Fine Line (Bucky Barnes x OC)

A Welcomed Reprieve

Three Years Ago

Luna was in her living room, lounging on her couch and waiting for Liam. He was supposed to come over so they could have dinner and talk, but he was four hours late. His drinking was getting out of control and she was seeing the same violence surface in him that she faced everyday with her father growing up. She had tried talking to Liam before and he promised that he wouldn't get drunk anymore. The next day he would come home drunk, forgetting the promise he had made to her.

It started off as him yelling at her, progressed to him forcing himself on her when he was drunk, and was now moving into physical violence. An outsider would think Luna was capable of fighting him off, but they'd be wrong. Luna and Liam had received the same training, but she was more skilled at hand to hand combat than he was. He was never happy with the fact that she could take down men twice her size with little difficulty while he struggled.

She learned to read people's body language after the abuse she suffered from her father. She paid attention to which side they favored or the way their weight shifted. But while she was better at physically attacking her opponents, Liam was a master at mentally manipulating his. With his knowledge of her past and the trauma that still lingered, she was no match for him. He'd tell her she was weak and was so convincing that she believed him.

Two weeks ago, Liam had slapped her for the first time. After his hand cracked against her face, she grabbed her cheek and her eyes snapped to his. His face was crimson red and his breathing was heavy as he stared back at her. Her lips parted in shock and she rubbed at her stinging cheek. Liam's face transformed from unhinged anger to one of realization. He reached out to her, but Luna stepped away from him.

He approached her again, this time with his hands up in surrender and a look of remorse on his face. He was drunk. He didn't mean it, she told herself. After all, her dad had never looked at her like that after hitting her. So, she let him pull her into his arms and whisper an apology into her hair as he held her and promised to never lay a hand on her again. But Liam didn't keep that promise because a few days later, he got angry at her and pushed her into the wall so hard her whole back bruised.

Luna had taken enough abuse from her father to fill this lifetime and the next. She loved Liam, but he was a different man now. He had become someone she didn't even recognize. Luna was at her limit and wouldn't spend the rest of her life with a man who would rather abuse her instead of love her. Tonight he would either agree to get help, or they were over.

Luna shut off her TV with a loud sigh and discarded her blanket as she rose to her feet. As she shuffled towards her bedroom, the door of her apartment swung open and Liam stumbled inside. He shut the door behind him and looked up to see her standing in front of him. She gaped in disbelief at his appearance. His fly was unzipped, shirt buttoned incorrectly, dirty blonde curls mused, but the most shocking was that there was lipstick smeared across his face and peppered down his neck. That was the final straw.

She had seen him come home with lipstick stains on his skin before, but never looking this disheveled. For him to actually sleep with another woman proved just how little he wanted her. Anger boiled in her veins and her jaw clenched tight. Liam wobbled on his feet as a slow smile crept across his face. He staggered forward, looking her up and down in her shorts and tank top.

"Hey, gorgeous." Liam said. "I've been thinking about you all day."

His hands began fumbling with the buttons on his shirt as he drew closer to her. Luna's mouth turned down with disgust. There was no way she was going to sleep with him after he had just been with someone else. The thought of letting him be inside her when she didn't know who his dick had just been in made her stomach churn. Liam pulled his shirt off exposing his lean, but muscled upper body, and dropped it to the floor. He grabbed at Luna's waist, but she side-stepped him.