Leverage
Chapter 1: The Astronomer
xXx
The heat was unbearable, sweat collecting around the bandana under his helmet. Captain Steven Rogers was not amused, even with his best friend in the seat beside him cracking jokes as the Hum-V bounced along the desert path. Corporal Dugan was in the front passenger seat, Pvt. Jones behind the wheel. They were rendezvousing with Mortia and Falsworth fifty miles down this very road and after that, Captain Rogers and his Howling Commandos were headed home; their final tour done in exactly forty-eight hours.
"I'm thinking a beer and a burger at McRory's pub once we get state side." Sgt. James 'Bucky' Barnes said over the roar of the engine.
"Sounds good to me." Steve replied leaning forward.
"You guys oughta come out to Brooklyn sometime. You haven't lived until you've had a burger from McRory's." Laughter carried back from the front seat.
"Sounds like a plan, Cap." Jones replied. Dugan chuckled.
"Yeah, a little red meat and an ice cold beer; sounds really good about now."
"I hear that." Bucky added.
Bucky's smile was the last thing Steve saw before the boom rattled the safety glass and sent the Hum-V into the air. Steve wasn't sure how he ended up outside of the vehicle but from his place on the ground he could see the Hum-V on it's top, wheels spinning while the undercarriage burned. Steve coughed, the dirt shifting with the bursts of his breath. Fighting against the ringing in his ears, he tried to move around, shifting to find his men. Jones and Dugan were out of sight, but Bucky caught his attention no more than fifty feet away from him.
Steve crawled toward his best friend, gritting his teeth as the pain ripped through him. He could feel the warm trickle of something liquid beneath his armor and chose to believe it was just sweat.
"Bucky," He wheezed as he struggled to make the journey to his side. "Bucky." He tried again, finally reaching him. Steve grabbed onto Bucky's vest, pulling himself closer.
Bucky was unconscious, blood dripping from his hairline down the side of his face. He was caked with dirt and sand and Steve had to force himself not to cringe at the blood pouring from the wounds; shrapnel embedded in his left arm.
"Fuck, Bucky." He gasped for breath, the ringing growing stronger. "Please jerk." He pleaded. The ringing was different now; not the kind that came when you lost a frequency in your hearing. No this was mechanical… this was a telephone.
Steve stared down at Bucky, the incessant ringing now accompanied by a buzzing vibration. He looked confused at Bucky's face, noticing his eyes were open.
"Bu…"
"Answer the phone Punk."
Steve startled awake, turning over abruptly to snatch the phone off the nightstand.
"Rogers." He answered.
xXx
The Osborne home sat in the top three floors of an upscale high rise in Manhattan. The street outside the building is filled with patrol cars, lights flashing without sound. A crowd of curious onlookers was growing on the sidewalk beyond the yellow police tape.
Detective Steve Rogers got out of his car and joined his partner, James 'Bucky' Barnes, on the short walk to the front doors of the building. "Lot'a noise for a simple home invasion. Why are we here anyway? Last I checked B and E didn't fall under Major Crimes' purview." Bucky grumbled, clearly not happy about being pulled out of bed so early in the morning.
"It does when the homeowner is Norman Osborne." Steve replied. They entered the lobby, noting the group of tenants gathered off to the side and speaking with uniformed officers. Most of them were complaining over their inconveniences. Steve shook his head at the scene, boarding the elevator alongside Bucky.
"What does it matter who owns the home? Theft is theft." Steve sighed in full agreement, but they both knew better.
"Osborne is close friends with the PC and Commissioner Fury assured Norman that he would do everything in his power to catch the thief." They emerged from the elevator onto the penthouse floor.
"Yeah, that's gonna be easier said than done." Detective Clint Barton informed them as they approached the front door. "No fingerprints, no hair, no DNA evidence. This place is showroom clean."
"Damn." Bucky cursed. Barton huffed in agreement, his face straight and unamused. Clint Barton was the kind of guy who could figure out your secrets just by observing you and it was one of the most infuriating things about him, especially since he kept his own secrets so close to the vest.
