Chapter Text
Babylon Baby, Babel On
For there was a time when the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech. When man first came to the land of Shinar, there they said to one another, Let us build us a city and a tower that may strain, reaching upwards to the heavens. But when the gods came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built, the lord then said, look at what the people, acting as one under the guide of a single tongue can do. Nothing shall ever be restrained from them. Whatever they dream, they can make real.
Go then, said the lord, let us confound their language, so that they may no longer understand one another’s speech and never again set themselves higher than the ground.
-The Tower of Babel, or, “The City and the Tower”
CHAPTER ONE: A Confusion of Tongues
Bucky understands that Alexander is in charge—but that doesn’t mean that he has to like it or even go along with it.
Rumlow and Jack think Bucky doesn’t understand, or maybe that he’s just a rebellious kid always testing the limits of his step father. But they’re all muscle and no brains. And that makes them careless—garishly poised as they are with slicked back hair that shines too brightly under the very lights they should be hiding from, and donning vintage, custom suits that register all too well on all the cameras.
They are unprofessional, is what they are. And Bucky taking their delivery supply off of them had been as easy as batting his eyes at Brock and sliding his flesh hand into Rumlow’s coat pocket, fingers slithering in and over the silk lining like Bucky could ever be going for anything other than the drugs.
Rumlow hadn’t had time for Bucky’s bullshit anyway. They had one of Pierce’s errands to run and for whatever reason Brock drew the professional line at going off to do his little jobs hard when he should be more worried about his stash.
By now the drop was probably happening, and Brock and Jack would be in a bad way and probably knew it was Bucky who stole the goods. Bucky wasn’t worried about them—they’d be busy with that damage control for a while and, anyway, Bucky was miles away on a side of town he didn’t frequent in a skin club he’d never been to called “Thirteen”.
It’s a shitty club. All of them are. The whole place shines: glistens from the ceiling, the refraction of the poles, the mirrors on the floors. Even the bodies glisten, hosed-down and brushed-over in glitter flecks and baby oil. The brightness of it all cuts through the muted blacks until they grow velvet in the corners. It’s nothing but tricks of the light masquerading as opulence. Bucky’s never felt more at home. Even the dull steel of his arm shines in here in a way he doesn’t have to hide. No one has a second glance to spare for fake parts. Not in places like these where everything is plastic. Plastic but alive. The whole place has a pulse, the same arrhythmic heartbeat as the rest of the city. The music thrums so loud that the beat of the bass gets picked up by the synthetic components of the metal; it makes the nerves still lingering in his socket throb. It’s actually rather interesting, Bucky thinks, how just that—the dull searing sensation of a phantom limb—is enough to make him cease to feel anything else. He’s not even angry. He’s not reckless, or anxious, or worried about what Rumlow’s going to do about the missing stash, or what Peirce is going to do to Bucky in return. He just feels the thrum.
Becky and their mother, Winnifred, think Bucky is just angry and that’s why he fucks with Peirce and his goons and his business deals. They think Bucky’s full of so much hatred and disdain for Peirce and the awful things he’s done since marrying Winnifred and bringing Bucky’s family into his empire that it makes him reckless and violent.
They’re smart, they know Bucky better, and so they’re a little closer to the truth. All of that is true and Alexander certainly disgusts Bucky with the way he runs his operation, how he’s always too touchy with Winnie, how he puts idiots like Rumlow and Rollins on important jobs, and how he always has just a little bit of dried egg yolk on his chin. But if it were just those things Bucky would just steal Peirce’s money and blow it on back rooms and cocaine. Bucky fully intends to do that tonight too—he’s already being led down a solid hallway of mirrors to a private dance room in the back with a bottle of top shelf champagne and a busty brunette named Darcy—but that’s not what he wants.
Bucky fucks with Peirce because he likes getting punched. Alexander never does it himself, he thinks his own hands are far too clean for such things, but he’s always ready to send a man or two into Bucky’s suite to bruise him up and teach him a lesson. The lesson being that Peirce is in charge and Bucky needs to respect that. Except it’s a stupid lesson because Bucky already knows. It’s just not as important to him as having that sweet ache in his body or a hand around his neck.
Bucky’s not looking for that tonight though—or at least he didn’t think he was. But then Jack had said some shit to him about Becky, asked him if she liked it from behind like Bucky does, and before Bucky could even get a punch in, Brock was holding him back and laughing.
Bucky hadn't wanted to get punched then, and he obviously wasn’t going to get to beat Jack’s lights out, so he went for the third option of just ruining both his and Brock’s night. If Bucky had wanted to get hit and fucked he would have hung around, or at least stayed somewhere Brock and Jack could track him down after stealing the supply. But he hadn’t wanted that—not from them anyway. So tonight the motivation is a little different and he tells himself that he’s fine with just a skin show and some heavy drinking.
He should have known that it wouldn’t be enough to quell his usual need for a high.
The lights of the VIP room are dull enough to reach his senses: maroons and magentas that turn most of the dancers’ skin bubblegum pink. The whole place feels a bit too much like it’s been shaken and stirred inside a Pepto bottle, something pale and sugary to coat the stomach cancer spindling from its center. Bucky knows he should enjoy the empty pleasures while they last. But now that the champagne is flowing and his stolen goods are burning a hole in his pocket, it simply isn’t enough. Even as Darcy gives him an admirable lapdance, white nylon leotard slotting up the cracks of her ass as she writhes, all Bucky can think about is how nice it would be to have someone hit him so hard he’d cut his lip up on his teeth.
Bucky pours himself a drink and fills one up for Darcy as well because he’s sweet like that. Even though her body’s too soft to get him hard, he’s still a gentleman.
Bucky has no idea what kind of good time Brock had been carrying. Alexander’s empire had grown vast enough in its unsanctioned pharmaceutical distribution lately that Bucky can’t even hazard a guess over whether the drugs he’d lifted are uppers or barbiturates but he’s bored enough to not be picky about it.
He pulls the little pill bottle out of his coat pocket and squints at the two white capsules sitting side by side at the bottom—an oddly innocuous choice in color, not the pops of blue or the fizzles of pink that Bucky’s used to.
Two is also an incredibly small supply which means that at least whatever they do must be strong, and considering the amount Jack said they were set to pick up tonight they must be hard to procure. Bucky can’t think of a single drug that has that much street value for two hits. It must be good shit. Given all the circumstances, he should probably try one first and take the other if he doesn’t feel anything in an hour.
Bucky pours one out, twists the capsule open, and dumps the white powder into his champagne. It dissolves, turning an electric blue when it hits the liquid—it’s a pretty sight, maybe a club drug after all, and Darcy gasps and stops the gyrations of her hips when she sees it. Bucky glances up at her as she twists her head around further, eyes squinting at the drink; he smiles with charm and nods to the glass, offering her a sip because, again, he’s a gentleman.
