Author's Note: hello, everybody! This is my new fanfic for Captain America because wo doesn't love Bucky? You gotta be crazy not to love Bucky. I was mostly ambivalent toward him in the first film, but after seeing him in Captain America 2 and learning his story between films, I knew I had to do something. So here it is! This story is a dual-storyline, one in the past and one in the present, with the present storyline set a year after Captain America 2 and the storyline of the past set in between Captain America 2 and the present. So let's hop to it! Enjoy! Let me know what you think!
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Once in the Winter's Tide
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Chapter One
One Last Mission
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The concrete wept condensation that slicked down his back as he leaned hard against the compound wall, trying to shove away the searing in his shoulder, the merciless pain in his gut. Blackness pulsed all around him, rife with shards of ice-cold fear scraping beneath his clammy skin. Strange. He'd never felt fear on one of his missions before, except…except in that moment when the support struts on the SHIELD Insight Helicarrier had collapsed, pinning him to the floor. Then death had whispered in his ear like a shadow lover, a serpentine hiss of failure and pain—pain even worse than the new gunshot wound in his gut, pain like the fiery ice of cryo-sleep when his handlers had shoved him into that coffin and sent winter pumping through him like death.
He pressed his hand hard to the ragged hole in his belly. Hot blood spilled over his fingers. For anyone else, it would've been fatal. But he was different from other men, stronger, faster, better. This would heal…but it would also get in his way. He had a mission to complete. He'd sworn after the Insight Helicarrier incident that he wouldn't take on another task, another mission, until he'd made sense of the memories whispering through the back of his skull.
But this one was different. He'd sworn not to take another mission, but he owed a debt to someone. That debt had driven him to this underground compound, to retrieve something invaluable. He wouldn't go back until it was safe again.
Which meant he was going to need help, because he was running out of time.
His metal hand, covered by a black leather glove, reached into an inner pocket of his jacket and pulled out a small, untraceable cell phone. It had one use and one use only; he'd set it up that way to ensure no one could use it against him. The soldiers protecting his current target didn't have the means to torture the proper code from him, and once a code was sent—correct or not—an EMP surge would fry the phone's circuits and leave it unusable.
The code took mere seconds to punch in and send via text. Then the phone crackled, sparked, and went dark. He stuck it back in his pocket—no point in leaving evidence behind for the guards to discover.
Forcing himself to his feet, he moved on down the darkened corridor, ears and eyes open for enemies, blood soaking his jacket.
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In a cheery, industrial-sized kitchen the ovens had been turned off and were now cooling down for the night. The air was redolent with the sugary, gooey aroma of chocolate chip cookies, the tang of lemon bars, and the sweetness of freshly-made, cooling caramel drizzle. The cookie-shaped clock on the wall ticked to ten-thirty-four. A bedazzled, cookie-dough-brown Smartphone buzzed on a smooth kitchen counter of polished walnut. Slender fingers picked it up and touched the screen. New text flashed across the screen. When the text opened, a message blinked into view.
Jack Frost is in the hands of the stars
The message flashed twice before disappearing. Setting the phone down, the recipient moved to the walnut cabinets under the long counter. Opening one revealed several dozen sacks of different flours labeled with multicolored paper blossoms. Inside a white bag with a blue China aster label in the very back of the cupboard, questing fingers drew out a slim, black tablet computer sealed away in a Ziploc bag to protect it from the sack of winter barley flour. Touching the screen brought it to life. Instructions appeared within seconds of waking the tablet and then vanished again.
Parking garage, Verdiers St. and 4th, Roanoke VA
When the lights in the kitchen had gone dark and the doors shut, the ovens were cold, the bag of barley flour was back in its place, the cabinets were closed once more, and everything was silent and still.
A green Dodge mini-van pulled out of the parking lot. In the back, two children slept clutching backpacks—one with Elsa from Frozen, one with Iron Man. On the floor at their feet was another bag with Thor's hammer. A pack with the dinosaurs from The Land Before Time sat on the bench-seat beside a car-seat holding a sleeping three-year-old.
