Open Case File [COMPLETED]

The Fifth Date (Clint's POV)

So sorry for not replying to last week's chapter comments. It wasn't a great week. I'm sorry. Hopefully I'll be able to answer the ones you leave on here. ❤️

☝️Yes, this is a chapter from Clint's POV. But I feel the need to warn you, he's really different when not with his brothers. Honestly, I'm not sure how much you'll like it... If at all...

Well, here goes nothing, enjoy!

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Clint leaned back against the passenger side door of his car, staring up at the FBI building. Sunlight glinted off the glass, painting the building gold, amber, and burnt orange. Around him, pedestrians hurried about their lives, failing to look up and spot the simple beauty.

Beauty. So many saw beauty as only appearance in a person. Others saw it as nature. But beauty was so many things and Clint didn't understand how people failed to see all of it.

Beauty was in the way a person found solace in the midst of a storm. The way one person cared for another. How music could echo the emotions someone felt. In a glance between two people. The courage of one brave soul. All of these and more were a form of beauty.

Yet, humans acknowledge so few of these things. Beauty would only be in the appearance of the woman exiting the FBI building and coming towards him.

Most others would fail to see the beauty in the way she walked, with confidence but not ego. They wouldn't see the beauty in the way the corner of her mouth curled just slightly as she saw him. Something that said she was more than happy to see him. It was all beauty to him.

"Hi," Eva said.

Clint leaned forward and gave her a light kiss on her cheek. As far as physical attention went, it was all he'd given her in their one month of knowing each other.

He'd learned. In previous relationships, if he opened the door to the physical, it seemed all his mind could focus on. In doing so he'd lose the fundamentals of a relationship: talking, sharing, connecting.

So a kiss on the cheek was all he'd give because this woman was one he didn't want to let slip away.

"Hungry?" Clint asked.

"Yes."

"What are you in the mood for?"

Eva twisted her lips to the side in thought. It drew Clint's attention to them, but he pulled his gaze back to her eyes.

"It was a stressful day, I would love a steak."

"All right," Clint said.

He opened the passenger door for Eva and closed it after she got in. He took the driver's seat and led them into traffic.

"Do you need to make a reservation?" she asked.

"It's covered."

Clint left it at that. He didn't tell her he had five reservations at different places with different cuisines. He over-planned. James was spontaneous but Clint wasn't. Order made him comfortable. It's what made him good at his job. He took the time to think through every possibility.

"Anything more to say about your day?" Clint asked.

"Nothing interesting enough to share," Eva said.

They felt silent. It felt easy to be quiet with Eva.

In the past, the girls were attracted to him because they liked the strong, silent type. But what they didn't understand that once they started dating that was still who he was.