Bones (An Avengers AU)

The Woman in the Sand Pt. II

Steve and you drove down the long stretch of asphalt for a half-hour, nothing but cacti and sand whipping past you. You thought back to that Skype call from earlier and that exchange between him and Natasha.

"So..." you began to say, grabbing your partner's attention, giving you a quizzical expression. "Are you and Nat a thing?"

Confused, he turned to you. "What?"

"What?" you mocked. "You know what I'm talking about Steven," you snickered after using his first name.

He rolled his eyes at you in annoyance. "Don't call me Steven."

"Then don't call me Bones, you shot back with a snarl.

"Anyways, there's nothing going on between Nat and me," he assured.

You laughed in his face. "Yeah, right and I'm Gandhi."

"You know for a squint, you're not that smart," Steve muttered.

"Heads up, Rogers. Victim's house is up on the right." You pointed at the trailer park that was on your side, completely changing the subject.

"And here I thought she left me," The victim's husband, Donald reacted solemnly after Steve told him that his wife's body was found.

"Now why would she do that, Don?" Steve asked, taking a seat next to you.

"I - I got laid off a couple of months ago." Donald ran his fingers through his hair, a nervous tick you happened to assess. "Poor Billie. She hated seeing me sitting around the house all day, depressed."

"Drinking?" You rose an eyebrow at the husband.

"Punching walls?" Steve added, to the skepticism you both had.

Donald's eyes quickly averted to his hand, then back at you. "No. I...I just fell off a ladder," Donald sputtered.

"Breaking a fall like that would fracture distal radius, not proximal phalanges," you noted aloud, quickly calling out his lie.

"My what?" he asked in confusion.

"She means that the fall would break your wrist," Steve clarified. "Not your thumb."

"Anyways, listen. I got my hands on a police record that says your neighbors heard you screaming at your wife three weeks ago," Steve mused, pulling the report from his back pocket.

"No. Just arguing. See Billie wanted to help out, she thought she could bring in some money, you know, the exotic kind. I kind of flipped out," Donald tried to explain to you both.

"And then you broke your thumb against your wife's face?" you ground out through your teeth.

"No!" Donald got up from where he was sitting. "Look, I could never hurt Billie. Okay?" He gave you both a look, pleading for you to believe him.

"Then how did she lose her hearing?" You still questioned him, damn sure that he was the reason behind her injury.

"I don't know." He shrugged his shoulders. "She was a kid playing sports. One too many soccer balls against the head?"

"Oh, please," you replied, unable to keep from rolling your eyes.

Steve got up as well and pulled out a pair of handcuffs from the waistband of his jeans. "Listen, Don, you're my number one suspect so it would be wise if you're straight with us," he warned

"Implants," Donald shouted, putting his hands out in front of him.

Both you and Steve looked at each other, then back at Donald before Steve spoke up, "Implants?"