Darcy does not appear to be charmed by this in the slightest. In fact, she glares at Bucky and stomps out of the room—quite a fiet on those high heels. Bucky watches her go, tries to think of what he’s done that’s so offensive—is she a recovering alcoholic? How was he supposed to know? He hasn’t even said a word since coming in here and everything Darcy said was related to the price of the private dance and where the back room was.
Bucky stands and opens the door that didn’t shut all the way when Darcy left. She hasn’t gotten far—she’s just a few feet away talking loud and frantically to a bouncer in a corner where the pink light cuts to blue then sputters into gold. The guy’s a very good looking bouncer. He’s tall and bulky in all the right places, looks like he could bench press Bucky if he wanted, and he’s got a well cared for blonde beard and a few tattoos peeking out from under the sleeves of a shirt that is at least two sizes too small. The guy is hot enough to be a dancer here, and Bucky can tell the club’s an equal opportunity establishment, but the fact that he’s working security instead must mean he’s not as hard up for cash like some people in the district. That and that he knows his way around a fight. Maybe, Bucky hopes, he likes a fight.
The beef cake bouncer listens to Darcy’s plight. Bucky can’t help but notice how the pale glow of his eyes stay on Darcy’s face even as she heaves the ample weight of her breasts in a sigh.
“He put something in my drink,” Darcy says, “I don’t know what. Some random pill.”
Right. Of course. Probably that looks very bad to a dancer. Or any dame. Or anyone else, Bucky supposes, that worries about waking up altered and sore with that wet feel of use between their thighs. That’s not something Bucky has ever worried about, personally; it’s too close to the high he chases. A good way to wake up. But for once he hadn’t been thinking about that at all. It’s no wonder she got out so quick. Bucky must look like a complete creep. The bouncer seems to agree—he puts a soft hand on Darcy’s shoulder and gently moves her to sit down at a nearby table. “It’s okay,” he says in a deep, calm, and commanding voice, “I’ll go take care of him.”
It is Bucky’s lucky night after all. He closes the door and turns back into the room and picks up the champagne glass on the far end of the table—he’s pretty sure that was the one he put the pill in—and downs it quickly. He pulls his coat off, tosses it on the couch next to him, and plops down, spreading his legs wide and his lounging sprawl backwards.
Steve, according to his name tag, is even hotter up close, coming into the room, letting the door shut behind him, and crossing his arms over his massive chest to glare at Bucky.
“Stand up,” he says and it’s very clear, very no nonsense, like he’s going to be very mad if he has to repeat himself.
Bucky doesn’t move, only grins wider and makes an audible moan as he drags his eyes up and down Steve’s body: He wants Steve to get very mad.
“Didn’t you hear me?” Steve asks, stepping forward and growling out the words. Bucky doesn’t want Steve to pick him up and throw him out (well he doesn’t just want that). Bucky will need to come up with a reason that he can’t leave just now—create an obstacle that could buy him a little longer in this dimly lit room with Steve.
“*Do you speak RL-12?*” Bucky asks on sheer impulse, words pouring out smoothly in his native tongue from the R-12 district and beams when Steve throws him a quizzical look. Bucky goes on, just to be sure, “*Lock the door. Have some champagne.*”
Bucky is pretty confident that Steve has no idea what he’s saying. No one who isn’t from the R-12 speaks that specific form of Babel and no one from that far out of the eastern block of the city ever finds themselves out this way, especially not for a job. The fact that Bucky’s tongue knows the familiar shapes of either language system is an oddity, one that he’s used to his advantage more than once. He’s been trying to teach Becky what he can of standard City, but her mouth still forms the harder City vowels awkwardly and his mother never learned at all, which is why neither of them ever ventures far outside the house now that Alexander has moved them to the city center.
Bucky hates the idea of them locked away in the cruel high tower that Pierce has built, a fortress emblematic of the core injustice of The City. How only those born to certain tongues really have a voice with which to speak and be heard.
Steve’s voice, for instance, is strong, no traces of anything other than his central accent. The guy grew up speaking City and nothing else. Bucky is sure of that.
Sure enough, Steve confirms Bucky’s suspicion with a further confused look. “I don’t,” Steve starts and then sighs, “Do you speak City? I--,” Steve breaks off, looking a little sheepish. “I don’t know what you’re saying.”
Of course he doesn’t. No one of worth does. Certainly not such a good central City boy. Although Bucky is sort of surprised for a moment that Steve actually looks bad about that fact, almost like he feels guilty that he doesn’t speak Bucky’s form of babel. And that was just weird, but also a little intriguing. This might even be more fun than anticipated.
Bucky pulls out his wallet, slaps two fifties on the table next to the remaining champagne and then taps the money for emphasis. Bucky leans back on the couch again and grins at Steve like he’s waiting for something. He gestures at Steve’s body and says, "*I want you to get your teeth on me.*".
“City or not you gotta go,” Steve insists and closes the distance between them, reaching forward to pull Bucky up.
Steve has Bucky by the elbows, but he hasn’t even lifted Bucky up yet when he stills, the rest of his body going momentarily frozen as the fingers of his big right hand flex around Bucky’s arm.
Bucky knows that the guy must have been expecting the soft give of flesh. Just as he knows the metal beneath his jacket is anything but. It’s not like the guy hadn’t seen a Circuit Graft before, surely. The human body has plenty of pieces to lose and there are plenty of ways in The City to lose them.
The club might not exactly be in The City Center, but it’s close enough that any old day in a joint like this should find a decent client blend of flesh and metal: bodies put through dangerous enough conditions on the regular but with enough of a steady income to sprinkle it with repairs. And that isn’t even counting the few that are well-off enough to upgrade by choice. So yeah, BoneGrinders and Gear-Grafters aren’t exactly uncommon in this part of The City. That doesn’t mean the all-organics don’t still have reactions though; People will find a reason to be prejudice about just about anything.
Bucky hasn’t seen all of the bouncer’s body yet, even though he plans to. There’s no telling what all the guy might have hidden under his clothes. But even so, Bucky’s pretty sure that Steve-the-golden-boy-bouncer is as organically all natural as they come.
The idea that Bucky might disgust Steve isn’t necessarily a dealbreaker. Bucky can work with that. A guy that hot calling him “disgusting” and maybe roughing him up a little has its appeal.
But Steve’s eyes don’t look put off and he doesn’t pull away. Instead that ocean melt turns sharper—interested—which is just interesting right back.
Bucky can work with that too.
Patrons aren’t supposed to touch the workers. It’s a steadfast rule that nobody follows. The real rule is that a customer can only touch the workers that want to be touched. Which usually meant money. Or, conversely, a look like that. Besides, the rules are different for bouncers.
There are no rules for bouncers.
Bucky grabs Steve by the shirt and starts to lift it, hand darting underneath to grope at the exposed muscle. The movement is enough to jar Steve, breaking his curious gaze from where it’s been fixed on Bucky’s left sleeve and leather glove. He yelps and jumps a little like he’s ticklish and Bucky giggles.
