Agape
Mafia!au x Steve Rogers
CHAPTERS:
summary: your escape to Brooklyn was harboured by secrets and a harrowed past, left abused and betrayed, you accepted your destiny of being swallowed by the crowd. Until the King of New York showed up in front of you and wanted a piece of you for himself.
a/n: never stopped thinking about this series! it has been over a year since like last update but I'm finally starting to fall back into it. this chapter is definitely a mouthful, and hopefully clear up some things about the reader. (and anyone still reading this story..thank you.)
divider by @firefly-graphics !
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The soft rush of the diner during midday rings familiar to your bones. The squeak of your fading sneakers against the linoleum floors, the fast paced beats coming from Frank's speaker, the chatter and noise of patrons-the ring of the door that still quickens your heart.
Things have changed however, when you had pushed through the back door into the small break room to shove your things in the rusting metal locker you feel it.
There was less of the rushed movements and haggard sighs from your coworkers, the burnout that could only ever be outlined in your features when you live paycheck to paycheck. The air of the diner had been filled with the frustration of working under a boss who’s greed and incompetence left most new hires to leave the next day.
A boss who now is manning the register, boredom outlined through her features as she lists the specials on display in the glass of the diner shelves. And it seems this change has not come gradual, as Clementine rushes into the breakroom, her face twisted in glee.
“Oh you’re finally back!” She grins.
Clementine doesn't wait before wrapping her hands around your midsection, bringing you tight against her chest as she squeezes you enough to rattle the emptiness of your chest.
The unexpected embrace leaves your arms limp at your sides that Clementine ignores, her warmth enough for the both of you.
It takes a moment after she pulls away, for you to blink back the bitter taste of the years that had gone by without a warmth like this and refocus your eyes on her.
Her face is animated as she rambles, her words getting caught here in there, rushed and jumbled as they try and escape her throat all at once.
“Hey hey, Clem. slow down” You chuckle, shaking your head when she nods quickly and takes a breath.
“You saw it right?” Clementine says after catching her breathe
“Saw what?”
“Mare?”
“Oh. At the register huh? I thought I walked into the wrong restaurant. Some place with benefits and annual leave” You joke, as Clemetine shakes her head.
“You’ve missed out on a lot. She’s been..around more, and not in the usual domineering over your shoulder kind of way. A couple days ago something just shifted, she just shows up one day without a smoke in her mouth and wearing fuckin’ work safe boots and takes over Ellis at the counter” Clem eyes widen, the swear coming out a little clunky. Like the profanity was the only way to emphasize how unnatural it was.
And it was, Mare had never once stepped past the laminate flooring that separated the office and the stained yellowed concrete that outlined the entirety of the diner. Yet now she was falling back to tier one of food service?
“What do you think made her suddenly start..workin’ again” You reply, straining your voice to sound curious.
You weren't stupid, you knew managers like Mae didn't suddenly develop altruism overnight. You grind your jaw in frustration when the familiar feeling of Steve nudges at your mind.
“Don’t know, maybe someone called HR or something? She seemed a little shaken up when she came in that day too” Clem shakes her head as if pushing away a thought.
“But I'm not one to kick a gift horse in the balls. It’s about time we got something good hm? After what we had to suffer with for months, I’m glad to say my belief in a higher power is restored once again” Clemeinte muses, tying her hair into a tight bun before sweeping back the flyaways.
“You have got to know that doesn’t sound right Clem. Besides, doesn't it feel..” You murmur, scratching at your elbow nervously.
“What?”
“Like wrong? Something scared her enough to-”
“To actually work? To take care of the people she pays? How long have we wished for something like this..to actually be treated with some dignity and respect. In a city like this it's easy for people like us to just be thrown away and replaced. Someone out there cares, honey, actually cares. Can’t you see that?” Clem replies, a hopeful glint in her eyes as she looks towards you.
It takes all of you not to prod further, nodding with a thin smile at the way her body buzzes with the change. It’s different and it takes you a moment to recognize it for what it is, hope. Clementine was good, too good for this city. She made peace with this abruptness the only way she could, it wasn’t her fault Steve had slunk his way into your life like peated sludge.