"What about the security cameras?" Steve gestured to the discrete structures near the ceiling. Clint nodded behind them and they turned to find Detective Natasha Romanoff turning away from two security guards and head their way.
"Someone spliced into the security feed remotely and inserted a loop feed."
"So nothing there either." Bucky grumbled, he really wasn't a morning person.
"We did, however, get a description of this guy." Clint added. Steve looked confused.
"Wait a minute, what? A thief smart enough to disable the cameras and good enough to not leave any physical evidence, left a witness?"
"He did more than that." Natasha replied. She gestured to a young teenage boy sitting on one of the sofas in the living room, holding a bag of ice to his cheek. "Harry Osborne, Norman Osborne's only son. He snuck out with some friends earlier in the night and while he was sneaking back in he discovered the suspect. They struggled and the perp knocked him down. Before Osborne could get back up, the suspect ran for the open balcony and dove off."
"Dove off?" Bucky questioned in disbelief. Natasha nodded.
"CSU found a cable and pulley system attached to the roof and trailing all the way down the back of the building."
"Who the hell is this guy, Batman?"
Clint snorted, but didn't reply.
Steve sighed. "What did they take?"
Clint pointed to the far corner where any empty frame sat on the floor, propped against the wall. "A reproduction print of a painting known as The Astronomer." Clint handed him a picture. "Worth a few hundred thousand."
Bucky looked at the photo over Steve's shoulder. "That's it?"
Clint nodded.
"Alright." Steve's voice changed and they all knew it was time to get to work. "I want to talk to Harry Osborne myself. Clint, Natasha, go talk to Norman Osborne, see if he can tell you anything about the painting." With that they separated; Steve and Bucky headed for Harry, Clint and Natasha moved toward Norman.
"Mr. Osborne," Steve began. "I'm Detective Rogers, this is Detective Barnes." They shook hands.
"Please, just Harry." he told them.
"Alright Harry. I know you've already given your statement, but do you think you could repeat it for us?" Harry nodded.
"Um, I came home about two A.M. The whole place was dark and I didn't really notice anything until I moved toward the stairs. I noticed the picture frame on the floor and I went to check it out, but before I could pick it up this big guy rushed me. He clocked me in the face and before I could get up to go after him, he jumped out the window. Dad came downstairs before I could run for the balcony."
"And can you tell us anything about the intruder?" Harry shook his head.
"Not much, he was dressed all in black, his face was covered. Oh, blue eyes, he had blue eyes. And he was a lot bigger than me." Harry was adamant. Steve nodded his understanding.
"And, uh, where did you sneak off to tonight?" he asked. Harry sighed.
"My best friend Pete and his girlfriend Gwen have been trying to set me up with this girl in our class, Mary Jane. After we dropped the girls off at home, Pete and I stayed out a little later than we should have."
"Alright, thank you Harry. I promise we'll get this guy." Harry nodded, but he wasn't all that enthusiastic.
xXx
The four detectives regrouped in the hallway a little while later. "Harry gave the same statement again. Nothing major to note." Bucky explained, closing up his notepad and slipping into the inside pocket of his jacket. "He did remember that the perp had blue eyes though."
Clint replied; "Yeah, well Norman did have something interesting to share."
Natasha continued; "Apparently he has everything of value marked with a special radioactive isotope that works like a GPS tracker."
"So we can locate the painting?"
"It's not that simple." Clint explained. "The back of the canvas is marked, however, the isotope is experimental and you have to be with in two hundred yards to pick up the signal."
"Osborne did offer us the hand held units they use to track the isotope. As many as we need."
"It's a long shot." Steve admitted. "We'll distribute the devices amongst patrol units. Maybe one of them will get lucky."
"In the meantime we should follow up with fences in the city. Who knows, maybe this guy is dumber than he appears." Clint stuffed his hands in his pockets, leaning back against the wall.
