Take It Back - Bucky Barnes x OC

Chapter Twenty-Six

[I just think about my baby I'm so full of love I could barely eat]

Paris, France

She was a sight to behold - a silver tweed dress that fell just above the knees, accompanied by black six-inch heels with red soles; Louboutins.

Her long hair cascaded down her exposed back as she threw her head back in a gorgeous sounding laugh that had all the men around ogling her.

She held a tight grip on the vanilla flavored champagne, the other hand holding onto the clutch that carried her spare euros and a MAC matte red lipstick.

A particular brunette man had his hand on her lower back as she reached over to put her glass down, his wide smile mimicking hers.

Where his black suit hugged his male-model physique, her tan legs ran for days passed the edges of her dress and into her shoes- toned and appearing worked out to perfection.

At least that's what the envious woman around her thought. Especially little blonde Kelly Sanders who eyed her from across the banquet floor, in a Valentino and all.

Little did they - Kelly especially - know that she was genetically lucky. Not having to go a day to the gym, she'd been blessed with curves in the right spots, a decent speed metabolism, and imperfections that were constantly overlooked, but to Ashlyn were bluntly obvious.

Not that she wanted people to see her imperfections or for them to vocally state their awareness about it - she had enough of that to deal with from her nagging self because of her extremely low self-confidence - but, sometimes, she wondered if the love the people around her showed her was really genuine.

She knew Tony's wasn't.

The only genuine thing in her life right now was Bucky, and she was ruining it because she thought she had been doing them a favor. Anything that once had a potential to be good in her life had been jeopardized by her, and she had spent the last five years trying to make up for it.

She'd do anything for her husband.

When Riley had turned to her in the train that one day many years ago, and brought up Kelly and her boyfriend and how they had gotten engaged after only five months of dating, any doubt she had about moving too quickly with Bucky had left her mind.

There was no doubt in her mind that what she had with him was rare and true love.

When she had seen his perfect blue eyes for the first time, and the way he had reached out to flick a snowflake off of her hair, she had been caught in a trance.

It was like something out of a movie, and her heart had fluttered when he gave her that iconic smile.

The smile that would soon belong to the man she'd end up marrying.

She knew who he was when she met him, but she had lied and pretended like she didn't know. She was afraid of coming clean after so many months, afraid that it would make it look like she did it out of using him, when the truth was that she didn't want him to think that his reputation was why she wanted to be with him in the first place.

They had swapped numbers after their first encounter, and she fell in love with him after two weeks, and she was certain he felt the same way.

Even Riley saw it; that un-denying chemistry.

Bucky was sweet, he was kind, and he was everything she had been waiting for since her parents had died.

After their death, she had felt more alone than ever.