Warning: I changed my username for fun!

Chapter 14

The next day, I woke up in a good mood that lasted approximately 10 minutes.

I'd gotten to sleep in until 8, and then getting up and ready hadn't taken long at all. Quick trip to the bathroom including brushed teeth, swipe of mascara, and a little lip balm followed by quickly pulling on workout clothes.

Then I stepped into the living room and kitchen area to find Ranger and Steve both sitting there in silence— Steve at the table with what was becoming the traditional breakfast spread made up and waiting, still steaming because he was freakishly good at timing everything and Ranger on the couch.

There was a bouquet of flowers sitting at the center of the kitchen table, which was set for four. It was a neutral location, but I knew that they were new. And that meant Steve had gotten them for me. My eyes locked with him, and he managed to quietly convey warmth and affection to me that had my cheeks flushing.

Of course, Ranger took that moment to stand, which drew my attention to him. From the far side, he pulled up his own bouquet of flowers, and he said, "Happy Valentine's Day, Babe."

"Oh, brother," I muttered. "I am not a bone for you to fight over."

Steve's eyes twinkled with amusement, and Ranger looked mildly put off, but not offended.

"We've been over this, Ranger," I told him calmly, warning in my voice. "We can be friends, but that's it."

"Can't blame a guy for trying," Ranger replied easily. He walked over to me, handed me the flowers, then before I realized what had happened, he brushed a ghost of a kiss across my lips and disappeared.

"Well that was awkward," Natasha's voice said huskily from behind me.

I yelped and jumped, I couldn't help myself. Behind me was my bedroom, and she hadn't been in there. I didn't think.

Natasha made a tisking noise at my reaction, no doubt thinking she shouldn't have taken me by surprise.

"Where did you come from?!" I whirled around, hand clasped dramatically over my thundering heart and looked at her wide eyed as I asked.

Her mouth just twitched into a smile, so I figured she wasn't going to tell me.

I was going to assume she had let herself in through the fire escape just then.

I looked down at the bouquet of traditional Valentine's roses I was holding and sighed. I set them on the kitchen counter off to the side and walked over to Steve.

By that point, he was holding two coffee mugs, and offered one to me. I took it from him, but also stood up on my toes to give him a brief but meaningful kiss.

I said, "good morning. Thank you for the daisies. They're so happy and make me think of spring; they're almost enough to make me forget that it's snowing out. Again."

I'd heard the front door open and the sounds of boots being stomped out as I was talking, so I was not surprised when Sam came in a second later.

Natasha probably hadn't stomped her feet out in my bedroom, and a quick look down made me realize that her shoes didn't look wet or like they had so much as a speck of salt on them. Her brows just raised in a challenge, and I decided it was a puzzle I would solve eventually.

"It's supposed to get really nasty out later this afternoon," Sam told me. "I saw Ranger in the hallway, and he looked pissed."

Sam looked at where I was still standing right up against Steve, to the daisies on the table, and then over to the roses on the counter.

"He giving you a run for your money?" Sam asked, clearly enjoying the situation.

"Yes," Steve said.

"No," I insisted at the same time.

I felt my gaze drawn to Natasha who just raised a brow at me, so I explained, "Ranger just likes the chase. I think he'd love for this to turn into another Morelli love triangle type thing because then he wouldn't have to be the one to provide for my emotional well being. He could just have some fun when he wanted to, but he could always push me back to Steve. And I wouldn't ask him for a relationship."

Natasha just continued to stare me down, and I gulped a little. She was intimidating, but I knew this moment was important. She was trying to watch out for Steve, and I needed to make her understand.

"Nat—" Steve started to butt in, but I cut him off by raising my hand up.

"If you'll recall from that oh so embarrassing day or so before Steve let me know he was interested, Ranger wasn't interested in a relationship. I don't think that changed in the week or so that he was in the wind. He's just confused now because I actually DID move on like he's told me to do countless times over the years. But even if he did change his mind, I'm not interested. I spent years being jerked around by Morelli, and to a lesser extent, Ranger. Though Ranger was always clear where the lines were, so he wasn't stringing me along with lies like Morelli was. I don't want to go back to that or anything resembling that. And Steve is nothing like Morelli. I like Steve, we're getting to know each other, I'm hopeful it will go well, and I am ONLY interested in Steve."

"Damn right Steve is nothing like Morelli," Sam agreed.

"Thank you," Steve seemed to address Sam, but his hand which had wound it's way around my waist gave my hip a squeeze that let me know it was really directed at me.

"And the kiss?" Natasha pressed.

"All Ranger," I told her. "And I think it was a goodbye kiss."

Probably. Ranger was complicated, but in the end, I thought he'd put a premium on preserving our friendship.

Natasha stared at me for a few more second then nodded and declared, "life is messy. The beginnings and endings of things as complex as relationships are rarely neat and tidy."

