Under False Pretenses
Pairing: Bucky Barnes/F!Reader
Word Count: 11.4k
Rating: Mature
Warnings: enemies to lovers, fake marriage, undercover mission, human trafficking involving children (non-graphic), child endangerment, canon-typical violence, blood, minor injuries, kissing, sexual tension, fade to black sex
Summary: Bucky Barnes is the last person you’d choose to spend a weekend pretending to be married to.
Unfortunately, Aidan and Evelyn Sinclair have an invitation neither of you can afford to refuse.
Author’s Note: written for this anon’s request for my 1k celebration
set post-The Falcon and the Winter Soldier but pre-Thunderbolts
The rings sat in the middle of the conference table between you and Bucky.
Yours was a slim platinum wedding band paired with an engagement ring set with a flawless diamond in a low, understated setting, expensive in the quiet way everything about Evelyn Sinclair was supposed to be. It didn’t need size or ornament to advertise what it had cost. Beside them rested Bucky’s plain platinum band, two fake passports, a slim folder of financial documents, and a photograph of you standing beside him on the terrace of a hotel you’d never visited.
His arm was around your waist in the picture, and you looked happy enough that the falseness of it was impressive.
“You’ve got to be kidding.”
Across the table, Bucky looked from the photograph to the rings and then toward the woman conducting the briefing. He’d been leaning back in his chair with his arms folded since the trafficking network appeared on the first slide, but now he straightened enough to reach for the folder.
“I’m afraid not.”
He opened it to the first page, where two names appeared in neat black type.
Aidan and Evelyn Sinclair.
You stared at yours for several seconds before looking up. “Evelyn?”
“It tested well.”
“With who?”
“People who don’t complain about operational aliases.”
Bucky’s mouth twitched.
You turned toward him. “Don’t.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were going to.”
“I really wasn’t.”
That probably annoyed you more.
The briefing officer tapped the remote before either of you could continue, replacing your fabricated marriage certificate with an aerial photograph of a sprawling alpine resort. Snow covered the surrounding mountains, broken only by the narrow road leading through dense pine forest toward the estate.
Saint Armand Lodge had been built as a private retreat nearly a century ago and renovated several times since. The current owner, Laurent Vey, had converted it into the headquarters of a charitable foundation whose polished website featured photographs of schools, vaccination clinics, refugee aid programs, and smiling children from half a dozen countries.
The classified file told a different story.
Vey’s legitimate companies moved medical equipment and agricultural supplies across international borders. The same shipping routes had begun appearing in investigations involving forged identities, missing minors, bribed officials, and private adoptions that had never existed outside falsified paperwork. Investigators believed Vey wasn’t simply financing the network. He was coordinating it.
“This weekend is the first time we’ve confirmed that all five senior members of the organization will be in one place,” the briefing officer said. “Vey is hosting donors and business partners under the cover of the foundation’s annual winter retreat. Twenty-four guests, all vetted personally. Married couples only.”
Bucky looked down at the photograph again, and you could practically feel his objection forming.
“The Sinclair identities have been active for eighteen months,” she continued. “Viktor Sarin put them in Vey’s orbit last year, and the invitation came through six months ago. Aidan Sinclair founded a private cybersecurity company, sold his controlling interest three years ago, and now spends most of his time managing the Sinclair Foundation with his wife. Evelyn handles charitable partnerships and cultural acquisitions.”
You flipped through the folder. There were property records, tax filings, travel histories, photographs, charity events, and enough documentation to make two imaginary people appear more established than most real ones.
“How long have they been married?”
“Four years.”
Bucky made a quiet sound beside you.
You glanced over. “Problem?”
“Just wondering what I did to deserve four.”
“I’m sure Evelyn has her regrets.”
The briefing officer continued before the exchange could gain momentum. “Your invitation came through Sarin, who’s cooperating with investigators and has agreed to treat the Sinclairs as longtime acquaintances. If Vey checks your history against him, he’ll corroborate the cover. Once you’re inside, your primary objective is the server housed in the administration wing. We believe it contains transaction records, payment schedules, transportation routes, and identifying information for victims.”
The photograph was replaced with a floor plan. You leaned forward, studying the administration wing where it connected to the main lodge through an enclosed passageway on the second floor. Vey’s private office sat at the far end, along with a smaller records room and a secured server closet. The electronic locks were isolated from the guest network, which meant you would need physical access.
“Security?”
“Twenty-seven personnel registered with the estate. We believe at least twelve are directly involved with the network. The rest may simply think they work for a paranoid billionaire. Avoid engagement unless necessary.”
That part was directed toward Bucky, and he noticed.
“So she gets to hit people?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You looked at me.”
“Experience suggests I should.”
You ignored him and studied the service corridors. “Extraction?”
“Scheduled for Sunday afternoon with the rest of the guests. If your cover is compromised, emergency evacuation is available, but the nearest response team will be operating from the valley. Weather conditions may interfere with air support.”
Another page appeared, highlighting a maintenance corridor running behind the east spa and connecting to a service staircase.
“An asset on Vey’s staff has placed an equipment cache here. Tactical clothing, masks, weapons, communications equipment, medical supplies. It’s emergency use only. The objective is intelligence collection. You are not going in to dismantle the organization yourselves.”
Bucky’s gaze shifted toward you, but you kept your eyes on the screen. The silence between you stretched just long enough for the briefing officer to notice.
“I mean it.”
“I heard you,” you said.
“So did I,” Bucky added.
Her expression suggested that somehow made things worse.
The presentation moved on to the cover identities. You and Bucky had supposedly met five years earlier at a charity auction in D.C. and married eleven months later in a small ceremony in Vermont. The Sinclairs had no children, owned a penthouse apartment in Manhattan and a house outside Burlington, spent two weeks every summer in Maine, and had recently begun discussing whether their foundation should expand into international child-welfare programs.
That last detail explained why Vey had taken an interest. It also made your stomach turn.
By the time the briefing ended, you knew Aidan Sinclair well enough to pass for his wife. You could recite his birthday, education, investment portfolio, favorite whiskey, and the invented relationship he had with a Labrador that had supposedly died the previous year.
The problem was that you already knew Bucky almost as well.
You knew he favored his left shoulder when he got tired because the place where metal met flesh started to ache after too many hours on his feet, though he’d deny it if asked. You knew he disliked crowded elevators but tolerated them without comment. You knew he drank tea when coffee had kept him awake for too many nights in a row, checked every exit on instinct, and slept lightly enough that a door opening across the hall could wake him. You knew he carried a knife at his ankle even when the mission packet specifically said unarmed.
You also knew exactly how furious he became when you ignored an extraction order.
That particular lesson had cost you three stitches, a gunshot wound through the upper arm, and nine months of mutual hostility.
You’d been assigned to the trafficking task force for months, but Bucky wasn’t technically part of it. They’d brought him in for this operation because his particular combination of infiltration experience and enhanced durability made him difficult to replace, which meant neither of you had been given much say in working together again.
When the briefing officer finally left, you remained seated long enough to skim the final page of your cover history.
“You’re enjoying this too much,” you told him.
Bucky glanced at the rings and reached across the table, gathering your wedding band and engagement ring into his palm. “I haven’t enjoyed any part of this.”
“You smiled when she said Evelyn.”
“That wasn’t a smile.”
“You’ve got a terrible poker face.”
“I spent decades being one of the most effective covert operatives on the planet.”
