Author's note: Hey guys, thank you so much for sticking around! I hope you're enjoying this story :)
Diana woke up just as the sun peeked over the horizon to Steve's mouth trailing along her skin, slowly and deliberately and with the familiar determination, her body responding to his touch before her mind knew to.
"Steve," she sighed, her eyes fluttering open but it was so hard to focus, to push through sensations taking over reason.
He hummed into her belly and glanced up at her with that cheeky grin she knew all too well.
"Morning," he murmured, tracing his tongue around her navel.
She cursed under her breath, not realizing that it wasn't even in English until he chuckled, inching slowly further down.
"I have to…" She faltered, her fingers burying in his hair without making any attempt to steer him off. "Steve, I can't… I have—I have to be at the museum soon."
"Not for another hour," he countered, his thumb drawing idle circles over the jut of her hipbone.
"I can't be late," she whispered, giving in to the heat pooling in her belly and spreading over every cell of her body.
"Forty-five minutes then," he didn't relent.
"I need to—Steve," her eyes dropped shut when his mouth closed over her. "I have to…" She trailed off, forgetting where she was going with it because she couldn't—couldn't—
Her fingers twitched in his hair.
"Thirty," he murmured with a smile.
She stopped thinking after that.
He wasn't going to make her late, Steve thought, coaxing another curse that morphed into a moan out of her. But he sure as hell was going to make her wish that she could stay, make their eventual reunion later in the day hungry and drenched with desire. Give her something to think of and look forward to…
He certainly would, Steve thought as Diana brushed a quick kiss goodbye to his lips on her way out, running awfully late. He didn't bother containing his grin.
Falling into a new rhythm was the easiest thing ever. It was like all of a sudden, the past decades fell away and they picked up right where they had left off years ago; a little awkward, a little uncertain but familiar to the core nonetheless.
Diana was concerned that he would get bored, and given a chance, Steve figured that he probably would. Eventually. As it was, though, he couldn't remember the last time he allowed himself to pause, to take a breath and have a look around instead of trying to outrun himself. To escape the time that he was stuck in, knowing that he needed a reason to keep going, lest his mistakes and regrets drag him into the dark pit of despair from which there was no way out.
Even in Gotham, when his life as he knew it suddenly skidded to an abrupt halt, taking a turn he never saw coming, he couldn't help but feel one disaster or another breathing down his neck. There was always something to do, some place to be, and people to pay attention to, which felt overwhelming at times even though he grew very fond of them.
Gotham didn't feel like a break so much as a detour. Paris, on the other hand, was a different story altogether. There were no rules here, no limitations, no expectations; no fear of being walked in on – something that Steve, personally, found the most consoling aspect of their trip.
Diana took him to the Louvre the first week after their return, having to bite back her laughter at the flock of co-workers that surrounded him in a heartbeat, charmed by his flawless French and easy smiles, and the fact that he had managed to melt the heart of the ever-reserved Mademoiselle Prince. Steve chose not to correct them and point out that Diana was the one who made him feel like he was truly living again, allowing the flow of unceremonious questions to wash over him, mildly panicky over the amount of attention, and yet amused by it at the same time.
"You're quite an attraction, I must say," Diana hummed when they were left alone at last.
"Yeah, I remember full well being one," Steve glanced over his shoulder, checking for a stray curator lingering nearby, before he turned to her.
She bit her lip around a smile, a memory flashing before her mind's eyes. So long ago, but as clear as if it only happened yesterday. She remembered her gaze sliding over him with unmasked curiosity when he stepped out of the pool in the cave on Themyscira, her head tilted slightly. Remembered thinking that the drawings in the anatomy books she'd studied didn't seem to have depicted men quite accurately.
"Who could resist?" Her voice dropped to a low husk that sent his heart into a gallop.
Steve hummed. "It's not like you don't have men here," he mused, looking around again but this time his gaze met only the sombre faces staring at him from a dozen canvases on the walls.
Diana laughed. "Rarely this young, never this dashing, and most often not interested in ladies."
He quirked an eyebrow at her. "You think I'm dashing?" he asked innocently, and there it was again flaring in her eyes – a temptation to call it a day at 10 in the morning and spend the rest of it doing something entirely more delightful.
And knowing that he still had that effect on her, even now, after all this time, was intoxicating.
He followed her down the wide halls, past tourists with pensive faces and fancy-looking cameras hanging around their necks and guided groups and kids filling out some sort of observation cards as they studied paintings and statues, their faces scrunched in concentration. He found himself trying not to smile. There was an odd quality to being here with Diana, seeing this world through her eyes. Odder still, to have people greet her by her name, her effortless way of navigating the labyrinth of corridors and endless rooms, where anyone else would have gotten lost already.
She belonged, and it filled him with inexplicable pride that Steve didn't have the right to own, but that still made something warm unfurl in his chest. He reached for her hand and squeezed her fingers, choosing to merely shake his head in response to her quizzical look.
He got to meet the infamous Pierre as well. A lanky man in his 30's whose feelings for Diana were a mix of utter adoration and endless exasperation. He seemed to carry the same sort of nervous energy as Barry, albeit somewhat less concentrated. Charmed against his will, Pierre seemingly couldn't help teetering on the brink between seeking Diana's constant approval and the desire to get things done his own way.
He shoved a stack of papers at her the second she appeared in his line of sight, disregarding Steve's presence altogether. Steve watched him try to explain something about two different conflicting collections to her and a shipment that still hadn't arrived, and asking if she could please make the relevant phone calls, what with her being the head of the department – all without stopping for breath once. No wonder he kept sending her messages at all hours of the day and night, Steve thought, biting back his smile. He watched Diana listen to the man with mild amusement at his apparent exaggeration of how drastic the situation was, laced with affection for this conversation, this life, this moment that made her one of them even if it never lasted as long as she wanted it to.
He was happy that she had Pierre, that she had them all, a small world that Steve knew she treasured more than she would ever be willing to admit even to herself.
"He thinks you're distracting," she told him when Pierre left with a huff, muttering something about deadlines and a waste of time and pure nonsense under his breath as Steve pressed his lips together, trying not to laugh.
He turned to her and grinned. "What do you think?"
She moved closer to him and tilted her face up to brush her lips briefly to his. "I'm going to hold my judgement."
He was, though. A distraction. And he knew it, and it wasn't right.
After that, Steve gave her space. Gave her a chance to slide back into her old routines, knowing that she needed it for the moments when normalcy was only a dream, if nothing else. She loved her job. He could see it in the care she was showing to the items, in the way her face lit up even when she spoke about something trivial. It was good to see her slip back into the comfort of it.
