Honor Among Thieves
Pairing: Mob!Bucky x Reader
Summary: Marrying Brooklyn’s most dangerous man was easy. Divorcing him proves to be a bit harder—particularly when you’re pregnant with his child.
Warnings: 18+. Unprotected p-in-v. Oral (f!receiving). Breeding kink. Hurt/Comfort/We-Almost-Just-Died-Sex. Morning sickness. Manslaughter. Brief coerced kissing. Beefy, mob boss Bucky is a possessive expectant father who just wants to make sure he knocked you up properly
Descriptions of violence throughout.
“You know exactly what you’re doing.”
Bucky’s words reverberated like a shotgun’s report, skimming across two dozen feet of marble, glass, and stainless steel before reaching your ears on the opposite end of the room. He was standing at the threshold of the kitchen, and your back was turned to him. Lucky thing, too, or else he would’ve seen the smile threatening to tug at both ends of your lips—effectively blowing your cover.
“Really, I don’t have the slightest idea, Barnes,” you told him, and it took everything in you not to laugh. Having just narrowly preserved your composure, you continued, “You keep me locked in this prison all day and expect me not to find ways to entertain myself? Well, this is all it is.”
Like hell it was, you could already hear in Bucky’s head. Feeling him eye you up and down from the archway, take his first steps into the room, loosen his tie, most likely.
“Prison?” You registered a low scoff, and his voice was already so much closer than it’d been five seconds ago.
Your husband was striding as quickly as his smooth, dark, tailored suit would allow, and he was undressing as he walked. You could hear the clothes coming off but pretended not to notice. Instead staring more intently at the crab bisque simmering on the stove before you, you licked the spoon you were holding and hummed a little.
“Yes,” you answered, simply, “Prison.”
Bucky was by your side in no time at all. Up close, he smelled like rosemary, oakmoss, and gunpowder.
“Well, this is news to me,” he said. He dragged out the middle syllables of his words longer than was necessary, likely to make his move sidling up closer to you. The last sound had scarcely died in his throat more than a second or two before you felt an arm loop around your back. A hand coming to rest on your hip, then his voice, again:
“See, I never knew they built ‘prisons’ up in first-class penthouse apartments in Brooklyn. Must be pretty nice.”
Bucky stepped behind you, and you were half-certain the black suit jacket he’d come home wearing was fully removed. Again, you pretended not to see, or care.
“It’s a metaphor, James.” But your voice wavered.
“A metaphor?” Bucky’s head sank into the soft groove between your neck and your shoulder, and he kissed it.
“Yes.”
Your mouth made a sound more akin to a breath than a real, enunciated word, and you knew Bucky felt it too. He sensed this headstrong, no-bullshit façade of yours was sure to come crumbling apart any second, and each new brush of his hands and lips would be making it happen. Knowing this, he wasn’t in a rush to get the rest of his clothes off. He did, however, start to toy with yours.
“Tell me more. Am I really holding you hostage, doll?”
You took a ladle and started to stir, trying to stay cool. Meanwhile, your husband tugged gently on your dress.
“Hostage, housewife, same thing,” you muttered, low.
For once, it was Bucky’s turn to break character, as he laughed. It was short-lived and sweet, and he pressed another kiss to the skin of your neck, as if in apology.
“Right, right. I forgot. You were forced to marry me.”
“Right,” you shook your head, just slightly emboldened by the way you’d made him crack, if only for a moment, “I’m forced to marry you, move into this horrific little shanty in Brooklyn”—gesturing to the multi-million dollar apartment surrounding you both—“and then you leave me here, all by myself, with nothing to do while you go play Godfather with your mobster friends. It’s not fair.”
By the tail end of that last sentence, you and Bucky both were already grinning a little, coming to terms with just how ridiculous it sounded when you phrased it like that. Still, your husband seemed game to keep the bit going.
“Now that’s just not true,” he said, tone all faux offense.
You felt the soft snap of a ribbon coming undone, and in a second realized it was the satin bow holding the back of your dress together. The fabric loosened, and Bucky’s hands slid down your sides, over your front—of course.
“I didn’t leave you ‘by yourself’ at all, doll,” he said, and suddenly, his palms were fanning out, over something, “Gave you this baby to keep you company, didn’t I?”
The ‘something’ he was touching now was your belly. All soft and smooth and protruding out in a perfect little globe beneath your dress, no bigger than when he’d left for work that morning. Bucky treated the bump like it was a novelty all the same—like he was seeing it for the first time and couldn’t believe he was actually the one responsible for making it get like that. It had gotten to be a hobby of his, nearly, just how much he loved watching it grow. He had his fingers splayed out across your tummy virtually every chance he could get, and that didn’t stop whether you were out in public or sharing a moment in the comfort of home; he couldn’t get enough.
Which was why Bucky was right when he’d said you knew exactly what you were doing when he came home that day. You knew just the kind of effect that wearing a tight, white dress while cooking dinner would have on him, and you hoped it would rile him up just like this: with his hands roaming over every inch of your body, making soft, sweet circles along the swell of your belly, and kissing your neck again and again. Biting some, too. Getting so worked up he was all but gnawing at the skin as he drank in your scent and got lost to pure instinct.
If it wasn’t clear that Bucky had had a breeding kink before, you saw it written plain as day across his face every morning and night since he’d first learned you were pregnant. Like all the life force within him was just a byproduct of the knowledge that you were his—and this baby, growing bigger each day, was a mix of you both.
You hated to say it, but fatherhood suited your assassin-trained, mob-heading, bloodlusting husband better than anyone could have predicted in a million years or more.
Presently, Bucky flipped you around and sank to his knees. He slid you over to the counterspace area, away from the stove, and made sure to flip each knob to ‘off’ to make sure there wasn’t a chance you’d get burned. You cast one last look at the crab bisque and knew at once your hard work would have to be put on the back burner for now, because Bucky wasn’t hungry for that.
Still, you kicked a foot in soft, muted protest when you felt him slide his hands up your legs, under your dress, and start to reach for your panties. You let out a breath.
“I spent two hours perfecting the seasoning on that, Barnes,” you chided him, gently and without much admonition in your voice as you pointed to the soup, “You say you want a good little housewife but won’t even leave me un-fucked long enough to try any food I make!”
“And I’m very sorry about that, Mrs. Barnes,” Bucky replied, head disappearing beneath your skirt so he could take your underwear off with his teeth instead.
But, much like your reproach, your husband’s strained apology held less than half of its professed sincerity. Your blue cotton panties were discarded in a second, your hips pushed back against the cool white marble behind it, and Bucky, almost too cheekily, brought his head back up from underneath your dress just to steal a quick look at your belly, then up at you. He was smiling.
“Anything you make tastes amazing, honey. Daddy just needs to eat a little something beforehand, that okay?”
He already knew what you’d say. The sweet, shit-eating grin hovering over your lower half knew all that and more. Bucky just loved to tease, taking the hem of your dress between his index and thumb, and rubbing all the more tenderly, murmuring again, ‘That alright with you, pretty girl?’ and ‘My wife likes getting tonguefucked in the kitchen, doesn’t she?’ while his breaths spread over you.
You nodded that you did. Momentarily forgetting the three-course meal you’d had planned for him since early that morning, you let your knees fall limply apart from one another, and Bucky’s broad form filled the space in between. The fabric of your dress was snug, especially so over your belly. Your husband pushed the material up your hips and let it rest just high enough to expose your warmth to him. Angling your hips back the slightest bit, trailing his fingers up your thighs and inside them, gently, Bucky let out a low groan against your body, and you could feel the vibrations of it travel up your spine.
“I really am mean for keeping you here all day, aren’t I?” he teased, sliding the tips of his fingers between your glistening folds and watching you jolt in response.
“So— so mean. Bucky, please.”
Your voice was far more hoarse than circumstances would seem to beget; your husband had just eaten you out that morning. Nevertheless, your hand was trembling as it reached for his head. Your pull was taut and dire. While your fingers threaded in through his hair and your body opened itself more and more for him, you could feel that kind smile, even if you couldn’t see it. Frankly, the swelling of eight-and-a-half months made it difficult to see much of anything below the waist, but Bucky made sure to let you know he was there. By holding your hand, skimming his lips against your skin, starting, just then, to sink his fingers in toward the heat of your body, and softly pulling his face away so he could look up at you.
“Baby?” he breathed.
Your eyes locked with his as he slid two fingers inside you. The stretch alone was enough to put your brain on the fritz, but, fighting the first shockwaves of pleasure:
“Y-Yeah?”
He withdrew. Pressed them back in and let out a grunt.
“I need you to do something for me.”
You couldn’t fathom what that might be, but you nodded anyway. ‘Anything’ was what you managed to choke out.
“And you might not like it, doll.”
Your eyes widened some.
“O— O-Okay, what?”
Bucky’s fingers curled inside you, and a short, sharp streak of dizzying pleasure pulsed through your body. Your knees felt weak, and your mind even worse, but with what little resolve you had left, you were able to keep your eyes entirely open and fastened to his. A look that struck you as almost bittersweet crossed your husband’s features, and you saw his gaze soften again.
“I need you to wake up,” he said, calmly.
“What?”
Your toes curled tight underneath you, and the warmth between your legs leapt up to over a thousand degrees.
“Melaya, I need you to wake up.”
At the same time, your blood ran cold in your veins. Surely, you couldn’t be hearing him right if the voice he used was so gruff and low—and laden with a Russian lilt.
“Bucky? What— What do you mean?”
But you knew. Or suspected something of it anyway.
Now the sound from your own throat was hardly one that you recognized as yours, so shrill and high and strange—what could he mean by that? Why was he watching you in that way? Your husband wasn’t smiling so brightly anymore, and the once-gratifying conflagration between your legs had grown to an almost scorching degree, no longer nice, generous, or pleasurable in the slightest.
“We need you to wake up now, honey. Right now.”
His tone, too, was distorted. Grating.
“Bucky, I-I don’t underst—”
“WAKE UP!”
“WAKE UP!”
Natasha shook you hard, and it hurt.
She didn’t mean for it to. She just needed you up and out of bed, and you’d been asleep for almost fourteen hours.
You started at the fifth or sixth shake, nearly punching yourself in the face when you tried yanking a set of covers up and over your head and discovered, shortly, that there was none. You were splayed out on a bed in an as-yet unfamiliar home—Steve’s new place—and, while you slept, you’d kicked all of the blankets you’d been given the night before off your body and onto the floor.
Your eyes were wide as saucers as they darted to Nat’s.
There was no need to say what had happened—she knew these dreams were getting worse by the day.
It’d been a week since you fled your Brooklyn apartment in an all-out terror. A week since a senseless, short-sighted idea on your part had led to the discovery that your husband was once part of a HYDRA sleeper cell whose activation phrase turned him into an agent of total destruction at will. A week since you’d seen a half dozen bodies litter your living room floor, more still being bludgeoned by the so-called ‘Winter Soldier,’ as Bucky had formerly been known. A week since you’d sobbed in Natasha’s arms and begged her not to let you go back. A week since you’d been obliged to hide out in Steve Rogers’ new bachelor pad upstate, because, frankly, there was nowhere else you could safely live until this whole ordeal with Bucky was settled—if it ever would be.
A full week since you’d learned you were pregnant, too.
As far as you knew, your husband was wholly unaware of this fact, and of Steve’s most recent real estate purchase up in Buffalo, and you’d been existing in a semi-serene and largely dissociated state for the past seven days.
Your gaze adjusted to the light, and you blinked up at Nat, feeling damp in just about every place on your body. You looked down and found yourself drenched in sweat.
“Hydrate. Please.”
It wasn’t so much a request as it was a standing order: Nat holding out a glass of water and instructing you to drink. Though your first instinct was to make a face and shake your head—you’d found that any new fluids in your body this early in the morning would only get thrown back up when you made your first frantic trip to the toilet—you accepted it anyway. You drank three big gulps to appease the woman standing next to the bed, then wiped your mouth with the back of your hand and smiled
“I’m gonna go puke now,” you said.
“Aim for inside the toilet bowl if you can,” Steve called out from the doorway. By the look on his face, you’d been doing a pretty shit job of aiming vomit lately.
“My bad, Rogers.”
You had a hand on your stomach, slowly easing back up into a seated position, when you heard something being flung across the room, followed by a ‘HEY!’ and a crash.
“Your aim sucks, too, Romanoff,” Steve griped, loudly, “And I was kidding. She can puke wherever she wants.”
By the door, a hefty hardcover book lay open on the floor. Apparently Nat’s options for projectiles had been limited.
“All good, Rogers,” you offered anyway. Fighting a smirk.
You were starting to stand, and your head felt as if you’d just taken your first steps off a rocking boat. Your other hand jumped to your mouth, and you muttered, ‘Fuck’ before brushing past Nat and her outstretched arms.
She held your hair while Steve retrieved the glass of water, as well as a towel. The unsightly first trimester ritual proceeded as it had for all of the last week, with Nat rubbing circles in your back and Steve making well-meaning but completely useless live commentary like, ‘Babies are a real pain in the ass, aren’t they?’ At the conclusion of each new stupid remark, Natasha would shoot a dirty look his way, but you never let her shoo him away. Through no conscious choice of your own, Steve had become something of a comfort blanket over the course of the past chaotic days. At the very least, you two were no longer at each other’s throats flinging accusations and exorbitantly-priced tumblers in the other’s direction, which was a marked improvement from where you were the day after you and Bucky’s wedding.
At length, you lifted your head from the toilet, and he daubed at your cheek with the towel—mostly just trying to wipe off spit and your own queasy-looking expression. He succeeded in clearing away just the former, but you forced a smile all the same, then shared it with Natasha.
Nat couldn’t smile back. In fact, the grimace on her face only etched even deeper, and her forehead creased.
“This is a horrible time to be asking you this, I know—”
“Nat, please.” Steve groaned.
Nat, what? There wasn’t a lot more that could catch you off guard after all the shit you’d come to see that week. Still, Nat’s breaths were both measured and slow, and you could see she was chewing on the inside of her cheek like she wasn’t quite sure how best to phrase her words. This, coming from one of the most astute legal minds this side of the Hudson River, gave you pause.
“Ask anything. I’m pretty numb, if you haven’t noticed.” You rapped on the side of your head for comedic effect, but neither Natasha nor Steve laughed or cracked a grin.
“How do you feel about filing for divorce tomorrow?”
At the sound of Nat’s words, you felt the bile jump back up your throat. You knew there wasn’t enough food or fluid to make much of anything now, but all the same, you craned your neck back over the toilet and retched. When nothing came out, as expected, you turned back.
“What?”
Natasha looked a little ill herself, but still, she continued.
“How do you feel about just…fast-tracking a divorce from him and taking off new? We’ll talk assets later.”
Assets? Fast-track? Divorce? What the fuck?
