Fic: if the curve of you was curved on me (The Avengers, The red thread series)
title: if the curve of you was curved on me (clint)
pairing: clint/natasha
rating: adult (17 +)
series: the red thread
warnings: physical violence/rough sparring, blood, sex. this part is darker than previous two.
timeline: the events in "thor" and "iron man 2" still haven't happened.
disclaimer: not mine.
summary: a monster, after all, isn't afraid of another monster, but that doesn't mean he will give her what she wants easily.
author's notes: as i've mentioned earlier, this series is set in the same universe as unwrapped/ unwrapping
the previous two parts are here:
the red thread (natasha)
i loved you before I knew you (clint)
part four is here: certain dark things (natasha)
Many many thanks to cybermathwitch for listening to my random and crazy ideas and discussing them with me, for understanding, kindness, encouragement, and generosity, for sharing headcanons, for beta reading this part and for cowriting with me <33333!!!!! ALSO, BABY, YOU SAVED THIS CHAPTER.
Also, dear workerbee73 and bob5fic, you two are an inspiration, in more ways than one. :) <3333! I want you both to know that. * squishes *
we're still playing with all the symbols you've seen in first two parts, this bit is a step further, because there's a reason why clint was drawn to natasha in the first place (and there's a reason why they work together and balance each other out so well), and I explored that in here. Mind the warnings, things got a little rough here, but it was necessary. I hope you'll enjoy it.
suggested music - santa maria del buen aire by gotan project, nyah by hans zimmer.
*
Other music exists to heal wounds; but the tango when sung and played is for the purpose of opening them, for the purpose of sticking you finger in the wound and to tear them until they bleed. - unknown
*
Clint remembers this dog from the circus, a dog without a name. He was black and ugly and too scared to step out of the cage they kept him in. If you tried to touch him, you got bitten.
*
She looks like a beast in a cage that's too small, too narrow. She is frustrated and angry, and looks dangerous when she's like this. He could feel this energy gathering inside of her for days and weeks before it started to spill over, threatening like a flood.
There's a valid reason why younger agents fear her. They know, like little animals hiding in the shadows, that she could tear them apart. The weaker always know.
He doesn't fear her. He's seen this, wild beasts coiled for a strike, too afraid to leave the cages they know, because they're better and safer than the unknown waiting for them beyond the bars. He's seen them in animal and human form (he's seen one in the mirror), and it's a familiar thing, like the blood pulsing under his skin.
He's been watching this for weeks, felt it as her frustration grew along with all the intensity of the kisses she branded him with, only to push him away. Her labyrinth becoming too small, confusing, a trap where she at least feels at home, and he knows he can't let her stay there. He knows there is one way, just one way to take the beast out of the cage and that it's him who has to do it, the same way it was done for him when he was young and angry and trapped in his own head. When he lay on the floor, bruised and bloody and was told,"Son, you're a beast. Accept that. Put that beast to use and stop trying to beat it."
He knows she can trust him only if he proves himself strong, she will trust him only if he doesn't show fear. She will kiss him only if she's certain that he won't turn his head away even when he sees her bloody and filled with rage - and he knows he won't because he's seen his own dark, he knows his eyes won't drown in it. He's seen her ride that edge, step up to what she wants and back away, afraid he'll end up like all the others in her wake.
She circles the mat like a lioness, muscles coiled and tight, ready to strike. She's beaten three men, too young and too new to be a real challenge for her. There was no pain, not enough struggle. She gives him a look full of anger and dare, and he faces her like he would face himself; that foolish and angry boy who needed to hurt and bleed in order to learn how to heal.
“Barton,” she drawls, and there's a sway to her hips, movement that reminds him too much of her naked skin and the heat of her mouth, and how it feels to be tempted with it and then pushed away. In his mind he knows and understands the shape and reasons of her struggle, the shifted equilibrium of power, but he is still a living, breathing man who wants her. Her frustration over the false safety of the cage that's become too small is mirrored in his own, and he wants to stare her down.
A monster, after all, isn't afraid of another monster, but that doesn't mean he will give her what she wants easily.
“Got a problem, Romanoff?” he asks flippantly, and he sees warnings flaring up in her eyes. It's all red, red, red; getting away from her like her hair from the tie she's bound it with.
