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sarahowritesostucky · 29 days

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📖"The Taste of You"

Rating: Explicit

Pairing: Steve Rogers x Bucky Barnes

Word Count: 3061

Tags: Fresh AU, dark rom-com, dark!Bucky, pre-serum Steve, kidnapping, cannibalism, yandere/basement wife, meet cute-ish, gay sex n' stuff, ignoring of sexual boundaries, dub-con bordering on non-con, (mostly humorous) gore, (mostly humorous) body horror

Summary: Steve is so tired of the meat market that modern dating has become. Just when he's deleted all the apps and given up on ever finding Mr. Right, he meets the perfect guy at the grocery store.

A dark, cute, funny, fucked up, and very tasty love story.

It's a Fresh AU. "If you can't handle the cannibalism, get out of the kitchen" ... or something like that

12. Tenderize

Wait! I haven't read a previous chapter. Story Masterlist

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Steve:

Bucky spends the afternoon doing what he calls "meat prep." Steve tries not to look, he really does, but the House Hunters show he puts on the television doesn’t really hold a candle to the morbidly fascinating process that is Bucky, "prepping" Melissa’s leg.

Bucky sends it up in the dumbwaiter after taking Erica her lunch. He washes his hands meticulously at the sink and dries them, picks the leg up and plops it down onto the counter with a flourish. It’s the lower leg. Left or right, Steve doesn’t take note, he just sees the painted toenails, the tattoo on the ankle that he can’t quite make out. He sits on the couch and peers over the back of it, watching Bucky work.

Bucky moves with a sort of glee, almost like a dance, as if he can hear music that Steve can’t. He looks very in his element, and very handsome and capable as he works. Steve would probably spend more time admiring that, if it weren’t for the fact that he’s also watching the man slicing pieces off of a woman’s calf.

“I usually take the non-dominant forearm, first,” Bucky tells him as he’s working. “This was Melissa’s … third cut? Anyway, it’s all I’ve got left of her now. I defrosted it a couple days ago. There’s this Italian guy who always orders shank, specifically.”

Jesus fuck, Steve thinks. "Shank." He actually calls it that.

“I send it with everything he needs for my grandma’s osso buco,” Bucky declares. “Herbs, wine, specifically-curated olive oil. All that and like, some hair or some panties or something. Because, you know: perverts.” He rolls his eyes and Steve has to suppress a horrible urge to laugh. Bucky looks up and catches sight of his twitching mouth, and he smiles back. “Yeah, I know. Good ol’ Gammy made hers with beef. But trust me,” he points his knife at Steve. “This way is so much better.”

Steve chews his lip. “I’ll take your word for it.”

“You-don’t-have-to,” Bucky sing-songs from the kitchen, in his element, happy. “You’re welcome to try any cut you want, anytime.” He produces a meat tenderizer and starts pounding away at the slices of meat he’s produced.

Steve winces as the hammer comes down hard, and then lighter in a series of almost loving taps. Christ. “I’ll pass for now,” he murmurs, unsure if Bucky’s heard him or not. He continues to watch the macabre display for a bit, but goes back to the television once Bucky is vacuum packing the meat with the herbs and spices.

He's very surprised (and honestly a bit grossed out with himself) that he doesn’t get more upset from watching the actual process. He doesn’t even get nauseous. Oh, it’s weird for sure. Downright shocking when he very first sees the leg lifted out of the dumbwaiter and plopped onto the countertop, the pedicured foot still attached, Bucky slicing away and hacking through bone. But Steve doesn’t retch and get sick like he thought he would. His stomach doesn’t once roil or threaten to turn. It’s like he’s already been desensitized to it, just from the sheer amount of stuff he’s imagined, from what Bucky’s told him and shown him so far, eating kidneys and ‘other-bacon’ right in front of him.

He thinks of Clint and watching Midsommar with him, asking him how he could stomach all the gore.

“It’s not real. Just movie magic, dude.”

His own lack of a physical reaction to this actual gore is what disturbs Steve the most, so he forces himself to sit back on the couch facing the tv, and actually pay attention to the show. The young married couple is searching for a house in Toronto. They need to upsize because they’re having another baby. Steve watches the show. He hopes they pick the middle house. They wind up picking the last one.

Absently, Steve wonders what osso buco is.

Bucky:

“What’s osso buco?” Steve asks.

Bucky’s just finished with his meat prep and woken Steve up from his nap on the couch. He’d been so sweet lying there, looking so peaceful. Bucky hadn’t wanted to wake him, but it's getting late, and he’s already started chilling the wines for dinner.

He smiles at Steve and sits at the opposite end of the couch from him, tangling their feet together in the middle. He describes what osso buco is. “I was surprised you watched,” he tells him gently, honestly. He rubs his socked foot against Steve’s bare one. “What’d you think?”