You wouldn't be the one to take that away from her.
You swallow the heavy weight of Steve in your mind. You’ve grown familiar-it was strange how he had not even existed to you weeks before, and now, now it felt his presence followed you everywhere.
She was right, as much as you hated the feeling of being watched and looked over, Steve was the only one to genuinely make a difference in this place. Your mind twists with conflicting feelings of being grateful that Steve helped out Clem and your diner, and the uncomfortable all consuming presence he had.
She reaches for your hand, and you quell her awaiting gaze with a squeeze of it. Moving to dab a bit of lip balm onto your lips before moving past the swinging doors into the awaiting bustle of the diner.
The rush of orders, customers and Frank's loud barrelling voice shouting out profanities numbs your mind to the thoughts that haven't stopped bludgeoning your mind. The gut lurching nausea of your husband and Rumlow hadn't left though, slinking to the back, dormant and waiting.
You wait a lot these days. And it tears at you all the same.
You crave to forget, forget about what you had done, forget that you were never going to have a piece of a life that was yours. But you settle for the afternoon rush of school kids and construction workers who leave equal amounts of mess, noise and spillage as they leave.
You’re wiping down a table in the back corner of the diner, dipping your washcloth in the lukewarm murky water as you slide the cloth over condiment and soda stains. You press your elbow into it, humming gently as you give yourself a moment of reprieve, content to the detachment of service work.
Crawling onto the diner couches, you reach from pieces of napkins and straw covers when you spot the stiff leather of new boots that haven’t yet been broken in. Mare waits for you to raise your head, moving from the seat to stand across from her.
When your eyes glide up to meet her gaze you let out a breath at the face looking back at you. Deep indented circles line her under eyes, her hair falling out of the rushed pigtail behind her, her lips are thin pulled into a permanent grimace.
In all your time here, which wasn’t long by any measure, you had never seen her like this. Mirroring the same hunched exhaustion Clementine, Frank and you had.
But her eyes, her eyes twitch as they barely meet your own. Tiredness edged into the faded colour of them, but that isn’t what she comes to you with. Her eyes dart behind you, past the rows of booths to the frosted windows that blurred waves of foot traffic and the city above.
You knew that look-you lived it-the nervousness that pulls at your fingertips, the checking and the surveying.
The wait
She was scared, the familiar paranoia is leaking from her into the linoleum floors as your gaze widens. Had Steve done that? Whispered into her ear in that voice of his, heady like molasses and terrifying.
“Mare?” You mumble, stepping forward to try and close the gap between you two.
Her mouth opens and closes, tongue curved like she was about to say something, your eyes flicker to the shake in her hand that has you reaching for it. She flinches, pulling away as she straightens her back, the look of trepidation falls from her face as she swallows.
“I wouldn’t be asking you this if there was no one else. I know- I know I said that before, and thank you for coming in” She replies
You furrow your eyebrows, taken back by her apology, you felt the vibration of the strings that moved her mouth in her words.
Beginning to shake your head, the tip of Steve's name leaves your mouth before she shakes her head and you nod slowly.
“You need me to close up?” You reply instead
Her eyes brighten, nearly jumping at the request before she folds into herself again.
“You don’t have to, I can catch the later train” Mare begins before you let out a sound of disapproval.
“You’ve been here since opening, I got it.” You quickly fill
Relief floods through her, eyebrows smoothing as her shoulders slump back.
“But..”
“I want to, I need the distraction. I’ll tell him that” You whisper the last part, hand on her arm. Her eyes fall to your fingers, but she doesn't pull away this time. Nodding softly before murmuring where the diner keys are and the last of the deliveries that needed to be put away.
The sun dips into the honeyes horizon as the hours tick by, you give one last nod to Mare as she hesitates before leaving through the back door. Frankie is in the back, sweeping up the last few potato peels and scraps off the greased floor.