“What the fuck, Nat?” you repeated as much out loud.
It normally wasn’t your thing to be so blunt with her, but the inquiry certainly seemed to invite some extra candor. You swiped at your mouth for any excess spit that might’ve trickled out, crudely, and in a second, Steve was handing you the towel. Then helping you to your feet, holding your arm and lower back in a grip you could feel was secure. You were unsteady on your legs, so he and Natasha guided you over to the sink, where you could regain your bearings and freshen up a bit. Sneaking a look at your reflection in the mirror was a bad idea; your face was sallow, and the rest of your body had every appearance of being horribly weak, for lack of a better word. You caught a glimpse of a gash sitting just above your left temple and immediately looked away. Stupidly, you hoped Steve and Nat hadn’t seen it.
“He did that to you,” Nat said without missing a beat.
You winced, and you washed your hands, not looking up.
“I thought you said it wasn’t him. Soldat, you told me.” And for a second, your eyes flickered to Steve, whose expression was a touch more sympathetic, if not visibly discomfited now. Like he didn’t want to speak for once.
He did, anyway: “Doesn’t matter if it was Winter or him, really. Point is he hurt you while trying to protect y—”
“And yet, you asked me to forgive him just last week for killing my dad in the same type of rage,” you replied, and instantly regretted the accusatory tone you’d taken on.
Your anger was misdirected at Steve. It wasn’t his fault for sharing the truth about your husband’s—his best friend’s—past when you’d asked him. These were queries you’d made, helping to form justifications for your own decision to stay after what had happened in Madripoor. Obviously, Steve would be biased to help support his friend in a time of need. But now things were different; Bucky had never been activated as soldat and ended up hurting someone he’d loved before. Steve was free to change his mind after seeing that happen and urge you to leave, or at least reconsider, your marriage to Bucky.
The second look you gave him attempted to convey as much, a bit more apologetic as he and Natasha led the way out of the bathroom. Steve smiled and held your arm again, though you probably didn’t need it. You walked downstairs to the kitchen together. Over by the toaster, Sam was inspecting a charred bagel with a scowl
“Rogers, you really need to ditch this shit,” he said, gesturing to the rusted metal contraption that appeared to be from 1918, and had just burnt two bagels to a crisp.
“It was a gift from a friend, piss off,” Steve replied, grinning a little. Reaching for the blackened bread roll and even going so far as to take a bite, crunching loudly.
“Did your friend happen to fight in World War II?” Nat asked. She lent one look to the archaic machine but said nothing further, opting instead to take a seat at the kitchen table, where a sea of papers was strewn about.
Then, to you, “Come. Sit.”
Somewhere in your tentative stroll from where you stood to where she sat, and in the middle of the men’s toaster bickering, Sam called out that he’d have bacon and eggs ready in a second. Steve offered up his singed sesame bagel in the interim, and you told him no thanks. With a still slightly throbbing skull and a nauseous gait, you took the chair next to Nat’s and looked down at her papers.
Honestly, you thought your present condition might warrant some leeway when it came to holding off on the heavy-hitting topics first thing, but, to your surprise, Natasha slid a crisp white packet over almost instantly.
“Nat, what the fuck?” you groaned for the second time.
“Read it. Give it a second to digest, then we can—”
“No!” you cut in, pushing the packet back to her with a little more force than you’d meant, “I-I can’t. Not now.”
On the very first page, in bold and capitalized typeface, there was printed a brief string of words you’d never wanted—or thought you would ever need—to see:
‘VERIFIED COMPLAINT: ACTION FOR DIVORCE’
“It’s just the petition. No harm in taking a look,” Nat said.
You could hear a faintly gentler tone in her voice, even as you shook your head and looked away from the papers.
“I don’t want to. I can’t do this right now.” You kept shaking your head for a couple seconds after, turning your gaze instead to the bay window of Steve’s kitchen.
A nice, sprawling yard stretched as far as you could see. In the distance, a fuzzy white horizon was punctuated the slightest bit by the outline of a wood fence, but apart from that, the land was empty. The lot was secluded. Happy and effervescent in a nearly cloudless sky, the midmorning sun cast its rays without so much as the threat of a storm’s hinderance. You fixed your eyes on the clear expanse above and silently wished it would rain.
Before more than a minute or two had passed like that, Sam was approaching the table with two platters. Steve balanced four more by himself, watching the sway of one plate of scrambled eggs in his arms with a wary look before setting each one of the dishes on the table.
“Bon appétit,” Steve said, butchering his French just about as badly as Sam had the bagels. You and Nat thanked them both anyway and started clearing off the table, pushing papers away in favor of steaming plates. Sam and Steve sat down, and all of you began to eat.
While you dutifully piled on each scoop of eggs, bacon, sausage links, biscuits, gravy, and grits—far more than you knew you could feasibly consume—you wished again for a rainstorm, and maybe a quiet breakfast. One that wasn’t marred by talks of legal separation and lengthy battles in court, if you could help it at all. To this end, and perhaps against your body’s best interest, you shoveled two supersized spoonfuls of egg in your mouth, so that if Nat tried reviving those subjects again, you could put off the conversation by simply continuing to chew. You felt your stomach turn inside you but, stubbornly, ate more.
You had just swallowed it all, about to make way for a warm, flaky buttermilk biscuit, when a sound cut in, and your belly flipped again. Your teeth had barely sunk into the bread a second when Nat set her own food aside, then used two fingers to push something toward you.
“Just skim it. Let me explain what the process can be,” she said, tapping her index on the first line and meeting your eyes as if to plead. She had to have known she’d be met with resistance—from you, of course, but also Steve. She raised a defensive hand to him before he even cut in:
“Come the fuck on, Nat. Will you give her a break?”
“I’m saying this for her sake! I’m doing it for her.”
“And throwing divorce papers in her face over breakfast is really the best way of going about it? Is that for her?”
Sam swallowed whatever he’d been chewing on, glanced down at the top paper, and seemed to brace himself.
“Guys, is now really the right time—” he started.
“That’s what I’m saying!” Steve barked over him.
Natasha ignored the plainly disdainful look from the latter, lifted her hand off the paperwork and instead trained her gaze solely on you. Just like she had in Zurich. Focusing intently on your face, ignoring whatever Steve or Sam were saying in the moment, she turned to you and found your expression was stale. Unmoving. Frankly, half of what was running through your mind right then was how badly you wanted to puke again. As if the eggs had turned rotten in your gut the second they reached their destination in your GI tract, you felt a heavy, oppressive fog of nausea taking shape between your ears, and you just wanted everyone to stop talking.
Sam and Steve continued on without a hitch, agreeing vaguely but also appearing to bicker over other things, like when was the most appropriate time to have this conversation. Natasha was leaning in, reaching for your hand this time, and you knew she meant well. You would bet any large sum of money there wasn’t a malicious bone in her body, and she was doing this for your benefit. All the same, you were grateful when the front door swung back on its hinges, and a new person walked in. Nat, Sam, and Steve all suspended their conversations.
“Hey, wh—” the blissfully unaware, semi-stranger began.
“Sharon!” Steve cried, “Would you tell Romanoff she’s being a goddamn pest with no sense of boundaries?”
Sharon halted at the threshold of the house, skating a look between Nat and Steve at first, then Steve and Sam, then just at you. The look didn’t linger for long, and before you knew it, she was setting down a fistful of grocery bags and twisting her mouth into a frown.
“Will you shut up, Steve?” was her only response.
Sam rose from his chair and pointed as if to say, ‘Yeah, that’ before joining her in the foyer to help carry in the Wegmans bags. Natasha leaned back in her chair with a vaguely pleased look, and Steve just rolled his eyes. He slapped his palm overtop the stack of divorce papers still laying before you and, seemingly undeterred, continued,
“Do you think it’s fair for her to force divorce papers on this poor soul—” pointing to you, the poor soul, apparently, “—when it’s been a week since she left?”
Sharon started handing off the frozen stuff first, sliding a box of Stouffer’s across the counter to Sam, who then deposited it in the freezer. These exchanges took place in relatively quick succession, with Sharon only chancing a look toward the kitchen table once or twice as they did.
“I think she should do whatever the hell she wants,” she said, “And I think their divorce is none of our business.”
Fair enough take. One that you could respect, at the very least, even if you weren’t certain she particularly cared for you at all. You reckoned she had no reason to, and on the whole, appeared to be a pretty reserved person.
You wanted to add a word in her defense, reiterate to Steve that he didn’t have to go to bat for you, the poor, defenseless soul, right now. Instead of being able to speak, though, you felt an upsurge of something heavy in your throat. You clamped a hand to your mouth again, cheeks flushing with the heady sensation and also out of embarrassment, then pushed your chair back and stood.
“I— gotta—” you stammered, just audible to the table, through the wall your fingers had made over your lips.
You sprinted up the stairs without another word.
The first trimester ritual repeated, and ten minutes later, you re-emerged from the bathroom feeling two big spoonfuls of scrambled eggs lighter and still none the happier, healthier, or wiser. You took a peek in the full-length mirror at the other end of the room and discerned from a distance of ten feet that you looked like dogshit.
You flopped down on the bed face-first, heedless of the pool of sweat that still encompassed roughly half of it, and let out a weak, muffled breath into the sheets. Someone had been gracious enough to replace all the blankets and pillows you’d kicked off last night. When you heard a knock on the door, it sounded a lot like Nat’s.
You rolled to the side, eyes screwed shut in frustration.
“If you’ve come to tell me my marriage is a fucking dumpsterfire, I agree completely, Natasha. I’m dumb.”
A little huff of a half-laugh sounded from the doorway. You opened your eyes and saw Sharon standing there.
Up close, she looked a little paler than you’d remembered seeing her last in Switzerland. Soft beads of perspiration dotted her neckline from what had likely been a hot and arduous journey walking up the driveway with all the food, and presently, she seemed tired. She wore a simple gingham blouse that had her eyes shining with vibrance, though, and both hands, you noticed, were full—she had a mug in one and a spoon in the other. She smiled kindly.
“The mob tends to have that effect,” she said, strolling in. Setting the mug on the nightstand and easing the spoon into it, stirring, “Don’t be too hard on yourself.”
You had no idea what all she knew about your marriage. You weren’t so sure you could extricate yourself from all the blame of having the thing go up in flames in four short weeks. Nevertheless, you smiled back and offered up something good-humored in return, like, well, I’m not exactly winning wife of the fucking year anytime soon.
Again, Sharon chuckled. It was small. She leaned back against the nearest armchair and, pointing to the cup she’d left to rest on the nightstand, said in a soft voice,
“Give that a minute. It’s hot.”
You glanced over and saw a little string that you guessed was attached to a teabag sitting at the bottom of the mug. The drink smelled like chamomile, maybe. You sat up, readjusted your pyjama top, then slid your socked feet underneath you so you could scoot closer to the edge of the bed. On a deeper inhale, you decided the tea was definitely chamomile. And too hot, as Sharon said.
“Thank you,” you told her.
“It’s not poisoned, I promise,” she replied. Letting out that funny little chuckle of hers—one too low to be considered a full laugh, but very close—and then, seeming to realize what she said might’ve sounded off, “Like— I heard what happened with Schröder. Him trying to drug you after the wedding and all…that. I— I’m sorry.”
Bad time to be making jokes, she appeared to chastise herself, but you just nodded along with the faintest grin.
“It’s OK. I’d pay money to be knocked the fuck out now.”
You grinned bigger, and she smiled too.
“It should make you sleepier, if you wanted to nap.”
You replied that you would, in fact, love to be unconscious right now if it meant not having to put up with all this bullshit morning sickness, and you slowly reached for the mug. Sharon stood up, and while you took your first sips, she fluffed the pillows behind you.
She was right. The tea felt like a hug. You settled under the covers and brought the cup to your lips once more, taking two big draughts before setting the drink aside. Yeah, that shit’ll put you right out, no drugs needed. You sank even further under the sheets and watched Sharon hover between the bed and the doorway, looking around as if trying to find something to do—some way to make herself feel more useful, if you had to guess from the pensive look in her eyes. Finally, she settled closer to the door and gave you one, fairly sanguine look. The warmth of your drink had already begun to nestle inside your weary bones, and your eyelids felt heavier. Still, you tried to return the sunny look before getting fully settled.
“Thanks again, Sharon. I appreciate it.”
“Yeah, of course.”
She started to leave. In fact, she’d already made it three-fourths out of the room when something stopped her in her tracks. She turned back to you, and you looked up.
“This…probably doesn’t mean a whole lot coming from me, but—whatever you decide to do with Bucky…is okay. We’ll support you, whether you choose to raise this baby with him or do…whatever it is you want to do. Don’t let Nat or Steve or Sam or anybody tell you differently. It’s your choice, y’know, whether you wanna stay married…”
Sharon trailed off, and somewhere inside, you could tell she meant to finish with words like, ‘…even if you didn’t get to make the choice to get married in the first place.’ You appreciated it. You beamed with just your head poking out from over the covers and thanked her again.
And, before she left, for the second time, she stopped. She walked over to the nightstand and bent slightly at the waist, just enough to set something small down. You turned to the side and saw a vial—a minuscule tube—on the surface. Your eyes widened, realizing what it was.
“Sam picked it up in Madripoor. He said Steve had given this to you…to, uh, give to Schröder, and I thought you should have it back,” she said, pausing, “Just in case.”
You eyed the little vial of poison on the nightstand and nodded, still not completely understanding. Your head throbbed, your stomach was still turning, churning. Your brain was about ten blinks away from logging off entirely and drifting to sleep. All you could do, then, was repeat what Sharon had said as you exchanged one final look.
“Just in case.”
Your eyes closed, and you fell asleep very soon after.
You couldn’t have been out for more than an hour; you were sure of it. However, the next time you glanced over at the clock on the bedside table, you saw it read 11:04.
P.M.
Shit.
SHIT.
That chamomille tea was no fucking joke.
Just as your thoughts drifted back to Sharon, the conversation you’d shared, the drink she’d given you, the poison she’d left behind for you to keep, you heard her voice all over again—and now, not just in your own head.
Presently, she was standing over your bed again, though the room was much darker this time around. She pressed a finger to her lips, hey, please, please, be quiet, alright? At first you wanted to make a sharp and strangled sound. A cry for help? You weren’t sure. Didn’t know. Couldn’t see very much of the woman at all, except for the outline of her face from the moonlight streaming in through the window. She stared and ‘shh’ed’ some more.
And you were contemplating yelling out a loud obscenity in response to it when next she cut in, markedly gentler:
“Keep it quick. Nat and the guys will be back in thirty.”
You blinked hard into the darkness and waited for your vision, or else your still-missing voice, to return. It didn’t. You just stared back, eyelids going up and down and up and down like a goddamn idiot gone sluggish off one too many Quaaludes, and it was several seconds more before she gestured behind her, into the shadows.
