Steve could hear him strip out of the dress as the taffeta and silk rustled and whispered together until they were replaced with what sounded like much more familiar clothing being drawn on. Pants, suspenders and the like so Steve ventured another glance once he heard water being poured into the toilette near to him.
Both repelled and fascinated by the industrious way the (well...what was he? A sodomite?) was wiping away first the lipstick and then the kohl lining his eyes, the blond sheriff finally tore his gaze away from the unsettling sight. He'd seen a lot in his days including a couple of sodomites in the army but this was definitely a first for him. But he had to remind himself that his business here wasn't to ask this obviously mixed up man why he was parading around in women's clothing, it was about the young Kat who was even now battling for her life.
"So, you uh--" Clearing his throat a little uncomfortably, Steve tugged at the collar of his shirt and drew out a pad to take down some notes. "You came in on the deceased assaulting Miss. O'Day?" Once more, he risked a glance over at Bucky and found himself once more fascinated by the strange sight of the odd man. It wasn't like he'd never seen another man shave before, just...never another man who wasn't quite a man, was he?
In Bucky’s line of work, people watching him meant only one thing. That they wanted him. So, when he caught the other man looking at him-especially the way he fixated on his lips as he wiped away his lipstick-Bucky felt a smugness creep onto his face. When he felt the man’s eyes on him again as he got ready to shave, he turned toward the man with a smirk that said I know you’re watching me. His actions were a little more careful, more staged after that.
“Yessir, and it wasn’t a pretty sight, neither.” His tongue slid across his lower lip as he loaded his brush with soap. Was it a subconscious act of concentration or deliberate? Who besides Bucky could tell?
“You have to understand, sir, I made a pledge a while back to look after my own. So when I saw him beatin’ poor Kat to death, I had to intervene.” He plucked a hair from the wig and opened his straight razor, cutting the hair to test its sharpness. He then wet his face before brushing the soap onto one side of his face.
At first, he was uncertain what to make of the smugness that stole over the man's face. Surely he was not relishing talking about how his fellow prostitute had gotten hurt so grievously? It was enough to have a frown tug at the blond's brow.
Then he happened to catch to slow, knowing smirk Bucky sent his way when he glanced over at him and the sheriff knew he hadn't been as stealthy in his surreptitious glances as he'd hoped to be. When the brunette swiped his tongue across his still rogue stained lips, Steve found himself starring once again. Realizing the danger he was in, the blond man was swamped with mortification and stubbornly tore his gaze away from the disconcerting man and glued his eyes on the note pad even as his ears started to turn pink once again.
"Alright, so you came into the room and found Mr. Keaton knocking Miss. O'Day around and then what happened? Who fired the shots, you? Was he facing you or away?" Steve switched gears from mortified Steve Rogers to Sheriff Rogers smoothly enough now that he wasn't looking at Barnes. The blond man had the feeling this wasn't Mr. Barnes's first brush with the law and would recognize the verbal trap for what it was but Steve had to try, right?
“What kind of a man do you think I am, that I would shoot a man in his back?” He intended to answer as little as possible about the gun he used, the shots he fired. To do so would risk revealing his greatest weapon.
He began to slowly, ever so carefully shave the portion of his face that was covered with soap. One stroke, two. He wiped the blade off on the handkerchief, remaining silent as he worked.
"It wouldn't be the first time such a thing had happened, Mr. Barnes." Steve pointed out evenly, and glanced up from his notepad to look at his only conscious witness to the whole affair. "So you are admitting you shot, Mr. Keaton then? And that Miss. O'Day had nothing to do with his death?"
The blond man's eyes were dispassionate as he moved to pick up the dress Bucky had left discarded on the floor. He moved as though to lay it out on the bed so it wouldn't get wrinkled but what Steve was really looking for was blood splatter across the front of the dress, thus indicating the sodomite's distance between Keaton when the shot had been fired. Steve in fact had already noted the large exit wounds on Keaton's body indicating he'd been shot from the front. There had been a six shooter close to the body that had been engraved along the stock of the barrel M.K. so it was a fair assumption that it was the late Keaton's piece.
"So what happened? You came in and he drew on you so you dropped him, is that it?"
“Well, I’ve never done nothin’ like that. ‘ve got integrity.” Said the man who cross-dressed and sold his body for a living. But he had standards, dammit, and shooting a man in the back was too low even for him. Even if the man was attacking a friend.
