Work Text:
By the time Natasha made it to the door of her apartment, she was ready to burn her stilettos. The soreness in her arches was all mental - she could run a couple miles in heels if she needed to - but the bruises on her ankles were very real. Though every step ached, it wasn’t nearly as irritating as her chafing skin. The glittery fabric of her dress had begun to feel like sandpaper against her underarms, and some idiot had tried to scratch her bare shoulder blades with his blunt nails. It was almost as bad as the red rings around her wrists from the rope Blunt Nails Guy had used to tie her to a chair.
The chair hadn’t lasted long. The wounds wouldn’t either. Her target’s salacious stare and grip on her ass, however, left a lingering sense of grime on her body. It was a shame she was only sent to gather intelligence and detain the target if necessary. The fact that one of his bodyguards had discovered her necklace camera was a blow to her espionage ego, but at least it had given her an excuse to kick someone in the head.
She was paying for it now. And if her goddamn jammed apartment door wouldn’t open soon, she would be paying for a new frame -
The door swung inward, and she was in striking position before her brain registered that it was James who had opened it. He gave her an amused smile. Her only response was a hard stare as she brushed past him into the apartment.
“The op was bad?” he guessed.
“The op went fine.”
She didn’t look at him as she dropped her keys in the basket and threw her purse towards the couch. There was a knife in there that she would have to clean later. With a hand on the back of a kitchen chair, she tried to undo her stiletto straps.
“So what went wrong?”
“Nothing,” she huffed. The strap wasn’t cooperating. Maybe she should grab that knife now and teach the offending shoes a lesson.
A metal hand caressed her shoulder before gently pushing her to sit. She plopped down in the seat but made sure to not look happy about it. James, unfazed, handed her a cool glass of water before kneeling. He had the shoes off in seconds. Relief eased a fraction of the tension from her shoulders, and she cast him a more grateful look. When he began to dig his thumbs into her arches, she had to bite back a moan.
“So the op went fine,” he said evenly as he kneaded her ankle below the bruises, managing to match the pressure of his metal hand to his natural one. “What bothered you?”
As far as interrogation tactics went, foot massages from James worked nearly every time.
She gulped down half of the water before simply saying “men.” James cocked an eyebrow. “Greedy pigs who think they’re kings just because they have the biggest gun in the room.” she elaborated. She let her eyes slip closed and took another drink. “I was the bigger problem, though. I’ve let some skills gather dust. I made a few rookie mistakes, blew my cover.”
He kissed her bruises before standing. “You got the job done?”
“Yes,” she answered. She had completed the mission.
“And no one died that didn’t need to?”
He moved around behind her and slipped his fingers into her hair. The first two bobby pins came out with hardly any resistance.
“No one died at all,” she said, and maybe it was a little more heated than necessary.
“Then it was a success. Beat yourself up as much as you need to so that you don’t make those mistakes again. Otherwise…” she could feel and hear him shrug as he continued to relieve the pressure on her scalp. “You know to leave it behind you.”
“Yeah,” she sighed. It was easier said than done. Her mistakes from this op would aggravate her until she didn’t make them on the next mission. She would likely replay certain moments in her head on repeat instead of sleeping. If she had worn a different necklace, used a recorder instead of a camera, gone for the gut punch instead of the kick…
“Natalia,” James murmured, his lips nearly brushing her ear. He was slowly running his fingers through her hair now. “Finish your water. Go take a shower. I’ll have food waiting when you’re done.”
“I appreciate it, but it’s late. You don’t have to coddle me, and I should -”
“Eat something, because you probably had to skip dinner. And take a warm shower because it will help you recover.” He carefully pushed his thumbs into the knots in her neck for emphasis. “And I would never coddle you,” he added.
“Liar.”
“Never with you.”
He came back into her line of sight. She really wanted to feel irritated, but it was difficult when his expression was so open.
“Fine,” she conceded. As she stood, James pressed a light kiss to her lips and then turned towards the stove. She watched him for a moment - the line of his shoulders, the way his muscles shifted beneath his shirt, his metal arm unselfconsciously on display as he reached into the cabinet - before heading into the bedroom.