"We should check hospitals too. I don't care how experienced you are, this guy was caught unaware and jumped out a window. There's a chance he hurt himself on the way down." Bucky added almost petulantly.
"You're right," Natasha agreed. "We should get CSU on a window washer's scaffold and check the outside of the building." Steve nodded.
"Alright, let's get to work."
xXx
One month passed with no new leads. As it turned out, there was no evidence on the outside of the building, despite three sweeps both inside and out. There were no witnesses other than Harry Osborne and no one checked into the hospitals or tried to contact any of New York's black market fences. As far as cases went this one was thoroughly stalled. Their only hope was that they'd managed to alert customs before the suspect attempted to flee the country.
Bucky stopped at his partner's desk, filled to the brim with files and papers and evidence. A stack of eight by ten photographs sat on top of the mess, each one depicting the same painting from different angles. "You're gonna run yourself into the ground punk."
"I know there's something I'm not seeing." Steve mumbled more to himself. A deep sigh finally drew his attention. Natasha approached them an amused Clint on her heels. Clint plopped down on the desk beside him while Natasha stopped beside Bucky. Natasha was giving him her patented look. The one that said I'm a former Government agent who's done questionable things in the name of my country and I'm not afraid to do them again if you don't stop being an idiot.
"Steven, we all want to catch this guy, but obsessing over this case isn't' helping anyone."
"Besides, it's not like this guy can't afford to lose a painting of all things." Clint sipped from his coffee. Steve looked up, his eyes focusing on the distant wall as a thought struck him.
"You're right." he finally replied, his voice soft. Standing abruptly he shuffled through the files on his desk.
"Of course I am. What am I right about?" Steve didn't answer his desperation showing through when he couldn't find what he was looking for immediately.
"Steve, what are you doing?" Bucky's concern was evident in his voice.
"Looking for…this." He pulled out a file from the bottom of the pile. He opened it up. "It says here the family the painting was stolen from is worth upwards of Six point three billion dollars. A good portion of that is tied up in art, jewelry, furniture, antiques and electronics in the home."
Bucky looked confused. "Yeah, so?"
"So, this thief could have gotten up to the master bedroom and taken a piece of jewelry worth three times as much as that painting with less risk. But instead they went after a painting with ten times the security as the rest of the house and will be nearly impossible to fence because of its notoriety."
"The thief wasn't just after a quick buck then." Bucky added. "They specifically wanted that painting."
"Exactly."
"But why this painting?" Clint posed the question. Before anyone could answer the collective ringing of their cell phones drew their attention. Natasha spoke first.
"Looks like we caught a break. The isotope has been located."
xXx
The isotope was pinged at a storage unit in Brooklyn. When they entered the storage unit property, the buildings were surrounded by police cruisers. Officers were moving in and out of the buildings and taking statements from the owner and his staff. Natasha steered Clint toward the owner.
"We'll go talk to the employees, see if we can get records." Steve nodded before following Bucky into the building with the most activity.
"Unit 4-5-0." Bucky stated as they followed the rows into the back of the property. As they approached, they watched two CSU scientists carefully unroll the canvas from a pool cue bag. "Well, I'll be damned."
"That explains how he transported the painting." Steve crouched down, examining the painting as it was laid out on a crate. "Huh."
"What's wrong?"
"Whoever created this painting did a really good job. The brush strokes look like perfect matches." Bucky snorted.
"Listen to you punk, that semester in art school wasn't a total waste now was it." Steve chuckled straightening to full height. He turned just as Clint and Natasha approached. "What did you find out?"
"Unit 4-5-0, is being rented by one Kat Dennings." Natasha handed them a photo printed from the DMV. The young woman had long brown hair and bright blue eyes. Bucky whistled.
"That's what I said." Clint told him.
"She doesn't look like an art thief."
"No," Natasha agreed. "But maybe she knows one. From what I've found she's an aspiring actress, but at the moment she's working at a Starbucks not far from here."
