america's assassin ➻ steve rogers

eight

"Mia." Somebody was shaking me, saying my name. Behind closed eyes, all I could see was Axel watching me in that calculated way he always had. I knew I was sweating. I could feel my hair stuck to my forehead and the back of my neck. My shirt was plastered to me and I couldn't seem to catch my breath.

"Mia, wake up." I recognised the voice this time as Steve's. I sat up in bed, breathing hard. Steve was sitting next to me, his hand on my arm. "You were having a nightmare." Yes, I had been. It was the same nightmare I thought I'd conquered a long time ago, but here it was again. I had to look down at my hands to check and see if there was any blood.

"Sorry," I gasped, fighting to breathe in oxygen as I pressed my hands to my clammy forehead, leaning my face against my knees. Steve's hand stayed on my arm as he shuffled closer, his shoulder and part of his chest pressed up against my shoulder.

"Are you okay?" His voice sounded close to my ear but I could barely focus on the way he seemed partially wrapped around me. All I could think about was the barrel of a gun pressed into my side and the raw and burning sensation of feeling my heart break for the first time when I had looked at Axel with the scared little girl vulnerability he had once told me he loved.

"Just..." I paused, pushing the nausea rolling through my stomach back down. "Give me a minute." He didn't say anything snarky and let me get myself together. With his free hand, he rubbed my back the way someone would comfort someone if they were sick. Slowly but surely, I put myself back together again. My breathing was still somehow too slow and too fast, but I was aware of the way Steve was touching me now. Carefully, I shifted so I could look at his face without jostling his position.

"What are you doing?" I whispered, so low I wondered if he could even hear me but he locked eyes with me and his fingers on my back slowed.

"I'm trying to comfort you," He said, lips twisting into a sneer momentarily before it stretched out and he pursed his lips, still watching me carefully. His fingers had come to a complete stop on my back and a shiver rolled through my spine as I realised how desperately I wanted him to do it again.

"Why?" I said.

"Sometimes being close to someone doesn't have to hurt," He said. I flinched, hard enough that his fingers tightened on my arm as I was a flight risk. But I was a flight risk, yet somehow right now I didn't want to move. I wanted to stay wrapped in this half-embrace with a man I wasn't sure I could even stand. Maybe that was why letting him touch me wasn't so scary. Maybe being close to someone didn't have to hurt if I didn't let them in all the way. Touching and caring was different, and suddenly I wanted Steve's hands in places that might have made me sick that morning.

"You don't have to stop," I said quietly, licking my lips as I struggled through the turmoil of thoughts in my head. I couldn't really be considering what I was considering, except I wholeheartedly was.

"What?" He asked, sounding confused but still staring at me.

"Touching me," I said. "You don't have to stop touching me." Hesitantly, Steve's fingers started moving up and down my back again, slowing when they reached the bottom of my back and stilling when they moved back to the top as he brushed the strap of my tank top with the utmost care. He shifted so slightly that I almost missed it and I thought he might be... interested.

"What was your nightmare about?" He asked, fingers drawing circles into my back.

"You'll understand why I don't want to talk about that," I said.

"What do you want to talk about, then?" He said. I shifted my face a little closer to his, a thrum of electricity in my veins, and glanced down at his mouth. I might be crazy, but I was becoming more and more desperate to do it.

"I don't really want to talk at all." Steve swallowed hard, his throat bobbing, and I knew he had caught up to my wavelength. He looked nervous and majorly confused.

"Why?" I shrugged and lifted a hand to put on his thigh. He stilled.

"Sometimes being close to someone doesn't have to hurt," I said, throwing his own words back at him. His brows furrowed and his palm splayed flat on the small of my back, unmoving.

"I'm not looking for a girlfriend," He said. I pulled back a little and stared at him, remembering why I didn't particularly like him in the first place.

"I think you missed my whole spiel about not letting people close enough to break my heart," I said. "I'm not looking for strings."

"No strings," He echoed, thinking it over. I rolled my eyes, even as desire painted its way through my body, he still managed to piss me off. Then as he caught my eye again, I sobered. All the frustration rolled away and was replaced by a kind of desperate need.

"Please, Steve," I said. "Make me forget."

His face softened and he nodded once, moving his hand from my arm and curling it around my chin to lift my face up and bring it close to his. He paused when our breath mingled, breathing just as heavy as I was, and shook his head as he muttered something about going to hell before he kissed me. His mouth was hot and soft and he kissed me gently at first, carefully, as if he wasn't fully sure he was doing the right thing, but by then I'd lost my head and kissed him harder. I climbed into his lap and locked my legs around his hips, pressing my tongue into his mouth. He kissed me harder back, the hand on my chin snaking around my throat and tangling into my hair as the hand still on my back slipped under my tank. With the hand in my hair, he pulled my head to the side and ran his tongue and teeth along my throat and across my collarbone, kissing the exposed part of my breast with a wet mouth and heavy breaths. I moaned as he moved his hand from my back and pulled the strap of my tank down my arm, touching me so gently it was at odds with the way his mouth felt on my skin.

"What do you want?" He asked me, voice hoarse with lips by my ear. I was breathing heavily again, barely able to contain the pulsing desire. I slid my fingers up under his t-shirt and over his tight stomach and chest, pushing as close to him as I could. I pressed my lips to his again, my tongue swiping over his bottom lip.

"I just want you to keep touching me."