Chapter 7
Sam returned from dropping Cookie at her new home hoping he could get to his room and changed into workout gear without running into anyone. Unfortunately, luck wasn't with him and he heard someone in the kitchen. He decided to speed walk past and hope that whoever it was, was too busy to notice him. That didn't work out either and as he heard Bucky calling his name, Sam cursed softly before stopping.
"Hey Bucky, what's up?"
Bucky looked at him, confused "Why are you coming from the hangar? I didn't hear about any mission."
Sam shook his head "Just a quick errand, not a mission."
Bucky's brow furrowed "On a quinjet? What's the story?"
Sam smirked "Sorry, Terminator. It's classified, I could tell you but then I'd have to kill you." He laughed out loud as he walked away.
They met in the gym a short while later and Bucky kept needling Sam to find out what he was up to but Sam held his tongue, even after Bucky gave him a black eye.
In the wee hours of the next morning, Tony Stark was fighting off sleep when he received an email notification *Transfer of Personnel*. Curious, because he hadn't approved any changes, he read through the email growing more and more angry as he realized what it said. He turned up his music and cursed for 5 minutes straight. Once he calmed down, he composed and sent an urgent email.
The Avengers, their ancillary staff and the new head of intel for the compound all received emails accompanied by an alarm, meaning that whatever it was, was urgent, forcing all of them up and out of bed.
Bucky looked at his phone which said 4am, cursing and threw on a shirt and sweats before heading to the conference room. As he grew closer he saw other Avengers and some staff that he knew but others he wasn't familiar with, all trudging the same way he was. He looked at his phone and saw it was 4:15 and swore again. Some poor intern was standing at the conference room door, in her bathrobe and slippers, handing out coffees to anyone who wanted one. Bucky took one and nodded in thanks before sitting at the table by Steve and across from Nat, Sharon and Yelena.
"Why are you here punk? Doesn't being retired mean you don't have to deal with this bullshit?"
Steve shrugged "Ask Tony, we were up late working so I slept in my old room and he included me in his email."
When the room was almost full Tony came in hands shaking, from anger or caffeine was hard to tell but he'd obviously had too much of both. Sam followed behind him.
Tony cleared his throat.
"Alright. Everyone sit down and shut the Hell up."
He paused for a moment to let everyone settle down before he spoke with an edge to his voice
"I want all of you to know how absolutely fucking furious I am right now so you can appreciate how hard I'm working to control myself."
Everyone looked at him with tired eyes before he continued
"First, I want you all to meet our liaison with the intel office here, this is Dylan, supervisor for the Compound intelligence office."
Dylan stood and waved nervously before quickly sitting down.
Steve looked confused "Why won't Cookie be our contact anymore?"
Bucky straightened up and looked at Steve when he heard him mention Cookie. He noticed Sam hadn't said anything and knew he was closest to Cookie lately. Sam looked suspiciously calm, considering what Tony just told them.
Bucky jumped when Tony slapped the table and shouted
"I want to know which one of you assholes made Cookie leave without even saying goodbye? I woke up this morning to an email from Fury letting me know she moved to a different office." Tony paused, panting "I wanna know who is going to make my cookies now? One of you fuckers better step up and find a way to get her to come back or there will be Hell to pay."
Bucky sat back in his chair in shock. He had planned to talk to Cookie soon, he just felt so guilty over hurting her again and again. He knew she deserved better than a broken man like him and when he had finally convinced himself that he deserved to be happy and finally showed her how he felt and spent the night with her, Nat had pulled him into Antonia's web. All he had done since then was hurt her, repeatedly.
Tony hadn't stopped ranting until he looked at Bucky "It was you, Manchurian, wasn't it?" He looked over at Nat, then Sharon and Yelena "and you three. You were all controlled by Antonia, and that's fucked up no question but Cookie got a pretty bad deal in all this too and she considered all of you her friends. So what did you do?"
All four of them looked down at their hands and mumbled incoherently.
Sam cleared his throat
"They didn't do anything, not a god damned thing."
He looked pointedly at each of them "You all acted like acknowledging her would prove that you hurt her and Cookie was so worried that you all seeing her around was making your healing more difficult so she left to make your lives easier while not one of you could be bothered to even try talking to her or spare a thought for her feelings or healing."
Bucky looked at Sam "So where is she?" Something occurred to him "That's your secret mission yesterday, wasn't it? You took her away from me." he accused.
Sam shook his head "No Barnes, you pushed her away. Even after you've been cleared by medical, you didn't even try to talk to her. Just kept skulking around, making her feel guilty."
"But she didn't do anything wrong why would she feel guilty?" Bucky argued
Sam rolled his eyes. "Just take a minute to think about it, you'll get there."
