Chapter Four – First World Issues
They were all changed and ready to go fifteen minutes later. Wanda handed Bucky a set of car keys as they were walking out the door, and he hesitated.
"Darlin' – the last time I drove a car was in 1944. I'm pretty sure they're a bit different these days."
"Oh, shit!" she gave him a wide-eyed, panicky look, and then cast one at Pietro. "But neither of us have ever learned to drive, we weren't even fifteen when HYDRA took us!"
"I drove a tractor that one time," Pietro murmured, and Wanda groaned.
"I'm willing to try," Bucky said. "I've been in plenty of cars in recent years. Just never driven one. I can probably figure it out…"
"We have to," she decided in the end. "Public transport's way too risky. They probably know that none of us can drive so they'll really be watching the trains and buses."
At least she'd chosen a fairly simple car to steal, a Fiat, not some fancy sports car, Bucky thought as they got in. Pietro sat in the front passenger seat and he and Wanda explained which pedal did what, and then Wanda sat behind Bucky and put her fingertips on his shoulders very lightly.
"Just making it less likely that we'll crash," she murmured as he met her eyes in the rear-view mirror.
"Thanks for the vote of confidence, doll," he said dryly, which made her giggle.
Considering the way Italians drove and how rusty Bucky was, Bucky suspected that Wanda had to exert her power quite a lot to ensure that they didn't have a crash on the way out of the city. Once on the autostrada heading southeast towards Naples at a steady speed, she sat back, but he sensed that she was ready to leap into action at any moment.
Pietro was extremely tense in the front seat, wincing and pressing on an imaginary brake pedal regularly. Bucky tried not to growl at him and asked him to navigate using the map they'd found in the glove box instead. They'd dumped the phone and tablet – Wanda said they could be tracked once the owner figured out they were missing – after wiping the browsing and call history.
Bucky had decided they'd turn east after Naples, head across to the eastern coast and the city of Bari, which he vaguely recalled visiting during the war. He suspected he'd be able to give Steve enough verbal clues without naming the place, to create a good spot for pickup near there. It would probably be about a four to five hour drive, at their current speeds, well below the limit to avoid attracting attention.
Not that Italians seemed to care about the speed limit – he winced as a red Ferrari went past doing about a hundred and forty miles an hour.
They had to make a stop for gas, trying to act casual and unobtrusive. Bucky was somewhat horrified when they got back in the car to discover that Wanda has appropriated another smartphone.
"You're a terrible thief, that's going to have to stop," he said disapprovingly.
"I resent that, I'm actually a very good thief," Wanda gave him a mischievous grin as he looked at her in the mirror, frowning. "Even better than Pietro, for all his speed. Because the people I've pickpocketed are always convinced they just lost whatever I stole…"
"That's not what I meant," Bucky said sternly.
"I know." She sobered, met his eyes. "Needs must, Bucky. The guy I stole this from was driving a Lamborghini. I was just Robin Hood-ing a little."
"He probably doesn't get the reference," Pietro said snarkily.
"Thank you, we did have stories about legendary medieval figures back in the forties, there was even an Errol Flynn movie. I get the reference," Bucky responded dryly. "Robbing from the rich and giving to the deserving poor, right?"
Pietro slow-clapped. Bucky gave him side-eye. Wanda ignored the pair of them and carried on playing with the phone, only glancing up if Bucky had to apply the brakes on the car. He was getting the hang of driving the modern vehicle, though. It was actually easier than a forties car if he ignored all the buttons on the dash.
"Wow," Wanda said after a few minutes, "HYDRA might not be quite as powerful as we'd thought. Seems they've suffered a few setbacks in recent months. Mostly due to your friend the Captain."
Bucky couldn't help but grin. "Stevie always did enjoy spokin' their wheels."
"Yes, well, the rest of the world don't seem too happy about neo-Nazis attempting to take over a major global security organisation, either. It's all over Twitter that the place we blew yesterday was HYDRA and there've already been dozens of arrests…"
"What's Twitter?" Bucky focussed on the one word in the sentence that he didn't understand. "And how do you know so much about this tech, doll? Thought you'd been locked up for nine years, and I remember nine years ago, phones weren't nearly as fancy as that…"
"Twitter is – you know what, I'll just show you later. It'll be simpler. As for the rest," Wanda shrugged, "yes, we've been held prisoner, but we weren't isolated. Some of the guards even talked to us. There was this one guy, kinda nice. He blocked outgoing communications but let me play with his phone."
