daryl dixons gf

“You said that you were gonna clean up while I was gone. There’s beer cans everywhere and the sink’s full. The trailer looks like shit.”

That’s what he was upset about? Without even meaning to, you rolled your eyes and scoffed. Daryl was about to lay into you again when you cut him off.

“The dishes are from me makin’ dinner for you. It’s in the fridge, asshole. I was just closin’ my eyes after.”

Your words made Daryl hesitate, but he wasn’t ready to admit his mistake. He was still choosing to fixate on the fact that you hadn’t picked up like you’d promised. This was out of character for him, but before you could call him out again, he snapped.

“That’s great, but it ain’t what I asked you to do. Is it that fuckin’ hard to pick up some cans and wash them dishes?”

Daryl had never spoken to you like this, and it was coming out of nowhere. You’d literally just woken up, so you were unaware of the kind of day he’d had. That didn’t excuse this behavior, though. You didn’t know how to respond, and you just stared at him. That only added to his anger and he kept going. He was meaner than a wet panther.

“Don’t look at me like that. Ain’t a monster just ‘cause I refuse to live in filth again.”

It was the last sentence that made everything click for you. Daryl was lashing out because he was being reminded of his childhood trailer. Your expression softened, and you opened your mouth to apologize, but he didn’t let you. He’d realized what he’d said, and he couldn’t handle a conversation like this. Not when he was roaring mad. His voice was quieter, but still harsh.

“I need a fuckin’ smoke.”

With that, he stormed out of the room and back out the front door. You made no effort to follow him. While he wallowed in his bitterness, you got out of bed and started cleaning the living room. There was no way for you know that he’d have this extreme of a reaction to you neglecting a chore. That didn’t negate the guilt that had settled in your stomach.

As you took care of the cans, Daryl was out on the front porch, huffing his cigarette. His free hand was white knuckling the wooden step. He took long drags and exhaled slowly, steadying his breathing without trying to. Once his muscles had relaxed, his brain spiraled again. You deserved better than him - someone who wouldn’t yell at you over something as simple as not picking up. Fuck, he’d been being a royal asshole.

Several minutes had passed when he finished the cigarette and prepared himself to go back inside. He dropped the butt in the ashtray you kept out here for him and dragged a large hand over his face. He needed to make it up to you.

Going back into the trailer, he saw that you’d thrown away all the trash and the remorse hit him like a truck. You were in the kitchen plating dinner. He cautiously went to join you when he noticed that you’d only prepared one plate. You glanced in his direction and shrugged indifferently. The hurt was clear in your voice when you spoke again.

“You eat whenever you’re ready.”

You didn’t even wait for his answer before grabbing your plate and moving to the couch. You weren’t even going to eat at the table with him? The tense atmosphere and the disruption in routine made his heart race. There was no point in arguing, though. Silently, he dished up and sat down at the table. Alone.

As Daryl examined the food, he could tell that you’d put a lot of time into it, and you’d made his favorites. You’d fried chicken and steamed collard greens. That explained the added dishes in the sink. If possible, he felt even worse about his outburst. Taking a bite of the chicken, his eyes fluttered shut, and he hummed in satisfaction. Despite the air in the home feeling suffocating, he spoke up in a much softer tone.

“This is real good, darlin’. Thank you.”

He half-expected you to ignore him, so he was surprised when you responded. You still sounded a bit upset, but your voice was devoid of any previous venom.

“You’re welcome. There are more greens in the fridge if you want ‘em.”

“Yeah? There’s turkey neck in it, right?”

In spite of the previous argument, Daryl’s question made you laugh. The only way to get him to eat anything green was to add meat. You finished your bite and smiled a little. The mood was lifting, even if it was only slightly.

“Taste it and let me know.”

“You best not be trickin’ me, woman.”

You rolled your eyes at his grumbling and watched as he finally took a bite of his collard greens. The turkey meat was visibly mixed in, but he still looked suspicious of it. As soon as he swallowed, he grinned and nodded.

“It was good.”

“Has it ever not been?”

“Not answerin’ that. That sounds like a trap.”

That comment is what fully broke the tension, and you erupted into a fit of giggles. Daryl was likely remembering the first time you cooked a meal for him and botched it. In your defense, the two of you had been teenagers. You finally pulled it together and feigned annoyance.

“Hey, that was one time. You ate that shit, too.”

“Only ate it ‘cause we were both stoned.”