“And somehow nobody taught you not to look smug.”
His eyes lifted to yours, the familiar tension between you stretched thin enough that neither of you needed to raise your voice anymore. Months ago, your arguments had been louder; eventually they’d hardened into something colder and more efficient.
Bucky held out his free hand. “Left.”
“I know which hand they go on.”
“Just checking.”
You gave him your hand before you could reconsider it. His expression changed so slightly that someone who didn’t know him might have missed it, his attention dropping to your fingers before returning to your face.
He slid the wedding band over your knuckle first, then settled the engagement ring above it. The platinum was cool against your skin, both rings fitting perfectly.
Too perfectly.
You’d never given the cover team your ring size, which left remarkably few possibilities for where they’d gotten it. When you looked at Bucky, his expression remained carefully neutral, but he didn’t ask why you were staring. His thumb brushed lightly along the side of your finger before he released you.
Then he reached for his own band, turning the plain strip of platinum once between his fingers before sliding it onto his left hand. It looked strangely natural there, which bothered you more than it should have.
“There,” he said. “Mrs. Sinclair.”
Your gaze lingered on his hand for another second before you dragged it back to his face. “You’re sleeping on the floor.”
His faint smile returned. “We’ve been married four years, my love. People might get suspicious.”
By Friday afternoon, you had discovered that pretending to be married to Bucky Barnes was considerably easier than preparing to pretend to be married to Bucky Barnes.
Preparation required practice, and practice required proximity. For two days, you sat across from him in one of the task force’s safehouses while handlers ran you through question after question, testing how well the two of you could sell a marriage that had never existed.
Where had Aidan proposed? Who cooked? Which side of the bed did Evelyn sleep on? What had they argued about on their first vacation? Which one had wanted the Manhattan apartment? What did they buy each other for their third anniversary?
Some answers came from the cover file. Others were deliberately omitted because real couples didn’t memorize their lives from a dossier. They remembered them together, which meant you and Bucky had to improvise.
“Aidan proposed in Vermont,” you said.
Bucky looked at you. “Maine.”
“The file says Vermont.”
“The wedding was in Vermont.”
You opened the folder.
He was right, and you disliked how satisfying he found that.
One of the handlers asked, “What did he say?”
You and Bucky went quiet.
“That wasn’t in the file,” you said.
“It wouldn’t be.”
Your eyes moved toward Bucky, who was already watching you. For several seconds, neither of you spoke before he leaned one forearm against the table.
“I told her I’d already bought the ring, so she could either marry me or make me return something I’d already spent way too much money on.”
You stared at him while the handler laughed.
“That’s your proposal?”
Bucky shrugged. “You said yes.”
“Apparently Evelyn has terrible judgment.”
“She married me.”
“That’s what I just said.”
The handler made a note on her tablet. “Good. Keep that one.”
You looked away before Bucky could see you smile.
By the end of the afternoon, the Sinclairs had acquired dozens of tiny details nobody had planned. Evelyn hated being cold but refused to admit it. Aidan pretended not to enjoy old movies and always watched until the credits ended. Their first apartment together had been in an old Manhattan building where the pipes knocked whenever the heat came on, something Evelyn had complained about every winter until they moved. They’d once driven three hours in the wrong direction because neither would admit the other person had misread the map.
Most of the details were fabricated, but some weren’t, and that became the dangerous part.
When the handler asked what Aidan drank when he couldn’t sleep, you answered before thinking.
“Tea.”
Bucky glanced at you.
“What kind?”
“Whatever’s there, as long as it isn’t chamomile.”
The handler looked at Bucky, who nodded once.
You shifted in your chair.
Later, when she asked which shoulder Evelyn usually carried a bag on, Bucky answered correctly.
You stared at him. “You know that?”
“I have eyes.”
“That doesn’t answer the question.”
“It does enough.”
The handler smiled, and neither of you acknowledged it.
By the time you boarded the charter flight under your new names, you had developed the kind of familiarity the cover required. You also had a headache.
Bucky, irritatingly, seemed perfectly comfortable.
He wore the clothes selected for Aidan Sinclair as if he’d been born into them: dark wool coat, expensive watch, simple black sweater, pants tailored to the quiet wealth his cover demanded. Subtle prosthetics altered the lines of his jaw and nose, while a pair of dark-framed glasses changed the way his face registered at a glance. None of the alterations were dramatic on their own, but together they kept Aidan Sinclair from resolving immediately into Bucky Barnes.
His left arm had required more planning. Aidan’s fabricated medical history said a motorcycle accident years earlier had cost him the limb, and the cover team had fitted Bucky’s vibranium arm with a cosmetic shell that made the visible hand and wrist resemble an expensive civilian prosthesis. His sleeves concealed the rest. Anyone who noticed it would see exactly what the paperwork told them to expect.
Nobody expected him to strip down in front of the guests.
At least, you hoped not.
The private car climbed steadily into the mountains while you watched snow gather along the road and Bucky reviewed the guest list one final time.
“You know it already.”
“I know.”
“Then stop reading it.”
His eyes remained on the page. “You nervous?”
“No.”
“You’re tapping your thumb.”
You stopped.
Bucky finally looked up, and irritation came automatically before the unpleasant awareness that he was right settled underneath it. You’d infiltrated criminal organizations before. You’d attended dinners with men who would have ordered your death if they knew who you were, lied convincingly enough to pass interrogations, and kept your pulse steady with guns pointed at your head.
None of that bothered you as much as the possibility that children were disappearing because the people at Saint Armand had learned how to bury them beneath paperwork.
Bucky folded the list, his voice losing its edge. “We get the records, we get the locations, and the teams move.”
“I know.”
“You can hate the plan. Still have to follow it.”
You turned toward the window.
There it was, nine months of resentment condensed into a single sentence.
“Thanks for the reminder.”
His jaw tightened, and neither of you spoke again until the lodge appeared through the trees.
Saint Armand looked more like a private palace than a resort.
Warm light glowed from dozens of windows beneath steep slate roofs. Snow covered the surrounding terraces and softened the lines of the stone walls, while black vehicles lined the circular drive beneath an enormous covered entrance.
A doorman opened your side before Bucky could, and you stepped out as he rounded the car while your luggage was unloaded.
The transformation happened immediately.
Aidan Sinclair emerged somewhere between one step and the next. Bucky’s expression softened, his shoulders loosened, and when he reached you, his hand settled against your lower back with easy familiarity.
You almost stepped away.
Instead, you smiled at him.
“You all right, sweetheart?”
The endearment landed with enough force to nearly ruin your expression, but you recovered.
“Long flight.”
His thumb moved once against the back of your coat. The gesture was probably meant to look affectionate, and you told yourself that explained why he did it.
Inside, the lodge smelled of cedar, woodsmoke, and money. A Christmas tree still stood in the central hall despite the holiday having passed weeks earlier, decorated in white lights and glass ornaments. Staff moved quietly between arriving guests while a pianist played near the fireplace.
Laurent Vey greeted you personally.
He was in his late fifties, silver-haired and elegant, with the controlled warmth of someone who had spent decades convincing people that wealth and morality were interchangeable.
“Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair.”
Bucky shook his hand. “Call me Aidan.”
Vey turned his attention to you, and you offered him the practiced smile that belonged to Evelyn Sinclair. “Evelyn. Thank you for inviting us.”
“I’ve heard a lot about your foundation.”