He tried not to think of how hard it must have been for Diana to find her place in this strange and crazy world when he had left her, although the guilt of it still throbbed like a poorly healed wound deep in his chest.
And so instead of bothering Diana while she dealt with the matters of the museum, he would walk the streets of the city that carried both fond and bittersweet memories for him, trying to get to know it anew. He would catch up with Barry or call Victor to ask about the progress on the S.T.A.R. Labs investigation, although there seldom were any news, what with Waller being adamant to keep it under wraps.
He would go to the Louvre sometimes and wander its endless halls, occasionally catching a glimpse of Diana, content to know that she was there without either of them having to crowd one another. Every now and then, he would sneak her away for a cup of coffee at the café across the street when she had a break, or bring her lunch when it wasn't an option.
Steve wondered if she'd be happier if this was all she had, or if she'd get bored too, her heart seeking more than this seemingly simple life could offer her. People always said that a person could never truly appreciate what they had until it was gone, but he figured that losing what mattered to them the most wasn't all that necessary. To Diana, knowing what death and hatred could be like was enough.
"Would you ever quit?" he asked her one night, the question slipping from his tongue before he knew to stop it. "The…" he stumbled over the words, "the 'being the saviour of the world' part?"
"Would you ever want me to?" she asked back, watching him closely, which was an answer in and of itself.
Steve shook his head. "No."
He would never do that to her. Not because he wouldn't want to – god help him, after all the battles they'd been through, all the losses and heartbreak, the only thing that Steve truly wanted was to never deal with slaughter and carnage that his people put upon themselves time and time again - but because it would never be fair to take it from her. To take away something that was thrumming in her blood like a second pulse. Something that was an integral part of her.
Like he knew that there was nothing she would ever want to take away from him, change about him.
She was scared, too. Steve could see it in her eyes, feel it in her touch. They had come too close to losing one another enough times to be scarred by those memories for the rest of their lives, but he would never demand that she put behind her something this important. Not even at the cost of his own peace.
xoox
"I did as you asked and you were right, Lex's name is all over Quinn's business," Lois's face on the screen of Diana's laptop was grainy and dark in the dim light of the reading lamp in her living room all the way across the world in Metropolis. "Which, technically speaking, is not illegal, as far as everyone is concerned."
Diana felt her brows knit together. "So, he was involved?"
Lois rubbed her forehead. "Their affiliation seems to have been rather superficial. There was a public transfer of funds," she added before Diana could ask, "but it was filed as sponsorship ." She tapped her pen against the notepad sitting before her, her eyes scanning the notes. "Two years ago, Lex housed a reception at Quinn's hotel. Annual executive dinner. Both of them were present at the reopening of the Metropolis museum after the renovation, however, there is nothing connecting them beside that. Which, if you ask me, doesn't mean anything ." She paused and raised her eyes. "What are you looking for, exactly? "
Diana drummed her fingers against the desk, feeling her jaw set tautly.
That was the problem, she thought. She had no idea what she was looking for, but finding a picture of Lex in the same room where she found a painting that went missing over 80 years ago set off something inside of her that she couldn't quite put her finger on just yet. It could be nothing, of course. Nothing at all, and maybe she was wasting Lois's time right now, as well as her own. But the fact that Lex's name popped up at all in conjunction with this case seemed like too much of a coincidence, even though Diana had no idea where to start unravelling the knot.
What she did know, however, was that she didn't want to get Bruce involved yet; not until she knew for a fact that there was a connection. If there was a connection. It didn't matter anymore, of course. Lex Luthor was locked up in Arkham Asylum, but the last thing she needed was to fire up Bruce's personal vendetta against that man, whatever the reason.
"I'm not sure yet," she admitted with a sigh. "But I appreciate the information."
"Of course," Lois's features softened. "I'm sorry I couldn't be of more help without going any deeper."
"Don't," Diana shook her head, a small strain in her voice. "I don't know what we're dealing with here, and I would rather not have you attract any attention to yourself." She paused, her eyes flicking towards the clock in the corner of the screen. "Am I keeping you up at 3 in the morning?"
"No," Lois rubbed her eyes tiredly. "No, it's not you. It's the deadline I have to meet in… 4 hours. I just saw that you were online and--" she stifled a yawn. "I'm sorry, long day."
"Thank you," Diana repeated, smiling. "For doing this, and for the call."
Lois folded her arms on the desk before her and leaned closer to the screen. " How is Paris? " she asked, far more interested and alert instantly, her expression one of unmasked curiosity.
"Paris is-"
"Hey, honey, have you seen my…" Steve interjected from behind Diana before she had a chance to finish what she was going to say, and when she turned around, she found him standing in the bedroom door wearing nothing but a towel around his hips, his hair damp from the shower and the few droplets of water that fell from it glistening on his skin. "Oh."
He trailed off when his gaze found Diana sitting at the desk by the window and he realized that they weren't alone, strictly speaking. And while she was wearing nothing but his shirt, Lois couldn't see that. With him, though—
His eyes widened when the realization dawned, his grip tightening around the knot on his belly that was keeping the towel in place. Diana bit her lip, watching his cheeks grow red in two seconds flat. For a long moment, he could do nothing but gape at the screen, and she could practically hear the gears of panic turn in his head. He swallowed, trying to find his voice, or perhaps regain enough composure to bolt out of the room. She wasn't quite sure which one.
"Hey, Lois," he uttered at last.
"Hi, Steve," Lois waved dutifully.
"What are you-" Diana began, but he shook his head.
"Nothing," he said quickly, glancing around for a second and then backing out of the room. "I'll just, um…" he poked his thumb behind his back and cleared his throat. "Right. Bye… Lois."
After a moment, Diana turned back to the screen, a smirk on her lips. She shouldn't have enjoyed the moment as much as she did, and yet…
"And I'm taking it Paris is good," Lois noted, watching her with overt amusement. "Honey?"
Diana glanced toward the hallway once more and then shook her head, unable to dismiss the flutter in her chest and the smile that threatened to split her face in half.
She thought back to the taste of Steve's mouth and the way he would sometimes look at her when she wasn't watching, the warmth and weight of his body pressed to hers when they slept, always touching one way or another. The sound of his voice washing over her, chasing away the memories of the time when it was only her and empty walls and nothing but loneliness keeping her company. Replacing them with those of him making her breakfast and lingering kisses and the electrifying sensation of his hands on her skin that was nearly too much to bear.
"Paris is very good," Diana admitted.
"I have never seen you like this," Lois said after a moment, her voice soft. "It suits you."
"What?"