He had a point. Neither of you would’ve stomached that meal if there wasn’t smoking involved. You decided to stop being stubborn and crossed the living room to sit with Daryl. He tried to look indifferent, but his eyes lit up when you sat beside him. Neither of you had brought up the argument, but he knew it was coming.

To his surprise, you kept quiet and went back to eating your food. The two of you continued in silence until you’d both cleaned your plates. Daryl went to grab the dishes when you spoke up again.

“You tryna make it up to me?’

Daryl’s cheeks flushed and shrugged. He knew you’d likely want a verbal apology, so he did his best. His voice was strained, but no longer biting.

“I’m sorry ‘bout earlier. I had a shit day at work and comin’ home to a dirty trailer pushed me over the edge.”

He paused and picked at his thumbnail for a second. Getting him to verbalize emotions was like pulling teeth. You made sure to give him your full attention and waited patiently. It took another few seconds for him to continue.

“You didn’t deserve to be spoken too like that. I was way outta line.”

“Thank you, baby. I should’ve cleaned like I said that I would.”

Unsure how to accept your apology, Daryl just nodded and got up on his feet. He gave your shoulder a soft squeeze and disappeared into the kitchen to put the dishes in the sink. When he returned, he pulled you out of your chair and started kissing your neck. You knew exactly what he was doing and you couldn’t resist teasing him.

“What’re you doin’?”

“Showin’ you how sorry I am.”

“You’re gonna have to do better than that, baby.”

That was all the incentive that Daryl needed. He grabbed your hand and lead you to the bedroom. Tonight was going to be about you and he was determined to fix things. Despite the fact that you’d accepted his apology, he was still sick to his stomach over the conflict. He was starting to spiral again when the sight of you lying on the bed broke him from his thoughts. His voice was thick with need when he groaned.

“Fuck, look at you. Where do you want me?”

“Right here.”

You gestured between your legs and Daryl immediately obliged. He got on his knees beside the bed and waited for further instruction. Your tone was slightly impatient when you spoke again.

“You plan on doin’ anythin’ or are you just gonna sit there?”

Daryl quickly corrected himself and started taking off your sweatpants. He was still moving a little slower than you’d like, but you didn’t comment on it. For now. Once they were off, and he saw that you weren’t wearing underwear, he paused again. This resulted in you tangling your hand in his dark hair and forcing his head forward.

“You scared of my pussy or somethin’?”

He blushed and quickly shook his head. You weren’t usually this rough with Daryl, but he was liking it much more than he anticipated. His words came out in a low whine.

“No, I-I just need to taste you.”

“Then do it.”

Wasting no time, Daryl hooked your legs over his shoulders and kissed from your knees up to your cunt. He flattened his tongue and lapped at your seam. His motions were slow at first, but he picked up speed when he felt your thighs squeezing the sides of his face. While he licked feverishly at your core, he mumbled apologies against your skin. Your fingers tightened in his hair, and you teased him between gasps.

“Speak up, baby. I can’t hear you.”

Daryl begrudgingly complied and momentarily pulled back to speak. His face was glistening with your essence, and he was slightly out of breath.

“I said, I’m sorry.”

“Can’t be that sorry ‘cause I haven’t come yet.”

Not wanting to upset you again, Daryl went back to work and his tongue swirled your clit. He sucked softly and kept looking up at you through dark lashes. His hands shook ever-so slightly as they anchored on your hips. He was getting worked up. You noticed this immediately and raised an eyebrow.

“You wanna come, don’t you? You don’t get to finish until I do.”

That was all the encouragement that Daryl needed, and his movements increased in intensity. He continued sucking at your clit while he slipped two fingers inside of you. They pumped in and out of your core as he worked. Praises fell from your lips as you neared that edge.

“Such a good boy. Makin’ me feel this good.”

His efforts were soon rewarded when the euphoria washed over you and you cried out. Your grip went slack in his hair and Daryl continued to guide you throughout the pleasure. He was desperate to be good for you. Being good meant that he got to find his own release. Once he knew that you were satisfied, he pulled back and wiped his damp beard. He smiled sheepishly and asked hesitantly.

“How was that? Was I good?”

It took several seconds for you to catch your breath before you nodded and found your voice. The pride in your tone was evident.

“That was real good, baby. Lay back and let me return the favor.”

Not having to be told twice, Daryl got up on the bed and laid on his back. He watched through hooded eyes as you undid his belt. You wanted to make this last, so you slowly removed his jeans. When his boxers were exposed, you were able to see the outline of his erection. You cocked your head and teasingly dragged your finger across the fabric.

