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When Clint came in the door and dropped his duffel on the floor, Bobbi was standing in the kitchen, a yellow envelope in her hands. She looked up from her mission packet with that look he hated, the one that said 'I'm about to destroy your world and I'm wondering how you'll take it, but I'm doing it anyway.'
"How bad is it?" He wasn't really in the mood for mind games after a week in the desert waiting to snipe a particularly nasty terrorist target.
Bobbi shrugged. "Got a mission. In Florida."
She sized him up again. He knew she was deciding whether to talk now or after he'd showered and eaten. He also knew the moment she realized he was reading her as easily.
She went over to the table, picked up another packet, and tossed it to him. "Fury's assigned you as well."
He fingered the envelope but didn't open it. "Did you ask for me?"
"And why would I do that?"
"We're assassins, Mock. You can't keep us wrapped up in cotton wool."
"Girl can hope, can't she." Bobbi moved off back into the kitchen and made a show of putting on coffee.
It wasn't really a question, so he didn't bother to answer it. "What's wrong with it? Straight from Fury. You usually like those."
Her shoulders went tense. She didn't look at him. "He's giving me the entire project. It's definitely a step up from trying to throw me into TAHITI."
Clint couldn't put his finger on it, but something about this was bothering her. He pulled out the sheaf of papers, read it over, and shook his head, frowning. "He signed the waivers, right? I mean, this is just another head of security job."
"For you, it is." Bobbi dropped down onto the couch beside him and set a mug of coffee on the table between. Peace offering. "Clint. She'll hate us."
She. Clint jerked his head slightly, parsing what Bobbi was worried about. "Natasha."
Bobbi leaned back, an insolent teen gesture but without the insolence. Her fingers moved as if to twirl something, a mannerism he instinctively recognized since he shared it. She shook her head. "She's already got detail with Rogers. You know she'll hate this."
"Then why not turn it down?"
"Because Fury's right," Bobbi exploded. "They're going to keep searching for the formula and keep hurting people, and we have the key to finding it. Now's the time to get it right."
But Natasha wouldn't see it that way. She'd be the one presenting the smiling face to Steve while they essentially stabbed him in the back. No matter that Steve had signed the standard SHIELD medical waivers allowing his samples to be used by the SHIELD SciTech division. He didn't get it. He hadn't really played on Fury's turf before and by Fury's set of rules.
Clint sighed and dropped the papers on the table. "You want this." He looked at her.
She had that still expression on her face she got when he'd nailed her but she didn't like to admit it, even to herself. She blew out a breath and flicked a pen around in her fingers. Natasha was always losing pens in the couch cushions. Bobbi was always finding them.
The silence stretched and Bobbi finally just admitted the reason she'd barely let him get in the door before confronting him with this. She wanted it, but… "She'll hate us both."
"You going to take the mission?" he asked her days later, when it was just him and her after a sparring session.
She got up, breathing hard, and shook her head, not in negative but in indecision. "Are you?"
He tossed her a water bottle. Head of security of the Project Gladiator facility. It was about as far removed from New Mexico, the Helicarrier, and New York that he could get.
"Yeah."
"I hate you both," Natasha murmured as she sank down between them.
Clint kissed her just behind her ear.
Bobbi just ran her fingers through Natasha's hair gently. "Yeah, because we'll be fending off mosquitoes in Florida while you play with Captain America."
Natasha swatted at Bobbi's hand and rolled over, one hand pressed to each of their chests. "We all know I don't swing that way."
"Guys?" Clint's eyebrows came up.
She rolled her eyes. "Unbonded."
Of course, technically, no one knew if Captain America, aka Steve Rogers, was bonded or not. It would be rude to ask, and even Bobbi respected his privacy enough to not figure it out from his medical details.
Technically, the only people who knew that Mockingbird, Hawkeye, or the Black Widow were bonded were the three of them. Natasha and Bobbi had bonded platonically several years before Clint ignored a SHIELD kill order and brought her in. Bobbi's first marriage had failed because Hunter couldn't tolerate being married without a bond. Clint had been willing to accept the two of them as a packaged deal and that was, for the most part, that.
"I hate Florida," Bobbi muttered as she dropped into the bed beside Clint.
He gave her a once-over, clearly indicating the fact that she was wearing skimpier clothing than she would in New York. "I don't."
She dropped her head back on the pillow and reached for the phone. "She's trying to find him a girlfriend."
"She's trying to figure out if he's bonded," Clint countered.
Bobbi doubted it. Natasha had been a shameless matchmaker for years. "Not everything's about the game."
His eyebrows came up. 'Rich, coming from you,' that look said.
She glared at him, handed him the phone just as Natasha picked up and said, "Hello."
Clint's expression darkened but he took it, handled it as smoothly as if he'd done the calling.
By the time Bobbi got on, it was just the missing you and laughter and easy rapport of people who usually worked half a world away from each other. There were no stories of Steve and his goodness and ideals that didn't quite fit in the world Bobbi and Clint and Natasha dirtied their hands in. There was no lying to Natasha, though Bobbi could and would if she actually had to.
"Birdie," Clint said quietly as soon as the phone was hung up.
Bobbi stared at the ceiling. "We don't keep things from each other. Even top secret, need to know." Except they did, if the other didn't ask.
Clint sighed. Lying by omission was still lying, but he didn't call her on it, just pulled her close until she finally let her stiff muscles relax and her head rest on his shoulder. They didn't really sync up, but the bond resonated between them anyway, warm and safe if missing an important, vital part of it.
"I miss her," Bobbi said quietly after a minute.
He rubbed her back in a soothing circle. "I know." She knew he meant he missed her too.