Steve is quiet for a long time. When he finally answers, he simply says, “You were right. We do look a lot like beef.”

Bucky busts out in a laugh and leans forward to slap him on the thigh. “Told ya!” He gets up to go and finish the final elements of their dinner. “You ready for date night, my dear?”

Steve watches him from over the back of the couch again. “Mmhm. What’re we doing?”

Bucky beams at him. He’s been looking forward to this all day. “First, we have our appetizer: La Pissaladiere.” He’s begun speaking in a very fake French accent, and Steve scoffs.

"That's terrible."

"Yeah it was kinda terrible, huh?”

Steve laughs, and then Bucky laughs with him, and for a second it feels just like one of those genuine, laughing stupidly together moments that they used to have. And it makes Bucky’s heart squeeze painfully as the brief moment fizzles out. He can see it in Steve’s face too, how it hurts.

Bucky looks down, clearing his throat. “Um, yeah. And then we’ve got this salad, pretty simple. And the main, which is …” he does a drumroll on the countertop. “Osso Buco!” He does that one in an equally terrible Italian accent, but Steve is not amused.

"What?! No! No fucking way!" he cries, tiny and furious and kneeling up higher on the couch cushions. Bucky marvels at him and has such a strong urge to tackle him into submission and sex right then and there, that he has to look away. “Bucky,” Steve growls. “You promised you wouldn’t make me—”

“Calm down, babe,” Bucky hurries, not wanting Steve’s temper to ruin their date night. “It’s the two version meal again, don’t worry. Yours is 'vegetarian'.”

Steve deflates some, but Bucky can see that he’s still wary. “Prove it,” he says, and Bucky sighs dramatically to cover up the disappointment he feels at Steve not being able to trust him yet.

“Okay, come here.” He unlocks Steve’s tether at the couch and brings him over to the island countertop, locks him there. “Look.” He points to each crockpot that’s been braising the meat for hours. He’d put tape on each one to label them. The right one reads “Vegetarian,” the left one reads “Melissa.”

He's pleased as punch when Steve rolls his eyes and even laughs a little. “This is so crazy,” he mutters. “Why can’t you just enjoy cow like everybody else?” He’s asking in a good enough natured way, so Bucky indulges him,

“I told you, Honey. We’re just better.”

“Yeah yeah, I remember. ‘Tastes like roadkill in comparison’.”

“It does,” Bucky insists, though he can see Steve rolling his eyes. “Only one way to prove me wrong,” he challenges, leaning over the counter with a smirk. Steve scowls and says no way, and Bucky backs off. Instead, he tries to explain it to him, musing, “And you know, it also just makes the whole meal more of a … a spiritual experience.” He meets Steve’s eyes, and they’re riveted on him. Bucky licks his bottom lip slowly, eager to explain, to make Steve see. “When it’s not just an animal? When it's us? Well then you’re not just eating. It's so much more than that. You’re taking someone else inside yourself. You’re consuming them. It’s …” he inhales deeply. “It’s heady. It’s meaningful.” He sees Steve gulp and knows he’s playing with fire here, but he pushes onwards, taking Steve’s small hand from over the counter and covering it with his own. “No matter what they did in their life, they’re still a person. And a person matters. In a way an animal never can.” He watches the movement of Steve's closed lips, the nervous rise and fall of his Adam's apple. Bucky shivers and breathes, “It’s a very powerful thing.”

Steve pulls his hand back slowly, never looking away from Bucky’s eyes. Bucky can’t tell if he’s terrified, or fascinated, or both. He’d take both.

He breaks the tension of the moment by pulling back and standing up straight again, giving Steve some breathing room after that—admittedly impassioned—speech. “And then of course, we have Dessert: le tarte tatìn—with fennel ice cream, though I think the French would arrest me for serving it à la mode.” He moves away to go check on the crock pots and then the oven where the Pissaladiere is baking. “Almost ready,” he says brightly, clapping his hands together. “Let’s go set the table!”

Steve:

After dinner, they decide to finish watching The Hunger Games. They’ve only got the last movie to go. Bucky puts it on and they snuggle up close together on the couch. Steve is left untethered to any cord or chain, and he spends at least the first ten minutes of the movie eyeing up every solid object in the near vicinity, imagining what would or would not be suitable for bludgeoning Bucky with.

It’s a dreadful train of thought, and when Bucky pulls him in cozily against his side and kisses his hair and whispers that he’s so happy to have Steve back with him like this, Steve almost feels guilty for his scheming. He knows he has to stay strong, though. He just sat through an entire—admittedly delicious—dinner service where he watched the other man consume wine and salad and human shank.

Excuse him, he means osso buco.

