Ronnie's POV
"You can do this Veronica Stark. You are not a coward and this is nothing more than Steve just dropping stuff off." She mumbled to herself. Biting her lip as she held up one side of her long skirt and made her way down the steps of the porch. Tipping her chin up a little she tried to continue to give herself a silent pep talk, but right this minute she really wished that she'd put on shoes as she carefully walked over to Steve, Sam and Bucky.
"From the looks of all of this either we're going to be here for months or the whole team is coming for the weekend." She tried to joke to keep the mood light, but it came out a little flat. Steve and Bucky exchange a terse look with each other but say nothing.
Okay then...
"Hey Ronnie." Being the great friend that he is, Sam came over to give her a hug to break the ice.
"Save me." She pleaded quietly in his ear, making him laugh. Squeezing him tight before letting him go she reached a hand out. "Here, hand me a bag and then I can introduce you to my brother's newest extraterrestrial guest." Ronnie nodded her head towards the porch. The tall raven haired god stared at them with his arms crossed, a hungry look on his face standing right where she'd left him.
"So that's Loki huh?" Sam slung an arm around her shoulders as they took their time heading to the house. He laughs a little, shaking her gently as he looks down at her. "He looks like he wants to eat you."
"God, seriously don't even get me started on that can of worms. He's determined to woo me." Glancing over her shoulder at Steve she lowered her voice. "How's he doing? With the funeral and everything I mean." Ronnie watched as he grabbed several bags of groceries and what looked like a weapons bag. She quickly turned around when he looked over at them.
"You know, you could just ask him and find out." He says with raised eyebrows and that annoying Sam 'I'm trying to butt in with unsolicited help' Wilson face. Glaring up at him she quirks an eyebrow and purses her lips. "Or I could just tell you. Yeah, I'll go with that option." She snorts out a laugh. "He's doing better than he thought he would. Got to say goodbye and get the closure he needed. Did you know Sharon was her great niece?"
"That makes sense." As they walked up the stairs Ronnie shrugged. "Her last name is Carter, but no I didn't know." Clearing her throat she briefly peaks over her shoulder one more time to see Steve to see him looking right at her with a hopeful look on his handsome face. Glancing up at Sam she says quietly. "I'm glad he got to say goodbye. I know how much he loved Peggy."
"Mm maybe, but not as much as he loves you." As she looked up at him in shock Loki came over to introduce himself. Holding out his hand he gave Sam a smirk that she was sure was meant to be a smile.
"Loki of Asgard and you are?" He looks down at her as if to say, look how nice I'm being.
Shifting to switch the luggage he carried to the hand that had been around Ronnie's shoulders he carefully took Loki's hand in his. "Sam Wilson, friend and teammate." He says amused by the exchange between her and the god.
"Careful Sam, he reads minds and is a massive prick." Bucky says as he walks up behind them.
She didn't know Loki could do that. Had he read her mind she wondered, watching the god with suspicion.
"I only read others' thoughts when it suits me or annoys people, such as you." He snarks at Buck who rolled his eyes as he made his way back inside with more luggage and several bags of groceries. Turning back to Ronnie and Sam he tells them congenitally. "I have no reason to read anyone's minds at the moment so everyone can rest easy." Changing the subject he smiles down at her. "Veronica darling, let me take that for you."
Before she could tell him to stuff it he'd already taken the large heavy bag walked to the front door and held it open for them. "After you."
Her look of suspension didn't go away as she walked past him, it only increased. He was up to something, she just knew it. Sam's face told her he didn't trust the god either, but he wasn't actually doing anything so he moved past him. "I see what you meant. Anyway, where do I put Steve and Bucky's stuff?" He asked gesturing at the two large bags slung over his shoulder.
Halting in her tracks on her way over to the couch Ronnie slowly turned around to look at her friend with wide eyes. "What do you mean Steve's stuff?" Her eyes narrowed as they moved over to the man himself as he stepped through the front door. "What's this about your stuff needing to go somewhere? Why would it need to go anywhere since you won't be staying here?"
"Because I am staying with you guys until we can get this figured out." Shaking her head she went to tell him no when he spoke over her. "This isn't up for debate. I'm staying. Please direct me to which room is left for me to use."
Glaring at him she jerked her bag from Loki, ignored Steve and went upstairs slamming the door to her temporary bedroom as hard as she could before locking it. The nerve of that man! He knew she couldn't just leave with everyone looking for her and Bucky and he was going to take advantage of that fact. Fuming she paced the length of the room several times until she couldn't stand to be inside for one more damn minute.
Carefully taking off the beautiful gown Loki'd given her she tore through her bag until she found an Office themed t-shirt, some jean shorts and a pair of Chucks. Getting dressed Ronnie grabbed her chest piece and tapped it as she walked over to the windows that faced the lake.
