Eclipse (Born at Dusk - Book 1)

15

September 18th, 1966

Kate had been ashamed before. She'd gone past every line anyone had every thought to draw. She had known the entire spectrum of human emotion and didn't feel the least bit concerned that it was normal to her. It didn't matter that she had lost herself, lost everything she ever thought she cared about, and still didn't care. All that mattered to her was the man standing in front of her.

James couldn't have come sooner. Except, the emotionless eyes that were staring into her own weren't those of James, but of The Winter Soldier. But she knew it was still James she was looking at, the soldier in him still hadn't rubbed off even after the guns left his hands.

Returning from his most recent mission, James made his way to the chair, his gate faltering from his injured leg. Stiff enough to be considered a super soldier herself, Kate prepped for the injury. Routinely slipping the latex gloves onto her nimble fingers, Kate didn't bother with the assassin beside her.

The gloves were the pair of skin she didn't mind ruining. The burns, cuts and blood that usually decorated her hands were absent underneath the thin plastic. Instead, she watched the lethal weapons that used to be her hands grip a four inch blade.

Sitting on a small stool, Kate sat beside the Winter Soldier, next to his injured leg. Kate examined the burned fabric of his pants and at what she knew was charred flesh beneath it. "What happened?" She questioned, gently prodding at the still raw wound before her.

James shifted at her touch before answering, "Fire," was all he said. Kate nodded numbly, slicing the fabric of his pants to view the burn. It was almost mechanical as she began treating his leg, disinfecting and wrapping the sensitive skin.

Kate worked quietly, but her head was roaring with thoughts of one their last encounters. She could still remember every emotion, every thought that had crossed her mind that day.

Kate had taken a particularly harsh beating from the general, due to the lack of reports, and Kate suffered. Except, James was suffering more after another treatment of brainwashing. That was the day he forgot, again, who he served and why he was doing what he was doing.

General Volkov had to remind him of his alliance and agencies to show him he was doing the right thing. A speech Kate had heard a dozen times in the past few years.

Though it was when the day was ending that things changed.

Kate could only suspect the unavoidable physical attraction that came with one woman in a men's facility. She could see it on the soldiers faces, and in their pants, of exactly what they wanted. But thanks to James, and only him, there was a very clear message to whoever tried to touch Kate. That rule still stood, after several years and after James most likely forgot the interaction.

Being a woman herself, Kate had also felt attraction in general, usually only during her ovulation. But she never considered anything, and even went as far as to drugging her own immune system to prevent her from getting pregnant if anything ever happened.

To her dismay, Kate could also see it in James, even when he tried to hide it. It was just as embarrassing to see the bulge in his pants when they worked, as to be thinking about the very thing. The uncomfortable tension between them had grown, but had stopped until that night.

James had been still bleeding after he'd ripped through the second set of stitches in his arm, and was trying his best to stanch the flow in his cell.

Kate, who knew how to treat the wound, and who had access to both the workroom and his cell, had a hard time deciding to act on his struggle. Eventually, she had entered his cell with a new role of bandages with needle and thread.