|1| Promise Me ✦ {Bucky Barnes}

Chapter 15: Amnesia

There were a lot of coincidences with Briar. A lot of secrets. There was still so much to know about her. After our first night together six months ago, I thought I learned her big secret. That although it was completely against the rules, she had feelings for me. But since we moved into the tower, I'd been getting the feeling that wasn't it- or that there was more to it than just a crush. And for some reason, I was fairly certain everyone in the tower knew what it was to some extent.

Even though they tried to hide it, I knew Steve and Briar were falling out. I didn't know why, Briar always denied she was even fighting with Steve, but my best friend was a lot more obvious about it. Steve was a bad liar to begin with- and now that I thought about it, we never finished our conversation about Madeline. He said he had pictures of her. And I asked for them after the night I dreamt about Madeline- or Briar in place of Madeline at my high school prom. Another coincidence. Now that I thought about it, just how many were there?

What about what she said about her file? Or her choice of words before leaving, the dream about my prom, or the last name in the paper. The last name... the nurses' uniform I found. Her last name was on it. Madeline was in the army nurse corps. But she went missing- if she went missing, I assumed her uniform would've too. But why would Briar have one? She was born in 1988, almost seventy years would've passed by the time she was able to even enlist.

But what if she did know something about her? I don't know how she would, or why she'd keep it from me if she did, but there were too many puzzle pieces missing not to at least consider the possibility that Briar was hiding something about Madeline from me. And there was only one place I knew for a fact I'd find at least a clue. Quickly, I made my way to the stairs and headed down to her and Nat's floor.

But when I got to the bottom of the steps and went for the door, I found that it wouldn't open. She locked it. Briar had never done that before, why would she do that now? Did she not trust me? What the hell gave her the inkling that I would- oh. The incident before Tennessee... I almost forgot about it. I guess she learned her lesson from the first time I snooped around her bedroom. And if the door was locked, that meant she'd restricted access from the elevator to her floor. Likely to prevent me from doing exactly what I was about to do again. Dammit.

But we'd been sleeping together for months now. We'd shared moments together I knew she shared with no other person before. She was my best girl. And yet, she still didn't trust me even after six months of all that. I felt a fire light in the pit of my stomach all of a sudden. I wanted to rip out my hair and I felt my face get hot. What the hell was she hiding from me?

"Fuck it." I sent the door flying off its hinges with the force of my boot and entered the kitchenette of their floor. I'd deal with the consequences later for breaking into their floor. Immediately I made a beeline for Briar's bedroom, and thankfully, the door was unlocked.

In true Briar fashion, the bed looked like a hotel had done it up, the floors were freshly steamed and not a single bit of dust-coated any shelf in the room. Everything was in perfect shape. The question was where would I start looking? She likely had everything locked in a safe somewhere in her closet. So I went over there first.

On one of her shelves was her SHIELD-issued safe. I knew I'd find pistols in there, but because I didn't bother to open it last time I searched her room, I decided a more thorough investigation of that safe was needed. So I ripped the door off. And inside, I found exactly what I expected. Two fully loaded pistols, no false bottoms.

Next, I pulled out the nurse's uniform and laid it on her bed before looking through all of the pockets and places where something could be hidden. Clearly, I hadn't been looking too closely at it the first time I'd seen it. Old, dry blood spatter that hadn't washed out littered the hem of the dress. Where had that uniform been?