"That smile. Happiness." She paused. "Are you happy, Diana? "
"I am," Diana breathed. "Very. You should go get some sleep."
"And you should get—well, I'm sure you're getting it," Lois hummed, her eyebrows arched pointedly. "I hope I haven't interrupted anything."
"No. No, you have not," Diana let out a small laugh. "Tell Clark I said hello."
"Will do."
A goodbye and a promise to talk again soon later, the screen of her laptop went black for a moment before switching back to the assortment of icons on the desktop. She closed it and stood up, crossing the room to go look for Steve.
She found him in the bathroom, sitting on the lip of the bathtub, still wrapped in the towel – a view that she enjoyed beyond measure, really - his face only a slightly paler shade of crimson than what it was a few minutes ago. He looked up when she entered the room, pausing in the doorway to allow her gaze to travel over his body, taking in the defined muscles of his arms and chest, sliding over his abdomen with a fondness she knew didn't escape Steve's attention.
Quite a lovely view indeed.
Steve grimaced.
"A little heads up next time?" he asked. "Not all of us like prancing around naked."
Smirking, Diana stepped toward him, and when she was close enough, he reached for her, pulling her to him and burying his face in her sternum with a sigh. She smoothed her hands over his shoulders, his skin warm against her palms.
She hummed. "And what a shame that is."
"Don't. Start," he grumbled.
"Never heard you complain when I-" she pressed on, not sure if she should be enjoying this as much as she was, but unable to help it, either.
Steve's hands flexed on her hips, his grip on her tightening. "In private. When we're alone," he interjected. She felt his face scrunch as he squeezed his eyes shut. "I'm never going to live this one down," he muttered.
"I'm sorry," Diana murmured, sweeping her fingers through his damp hair and curving down to press a kiss to the crown of his head, taking note of how she definitely liked having him smell of her shampoo. As if he was part of her, she thought, smiling.
He exhaled into the fabric of her shirt, his breath warm on her skin. "You're not."
"No, I'm not." She let out a small, choked laugh and assumed that the sound that rose from the back of his throat was meant to indicate displeasure.
"Does it not bother you that an alarming number of your friends have seen us like… like this?" He nuzzled into her belly.
"Two is not an alarming number."
"That's exactly two more than necessary," Steve countered.
"They haven't seen anything," she reminded him.
He groaned in response.
Diana chuckled and slid her hand lower, gripping the hair near the nape of his neck and tugging at it, just enough for him to lift his face up to her, the reverence in his eyes all but taking her breath away. So much so that it frightened the deep part of her that was acutely aware of the power that he wielded over her, however unwittingly. The force of it like nothing she had ever seen, and the pain that it could cause if he'd choose to use it against her.
She stroked her hand down his cheek, watching him watch her for a few moments as her thumb drew circles over his cheekbones, both of them wrapped in the remnants of sweet-smelling thick air after his shower.
"You are very nice to look at," she informed him.
"Well, that changes everything, then," he deadpanned.
She smiled. "We're going, yes?"
It took Steve a moment to remember what she was talking about, and then he nodded. He leaned forward to kiss her stomach and then gave her hips a small squeeze before looking up at her again.
"Yeah. Let's go."
It was their second weekend in Paris, and despite her better judgement, Diana chose to take some time off from arranging the collection that had been finally assembled in one of the storage rooms, and drive them to Versailles before the weather turned foul.
She hadn't been there in quite a while and Steve had never visited, and even though Pierre had summoned her to the museum at the crack of dawn on a Saturday morning because of some mix up – something that wasn't nearly as urgent and catastrophic as he made it sound because they still had a week and a half before the opening, and the mix up was merely a case of a mislabeled item – she was adamant to make something of their Sunday, at least.
Steve didn't argue.
Unlike Bruce's aggressive cars that existed to impress and threaten and remind everyone about his wealth and status, her Volvo was sleek and smooth, practical and convenient more than anything, and hungry for speed when they finally reached the road leading out of town. They would have time in Paris, she knew. She missed it and she loved it more than she ever thought she would, and there was eagerness in her to create new memories now that she had Steve back. To wipe away the past decades of longing for what she couldn't have.
But it was starting to feel like a routine, too. Today, she wanted to break out of it.
The day was warm, almost unnaturally so for early November, the low sun bright and welcoming. Diana rolled down her window, allowing the air smelling of wheat and fallen leaves and something that had an unmistakable tang of autumn to it to rush inside, tugging at her hair, cajoling a smile out of her.
Her gaze remained steadily on the road before them as she guided the car smoothly around the curves, but Steve's barely shifted away from her, making her skin prickle.
"I get it now," Diana said with a smile after a while.
"Hm? Get what?" he asked.
"When you say that you can feel me looking at you."
He chuckled and finally turned to look out of his own window. "I never said I didn't like it."
She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye and smirked.
She could feel him, too, his presence like an electric charge in the air making the hairs on her arms stand on end. Apart from his actual physical presence and being able to touch him and love him whenever she pleased, she missed that feeling the most, that odd sense of peace that she had always felt around him. The way her soul longed for him even when Diana forbade herself from thinking of him.
Who knew that missing something like that was even possible?
He reached for her hand resting on the gear stick and brushed his thumb along her knuckles before lifting it to press a quick kiss her fingers.
"We could do this sometime," Diana said when he let go.
"What?"
"Go somewhere, just us. Like this."
His brows furrowed. "Isn't this what we're doing now?"
"No, I'm working now," she shook her head. "We can't really leave. Besides…"
"Gotham," Steve finished for her, a strain in his voice.
Her lips flattened into a thin line. "Yes."
"Is this what the call with Lois was about?" he asked. She was surprised it had taken him this long to bring it up.
"Well… until you walked into the room – yes," Diana noted, amused.
"God," he muttered and rubbed his eyes. "I swear you're doing that on purpose."
She let out a small laugh. "Maybe."
He turned to her. "Want to tell me about it?"
"We both think you're fairly handsome," she responded smoothly.
Steve made a strangled sound in the back of his throat. "Not that." And when she darted a quick look at him, his cheeks were flushed again.
That was the thing about him, she had learned. He knew that he was attractive and desirable and far above average in every sense that she could think of, and, given the slightest chance, he would gladly point out all those qualities. However, if someone else did that, if she so much as mentioned his handsomeness or dared to offer him any other kind of compliment, he would get shy and flustered in a way that made her heart ache with tenderness. It was as if having attention turned to him made him feel like he was losing control.
And she loved it.
She wondered sometimes if he even noticed that. If he knew that there was one thing that being a spy had robbed him of when he wasn't looking – the comfort of being seen.
Diana bit her lip. "Maybe later," she said at last. "It doesn't matter now."
