Author's Note: And here I come to update today...and I look fabulous! So let me know what you guys think of this chapter, okay? Huggles to everyone who's returned for a second chapter, yay! Reviews are love (and they help me figure out where this is going).

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Chapter Two

Winter in the Garden

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12 months ago…

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Needles of ice drove into his skin, ripping the breath from his body. Cold slammed into him like a slab of concrete. White stars exploded across his eyes, gutted and bleeding into his skull. He flailed at the wall of water pushing him down deep and deeper into the silty blackness sucking the heat from his body. Bubbles spewed out of his mouth, precious air slipping away as he clawed at the dark, trying to climb through…but the cold whispered in his mind, sickening seduction to sleep. The water burned his eyes, he wanted so much to close them, but the darkness…if he closed his eyes, it would take him.

Frost crept across his lashes, snatching the choice away, freezing his eyelids, sealing them shut. He vaguely felt his swiftly-numbing hands slam against a thick slab of ice. No. No, not ice. Glass. He beat against the glacial sheet of glass slowly going misty with the cold. He opened his mouth to scream but more bubbles erupted from his lips, billowing in the black water.

Not bubbles. Steam. The silver vapor of his breath, poisonous as burning mercury, burning his throat and fogging the glass faster, obscuring the chubby-faced little imp with the beatific smile and the beady blue eyes behind tiny, wireless spectacles that he knew was there even though he couldn't see.

Not water flooding his lungs but ice crystals in the dry and frigid air, cutting his throat. He tasted copper and salt, hot blood, freezing on his tongue, on his lips. His fingernails scraped against the fresh, thin layer of ice on the opaque glass. Fire ripped across the top of his middle finger and steam wafted up as blood spilled from the torn fingernail. Metal scraped the ice and glass, a harsh skree piercing his ears.

Steve, the name pounding like a heartbeat in the back of his skull, Steve, help me! Steve, please! Don't let them do this to me! Don't let them do this! Steve! Steve! A child screaming in the dark, a man crying silently in the night, the plea went on and on as fire exploded across the surface of his left arm, scouring away the flesh, peeling back muscle and tendon and sinew to reveal the bone, charring down to the marrow. His screams slammed against his teeth, locked in his mouth and cramming into his throat as the ice flooded him, silenced him, suffocated him.

Buried him.

A tear squeezed between the frosted lashes, a single splash of warmth that quickly froze to the chilled skin at the left temple. Pale, blue-tinged lips shaped a name, a word without meaning, an echo of a child's dream. A slender thread to anchor the truth of himself in his own mind.

Steve…

A blade of ice cut that thread to ribbons and left him plunging straight down into the abyss echoing with the ghosts of his screams.

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He bolted awake to the discordant screech of a car alarm. The pearl-gray ambiance of false down dared to poke its fingers through the motel room window, past the moth-eaten curtains and humidity-swollen windowpane. Shadows painted the room like a nightmare. The abyss whispered from the deepest parts of the dark.

He tasted copper. Licked his lower lip and realized he'd bitten it his sleep. A thin crust of blood marred the rough stubble he hadn't bothered to shave off. Pushing at the thick locks of bed-tousled hair with his metal hand, he set down the Magnum he hadn't even realized he'd snatched from under his pillow on the nightstand. Blood-red alarm clock numbers limned the dark-painted steel.

Three weeks. He hadn't returned to his handlers in three weeks. Three weeks since he'd nearly died trying to complete the assignment—kill Captain America. Three weeks since he'd been saved by the man he'd been sent to kill. A man who recognized him. A man who shared his long, blurred history.

A man he didn't even remember except in the depths of the nightmares that left sweat dripping down his spine and plastering his hair to his neck, that left blood in his mouth. Nightmares that woke him with a gun cold in his hand and a name he couldn't remember on his lips.

The air-conditioner, he realized with a start. It had come on in the night. The room was a freezer. Throwing back the itchy bedclothes, he swung his bare feet to the floor. Marched to the AC unit and switched it off. Then he moved into the tiny bathroom, filled one of those cheap plastic cups with water as hot as he could stand from the sink, and downed it in gulps that seared his throat. Heat flooded his chest and belly, pushing back memories of ice and darkness.

