Wow, yay! I wanna thank each and every single person who's taken the time to read this and seem to be enjoying it so far. Still not sure if I'm gonna pair my original character with Bucky or Steve yet. But I'll definitely keep working on this one because so far (fingers crossed) you guys seem to actually like it, and I'm not screwing up royally.
Thanks again for all the support and reviews, I love you guys so much!
CHAPTER 04
He woke up to the sound of oldies playing, the smell of food cooking. And it didn't smell half bad. It made his stomach rumble and remind him that he hadn't eaten an honest to God home cooked meal in a really, really long time.
Just as La Bamba started to play, he slid out of the bed, grumbling and wondering to himself why he couldn't have picked a quieter captive, one of those librarian type dames or something.
He stepped out of the bedroom and from the spot in the hall, he could see her sort of dancing around the kitchen while she cooked what appeared to be several things at once.
For a split second, he found himself wondering if his life might have been like this, had he not went off to war and let Veronica get away from him without telling her he loved her, she was the one girl he wanted to spend his life with, his subconscious reminded him bitterly, 'Yeah, and if you really gotta ask yourself, Bucky, why you grabbed Blondie that night.. You're a lot stupider than anybody on the planet. And you're really an idiot if you think this is gonna end any other way than bad for you. Steve woulda gotten a kick out of her though, he really liked Veronica before you stepped in and swept her off her feet...'
She felt eyes trained on her body and she stopped doing stupid idiotic things (dancing around the kitchen while she made food for herself to eat) long enough to look up and see him lurking in the doorway that lead from the living area to the smaller kitchen.
"What?"
"Didn't know you cooked, Blondie." Bucky remarked smugly, stepping into the room to sit down at the table only after pouring himself a cup of something he thought was coffee.
He spat it out about ten seconds later when he realized that not only was it cold, it was apparently not coffee. It was sweet tea or something, he wasn't entirely sure.
"Oh haha. It's better than whatever you made the past two nights.. Spaghettios?" she remarked sarcastically as he looked at her and shrugged casually then pointed out, "Lucky I don't lock ya out in that shed behind this place. Most people who actually take someone captive don't actually treat them as decently as I've treated you.. Especially not when they're possibly the sister of the enemy side."
She nodded quietly, thought about what he said. He made a good point, even when she'd tried escaping at least 4 times by now, he hadn't treated her like some slave or something, or tried to hurt her. And he had a thousand chances by now to have done that very thing.
"Took a cooking course in high school, back before they cut stuff like Home Ec out for good." Natalie muttered as she avoided his gaze, the way his eyes lingered slowly on her body, asked mostly to change the subject, "It hot in here to you?"
All she got was a shrug, him muttering something under his breath again. He averted his gaze, biting his lower lip as he asked her calmly, " Do you ever actually wear shoes?"
She shook her head and said with a shrug, "Not indoors." as she fixed herself a full plate, grabbed a glass of orange juice and sat down at the opposite end of the table, picking at her food.
He watched her, took a few long breaths and then remarked, "It's not bad." as he shoveled the food into his mouth then asked "So.. Do ya dance around by yourself all the time?"
"Dancing takes my mind off of things. Current situation included." Natalie said as she looked up and bit her lower lip, asked him "What's with all the questions today? Usually when I try to ask you more than two at a time, you get grouchy and walk out of the room."
He shrugged. He didn't know why he kept trying to ask her personal stuff, really, she just made him curious. And he figured that if he were going to be stuck with her until he figured out his next move, he could at least get to know her. Even as he tried to convince himself of this, his mind was arguing the opposite, arguing 'Sure, Bucky.. Sure it's just that. You feel nothing for her.. Go on, man, try to tell that crap to somebody else. If you let her close to you, you put her in worse danger, and you'll only mess it up in the long run. You really think she'd go on the run with you, Bucky, if by chance you do make it out of this?'
"Just curious." he lied casually as he looked at her and then said quietly, "We're gonna go into town today. Gotta get some things to make blending in easier, some more food."
"Maybe I can call my sister?" she asked, hopefully, which as usual, only got met with his standard laugh, the shake of his head as he said quietly, "Nope. Told ya, Blondie. I've gotta figure things out first."
Truthfully, he didn't want to just hand her over to anybody, not until he was damn sure she'd be okay.
The only person he even partially trusted was Steve, but he didn't want to have to hurt his former friend if Steve did what he'd done the night before all this actually happened and come after him, intent on doing something to hurt him, or even killing him, first.
"Soon though." he said as he took a long sip of the tea in the cup in front of him and said "Gotta admit though.. Probably the worst tea I've ever drank, doll."