Up front, a mutant drove with fingers curled tight around the wheel, knuckles white in the passing glow of the street lights. On the passenger seat was the tablet and a Browning Hi-Power with several magazine clips. On the floor was a backpack the mutant hadn't packed or even looked into. The mini-van's tires crunched over the GPS device that had once sat on the dash, destroying any chance that it could be used to track the vehicle.
It probably didn't matter. Once they got to the parking garage in Roanoke, they were getting a new car, courtesy of the person who'd sent the original text message. But instructions were instructions. Lives could depend on obeying them. Precious lives, like the three children sleeping in the backseat of the car.
And besides, it was nearly two hours to Roanoke. Who knew what might happen before then?
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Natasha Romanoff—birth name, Natalya Romanova, codename Black Widow—strode down the hall toward the CEO's office of Stark Industries. The Stark Industries building gleamed like a giant of chrome and white marble with electric cables and high-tech circuits for veins and nerves. The former SHIELD agent smoothed down her black skirt. The point of the somewhat matronly woman's suit, as well as the severe but reserved makeup and hair, was to give off the impression of a driven business woman who focused so much on looking mature and coming across as a corporate threat that she wouldn't know a Glock from a Magnum.
It was all a show for the Stark Industries staff. Tony Stark, Pepper Potts, and their two guests knew very well that Natalie Roman, as she'd been known during her brief stint working undercover at Stark Industries for Director Fury, was nothing if not a threat. A woman didn't become one of SHIELD's best agents on her looks alone.
Her fingers curled around the large, manila envelope in her grip. She'd told a friend of hers that pulling on certain threads might not be a good idea, but Steve had wanted to do it anyway. She supposed she could understand. If it had been Clint, for example, she'd have gone above and beyond what even SHIELD might expect to protect him, to find him, to help him. That was her one weakness, her Achilles' heel. Very few people knew about it. One had until semi-recently been rotting in an Asgardian prison somewhere in a far galaxy, and until two years ago she'd fully expected him to rot there for the rest of his pseudo-immortal life, since Thor hadn't given her the satisfaction of putting a bullet in his head. The other three were people she trusted with the information: Director Fury, Agent Coulson, and Agent Hill. Agent Coulson was dead, so that left two people in the world who knew her only weakness.
The old Natasha might not have been okay with that, but the one who'd saved the world with Iron Man once upon a time, the Avengers, and even Captain America himself…that Natasha was okay with trusting them just a little.
Steve had trusted those same people, and Natasha, with one of his weaknesses: Lieutenant James Buchanan "Bucky" Barnes. The Winter Soldier. The HYDRA hitman with the mechanical arm and a mostly-wiped memory. He'd put a bullet through Natasha's lower left abdomen once to assassinate an engineer she'd been protecting. He'd put another bullet through her left shoulder about a year ago, trying to kill her this time. He'd shot Cap in the thigh, shoulder, and twice in the abdomen trying to stop the super-soldier from preventing the murders of over a million people.
He'd also saved Steve from drowning after Steve fell from the Insight Helicarrier.
After that, he'd dropped off the grid. Steve had gone looking for him with a friend, Sam, codename Falcon, former paramilitary rescue. Tasha had it on good authority that so far, Steve hadn't had much luck. That was why he was here at Stark Industries today—asking for help from Iron Man. Except she also had it on good authority that whatever Tony would dig up would be out of date, thanks to the manila envelope in her hand.
Happy Hogan, Stark's bodyguard and chauffer, half rose from his seat beside a television playing an episode of Downton Abbey when she clicked her way into the waiting lounge in her stiletto heels. She just looked at him. Happy was good at his job, and he'd helped her—if you could call it that—take out some goons guarding a warehouse full of important technology back when she'd been undercover working alongside Tony. But Happy wasn't a SHIELD agent, or even a government agent. He couldn't take her. She'd kicked him around the block once when they'd sparred in the boxing ring. So she just flashed him a smile and he sighed, rolled his eyes, and pressed a button that no doubt told Tony Stark she was here.
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The drive to Roanoke had been fraught with tension but relatively uneventful. No one was looking for them…yet.
Swapping out the mini-van for a periwinkle SUV, they'd made it to Philly, where they'd received a black jeep to take to Manhattan—still a wreck after the attack a couple of years ago by aliens or whatever the Avengers had gone up against, but at least it was drivable now.
Now came the hard part.