“This is just from eatin’ me out?”

Your boyfriend was slightly mortified by the question and his skin flushed all the way to the tips of his ears. Daryl avoided your eyes and nodded. You grabbed his chin and directed him to face you. Your tone was thick with demand.

“Look at me and use your words. I won’t touch you if you just lie there.”

The threat of not being touched was all it took for Daryl’s throat to tighten with something akin to panic. His breathing was ragged when he frantically shook his head.

“Don’t stop. Touch me. Please.”

“That’s a good boy. Keep doin’ that. Tell me what you want, my hand or my mouth?”

Daryl took a second to think before coming to his decision. He forced himself to sound more confident than he felt, but it still came across as him begging. That was exactly what you wanted.

“Your mouth. I-I want your mouth.”

Satisfied with Daryl’s pleading, you freed his hard cock and took it into your hands. You licked the underside of his shaft and held eye contact with him. He rested a large palm on the back of your head, but he was careful not to push you. You were the one in control.

You kept your eyes locked with his and wrapped your lips around his cock. Shifting forward, you moved him deeper into your mouth and began bobbing your head. Daryl’s head lolled back against the pillow, and he let out a low whine. The sound was music to your ears. He choked out a word between his gasps.

“Please.”

You knew exactly what he was asking for and you doubled your ministrations. Your hand stroked part of Daryl’s length while your tongue circled the head of his dick. The stimulation was more than enough and the orgasm knocked the wind from him. He whined and whimpered your name as he came. You didn’t stop until your mouth was filled.

Giving him a moment to breathe, you removed him from your mouth and swallowed. Daryl wiped the sweat from his brow and gathered himself. His words were weak and slurred with exhaustion. That didn’t wipe the smile from his face, though.

“We’re good at this whole makin’ up thing.”

“Damn straight, we are.”

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The drive home always dragged.

You let out a long, exhausted sigh, fingers tightening on the wheel as the road stretched endlessly ahead. This wasn’t how the weekend was supposed to go. You were supposed to stay with your family for two more days—grit your teeth through the small talk, sit through the passive-aggressive questions about your job, your life, your choices. Smile. Nod. Pretend. But instead, you were barely a few hours in before it all fell apart.

Dinner had started fine. It always did. But then one question turned into a pointed remark, then into something sharper, something meaner. The same fight, just recycled into different words, but this time, you weren’t in the mood to swallow it down. This time, you pushed back. Voices rose, tempers flared, and before you knew it, you were grabbing your keys, shoving out the door, leaving behind the half-eaten meal and whatever thin thread was still holding the conversation together.

Now you were here—alone on the highway, miles of darkness stretching in every direction, headlights carving a path forward. 

Traffic jams bled into one another, each red taillight blurring into the next, the clock on your dash creeping past midnight. Eventually, the further you went, the emptier the roads became, until it was just you and the long-haul truckers, their rigs groaning under the weight of whatever cargo they hauled through the night.

Your eyelids grew heavier, dipping lower with every mile. You blinked hard, willing yourself awake, but exhaustion clung to you, thick and suffocating. It wasn’t just the late hour—it was the crash after the adrenaline of the fight, the weight of too many words you couldn’t take back pressing down on you.

You told yourself you’d be fine. Just another two hours to go.

Then a deafening horn shattered the quiet, and before you even realized what was happening, your tires veered across the lane. You gasped, jerking the wheel hard, the car lurching as you barely corrected in time. The highway was nearly empty, but that didn't matter—your heart was pounding, hands clammy where they gripped the steering wheel, the sudden shock of how easily that could’ve ended differently locking your breath in your throat. That was it, you knew you needed to stop, needed to pull off and find a place to get some rest before hitting the road again in the morning. 

You took the next exit, into a town that was barely a town at all, just a forgotten smear of civilization on the side of the highway. The streets were empty, the buildings slumped and decayed, as if the place had given up on itself long ago. A gas station, a diner with its ‘Open 24 Hours’ sign flickering in and out of life, and a squat little motel, its vacancy sign buzzing weakly in the dark.

Pulling into the parking lot, your headlights washed over cracked pavement and weeds pushing up through the concrete. Only a few cars were parked outside, most of them old and rusted, as if they’d been sitting there for far longer than a single night’s stay. The only light came from the neon sign overhead and the sickly yellow glow spilling from the front office window, casting shadows that felt too long, too stretched.