“I do have a problem,” he's close to the mat now and she starts walking towards him, but he turns away.
“I won't fight you,” he says, and it makes her even more frustrated, because she wants a proper challenge. She wants equal strength, she wants the sweat, she wants someone who will make it hard, and part of him wants to leave her like that, wanting.
“The hell you won't,” she says and pushes him, and it does hurt. She's strong, much stronger than she looks, all those tight little muscles honed and perfected and wrapped into a soft and smooth, deceiving package. He's quick enough to recoil and she steps back, eyes bright and angry and boring into his.
“Why should I?” he asks, all false calm and iron control and she lifts her chin. “Tell me why I should?”
She is so, so angry, and part of him is glad that she is, because she can't go on like this any more. “Are you a hawk or a chicken?” she says, and it's a weak insult, but it's a sign that she's close to the edge. He narrows his eyes and steps in her direction, and he can see her, all of her.
“Neither,” he says, just before she strikes.
What he does goes against all of his instincts; he avoids and only defends, and even lets her strike and hit him and it only serves to fuel her rage.
“Fight,” she says, and her voice is a low growl over the sound of music she plays every time she practices. It's a backdrop in his mind, the shifting, changing rhythm reminding him of her; dangerous and sharp and beautiful. “Fight me,” she growls again, and she attacks and he ducks, blocks, avoids her, just like she avoids him; he cheats, he denies her, and there's nothing that she fears more. Fighting is all she knows, violence is the only weapon she's practiced with, and he wants her to see he can take it, all of it, because that's what he is made of as well.
He sees the moment when her rage spills over, in vicious swipe of legs that brings him to the floor, only he is ready for it. He turns and moves away, and when she lunges for him, she is his, brought to floor and pinned under his bigger weight. She groans, tries to hit him with her knee, and he blocks it with his hand, grabs her hair and pulls hard, only to leave her on the floor like that. She attacks again, and he can see hurt on her face, when he brings her down again. It's harder and she bruises him, but he makes it look like it's nothing, like his buttons aren't pushed and his lip cut; he ducks her fist and catches her with a right cross and he can see that hurt in more ways than one.
But it has to happen. It has to She cannot keep herself in a cage. He knows because he learned it, and now he has brought her here, and she is his responsibility. He will fight her if he has to in order to bring it out, if she's too stubborn to accept that she is this, because she can't cut it off. She'll bleed out if she does.
One last time she attacks and they collide, and it takes all he has to bring her down and hold her there, defeated on the floor.
"Stop hiding who you are," he says with voice soft enough to crack and hurt.
*
Later, when she enters his quarters she strikes without a warning. This time he's not prepared and he struggles to retain his balance, to not let her knock him over. They crash against the wall, all of her height and weight and anger slamming into his body. Then she punches him hard enough he tastes blood.
“What was that?” she growls. “What the fuck was that?!”
He grabs her and flips them and she doesn't even blink when her back hits the wall.
He expects her to keep fighting, but she can still surprise him. When her mouth meets his he resists, but with the distraction, he's an easier target. She's pressed against him, and when he moves away, she moves forward and grabs his head, kisses him as viciously as she's hit him, and this time it doesn't look like she's about to let go.
He has no problem with that, and he meets her challenge in the middle of the room, then she starts shoving him towards his bed and he walks blind, guided by her fire. She strips, one smooth motion and her top is gone, she loses her bra and kicks her pants away, makes sure that this time he can't resist, can't walk away.
He isn't even going to try. She pushes him backwards and he lands on the bed, hunter becoming prey, spread like an offering before her eyes. She moves over him, slender, soft and dangerous, and places a hand in the middle of his chest as he takes all of her in. She moves to kiss him and stops before his lips, taunts him with dangerous fire in her eyes. He grabs her head, fistfulls of red hair and claims her mouth, and it's hard and greedy and aggressive.
He can feel her growl, deep in her throat, as she lets him into her mouth. She looks wild and content and as unrestrained as he'd seen her, a mythical creature that could well end his life, and he doesn't care. He flips them around and she groans and arches into him. He is so hard it almost hurts, and he has to take her, now, right now.