In the jeep in a metal trunk in the backseat had been four things that had added a fresh layer of terror to the night's adventure: a Smartphone with an Iron Man sticker on the back of it; a Stark Industries issued portable DVD cam-and-recorder; a new black tablet (the first and second tablets had been disposed of at the appropriate drop-off points); and a custom-made, child-sized Kevlar vest. A silver flashdrive dangled from the new set of keys. The moment the tablet screen came to life, the text had ordered, Parking garage, Stark Industries Headquarters, NY.
And here they were. There had to be some kind of tracker or something in the tablet because as soon as the jeep parked in the multi-story garage, the screen flickered on again and new words appeared.
Record the message to flashdrive
Give the vest, flashdrive, and phone to Will
Put him in the elevator
Go to safe-house SC-B-554
Wait for instructions
Shaking hands obeyed. If the voice in the recording trembled a little, the sleepy children in the back of the jeep didn't notice. Then the jeep backed out of the parking space and drove in search of the elevator.
William Gardner, age five years and seven months, was Iron Man's biggest fan. Maybe that was why he'd been chosen to infiltrate Stark Industries—with a little help, of course. With a hug that squeezed him breathless and a dozen kisses all over his face, he was sent into the elevator. At nine-thirty in the morning, there weren't many people around. He was alone in the elevator.
The jeep didn't drive away until the doors dinged shut.
Feeling very small in his custom Kevlar vest, the flashdrive on a leather cord around his neck and the Iron Man Smartphone clutched in his trembling hand, Will glanced at the phone's screen as tears pricked his eyes.
Press the 1 button
Will pressed it. With a lurch that made his tummy jump, the elevator made its descent.
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Tony, Pepper, and Steve were waiting when Natasha strolled into a marbled room furnished in white fiberglass and shiny chrome. She winked at Pepper, who smiled and rose to her feet, arms outstretched as if to hug her.
"Agent Romanoff!" They hugged. If Natasha had been in any business but espionage, she would've considered Pepper Potts a friend. "How are you? Does SHIELD need Tony for something?"
Tony scoffed. "That's not happening. Besides, I heard SHIELD fell apart faster than a shoddy Jenga tower."
"And you sound so disappointed, Mr. Stark," Natasha said, sinking into a chair near the massive chrome desk that Steve pulled out for her. She set the manila envelope on her lap and folded her ankles, tucking them slightly beneath the chair. A prim and proper pose to go with her current disguise. A quick scan of the room showed no SHIELD bugs. JARVIS, Tony's AI butler, must've found the ones from the last plant.
"My heart shattered into a million pieces when I heard," Tony said dryly. "You know what I thought? I thought to myself, 'If Fury's retired, that means I can't bug the crap out of him with my antics. What am I supposed to do with my afternoons?' So, the lovely Agent Romanoff. What are you doing here darkening my nice, shiny new doorway? You can't have Maria back, I like her."
Natasha leaned back in her chair and allowed herself a smile. "You know, I heard Agent Hill was working for you now."
"Former," Tony said. "Former Agent Hill. She's mine now. Part of my security team. How do you say 'I don't share my toys' in Latin?"
"Aw, you remembered I speak Latin."
He shrugged. "It's hard to forget a pretty girl who turned out to be working for the angry, one-eyed sourpatch kid."
The smile got slightly bigger. "So hostile, Mr. Stark. But I'm not here for you. I'm here for him." She nodded to Steve. Sandy blond brows rose and he eyed her with obvious surprise and no little wariness. The wariness stung a bit, but she put it aside. No doubt he thought she'd come to ask a favor on Director Fury's behalf. "I have some information for him."
Steve frowned and sat up a little straighter. Brows furrowing, he said, "You found something on Bucky."
She handed him the manila envelope, smiling a little wistfully when he tore it open and rifled through the series of photos. He looked so hopeful, like a kid opening the unexpected gift at Christmas. As the captain studied them, the SHIELD agent—forget this "former" stuff, SHIELD wasn't going to fall that fast or that easy—started filling him in.
"I managed to trace him as far as Roanoke, Virginia eleven months ago. Then the trail went cold. He went completely off the grid. I thought HYDRA might've gotten their hands on him, put him back in cold storage, but when he resurfaced four days ago, he wasn't keeping to his usual habits and there have been no unclaimed assassinations since some friends of mine spotted him. They haven't seen him in almost twenty-four hours, but I'm not certain that means he's gone back to ground."