You tensed under the covers, chock-full of terror. You squinted, and shrank, and might’ve nearly pissed yourself were it not for the intervening force of a face.
A familiar face.
Bucky’s face.
You leapt up from the bed, displacing each one of Sharon’s cool and careful warnings from your mind all at once. You didn’t mean to, and as soon as she’d shushed you again, you shut your mouth. Fell still. Sharon slipped out of the room, reminding you both, again, that you had to be quiet, and you had to be quick. Then it was just you and Bucky. Silence and slightly less than five feet of space between you two. Then, shortly, no space to spare at all, as you ran to meet each for a hug a second later.
Your head struck his chest, and it was hard. That, alongside the python’s squeeze he wrapped around your body, hugging you to him in the tightest embrace imaginable, had your mind reeling, skull pulsing just a bit. You pulled back and stood smiling up at Bucky, whose eyes were wide, drinking the sight of you in.
‘Are you hurt?’ were his first words.
You shook your head that you weren’t, still unable to talk.
“Why are you— Who— who brought you— I didn’t—”
It seemed Bucky was equally hard-pressed to form a sentence himself, while his eyes were roaming wildly, all over you. Looking for bumps or bruises or cuts, whatever the wound might have been. He stumbled to the lamp and flicked it on. You tilted your head left, reflexively.
“I’m fine, Bucky,” you said. Sudden and swift, “I’m good.”
But you didn’t move your head too far to the right, either, for fear he might see the cut above your temple—the one soldat had caused when he’d pushed you to the floor, trying to protect you from a threat he couldn’t see.
As it was, your husband seemed to be too much in shock to see anything else apart from what stood immediately in front of him. He hugged you again. He kissed the crown of your head. He constricted your body so tight in his arms you felt a pressure start to build behind your eyes, and suddenly you weren’t so much pulling away as you were wrenching your body from him. When you met Bucky’s gaze again, the sweet blue irises were glossy.
“Nat wouldn’t say where you were, just that you were safe and needed to be…be alone for a while, but I—” He stopped, and it was as if he couldn’t even finish with the words, because his breath was stuck in his throat and his eyes were stinging too much. He looked down, briefly.
You wanted to reach for his hand but hesitated. He took yours a second later, holding extra tight as he continued:
“I thought I’d— thought you might’ve…left. I don’t know. I hadn’t been able to sleep, and then she— Sharon, she called me tonight, said you were here, so— so—”
You felt a pang of guilt holding his gaze, seeing how all the hurt that had come to accumulate behind those eyes over the last week went spilling, at length, into emotions he was either too overcome or sleep-deprived to express. The weight of this suffocated him, made him extra quick to speak his mind but slow to make sense of just about anything that was coming out of his mouth. He stopped, sucked in a breath, then pinched your hand in his, and you didn’t know what to do. You had no idea what to say.
“I was scared, Bucky.”
It sounded pathetic coming out of your mouth. Your husband nodded as though you’d just said the most profound thing in the world. His knuckles went white from just how hard he was gripping your hand, his head bobbed along in agreement, and for a moment, you winced to think that he might hug you again. Instead, the fingers tangled between yours just made a tighter knot.
“I know. I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” he said.
“You scared me,” you added, voice wavering.
Your left hand was going numb. You didn’t want to give him pause—possibly hurt his feelings—by freeing your touch from his, but that grip was brutal. Deathly rigid and unforgiving. Thoughts of Brooklyn and Madripoor came flooding back; Bucky was so much stronger than he realized. His tone, in contrast, was dulcet and soft.
“I didn’t know I’d get like that. I should’ve told you, doll.”
“I shouldn’t have tried the activation in the first place.”
You shouldn’t have tried digging into Bucky’s past all. When all there seemed to be at every turn was a brand new way for him to hurt you, or the people you loved, maybe there came a time when you had to stop asking questions altogether. Maybe that was what his mother and all the women who’d gone before her had known to do, what you had been too stupid to see all along. There was no knowing these men at all, only taking them as they were and learning to cope with what they became.
Bucky shook his head.
“No, doll, it’s not on you,” he murmured low. Still forceful
Thankfully, he released your hand to cup your cheeks, and he kissed your forehead. You felt your pulse in your palm, throbbing from where he’d held it. When he let go the second time, his expression was considerably softer.
“Listen, I’ll take you home, we can talk things over. As long as I know you’re safe, it doesn’t have to— to—”
Hey. He was already halfway toward the door before he realized you weren’t following him. He turned and gestured forward. He beckoned you, brows drawing in.
“Baby? C’mon.”
You didn’t budge.
Your feet were rooted in place, as though cemented to the floor. No matter how much you wanted to appease him, go along with whatever he asked, you couldn’t. You shook your head, and Bucky tilted his own, confused.
“Baby?”
“I’m leaving, Bucky.”
You couldn’t hear your own words slipping out between your teeth, only the blood rushing through your ears. Bucky stopped and turned to face you completely.
“What?”
“I’m leaving.”
“What— what do you mean, ‘you’re leaving’?”
“I want a divorce.”
That part you did hear yourself. You wished you hadn’t.
You wished you hadn’t seen the light break off from Bucky’s eyes, expression going limp the instant your words registered with him. You nearly wished you hadn’t said them at all, seeing just how far his face fell and how hurt he looked by them—but quietly, from somewhere more rational-headed inside yourself, there was a voice reminding the rest of you that it needed to be done. You couldn’t keep pretending like this wasn’t what had had to come next. What you’d been skirting with Nat all day and hadn’t been able to bring yourself to admit before now.
Your husband still didn’t seem to be computing it fully. He walked closer to you, and his gait was unsteady.
“Divorce?”
Your vision was bleary; you hadn’t even realized tears had begun to brim at your waterline as you watched him.
“It’s what we need, Bucky,” you could barely get it out.
“I don’t,” he shot back, not missing a beat, “I don’t.”
“It’s what I need.”
“You don’t mean that.”
His voice was hoarse, face shifting from lax incredulity to one of a wince—screwed up in a way that said he felt ill. You shook your head but couldn’t look away from him.
“You don’t mean that,” he repeated.
“It’s what I want,” you pressed on, just as sick yourself.
“You said what you wanted was me.” Again, Bucky’s voice splintered, and you could feel the pain in it.
“You said you wouldn’t hurt me, Bucky.”
Gritting your teeth, unsure where else to fix your stare on his face but those eyes—while your own betrayed their feelings too easily, fraught with wet, rolling tears—you shouldn’t have been surprised when his went wider.
“What are you talking about?”
The question was short, sharp, and biting, spoken with such haste as might be mistaken for anger, but the eyes softened his look at once. The anguish painting them now as he stared back at you were a proof, beyond a doubt, that it was betrayal, not rage, which steered him. He turned, and it was as if he couldn’t see a thing but you; his elbow clipped the lamp and knocked it over, but still, he just stared. In turn, the ceramic appliance rolled onto its side, toppled the mug and the vial beside it, and all three went crashing to the floor. Bucky didn’t blink.
“Wh—” he started again, but you didn’t hear the rest.
You remembered Sharon. Heard a flash of her last admonition in your head—be quiet, be quick—and without thinking, you fell to your knees. You tried retrieving what pieces of chipped lamp and shattered mug you could, quickly. You spotted the small vial on the floor and shoved it in a pocket. Your hands swept over the broken pieces without any real idea of what you were doing—all except needing to clean Bucky’s mess—and then swiftly, stupidly, you tried picking it up by yourself.
Of course, a shard cut you. The little slit that was left in its wake could have been no wider than a fraction of an inch, but still, it bled. You looked down at the cut, just then starting to sprout red from left to right along the side of your palm, when a new sight crossed your vision. It was fast, too. All but thoughtless in the way it broke in, gripping your hand in his, and yanking you to your feet. Bucky hadn’t seen that you’d cut yourself, it seemed, and, out of instinct, had grabbed your hand to help you up. As before, his grasp was like a vice, and his thumb pressed right inside the lacerated flesh, sending a whole new maelstrom of pain shooting up your wrist and arm. Now, as then, he was heedless of his strength and his sheer, brute force, that he didn’t even see the effect of his grip. He just held on, held you, tighter, tighter, and—
“STOP!” you shrieked.
You shoved him off. Pried his touch off your palm and gripped your forearm in your other hand and pored over the sight, seeing the gash almost doubled in size from just where Bucky’s finger had sunk into the fresh wound. You let out a sharp, muffled cry through lips that tried to stay closed—remembering Sharon again. You shook your head, clenched your jaw, and tore off the other direction.
And when your husband reached out, eyes wide with their own shock and apologies, ‘Baby, fuck, I’m so sorr—’ you threw him off again. With your non-bleeding palm, you thrust your hand against his chest and pushed hard:
“Don’t touch me!”
When he reached for you again, as if by force of habit, you held up a defensive arm and sobbed out, ‘Stop!’
‘Don’t touch me, don’t—don’t—don’t fucking touch me.’
You screamed it. You didn’t mean to. Thinking only vaguely of the need to be quiet, and almost entirely on the stabbing pain in your hand, the imprint of Bucky’s touch on your body, and the blood trickling down your forearm, you darted into the bathroom and threw the door closed behind you. You locked it. You meant to.
Twenty minutes might as well have been twenty years in Bucky Barnes’ mind. In a moment like this, following yet another supreme fuck up on his part, he felt powerless. He had had to fight the instinct to barge into the next room over with every fiber of his being, and, making fists by his sides and pacing the floor and hating himself was all that seemed capable of occupying his mind just then.
He’d knocked on the bathroom door at least ten times. He’d been ignored each time, no matter the duration.
He still had your blood on his thumb, and it made him ill.
You said you wouldn’t hurt me, Bucky.
While he uncurled his hand from a fist just long enough to stare at the streaks of red stretched over his finger, he heard those words replay over and over again in his head. He’d said it—swore it—himself, and still your blood was turning a cool, dark, dry shade of crimson on his thumb.
This wasn’t how he’d meant for any of this to go. Still, notwithstanding his best intentions, none of it mattered. He’d seen a sincere look of fear in your eyes looking up at him, and nothing in the world would change what he’d done, or who he was. He’d caused you pain tonight, last week—though his memory of that was still so hazy and dark he hardly knew what else had happened, even now—and above all, he’d failed you as a husband, a protector.
You were likely curled up in a ball by the bathroom sink, cowering in fear because of him. The thought sent another tidal wave of nausea thrumming through his skull, a lump in his throat growing larger alongside it, and before he knew what he was doing, Bucky was striding back to the bathroom door. He banged his fist against it.
“Honey?”
No answer.
“Baby, please open the door.”
More silence.
The moment brought to mind a memory from the night you two had been married. How you’d fled to the en-suite bathroom and locked yourself in it; how Bucky had rattled the whole doorframe with the force of his knocks, demanding you come out. He’d hardly known you then. You hardly knew him now. The realization of this made the weight in his throat all the more excruciating as he stood, and, wincing with pain, Bucky kept knocking.
“I’m sorry, honey, I’m so sorry.”
Pleading now. His voice was hoarse all over again.
Had he been the slightest bit more desperate and reckless, he might’ve been tempted to muscle through, kick the door in with his boot. But Bucky knew better. He could already guess how much that action would terrify you now, while tending to an injury that he himself had inadvertently made worse. Barreling inside would be neither romantic nor sweet, just sinking what may then be a lethal dose of salt in the deeper, metaphorical wound. He refrained. Instead of continuing to knock, he dropped his forehead to the door and closed his eyes.
“Please believe me, baby,” he tried again.
He’d said it so quietly he feared you might not hear it. Then, a little bit louder, ‘Please, please believe me.’
No sound to be heard inside but running water.
“You mean everything to me, doll.”
By now, his voice was clogged with pain, teetering on the brink of agony as he rested his hands on the door, and willed you to open it. Say something to him. Anything.
“I’d never mean to hurt you. Not in a million years.”
For a moment, he heard nothing more. Just how desperately he needed to hear a voice in reply could not be overstated. Craving a new sound worse than oxygen in his lungs. At first, when he heard something other than himself nearby, it nearly knocked him back with joy.
A voice right next to his ear, “But you did, didn’t you?”
The joy lasted less than a second.
The voice beside him was low. And close. Not coming from the other side of the bathroom door, as he might’ve reasonably expected from you, and not even in the tone of a female’s voice, as he might’ve seen, were Sharon to have appeared by his side. This new voice was deep, and masculine, and in his ear now, chuckling some as a gloved hand pressed the barrel of a gun to his temple.
Bucky didn’t blink.
You stepped outside not wanting to see him.
The bleeding had long since stopped, thanks to the aid of a cool, damp washcloth and a few minutes’ pressure, but even once it ceased, your legs were reluctant to carry you back. You dreaded the thought of having to resume your conversation with Bucky—of having to look him in the eye and tell him all over again that it wasn’t safe for you to be married to him. But you didn’t have much of a choice now, either. This wasn’t your honeymoon, where you could stay locked in the bathroom, try climbing out a window, and hope for the best like you’d done before. You had the man’s child inside you, for fuck’s sake.
That uncomfortable subject and at least a dozen more were already swarming your brain as you made your way out of the bathroom. You’d taken a few extra squares of toilet paper to press into the cut, were looking down at it with a tense, uncertain gaze as you ventured out, when you were obliged to stop just a few steps into the room.
“Hi, honey.”
It wasn’t Bucky.
Your eyes snapped up to the source of the voice in an instant, and, on seeing you were right—that it wasn’t Bucky but a gaunt, grinning blond with a gun to your husband’s head—you almost screamed at the sight.
You’d wanted to scream, anyway. It would’ve been the sane thing to do, and one that nobody could’ve blamed you for in the moment, you reckoned, but strangely the sound never came. You just stared at the two, eyes wide and jaw slightly more lax as your lips made an ‘o’. Bile jumped up in your throat. You wished it would choke you.
‘Please. Don’t.’ was all you could get out.
Johann Schröder’s smile stretched wider.
“Don’t what?”
The question was clearly meant to be derisive, rhetorical. Still, with your fingers trembling, you tried answering:
“Don’t hurt h—”
“Why?”
You watched the gun sink deeper against your husband’s face, and he flinched. Your stomach clenched inside you.
“Why shouldn’t I hurt him, hon? Seems like he’s gotten pretty damn good at doing it to you,” Schröder sneered.
His words stung. The grin didn’t flinch. And, as if to punctuate his sentence, or else remind your husband that he was tied to a chair and entirely at his mercy now, Schröder struck Bucky in the face with the butt of his gun. If an onlooker hadn’t known better, they might’ve mistaken you for the one who’d been hit, though—at last, you unleashed that scream, and you reached out for Bucky, hands open and pathetic and desperate to help.