He gave the other man a droll look as he gathered more soap on his brush. “No. Kat had nothing to do with his death.”
And he wasn’t telling Steve anything else. Not if he could help it. Brushing soap onto the other side of his face, he looked at the blonde out of the corner of his eye. He wasn’t too bad looking, really. Better than a lot of the guys who came here. But that wasn’t why he was here. Bucky had to remember that. He was being questioned for murder, not trying to bring in a customer. Thus began the stroke of his razor. One...two…
To his credit, he didn't scoff at that ridiculous statement or the cold hard fact that Bucky was a sodomite who dressed up in women's clothing and was, in fact, a whore. Steve's mama had raised him with the mantra of 'If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all'
The sheriff definitely wasn't hard on the eyes in the least, not with his tall build and obvious muscles. When combined with his good looks, bright blond hair and blue eyes, he'd certainly caused his fair share of second looks and sighs from the female population in the city. Unlike Bucky though, he was unshaven thanks to having been dragged out of his bed at the local boarding house in the middle of the night. And wearing a faded blue shirt, dark pants and a simple black vest, he certainly looked the part of a bachelor since no self-respecting wife would have let her husband go out in the middle of the night so casually dressed.
"You didn't answer my question, Mr. Barnes." Steve reminded him quietly, looking in Bucky's direction once more.
Bucky stopped shaving for a moment, eyes squinting as if he were confused or trying to remember something. “I’m sorry, what was the question?” The question sounded sincere enough, but Bucky was just buying time.
As he covered his mouth and chin area with a layer of soap, he looked the man over again. Really looked at him instead of just a glance for the first time since he’d arrived. Alright, so “not too bad looking” was a bit of an understatement. He was tempted to offer the man a freebie, but had to remind himself again that this wasn’t the time for that. Not to mention not the person. Were he anyone but the sheriff...but he wasn’t.
He gestured to Steve’s unshaven face with his razor before starting on his upper lip. “Look like you could use a shave, yourself. You been workin’ too hard lately?” He secretly liked the look, but again, was buying time.
Dem glasses. You should not be able to look sexy in dem glasses. Curse you, Sebastian Stan!carriesashieldMay 31 2012, 01:19:14 UTC
The look Steve shot his way was long-suffering and unamused. After all, this poor man had been dragged out of his bed in the middle of the night to deal with two of his least favorite people in the world, drunks and abusive drunks.
"Did you walk in and he pulled on you so that is why you killed Keaton?" He repeated as he finished fussing with the dress and turned his attention to the room and its occupant more closely. Bucky's unexpected observation had one sandy brow shooting upwards as the first gleam of humor touched the tired man's face.
"Are you offering me a shave, Mr. Barnes?" Steve drawled a little incredulously. "And yes, shootings in the middle of the night tend to do that unfortunately. Now, if you'd just answer the question, we could all get back to bed once this nasty business is taken care of. If not, I'm afraid I'll have to escort you down to the station for your own protection. Mooney Keaton has some pretty nasty kin I've been lead to believe. I doubt you want to be here when they kind out you killed their Pa."
His brows shot upward. Another verbal trap. The man wasn’t at the top of his game-no doubt because he was tired. “Why don’tcha go home and sleep, sir? Come back in the morning. You’re not exactly doin’ your best work in your current state, if it’s not out of line to say so.”
He hissed as his blade caught his skin, leaving behind a small line of red. “Shoot. Don’t suppose you’ve got a clean handkerchief on you?” Of course, he had plenty of them right in the top drawer of his bureau. But Steve didn’t know this. And if accidental, incidental touching happened to occur in the transfer, well. It’d be accidental and incidental.
"Your concern is most touching, Mr. Barnes, but I fear duty calls." The blond man muttered to himself before sighing and reaching up to pinch the bridge of his nose. "Look, I'm not trying to get you into trouble. I genuinely believe that if you shot Mr. Keaton, you did it with the best of intentions and to keep him from killing Miss. O'Day."
He looked up when he heard the hiss of pain from the man and watched quietly for a moment as blood trickled the line of the man's upper lip. "Of course, here," That was just the kind of person Steve was, he reached into the inner pocket of his vest and crossed the room to hand Bucky the plain, white linen handkerchief.
“Thank you kindly, sir.” As he reached out to take the handkerchief, his fingers brushed against the other man’s, lingered perhaps a little bit longer than necessary, allowing the man to feel the warmth of his skin. He flashed Steve a winning smile before turning back to the mirror and holding the handkerchief to his cut.