Tony leaned over to get a look at the pictures Steve spread across his desk. "Roanoke again," he muttered. "I recognize that intersection, we've got an R&D lab near there. Philadelphia, City of Brotherly Love. That looks like someplace in Alaska or Canada, that's part of the boreal forest. And is that the parking garage for this building?"
Natasha offered him a casual half-shrug. "Looks like it."
The super-genius scowled. "JARVIS, is there a reason security didn't pick up on a breach on…What's the time stamp on this photo?" Glancing at the numbers, he growled, "This was yesterday, for crying out loud! You know, if I'm going to just douse my money with gasoline and set it on fire, I like to know about it first; what do I pay my security team for again?" He focused on Natasha. "On second thought, maybe I'll give Maria back."
"Don't blame her, Stark. The Winter Soldier is a ghost. He's even gotten the best of me once or twice. The only reason my friends managed to take these photos is because a friend of a friend programmed an algorithm looking specifically for the Winter Soldier's face. And before you ask, yes, he managed to hack security feeds for most of the major cities in New England."
"I want his number," Tony said. "I need to scoop him up before Fury or some other government bureaucracy puts him through one of their brainwashing camps and turns him into an evil genius bent on world domination."
"Not going to happen, Mr. Stark. At least let the kid finish school first. Besides, Mr. Forge doesn't work for the government and probably never will. But that's not important. What are important are these photos. The thing I'm trying to figure out is—"
"Is why he's here at all," Steve interjected softly, staring at the glossy 8"x12" images. "What's Bucky up to? None of these places have any real strategic value and you said he hasn't assassinated or even hurt anyone. But look at him." Steve pointed to the dark but nondescript clothes, the low-brimmed hats, the dark scarves that weren't at all out of place in the middle of early April in New England. "He's on a job."
Tasha nodded. "Yes, he is. The question is what kind of job? And for whom?"
There was a beep, a crackle of static from the intercom built into Tony's desk, and a hum as the lights momentarily dimmed before brightening again. Tony frowned at the intercom, Pepper frowned at the lights, and Steve and Natasha eyed the door. Sudden tension prickled along the Black Widow's spine and across her shoulders as she realized that the distant babble of Happy's television show had suddenly gone silent.
She shifted her weight forward just a touch and pressed a hand against her back as if to pop her spine. The outline of her gun was a soft mound under her blazer. She noticed Steve reaching for his shield, which sat on the floor propped against the wall. Pepper reached for her defensive spray and Taser, which—Natasha noted with approval—she kept on a chain attached to the purse near her feet.
A cultured, slightly tinny British voice came through the intercom. "Sir, there's been a security breach."
Natasha pulled out her gun. Pepper grabbed her Taser. Steve picked up his shield.
"What sort of security breach?" Tony asked softly, rapidly pressing buttons on a pad near his computer. "HYDRA? Random crackpot goons? Rival companies who think playing copycat will make them more friends on the playground?"
There was a moment of silence, then JARVIS replied, "It's a little boy, sir."
A longer stretch of silence. Then, "Come again?"
"It's a little boy. Perhaps five or six years old. He appears to be unarmed—"
"Is he a killer robot?"
Natasha shot Tony a look, but he seemed to actually be serious. The disembodied British voice replied, "I doubt it, sir. As I was saying, he appears unarmed, though he is holding a cellular phone and a flashdrive. He's wearing a bulletproof vest."
"Could be a bomb," Natasha said, rising to her feet. Steve shot her a look like he thought she was crazy. One day she'd have to tell him about some of the child assassins she'd met in Russia back in the old days. But for now that would have to wait.
JARVIS said, "I don't think so, Agent Romanoff. I've scanned both phone and flashdrive. They're nothing out of the ordinary except the phone appears to have a microchip inside to render it untraceable. I'm having difficulty following the path of origin to whoever was sending the child instructions."
Tony stood up. "It's a kid and someone's sending him instructions via phone?"
"Yes, sir. The boy appears to be in some distress."
The intercom on the chrome desk beeped. Tony pressed the button. "Yeah?"