“Think it hurt as bad as your hand?” Schröder hummed.
Your feet were stumbling forward, “He didn’t mean—”
Another resounding thud against Bucky’s skull, this time hard enough to split his lip in half. If he’d grimaced in the slightest, you would’ve seen the teeth smeared with blood. But, true to form, James Barnes didn’t wince. He hadn’t even seemed to acknowledge the blow as it landed. Just stared at you and, with eyes as hollow and deadened and faintly pleading as you’d ever seen them before, manifested their silent apology to yours—again.
“Bet he didn’t mean to hurt anyone as the Winter Soldier, either. Still couldn’t have felt too good for all the folks he butchered, though.” At that, Schröder’s sick amusement morphed into a laugh, and he was taking Bucky’s collar in his other hand. Shaking him lightly while he spoke.
“Couldn’t have felt all that great for your dad, I bet.”
The diversion turned to you, all toothy smiles and mocking eyes. He didn’t care. He let you stagger another step toward the two of them, even try to get your hands close to Bucky. But when you’d drawn too close, he stopped you cold. Not thinking much else in the moment, you made a move to push Schröder’s arm away, hard, and were shortly rewarded with a shove of your own. He knocked you sideways onto the bed, and you landed on the hand you’d hurt. Before you could let out so much as a sound yourself, Bucky’s voice tore in:
“Schröder.”
Schröder turned. He raised his Ruger to your husband’s head again, as casually as if he’d asked him for the time.
“Yes?”
“Don’t touch her.”
Schröder turned to you. Though he didn’t move the Ruger again, he did point his finger at your form, haplessly curled into itself amidst the covers and pillows.
“Why? Saving all the rough stuff for later, are we?”
You cowered as his free hand reached for you, and just as your husband’s eyes went wide and a vein nearly tore through his skin from how hard it protruded, you cried,
“What do you want?!”
Schröder stopped. He brought his hand to a halt just south of your thigh—and then he dropped his weight on the bed beside you. He gestured indistinctly, almost disbelievingly, toward Bucky. The latter appeared near-apoplectic, nails raking down either arm of the chair.
“What do I want?” Schröder quipped, incredulous, “What do you want, doll? To stay married to him?”
And you knew he’d intended the question to be hurtful; you knew it by the glint in his eye, the goading tone of voice and the look he’d flitted to Bucky—nondescript and yet saying a world more than words could ever convey. He knew what had gone on between you, had likely heard your last conversation in its entirety, and was now using it against you. Mostly to taunt, then to injure your husband with truths he hadn’t yet uncovered himself.
Schröder’s eyes were shining with sadistic delight as he took your hand in his. He didn’t waste another second.
“No, no, that isn’t what you want at all, is it?”
Ignoring the screech of Bucky’s restraints as he tried to lunge out of his chair. Hearing him curse when he failed.
“—you said you’re leaving him, right?”
Schröder slid the thin, glistening ring off the hand he’d been holding before you could even think to stop him.
“—said you want a divorce, is that it?”
Then his grin got so big and conceited and enlivened by the sight of pain working its way onto Bucky’s face that any good sense you’d had left inside you was abandoned in a blink. You didn’t hesitate, or else try and make a pass to retrieve your ring—you just hit the man in the face.
Your fist was small, and his chin was hard. You knew before you ever threw the punch that it’d probably hurt you more than him, but you did it anyway. It succeeded, at the very least, in catching Schröder by surprise and swiftly pissing him off. Seeing this and feeling a bit bolder, you were somehow able to dodge his hands when he lurched for you again. Inside, your own anger flared.
“Why the fuck do you care?” you spat.
You found momentary respite in the corner of the bed, sliding back against a wall that would only protect you for so long. As soon as Schröder regained his bearings, he had you back in his sights and his grasp just as quick.
He dragged you back. He pulled you up. He dug the tips of his fingers so hard into your side that you thought the flesh might tear in two across your ribs. But it didn’t. Crescent-like indentations did leave their mark in a grisly set of five, though. You felt the sting of it as Schröder loosened his grip, then sucked his next breath through his teeth as if calming himself. Your gaze only hardened.
“I care,” he said, once he’d completed this slow inhale. He replaced his touch by pinching your face in one hand and bringing it up to his, expression more like a snarl. Then, raising the gun to your face in his other hand, “because I made a deal with your father. Remember?”
You did. Your head jerked back by force of instinct, but he held it. From every direction, then, you had nothing to hear but the sound of your own pulse thrumming a fast, panicked tempo in your skull. You tasted blood in your mouth without a drop on your tongue. And, had that deafening fear and revulsion been anything less, you likely would’ve heard something else beneath it all.
Would’ve felt it, if you weren’t already so numb: Schröder’s hand sliding its way down your body, diamond ring still stuck to the tip of his index finger. You sensed it as though seeing yourself from another perspective—watching his hand trail lower, lower, lower until something in Bucky split in two and he bellowed:
“SCHRÖDER—”
He said something more after that; you were sure of it. You just couldn’t hear him, or see him, or discern much of anything else but your own racing heart as the man who’d just beat your husband twice and lifted a gun to your head proceeded to press his touch to your belly. Almost conscientious and gentle as he lowered it.
“Was this part of the deal, too, doll?”
Your eyes widened. Realizing—then feeling fear seize you completely. Forgetting the metal at your temple and shaking your head with a force, but slow enough that your husband wouldn’t see it. Meanwhile, across from you both, Bucky seemed more than sufficiently occupied by his own blinding rage—he spit a glob of blood to the floor and, with his teeth bared again, swore he’d kill him.
Over and over and over again, oaths of taking Schröder’s life and making it gruesome and painful and slow filled your ears, but none of it stuck, for either you or Schröder. Instead, your maniacal captor just smiled, leaning in.
“I said, was this part of the deal, Mrs. Barnes?”
The heel of his palm sank into your stomach, and as the shock of his first words began to fade, a pain replaced it. His hand made an impressive demonstration of flattening and forcing itself so hard against the skin that a flurry of stars cropped up in your eyes, and you cried:
“Stop! I-It wasn’t— just— just stop. Stop.”
“Stop? Was it part of the deal or not?”
Schröder bore down even harder.
“It just happened!” you keened. Unsure why you felt compelled to answer for what had gone on at all—addressing the baby in this awful, oblique way—though reckoning it had something to do with the pressure he was applying to your stomach. You tried to squirm back.
But your stuttering pulse and your pleading gaze and the ache in your stomach proved to be all too much for any real progress to be made. You’d scarcely moved off an inch before he drove his palm deeper, and with the agony of a body about to rupture beneath it, a shriek clawed out of your throat. Your mouth fell open, and for once, you couldn’t curtail the pain, or fear. Schröder’s hand had just forced the noise from your mouth, along with some mindless, broken pleas to stop pushing, it hurts, please, please, when the face above yours only brightened. Schröder’s cruel, snide mouth flashed a smile above you, and before you could whine again—
He kissed you.
It couldn’t have lasted for more than a second.
Still, the moment seemed to stretch indefinitely. And felt perverse. So deeply nauseating and unsettling to every last nerve, muscle, tendon, and bone in your body that the response it evoked could be nothing less than visceral. You didn’t need to think at all to shove him off. Whatever might’ve given you pause with a loaded gun to your head was forgotten in a second, and soon enough, you weren’t alone in letting your reproach be known.
It started off with a crack, then a harsh, crude splintering of wood. A violent rift, from what you could hear of it, and when you turned your head, your suspicions were confirmed: Bucky had snapped half the arm of his chair away from the seat, and his right hand was almost freed.
Whatever barrier he faced in being bound more than four times over with rope seemed immaterial to him now. He could strain as hard as he pleased—feel the coarse synthetic fibers dig into his flesh and leave streaks of red, if not break the skin itself—and any pain, as before, hardly appeared to register with your husband at all. He just muscled through it, thrusting his wrist even harder. The whole force of this movement rocked the chair on its legs, and just when you sensed it might collapse beneath his weight, you felt Schröder stand up. The man didn’t need to move too far or do much else other than drop his hold on you and flip his gun to point it at Bucky instead.
Even when he had, though, Bucky didn’t flinch. His hands were in fists and his drive was like a machine’s—he tried forcing his way out of the right hand’s restraints, and the second the wood gave way, he was shoving it off.
Blind to the firearm Schröder was holding, or his words:
“Stay where you are, Barnes.”
Bucky was just then shaking off the rope that had been loosened by the break in the wood, jaw still tight as ever.
“You’ve got three other limbs to free, my friend, just—”
Schröder was still speaking when you saw his finger slip to the trigger, and it seemed to you it was itching to pull.
“James, stop!”
That plea came from you. More of a strangled cry, really—no more pleasant for either man to hear than it was for your throat to shriek. It did, however, stop Bucky cold. Your husband paused just long enough to meet your gaze. And in it, you saw, at least, that he was all there, if not enraged. But not soldat, or anyone else but himself.
You sighed in relief, despite what seeing two red rivers seeping out of Bucky’s mouth might otherwise provoke.
It was him. You might’ve smiled if another hadn’t cut in.
Schröder seized Bucky’s wrist. With it, you saw his hand just as mangled and bloodied as his lips. Knuckles cracked, slit, and soon to be littered with bruises of every shade, he shocked you again by how calmly he took it. Even when Schröder sank a thumb inside a big, gaping crater of a flesh wound he’d found on the back of his hand, your husband didn’t blink; he just looked at you.
‘I’m sorry.’
When the barrel of the gun returned to his head—this time, at the rear, as Schröder had circled back around the half-broken chair and was leaning over him—you could see the apology lodged in his eyes on full display.
“For safekeeping.” The man wielding the gun seemed almost pleased as he dropped your ring inside the breast pocket of your husband’s shirt, before patting it gently:
“Now where were we?”
A beat. Bucky’s right hand twitched beside him, but evidently, he knew better than to move in that moment.
“Right, right—” Schröder pretended to be remembering, tapping steel to Bucky’s skull, “She’s leaving, isn’t she?”
More silence.
You wanted to speak, beg Schröder for mercy, anything.
“Do you know why that is, Bucky?”
But before you could utter even a word of protest, the voice pressed on. Schröder was leaning in his ear.
“—what you did to her?”
The baby. Brooklyn. All the bloodshed that had ensued last week, leaving your husband completely in the dark. Of course, he couldn’t remember. He hadn’t been himself, and was scarcely more able to control his actions as the Winter Soldier than he could in a dream.
To your horror, Schröder reached down for Bucky’s hand, and, still holding the gun to him with the other, lifted it.
Pointed it.
Pushed it closer to you.
“C’mon, Buck. You don’t want me touching her, right? Why don’t you feel for yourself what she’s been hiding?”
Your blood turned to ice. You’d never felt so immobile—paralyzed—in your life, but seeing the hands drift closer and closer and feeling defenseless to their course, your body went numb. Your limbs grew heavier than lead.
And when you felt the smug, smiling blond guide your husband’s touch toward your head, you understood it all.
You were perched at the edge of the bed a foot away. Schröder was nudging Bucky forward in his chair, urging him to reach out and tilt her chin a little, go on, that’s it. And neither one of you had a choice, so he touched you. His fingers, directed by someone else, were obliged to brush the skin of your chin, your jaw, your cheek, and your brow, before finally settling above your left temple.
Your husband felt the cut—touched the stitches.
You winced, but not from any physical pain. It was Bucky’s face as the tips of his fingers skimmed the wound. The look of chagrin that crossed his eyes. Then bewilderment. Fear, as plain as anyone could see it— was he the cause of that? Had the hurt been from him?
You couldn’t bear to answer him, so you looked away. It was Schröder, again, who had all the power to speak.
“Can’t remember pushing her down?” he said, tone dark, “Making her split her head open on the bedside table because soldat didn’t know his own strength—only that he had to keep her safe—and sensed a threat outside?”
Bucky shook his head. His face was grave.
Schröder kept making him prod the skin.
“It’s bruised here, too. You feel it?”
Your husband did, and you thought it might break him. So tender and forlorn were the eyes, raking over every spot where a touch, his touch, had left you hurt before.
If nothing else could bring you back to your senses, the wounded look in Bucky’s gaze was sure to get it done.
You hardly thought again, just croaked: ‘It’s not his fault.’
Schröder’s hand then descended your neck, your torso.
As if he hadn’t heard you at all—
“You already saw what happened to her hand.”
—and forcing Bucky’s touch lower still.
“But what about here?”
Your breath hitched in your throat when you felt your husband’s hand come to rest on your stomach.
It was like a fire had ignited in your lower half, and nothing close to the soft, pleasurable kind. Not the flutter felt in anticipation of a touch from your husband, not the desirous sort. In fact, you dreaded it now; seeing Schröder over his shoulder, urging him closer, making him flatten his big, broad, scorching palm over your belly.
What should’ve been the ecstatic scene you’d conjured in your mind at least a hundred times since marrying him—the picture of domestic bliss as you said it, smiling, I’m pregnant—was now nothing short of torture. Choice all but stripped from you here, forced to emerge inside this terrible place, you found yourself needing to shrink back, shake your head, look to Schröder’s stubborn, unyielding gaze and beg him not to make you do this now. Not now.
Not here, with Bucky’s skin a shade of glacial white and his eyes going wide, taking on a look you’d never seen.
“What do you—”
He stared hard at the hand on your belly, but it didn’t last for long. As if realization were trying to seep in, he couldn’t meet it. His eyes flitted back to your face.
“Baby, what’s—” he tried again, stammering.
“—right, that’s it, Mr. Barnes.” That was Schröder.
Satisfied in the suspense of the moment keeping your husband still, he lifted his hand from Bucky’s and snapped, that’s it, and clapped him over the shoulder.
Congratulating him before the truth had even sunk in.
“A baby, that’s right! You’re going to be a father, Buck.”
And how far was the look on Bucky’s face from the one you’d dreamed before. The lips you’d envisioned in a smile now twisting bleakly, parting slightly, and the eyes you’d once hoped to be bright and elated only staring back with rings of red enveloping the irises. Whatever tears formed at his waterline were decidedly not of joy.
Only guilt.
“You did it.”
Desperation.
More moisture in his eyes as his hand started to tremble across your stomach, voice hoarse and soft, “Is it true?”
You didn’t need to nod. You just watched him, let your own eyes fill with the worst, stinging tears you had felt in your life, and from the silence that followed, Bucky knew.
As if the life beneath his palm were something dear, but still too much for him to comprehend, he shook his head. He stroked his thumb over the cotton of your pyjamas and tried inching closer, as much as his restraints would allow him. Then, with words that were audibly strained, but always gentle, he lowered his voice—as if to keep the communication between you two, despite your position:
“I love you.”
His hand was still on your belly as he said it. He reached up to cup your face. Even lower than before, “I’m sorry.”