"We've got a couple of black and whites picking her up now."
xXx
Kat Dennings was showing just the right amount of cleavage in her plain black V-neck t-shirt to earn herself a plethora of tips from pervy patrons. She sat in a chair facing the two way mirror on one side of the table, fidgeting in her seat. She wasn't nervous though, it seemed more like she was incapable of sitting still. Bucky sat in front of her a charming almost comforting smile on his face.
"Ms. Dennings, first of all, I'd like to thank you for agreeing to come down here and speak with us." Steve rolled his eyes. No matter the situation Bucky's charm never seemed to fail him.
"Agreeing? You mean I had a choice? Cause the uniformed police officers showing up at my place of employment and telling me I need to come with them, does not a choice make." Until now apparently.
"Well, I apologize for that. We didn't mean to make you feel like you've done something wrong."
"Whatever dude. What do you want? And can you make this fast? I need to get back to work and do damage control. Do you know how hard it is to find a boss who'll hire you without expecting you to put out? What am I saying, of course not, you're a man."
Beside him Clint snorted and Steve had to resist the urge to do so as well. Bucky shifted in his seat a bit, thrown off his game by the young woman. "Again, I apologize. The thing is, we called you here because of your storage unit."
"My storage unit? What about it?" Her confusion was genuine to their eyes. "Did someone break in or something?"
"No, but we did find some stolen merchandise in it."
Kat looked startled, pushing away from the table with her hands thrown up. "Whoa man, it's not mine. I didn't steal anything. It has to be Darcy's"
"Darcy?"
"Yea, she's the girl I share the unit with."
"You share the unit?" She nodded. "With a girl named Darcy?"
"You're not as smart as you are cute, are you?" she asked. This time Steve didn't hold back his snort. Bucky scowled.
"Does this Darcy have a last name?" Kat shrugged.
"If she does I certainly don't know."
"So you're sharing a unit with a girl you don't really know?"
"Yeah. Look," Kat sighed in exasperation. "my apartment in Williamsburg is like the size of a shoebox, okay. So I got a unit to keep my extra crap from college. The problem is, all he had at the time were big units, so I put an ad out on Tumblr for someone to share with me and split the rent. I got a message from this girl a couple days later, mailed her the spare key and she sends me cash for her half every month."
"So you just sent someone you've never met a key to your stuff?"
Kat nodded. "It's all junk, no real loss if she stole it. Not really anything to steal."
Bucky sighed, finally opening the file before him. He pulled out two eight by ten photographs and pushed them toward her.
"Do you know what this is?"
"Are you kidding? Of course I do. The Astronomer by Johannes Vermeer. What's it doing out of its frame though? Oh my god!" she exclaimed looking up at Bucky excited. "Was this what was in my unit? Damn, I can't believe the rumors are true."
"Rumors?"
"Sure, there was a rumor online that the Louvre had been burglarized and a few paintings stolen."
"I'm sure something like that would have been national news."
"Not if the curator and the French government wanted to keep it hush hush. Do you know how embarrassing it would have been to admit that one of the most secure museums in the world was robbed?"
"I'm sure that would have sucked for all involved, however, this painting is a licensed forgery."
Kat squinted at him before looking back down at the photos. "No it's not." She pushed the photos to him then pointed to the one of the back of the canvas. In the corner was a small black swastika. "See this? This was stamped on all the art stolen by the Nazis during World War II. The Astronomer was stolen from the Rothschild collection in 1940 when the Nazis invaded Paris. When the war was over it was returned to the Rothschild's and a few years after that they donated it to the Louvre. If this was a duplicate it would be a little tasteless to forge the stamp. "
"And how exactly do you know this?" he asked her.
"I took some art history classes before I dropped out of college."
"Well you should go back." He told her his charming smile back in place.
"Oh I see, you don't have to be smart, because you're charming." The smile dropped.
"Right." he murmured in defeat, standing up. "Excuse me one moment."
When Bucky stepped into the observation room he shot a glare at Clint's smug grin. "Someone's losing their touch."
"Fuck you Barton." He turned to Steve and Natasha. "What do you think?"