“Dance, yes?” Bucky says in the thickest accent he can muster and Steve blushes.
“No,” Steve says, firmly taking Bucky by the wrists without pause this time and pushing his hands away from his stomach. Bucky makes an exaggerated pout as Steve says, “I’m not a dancer.”
“*What’s it going to take to rile you up?*” Bucky presses forward and nuzzles his nose against Steve’s.
“Stop that,” Steve growls, “I don’t understand you. I’m trying to throw you out.”
Bucky whines like a kicked puppy and twists his wrists out of Steve’s grip so he can get at the button and zipper on Steve’s jeans, tickling his fingers over the fabric.
Steve smacks Bucky’s hands away again and Bucky sighs, putting his hands up in a show of defense. Steve looks annoyed but he’s also looking, eyes fluttering between Bucky’s mouth and his raised palms.
Or at least the left one.
Oh, Bucky thinks. Maybe Steve isn’t disgusted after all, but rather the opposite. The kind of guy who grows harder, more wanting, when looking at a grind.
That’s not unheard of either, but it’s definitely more rare to find a guy that can look at Bucky’s prosthetic and salivate at the sight of it. Bucky’s been around. He knows what his mouth does to some men, just like he knows what his arm does to some men. It would be too perfect if Steve fit into both those categories. It’s been a long time since Bucky had that kind of lucky night though. The kind where he came across a guy who might understand exactly all the things that he could do with Bucky’s body.
It’s worth a shot though and so Bucky tests the waters, licks his lips, gets them shiny and wet as he peels off his glove with his teeth, biting from the middle finger and pulling. He does it slowly. It’s that kind of club afterall, the room is lit for it, strobing the light into a soft neon snow; he might as well give Steve a show.
The metallic flex of his palm glows in the light, refracting all the colors of the room. Steve hasn’t moved, his eyes tracking the mechanical motion of Bucky’s hand, his pupils dilating wider at the sight of it.
Steve, it seems, is exactly that kind of guy after all. The confirmation makes Bucky’s smile grow into something radiant as he sits back down, spreading his legs as wide as he can, and rubs the heel of his palm into his crotch, lets the soft whir of the circuitry purr. Steve remains fixated, momentarily distracted by the movement, the determination of his body language slackening slightly at the sound. So Bucky makes even more of a show of it, syncopates his moans to the beat of the music as he curves his bottom lip into a bite of pleasure.
Bucky isn’t sure how long the drug takes to activate or what it’s supposed to do, but he feels light and giddy and like if Steve doesn’t jump his bones he’s going to disintegrate—catch fire, combust, and burst into neon ashes, melding with the strobe lights.
Bucky doesn’t normally feel like that, so something in the drug must be working. But he still has his whole language barrier ploy to carry on. Steve’s not drugged; he could still come to his senses at any moment and kick him out.
Bucky rolls his hips into the pressure of his own palm and moans out an encouraging, “Dance” to Steve again.
“I’m not going to dance for you. No, Dance,” Steve insists, but his throat sounds tight, and when Bucky whimpers again, like Steve has broken his heart, Steve presses, “Understand?”
“You no dance?” Bucky slips a little on the ‘you,’ but gets the thick accent back before Steve can notice it.
Steve just seems relieved that he’s gotten his ‘no dancing’ point across. Bucky’s going to have to watch himself if he wants to keep this facade going.
“Right,” Steve sighs. He holds his hand out to Bucky who takes it just long enough to get a good grip and pull Steve forward and onto the deep royal velvet of the couch. The champagne glasses don’t make it. They smash on the floor, the one that’s full emptying out onto the carpet in a delicate mangle of bubbles and shards.
Steve lands awkwardly and Bucky takes advantage to roll them over so he can straddle Steve’s lap. Man on a mission to exile Bucky or not, Steve’s not exactly soft in his jeans, and Bucky laughs in victory, grinding his own rising erection down onto Steve’s.
“What are you-?” Steve yells before Bucky cuts him off with a kiss. Steve kisses back, just for a second, but Bucky takes note of it, and when Steve pulls his mouth away Bucky leans back far enough to peel his own shirt off and toss it to the side.
Steve’s eyes go wide as he takes in Bucky’s skin, breath turning sharp, and Bucky knows he has him. The guy can’t seem to look away. Bucky has always had more muscle than his build would suggest, chipped and chiseled through sheer recreation.
Steve seems to appreciate that about him, but he also seems to still appreciate the prosthetic even more, his pupils dilating slightly as he hones in on all the parts. It’s a complicated piece of tech, more advanced than most of the people this side of the city could afford. Not too many men have ever seen one in person, let alone know what to do with it. Bucky’s pretty sure Steve knows though.
“*What do you want to do to me?*” Bucky grabs one of Steve’s huge hands and presses it to his chest while giving his hips another roll. He’s curious if Steve will touch him on his own. If his hands will stray to Bucky’s limbs. There’s just something about Steve—something so beautiful, concrete and unyielding. Maybe it’s the drugs, but Bucky would do just about anything for Steve to touch him. And maybe Steve can’t understand what Bucky’s saying, but anyone should be able to discern the dripping, pointed tones that spill out of Bucky’s throat.
“*I could be so many things for you*,” Bucky tells him. Because it’s true. “*Your bratt. Your whore. I can fight if you want. I could struggle. You can hold me down.*” Bucky shudders out his next breath, the ideas forming in his head too great to be contained. “*I’d let you be so mean.*”
“I don’t,” Steve replies, breathless and seemingly trying to focus on anything but Bucky’s skin under his fingers, “have any idea what you’re saying.” Steve’s thumb grazes over Bucky’s nipple, soft at first, but then it turns into a harsh pinch and Bucky shutters. “Well,” Steve admits, with a hint of a smile, “I have some idea.”
Bucky laughs. “*I’ll bet you’re very good at making people hurt,*” Bucky takes Steve’s free hand and coaxes it to his throat. “*I bet you’d be very good at hurting me.*”
Steve closes his hand around Bucky’s neck faster, more instinctually, than Bucky had expected. The sudden restriction of air goes straight down Bucky’s spine, cutting off the blood flow in both his veins and his capillaries until his cock starts to harden under the strain.
Bucky reaches down to let himself out of his jeans, mindlessly seeking out the relief of the cool air and a loosening of the material’s restraint, but Steve’s unoccupied hand gets a firm grip on both of Bucky’s wrists and holds them away.
Bucky whines, more out of delight than frustration, and Steve pulls him down by the throat, almost kissing him, but holding their lips just inches apart.
“What do you like?” Steve asks. His words are warm and commanding, brushing across Bucky’s open and panting mouth. “You want me to squeeze tighter?” Steve grips Bucky’s throat harder and Bucky can’t help himself.