“Hopefully only the flattering ones.”
Vey smiled. Bucky’s thumb brushed once against your waist as the two of you followed him farther into the hall, the gesture easy enough to pass for affection.
Introductions blurred together after that: a shipping executive and his husband from Rotterdam, a banking heir from Geneva, a pharmaceutical investor from London, a married couple who funded private schools across Eastern Europe, and two diplomats whose presence would cause problems for three different governments if they were ever connected publicly to Vey.
Every one of them had been investigated. Some were considered clean. Others weren’t.
Your room was on the third floor.
One room, with one bed.
You stood inside the doorway while the porter placed your luggage beside the wardrobe. Bucky tipped him generously, and the door closed behind him.
You looked at the bed, then at Bucky.
He followed your gaze and sighed. “Don’t start.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were about to.”
“And what was I about to say?”
Bucky glanced toward the sitting area. “That I’m taking the couch.”
Your eyes moved to the velvet sofa, which was approximately five feet long. “You’ll fit.”
“I’m six feet tall.”
“Curl up.”
He gave you a flat look and moved toward the window instead. Outside, snow had begun falling again. Bucky checked the terrace, adjacent balconies, and sightlines toward the security wing while you opened the luggage, most of which had been packed by the cover team.
So had the personal effects.
You pulled out a toiletry bag containing two toothbrushes, a bottle of your usual shampoo, Bucky’s preferred shaving cream, and a handful of Polaroids tucked into the side pocket. The cover team had apparently decided Evelyn Sinclair was the kind of person who kept physical mementos, even while traveling.
One showed you kissing Bucky’s cheek. Another had him looking down at you while you laughed.
The editing was convincing enough to make them look like moments you’d somehow forgotten living through.
“They’re creepy.”
Bucky turned.
You held up the Polaroids.
He crossed the room and studied them. “Could’ve picked a better angle.”
“You look fine.”
The words left before you could stop them.
His eyes shifted toward you.
You tucked the photos back into the pocket. “I mean the editing.”
“Right.”
A knock sounded, and both of you went still. Bucky’s hand moved toward his ankle before you caught his wrist.
“Aidan.”
His expression changed again.
By the time you opened the door, he was standing behind you with one hand resting at your hip.
A member of the lodge staff smiled. “Mr. Vey asked me to remind you that cocktail hour begins at five.”
“We’ll be there.”
Her gaze flicked briefly over the room. You leaned back into Bucky without thinking, and his arm came around you.
The staff member smiled more warmly. “Enjoy your stay.”
The door closed, but neither of you moved immediately. Bucky’s chest pressed against your back, his hand resting low on your stomach, and you could feel his warmth even through both layers of clothing.
“You can let go.”
“I know.”
He stepped away.
The sudden absence of contact felt colder than it should have.
By the time you left the suite for the cocktail hour, the cover had settled back into place. Bucky had changed into a charcoal suit with a burgundy tie, his glasses and subtle prosthetics making Aidan Sinclair look polished enough to belong at Saint Armand. You’d traded your travel clothes for an evening gown in the same deep burgundy, elegant without being conspicuous among Vey’s guests. Together, you looked exactly like the wealthy married couple everyone expected to see.
Cocktail hour gave way to dinner at 1800, and dinner lasted nearly three hours.
You learned quickly why married couples had been required. The entire retreat had been designed around intimacy as a form of vetting. Guests were seated together on low sofas before dinner, encouraged to tell stories about travel and family, then arranged by couple along a long table so each pair was drawn into conversation with the guests opposite them.
The questions sounded harmless. They weren’t.
“How long have you two been married?”
“Four years,” you answered, and without looking away from the man across from him, Bucky held up four fingers at exactly the same moment.
The woman beside him laughed. “That synchronized already?”
“You should see us argue.”
Bucky’s eyes flicked toward you, and the laughter spread around that end of the table.
You smiled into your wineglass. You’d been nursing the same glass of Bordeaux since dinner began, taking only the occasional sip. Bucky, meanwhile, was on his second scotch, pacing himself with the rest of the table so no one noticed how little the alcohol actually affected him.
Vey glanced toward your nearly full glass. “You don’t like the Bordeaux?”
“I do. I usually leave the alcohol to Aidan.”
Bucky turned his scotch slowly between his fingers. “Apparently I’ve developed a reputation.”
His mouth curved when you looked at him, and Vey watched the exchange with open amusement.
You realized a second too late that you had fallen into something effortless. Bucky realized it too.
Neither of you let it show.
Later, Vey’s wife asked how you’d met.
The cover file said charity auction, so you began with that until Bucky interrupted halfway through to say you’d corrected him about a painting.
“That is not what happened,” you said.
“You absolutely did.”
“You called a Monet a Manet.”
“I was looking at the plaque.”
“You were pretending to look at the plaque.”
“Because you’d already corrected me in front of six people.”
Vey’s wife laughed. “And that was attractive?”
Bucky’s gaze settled on you.
For once, there was no sarcasm in his voice when he said, “She wasn’t afraid of embarrassing me.”
Your smile faltered.
He continued before anyone could notice. “Still isn’t.”
You nudged his ankle beneath the table.
His expression didn’t change.
After dinner, guests gathered in the library for drinks while snow thickened beyond the windows. You and Bucky occupied a small sofa near the fire, his arm resting along the back behind you while your hand lay casually on his thigh.
It had been there for ten minutes, but somewhere around the five-minute mark, you’d stopped thinking about it.
Vey was discussing charitable partnerships with three donors when one of his aides entered and whispered something in his ear. His expression remained pleasant, but his fingers tightened around his glass.
Bucky felt you notice. His hand touched the back of your neck, affectionate to anyone watching, while the slight pressure of his fingertips told you to wait.
You did.
The aide left, Vey resumed his conversation, and nothing else changed.
At 2300, the guests began retiring. You and Bucky walked upstairs together, his hand remaining at your waist until the suite door closed behind you.
Then the performance loosened.
“That wasn’t nothing,” Bucky said.
“No. Whatever his aide told him, he didn’t like it. He reached for his pocket right after.”
“Phone?”
“Probably.”
Bucky loosened his tie. “Could be unrelated.”
“Could be.”
Neither of you believed it.
You checked the time. The patrol gap your inside asset had arranged around the administration wing began at 0200, giving you just under three hours before you needed to be in position.
Bucky disappeared into the bathroom to change out of his dinner clothes while you began laying out what you’d actually carry to the server room: the bypass kit, encrypted comms, the drive supplied by the task force, two pairs of gloves, lightweight face coverings, and a handful of compact restraints. The heavier tactical equipment was still waiting in the emergency cache.
He came back a few minutes later in dark pants and a sweater that could pass for expensive loungewear while still giving him enough freedom to move.
The secured tablet remained on the desk. From the outside, it looked like the kind of expensive personal device Evelyn Sinclair might have carried anywhere, but the task force had loaded it with the encrypted software and credentials you needed to access Saint Armand’s surveillance system. You would use it to establish the initial camera loop before leaving, and it would stay behind in the suite while you worked.
You stripped off the jewelry Evelyn had worn to dinner and set it beside the tablet, leaving only the engagement ring and wedding band on your left hand. Those could have come off too. There was no reason to keep wearing them while you waited in the suite.
For some reason, you didn’t take them off.