And then things kinda just shifted into what was becoming our normal. We ate some breakfast and sat around shooting the shit for a good hour after to digest.

"So, Steph!" Sam rubbed his hands eagerly as the last of the dished was put away. "What'll it be today?"

"I was thinking cardio kickboxing?" I told him. "You said you could do that, right?"

"Perfect!" He told me. "I am going to change it up a little from what you might find in a gym setting though. Given your job, it can't hurt to focus technique while you're at it. The more moves that you know, even from different styles, the more you might be able to pull out when you need it. Plus, fun though it would be, I don't actually want to see Cap's head explode from frustration in teaching you things that are almost but not quite defensive technique."

"I actually thought I might skip today," Steve said. "I want to get in a run before the weather gets too awful, and then I have a few errands to run. Kickboxing can be quite effective in a fight though— I've had to work against it before."

Natasha had either rented or procured by other means a big studio space that we used for most of our daily workouts since it was still too cold out— at least for Sam and I. Steve didn't seem to be overly fond of the cold, but he also didn't seem to be physically affected by it. And Natasha would just mutter in Russian whenever someone called it cold out, usually making it blatantly obvious that she disagreed with our assessment.

It was nearby, so a couple hours later, I was walking back into my apartment, carefully clearing it to make sure it was safe of bad guys and super spy training booby traps. I didn't see Steve, but a quick look at the mirror above my dresser told me he'd been back at some point— and with more elaborate mirror drawing supplies.

On the top, it said, "be your own superhero" in one of those pow bubbles like from a comic. And in the bottom corner, he'd drawn a little figure that I assumed was me given the hair with her leg up like she was kicking someone.

I chuckled at it a little then grabbed clean clothes to take into the bathroom with me when I showered. Of course once I reached it, I saw that Steve had decided to go all in with the mirror thing. The mirror above the sink simply said, "believe in yourself."

While I was in the shower, I had a mini panic attack over the Valentine's Day thing. I may or may not have (but definitely had) forgotten about it. Morelli hadn't been a Valentine type guy, and I guess it had just fallen off my radar.

As a queen of fibbing, I thought up a series of stories to tell Steve to try to shake him from shadowing me so I could go out and get something for him, but I couldn't think of what to get in the first place. By the time I made it out of the shower, got myself ready, and stepped into the living room, I had myself all worked up into a state.

"What's wrong?" Steve asked because of course he immediately clued in to my agitation. He was a tough one to sneak things by.

I blew out a sigh and said, "I forgot about Valentine's Day, and I didn't get you anything. And I can't think of anything to do for you."

Steve flushed a little and I thought he might have growled, which made me realize I thought he might already have an earpiece in for the day. And possibly Sam or Natasha had suggested something I could do for him.

Which was definitely an idea, but I thought maybe it was a bit soon for that- at least in Steve's eyes. Or maybe I was the one being gun shy about it because of the Ranger thing.

I'd have to think on that. Because if that was the issue, I needed to just get over it. Ranger and I weren't going to be anything, and Steve had already made it clear that he wasn't concerned or upset about the recentness of my past with him.

"Nothing would make me happier than just to spend some time with you today, whenever you're free. I don't know if you're planning to go out in the snow or not?" The last he said as a question, even though it wasn't really worded like one.

"I thought about that," I told him. "I think I'll go out while the roads are still at least a little passable. It seems like a lot of people will probably wind up staying home today, which makes them easier to find."

"Makes sense," he agreed. "Will you let us give you another car with four wheel drive?"

"Are you prepared for that car to be destroyed?" I asked him. Then in a rush, I added, "not that I would purposely do so… history just tells me that, well…"

"It might be a foregone conclusion?" Steve finished for me.

"That," I agreed. "I don't know if you have figured this out yet, but I'm a bit of a disaster. You may want to run while you still can."

Steve stepped forward, quickly closing the distance between us and then pulled me into him. He gave me one hell of a kiss before saying, "It's already too late; I've gotten attached to you. And you're NOT a disaster."

"Pretty sure there's an entire city that would disagree with you," I told him. "I'm certain at least half the Burg has been calling my mother about how I burned another car, and she's probably ironed everything in the house at least 5 times by now."

"What does ironing have to do with this conversation?" Steve had clearly gotten distracted.

"She irons when she stresses," I told him. "And she tipples a little from the bottle of whisky she hides in the kitchen. The ironing keeps her from tippling a lot."

Usually.

"Will I get to meet your family?" Steve asked curiously.

"How would that even work? I thought you were hiding," I told him.

"Mmmm, for now," Steve agreed. Then he playfully said, "so I guess that buys you some time."

"My family is definitely crazy," I agreed. "Gotta try to get you on the hook first."

Steve just grinned at me and shook his head then teased, "don't you have work to do?"

"Such a task master," I shot back.