"I agree with Barton." Steve joked.
Clint howled with laughter.
"Oh awesome, am I the only one working today?" Bucky asked.
"Seriously though," Steve continued. "I think she's telling the truth."
"Yeah, me too." Clint added. Bucky turned to Natasha, but before she could say anything Kat knocked on the glass. They turned to find her squinting at the mirror.
"Hey, um… I think I may have remembered something that could help." Bucky took a deep breath, before turning on his heels.
"Yes, Ms. Dennings?"
"I vaguely remember a conversation we had online. I don't even think you could call it a conversation, but I asked her what she did for a living and she said she was an assistant, I think, or maybe a manager for some guy named…Lucian? Or…Louie… oh Lewis! His name was Lewis!"
Someone knocked on the glass. "Hold tight."
When Bucky emerged in observation again, Natasha was speaking Russian into her cell phone. He looked to Clint in confusion.
"Lewis is the only known name of an international thief." Clint explained, tapping away at a desktop computer.
"Where's Steve?" Natasha pointed out the door and across the bullpen to Captain Hill's office. He could see Steve talking with the Captain. "That was fast." Within a few minutes Hill and Steve walked into observation, Captain Hill shooting a look into the interrogation room before turning to her detectives.
"Natasha?"
"I'm trying to get a hold of my old boss at Interpol."
"Keep us updated." Natasha nodded, heading for her desk. "What do we think about the girl?"
"I think she's in over her head, she's just trying to get by, and has no reason to lie." Bucky explained.
"I agree." Clint added. Hill turned to Steve.
"What do you think?" He hesitated.
"I don't honestly know. This whole case isn't sitting well with me."
She nodded. "Alright. Get her information and then cut her loose. Put a detail on her too. Let's not rule out the possibility that she's lying. Observe and report and make sure she knows not to leave town."
xXx
"So Dennings was right." Clint said, taking a seat at his desk. "The art expert says the painting is authentic. Natasha got a hold of her contact at Interpol, he's on his way. They're hoping to get some answers from the French government."
"In the meantime," Steve added. "Commissioner Fury has authorized us to open up an investigation on Norman Osborne. He wants to know how Osborne ended up with a stolen Multi-Million dollar masterpiece."
"I think I can answer that." Natasha interrupted as she entered the bullpen, behind her a midsized man with dark brown hair in a pristine black suit. "Or rather he can."
"Agent Coulson, Interpol." He introduced himself. They shook hands. He handed a flash drive to their tech specialist who plugged it into a computer to control a smart board. "We've been tracking Mr. Osborne's movements around the world for years. We have reason to believe he's in bed with high ranking members of underground criminal organizations all over the world. We think this painting was a payoff."
"I don't suppose knowing the painting was stolen from him is enough to put him away?" Bucky questioned. Coulson sighed.
"Unfortunately no. He could easily admit he didn't know and we'd have no way to dispute that."
"Alright, well do you know who stole the painting in the first place?"
"We believed at one time it was Lewis, but now we're not so sure." Coulson paused. "There are not a lot of people who are capable of pulling off a theft of this magnitude. Of the people who are capable, Lewis is on the top of that list. However, since we can presume Lewis is the one to steal the painting from Osborne, we can assume Lewis didn't steal it from the Louvre."
"Why's that?" Clint asked.
"Because when Lewis steals something, you don't ever see it again. Lewis doesn't steal for money or notoriety. He steals because he enjoys it; it's a game to him."
xXx
Bucky, Natasha and Clint watched Coulson and Hill through the glass wall of Hill's office.
"Anybody else get the feeling we're being played with?" Clint mumbled, slouching down into his seat.
"There are so many unknown variables in this case. I hate to say it but I think we're out of our depth." Natasha answered, sitting poised and elegant in her chair.
Bucky turned slowly from the window. "What do you think Punk?" Steve never looked up from his work. The three other detectives watched him as his complete attention was focused on the file in his hands. "Steve?"
"Huh?" he finally roused from his thought. Bucky nodded at the folder.