Before 0100, you changed into dark pants and a sweater that wouldn’t restrict your movement, then pulled the silk robe over them. If anyone saw you and Bucky wandering the guest floor in the middle of the night, Evelyn Sinclair looking as though she’d left her room without bothering to dress properly was considerably less suspicious than an operative dressed for a break-in.
At 0147, Saint Armand was quiet.
You clipped the task force’s encrypted comm beneath the hem of your sweater and settled the nearly invisible earpiece into place while Bucky checked his own. Using the secured tablet and the credentials supplied by Vey’s inside employee, you accessed the lodge’s surveillance system and looped the cameras covering your corridor, the guest stairwell, the service route, and the approach to the administration wing.
Only once the loop was stable did you leave with Bucky beside you.
You kept an easy pace through the guest wing, close enough that his hand could settle naturally at your back whenever you crossed an exposed stretch of corridor. If a member of staff happened to see you in person, they would see Aidan and Evelyn Sinclair wandering away from their room late at night rather than two operatives headed toward a restricted section of the lodge.
The performance ended when the service-stairwell door closed behind you. Bucky’s hand dropped from your back, and the easy pace you’d kept through the guest wing gave way to something quicker and more purposeful as you descended toward the administration wing.
Once you were out of the guest areas, the rest of the cover disappeared with it. Bucky removed his glasses and slipped them into an inner pocket before you both pulled on the gloves and lightweight face coverings you’d brought from the suite, concealing enough of your faces that anyone who crossed your path would remember two intruders rather than Aidan and Evelyn Sinclair. From that point on, neither of you used names.
The final corridor was secured by two coded doors and a separate electronic lock. The credentials from Vey’s employee carried you through the first two; the last required a manual bypass. You crouched beside the panel and opened your kit while Bucky took position at the corner, listening for movement beyond the range of the cameras.
“How long?”
“Thirty seconds.”
Bucky glanced toward the corridor. “Make it twenty.”
“That’s not how electronics work.”
“Tonight would be a great time to prove yourself wrong.”
“Watch the hall.”
The lock released with a soft click before he could answer.
Bucky reached for the handle and opened the door.
The server room was colder than the corridor. You connected the drive supplied by the task force and began the download while Bucky took up position beside the door.
The progress climbed through eight percent, fifteen, then twenty-two as you opened the directory structure. Most of the files were encrypted, but the active operating logs weren’t, and the screen filled with routes, vehicle identifiers, hotel names, border crossings, and payment records.
You scrolled until something stopped you.
Bucky noticed immediately. “What?”
You opened the latest transportation schedule.
Seven entries had been added that afternoon, each containing a first name, an age, a forged nationality, and a destination. The oldest was fourteen.
The youngest was six.
Your stomach dropped.
Bucky crossed the room and leaned over the screen. “Where?”
You opened the location field.
SAINT ARMAND — SERVICE ANNEX B
“They’re here.”
His jaw tightened.
The download reached forty-one percent while you opened the next file.
Departure was scheduled for 0430.
You checked the time.
0206.
Just over two hours.
Your hand moved toward the encrypted comm at your waist, but Bucky caught your wrist.
“Wait. Finish the download.”
“They’re moving them tonight.”
“I can read.”
“Then you know we don’t have until Sunday.”
“I know.”
His grip loosened.
For one moment, you expected the argument. It would have been the same one you’d had nine months earlier in a burning warehouse when he’d told you to leave and you’d refused.
Instead, Bucky glanced toward the progress bar and then back at you. “Send the emergency code.”
You stared at him. “What?”
“I’m agreeing with you. Try to appreciate it.”
You pressed the recessed switch on the comm twice, transmitting the prearranged distress signal.
The acknowledgment sounded in both earpieces seconds later. “Response team thirty-two minutes out. Air support grounded.”
The download had reached sixty percent.
Bucky looked toward the screen. “They can move seven kids in thirty-two minutes.”
“Yes.”
Neither of you needed to argue about what came next.
“Cache?” you asked.
“East spa.”
The download reached seventy-eight percent before footsteps sounded in the corridor.
Two sets.
The handle moved.
You ripped the drive from the server at ninety-one percent as Bucky killed the light.
The door opened.
Bucky moved before the first security guard could bring his weapon up, catching his wrist and driving him into the doorframe hard enough to knock the breath from him. You intercepted the second at the same time, redirected the barrel toward the floor, and swept his legs out from under him before he could fire.
Neither fight lasted more than seconds.
You rendered your guard unconscious while Bucky did the same with his, then immediately checked both men for additional weapons. Their wrists and ankles were bound with the compact restraints you’d brought from the suite, and both rifles were unloaded before being shoved beneath the server rack well beyond reach.
Neither man had seen enough of your faces to identify you later, and neither would be waking up in time to follow.
Bucky checked the corridor while you secured the drive beneath your sweater at your waistband.
“Think the server flagged us?” he asked quietly.
“Maybe. Could’ve been the download.”
“Then they know someone’s inside.”
You pressed a hand briefly over the drive. “Ninety-one percent has to be enough.”
“It will be.”
Bucky picked up one of the guards’ radios just as a voice crackled through it.
“Lock the east wing. Nobody leaves their rooms.”
His eyes met yours.
The operation had changed again.
The equipment cache sat behind a removable panel in an unused spa treatment room.
You locked the door while Bucky pulled the panel free, revealing two black packs. Inside were dark tactical layers, lightweight armor, gloves, close-fitting hoods, masks, and protective eyewear that left almost nothing recognizable exposed.
The rest of the cache was built around getting in and out without escalating the situation: collapsible batons, compact stun devices, restraints, medical supplies, a ruggedized control handset preloaded with the access credentials supplied by Vey’s inside employee, and a pair of throat mics designed to link with the encrypted earpieces you were already wearing.
Bucky’s gear included one additional piece. A reinforced sleeve fit over his left arm from shoulder to fingertips, hiding both the cosmetic shell and every trace of vibranium beneath matte fabric and armor.
You stripped off the robe and folded it into the open cache before pulling the tactical layers over the clothes you were already wearing. Bucky slipped his glasses from his inner pocket and tucked them into the zipped pocket of the robe.
Your rings came last.
You looked down at them for a second.
Bucky was fastening his vest. “You can leave them.”
“They’ll catch.”
“Then take them off.”
You slid off the engagement ring and wedding band and placed both beside his glasses. Across from you, Bucky glanced down at his own hand before pulling off the plain platinum band and adding it to the pocket.
For the first time since you’d left for Saint Armand, neither of you looked married.
The bare skin beneath your rings felt strangely noticeable.
You zipped the pocket closed, folded the robe securely around the items inside, and pushed it farther into the cache before sealing the panel.
Bucky glanced over after securing his mask. “Hair.”
You gathered your hair at the back of your head and twisted it into a tight bun, securing it firmly enough that nothing could work loose beneath the hood. Once it was pinned flat, you pulled the hood into place and checked the edges in the mirror.
“Yours too.”
Bucky gave you a look. “I don’t have enough for that to be a problem.”
You almost laughed.
Instead, you took the control handset from the cache and expanded the camera loop across the east spa, service corridors, and annex. Anyone reviewing the feeds afterward would see empty hallways rather than two unidentified operatives moving through them. Once the loop was stable, you secured the handset to your vest and checked the rest of your equipment, making sure the collapsible baton, stun device, and restraints were all within easy reach.