“Get naked,” she says in a deep breathy voice and he does, as quickly and efficient as he can. He can barely stand before her looking at her like this, flushed skin and rapidly rising breasts, and that raw look in her eyes. “Now,” she's almost pleading, only it sounds like an order, and when he finally, finally strips bare she wraps herself around him, every deadly inch of her skin against his. He pushes her back on the bed and holds her face, and perhaps he's too rough, but everything he sees on her face tells him that this is just what she wants.
He kisses her everywhere but on the mouth; her face, her neck, the hollow of her collarbone and her breasts, and she sounds like she's falling apart. Her thighs hold him, and she's pulling him down to her, trying to pull him into her and he has to struggle against her and the need to be inside of her, but he won't give her that so easily, either. He leaves her breasts for her mouth and kisses her hard and deep and long, until she's gasping.
“Do you trust me?” he mouths against her neck as she struggles. “Come on; Tasha. Do you trust me?” he asks, using his entire body to hold her down, hand on her face, thumb against her lips. He waits until her eyes feel steady and he can see things beneath the rage and desire, and he senses the moment is right. He lets go of her face to touch her neck, his fingers against her pulse and it looks like she's struggling to stay still. Her eyes are on his, her body is tense, almost like every muscle is ready to attack, except she won't, this is a different tension now. She watches him while he explores her, bit by bit, the tender hollow of her throat and pink peaks of her breasts, each rib and the spaces between them. He can feel her heart beneath his hand, alive and beating, her breath, the way life is pulsing through her.
“Do you trust me?” he asks, softer this time, when she is still with anticipation under his hand. She licks her lips and nods and looks at him, all of her rough edges and aggression and soft shapes of a woman hidden in shadows.
“Yes,” she says, as his hand covers her stomach and touches the tender skin there. “Yes,” and his fingers are skimming lower, and she spreads her legs for him. He strokes her, teases her and watches how her breath turns shorter, quicker, desire spreading blatant and open across her face. “Yes,” and she closes her eyes as he enters her with a finger, than two. She moans and arches and her legs tighten on his arm. Her breathing takes on the rhythm of his strokes, she shifts and ebbs and flows with his hand, eyes now open and wild as she looks at him.
He removes his hand and licks his fingers and watches her reaction. Her look is hungry and bright and dark and her expression is feral when he moves over her again and positions himself between her legs.
This time she waits, quiet and suspended and like she's barely holding herself together. He knows this will be rough and fast, but he wants to start this on his own terms, wants to seal this moment between them. He is careful even as his heart is pounding and he feels like he might explode. She's wet and tight and she makes a painful sound as he pushes inside, but her eyes welcome the pain and him. Then, he's all the way in and they're panting, and his arms start to shake with control as he holds himself still. He pulls out and pushes in, and again, and again; and he can feel her body loosen and relax. She rocks against him, every bit of her skin hot against his and he goes a little faster. She moans and starts touching him everywhere she can reach, goading him on with noises she makes, with his name falling from her lips. She asks for more and harder and her nails claw his back, and he becomes the maze and the way out of it, and she clings to him with all her pain.
There's darkness in her kiss, darkness he knows so well. She's trying to hold it all inside, the frustration, the anger, the fear she'll cut loose and hurt someone, everyone; and he knows she has to break free and crash and fall to get up again. The cage won't contain her, the maze won't work any more to hold the monster in, and he wants to show her that she won't be alone, isn't alone. He won't leave her alone no matter what he sees. Her teeth sink in his lip and he can feel the pain but his mind is too far gone to stop her, he kisses her; her mouth, her face, her throat as he fucks her hard and fast.
He looks down and there's blood - smears on her face and neck. He stops, frozen to see her like this, unguarded and red.
“Clint,” she says and touches his lip, it stings and he realizes he's bleeding, that the blood smeared over her skin is his.
“It's okay,” he says and his voice drops low. Looking at her like this does something to him, something he doesn't expect. It's almost like he sees her clearly for the first time and all the fractured images fit together and become one in front of his eyes. She becomes one. The one.
