Strictly business (until it wasn't) - Chapter 5: Chapter 5

Y/N's POV
The restaurant was all dark wood and soft lanterns, filled with the gentle hum of music and whispered conversations. It was beautiful. Intimate. Definitely not part of the itinerary. We were led to a private booth near the back of the restaurant, Nat slid in and I followed suit.
I should've asked what we were doing. Why we were here. But something in her posture told me not to, her shoulders were too stiff, her movements too precise. She was either seething or trying not to show it. Maybe both.
When the waiter appeared, she shifted without looking at me, ordering for us in fluent Japanese. It rolled off her tongue smooth and sharp, confident and practiced. I stared at her, not bothering to hide it.
I had heard her speak a dozen languages, but hearing her do it here, low-voiced and without effort, made something twist in my chest. God, she was ridiculous. Beautiful, brilliant, powerful... and currently knocking back a full glass of red wine like it was a shot of vodka.
She refilled her glass and immediately started drinking again.
"We have another meeting this afternoon, maybe just slow down with the wine." I suggested.
Natasha looked at me for a moment. "I can handle it, Y/N."
She swirled the wine around in the glass before taking another sip.
She arched a brow. "You know he was flirting with you at the end of the meeting right?."
What?
"I mean..." I shrugged, unsure how to play this. "Yeah. It was obvious. I ignored it."
"You smiled at him."
This is what this is about? Was she jealous?
"I was being polite."
"Polite," she echoed, like it was a curse word.
"Is being polite okay with you, boss?" I asked with a tone of sarcasm.
"It's not about being polite" she answered.
"Then please, tell me, what is the issue?" I questioned.
"It's- no, never mind. It doesn't matter." She stopped herself.
"It does matter."
Only silence followed.
By the time the food came out, Natasha was on her third glass of wine. She didn't give much away while we ate.
The food was delicious, each bite carefully crafted, rich with flavour and precision. I should've been savouring every second of it, but my focus was elsewhere. Next to me, Natasha was too quiet. Too composed. She barely touched her food and went through two more glasses of wine without saying much. Her silence was a wall. One I couldn't climb unless she let me.
I shifted in my seat, finally breaking the silence. "Natasha."
Her eyes lifted to mine instantly, sharp, alert, cutting right through me like always. No delay. No warmth. Just attention. She looked at me like she was trying to read a page she'd already memorised.
It felt strange, using her first name. I always called her Miss Romanoff, at her request. Strict, professional, and safe.
But right now, none of this felt professional.
I didn't know how she would react, if she would be mad or not for me using her first name. She didn't seem upset about it all, she just kept looking at me. All I wanted to know what was going on in her mind.
"I like the way you say my name," she murmured.
I let out a breath, shocked by the words I just heard. She couldn't have meant it, she had been drinking after all.
Her voice was lower than usual, roughened slightly by the wine, or maybe something else. She held my gaze for a second too long, then shifted, sliding closer to me in the booth. Her movement was slow, fluid, and entirely deliberate.
She didn't stop until her thigh was pressed lightly against mine. The proximity knocked the breath out of me. She was close. Too close. Her perfume hit first, subtle, expensive, familiar. Then her warmth. Then the way she was looking at me, eyes softer now, but no less intense.
"Natasha..." I swallowed. "You've been drinking."
Her lips curved into a small smile. Not smug. Not sharp. Just... tired. "Not enough to forget what I'm feeling."
I turned to face her fully, knees brushing under the table. "What are you feeling?"
She didn't answer right away. Her eyes dropped briefly to my lips, then flicked back to meet mine.
"I'm tired of watching people flirt with you. Of pretending I don't care when you wear that perfume I like. When you smile like that. When you bite your pen in meetings because you're overthinking something. I notice all of it."
My heart was pounding now. Loud and insistent.
"Natasha..."
"And you saying my name like that, it's not helping." She leaned in, her voice just above a whisper. "Tell me to stop, and I will."
The air between us was heavy. Her lips were a breath away, her hand lightly brushing my knee now, grounding me and electrifying me all at once.
"I should say stop," I whispered. But I didn't move.
She didn't either. "But you won't."
My fingers curled into the edge of the seat. I could still feel the hum of the restaurant around us, soft conversation, the clink of cutlery. It all felt far away now.
As Natasha leaned in, everything in me went still.
Her breath brushed my skin. Her hand was warm against my knee. I could taste the wine on the air between us, feel the weight of everything unsaid pressing against my ribs. It was happening, finally happening.
But just as her lips were about to touch mine... she stopped. She Pulled back. Eyes wide, almost startled.