Crouching as you place the last few specials into the white bleached box, you hear Frankie and Clem weave through the restaurant to find you. You turn as you catch them, wiping flakes of pastry from your fingers.
“Get home safe” You motion to the inky darkness that blanketed the city now.
“Don’t worry, Frankie’s walking me to the train” Clem replies, readjusting her bag on her shoulder as he grins beside her.
“Left you a sandwich in the back. Running around all day I know you haven't eaten” Frankie throws a thumb to the kitchen. Your stomach grumbles audibly at the mention, as you wince as he laughs.
You smile then, a real one. You let Clem press you into the second hug today, this one tighter than the last that has you letting your body fall into it.
“Don’t work too hard, some stains never come off” Clementine mumbles, and you blink at her words. If only she knew.
You wave your goodbyes, as they exit through the front doors, locking it up after them.
The list of all the things you needed to do before closing shop ring familiar in your mind. It provides a healthy distraction from the darkness outside as you sweep, mop and count the last of the change that clings back into the register.
You feel him before you hear the leisured foot falls of his shoes, no doubt shining brightly against the stained floors despite the yellow hue of the lights above. The hairs on your back stand, and you swallow forcibly when he taps against the door methodically.
You pause for a moment, before turning around from the safety deposit box the envelopes of the day’s cash was stored.
The office is already too small, cramped in it’s walls and the meek desk and chair pushed into it, but Steve swallows the space. You forget how large he is, until the wide expanse of his chest stretches across the threshold of the doorway.
Blocking the light that floods from the hall, the hardened edge of his shoulder leans against the door frame as he watches you.
“How long have you been standing there” You let out after your eyes scan the familiar draped fine tailoring of his suit.
He considers you for a moment, the curled honey locs of his hair pushed back and falling out.
The air tinges with the faint smell of blood you recognise, but it fades quickly with heady smell of him.
“Long enough”
Your mind falls back, hadn’t you locked up? You were sure of it, right after Clem and Frankie had left.
Steve cocks his head
“Backdoor sweetheart. Somethin’ you should’ve made sure you keep locked”
“To keep men like you out” You grunt out without thought, your eyes widen at your words. Steve’s mouth quirks to the side, seemingly entertained by your little misstep.
“Yes, to keep men like me out” Steve nods to your surprise, the voice darkening.
“What are you doing here?” You reply
“Taking you home. It’s late, too late” Steve mutters disapprovingly, eyes glancing towards the thick darkness that coated through the diner windows.
“I wanted to close up” You say suddenly, the thought of Mare facing the brunt of Steve pushing into your mind.
Steve looks back to you, “I’m sure you did. You’re too forgiving for your own good”
You shrug your shoulders, he was not wrong. But it felt like pulling teeth to be anything else, saying no felt like pushing against a brick wall. Have you always been like this? Or did your husband change you?
You feel that it was something innate, your need to please everyone, to let things just happen to you. You were yoked to this detrimental good you carried the moment your soul was uttered into existence.
Steve's gaze flickers, and you link your fingers together at the realization of being watched. You spent so long blending into their background, unconsidered, minute. But with Steve it felt all he could do was watch you.
Unrelenting and filtering everything else around you as it stuck to your turned face.
“Where are Sam and Bucky?” You say, after the silence fills the space between you two again.
“Out. Doing some work for me” Steve grunts, voice murky as he weaves through your answer diplomatically. Steve was good at giving you just enough information, keeping you in the dark and too deep simultaneously.
You collect your things from the locker room, swinging your bag across your chest while Steve follows you wordlessly. You take one quick sweep of the diner, before fishing out your keys and locking the back door.
The hum of a car has you turning your neck into the alleyway behind the back door as you spot the outline of Steve's car that seems to blend into the pitch darkness. It matches him perfectly, dark, silent and more expensive than your entire life.
Steve is by the passenger side, hand gripping the curved window while he waits silently for you to get in. It’s different to when Bucky or Sam picks you up, and you feel the intensity of it as you slide into the leather seat.