"Boss," Happy Hogan said, and to Natasha's ears he sounded more than a little freaked out. "There's a kid out here who says he has to see Captain Rogers like, ASAP. I don't know how he got past security—"
"Send him in," Tony muttered. To Natasha he added, "You think you're gonna need a gun against a five-year-old? Seriously?"
One slim, auburn brow lifted in an elegant arch. "I was shot by a five-year-old once." She waited in the ensuing silence for someone to say something or for the door to open. She wasn't sure what they might say or ask, so she was more than a little relieved when the door opened and a little boy with skin the color of milky coffee and curly black hair done up in a million little braids walked in.
His jeans and Iron Man t-shirt looked liked they'd been slept in, and the Kevlar vest and the kid's hair were both covered in dust. The knees and seat of his jeans were filthy. Tears had cut tracks in the grime on his cheeks. He held out the phone and flashdrive with shaking hands. Made a little whimpering sound as more tears spilled down his cheeks.
"Are you St-St-Steve?" The boy asked, daring to take a small step into the room. Steve nodded, got up. "I'm s'posed to give you these," the kid added as Steve knelt in front of him. He took the flashdrive and phone. Glanced at the screen. Natasha caught a glimpse of words.
His name is Will. Keep him safe.
Then the screen went dark.
Tony frowned, eyeing the flashdrive Steve handed to him. After a moment's hesitation he popped it into a USB port with a tersely muttered, "JARVIS, scan it."
"Scanning, sir."
While JARVIS worked, Steve put a hand on the kid's shoulder. "How did you get in here?"
Will sniffled and scrubbed a hand over his eyes. "Jack told me how. He said I had to give you a message."
"Who's Jack?" Steve asked gently.
"My friend," the boy said. "He's gonna help us. He promised."
Trying to keep her voice as gentle and cajoling as Steve—she didn't know much about dealing with unhappy children in a situation like this—Natasha interjected, "Help you do what?"
"One file detected, sir," JARVIS said before Will could say anything. "Encrypted MP4 file, no viruses found. Decrypting now. The video should be ready in three…two…one…"
Tony swept his fingers across his desk when lines of blue light appeared on the silvery surface. A holographic projection of a massive computer screen flashed from the desktop to the white wall on one side of the room. A touch of a button dimmed the lights to make the projection easier to see. Onscreen in the middle of a video-player window was a woman's face. Messy, dark auburn hair framed a tired-looking face. Exhaustion bruises shadowed under honey-gold eyes framed by a pair of so-called hipster glasses. Behind her, they could see the interior of a car and three shadowy lumps in the backseat. One of them was Will. One was a little girl in a car-seat who could've been his sister. The third was an Asian girl a few years older than Will, asleep and cuddling a backpack with a bug-eyed snowman on it.
Will sniffled again. "That's my mom and my sisters."
The adults exchanged a glance before Tony pressed PLAY.
"Captain Rogers," the woman in the video said. "I don't have a lot of time. My name is Sally Gardner. Please take care of my son. His name is William. A mutual friend of ours, Jack—he said you call him 'Bucky'—told me to send Will to you with this message. Jack said if we ever needed help we could come to you, but he wasn't sure how easy it would be to contact you. We need help, Captain Rogers. This group, HYDRA…Jack says you've dealt with them before. They…" Tears welled up in the woman's tired eyes and spilled down her pale cheeks. "They're after my family. Jack said they were recruiting mutants, kidnapping us. They t—"
She cut off abruptly, glancing over her shoulder, eyes wide. Natasha saw she was actually holding her breath, as if that might help hide her from HYDRA and whoever else might be after her. Turn back to the camera, she said quickly, "We have to leave. They could be here any second. Jack said to tell you that the rendezvous is at the tipping point. He said you'd know what that meant. He needs your help. And he said to tell you that we'll be waiting at the beginning of the line." Swallowing, the woman added, "Please, Captain Rogers. Please help us. Jack said we could trust you. Please."
The video ended and Natasha, Tony, and Pepper stared at Steve, who'd been gaping at the screen ever since this woman—Sally Whoever—had uttered the name "Bucky." William had latched onto the super-soldier's arm and had yet to let go. Steve swallowed. Squeezed his eyes shut tight once before opening them again. Then he got to his feet.
