Going straight to Clint's probably wasn't the best idea Steve had ever had, especially considering that he was trying to manufacture some distance between them. Natasha, certainly, wouldn't thank him for this show of familiarity.
He didn't want to think about Natasha right now.
The things she'd revealed to him were still swirling around his head on horrifying repeat, a litany of Stane's crimes against Steve's fellow Victors. This new information was a particularly disturbing realization, and Steve was having trouble coming to terms with the fact that he'd missed it. He wasn't sure that you could qualify forced prostitution against forced killing, but to Steve, who was still waiting for a right partner, it seemed a particularly brutal degradation. Something specifically designed to cut a person down, to exploit them.
Natasha'd been sixteen. About Becca's age. Cassie's age. Steve's stomach turned, threatening a rebellion of its own.
He didn't want to think about Natasha, but he didn't want to think about Clint either, or Bucky, or just how deep this might go, how much Steve had been shielded from it - and he still didn't have a clear answer on why Natasha had done that either, and...
This kind of thinking wasn't going to do anything but get him worked up all over again, and so he shoved those thoughts from his head, focusing instead on getting to Clint's. He kept up a brisk pace, arriving faster than he would have anticipated, and since Clint knew he was coming, he gave a quick rap on the door, but didn't wait before opening it himself and stepping inside.
Clint was sprawled on the couch, a bottle of whiskey beside him on the table, and Steve thought he looked like shit. Tired and drawn, and something a little glazed about his face, maybe - though Steve couldn't tell what was causing that. It might as well have been a bucket of ice water dumped right over Steve's head, because his anger seeped out of him all at once, leaving him feeling more drained than anything else. And for some stupid reason, the fact that Clint managed a smile for him, the fact that he called him Ace even though Steve had been a jerk to him over their texts, made Steve want to cry.
"Hey," he replied quietly, locking the door and crossing over to take a seat on the couch, right at Clint's feet. Steve didn't take off his shoes or his jacket, unsure if Clint would want him to stick around - unsure if he wanted to stick around himself. He ignored the whiskey for now. It'd probably be nice to have a drink, but he'd been doing more of that lately, more than he'd ever done in the Capitol, and he didn't want to turn it into a habit.
"Sorry again, about the texts," Steve murmured, mustering up a smile that was anything but amused. It wasn't quite a grimace, but it was close. "Natasha's got this knack for getting under my skin, and I just - you were the person I texted, so you got the brunt of it. But you didn't deserve it, and I apologize." He was quiet for a few more moments, and then he sighed, let himself slump a little more firmly into the couch.
"Guess we've probably got some stuff to talk about, huh," he said, because they hadn't, really, not in a while, and suddenly it felt like there were all sorts of things piled up between them - the prostitution, Natasha, the demonstration in Eight. They were overdue for a talk, and as much as Steve didn't want to have it, he knew it was the better choice in the long run.