It was a lengthy connection flight, but once they made it to Brussels, the two wasted no time in looking for the rendezvous point.
"You're pronouncing it funny, Lar," Bucky muttered, to which Lara rolled her eyes and repeated the enunciation.
"It's 'Hôtel Métropole' how hard is that to pronounce?" she pointed out in mute frustration.
"You got the aigu accent messed up," he replied smugly, and she couldn't help but want to hit him in the shoulder, but his reflexes got the better of her.
"My aigu is just fine but I thank you for the concern, monsieur," Lara feigned a sense of gratitude, while Bucky wrapped one arm around her waist as she hailed a taxi.
"Pas de problème, ma cherie." The seductive undertone in his voice made her scoff, though he knew she enjoyed it.
"Oh, stop. You love it when I talk French," Bucky retorted.
"Yeah, next thing I know you'll be singing French songs like you work at the Moulin Rouge," she bit back, stifling her urge to laugh at the thought.
"Voulez-vous chouchez avec moi, ce-soir?" he sang the words in a low voice, and she had to cover her mouth when she snorted.
Finally, a cab had slowed along the sidewalk where they stood, and she urged him inside. "Let's go, Marmalade."
"Merci," he raised the corner of his lip in that smirk which made her blush despite her best efforts to ignore him when he was getting cocky.
They pulled up outside the hotel, and Bucky made the arrangements while Lara looked at her surroundings without trying to appear even slightly conspicuous. With Hydra, no one knew what to expect, no matter how often they had crossed paths.
"Well, that's sorted," Bucky pointed out as he strode towards her from the reception desk.
"What floor?"
"Fifth, they're waiting for us there," he answered, leading her to the elevators.
They stood waiting for a lift to arrive when he snaked his arms around her a little from behind, and they looked at each other through their reflection in the stainless steel of the mechanisms.
"You know why they put this kind of mirror in the elevator doors?" Lara asked of her partner, who was now resting his chin on her shoulder. He sighed in uncertainty, while she elaborated on the little piece of trivia further.
"It's because people are so easily distracted with the reflections that they forget how long the elevators take," she mused, suppressing a grin when he began placing kisses on her shoulder and neck.
"I don't know about you but I'm thinking you're right on that one," he whispered in her ear, and she tilted her head a little to give him a chaste kiss to the lips.
"Which is why I suggest we take the stairs," she beamed at him, taking one of his hands in hers and was about to lead him to the staircase when the familiar ring of the elevator came, and Bucky almost dragged her into the lift.
If they weren't about to meet the others, Bucky would have slammed the emergency stop button and pinned her against the wall, lost in the expansive dimension of themselves when the inner mirrors reflected nothing else. Instead he simply leaned in and kissed her until they reached the fifth floor. Stepping out into the empty hallway, they strode into one of the corridors, following the directions to the room number they were given on the walls.
"Isn't this it?" he asked of Lara, who nodded in agreement. "Room 581," and just as she was about to knock, the door of the opposite hotel room was yanked opened by a friendly face. "Almost thought you guys weren't gonna show up," Sam called out, making them twist on their heels.
"Missed you too, Sam," Lara motioned towards him, embracing him with one arm.
"I know you did," he spoke nonchalantly, and when she walked into the room, he patted Bucky on the back.
"You liking the new arm?" Sam asked him as they joined the rest in the room.
"Still has a few kinks," he replied, and Sam couldn't help but make fun of the response.
"Yeah, I'm sure it does, man," he muttered, earning a glare from Bucky, which Sam shrugged off.
They found Lara bowing her head to T'Challa before she gave a quick hug to Steve, and then asked them why the room number changed.
"It's just standard precautions, we switched them to confuse people," the king assured her, and she heard Wilson say in a low murmur something along the lines of "been watching Ghost Protocol too much."
"Did you run into more Hydra after we spoke?" Steve asked of the new arrivals, to which they shook their heads in negation.
"Doesn't mean they've been shaken off," Lara reminded them, and turned her attention to the Wakandan ruler.
"Do you know if the compound is still compromised?" she inquired curiously.
"The Dora Milaje have the nurse in their custody, they've been questioning her for days but they haven't obtained any valuable information yet."
"Wait, you're holding her hostage?" Bucky intervened, evidently startled by this new piece of information.
"Of course," T'Challa reaffirmed, eyeing him with an air of resolve.
Steve also looked at Bucky with suspicion, while Lara and Sam seemed to be more confounded than wary. The star-spangled man took a step forward before he began to voice his concern.
"Buck-" he pronounced his name slowly.