Steve nodded and didn't press.
There was something in Lois's words that left her with a deep unease, even though, try as she might, she couldn't figure out what it was, save for the heavy feeling in the pit of her stomach that she could write off to foreboding. She didn't like it. Sooner or later, they would have to deal with that mess, and if her experience was any indication, it would most likely be sooner rather than later.
But not now. Not today. Today belonged to her and the man sitting next to her as they cut across endless outstretch of fields on either side of the road.
Today, they would have lunch in one of the towns strewn around the region like jewels, waiting to be uncovered. They would walk the halls of the palace, enjoying lavish luxury which never failed to leave Diana enthralled and the gardens surrounding it, and follow the maze of footpaths that millions of people had walked before them. They would watch the sunset from one of the galleries, surrounded by sunlight, and she would kiss the breath out of him, because she could.
Today, being together would be enough.
xoox
Veld, 1918
Some people thought that the worst thing about the war was hunger and raids and never knowing what tomorrow might bring, and the never-ending guessing game of death and wondering if they'd ever see their loved ones again.
To Steve, the worst thing was losing hope. Forgetting what anything else even looked like, not seeing anything beyond blood and smoke.
A month before he was sent to investigate Ludendorff, a feeling of such dread and despair settled inside of him that he could feel it eating him up with every breath he took. It wasn't that he didn't believe in victory anymore. It was that after all those years he didn't know how to.
And then Diana happened. And in a day and a half, she managed to breathe a whole new faith into him. It was delicate and fragile, but real nonetheless, and he was desperate to protect it at all costs. Suddenly, his heart was beating in earnest again and there was a new meaning to what they were doing. For him, yes, and for every innocent life that could still be saved from this unspeakable slaughter. But also for her because he wanted her to be right. He wanted her to see the world the way she thought it was supposed to be – good and kind and just.
He roused slowly when the first rays of sun broke through the blanket of clouds, colouring the bleak world in gold. His muscles ached pleasantly, his body spent in the best way Steve could think of. He scrubbed a sleepy hand over his face, only then realizing that the spot beside him was empty.
The snow had stopped some time after they fell asleep, and now Diana was standing by the window and looking at the silent world on the other side of the glass, still fast asleep after a night of celebrations. It was so quiet that if it wasn't for the slight creak of old wood as the house lived a life of its own around them, he would've thought that he had gone deaf.
Her armour was on, but her gauntlets and tiara were resting on top of her shield, lying on the chair in the corner, her boots sitting underneath it. Grace and force and power. He allowed his eyes to travel over her frame, taking in the way her hair curled at the ends in thick coils and the straight line of her back, her face impassive but concern lurking in her eyes already. As if she saw something that he couldn't.
Steve thought of her languid in his arms, pressed beneath him with her own arms wrapped around his body and the sound of her voice consuming all of his being. They had talked, and laughed, and memorized one another, and whispered the things that could only be said in the dark. And in those moments, he found a peace he didn't know still existed within him.
But now in the harsh light of day, however dim it still was, he was at a loss, not certain what to say, what to think. Maybe if he woke up with her still curled around his body – the way she fell asleep – he would know, but not now, not like this. Not when there were no rules because there couldn't be any rules about her. Not even if he lived to be thousands of years old.
Diana turned to him then and smiled, and the brightness of it took his breath away. There was a promise in her eyes, and so much spirit and hope, that it was like looking into the future beyond anything he could ever have imagined and seeing his very soul.
"Morning," Steve murmured, his blood feeling like it had caught fire all over again.
"It's so quiet," she said.
It occurred to Steve that by this point, the only things she had seen of his world were one of the busiest cities there was and the chaos of the war. No wonder the quiet moment of peace seemed so alien to her.
He smiled. "Everyone's still sleeping," he said. "It's early."
"It's not that early," she countered.
"I wish it was," his voice dropped. "Come here."
She did, sitting on the edge of the bed beside him, and when Steve kissed her again, he could taste the future that he wished for, could feel it thrumming beneath his skin and running through his veins, everywhere inside of him, waiting.
Diana stroked his cheek, her fingers warm even in the room that had cooled over the night after the fire in the hearth had died down.
Today, they would find Ludendorff, and they would stop him, and then—
"We'll have time," he whispered against her lips as he pulled her to him, his hands moving over the buckles of her armour. "We will."
xoox
Paris, 2017
Draped across Steve's bare back in front of the fireplace in her living room, Diana traced her fingers slowly along the lines of his muscles, following the movement of his ribs as he fought to find his breath again. Her chest was rising and falling slowly against his shoulder blades to the sound of rain pattering against the roof and windows and the heat of fire licking at their bodies.
"I love you," she whispered softly. "I will still love you even when all the stars turn to dust and no memory will be left of them."
Steve shifted beneath her, and she pulled back as he rolled over onto his back to face her, still searching for his bearings in the aftershocks of pleasure. His eyes were slightly dazed which left Diana awfully pleased with herself.
He smiled. "And I you."
A few hours ago, a storm had come hard and fast, heavy clouds rolling from the east and chasing away what little was left of the afternoon sun. By the time they reached Paris, it was pouring so hard that the wipers were useless against the heavy rainstorm that was seemingly set on drowning them all. The whole world looked like someone had overturned a bucketful of frigid water onto it, sheets of rain slicing at everything with frightening dedication.
In the half a minute that it took them to race from where Diana had parked the car to the foyer of her building, they were soaked to the bone and dripping water on the marble floors and her chest was so light with unexpected exhilaration that she could barely take a proper breath. In the elevator, Steve shook his head like a dog, sending droplets flying everywhere, and she laughed. And then he looked at her from under his dripping hair, his eyes dark, and suddenly nothing was funny anymore.
Maybe one day Diana would figure out how he was doing this to her with a single glance or a crooked curve of his lips, like a spell he was casting at her without knowing. Steve moved to her, and when she shivered at his touch, it had little to do with the bone-deep cold.
"You know, when I asked you to lie with me, earlier, I didn't mean let's collapse on the spot," she noted evenly.
"Oops." Steve grinned at her. "You might want to be more specific next time."
Diana propped her head on the heel of her hand, watching him with unashamed amusement and a touch of fondness. "I have a perfectly comfortable bed, you know."
"Oh, that I do," he assured her. "It's a very good bed. Above average even."
She felt something warm unspooled in her chest as a smile broke fully across her face.
In all honesty, Diana couldn't remember trying to steer him in the direction of the bedroom, consumed by the fire that flared up inside of her when Steve drew her to him, murmuring her name as his mouth trailed along her neck and his fingers busied themselves expertly undoing the buttons of her shirt. Couldn't remember much past his breathless I want you, period.