As she opened it a knock sounded on the door. "Ronnie, I know you aren't happy I'm here, but I don't want you and Buck to go through this alone. Can you open the door so we can talk?"
If Steven Rogers thought she'd willingly fall for his sympathetic 'I'm just trying to be your friend, but I'm really going to try to make my case about why I was a lying asshole for two years' he was in for a rude awakening. His muffled voice came through the door sounding a little exasperated. "Come on Ronnie, you can't stay mad at me forever. We need to talk about this like adults." Really?!
"Fuck you, Rogers!" Sitting on the edge she jumped off and flew herself safely down to the ground as he called out to her again. Tapping the chest piece again to fold away her suit she stormed off towards the lake and away from Steve, Bucky and Loki. She just needed five minutes away from anyone with testosterone who was trying to get into her pants.
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Steve's POV
Sighing he quietly watched Ronnie storm off up the stairs with a swish of her green skirts. A few seconds later they all heard the extremely loud slamming of her door. Hanging his head for a moment Steve's heart dropped to his stomach. He'd known she wasn't going to be very thrilled about this arrangement, but Tony and Fury had agreed with him that with Loki here Ronnie and Thor would need the backup. Not to mention he didn't want Loki going after his sister. Sam had initially volunteered to stay, but he'd backed down at Steve's hard stare. Instead he volunteered to fly the quinjet back to the Compound after dropping him off.
"Hmm I dare say I received a much warmer welcome in comparison." Loki laughed as he walked back outside with a large smirk on his annoying face. "Good luck winning back her affection, Captain."
"Ignore my brother. He's, well he's Loki." Thor shrugs apologetically coming out of the kitchen from dropping off the last of the groceries. "There is only one room left, it's to the right of the stairs at the end of the hall." He tells him glancing up at the ceiling in the opposite direction of where Steve assumed Ronnie's bedroom was.
Bucky and Sam stand by making their feelings known about Loki by the looks on their faces. Neither was a fan of the Asgardian, Buck more so than Sam; but he had an invested stake in this that the other man didn't. Swallowing roughly Steve tried to push that away for now and focus on the woman he loved who was very pissed off at him.
Dropping the groceries off in the kitchen he took his bags upstairs to his room before heading down the hall to Veronica's. He could hear her moving around inside as he pleaded with her to open the door, but she refused to answer. The sound of her sure footsteps walking across the room had him hopeful for a second that she was coming over to open the door, but instead he heard the window opening.
Bracing his arms on either side of the door frame he called out to her again hoping that she would let him in. "Come on Ronnie, you can't stay mad at me forever. We need to talk about this like adults." Her reply?
An angrily shouted, "Fuck you, Rogers!"
Okay, he might have deserved that, but at least she was talking to him which was more than she had been. "Veronica, please open the door." No reply.
Listening hard he couldn't hear any movement inside, but he did hear Loki from downstairs laughingly tell Thor, Buck and Sam that he'd just watched as Ronnie jumped from her bedroom window to avoid him.
Seriously?!
Pushing off of the wall Steve rushed down the stairs past the bemused faces of his friends and out the front door. The screen door slammed shut behind him. Sure enough Ronnie was angrily stalking away from the house as her suit folded away towards the lake. Storming after her, Steve called out, "Veronica Stark, did you just jump out of the Goddamn window?"
He could see her shoulders hunch when she realized he was coming after her. Deciding to ignore him she kept walking, but at a much faster pace. Rolling his eyes he sped up until he gently grasped her arm to get her to stop. Yanking her arm away she glared up at him, "Don't touch me!"
Furrowing his brows in hurt at her pulling away from him Steve stood there a little angry himself at the moment. "Seriously Ronnie? After everything between us you're going to act like this?"
"Yes I am. Wanna know why? Because I get to as the person who was betrayed by my best friend." She shoved him hard. Since he wasn't prepared she actually moved him back a step. Shoving him again she spoke. Her words were angry, but her voice come out broken. "You kept something from me that I should have known about the moment you found out. I trusted you with everything and you know how hard that is for me! After Obadiah and Tony, you knew how much the truth means to me and you still kept it from me."
"Ronnie I-"
"No, you don't get to talk!" She yelled, cutting him off. "I fell in love with you. I don't know when, but I think I've been in love with you for a long time." Steve's heart soared at her words even if she was angry and shoving him backwards with every sentence. "But I don't want to love you anymore because it's all meaningless now!"
"It's not meaningless to me." He said softly his heart breaking at the look of pain and anguish on her face.
Ronnie took her hands off his chest to scoff up at him. "Really, it's not? So you'd be okay with two years worth of lies being told to you? If the roles were reversed and you were me and had gone through everything I had, could you honestly tell me you'd be fine? That you wouldn't look at me differently?"