You swallowed, gripping the steering wheel. Something about this place felt…off. Not in an obvious way—no shattered windows, no ominous figures lurking in doorways—but in a way that made your skin crawl. Like the air itself was holding its breath, waiting. These were the kind of motels in movies where you’d scream at the protagonist: Keep driving, idiot! Find someplace else!

But there was nowhere else, and you couldn’t risk driving another hour to find the next rest stop.

It wasn’t ideal. Hell, it was probably a breeding ground for bed bugs, or worse–the kind of place where people checked in but didn’t always check out. But the thought of curling up in your car for the night, stiff and vulnerable in an empty parking lot, wasn’t much better.

All you had to do was get the key, lock the door, and make it through till morning. You’d toss your clothes the second you got home, scrub this place off your skin like it never touched you.

It was fine. It would be fine.

The fluorescent lights in the front office buzzed overhead, their hum just a little too loud in the unnatural silence. The air inside was stale, thick with the scent of something overly sweet—like someone had tried to cover up years of cigarettes and mildew with cheap air freshener.

A small bell sat on the counter. You hesitated, then tapped it once, the chime ringing out sharp and hollow.

Nothing.

You waited, shifting your weight from one foot to the other, the feeling of being watched crawling up the back of your neck despite the room being empty. Just as you were about to hit the bell again, a figure shuffled out from the back.

It was a woman, older, her expression carved from stone. Stringy hair pulled back into a loose bun, a cigarette smoldering between two fingers, her nails yellowed from years of nicotine.

“What can I do for ya?” she drawled, exhaling a long stream of smoke. It curled thick in the air, stale and cloying. You forced yourself to breathe through your nose, ignoring the burn in your throat.

“One room, please. Just for the night.”

She tapped at the ashtray on the counter, knocking the embers loose without looking. Her gaze stayed on you, too steady, too knowing, as if she was peeling you apart one layer at a time.

“You travelin’ alone, honey?”

Your spine straightened.

“No,” you said a little too quickly. “My dad’s waiting in the truck.”

She hummed, dragging another long inhale from her cigarette as her beady eyes stayed on you. Like she could tell it was a lie, no matter how sure you tried to sound.

“So, two beds?”

“Just the one is fine,” you said, tightening your fingers around your bag strap “We’ll manage.”

"Cash or card?" she asked, watching, peeling away whatever confidence you tried to have.

"Card," you murmured, fishing it out with stiff fingers.

She slid it through an ancient-looking reader, her other hand tapping the desk with the long, deliberate patience of someone who had nowhere to be. Her name tag was smeared, almost unreadable, and the glass of the front desk window was covered in a film of grime. 

She handed the card back, then a single brass key, its tag worn soft with age.

“Room one eighty,” she said, sliding it forward. “End of the lot.”

You took it quickly, fingers brushing against the cold metal.

The woman leaned back, taking another drag, her lips curling around the cigarette. “You let me know if y’all need anything, alright?”

You forced a nod, but something about her stare made your skin prickle. You turned toward the door, gripping the key so tight it pressed sharply into your palm.

Outside, the air felt too thick, like the humidity had climbed in the last few minutes, settling heavily on your skin. 

Then, you felt it again.

That thick, crawling awareness pricking at the back of your neck. That quiet, animal instinct that told you someone was watching. You turned your head before you could stop yourself.

Across the parking lot, just beyond the neon glow of the motel sign, a man stood under a broken street light. At first, he was nothing more than a dark shape, half-obscured by the flickering light, his face hidden in the deep hollows of shadow. 

He was just… standing there. Watching. 

You didn’t recognize him, and he was too far away to make out anything but his built form, the broadness of his shoulders. But there was something in the way he stood, still as stone, his body angled just slightly toward you, his gaze locked and unblinking.

The look in his eyes, dark and unreadable even from a distance, sent a shiver licking down your spine.

You turned quickly, your nerves on fire. But as you made your way down the long stretches of rooms on the outer perimeter, the railing overlooking the parking lot, you began to hear signs of life. The sounds seeped through the walls, slipping under doors and filling the narrow stretch of concrete. A bass line thrummed from somewhere nearby, muffled by thin walls as it seemed to pound with the rhythm of your heartbeat. Somewhere farther down, men shouted, their voices rising and falling, drunken or angry or both. Laughter burst out, sharp and sudden, followed by the distant clatter of something knocking against a table or a wall.