He didn't mind the darkness so much unless the cold came with it. Then his blood chilled in his veins, ran sluggish as a corpse's, and his heart tried to jackhammer its way out of his chest. But he was all right now. He was fine. He had a task to complete, a goal. Remembering that helped him focus.

Goal number one: find out the truth—all of it—about his connection to Captain America.

Goal number two: if it was possible, get back the memories he hadn't even realized were missing.

Goal number three: don't get killed by either HYDRA or SHIELD.

Supposedly SHIELD had been disbanded in their efforts to take down HYDRA, but he didn't believe it for a second. HYDRA had slipped its tentacles into so many government organizations like SHIELD across the globe, there was no way to eradicate them completely. They were like roaches—impossible to exterminate. Fitting that despite their name, their symbol was a skeletal octopus. And SHIELD wasn't going anywhere either. Not if agents like Nick Fury and Natasha Romanoff had anything to say about it.

The sweat had chilled and gelled to his skin, leaving him sticky, uncomfortable in the sweats and black t-shirt he'd slept in. He hit the hot water in the shower, listening to the death-rattle of decrepit pipes echoing in the walls. Before stripping out of his clothes he retrieved the Magnum and set it on the bathroom counter—just in case.

After his shower, he'd get out of here. Move on. There was a little coastal town about twenty miles down the freeway. He wasn't going to risk hitchhiking, in case HYDRA or SHIELD were closer than even he guessed, but he could hoof it. He'd be there by noon at the latest.

Plan laid out, he filled the cup with hot water one more time and downed it, swallowing back a tumble of words that always slithered into his mouth after the nightmares that had dogged him the last three weeks. Words he refused to speak aloud.

Who am I? and What's my name? and When was I born? and even How old am I?

The words writhed in his throat until bile burned them away. Shaking his head, he stepped into the shower and shoved his head under the sizzling spray, trying to vaporize the coldness still crystallizing inside him.

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The February sun fumbled its weak way through a bank of gray clouds that made cheap promises of an afternoon downpour. He'd been following the highway at a distance, prowling along in ditches and among the trees flanking the interstates running through Virginia. Normally he wouldn't head there from DC if he was trying to hide, but he knew HYDRA. They'd expect him to either fall completely off the grid and run to Cancun or Tahiti, or they'd expect him to stick to DC like a bloodthirsty tick, since that was where he still was. Captain America.

Instead he'd done the smart thing: stayed close, but not too close. Once HYDRA started thinking he really was in Tahiti, he'd go back to DC. But in the meantime, he needed to stay nearby. Keep his finger on the pulse of everything; keep immersed in the blood-thrum of government agencies and conspiracies.

But he couldn't stand the big cities with their cold, gleaming spires and human cattle herding in droves through the subways and streets. Not after that moment over the Potomac. For just a second, dragging the unconscious Captain America out of the murky water, he'd felt right. As if he was doing something he was meant to do. He'd never felt that innate rightness in the executions he'd undertaken for HYDRA.

He wanted to recapture that a little, which was why he approached the small town on the Virginia coast instead of hiding out in a major city like Richmond. For the first time since he could remember, he realized he wanted to be surrounded by basic quietude, trees, and the sound of rushing water. Just for a while. So slipping like a wolf through the kudzu and tall grass, he dodged around the sign that read Welcome to Whistle-Stop! Population: 3998.

Make that 3999, he thought as he moved out of the cover of the pine and oak trees. Stepping onto the narrow, two-lane road—a white-washed sign quaintly proclaimed the thoroughfare as Main Street—should've made him feel like an insect under a microscope, but there weren't too many people outside just then. Those that were took a quick glance and looked away, put off by the cap pulled low over his face and the dusty leather jacket, the boots and the black duffel slung over his shoulder. They didn't even know about the weapons wrapped in black canvas and stowed in his duffel, or about the Bowie knife and the switchblade shoved into the specialty sheaths in his boots. People in this town had good instincts. They might remember a drifter coming through, but they wouldn't have dared look close enough to be able to describe him if SHIELD or HYDRA agents ever came calling.

Still, better to get off the main street. He wanted to see if the place had a motel—too small for a hotel—or maybe a house for rent. If the landlord accepted cash, he'd be set for a few days until he decided to move on. His general plan was to circle DC by skirting through the surrounding states until it was safe to go back.

