Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The first time Darcy ran into Bucky in the hallway outside her apartment in the tower he was bleeding. He was also limping, and she was pretty sure he’d been groaning a second earlier, but the minute she opened her door, he clamped his mouth shut like a vice. It wasn't the first time she’d seen him in the building. They’d run into each other before. Just never in the family wing, as Tony liked to call it.

It wasn’t that she didn’t want to run into him. She did. Bucky Barnes ticked her ‘super hot, dangerous bad boy with a heart of gold’ boxes in a way that had Darcy thinking about him way too much lately. And judging by the way his gaze tended to linger on her whenever they did end up in the same place together, he felt the same way. Except apparently his boxes were labeled ‘swears like a sailor’, ‘assertive as hell’, and ‘curves for days’.

So yeah. He was definitely her type. She seemed to be his type. There had been some minor flirting, some slightly less minor checking each other out, and on one very memorable occasion, a wink that made Darcy want to dive after him into an elevator and find out just what it felt like to have his ridiculously sexy thighs wedged firmly between hers.

The issue was timing. Bucky was away doing Avengers stuff more days than not. Her position with Interplanetary Relations was super busy and required her being off planet half the time. Plus, Bucky lived at the other end of the hall, and it was a really, really long hall.

Anyway, there he was, limping along the aforementioned really long hall with the most stubbornly clenched jaw she’d ever seen. He was sporting a split lip, a wicked looking cut on one cheek, and an awful lot of dark patches on his tac gear. Darcy assumed the patches were blood. Whether it was his or not...well, that was yet to be seen. She doubted it was all his. Having seen Bucky in action once or twice, she figured the other guy probably looked worse.

Not that Bucky looked all that great at the moment. He was still continuing his slow trajectory down the hall, boots plodding along with dull thumps. She was sure he knew she was there watching, and this assumption was borne out a second later when he leaned against the wall for support with a long sigh, and said, “Didn’t your mother ever teach you it’s rude to stare?”

“Didn’t your mother ever teach you that it’s rude to bleed out on the carpet?” she retorted, folding her arms over her chest. “And while we’re on that subject, do you need a hand getting home, dude? Because right now, you look like you’re going to die in the hallway next to Wanda’s geranium planter.”

Bucky tipped his head back against the wall, eyes closed, and forehead wrinkled in pain. “It’s not so bad. The other guy looks worse. Trust me.”

“I just bet he does. You didn’t answer my question. Want some help getting home?”

For a moment it looked like he was going to refuse. Then he grimaced, pushing away from the wall. “You can try. I’m heavier than I look, though.”

“I think you are totally underestimating how heavy you look there, Sergeant Beefcake, but I once assisted Thor in dragging Volstagg’s inebriated ass out of the great hall, and if I can handle that, I can handle anything. Come on.”

He raised his left arm and she ducked under it, pushing up to support as much of his weight as she could. They made their way down to his door, pausing twice so he could rest. Darcy was starting to get worried by the time they got there. It was obvious that he was in a truly stupid amount of pain, and she couldn’t figure out why he hadn’t just gone to medical.

“I’m sure you know this, but there is a whole medical wing dedicated to stitching you guys up. Cho and her staff are stellar at their jobs, too. Is there a reason why you are here and not there?” she finally asked once they’d reached his door.

“It’s nothing I can’t handle myself,” Bucky replied. “And I heal fast enough to make it a waste of good bandages.”

“You’re going to fix this yourself?” she said incredulously. “No offense, but you barely made it down the hall without falling over.”

He shrugged as he waited for the retinal scan to complete so his door would open. “I’m alright. Thanks for your help.”

“Uhuh. I’m propping you up right now. You are literally using me like a crutch. No offense, but that’s the textbook definition of not alright.”

The door popped open, and Darcy had a glimpse of the sparsely decorated room beyond. The walls were bare, the couch looked like he’d found it left for dead on a street corner, and the coffee table was two wood planks held up on cement blocks. She wondered if Steve knew Bucky was living like this, and then realized that he probably did know, and couldn’t do anything about it.