It was hard to tell if the other man was sincere. Bucky was an expert liar and an expert manipulator, but this man had him stumped. He seemed sincere enough. The way he’d turned away while Bucky had dressed. Of course, that might have been because he’d thought Bucky was a woman. Wouldn’t be the first time it happened. Still, he was reluctant to give anything up. He turned to look at the man a good, long moment, studying him as he held that handkerchief-Steve’s handkerchief-to his lip.
"It's Rogers, actually. Steve Rogers." He wasn't one for inappropriately lingering touches with strange men, especially those who dressed in woman's clothing and no doubt sold their bodies to please some perverse clientele who apparently liked seeing men in woman's clothing. But still, that touch lingered longer than was appropriate but thankfully, the man finally withdrew his hand and flashed him a blood tinged smile that was no doubt supposed to be charming. But whose charm was somewhat lost in the fact that he had a thin film of red tinging his teeth thanks to the cut bleeding into the man's mouth.
"If you tilt you head back and apply firm pressure to the cut, it should stop bleeding quicker." The sheriff supplied helpfully, having been in more than his fair share of scrapes growing up before a strange German doctor had approached him about a once in a lifetime opportunity to help out his country and improve his frail and failing health.
He nodded. If this guy was going to tell him his name, he might as well do the same. “Bucky.” At the man’s “helpful suggestion,” Bucky’s brow quirked almost imperceptibly. “Like this?” He did as instructed, but not quite correctly. This, like everything else Bucky had done since the sheriff got here, was done on purpose.
And Steve unfortunately, didn't see the play for what it was and his brow furrowed just a little in with concern. "Not quite, you need to really put pressure on it so the blood thickens quicker against the cut.
Forgive the guy, it wasn't like he spent a lot of time around whores, especially not sodomite whores who had a predilection for women's clothing.
Bucky frowned. “Show me how?” He looked up hopefully at the other man. He may have been a sodomite whore who dressed in women’s clothing, but he was undoubtedly in control of this situation. Steve was in over his head.
Both repelled and fascinated by the industrious way the (well...what was he? A sodomite?) was wiping away first the lipstick and then the kohl lining his eyes, the blond sheriff finally tore his gaze away from the unsettling sight. He'd seen a lot in his days including a couple of sodomites in the army but this was definitely a first for him. But he had to remind himself that his business here wasn't to ask this obviously mixed up man why he was parading around in women's clothing, it was about the young Kat who was even now battling for her life.
"So, you uh--" Clearing his throat a little uncomfortably, Steve tugged at the collar of his shirt and drew out a pad to take down some notes. "You came in on the deceased assaulting Miss. O'Day?" Once more, he risked a glance over at Bucky and found himself once more fascinated by the strange sight of the odd man. It wasn't like he'd never seen another man shave before, just...never another man who wasn't quite a man, was he?
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“Yessir, and it wasn’t a pretty sight, neither.” His tongue slid across his lower lip as he loaded his brush with soap. Was it a subconscious act of concentration or deliberate? Who besides Bucky could tell?
“You have to understand, sir, I made a pledge a while back to look after my own. So when I saw him beatin’ poor Kat to death, I had to intervene.” He plucked a hair from the wig and opened his straight razor, cutting the hair to test its sharpness. He then wet his face before brushing the soap onto one side of his face.
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Then he happened to catch to slow, knowing smirk Bucky sent his way when he glanced over at him and the sheriff knew he hadn't been as stealthy in his surreptitious glances as he'd hoped to be. When the brunette swiped his tongue across his still rogue stained lips, Steve found himself starring once again. Realizing the danger he was in, the blond man was swamped with mortification and stubbornly tore his gaze away from the disconcerting man and glued his eyes on the note pad even as his ears started to turn pink once again.
"Alright, so you came into the room and found Mr. Keaton knocking Miss. O'Day around and then what happened? Who fired the shots, you? Was he facing you or away?" Steve switched gears from mortified Steve Rogers to Sheriff Rogers smoothly enough now that he wasn't looking at Barnes. The blond man had the feeling this wasn't Mr. Barnes's first brush with the law and would recognize the verbal trap for what it was but Steve had to try, right?
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He began to slowly, ever so carefully shave the portion of his face that was covered with soap. One stroke, two. He wiped the blade off on the handkerchief, remaining silent as he worked.