When you turned around and looked back across the parking lot, the man was suddenly gone.

TVs droned from multiple rooms, the glow of static flickering through slatted blinds. Someone had left theirs too loud, a newscaster rehashing old stories like it wasn’t the middle of the night. A couple was arguing behind one of the doors you passed, their voices biting and loud, words slamming into each other with no space to breathe. Something crashed—glass, maybe, or a chair knocking over—and you picked up your pace without realizing it.

Anywhere else, maybe it would have felt normal. Just people awake too late, passing the time, waiting for morning. Here, it only set your teeth on edge. Something about it felt wrong.

The fact that so many people were still awake at this hour made the muscles in your back pull tight. You weren’t alone here. But that didn’t mean you weren’t isolated.

Then, a heavy thump.

It came from the room to your right, sudden and jarring, loud enough to shake the thin wall between you. Your breath caught as you flinched back, your heart hammering against your ribs. There was movement, the slow creak of weight shifting, but nothing else followed. No voices, no explanation. Just silence settling too quickly, like whatever had happened had stopped the second you reacted to it.

Your feet moved faster, a reflex more than anything, carrying you down the walkway before you could think too hard about it. The numbers on the doors passed in a blur—178, 179, and finally, 180—your fingers tightening around the key as your room finally came into view. 

You fumbled once, just once, hands suddenly damp, but the second the lock turned, you pushed inside, slamming the door behind you.

The second it shut, you turned the lock.

The noises outside dulled, voices and music muffled the moment you closed the door and slumped your back against it, your chest rising and falling like you’d just run a half-marathon instead of walking across a motel lot. Your fingers curled into the fabric of your shirt, gripping at nothing, your pulse a frantic beat against your ribs.

You dragged in a breath, trying to slow the restless thrum in your veins. Just get through the next few hours, get some rest, and then you’d get the hell out of Dodge.

It was fine. It would be fine.

Except, sleep didn’t exactly come easy. You tossed and turned on top of the stiff bedspread, every shift of fabric loud in the silence, ears straining for any sudden sound beyond the walls. A door shutting, footsteps outside, voices carrying just enough to make you wonder if someone was too close to your room.

After what felt like forever, you gave up, flipping on the TV just to drown out the rest. The low murmur of late-night programming filled the room, casting weak blue light over the cracked ceiling, but it didn’t do much to settle you. You weren’t sure anything would.

The one thing you couldn’t ignore in favor of sleep, though, was the slow, gnawing ache of your stomach.

You should’ve stayed for the rest of dinner. Sat through the tense conversation, swallowed the words you wanted to throw back at them, and picked at your plate even if you had no appetite. At least then you wouldn’t be thinking about stepping outside again, not in the dead of night, not in the seediest motel you could’ve possibly stumbled across.

But the longer you lay there, the worse the hunger got.

Every motel had a vending machine, didn’t they?

You sighed, scrubbing a hand over your face, already hating where this was going.

You just had to be quick. In and out. Then you’d lock yourself in and actually try to sleep.

You knew it was wishful thinking to assume the vending machine would be easy to find. It was never that simple. You circled the building twice, passing the same cracked pavement, the same rusted-out cars, the same rooms with their curtains drawn too tight.

By the time you finally stumbled across the middle hallway, the glow of a single overhead light barely illuminating the space, you were already regretting this. The vending machine sat in the corner, humming under the flickering fluorescents, the metal frame dented, the glass fogged with fingerprints.

Your fingers hovered over the rows of snacks, barely able to focus on the choices, your body still on edge from the walk over. The motel felt alive, like every sound behind every door was something you weren’t supposed to hear.

The machine hummed under flickering light, the buttons worn down to the plastic. You fed it a couple of crumpled bills and tapped at one, then another, and waited. A loud mechanical churn. Then—nothing.

Great.

You smacked the side of it. Nothing again. Your stomach twisted painfully, a sharp reminder of just how long it had been since you’d last eaten. You sighed, rubbing a hand over your face, and turned to leave.

And that’s when you noticed it.

A door, cracked open at the very end of the hall.

The frame was splintered, like it had been forced open.

Something in your gut tensed.

You should walk away. Right now. Get back to your room, lock the door, and pretend you never saw anything. But something about it—about the stillness of it, the way the dim glow of a bedside lamp barely reached the threshold—made your feet stall.

Someone could be hurt. Or worse.