“Please,” Bucky begs, forgetting the R-12 entirely in favor of making sure Steve understands. “Please, Sir,” he adds on impulse, thickening the accent until the R purrs. He fights to free his hands of Steve’s grasp, but not hard, just enough to show that Bucky wants to touch Steve, would put his hands anywhere if Steve would just let him.
“So you know those two words?” Steve asks—and it’s cruel and syrupy. Bucky realizes with a thrill that Steve is teasing him. “Say ‘em again,” Steve orders and Bucky laughs with the little air he can get through Steve’s clenched hand.
“Please,” Bucky purrs out again, “Sir.”
“Do you understand me?” Steve asks, like he’s more curious than frustrated now. “I get that you can’t speak City, but do you understand it?”
Bucky’s not entirely sure how to answer that. The whole point of the ruse before was to imply that he didn’t understand anything—things like Steve trying to kick him out of the club. But Bucky’s pretty sure Steve isn’t planning on doing that anymore. At least, not right away. The idea that they might instead find themselves in some impromptu heated fuck in the back VIP suite, where Bucky knows is one of the few places there aren’t any cameras, is looking more hopeful by the second. Not to mention Steve-the-adonis-turned-bouncer might just have a dark, impulsive side after all, the kind Bucky might be able to coax into choking him out while he rails him. And the last thing Bucky needs is for that not to happen because Steve was worried about a miscommunication. So Bucky takes the risk and nods.
Steve eyes him skeptically. “Alright, hold up three fingers if you understand me.”
And sure, it’ll look pretty suspicious if Bucky complies, considering he didn’t understand “no dance,” ten minutes ago. But maybe he just understands City better when he’s hard. Or something.
Bucky holds up three fingers. The mechanisms of his left wrist crackle and whir as it flexes to accommodate the movement. Luckily, that’s enough of a distraction and Steve zeroes in on Bucky’s hand, his tongue darting subconsciously across his lip.
“Good. I’ve got something for you,” Steve leans up, takes Bucky’s metal wrist in one hand, caresses it, bites a soft bruise into Bucky’s neck.
Bucky’s so distracted by the wet pull of Steve’s lips on his pulse that he only barely registers Steve bringing the arm above Bucky’s head, pressing it to the wall as the suction of his mouth grows stronger. There’s the sound of clicking, metal on metal, and then a low hum that Bucky doesn’t so much hear as feel in the wrist of his metal limb.
Steve pulls off of Bucky’s neck, smiles mean at him and pulls back. Bucky tries to move his prosthesis, but finds it suddenly stuck in a pair of magnicuffs that Steve has apparently just used to chain him to the wall.
Bucky jerks at his arm a couple of times, finding it immovable. Steve slides the knuckles of his own hand over the trapped limb, skimming playfully over the synthetic nerves humming beneath the metal, his blunt nails sending pleasant little chills through Bucky’s forearm.
“So you don’t make any more trouble,” Steve explains.
“*You’re prepared,*” Bucky praises, and works his still free flesh hand down to between them to cup at Steve’s cock instead in gratitude, “*I should come here more often.*”
He’s pinned but Steve either only has the one pair of magnicuffs or he thinks Bucky is trapped enough—either way there’s no motion to restrict Bucky further. Steve, it seems, just wants the arm up and held in place where he can admire it.
Bucky’s arm is pretty sensitive to pressure—Shuri fixed that up for him—so even the tiniest strokes of Steve’s fingers on his forearm are registering. Steve’s touch is very light though, and the arm beneath Steve’s teasing caress whirrs and whines, working to pick up the sensations even through the magnetic tech that’s slowing his neural responses down. The pleasure of that denial crawls its way through Bucky’s veins like molasses, sticky and sweet and not quite enough to satiate.
The cuffs have to be a custom job, built to hold biotech exactly like Bucky’s. Steve has some quality stuff—too quality for a bouncer making his living in the forgotten districts—and if Bucky himself didn’t know how rare limbs like his were he’d say Steve does this often. But maybe Steve just hopes that this kind of thing will happen. Bucky’s not sure he cares why Steve has equipment to chain him, just that he does and Bucky is blissfully trapped.
Steve shoves Bucky out of his lap unceremoniously and stands to cross the room to the door. Bucky whines, sure for a moment that Steve played a trick of his own just to get Bucky out of the club, the whine sliding into a moan as the harsh projection forward tugs sharply at his shoulder.
But, once he reaches it, Steve doesn’t open the door. Rather, he locks it so they can’t be disturbed, and then turns back to Bucky, pulling his shirt off and tossing it to the floor before he’s back, caging Bucky in.
Steve shirtless in the twilight pulse of the room’s strobe lights is quite the sight to behold. Bucky’s mouth feels dry as he swallows, and Bucky wonders if that too is another possible side effect of the drug. Or if the rough ache in his throat is just the most natural reaction to having Steve standing over him all tall and powerful.
And then there’s the case of Steve’s jeans, which are as tight as they could be—tighter than Bucky’s even, which is saying something. The guy does work in the club, so the uniform tracks, only the revealing nature of them isn’t fair. The head of Steve’s cock is standing at full attention, fully visible from the contours of the light. Steve is fucking hung—thick and heavy and, Bucky thinks, begging for someone to beg for it. Bucky spreads his mouth open in offering, but Steve only has concerns for Bucky’s arm.
“You’re gorgeous,” Steve leans down, bypassing Bucky’s lips as he takes each metal digit into his mouth, the wicked suction of his tongue engulfing the whole of each finger until his lips brush against Bucky’s palm. The bright, tingling sensation is delayed by the magnet, but Bucky still feels it, maybe even a little stronger than usual. “What are you made out of?” Steve asks and Bucky wonders why Steve would bother forming complex questions at Bucky who, as far as he knows, can’t answer him properly if he wants to, when he realizes that Steve is talking to the arm.
Bucky’s own cock jerks in his slacks, the hot rush of arousal in that realization mangling with the sharper heat of jealousy. Bucky tells himself that he’s not about to get jealous of his own prosthetic—especially not one as advanced as his that has been so hardwired into him that it might as well have always been there. It’s a part of him. If Steve is touching the arm, he’s touching Bucky--admiring Bucky and his body in the very way Bucky is eyeing and appreciating the thick muscles of Steve’s own biceps. That part isn’t the problem. It’s that Steve won’t put his mouth or his touches anywhere else, like Steve knows just how much that will drive Bucky crazy. Like he just knows Bucky’s the kind of boy who likes to be reduced to his parts, seen as an object. A pretty thing with foreign luxury pieces. And that’s the problem: Steve is right.
The other problem is that Steve uses that to be a goddamn tease.