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The blond man's eyes were dispassionate as he moved to pick up the dress Bucky had left discarded on the floor. He moved as though to lay it out on the bed so it wouldn't get wrinkled but what Steve was really looking for was blood splatter across the front of the dress, thus indicating the sodomite's distance between Keaton when the shot had been fired. Steve in fact had already noted the large exit wounds on Keaton's body indicating he'd been shot from the front. There had been a six shooter close to the body that had been engraved along the stock of the barrel M.K. so it was a fair assumption that it was the late Keaton's piece.
"So what happened? You came in and he drew on you so you dropped him, is that it?"
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He gave the other man a droll look as he gathered more soap on his brush. “No. Kat had nothing to do with his death.”
And he wasn’t telling Steve anything else. Not if he could help it. Brushing soap onto the other side of his face, he looked at the blonde out of the corner of his eye. He wasn’t too bad looking, really. Better than a lot of the guys who came here. But that wasn’t why he was here. Bucky had to remember that. He was being questioned for murder, not trying to bring in a customer. Thus began the stroke of his razor. One...two…
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The sheriff definitely wasn't hard on the eyes in the least, not with his tall build and obvious muscles. When combined with his good looks, bright blond hair and blue eyes, he'd certainly caused his fair share of second looks and sighs from the female population in the city. Unlike Bucky though, he was unshaven thanks to having been dragged out of his bed at the local boarding house in the middle of the night. And wearing a faded blue shirt, dark pants and a simple black vest, he certainly looked the part of a bachelor since no self-respecting wife would have let her husband go out in the middle of the night so casually dressed.
"You didn't answer my question, Mr. Barnes." Steve reminded him quietly, looking in Bucky's direction once more.
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As he covered his mouth and chin area with a layer of soap, he looked the man over again. Really looked at him instead of just a glance for the first time since he’d arrived. Alright, so “not too bad looking” was a bit of an understatement. He was tempted to offer the man a freebie, but had to remind himself again that this wasn’t the time for that. Not to mention not the person. Were he anyone but the sheriff...but he wasn’t.
He gestured to Steve’s unshaven face with his razor before starting on his upper lip. “Look like you could use a shave, yourself. You been workin’ too hard lately?” He secretly liked the look, but again, was buying time.
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"Did you walk in and he pulled on you so that is why you killed Keaton?" He repeated as he finished fussing with the dress and turned his attention to the room and its occupant more closely. Bucky's unexpected observation had one sandy brow shooting upwards as the first gleam of humor touched the tired man's face.
"Are you offering me a shave, Mr. Barnes?" Steve drawled a little incredulously. "And yes, shootings in the middle of the night tend to do that unfortunately. Now, if you'd just answer the question, we could all get back to bed once this nasty business is taken care of. If not, I'm afraid I'll have to escort you down to the station for your own protection. Mooney Keaton has some pretty nasty kin I've been lead to believe. I doubt you want to be here when they kind out you killed their Pa."
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He hissed as his blade caught his skin, leaving behind a small line of red. “Shoot. Don’t suppose you’ve got a clean handkerchief on you?” Of course, he had plenty of them right in the top drawer of his bureau. But Steve didn’t know this. And if accidental, incidental touching happened to occur in the transfer, well. It’d be accidental and incidental.
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He looked up when he heard the hiss of pain from the man and watched quietly for a moment as blood trickled the line of the man's upper lip. "Of course, here," That was just the kind of person Steve was, he reached into the inner pocket of his vest and crossed the room to hand Bucky the plain, white linen handkerchief.
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It was hard to tell if the other man was sincere. Bucky was an expert liar and an expert manipulator, but this man had him stumped. He seemed sincere enough. The way he’d turned away while Bucky had dressed. Of course, that might have been because he’d thought Bucky was a woman. Wouldn’t be the first time it happened. Still, he was reluctant to give anything up. He turned to look at the man a good, long moment, studying him as he held that handkerchief-Steve’s handkerchief-to his lip.
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"If you tilt you head back and apply firm pressure to the cut, it should stop bleeding quicker." The sheriff supplied helpfully, having been in more than his fair share of scrapes growing up before a strange German doctor had approached him about a once in a lifetime opportunity to help out his country and improve his frail and failing health.
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Forgive the guy, it wasn't like he spent a lot of time around whores, especially not sodomite whores who had a predilection for women's clothing.
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