He couldn't do anything but look down into her hollow eyes and see that he'd truly broken her heart. That was the last thing he'd ever wanted to do, but he'd done it all the same. "Veronica, I-" Shaking his head he started over. "No, you're right I wouldn't. I would probably feel just like you do right now, but I know you. You understand why I did it, don't you?" She heavily sighed, but nodded her head yes.
Shifting backwards a few paces to put some space between them she hugs her arms across her stomach. "Let me ask you something."
"Anything." Ronnie looked up at him, her eyes scanning over his face seeing nothing but love for her reflected there.
"Did you trust me back then?" His face softened at her question.
"You know I did. I still do." He tells her earnestly wanting her to see that he meant it. Furrowing her brow she lifted a hand to tuck back a loose strand of her hair.
"Then why? Why didn't you tell me? Because if you really did you would have told me." He just needed to be honest and tell her every doubt that had plauged him from the day he found out until she knocked on his door to tell him she knew.
"Because I didn't want to lose you. I thought if you knew what he'd done and that I was still going to help him I'd lose you." That had been his biggest fear. It wasn't just losing her he feared, but Tony's friendship as well. That on top of having lost Bucky again would have broken him just like it was now.
"After the fall of SHIELD and Hydra you could have shown me his files. Had me read everything I've been reading for weeks now to make his case." She says, trying to show him that this was what would have happened had he been honest with her. He knows that, but at that time too much had happened in such a short space of time and he'd been overwhelmed.
"I didn't think, Veronica. I panicked. I'd just found out Buck was alive, hearing what Zola told me and then me and Nat almost died, several times. I was trying to wrap my head around everything and when I came home to you. Seeing you.. I just couldn't say it out loud. It would have been too much if I lost you and Tony on top of Bucky."
"You didn't think that the longer you waited the worse it was going to be? That this, right now, wasn't going to be the result? Did you think I'd be 'oh it's okay because love wins out in the end?' Life doesn't work like that Steven. I already have life long issues that effect my relationships with people. I didn't think that you would do this to me too."
"You know, deep down I knew I fell in love with you weeks after I met you. I can even tell you the day." Eyes tearing up she shakes her head and walks towards the dock at the end of the trail not wanting to hear this. Following behind her he speaks because this might be the only chance he had to tell her.
"July 6, 2012 you took me to Coney island after I'd told you what Buck and I used to do to celebrate my birthday." Steve watched as Ronnie stood at the end of the dock swiping her tears away. "We stayed all day doing all of the games and rides even after I could see you were exhausted. All because you said there was something special happening and we had to stay so I could see it."
Coming to stand in front of her he tilted her face up to look at him wanting Ronnie to see how much that day had meant to him. "When the fireworks began to go off we were just getting on the faris wheel."
She laughed as she closed her eyes remembering that night with a sad smile. "I paid the operator two hundred bucks to keep us up there so you could watch them."
He smiled as he brushed his thumb over the soft skin of her cheek. "You told me that even though I'd lost Buck it didn't mean I couldn't have a new best friend. Not someone to replace him, but someone just as good. As I watched the fireworks going off all I could think about was how this incredible woman was taking off a whole day at work, something that she lives for because she knew how sad I'd been all week. Who'd helped me recreate one of my favorite traditions that my best friend who had died had started. That was the moment I fell in love with you Veronica."
Her beautiful eyes opened letting him see how much his words meant to her, but the pain that filled them was winning. His words came out squeezed tight. "But it doesn't matter because in the end I've already lost you."
"Up until a month ago you never gave me a real chance, Steve. You thought I'd tuck tail and run at the first sign of something difficult. You decided I couldn't handle it. You. No one else." Leaning her face into his touch for a moment before taking his hand in hers Ronnie quietly spoke. "I don't want to lose you from my life, but I don't know if this, us, could ever be a thing." She looked down at their clasped hands as her tears begin to freely fall.
"There's just no trust anymore and we have to have that with each other for this to work, but I just don't. Not with my heart, not any more." Stepping back she let go of his hand, wiping at her face Ronnie straightened to her full height something she did when she was gathering herself together. "We'll work this thing out with Bucky and the Accords, but after that I'm going to need some space to figure out some stuff."
"Okay, I get that." It hurt, but he understood she would need some time. "Ronnie, I really am sorry."
"I know you are Steve, but it doesn't change anything for me right now." Turning around she slowly walked away from him and further along the lake needing distance.
Steve stood there for a long time collecting his own thoughts and to shed a tear or two himself. He'd been so close to real happiness for the first time in seventy years. So close and now? As he watched Ronnie walk the rocky shoreline of the lake he felt her pulling further and further away from him. Swiping at his face he took a deep breath before heading back to the cabin.
They were still working out who was behind the bombing, but so far there weren't any good leads. With Natasha on her way home and the Wakandan's new king out for blood they needed to figure this out and fast before T'Challa came for Bucky regardless of his innocence. Taking just a second to steel himself Steve opened the front door and stepped inside. "Buck, why would someone frame you for the bombing?"