Bucky lunges forward to get his mouth on the exposed flesh of Steve’s torso only to be stopped short with Steve’s tight hand, finally on his throat once again. Steve looks down at Bucky, gaze mockingly disappointed but definitely hungry. Bucky pushes forward into the grip, mouth reaching for what is so close and so far, and Steve holds him firmly in place. “You’re impatient,” Steve criticizes.
Yes, that’s fair; Bucky wants and Steve is toying with him. There’s also the fact that they’re in a back room where Steve works, where people on the other side of the door are expecting Bucky to be dragged out any minute. Bucky knows there’s a ticking clock on this game but here Steve stands, like he has all the time in the world—that he can play this game as long as he wants. Maybe he can. Maybe Steve has more power than Bucky gave him credit for. Perhaps no one is going to come in and check on Steve. They certainly aren’t going to come to check on Bucky, which means he’s more trapped than he realized. Steve has all the control in this situation—control over his own arousal (since he’s still so unconcerned with his own hardness), and of Bucky’s. And as far as Bucky’s concerned, that is simply fucking fantastic.
“Please, Sir,” Bucky moans and he’s glad he gave himself those two words at least because he feels he’s about to use them a lot.
“Greedy,” Steve teases and presses his thumb into Bucky’s Adam’s apple, making him choke a little. “Spoiled thing aren’t you? Used to getting what you want right away, is that it?”
Bucky wants to nod—if he hadn’t backed himself into this language corner he could be begging Steve right now. Bucky can tell already that Steve likes begging—it’s why he’s teasing Bucky so mercilessly. Bucky can’t beg with two words, not properly like Steve deserves, so instead he locks his eyes onto the thing he wants, Steve’s cock, opens his mouth wider, and lets out the filthiest whines he can muster.
Steve’s thumb twitches against his windpipe before he digs in deeper. “Is this what you want?” Steve asks, like that would even be a question.
Bucky nods anyway, throwing in another “Sir” just to see the way it makes Steve’s eyes flash.
Steve pulls Bucky forward by the throat, his left arm and shoulder wrenching further in a twist above him, flesh hand clutching at the velvet cushions as the pull brings Bucky down closer towards Steve’s lap in licking distance of Steve’s dick.
Bucky almost falls for it, he almost wraps his lips around the thick bulge behind the denim without permission, Bucky’s eagerness always three jumps ahead of the will to obey orders. But now, with Steve’s hand on his throat, and Steve’s cuffs on his wrist, and those sharp glacial eyes watching so closely, Bucky is overwhelmed with the need to please—the desperate rebellion always sitting in his belly snuffed out by just a look from Steve. So Bucky closes his eager mouth, bites hard onto his bottom lip just to make sure his tongue can’t slip out and act without him. He bites down to keep himself from speaking, too, wondering what Steve would do to him if he just started begging in City, dropping the facade. Steve would be angry, probably, and Bucky wants to see him angry, eventually, but for right now he needs that approval that Steve is withholding more than anything else.
“Good,” Steve praises in response. And something on Bucky’s own face must react enough to the word that Steve says it again even better, “that’s a good boy.”
His grip on Bucky’s throat slackens so he can slide his thumb between Bucky’s lips and pry his mouth open. He’s mean with it, but he doesn’t need to be; Steve must simply like the cruelty of it as much as Bucky does. Bucky will open up easily for him anywhere: mouth, ass, Bucky would even cut a hole into himself if those places weren’t enough for this wonder of a man.
The soft snowfall of the lights bleeds into green. Steve looks into Bucky’s mouth, runs his thumb over his teeth, feels the softness of his lips and tongue. Bucky sucks the digit in, can’t help himself anyway and Steve doesn’t tell him to stop. He gazes up at Steve through his eyelashes, knowing the weight of them at such an angle must look incredibly soft.
“Beautiful,” Steve confirms. He watches Bucky for a moment, thumb stroking at Bucky’s jawline almost soothingly before, without a single warning, he adds two fingers, shoving them in hard and as far back into Bucky’s parted lips as they will go.
Bucky doesn’t gag, he’s proud of himself for that. Instead he relaxes his throat and doubles his efforts: his mouth is more than just a pretty thing to look at. Steve’s hand tastes like lime and salt.
“That’s my boy,” Steve praises, pushing his fingers in and out of Bucky’s working mouth, “being so good for me. Working so hard. You must want it so bad.”
Bucky has just enough situational awareness to hone in on the way Steve’s other hand unzips his own fly, the thick weight of his dick tumbling out into the air the second the barrier of the metal teeth give way. Were his mouth not completely occupied with Steve’s fingers, Bucky would scream to be fucked. His whole body already feels raw. Flayed open with all the nerves exposed.
He gets his chance a few moments later as Steve pulls his fingers out with a wet pop and Bucky chases after them with his mouth. He misses the taste; he needs to be filled.
“*Make me cry,*” Bucky whimpers, “*I’ll be such a good boy for you. Make it hurt, please.*”
If only Steve could understand him. But judging by the dark look in his eyes and the way he pulls Bucky by the hair and shoves into his mouth—all the way to the back of Bucky’s throat without an ounce of hesitation—Steve does understand.
Bucky slides his free flesh hand under the waistline of his own pants, knowing before he even does it that Steve is not going to let that shit stand.
Sure enough, Bucky’s barely grazed himself with his fingertips before Steve wrenches Bucky’s wrist away, twists it back far enough to hurt, and says, “No one told you to touch,” all while still thrusting with a tsk into Bucky’s working mouth.
Bucky's eyelids flutter, the eyes beneath them rolling back. He can’t apologize out loud, for multiple reasons, so he whines around Steve’s dick and thrusts his hips helplessly into the air. His metal arm, linked into Bucky’s desires deeper than his flesh one, whirrs and whines for him, the pathetic desperation a louder echo of Bucky’s own.
“Poor thing,” Steve says, voice thick with condescension, and leans over to kiss the palm of Bucky’s left hand again. Bucky’s right is still twisted back in pain for a few beats longer before Steve pulls it to lay flat against his own broad chest. “Me,” Steve allows, “you can touch me if you’re so needy.”
Bucky goes with his first instinct: to drag his nails down Steve’s chest sharp and deep. Steve hisses, pulls Bucky’s hair in retaliation, and jerks his hips further into Bucky’s mouth. There are red marks to show Bucky’s work but they fade too quickly. Steve laughs, breathless, and says, “You can do better than that,” and if that doesn’t make Bucky eager to prove Steve right then nothing will. He thinks, briefly, that it’s unfortunate that he only has one arm to work with, but he wouldn’t change the hold Steve has over him for anything. Bucky tries again, catching some of Steve’s skin under his nails this time and these marks stay like they’re supposed to.
Steve starts to push and pull Bucky’s head by the hair where he wants Bucky’s mouth to go and stills his own hips, letting the slide of Bucky’s lips and tongue do all the work for him. Bucky feels handled and the sharp pain in his scalp has him dripping in his jeans, strained so hard he’s leaking, dizzy with the need.