You clipped one of the throat mics beneath the edge of your collar and paired it with your earpiece while Bucky did the same. The encrypted channel was already secure, and the microphones were sensitive enough that neither of you would need to raise your voice above a murmur. At close range, you’d use hand signals when you could; if you needed to speak, there would be no names.
Once the tactical layers were in place, you transferred the drive from your waistband to a secured pocket on your vest.
The stolen radio crackled before either of you could do anything else. “Guest wing secure. Search teams to administration and east service corridors.”
You looked at Bucky.
He pulled the collapsible baton from his vest and snapped it open. You drew your own a second later, the stun device still secured at your side if you needed it.
From that point on, anything that couldn’t be communicated by hand signal passed quietly through the encrypted channel.
The lodge narrowed to dark service passages, muted radio traffic, and the sound of bootsteps moving somewhere ahead. You’d spent enough missions arguing with Bucky to know exactly how he moved: how his weight shifted before he cleared a doorway, how he committed to one angle only when he trusted you to cover the other. He knew you just as well, catching the fractional change in your stance before you broke formation because you’d spotted something he hadn’t.
At the first junction, Bucky held up two fingers.
Two guards.
You nodded.
Both men were armed, which made getting them down quickly more important than winning quietly. Bucky stepped into view first and caught the nearest guard’s rifle before he could bring it up, wrenching the barrel toward the wall while his baton struck hard across the man’s forearm. You closed on the second at the same time, knocking his weapon aside before driving the stun device against his vest.
He dropped almost immediately.
Bucky’s guard lasted only a few seconds longer. By the time you turned back, the rifle was on the floor and Bucky was lowering the unconscious man beside it.
You checked both for additional weapons before binding their wrists and ankles with restraints. Their radios joined the one you’d already taken, and the rifles were unloaded before you pushed them beneath a service cart where nobody could reach them quickly.
Neither man would be getting back into the fight.
Bucky retrieved his baton. “You changed sides.”
“You were blocking mine.”
“I was clearing yours.”
“You were standing in it.”
“That’s called covering you.”
“You can cover me from somewhere else.”
His eyes narrowed behind the protective lenses, but you were already moving.
The service annex occupied the lowest floor beneath the eastern guest wing. Two armed men stood outside the entrance, with a third visible through the narrow window in the door beyond them.
Bucky signaled left.
You went right.
This time, the first guard managed to fire before you reached him. The shot buried itself in the stone behind you, forcing you sideways as Bucky closed the distance on the other man. You caught your guard’s wrist with both hands, drove the gun toward the floor, and brought your baton sharply across his arm until his grip broke.
The weapon clattered away.
Your stun device finished the job.
Across the corridor, Bucky had already put his own guard down and kicked the man’s rifle beyond reach when the third came through the door.
“Down,” you murmured.
Bucky heard you through the earpiece and ducked immediately.
You stepped past him and struck the third guard’s weapon aside as he fired, the shot going harmlessly into the ceiling. Bucky caught him from behind before he could recover, tore the gun from his hands, and drove him hard enough into the wall to leave him dazed. One touch of the stun device dropped him the rest of the way.
Bucky looked at you as you lowered your baton.
“You could’ve warned me.”
“You ducked.”
“Because I know you.”
The words landed harder than they should have.
You secured all three men before moving on, checking that none of them had a second weapon or radio hidden beneath their jackets. By the time you reached the interior doors, five guards lay unconscious and restrained behind you, their weapons disabled and well out of reach.
The rooms beyond had once been staff quarters. Now the windows had been covered, and electronic locks had been installed on three interior doors.
You reached the first and tested the handle.
Locked.
Bucky stepped forward. “Move.”
“You’re supposed to be hiding the arm.”
“They won’t see what it is.”
He gripped the handle with his left hand and tore the locking plate from the frame beneath the tactical covering.
You stared at him. “Subtle.”
“We’re past subtle.”
Inside, four children recoiled against the far wall.
You lowered your baton immediately, and Bucky collapsed his behind you. The children stared at the two masked figures in the doorway, one of them beginning to cry.
You crouched slowly, keeping your hands visible.
“It’s okay. We’re getting you out.”
The oldest child in the room looked about thirteen. Her eyes stayed fixed on the baton in your hand, so you collapsed it and secured it against your vest before crouching a little farther away.
“You’re police?” she asked.
“Something like that.”
Her gaze moved toward Bucky. He remained masked, but he lowered himself slightly so he wasn’t towering over them.
“There are three more,” she whispered.
“We know.”
Bucky looked toward the remaining doors. “I’ve got them.”
You stood. “I’m coming.”
“You stay here.”
Your eyes narrowed. “We’re doing this now?”
“I’m not leaving them alone.”
You looked at the four children behind you.
He was right.
You hated that.
“Fine.”
Bucky disappeared into the corridor.
The oldest girl watched him go. “He’s coming back?”
“Yes.”
The certainty of the answer came before you had to think about it.
A few minutes later, Bucky returned with three more children, including a boy who looked about fourteen, matching the oldest profile from the server records. A fresh tear ran through the right sleeve of his tactical layer. Through the open doorway behind him, you could see another guard unconscious and restrained against the wall.
You counted all seven children twice anyway.
Once everyone was ready to move, you drew your baton again and led them toward the reinforced laundry room.
The update from the response team came through your earpiece as Bucky took position at the door.
“Twelve minutes.”
The next several minutes dragged. Bucky remained at the door while you stayed with the children, listening to fragmented security traffic through the stolen radio and the occasional rush of footsteps somewhere beyond the laundry room.
You sat with the youngest child, who still hadn’t spoken. His hands shook, and when you removed one glove and offered him your hand, he hesitated before wrapping his fingers around it.
Gunfire erupted somewhere beyond the laundry room.
Bucky touched two fingers to his earpiece. “Status?”
The response came immediately. “Four minutes out.”
His eyes met yours. “Not ours.”
You exchanged a look.
The shooting continued, accompanied by increasingly chaotic traffic over the stolen security radio. From the overlapping calls, it sounded as though some of Vey’s contractors had realized what was in the annex and were refusing orders, while the personnel loyal to him tried to contain the area and destroy evidence before law enforcement arrived.
“They’re turning on each other,” you said.
Bucky tightened his grip on the baton. “Stay here.”
This time, you didn’t argue.
He disappeared through the door, and the youngest child tightened his grip on your hand.
Three minutes later, Bucky’s voice came through your earpiece. “East corridor clear. Team entering through the loading dock.”
You exhaled.
The response unit reached you shortly afterward. Their leader knew both of you and carefully avoided using either of your real names while the children were transferred to the medical personnel arriving behind them.
Vey’s loyal security staff were being detained, and the server drive was placed in an evidence bag. For the first time since leaving your room, you allowed yourself to breathe.
Then the team leader looked between you and Bucky.
“Your cover’s still good.”
You frowned. “Why?”
“Two senior targets are unaccounted for. We don’t know whether they got out before lockdown or whether they’re still somewhere on the property, and we don’t know whether they had observers among the guests or staff. Officially, any masked personnel seen tonight were part of the advance tactical unit responding to an anonymous tip. Nobody knows the Sinclairs were involved.”
Bucky looked down at his tactical gear. “Then we need to change.”
“You’ve got about ten minutes before we start moving the guest wing.”
You turned toward the service corridor, and Bucky followed.
Ten minutes later, Aidan and Evelyn Sinclair were terrified.
It required more effort than the fighting had.