"What?" the soldier snapped, knowing where his friend was going to direct the conversation.
"You can't talk to her," he said calmly, the severity of his expression meeting with defiance.
"You know that I can get into their heads better than anyone." He glared at his oldest friend sternly.
That was the moment that the rest had understood what was being discussed, or demanded.
"You think that's the smartest way to go around this?" Steve posed his question, though it would have been better to have ended without an answer.
"The rest of them are trying to capture us or blow up buildings, maybe it's not so bad-" Sam was trying to give his own diplomatic two cents, but was cut off by Steve.
"He can be manipulated with a string of words that we don't even know about, we know what will happen if he gets anywhere near a Hydra operative."
Bucky was on the verge of breaking a piece of furniture, the chair beside him or the lamp in the corner. It didn't matter, all that was clear was the rage building up inside him. Lara herself felt anxious as she watched him grow more and more agitated.
"What difference is it going to make? We're not going back to Wakanda anytime soon," Lara blurted out impatiently, desperate to steer the conversation back to what they were here to do. However, her attempts were rendered futile when the King corrected her.
"I never said she was being held in Wakanda." The royal's gaze moved from Lara to Bucky, and in a manner, was certain that he would only be fuelling Bucky's determination by disclosing this.
"Where is she?" Bucky asked, now more restless, and yet worn by the thoughts of him being too fragile or vulnerable to be of any real use to defeating Hydra. The strings which held him in place were tightly woven, like a flightless insect caught in the web of a looming spider.
"She was running in Belgium, avoiding detection, but the Milaje traced and caught her before she could make it in the vicinity of their Belgian base," T'Challa replied coolly.
"So she's here?" Lara deduced rather than asked, and Steve only confirmed what she believed.
"Somewhere close by, where no one can interrupt," T'Challa added, placing an emphasis on the action which he knew that Bucky was keen to carry out.
"What if one of us questioned her, and Bucky was aiding us through an ear piece?" the only woman in the room suggested among them. Steve was the only one who didn't seem too intrigued by the idea.
"She might recognise the techniques, and once she realises he's listening-"
"They need to shock me before, otherwise it has no effect on me," Bucky interjected impatiently, but was quickly followed by Steve's retort.
"You can't know that for sure, you said it yourself, you can't trust your own mind." The words came out like the exasperated rattle of gunfire.
"I think I know them better than you could, or more than I ever wanted to!" the scruffy soldier raised his voice with a force that made him all the more fixated, his entire stance as unshaken as his intent.
Steve wound up holding his tongue for a moment, feeling like the effort to dissuade him would be futile, so he sat at the edge of the couch in their room, letting out an almost inaudible sigh.
"If that is the course of action you are willing to take," T'Challa broke the silence, his gaze focused on no one but Bucky, "I will see that you get your interrogation."
"Okay, great but who's going to be doing the actual interrogating?" Sam asked the room, and Steve stared at his hands as he spoke. "I can do it."
"No, you and me have been too close to this," Bucky pointed out lowly and turned his head to Lara, who gave him a look of subtle astonishment.
"You're sure?" she nearly murmured the question, while Sam spoke up from her other side.
"Don't worry, I'll hold his hand while you make us proud," he said coolly, though his eyes lit up in a mischievous manner, and even Bucky couldn't fight the urge to grin at them both.
"You'll manage," he said to her encouragingly.
She sighed, and looked at Steve who seemed more occupied with worrying thoughts than annoyance. She knelt beside him, and nudged him a little.
"I get where you're coming from, we'd both lost someone to these guys," she began, watching his expression carefully as she picked her words, "but he trusts me and you, so maybe we owe that to him and his judgement." He turned to her and uttered the unexpected surrender.
"You're right."
She patted him on the back, and looked to him again when she rose.
"And hey, I got him this far, didn't I?" she gave him a slight smile, which he returned after a few moments.
"Yeah, well you're lucky you had that pan around," Bucky added, to which the rest stared at him.
Whether they were just confused or awaiting an explanation, he gave it to them readily.
"She knocked me out with a pan," which earned a wider smile from both King T'Challa and Steve, while Sam stood by, almost dumbstruck.
"Dude, seriously?" Wilson finally managed, still staring at Bucky in amazement. "Of course she did," he ended up muttering to himself, making Lara grin all the more.
A/N: Hey everyone, just wanted to thank you all for being patient for the next instalment, the cloud of exams has finally cleared! Hope you enjoy this chapter and if you're interested, I've also begun an M-rated Loki x O.C. fic called "Very Much Alive" so feel free to check that out.