She touches him almost gently, a contrast to just moments ago, and wipes away some of the blood, then lifts her head to kiss him and lick across the cut. He tries to hold still but he's shaking as she does this, as it becomes clear that she can take and hold everything that he is, everything dark and twisted that he's keeping inside. She's everything he's been searching for and didn't hope he'd find. It's right there, in her eyes when she looks at him. There's edge to her tenderness, fascination, hunger that's raw and unrestrained. She pushes him and he rolls over, and looks up at her - his lioness, finally free. She starts to ride him, sets a pace that makes her mouth drop open and her head fall back, and she is so, so close.
He wants to see her shatter and fall apart. He holds her hip with his right hand and slips between her legs with his left, his shooting hand. She reaches down as she arches above him, and she guides him, shows him the way and they conquer the maze together. She cries out as she comes, beautiful with her bruises, with his blood on her skin and red ribbons of her hair tying him to her as her head drops forward and they brush his skin. She's still gripping his hand and he's holding onto her flesh as he comes in wrecking, powerful waves. Finally, she collapses on top of him, hands on his shoulders and head against his chest and he feels like he's crashing against her shores, inviting and full of dangers and promise.
This time, she stays.
*
Later, he finds her in the bathroom. She's standing in front of the mirror, naked but partially hidden by her hair. It looks like red stains against her white skin.
He nears her and stands behind her, and she's looking at herself with searching eyes, like she's trying to determine where she begins and where she ends. His hands are gentle on her shoulders, he wants to steady her, because he needs to feel steady in his own skin again. She looks up to his reflection, watches as he kisses the top of her head while he takes in the innocence of her face and bruises on her skin that are revealed as he moves back the hair.
He sees the blood as well, his own blood smeared on her and allows his eyes to linger, but just for a moment. Her face still looks distressed, and he wants to show her a different picture, so he turns her around to face him.
“Come here,” he says as he touches her face and reaches for the washcloth on the sink. She's looking at him with that searching expression as he cleans her, her hands on his chest and their bodies close together.
“Clint,” she says, and it feels like he hadn't heard that voice in a long, long time. It feels like she's coming back from somewhere far away as she's looking at him and seeing the way he sees her. He smiles, and it feels too rough on his face, but she smiles in return and touches his lips. “Does it hurt?” she asks and he shakes his head. “Liar,” she says and lets her forehead fall softly against his chest.
He gathers her hair in his hands and kisses the top of her head and thinks how it doesn't hurt, because it feels good.
pairing: clint/natasha
rating: adult (17 +)
series: the red thread
warnings: physical violence/rough sparring, blood, sex. this part is darker than previous two.
timeline: the events in "thor" and "iron man 2" still haven't happened.
disclaimer: not mine.
summary: a monster, after all, isn't afraid of another monster, but that doesn't mean he will give her what she wants easily.
author's notes: as i've mentioned earlier, this series is set in the same universe as unwrapped/ unwrapping
the previous two parts are here:
the red thread (natasha)
i loved you before I knew you (clint)
part four is here: certain dark things (natasha)
Many many thanks to cybermathwitch for listening to my random and crazy ideas and discussing them with me, for understanding, kindness, encouragement, and generosity, for sharing headcanons, for beta reading this part and for cowriting with me <33333!!!!! ALSO, BABY, YOU SAVED THIS CHAPTER.
Also, dear workerbee73 and bob5fic, you two are an inspiration, in more ways than one. :) <3333! I want you both to know that. * squishes *
we're still playing with all the symbols you've seen in first two parts, this bit is a step further, because there's a reason why clint was drawn to natasha in the first place (and there's a reason why they work together and balance each other out so well), and I explored that in here. Mind the warnings, things got a little rough here, but it was necessary. I hope you'll enjoy it.
suggested music - santa maria del buen aire by gotan project, nyah by hans zimmer.
*
Other music exists to heal wounds; but the tango when sung and played is for the purpose of opening them, for the purpose of sticking you finger in the wound and to tear them until they bleed. - unknown
*
Clint remembers this dog from the circus, a dog without a name. He was black and ugly and too scared to step out of the cage they kept him in. If you tried to touch him, you got bitten.
*
She looks like a beast in a cage that's too small, too narrow. She is frustrated and angry, and looks dangerous when she's like this. He could feel this energy gathering inside of her for days and weeks before it started to spill over, threatening like a flood.
There's a valid reason why younger agents fear her. They know, like little animals hiding in the shadows, that she could tear them apart. The weaker always know.