Regardless, there was absolutely no way she was going to let Bucky go take care of his wounds by himself in his sad travesty of an apartment. It was unthinkable, and she told him so. “Right. So this is terrible and sad, and I’m fantastic at putting on bandages, ergo that offer of help has just become a solid ‘this is happening’.”

Bucky turned to block the door with his body, hand on the frame. “Listen, Lewis… It is Lewis, right?”

“For the past twenty-seven years,” she replied.

“Twenty-seven, huh?” He glanced at her appraisingly. “You look younger. Anyway, Lewis, I’ve been taking care of myself longer than you’ve been on this earth…”

“Blah blah blah, you’re super old and super capable, whatever. Just point me in the direction of the first aid kit, Duncan MacLeod. I don't have time for your stiff upper lip bullshit, and… Oh my god! Is that a stab wound??? Yeah. Get in there. Sit down. I’ll find the kit by myself.”

He sighed, scrubbing one hand over his face. “You’re not gonna take no for an answer, are you?”

Darcy shook her head. “Nope. So you might as well move out of the the way, because I’m coming in.”

The long-suffering exhale Bucky released at her words let her know that he’d given in, and she was already brushing past him when by the time he said, “Fine. Bathroom. Under the sink. Not the black case.”

She paused on her way down the hall. “What’s in the black case?”

“What do you think?”

“Really?” she asked dryly. “You keep a case full of weapons under your bathroom sink. Is getting ambushed while brushing your teeth a thing that happens often for you?”

“Doll, I keep weapons in every room. There’s a glock and a two knives strapped to the bottom on that table.” Bucky jerked his chin at the boards masquerading as his coffee table, and she snorted.

“We are gonna have to work on your definition of a table, my guy. But first, I’m going to prevent you from dying on me. I’ll be right back.”

They’d managed to get to the couch by this point, and she watched to make sure he landed safely on its threadbare cushions before bustling off down the hall to get the first aid kit. It was right where he said it was. After a moment’s hesitation, she set the kit on the vanity, got a washcloth out of the linen closet in the hall, and ran it under warm water. By the time she got back with both, he had the top half of his tac gear off, and was working on the shirt beneath.

“You can set those on the table you think isn’t a table,” he said, gesturing at the kit and washcloth.

“Don’t you mean the rustic, deconstructed, weapons concealment unit?”

His lips twitched in what looked like the beginnings of a smile. “Yeah. That.”

“Are you sure it won’t collapse under the weight of the disinfectant and gauze? Because I don’t want to belittle your carpentry skills, but yikes.”

“Do you always walk into someone’s apartment and give them this much shit about their choice of furniture?” This time the smile was unmistakable. It altered his whole appearance, grin pushing through the blood and grit like a sudden break of sun through clouds. It lasted just as long as that, though, falling away the moment he pulled his bloodied shirt over his head with a muffled grunt.

The stab wound was entirely visible now. Darcy could see the advanced healing at work in the scabbing, and red-tinged edges of scar tissue already forming. Bucky was still wincing with every movement, though, and it worried her.

“Nope. You’re the first,” Darcy said. “So, where do you want me to start? Face? Ribs? Whatever that is?” She frowned at the suspicious swelling over his collarbone. “We might need ice for that.”

“S’broken,” he replied. “Or it was. Probably knitting up by now.”

“Of course it is. Hooray for super serum. Can you feel when that happens?”

Bucky rolled his shoulders, wincing again. “Yep.”

“I’m not gonna lie, that sounds horrendous.”

“It’s no walk in the park,” he replied.

“Ugh. Okay, so I’m going to start with your lip. Sorry if this burns.” Darcy carefully dabbed at the blood around the healing cut. About halfway through she became aware of his eyes on her, the steady gaze making her a little self-conscious as she wiped away the signs of battle from his face. “I think you might have a bruised cheekbone. Want me to get ice?”

“There’s a bag already made up in the freezer.”

She went to get it, calling back over her shoulder, “That’s just sad. You know that, right?”

“What, that I’m prepared for the worst?” Bucky asked.

“No, that you need to be prepared for the worst,” Darcy corrected as she returned with the ice. “Don’t you guys ever get a day off from saving the world?”

“Sometimes. I’m supposed to be off the roster this week.”

