Chapter Fourteen

Over the next month, Maria started spending less time in hotels when she was in DC and more time at Team America headquarters - and most of that time spent exclusively with Sam.

It only took four weeks for her to finally invite Sam to New York.

With Falcon making his nest elsewhere for the weekend, Bucky tracking a lead through Canada and Steve fulfilling an obligation at the Smithsonian, Sharon found herself at home and alone for the first time since the discovery of the tracking beacon on her car.

There hadn't been so much as a blip from the tracker or any sight of Rumlow, which only made Sharon question once again whether she'd seen him in DC or not. The presence of the tracker could still explain how he'd found her last fall up at her family's cabin but maybe following her around the city was just beneath the Hydra agent's busy schedule.

Whatever the reason, the lack of activity meant that the boys had relaxed their rules enough that Sharon was able to make use of Steve's truck or Sam's jeep without them or Bucky tagging along where she went.

So, after a run at a nearby dog park with Rocky, Sharon was content to spend a quiet Friday night in her pajamas with a mind-numbing romance novel, glass of wine and giant bowl of popcorn.

She was a third of the way into her book, with the main characters trying to figure out if the immediate and mutual dislike they felt for each other had actually been a heady and passionate desire in disguise, when the alarm panel in Sharon's living room began to beep frantically.

Rocky's head came up and she followed Sharon to the panel, sitting patiently.

Sharon pressed the alarm icon on the panel and a voice and readout indicated, "Unauthorized motion detected. Command level."

Command level? Sharon thought. The only way into the Command Center was from the third floor or the garage level. If someone was down there, they'd somehow circumvented the sensors on the floor above or below.

She pulled up the video feed of the second floor, the infrared camera showing her a hooded figure at Sam's desk, trying to hack their network.

There was only one someone she could think of who would break into their warehouse while the boys were gone and she fought the chill that ran down her spine.

Rumlow, she thought. He was making his move.

"Suck it up, Sharon," she said aloud. "Time to get your game face on."

Sharon looked down at Rocky, who merely cocked her head and dutifully trailed Sharon as as she grabbed her gun and strapped a knife and spare pistol to her waist.

Rumlow had caught her off-guard once before. She didn't plan on being so vulnerable this time.

The last thing Sharon grabbed was her cellphone - which she used to send an SOS to Steve - before she silenced it and slipped it into a pocket on her belt.

She took another look at the panel, confirming that their intruder was still at Sam's computer, and opened the door with Rocky at her heels.

Sharon turned, about to tell Rocky to stay, when she had an idea and grabbed the collar off the table.

Rogers and his team had made considerable improvements to their security since their shadowy intruder had done his surveillance. He hadn't expected the biometrics in the garage but had managed to avoid detection with a reflective thermal blanket he had in his survival kit in the trunk of his car.

Choosing speed over stealth, he ditched the blanket once he got to the main level but hadn't expected the Stark encryption on the computer he tried to access.

The job should have been a ten-minute, in and out before anyone even realized he'd been there, deal. Now, at twelve minutes, he was feeling the pressure of imminent intrusion on his goal.

He was just about to give up when he finally cracked the computer password - only to be distracted by a jangling sound. He froze, his ears straining as the sound grew closer, and he strained his eyes into the darkness.

Suddenly, the jangling materialized as the tags of a dog collar - attached to the German Shepherd that came trotting up to him.

"Hey there, doggy," he said, putting out a wary hand to gauge if he was a pet or a guard dog.

"Where'd you come from?" he asked, giving the so-far friendly canine a scratch between the ears. "You're a nice doggy, aren't you?"

In answer, the dog jumped backward just as a high kick from behind knocked him out of the chair.

I fell for a furry diversion tactic, he thought in disgust and wondered if he was losing his touch. He immediately got to his feet, his arms and legs in a defensive stance and searching for his attacker. Since he was still conscious, it obviously hadn't been Rogers or Barnes who'd kicked him.

He spun, blocking the next blow and surmised from the height - or lack thereof - that it was Carter, formerly Agent Thirteen.

He swung out, smacking her arm away, only to hear a growl and the scuffing of claws on the tiled floor.

Great, he thought. Apparently doggy's not so friendly now.

He jumped, just missing the snapping jaws that had been about to latch onto his calf as his in-and-out, no one will notice mission was quickly escalating into a full-on confrontation he wasn't prepared for.

He blocked another blow from Thirteen only to have the dog jump on him, her momentum pushing him forward and into what sounded like a filing cabinet as it crashed to the ground. He recovered his balance, only to have Carter take the dog's tactic and launch herself at him.

He rolled, pushing her away, and started forward when he didn't immediately hear her get back up.

He went for the light switch and the room flooded with fluorescents - illuminating the nine-millimeter aimed at him.

"Agent Barton?" Sharon asked, disbelief evident as she recognized their hooded intruder.

"We're not agents anymore, Sharon. You can just call me Clint."

Sharon lowered her weapon. "What are you doing here?"

"A terrible job of breaking and entering, that's what," Clint said, sitting back down. "You okay? I didn't want to hurt you."

"Didn't want to hurt me?" she asked, the gun now at her side as she signaled for the dog to stand down. "Then why the hell did you break into our command center?"

"That money trail you've been following? It's me."

"You?" she asked, her gun coming back up and the fur rising on the dog's back.

"Don't worry, I'm not Hydra," he protested, putting a hand up in surrender and trying to ignore the dog's growl. "I've been on a deep cover assignment and that account's been funding it."

"Mission for whom? You just said yourself that we're not agents anymore."

Clint sighed, irritated with himself. He may as well come clean since he'd already been busted.

But the boss wasn't going to like it.

"I'm working for your aunt," he admitted. "She wants me to find who poisoned her."

Sharon relaxed her gun hand again, allowing that information to sink in. It wasn't surprising that Aunt Peggy was looking for answers to the long-term plot to keep her incapacitated but it was surprising that she didn't ask Sharon and her team to look into it.

"I can see you're wondering why she didn't tell you or ask you to do it," Clint said, leaning back in the chair. "When the Triskelion fell, I was already in deep-cover and your aunt wanted me to use those contacts for this fishing expedition."

Sharon allowed herself to be distracted by the vibration of her phone and saw the multiple missed contacts from Steve. She sent him an all clear sign as she signaled again for Rocky to relax as she took her own seat, the dog sitting at her feet.

"How did Peggy contact you if you were in deep cover?"

"Do you even have to ask? Your aunt's still very much connected. Good as Fury was, I don't know if he'd ever have been the equal of Peggy Carter."

"Have you found anything? Do you know who poisoned my aunt?"

Clint's mouth set in a grim line. "You're not going to like the answer."

"I didn't expect that I would," she said, suddenly tired, and was relieved to hear the ping from the wall panel indicating that the garage door had been activated and the familiar purr of Steve's motorcycle as he pulled into the warehouse's lower level.

"I hope that's Cap," Clint said, hearing the bike. "Maybe he'll keep you from doing exactly what I think you're going to do when I tell you want I found."

Sharon turned back to Clint. "And what is that, exactly?"

"The one responsible for your aunt's poisoning," he explained. "It's her son. Your cousin Trent."