The car door closes, the air inside cut short as let out a shaky exhale. Watching Steve move to the driver side with ease. He barely spares you a glance, the engineering roaring to life as he pulls out of the Diner’s alleyway and into the city streets.
Your bag is sat on your lap, you grip and fiddle with the straps nervously as the flash of skyscrapers and traffic light illuminate the walls of the car. He slinks past traffic and main roads with ease, eyes almost glazed over like the city was etched into him, following the road ways to your apartment like he had been there countless times.
Unease prickles you as you realise he had, possibly even before you had known about him. Before he had strolled into the diner those weeks before, before you fell into his palm and the dizzying spiral.
You don’t feel the fear you had grown accustomed to with your husband however, it’s different, familiar in a way you can’t explain.
As you drive through the bridge that separated the boroughs, to the side of town that was darker and more decrepit than the city centre you think back to Bucky and all that he had confronted you with yesterday.
Steve and his secrets, the life he lived now born from what was before, you bristle when you remember.
Bucky's thinly veiled anger when he talked about your husband, about what he had done. To Steve. How could Steve be in a car with you, drive you home, vow to trust him when your own husband had obliterated any sense of love he had?
He had killed her, took Steve’s fiance or what she was without thought, all for this world. To be granted power and control and he had found it, maybe that was Steve's endgame. The thought morphs before you can take hold of it, until it blares in your mind, hot in your ear.
Was this retribution? An eye for an eye? Would he remove you from your husband in the same quickness as she was?
You hear Steve call your name, eyebrows furrowed and it takes you a second to realise your hands are shaking, wrapped tight around your bag.
“Stop it”
You can barely think, swallow, you give a pitiful exhale as an answer.
“Whatever your thinkin’, don’t.”
“Steve” You plead, his knuckles whiten against the steering wheel as he slows. The streets are vacant, no sound of any traffic or wheels behind or infront of you.
“He killed her. He killed her” You whisper horrifyingly, hand coming up to cover your mouth.
Steve closes his eyes, you see his tongue press against the roof of his mouth. He opens them, the blue hues like glitter against the dark around him.
“Bucky told you”
You nod, turning your body in the passenger seat to face him. “How can you even agree to be around me knowing what my husband did? To- to your” You mumble, not knowing what to say, how to say it.
“It was a long time ago” Steve replies, his voice is soft. Careful.
Your eyebrows crease as you shake your head fervently.
“That matters?” You reply incredulously
“Time brings perspective. It changes things.” Steve hums
“Changes what you want. You don’t think I could have tracked him down and taken his head for what he had done?”
You swallow, Steve's eyes tracking the moment. No doubt
“Why didn’t you?”
“Revenge is something juvenile, it feels good in the moment and then you’re left with the real world. To survive in this life is to think ahead, that’s all it ever is. Thinking, and planning and waiting”
You knew that word intimately. Waiting.
You fall back onto the seat,
“I think too much” You mumble out
Steve shakes his head “It saved your life”
“You know more than what I wanted you to, but that isn't your fault. You lived the way you could, that is something I cannot say for a lot of people. Surviving the way you did, most of my men wouldn't”
Steve's words surprise you, the defined nature of them. He believed it, most people wouldn't call it survival. You don't forget Rumlow’s words, how they had sunk their way into you, even Sam and Bucky had that silent reservation.
She was the one who married him, what did she expect?.
“Who was she? To you. Bucky said..” You begin, words trailing off when Steves gaze hardens
“Bucky only knows what I tell him.”
He scratches at his jaw, no doubt considering what information to leave out when he weaves through your question.
“It was brash, rushed and quick. Thought we could elope and run to goddamn nowhere. A town where no one would know my last name.” Steve shakes his head.
“Fucking foolish. I asked her to marry me without a ring and the clothes on my back after my father set me down. Told me it was time.”
“Time?” You interject
“Time to be a made man. Time to take over what he left me with, what would be mine”
“You didn’t love her?” You ask, careful with your words but it doesn’t hit Steve in the way you thought it would.