You swallowed hard, pulse in your throat as you crept closer, every instinct screaming at you that this was a bad idea. The air shifted the closer you got, thick with something you couldn’t name, something wrong.

And now that you were standing at the threshold, staring at the cracks in the doorframe, splintered from some kind of forced entry, your eyes drifted lower. Something dark and sticky was splattered on the ledge of the door, thick streaks leading onto the carpet inside.

Your heart stopped altogether. It was no longer rattling in your chest from fear, but fully frozen, skipping and halting as if trying to jumpstart itself while you stared into the dimly lit room.

At first, it was just shapes—shadows swallowing each other, the motel’s tiny lamp and the flickering TV casting everything into uneven light—warm and dark one second, sharp and cold the next. As your mind caught up to your eyes, it sharpened, the darkness peeling away, and you finally realized what you were looking at.

On the queen-sized bed in the center of the room, the bedspread was untouched, barely rumpled, except for the body laying perfectly still atop it.

Like someone had laid them there on purpose.

A mess of red had soaked deep into the fabric, fresh enough that the air was thick with it. The copper scent was overwhelming, clinging to the back of your throat, so metallic and sharp you could almost taste it. There was so much blood. More than you had ever seen in one place. Too much for it to be okay, too much for it to mean anything other than the obvious. You should have turned around. You should have stopped looking. But you couldn’t. You couldn’t do anything except stand there, heart frozen in your chest, as your brain worked double time, locking onto every detail like it needed to catalog the carnage in order to make sense of it. The body was positioned too neatly, arms at its sides, legs straight, head turned away just enough that it felt unnatural—like whoever had done this hadn’t just been brutal, but deliberate.

Your stomach clenched. The smell invaded your nose again, worse now, thick and nauseating, making something cold claw its way up your spine. You stumbled back a step, your hand flying to clamp around your mouth before you could decide whether you were about to scream or be sick. You needed to move. You needed to leave. You needed to call someone, do something, but your limbs refused to cooperate, locking up as if freezing in place would somehow make this all disappear. Your body was waiting for direction, for instinct to kick in, but it never did.

Then, the bathroom door on the other side of the room swung open, spilling yellow light into the dim space as a man stepped out.

At first, it was the fluffy pink robe that threw you off, a ridiculous contrast against the raw violence laid out before you. Your brain latched onto it, desperate for anything that made sense, anything that didn’t belong to the nightmare in front of you. But then your eyes dragged upward, and you saw it—the blood.

It was everywhere. Splattered across his throat, smeared up his neck, drying in dark, uneven streaks along his collarbone. His hand was coated in it, the thick, dried red cracked over his knuckles, like he hadn’t bothered to wash it off. Like he hadn’t cared enough to try.

Panic reared its head, shoving its way into your chest, squeezing your lungs tighter than before. It was one thing to stumble across a body, to witness a crime. It was another to look into the eyes of the man who had done it. Your body understood before your mind did—the liquid fire of adrenaline flooding through your veins, your muscles locking up in place, every nerve screaming caught, caught, caught.

His gaze locked onto you, heavy and assessing, and even from where you stood, you could tell his eyes were the deepest ocean blue you had ever seen. There was no rage in them, no madness—nothing that fit the sheer bloodshed he had left behind. He was unnervingly handsome, despite it all. Maybe because of it.

He inhaled, dragging another slow pull from his cigarette, letting the smoke curl lazily from his lips before shifting his weight, completely unconcerned.

Then, finally, he spoke.

“Well,” he muttered, voice rough and edged with disinterest as he let out a puff of smoke, “shit.”

You should have run.

You should have turned and bolted down the hallway, thrown yourself outside, screamed for help—something. But you didn’t. Your body wouldn’t listen, wouldn’t let you turn and run from the scene in front of you. Your limbs were locked in place, rooted to the motel floor like they had forgotten how to move, how to respond, how to do anything but tremble.

He seemed to notice, and flicking his cigarette, he made his way slowly toward you. He was so slow and careful it was almost predatory, like he was trying to camouflage into whatever normalcy was left in the room. Like he was trying to convince you that this was completely normal and he wasn’t some axe murderer in a pink fluffy robe.

“C’mon now,” he muttered, stepping toward you with zero hesitation, like your presence here was nothing more than an inconvenience. “Least shut the damn door.”

He moved with easy, unbothered confidence, reaching past you, pressing his palm against the motel door and nudging it inward. It swung heavy on its hinges, closing behind you with a soft, final click.

