The sky was heavy with the coming storm, the clouds a peculiar shade of green that always seemed to proceed thunder and lightning. She had always loved thunder, even as a child, feeling somehow like the sky's anger was an extension of her own. Even now she wanted to tilt her head back, raise her face to the sky and scream out the echoes of the thunder that resonated within her bones and somersaulted within her lungs.
She knew that she was being unfair, that her need to draw a line under what had happened to her was pushing them both to the breaking point, but she couldn't step back from it to tell him that. Natasha honestly felt that she was becoming the living breathing bitch in that old saying about payback. She needed closure and killing the men who had hurt her was the only way that she knew how to get it.
None of what was going through her head was Clint's fault, if anything he had done more than she would have thought possible to aid her in this, tracking down the men they hunted, gathering information on them, understanding without having to be told that she needed to be the one who looked them in the eyes as they took their last breath. He just understood her, in the same way as he always had. Tonight as she waited for him to return to their latest safe house, she was sure that if she didn't move soon she would explode.
As if her thoughts had summoned him, she heard his key in the lock. Turning from the window she watched him as he stalked across the apartment, rainwater dripping from his hair and the dark clothing that he had worn during his stake out of the warehouse building. He was soaked to the skin and she wondered how many hours he had spent on a rooftop or in rubbish strewn alleyways waiting for the moment that his prey revealed himself. It wouldn't help either of them if he got sick because he'd spent too much time out in the rain.
"It's definitely him," he announced, grabbing a towel and roughly drying his face and hair. "I followed him from the warehouse to a converted loft downtown, security is tighter than it was at the farm but nothing that we can't get through."
"What about the warehouse?" she asked, wondering what it was that had pulled one of her tormentors here when the others had kept such a low profile.
"Weapons," Clint replied, shrugging out of the wet leather jacket and throwing it over the back of a chair to drip dry. The shirt followed a moment later, landing with a wet thud on the carpet. "I didn't get a good look at what was in the crates but we should probably make our move soon so that none of those weapons find their way to the targets before we do."
She watched him as he moved across the room to the city map that they had pinned to the wall, a huge image intersected by lines mapped in brightly coloured string and pins. They had been holed up in this particular apartment for two weeks, tracking the movements of their target, learning his routes and his routines. As she watched him trace his fingertips over the streets of the map, pin at the ready, she considered the times that she had trailed the mark through the busy streets of the business district, fingers itching to corner him somewhere and show him just why it was wasn't advisable to give a woman like herself reason to hate. Only her trust in the man in front of her had stopped her from doing it. They had worked too hard for her to destroy everything in a fit of temper.
"This is where we're going," he told her, gesturing to the newest pin that he had put in the board. "His loft takes up half of the top floor, if we scope the rooftop I'd be willing to bet we can get access from there. I managed to swipe one of their ear buds when I wandered in there to ask for directions so we can listen in to the security chatter while we're there. Once we're in we'll need to be quiet, in and out between the building's security patrols, four guards who are mostly interested in the floor below the loft, thirty minutes tops."
Natasha studied the map, taking in the details of the area that surrounded the building they were heading for. In the weeks that they had watched him, they had seen definite signs of agitation. Word had reached the survivors that two members of their brotherhood were no longer breathing, if he suspected that he might be in danger they could no longer afford to take chances when they approached him.
Half an hour didn't seem like long enough to her for him to pay the debt for her days of suffering but it would have to be long enough.
"When?" she asked, turning to face her partner, taking in the set of his shoulders and the grim determination of his features.
Clint looked at her, eyes sweeping over her face, searching for something, before turning back to the map. It bothered her that she had no idea what he was looking for or whether he thought he had found it, in this moment his expression was locked down, unreadable, the strategist in him turning over the scenarios that would lead them to where they needed to be.
"Sooner the better," he replied. "Give me an hour to see if I can pull the building plans. If I can see a way in we'll hit it tonight. It's better if we can do it and get out-of-town before the others are aware we're here."
Unable to just sit tight and do nothing, she headed into the kitchen and cracked the refrigerator. If she had to stay here longer than she liked, she could at least make herself useful and fix them both a sandwich. It might not be the a culinary masterpiece but at least she would have the satisfaction of knowing that Clint had at least eaten something that day and she could get a couple of hot drinks into him to help bring some warmth back to his bones.