Steve’s "vegetarian" version had been delicious. Bucky is an excellent cook and Steve really, really wishes he was just a normal boyfriend. Because cute little cooking-at-home-together dinner dates are so much fun with him. If only, if only. It’s so horrible that it’s laughable, and that’s what Steve’s found himself doing more often than not. Laughing about the absurdity of the situation in which he finds himself. He tells himself that it’s okay, that it’s a coping mechanism, and not him becoming used to anything. God forbid.

In the end, Steve concedes that Bucky was right: Peeta is a much better match for Katniss. “But only due to their circumstances,” he argues, as they’re eating their dessert on the couch, the credits and soundtrack music still rolling up the tv screen. “I mean, they’re just bonded through PTSD, basically. If things had gone differently, Gale would’ve been the one to know her better, deeper.” He shrugs. “Plus, he’s cuter. And taller.”

Bucky counters by pointing out that it’s always about your circumstances. “You can’t play that ‘what if’ game,” he says. “We live through what we live through. And it changes us, and that’s okay. Life doesn't always turn out the way we planned. Happiness comes from acceptance of that.”

He’s staring straight at Steve as he says it, and Steve finds his next mouthful of tarte tatìn going down with some difficulty. “Yeah,” he murmurs. “I guess so." Does Bucky really expect him to accept all of this? He shifts uncomfortably and holds out his bowl. "I ah, I think I'm done with mine.”

Bucky takes it with gentle fingers and a soft expression. “I hope you liked everything,” he says. “I wanted to make this special for you. A real treat.”

"Oh." Steve flounders with his heart in his throat. “It ... it was.”

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“Mm.” Bucky sets both of their bowls on the coffee table, then he comes back and crawls over to Steve on the couch, crowding him back, and back, until Steve is lying down and Bucky's over top of him. Steve shudders, parts his lips to say something in protest, but Bucky kisses him before he can.

It’s not just the kiss, is the thing. It’s the way that Bucky’s elbows and forearms box him in. It’s the way his hands slide up Steve’s shoulders, how they trace his neck and his jaw. It’s how his full body lies atop him, how his weight pushes down, sinking Steve into the cushions as good as any restraint could. It’s how he fits so perfectly between Steve’s legs, and how his hips roll, slow and purposeful, while he kisses him.

Without meaning to, Steve moans, and the moment his hands come up to hold Bucky’s shoulders, he knows it’s game over: He's lost, tonight.

He still protests the loss, of course. Tries to stop it on the couch, and then in the hallway, and in the bedroom. But Bucky hushes him endlessly, kisses away his whimpers and licks his moans into existence, taking them as permission, as Steve conceding his loss.

Steve really, really doesn’t mean it that way, but there’s only so much he can do, and so much he can take. He’s been alone and scared for weeks now, and every time Bucky touches him it’s like a dagger in his guts, a sharp and painful reminder of how they used to make love before all this happened. How good Bucky used to make him feel, how well he’d played his body and taken him apart and made him come and cry. Steve wants that again, god damn him. He wants to feel good again.

So, somewhere in-between the leather couch and the luxury bedcovers, he really does give in.

The second he stops squirming and starts really kissing back—not just accepting it, but participating—Bucky moans louder. He bites Steve’s lip and says, “Yes, baby. Come on. Let me make you feel good.”

And isn’t that just what Steve wants? It’s certainly the best he can have, in his present situation. He shivers full-body as Bucky undresses them both, then lies out over him, warm and naked. They’re both hard, and Steve pants when Bucky slots one of those thick, firm thighs between his legs and pushes, rocks his hips so his own cock drags against Steve’s belly. “Fuck, Honey,” he breathes, kissing him. Hot kiss after hot kiss, that dominating tongue rolling in and keeping Steve’s thoughts short and disjointed.

Steve keens sharply at a particularly good roll of their hips. “Oh, oh, yeah …”

“Yeah,” Bucky says, nipping his chin. “What do you want, baby? You want my fingers? Want Daddy to make love to you?”

Steve groans and turns his cheek into the pillow to escape it, the kisses and the words, both. Bucky just hums knowingly and takes up residence at his throat instead, sucking and licking and biting at the skin. Even after all that’s happened between them, he’s still remembered that one slip Steve had, when he'd let the word tumble out of his mouth: Daddy. He squeezes his eyes shut and writhes against Bucky’s larger body, dick blurting out precum at the way Bucky touches him and treats him and talks to him. He’s so fucking perfect. ... Well, except for the whole cannibalism th—

Bucky wraps a hand around his cock and starts stroking just in time to put an end to that train of thought, and Steve gasps, his belly tightening in such sharp pleasure that he thinks he might come. “Sl-slow down!” he gasps, unable to stop his hips from jolting up. “I-I can’t. Wait, wait ..."