You stripped away the tactical layers in the spa room, returning to the dark pants and sweater you’d worn beneath them. Bucky peeled off his hood, mask, and reinforced sleeve beside you, checking that the cosmetic shell over his left arm was still secure.
You pulled the pins from your hair and worked it loose from the tight bun before retrieving your robe, pulling it around yourself before reaching into the zipped pocket.
The rings waited inside.
You slid the wedding band back on first, followed by the engagement ring. Across from you, Bucky retrieved his own band and pushed it back onto his left hand before replacing his glasses.
For a moment, your eyes caught on the platinum around his finger.
Bucky noticed. “Convincing?”
You dragged your attention back to his face. “Too convincing.”
His mouth twitched before his gaze moved over the rest of you. “You’re too clean.”
You frowned as he reached toward your hair.
“What are you doing?”
“People who’ve spent the last half hour hiding from gunfire don’t look this put together.”
His fingers loosened your hair, pulling several strands free around your face.
You stared at him. “Your turn.”
“You’re not touching my hair.”
“You touched mine.”
“For operational reasons.”
“So is this.”
You reached up and ran both hands through it.
Bucky went very still.
You pushed it out of place, then tugged his collar loose enough to make it look as though he’d been pulling at it under stress. Your fingertips brushed the warm skin beneath his throat.
His eyes remained on your face.
The room suddenly felt smaller.
You withdrew your hands.
“There.”
His voice was lower. “Good?”
You nodded.
Neither of you moved until radio traffic sounded somewhere beyond the wall and reminded you where you were.
“We should go.”
Bucky opened the door.
You stopped him. “Wait.”
He turned.
“If we were hiding during an armed raid, we wouldn’t walk out looking calm.”
Understanding crossed his face. “What do you want me to do?”
You stepped closer. “Hold me.”
For once, Bucky didn’t make a joke.
His arm came around your shoulders, and you slid yours around his waist. The position felt wrong for exactly one second before your body remembered every touch from dinner.
His hand moved slowly up and down your arm.
You drew a shaky breath.
Some of the adrenaline was real enough that acting became unnecessary.
“You okay?” he murmured.
“Yeah.”
His grip tightened slightly. “That wasn’t Aidan asking.”
You looked up.
The concern in his expression belonged entirely to Bucky.
“I’m okay.”
He studied you another second before nodding.
Footsteps approached.
You buried your face against his chest just as a response officer rounded the corner with two armed agents behind him.
You startled convincingly, and Bucky pulled you tighter.
“Hands where we can see them.”
Bucky immediately raised his right hand, his left remaining around you until the officer ordered him to move it.
“We’re guests,” he said, allowing his voice to shake just enough. “Aidan Sinclair. This is my wife, Evelyn.”
You nearly admired him for it.
“Why are you down here?”
“We heard shooting from our room,” you said. “Someone in the hallway was shouting for everyone to get downstairs, so we took the service stairs. Then there was more shooting, and we hid in a storage room.”
The officer approached.
Bucky positioned himself subtly between you and the weapon.
That part wasn’t acting.
The officer lowered it. “You’re safe. Stay with us.”
You nodded.
Bucky took your hand, and together you returned to the main lodge.
Chaos had replaced its carefully curated elegance. Guests crowded into the library wrapped in blankets, armed officers filled the hallways, and medics moved between people being treated for minor injuries.
Vey was nowhere to be seen.
You knew he was already in custody downstairs.
Nobody else did.
A woman from dinner spotted you. “Oh my God, Evelyn.”
She crossed the room and hugged you. You stiffened before remembering to return it.
“We thought you were still upstairs.”
“We couldn’t stay there once the shooting started.”
She looked past you. “Aidan?”
Bucky stood close behind you. “I’m fine.”
The woman touched his right arm. “You’re bleeding.”
You looked.
A thin line of blood had soaked through his sleeve near the elbow.
Your stomach tightened.
Bucky glanced down. “Glass.”
Lie.
You knew immediately.
The cut had come from the fight, and he hadn’t mentioned it.
You caught his wrist. “Aidan.”
“I’m fine.”
The words carried the same stubborn finality they always did.
This time, you were supposed to be his wife.
You leaned into the role. “You said that last time you needed stitches.”
One of the other guests laughed nervously.
Bucky stared at you.
You smiled sweetly.
A medic was summoned, and he had no choice.
The injury turned out to be shallow. You took the chair beside Bucky while it was cleaned, his right hand settling against your knee as the medic worked.
Nobody nearby was paying enough attention to require the gesture.
His thumb moved slowly over the fabric of your pants.
You looked down.
He stopped for a second, then started again.
You let him.
At 0300, the remaining guests were evacuated from Saint Armand. With the roads below the lodge partially closed, everyone was transported to another resort twenty minutes down the mountain.
You and Bucky were given another private suite, along with the same instructions as everyone else: stay available, don’t leave the property, and expect formal statements in the morning.
Your bags followed not long afterward. Once the guest floors at Saint Armand had been cleared, officers had begun collecting luggage and personal belongings to be sent after the evacuees. The task force made sure someone who knew what they were looking at handled the Sinclair suite, so when your things reached you, the secured tablet had been returned to its innocuous case and everything else looked exactly as though an ordinary married couple had packed it.
Once the door finally closed behind you, the secure comm vibrated with a second set of instructions meant only for the two of you.
COVER REMAINS ACTIVE. STAY WITH GUEST GROUP. DO NOT INITIATE CONTACT.
There was one bed again.
Neither of you commented on it.
Bucky tugged at the collar of his sweater while you kicked off your shoes. The adrenaline had begun fading, leaving exhaustion behind, and he crossed toward the minibar to retrieve two bottles of water before tossing one to you on the sofa.
You opened it as he sat in the chair opposite.
For the first time all night, there was nothing you were supposed to be doing.
The silence felt heavier than gunfire.
“You should’ve told me you were cut.”
“It wasn’t bad.”
“That isn’t the point.”
His expression tightened.
You recognized it immediately.
“Don’t.”
“What?”
“Turn this into Marseille.”
The city dropped into the room between you, bringing nine months of resentment with it.
The warehouse had been coming apart around twenty-three civilians while your extraction route collapsed with it. Bucky had gotten the last two hostages through an emergency exit before part of the structure came down between him and the transport, and you’d been ordered onto the vehicle with everyone else.
You went back instead.
Bucky had spent the entire time telling you over comms to leave him there. You’d found him trapped beneath a collapsed steel support while armed men closed in, freed him, and almost made it back out before someone shot you through the upper arm. A piece of broken metal had opened another cut along your side in the escape, leaving you with three stitches to go with the bullet wound.
Neither of you had spoken to each other the same way afterward.
“You’re the one making it Marseille,” Bucky said.
“Because apparently bleeding is only a problem when I do it.”
“That’s not what happened.”
“You spent months acting like I committed some unforgivable offense because I went back for you.”
“You ignored a direct extraction order.”
“So did you tonight.”
His jaw clenched. “You were willing to go into that annex before the team arrived.”
“So were you.”
“I know.”
“Then what exactly have we been fighting about?”
Bucky looked away.
The anger in you had been waiting too long, and you pushed to your feet. “You told me to leave you in that warehouse.”
“There were twenty-three civilians already on the transport.”
“And all twenty-three got out.”
“You didn’t know they would.”
“I knew I could get you.”
“You got shot.”
“And you’re angry because someone shot me?”