"I'm so sorry," she said quickly, voice low and shaken. "I don't know what came over me."
She didn't meet my eyes as she grabbed her jacket and slid out of the booth. Her movements were sudden, controlled, but too fast for someone like her. Natasha Romanoff didn't rush. But right now, she looked like she needed to get out before she unraveled.
"We should go," she said, already halfway to the door.
I sat there for a second, stunned. The warmth of her touch still lingered on my skin, but she was already shutting down. I could see it, shoulders squared, face neutral, walls rebuilding by the second.
I stood, leaving my half-eaten dinner behind, and followed her out into the Tokyo night. The cool air hit me like a slap. The city was still alive around us, neon signs, traffic, laughter from the nearby bar, but it all felt muffled.
She didn't speak as the car pulled up. Just opened the door for me, like always, as if she hadn't almost kissed me two minutes ago.
I slid in. She followed.
The car was silent as we drove. Not the comfortable kind of silence we sometimes shared, but the brittle kind, like glass stretched too thin. I could feel her beside me, rigid, arms crossed, staring hard out the window like she was angry at the skyline.
I turned to her, unsure if I should speak. Unsure if I wanted to hear whatever excuse she'd come up with.
"Are you okay?" I asked
She flinched.
"It was a mistake," she muttered.
"A mistake" I repeated quietly.
Her eyes snapped to mine.
"Yes a mistake" Natasha answered quickly, almost too quickly, like she was trying to convince herself as much as me.
"That's not fair."
"What isn't fair, Y/N" she asked.
"You don't get to act all jealous when someone talks to me. You don't get to take me to lunch and tell me how much you like when I say your name and then go to kiss me. You don't get to do all that and call it a mistake, call me a mistake." I explained. "It isn't fair."
Her jaw clenched. "I'm your boss, you're my assistant."
"You leaned in first." I pointed out. "If you were so worried about me being your assistant, you wouldn't have gone to kiss me."
She sighed. "It doesn't matter."
I leaned back against the seat, trying not to show how much it hurt. "If you regret it, just say so. We can move on."
She never answered.
We pulled up to the hotel. She opened the door and got out first, holding it like she always did. I hesitated, then stepped out beside her.
I waited for her to say something. Anything.
She didn't
When we reached our floor, she stopped outside her room, gave me a quick look, and disappeared inside without a word.
The door clicked shut behind her.
I stood there for a moment, staring at the empty hallway like it could give me answers. It didn't.
I turned and walked into my own room.
The door closed with a soft thud. I leaned against it, eyes shut, trying to make sense of what had just happened, but I couldn't.
I eventually kicked off my heels and m crawled onto my bed fully dressed, staring at the ceiling. we had a meeting in 2 hours so I couldn't be bothered changing into something more comfortable. My thoughts were a mess. Natasha Romanoff, my boss, my untouchable, unshakable, unreadable boss, had nearly kissed me.
She had been jealous. Not annoyed. Not protective. Jealous.
She had watched that guy flirt with me after the meeting and hated it. And that look in her eyes, the way she touched my knee, the way she said she liked how I said her name, it wasn't some drunken misstep.
She wanted to kiss me.
And God, I wanted her to.
I wanted her to cross that line. I wanted her to close that space between us and stop pretending she didn't feel it too, that pull, that ache that had been building for months. I had felt it in every brush of her fingers when handing me a file, every lingering glance from her desk, every smirk.
But those walls she always held up so strongly, started to crumble.
Then she rebuilt it just as fast.
I let out a breath, frustrated. My heart was still racing, my skin still humming from where she had touched me, where she almost kissed me. I rolled onto my side, pulling the sheets around me like they could hold me together.
Why did she pull away?
Was she scared?
Regretful?
Or did it just scare her how badly we both wanted it? Because if she felt like I did, then she would feel how much she drive me wild.
I stared at the wall between our rooms, the space that suddenly felt far too thick.I didn't know if I should knock on her door. Or wait. Or pretend later that none of this happened, just like she probably would.
But deep down, I already knew: this wasn't going away. This attraction I felt, it was magnetic.
My phone buzzed on the nightstand, the sound far too loud in the quiet of the room. I rolled over, heart still dragging from the earlier, and grabbed it without thinking. A message lit up the screen.
Natasha: Our last meeting is in an hour. Meet me downstairs in 20.
That was it.
No mention of the restaurant. No acknowledgment of the almost-kiss. Just cold, clipped professionalism. The kind she used with people she barely tolerated. I stared at the message, my thumb hovering over the screen, debating if I should reply. Ask her if she was okay. Ask her what it all meant. But I didn't. What was I supposed to say? "Hey, just wondering if you still regret trying to kiss me or if we're pretending it never happened now?"