Steve runs the back of his hand up and down Bucky’s cheek. The motion feels adoring but borderline threatening like he could choose to slap Bucky at any moment. “You’re soft and warm all over,” Steve says jerking his hips suddenly and giving Bucky a reason to choke, “I knew you would be. Just had to go deep.” Bucky’s eyes flutter and he pushes down further onto Steve’s dick trying to get him deeper still. “This is all you needed, isn’t it doll? Just needed something in you to make you all sweet.”
Steve, with his free hand, mercifully reaches down and sets Bucky free of his zipper, and slides his hand in to find, to Steve’s clear delight, that Bucky isn’t wearing underwear. He only gives Bucky a soft tug, too light to be anything other than a mockery of Bucky’s pleasure, before he circles his index finger around Bucky’s head, catching some of the precome on his finger, before he brings his hand back up, sliding his fingers into Bucky’s mouth alongside his cock. Bucky feels stretched around Steve already and the addition of his fingers is too much—tears leak down his face and Steve pulls out completely and leans down to lick at the droplets on his cheeks.
Steve’s tongue is soft and Bucky leans forward, angling his jaw towards Steve’s dick again, finding the feeling of being empty so deeply awful he needs his mouth to be put back to use. But Steve just cruelly holds Bucky back by the hair, keeping his mouth from its goal, and uses his other hand to tug Bucky’s pants off. The angle is wrong and Steve is pulling Bucky’s body up by the hair, throwing him against the back of the couch so he can crouch down and work Bucky out of his suit.
Steve stands up straight again and stares down at Bucky, considering him as he lays there hard, completely naked, and wet mouth begging and empty. Bucky shivers—not from any chill, the room feels like it’s burning all around him—but from Steve’s pensive gaze while he towers over Bucky, mostly clothed while Bucky is stripped of everything. It’s exactly the kind of high Bucky’s been cruising for all night: the shivery imbalencing offset of power as Steve stands there, taking his sweet time looking Bucky over and deciding what to do with him.
With his mouth tragically unoccupied and his desire raging inside of him, Bucky speaks again, pleads with Steve to use him, “*I want,*” Bucky groans and tries to form the words around the ache in his throat, “*Don’t be a tease, you asshole.*”
“I hope that was something nice, you sound frustrated,” Steve says as he runs his knuckles down the side of Bucky’s face. Too soft, gentle where Bucky wants heat and pain.
Bucky spits a curse at Steve, something that is very specific to the R-12 dialect, hard to translate, but his expression and tone aren’t. Steve picks up on the ire of the insult if not the full meaning, and brings his hand up in the air ready to slap Bucky for his words. Bucky leans into it, lifts his cheek and closes his eyes, a soft smile of anticipation forming on his lips and waits a full beat before he realizes that Steve isn’t bringing his hand down. Bucky opens his eyes, one at a time and groans, disappointed because Steve is just standing there, eyeing him curiously, hand still poised in the pre-slap position.
Steve smiles, laughs hard and small like he can’t believe Bucky is real and asks “Where did you come from you twisted, beautiful little fuck?”
“Please, Sir,” Bucky purrs, closing his eyes again and offering up his face. Before he has time to worry that Steve doesn’t understand, or that Steve doesn’t want to, the harsh bite of the slap hits him where he’s asked for it, so hard Bucky actually falls over, the cuffs on his arm the only thing keeping him on the couch. He’s on all fours, or all three rather, and he wishes he could feel the bite of the cuff in his arm—it whirrs and sparks in its own type of delight at the pain. Bucky pulls himself up, the cuffed arm doing the bulk of the work, and turns to present the right side of his face to Steve.
There’s no hesitation now, hopefully Bucky has snuffed any out for the rest of their time together, when Steve swings his closed fist this time at Bucky’s face and hits him so hard Bucky finally catches and cuts his lip on his teeth, tasting blood.
The noise that the impact pulls out of Bucky is so primal, so wanting and needy that Steve pauses for a split second above him, eyes flashing out the tones of Bucky’s guttural sounds. A moment passes between them, rich with an understanding that supersedes the language barrier, and then Steve is on him, the hard length of his body enveloping Bucky’s as Steve’s heavy weight pins him deeper into the couch.
Bucky does what he can to open himself up for Steve’s taking: spreads his legs, tilts his spine, lets the heavy pull of gravity against his arm build. In turn, Steve does what he wants with Bucky’s body, twists him upwards, prodding with sure, efficient fingers as he pulls the cheeks of his ass open, takes a swig of champagne into his mouth directly from the bottle and spits it back out in the vague direction of Bucky’s hole. The surprising warmth of the liquid drips, sticky and sweet down the split of him and Bucky cries out in surprise before Steve is pushing his way in, gentle but steady on nothing but a 300 credit bottle of Don. Bucky’s taken enough dick to know how to take it now, even like this. It’s dry, burns: it lights Bucky up.
Steve barely gives Bucky a moment to adjust to the overwhelming size of him before he’s moving, heavy, heady thrusts of his body driving Bucky’s back into the soft plush of velvet cushions beneath him. With how dark the things are that Steve whispers into Bucky’s ear, he either knows Bucky can understand him and that Bucky likes what he’s saying, or Steve is taking advantage of the freedom to grit out all the dark thoughts in his head while he fucks Bucky, thinking they’ll stay secret like a confession.
Bucky’s pretty sure it’s the later—that Steve is finding a deep kind of freedom in the catharsis of being able to speak without being heard. That he thinks he’s safe to let some of his darker thoughts out. The thought is an exhilarating one: that Steve is a man who has layers, and that the glimpses of them Bucky has seen are only the ones that lurk just beneath the surface, ready to slip out during an impromptu collision of strangers. That Steve is bound to be even darker at his center. Bucky will do anything to get to know the core of him. Because the things Steve are saying are exactly the things he wants to hear from Steve. To have from Steve.
“You’re such a beautiful little whore,” Steve breathes against the shell of Bucky’s ear, fingers drumming over the increased pulse below Bucky’s chest. “I should take you home. I’ve got cuffs there to hold you. A nice warm bed and a cage to keep you in. You’d like that, wouldn’t you? Getting locked up like an animal, something I only keep around to fuck and punish. You’d beg for it. You’d be my prisoner, my good boy, and I’d give you everything you need when I say you need it. I’ll soundproof the walls so you can scream all you like. With lips like yours, I bet you'd be so pretty when you cry.”
Bucky isn’t sure what kind of person it makes him exactly that he’s getting off on Steve talking about literally abducting and imprisoning him, but his first guess is: Steve’s Good Whore. Does Steve really have those things? A cage and chains and sound proof walls? It's likely just a fantasy. A tailor made form of dirty talk comprised of pretty words for men like them. But it works. As far as Bucky is concerned, Steve can keep him in a cage all he wants to, or chained to the wall, or maybe a shock collar on his neck, or some lovely combination of all three because Bucky misbehaves and tries to escape just so Steve will punish him—remind him what he’s good for, where he belongs, who he belongs to.
