you'll poison yourself, so sure."

Which might not have been the best thing to say in front of the college student serving them, Natasha realized. But Rumlow was laughing.

"Make it two," he told Leanne. "With pasta e fagiole to start."

Leanne nodded and, with a last dubious glance at Natasha, left them alone again.

"Zola said that Hydra was founded on the belief that people couldn't be trusted with their own freedom," Natasha said. "Each side of your family seems to be a counter-argument. Your father's side has a history of fighting for, dying for, that freedom. Your mother's side came to America to pursue that freedom. Both sides agree that freedom is worth sacrificing everything that matters."

"Huh." Rumlow shook his head. "I hadn't thought of it like that before. It's a good point."

"With that background, especially since you went into the service yourself, something must have happened to change your beliefs." Natasha studied him. "Something while you were in service?"

"It wasn't one event," Rumlow said. "It was a culmination. And I never entirely agreed with Zola's philosophy."

"You agreed enough."

"I didn't want to."

Natasha made a noncommittal noise, encouraging him to continue.

"You're right about my family – both sides. I grew up on apple pie in the land of opportunity. America, right or wrong, in a nutshell. And then my father got shipped off to Vietnam."

Rumlow sat back as Leanne arrived with their soup and a basket of garlic bread.

"Try it," he said.

Natasha wasn't sure whether he meant the soup or the bread, so she took a bite of each, her eyes widening as flavors burst on her tongue. Rumlow just smiled as he took a spoonful of soup.

"I didn't have a problem with the protesters," he said. "Even as a kid, my folks made sure I knew that people could say whatever they wanted, within reason, like not yelling fire in a crowded theater. Freedom was supposed to be exercised responsibly, though they never said it out loud."

"Responsibility is the reverse of the coin of freedom," Natasha agreed.

"Poetically put." Rumlow lifted his glass in acknowledgment, took a swallow before continuing. "But what I saw then, when Pop and others came home – that wasn't the responsible exercise of freedom. That was people calling honorable soldiers the vilest of names, accusing them of things that they couldn't prove and that might not have actually happened."

"It made you angry."

"I was a kid, it's not like I had deep philosophical thoughts, but yeah, I got mad. And every time I'd see someone else acting irresponsibly with their freedom – even something as simple as bitching about the state of the country but not voting, not even trying to change things – I just got madder."

Rumlow stabbed the air with his fork. "Zola was wrong. It's not that people can't be trusted with their freedom, it's that they don't want the responsibility that comes with it, and they don't realize you can't have one without the other."

"So you'd take it away from everyone, because some people don't want it?"

"Because most people don't want it."