"What are you thinking about?" Steve shook his head.
"I don't know. It's probably nothing." Before anyone could say anything else the door to Hill's office opened and Hill and Coulson filed out.
"We're turning the case over aren't we?" Natasha questioned.
"Only the investigation into Norman Osborne," she explained. "There's too much foreign power at play to open an investigation here. So we'll turn over anything we have and focus solely on the theft."
"Since we've pretty much concluded that the thief is this Lewis character, are we to assume if we manage to catch him or his accomplices we have to turn them over too?"
"We'd appreciate it. Lewis is responsible for some of the most high profile robberies in history. He's one of the most wanted men in the world with bounties on his head in four different countries. He's one of our biggest priorities."
"No one's ever seen him though." Clint stated, he didn't really know exactly what he was trying to say.
Coulson shrugged. "He's an enigma."
"Yeah, he is." Steve's voice mumbled with a tone that caught everyone's attention. They all turned to see him slouched down in his chair resting his chin on his fist. He was staring off into space, lost in thought.
"Still nothing?" Bucky questioned, his voice breaking through Steve's thoughts. Steve looked to his partner.
"Probably."
xXx
Agent Coulson left not long after he arrived taking copies and logs of evidence on his way out. When he was gone the team turned back to solving their case while Steve slipped out for a moment. Steve made his way into an empty office, closing the door behind him and pulling his cell phone out. He dialed a number he hadn't in quite some time.
"Hello?"
"Peggy? It's Steve." There wasn't any hesitation in her reply.
"Captain Steve Rogers, to what do I owe the pleasure?" Peggy's voice was still as smooth and warm as he remembered and he couldn't keep the smile off his face.
"I, ah, actually have a favor to ask." Her chuckle curled deep in his chest.
"Three years and the first thing you ask of me is a favor. Should I be offended?"
"What? No, I…" the sound of her laughing interrupted his stuttering. "You're messing with me."
"Of course." He could hear her smile. "Now, what can I help you with Steven?" Steve sighed.
"Buck and I are working a case and I was wondering if you could scrutinize an ID or me? Dig in, see if you can discredit it?"
"Certainly, I'll see what I can do."
"Great, the ID should be in your email."
"Alright." There was pause as Steve heard keyboard keys clicking. "Kat Dennings?"
"That's the one."
"Let me see what I can do. I'll call you back as soon as I have something."
"Thank you." He hesitated. "And Peggy… it was…it was really nice to hear your voice again."
"Likewise Steven."
xXx
Consciousness found Steve slowly, the darkness lifting to color the most beautiful woman he'd ever had the pleasure of meeting.
"Peggy?"
"Welcome back." Her voice was filled with relief. "You really had us all worried there."
"Sorry." He replied slowly, his thoughts having trouble catching up with his mouth. "My men? My team? Bucky?" He tried to sit up but Peggy pushed him back down.
"Your men are fine Steve, I promise. You need to stay in bed you've lost a lot of blood."
"Bucky…?"
"Listen to Agent Carter, Punk." Bucky's voice stopped him short. He turned his head to the second bed in the room. Bucky sat on the edge, his arm and shoulder wrapped completely in bandaged and kept in a sling. "Everyone's fine, aside from worrying about you."
Steve huffed and coughed, his abdomen twinging in pain. He looked down to find his chest and stomach wrapped in gauze and tape. "Damn. What happened?"
"IED. Hit the Hum-V's front tires and flipped us backwards. You and I were thrown through the back windshield and Jones pulled Dugan out through the driver's side door. Both of them were lucky Dugan got the worst of it with a concussion."
Steve snorted. "Bullshit, his head is way too hard for that."
Bucky smirked. "That's what I told the doctors."
"What about you?" he asked gesturing to Bucky's arm.
"I'm gonna need Physical Therapy, but I'll live. You on the other hand; I swear punk. What the hell were you thinkin'?"
"What?"
"What? What! You got hit in the gut with shrapnel. If you hadn't moved around so much you wouldn't have lost so much blood!"