“There was love there, but, it was always something else. Retribution, revenge against my father. We both knew what it was and what it wasn’t. It was beyond us, just childish meddling to escape the inevitable. We both needed each other-”
“Like how you need me now?” You’re caught off guard by the bristle of your voice. You didn’t mean it, but it came out heated anyway.
Steve looks up at you with a cock of the head.
“Margaret wasn’t the love of my life”
Margaret. He said her name with the same detachment as kicking a rock off his path.
“But they murdered her anyway. He murdered her anyway.”
“Yes he did”
There’s a flash of something that passes through Steve’s hard demeanour. Something close to guilt and sadness. You’re caught off guard by the emotion of it. Every assumption you form of him changes with the next word that comes out of his mouth.
His eyes glaze, thoughtful, you see the smooth curves on him that come out edged now as he speaks. He still held her death as a causation of him.
“Am I set to the same fate Steve? Am I going to be murdered by my revenged obsessed husband? By this world?”
There’s a tick that appears in Steve’s jaw at your comment, his eyes cast low.
“No, you aren’t. But I can’t promise that if you keep things from me-”
You can’t help the laugh that falls out of your mouth.
“You want honesty? Is that what this is, Steve? Are we going to pretend like we know each other” You reply, confused.
Steve's gaze hardens at that. You’re taken back by the mix of anger that flashes through his eyes.
“I know there are things you don’t understand. There is so much you don’t know-”
“Then tell me!” You reply harshly. Steve sighs, grinding his jaw as he parks the car, the view of your apartment complex against the windshield.
“It’s better this way” Steve replies curtly, you don't wait for him to reach your side of the door as he gets out, pushing it open roughly as you stomp towards your apartment.
You were going to drown with everything you knew and everything you didn’t, couldn’t he see that?
Steve calls out to you roughly, but you ignore him. The elevator to your apartment is occupied so you twist to the staircase that leads to your floor. You hear him behind you, steps quiet but you can feel the warmth of him at your back.
You open your apartment door, shouldering in and attempting to slam it behind you. The shine of Steve’s shoe stops it, his broad shoulder side stepping into your home.
“You don’t close doors in my face” Steve replies, voice devoid of emotion as he shuts it behind him.
He was incredible, marching into your home like he owned it and chastising you.
You drop your bag on the counter of your small kitchenette, opening cupboards and rifling through to find the recognised brown stained glass.
“Do you want one?” You bristle to Steve without looking up.
“No”
You miss the way Steve's gaze hardens as he watches you, it's rough and uncontrolled, how you set down the glass and pour the liquor without thinking, itching for the burn to coat your throat and make you forget.
You down it quickly, reaching to pour yourself another greedily before Steve wraps his enormous hand around the neck of the bottle
“I think that's enough” Steve grunts, you try to reach for it and he shakes his head. Moving to your living room window and dropping the bottle down. It crashes, the sound vibrating through as a cat shrieks close by.
Your mouth hangs open as he appears in front of you again in a flash. You’re mad now.
“Oh fuck you! You lied to me Steve! You keep lying to me!”
“I never lied to you”
You ignore his reply in favour of the buzz humming anger you feel coursing through you.
“You lied to me after I thought you were the only thing- god-I was so goddamn stupid, how did I ever think”
“I did not lie to you” Steve repeats harsher, stepping closer
“What about Rumlow huh?”
“What about him?” Steve grunts
“He told me the truth! About what you want, why I’m here”
“And what did he say huh? Tell me, what do you think this is?” Steve’s eyes darken, crossing the threshold in two long strides to press close to you.
Your throat dries up as he grinds his jaw expectantly.
“He told me to put out. So that you could be done with me” You grunt, blinking back the bile and fear that day erupted in mind.
Steve's eyes blink, one twice, you see his hand twitch, furling and curling into a fist.
“He is nothing, a soldier for hire that would say and do what he wants without care. You don't know anything. You are just naive and-”
“You don't tell me anything!” You scream out frustratingly. You wanted to pull your hair out.