She shifted closer to him, pressing to his side. Her leg curled around one of his under the quilt that she had pulled from the couch, more for Steve's benefit than hers, as she leaned forward to press a kiss to the scar running above his heart. A memory from Themyscira, if she recalled correctly.
He might have been right about some things, about them being different now from the people they had been when they parted their ways over half a century ago. She wondered sometimes if she'd still want to be the person she was back then. If the touch of cynicism that man's world had marked her with was something that she wanted to carry inside her.
And yet, despite all that, there were things she could remember so easily that it was hard to tell sometimes that any time had passed at all, as if she'd only imagined it. The texture of his skin. The patterns on his heartbeat beneath her palm. The sound of his breathing as he slept, so soothing she didn't know she'd missed it until she had him back. The way he responded to her touch, and the eagerness with which she responded to his.
Diana traced her tongue along his skin, smiling when Steve inhaled sharply and swore under his breath.
"Want me to stop?" she murmured.
His breathing stuttered. He swallowed, audibly, and said hoarsely, "No."
She hummed, pleased and drunk on everything they had done in the past couple of hours, her mind swimming.
Diana puffed a breath into his chest and kissed his skin before looking up.
"What?" she asked when she found Steve studying at her with that odd, unreadable expression that she caught on him now and then. One she couldn't quite grasp.
"I look at you sometimes, and I can't remember myself," he said quietly, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, his fingertips trailing along her cheek. The slight edge in his voice made her pulse trip. "I don't think there are words to express how much I love you."
Diana smiled, slowly, lazily. "Didn't stop you half an hour ago," she told him, resting her chin on the back of her hand sitting on his sternum.
Steve blinked at her for a second and then dropped his head back against the thick carpet, his huff morphing into a groan. She could practically feel the heat rise up his face, which made her smile stretch out wider.
"That's different," he said, almost indignant.
"Different because we were-" she started, leaving a pointed pause to hang between them.
"Diana…" he muttered, half-warning and half-curse.
She bit her lip, enjoying the moment more than she should, perhaps. "So, you can make love to me but can't talk about it?"
Steve closed his eyes and let out a slow breath.
It was too easy sometimes, she thought absently, a little more amused by his reaction than the situation warranted. She watched his face reflect every aspect of his inner turmoil and the struggle raging in his head, and was suddenly overcome with such consuming tenderness toward him that she could barely stand it. Like her heart might burst from the fullness of the feeling. This was the man who was willing and eager to make even the smallest of her fantasies come true with enviable determination, but who would stammer when speaking of it outside of the bedroom… Or, well, outside of the moment, she amended in her mind, considering they didn't even make it to the bedroom this time.
What the two of them had… Diana never thought of it as just sex, in the general sense of the concept. Not the way she had viewed it with her other partners in the past. With Steve, there was more to it - always had been, even when it was fast and rough and happened in the back of her car or in a secluded corner of the restoration room on her lunch break when she had meant to give him an excursion but they got very distracted, very quickly.
It was about connection and trust and devotion, yet she could never resist the temptation to speak of it bluntly, knowing it would conjure that delightful blush that she found so endearing.
(She was going to remind him of that later.)
"It's not that," Steve started. "I'm not—I can talk about it." He ran his hand over his face and glanced at her again, clearly cross. Diana pressed her lips together around a smile, watching him as an ocean of affection pooled in her chest. "You can take a guy out of 1918 but you can't take 1918 out of a guy," he grumbled under his breath, and she smirked. "I can't just… I mean, what I was trying to say…"
"What?" She dipped her head to kiss his collarbone, her breath on his skin making him lose the train of his thought.
Too easy.
"That I have no idea how I lived without you all this time," he uttered at last with a shuddered exhale.
"You don't have to anymore," Diana whispered, watching his eyes grow dark with want, her voice gaining that lilt that she knew tended to make his blood turn to molten desire in his veins. "I am not going anywhere."
Hera help her, she loved him so much it made her very soul ache.
Steve traced the back of fingers down her cheek, his knuckle sliding under her chin to tilt her face up. He pulled her closer, rising to find her mouth with his. For the thousandth time this night, a thought thrummed in the back of her mind – I'm yours, for as long as you'll have me.
His lips parted against her, deepening the kiss as he gathered her to him, fingers tangled in her hair, her body half draped over his. She felt his fingers dance over the length of her spine, heat spiking in her blood, a low hum of desire making her arch into Steve's touch—
A high-pitched shrill pierced the charged air.
Diana pulled away from him, startled, her hand pressed flat to his chest. She dropped her forehead to his shoulder with a groan and a quiet swear in Greek when she placed the sound.
"What the hell is this?" Steve croaked, momentarily disoriented.
"My phone," she said. And muttered, "I'm going to kill him."
"Who?"
"Bruce, I assume. No one else would call me this late on the weekend without any regard for my personal time." There was no frustration in her voice, but it had lost the soft husk of need from the few minutes before.
"Answer it," Steve said, resigned. He rubbed his eyes and added when she didn't move, "It could be an emergency."
"It better be," she muttered darkly, which made his lips quirk.
He brushed his thumb over her chin. "I'm not going anywhere, either," he promised.
By then, the ringing had stopped.
Diana reached across him for her pants lying on the floor near the couch and pulled the phone out, her brows knitting together at the follow-up text message, short and dry, and still somehow capable of sending a trickle of cold down her spine.
"Diana?"
She looked at Steve who was propped up on one elbow, watching her with growing concern.
"It's the museum," she said, still frowning. "Something triggered the alarm."
She pushed the blanket aside and reached for the rest of her clothes, but then paused and glanced at him.
"It's probably nothing," she added in response to the furrow that creased his forehead. "It's a very old building, and so is the wiring. Every time we upgrade the security system, it takes time for it to adjust." She grabbed her bra from where it had landed on the couch earlier. "I just need to—I have to go there. To make sure…" Her voice trailed off.
There was a flicker of hesitation on his face, more questions too, and then he sat up as well, looking around the room for his own discarded garments. "I'll come with you," he said decisively.
"You don't have to," she shook her head.
"I don't think I could say no to a night stroll in Paris," Steve noted. He grabbed his jeans, mostly dry now, and looked around for the rest of his stuff.
A small smile flickered across her features, the tightness in his chest easing. "It's vastly overrated," she assured him.
He chuckled. "I don't mind checking it for myself."
