Chapter Text
“The Moon can indicate a time of uncertainty and illusion, when nothing is what it seems.” -Brigit Esselmont, Moon Tarot Card Meanings
~~~
The moon over Riga is bright and waning.
You want to blame it for why you can’t sleep; when Sam eventually asks why you’re so down in the morning, you could say, “The moon was shining through the window. Couldn’t get past the light in my eyes.” But that isn’t the case at all, and you would all know it. You and Sam and Bucky and the Baron.
The Baron.
It's awful enough that you have to watch Steve’s shield be hauled around by an imposter. It’s doubly awful that, once you get back to the States, Bucky’s pardon will likely be revoked, and Sam will likely be dishonorably discharged, and you will probably be arrested on the grounds of international espionage or something equally abhorrent. All because you broke Zemo out of prison.
And now, well. Now you’re having to deal with the aftershocks of that little indiscretion.
You shouldn’t like him. Helmut Zemo is not the type of person you’re supposed to like; he’s a fugitive, a criminal. A murderer. The things he did aren’t the kind that are easily forgivable, and yet, all it takes is a single off the cuff joke from him and your stomach flutters. A pointed look in your direction and your heart is soaring. A touch, a tempest. Despite yourself and all your best efforts, you’re maddeningly attracted to him, so much so that you’re losing sleep.
You guess that it started in Madripoor. The three men had exited the plane to let you get dressed in peace before your attempt to find Selby. You stood in the middle of the empty jet, naked save for your panties, holding your flimsy slip dress in your hands and fiddling with it. It was a piece you weren’t accustomed to wearing, cowl necked and tight with a slit up the thigh. If ever there was a dress to make you feel self conscious, this was it. But, as you had known the club scene in Madripoor wasn’t without its fair share of scantily clad people, you had grabbed it from your closet without really thinking of the repercussions.
You pulled it on with haste and slipped on your heels, and steeled yourself before stepping down the stairs onto the tarmac.
Sam was the only one facing you, with Bucky and Zemo standing side by side with their backs to you. They’d been arguing about something, of course, with Sam playing mediator and Bucky’s posture looking extremely rigid next to Zemo’s relaxed stance. Sam was in the middle of talking, until he saw you and he stopped.
The two other men turned just as you descended the last step and began to walk toward them. You prayed to whatever god was listening that you appeared more confident than you felt as you approached them, holding your chin high and your shoulders back. Then you made the mistake of focusing on their reactions.
Sam is always prudent enough to keep his expression refined, but you couldn’t miss the way his eyebrows creeped up slightly as he shifted his weight from foot to foot. Similarly, Bucky tends to do a lot of staring in general, but the look on his face was something close to horror, lips parting just slightly and eyes widening.
And then there was the Baron. Zemo turned on his heels, and you were surprised to see him holding a cell phone in his hand. He punched the off button just as he raised his head to turn his gaze on you. And he kept it there, eyes sweeping up and down the length of your body like he was assessing the best place to land a killshot.
The only sound in a mile radius was the clack of your heels on the pavement as you strolled to a stop three feet from them. You tried to ignore the flames of embarrassment licking the back of your neck as your eyes instinctively dropped to the pavement to avoid their scrutinizing gazes.
“And a hush falls over the crowd,” you mumbled, disliking the sullen tinge in your voice. Way to sell your confidence.
Sam cleared his throat and stepped away from the circle you’d completed. “Right. Uh- we’re supposed to meet our ride?”
“Indeed.” The Baron pointed toward a brightly lit cable suspension bridge past the far end of the tarmac. “There’s our rendezvous point.”
Bucky said nothing, but you could have sworn he nearly took off at a run. At his side, his fist clenched and unclenched like he was itching to grab onto something and chuck it as far as possible. You watched after him, catching Sam glimpse you one more time before walking in the same direction.
You were left beside Zemo, who continued to stare at you more pointedly than either of the other men did. When you looked up at him, you found his dark eyes still sweeping across your face and body with increasing intensity.
“If I’m so appalling to you, you can just say it.” Your tone didn’t drip with malice so much as it did sheer disappointment. It was going to be a long night, and you without a change of clothes.
The Baron said nothing at first, just regarded you with a hint of an amused smirk on his face. Then, taking you by surprise, his gloved hand brushed your fingers.
You froze, blood going icy as he gently lifted your hand, and his leather-clad thumb cradled your fingers as he bared your knuckles forward. He brushed a kiss along them, his lips softly caressing your skin and his breath whispering across the back of your hand.
You blinked at him, your mind going completely blank. It was like all thoughts were plucked out of your head and you were left stranded under the Baron’s piercing gaze as he straightened up and lowered your hand carefully to your side, not dropping your hand until it was back where he had found it.