“You want to know? Huh, is that why you came to my office with all my men fucking ogling you?”
You shake your head dismissively “Fine. Yes, and you still give me nothing. You have to give me something, anything about why I’m here and why you need me-”
“You don’t know yourself!” Steve cuts you off, his loud booming voice taking up your entire apartment. Bouncing off the tattered carpet and the peeling walls. It stumps you into silence as your mind reels to catch up.
“…What?” You whisper, gone is the anger that had filled you before, all that’s left is the wait. Again. Waiting for him.
Steve shakes his head, muttering in a language you don’t quite understand. Wiping a hand down his face, his blonde hair tousled and out of place.
“You have absolutely no idea about who you are, who you are in this life” Steve replies, eyes flickering to the skyline of the city that peeks through the buildings outside your apartment.
“Steve..what do you mean?” Your words creak out of your mouth without air
“You’re right, you have been lied to, doll. You have been lied to by that fucking husband, and your goddamn father-”
“My father? What-how do, what do you know about my father” You hadn't thought about your father in years. In moments only in grief and bitterness. He had died long before you could fit his outline into your mind.
Silence.
It's different, what he says now. He jitters a little, mind jumping as he tries to clear his head. Steve never faltered, he never let human error, the misstep leak from him and stain the prisms he had created for himself. You had sunk your fingers deep, clutching at his ribs and his lungs and his goddamn vocal cords, and now the road he had taken you on crumbles underneath him.
“Steve” You plead, fingers taut into a fist. Fingers and vocal cords, tugging and pulling and retching him to speech.
“Your husband isn’t the one that tethers you to this life underneath our shoes, your father is. And whether or not you want to believe it, you were meant for this. It’s in your goddamn blood” Steve rasps, brushing against your chest as he leans in, his eyes trailing across your face.
“But, my-he's gone.” You shake your head furiously, search Steve's face to find the lie. You know already that he isn’t, blue eyes boring into yours. “My father he was-”
“He fell in love, and all good men always end up dead that way” Steve spits out bitterly.
“No, no Steve”
“Yes. Your grandfather carved his place in the underground. Parts of the city even I can’t reach, and it would have become your fathers too. So now it is yours. No matter how hard your father had tried to shield you away from it, this life has a way of making sure you receive what you are owed one way or another.”
Steves feels almost guilty at the wave of nausea that takes over you, this is why he didn’t want you to know. But you ran him ragged and god almighty it felt like you controlled his very mind.
He steps forward when your body pulls away from him, your fingers coming up to press into your temples and you shake and blink and look at him wide eyed.
His body is turned into you, fingers curling and uncurling like the very space between you both physically hurt him.
You don’t lean into him and he doesn't move further, finding yourself at stand still as the air seems to hang onto your shoulders.
You did not know your grandfather, catching only slivers of memories from your childhood about a man with shoes like Steve and cufflinks that came one afternoon, the day your father died and your world had splintered into two.
You would not see him again, and you felt that was purposeful now.
This is what you had wanted, wasn’t it? To know? To rub out the waiting that filled your mind every passing day you were kept in the dark.
Your life is no longer governed by linear time, just in moments. Moments like now, where the past was held by people you didn't even know a month ago, pieces and parts of you that should have been yours. Instead you find them spilling out onto the small tiled floor of your kitchenette.
Your father, your father. Your lip trembles when you try to piece him together, you feel his warmth in your mind, safe and all consuming but that is all that he left you with. You can’t picture his face, the slope of his neck, the lilt of his voice. But his blood runs through you now, and no matter how inconceivable it was, Steve was right, you knew what lineage meant in this world.
Steve had tried to run for it, your husband had killed for it, and you would be born into it in every timeline and universe.
You had thought you were a victim in this world, pulled from the streets like a hostage and thrown into a room and clothes that did not fit you. A bystander brought into this life through matrimony rather than blood.
You wondered why your husband had been so adamant in marrying you, you were plain, unassuming. It wasn’t love that guided him, no, you were a chess move. Another insurance to his power and kingdom that any heir of his would swallow up an even greater part of the world.