Diana stood up in her bra and panties and padded into the bedroom to grab a shirt that wasn't missing any buttons – unlike the one that was currently draped over the armrest of the couch, courtesy of Steve's impatience. She didn't bother to turn on the light as she rummaged through a drawer in the gleam of streetlamps streaming through the window while trying to focus more on the frustration over being interrupted, than the cold feeling in the pit of her stomach – a gnawing concern that she couldn't quite ignore.
It had happened before, she reminded herself. It had always been nothing, a mistake.
And yet…
Back in the living room, Steve had managed to locate his socks and was crouched by the fireplace putting out the flames. His hair was sticking out comically in every direction, and that small thing made her ache with so much tenderness she didn't know how her heart could contain it.
"You should stay," Diana repeated, shimmying into her pants. "It's likely a false alarm."
He shrugged. "Then it won't take long."
She twisted her hair into a messy knot and secured it at the nape of her neck, smiling. "It's cold outside."
"Can't say that's ever stopped me before," Steve told her as he stood up and grabbed his shirt from the armchair, pulling it on. His head appeared in the collar, his smile slipping. He hesitated. "Unless you'd rather I waited for you here."
Diana paused.
There were so many things she would have rather done tonight, all of them involving Steve and none – their clothes. She wished she could spend the next few hours telling this man who would willingly give his whole world to her if she so wished how much she loved him, over and over again until her throat was raw, desperate to make him see that she meant it, every word and every confession and every promise. Just how lucky must one be to find what they had?
Her chest constricted, and Diana forced herself to keep breathing around it. She shook her head, smiling a little despite the frantic flutter of worry in her stomach. If she told him to stay, she knew he wouldn't argue. He didn't offer this to be chivalrous, or to prove something to either of them, she realized, watching his earnest face as she waited for her decision. He simply wanted to be with her, even if it meant running a possibly pointless errant late a night.
She pulled her jacket on and reached for his hand.
xoox
At the rebellious and exciting age of 15, Steve broke into his school at night. On a dare, of course – to prove to himself and a handful of other kids that he could do it and that it wasn't a big deal. He knew for a fact that a small window in the custodian's office was broken and couldn't be locked. All he had to do was push it open carefully, and that was it.
Truth be told, the whole experience was less than thrilling. Long before the age of alarms and security guards, there was no excitement to this adventure, save for the fact that it allowed him to escape a downpour raging outside that night and maybe gained him a degree or two of admiration from his friends for the next couple of days.
However, he had never forgotten the odd feeling he'd had walking down the dark corridor that night, surrounded by empty rooms, his footfalls echoing in the corners. For once, all he could hear was the sound of his breathing and the loud ticking of the clock in the front room. He wasn't scared – there was nothing to be scared of, it was just an empty building – but he had that unsettling sensation in his chest all the same. Like reality itself was warped in that place when no one else was around.
Walking down one of the hallways of the Louvre as the time neared midnight, their footsteps soft and almost soundless on the parquet floors, he found himself consumed with the same feeling. It wasn't completely dark, what with the night lights glowing dimly along the walls on both sides of them, but it did give the portraits a sinister look as their eyes followed him and Diana, and the shadows lurking around were making him strain his ears for whatever might be hiding in them.
"So, you said this has happened before?" he asked, walking beside Diana down the stairs toward the lower level that housed the offices of the curators, storage spaces, a laboratory and other staff facilities.
Diana nodded. "Yes. There was one time when part of the basement got flooded during the storm, short-circuiting the power. We had a mice problem a while ago when several cables got chewed up and it kept setting off the security alarms on the second floor." Her voice was quiet but it still kept ricocheting off the ceiling, echoing in the distance. "Sometimes the staff accidentally trigger something." She glanced at him. "It's not unusual."
"You're worried," Steve noted.
"I'm concerned," Diana corrected him. "Just because something never happened before doesn't mean it can't happen." She squeezed his fingers. "Thank you. For being here."
He swallowed the answer that would most definitely have been along the lines of 'I would follow you to the dark pit of hell if you'd asked me' if he'd allowed it to slip. There was nothing wrong with it, per se. Steve wasn't in the slightest bit ashamed of saying those words. He had said them. On multiple occasions. And he meant them every time. Now just wasn't the best moment for being sentimental. Not when there was an uneasy frown on her face and a tightness in his stomach, intensified by the quiet darkness around them.
Instead, he squeezed her hand back and nodded.
"Anytime."
Diana had told him already that they had two dozen night guards present at the museum after hours. After the premises were cleared each evening, and there were no visitors and unauthorized staff left in the building, there was no need for more than that. The state-of-the-art security system was supposed to be more than enough to keep the priceless collections safe.
None of it seemed complicated, although if it was Steve's choice, he didn't think he would want to be spending the darkest hours of the night in the company of grim men and women staring at him from old paintings, their eyes following him wherever he went.
It struck him how different the light and airy halls looked at night. Almost ominous.
Diana paused at the door labelled Sécurité and turned the knob. It didn't give in, and when she rapped her knuckles on the thick wood panel, nothing happened either. The room on the other side remained silent.
"They must be doing their rounds," she explained and beckoned Steve to follow her. "Come with me."
In the two weeks that they had been there, Steve had yet to actually see her office. Somehow, their attention was always steered elsewhere – he would either meet her upstairs or somewhere in one of the galleries on the upper floors. The staff level was far less fancy, more concrete and bare walls than beauty and history.
He whistled quietly when she swept her fob card over the lock and led him into a room with glass shelves lining the walls and a massive desk facing the door. She crossed to it and booted her laptop while he gaped around in awe, trying to figure out how she managed to stuff seemingly half of the museum – Greek and Roman items, primarily, he noted - in this small space.
She glanced up at him and smiled.
"Don't touch anything."
"Roger that," Steve echoed, staring at the two swords behind the glass pane that looked very much like the one that she had wielded in battles, although with a touch of rust on them. He turned to her. "What are you doing?"
Bent over the laptop, she was typing fast, her fingers flying over the keyboard. "I have access…" she started.
They both turned to the sound of footsteps behind the door that they had left half-ajar. Diana straightened up, going completely still as Steve turned fully to it, taking a small step back and further away from it. He was all but holding his breath as the door opened wider, revealing a man in his mid-60's. He carried a flashlight in his hand while his other one was resting on the handle of a gun tucked into the holster on his waist.
His expression cleared the second his eyes landed on Diana, who relaxed visibly as well. It was only then that Steve noticed the uniform and a name tag on the guard's shirt, his own heart stuttering for a second before it settled back into its proper rhythm.
"Jean-Luc," she smiled, slipping habitually into French. "You started me."
"Mademoiselle Price," the man beamed at her. "My apologies. A little late to be working?"