He doesn't fear her. He's seen this, wild beasts coiled for a strike, too afraid to leave the cages they know, because they're better and safer than the unknown waiting for them beyond the bars. He's seen them in animal and human form (he's seen one in the mirror), and it's a familiar thing, like the blood pulsing under his skin.
He's been watching this for weeks, felt it as her frustration grew along with all the intensity of the kisses she branded him with, only to push him away. Her labyrinth becoming too small, confusing, a trap where she at least feels at home, and he knows he can't let her stay there. He knows there is one way, just one way to take the beast out of the cage and that it's him who has to do it, the same way it was done for him when he was young and angry and trapped in his own head. When he lay on the floor, bruised and bloody and was told,"Son, you're a beast. Accept that. Put that beast to use and stop trying to beat it."
He knows she can trust him only if he proves himself strong, she will trust him only if he doesn't show fear. She will kiss him only if she's certain that he won't turn his head away even when he sees her bloody and filled with rage - and he knows he won't because he's seen his own dark, he knows his eyes won't drown in it. He's seen her ride that edge, step up to what she wants and back away, afraid he'll end up like all the others in her wake.
She circles the mat like a lioness, muscles coiled and tight, ready to strike. She's beaten three men, too young and too new to be a real challenge for her. There was no pain, not enough struggle. She gives him a look full of anger and dare, and he faces her like he would face himself; that foolish and angry boy who needed to hurt and bleed in order to learn how to heal.
“Barton,” she drawls, and there's a sway to her hips, movement that reminds him too much of her naked skin and the heat of her mouth, and how it feels to be tempted with it and then pushed away. In his mind he knows and understands the shape and reasons of her struggle, the shifted equilibrium of power, but he is still a living, breathing man who wants her. Her frustration over the false safety of the cage that's become too small is mirrored in his own, and he wants to stare her down.
A monster, after all, isn't afraid of another monster, but that doesn't mean he will give her what she wants easily.
“Got a problem, Romanoff?” he asks flippantly, and he sees warnings flaring up in her eyes. It's all red, red, red; getting away from her like her hair from the tie she's bound it with.
“I do have a problem,” he's close to the mat now and she starts walking towards him, but he turns away.
“I won't fight you,” he says, and it makes her even more frustrated, because she wants a proper challenge. She wants equal strength, she wants the sweat, she wants someone who will make it hard, and part of him wants to leave her like that, wanting.
“The hell you won't,” she says and pushes him, and it does hurt. She's strong, much stronger than she looks, all those tight little muscles honed and perfected and wrapped into a soft and smooth, deceiving package. He's quick enough to recoil and she steps back, eyes bright and angry and boring into his.
“Why should I?” he asks, all false calm and iron control and she lifts her chin. “Tell me why I should?”
She is so, so angry, and part of him is glad that she is, because she can't go on like this any more. “Are you a hawk or a chicken?” she says, and it's a weak insult, but it's a sign that she's close to the edge. He narrows his eyes and steps in her direction, and he can see her, all of her.
“Neither,” he says, just before she strikes.
What he does goes against all of his instincts; he avoids and only defends, and even lets her strike and hit him and it only serves to fuel her rage.
“Fight,” she says, and her voice is a low growl over the sound of music she plays every time she practices. It's a backdrop in his mind, the shifting, changing rhythm reminding him of her; dangerous and sharp and beautiful. “Fight me,” she growls again, and she attacks and he ducks, blocks, avoids her, just like she avoids him; he cheats, he denies her, and there's nothing that she fears more. Fighting is all she knows, violence is the only weapon she's practiced with, and he wants her to see he can take it, all of it, because that's what he is made of as well.
He sees the moment when her rage spills over, in vicious swipe of legs that brings him to the floor, only he is ready for it. He turns and moves away, and when she lunges for him, she is his, brought to floor and pinned under his bigger weight. She groans, tries to hit him with her knee, and he blocks it with his hand, grabs her hair and pulls hard, only to leave her on the floor like that. She attacks again, and he can see hurt on her face, when he brings her down again. It's harder and she bruises him, but he makes it look like it's nothing, like his buttons aren't pushed and his lip cut; he ducks her fist and catches her with a right cross and he can see that hurt in more ways than one.