Natalie glared at him and then said calmly, "Probably, Bucky, because I normally don't do the whole domesticated thing."
"Kinda figured that." he remarked with a smirk as he stood and walked hurriedly out of the room, away from the temptation and distraction that were Natalie.
If she had any idea what she actually did to him, having to be around her so damn much...
–
Natasha woke up from a strange dream and rolling over, she grumbled and swore when she realized that it was 9 am and as usual, Steve was awake, he'd already been awake for hours, sitting in front of her black and red laptop, obviously having a voice conference with what appeared to be Tony Stark.
Whatever was being said was angry, at least on Steve's end. That's usually what happened though, she thought to herself, when Steve Rogers and Tony Stark were in a room together, unsupervised, for more than ten minutes. She cleared her throat as she moved to stand in the doorway, Tony greeting her, asking the same questions that Fury had when she'd went to him with her problem a week or two before.
"I got a threat, Stark. And she is my baby sister, I don't take threats towards my family, either of them, lightly." Natasha said as she scowled at Tony who said "Either way, those coordinates you found at Winter's hideout are to some cabin out in the middle of nowhere."
"In New York?"
"Nope.. In Indiana." Tony said as he asked Steve, "What is it with you and this guy?"
"It's none of your business, Stark." Steve grumbled as Tony glared a moment and then said "This guy is part of Hydra, which we work against, so yes, Capsicle, I'd say that makes it very much my business."
"Forget I asked for help." Steve started as Natasha cut him off and said calmly, "Can you two knock it off for at least a few minutes? Maybe he needs to be involved, Steve. We all are a team."
"Yes, I realize this, but.." Steve started as he said "Fine. But only because this could start to happen to everyone else."
"Already has, actually." Tony said as he leaned in and whispered "I've been getting threats too.. Against Pepper? Yeah. So.. We're not bringing Fury in."
"We already had to." Steve admitted as Tony mulled it over and then said calmly, "If he tries any of this keeping things hidden crap again, I'm out. I'm done. I don't have to work for the guy, and I really hate it when he hides things because usually, when he's hiding something, that's about when the shit hits the fan for all of us. Did we learn nothing from Manhattan?"
"He's got the same problem with us right now.. Shield, Tin Can, was compromised. After he put all that work into keeping it going. Hydra was playing it from the inside. Or have you just been ignoring the news again?" Steve said through gritted teeth and said "Everyone just needs to find somewhere, meet up and talk about everything that's happened, face to face, man to man."
"Good idea, Capsicle."
"I know, Tin can. Kind of why I suggested it." Steve said calmly as he and Tony glared at each other for a moment, the screen on the computer going dark, hinting that Tony had signed off.
–
The scientist grumbled as a sector leader for Hydra filled his doorway. "Can you find him?"
"The chip in his mechanical arm, sir, it's been scrambled. By a Shield device." the scientist admitted meekly as the sector leader growled and crushed a soda can, flinging it at the scientist's head. "You have 24 hours, Dr. Vance. If you haven't found them in 24 hours, consider yourself dead."
The scientist gulped and the door shut, cloaking the office in darkness once again as the sector leader went down the hallway, grumbling to himself in anger, pushing open another office at the end of the hallway.
"We need more time, sir.."
"Nonsense! Get me Winter Soldier and get him here now! What's so impossible about that? Did we not make him?"
"But sir.."
"No buts soldier, if we made him then we're going to find him and bring him back here, exterminate him. If Shield's gotten hold of him..."
"Yes sir." the sector leader said quietly, stepping out of the office, grumbling as he walked out to take a smoke break.
How in the hell had Bucky gotten someone to scramble his chip? Who did he know in Shield? And what the hell was he up to, going rogue, defying a direct order? He'd been specifically programmed..
Was the programming starting to fail?
–
He stood in the doorway of the room she slept in, watching her do some kind of stretching that looked like a contortionist or a gymnast would do it, amazed at how someone so curvy and petite could actually move their body in that manner without breaking something or at the very least, getting stuck.
She felt eyes on her again and bit her lower lip, stopping in her yoga warrior pose, righting herself and turning to look at him. "What?"
"What the hell were you doing?" he asked as she said simply, "Yoga."
"And it doesn't hurt ya?" he asked as she laughed a minute then said "Wow.. They really did leave you asleep a long time, didn't they?" moving closer to the doorway where he stood, sitting on the floor by him as she looked up at him.
He pulled her off the floor and then said quietly, "Yeah. They did. Nothing makes any sense now, actually."
She laughed a little and looking up at him, gave him a shrug and said quietly, "Don't feel bad, James.. I was born in this time, unfortunately, and I hate it. Things are so complicated.. Like, I'm imagining they used to be way simpler..." which made him nod and admit "They did." as he found himself migrating closer to her, his eyes locked on her full pink lips.
