Caught In The Widow's Web

Ch 14

I'm dressed in regular clothes, a hoodie over my head as I walk through the hospital to retrieve the flash drive. I walk up to the vending machine and my eyes widen when I see the flash drive isn't there anymore. Instead, I see Natasha's reflection in the glass chewing gum and she blows a bubble. I clench my jaw turning around and push her into a room and against the wall making her release a small huff.

"Where is it?" I ask immeditately.

"Safe." She answers simply.

"Do better!" I grit.

"Where did you get it?" She asks chewing on her gum.

"Why would I tell you?" I retort with a scoff.

"Fury gave it to you. Why?" She raises an eyebrow.

"What's on it?" I ask with a nod.

"I don't know." She says.

"Stop lying!" I huff.

"I only act like I know everything, Barnes." She says making me roll my eyes.

"I bet you knew Fury hired the pirates, didn't you?" I ask.

"Well, it makes sense. The ship was dirty, Fury needed a way in, so do you." She says.

"I'm not gonna ask you again." I tell her seriously.

"I know who killed Fury. Most of the intelligence community doesn't believe he exists, the ones who do call him the Winter Soldier. He's credited with over two dozen assassinations in the last fifty years." She says.

"So he's a ghost story." I shake my head.

"Five years ago I was escorting a nuclear engineer out of Iran, somebody shot out my tires near Odessa. We lost control, went straight over a cliff, I pulled us out, but the Winter Soldier was there. I was covering my engineer, so he shot him straight through me." She says then pulls up her shirt and I look down to see a scar on the side of her stomach making me swallow thickly.

"Soviet slug, no rifling. Bye bye bikinis." She adds.

"Yeah. I bet you look terrible in them now." I deadpan.

A hint of a smile plays on her lips.

"Going after him is a dead end. I know, I've tried. Like you said, he's a ghost story." She says holding up the flash drive and I take it.

"Well, lets find out what the ghost wants." I say and I go to leave the room but stop turning back to face her.

"Is that all you know about the Winter Soldier?" I ask raising an eyebrow.

She takes a second before she responds. 

"Yeah." She nods.

We sneakily make our way back outside where Steve was waiting.

"I was starting to think they got you and what's she doing here?" Steve asks looking over at Natasha.

"I'm helping because I know who killed Fury." She says simply getting in my truck.

Steve raises an eyebrow at me and I sigh waving off towards Natasha and he just goes along with it. I drive off while Natasha catches Steve up with what she told me back in the hospital.