He'd have to be stupid to stay in one place for more than a week at most, though. Of course, the people following him knew he knew that, so if they just so happened to find him wherever he was, he could make the trail look days old, and they'd move off in one direction following his shadow while he took off the other way and escaped.

Honestly, they'd trained him too well. As long as this place had internet and a nearby cell tower, he was a ghost.

Dodging down an alley between a local barbershop called Snips and a small, used bookstore that seemed to double as a computer repair shop and sandwich place with the bizarre name of Jefferson's, he found a minor street running parallel to Main called Grace Ave. He followed that for a few blocks until he stopped in front of the police station. He would've kept walking, but fluttering in the cool, damp breeze coming off the ocean roaring in the background was a poster duct-taped to an iron lamppost. He only noticed it because the duct-tape had a brick pattern and the paper was fluorescent yellow.

For Rent
Guest house on private property
One bedroom, one bath
Cable and internet included
No smokers or heavy drinkers
Must love kids and dogs
Home-cooked meals available
Rent negotiable
Cash or money order only

There was an address listed with a little map, and a date—three days ago. Unless someone had snatched the place up already, it actually suited him fine. He could avoid the kids and the…dog. He didn't smoke or drink, he needed internet, and paying in cash was perfect. Pulling the flyer off the lamppost, he folded it in quarters and stuck it in his pocket before heading for the address.

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James Gardner was seven years old. His mother usually called him Jamie, unless kids at school made fun of him for being adopted or because his mom was a mutant or because of his twin sister Rebecca. Then his mom called him Ronin because it made him feel cool. And if he was in trouble she always called him "James Stephen Gardner" in her Mom Voice, which was kind of scary.

He liked to tell grownups that being Japanese was cool because that meant he could be a samurai when he grew up. He didn't know why that always made them laugh. He liked school but didn't like recess because kids would push his sister on the playground or call her names and then he and his brother Will ended up getting into fights and the principal always called their mom. Then she'd have to come down to the school and they'd have to explain that some of the big kids from the older grades had called Becky the R-word, which was a really bad word for someone like her, and they'd had to do something. Then their mom usually yelled at the principal.

Jamie didn't like to fight, but he watched a lot of anime and read a lot of comics and books and he knew that sometimes you had to fight even if you didn't want to. Even if it was scary. Even if the bad guy was bigger than you. Which is why even though he felt like any second he was going to pee his pants, he kicked Miguel Quintana in knee as hard as he could.

The eighth-grader spun around and punched Jamie in the face. Jamie strangled on a yelp of pain as the big knuckles connected with his eye socket. Black spots danced across his eyes and he staggered back into the waiting arms of Miguel's friend Zack. Four-year-old Will, who was almost ready to graduate from Pre-K to kindergarten, let out a Tarzan yell and jumped on Miguel. Miguel grunted, rolled his eyes, and then slammed his back against one of the metal posts holding up part of the playground equipment. Will let out a harsh wheeze and dropped to the sand like a rock. Miguel nudged him with the steel toe of his combat boot as the four-year-old started to cry.

"No!" A girl's voice. Jamie started squirming hard because if Becky got upset, she'd start screaming and getting scared and Miguel would do all kinds of horrible things to her. When Miguel turned around to tell Jamie to quit squirming around, Jamie lashed out and kicked him in the thigh. Miguel grunted again. Narrowed his eyes. Then he punched the seven-year-old in the pit of the stomach. Zack dropped him when he started heaving. Distantly, Jamie heard Becky shriek, "No!"

Oh, no, Jamie thought, eyes widening as Becky picked up her lunchbox and swung it at Miguel. No, Becky, no! He tried to get to his feet again, but his knees knocked together and he fell back down. Miguel grabbed Becky by her one long braid.

"Hey, the little freak's trying to help her dork brothers," Miguel said, smiling. Becky hit him with her lunchbox again and he yanked on her hair. She screamed and started crying. "Awww, poor little crybaby. Looks like somebody needs a timeout."

"Leave her alone!" Jamie yelled, finally dragging himself to his feet using the jungle gym bars. His stomach hurt and his head felt funny. He was pretty sure his whole face was purple but it didn't matter. "Leave Becky alone!"