“Yeah, and look how that went,” she said. “Here, hold this on your face while I check out your ribs.”

Her fingertips delicately probed the bruising on his chest. There were marks everywhere, some worse than others. He bore all of it patiently until she reached a spot near the stab wound, when he sucked air in through his teeth in a loud hiss of pain.

“I don’t suppose you’ve got more ice bags made up?” she inquired dryly.

The fleeting grin from earlier made a second appearance. “Check behind the ice cream.”

All in all, it required two more trays of ice, a roll of bandages, and his entire supply of surgical tape before Darcy considered her charge to be in any semblance of properly patched up. Once the last piece of tape was in place, Bucky shifted on the couch to reach something behind it. He fished around for a moment, grunting uncomfortably, and then pulled out a bottle of clear liquid.

It was tall, completely suspect, and didn’t even have the decency to pretend to have a label. Darcy watched warily as he unscrewed the cap, took a long sip, and passed it over to her.

“For a job well done,” he said.

She cautiously sniffed the contents, nose wrinkling in disgust. “We’re celebrating my excellent triage skills with paint thinner?”

“C’mon. It’ll put hair on your chest.”

“That’s not exactly a selling point,” Darcy replied, but took a tiny sip anyway.

A full minute later she was still coughing, eyes watering helplessly as her body told her under no uncertain terms was a second sip advisable. Bucky had taken the bottle back, and was watching her as if he couldn’t decide whether to thump her on the back or administer CPR.

“CPR,” she suggested, as soon as she could get a word out between the choking.

His eyebrows drew together in confusion. What?”

“It’s a simple equation. If I’m gonna die from this, I want to get something out of it at least. So feel free to administer CPR.”

She saw the minute understanding dawned in his eyes, and then she saw something else: pure, unbridled lust. For a few moments the whole atmosphere in the room went thick with it, and Darcy had a feeling that if Bucky hadn’t been recovering from a broken collarbone and bruised ribs, he would have done something about it.

It didn’t go any further than that. Not that day anyway. That’s not to say that Darcy didn’t shelve away their little moment to unpack later when she wasn’t trying to survive drinking whatever the hell was in that bottle. She unpacked it a lot, in fact. Most of the unpacking happened in bed, and ended with her gasping his name while her fingers stood in as a substitute for the fantasy Bucky in her mind.

Things did change between them after that. Bucky was friendlier in the halls, or what passed for friendly in Bucky terms. There were more smiles, and a few more winks. He acknowledged her with a small nod, or a quiet, ‘Lewis’. She returned these with nods of her own, and a flirtatious ‘Sergeant Beefcake’.

Then the Avengers went out on another mission. Whatever it was, it went on all night, and Darcy woke up to a knock on her door just after she’d gotten out of the shower the next morning. It was Bucky, banged up again.

“I uh...I was wondering if you’d give me a hand. Got a little busted up this time, and…” He trailed off, swallowing as he took in her dripping wet hair, and fluffy-yet-kinda-obscene bath towel sarong. “Or if you're busy I could go to medical.”

Darcy took one look at the weary sag of his shoulders, hitched the towel up higher on her chest, and said, “Park yourself on my couch, Sarge. I’ll be out in five minutes.”

She fixed him up, this time with her own first aid kit, and they celebrated with beers. It became a tradition of sorts. When Bucky got back from missions, they’d end up in his place or hers. Him sitting quietly while she applied bandages, deadpan wit, and alcohol that wasn’t terrifying to drink to the situation.

Eventually he started talking more, telling her what happened out on the field, filling her in on life with the Avengers. Sometimes he skipped the Avengers talk entirely, and told her anecdotes from when he and Steve were young.

The months wore on, and they grew closer. Pretty soon Darcy was starting to notice things. Little things at first, but then those little things kept multiplying. Like the way that he was coming to her even for minor scratches. She’d literally put a band-aid on him the week before. A band-aid. And they both knew the cut she’d been tending would be healed even before they got to their celebratory beers.

Then there was the flirting, because it was getting a little bit out of control. The flirting, and the touching but not touching, and that whole lip-bitey thing he did while talking to her that was starting to drive her crazy. She wanted to kiss that lip-bitey thing straight off his stupid face. Plus celebratory beers had morphed into celebratory beers and Netflix, and there was no missing what that was about.