Bucky listens, cooing apologies and praise at him and petting his dick back down against his belly. His hand is slick. Where the hell did he get lube? Steve stops wondering when the hand ventures further back. “Tilt up for me, Honey,” Bucky murmurs, kissing his collarbone, humming an approving sound when Steve listens. “There you go. Good boy.”

Steve squirms harder at his embarrassing reaction to being praised. But it’s something he’s always gone for, and hearing Bucky say it in his gorgeous voice, from his gorgeous lips, makes it hit even harder. He feels a finger go in, and Bucky finds it easily, just like he always had before. He strokes over his prostate, never too rough, always gentle, letting the pleasure and pressure build inside Steve at his own pace.

“Shit,” Steve curses, gritting his teeth and rolling his hips against Bucky’s hand. Another finger joins the first, so easy, and Steve humps down harder against it. “Bucky,” he chokes, gasping. “W-wait, wait.”

“So sensitive, baby.” Bucky eases his fingers out and kisses at the corner of Steve's mouth, speaking smugly against his lips. “So wound up. What’s the matter, Stevie? Haven’t you been getting laid?” Steve grits his teeth and snarls a half-hearted “fuck you” at him, but it only makes Bucky laugh and slick his cock up and fit the head right to Steve’s entrance. “Don’t worry,” he whispers, propping himself up with his other arm, pushing in just a little, so slow, letting Steve’s body suck him in. “I’ll be gentle.”

He is. He pushes in so incredibly slow. So slow that it becomes torturous, makes Steve wrap his arms around his shoulders and hook his feet over the backs of his thighs, pulling him in closer. “Fuck,” he exhales against Bucky’s ear, dragging his lips over it. “Oh, Bucky.”

“Yeah.”

“Fuck me.”

Bucky starts rolling his hips, rocking into him and pulling out just a little, just enough. It’s like he doesn’t want to get too far away from Steve, doesn’t want to separate from him long enough to make their sex anything but close and deep. Steve cries out and moans and makes all sorts of shameful noises, because it feels amazing. Grinding down against Bucky and slipping a hand between their bodies to stroke himself off, it feels so goddamn good that he cries.

He tells himself that they’re tears of pleasure, of ecstasy. But that’s not entirely true. Bucky seems to know that by the tender way he kisses them off his cheeks, by the way he whispers "it’s okay, it’s okay" to him as he fucks him, and by the way he holds him so tightly once it’s over and they’ve both spent all over Steve’s stomach. “Shh sh sh,” he calms him, forcing him still once he starts to panic and cry out and pull. “Shhh. It’s okay.” He kisses his hair and holds fast until Steve collapses, giving up the struggle, exhausted. Steve cries sluggish tears, and Bucky hugs him and says quiet things into his hair for a long time. One of them might be "I love you," but Steve isn’t sure.

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sarahowritesostucky · 3 months

Text

📖"The Taste of You"

Rating: Explicit

Pairing: Steve Rogers x Bucky Barnes

Word Count: 4002

Summary: Steve is so tired of the meat market that modern dating has become. Just when he's deleted all the apps and given up on ever finding Mr. Right, he meets the perfect guy at the grocery store.

A dark, cute, funny, fucked up, and very tasty love story.

It's a Fresh AU. "If you can't handle the cannibalism, get out of the kitchen" ... or something like that

10. Acquired Taste

Wait! I haven't read a previous chapter. Story Masterlist

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Bucky:

Bucky typically has two avenues, when it comes to acquiring new product.

1) Conduct recon, establish a relationship with her/him (though usually her), lure to a secluded location, incapacitate (usually via roofies)

2) Conduct recon, stab & grab on site (needle, not knife—jesus he’s not a monster)

Each avenue presents its own advantages and risks. Relationships and dates take more time and work, they don’t guarantee he’ll get the access he needs, and he runs the risk of someone else in the victim’s life learning about him before they’re disappeared. Stab & grab is by far his preferred method, but he has to be extremely mindful of security footage. Everything’s recorded these days, and in a city like New York, people live in each other’s pockets. Which method Bucky chooses usually comes down to how isolated the candidate’s life is. Carlo made his pick for who Bucky’s got to pay him with, so Bucky drives into the city early Monday to begin his reconnaissance process on Erica Buccanetti. He spends that Monday through Wednesday 7am-10pm, learning all about her.

Erica is twenty-nine. She’s a short, white, “curvy” woman of middling education who works at the DMV. Her job alone makes her deserving of what she’s going to get, Bucky thinks. Erica works Monday through Friday, gets in at 8:55, eats lunch at her desk, and clocks out no later than 4:50 every day. Erica goes to a gym after work and runs on the treadmill until she looks miserable and exhausted. Erica takes the train home to her duplex in Alphabet City, where she has a cat and drinks wine and…

Bucky tosses his binoculars aside, exasperated. “Dammit.”