But it has to happen. It has to She cannot keep herself in a cage. He knows because he learned it, and now he has brought her here, and she is his responsibility. He will fight her if he has to in order to bring it out, if she's too stubborn to accept that she is this, because she can't cut it off. She'll bleed out if she does.
One last time she attacks and they collide, and it takes all he has to bring her down and hold her there, defeated on the floor.
"Stop hiding who you are," he says with voice soft enough to crack and hurt.
*
Later, when she enters his quarters she strikes without a warning. This time he's not prepared and he struggles to retain his balance, to not let her knock him over. They crash against the wall, all of her height and weight and anger slamming into his body. Then she punches him hard enough he tastes blood.
“What was that?” she growls. “What the fuck was that?!”
He grabs her and flips them and she doesn't even blink when her back hits the wall.
He expects her to keep fighting, but she can still surprise him. When her mouth meets his he resists, but with the distraction, he's an easier target. She's pressed against him, and when he moves away, she moves forward and grabs his head, kisses him as viciously as she's hit him, and this time it doesn't look like she's about to let go.
He has no problem with that, and he meets her challenge in the middle of the room, then she starts shoving him towards his bed and he walks blind, guided by her fire. She strips, one smooth motion and her top is gone, she loses her bra and kicks her pants away, makes sure that this time he can't resist, can't walk away.
He isn't even going to try. She pushes him backwards and he lands on the bed, hunter becoming prey, spread like an offering before her eyes. She moves over him, slender, soft and dangerous, and places a hand in the middle of his chest as he takes all of her in. She moves to kiss him and stops before his lips, taunts him with dangerous fire in her eyes. He grabs her head, fistfulls of red hair and claims her mouth, and it's hard and greedy and aggressive.
He can feel her growl, deep in her throat, as she lets him into her mouth. She looks wild and content and as unrestrained as he'd seen her, a mythical creature that could well end his life, and he doesn't care. He flips them around and she groans and arches into him. He is so hard it almost hurts, and he has to take her, now, right now.
“Get naked,” she says in a deep breathy voice and he does, as quickly and efficient as he can. He can barely stand before her looking at her like this, flushed skin and rapidly rising breasts, and that raw look in her eyes. “Now,” she's almost pleading, only it sounds like an order, and when he finally, finally strips bare she wraps herself around him, every deadly inch of her skin against his. He pushes her back on the bed and holds her face, and perhaps he's too rough, but everything he sees on her face tells him that this is just what she wants.
He kisses her everywhere but on the mouth; her face, her neck, the hollow of her collarbone and her breasts, and she sounds like she's falling apart. Her thighs hold him, and she's pulling him down to her, trying to pull him into her and he has to struggle against her and the need to be inside of her, but he won't give her that so easily, either. He leaves her breasts for her mouth and kisses her hard and deep and long, until she's gasping.
“Do you trust me?” he mouths against her neck as she struggles. “Come on; Tasha. Do you trust me?” he asks, using his entire body to hold her down, hand on her face, thumb against her lips. He waits until her eyes feel steady and he can see things beneath the rage and desire, and he senses the moment is right. He lets go of her face to touch her neck, his fingers against her pulse and it looks like she's struggling to stay still. Her eyes are on his, her body is tense, almost like every muscle is ready to attack, except she won't, this is a different tension now. She watches him while he explores her, bit by bit, the tender hollow of her throat and pink peaks of her breasts, each rib and the spaces between them. He can feel her heart beneath his hand, alive and beating, her breath, the way life is pulsing through her.
“Do you trust me?” he asks, softer this time, when she is still with anticipation under his hand. She licks her lips and nods and looks at him, all of her rough edges and aggression and soft shapes of a woman hidden in shadows.
“Yes,” she says, as his hand covers her stomach and touches the tender skin there. “Yes,” and his fingers are skimming lower, and she spreads her legs for him. He strokes her, teases her and watches how her breath turns shorter, quicker, desire spreading blatant and open across her face. “Yes,” and she closes her eyes as he enters her with a finger, than two. She moans and arches and her legs tighten on his arm. Her breathing takes on the rhythm of his strokes, she shifts and ebbs and flows with his hand, eyes now open and wild as she looks at him.
He removes his hand and licks his fingers and watches her reaction. Her look is hungry and bright and dark and her expression is feral when he moves over her again and positions himself between her legs.