Yeah. No.
I tossed the phone onto the bed and sat up, scrubbing a hand over my face. My chest still felt tight. My head ached in that heavy, emotional-overload kind of way. I checked my reflection in the mirror.I looked fine. Professional. Steady.
I was lying to the world. I felt anything but steady. I pushed away my thoughts, I had a job to do.
By the time I got down to the hotel lobby, she was already there, standing near the glass doors in a black blazer, arms crossed, face blank. Her hair was tied up neatly, and she looked as unreadable as ever.
Except for her eyes.
Her eyes met mine the second I stepped off the elevator. And for a heartbeat, I saw it.
The hesitation. The regret. The want.
Then it was gone.
"Ready?" she asked, voice cool.
I nodded, swallowing hard. "Yeah."
She turned and started walking toward the car, her heels clicking against the marble floor. I followed, silently counting the steps between us, the space between us felt miles wide.
The meeting went smoothly. Of course it did. Natasha was calm, controlled, lethal in her negotiations, getting everything she came to Tokyo for. I watched her glide through the discussion like nothing was wrong, like last night hadn't happened, like I didn't still feel the ghost of her almost-kiss on my lips.
She didn't even look at me during the meeting. Just business. Just cold. And I played along. Sat beside her, took notes, nodded in all the right places. By the time we were done, she'd wrapped up the last few days of work like a pro. Another job complete. Another city, another set of closed doors.
When we got back to the hotel, she barely said a word. Just told me to be downstairs in twenty to head to the airport. I went upstairs, packed, I had everything ready to go but she said 20 minutes so I decided to wait out on the balcony for some fresh air. When I had 5 minutes left to spare, I headed downstairs.
I approached the car, expecting to see Natasha in the back seat like always, on her phone, sunglasses on, head tilted in thought.
She wasn't in the car.
The driver said she had gone straight up to her room and came straight back down. He dropped her off at the air port 15 minutes ago.
She didn't wait?
We drove to the airport, I was half expecting the jet to already be gone, I was ready to expect the fact that she had abandoned me.
I spotted the jet the second we pulled up. Sleek. Familiar. Unmistakably hers.
The driver parked, and I climbed out slowly, heart caught somewhere between frustration and relief. My suitcase rolled behind me as I crossed the tarmac, the hum of the engines quiet under the roar in my chest.
I boarded without being announced, no one ever stopped me anymore. I was Natasha Romanoff's assistant, after all. I had clearance. I had proximity. I had... no idea what we were anymore.
The cabin door sealed behind me with a hiss. I stepped inside, half-expecting to find the jet empty. That would've been the cruelest ending to the story, her being gone.
But there she was.
Sitting near the back of the cabin, legs crossed, tablet in hand, posture straight and cold like nothing had happened.
I walked over and sat across from her, not waiting for her to speak. I dropped my bag beside me and exhaled.
"I thought you left without me," I said flatly.
She looked up, her expression unreadable. "You were taking a while. I figured I'd meet you here."
"You said 20 minutes" I replied.
She didn't respond right away.
I watched her closely, trying to find a crack in the facade, but it was Natasha. Walls of steel. Eyes like ice. Except... they flickered.
"I didn't want to sit in the car with you," she admitted quietly.
That stung.
"Wow. At least you're honest."
She set the tablet down and finally looked at me, really looked at me.
"I didn't know what to say."
"'Sorry' would've been a start."
"I am sorry," she said. "I shouldn't have let it get that far."
"That's not what I meant."
She tilted her head, a flicker of confusion crossing her face.
"You just shut off, went to kiss me and then Nothing. No discussion, no message." I stated.
There was a long beat of silence. Then another. Her hands flexed slightly in her lap.
"I've spent most of my life walking away first," she said. "It's easier than staying and watching someone decide you're not worth the risk."
I swallowed, surprised by the crack of vulnerability in her voice.
"You don't get to decide that for me."
She looked at me again, and this time she didn't look away.
"I was scared," she admitted, quieter now. "And I don't scare easily."
That was the closest thing to truth she'd ever given me.
I sat back, folding my arms. "You were going to kiss me, I was going to kiss you back. Or didn't you notice?"
She huffed softly, almost a laugh, but not a happy one.
"I notice everything about you," she said.
She did?
Her gaze softened. Just slightly. The chill began to fade.
"So what now? Do we just pretend it didn't happen?" I asked.
"I don't know, its hard to explain. You're-. You're a risk I want to take. I just don't know if I can."
I turned around, facing away from her.
"I don't want to be someone's risk."