Erica has three housemates. Fuck.

He can’t do a stab & grab when there are roommates, certainly not three. It’s too risky. Now he’ll have to put in the extra effort to try and run into her somehow, strike up a conversation, get a date or three.

He puts the car in gear and speeds down the block, eager to get on the highway and get home to Steve. He tunes the radio to an 80’s station he likes and taps out the beat as he navigates traffic.

This is the last time, he swears to himself, the absolute last time he lets a client pick their target. It’s too much pressure on Bucky, having to succeed with that one specific girl. Better to have a handful of potentials going, scoop up the one who makes herself the easiest victim. It’s not like most of them don’t do a bang up job of it.

Twenty-some years of “stranger danger” and true crime shows are usually enough to cement the “it won’t happen to me” mindset. Sometimes they’ll even find the right moment to throw out a lame, faux-suspicious “You’re not a serial killer, right?—haha just kidding!”

Bucky thinks it’s a hoot. Obviously these bitches don’t follow the eastern principle of karma.

Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday nights, he gets in very late, after midnight. But he still pops down to check on Steve. He brings them both a drink, hands Steve his, then slides down the far wall to sit. “Ugh.”

“How was your day, honey?” Steve asks. Sarcastically, but at least he’s making jokes.

“Long,” Bucky says, tipping back his old fashioned. They both like them. Maybe it’s become one of their things. “So for this payment, I let Carlo pick his girl,” he says, letting his eyes slip closed as he rolls out the tight muscles in his neck. “Stupid.” Steve is quiet for a long time, and Bucky suspects he’s staring at him. He doesn’t open his eyes to find out. “What?”

“Nothing,” Steve says. “Just … wondering about the logistics of it, I guess.” He’s quiet for another long moment, the ice clinking in his glass telling Bucky when he takes another sip, and then another. “So … are you bi?”

Bucky opens his eyes. “What?”

Steve shrugs. “You date them to get to them. Does that mean you’re into women?”

“Well …” Bucky is, but … “I prefer men,” he says. “By far. But the clients want women, so that’s what I supply. It’s pretend, Steve.”

“Mm.”

Bucky narrows his eyes, sensing Steve’s judgment and not liking it. “I pretend to date them. Briefly. If I have to.”

Steve shrugs and looks away dismissively. “Seems kind of mean, to me.”

“It’s not!” Bucky scowls, straightening up from where he’s been sitting slumped against the wall. “I’m totally nice to them!”

Steve snorts. “Yeah, until you start harvesting their parts for food.”

Bucky glares at him. “Maybe we shouldn’t talk about this.”

“Yeah maybe we shouldn’t.” Steve sniffs and looks away. “Not exactly great to hear all about how my boyfriend’s a serial killer.”

Bucky brightens up some at the word ‘boyfriend’. “I’m not, you know. A serial killer.”

Steve’s eyebrows raise sky high. “Oh really? So what would you call it when you kill people, ya know, serially?”

“I don’t get a thrill out of murdering them,” Bucky insists. “I keep them alive as long as I can.”

“I’m sure they appreciate that so much.”

“I keep them comfortable!” Bucky defends. “This is a nice place! I give them gourmet food, they’re on tons of pain meds. They don’t feel a thing.” Steve isn’t even looking at him now, and Bucky’s mood sinks. “... They’re not nice people, Steve,” he says darkly. "They deserve a hell of a lot less than what I afford them.” He watches Steve for a reaction, but doesn’t get one.

Steve just tosses back the end of his drink and fishes out the cherry. He pulls it off the stem with his teeth, chewing it while staring Bucky down. “Done,” he says, pushing the glass in Bucky’s direction.

It’s like he’s saying the conversation’s done too. Bucky sighs and shoves up to standing. He goes over and picks the glass up and gives Steve a long, rueful look. “Eileen,” he eventually says.

“What?”

“The woman in the other room." He nods out towards the hallway. “The one you saw. Her name was Eileen. And that’s whose kidney I had for dinner the other night.” Steve’s eyes widen a little, and Bucky smiles placidly. “Yeah. Good old Eileen. She was thirty two you know. Divorced but seeing someone new. She had a daughter. Cute kid: Tracy. She’s like, seven, eight? Has freckles and pigtails, likes Pokémon.” Bucky shrugs, then lets the mild expression slide right off his face. “Eileen was letting the new boyfriend rape her.” He gets satisfaction from the way that Steve’s eyes widen further and his lips part without a comeback. “Hm, yeah.” Bucky throws back the end of his drink and crunches down on the pieces of ice that float into his mouth. “So, Steve, when I tell you that you really shouldn’t feel bad for these people? You really shouldn’t.”