Miguel just rolled his eyes. "Shut up, twerp." Before Jamie could do anything but take a few steps, Miguel had thrown his sister into the open metal shed where the town playground monitors—high school kids who volunteered so they had something nice to tell colleges about—kept the extra special playground equipment like footballs and basketballs and tennis rackets, and he shut the door. Holding it closed, he put all his weight on it.

Becky started screaming, pounding on the metal door with her fists. Miguel pounded right back. Jamie could practically feel his sister's heart pounding, feel how scared she was. He lunged for Miguel but Zack grabbed him. "Not so fast, Mr. Samurai!"

"Becky!" Jamie yelled, kicking and flailing. Will was still crying hysterically from the sandbox. "Becky! Becky!"

"Hey."

The voice wasn't loud. It didn't thunder across the playground. But somehow it cut through the sound of Will sobbing and Jamie yelling his sister's name, Miguel laughing and Zack sniggering. Becky continued hammering on the door to the shed and shrieking, but everyone else went quiet as a grownup in a baseball cap and a leather jacket stopped a dozen paces away on the sidewalk.

"What do you think you're doing?"

Jamie didn't know it, but at that moment Miguel made a big mistake. Sneering at the grownup, he said, "What's it to you?"

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He stared at the kids, wondering just what exactly he thought he was doing. This was not his business. Not in the slightest. He had no reason to care what these punks were doing to each other.

But a wisp of memory in a nightmare flitted through his mind. The name Becky—but hadn't it actually been Bucky?—A boy, scrawny as a skeleton, gasping hard for breath. Almost like someone was trying to strangle him. Blood shone red as paint on his pale lips from a busted mouth and a bleeding nose. His eye was already swelling, black bruises circling a sky-blue iris as hard as steel. That boy was in trouble. That boy needed help. It was his job to help him.

Becky…

Bucky! Bucky!

That sharp fragment of buried memory lodged at the base of his skull, sending dull pain shooting through his neck and into his head. He'd take care of the little kids and the punks, then head out to this cottage place and see if it was still up for rent.

"What's it to you?"

The thudding pain in his skull sharpened, shards of glass prodding the raw nerves in his brain as the memory flooded each phantom prick with fire. He narrowed his eyes at the tall thirteen-year-old with an attitude problem and a death wish. He imagined what he wanted to say just so he wouldn't have to deal with the kid for the next twenty minutes.

Look, you've got two choices. You either turn around and walk away, or I shoot you and your buddy in the head and you die. But he wasn't a murderer. A killer, yes, but he'd never killed children. He'd executed enemies of HYDRA, politicians and scientists working for SHIELD, soldiers and military geniuses. Enemies of his cause.

His former cause.

So just because he might want to shoot the kid didn't mean he would. Or that he would seriously think about it for more than five seconds. Instead he focused on the little tin-roofed shed that shook with the impact of whoever was beating it half to death from the inside. He jerked his chin at the rattling door. He could hear someone—a little girl from the sound of it, unless someone was torturing a cat in there—sobbing so hard she was practically screaming.

"Let go of the door."

Even though he hadn't even so much as looked at the other kid, he knew the instant the other kid dropped the boy who'd been flailing and screaming while trying to get to the kid in the shed. The little boy started for the idiot holding the door closed but he stopped a couple feet away, hands clenched at his sides.

"You let her out," the kid snarled, hunching his shoulders and lowering his head like a bull about to charge. "Or I'll punch you in the nuts and this time, I won't miss."

The other kid—younger, maybe four or five—who'd been weeping in the sand gave a little gasp. "Jamie! You's not s'posed to say that!"

Well, the kid was brave. Had to give him that. Ignoring the adolescent threats, focusing on the jailer, the man known as the Winter Soldier let himself relish the way the thirteen-year-old moron's eyes widened and he shrank back as a fully grown adult stranger approached, murder in his eyes. It took four steps before the kid broke and ran, practically tripping over himself and kicking up a dust cloud as he booked it down the street. His idiot friend raced after him, calling for the other kid to wait.