James had been cleaning again. She had only been gone for thirty six hours, but Steve and Sam were both out of town on their own assignments, Clint was having a family weekend, and Wanda - and by extension, Vision - had been working with Dr. Strange. Without his own op or trusted friends to occupy his mind, James found other ways to keep busy. Cleaning was one of his healthier coping mechanisms, she supposed, and definitely better than using the cabinets as targets for throwing knives. Now the bed was made up with fresh sheets, the dust from the dresser tops was gone, and he had definitely vacuumed. The entire room seemed soft, somehow. Maybe that was just her tired brain and the carpet against her sore feet.
With a few muttered curses, she got out of the dress, removed her earrings and widow bites, and unbuckled her hidden sheaths. The jewelry and weapons went to their proper secure places. The dress and her underwear were dropped unceremoniously into the hamper. In the bathroom, she shut the door and gave herself a moment to stretch. She loved her job, and she even enjoyed fancy events on occasion, but some costumes were more uncomfortable than others. When her arms fell to her sides again, she released a long breath, and a bit more of her irritation faded.
She turned on the shower and set the temperature a little higher than usual. As the water warmed, she removed her makeup, finally dismantling the last piece of the mask that had enticed her target tonight.
The water had just begun to steam when she stepped under the spray. James had been right - her knotted muscles seemed to sigh right along with her as the heat seeped into her bones. She kept her movements slow, turning under the water to soak her hair and letting it cascade over her face. Her scalp buzzed pleasantly as she scrubbed in her shampoo, and the fragrance finally chased away the scent of cigarette smoke, sweat, and expensive cologne. She imagined all of the power-blind idiots from the mission swirling down the drain, their ignorant smirks and ridiculous guns evaporating with the water. While the conditioner worked in her hair, she lathered up her loofa and scrubbed every inch of her body twice. A freshly cleaned washcloth hung from the soap rack and felt like a hug on her face and ears. By the time the conditioner was rinsed away, the bathroom was filled with a humid, floral-scented cloud, and she couldn’t bring herself to feel guilty about the time wasted.
There was a towel on the counter that she used to wrap up her hair. When she reached into the cabinet to find one for her body, James suddenly cracked open the door, stuck just his arm in, said “use this one,” and thrust one of their biggest towels towards her. She didn’t have a chance to ask for an explanation before he left, but she realized she didn’t need one: the towel was warm and smelled like fabric softener. James had put it in the dryer just for her. She couldn’t fight the stupid grin that spread across her face as she dried off and wrapped the towel around her like a cozy cocoon.
When she stepped out of the bathroom, she hoped James would be there for her to say thank you, but instead she found her favorite candle lit on her nightstand, her most well-worn t-shirt and yoga pants laid out on the bed, and a pair of fuzzy socks set on top of one of James’s folded sweatshirts. He had even put out her most comfortable pair of panties. She shook her head at the sight, still smiling like a fool even though exhaustion weighed her down. A part of her wanted to drop her towel and stride out into James’s arms, but another glance at the clothing made her reconsider. James was making her food. He had warmed up her towel. He had done everything he could to help her decompress again after her op, and he planned at least some of it before knowing she had had a bad day. She couldn’t derail his efforts now.
She took a few extra minutes to moisturize, the cool lotion a reprieve for her chafed skin. The lounge clothes were a soothing caress after the sandpaper sequins of her evening gown, and she dug her nose into James’s sweatshirt once it fell over her head. She was a tad reluctant to leave the radius of the candle, but when she stepped out of the bedroom, the smell of whatever James had cooked made her stomach grumble.
“Hey,” he chuckled as she wrapped her arms around him from behind. “Feel better?”
“You knew I would,” she answered with her forehead pressed between his shoulder blades. “Thank you.”
“For what? The towel?” he said as he turned around to face her. She stared up at him openly, and his teasing faded into understanding. “It’s my pleasure, Doll.” He tilted her chin and pressed a gentle kiss to her lips. “Go sit down, I’ll bring a bowl over.”
