Do You Trust Me? // Bucky Barnes

30

Ava

The thrum of her heart matched the heavy, pulsating, throb of music that vibrated through the people grinding and pushing up against each other with reckless abandon. The air was thick with sweat and sex as bodies pressed in corners and lips locked as men and women she had once melted into danced and drank and sank all of their fears and worries into one another.

She had once felt like this sort of place was the world she belonged in. She had slipped into the skin of a woman who thrived in this world, when inside she was anything but. She knew that now as she placed a hand on the waist of the woman in front of her and slipped past quickly. She knew it now as she felt her heart climbing into her throat with every step she put between her and Sam. The American Eagle watched from a dark corner by the bar, his ear-piece connecting him to Torres and his eyes never leaving her back as she ducked and weaved through the crowd, and she wanted to turn to check he was still with her, but she knew she couldn't. She wasn't supposed to give his position away. So instead, she walked with unsteady footsteps and a nausea rolling over every single inch of her. She walked into the den of the devil and the devil herself watched her.

The Powerbroker sat in a booth, separated from the masses by a thick velvet rope and a wall of muscled guards who eyed Ava like she was a piece of meat served to satiate their appetites. Sharon smirked and Ava stopped moving. The bodyguard closest to her smirked as he raised an eyebrow and looked over her slowly. She wanted to hit him. She wanted Bucky there to hit him. She breathed deeply and pushed her way past him, making sure her elbow hit into his side with as much force as she had.

She was afraid, but she was still Ava fucking Hall and she had lived in this darkness long enough to know how to utilise it.

"Easy, little lady. I'm more bite than I am bark," he called to her over his shoulder just as Sharon waved a hand for him to stop.

"And I'm more bullets than bite," Ava retorted, flashing the firearm tucked into a holster on her thigh - a parting gift from Talia as she left her home. "So back off."

The music seemed to die down in the back of Ava's awareness when Sharon pushed to her feet and the monstrous body guard sneered at her.

"Let me guess," Sharon spoke in a sing-song sort of mockery as she circled Ava, her fingers skimming across her waist and scraping over her skin. "Little G.I. Barbie couldn't deliver now that Bucky boy is warming her bed at night?"

Ava didn't speak. She didn't move as Sharon pulled Ava's hair back - clearly checking for an ear-piece she wasn't wearing - and she didn't so much as blink when the woman stood in front of her and stared her down in challenge. She knew she was surrounded by Sharon's best men. She knew she needed to be smart if she wanted to walk away from here unscathed... or at least with enough life left in her to get back to Bucky.

"You know." She pulled the mask she had once worn when Sharon had shown her how she was going to live in this new world order into place now, only this time she faced the woman in front of her with it, instead of letting her show her how it was done. "You won't always be protected, Carter."

Sharon smirked as one of her men stepped up behind Ava and pressed the barrel of his gun into her spine. His fingers skimmed against her thigh as he pulled the weapon she had carried with her from it's spot against her skin, slowly touching her in a way that made her skin crawl and bile crawl up her throat. And then he pushed her to move. Ava stumbled slightly as he forced her towards a door away from the crowd and she swallowed her fear. She needed to think and she needed to think fast.

She'd screwed up. She'd shown her hand too easily. She'd flashed a weapon she wasn't supposed to be carrying and now she was being forced away from Sam and into the crowd.

"Oh, honey." Sharon called over her shoulder as she led Ava and her men through the throng and towards the back exit. "If you ever want to see that handsome little brother of yours again, you'll be the one protecting me."

And the world slipped from her fingertips.

"It's not..." A sob racked through her entire body as she stopped moving. The man behind her gripped her waist and leant his face down to her ear, inhaling before he spoke. 

Ava closed her eyes and her tears came freely.

"Move it, little lady, or I'll have to carry you." He grinned as his lips grazed her skin and she flinched.

"He's... That's not..."

"Possible?" Sharon laughed as she pushed a dark door open and nodded towards it. "Oh Ava, sweetie, it is. So now you have a choice: you can kill me, and therefore your chances of ever seeing Teddy again, or you can protect me and I'll bring you to him." She stepped away from the door and up to Ava, gently stroking along her hairline and down across her jaw. "Which will it be, Sergeant?"

Chaos overwhelmed Ava's mind as she finally glanced to the man who had promised her just two hours ago that things would be alright, that this was the beginning of the end and that he'd get her back to Bucky in no time, and she knew he saw it in her eyes. He saw the agony. He had to have, because he stepped forwards instantly and began pushing to get to her. She could see his lips moving.

I'm coming, he was saying - calling to her beneath the screams in her mind. Don't panic. I'm coming, Ava. I'm coming.

"How?" She turned to The Powerbroker with unfiltered agony and Sharon just smiled. "He was... He was in the car."

"Sweetie," Sharon crooned as she grinned. "You won't believe the things that money can buy: this place, your compliance... a forged death certificate and a police report littered with lies."

"He was in the car," Ava repeated, her head now shaking as she heard Sam's shouts carrying over the noise. 

He was close now.

"He was never in the car, Ava. Now move."

Ava turned her face to Sam - pushing his way through angry men and women and frantically shouting over the music.

 I'm so sorry, she mouthed, just as he slipped off of the dance floor.

And then she followed Sharon Carter into the night.