Chapter 23 - The Widow's Sting

[A/N]: 🚨 Bad news, good news time! With the monthly reset we've been knocked way back down the ranks… but that just means a fresh battlefield! We've got 1 full month to fight our way into the Top 10, and if we do, I'll drop a 7-chapter mass release as our victory banner! 💥

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And because you guys worked so hard last round, I won't make you wait — I'm releasing 2 bonus chapters right now as thanks. 💪🔥 Let's rally, let's climb, and let's make this month ours!

Jay's old apartment in Queens still smelled like takeout and old books, exactly the way he'd left it weeks ago. He kept the place as a backup—somewhere off the grid for clients who needed discretion. Today's appointment was supposed to be simple: some Park Avenue socialite with money to burn and a scar she didn't want questions about.

He should have known better.

The knock came exactly at 11 AM—soft, polite. He opened the door to find elegance incarnate standing in his hallway.

Auburn hair fell in perfect waves past her shoulders. Green eyes that catalogued everything in a single sweep. The kind of bone structure that belonged on magazine covers, wrapped in a designer coat that probably cost more than most people's cars. When she spoke, her voice was honey over steel—cultured American English with just the faintest ghost of something else underneath.

"You must be Jay. I'm Catherine Volkov. Thank you for seeing me on such short notice."

Jay's Comic Nerd perk kicked in hard, cross-referencing the face with every comic panel and SHIELD file cached in his brain. The resemblance to Natasha Romanoff was too precise to ignore—but he kept his expression neutral, stepping back to let her in.

"Of course, Ms. Volkov. Please, have a seat."

She moved with liquid grace, every step calculated yet appearing effortless. Her eyes swept the apartment in a casual glance that missed nothing—exits, potential weapons, sightlines to the windows. Professional habits died hard.

"I appreciate your discretion," she said, settling onto his couch like she belonged there. "The injury is... delicate. I'd prefer to avoid traditional medical channels."

"That's what I'm here for." Jay took the chair across from her, close enough to work but far enough to react if needed. "What happened?"

Her fingers ghosted over her waist beneath the expensive fabric. "Riding accident. My horse spooked at a fox, threw me into a stone fence. The doctors did what they could, but..." She gave him a perfectly practiced look of embarrassed vanity. "I'd rather not carry permanent reminders of my clumsiness."

Jay nodded, pulling on his professional mask. "I'll need to see the injury to assess what we're dealing with."

She rose with fluid ease, turning slightly away as she lifted her shirt. The scar ran along her left side—not large, but deep. The kind of mark left by precise surgical instruments, not fence posts.

But that wasn't what made Jay's breath catch.

There were other scars. Faded ones that most people would never notice. His medical training kicked in, cataloguing what he was seeing. Burns. Blade wounds. And lower, barely visible beneath her skirt's waistband, the telltale marks of invasive surgery.

He'd seen those scars before, in medical textbooks. In case studies of procedures that had been outlawed in most civilized countries decades ago.

Jay placed his hands over the fresh wound, letting his healing energy flow in its familiar green glow. The flesh responded immediately, cells knitting together with supernatural speed.

"Riding accident, you said?" he asked conversationally.

"That's right." Her voice didn't waver.

"Must have been quite a spill to need surgical repair. Very clean work, though. Almost like it was done in a proper medical facility rather than an emergency room."

He felt rather than saw her subtle shift—weight redistributing, muscles coiling like a predator preparing to strike.

"You know," Jay continued, hands still glowing over her rapidly healing skin, "you remind me of someone. Has anyone ever told you that you look like Natasha Romanoff?"

The temperature in the room seemed to drop ten degrees.

"I'm not familiar with that name," she said, but the honey had crystallized into ice.

Jay smiled without looking up from his work. "Course not. Just like Nick Fury doesn't know I exist, and there's definitely not an archer on the roof across the street who's had me in his crosshairs since you walked through that door."

Her reaction was lightning-fast and poetry in motion. She spun toward him, strike aimed at his temple with surgical precision. Jay's danger sense screamed and he jerked backward, her knuckles brushing air where his head had been. He rolled off the chair as her follow-up came in low and fast.

"Not bad," he said, still annoyingly calm as he straightened. "But if you wanted me dead, I'd already be bleeding out. So what does SHIELD really want?"

She went perfectly still, green eyes calculating. "How did you—"

"Know about your friend with the bow? Lucky guess." Jay brushed imaginary dust off his shirt. "Also, next time you want to sell the socialite act, maybe don't scan for exits like you're planning an extraction. Dead giveaway."