This time she waits, quiet and suspended and like she's barely holding herself together. He knows this will be rough and fast, but he wants to start this on his own terms, wants to seal this moment between them. He is careful even as his heart is pounding and he feels like he might explode. She's wet and tight and she makes a painful sound as he pushes inside, but her eyes welcome the pain and him. Then, he's all the way in and they're panting, and his arms start to shake with control as he holds himself still. He pulls out and pushes in, and again, and again; and he can feel her body loosen and relax. She rocks against him, every bit of her skin hot against his and he goes a little faster. She moans and starts touching him everywhere she can reach, goading him on with noises she makes, with his name falling from her lips. She asks for more and harder and her nails claw his back, and he becomes the maze and the way out of it, and she clings to him with all her pain.
There's darkness in her kiss, darkness he knows so well. She's trying to hold it all inside, the frustration, the anger, the fear she'll cut loose and hurt someone, everyone; and he knows she has to break free and crash and fall to get up again. The cage won't contain her, the maze won't work any more to hold the monster in, and he wants to show her that she won't be alone, isn't alone. He won't leave her alone no matter what he sees. Her teeth sink in his lip and he can feel the pain but his mind is too far gone to stop her, he kisses her; her mouth, her face, her throat as he fucks her hard and fast.
He looks down and there's blood - smears on her face and neck. He stops, frozen to see her like this, unguarded and red.
“Clint,” she says and touches his lip, it stings and he realizes he's bleeding, that the blood smeared over her skin is his.
“It's okay,” he says and his voice drops low. Looking at her like this does something to him, something he doesn't expect. It's almost like he sees her clearly for the first time and all the fractured images fit together and become one in front of his eyes. She becomes one. The one.
She touches him almost gently, a contrast to just moments ago, and wipes away some of the blood, then lifts her head to kiss him and lick across the cut. He tries to hold still but he's shaking as she does this, as it becomes clear that she can take and hold everything that he is, everything dark and twisted that he's keeping inside. She's everything he's been searching for and didn't hope he'd find. It's right there, in her eyes when she looks at him. There's edge to her tenderness, fascination, hunger that's raw and unrestrained. She pushes him and he rolls over, and looks up at her - his lioness, finally free. She starts to ride him, sets a pace that makes her mouth drop open and her head fall back, and she is so, so close.
He wants to see her shatter and fall apart. He holds her hip with his right hand and slips between her legs with his left, his shooting hand. She reaches down as she arches above him, and she guides him, shows him the way and they conquer the maze together. She cries out as she comes, beautiful with her bruises, with his blood on her skin and red ribbons of her hair tying him to her as her head drops forward and they brush his skin. She's still gripping his hand and he's holding onto her flesh as he comes in wrecking, powerful waves. Finally, she collapses on top of him, hands on his shoulders and head against his chest and he feels like he's crashing against her shores, inviting and full of dangers and promise.
This time, she stays.
*
Later, he finds her in the bathroom. She's standing in front of the mirror, naked but partially hidden by her hair. It looks like red stains against her white skin.
He nears her and stands behind her, and she's looking at herself with searching eyes, like she's trying to determine where she begins and where she ends. His hands are gentle on her shoulders, he wants to steady her, because he needs to feel steady in his own skin again. She looks up to his reflection, watches as he kisses the top of her head while he takes in the innocence of her face and bruises on her skin that are revealed as he moves back the hair.
He sees the blood as well, his own blood smeared on her and allows his eyes to linger, but just for a moment. Her face still looks distressed, and he wants to show her a different picture, so he turns her around to face him.
“Come here,” he says as he touches her face and reaches for the washcloth on the sink. She's looking at him with that searching expression as he cleans her, her hands on his chest and their bodies close together.
“Clint,” she says, and it feels like he hadn't heard that voice in a long, long time. It feels like she's coming back from somewhere far away as she's looking at him and seeing the way he sees her. He smiles, and it feels too rough on his face, but she smiles in return and touches his lips. “Does it hurt?” she asks and he shakes his head. “Liar,” she says and lets her forehead fall softly against his chest.
He gathers her hair in his hands and kisses the top of her head and thinks how it doesn't hurt, because it feels good.