They were dating. True, it was some kind of socially awkward, sad hobo dating, but Darcy knew dating when she saw it. Bucky liked her, she liked him, and not in the ‘hey let’s just be friends’ sense. They spent several nights a week together drinking beer, watching indie flicks, and flirting while pretending all the little brushes of skin between them while she was patching him up were not intentional.

It was definitely dating-esque. Pseudo-dating maybe? That was it. Sad hobo pseudo-dating, and she suspected this had to do with Bucky. As sure of himself as he was when it came to kicking ass with the Avengers, he was totally unsure when the two of them were alone in her living room watching TV. She could sense it in the way that he’d let her touch him but not make a move, how he always sat with his left side away from her, and how his eyes were always saying things that his mouth wasn’t.

So the next time they were together, bandages and tape still spread out on the boards that made up his coffee table, Darcy decided to take matters into her own hands. She didn’t give him a chance to slump into the corner of the couch like he usually did after the triage part of the night was done. Nope. She just turned and dropped into the cushion directly to his left, and then snuggled into his shoulder with a contented sigh.

Bucky froze. Seconds ticked by while Darcy wasn’t even sure he was breathing. Then she felt his arm slipping hesitantly around her, and she glanced up at him with a smile.

“So. How long were you going to act like this wasn’t happening?” she asked.

He cleared his throat, corner of his mouth tucking up sheepishly. “Until you gave me the green light to take it further.”

“I see.” She nodded. “Just to be clear? This is the green light.”

“Yeah, I kind of caught that.”

“Good. So, have you ever considered taking this party out of our living rooms and into say...an actual establishment that serves food and beverages?”

“You asking me out on a date, Lewis?”

“I am. Is your whole eyebrows raised plus smirky face a yes...or...?” Darcy replied.

Bucky chuckled. “It’s a yes, Doll.”

“In that case, it’s a date, Sergeant Beefcake. How does Friday sound?”

He was down with Friday, and so they went out on their first official date. Or...okay they tried to go out on their first official date. It was a decent attempt. They picked a restaurant, caught a cab, ordered food…

And then everything went to shit in a truly worst date ever kind of way. With gunfire. And screaming. And a stinging pain just above her right knee as she was about to bite into a delicious cheese ravioli. Then there was the whole part where she went into shock, and the room tilted, and Bucky kicked the whole damn table out of his way just to get to her.

Time went wobbly-slow as Darcy slid towards the floor. She had a moment’s awareness of something bright and fast whizzing by overhead, another flash of blue and red racing past, and then a pair of very solid arms caught her before she made contact with the carpet.

She blinked up at Bucky, trying to sort out what the hell had just happened. “My leg hurts.”

“Where?” His eyes scanned her body frantically, pausing on her leg while his whole expression went ten shades of furious. “Fuck,” he said, clamping his metal hand over where it hurt. Then he glanced over in the direction where the blue and red blur had gone. “Steve, you and Sam got this?”

“It’s under control. Get her out of here, Buck.”

“No. Wait. Put me down.” Darcy, who still wasn’t fully comprehending what had happened, struggled in Bucky’s arms. “More people might be hurt. We should.... We should help.”

“You’re the one who’s hurt, Doll,” he answered grimly.

“What? No. I just...I got hit by some flying debris or something. These people are seriously scared. We need to stay here and help them.”

“Darcy, you took a bullet to the leg. So you’ll forgive me if I call it a night, and get you back to medical where we can get it fixed.”

The room swam as reality hit her. “How much bullet?” she asked faintly. “Like, all the bullet, or a little bullet? Two thirds bullet? Fifteen sixteenths? I'm gonna need a percentage here, for reasons.”

“Grazed,” he bit out, shouldering through the doors and out onto the street. “Stop moving, I’m trying to slow the bleeding.”

She’d been attempting to see the wound, but slumped back into Bucky’s arms at his admonishment. “Motherfucker. It just had to be bullets, right? I’ve got no contingency plan for getting shot. My whole strategy for tonight involved eating ravioli, and getting in your pants later. There was literally nothing in my plan to cover this at all.”