He would take from you, your name, your father, the very birthright owed to you.
An anger fills you as your past connects with your present, it's a strange thing. This small inking feeling of hunger that lines your insides. You welcome it, feel the tug of its vibration through your fingers as you think back to all the times you were pressed under your husband's thumb.
It’s dizzying, the way Steve's words have changed what you know about yourself so quickly. It’s the same hunger that clicks the confusion and displacement you had felt all these years into place.
And when you look up Steve's eyes seem to glint under the overhead light, like he knew. Knew the feeling, knew the change that occurred in your mind. His head falls to the side as he blinks, fists relaxed from their cramped curl.
You hadn’t planned on Steve, not in his unrelenting chase of you, not the way he had irrevocably changed your irate escape from your husband.
You remembered you had wanted to go up to Alaska, when you pulled together enough savings. Far enough away where the cold ate at anything worth trying to drag back, it was useless, you were tied, it was blood against snow.
This world would find you again and again and again until you grew familiar under the maelstrom.
“Thank you.” You don't need to continue, Steve understands it.
You attempt to put away the now empty glass and other things left on your kitchen counter has your head spinning. You grip the wall with a grunt as your head spins, stomach twisting with alcohol and Steve's words.
“Why..why can’t I remember all this? My father, the past, anything” You grunt, frustration grinding away at you.
Your memory is so hazy, even more when you try to piece together the past Steve tells you that belonged to you. It’s like an oil spill each time you sift through the hole in your mind where it should be.
Steve hardens in a blink, face going blank and eyes as dark as pitch when he tears his eyes away from you.
“You need to sleep.” Steve replies instead, and it’s not until he says it do you feel the lead of your limbs tug at you tiredly.
You open your mouth, and Steve eyes flicker back at you from his gaze towards your bedroom.
“Can..can you stay tonight? Please” You whisper the last part and Steve's eyes go half mast, his eyelashes brushing against the curve of his cheek.
“I wasn’t planning on leavin’” He grunts out, voice heady with something you want to wrap your fingers around.
You nod before moving silently through your home, Steve remaining against the kitchenette counter as you shred your clothes and change into something that wasn’t stained and greasy. When you poke your head out your bedroom door, Steve is already eyeing you.
“I’m afraid I don't think I can find anything for you to sleep in” You murmur, your face pulling into a frown at his suit that did not look easy to move in let alone sleep.
Steve shakes his head dismissively, “Don’t worry about it” and begins to shred his suit tie. He folds it over your chair neatly, and you can’t tear your eyes off of him as he turns from you and slowly unbuttons the cufflinks of shirt. The tinge of blood staining the collar is faded, a pinky grey as you recall its smell in the diner.
You cut your eyes away when he begins to turn,
“I’ve got to make a phone call. I’ll be outside, okay?” Steve waits for you to nod, before slipping out of the apartment door. There's a small crack, and if you walk a bit closer you can probably make out his mumbles.
Steves turns his body from your apartment door, eyes straining down the poorly lit hallway of your apartment complex in silent scrutiny.
While this side of town wasn’t half as bad as the neighborhood Steve has dealt with, it was still dicey. You hadn't noticed, or maybe you had and had grown accustomed, to the beady shadows that scurried at every corner and alleyway.
It wasn’t safe for you here-it wasn't where you should have to live-but Steves reconciled only because of your fierce ownership of the one thing that was yours, entirely.
You were strong, so goddamn resilient it stumped him at times. It causes him to grind his jaw and grip his phone too, swiping his tongue across his teeth as he remembers what your husband had done to you. That same hunger for blood shoots through his veins, the one that had been so hard to stave away when Rumlow had cornered you on the balcony.
He wanted to paint the windows red with him then it itched his gums. And he would get the chance, he promised himself that at least, when you were back home and safe.