"I had to make sure you were okay." Steve mumbled looking back up at the ceiling. Bucky sighed. Turning to Peggy in defeat. She shrugged at a loss.
"Always gotta be the hero."
xXx
Hill rushed into the bullpen grabbing up the remote for the overhead TV. "We have a problem." she stated switching on a local new station.
"…The Oscorp CEO was seen boarding his private Jet by airport personnel in the early morning hours. His plane has been tracked to Latveria where there are no extradition treaties. All of this comes not twenty-four hours after the NYPD discovered a painting stolen from Osborne's penthouse was originally stolen from Louvre. Since then an investigation by Interpol has been brought into the spotlight spanning the last five year."
Hill switched off the TV.
"Osborne and all that applies are officially Interpol's problem." Hill explained.
"So we're done with this case then?" Bucky asked tossing down his pen.
"Looks like it," she continued. "Everything needs to be packed up and shipped off to Interpol's head office." She looked around. "Get to work; I'll sign off on everything when you're finished." She turned on her heels and returned to work.
"Well this blows." Clint grumbled, throwing files into boxes.
"We've got half a dozen unsolved cases waiting for us, Barton. Now we don't have to pander to anyone who threw some money around to get priority and can actually help the real victims." Natasha replied, slapping a lid on a box and sealing it.
"Amen." Bucky murmured tossing some files into the box Steve was working on.
"Look, I realize this case wasn't exactly the best use of our time, but seriously, we've never had a case taken from us. It's like an open wound."
Bucky shrugged. "I guess that makes sense."
Natasha sighed. "Well, you'll have to get over it. This case was unsolvable anyway."
"Why's that?"
She shot him a look. "Think about it. We may know who did this, but no one has ever seen this guy. We have no idea what he looks like and even if we did, we have no way to prove anything."
"We're basically dead in the water no matter what we do." Bucky added, plopping down in his desk chair. Steve sealed up his own box before speaking.
"The only thing we can do is move on and hope to find some kind of satisfaction in the idea that we can solve other cases." As he finished his cell phone went off. He checked the caller ID and excused himself from the group. Walking into the break room he closed the door behind him, putting his phone to his ear; "Hey Peggy, did you find anything?"
"Well if by anything you mean nothing then yes. Steven this girl does not exist anywhere but on paper."
"That's what I thought." He replied with sigh.
"What have you gotten yourself into?" Peggy asked, concerned.
"I'm not one hundred percent sure yet, but I think I'm starting to get all the pieces to fit together."
"Well then, sounds rather interesting. Be a dear and let me know how it goes won't you? You know how much I love a good puzzle."
"Will do, Peg, thanks again for the help."
"Anytime Steve. I really mean that."
Steve chuckled. "I know I," Before he could continue Natasha knocked on the door to the break room. He turned to her. "I have to go, I'll call soon, promise." He hung up after her goodbye. "What's up?" he asked, opening the door.
"Harry Osborne is here. He wants to speak with you. He's quite adamant."
Steve followed her out to the Bullpen where he found Harry waiting beside his desk. He walked toward him stopping in front of Bucky's desk first. "Hey Buck, did you relieve the surveillance guys on Dennings yet?"
"No, I was just about to call them."
"Do me a favor?" Bucky nodded. "Call them, tell them to go in and check on her wherever she is."
"Sure, what do you know Punk?"
Steve smirked. "Nothing for sure yet."
With that he continued on to his own desk. "Morning Harry. How are you doing?"
"I've been better, I've also been worse. The Feds have frozen all the assets I have access to which means now I'm staying with my best friend and his aunt, I feel like I'm mooching, but on the bright side, my dad's not here, so that's a plus."
"You two don't really get along?"
Harry shook his head. "Nah, I'm his biggest disappointment. Which is kind of why I'm here. In an attempt to keep him from looking any further down at me I lied to you that night."
"What did you lie about?"
"The robber; I said he was a big guy, bigger than me, I lied, the robber was a woman and she was shorter than me by a couple inches."