Your breath shuddered. You were really stuck here now, with him, and for some reason, the panic in your chest wasn’t flaring like before. You remained stock-still, frozen, waiting for him to make his move, to put you out of your misery for being a witness to his crime. What was his weapon of choice? Did he have a knife? A gun? Did he kill with his bare hands?

The man stepped in close, standing just in front of you now, close enough that you could see the uneven streaks of blood drying against his throat, close enough that you could smell the mix of cigarettes and sweat and something deeper layered with the metallic tang of blood. 

He didn’t say anything right away. Just looked at you, head tilting ever so slightly, like he was turning over a thought in his head, working something out.

Then he exhaled, lifting a hand—slow, deliberate, like he was giving you a second to react—and twisted a lock of your hair between his fingers.

His touch was light, but it sent a bolt of something electric straight through your spine, and yet, still, you didn’t move. You should have pulled away. You should have slapped his hand down. But your body wasn’t yours right now. It belonged to fear.

He hummed low in his throat, almost to himself, turning the strands between his fingers, studying them with an unreadable expression.

“You’re real pretty,” he muttered, almost absentmindedly, like it was a passing observation, not something meant to soothe you. His voice was low, rough, dragging over the syllables like he didn’t use them often. “What’s a pretty thing like you doin’ in a place like this?”

Your throat locked up, lungs seizing against the flood of adrenaline. You weren’t even sure if your heart was still in your chest based on the way blood was roaring in your ears, drowning out every rational thought. He was teasing. Curious. And—God—flirty?

If you didn’t know better, if you hadn’t just stepped into this room, hadn’t seen the blood, hadn’t noticed the body stretched out too perfectly on the bed—you might’ve… you might’ve…

You swallowed hard, but your throat was too dry to get any sound out. Your pulse slammed in your ears, your heartbeat betraying everything you wanted to hide. He watched you for a moment longer, then let your hair slip from his grip, rubbing his bloodstained fingers together as if testing the softness.

“You’re shakin’,” he observed, mouth pulling into something that wasn’t quite a smirk, but leaned in that direction, like your fear was interesting to him… like it was cute.

His fingers twitched then, and after a pause, he reached up again after sticking his cigarette in his mouth—this time, just barely brushing his knuckles along your jaw. The touch was fleeting, but enough to make you tense even more.

He made another small sound in the back of his throat, mock sympathy edging into it.

“Like a scared little bunny.”

You should have been running. Screaming for your life. You should have turned and bolted the second you saw the blood. Why weren’t you fucking running?

The part of you that should have been shutting down, the part of you that should have been clawing for survival, digging its heels into your fogged, terrified brain to pay fucking attention—that part of you…

It was curious about him too.

You watched as his face changed then, watching your reactions like a predator tracking in his prey, eyes narrowing as they darted around your face, reading you, piecing something together. His lips twitched like he was amused, like he had figured out something you didn’t even understand about yourself yet.

“No…” he said, pulling his hand away, head tilting slightly before his face split into a grin, pulling the cigarette out between his fingers, “you’re not scared, are you, little bunny? You like this.”

“No!” The word ripped out of you, barely a whisper at first, but then louder, cracking in the dim room around you., “No.” Your breath stuttered as you tried to sound more confident, your whole body wired too tight, but the denial felt weak even to your own ears.

“Oh, there she is,” he said, watching you closely, pleased that he had finally drawn something out of you. “You gotta name, sweetheart?”

Your lips pressed together, your jaw tight, but your eyes sharpened, taking him in, really seeing him now. His blue eyes were dangerous and beautiful and terrifying all at once, cutting through the haze of your fear like a blade. There was blood splattered up his face, drying along the sharp structure of his cheekbone, disappearing into the strands of dark hair that hung loose in his eyes. It should have made him look monstrous. It should have made him unrecognizable as anything human.

But it didn’t.

It made you want to lean forward. Your mind flashed with the idea, and you did everything you could to keep your body from following, the idea that you wanted to trace the sharp cut of his jaw, to drag your tongue over the remnants of metallic blood he had missed along his lip and—

No.

No no no no no.

The thought seared through you like an open flame. Your breath caught, your skin igniting in humiliation, a flush so deep you wanted to disappear. You couldn’t believe this. Couldn’t believe your own body, couldn’t believe the way your stomach clenched, the way something hot and ugly was overlapping the sheer horror of what this man had done. There was fear, yes—a lot of it. But there was something else crawling underneath, something just as intense, something that made your pulse skyrocket as his hand moved.