It turned out the delicious smell was homemade chicken and rice soup. Loaded with protein and vegetables and easy on the stomach, it was a great meal for a late post-op dinner. Natasha ate the first half of the bowl with gusto, but when she caught James smirking at her from behind his spoon, she glowered at him and began savoring each bite a little more. Eventually, she asked James about what he had been up to, and he regaled her with all of the mundane things a supersoldier ex-assassin does in his free time: clean the apartment, buy groceries, play with the cats when they allowed it.
“Speak of the devils,” Natasha said with a chuckle when she felt something fluffy brush against her ankles. Glancing down, she found both Liho and Alpine winding themselves around her feet, rubbing their cheeks against her socks to claim her as theirs.
“They missed you, too,” James told her. He took her now-empty bowl to the sink as she lifted the cats into her lap. Liho continued to push into her hand, begging for attention. Alpine accepted a few more scritches before jumping down to go bother James.
Natasha suddenly yawned so hard that her jaw almost cracked.
“Time for bed?” James teased. She shot him a glare, but its effect was dulled by her sleepy blink and the way Liho butted his head against her collar bone.
“Not quite yet,” she answered. She put Liho on the ground and joined James at the sink again. “I didn’t give you a proper hello earlier.”
“Is that so?” he said, his voice low as he bent towards her.
“Mhmm.”
Their lips met in a deep, unhurried kiss, and she sank against his chest. His arms were sturdy around her back, holding her up. He seemed to be doing more of that lately: supporting her, protecting her, giving her a safe place to come home to at the end of the day. At one point in her life, she would have packed her meager belongings and disappeared at the first sign of attachment. Now, she leaned into it - literally. As she pulled back just enough to see James’s face, she felt the warm steadiness in her core that reminded her that this wasn’t something to run from. This was not a weakness. Having someone to watch her back and help her recover after a long day had only made her stronger.
James shifted to press a feather light kiss to her cheekbone, her temple, next to her pulse point -
And another jaw-cracking yawn interrupted him. He chuckled. Natasha could feel the rumble of it in his chest.
“Now is it bedtime?” he murmured against her ear.
“I suppose so,” Natasha sighed. She stretched up to give him one more quick kiss, but she hadn’t made it half a step back before he swooped his left arm beneath her knees and hoisted her up bridal-style. With an indignant yelp, she swatted the back of his head, but he just grinned like the cat that got the cream.
“It wouldn’t be right for me to force a hard-working dame like yourself to walk to bed, now would it?” he said, all Brooklyn charm and crooked smile. Natasha glared at him appropriately. He just looked even more smug. He handled her weight like it was nothing, making his way around the kitchen with ease to turn off the lights and check the locks on the door. “Hey you two, don’t do anything stupid tonight,” he commanded as he took an extra large step down the hallway. Nat pictured Liho and Alpine laying sprawled on the ground, waiting for James to trip. But he made it all the way to the bedroom without incident, and he didn’t set her down until they were standing in the bathroom. Natasha rolled her eyes at him again, as was warranted, but unlike most times, she didn’t chastise him.
They finished their nightly routines side by side, and while Natasha brushed her hair one last time, James blew out the candle and arranged the pillows. He had his right arm out and waiting for her when she slipped under the covers. She tucked herself into her place next to him. They both exhaled at the same time, and she melted into the mattress.
She tried to run through the mission in her mind again. There were a few mistakes she needed to consider more carefully, a few moves that needed tweaking, and - and her brain wouldn’t follow. The mission was in the past, and she was here in the present with James warm and steady beside her. Everything was clean and smelled like flowers, and the sound of James’s heartbeat was making her eyes heavy.
“I love you,” she mumbled with her face squished against his chest. Though she couldn’t see him, she could feel his gentle smile in the way he settled further into the pillows and tightened his arm around her.
“I love you, too,” he replied, and they drifted off into a dreamless sleep together.