[FIC] Rituals - Chapter Four (Clint/Natasha)
Characters/Pairing: Clint Barton/Natasha Romanoff (Hawkeye/Black Widow)
Rating: M, for swearing and sex
Word Count: 17150 (Completed)
Disclaimer: For fun and fun alone. All hail the great and mighty Joss and the venerable Stan Lee.
Warnings: For this chapter - sex. Explicit. Spoilers - vague nods at things that happened on screen
Summary: After defeating Loki with the Avengers, Clint and Natasha spend 24 hours in a hotel suite. Together they recover from the trauma inflicted on each of them by Loki. As Clint’s memories return, he relives the various encounters with Natasha that lead them to where they are now, beginning with Agent Barton’s failed mission to kill the Black Widow in Cairo.
Previous Chapters:
+Chapter One
+Chapter Two
+Chapter Three
New York
Present Day
19:00
They awake in each other's arms, their towels dried stiff to their bodies. The room is dark and chilled. Through the drapes he see a sliver of the city, and from that one slice, it appears normal. He resists the desire to peek. It's been twenty-four hours since they defeated Loki. He wants to pretend the destruction isn't that bad.
“Doesn't look too bad from here,” she says, echoing his thoughts.
“New York is New York,” he says. “Takes more than a rogue Asgardian to take her down.”
“To be fair, I think the Hulk did the most damage,” she says. She sits up, stretches.
He glances at her, sidelong. He knows something went down with the Hulk on the carrier, something that scared her pretty bad.
“Nat?”
“I'm starving,” she sidesteps. “You?”
“Ravenous.”
“Room service?”
“Yeah.”
They spread the menu between them.
“Breakfast,” she says. “One of everything.”
“Gotcha,” he says, picking up the room's phone. She slides from the bed and disappears into the bathroom.
“And ice cream,” she calls back. “Hot fudge!”
The operator picks up and he places their order. “Oh, and,” he whispers the next bit, “I'll quadruple your tip if you send up a can of whipped cream.”
She meets him in the hallway as he ends the call. She gives him a look. “What?” she says.
He feigns innocence. “Nothing.”
“How long til it gets here?” she asks.
“Half an hour.”
She drops her towel to the floor. “How much damage can we do in thirty minutes?”
He drags her down with him. “Lots,” he says.
He isn't quite sure how it happens, but he's not arguing with the turn she takes. She wraps her legs around his neck and inverts her body against his, and he groans as she takes his cock into her mouth, all the way in, all the way down.
Clint knows she enjoys this, being yin to his yang, because it's equal, it's fair, balanced. He brings her legs around his neck, parts her legs, and lets his tongue glide into her. She shudders. He feels it in the way her mouth contracts around him. He breathes in her soft musky scent as his tongue nips at her, slow and shallow at first, then each stroke longer and deeper inside. He sets a rhythm and she matches motion for motion. Her hips buck against him, and she moans, a silky, throaty sound that he feels like a fire building in his nerves. Her fingers trail between his legs and she strokes the underside of his balls and it's suddenly very hard to concentrate, even harder to breath, and he feels his eyes roll back...
There's a knock on the door. “Room service.”
He raises his head. “They're early? It’s been ten minutes, tops.”
She raises her head, wipes her chin. “They can wait.”
He's not about to argue. Then he remembers. “The ice cream--”
She knots her hand in the sheets. “I just need, like, two minutes...”
He smirks. “Is that all?”
She narrows her eyes. He flips her onto her back, pulling her thighs to rest against his arms. He slides two fingers into her, and she's hot and wet, and he growls as he brings his mouth to her clit. He sucks at her, drinking her in, bathing her with the broad blade of his tongue, and she slams against him. He drives his fingers deeper, moving them in frenzied circles, and she cries out and comes hard this time. Her nails rake the backs of his arms and her hips rise as she rides out another wave. He grips her arm with his free hand and in seconds she sags against him.
The knock at the door again. A persistent, “Hello, room service?”
He withdraws, sits back on his haunches, surveys his work. She's smiling up at him.
“You're the devil,” she says.
“Your ice cream awaits,” he answers. He pulls the towel from the floor and wraps it around his waist.
“The devil!” she calls after him.
He answers the door. He quadruples the tip.
Port Sa’id, Egypt
2005
Wearing one of his plain black t-shirts and her flare-legged salwar pants, she looked the part of a tourist as they slid into the booth at Fashwar's Seaside Bar. The illusion was only slightly ruined by the frays in the fabric of her pants, and when she ordered in fluent Arabic.
“I feel less like your prisoner here,” she said, leaning on her elbows. She smiled then, like it's their private joke.
“You're...” he caught himself. He was going to say, Not my prisoner. But wasn't she? He hadn't carted his bow along; he'd learned from experience that people tended to openly gawk at a man wielding a five-foot recurve. But he did have the crossbow concealed on his belt... So he said nothing.
The waiter brought out kofta and falafel and a pot of mint tea, and Barton realized after three bites that he was starving. They tore into the meal, devouring it in silence, though they both seemed to realize halfway through how utterly ridiculous their situation was. Which made them laugh.
She was mopping the last dregs of curry from her plate with a strip of pita when he asked, “Who's Turgen?”
She recoiled like he'd kicked her, but then recovered, slowly, like she was re-assembling into the shell of herself.
“He's, um, Evgeny Turgenev. My partner,” she said. “He was my partner.”
Barton scrutinized her. She didn't seem the type for falling apart. She had reasons for everything she did. Every word. Every gesture. Every glance. But just for a second there, he'd seen under that armor. Unless that was what she wanted him to think.
“So the South African--”
“Crizer,” she cut in.
“Sure. He was working for your former partner?”
“Yes.” Now her eyes leveled on his. “Zimsky's amassed a fair number of enemies,” she said.
“Stealing weapons of mass destruction tends to cause that,” Barton quipped.
“Why do you have to try and simplify it like that?” she said, her voice raised just enough to draw attention. Conversations lulled as everyone turned to look at them. In the silent moment that followed, the waiter scurried to the table to drop off their check.
Barton slid the battered receipt book across the table. A worn image of the Pyramids of Giza embossed the cover.
He laughed. “What are we doing?”
She sat back. “You tell me, I'm your prisoner.”
“You're not--” He clenched his fists on the table between them. “Look, I'm off the grid here,” he said. “Way, way off grid.”
“Your agency?”
“All they know is I'm hunting you.”
She sniffed. “You and half the country.”
“Heh.” He pushed the embossed receipt book to the center of the table. “All my life, I've wanted to see these,” he said, tracing the pyramids with his thumb.
Romanoff leaned forward, rested her chin in her hand. “They're only a hundred miles away, Agent Barton.”
He clung to the indecision of the moment, because in his life until now, he'd been sharp, decisive, loyal. Before, he'd seen things so clearly, and now they were wonderfully, frighteningly, dangerously muddled.
“It feels like we're pieces in this game. We're getting moved around from place to place. It's what I signed up for; I mean, I knew what I was getting into. Mostly. Sort of. It's just, now I think, what if we - move - off the board...”
“Tell me what you're thinking, right now,” she said.
“I’m thinking... You set aside the Widow. I set aside the Hawk and we’ll just be... Us. Natasha and Clint.”
She snapped up the receipt book and paid the check. He had a moment to wonder where she’d hidden the money before she asked, “What are we doing, Agent Barton?”
“Not sure,” he answered. “But it is definitely unsanctioned.”
“My kind of holiday,” she said. She slid from the booth and held out her hand.