I’m sorry.
That much was evident from every look he’d given you tonight. Every move he made a de facto apology, all actions in the vein of atonement, it couldn’t possibly escape your mind or his that he knew he’d done wrong. It was only a matter of accepting this—maybe coming to terms with the fact that your life wasn’t safe in his hands—for the guilt plaguing Bucky to multiply. Paralyze him.
There was no better time for Schröder to strike. Just as the anguish had flooded Bucky’s face completely, and his hand had had to lower itself from want of strength, a sound split the air. Bucky was so lost in his thoughts that it didn’t even register at first, but the impact was real, and it was harsh: Schröder punched him squarely in the jaw. The next, swift snap was his nasal bone taking a blow, and breaking beneath it. Blood breezed down and into his mouth. Feeling warm, his lips and chin doused in a second, he sensed nothing else. He might’ve groaned.
He caught another swift right hook, and his mind went blank. Nothing of substance threatened to materialize between his ears, save for the rush of blood through and from his skull and the dim recognition of something ugly.
Something horrific.
He couldn’t protect you.
His body was as much an idle waste as it was a danger. Useless now, as he was tied to this chair, and a risk to your well-being even if he weren’t. The hazard was him.
Schröder hit him again, and Bucky realized that the ringing he’d heard in his ears was your screaming.
“I’m doing her a favor,” Schröder spat before shoving him back in the chair, almost knocking it sideways.
The blond advanced with ease. His knuckles were drenched in blood; none of it was his. When he reached for Bucky again, the resistance was slight, and a simple, firm grip on the collar was all that was needed to drag his frame to sit straight. Bucky was barely upright for a second before the next—and worst—blow struck his face. His whole head rang with it, reeling, but still, he could make out the words as they were spoken to him.
“She’ll never be safe with you, Barnes. Never—” and at the last, Schröder lowered his gun. Started to loosen the rope from Bucky’s left arm, “—I could free you now, and you still wouldn’t get within an inch of what you want.”
He nudged the rope away and let it fall to the floor. Bucky lifted his hand, but the effort was in vain. No sooner had a finger of his stirred than Schröder was delivering a kick to the chair and letting it splinter. Topple. Skitter a half-foot across the hardwood floor with Bucky’s ankles still bound to it, before finally, gracelessly, breaking apart.
Bucky was on the floor, blinking through a stream of blood and a sea of muddied thoughts when Schröder kicked the chair again. The rope slackened some more.
“Her own father knew as much, so he made me a deal to take her off of your hands. Settle his debts the way he should’ve done the first time around,” Schröder said, and now his tone was lower. Lethal as it ever was, and stern.
“I know how much you hate to lose your playthings, Buck, but this one’s better off with me, I promise.”
And, as if to emphasize his point, Schröder turned and reached for you. Bucky’s own hands were slow, fumbling in fits and bursts to get the rope unwound from his ankles, but they were determined. He just couldn’t get the bleeding to stop, the ringing to subside, or his brain, in its concussed state, to let him move with a little more agility. He’d been hit too many times. He could barely lift his head off his shoulders and hold it straight, so he was forced to stay where he was, keep at his task, and listen.
“You’re weak when you’re not soldat.”
Using his knuckles, Schröder brushed the blood that was evidently all Bucky’s across your cheek, and you flinched.
“When you make the switch, still…you’re inhuman.”
Then he tilted your head, making you show them both the mutilated, stitched-up flesh above your temple. Again, you tried to slink away, but his touch was firm.
“Don’t you think your bride deserves better than that? Your child? Forced to live in fear of that thing you are?”
Blood coursed down Bucky’s face, and his lips were curled apart in a grimace, mouth hanging slightly ajar. His eyes fixed their look on you. The rope was undone.
He’d just started to try and stand when the edge of his vision blurred. He felt the lacerations in his face pulse as one, and with it, half his sight went skewed to the left. Schröder couldn’t help but crack a smile seeing him stumble, pitch back, and barely catch himself on the bedside table. When he stood, he was mostly hunched.
“Look at you, Buck. You can’t try and save her like this,” Schröder taunted, drawing you closer, “So stop trying.”
The man’s hand was like ice holding your face. The grip grew tighter when he saw your husband limping your way, and before either one of you could move, the index of Schröder’s other hand had slid down to the trigger. He didn’t wait to give another warning before he did it—just pointed the gun and fired one shot over Bucky’s head.
His aim was good. The bullet missed your husband by less than an inch. The gun had gone off by your ear, and immediately, you seized the side of your head as a sharp, searing pain cropped up. Your skull was still ringing when you heard the thing discharge again, and you realized it had been aimed at Bucky’s neck. He’d ventured another step, and Schröder had fired a second round to graze the top of his shoulder. Crimson bloomed through his shirt.
Bucky should’ve stumbled again. He might’ve staggered back with a grunt of pain, lifted a quick, reflexive hand to feel the wound, but the sense of it all was slow to reach him. The moments that passed him were delayed just the same, as if the world around him were distorted—the fibers of time tugged and stretched before his eyes—and he could hardly keep himself straight. When he got another look down the barrel of the gun, he didn’t blink. Couldn’t see, really. It was all misshapen sights and sounds and a dim recognition that his mind was in a fog.
Somewhere from within that mist, he heard, faintly:
“I’ll go— I’ll go— I’ll go with you, I’ll go— just stop.”
Schröder turned to you, and the smile that he wore was cruel, but Bucky wasn’t able to make out the expression.
All he could see then, to the faintest extent, was you—your face, gripped hard in another man’s hand, eyes pleading and wet with tears, and a slightly slack jaw.
“Leave him for me?” Schröder repeated, sneering.
You nodded. Blinked. Rolled your tongue along the inside of your cheek before pulling it back and biting down once. There was a hint of a wince in your eyes, but, from what Bucky could tell, it vanished just as fast as it came.
Your lips parted again. Your eyes widened a little.
“So the girl has some fucking sense.” That was Schr��der.
He’d had his weapon re-holstered and your face firmly seized in both of his hands in no more than a second.
What came next surprised no one, though the sensations of disgust and rage were as quick to turn a stomach as the shock would have done. Schröder bent down and, having pulled your face closer to his, kissed you again.
Schröder’s mouth was glistening with a grin and Bucky’s own blood—smeared all over your face from how hard he’d been holding you—when he looked up and turned.
“Sensible and sweet, isn’t she? Tastes like it, too.”
Bucky saw nothing but red. It wasn’t just blood crowding his vision now but violence and rancor and outright hatred, stirring his limbs to start moving again when the rest of his body was plainly too battered to venture an inch in that condition. He staggered again, watched you again, and had made it almost halfway across the room when another sight slowed him, if only for a moment.
Schröder’s lips were back on yours, as if to mock him, but what startled him, really, was the way you’d opened your mouth. You couldn’t mean it. Clearly. Schröder was gripping your jaw, forcing it open—it had to be—and he was coaxing your tongue out from inside and weaving it with his. Once more, time moved like molasses, and that was all your husband had had to see: you kissing him back, gripping his arm through the thick, black tactical gear, and still parting your lips more and more for him. Like you needed a touch, or something, worse than ever.
That stalled Bucky, though he was nowhere close to stopping now. Briefly preoccupied, and seemingly shocked as well that you’d accepted the kiss so eagerly this time, Schröder didn’t see the approach. If he had, he likely would’ve turned and made a move for his Ruger, but as it was, he had only to blink—and there was Bucky.
He hit him with a force that was blinding, directly to the side of his head so hard that he’d had no choice but to separate from you. Schröder was stunned one second and on the floor in the next. Bucky threw him there, kicked him down, and, wavering for only a moment to cock back the shoulder that’d been shot, he ignored the pain and punched the man again. And again. And again.
There was a callousness, an indolence, and an ease with which he was able to inflict the pain, that much was evident. What didn’t seem so natural, at least in Bucky’s mind, was the weight that was in his hands: Schröder’s body felt limp before he’d even landed the second blow.
The pressure grew heavier and heavier in his hands the harder, and more frequently, he delivered each hit, but for now, he didn’t care. Bucky kept on punching until the face beneath him was gnarled and bloody, and his own fist, too, slashed every which way with more cuts than he was able to count. He would’ve kept going—could’ve ignored the stabbing pain in his shoulder for as long as it would take to ensure the man was dead—but as it was, he refused to ignore the voice he heard. It was yours.
Muffled now, as your body was bent to the side and your head drooped lower still. Your voice was soft but clear:
“Bucky, please, stop.”
He did.
He dropped the man’s collar from his hands as soon as he’d heard you say it, and he turned away as if nothing had transpired behind him at all. His focus was on you.
“Baby—”
To his surprise, he watched you spit on the floor.
Your face was grim and almost sick, and you spit again.
The look grew even worse, and afterward, you didn’t waste a second more; you stood and left the room.
Bucky was stunned at first, and his instinct had been to follow. Then he heard a rattling sound beside him. He glanced down and paled, seeing Schröder there.
His face had turned blue much sooner than Bucky had expected—and not from any bruising but a lack of oxygen in his lungs. He was choking, foaming slightly at the mouth while he gasped for air. Surely, it hadn’t been the hits that caused it. The whites of Schröder’s eyes were as conspicuous as he’d ever seen them. Desperate.
Bucky swiftly got the sense that the life of his former captor was lost, and frankly, he didn’t care enough to watch him die. He left what remained of Schröder’s form to continue writhing on the floor, choking and sputtering for a breath that would never come, and went after you.
Downstairs, he found you hunched over the kitchen sink—spitting, retching, and trembling, too, but breathing.
You let the water from the faucet fill your mouth, and you rinsed again. You winced as something stuck your cheek.
Bucky drew closer, quickly, and when he was right by your side, he saw you spit a shard of glass into the sink. He looked over to the counter, and he spotted three more
They were minuscule, really. Nothing quite the size to leave a wound too deep, but sharp enough to cut your lips, your tongue, or the insides of your cheeks. When Bucky leaned in, he saw droplets of red joining the flow of the water beneath it. You coughed over and over again
“Don’t,” you croaked, seeing Bucky reach for the glass.
Before he could reply: “It’s the poison. From Madripoor.”
Your husband’s blood went cold in his veins. He didn’t touch the glass, but he did press closer to you, feeling his insides churn as the cogs started to turn in his head.
The vial of poison you’d been given to slip in Schröder’s drink at the Foxy Den—how the hell had you gotten it back? Why would you think you needed it, if he— but no, that couldn’t be the case. There wasn’t a shot you just—
“—put it in your mouth?” Bucky couldn’t curb the fear in his voice. He reached for you and spun you to face him.
“Did it kill him?”
Your eyes were wide for entirely different reasons. Bucky couldn’t believe what he was seeing; his mouth was dry.
“I didn’t want to kiss him,” you went on, voice shaking a little, “I didn’t— I just— I couldn’t get him the poison any other way. I knew he’d kiss me again, and when he did—”
“I know,” Bucky said. He smoothed the hair from your face, shaking his head. Feeling his stomach clench with fear and dread as he hurried to get a look in your mouth.
You’d snuck the vial inside your cheek, then crushed it between your teeth before Schröder had kissed you. You’d all but forced him to swallow the poison, shoving your tongue down his throat, but what of the stuff that remained? The rough, trembling fingers of Bucky’s hand were trying to pry your lips apart as gently as they could, ensure all the serum was out, but at present, you wouldn’t let him. You pushed back gently, though not too far to prevent your own touch from roaming his shoulder.
“The bullet—” you started.
“Barely nicked me,” Bucky cut in, “Baby, I need to see—”
That you’re safe. That you won’t be hurt in any way. He couldn’t finish the thought himself, having seen what the poison did to Schröder. Instead, he just held you closer and fought the lump that was starting to form in his throat. Adrenaline had worked well enough to clear his mind of the haze, but the rest of him was all high-strung.
Your clothes clung to you both, wet with blood and sweat. Your breaths were fast. Your expressions were feral, eyes no calmer as they scanned over the other’s form and soaked in every trace of what had happened. Bucky in his formalwear and you in something close to a chemise—like your honeymoon night all over again—you each got a glimpse of the gore ornamenting yourselves and let the room fall quiet, if only for a minute or two.
Your husband was the one to break the silence, at length, with cracked and grisly hands sliding down to your hips.
“You’re okay?”
His touch shifted you back in place to sit on the counter.
“I’m alright.”
You wanted to say more; assure him, in a voice as sedate as you could manage, that this wasn’t his fault. Whether he would believe a word of what you said was a separate question, but, at any rate, it didn’t matter. The next thing you knew, Bucky was slotting himself in the space between your legs and pulling you into his arms.
In spite of himself and all the wounds, he held you tight.
“You’re alright,” he repeated.
His face sank into the crook of your neck, and you felt his muscles contract again—pulling you closer—as he drew a shaky breath against your skin. You hugged him back.
“Are you?” Your voice was small.
In a blink, Bucky resurfaced. He lifted his head from your neck and, still holding you, hadn’t seemed to have heard.
“The baby,” he said quickly.
He stepped back. Lowered his gaze and his hands to trail over your hips and near your stomach, and he stared, as if trying to make sense of something dire. His blue eyes were wide, and they assumed such a look of panic that you feared a blood vessel might actually burst in one.
After all the great lengths he’d gone to, ensuring you were safe and taking extra precautions, on the off-chance you might be pregnant, here you were.
And there he went, sliding his touch lower and lower again until his hand was pressed into your belly, and the gaze you’d once thought soft before had all but melted into tenderness—delicacy. Complete, loving unreserve.
When his eyes met yours a second time, they were shiny.
Wet with the only kind of tears you’d want to see in them.
“You’re really…” he started, just to taper off, blinking.
And then his cheeks were dotted with the tiny, round droplets, and he’d finally ventured a smile for the first time in what seemed like ages and you couldn’t keep from reaching for him. The second you’d lifted your arms you were back in his, lips and nose smushed against the front of his stained white button-up and breathing deep.
Or trying to, anyway. Bucky had you squeezed so tight to his chest you had nothing but his shirt to inhale at first. You didn’t mind, and when he pulled away a moment later, you realized that your eyes, too, were filling up quick. You had to steel yourself against a maelstrom of emotions that threatened to emerge—the aftermath of a half-dozen traumas laid bare over the last hour—but the longer you were here, and the more your husband stared at you like that, the quicker your courage was depleted. In the span of five seconds, your senses were shot to hell. All you could think was what you could feel, and all you felt was Bucky: his arms and his hands and the raw, blistering heat between your bodies. The rest was noise.
It surprised you both when you kissed him. Physically, your mouth and his were hardly up to do it, injured as they were, but the impulse was strong, and it flowed between you. As soon as your lips latched onto his, Bucky was holding your face, molding his body to yours without so much as a second thought, and the mouth you met was sturdy. Hungry in the way it kissed back.