“Ești frumoasă.” The words fell from his tongue like a secret, shared just between the two of you. You couldn’t speak Sokovian to save your life, but at that moment you would have bet a million that he hadn’t said, “What an ugly dress.”
That marked the first time you ever wondered what his lips would feel like against yours. If he might kiss you as gently as he had kissed your hand, or if he would be rougher, more passionate.
Then, of course, there was the way that his hand found your waist in the bar when he told Bucky to fight a number of men to keep up the ruse. He tugged you out of the way just as Bucky grabbed a man by the neck and forcibly dragged him away from where he had placed a hand on Zemo’s shoulder. In the ensuing ruckus you found yourself pressed up against the Baron’s side as he seemed to protectively shield you from the chaos, and shoved a man into the fight with his free arm. You became enraptured by the scent of his expensive cologne, your hand instinctively pressed against his chest for stability.
Then, in Selby’s lounge, when she had shown keen interest in why you were there, specifically. You hadn’t been given an alias as Sam and Bucky had; you knew too many people in Madripoor to get away with pretending to be somebody else. It was a drawback of your past, really, being an ex-shield agent. You had no real reason to be doing business there.
The Baron surprised you again by answering for you. “She is with me, naturally,” he told Selby as he stepped around Bucky. Zemo strode toward where you sat cross-legged on one of the couches, drawing your eyes up to him.
Later, you would dismiss it as him trying to sell the act, putting on a bit of a show for the enemies in the room. But the look he gave you as he gazed down at you was scorching, almost ravishing, as if he was trying to undress you with his eyes. “Every empire needs a beautiful queen.”
He purred the words like he was gloating. Like you were Helen of Troy, beautiful enough to cause armies to go to war for you. Like he would start a war for you. At that moment, you were spellbound by him. You nearly forgot about the ruse.
“Uh-huh,” Selby said contemptuously, and the moment was over.
Then Sam’s phone rang, and Sarah blew your cover. And just as a bullet ripped through Selby’s body and she fell to the floor, you pulled your knife from where it was strapped to your thigh and launched it across the room. It whizzed just past Zemo’s ear and lodged into the head of the guard who was about to attack him from behind. Zemo ducked out of the way and watched the man fall down in his place, and then looked at you.
He smiled.
These are the things that keep you up for hours. Here, in Zemo’s flat in Riga, you find it all the more difficult to ignore them. When he’s only two rooms away from you and it’s quiet at night, your mind can tend to get stuck on an uncomfortable loop of what ifs. What if you knocked on his door in the middle of the night? What if he took you into his arms like you wanted him to? What if it was all just an act?
The window in the living area is perfect for late night pondering. Whereas the window in your little assigned room is only big enough to let in a distracting beam of light and not much else, the stained glass window of the sitting area has a hatch that opens wide, and a long expanse of windowsill to sit on. So you find yourself here, your knees pressed to your chest while you stare out the open window and get lost in a sea of thoughts.
It’s a darling moment, lost in meditation, watching the sparse city lights twinkle in the darkness of night while the soft music in your earphones offers you a bit of company. You don’t hear him approach until he nearly bumps your shoulder. His foot scuffs the tile floor, and you quickly snap your head to look at him.
“Good evening.” Zemo turns his dark eyes from you to the sight of the moon through the open window, and back. “Or, should I say, good morning.”
Suddenly you’re having a crisis. The Baron is wearing a royal blue robe that’s gaping open at the chest. It takes everything in you not to fixate on the sight of his pale skin and the glittering gold chain around his neck in the moonlight. Your brain is whirring and giving off nuclear fallout sirens as you give him a tight lipped smile and rest your chin on your knees, peering up at him through your lashes. “Hello, Baron.”
“I hope I am not disturbing you.” He tilts his head to the side in his usual manner, eyes sweeping over you cautiously.
“No,” you say, straightening up and looking everywhere but at him. “Nope, I’m just listening to my music and admiring the moon.” You nod out the open window, like it wasn’t obvious what you were doing.
A small smile flits across the Baron’s features. “May I listen?”
Your breath stutters annoyingly in your chest as you shift closer to the window and give him a bashful glance. “Absolutely.” You try to ignore how your face burns as you pull out one of your earbuds and hand it to him as he sits just beside you on the ledge.
He positions himself so that he can stare over your shoulder and out the window at the moon as well. You assume it’s to get the full experience, but you can’t help but clench your jaw to feel his knee brush against your hip as he pulls his leg up to rest on the surface just behind you. You barely glimpse the sight of his bare thigh as his other leg hangs from the ledge, and you tear your eyes away with a giddy, incredulous grin.
This is stupid. Who the hell gave him the right to be so damn attractive? Your mind briefly entertains the idea of just throwing yourself from the open window and letting god handle the rest, because he’s certainly not having mercy on you right now.