"The tipping point?" Natasha asked softly. "Do you know where that is?"
Steve nodded. "Yeah. It's where the Winter Soldier saved my life." He shook his head. "But what could he possibly need my help with? Protecting that woman? He could get her off the grid faster than I could."
Will tugged on Steve's hand. "He's gotta get Jamie. The bad guys took him away."
Natasha settled her forearms on her knees as she leaned forward. Still pretending to be as gentle and child-savvy as Steve seemed to be, she asked, "Who's Jamie?"
"My brother."
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He staggered once before slipping soundlessly into the air duct, a shadow along the wall. The vent made zero sound as he pulled it back into place behind him. A brief scan of the rim of the duct showed him no blood marked his passage. Good. He could take an hour, remove the bullet lodged in his belly, and maybe catch a few minutes of sleep before heading out of the compound. He wouldn't make it on his own, so he needed to bring back reinforcements.
Even if the thought lodged like a bone in his throat.
Crawling along the wall on one elbow while he plastered a hand to his stomach, he maneuvered several feet into the duct, turning a few corners, before he knew he'd be relatively safe from detection. Propping himself up and bracing his boots against the opposite wall of the ventilation shaft, he leaned back against the wall and opened his jacket to better examine the wound.
The bleeding had almost completely stopped, thanks to the exacerbated coagulating factor in his blood. Rolling up the black t-shirt sticky with blood, he studied the bullet hole through the single, uncracked lens of his night-vision goggles. He didn't have much in the way of supplies, but he always carried a few necessities. Removing the slug took about ten minutes of teeth-clenching, sweat-drenched pain like a bad dream of fire and acid. When it was over he folded a thick pad of gauze and taped it in place over the wound. If he made it out of here and had some time, he'd patch it up properly instead of giving it a simple field-dressing.
If he made it out…No, not if. When. He would rendezvous with Rogers, fulfill the mission, and get back to Whistle-Stop, and then…Well, and then he had some choices to make. He'd already made a big one: calling in Captain Rogers; the guy who claimed to be his best friend since childhood; the guy he vaguely remembered in a fuzzy, dreamy sort of way. He'd made the choice to trust Rogers with this mission. Once it was over, he had to decide whether he could trust himself with the next step regarding the target and the mission handler.
That's how he had to think of all this—targets and missions and handlers. Anything else would rip into him like icy claws, slicing through the thin veneer of indifference he'd used so far to even accomplish this much. He wasn't James Buchanan Barnes right now, whoever that was; he had no memory of that man. He wasn't Rogers' friend Bucky. He wasn't even Jack, a new name for a new life.
Right now he was the Winter Soldier and he had a mission.
He had to get Jamie back.
For a moment a cold slither of fear snaked down his spine. He clenched his teeth and shoved it away. He was going to get Jamie back. He was going to bring the boy home again. No one was going to stop him. Especially not HYDRA.
A soft vibration from his untraceable cell phone buzzed against his chest. He bit back a sigh and pulled the phone out of his pocket. A message from the enemy flashed on the screen.
You are running out of time, Winter Soldier.
In 72 hours, your target will be dead.
Give yourself up and we might make a deal.
He knew better. HYDRA didn't make deals. He ought to have known—he'd worked for them long enough. Sliding the phone back into his pocket, he let his head fall back against the shaft wall. He closed his eyes. Steadied his breathing. Pushed down the pulsing burn in his abdomen. He'd take ten minutes to doze, a trick he'd picked up…somewhere. He couldn't remember. It didn't matter.
Just before sleep claimed him, he thought he smelled warm chocolate chip cookies. His lips twitched for a split-second in a flickering ghost of a smile.
Don't worry, he thought tiredly at the mutant he hoped was at this very moment driving to a safe-house in Ohio. In his mind, he saw the quiet streets of Whistle-Stop, the cheerful storefront of the Van Schweetz bakery. Will's pit-bull lounging outside by the door, hoping for a customer to drop some crumbs. Jamie's bike propped against the wall. Flowers in the store's window-boxes. He could almost smell the freesias. Don't worry, Sally. I'll bring him back.
And he was asleep, and in seconds was dreaming of the past.