The idea of it pushes Bucky higher. Steve sounds so sure of his words, like he maybe isn’t lying. Like the fantasies he offers might have real foundations. Bucky swears again, R-12 expletives a go-to when he’s lost to sensory bliss, even when he isn’t pretending to only bable. They spill out of him now, melodic clashes of syllables that must be foreign noise to Steve’s ears, but ones he seems to like if the low growls and sharper grunts he offers in response are proper indicators.
“God the way you move,” Steve tells him, which Bucky thinks is a curious statement seeing as how very little of his current movement is his alone, manhandled and manipulated as he is by Steve’s body. Bucky’s completely caged in by the weight of it, rocking only to Steve’s rhythm. If Bucky’s moving in any way, it’s because Steve is moving him. But Steve still seems captivated by that anyway, eyes raking over the fragments of Bucky that he can see from up that close as he continues to speak. “It’s like you want to be prey.”
And well, Steve’s not wrong. So Bucky whines, shakes his head yes, even though Steve probably assumes that Bucky can’t understand him.
“Bet I know what will really bring you under,” Steve promises, and the tone of it is hungry, sounds almost uncannily dark on a face so wholesome and bright. Bucky can’t wait to find out what that means and he doesn’t have to, because suddenly Steve is shifting, hiking Bucky’s legs over his ridiculously broad shoulders so that Steve can leverage himself closer towards Bucky’s up-stretched and bound arm.
The moment Steve gets his mouth on it, Bucky’s world flickers, his senses strobing with the club lights. Steve doesn’t just lip the metal, he licks it, a long wet stripe of a rolling tongue that lights up the circuits beneath the casing. When the tip of Steve’s tongue finds the first dip of its ridges around the joints, a split in the tech designed for movement, but all the more vulnerable for it, he digs the slick of the muscle right in and the pleasure of it is almost too bright, swells up inside of Bucky in an electric wave of live wires and conductive metal, licked and coaxed to spark; Bucky screams.
Steve’s own forearm is on him in a second, the thick muscle under his flesh pressed hard to Bucky’s lips to keep him quiet, the size of it enough to force Bucky’s jaw open so that the side of Steve’s arm can rest inside it, muffle the noise and give Bucky something substantial to bite. Bucky complies, digs his teeth in as Steve proceeds to suck, lavishes Bucky’s prosthesis with the kind of attention that Steve has no business knowing about. It’s not like the heightened sensitivity of mainline-wired forms of biotech is common knowledge. It’s something a person either learns when they get it, or from a very prolonged and intimate study of someone else that has it. Or, potentially, is knowledge garnered from the alley-lurkers that make a living with all their parts over in the unnumbered districts.
As far as Bucky can discern, Steve has no such tech himself. Which only leaves so many remaining options, all of which really just posits more questions. Bucky doesn’t have time to ask any of them now though. Nor does he want to. Not when Steve runs a sinuous tongue from his elbow to wrist in a way that makes Bucky’s spine arch, helpless little keanings pushing past the pressed seal of Steve’s forearm to Bucky’s lips. Steve simply humms, a mocking, soothing sound that vibrates through the chrome. And it’s all just too acute, too raw, the best kind of wound that shakes in his soul until all of Bucky’s muscles seize and quake and he comes, orgasm hitting fast and hard without warning as the overexposed sensors on his wrist register the quirk of Steve’s lips as the shape of a smile.
Bucky might as well have lost time for as little as it means to him after that. His whole body feels frayed, severe burns soaked in oil, all on the precipice of a dangerous ignition as Steve continues to steadily stroke and spark inside him. He lets Steve move him—use him—even more so than he had before, body going ragged and limp. Steve keeps himself steady, a casually relentless pace to the thrust of his hips as he finds his own orgasm on his own time, unhurried despite the lingering threat of whoever and whatever could await them outside the door. Bucky would verbally commend him for that, but he doesn’t have the words. And as far as Steve is concerned, he doesn’t have any words. So Bable will do.
“*I want you to use me until I burn,*” Bucky mumbles, because he’s always been nonsensical and poetic after an orgasm.
Steve can’t understand him anyway, but his eyes are sharp, even when his mouth is slack, and he still groans when Bucky speaks, like he likes the lilt of it. “I’m going to come inside you,” Steve informs him, seeking permission in the guise of a command. His voice is blunt, but it teeters at the end, a vibrato of pleasure.
“Please,” Bucky encourages as he nods. He has no idea where Steve has been and Steve’s already raw. Bucky will walk out of the club dripping with the essence of a stranger. One who apparently lives for The Risk of life, just like Bucky, seeking out pockets of bad ideas in the chase of better consequences. “Sir,” he adds, because even fucked out with his circuits blown, Bucky can still be good like that.
Steve's face softens with the permission. Still surprised by the depths of Bucky's acquiescence to their rough collision. “Such a good little doll,” Steve breathes, hips stuttering, peaking towards a release.
“Your doll?” Bucky rolls the words off his tongue thickly, like the syllables are foreign and heavy. Like he’s testing them out, seeing if they’re right. Innocent and offering, even though Bucky hasn’t been innocent for years, and he never offers without taking in return. But the tone of the words and their meaning still land and it’s all it takes to send Steve over.
Unlike Bucky who always quakes when he comes, Steve finds his apex of pleasure in one long full body undulation, thrusting into Bucky one final time before he freezes there, pressed as deep to the root of him as he can as everything inside Bucky turns suddenly hot, the pulse of Steve’s orgasm filling him up, making him wrythe.
Steve strokes at Bucky’s cheek as he looks at him, offering a final nuzzle of his nose to the crook of Bucky’s jaw before he pulls back. Bucky’s skin turns instantly cold when Steve pulls out of him. The back lounges are kept a little chilled to perk the dancers up, and even the timed transformation of the lights from aquamarine to red do nothing to warm the room up. The crimson glow does make Steve seem even more beautiful though, smoothing his skin until there’s nothing there but dips in the muscle and remnants of fluid: seman and sweat that looks in the light like watered-down blood.
Bucky licks at his lips, wishes they were Steve. The drugs must have a long delay period in them because even though Bucky feels fucked out and ravaged he knows instinctively that that’s all because of Steve—the crash of pure sex and adrenaline that comes even without substances in the mix, heightened further by whoever, or whatever, Steve is.
As Steve dresses he leaves Bucky chained, naked, and stained on the couch. Bucky doesn’t mind—Steve is making a show of covering himself up and Bucky didn’t think that could be sexy. But the way Steve does it feels like a power move—a slow display of stripping in reverse; he’s done with Bucky and his doll can wait naked and debauched, like he belongs, while Steve makes himself a picture of clean cut, wholesome, good City boy even as Bucky is covered in evidence to the contrary.