His eyebrows shot up as he ducked them both into a waiting SUV, his hand still clamped around the wound in her leg. “Did you just say you were gonna get in my pants?”

“Yes. Now the whole thing is shot to shit. Like, actually shot.” She frowned. “This is the stupidest thing ever. Also? I’m feeling kind of woozy. Is that normal?”

“What? Yeah. It's normal. Can we go back to the part where you said you were planning on fucking me tonight?”

“No we cannot. Bucky, I’m just gonna take a little rest now.”

“No you’re not,” he replied. “You’re gonna keep talking to me.”

“That’s what you think,” she said. “Meanwhile my brain is all, ‘fleeble blooble dobble doo.’ It’s not my fault. I think I’m in shock.”

“You are in shock, and I don’t care what you say, as long as you’re talking.”

“Okay. By the way, you are fucking hot as hell in a crisis, Sergeant Beefcake. Like, ten out of ten, would date in a hail of gunfire again,” she responded, and he snorted.

Getting back to the tower was a little hazy. Darcy wasn’t unconscious, but she wasn’t fully cognizant either. Bucky fought to keep her talking during the drive, and god only knew what she said to him. She vaguely remembered mentioning his thighs and just where she wanted them….several times...loudly. All in all, she decided it was better not to think about it too hard.

What she did remember was what happened after they got back. Namely getting stitched up in medical, which sucked, and Bucky helping her get back to her place and her asking him to stay. After that, the pain meds Cho had given her kicked in with a vengeance. Darcy had the faintest memory of a soft bed beneath her, and strong arms caging her in, before succumbing to sleep.

Chapter Text

She woke up with those same arms around her. Bucky was still passed out behind her, but that only lasted until she tried to wriggle away to use the bathroom. The moment she moved, his hold on her loosened.

“Morning, Lewis.” he said, the sleepy gravel of his voice rumbling through her, and stirring thoughts she probably shouldn’t have when she was feeling as crappy as she did. “How’s the leg?”

Darcy frowned as her brain worked through his question. It took a few seconds to connect the dots, and then the events of their ill-fated date flooded in. Ravioli. Flirting across a table. The way he smiled when she passed him the breadsticks. Screaming. Getting shot.

Getting shot. God. Had that really happened? Judging by how much she hurt, yes it had.

The throbbing pain above her knee seemed to grow more insistent as she focused on it, and Darcy grimaced in discomfort. “It hurts. Plus I feel like I ate a bowl of cotton and sand at some point between getting shot and now.”

“That’s the painkillers, They dry your mouth out. Hold on.” The bed creaked as he shifted away. She could hear a clinking sound, followed by liquid sloshing. Then a glass of water appeared in front of her face, grasped by bright metal fingers. “Here. This will help.”

“You brought a pitcher of water into my room last night?” Darcy asked, pushing up on her elbow so she could take a sip.

“Earlier this morning. I knew you’d need it,” he replied.

“Ugh,” she declared, and then looked at him over the rim of her glass apologetically. “Not ugh, you. You’re awesome. Ugh to getting shot, and dry mouth, and feeling like shit.” She shook her head, trying to dispel the cobwebs, and squinted at the bright light pouring in the window. “Hey, what time is it? Because it looks late. For morning anyway.”

“About eleven am.”

“Shit!” Darcy exclaimed, pushing all the way up into a sitting position. “I’m going to miss lunch with Jane. You need to take this water, and I need to take a shower. Wait. Can I take a shower? I feel like Cho said something about waiting forty-eight hours before getting the stitches wet.”

“Slow down there, Doll. Nobody is running off to lunch right now, least of all you. And anyway, lunch was yesterday.”

“Lunch is every day, Bucky. It’s the meal that happens between breakfast and dinner,” she replied. “But this particular lunch is with my old boss who has been away giving lectures for almost a year, and it’s in an hour, so I need to get up.”

“Like I said, lunch with Jane was yesterday,” he repeated patiently. “Sweetheart, you’ve been in and out for the better part of two days.”

Darcy stared at him. “I’m sorry, what? Two days? How is that even possible? I didn’t get shot in the head, Barnes, I got shot in the leg.”