He turns and leaves before Steve can think of any other arguments. It’s good, Bucky thinks. It’ll give him time to think. Bucky didn’t come to grips with all of this overnight, after all. He can’t expect Steve to, either.

Steve:

In the basement, Steve has lots of time to think. In fact that’s all he does other than sleep. He thinks about the chances of anybody ever finding him here, figures they’re probably low. Bucky’s done this before, maybe dozens of times. He knows how to get away with it. Steve thinks a lot about that, about how there are a bunch of rich as fuck cannibals out in the world, just existing and merrily eating people. How Bucky eats people and thinks that it’s totally fine. How he likes the taste of eating people. It’s nuts.

Steve does wonder, sometimes. What’s it taste like? He feels halfway sick with himself when the thought occurs, but it does occur. It must taste good, he thinks, to warrant such effort and risk. It must taste really damned good. At least to Bucky and his rich friends it does. Steve is sure he’ll never find out for himself. He wouldn’t be able to stomach it.

He thinks about the women who came before him, about how they must’ve felt, trapped down here while Bucky slowly sold off their meat. How many have there been? Steve wonders. And what were their crimes that got them sentenced to this? How did Bucky know they were bad? Steve can’t figure it out, but he also can’t forget what Bucky told him so seriously about Eileen the other night. It sits in his mind, coloring his memory differently. Now when he thinks of Eileen lying on the floor of her cell, begging him for help, he doesn’t feel as much pity for her as he used to. He doesn’t feel as much horror when he remembers her limbless torso wriggling pathetically under the sheet.

Bucky could be lying of course, just making it up so that Steve will accept him more readily. But somehow Steve doesn’t think so. Bucky’d had this look in his eyes when he said it. He’d looked vindictive, and vindicated. Steve shivers as he remembers it. Bucky truly does not have any compunctions about what he does, and he expects Steve to come around to it. Steve doesn’t think he can do that. He’s just hoping against hope that he can pretend long enough to convince Bucky. Long enough until he can get his chance for escape and take it.

He thinks about Carlo, working on the cell down the hallway. Steve doesn’t see him much at all, just hears the sounds of his tools whirring, the smell of fresh wood being sawed, concrete being poured, him taking a piss in one of the other cells' toilets every few hours.

At first Steve does wonder what he might be able to say to try and entice the man to help him escape. But he settles on a big fat nothing. There’s nothing Steve could offer him to get him to take that risk, no way. And it’d be too big a gamble to try anyways. He doesn’t want Carlo to alert Bucky to his attempts at scheming, which Bucky warned Carlo would do if Steve acted up. So Steve keeps his mouth shut when the man arrives and departs each day.

Carlo doesn’t say anything to him. He probably figures that Steve’s dead meat anyway.

Steve considers that maybe he is, and Bucky’s just lying to him to keep him calm. Maybe Bucky tells all the women that they have a chance for survival, if only they’re good and don’t act up.

It’s fucked, but Steve imagines Bucky doing it—taking little pieces from him until there’s nothing left to do but put an end to him. He imagines Bucky kissing him lovingly, then injecting something into his veins and harvesting his internal organs. He imagines Bucky working in the attractive kitchen upstairs; humming a tune, cutting Steve up, pan searing his kidneys and eating them with a Beaujolais.

Steve wonders if he’d taste any different than everyone else Bucky’s ever eaten. Probably not.

Stringy, he thinks, looking down and assessing his arms and legs and torso with a novel sort of appreciation. Steve’s so thin and so tough, he’d probably make a horrible meal.

Bucky:

He plans it out meticulously, just like he always does. But even after all these years (fifteen, to be exact) he still gets that nervous feeling every time he makes his move. Stab & grabs don’t get to him nearly as much. Those are easy, impersonal. It’s the women he has to introduce himself to and flirt with and feign interest in and good intentions for that cause the nerves. He’d call them butterflies, but that seems cruel to compare his meet/capture/kill nerves to first date nerves. When he met Steve, it was a whole other feeling. What he’s about to do now isn’t the same, it’s not innocent like that, and he doesn’t need to pretend that it is.

Bucky knows he’s actually like, the perfect guy for this. He’s good looking and a natural flirt, excellent at making conversation and getting people to like him and to want to open up to him. Women tend to feel instinctively safe around him, so normally he’s guaranteed success in the “meet cute” department. It’s just that ... well …

He’s getting on in age these days, alright? He’s a—very damn handsome—37 years old now, and unfortunately for him, his clients’ tastes tend to stay the same, meaning the pervy old leches keep wanting their women rare at 20-ish. Bucky still has a very high success rate, but there’ve been a few college-aged girls who he approached wrong and they turned their noses up at him.