The door flew open on the next bang and a little Japanese girl stumbled out, scraping her knees when she hit the ground. Then she just sat on the gravel, hands covering her face, screaming as the boy—obviously her brother—rushed over and squatted down next to her. The other kid, whose caramel-colored cheeks were streaked with dirt and tears, hurried over too, scrubbing his face. They were careful not to touch her. The Japanese boy looked strangely grown up as he held up his hands, palm-out, and started smoothing them across the air.

"It's okay, Becky," he cried over the girl's hiccupping shrieks. "They're gone. You're okay. It's okay. You're in your box. Nobody's gonna do anything bad. It's okay. You're in your box. It's safe. It's okay. It's safe in the box."

Those hand motions were strangely hypnotic; the girl seemed to feel that way, too, because her sobs died away as her brother continued moving his hands in the same patterns through the air over and over again. It was odd. The kid never looked his sister in the eye. Neither did the younger boy. In fact, the younger one barely looked at her at all. He just sat motionless on the gravel next to her, with maybe six inches of space between them, watching the boy he'd called Jamie.

When Becky was only sniffling, Jamie started humming. He kept moving his hands and she started watching them more closely. Eventually he stopped and sat down on the gravel. Tilting his head to the side, he glanced sidelong at his sister and smiled. She dropped her gaze to the gravel, but her lips twitched into a small smile.

What was all that? Watching the kids, there hadn't been a moment when Jamie seemed at a loss as to what to do. But what was wrong with his sister?

But the assassin didn't ask aloud. He just called, "You three all right?"

Jamie helped Becky to her feet and nodded. "Yeah. She just got scared. She's scared of the dark and there are spiders in there." He pointed over his shoulder at the open shed. "She doesn't scream all the time. Just about Miguel. He scares her."

"He's mean t'her 'cause she's got ASD," the younger boy said. "That means she's got artism."

"Autism," Jamie corrected. "But she's not bad," he added defensively. "Autism doesn't mean she's bad. She just gets confused or scared sometimes. And she doesn't like looking at people."

"An' when she's scared, don' touch her," the younger boy added, shaking his head solemnly.

"I'm Jamie. This is Becky." Becky shot a lightning-swift glance somewhere around the vicinity of the assassin's knees. "And this is our little brother Will. He's four. So…so thanks for saving us. 'Cause they were gonna cream us, I bet. "

Suddenly uncomfortable—this whole thing felt like a surreal dream—he shrugged and said, "I don't like bullies." Then he frowned as an echo of another voice, at once as familiar as his own but as strange as the memories shuddering through him at random intervals like mindquakes, murmured the words in his brain.

Movement out of the corner of his eye distracted him. He fought against flexing his metal fingers when he noticed—and it astonished him that they could really be that stupid—the two teenagers who'd been tormenting the three little kids were actually waiting for him to leave so they could start up again. Really? He was standing right here. Did they think he couldn't see them? Apparently he had the word stupid tattooed on his forehead. Being underestimated, even by a kid, pissed him off.

But now was not the time or the place to lose his temper over some dumb kids, so he focused on Jamie. "Where do you live?"

Jamie hesitated. "Um…we're not supposed to tell strangers that." The hesitation disappeared when the stranger in question surreptitiously pointed toward the waiting bullies. "Oh. Three-twenty-seven Arandelle Street. Oh, cool! That's my mom's poster," Jamie added when the ex-HYDRA soldier unfolded the flyer he'd stuffed in his pocket to check the address. "Awesome! Are you gonna live behind our house?"

Must love kids and dogs. Huh, he thought, eyeing the kids the poster no doubt referred to. Two little boys and a girl with autism. Well, at least they wouldn't bother him, if the girl was as afraid of everything as she seemed to be. This…wasn't a real problem. And he was only staying for a few days.

"We can show you how to get there," Jamie said. "Come on!"

Absently wondering if his nightmares had turned into an incredibly bizarre dream—or maybe he'd been drugged and didn't know it? Except he felt perfectly alert—he followed the three kids headed for the cottage that would soon become his temporary secret lair.

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There was no chance HYDRA or SHIELD would look for him here.