“The painkillers Cho gave you are pretty strong, and you’ve got a low tolerance. They knocked you out.”

“And you stayed to keep an eye on me the whole time?”

He shrugged. “Somebody had to. I was happy to do it. You’ve taken care of me enough times. Consider it evening the score a little.”

“Did… Did you sleep in here?”

“Yeah. You asked me to stay in here with you. You were a bit insistent on that point, in fact.” Bucky cleared his throat. “I thought you seemed pretty coherent at the time, but I’ll apologize if you weren’t. Just so you know, I didn’t lay a hand on you. I wouldn’t.”

“I know you wouldn’t. And it’s fine. Seriously. I kind of remember asking, but I wasn’t sure if I dreamed you being here or not. I didn’t do anything gross, did I? Like drool on you, or I don’t know, other gross sleeping stuff?”

“Nah. You were just sleeping. You might have whimpered a little when you needed another dose of painkillers. That’s all.”

“So what you’re saying is that you have been watching me sleep, and fetching me pills for almost two days straight. Bucky Barnes, you are a saint.”

He laughed. “I’m a lotta things, Doll, but I’m definitely not a saint. Trust me.”

“Whatever. In my book you are up for canonization. So. About that shower. Am I good to go, or…?”

“Yeah. It’s been long enough since the stitches were put in. Want me to go turn on the water?”

“Did you just offer to run me a bath?” she replied. “What else have you got in your repertoire, James Buchanan Nightingale? Can I talk you into squeezing some toothpaste on my toothbrush too, or like, warm up a towel? Fluff my washcloth? Press my bathrobe?”

“Press your bathrobe, huh?” Bucky snorted. “The only thing that’s getting pressed right now is your luck.”

“That’s just mean. So mean. Here I am, all shot, and you won’t fluff my washcloth for me. You know, I seem to remember wiping your fevered brow…”

“What fevered brow?” he interrupted. “I haven’t had a fever since nineteen-forty-five.”

“...wiping your fevered brow,” she repeated in a louder tone, drowning out his words. “Putting ice on your bruises…”

“Is this gonna go on for a long time, or should I get the water running?”

“And the sheer amount of antibiotic ointment. I spent like, half my paycheck on antibiotic ointment a couple months ago, did you know that? For real. Dabbing it on your cuts, and wounds or whatever,” Darcy continued. “Did I mention the bandages yet?”

“No, Doll, you didn’t.”

“There were a lot of bandages, Bucky. So many. Remember that first time, when you had the stab wound, you know, right there...” She waved her hand in the direction of his stomach. “...and you had to take your shirt off?”

“I’ve got a slight recollection of that, yeah,” he said dryly.

“Okay, but did I ever tell you the part where I was having a very hard time staying all medical and impartial and shit? Because I feel like that’s important.”

“Were you?”

She looked him straight in the eye and said, “Yep. I wanted to do totally unprofessional things to you, Bucky Barnes.”

He swallowed, eyes skipping from her eyes to her lips, and back again. “Good to know.”

“Right? How’s that washcloth fluffing coming along?”

“Doll, do you have any idea how deadly dangerous you are?”

“Yes I do, Sergeant Beefcake,” she replied, dropping back onto her pillows. “Yes I do.”

He shook his head, rueful chuckle spilling out, and said, “I’m gonna go get that shower going for you. Stay put, okay? Sometimes walking is dicey after you’ve been out as long as you have.”

“Aye-aye, Captain.” Darcy saluted him from her spot on the pillows.

“Steve’s the Captain, that was the wrong hand, and I’m just gonna ignore the Navy reference completely, otherwise we’d be having words.”

“Picky, picky.”

“Right hand, right eyebrow,” Bucky told her as he left the room. “And it’s Sergeant Barnes. I ain’t been promoted since Roosevelt was in the White House.”

“I expect to get rewarded for suffering through boot camp here, buddy. Just so you know that.”

“Boot camp,” she heard him mutter. “I’ll show her boot camp.”

“I HEARD THAT!”

If Bucky replied, she didn’t hear it. A few minutes later he came back and made sure she got into the bathroom safely. Stacked on the side of her vanity was a towel and washcloth. When Darcy grabbed them after brushing her teeth, she realized both were warm.