But he dyes his greys now, okay? He does the whole skincare regime, does Botox (conservatively—he’s got taste). And he’s learned to dumb himself down a bit when he’s going after the younger ones; talk a little smoother, a little less cultured, dress more age-appropriate. Turtlenecks apparently send off the wrong vibe. Unless the girl is into the whole Daddy thing, then it works in his favor.

Anyway, it’s not that big of an issue. All he has to do is flash his car or casually wear a Rolex on a date and even the most dimwitted or discerning potentials fall all over him. Bucky could give straight guys lessons, he swears.

He drives into the city wearing joggers and sneakers and a too-tight tee shirt, hair artfully tousled and earbuds draped around his neck in show. He goes into the gym, into the locker room, spritzes water around his hairline and the neck of his tee shirt, then bumps into her outside—when she’s on her way in, not out. No woman feels sexy after a workout (at least not the kind Erica is torturing herself with)—and exclaims in concern when she stumbles. Ohmygod, I’m so sorry! He grabs her forearm and lets the other hand brush over her waist as he “makes sure she doesn’t fall”. Are you okay?

Her eyes catch on his smile and his biceps right away, so Bucky's confidence is bolstered. He spends the next twelve minutes flirting with her, telling her his name (James), and how glad he is that he at least bumped into the prettiest girl at the gym (not true). Her eyes light up when he mentions that he’s a doctor, and shortly after that he’s typing his burner cell number into her phone. I put myself down as ‘handsome stranger whom you’re definitely gonna call’.

She titters at his joke and smiles, obviously tickled pink as they’re saying goodbye. “Yeah. I’ll um, I’ll call you. Maybe we could meet up for drinks or something?”

“Great!” Bucky shoots her a wink to seal the deal and jogs off down the block. He stops once he’s around the corner and starts walking at a normal pace back to his car. He hums a tune to himself, pleased at how easy that’d been. Now he can get home and probably not have to go out again until Saturday. If Erica’s as easy as he thinks she is, he shouldn’t have to go on many, if any, other dates.

Steve:

“Hey.” Bucky knocks on the doorframe as he slides it open. He steps in, head tilted, cautious smile playing at his lips.

Unfairly handsome, Steve thinks. Those women don’t stand a chance. “Hey.”

“I was hoping you’d still be awake. Wanted to say goodnight.”

“You get her number?” Steve asks. Because he knows that’s what today was—bump into Erica day.

Bucky seems wary, but he comes in and engages anyway. Steve almost feels bad for him. “Yeah,” Bucky says, toeing at the carpet. “Taking her out on Saturday.”

Steve rolls his eyes, scoffing. “‘Taking her out’, yeah.” He sees the hurt flash across Bucky’s face though, and feels bad about it. Ridiculous, but he still feels bad. “Sorry,” he mumbles, looking away. What else is he supposed to say? I understand? He can’t say that when Bucky’s holding him prisoner in his basement. Steve’s literally chained to the floor right now.

He sighs again, disappointed. He’s never been so disappointed in anything in his life. He fucking aches with it. Enough to cry, sometimes, if he thinks enough about Bucky’s smile over a martini glass, his bad dance moves in Steve’s apartment, his body in Steve’s bed. What they'd had together, how it'd felt like they were building something, something to look forward to. Steve bites his tongue so he doesn’t start tearing up when Bucky’s standing there. He doesn’t want to look like another weak victim, even though he knows he is. “You seemed like such a nice guy,” he murmurs, not looking at him.

Bucky comes over and kneels down in front of him. He looks so sad. “Hey,” he says softly, reaching out to palm the side of Steve’s face. He hums when Steve lets his eyes slip closed and leans into it.

Crazy, what a little bit of isolation will make you feel, Steve thinks.

“I miss you, Steve. I promise you this isn’t going to last forever.” When Steve just breathes silently, Bucky strokes his thumb over his cheek. Steve shivers. “Hey, would you want to go on a date with me?”

Steve’s eyes open. “What?”

Bucky smiles softly. “A date. You’ve been so good this whole time, and I miss you.” He leans forward and pecks a kiss to his lips. It’s brief, but it still makes Steve’s lips tingle. “I miss spending time with you.” Bucky’s eyes flick over his face. “So how about it, huh? You want to come up and just hang out one night? I can make us something. We’ll have drinks, maybe watch a movie?”

Steve blinks, feeling so odd at being asked a question like that. One of the things he thinks about to pass the time is what he and Bucky might be doing right now, in their new relationship, if Steve hadn’t opened the basement door. “A movie?” he repeats softly. The idea of getting to leave this boring room for anything is tempting. Steve wants to escape of course, but even if he knew he couldn’t, he still thinks it’d be nice to get to do something. Even if it’s with Bucky. “Yeah,” he breathes, hopeful. He hasn’t been allowed upstairs in days, not since he took a shower. “M-maybe I could …” he cuts himself off, remembering how Bucky had taken advantage of the last time, how he’d touched him. And Steve was weak. He’d let him do it.