He'd been considering that maybe this wasn't the best idea after all—kids could be a liability, and interfering on their behalf like he had hadn't been smart. It would leave an impression on them and their mother, his potential new landlady. He'd been weighing the pros and cons of moving on to a different town when they'd arrived on Arandelle Street and he'd seen the Silly Pastry Garden. Actually the sign was faded, so it said something like S_Y_ PA_RY GAR_N. He just figured, based on the décor, that it was Silly Pastry Garden.

The combined bakery and home sat at the end of the street just before where cracked asphalt melted into dirt pathway and tall grass. A two-story, wooden building with flower-boxes hanging from the first-floor windows and green shutters, hunter green shingles on the roof showing dark against the white-painted wood, it practically screamed coziness and fireside rocking chairs, fresh-baked cookies and tall glasses of milk. Probably a perfect building for a bakery. The aroma of chocolate and something tangy and citrusy drifted from the front door, which had been propped open with a heavy flower pot half as tall as Jamie. Pale green shoots poked up from the dark earth inside.

"Mom's probably hot," Jamie said, glancing over his shoulder at the silent shadow following behind him. "The air-conditioner broke, and it's hot in the kitchen, so she keeps the door open when it's not dark out."

"Da fix-it guy won't come out until next month," Will chimed in, "'cause he's a jerk."

"That's a bad word," Jamie reminded his brother.

Will scowled. "That's what Mommy said 'bout him when he left, 'member?"

"Shhh," Jamie insisted, glancing back again. The Winter Soldier said nothing. A broken air-conditioner in a place as icy as Virginia in February didn't bother him. Whatever heat those commercial ovens were spitting out was nothing compared to the thick, molten air of the Sahara or Mojave Deserts or the jungles of South America. "Don't say that," Jamie added. "The car guy already got mad at you for saying it about him."

The four-year-old snapped his arms tight across his chest and sulked, glaring at the little cobblestone path leading to a trio of steps going up to the bakery door. Still silent, the assassin followed the three children up the path and the steps. A little wooden sign hung on a nail in the wall next to the doorway. The robin's egg blue sign showed an anthropomorphized white rose that beamed cheerily from where it sat on a little mushroom with cartoon eyes, eating what looked like a muffin and sipping from a cup shaped like a tiny daffodil. A speech bubble coming out of its mouth said in big, rainbow multi-font, OPEN.

A flicker of curiosity had him flipping the sign over to see the back. The rose was now curled up on the grass beneath a taller mushroom that had been in the background on the other side of the sign; an empty plate with some crumbs and an empty cup sat on the squat mushroom, whose eyes were closed as if it was sleeping. The rose seemed to be asleep too. Instead of the pale, spring-blue background, the sign was painted in a swirl of violet and azure, with metallic stars spelling the word CLOSED.

"Mommy likes fwowers," Will said, peering at the spring shoots sprouting out of the big flowerpot being used as a doorstop. "But she says cake is better."

The woman sounded like a twit. Again he briefly considered turning back, but this place was the ultimate cover. No one would think to look for him here. He wouldn't have to leave after a week. He could stay probably as long as a month, rest up, fine-tune the plans for his next few moves.

There was no one behind a wooden counter the color of rich butter-cream, but a low humming came from somewhere. He would've cautiously leaned in just enough to see around the doorframe, but Jamie barged in ahead of him and yelled, "Mom! We're home!"

"We have a peoples with us!" Will added. Becky just marched up to the half of the counter that looked more like a bar, climbed onto a barstool, and dropped her face into her arms. She didn't even take off her backpack or drop her lunchbox.

"I know," a woman's voice called.

The assassin frowned. She knew? He stepped into the bakery and felt the heat crash over him in a wave, chasing away the chilly damp from outside. His gaze darted to every potential exit or entry point. Six tall windows—three standard, three in patterned stained glass—the door they'd just come through, a set of wooden double doors that no doubt led to the kitchen. Potential weapons? Bar stools, chairs, tables, metal and plastic cutlery, stainless steel and glass bakeware, glass dishes.

This wasn't the most secure location, but unless HYDRA decided to launch a missile at the place, he knew he could get out quickly. At least the windows were tinted—probably because they faced east and the sun would've lanced right across the counter into the proprietor's eyes.