He’d put them in the dryer. For real. Bucky Barnes had fluffed her washcloth. Darcy was still smiling when she stepped under the shower spray and reached for the shampoo.

The shower went okay. A little wobbly, a little painful with every movement that stretched her injured leg, but the important part was that she came out clean and relatively unscathed from the experience. She pulled on the bathrobe, and made her way back to the bedroom. Bucky was already there waiting.

“You okay?” he asked, and she nodded.

“Yeah. A little tired? It seems weird because I just woke up.”

“It’s normal. How’s the leg?”

“Sore, itchy. Am I supposed to put another bandage over it?”

“Stitches dry?”

She reached down and felt them. “Yep.”

“Then yeah, we can cover it up. Let me get the kit.”

It was with a weird sense of backwards déjà vu that she watched him kneel on the floor in front of her, and crack open her first aid kit. He laid everything out neatly on the bed, and went to work applying a bandage. There was a level of meticulous concentration in his movements that almost had Darcy in a trance as she watched.

That might also have been due to the gentle touch of his fingers on her thigh, though. Darcy wasn’t thinking too deeply about it at the moment. She was way too busy focusing on the intensely attractive guy crouched between her legs.

Bucky’s frown of concentration evaporated once the last piece of tape was set in place. Then he leaned forward, pressing his lips to the spot as her breath caught in her throat. One of his hands was still resting on her leg, and his thumb was drawing slow circles on her skin just beneath the hem of her bathrobe. He pulled back, gaze traveling up the length of her body, from rumpled hem to parted lips, finally stopping when he reached her eyes.

“How’s that?” he asked, thumb never stopping in its distracting circles. She could feel the rough edge of a callous against her skin, and something about it was making her legs start to shake.

“It’s good. So good. The bandage, I mean, not the uh…the whatever your thumb is doing, which is also very nice. And good.” Darcy abruptly stopped talking, and snapped her mouth shut before any more ridiculous babbling could sneak out.

“You okay there, Lewis? You look a little flushed,” he said with a mischievous light in his eyes.

She straightened up as primly as she could with him still sitting between her knees. “That is a ‘recovering from getting shot’ flush, thank you very much.”

“Oh, I see. Well then, I won’t ask you the question I was going to ask you. Wouldn’t want to put a wrench into your recovery or anything.”

Wait, Darcy’s brain said. Hold up on second. WHAT QUESTION EXACTLY?

“Just um, just out of curiosity, what would that question be?” she asked, nonchalantly brushing some invisible lint off her pillowcase.

“Curiosity, huh?” He grinned at her. “Are you sure that’s all it is?”

“Absolutely,” she lied. “Just ask your damn question, Sergeant Beefcake. I don’t have all day.”

“In that case, I’ll get on with it. But first…” Bucky stretched up, leaning in so their faces were level. “...I’m gonna need to do this.” There was the warm press of his hand cupping her jaw followed by the warmer press of his lips against hers. It wasn’t long, a brief brush of mouth and stubble, before he pulled back and murmured, “This okay?”

“What? Yes. Definitely okay.”

Her response made him chuckle, and he leaned in to capture her mouth again. The kiss quickly deepened into something more insistent, lips parting with a tantalizing flick of Bucky’s tongue over hers. Darcy melted into it as her hands slid up his arms to pull him closer. By the time they broke apart, his breathing was coming as ragged as hers was.

“Been wanting to do that for months,” he said. “Ever since the first time you bullied me into letting you patch me up. Probably before that, actually.”

“Me too,” she replied.

“Yeah, I kind of figured that, the way you were going on about it while I was getting you back to the tower.”

“Oh god.” Darcy made a face. “I was pretty of out of it, but I sort of remember that. While we're on the subject of that particular trip back here. Did um...did I say something about your thighs...and, uh...where I possibly wanted them?”

He nodded, lips working their way up into another grin. “You might have mentioned it once or twice.”

“Right. So that happened. Super.”

“It did, which brings me to my question. I know you seemed pretty set on wrapping your legs around my thighs, but I was wondering how you’d feel about my shoulders instead?"

