look after you × winterwidow & oc

VI. is this love, agent romanoff?

Another blast never came.

"Get out of my way, Romanoff." Tony warned.

She moved, but not away like he wanted, she turned around and faced him instead.

"Tony, please, listen to me-" she knew she didn't have much time before his feelings take over him completely. "You don't have to hurt him anymore, he's defenseless-

"Well, then it's a good thing I was never an honorable man." he shrugged. "Don't get on my nerves, Natasha, not again." he raised his arm. "You either get out of the way or you die with him."

She kept looking him dead in the eye as she shook her head.

A bit of confusion but mostly surprise flashed across Tony's face, still tensed up from all that rage and a reopened old wound. He tilted his head before lowering his arm slightly.

"I'll be damned." he let out a dry chuckle. "Is this love, Agent Romanoff?"

Stark shook his head like he wasn't sure himself why he even cared about this enough to ask. Natasha heard Steve move in the back, Tony moved his arm to him, a silent warning not to take another step.

"Yes," she said, swallowing, trying to get rid of that lump growing in her throat and bringing Tony's attention back to her. "This is love."

Desperate times call for desperate measures.

"So if you want to make him suffer like you are suffering now, if you really need to hurt someone..."

Natasha had trouble keeping her voice steady and was glad that James wasn't exactly conscious because she knew he would never let her say any of that.

"Then hurt me. He loves me. If you want revenge, then pick me.

"Don't make me kill you." Tony's voice gained almost a pleading tone, it was unclear, like on the verge of breaking. "You have a daughter, Romanoff. I don't want to make a child an orphan. I know what it's like to lose your mum. Is he really worth it?"

"Katya isn't mine. I adopted her, remember?" Natasha reminded. "She isn't my daughter. She is his, but I raised her and we are the closest thing he has to a family. I'm the logical play if you really want to have your revenge, Tony, but you don't have to kill anyone." she changed her position slowly and began to stand up with arms up, so he knew she wasn't planning anything. "You can let us go."

Stark scoffed "Don't be ridiculous. I'm not letting them go."

"I'm not asking you to let them go." she stood up, her arms still open. She didn't dare to even glance back before her next words. "I'm asking you to let Barnes go."

Ever since the beginning, there was something destructive in this bond of theirs. Not in a negative way, no. But the lengths they were both willing to go to for each other, reaching as far as giving their mind or even lives altogether away for the other person.

James would die for Natalia and Natalia for James.

And in the face of that, suddenly one more betrayal and a few more lies didn't seem so extreme.

"He was a weapon. He couldn't tell you about your parents. I'm pretty sure he didn't remember them until he saw that recording." her eyes flicked to the side but she didn't see Steve from that angle. "But Rogers knew."

A single tear that rolled down her cheek then, added even more of drama to that situation as she looked Tony in the eyes and lied like it was the easiest thing in the world. She knew too. But he didn't have to know that, did he?

"Steve knew. He could have told you. But he didn't."

Stark's eyebrows raised in surprise. "God, you're not a double agent. You're a triple one." he clicked his tongue and shook his head. "And that's a low blow even for you."