Speaking of the proprietor…

She came around the corner, a plate of cookies balanced expertly on the palm of one hand. She set the plate on the counter next to Becky without saying a word to the strange man standing in her kitchen, picked up a cookie, set that on the counter, and pushed it carefully under Becky's arm. Only then did she look at the Winter Soldier with eyes the warm color of honey melting in the sun, shielded by black-framed glasses.

"I wondered when you'd get here," she said. His brows drew sharply together and wariness prickled like icy needles along his spine. His fingers twitched once toward the knives he kept hidden in his boots. His metal hand, hidden by the sleeve of his jacket and a black glove, convulsed around the handle of his duffel bag. The word trap slithered through his brain, poisonous and cold.

But the woman didn't look like a SHIELD or HYDRA agent. She didn't carry herself like one. A pair of faded jeans and a white t-shirt with a rainbow infinity symbol didn't exactly scream government agent. The cheap jewelry draped around her neck would've been easy to grab; so would the auburn braid down her back. Maybe the blue and black enameled ribbon pin on the shoulder of her shirt was a recording device. Maybe the gold ring, bright against the light brown skin of her left-hand, had a poisoned spike in it or had one of those practically-microscopic HYDRA computers in it. But somehow…he really doubted it, even after what she'd said.

"You were expecting me?" He kept his voice warm, friendly. People tended to remember the douche bags more often than the nice guys. He doffed his cap and offered her the barest hint of a smile to keep up the charade.

The woman shrugged and tucked a lock of auburn hair behind her ear. "I had a hunch that my renter would arrive this afternoon. I'm Sarah Gardner, but everyone calls me Sally."

He realized then that the sign on the bakery's front had said SALLY'S PASTRY GARDEN.

"Just a second. What," she added, dropping her gaze to Jamie, "the blue devil happened to you, Mister? Does the other kid look worse?"

Jamie heaved an aggrieved sigh. "No. It was Miguel. He locked Becky in the ball shed again!"

Color flared darkly in Sally's face as she glared out the window, as if she was actually looking for Miguel. "That boy is getting on my last nerve," she muttered. "I've called his parents, I've called the principal, I've called the cops. I'm seriously considering disarticulating his limbs and feeding them to small, ugly, rabid dogs."

"Can we watch?" Jamie asked, helping himself to a cookie. He winced when he bit into it.

Sally's lips twitched. "That would be a big, big no. Alright, head up to the bathroom, I'll be in there in a minute after I talk to this gentleman, okay? Will, you go with him. Yes," she added as the boys opened their mouths. "You can take your petty bribes of sugar and Crisco with you. Begone. Vamoose. Curl away, my sons." When the pair had gone around the corner and clomped up what had to be stairs, Sally braced her hands on the counter and leaned back. "You scared Miguel Quintana away from my children?"

Wondering if somehow he'd managed to offend her by coming to the rescue, he shrugged. "It wasn't a fair fight, and they seemed like they needed some help. I hope I didn't overstep myself."

She shook her head and glanced at Becky, who hadn't picked her head up yet. The plate next to her was noticeably depleted, though. More than four cookies were missing. Sally danced her fingers over the countertop like pretend spider legs until they were less than an inch from Becky's arm. Two little fingers peeped out under Becky's arm and touched her mother's knuckles. Sally smiled.

"Thank you," she said to the assassin. "People warn you about small towns practically being cults sometimes, like something out of Children of the Corn, but what they don't say is that being a mutant in a big city is even worse. Believe it or not, this is the safest place for my kids." She sighed. "So, you're here about renting the guest house, right?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Please don't call me that," she said with a tired smile. "Makes me feel kind of old. Or like I live down south. I'm from New York, so it's a little weird. So a few questions for you before I show you the house. Do you smoke, drink, or do drugs?"

He raised an eyebrow. "You'll just believe whatever I say."

Her smile widened just a touch. "I'm a mutant. Not a very powerful one, so most of the people in Whistle-Stop don't care. But it comes with a few perks. One, I get hunches sometimes. I know things, like when the phone's about to ring and who's going to be calling, or if someone's at the door or if it's going to rain even when the sky's still clear. Nothing big. But my second little talent is, I know when people are lying. It's like a mini superpower. So yes, I'll believe you—if you tell me the truth. Smoking, drinking, drugs?"

"None of the above."

"Are you on the run from the cops?"

Too specific, he thought with an inward smile, but just said, "No."