Her mouth went completely dry, and she had to clear her throat just to respond. “A girl can hardly say no to that, right? I mean, as far as requests to go down on someone go, that was smooth as fuck. Have you been this smooth the entire time we were hanging out?”

“Darcy Lewis, you haven’t begun to see smooth,” Bucky countered, sliding both palms over the tops of her thighs, and pushing her robe up ahead of them. “Not by half.”

“Let me guess, I’m about too, right?” she replied flippantly as he ducked down, and pulled her unhurt leg over his shoulder. “You’ve set a high bar here, Bucky. I’ll have to let you know if you measured up once you’re done.”

Bucky gripped her other leg, gently settling it on the opposite shoulder, and winked at her. “I have a feeling I’ll know long before that.”

“Braggy. So braggy. You know what they say about guys who brag? They say…” Her words ended in a gasp as he dragged his tongue up the length of her slit, pausing to roll it over her clit at the top.

“That we know what we’re doing?” he asked.

“Shut up. Just shut up,” Darcy replied. “I do not have time for you and your smart mouth, Bucky Barnes.”

“What, this mouth?” He bent his head, licking her again, and then looked up with a smirk. “This mouth right here?” Another lick followed his sentence. “The one that’s making you wet?”

She dropped back against the mattress, closing her eyes. “You’re a pain in the ass.”

“Ain’t touched your ass yet, but if you want…” He slid both hands under said ass, and started to lift.

“OH. MY. GOD. BUCKY!”

“No?”

Darcy swallowed. “Later?”

“We’ll work our way up to it,” Bucky said. “In the meantime…”

She gasped again as his mouth descended on her. This time all pretense of teasing went straight out the window. His tongue worked her over, licking over her folds, flicking against her clit. The fingers on his right hand joined in, first one, and then two, curling inside her until she was clutching the blanket beneath her in both hands, and arching off the bed.

“Wanna hear you come, Doll,” he murmured. “Wanna feel it. Taste it. Tell me what you need.”

“What you’re doing is good. It’s…fuck it’s good. Maybe just like, suck a little? You know?”

“Like this?” Bucky mouth moved, lips closing over clit, and Darcy let out a ragged moan.

“Uhuh.” She nodded. “Just like that.”

He didn’t reply, just worked out a rhythm that began to take her apart piece by piece. By the end Darcy didn’t even remember having the stitches in her leg, or that she had legs. Everything was eclipsed by the sensations he was eliciting between her legs. The sensations that were steadily building, and growing, and spreading until it was like there was nothing else but how he was making her feel. And then…

“Bucky,” she whispered, sharp little breaths tacking on either side of his name. “Bucky, I’m gonna…”

Darcy’s sentence wasn’t even finished before her release hit. Her hips lifted, and all she could feel was his hand tight where it pinned her back to the bed, and his lips still wrapped around her clit as she came with a rush that had her tingling all over. It left her breathless and gasping, and she reached one hand down to smooth his hair off his face, the only means of communication she had until she could get the jumbled mess of words in her head back into any semblance of order to speak.

He looked up at her, placed a damp kiss on the inside of her thigh, and said, “About that measuring up, how’d I do?”

“Do you want the results on a scale of one to ten, or should I draw a graph?” she replied. “The scale would be faster, but I always feel like there is something to be said for visual aids.”

She wasn’t sure if she could call his response to her words a laugh or a snort. It was a little of both.

“I dunno.” he said. “Let’s go with a scale of one to ten. Sounds like that would be faster.”

“Cool. So on a scale of one to ten, I’m giving you a solid seventy-five billion.”

“Oh yeah? That’s some scale, Doll.”

“That was some oral, Sergeant Beefcake,” she told him. “Like, the best. I don’t suppose I could interest you in letting me return the favor once I stop feeling like jelly, could I?”

“I might be open to that,” he said, and she laughed.

“Well then. It’s a date. Until then, want to share a pillow?”

“Doll, I’d be honored to share a pillow with you.”

“Well, today is your lucky day then, Bucky Barnes. Come on up here.”

He did. They shared a pillow, and then when Darcy stopped feeling like jelly, she totally shared her swirly trick with him. He gave her a seventy-five billion out of ten too.