A string of words from Schröder flashed in your mind—‘Never be safe’—and you grit your teeth together, snagging the cusp of Bucky’s lower lip as you did it. He groaned. Before you could even try to apologize, though, he was gripping your face harder in his hands and coaxing your mouth open with his tongue. His front was still flush with yours, and your legs were starting to wind around his hips. Your husband nudged you back against the cabinets, and from the force of that push, you felt it.
Felt him.
Surely, it had had to take two very fucked up individuals to get all hot and bothered from a bloodbath that had just taken place; but, again, here you were—together.
And there you went, grinding your lower half with his.
“Doll?” Bucky broke out, word slurred just a little.
For a second, you thought he was going to stop you. Your eyes scanned his, and you were already planning to apologize for being so horny, it must just be the—
“You know I love you, right?” he breathed.
You blinked. You were about to nod, when you felt the bulge in his slacks start to rub against your barely-clothed heat, and something akin to a shockwave coursed through your frame. It couldn’t be helped. A monsoon of hyper-sensitized pleasure trembled over the skin in a way you’d never felt it before, and suddenly you were letting out a moan: a muffled cry of, ‘Yes, I-I know.’
Your husband swallowed and stared, slightly taken aback by the reaction his erection had produced. He’d never felt that either. At least from what he could remember.
The truth was that he’d never had a pregnant wife before—someone whose body was now extraordinarily responsive to his touch, nearly aching for him.
When you scooted your butt to the edge of the counter and dug your heels in the backs of his legs, humping him, almost, he got the idea. Bucky swallowed again.
“I love you too, I— I—” you started, already out of breath, “I just really need you to fuck me. Can you— please—”
Bucky didn’t need to be asked once, much less twice. He already had his belt, button, and zip undone before you could even look down, and then your own pyjama shorts were sliding off too. The counter was cool against your skin, but your husband’s warmth was more than enough to compensate for the loss. You smiled again, sheepish.
“It’s just…hormones,” you said, quieter toward the end.
You weren’t sure why you felt so ashamed to simply say, ‘James, I’ve been damn near insane with desire ever since you put a baby in me. Can you give me five more?’ But you did. You felt your cheeks start to heat as your lower half was left exposed to the air, and Bucky slipped his hand down between your legs, practically groaning:
“Honey, you’re soaked.”
There wasn’t one iota of shame in his tone.
He was more than happy to find you drenched beneath his touch. He had a smile on his face and a warmth bleeding from every fingertip as he caressed that soft, tender spot. You didn’t need to tell him what was on your mind, either. He sensed something was making you shy, and rather than have you say it aloud, he just touched you gentler, stroked the skin more affectionately, and tilted his head so only you could hear him, quiet as ever:
“That’s my girl. Feeling good for me?”
You felt your heartbeat between your thighs.
“My baby,” Bucky went on, voice dulcet and slow.
Your body was trembling at the edge, waiting. Impatient.
“My wife,” he said that with a smile, into your neck.
He lowered you onto his length, and you whined.
“Mother of my child.” The smile got bigger.
You couldn’t see it, but you could feel it. Feeling him slide inside the most precious, wet, pliable part of you, stretching you out, you couldn’t help the sounds you made. You felt full in a whole new way; the groan Bucky let out when you were impaled down to the base of his cock said he shared the feeling. He throbbed inside you.
“You’re—fuck.” Bucky’s words broke off at the sensation.
Your walls were as slick as ever, your body delicate, rolling your hips to the first gentle thrusts that his shaft carved inside. Neither one of you could last long like this.
Still, at the threat of sublime pleasure, you felt fear, briefly: Schröder’s implacable stare—and the thousands more like him in HYDRA. You couldn’t help but grip Bucky tighter, willing these thoughts away with the rhythm of your body over his. Feeling him fill you up, fuck you with quick, deliberate thrusts and hold you, ‘That’s it, take what you need, sweet girl, you’re okay.’
You wished you were. You wanted to be. With every stab of Bucky’s hips, you hoped this would be the last night you ever feared for you or your child’s life, but deep down, you knew that wasn’t true. This was everything your husband’s varied ‘enterprises’ entailed, and a life with him meant never knowing a day without it—fear.
The head of Bucky’s cock grazed an especially sensitive ridge in your walls, and you whimpered into his shoulder.
You smelled blood.
He pushed you back against the counter and pounded harder, breaths heavy and labored and gruff as he spoke:
“You’re okay, baby, it’s alright.”
Your mind tried clinging to that thought, nodding along as if to convince yourself. The pleasure grew stronger, and your body was hot. Everything was heightened. Bucky couldn’t keep his eyes or his lips or his rough, bloodied touch from roaming you wherever he could reach, and he kept rutting his hips, assuring you gently, again and again, that it was all okay. He was right here.
The pleasure from the depths of your body was beyond your control—you couldn’t help it when the band inside of you snapped. You held Bucky closer and you moaned, more desperate and needy and soaking for him, taking something from him, and knowing the bliss you felt would only steal the dark thoughts for a moment or two.
Bucky’s eyes said it just the same. He couldn’t keep stuffing you full, feeling his pleasure hit its peak, and finally painting your insides without sharing that look.
You were less than halfway down from your highs when you felt him go still, panting fast, then hold your face.
“I love you.”
It was desperate. Hoping for something.
“I love you, too,” you told him, and you meant it.
But there was more. Both of you knew there was more.
“I can’t be married to you, Bucky.”
You didn’t know why it had to come out now, but the emotions were there—his gaze had all but drawn it out.
Still sheathed inside you, your husband tensed. He looked as if he might try and shake his head, but the movement was stalled by his own momentary shock. He’d known the words were coming, but the sound of you saying them now wasn’t any less jarring to hear. Before he could reply, you found yourself cutting back in:
“Not now, at least. We need some…time. To think.”
You weren’t sure what you were saying, just that your lips were moving and every new word was hurting him more.
“Even with Schröder gone, there are so many…dangers for both—or, all—of us, and I don’t know…I just can’t—”
—imagine bringing a child into a world like this. Like his.
You didn’t need to say it.
The pain in Bucky’s eyes already communicated as much, and the conviction in your own only convinced him that you’d meant it—and what you said was the truth. You couldn’t stay in a marriage that wasn’t safe.
Just as you opened your mouth to say something more, the man surprised you when he squeezed your hand.
Nodding, almost imperceptibly, in front of you.
“I can wait,” he said, “Whenever you’re ready, doll.”
His voice was hoarse, words strained from the lump in his throat as he spoke, but the message was sincere.
“Whenever you feel safe,” he added, softly.
You wanted to hold him again. Like before, your eyes began well with something stinging and harsh, but the look you’d fixed on him was filled with nothing but love. You would’ve reached for him then, if he hadn’t moved his hand to his pocket. He felt around inside it, briefly.
Then Bucky retrieved your wedding ring.
Holding you up against him, pressed snugly into the counter with your legs still wrapped around his lower half, he pinched the silver band between his forefinger and thumb and held it up to you. It glistened in the light.
“The next time you wear it, I want it to be because you chose to marry me. Not for anything, or anyone, else.”
Nothing arranged, no game, no being forced to stay.
You nodded and had to blink through a layer of tears.
Bucky’s thumb traced the moisture, cupping your cheek in one of his hands. He’d had to keep blinking himself, and before you could reach for him, he kissed you.
“I really hope you marry me again one day, Mrs. Barnes.”
You smiled, having parted but still holding on.
“I think I would like that, too. One day.”
The next thing you heard was a sound at the front door: what sounded like a crash. Half a dozen sets of feet stumbling inside, crowding the foyer, making a loud, frantic clamor that you and Bucky knew only too well. The two of you scrambled to get your clothes back on as Steve, Nat, Sam, and Sharon all seemed to yell at once.
You had one hell of a story to tell them.
Taglist: @vicmc624 @she-could-never @mcira @kentokaze @ordelixx @stinkerbelle007 @wilsons-striped-ties @pono-pura-vida @geminiflanagansblog @buggy14 @sky-full-0f-fl0wers @buckysdoll1520 @armystay89 @kunakizen @ghostiebby06 @blackhawkfanatic @sushiseoks @deansapplepie @mrsjoequinn @lunaroserites @first-edition @jaggedsi @excusememrbarnes @mostlymarvelgirl @yujyujj @mrs-bucky-barnes-73 @athenabarnes @christinabae @wintrsoldrluvr @bethbunnyy @i-heart-smut @5thgoddess @oogaboogabeepboop @sky-full-0f-fl0wers @buckysdoll1520 @armystay89 @mimimarvelingmarvel @counteveresttt @thepetitemandalorian @diannana @aagn360 @aka-tua-braindump @shortnloud @dahliawolfe @fantasyfootballchampion @lilyevanstan1325 @kandis-mom @ladyvenera @gyokujyn @bigtreefest @winterschildren8 @mega-kittyglitter-1
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baby daddy.
paige bueckers x reader
3.2k
like guys . I don’t even know what to say rn . this is PURE fucking filth like yas there is some exposition in the beginning and its dialogue heavy but like ✋✋ just know this is fucking porn . So sorry for anon if this isn’t up to par but the wormz took over my brain and this is all i have to show for it . Love u so much for the idea tho <3
ANYWAYZZZ !!!! you and paige buy a strap. filth ensues.
MAJOR 18+ WARNING!!!!
“babe.”
it’s deadpan, borderline exasperated as you turn your head, meeting a wildly unimpressed expression from paige that makes you snort out loud, hand coming up to cover your mouth.
in your girlfriends hand, dangling from her fingers, is a dildo of some sorts, shaped horrifically in the form of an anatomically incorrect fist, and it’s almost impossible to keep your surprised laughter from bubbling out, taking a step closer with a look of awe.
“dude, you’re kidding,”
“babe, why are we even here? like, deadass i have two hands and ten fingers, this is so extra.”
to be fair, she had a point— those two hands and ten fingers had never done you wrong in the slightest, but this was simply an act of impulse, deciding just that morning after you guys had spent the time with each others hands down each others pants, you’d declared in a sudden rush of post-nut clarity, that you simply had to see paige in a strap.
which, was met with a bit of intrigue and then, obviously, because paige bueckers is competitive in anything she can consider herself good at, couldn’t help but interrogate you in outright disbelief.
‘so, what i’m hearing is that i’m not enough?” it was said in the tone she uses when her sarcasm is over the top, and you can’t help the laugh that bubbles out of you, slapping her arm.
‘baby, stop being so dramatic, oh my god.”
you’d kissed her to silence her delusions as to why you’d even brought it up in the first place, before explaining ever so gently that it was never a matter of what paige couldn’t do, and more so about the capabilities of what she could do, and that you promised it would be fun.
truly, she was on board after you’d told her that for some girls it was hard to use, so that, ‘if she couldn’t handle it, she could give up’ — of course paige would never back down from a challenge.
“you do have two hands, and i love them just the same. i just wanna try it, okay? is that okay?” you say it in your quiet, softest voice, and maybe you’re kinda being a brat because you know paige could never say no to you when you talk like that, or when you walk up to her, tracing a thumb against her cheek before pulling her down to peck her nose.
it’s immediate the way she chases your lips, presses a quick one to your mouth before she’s rolling her eyes, “anything for my baby, i guess.” but, she’s smiling, and that feels like more progress than before.
in the end, you guys end up picking something pretty beginner level— it’s only six inches, has a dual ended pleasure vibrator nestled in the crotch for the one wearing it and due to paige’s prompt request, it is in fact purple, which only makes you laugh at the excited shimmy she does as you both walk out, hand in hand, the black privacy sack swinging between her fingers.
“thought you were so against the idea?” you couldn’t help but tease her once you guys are in the car, music already blasting— you know all her music without really knowing it, but it’s definitely something by brent faiyaz.
“yeah,” she shrugs, “until i thought about getting to fuck you with it.” she says coyly, glancing over at you with a raised eyebrow before she’s pulling out of the lot, hand secured on your thigh.
you guys don’t really get to it that night, or the next day— instead settling for the slow, tired morning sex that you guys indulge in before her practice and then after, the languid, loving type of sex you both revel in for the evening when she’s back at the dorms.
no, for some reason, it isn’t until a week or so later that it suddenly comes up— and even then, you weren’t necessarily thinking about it too hard, not until the teams all at dinner. you, paige, KK, and aubrey all sit together, and it’s really in moments like these that you love to actually participate in conversations with the team— KK and aubrey had been one of the first to welcome you in with open arms after you and paige had begun dating, so you really felt most at ease with them, even if they could be complete idiots.
not like paige was any better.
it had started with someone making a tiktok, going around asking who they’d never let their son or daughter date— resoundingly, enough people said paige, which was both parts hilarious for you, and astounding for paige.
“bro! literally i’m like, the best girlfriend, that’s some bull.” she couldn’t help but scoff, even if she’s smiling just a little, “baby, i’m a good girlfriend, right?”
you purposely take a minute to answer, pretending to think about it until she grasps your thigh beneath the table, making you snicker as she squeezes, and suddenly, you know exactly the angle she’s playing.
“girl, i don’t trust you,“ KK snorts, making a face, “you’d probably get my kid pregnant or somethin’, like—“
KK’s words make paige snort, shrugging a bit, “shoot, i mean, no wonder they call me baby daddy.” she sticks her tongue out, entirely too immature for the setting of the restaurant, but it makes you warm all over anyway— you love her, even when she’s being childish, which is pretty much most of the time.
the conversation continues after that, and though you pay attention, laugh when it’s funny and answer when you need to, you can’t quite get that out of your head— baby daddy.
it makes you think.
it’s late by the time you guys get home, and true to paige’s fashion, the door is only shut and locked for a second before she’s behind you, pressing kisses to your neck and sliding hands up your shirt, humming quietly— “i’m a good girlfriend, yeah?”
it’s not often that paige asks for reassurance, mostly because she usually already knows, but it’s why it makes it extra special when she does.
“duh.” you whisper out, tilting your head back to grant her more access while she sneaks a hand into your jeans, forgoing the button entirely. her fingers are prodding against your clit when you let out a soft moan, your fluttering eyes only opening for half a second before they spot the black sack from across the room, your own hand gently grasping her wrist to still its movements.
“baby, why don’t we…?” your tilt your head in the direction, leaning your head sideways to try and capture her reaction.
surprisingly, she looks just as interested.
it’s comes out quietly, pressed to your temple, “get on the bed then.”
you don’t waste much time, stepping out of your jeans and your top until there’s nothing left but the black, simple thong that rests against your hips, crawling back against her purple sheets with an inquisitive look on your face while she pulled the thing from its plastic package.
“remember what you said earlier?” you say offhandedly as you watch paige’s muscles flex and tighten, looping the belt around her before she glances up at you, “which part?”