The mask didn't slip—it simply evaporated. The vulnerable socialite vanished, replaced by something infinitely more dangerous. When she spoke again, her voice carried the faintest trace of Russian accent, like an old scar that showed through new skin.

"You're observant."

"I try to be. So what's the play here? This clearly wasn't an assassination—you're too good to miss by accident. Intelligence gathering? You've blown your cover. Which leaves..."

She tilted her head slightly, reassessing him like a puzzle with missing pieces.

"Recruitment," she said finally.

Jay actually laughed. "Recruitment? Lady, I wouldn't trust SHIELD to water my plants, and I don't even have plants."

"We know about your activities," she said, ignoring his commentary. "The healings, the connections you're building. The consultation work with enhanced individuals."

"And?"

"And Director Fury believes we could reach a mutually beneficial arrangement."

Jay perched on his chair's armrest. "Let me guess. You scratch my back, I scratch yours, everyone wins, and definitely nobody gets a bullet in a dark alley when I become inconvenient."

"Something like that."

"Tempting offer. But I've got a counter-proposal." Jay's expression grew serious. "I could fix it, you know."

For the first time, her composure cracked slightly. "Fix what?"

"What they did to you in the Red Room. Their little graduation gift." His voice gentled, became clinical rather than cruel. "I've seen those scars before, Natasha. Not many surgeons are that precise with that particular procedure. Fewer still would perform it on someone so young."

The fury that flashed across her face was molten and deadly. She moved without conscious thought, fingers seeking his throat.

Jay's danger sense fired and he twisted away, her hand barely grazing his neck. "I could give you back what they took," he continued, still evading her strikes. "Make you whole again. Consider it professional courtesy."

She froze mid-lunge, breathing hard. "That's impossible."

"I've made a career out of impossible." Jay met her eyes steadily. "Question is—what would that be worth to you?"

For just a moment, something raw and desperate flickered behind her professional mask. Hope, maybe. Or the ghost of dreams she'd buried long ago.

Then her comm crackled softly and she pressed a finger to her ear, listening.

"How did you know about the archer?" she asked.

Jay smiled. "Tell Clint I said hello. Ask him how Laura and the kids are doing. Still keeping that farm off everyone's radar?"

Her eyes went flat and lethal. "You know about his family."

"I know lots of things. But asking smart questions is apparently above SHIELD's pay grade."

Her comm crackled again—some coded response from her backup.

"Impressive," she admitted.

"I have my moments." Jay walked to the window, looking across at the building where he knew Barton was positioned. "Here's how this works. You want to recruit me? Not happening. But we can make a deal—on my terms."

"Which are?"

"First, all SHIELD surveillance on me stops. Not reduced, not transferred—stopped. Every file, every report, every blurry photo gets wiped."

Her smile was razor-sharp. "You know that's not possible."

"Sure it is. You just don't want to do it. Second, I want a face-to-face with Fury himself."

"Continue."

"Third, unrestricted access to Howard Stark's R&D archives. Throw in Erskine's serum research while you're feeling generous."

"Those files are classified beyond—"

"Beyond your clearance level? Shocking." Jay shrugged. "Fourth and final—next time SHIELD wants to chat, I want Phil Coulson as my handler. I prefer my government contacts with fewer kills on their record and more dad jokes in their repertoire."

Natasha was quiet for a long moment, processing his demands with the calculating precision of a chess master.

"I'll relay your terms to the Director," she said finally.

"You do that." Jay walked to the door and opened it for her. "Oh, and Natasha? Next time you want to play civilian, work on the accent. 'Catherine Volkov' sounds like someone learned Russian from bad Cold War movies."

She paused in the doorway.

"The offer stands," he said quietly. "About what I could fix. Just... think about it."

Something shifted in her expression—vulnerable and dangerous at once.

"I'll consider it," she said, and then she was gone, moving down the hallway like smoke given form.

Jay waited exactly three minutes before Bobby pushed through the door, trailing cigar smoke.

"Christ, Jay, what happened in here? Sounded like you were redecorating with your face."

Jay walked to the couch and pressed his palm against the armrest. A small electronic device popped free, its frame now crushed.

"Company," he said simply. "SHIELD finally decided to poke the hornet's nest."

Bobby examined the listening device, whistling low. "How long they been watching?"

"Don't panic, we knew they were coming." Jay pulled a burner phone from his jacket and tossed it over. "Time to activate the network. Get word to our people—the Queens safehouse is back in business. Any mutants with useful powers who want out of the life, route them through here."

"You really think this escalates from here?"

Jay looked out the window. The building across the street was empty now, but he could still feel eyes on him from his danger sense.

"Bobby," he said quietly, "this has not even started."

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