It was that stupid Ontario job that did it.

Hill assigned it in January, and shipped his seething ass off to Toronto before he had time to argue. His orders were to maintain his cover for as long as necessary, and to track the movements of a disreputable league of rowdies before reporting back to SHIELD. Simple, standard, solo.

Some three months later, while holed up in a safe house bordering Brampton, he saw it all go down. Standing in front of the TV with his jaw slack, he watched in horror as sheer chaos rained down on the capital. The Triskelion crumbling. Helicarriers exploding. Half of SHIELD's best operatives, exposed as traitors.

And then there she was. Sitting in a court council, arms crossed, dryly informing the committee general who asked for a word from Rogers that she thought "the rock in the middle of the Potomac made his point fairly eloquently", all the while exuding that all-too-familiar attitude of slightly pissed-off boredom.

Clint lowered himself onto the arm of the sofa to watch.

"There are some on this committee," one of the council members was saying, "who feel – given your service record both for this country and against it – that you belong in a penitentiary, not mouthing off on Capitol Hill."

Clint grimaced.

Natasha, however, was clearly unimpressed.

"You're not gonna put me in a prison. You're not gonna put any of us in a prison." She tilted her head. "You know why?"

The council member took a stab at sarcasm. "Do enlighten us."

"Because you need us," Natasha said bluntly. "Yes, the world is a vulnerable place, and yes, we helped make it that way. But we're also the ones best qualified to defend it." She gazed coolly at the council member. "So if you want to arrest me, arrest me. You'll know where to find me."

She stood without ceremony and left the council.

The footage cut to a clip of her badass walk out of the courtroom, and the news anchor resumed her commentary.

"This hearing took place on Sunday afternoon, just days after the public exposure of SHIELD's so-called 'Project: Insight'. According to U.S. government administrators, Captain America continues to remain MIA, while SHIELD's own director, Nicholas Fury, has been pronounced KIA. Ex-soviet agent Natasha Romanoff, codename Black Widow, has also gone off the grid, and court officials who attended the hearing have said…"

The news anchor droned on, but Clint had stopped listening. His sharp eyes had caught a glimmer of silver at Natasha's throat… was that…?

You'll know where to find me. Natasha's words echoed in his mind, and suddenly, he understood. Natasha was AWOL. The U.S. government wouldn't know where to find her, that comment couldn't have been for them. The necklace, the parting words… it was a message.

And Clint knew exactly where she was.

He sprang off the couch and headed into the kitchen.

In the doorway, he froze.

Natasha was sitting on the countertop, running a scrap of cloth along the blade of a short, silver knife. She didn't meet his bewildered gaze, just calmly focused on her task as he struggled to work out what she was doing here.

"Thought you'd be in Ottawa," he said at last. "The rendezvous point."

"Got tired of waiting," she said without looking up. Clint narrowed his eyes, disbelieving.

Gradually, he began to understand. The 'message' hadn't been a message at all – it had been a ruse to convince him that she was in Ottawa, so she could catch him off guard.

And at last, he understood why she was here. He knew what she wanted.

Clint leaned his shoulder against the doorframe, folding his arms. "You know you really should start calling ahead. Give a guy some warning."

Her lips twitched into a smirk. "And spoil the surprise?"

Clint shifted his posture, forcing himself to relax despite his wariness.

"I heard SHIELD went to hell. Puts me in a tight spot, seeing as protocol dictates a full post-mission debriefing. And, from what I hear, there's little to no reliable senior agents I can report to." He jerked his chin upward. "Nice hair, by the way."

Natasha finally looked up, her green eyes fastening on him. "With the way things stand, that's the least of our worries right now."

"What, the hair or the debriefing?" Clint joked. He pushed off the doorframe and took a step forward.

The tension in the room palpably thickened.

"Rogers?" Clint said.

Natasha resumed her knife-cleaning. "He's off the map."

"And?"

Her eyes slid up to his. "That's all I know."

Liar.

Clint took another step forward. "What about—?"

She lunged at him so swiftly that, although he'd expected it, he could hardly have reacted had he tried. He landed hard on his back, her knee pinning his chest to the floor.

Her face was inches from his, eyes sparking with dangerous ferocity as she pressed the knife to his throat.

"Say it," she hissed, twisting his arm until his shoulder seared hot. "I want to hear you say it."