She shook her head, her expression growing serious. "The alarm-"
"Ah," Jean-Luc turned off the flashlight and stuffed it into his pocket. "It was nothing, we checked every floor. The new upgrade…" He grimaced as if it was a foul word. To them, it probably was, Steve thought as his eyes darted between the man and Diana. "I called Dr. Morris."
"There is no need for her to come in," Diana assured him. "I will sign this off before I leave."
The guard nodded. "I will let her know. Thank you." Then his gaze shifted to Steve who had been watching the whole scene with a mixture of fascination and curiosity, as though noticing him for the first time. It never quite ceased to amaze him how Diana managed to make everyone look at her like she was the sun, himself included. The man gave Steve an assertive look, one eyebrow quirked curiously. "Monsieur Prince?" he suggested, smiling.
Steve offered his hand to him. "Steve Trevor," he introduced himself, barely able to bite back his laugh. "I am-"
"We're together." Diana stepped around the desk.
"Ah," the man repeated, his features softening. "Well, I guess I…"
She gave Steve a small nod and squeezed his arm for a moment before she followed Jean-Luc out of the office. "Why don't you show me…"
Her voice faded off, swallowed by the hollowness of the corridor, and Steve was left alone.
He turned around and found two skulls with gaping mouths staring at him from one of the shelves, frozen forever in a silent scream. They made him think—
They made him think of things he would much rather not remember. Axes, on the other hand… He stepped toward the display and away from the human remains, reading the description cards. History encapsulated, he mused. His gaze swept over the brief information, and he made a mental note to ask Diana if anything here carried the same historic weight to her as it did to everyone else, considering that she was older by at least a few centuries than the majority of the displayed objects.
One would probably look at all of this differently from that perspective.
"I told you it was nothing." Diana's voice made him straighten up and he turned around to see her walk through the door.
"Thank god for that," Steve said, offering her a small smile. Now that the issue was resolved, he could see that the line of her shoulders had relaxed, that her back was no longer rigid and her body wasn't braced for attack. "Also… ah, correct me if I'm wrong, but really does seem like you don't bring your boyfriends over here often," he observed, stuffing his hands into the pockets of his jeans and watching her expectantly.
She smirked, pausing near him, a hand on his shoulder as she also studied the display before them. "As far as everyone here is concerned, I have never been on a date in my life."
He looked at her. "You know that is entirely implausible, right?"
"If you say so, Monsieur Prince."
He grinned and tucked a strand of hair that escaped the loose knot around her ear. "For the record, I liked the sound of that," he told her. "Say something in French," he asked, his voice dropping. "I love it when you do it."
Diana let out a small laugh. "You hear me speak French all the time," she pointed out.
He shook his head. "No, to me."
"Oh." She leaned closer to his face, her hand sliding under his jacket, and whispered into his ear. "Je t'adore."
"Goddammit," Steve muttered and turned his head to press his mouth to hers, turning around to properly gather her to him, tasting the need that hadn't been entirely sated earlier even though they had spent quite some time working on just that.
"Wait," she drew back, dazed. "I have to show you something."
He cleared his throat when she stepped out of his arms. "Should we maybe lock the door for that?"
Diana did not dignify that with an answer. For a moment, he watched her punch a code into a keypad on a black safe mounted in a wall in the corner. It beeped with a soft click of the lock sliding out of its slot. And then she was pulling a briefcase from inside of it and setting it on the desk in front of him.
"What is this?" Steve asked.
"You'll see."
She lifted the lid, and five solemn faces stared at Steve, their gazes and the story behind them like a sucker punch he never saw coming. One that knocked all air out of him.
He took in Charlie's slight frown, Chief's pursed lips, his eyes nearly hidden in the shadow cast by his hat, and Sameer's raised chin, his eyes full of well-deserved pride. Steve's gaze paused on his own image - the man he no longer was and could barely recognize on the grainy glass plate. And then, at last, it moved to Diana, standing sure and certain right in the middle, where she belonged.
Looking at the photo brought back the smell of gunpowder and smoke and cold dirt, and shivering in clothes that weren't warm enough while knowing that there was no coming back from where they were headed. He felt his boots slip on the mud, saw the watchtower collapse before his eyes, his ears once again ringing with the cheering of the crowd when the last of the snipers had been taken down.
Never had his heart been as close to leaping straight out of his chest as it had been back then; in the moment of their first victory.
Steve traced his fingers along the glass, careful not to touch the five figures for fear of having them dissipate before his eyes.
"You found it," he murmured.
Diana moved closer to him and rested her chin on his shoulder, her hand hovering for a second over his form on the photo before she drew it back.
"Bruce did," she said quietly. "I've never got around to asking him how."
"Back then, I thought it was the best day of my life," Steve confessed.
Diana smiled. "The best? Surely you had days in your life when you weren't being shot at."
"Come on," Steve chuckled. "Just seeing you charge across No Man's Land was something out of this world. It was an almost religious experience… which, come to think of it, it kind of was, considering that you're a goddess." She rolled her eyes, but he continued. "Then we liberated the village. We danced. We, ah…"
"Oh, that part," she smiled. "Yes."
He shook his head and turned to her. "I mean it, Diana. You gave people hope for the first time in years. You gave them something to hold on to when they had nothing left. Nothing. You had only seen a fraction of that war, but living the way those people did, for years- It may not have meant a lot to you, not in the same way, but to us…" He paused, his eyes searching her face. "That memory can't be easily surpassed."
"I meant a lot to me, too," she said.
He nodded. And then his brows knitted together and he turned back to the photograph, a new kind of apprehension in his eyes.
"So, the photograph…" he repeated absently. "You have it."
Diana rubbed the small of his back. "We have just established that, yes."
"No." He looked up again. "That means that Waller doesn't."
Her smile slipped. "Of course, she doesn't—What are you saying?"
"This?" Steve pointed at the suitcase. "This was her bargaining chip in our deal."
Diana frowned. "I don't understand…"
"Yeah, well, neither do I." He ran his hand through his hair and then rubbed his cheek back and forth. "She has my records, Diana. My medical files, everything that existed before the war. Everything that I made sure wasn't easily discovered. And trust me, I took every precaution to ensure that it was near impossible to track them down. Track me down. Yet, she did it. Somehow, she knew what to look for.
"But the thing that convinced me that she wasn't bluffing when she first tracked me down was the mention of this photo." He tried to keep up with his own thoughts, but the memories from the past several weeks kept bumping into one another in his head, making it hard for him to make sense of them. "See, my records were, technically, public knowledge up to a certain point. And, technically, the copies could still be in archives that I don't know about but not this, not-" He stepped away from her and started to pace her office. "There was only one copy of that photograph."
