A/N: So this is actually a rewrite of a fic by the same name that I posted forever ago. I'd been thinking about coming back to it for a while and I finally got there. I'm going to revise what I've got done already and then I've got a bunch of new stuff to add, so stay tuned!

Phil Coulson had known the Black Widow was bad news from the time the file landed on his desk- her kill count told him that much- but he also knew that she must have had some redeemable quality to her because from his intel, she'd run away from her former employers and was now working freelance. The problem was that the Council had issued a kill order and pretty much every agent in the office was hardwired to obey or die. Key words being pretty much.

This was why when Clint brought her in instead of killing her, Coulson hadn't been the least bit surprised. His best agent was great in the field, but a softie at heart. Seeing a tired and worn twenty-two year old Black Widow had killed his resolve and he ended up bringing her in, which was exactly what the senior agent had been secretly hoping for. Unfortunately, the archer's faith in the assassin made him blind to her actions, and while Coulson was all for people being turned to the correct side, he wasn't stupid enough to trust them right off the bat. Which was why it was Coulson that tailed her one night when she snuck out of her cell and went off base.

The only had to follow her for a little while before she was at an apartment and shoving a key in the lock, carefully looking around before entering. Phil had to breathe a sigh of relief at that. He was more than the regular agent he looked like, having had years of training and learning to blend in with the shadows, but she was the Black Widow for god's sake! As much as he was loath to admit it, her skill set was more than a little daunting. Thankfully, those years training also meant that he knew how to get into the apartment she'd just entered undetected, and he did so flawlessly.

To say he was shocked to hear voices at the end of the hall after disabling the security system and creeping in would be an understatement. He'd half expected her to be alone and contacting her old agency, so he stuck the shadows of the dark apartment and watched. The Widow smiled and thanked whoever was there, a young man by the looks of it, and passed him some cash. The man smiled and left, telling the Widow that he'd be back in thirty, then took off. The Russian only nodded at him and Coulson crept soundlessly forward to get a better look at the scene in front of him and felt the shock down to his core when he saw the woman holding a brown haired baby. It was nodding off in her arms as she sang him a Russian lullaby and Coulson couldn't find it in him to break them apart just yet. Half an hour later, when the other man came back, Widow left and the agent snuck into the baby's room. He- if the Mommy's Little Prince onesie was to be believed- couldn't have been more than a week old, and as Coulson stared down at him, he woke, and stared right back at him with eyes identical to a certain assassin's. There were a few things that Agent Phil Coulson knew in that moment. One, this tiny boy was an innocent civilian caught in a bad situation. Two, he was most definitely the Widow's son. Three, he was likely the only person on the planet that the Widow cared about, and four, Coulson wasn't going to let them be separated, no matter what.

He took off as silently as he'd come in and tried to figure out how to he was going to broach the subject with his prisoner. He easily decided that quicker was better and confronted her the next day. She was lounging in her cell when he turned off the cameras and snuck into the room, helping himself to the metal chair across from her. "How old is he?"

Widow looked up, unimpressed. "Hawk? I'd put him somewhere in his mid-twenties. But shouldn't you already know that, Mr. SHIELD Agent?"

Coulson let out a breath of a chuckle. "No, your son, I know you have." He paused to let that sink in. "He has your eyes, by the way."

Were in not for the cuffs around her wrists and ankles keeping her securely tied to the bed, Coulson had no doubt that she would have been across the room and snapping his neck before he could take his next breath. As it was, he was pretty sure her glare was deadly, and her almost amused façade had dropped in an instant. "Touch him and I will end you."

The senior agent held his hands up in the classic "I surrender" pose and offered a kind smile. "I'm not going to hurt you or your son. I just need a few answers so I can help you. Okay?" She nodded reluctantly and Coulson put his hands down. "How old is he?"

"Almost three months."

"He looked a lot smaller than that."

"He was almost a month premature. Healthy, just small, thank god."

Coulson nodded, filing the information for a health profile later. "Name."

"Dmitri."

"Who's the man that takes care of him."

"Just someone I pay well to look after him seeing as I'm tied up here." She smirked, hiding the terror in her eyes behind humor. "Literally."

Coulson gave another nod. "Okay. Well, I'm going to go about getting you transferred out of here to somewhere safe. We'll get Dmitri to you very shortly after that. Sound good?"

Widow looked shocked. "Why would you help me?"

Coulson gave a soft smile. "You defected from a powerful and terrifying corporation because you loved you son enough to get him out of that life. You deal with not seeing him for most of the day so he will be protected from yet another powerful and terrifying organization so you won't have to lose him.

"I'm helping you because that boy deserves a mother and you are a mother that deserves to be in her son's life. I'm not going to take that from you because you were brought into a bad situation as a child, and I will do whatever it takes to protect and innocent boy. And that innocent boy is going to need his mother. That's why I'm helping you." He stood and straightened his suit. "I'll be back soon to transfer you." He turned to leave, but paused on his way out. "I'm going to need names for both you. I'll get your old one for your file later, but I need something new for both of you. He can keep his first name, but I'm going to need you to come up with something your old agency won't recognize."

She didn't even need to think. "Natasha Alianovna Romanoff and Dmitri Nikolai Romanoff."

Coulson nodded and left.

A/N: Thoughts?