It was stupid of Bucky to feel jealous because Wanda had befriended a prison guard. His jaw clenched nonetheless. "Was he one of the guards who died last night?" he asked carefully.
"No. He stopped being on duty about four months ago. Right about the time HYDRA came out of the shadows within SHIELD – hmm, I wonder if he was a double agent? I hope he didn't get caught," Wanda murmured, and Bucky's irrational jealousy increased.
Pietro's frantic pressing on the imaginary brake pedal made him realise that he was pushing the Fiat way too fast, and he eased slowly back, steadying the car back into the stream of traffic.
They got to Bari and Bucky drove on through the city to the south before asking Wanda for the phone and calling Steve again. He could hear what sounded like an aircraft in the background behind Steve and guessed he was in the air.
"Where are you, bud?" Steve asked.
"You remember that night when Gabe and Jacques dragged us out to a local bar and we bet on cockroach races?" Bucky said obliquely.
Steve was silent for a moment, obviously thinking back. "Yeah."
"We're about twenty miles south of that bar."
"Okay." Murmurs in the background as he spoke to someone else; a pilot, Bucky guessed. "Right – we can be with you in about forty minutes. Can you keep that phone on? We can track the signal when we get close. Will anyone be looking for it?"
"Doubt it. It was stolen about a hundred miles from here and won't have been missed yet." He glanced at Wanda.
"It won't be missed for hours," she said confidently, and he shrugged.
"I'll keep it on, punk. Don't be late now."
He heard Steve huff out a laugh before the line cut out. Handing the phone back to Wanda, he looked at her. "He says about forty minutes."
"Well," she shaded her eyes, looking around, "why don't we leave the car somewhere? Find a nice isolated spot for him to pick us up?"
They let Wanda pick a spot, drove the car in between some large trees and abandoned it with the keys in. Pietro took off his hoodie and used it to wipe over pretty much every surface in the car, muttering something about fingerprints, which had Bucky confused. That said, he was quite happy for Pietro to be busy and distracted. It meant he could wander up to where Wanda was leaning against a tree, fiddling with the phone again, and nonchalantly lean his arm against the trunk just above her head.
She looked up at him, her soft, pretty mouth curving in a smile. "Bucky."
"Hey, doll," his eyes half-lidded as he looked down at her, and Wanda gulped a little nervously. Slid the phone into the pocket of her jacket. She couldn't help but lick her lips under that intense blue stare, and a moment later Bucky was kissing her very thoroughly indeed.
He was the first, the only man who'd ever kissed her. Oh, there'd been a couple of boys, back when they were with the Romani, but she'd been still a child then, barely in her teens, without awareness of what really went on between men and women. She still didn't have all that much of an idea. She'd seen the way men looked at her; one or two guards had even crudely jacked off in front of her cell, not that they'd ever dared to touch her. And she knew how basic biology worked.
Actually being kissed by Bucky Barnes was a whole new ball game, however. His lips were warm and soft, his tongue playing with hers in light, teasing flickers that made her melt against him and clutch at his arms, needing something to support her suddenly rubbery legs. One strong arm wrapped around her waist – the metal one, she realised, because his human hand was running gently into her hair, tilting her face at the perfect angle for him to kiss her even more thoroughly.
"Knock it off, you two," Pietro's exasperated voice separated them finally. "I think our ride's here." He gestured upwards.
Bucky couldn't help flinch at the sight of the quinjet settling gracefully to earth. He'd been in too many of those in the last few years as the Winter Soldier. Half-expected Rumlow or Rollins to come striding out now, ordering him in to take him back to base. But it was Steve who came down the ramp, his golden hair shining in the sunlight, a joyous if slightly wary smile on his face.
"Bucky," he said, grinning, then spied Wanda in the circle of his arms, pinned between him and the tree, "wow, you weren't kidding about the beautiful dame!"
Bucky's arms tightened around Wanda and she felt rather than heard the subliminal growl he let out.
"Now now, play nice," she told him with a soft chuckle. "I'm yours, Bucky. Soulmates, remember?"
Bucky let out a rueful laugh. "Yeah, I know. I'm bein' awful. Time was, the girls always used to look at me, but after Stevie got big, I didn't get a look-in. I'm just scared you'll take one look at all that big blond prettiness and forget all about me."
Wanda smiled up at him, shaking her head lovingly. "Silly man." Her fingertips caressed his stubbled jaw lightly. "Come on. Introduce us to your friend."
As always, I'd love to hear what you think!