Five hours later, at the approach of midnight, Natasha found herself on the rooftop of the building Clint had followed Anders to earlier in the day. Time had given her the opportunity to study the files in detail, learning the names of each of her attackers and a bit about their backgrounds. It wasn't a great surprise that Thomas Anders had found himself work as a mercenary, not when she had read the military records that Clint had managed to hack into, violence, dishonourable discharge, several complaints of abuse towards women. He had all the skills required of a mercenary, violent tendencies, no morals and no loyalty to anyone but himself.
Suited up and hugging the shadows, she waited for her partner to give her the go ahead from his position further along the rooftop. Once Clint had finished with the access door, she would patch into the surveillance system so that they could keep track of the security detail on the floor below Anders' apartment. Standard procedure. Piece of cake. They weren't unduly concerned about the security guards, knowing that they were more interested in preserving the property stored on the lower floor but that didn't mean that they would be taking any chances, Natasha's guns had silencers fitted – not that she planned on using her guns this time.
At Clint's signal, she moved to his side, both of them slipping through the doorway and into the narrow stairwell beyond. It was the work of a minute or two to establish a link to the frequency being used by the guards so that they could hear the communication between the two that patrolled the building and their pair of colleagues on the ground floor.
Killing the lights in the service stairwell, they moved quickly downward, the steady thumping of her heart and the occasional radio chatter in her earpiece the only thing to interrupt Natasha's thoughts.
"Once we get through the door we need to kill the camera and keep left," Clint explained, "there are two apartment spaces up here, Anders occupies the one on that opens from the left doorway. I'll keep watch while you take care of the lock."
Natasha merely nodded, following his cautious steps as he disconnected the wiring that led to the cheap monitoring camera and moved along the hall. It was rare that she went anywhere without a set of lock picking tools secreted somewhere about her person, some old skills and old habits died hard and Natasha had learned her trade from people who set her to work as soon as she was old enough to wield the tools efficiently. There were few locking systems that she hadn't developed the technique to infiltrate and the rudimentary locks on the door of Thomas Anders provided little challenge.
The apartment was almost silent and mostly dark, the only light coming from a TV screen in another room. Slipping silently through the door, they moved to opposite sides of the room, Clint moving toward the window wall whilst she stuck to the interior of the apartment.
Removing the ear bud so that it wouldn't distract her, she slipped it into her pocket, drawing one of her guns so that she was ready in the event of a surprise attack. She lost sight of Clint within seconds, his body melting into the shadows in a way that made him almost invisible to her gaze.
The sound of someone closing a refrigerator door drew her toward the kitchen area where she found Anders opening the beer that he had just removed. Natasha felt the wash of fury riding her, this was not the hot anger that passed quickly, the anger of passion and surface temper, but the deadly cold of hatred that could only be appeased with violence of a near surgical precision.
She assessed the room in which he stood, the counter tops and the TV mounted on the wall, no way in without being seen, no way to get a clear shot without exposing herself.
The light caught his features in such a way that she was reminded almost forcefully of the way his profile had been lit when he visited her in that basement room. For a crazy moment she actually entertained the idea of just stepping out of the shadows and walking brazenly into the kitchen, she actually quite liked the idea.
A scuffed sound to her left drew her attention and that of her target. In an uncoördinated rush, Anders dropped the beer and grabbed for the .44 on the counter, moving out of the kitchen and into the open plan living area of the loft. Though he kept the Magnum by his side, she knew that he knew how to use it and he wouldn't hesitate to do so.
There was no way that her partner, a man who could move almost silently, had betrayed his location by accident, which meant that he had deliberately announced his presence to give her a chance at the target. Damn him, putting himself in danger that way. Keeping her back to the wall, she slid her gun into its holster and reached for her favourite knife. Her eyes skimmed the shadows, seeking something that would confirm Clint's location.
Thomas Anders had taken great pleasure in pressing his hunting knife to her throat when he tormented her, pushing the blade into the soft skin until she could feel its bite while he breathed those vile words into her face. She wondered how he would feel when he found himself at the mercy of someone else's dagger hand.
Years of experience and the bone deep understanding that came from being Clint's partner helped her to find him. He was concealed behind one of the floor length curtains covering the window nearest the corner of the room with little opportunity to manoeuvre and even less to escape if the mercenary opened fire. She watched Anders' gaze tick right and left, his body coiled and ready to attack at the slightest provocation and she knew that it was only a matter of time before he found her partner in his current hiding place. There was no time to play games with him, much as she would have liked to, because in the moment she found that her revenge didn't matter half as much as Barton's safety.
In spite of her desire for vengeance, he was the only thing that mattered.