“Maybe what?” Bucky asks, looking so kind. He always does, like he’s just a kind, caring guy who also happens to keep Steve chained in his basement. “Steve? What were you going to say?”

Steve smiles and shakes his head. “Mm, nevermind.” He doesn’t need a shower. “Nothing.”

Bucky seems unhappy about whatever Steve’s not saying, but he doesn’t press him any further. He takes a deep breath and stands back up. “I won’t be out so late anymore,” he tells him. “Just a trip or two more to the city. You can have your real meals back again, no more of this junk food.”

Steve nods. Bucky’s left him with plenty of snacks these past few days, but Steve has missed the hot meals. He’s missed seeing Bucky three times a day, even missed the attention Bucky gives him when he’s eating. “Okay,” he says.

Bucky stands there for a long minute, staring at him. Steve keeps his eyes on the carpet but he can feel the weight of Bucky’s gaze. Eventually he hears Bucky sigh, then leave through the door. Steve looks up to try and catch sight of him on the way out, but he’s already moved on down the hall.

That night Steve falls asleep thinking about what it’ll be like, once there’s another person in the basement with him.

Bucky:

Bucky meets her for the aforementioned drinks. He’s dressed nicely, in a black button down and slacks and nice shoes. He wears the Rolex, because Erica’s got three housemates so flashing his wealth at her can’t hurt. He greets her with a smile and a hug at the bar, and they both settle in and order their drinks. Bucky asks her about her life, quickly figures out that she’s body conscious and makes sneaky little comments about how he likes a woman that doesn’t slip right through his fingers. She eats that shit up, and before Bucky knows it, she’s excusing herself for the bathroom and leaving her third cocktail behind.

Too fucking easy.

Bucky picks up both their drinks and informs the bartender that they’ll be moving over to that table in the dark corner over there. The bartender gives him a nod, and Bucky nods back. He can’t have the guy seeing it, when he slips the roofie in her drink.

He’s learned to crush them up into a Splenda packet. It masks the bitterness and then if he does get caught, it just looks like he’s sweetening the drink. Erica returns from the restroom and he flags her down to their new spot. “More privacy,” he purrs at her, and she giggles and sits down next to him.

They continue to flirt and talk about pithy little topics until he can tell that she’s starting to feel the effects. “Hey,” he says, not wanting her to be stumbling before they leave the bar. “I know this is fast but… I dunno, I just really like you.” He says it all bashful, like he’s embarrassed of himself, and she eats that up, too. “Would you maybe wanna go back to my place? We could have another drink, talk and listen to some music, or…”

He trails off, and she gives him an enthusiastic, “Sure, okay!” sloppy at the edges from how the drugs are creeping into her system now. She hasn’t realized it yet. Bucky has to get her out of this public place before she does.

“Great,” he says, smiling. He offers her his arm like a gentleman (and to make sure she’s steady enough on her feet to not draw attention), and she simpers and holds onto him and they head out. Bucky sees her recognizing the type of car that he drives as he opens the door for her and she gets in. She tucks her lips in like she’s trying to keep herself from outright grinning, which makes Bucky chuckle as he slides into the driver’s side and shuts his door. “Buckle up,” he tells her sweetly. “Wouldn’t want anything to happen to you.”

She giggles and obeys, and Bucky thinks about how she’ll probably be so easy, in the basement. Girls like her just want to be loved and approved of so badly. She’ll probably go from the Depression stage to Acceptance so fast, it’ll make his head spin. He’s glad. It’s always easiest for those girls. They suffer the least. And despite the fact that Bucky knows about Erica and her little brother who died under “suspicious circumstances” in 2009, he still doesn’t want to torture her. He’s not a sadist.

He’s karma.

She’s still conscious when they get on the highway, enough to look out the window and make a cute little confused noise. “Mm. You said your place’sin Tr’becca?” she slurs.

Bucky smiles and pats her hand. “Yeah. But I’m taking you somewhere else.”

It’s cute, how she pouts and tries to protest that. Bucky’s almost tempted to say something right then and there. But he doesn’t. He always likes to save the Big Reveal for when they’re settled in their rooms and fully sober. He likes to have a drink in hand, be relaxed in something comfortable. Really settle in for the show.

“Just close your eyes,” he soothes her, watching her fade out. “We’ll be there soon.” She passes out and Bucky smirks, thinking about how she’s about to get hers.

Because Karma’s not a bitch.

It’s a plastic surgeon who likes to cook.

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