Bucky is going to have bruises for days, the smell of Steve in his hair and clothes so long as he doesn’t shower, and Steve’s cruel words in his ear for ages.
Fully dressed now, Steve picks up Bucky’s shirt from the floor and firmly cleans Bucky up with it. His movements are hard but not mean, like Bucky is a messy boy that Steve is determined to make presentable, but still something fragile that Steve has finished breaking—for now. Steve is a good man who cleans his toys when he’s done with them. It’s kind and the juxtaposition makes Bucky laugh. Bucky laughing earns him a smirk from Steve.
“You having fun there?” Steve asks, voice soft now and adoring. He runs his hands through Bucky’s hair, straightening out the tangles he pulled into it moments before. Bucky’s shoulder is starting to ache from having his metal arm held above him so long but he doesn’t rush Steve to unchain him—Bucky likes a little ache, after all.
As an answer to Steve’s question, Bucky leans in for a kiss. Steve allows it, the press of their mouths feeling somehow more vulnerable when there’s no sex to build to.
Bucky has never wanted to kiss someone before just for the sake of kissing them—kisses are like drugs, they’re supposed to lead somewhere, to something, a rung on the ladder to climax. But they’re all done with that now, Bucky has gotten his and though he’s sure Steve’s got another go in him that’s not what the kiss is about. It’s exactly what Bucky means it to be: an answer to the question—yes, Steve, I’m having fun.
Steve pulls out of the kiss, slowly, like doing it quickly could startle Bucky, and runs his thumb over Bucky’s lips, a substitute for all the other parts of him Steve has had there tonight. “Such a sweet boy,” Steve chuckles and then reaches over to pick up Bucky’s long discarded coat from the couch. The orange bottle with the lonely little pill in it falls out of the pocket—Steve has good reflexes on top of everything else and manages to snatch it before it gets to the ground. Bucky watches him, holding his breath, his belly squirming in a pleasant way wondering if the reminder of the drugs, the reason Darcy sent Steve back here in the first place, is going to earn him some punishment.
“This isn’t E,” Steve says, curious, as he pops the bottle open and pours the little disc into his palm. “Not a form of it I’ve seen anyway.”
Bucky could break the facade now, speak in City and just explain the misunderstanding to Steve. But what would he say? That he doesn’t know what it does either? That so far it appears to do nothing? That might do more harm to Bucky than he’s strictly comfortable with so instead Bucky opens his mouth and sticks out his tongue--an action Steve will understand with total clarity.
Steve smirks and holds up the pill between his thumb and forefinger, far from the reach of Bucky’s eager mouth. “You want this?” Steve comes closer, leans his body over Bucky’s, a tower of a man, and slides his knee between Bucky’s thighs splitting them apart. Steve is standing on one leg, with one knee nestled close to Bucky’s exposed crotch, and his free arm supporting him against Bucky’s head. Bucky doesn’t dare close his mouth or even rescind his tongue. “Take it,” Steve offers, holding it out of reach and pulling it away even as Bucky moves closer to it. Bucky closes his mouth to pout and it makes Steve laugh. “I see. You want me to give it to you?” Bucky nods, lips parting and tongue stretching out again. “You like taking what I give you.”
“Please, Sir,” Bucky begs and the two words have just the effect Bucky intended, a little fire lighting up in Steve’s eyes as he concedes.
“Good boy,” Steve puts the pill on his own tongue, rests it there gently, and then lowers it into Bucky’s mouth.
This is a kiss with purpose—Bucky can be a sweet boy, he’s sure he’s shown Steve that, but he can also be a snake, a trickster, a brat who wants attention through making trouble—Bucky shoves the pill deep into Steve’s mouth, pushes until Steve swallows it down. When Bucky pulls away he’s grinning in victory. Any number of things could happen because of what he’s done and Bucky thinks of himself, sometimes, as a scientist.
“You filthy little punk,” Steve growls, some anger but all heat, as he grabs Bucky by the throat and slams him against the wall. “What the fuck did you just give me?”
“*We’re going to have so much fun. I’ll bet that stamina of yours doubles. You can take me home—like you wanted.*” That’s a good idea: Bucky will come clean once he’s locked up in Steve’s place. Steve will be too deep in at that point and hopefully the drugs will finally kick in and they’ll both be too high to care. Bucky can tell Steve what he likes to hear--Steve can know how twisted and lucky Bucky feels to have found him.
Something about Bucky’s need must show on his face. How utterly gone Bucky is on this moment and how much Bucky wants to please him, an intimate stranger, because Steve’s eyes go soft, the flash of anger draining into a tender kind of wonder.
Steve blinks at Bucky like that—trying to understand Bucky’s babel even though he only needs the tone and the flutter of Bucky’s eyelashes to know the idea. Usually Bucky would be done with this whole scene by now. His curiosity satiated and already moving on to chase his next high with someone new. But there’s a connection between them. Bucky knows that there is. He’s not done with Steve yet. Not even close. He can feel it in the air, a trail of oil waiting for a spark. He knows Steve can feel it too.
“What’s your name?” Steve tries, his grip on Bucky’s throat loosening and even turning into a gentle stroke like Bucky needs to swallow something. Bucky couldn’t agree more.
Bucky is going to tell him, he is. He’s resolved to give up the ruse.
Something about the way Steve’s eyes shine brighter than the ultraviolet LED strips lining the floor makes Steve seem both other-worldly and solid. Makes Bucky want to press against him, open his mouth and speak. Under the full spectrum of light, the crisp trim of his beard is almost too precise and the blonde in his hair bleaches white.
It's a bad idea. To bring this stranger into his world. Bucky hasn't been his own man for a long time. Not since Winifred remarried. Not since The Tower became his home. Not when he knows Alexander Peirce will always be the one in charge.
But Bucky can't help it. This stranger - Steve - is just the kind of wholesome and wholesale danger Bucky lives for.
Bucky takes in a deep breath, lets it rattle through his chest where his bare skin still presses against the strain of Steve’s shirt. There’s a beat of a moment, a rustle followed by a thud from outside in the hall.
“Tell me your name,” Steve repeats, a steady whisper, imploring and demanding all at once in a way that makes Bucky feel both controlled and revered, another dangerous combination. And in that moment, Bucky knows he really would likely give Steve anything, provided he used that tone.
Bucky opens his mouth to answer, only to be interrupted by a flurry of splintering sound as the door is kicked in, shards of wood flying everywhere. Steve, bodyguard bouncer that he is, is on Bucky before the scraps of the door even have time to hit the floor tiles, his thick body engulfing Bucky’s on reflex. Bucky startles, his own body jerking at the sudden surprise, only to groan and roll his eyes as an annoyingly familiar voice shouts, “James Buchanan Barnes—hands up!”
Fucking Cock Block Detective Wilson; Bucky knew his night had been going too well.