Clint's eyes were watering, and he winced as his arm began to throb. "I'm not HYDRA," he growled through gritted teeth.

She yanked his shirt front and slammed him into the floor.

"Like you mean it," she snarled.

Clint forced his pain aside and concentrated instead on her anxious green eyes. No, not anxious – terrified. She was afraid that her partner, her best friend, the person who had taught her trust, had lied to her from the beginning. Had betrayed her.

Clint took a slow breath.

"Nat. I'm not HYDRA."

Her eyes narrowed critically, and her grip on his arms tightened as she searched his face. A moment passed in tense silence.

Then the pressure on his arms relaxed, and she let out a breath of relief, closing her eyes.

"Thank God," she murmured.

She rolled off of him and stood up, then reached for his hand, pulling him to his feet. "I had to check," she said by way of apology.

"Would've been offended if you hadn't," he grunted, massaging his aching shoulder.

Her eyes tracked the motion and she stepped forward, brushing his hand away, then pulled the neckline of his shirt aside to inspect the injury. His skin smarted where she had twisted the limb, Indian burn-style, and when she glanced at him, her expression was almost apologetic. She ran her cool knuckles past the inflamed skin with surprising gentleness.

"So fill me in," Clint said at last, and she looked up. "What the hell's going on in D.C.?"

Natasha's hand slid off his shoulder and she crossed her arms, leaning back against the counter.

"Well, for starters, Fury's not dead."

Clint chuckled. "That son of a bitch, I knew it," he said, and then, "What about Rogers? Heard he was MIA."

Natasha grew serious. "He went after the Winter Soldier."

Clint furrowed his brow. "The Winter Soldier? You mean the one who…? In Odessa…?" At her nod, he continued, "You said it was a dead end."

"It was," Natasha replied. "He was nothing but a ghost story… until Fury made Pierce unlock SHIELD's intelligence database. It's all out there now, everything they've been hiding."

"Hang on. Pierce?" Clint repeated. "Secretary Pierce?"

"HYDRA," Natasha confirmed.

Clint scowled. "Anyone else we know?"

"Rumlow," Natasha said. "Jack Rollins, and Jasper Sitwell."

Clint glared at the floor. He'd done ops with each of these men – it was hard to comprehend that they had been double agents from the beginning. He was quiet for a moment, thinking.

"So what now," he asked finally.

Natasha exhaled. "Now we run," she said. "SHIELD's been labeled a terrorist organization, which means we're not just on HYDRA's hit list – we're considered threats to national security. I blew all my covers to expose HYDRA, I need to disappear. And SHIELD safe houses aren't exactly safe anymore; you can't stay here. You need to be out by tonight."

"Twenty-two hundred, I'm gone," Clint agreed. He paused. "But I think you're kind of missing the obvious."

She raised her eyebrows expectantly.

"We could stick together," Clint said, trying to sound casual. "We'll find someplace to lay low for a while until this all blows over.—"

Natasha was already shaking her head. "We can't do that. That's exactly what they're expecting us to do. Our chances are better if we split up." She quirked an eyebrow. "Also… last week, I was SHIELD's most wanted fugitive. I'm kind of a hazard to be around right now."

"When aren't you," Clint muttered.

She smiled then – a real, genuine Natasha-smile that made him realize how much he'd missed her. And how much he was going to miss her.

"Anyway." Natasha straightened, still smirking a little. "Now that I've confirmed you're not secretly a Nazi."

Clint smiled. "I'll see you, Romanoff."

"Watch your back."

She headed for the door.

Clint shoved his hands into his pockets and watched as she opened the door, then stopped abruptly on the the threshold. She faced him, frowning.

"You never asked if I was HYDRA."

Clint looked at her thoughtfully for a moment, then crossed the room to where she stood.

"Didn't need to," he said quietly. Then he bent and impulsively swept a kiss past her cheek.

"Goodbye, Natasha."

He closed the door.

Said stupid Ontario job may have laid the foundation, but it was that goodbye that set the thing in stone. If he'd argued his point, if he'd convinced her that they should stay together, things might have turned out much differently.

Finally back with another long-ish fic! :) I actually started this one aaages ago, set it aside, found it again, and decided to finish it. I feel like the plot is really iffy, but I think it has some good bits, so I decided to post anyway.