CHAPTER THREE

He wasn't exactly following her, he was looking for the roof access stairs. Whenever Clint had a problem, he headed for a high place.

He also thought he might be able to spot the car from up there, because Natasha had parked it and didn't tell him where.

It was entirely a coincidence that the stairs were in the same direction Natasha was walking.

Clint may not have been very good at lying to himself, but he was good at not being noticed, even by a master assassin trained to notice everything. At the last crossroads before the end of the mall, Clint let Natasha walk on ahead while he ducked into a popcorn store.

He was greeted with a frantic, "We're closing!" from the two girls behind the counter.

"Oh, right, sorry, thanks," he said, smiling and backing out. They forgot him as soon as he was gone.

Natasha had reached the back wall, and was scrunched into a corner, concentrating on her phone. The sight of her, with the slight frown wrinkling her forehead, almost made him go over to her then, to apologize and try and find a way to make whatever was wrong better. But she was so intent. On the mission, on getting her job done; she wouldn't welcome him intruding. Again.

I don't need you…I don't want you…

The roof access was a yard away. He eased the steel door shut silently behind him. Natasha had called it his 'superpower' once; the ability to walk so softly and move about so that even she couldn't hear him. Archery depended on the element of surprise.

He took the stairs two and three at a time, suddenly desperate for fresh air and the sky. Ducking under the yellow chain marked 'Authorized Personnel Only', he pushed open the roof door and emerged onto the gravel coated top of the mall.

Several yards away, another wall rose, a metal ladder leading to a higher part of the rooftop. Right here was an empty stretch, the top of a wing of the building. Nothing surrounding him, and he could breathe again.

He walked to the edge and lowered himself to a crouch, balancing on the lip of the building. He could feel the thin space of solid concrete under his feet, the familiar press of his collapsed bow inside his coat. This high up, the ice cold wind snapped in his ears.

It would be up to him to apologize, when they got back. And if he had to wait out her anger, well, so be it. He had done it before. After all, snipers could be very patient.

A sharp scream of a siren cut into the night below him. He saw two figures run out of the mall, one swiftly taking down the other. He smiled. That would be Tasha. She'd be done soon. He stood up and started to turn away. He should find the car. Maybe if he brought it around, they could just save time and ride back together. It was stupid for her to have to call in transport from SHEILD when her car was still here. Besides, he hadn't been looking forward to the Ride of Shame back alone.

Gunshot.

Instantly, he was back at the roof ledge, bow drawn and an arrow in place. The light in the parking lot below was crap, but there were twelve men down there (where the hell had they come from?), Parker looked dead, and a fight was in progress.

He picked out Tasha from her hair catching the light. She moved almost faster than he could cover her. Keeping one eye on the scene, he fished in his coat for a rappel line; no way was she getting out of this any direction but up. She was cornered.

He saw her drop down off a loading dock. Target in the long coat was already there, gun drawn. Tasha wasn't moving.

He took the shot.

The man dropped, and Clint followed that arrow with a second, streaming the rappel line behind it. He secured it on the metal ladder to the second story, and was back at the edge in time to grab Tasha's arms and help her over the side.

She thrust a bloodstained backpack at him. "You have pockets. Take the stuff out and toss the pack down to the hyenas."

"Baljistani?" he asked, securing the schematics and flash drives inside his coat.

"No. HYDRA." She tossed him his coiled rappel line. "Either HYDRA eliminated them and took over the contract, or Parker was even stupider than I thought."

A crunch of gravel came from above and they both whipped around. Clint saw the gun first. He pulled Natasha down to the rooftop with him, and the bullet chipped into the concrete behind them.

"I'm going to go with Option B," he said.

"Where is the package, Parker?" shouted a heavily accented voice on the upper roof. Natasha swore in Russian.

"Up or down?" Clint asked her, fitting another arrow into his bow.

He saw her glance back at the parking lot, weighing the options. The HYDRA agents were regrouping in suspicious silence. Probably getting ready to stand on each other's shoulders or something.

"Up," she said. "Cover me?"

He gave a nod, backed up into crouch and took out the man above them. Natasha was up the ladder. He saw a flash of her red hair in the security light as she launched herself into the fight.

The HYDRA agents below had been creative. Between the remaining eleven, they were wheeling a dumpster over against the wall. It reached halfway up to the roof. Clint shot down three before the sound of a body landing behind him made him turn.

Natasha. A Baljistani heavy skipped the ladder and landed beside her. She swept his legs out from under him, crashing him down on top of her. Clint prepped for the shot. Just a few inches further away from Natasha, that was all he needed—

Shots fired from above and below, and there was chaos on the square of rooftop. Natasha and her assailant rolled toward the edge. Clint could no longer take him out, he was too close. Dodging another volley from above, he lowered his bow to kick out at the agent wrestling with Tasha. The man rolled suddenly, crashing into Clint's leg and surging to his feet.

He heard Tasha yell his name, her hoarse voice swirling in the whoosh of air as the roof fell away beneath his feet. And then there was only air, and falling.