Bucky slowly figured out what Sam was talking about and his head fell. He knew he needed to talk to her, even Dr Raynor who he had been seeing 3 times a week had pushed him to tell her but he hadn't felt ready for Cookie to confirm what he already knew. Even though it wasn't really his fault it was still him and their chances for any kind of relationship were dead.
Bucky felt his eyes fill with tears "It's my fault Cookie is gone but I need to find a way to talk to her and convince her to come home." He looked at Sam "Where is she?"
Sam shook his head "Not a chance. Not until Cookie gives me the ok. Sorry, tin man."
Bucky growled and hit the table, making Tony shout until Bucky glared at him before stalking out of the room.
When Tony was done ranting, Steve left to find Bucky. He went to Bucky's room but he wasn't there. Or in the kitchen or common room. Steve was ready to give up when Friday's alarm blared and announced that the sprinklers had come on in the Avengers private gym which was limited to the team and a select few agents. It was rarely used since the team was usually training with recruits, except for Bucky.
By the time Steve made it to the gym, Bucky was kneeling in the middle of the destroyed room, breathing heavily, sprinklers raining down on him.
"It's my fault, Steve. I fucked everything up and now she's gone." He shook his head "I can't do this without her, I don't know how to deal with all of this every day without her by my side like she has been for the last 2 years." He looked at Steve sadly "What do I do now? How can I get her back?"
Steve shrugged and shook his head "I don't know Buck, I just don't know."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In her new city, Cookie woke up in her new townhouse and got ready for her first day in a new office. Considering how the compound had felt recently she enjoyed having her own kitchen and living area. No one avoiding or ignoring her, making her feel bad for just existing in their space.
Different office but the same job and she already knew all of the analysts here, had hired most of them, but people behaved differently when the boss was around.
It was a beautiful spring day so Cookie decided to walk the short distance to her office. Like the compound her department only took up a floor but instead of Avengers they were surrounded by CIA agents, definitely not as friendly but that was fine with her. Cookie was more interested in work than any personal entanglements with her co-workers.
Cookie entered the building and went directly to S.W.O.R.D. Director Tyler Hayward. He was an ambitious man who wasn't thrilled to have someone in 'his office' who reported to someone else and wasn't in his control but he wasn't going to risk going against Fury so affixed a fake smile to his face and welcomed Cookie to the office.
They spoke for a few minutes before he led her to a conference room to meet with all of the analysts that report to Cookie. Annie was the senior analyst and had known Cookie for a few years so showed her to her new office.
Annie and Cookie had become good long distance friends, bonding over their shared love of mystery books.
When they arrived in Cookies office, Annie told her about a new book release by an author they both loved. The party was this coming Saturday and the publishing company had their offices a few buildings over. Annie had been able to get her name on the guest list and wanted Cookie to be her plus one since Annie's girlfriend didn't care for mysteries.
Cookie responded enthusiastically and they planned to have a late dinner after the party. Cookie was excited to have the opportunity to look around Boston and maybe meet Harland Thrombey.
She thought to herself. Maybe the move wouldn't be so bad after all.
Cookie had a busy week getting settled into her new office and butting heads with Tyler over some tips she had offered to streamline some of their processes. She went to work for a few hours on Saturday before meeting Annie for a mani-pedi after lunch. She went home to get dressed in a purple, silk, cocktail dress with a deep v-neck that fell just above her knees. Adding black stilettos and clutch to complete the look.
She met Annie at the entrance to the building, they checked each other out appreciatively and linked arms as they walked into the party.
A tall, well built, dark blonde haired man noticed Cookie's entrance and his bright blue eyes followed her around the room, after deciding the tall woman he had never seen before would be the evenings prey.
He approached them as she was getting a drink "You're new in town."
Cookie looked at him curiously, feeling her face heat up as he so obviously checked her out. She nodded "I am. Are you the welcoming committee?"
The man nodded "For a lady as pretty as you, I will endeavour to be welcoming." He took her hand and kissed the back "Ransom Drysdale, pleased to meet you."
"I'm Y/N Y/L/N but my friends call me Cookie, this is my friend Annie. Your name is familiar but I can't- oh my gosh you're Harland Thrombey's grandson. One of the VP's here."
Ransom smiled and made a small bow "That's me. Would you like to meet him?"
Annie and Cookie nodded enthusiastically and took the arms Ransom offered to lead her over to meet his grandfather who was as kind and gracious as she hoped he would be. Unfortunately the party was crowded and there were many others waiting to meet the author, so they only chatted for a few minutes.
Shortly after they met Harland, Annie's girlfriend called, asking her to pick up some infants pain killer as their daughter had woken up from teething pain. She tried to apologize but Cookie shooed her away and promised she would find her own way home.
As soon as Annie was out of sight, Ransom smiled at Cookie and licked his lips. "So, Cookie, do you want to get out of here? My club has a great late supper menu if you're hungry or I'm sure we can find something to do."