"Might as well come out, I know you're here." That voice, the sibilant whisper that haunted her sleeping and waking moments, the memory of words thrown in her face. He didn't know where to look, not yet. Tracking every twitch of his muscles, she saw the exact moment that he became aware of Barton's hiding place, she saw the movement as he adjusted his grip on the revolver. "Step out into the light. I want to see your face before I shoot you."
Clint stepped slowly out from behind the curtain, directly into the line of fire, keeping his back to the window. In the dark his features were concealed, his build disguised by the dark fabric of his suit. She saw a wavering in Anders expression as she crept silently closer, moving to stand directly behind him, blade ready. His eyes narrowed, searching the darkness for features that might have been familiar to him, his grip on the gun faltering slightly. "I know you, don't I?" he asked.
Natasha stepped from the shadows and she knew from the slightest movement in Barton's shoulders when he saw her. She moved quickly, her blade glinting in the moonlight as she raised it. She knew that she'd caught him by surprise when she grabbed a handful of his hair and yanked his head back, exposing his throat to her blade. "I should hope so," she hissed in his ear, enjoying the fear that she could suddenly smell on him. "I am vengeance."
Blood sang in the dark as she drew her blade across his throat, air hissing over his severed vocal chords as he attempted to call out. She hadn't given him time to react, hadn't given him time to retaliate, and now his attention was fully on trying to stem to flow of blood from his wound. As he dropped gracelessly to the ground, she wasted no time in kicking the gun out of his reach. With quiet efficiency she sliced the tendons at the back of his knees so that he couldn't run and then turned her attention to the flexor tendons in his forearms.
Immobilised and bleeding out, Anders stared at her with impotent hatred. Natasha didn't flinch from his gaze, showing the disdain that she felt for him, allowing her hatred to simmer as she watched him bleed.
Clint moved through the shadows of the apartment until he reached her side, standing over her crouched form. Anders tried to reach for her, his anger giving him a range of movement that she wouldn't have expected given his current predicament. His hand never reached her. Clint's booted foot came down on his wrist, pinning it to the floor. Anders whimpered pitifully and for a split second Natasha wanted Clint to increase the pressure so that she could hear his best attempt at a scream.
"This is the one who liked to cut you?" he enquired with disgust. Natasha nodded, not trusting what would come out of her mouth. Barton's own mouth twisted into a sneer. "That is fucking poetic."
Rising to her feet with the help of her partner's hand, Natasha stared down at the whimpering mess that had haunted her for months and felt nothing, no guilt, no remorse for the manner of his death. If anything there was a slight feeling of relief that Thomas Anders would never have the chance to harm another woman, it was too late for her but not for the others that she was sure would have suffered at his hand. She slipped the ear bud back into her ear, taking a second to listen to the chatter of the security guards, nothing out of the ordinary, no signs of alarm on the radio.
As soon as the light left Anders' eyes, she turned to Clint, seeking his eyes in the dark. "You could have got yourself killed!" she told him sternly. "What the hell were you thinking?"
Barton merely shrugged a shoulder, "you had me covered. I trusted you to get the job done otherwise I never would have pulled that move with the footsteps. You needed an opening, I gave you one."
"Seriously," she stalled, "ungh!"
The expression of frustration was familiar enough and Clint's lips quirked into the beginnings of a smile when he heard it, throwing an arm around her in offer of support
"You know that I love you right?" she told him, her tone conveying exasperation and affection all at once.
Clint grinned. "Of course you do, I'm irresistible!"
The swat to his shoulder wasn't a surprise but she suspected that the force behind it was. Her gaze flicked to the body at their feet, humour draining from the moment. "He deserved what he got and more, I have no regret."
"I'd be surprised if you did," he told her. He tugged her arm and pulled her away from what she had done. "Come on, lets head back to the apartment, grab some shut-eye and tomorrow we can plan our next move."
They retraced their entry route, reconnecting the camera feed as they left and slipping out onto the rooftops and down into an alleyway a few buildings over. As they moved through the streets on the way back to their apartment building, Clint's arm slipped around her shoulders and her head came to rest against him, helping them to blend in among the crowds that loitered outside several bustling nightclubs. It was easier to assume the cover of a couple on a night out if they wished to remain unnoticed among the leather clad crowds.
Despite the warmth of the night and the adrenaline that still surged in her veins, it didn't escape her attention that Clint's touch was the only warmth she could feel.
Natasha was thankful that she was too weary to analyse what that meant.