She looked at him for a moment and then said quietly, " Gonna go shower." as she attempted ducking underneath his human arm, only to have him stop her, ask her with a sort of playful smirk, "Why do you do that?"
"What?"
"Get nervous when somebody gets within touching distance?" he asked as she shrugged and said quietly, "I just do, okay? And I'd rather not talk about it."as she tried to leave the room again, only to find that now her feet weren't cooperating, they were frozen in a spot.
Their bodies brushed each other , her soft skin a shock to his tense and rigid muscular chest,and she bit her lower lip, dropped her eyes quickly. He tilted her chin up and then said quietly, " What about me scares you, Blondie?"
"It's not you, exactly, it's..." Natalie admitted, rambling nervously as she looked at him and felt her knees turning to Jello again, tried again to remind herself that he was NOT one of the good guys anymore.
And she was somebody he'd taken captive for whatever reason.
This whole bizarre attraction was just her fondness for bad guys surfacing yet again, that's all it had to be.
"It's what?"
"It's the way I feel around you, okay?" Natalie forced herself to answer before ducking under his arm and bolting into the bathroom, shutting the door firmly behind her, sitting on the floor in front of it.
If he kept making this happen, if she kept letting herself be stupid enough to be tempted, she figured that she'd never be able to get out or get away from him.
And she really, really wanted to be safe again, to have her normal life back.
'But admit it, Nattie.. You kinda want him too. If you could have it both ways, you know you'd have to at least give it a try.. Even if it backfired like every single other time you let yourself be dumb enough to fall for someone, only to be hurt by them almost as soon as you let them in.'
He went back over her words and stood there, not sure what to do with what she said. This was already an awkward and tense enough situation, and he certainly didn't want to make things even more tense or awkward. "And you feel things for her too, you know it, Bucky. But you also know that it won't and shouldn't happen. Not since Hydra got their hooks in, made you into this machine man.. You'd never be capable of the normal, the kind of life that girl deserves."
He punched a wall because if all this (or most of it) hadn't happened, he'd have a lot simpler things to worry about. He wouldn't know the infuriatingly attractive and tempting 23 year old girl he'd taken hostage to save her life, and he wouldn't actually be battling emotions, things left over from his old life, from the guy he used to be.
'You want her. That's it, plain and simple, Bucky. It's lust. You haven't had a woman in god knows how long. This is not some bizarre love type relationship. Because Hydra took that from you.. They took all your emotions, they took your ability to even care about someone or something.'
He walked down the hall to the bathroom and knocked on the door firmly, waiting. When she didn't answer, he got angry, figured that she was trying to escape again, and kicked the damn thing off the hinges. Instead of finding an empty room and a broken window, finding her gone for good, he found her sitting in a tub full of bubbles, earphones in, the mp3 player she kept in her pocket and listened to music on, docked nearby. His eyes roamed over the skin not hidden completely by peach scented bubbles, and he groaned to himself, bit his lip and shifted his stance to try and ease off the knee jerk reaction his body was having at seeing her like that, almost totally exposed.
Natalie felt his intense gaze on her and looked up, shrieking "What the fuck? I'm kinda bathing here." as she scrambled for pretty much anything to cover herself up. He shrugged and said "Seen it all before, Blondie, it's not gonna bother me. Part robot, remember?" as he grumbled to himself, knowing full well that he was telling a huge lie currently, that she DID have an effect on him, and that if he couldn't get his shit together and fight it, then he'd never make it through this without compromising everything and putting her in worse risk.
"Would you stop popping into rooms like that? It's kind of annoying." she snapped, her stomach feeling like there was hot lava sitting in the pit of it as she locked eyes with him, held the towel closed over her as best as she could. 'Damn it, it's the way he watches you, the way he looks at you. It's his body and that smirk and god damn it, it's those eyes, his lips. This is not love, Nattie, this is called you're horny. There is a difference. And the fear, confusion, anger and everything else are just all coming together and mixing, they're trying to make you think you love the guy. When all you want is your own wants satisfied. You wanna finally NOT be the good girl anymore. You want him, girl, that's it.'
"What you said.. What'd you mean?" he asked as she looked at him, then her hands, then the floor and her feet and said quietly, "I don't know, okay? I just know that in light of this situation? It's not normal." while drying off, keeping her body covered mostly in her own shyness, her own awkwardness.
He watched her, confused.
And he'd only thought women were confusing in his old life.
Apparently, now, they were twice as confusing. And getting one to actually tell you what the hell was going on in her head was almost like getting a tooth pulled, or pulling one.