“I’m angry because you were there to get shot in the first place.”
You stared at him.
Bucky pushed out of the chair. “You want to know why?”
“Yes.”
“Because I told you to leave.”
“I heard you.”
“And you came back anyway.”
“Obviously.”
“You don’t get it.”
His voice rose for the first time.
You folded your arms. “Then explain it.”
Bucky went quiet.
He looked exhausted suddenly, older in a way that had nothing to do with his face. When he spoke again, his voice had lost most of its anger.
“I’ve spent most of my life being the one who goes back. I know what it sounds like when somebody tells you they’re fine and they’re not, and I know what it feels like to decide you can take one more hit if it means somebody else gets out. I know exactly how easy it is to convince yourself your life is the acceptable cost.”
Something inside you shifted.
Bucky’s gaze dropped for a moment. “And then you did it for me.”
“I wasn’t trying to die.”
“I know.”
“Then why—”
“Because I finally understood why everybody gets so damn angry.”
Your mouth closed.
His gaze returned to yours.
“You came through that door after I told you to leave, and all I could think was that if you got killed because of me, I was going to have to live with it.”
The room became painfully quiet. “That’s why you’ve hated me?”
His eyebrows drew together. “I don’t hate you.”
“You’ve done a convincing impression.”
“I was angry.”
“For nine months?”
“You make it easy.”
Despite everything, a laugh escaped you.
Bucky’s mouth twitched, easing some of the tension before he stepped closer.
“I was angry because you scared me. Every time you did something reckless after that, it happened again.”
“You do reckless things constantly.”
“I know.”
“That’s unbelievably hypocritical.”
“I know.”
“You’re admitting that?”
“Don’t make me repeat it.”
You shook your head.
Bucky was close enough now that you could see the faint bruising beginning along his jaw from the fight. Your hand rose before you thought better of it, fingertips touching the darkening skin.
He went still.
“You could’ve just told me.”
“Probably.”
“Instead, you decided to be unbearable for almost a year.”
“I was already good at it.”
Your thumb moved lightly along his jaw.
Bucky’s eyes lowered to your mouth.
The shift between you happened quietly. There was no mission alarm or watching audience to justify the moment now. You weren’t Evelyn Sinclair, and he wasn’t Aidan. There was nothing left to perform.
His hand settled at your waist.
“Tell me to stop.”
You could have.
Instead, you stepped closer.
Bucky kissed you.
The first contact was almost careful, as though both of you expected the other to reconsider.
Your fingers curled into the front of his sweater and pulled him back when he started to retreat.
That changed everything.
Bucky kissed you again with enough force to move you one step backward. His hand tightened against your waist while yours slid around the back of his neck, months of resentment taking on an entirely different meaning as every argument, every irritated glance, and every moment you’d caught him watching you across a briefing room came rushing back at once.
You bit his lower lip.
Bucky made a quiet sound against your mouth, his other hand settling against your back.
The edge of your engagement ring pressed against him.
He noticed.
His mouth slowed as his fingers caught your left hand between you, the diamond catching the light above the narrow platinum band.
For a moment, neither of you spoke.
“Aidan and Evelyn,” you murmured.
“Terrible couple.”
“They fooled everybody.”
“They fought too much.”
“You made up half the arguments.”
“You started the other half.”
You met his gaze, expecting to see that familiar look of satisfaction he got whenever he got the last word.
Instead, Bucky lifted your hand and brushed his thumb over the rings.
“Take them off.”
Something in your chest sank unexpectedly.
Of course.
The rings belonged to the cover, and maybe he’d finally remembered that whatever had changed between you at Saint Armand had started with pretending.
You reached for the engagement ring, but Bucky’s fingers closed around yours.
“Not because I want this to stop.”
You looked up.
He seemed almost annoyed with himself.
“Those rings belong to Aidan and Evelyn.”
“Aidan and Evelyn aren’t real.”
“That’s my point.”
Understanding arrived slowly.
Bucky’s thumb moved across your knuckle.
“If I’m kissing you, I don’t want it to be because we’re still pretending.”
The answer lodged somewhere behind your ribs.
You slipped off the engagement ring, then the wedding band beneath it, and set both on the table.
Bucky looked down at his own hand as though he’d only just remembered the band was still there. He pulled it free and placed it beside yours, three pieces of platinum belonging to two people who had never existed. Bucky pulled off his glasses and set them beside the rings.
When he looked back at you, whatever happened next belonged to the two of you rather than the people you’d been pretending to be.
Then you reached for him again.
This kiss was slower for all of a few seconds.
Bucky’s palm settled against your cheek as you leaned into him, but whatever restraint had survived the first kiss disappeared when your fingers curled into the front of his sweater. He made a quiet sound against your mouth and pulled you closer until there was hardly any space left between you.
Without the cover, everything felt different. His hand at your waist wasn’t there because someone might be watching, and yours against his chest had nothing to do with selling four years of fabricated marriage. The three rings sat abandoned on the table beside you, and neither of you had any excuses left.
Bucky kissed you harder, backing you up until the edge of the table pressed against the backs of your thighs. His hands stopped there, steady at your waist even while his mouth moved against yours with considerably less restraint.
“Still want me to stop?” he murmured, and began to pull away.
You caught his sweater and pulled him back down. “Does it look like I do?”
A faint smile touched his mouth. “Just checking.”
“You’ve been checking since we got here.”
“Wasn’t allowed to do anything about it until now.”
The admission sent heat through you that had nothing to do with the temperature of the room.
“You wanted to?”
His expression changed.
There had been plenty of moments since arriving at Saint Armand when you’d caught him looking at you, but you’d dismissed every one of them as part of the cover because acknowledging any other possibility had seemed considerably more dangerous.
Bucky’s thumb moved slowly against your side.
“You really need me to answer that?”
Apparently you did.
You looked at him, and whatever he saw on your face erased the last trace of humor from his.
“Yes,” he said quietly. “I wanted to.”
Your next kiss nearly knocked the breath from both of you.
Everything that followed carried the same strange combination of urgency and care. Months of arguments had taught you where to push and where he would push back, but this was different. Every touch came with the possibility of stopping, and every time either of you hesitated, the other closed the distance again.
Somewhere between the table and the bed, Bucky’s sweater landed on the floor.
You didn’t remember deciding to put it there.
You did remember the moment his hands settled at your waist again and he looked at you, waiting.
There was no performance left to hide behind.
You reached for him.
That was answer enough.
Later, the room was quiet except for both of you trying to catch your breath.
The three rings were still sitting together on the table where you’d left them, platinum catching faintly in the light from the window. From the bed, they looked strangely small considering how much space they’d occupied in your head since the briefing.
Bucky lay beside you with one arm draped across your waist.
You traced an idle line over his chest.
“You know this doesn’t mean you were right about Marseille.”
His eyes opened.
“You’re bringing this up now?”
“I’m establishing the record.”
He stared at you for several seconds.
“You were right.”
You lifted your head. “That was suspiciously easy.”
“I’m exhausted.”
“Still counts.”
“Go to sleep.”
You smiled and settled back against him.
His arm tightened around you.
Neither of you mentioned the rings again.
For a few hours, neither of you had to be Aidan or Evelyn either.
Morning arrived with the quiet vibration of the secure comm on the bedside table.
You woke beneath unfamiliar sheets with Bucky’s arm around your waist. For several seconds, you didn’t remember where you were until your gaze landed on the three rings and Bucky’s glasses still sitting together on the table across the room.