“baby daddy,” you can’t help but grin, tossing your head back against the bed, “just wanted to see how true that is.”
paige scoffs, and it’s obvious she likes that, plays into it even as she crawls onto the bed, looking down at you with a narrowed glance, “how true what is? that i could get you pregnant?”
it’s almost immediate the way your body flushes at that, the subconscious squeeze of your thighs together as you look up at her through lidded eyes, “mhm. is that bad?”
“i mean,” she’s smirking though, and her hand wraps around the strap on slowly, as if simulating it to be an extension of herself— it’s really fucking hot, “it’s sexy that you even thought about it like that,” she whispers, and you can practically see the confidence rising within her at the prospect, before her eyes flicker up at you. “wanna suck me off, ma?”
it makes something within you go haywire, and your mouth practically fills with saliva as if to prepare for it before you nod slowly, propping yourself up on your elbows before you stick your tongue out, paige’s blue orbs never leaving you for one second, before she’s sighing, hard under her breath, “fuuuck.”
she gets up on her knees, running her hands through your hair to gently guide your mouth down to the tip, her teeth teasing the bottom of her lip as you slowly slid the length into your mouth. it felt foreign, heavy on the tongue, but the texture was so lifelike, it almost felt like it was attached to paige.
“shit, baby,” she sounds out of breath as she thumbs your hair from your eyes, wanting to catch every dirty look you send up to her, mouth full and eyes watering, “god, you’re such… a slut.”
it must’ve been the strap or something, that had the endless string of dirty talk spilling from paige’s mouth, not entirely too uncommon and yet it had shifted the atmosphere completely. it felt lavacious, provocative, tantalizing even.
still, it makes the arousal pool between your legs, making you practically squeeze your thighs together again and again, chasing the feeling of some type of friction as paige pushed her hips up slightly, the tip only then touching the back of your throat and eliciting the first drop of a tear from your eye.
she notices, because she doesn’t miss a thing, and is slow as she pulls it from your mouth, eyes lingering on the string of saliva that connected your bottom lip from the tip of the strap.
she’s breathing heavy, blonde strands falling into her face, loose from the usual braid she kept her front pieces in as she grasps your jaw, “does that hurt?”
it doesn’t, but it makes you smirk that she even asks, shaking your head before you lean back now, head hitting the mattress as you open your thighs, raising an eyebrow inquisitively.
“you can make it hurt,” you suggest, and paige lets out a slow exhale, a teasing grin on her smile as she grasps it by the hilt, “you’re driving me fucking crazy, y’know that?” the words are hissed down at you, spoken between her lips, chapped from how hard she’d been breathing as she rubs the tip of the now warmed, messily lubricated length against your cunt, eyes narrowed and focused as she drags it up, then down.
“you’re so wet,” it sighs out of paige as if she doesn’t even realize that she’d said it, a whine puffing past your lips involuntarily, ready to spit some type of urgency towards her, until she pushes in, finally, and you fucking gasp.
it was unlike what you’d really ever felt before— especially having never been with men or experimenting with penetration on this degree. it’s thicker than you expect, thicker than paige’s fingers combined, and your back arches upwards off the bed, right as paige grasps your hip to keep you right in place. “shh, shh— fuck, you’re so good, baby.”
“ohhh- oh fuck, paige—“ the words come out in a mess of noises, as you fling an arm over your face to try and focus on the comforting rub of paige’s thumb, the smell of her cologne, instead of the stretching, hot pressure that’s collected between your legs.
it only takes a couple moments before it doesn’t completely hurt, but the second that it does, you can finally blink your watery eyes open, letting out a soft moan at the furrowed eyebrows on paige’s face, her own lips parted as she carefully gives a shallow thrust into you, the subsequent friction of the dull, now audible buzzing of the vibrator on the other end of the dildo against her clit and it’s obvious.
it’s in the way she grunts, tongue darting out to seek attention to her bottom lip. “s’that feel good?” she’s panting already, and it makes your stomach swirl in arousal, nodding quickly as she gives another slow, but shallow thrust that sends immediate shivers up your spine, a rush of rampant pleasure up your stomach as you let out a groan, “more?”
it doesn’t take long for paige to find a rhythm— surprising considering her dancing abilities— and once she does, you can practically sense the confidence that radiates off of her. it’s in the way she wraps an arm around your thigh to hoist your leg up, higher, higher, until your cunt is on full display, and she’s leaning atop you, pressing wet kisses to your breasts as she drags her hips into you, each push making you both shudder out a moan.
“shit, baby— so fucking— so fucking wet. wan’me to fuck a baby into you, huh?” paige always has a habit of going on these fuck-drunk tangents, ones that usually send you careening over the edge in due time, but this— it makes you mewl into her ear, the thick, heavy weight of the strap punching into you, deeper than you or paige could ever reach, and it makes your hips jerk upwards, wanting more of it, all of it.
for half a second, you hoped, by some weird anatomical technique, she could get you pregnant.
“ohhh— fuck! paige, paige— pleasepleaseplease—“ what you’re begging for, even you can’t decipher, but it’s really just to make sure that she rocks into you like that again.
and she does— again and again, drool collecting in the corner of your mouth from how long your lips have been parted, and paige looks at you, delirious and flushed as she drags her thumb over your mouth, wipes away the spit and reaches between you two.
before you can figure it out, you feel her finger tracing the outside of your stretched cunt, the wetness that’s collected there as she lets out a wanton sigh, something more high pitched than what paige usually grunts out, “stretching you s’good, baby— fucking- take it, jus’ like that— fuck, wanna fuck you stupid, baby.”
it’s almost too much. your head presses hard against the comforter as paige’s hips push flush against your own, the final stab of the length being inside of you makes your head swim, your body acting upon it’s own accord as your thighs, shaking, squeeze around paige’s hips, your stomach flexing and jumping as paige gives up whatever bit of composure or control she has left, before she’s quick to fuck into you without a single strand of resistance.
it’s hot, heady, and the sweat that collects on the surface of your skin is almost like a sense of accomplishment as her face falls into your neck, your thighs pushed impossibly high to give her the best angle, as she ruts into you. the slight curve of the dildo somehow gives a direct angle to your g-spot, and it punches a shout out of you, one that’s followed with a crying whine that even you knew was bound to get you both caught.
“fffuck— shhh- shut the fuck up—“ her mouth is on your neck in an instant, other hand quick to clamp over your mouth, but the friction against paige’s clit has her bottom lip quivering, struggling to close as each of her gravelly, breathy moans launch right into your ear, and it’s clear that she’s being greedy, grinding the strap into your cunt for the effort of chasing her own high, and it’s fucking sexy.
this deep, you can almost feel the fucking vibrator, and it reduces you into nothing— fingers twine into paige’s hair, sweaty and sticky, as she fucks into you with reckless abandon, the bed frame squeaking in protest, your cunt wet enough that you can fucking hear it, can feel it drip onto the bed below, feel it coating the sheets and paige’s thighs and you think she’s about to orgasm with how quick her breath has gotten, how shaky her hips are with each incessant thrust, like an earthquake pulsing through your body and it makes you sob, because it feels so fucking good, and paige is so deep, you can feel her everywhere.
“wanna cum inside of’you— ohmyfuck- please, wanna fuck my babies into you— iloveyou, so, fucking- so fu-ucking sexy, baby, fuck.”
it’s all gibberish really, a promise that makes you turn into a pile of mush, because you can feel your cunt tighten around it— delusionally, you imagine paige can feel it too— because even her declaration of love is enough to send you flying over the edge as your legs tighten around her hips, the vibrator nestled deep against paige’s clit until she’s coming too, and it’s a glorious thing to hear— ripping from her throat in a cacophony of throaty groans and whines that mimic yours, only deeper, grittier.
she thrusts into you, sloppy and out of control until you can feel her release on your cunt, spread against your thighs, the dull vibration now pressing hot and wet against you, so much so that it makes your body flood in aftershock, pleasure wracking through you in earnest as your body twitches and jumps, every embarrassingly high pitched noise ripping from your throat, as paige’s go muddled and unintelligible against your neck.
it’s like a cathartic release of sorts, leaving you feeling boneless and jellied in the wake as you slowly return to your senses, fucked out and exhausted as you try to experimentally move your hips, but the soreness between your legs is almost unfathomable.
“shit—“ you hiss as paige finally lifts her head, her own hand slow to guide the strap from your abused cunt, and it’s clear by, not only the tired, almost loopy smirk on her face, but the redness in her eyes, the wetness coating her lashes, that she’d enjoyed herself as much as you had— and while sex between you had always been mutual, it wasn’t often you got to see her fully release like that.
“was that good, hm? did i do okay?” she’s always quick to look for approval, her hand coming up to brush the tears from your face, to pepper a light array of kisses against your lips, chapped and puffy, as you let out a tired laugh, “fucking duh, that shit was… so hot,” you trace her blonde strands, plastered to her forehead, away from her face, “don’t think i’ve ever heard you sound like that.”
it makes her cheeks red, eyes rolling with a scoff, as she lets out a quiet laugh, already trying to play it off as cocky instead of flushed, “well- yeah, ‘cause, i was watching you take my dick.” you slap her arm weakly with a snort, wincing at her usage of words, “ew, you’re so gross.”
“and you’re so pretty,” she counters, before pressing a quick kiss to your mouth.
you both don’t really try to address the fact that there was probably no way you’d both been quiet enough to not at least alert one of the girls, but you ignore it anyway.
besides, it’s only KK that ends up putting you both in a group message the next morning, sending a string of angry emojis and a text that says, ‘bye. im moving rooms’.
you both laugh, because you know she’s not, and more so, you all three know it wasn’t the first time and definitely not the last.
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Every Universe (Logan Howlett x fem!Reader)
A/N: This was written while I was slightly intoxicated, I regret nothing though and hope you guys enjoy it. It was proofread but I cannot say there will be no grammatical errors. Regardless, please enjoy!! :) Also, takes place in the Deadpool and Wolverine universe.
Word Count: 4,158 (this bitch is long, for me at least)
Warnings: None really unless you count angst and fluff as well as the mention of butt stuff
Finding out that not falling in love with a man being the sole reason you were sent to the void seemed like a pretty patriarchal reason to essentially be damned but who were you to question the TVA.
The day you were sent to the void you’d seen the news, MULTIPLE CASUALTIES AFTER ATTACK AT XAVIER’S SCHOOL FOR GIFTED YOUNGSTERS, names such as Jean Grey, Marie D’Ancanto, Scott Summers, Hank McCoy, and Logan Howlett were read out by the heartbroken looking anchor.
Being a mutant yourself, the news stung and left a pit of anxiety in your stomach. It was an attack by an anti-mutant terrorist group, if they were bold enough to attack the home of Charles Xavier, why not a shopping mall next, or another school full of mutant and non-mutant children alike.
Only minutes after the newscast on the tragedy started four rectangular, orange portals opened in front of and behind you. Four men dressed in odd looking military uniforms stalked towards you. You didn’t even have time to attempt to fend them off before they grabbed you, holding you down while you attempted to break free but even with your mutation, they were too strong.
All you remembered was one of them placing some weird stick against your stomach and you screamed as you essentially dissolved into nothing.
When you woke you were found by who you now knew as Blade, and were told you were in the Void, where you would stay until you died or were killed by a fellow member of said Void.
You’d been there for a what you thought was probably a few years when a couple of Deadpool and Wolverine variants were found by Laura in an absolutely fucked Honda Odyssey. She brought them there and Gambit and Blade brought them inside and laid them down. They appeared as if they’d just had a horrific fight or the most violent sexual encounter ever.
The Wolverine variant was the first to wake up, quite literally shooting up into a sitting position while breathing heavily. His claws extended quickly from his knuckles, and he made an almost animalistic sound.
“Easy there killer,” you almost teased, holding up your hands, you’d been the one unfortunate enough to be closest to him when he woke up, so his eyes immediately fixed on you.
Several emotions seemed to flash across his face at once, his look of anger changing to one of shock. His claws disappeared just as quickly as they’d appeared just moments ago as you slowly put your hands down, now a little concerned for the man.
“Y/N?”, he asked, his head tilting slightly.
It was your turn to look confused, “Did we know each other?”, you asked.
Sure, you’d heard of Wolverine, of Logan, but you’d never met him personally, you had originally been set to attend Charles Xavier’s school when you were 18 but after an attack on the school the same year your parents had decided against it.
The Logan before you’ s face fell slightly; he seemed almost hurt. It took him a second to respond, “I, uh, I guess not.”
That was when Elektra cut in, explaining to Logan where he was and how she’d found him and Deadpool. While he seemed to only half listen, he got up and found the nearest bottle of Gambit’s booze and started drinking it.
When Deadpool woke up it was a completely different side of weird, you hadn’t had the pleasure of coming across a Deadpool variant, but you’d heard how odd they were, and unfortunately for you, you thought they were exaggerating.
After annoying literally everyone in the room, the Deadpool variant all got you to somehow agree to help him and Wolverine get back to the TVA to save his timeline, as well as a sneak attack on Cassandra Nova. The whole time Logan watched you from the corner of his eye.
He couldn’t completely convince himself it was you. The last time he’d seen you, you were lying dead on the front lawn of the school, killed by a large group of humans, along with almost everyone at the mansion. You were covered in blood and cold by the time he’d gotten there. He’d held onto you until the coroner was nearly begging to take you away.
Logan remembered almost everything about you. Your favorite movie, what food you hated, and even the feel of your hand in his. But when you looked at him with little to no recognition in your eyes, his heart could’ve broken all over again.
You had no idea the conflicting feelings he’d had while you sat only a few feet away. You looked practically the same, maybe older than you were when you’d died in his world, he was older too, maybe you just didn’t want to be with an old man and were pretending not to know him. He was the worst Wolverine after all, he wouldn’t blame you.
But then there were some things you did that reminded him of his version of you, the way your laugh sounded exactly the same, how you sat the same way in your chair, and you even made the same face when you’d taken a drink of Gambit’s whiskey as when you’d sip his occasionally while the two of you sat on the couch in the mansion watching some movie one of the others had put on.
It was you, just, one that apparently hadn’t fallen in love with Logan Howlett. Logan himself couldn’t help but wonder if that had been your reason for being sent here, but thought better of it, deciding he'd probably never have that kind of impact on any kind of world.
After a successful attack on Cassandra and her small army, Deadpool and Wolverine were gone, and you hadn’t expected to ever see them again. Then Cassandra almost destroyed every timeline to exist, and you’d thought for sure those two variants had gotten themselves killed.
But then the TVA came for you and brought you to said Deadpool variants world, which he had successfully and somehow saved with Wolverine’s help. You couldn’t help but notice Logan’s shirt missing this time around. Almost cursing yourself for not trying harder to go to Xavier’s school when you were younger, having a chance to meet your world’s Logan. A man’s abs can do that to a woman.