Fury found enough time to call them to get out of dodge. "You may have HYDRA down there. Trust no one."
"Par for the course," Bobbi snapped.
Clint just gave her a look and covered her as she got to work destroying files and hard evidence in the labs. She trusted Clint; she trusted Mack; she covered the entire order by framing a more mundane leak than covert HYDRA agents.
Then of course, the Triskelion blew and everything went downhill from there.
They didn't take time to catalog how long would their secrets keep (they'd kept secrets before) or whether time would run out for them at all. They came together in a tangle of warm bodies, soft laughter, rough movement, and a need to remember what it felt like to all hum with the same feelings running through their bond.
They took the time, ignored the world, and didn't leave the bed unless they absolutely had to.
The phone wouldn't stop buzzing, and Natasha finally untangled from Clint's arm and Bobbi's hair to answer it.
She paused on the caller ID, then flipped open the phone. "Stark."
The sharp tone she used to answer was probably what brought Clint blinking out of sleep and Bobbi sitting up groggily, a question in her narrowed eyes.
"Morning, sunshine," Stark's altogether too cheerful voice came over the line. "There's something I think you need to see from the great SHIELD leaks. I sent it to your email. Encrypted of course. Your Stark Industries email."
She barely refrained from rolling her eyes. "Any more 90 year old soldiers unburied from their graves?"
Clint tensed. Bobbi just waited, still and inexpressive.
"Well…"
Her voice softened. "I know about him, Stark." She didn't say Coulson's name, and Clint's head dropped back to the pillow.
"It's not about Agent," Tony countered, suddenly human and caring in his voice. "I know you and Legolas are close, and I just think you need to know."
Legolas… Clint? Natasha listened puzzled as Tony rapidly talked his way off the phone and hung up. She scooted forward to the foot of the bed and dug in her bag on the floor.
"Can't it wait?" Clint mumbled sleepily into the pillow.
Bobbi didn't say anything at all. She sat, watching Natasha for some sign of what was going on. That could be very normal or very bad.
Natasha flipped open her notebook and opened her email. The file was labeled Project Gladiator. That was one of Fury's projects, and not one Natasha had bothered to familiarize herself with, seeing as it was need to know, mostly redacted, and under SciTech.
Bobbi was SciTech.
Natasha stared at the file a moment longer, then closed the computer gently. "I'm not going to like it, am I?"
"Don't know," Bobbi said easily. "What did he send you?"
Clint didn't stir.
Suddenly Natasha wondered if that was because he had actually dozed off or if he was trying to avoid getting in the middle of a fight. He'd always had a low tolerance for conflict between the three of them.
She snatched up the notebook and opened the file.
Project Gladiator. Senior scientist: Bobbi Morse. Objective: recreate the supersoldier serum by reverse engineering Steve Roger's biosamples.
Experimentation without knowledge on her partner who trusted her, without telling her, without…
"Why didn't you tell me?" She turned around and stared at them both.
It was obvious now that Clint was not asleep. He was staring at the wall behind Bobbi, his whole body tense as if waiting for a blow.
Bobbi just leaned back, eyes dropping and mouth twisting in resigned disappointment. "You couldn't have been his partner if you'd known."
Natasha looked between them, Clint who was not looking at her and Bobbi who was, but with that unhappy but unrepentant look Natasha had never expected to be turned on her.
"You knew we were working on a level seven project," Bobbi finally added. "You knew we hadn't told you what it was."
"Don't even tell me I should have asked," Natasha retorted coldly.
"What? I'm supposed to tell you to trust me?" Bobbi's eyes narrowed. "You know what kind of agent I am, and you know that all of us do whatever needs to be done."
"This didn't need to be done." Natasha was up on her feet.
Clint flinched. "Stop."
There was enough intensity behind the command to stop them both cold. He had skeletons in his closet that neither of them wanted to rattle when they fought.
"I'm going for a run." Natasha pulled on the requisite clothes in the tense silence left behind.
Bobbi, she could expect to do something like this. She hadn't expected it of Clint.
"She's still mad at me," Bobbi said softly when Clint came to bed a few days later.
Natasha had been running 'errands' and keeping hours that enabled her to sleep in an otherwise empty bed. It wasn't really a question, so Clint didn't really answer.
He sighed as he tucked himself around her. "I hate it when you fight."
Bobbi soaked in the warmth of the gesture for as long as she could before finally rolling over and sitting up on one arm to trace gentle fingers over the lines of his face and commit it to memory before she broke his heart.
"I'm leaving."
He flinched, incomprehension in his eyes and the seed of fear and anger she knew he'd lash out with when he realized she was serious. "What are you—?"
"Coulson has a SHIELD mission for me." She forced herself to go brusque, watched Clint relax the faintest notch.
"How long?" He studied her face intently, reading everything she wasn't good enough to keep locked away.
She really should have asked him years ago for a list of all her tells. But she shook her head and slipped out of his grip to the edge of the bed. "Complete radio silence. Deep cover. As long as it takes."
Clint stared at her. He knew where she was going with this, and much as he hated it, he'd probably even figured out why. "No. You don't just leave your bondmates."
They had spent most of their lives together working half a world apart. That wasn't the issue and both of them knew it. You didn't just leave Clint. Abandoning him would be as hurtful as betraying Natasha's trust. But Natasha had fallen in love with him first, and he had fallen as hard for Natasha. Bobbi had lived alone with a useless bond before, and Natasha was protective enough to accept Clint's passive part in Gladiator if Bobbi wasn't in the picture anymore.
He deserved better. They all did.
"I'm sorry."