"Well, the sooner you decide you're done for the day, the sooner I can steal your time all for myself on this Valentine's Day. I've never gotten to spend Valentine's Day with a special someone before."

Well, geez. Now I really felt like crap for not getting him anything. I thought he genuinely didn't care, but I really wished I could do SOMETHING for him. Then like a flash of lightning, the idea hit me.

"Hold on!" I yelled at him. "Stay right there, I'll be right back!"

Then I grabbed my messenger bag, found tape in the kitchen drawer to snag as well, and dashed back into my bedroom. I scribbled a note out, taped it to my bedroom window, and left.

When I got back to Steve, I grabbed his hands and hustled him to the door. I chattered constantly, trying to keep his attention on me by telling him about the skips I'd be looking for that day as we trudged into the new SUV they'd procured for me to use and pulled out of the lot.

Once we were out of sight of my bedroom window, I relaxed slightly. I had to figure that the Black Widow was onto me, but I was hoping she wouldn't blow my cover.

We pulled up outside of the house of my first skip of the day, Raymond Sobota, and I parked a few doors down. In the past, my cars haven't been able to stay idling for various reasons revolving around them being pieces of crap, but this one seemed nice enough that it was quiet and there wasn't smoke coming out of the exhaust, so I was hoping it wouldn't draw too much attention.

Since Sam and Natasha were on the coms with us, I asked, "have you found out anything more from the state cops about where I was held when I was kidnapped."

"I was wondering when you would ask," Natasha commented.

"I know, I know," I said. "Sometimes I like to go into denial land and pretend that bad things aren't happening."

"Did you remember anything new?" Natasha asked.

Probably she didn't want to taint any memories by giving me more information.

"Not really," I told her on a sigh. "The other day, I remembered that I had taken papers from Jason's apartment, but they aren't in there anymore. I assume Ranger has them. And other than that, I just remember all the foil everywhere. Then I don't remember anything else about my actual kidnapping. It is frighteningly, and annoyingly, blank in my mind still. I can't even see faces when I remember the people in lab coats. They all wore masks, and I don't remember anyone speaking to me or anything."

"Text Ranger," Steve said eagerly. "Ask him about the papers."

"Okay," I said slowly. "Should I ask about the foil too? I know he had some ideas on that."

"Guy was probably paranoid," Sam cut in. "foil would block radio frequency so people couldn't monitor him with bugs and the like. Of course it would be a pain because it probably cut off his cell phone signal too."

"It would prevent people from monitoring him with infrared as well," Natasha agreed.

"So, we've got foil theories covered then," I said with a small smile. "Should have known. You all are the best of the best after all."

"Ranger's pretty good too," Steve conceded. "In some ways."

I shook my head a little at that, but pulled out my phone. When I did I saw that I had a text message from an unknown number. First things first, I sent my message to Ranger, knowing it might take him a while to respond if he was busy.

Then I pulled up the new number.

"Do you really think I'm going to fall for that kind of trap? I wasn't born yesterday, just ask Stevie."

It took a lot of thought to keep my face blank as I typed out a response, "sorry. I just thought that it's Valentine's Day, and I didn't get him anything. And you would be the perfect present."

"I'm sure he'd rather spend time with you," came the response. Either Bucky was still eavesdropping on us, or he figured Steve would have told me as much.

I was betting it was the former.

"He and I have plenty of time to spend with each other, and really it's just a day. HE MISSES YOU. He would be ecstatic to see you. And where are you even staying? Does it have heat? It's going to be really cold tonight. Come in. Stay. Have a slumber party with us. It'll be warm, and we have lots of food."

"I can handle the cold," Bucky texted back.

"But you shouldn't have to," I responded. "Not if you don't want to. And why would you want to?"

I got no response after that, so I gave another sigh. It had been worth a shot.

"Anything from Ranger?" Steve asked curiously.

"No, sorry," I told him with a small smile. "Just got distracted with an old message."

Steve studied me carefully but then nodded his head. "You'd tell me if there was a problem or you were being threatened, right?"

I felt my eyes go soft at that. He was worried about me.

"I absolutely would," I told him. "Well, probably. But this was nothing like that."

"Probably?" Sam asked indignantly.

"Well, I mean, it depends on the situation, right? I can't predict everything that might happen, and I don't want to lie or promise I will as just a blanket statement like that," I reasoned. After all, Steve was big on truth. "What if it was something like someone who was threatening me to try to get to Steve?"

"Then you would tell me," Steve and Natasha responded at the same time, both forcefully and with almost the exact same inflection.

"That was spooky," I told them.

"Seriously," I could practically see Sam nodding along with me.

"Oh, will you look at that?" I interrupted. "There's Sobota now; gotta go!"

"We'll talk about this later," Steve called out after me as I made my escape.

A/N: Apologies for anyone who worried after my mention of not feeling great— all is well. Just some morning sickness which turns out to be extra draining when also corralling a toddler all day every day! ;)