"I see. Same blue eyes?"
Harry paused, thinking about it. "Yea, yea that much was true."
Steve took a deep breath. "Alright, well thank you for being honest with me now." He stood up and Harry followed allowing Steve to lead him to the door. "Listen I know things are difficult for you right now, so if you need anything your welcome here." Harry smiled.
"Thank you detective, I really appreciate that." Steve smiled back patting him on the shoulder as they made it to the door.
"Hey who knows, maybe we could find some part time work here or something. Keep ya busy."
"That honestly sounds great."
xXx
"Steve!" Bucky ran up to him as he made it back to his desk. "The surveillance guys just called, Dennings ditched her tail. They have no idea how long she's been missing."
"Hmm." Steve hummed in thought.
"Alright, seriously Steve, what is going on?" Steve took Bucky by the elbow and led him away from listening ears. "What are you doing? You've been like this for weeks now. You won't talk to me, you won't talk to the rest of the team. What the hell Punk?"
"Kat Dennings doesn't exist except on paper." Steve said in hushed tones.
"What? How do you know that?"
"I had a hunch so I called Peggy and asked her to do some digging for me."
"You called Peggy? Is that a thing now, you two actually talking again?" Steve scowled.
"Can we focus please?"
"We are definitely coming back to this. Go ahead."
He sighed. "Anyway, some details didn't make any sense to me so I dug a little deeper. All these pieces fit together in a way I couldn't see yet. It's all becoming clearer now."
"How so?"
"Harry Osborne was just here."
"So I noticed."
"He's just informed me that he lied about the thief. It wasn't a man who attacked him, it was a woman. A woman with blue eyes."
"Noooo." Bucky squinted, putting the pieces together himself.
Steve nodded. "And we know for a fact right now that Lewis definitely robbed that Osborne penthouse." Steve motioned for Bucky to follow and then led him into one of the conference rooms. He sat at the computer and logged into the database. "Now if my assumptions are correct, the reason Lewis doesn't leave evidence is because her DNA is in CODIS." Bucky sat down beside him and watched while Steve searched for the name Darcy Lewis in the Database. It took less than a minute for a picture and a profile to pop up. A ten year old Kat Dennings with a mean glare and bad attitude stared back at them.
"Holy shit." Bucky breathed.
xXx
Steve took a deep breath when he finally pulled into the garage beneath his loft apartment. He parked beside his motorcycle and grabbed his things off the seat beside him before heading inside. The loft was basically one large space, sectioned off here and there where privacy was necessary. Entering from the elevator he made it first to the sofa where he dropped his bags and suit coat, then dragged himself into the kitchen for a beer from the fridge. He flipped the light on as he made his way back to the sofa, stopping short when he spotted Darcy Lewis sitting in his lazy boy recliner at the far end of the coffee table. He watched her for a moment, then sighed and plopped down on the couch.
"Only one other person has ever figured me out." she told him, her blasé attitude from the last time they had met replaced with something much more mature.
"Oh really? Let me guess, they're dead?"
"No, but they are doing nearly twenty years in a federal penitentiary. Apparently they broke more than a few laws trying to prove to their fellow law enforcement officials that I was Lewis."
"A cautionary tale." He took a swig from his beer. "If you came here to warn me, you've wasted your time. I have no intention of telling anyone what I've found."
"Really? Well that was easy."
Steve snorted. "I could tell everyone I know who you really are, that doesn't mean they'll believe me. You survived all these years because everyone thinks Lewis is a man, and that detail, fake or not, is cemented in the minds of your pursuers. There could be unlimited amounts of evidence proving who you really are and there will always be people who don't believe it. Unfortunately, those people are likely to be the only ones capable of stopping you." He chuckled. "Besides, I have it on good authority that you're not the villain they make you out to be." He told her as he reached into his bag and pulled out her Child Protective Services file. He contemplated it in his hands. "Sometimes, you've just got to do what you can to survive."
When he looked up again, she was gone.