The only thing you can be thankful for is that the Baron isn’t looking directly at your face when he puts your earbud into his left ear and gives a small hum of approval. Fortunately, you weren’t listening to anything particularly humiliating when he asked to join you; an echoey big band sounding like it was recorded on a tin can is playing a moonlight serenade.
“I like to watch the moon sometimes,” you offer as a way to break up the heavy atmosphere being created by the heat of the Baron’s presence against your back. “I wish I could take a picture of it. The way the moon is lighting up the clouds there,” you point at the sky, where lighter streaks of stratus reflect the blue moonlight, “and you can see little stars around them. I know I’ll probably see it again someday, but not exactly like this. Not in the same place.”
“And with the same soundtrack,” he muses. You can almost feel the vibration of his voice for how close he is.
“Give it a few seconds, it’ll play something atrocious.” You both pause as the music fades out, and in the silence you hear his breathing just beyond your shoulder. Then there’s a lilting guitar intro, and a velvety voice sings, “When I first saw you, the end was soon.”
Zemo tuts at the sound of Hozier’s vocals. “It seems your idea of atrocity vastly differs from mine,” he speaks quietly, and then presses a bit closer to you, until you can feel his breath hit the shell of your ear. “Just as your idea of what appalls is not mine.”
Your eyes snap forward toward the wall beside the window, and you blanche. Your voice wavers when you say, “You’re referring to what I said in Madripoor.”
Zemo hums, and then he strokes the knuckles of his fingers down the side of your arm. His gentle touch burns, prickling where he barely skirts along your skin. This time his lips brush your ear when he whispers, “What do you remember about that night?”
You open and close your mouth, wondering where exactly he’s going with this. His knuckles continue to caress up and down your arm, pulling your attention toward it, but you rack your brain for an answer. “Everything,” you mumble. His fingers stop moving. Then you confess, “Well, no. I remember everything up until about an hour into the party. I remember having a couple drinks, and then I woke up on Sharon’s couch.” The Baron is quiet. Too quiet. “Oh my god, we didn’t…?”
“No.” The answer is firm, and serves to soothe your nerves as his fingers resume their gentle caress of your skin. “No, I would never take advantage of a woman under the influence. Especially when she drank half a bottle of whisky.”
“You’re kidding.” Your tone is deadpan, and louder than you meant for it to be. Zemo softly shushes you, his right hand coming up to rest against your other arm. You lower your voice as you ask, “Half a bottle? Really?”
“Yes,” he murmurs into your ear. “I can understand how you may not recall serenading me on the dance floor.”
At that, you drop your knees and straighten your spine, your earbud falling clumsily from your ear and clacking against the window ledge. Your back bumps flush against the Baron’s chest, the sudden movement startling him and causing him to grip your arm a bit tighter as you turn your head swiftly to try to look at him. You find him smiling wryly, like he’s enjoying your humiliation.
“I did what?”
“Oh, yes,” he chuckles, his eyes glinting devilishly in the moonlight. You watch him lift two fingers and gently pull the earbud from his own ear, setting it down on the ledge beside yours. “You sang like a canary, my dear.”
“What did I sing?” you hiss at him through your teeth. His smile only grows wider, and you’re sure it’s probably because you look about as intimidating as a bunny rabbit.
“It’s difficult to put my finger on,” he hums playfully as he turns his eyes back toward the moon. “Something about, ‘I’ll lay down face up under you, I want to be that guy.’”
“Oh, no.” His paraphrasing is subpar, but you can still recognize the song he’s talking about. Leave it to you to bust out Lady Gaga at the one man who’s gotten you hot under the collar in a long, long time. You turn away from him again, squeezing your eyes shut, your hands flying up to cover your face. “That’s... no, that’s terrible. I am so sorry.”
“Again, we disagree. I found it immensely flattering.” His right hand trails down your arm and across your waist to pull you closer to him. You can now hear every minute deviation in his voice when he whispers, “And quite adorable.”
The sudden embrace makes your heart pound, but you find yourself melting into the warmth of the Baron’s chest, regardless. “I doubt that,” you say, your hands falling to grip his arm as it holds you firmly against him.
“You are so unsure of your own beauty,” he purrs, and his lips brush along your neck much in the same way they did your hand. You shiver at the touch, legs clenching together when his teeth find your ear and give it a gentle tug. You become aware that your fingers are clenching around his wrist for dear life when he asks, “Have you any idea of the ways I wish to worship you?”
Your breath control is nonexistent. You stare at the moon as you flounder for a response, nerves on fire where his lips touch your neck and his fingers skim along your arm. “How dare you say that when I can’t see if you’re lying.”
You can feel him smile against your skin. The fingers that have been caressing your arm move lower, stroking delicately across your bare thigh. Your legs spread just an inch, an instinctive movement that leaves you feeling hot beneath your skin. Your mouth falls open when he uses the tip of his index finger to brush lightly along the soft flesh at the hem of your sleep shorts, your cunt pulsing as he circles around and draws it back toward your hip.