Saint Armand, the children, the fight, and Marseille came rushing back.
Then Bucky.
The device vibrated again.
His eyes opened as you reached for it, his arm remaining around you while you read the message waiting on the screen.
COVER REMAINS ACTIVE. STAY WITH GUEST GROUP. FORMAL STATEMENTS AT 1000. DEPARTURE PENDING.
Bucky read it over your shoulder. “Guess we’re still married.”
Your gaze dropped pointedly to the arm around your waist. “Apparently.”
He didn’t move it.
Neither did you.
Eventually, you slipped out from beneath his arm and crossed to the table. The wedding band went on first, followed by the engagement ring above it.
Bucky joined you a moment later, picking up his own band and sliding it back onto his left hand.
Something about watching him put it on felt different after last night.
The rings had been props when you arrived at Saint Armand. Now you knew exactly what it felt like to choose each other without them.
You looked away before Bucky could catch you staring.
He reached for his glasses next and settled them back into place, restoring the last obvious piece of Aidan Sinclair before you left the suite.
By 1000, the guests from Saint Armand had been gathered in one of the resort’s conference rooms to give formal statements. You and Bucky sat together while investigators moved from couple to couple, asking where everyone had been when the shooting began, what they had seen, whether they recognized any of the armed men, and how they had ended up away from the guest floors.
You gave them the same story you’d already given the response officers.
Someone had been shouting for guests to get downstairs. You and Aidan had taken the service stairs, heard more gunfire, panicked, and hidden in a storage room until officers found you.
Bucky kept hold of your hand throughout the interview.
Nobody questioned it.
You weren’t entirely sure it was necessary.
The authorities kept everyone at the resort through early afternoon while identities were verified and the roads were cleared. Food and coffee were brought into the conference room, and the guests spent several hours trading increasingly elaborate theories about what had happened at Saint Armand.
You listened to a banking heir insist that Vey had been the target of an international assassination attempt while Bucky drank tea beside you and said absolutely nothing.
Beneath the table, his knee remained pressed against yours.
Nobody looked at either of you twice.
Shortly after 1400, the guests were finally released.
You and Bucky left with the others, your luggage loaded into a private car arranged for the Sinclairs. The Sinclair rings remained on your hands, the passports stayed in your bags, and Bucky’s fingers found yours as the car pulled away from the resort.
You remained Aidan and Evelyn Sinclair all the way to the airport. The car delivered you to the private aviation terminal listed on the Sinclairs’ itinerary, where anyone watching would have seen exactly what they expected: a wealthy couple leaving the mountains by charter after a disastrous weekend.
Only after you were through the restricted entrance did a task-force handler intercept you and lead you through a staff corridor toward a secured hangar.
Bucky’s hand was still around yours.
You looked down at it. “You can stop now.”
He followed your gaze. “I know.”
Neither of you moved.
You lifted an eyebrow.
His mouth twitched. “Operational requirement.”
“Nobody’s watching us anymore.”
“Slow transition.”
You let him keep holding your hand.
The task force had taken over a private hangar on the far side of the airfield, well away from anyone who might have followed the Saint Armand guests. Only after you and Bucky were inside, the doors closed behind you, and the Sinclair identities were no longer required did anyone address you by your real names.
There was time to shed the last pieces of the cover before the debrief. Bucky disappeared with one of the cover technicians long enough to have the subtle prosthetics removed from his face and the cosmetic shell taken off his left arm. When he came back, the familiar lines of his jaw and nose had returned, along with the vibranium you were used to seeing.
Seeing him look entirely like himself again affected you more than it had any right to.
The formal debrief began late that afternoon.
By then, analysts had already started working through the recovered data. Ninety-one percent of the server had been enough. Investigators had obtained names, routes, accounts, safe houses, transport schedules, and records connecting Vey’s network to dozens of previous disappearances.
All seven children recovered at Saint Armand were safe. Relatives had already been identified and contacted for three of them, while the remaining four were in specialist care as investigators worked to trace their families.
Vey was in custody, along with two of the four other senior members who had attended the retreat.
Two remained missing.
The case officer closed the file in front of her. “They know Saint Armand is compromised. Every guest there is going to be scrutinized now, whether they were involved or not, which makes the Sinclair identities more liability than asset.”
“So that’s it?”
“For the two of you, yes. As far as anyone looking from the outside is concerned, Aidan and Evelyn boarded their charter this afternoon and left the region. The cover team will maintain their movements from there. You’re just done wearing them.”
Your fake passports went into a destruction envelope along with the phones, credit cards, keys, and identification attached to the cover.
Finally, the case officer held out her hand. “The rings.”
Bucky removed his first.
He turned the plain strip of platinum once between his fingers before dropping it into the evidence bag.
You looked down at your own hand.
You hadn’t worn the rings for long, and they belonged to a woman who had never existed and a marriage assembled from forged documents, invented memories, and whatever pieces of yourselves had slipped into the spaces between.
Still, something tightened unexpectedly as you pulled off the engagement ring and then the wedding band beneath it.
The case officer took them.
Your hand felt wrong afterward.
You curled your fingers into your palm.
Bucky noticed. Of course he did.
You didn’t get outside until evening.
The sun had dropped behind the mountains, leaving the airfield washed in the blue-gray light before dark. Two vehicles waited beyond the hangar to take the team to a secure hotel for the night before outbound flights resumed in the morning.
You stood beside Bucky beneath the overhang.
For the first time since the briefing, nobody expected either of you to touch.
He kept his hands in his coat pockets.
You almost missed his arm around you, which was ridiculous.
“So,” you said.
Bucky looked over. “So?”
“What happens now?”
His expression shifted. “Now?”
“We’re done being Aidan and Evelyn.”
“Good.”
You frowned. “That’s not an answer.”
“Wasn’t supposed to be.”
You looked down at your bare hand.
Bucky followed your gaze. “You miss them?”
“The fake marriage?”
“The rings.”
You considered lying. “A little.”
“Me too.”
That brought your eyes back to him.
One of his hands came out of his coat pocket and reached for yours, his fingers threading through them with the same easy familiarity he’d spent the mission pretending belonged to Aidan Sinclair.
Only this time, nobody was watching.
“Not the pretending,” he said.
His thumb brushed slowly over the bare skin where the rings had rested.
“Just having an excuse for this.”
Bucky leaned down and kissed you.
There was no cover story waiting afterward, no fabricated anniversary, invented house in Vermont, or four years of memories constructed behind a desk. You were done being Aidan and Evelyn. Now, it was just you and Bucky, all the way through.
There was only Bucky standing with you in the cold mountain air, holding your bare left hand because he wanted to.
When he pulled away, his forehead rested briefly against yours.
“You know,” he murmured, “Evelyn wasn’t that bad.”
You stared at him. “I’m leaving.”
His grip tightened before you could move.
“You’re riding with me.”
“Operational requirement?”
“No.”
The word settled warmly between you.
This time, when he started toward the waiting car, he took you with him.
You let him.
credit to @uzmacchiato for the cherry divider ❤️💛
taglist: @twentytomidnight, @ferbiederbie, @dutifullyshamelesstrash, @seamlessepiphany, @fwrdsl4sh
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Them being a couple somehow sounds like an asset and liability to the agency going forward in a lovingly unbearable old married couple behaviour kinda way 🤣🤣🤣