It wasn't making any sense. He'd looked. He'd looked for it because it was a matter of safety, and that was something he didn't take lightly. (He didn't think she would, but he should have, perhaps. Should have known Diana better than that.)
"So, this means she has nothing on you," Diana said, watching him, her arms folded across her chest.
"It's not that simple," Steve breathed out.
"Why?"
He stopped in the middle of the room. "She still has other information on me. But it's not just that."
The moment felt like some sort of alternate reality where he was trapped without a chance to get out.
"What is it, Steve?"
He took a breath and then exhaled slowly. "I spoke with her. In Gotham, before we—before you and I-" He cut off. "After what happened in Metropolis, in Quinn's house. And she said that if I didn't do as she asked, she would come for Barry and Victor."
Diana went still. "She won't," she said firmly, her voice uncompromising.
But she couldn't know that, Steve thought. She lived in Paris, not in Gotham. She was not going to move there to keep an eye on the League day in and day out, and she was not going to bring them here, either. Amanda Waller might have been a pain in the ass but she was wasn't stupid. She wouldn't go after Steve because then Diana would come for her, and even someone like the Director of A.R.G.U.S. with her fixation on accountability and control wouldn't be willing to have Wonder Woman as her number one public enemy.
Threatening Barry and Victor, on the other hand, was just as effective, if not more so, because Diana couldn't and wouldn't be around them at all times. She wouldn't be able to protect them when she was half a world away. They could be fast and strong and knowledgeable, but they weren't as invincible as Diana and Clark, and with the right strategy, they would be perfect targets.
Steve had no doubt that Waller was good at strategizing.
He didn't tell Diana that, though – in part, because he didn't want to say the words out loud, and in part, because judging by her expression, she had figured that out on her own already.
Instead, he nodded. Maybe they could both pretend that they knew answers to every question for just a while longer.
"Why do you keep it here?" he asked, nodding toward the briefcase, noticing the Wayne Enterprises logo.
Bruce. How on Earth-
"It's fragile," Diana explained. "And I like looking at it now and then when I'm here. When I need a distraction." She stepped toward him, her face open, and he wanted so badly for this heaviness to lift off of him as well. She ran her hand across his shoulders. "Amanda Waller is not a threat to us."
Steve nodded again. Maybe if he pretended that he believed her, it would actually be true sooner or later.
"I was going to ask you," she started, changing the subject. "Will you come to the opening with me?"
"The exhibition?" he asked, choosing to play along for now. They would have to come back to this conversation, but none of that needed to be sorted out tonight.
"Yes."
He narrowed his eyes at her. "Will I have to wear a suit?"
Her hand curled around his shoulder. From this close, her eyes were so luminous it hurt to look.
"Yes."
"Will you wear a dress?"
"Yes," she smiled.
"Will you let me take it off afterwards?"
Diana laughed. "Yes."
"Well then," Steve drawled theatrically. "You've got yourself a date, Mademoiselle Prince ."
She leaned forward to brush a kiss to his mouth. "Let's go home."
xoox
The phone call caught Steve in the bakery a couple of days later, stark in the middle of debating between three different kinds of baguette. Who needed so many types of bread?
All things considered, though, this was perhaps the first time in over half a century when he had nothing to do, nowhere to be. And even though Steve knew that sooner or later he would grow restless with the idea of sleeping in and alternating the rest of his time between consuming French pastries, walking the streets of Paris, and generally not being preoccupied with anything in particular, he found himself quite enjoying it for now. It was a relief to find out that he was still capable of simply living.
Truth be told, he couldn't remember the last time when running out of bread was the biggest problem in his life. He could definitely get used to it, he thought.
When the phone rang, he broke into a smile at the sight of Diana's name and the photograph of her that he took several days ago – beaming at him from across a table in the small café two blocks from the museum, so radiant he couldn't help but capture the moment, needing to encapsulate it forever – glowing on his screen.
"Hey," he breathed, his eyes still scanning the rows and rows of freshly baked loaves.
"Hey," she echoed from the other end of the line, her voice pleased and relieved in equal parts. The way it tended to sound whenever they would speak after spending some time apart. Like she was still surprised that she could do something as simple as dial his number and he would be there.
Steve could hear someone else speaking in close proximity to her, and the image of Diana walking down one of the halls of the Louvre sprung up in his mind. He had told her once that she belonged there not as a curator but as another work of art, making her roll her eyes a little at the cheesy line while she tried to hide her smile. But he did mean it, even though, admittedly, it sounded better in his mind.
Some spy he was...
"Where are you?" she asked, cutting into the imagery that Steve managed to spin out in a matter of seconds.
"That bakery down the road," he explained, pointing at the loaves that he liked and having the man behind the counter nod and ring his order. "I'm going to swing by the store on the way back. It thought maybe I could cook something tonight. Are you in the mood for anything special or would you like it to be a surprise?"
Diana was an excellent cook, although that didn't come as a surprise. There wasn't anything that Steve could think of off the top of his head that she wasn't good at, but even though his own culinary skills were much less sophisticated and refined, he still took pleasure in occasionally messing up her entire kitchen – their kitchen, he reminded himself. The thought made his lips curve into a smile on a will of their own.
She wasn't meant to work late tonight, if he was not mistaken, and unless some emergency came up, she'd be home by six. He could stop by the market, Steve thought as he went through his mental shopping list. And maybe get that wine that she loved on the way back-
There was a pause on the other end that took him a few moments to register, and when he did, his smile slipped.
"Diana?"
"Can you come over?" she asked, and this time he heard the tension in her voice that kept her words clipped. Even her footsteps sounded forceful somehow, uneasy.
"What's going on?" Steve paused at the register, absently putting several banknotes on the counter. He grabbed his bag and declining the change with the small shake of his head, heading for the door immediately. "Where are you?"
His fingers flexed on his phone as if gripping it harder would make him hear her better. If he had her strength, he'd crack it in half.
"The museum," Diana said. He heard a soft swish of her fob card followed by the faint creak of hinges and a click of the lock sliding into place. And then silence. "I was wrong." She took a breath, and he realized that he could barely hear her through the roar of blood in his ears. "The other night when the alarm went off," she exhaled and Steve could oh so clearly see her rubbing her forehead as she paced the space of her office. "Something did go missing, after all."
"What?" he asked, his throat dry. And then added before she could answer, "I'll be there in fifteen."
A/N: Welp, I promised you more plot :)
Thoughts? Theories? Speculations?
Please let me know what you thought of this part, or just come and yell something incoherent about WW84. Or anything, really. We're all excited, I know!