A/N: Please read and review!
I woke up in the hospital, which was not the kind of feeling that I liked. Not even close. A calming and gentle hand on my shoulder to have me look up to see Steve. That was enough to calm me down. Slightly.
"You're fine," Steve said to me. "You're with me. There's nothing you need to worry about."
"I'm still not going to like the hospital," I said to him. "Ever."
"That's fine with me," he said to me. "Just as long as you're okay."
"I'm feeling better, Steve," I said to him. "Much better."
That was the only time he had started to allow himself to relax. "I can see that."
There was a light knock on the door before it was opened to show Agent David Rossi. Of course he was going to be the one who would talk to me about what had happened at that house. That made it feel a little bit better. Probably the only one of those agents I felt so comfortable with.
"There's some questions I'd like to ask you, Ms. Tjaden," he said to me. "Only if you are up to it."
"Might as well get it over with," I said to him, making some kind of dismissive hand gesture back at him. "Fire away."
"Were you there when they killed the other women?" He asked me.
I shook my head. "No. I wasn't." I grimaced. "But, I knew it was happening."
He nodded. "What happened that night?"
"I wasn't feeling too good," I said to him. "If at all. Someone helped me out of the room, but I couldn't move too well. So, he left me alone in the kitchen and gave me something to drink."
"That's why I'm curious," he said to me. "I know how particular the people of your family could be. The only reason why you would accept that drink would be when you trusted him."
"I was really out of it," I said to him. "Maybe that didn't matter too much to me."
"Maybe . . ." Rossi said, giving me a thoughtful look. He probably didn't believe what I said to him. "You probably recognized him. More than you should have." No reaction out of me. That may have been why he looked over to Steve. "They removed the bullets from them. Russian. No rifling marks on them."
There was that faintest of recognition from Steve at those words. He should have really known what that could've meant. They would have come from Bucky's gun. That happened back from when he was used as the Winter Soldier. Some things would have come naturally to him. His choice of weapons would not have been much different.
Rossi noticed the look we had been sharing, and he knew we were not going to speak about what we would've known.
"It is curious on how he knew where to look," Rossi commented as he started to leave the hospital room, gauging what our reactions would have been like. He had to have known that we knew who the man was.
"If you find him," I said. "Ask him why it took so long to get me out of there if had been following me like that."
There was a pause after Rossi had left the room, and Steve looked at me. I couldn't really read his facial expression over what had happened.
"Before you passed out," he said to me. "You said you recognized who helped you."
I slowly nodded back at him. "Yeah. Bucky. That was the second time he saved me."
The first time was being by the Potomac, and Steve knew about what happened there. He could only nod at me when I said that to him.
"How was he?" Steve asked me. He sounded both hopeful and full of dread when he asked me that question.
I knew he was looking into the Winter Soldier Program in an attempt to learn more about Bucky to better find him. It sounded like it wasn't too pleasant, so there was a chance it would take too long to make him seem normal again. At least in part
"He mentioned to me before help arrived that he used to get you out of trouble," I said to him, and I could see how his eyes started to light up as he listened to me. "But, he couldn't seem to do that any more. You're Captain America. You don't need that kind of help any more from him. But, you will keep an eye on your best girl. Because apparently I seem to keep getting in trouble."
"That does sound like something he would do," he said to me.
He noticed the scowl I was starting to wear. It started to appear when I said that to him. Something about the whole situation had really, really bothered me.
"What's wrong?" He asked me. He would've known what that would have meant.
Usually nothing good, if my past attitude had been of any indicator.
"I hate being the damsel in distress," I said to him. I probably sounded like a petulant teenager at that moment. "I can take care of myself."
"Not all of the time," he said to me. "Not everyone can take care of themselves all of the time. There's nothing wrong with having that extra help."
"I don't like it that it has to be all of the time, though," I muttered back at him.
He could only shake his head back at me. He knew there was no way he could really argue with me when I was in that kind of a mood. Steve could only hold me close to him in that moment like he could never seem to ever let me go.
"You always do seem to attract that extra trouble. All of the time." Steve lightly kissed my forehead. "I'm just glad you're alive."