Flickering through the small contact list, Steve presses the familiar number of the long blond haired nordic. Thor picks up in two rings, the sound of booming music, and clinking bottles filtering through the receiver. It was nearly 2 am, and yet the other half of the Odinson charter seemed to buzz with bleary eyed glee.
“Rogers, didn’t think you would take up my invite but alas there is alcohol and enough women for us both”
“That’s not why I’m calling” Steve sighs, dealing with the Odinsons was tiring, and he only did it when it was necessary.
“I know. But you don’t usually call when you know I’m no longer talking business. And this late too” Thor replies, the sound of the nightclub slowing down as he moves to a more secluded area.
“Rumlow” Steve grunts
“He seems to be a bit of a problem huh?”
“He come to you?”
“Some of my men came back with a little surveillance. Last I heard he's gone AWOL though. Hasn’t been on the streets, or in my club for that matter.”
“Think he ran?” Steve muses, he called Thor to try and locate the mercenary, not find out he disappeared.
“Mmhm, that or.. he’s laying face down in the Hudson” Thor replies, Steve had felt the smile that pulls at his face through the phone. Thor had spent years as a butcher, and only when Loki had shown back up had their father passed on the mantle. That sort of hunger for removing bodies doesn't leave no matter what half brother comes back for a family reunion.
Thor agrees to keep an eye out, attempting to persuade Steve to come down for a second time before reconciling. In all the time they had known each other, Steve had never indulged in the debauchery their type of work had gifted them. It didn’t stop him from asking him every time however.
Your hands are wring together, twisting nervously when Steve slides through the crack in the door back into your apartment.
“I’ll make up the couch for you. I think I have some winter blankets somewhere in the hallway closet” You mumble before Steve's stern gaze stops you.
“No”
Your eyebrows raise at the anger steeped into it, “Steve, I’m not letting you sleep on the rotting carpet”
“Why can't you just let yourself rest?” You try to shake the uneasy feeling that fills you with his words, feeling bare and self conscious as you wrap your hand around your stomach.
“I..” The words die in your throat and Steves swipes a hand down his face, sighing evenly as he moves to you in two long strides.
There is no amount of protest that can stop Steve from wrapping an arm under your knees, the other bringing you to the stiff planes of his chest. You can’t speak, stunned as he moves easily down the corridor, stealing a hesitant glance up to his face as he watches you. His face is still, muscles taught like the effort of holding himself back from-what- you don’t know burned through him.
He pauses at the threshold of your room, tracking his eyes across the strewn sheets of your bed.
You didn’t know where to put your hands, your own proprioception off kilter as you stayed limp. Steves seems to know, his grip on your gentle and featherlike, like he knew he’s too big body crowded you. Muscle stretching and pulling against the sweetness of your belly and curved hip.
His chest caves in, ribs beneath the rippled muscle of his stomach inhaling the tinged air between you. Your mouth is slightly open, swallowing as you try to decipher what face Steve has unearthed for you now. The moment seems to stretch on, the one that sits between you, you don’t know why you latch onto it, wanting time to stretch on so you could have this.
You don’t even know what-this-is but it startles you how familiar it rings. Like your body knew something your brain did not, the gap in your mind intercepted with the memory your body held.
Steve’s eyes fall to half mast, and they no longer have the dark pouring ink you had grown used to. It wasn't desire, no, it was something entirely different. An emotion you hadn’t been on the receiving end of in a long time. Something ripe and heavy and wanting.
“Come back with me. Please” It’s the first time Steve has begged for anything in years. Somehow you know this.
You watch his eyebrows twist, and you flutter your eyelids considering it. You gulp when you think about Rumlow and your husband knowing where you live and you nod.
Steve's shoulders fall at your acceptance, and it's the last thing he shows you, closing up his mind and his thoughts while he pushes through the cracked space of your bedroom door before carefully placing you onto your bed.
You turn quickly, trying to find words, a quip, anything to still rapid beat of your heart. Steve is already gone before you can think of it, the door shut gently. You don’t hear his footfalls until a moment later, like he had stood by the door.
Sleep finds you before you can try to understand why.