“Happy to not be in the void and all, but why am I here?”, you asked, eyeing the agents around you and taking in the cracked subway station.
“I thought I’d give a little gift to Wolvie here,” Deadpool replied in an overly enthusiastic manner, throwing an arm around Logan who instantly pushed him away.
“I’m not a gift to give you dumb fuck,” you replied, crossing your arms over your chest.
Deadpool ignored your obvious distain and continued, “Well I figured since he lost you in his world and you never falling in love in your world caused his death that you could stay here with us!”.
Your eyes widened and you had to think about what he’d said for a moment, “I-I got him killed? I got Logan and those other mutants killed?”.
Logan couldn’t focus on the other details once his name left your mouth; he hadn’t heard you say that in almost a decade.
You on the other hand turned to the woman beside you that looked to be in charge.
“Is that the reason I was sent there, because I didn’t fall in love with Logan Howlett and he died because of it?”, you asked, you felt like you could be sick.
The woman sighed, almost regretful, “Yes, it was,” she finally answered you. “Without your help of your mutation those mutants did not survive that attack on the school.”
“Oooooo, trauma plot twist,” Deadpool practically squealed.
“Shut the fuck up!”, you snapped back, making Deadpool whisper a bashful, “Sorry,” and take a step back.
The TVA agents left shortly after, and that was how you found yourself living in a small apartment with Wade, Logan, and the craziest old lady you’d ever met, Blind Al.
Wade and she shared a room as weird as it was, you were given the spare room Blind Al reluctantly let you use, as it was now formerly her grow room, and Logan elected to sleep on the couch.
You settled in somewhat nicely, you still felt awkward in a world that wasn’t yours living with a doofus that you'd grown somewhat fond of and a man you got killed in his other life, but you had new friends, ones that didn’t have a huge chance of dying every day so that was a plus.
Yukio and Ellie had gravitated towards you, you were somewhat close in age, with them being early twenties and you in your somewhat late twenties, they reminded you of your younger sibling’s friends from back home in your previous world.
So, when they invited you to go out a month after you settled in, you couldn’t say no, it would get you out of the house at least, you wouldn’t have to sit and listen to Wade and Logan argue or endure Logan’s kicked puppy look when he thought you weren’t looking.
You felt awful you weren’t the you he thought you were, and you knew it was nothing you could control but after Wade let it slip what had happened to you in Logan’s world you couldn’t imagine how you’d feel if the roles were reversed.
So, to hopefully be able to forget about everything for a few hours you got ready, doing some easy makeup and hair, you put on a cute outfit you’d bought earlier in the week, Yukio had begged you to go shopping after finding out you didn’t own anything for “going out” yet on this world.
You relented and picked out a skirt, top, tights, and boots, it was simple yet cute enough to not be mistaken as any old outfit.
When you’d exited your bedroom in your shared apartment shortly before Yukio and Ellie were due to come get you, Wade looked up from whatever the hell he was doing on his phone, which could be anything from porn to angry birds.
His eyes widened slightly, “Got a date?”, he asked, only slightly feigning shock.
Logan had looked up immediately at the mention of a date, he was sipping a bottle of whiskey at the kitchen table. His eyes traveled over your outfit when he thought you were busy glaring at Wade.
“Not that its your business merc but no, I’m going out with Yukio and Ellie,” you stated, tossing a lip balm you had in your hand to your small purse.
“Girls nightttt,” Wade sang, only making you sigh.
As if a divine intervention interrupted there was a knock on the door and when you opened it you found the two girls standing there waiting.
“Hi Wade!”, Yukio exclaimed waving at him.
Wade leaned back in his seat to look around you at Yukio, “Hi Yukio!”.
“Come on,” you told them, moving to leave but a hand on your shoulder made you turn around. It was Wade.
“Now honey,” he began, “don’t take drinks from strangers, don’t go off alone, and don’t hook up with anyone. You know what they say about beer goggles, you’ll be waking up next to the crypt keeper.”
While you rolled your eyes and pushed Wade’s hand off your shoulder although you knew he really did care. Logan on the other hand clenched his jaw. You weren’t his and he knew that, but Wade’s last comment set his teeth on edge.
“I’m a big girl Wade, but thanks,” you told him, turning around and leaving this time without so much as a glimpse Logan’s way.
When the door shut Wade spoke again, “She’s gonna get picked up by every hottie in the club in that outfit. Did you see her legs Peanut?”.
Wade then almost immediately flinched when he felt glass shatter on the back of his head, the alcohol in the now broken bottle staining the back of his My Little Pony shirt.
He didn’t even have to look back to imagine the look on Logan’s face, “Gotcha,” was all Wade replied, picking out a rather large glass shard from the back of his neck.
…
It was hours later when you were so drunk you couldn’t feel the cold outside, but you sure felt good on the inside. The only bad thing was that the other girls wanted to go to another club, and your social battery was just about gone.
You three stumbled out of the club, Yukio and you giggled at something Ellie had yelled at some perv leering at you when you’d walked out. Stopping the other two from turning the opposite way to another club, you spoke rather loudly despite being out of the crowd and loud music.
“I-I think I’m gonna go home! You girls go!” you told them, making Yukio frown.
“Don’t walk home by yourself, call Wade or something,” Ellie commented.
You nodded thoughtfully before gasping, “I’ll call Logan, Wade is doing butt stuff with Vanessa tonight!”.
Your loud comment sent Yukio into a giggling fit and made a guy near you wince, maybe he’d done butt stuff too.
Ellie only nodded, rolling her eyes as you pulled your phone from your purse, scrolling through the very few numbers you’d had, Wade had gotten both you and Logan phones soon after arriving, claiming he needed to be able to send you both funny videos every day. Which were no doubt ignored by Logan.
Pressing on Logan’s contact, you put the phone up to your ear, listening to it ring only once before the call was answered.
“You alright?”, was the first thing out of Logan’s mouth and you couldn’t help but laugh.
“Oh, I’m great!” you replied, “but Ellie doesn’t want me walking home alone and Wade is doing butt stuff so will you come? I’m only a few blocks from home.”
The whole sentence was sort of rushed and you thought maybe Logan hadn’t heard you correctly because the line went silent.
You were about to repeat yourself when Logan stopped you, “I’m coming,” he told you, you could hear him shuffling around and the sound of a door closing, “What’s the name?”.
Despite having been in the club for well over an hour you had to look up and squint at then brightly lit sign, “Uhhhh,” you mumbled into to the phone, before your eyes finally focused, “House of Yes!”.
You could’ve sworn Logan chuckled, “Be there soon,” was all he said before hanging up.
“Escort secured,” you told the two girls, slipping your phone back into your purse. “He’ll be here soon,” you added, attempting to replicate his gravely tone, only succeeding in making yourself cough and sending Yukio into a laughing fit.
It was only 15 minutes of standing around before Logan showed up, you spotted him first, having turned yourself that way to look for him. He was dressed in his usual jeans, button up, and undershirt, along with a leather jacket he’d picked up recently.
He looked good you had to admit, nearly every girl outside, and even some guys turned to look at him when he walked past. He didn’t give them any sort of acknowledgement though, earning some disappointed looks from a few of them when he walked up to you.
What was it Wade said about beer goggles? Logan was hot without alcohol though, so you shook off the thought.
“Ready to go?”, he asked, eyes scanning over you, not to be a perv but to make sure everything was the same as when you left, and it was, save for the way you swayed slightly and the way you smiled at him like you were so happy to see him. He thought he’d never see that again, but he has to remind himself for what felt like that hundredth time that it wasn’t you, not his you at least.
You nodded, turning around to hug both of the girls, telling them to be safe, although you knew Ellie wouldn’t put up with anyone’s shit.
“Bye Y/N! Bye Logan!”, Yukio exclaimed, waving at you both before grabbing Ellie’s hand as they turned the opposite way.
“Alright, come on,” Logan said, taking a step away from you and waiting for you to follow him to keep walking, he made sure to keep you closest to the buildings, it wouldn’t be too great to have you fall in the street in front of a car.
It was silent for a couple minutes, you stumbled every so often and Logan’s hand always shot out, ready to catch you, but you always righted yourself, giggling as you did, and Logan found himself smiling at the sound.
You caught him smiling after a couple times, narrowing your eyes, “What’re you smiling at grumpy?”, you asked, voice anything but angry.
“Grumpy?”, he asked, raising an eyebrow at you.
“Yeah, it’s what I call you sometimes in my head, Mr. Grumpy is also a good one,” you told him in a very serious tone.
“Mr. Grumpy,” Logan found himself repeating, only making you laugh, which made you stumble, nearly knocking into someone walking the opposite way of you both. Logan instinctively wrapped an arm around your shoulders, pulling you away from the almost collision and into his side.
You immediately noticed he was warm, you could feel it even with his multiple layers on, it was growing colder now outside as the days went on and you yourself knew without the alcohol, you’d probably be cold but here he was, a personal heater.
“Are you actually just a werewolf?” you asked him, making him stop walking completely and turn towards you, removing his arm from your shoulders, making you pout a bit.
“I am not a werewolf,” he told you seriously.
You groaned, “Okay but you’re really warm, you have claws, you can run on all fours, and you’ve got those little…,” you trailed off, putting your pointer fingers up on each side of your head, attempting to mimic the little swishes his hair made.
Personally, you had no idea if his hair just did that (because he’s a werewolf), or if he styled it that way. You couldn’t decide which option to like more.
When Logan didn’t seem to understand what you’d said, you reached up, lightly running a finger along one of the swoops of his hair. You jumped a bit when his hand caught your wrist as you were pulling your hand back.
There was a look in his eyes you didn’t recognize but it soon disappeared as he let you go, “Sorry,” he quickly said. “Reflex.”
You shrugged, “No harm done,” you told him, and his eyes softened at the way you brushed off his behavior from years of enduring nothing even remotely close to the gentle way you’d just touched him.
Maybe you didn’t think so badly of him. You always seemed so wary, afraid to make him angry, to say something wrong, like he was a ticking time bomb. It put him on edge and made him want to steer clear of you, he didn’t want to scare you off either. But now, standing there staring at you while you just smiled at him made him relax a bit.
“Let’s go,” you suddenly said, beginning to walk away from him. He was back at your side in moments, and you found yourself bumping into him every so often, apologizing every time you did.
Finally, he wrapped an arm around you again, pulling you back into the warmth of his side. You smiled when he did, stumbling slightly but he held you up easily, not letting you fall.
“Thanks for coming to get me,” you told him when you were only a block from home.
“No problem,” he replied, keeping his eyes on the sidewalk ahead.
There were a few moments of silence before you began to giggle suddenly, Logan’s brow furrowed as he looked down at you, “What?” he asked, hopefully not regretting asking.
“So, you’re not a werewolf?” you asked, looking up at him.
Logan groaned looking away from you, “No, and if you keep asking, you’ll regret it.”
“Ooo what are you gonna do?” you mocked, poking his side.
“Wouldn’t you like to know sweetheart,” he replied, making you stumble at the nickname.
“I would,” you challenged, after righting yourself with the help of Logan’s arm around you.
Logan regarded you for a moment before shaking his head, “You’re drunk, another time.”
“Ughhhhh,” you groaned, “Tell me!”.
“Not a chance,” Logan replied, smirking a bit. He’d been drinking since you left and was buzzed himself, he couldn’t help but smile at your behavior.
The you he’d known had always acted like this, at least when intoxicated. You were whiny, clumsy, and clingy. The way your fingers gripped the back of his jacket to stay up right made his heart ache though and his smile fell.
You noticed his attitude change and became concerned, “You okay?” you asked, attempting to stop walking, but Logan kept you going.
“Fine” he replied, his hold on you loosening slightly, you couldn’t help but notice.
So, you stopped, much to Logan’s dismay, moving to stand in front of him, swaying slightly as you very determinedly looked him in the eye.
“What’s wrong, did I do something?” you asked, genuine concern in your voice, he could almost feel his heart crack just slightly.
“No, it’s…,” Logan began, his tongue getting tied, he was never great at emotions, that’s why he drank so much. You didn’t have to feel anything then.
“I’m listening,” you reassured, resisting the urge to take his hand.
“You’re so much like…like her, like you,” Logan finally said, not really meeting your eye. “I thought I could ignore it, but I can’t, you even smell the same.”
Logan had rendered you with nothing to say, could you truly comfort him? Reassure him? You felt yourself sobering up a bit at the thought.
It was a few moments of silence before you found your words, “I know this has been shitty for you too, and I'm sorry I haven't been a better friend. Honestly sometimes I think you hate the fact that I'm not her, me her, whatever...that you hate me. But then you do things like this and it makes me think otherwise. I guess I just don't know how to...approach you, Logan."
Logan felt his heart drop at the word “friend”, and the thought he made you feel inadequate. God he really was stupid enough to think he might have a chance with this version of you.
But he found himself lifting a hand to your cheek, feeling your skin heat up beneath his fingers, “I could never hate you, not in this universe, not in any, got it? Its my fault, for pushing that onto you, making you feel like you have to be someone you’re not.”
You couldn’t help but laugh slightly, “We’re both just fucked up in our own special way, aren’t we?”.
Logan nodded, dropping his hand, but you caught it in your own, “It’s not your fault either you know, I personally blame whatever bitchass overlord of the universe did this.”
Logan had to keep himself from solely focusing on the way your hand wrapped around his, “But…,” he went to argue.
You put up a hand to stop him, “Enough with the self-pity Howlett, its unbecoming of a man of your nature.”
“My nature?” Logan asked, titling his head at you.
“Yes, the nature of being absurdly attractive,” you admitted, looking away from him as you spoke, attempting to walk away, but he pulled you back, almost into his chest, but he kept you a few inches away, still concerned with scaring you.
“Absurdly?” Logan asked, the smirk returning to his face.
You swallowed hard, “Did I say that? I meant unappealing, completely unsightly.”
Your attempt at saving your future sober self from your drunk self was failing miserably, but Logan gave in after a few seconds, shrugging as he turned, placing his arm around you once more, guiding you towards the apartment building you could finally see in the distance.
“Whatever you say kid,” he told you.
This was the most at home you two had felt in a while, and when you sat next to each other at breakfast in the morning, Logan passing you whatever you needed when you’d asked, Wade gasped dramatically.
“Did you two also engage in butt stuff last night, or is that not your cup of whiskey Wolvie?” Wade asked.
This earned him a fork to the forehead, easily tossed across the table by Logan.
The way you laughed made Logan’s heart skip a beat instead of crack again. For the first time in quite a while he felt hope, and if being here with you meant putting up with Wade’s dumbass mouth, he could make an exception just this once.
A/N: Thank you so much for reading! I felt like Tumblr was seriously lacking in Logan fluff so here ya go!
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