She eyed him for a minute, then nodded. "Okay. Next question: are you a pedophile?"

His eyebrows snapped together and he stared at her. "What?"

One slender, fiery-gold brow winged upward in a lift that practically dripped with a thousand silent messages. "I have four children. If I don't ask, and something happens, I'd be one of those horror flick girls who are too naive to live. So it's a valid question, considering you'll be living on my property. Oh," she added, an eerie blankness stealing over her face. "And just so we're clear, if you try to harm any of my children in any way, I will kill you flatter than dead. I've done it before."

As inexplicable and really kind of laughable as it should have been—he was the Winter Soldier, HYDRA's top assassin—in that second he believed her. He had no idea what she would do, but he had no doubts at all that if he ever hurt her kids, she would do everything in her power to track him down and ghost him. She probably wouldn't succeed…but then again, he'd thought Agent Romanoff wouldn't have survived his attempt to eliminate her, and she had.

He inclined his head to Sally. He wondered who she'd killed and how she'd escaped prison.

"I'm not a pedophile. I'm not a serial killer. I have no intention of hurting you or your children. I'm not someone you need to worry about, and I'm not staying long. A month at most. I just need a place to stay for awhile."

Folding her arms across her chest, she tilted her head down and studied him from beneath her brows like a snake watching a mouse. Except he wasn't a mouse, he was another snake, a king cobra, and she was just a harmless little garter snake. Still he let her study him at her leisure before she spoke again.

"Utilities are included in the rent; since you're only staying a month, you pay by the week on Mondays. First week's rent needs to be in my hands before you move in, cash or money order. You can opt to have meals with us if you give me enough warning; we always have plenty to spare. I don't allow loud music after six-thirty—my daughter Lori's two, that's her bedtime—and I don't allow swearing around my kids. You can watch what you want in the guest house, there's cable, but if it's rated above Y-seven, make sure I can't hear it outside. You can't walk around outside in your boxers and you can't wear anything out of the house that you couldn't conceivably wear at a preschool. No women, either.

"I allow pets but you need to run them by me first because we have two dogs and five cats ranging around here. That," she added, pointing to a mostly-white cat with threads of gold, brown sugar, dove gray, and black through her fur, who sat sunning itself in the window and licking one dainty paw, "is Starbright. She's our mascot. She's kind of old so be gentle with her.

"At the moment we need someone who can fix some stuff up around here and maybe work the counter because my cashier left on her mission two days ago. I'll take whatever work you do out of your rent fees if you're interested. I don't mind you spending any time with my kids but be careful with Becky." She nodded to the Japanese girl, who'd finally sat up and was now busy pressing the tines of a fork in a line down the center of a cookie, making the tiniest indents. "Will probably told you she's autistic?"

He nodded. "She doesn't like the dark or spiders." He shrugged. "Non-issue. I'm not going to bother your kids."

"She doesn't like being touched by strangers, either, so watch it. And she's on a strict schedule and I expect you to respect that. Becky and Jamie are adopted; you got a problem with that, I don't care. Lori's a mutant—she has vertical pupils. You got a problem with that, again, I don't care. Find somewhere else to live." She shoved her glasses up the bridge of her nose with one finger. "Any questions?"

The sudden bizarre urge to smile tugged at his mouth. She had no idea who he was. She'd have been terrified if she ever figured it out. But because she didn't know, she had no problem being the alpha here. He could've killed her in six different ways in under a minute without giving her the chance to even squeak, but she was talking to him like an officer to a raw recruit still wet behind the ears. It reminded him of…of…something. It slipped away when he tried to grab it, though. Mentally shrugging it off, he focused on Sally.

"Can I see the house?"

And for the first time she offered him a real smile, bright as the cozy glow from the shaded amber lights hanging from the bakery ceiling. She nodded. "Sure. Just let me take care of Jamie and Will real fast. Oh, uh, sorry, I forgot to ask. What's your name?"

It took him a split-second to decide. Offering his right hand, he said, "Jack Winter."

Too late he remembered Sally's so-called "superpower." But she cocked her head and blinked owlishly at him through her glasses before making what could only be described as a what the heck? face and taking his hand.

"Nice to meet you, Mr. Winter."