“Would you like me to demonstrate?” His voice is hushed and ragged. A quiet whimper falls from your lips as he continues to tease his finger along your skin, dipping down further to brush your inner thigh.
Your mouth feels dry from the rush of your breathing, eyes falling shut as the Baron lays another kiss to your skin, this time sucking sweetly against it. “That moment in Selby’s,” you mumble, and you can tell he knows what you’re talking about by the way his mouth stills against your neck. “Was that part of the act?”
His lips linger soothingly over the spot he just sucked a bruise onto as he speaks. “No.”
It’s difficult to focus on anything past the throbbing in your core, and the Baron’s sweeping finger so close to the mark is maddening. Your resolve thins almost too readily. “Show me, then.”
Zemo’s movements are quick and deliberate. He unfolds his leg to stretch alongside yours, and pulls you closer until your entire body is spooned against his. And then the hand that has been tracing circles on your thigh slides up across your stomach, and dips under your waistband.
The bliss that comes from him teasing one finger over your clit is so strong that you gasp, and your hand shoots out to grab onto the Baron’s bare thigh where it rests against the edge of the sill. He makes a satisfied sound in the back of his throat, finger dipping in between your folds to feel how wet you are and tease your slick around.
“Oh, I see,” he breathes against your ear, his finger beginning to rub slow circles around your swollen bud. “You’re a keen little thing, aren’t you? You have nothing to prove to me.”
You whine, your fingernails digging into his skin as he continues to pump one finger through your folds, dragging over your clit with the slightest pressure. Your eyes fall shut, hips rolling against his fingers as they stroke against you. Your head lolls back against his shoulder, baring more skin to his lips.
The curling of his two fingers is catastrophic as they descend, pumping inside of you. Your mouth falls open, but you hold in the moan that threatens to spill out when he shushes you again, his hand lifting from your waist to close down over it.
“You don’t want to wake the others, do you, dragă?” The sokovian pet name falls easily from his lips, ghosting against your skin like a kiss. You think for a moment that perhaps you can feel the world spinning for all the ecstacy he’s drawing forth with his hands.
You whimper against his palm as your head rocks back against his shoulder. Your hand slides further up his thigh, desperately seeking something grounding to hold onto, and he gives a soft groan into your ear.
“Do you feel that, darling?” Your breath hitches in your throat over the absolutely vulgar wet sounds of his fingers dipping into your cunt. “Such a beautiful girl, so eager for me. I wonder how sweet you taste.”
The whine that breaks in your throat is muffled by his hand, hot and salty with sweat against your lips. You’re aflame as his fingers pump into you, as he whispers into your ear like you’re so precious, holding you between his legs like you’re loved. Your hips buck against his hand, and you hear him hiss between his teeth as his hardened length presses along your lower back. It strikes you then that he’s not wearing anything under that robe… and you give a quivering breath through your nose as you rake your nails experimentally up his bare thigh, grinning against his palm at the lewd moan he makes directly into your ear.
“Dragă frumoasă. Look at you, divine girl.” His voice is sin. His fingers pick up speed and strength, propelling you further toward your tipping point. “Will you come for me, darling?”
Your heart pounds in your chest at the speed of his fingers working over you, inside of you, while his palm presses down on your open mouth and arches your head back against his shoulder. The stars are bright, but you can’t tell if they’re in the night sky or behind your eyelids.
“Will you, my love?”
It’s his impassioned growl that sends you over the edge. Flames erupt in your core as your fingers tighten exponentially on his thigh, gripping for dear life as you clench down on his fingers pumping inside of you. You buck against him, mewling into his hand as he mumbles praises into your ear in a language you can’t understand, but don’t need to in order to know what he’s saying. His fingers continue to rub through your folds as you come down, sending jolting aftershocks through you while you scratch your nails along his skin.
“Good girl.” The Baron releases your mouth when he feels you’ve been reduced to quiet pants. Small huffs fall from your open mouth, eyes fluttering open when you feel him drag his fingers one last time through your folds and his hand withdraws from your shorts. You watch in a daze as he lifts his two fingers, glistening wet in the moonlight, and turn your head slightly to see him suck them into his mouth and lick your juices clean from them.
He pulls them from between his lips with a lewd pop, and turns to brush his mouth along your cheek. “Perfection,” he whispers as your hand flies up to caress the side of his face.
Your eyes are shut when you rock your head against his, trying to turn to capture him in a kiss. The angle is awkward, but he manages to land a soft kiss onto the tip of your nose for your effort. “Now you?” you mutter, half asking and half demanding.
“Yes, my dear. But let’s stay here just a bit longer.” His arm drapes across your stomach again as his other points out the window to the sky, where a trail of dim stars form a V on the horizon. “Pisces is visible now.”