His hand pushed the cigarette into the wooden frame, the hiss of the burning end snuffing out by your head. His fingers then found the strap of your shirt, curling around the fabric, dragging it down over your shoulder with his bloodstained grip.

“No name, huh?” he murmured, watching your face, watching every shift in your expression, like he was memorizing what you looked like when you trembled. His voice was lower now, quieter, dangerous in a way that wasn’t loud or obvious, but steady and unshaken. He leaned in closer, close enough that the heat of his breath ghosted over your throat.

“That’s okay, bunny,” he muttered. “I don’t got a name either.”

Your stomach dropped.

And then, to your utter horror, he kissed your shoulder.

Not deep. Not forceful. Just the slow, deliberate press of his mouth against your skin, his lips barely parted, dragging warm and rough over the place he had just exposed.

It sent a violent shudder down your spine. The sensation—the heat of him, the quiet intimacy of it, the way he didn’t move away after, just lingered there—lit something in your chest, something sharp and unbearable. Your nipples, the traitors, hardened underneath your shirt, poking through the thin fabric that stretched across your chest. A gasp left you before you could stop it, your eyes widening in shock.

The man huffed softly against your skin, something amused in the sound.

“You like this, bunny?” His voice was slow, edged with something almost thoughtful, like he was figuring it out as he spoke. His nose brushed the side of your throat, his breath warm as he tilted his head, inhaling the scent of your perfume.

“You like a man like me takin’ advantage of just how scared you are?” His hand tightened just slightly at your shoulder, his mouth ghosting along your jaw before he murmured, “That it, bunny? You like the fear?”

His lips brushed your pulse.

“The shame?”

His fingers traced along your collarbone, the metallic tang of copper filling your nose as his hand got closer and closer to your face again.

“You turned on by a little bit of blood?”

Your breath caught in your throat, fingers curling at your sides, and you knew whatever you said next would change everything. You should have lied. You should have denied it, should have shaken your head, should have shoved him away and run before it was too late.

Your mouth parted, your chest heaving like you had just surfaced from drowning, but before you could answer, his hand snapped up, grabbing the nape of your neck, fingers lacing in your hair. His other hand suddenly gripped your jaw, forcing your face to tilt toward him.

It was fast, sudden, a flash of violence that slammed through you like a bolt of electricity, it made you gasp sharply, eyes going wide.

His grip wasn’t bruising, but it was firm, unyielding. His fingers dug into your jaw just enough that it bordered on pain, enough that you felt the quiet threat humming underneath him.

His eyes narrowed, sharp, dark, and hungry, locking onto yours like a predator seeing prey for exactly what it was. His grip tightened for a split second, his thumb dragging rough over your cheek, the dried blood flaking slightly against your skin, crumbling like dust beneath his touch.

“Say it,” he rasped, voice still calm, still steady as stone, but something inside it had changed—harder now, more dangerous.

Your body locked up, trapped between the heat of him and the cold reality of what was happening, of what had been happening for longer than just that moment.

Because it hadn’t started when you stepped into this room.

It didn’t start when you saw the blood. It didn’t even start when you heard the body hit the floor.

It started long before that.

You’d always known something was wrong with you. The way fear didn’t keep you away—it called to you, wrapped around your ribs and had you in its grip. The way you’d always looked for danger, for the spike of adrenaline that made your heart hammer against your ribs, made you feel more alive than anything else.

You could’ve stayed at your parents’ house. You could’ve forced yourself to sit through another dinner filled with questions about your future, their expectations suffocating you like a cage you were never meant to fit inside. But you didn’t.

You left in the middle of the night, peeling away from their house like something inside you was clawing to be free, chasing an impulse you hadn’t fully understood at the time.

You hadn’t stopped driving until exhaustion forced your hand. And when you pulled into this motel, when you stepped onto that cracked pavement, when you heard the distant sounds of raised voices, of something heavy hitting the ground—your pulse hadn’t stuttered in fear.

It had spiked.

And while you tried to ignore it, ignore that pull, to force yourself to sleep, you couldn’t say no to that part of you that needed to see. You’d left your room, weaving through the shadows of the motel, passing this exact door. The vending machine hadn’t been the excuse you told yourself it was. It wasn’t hunger for food that had your stomach twisting, your body restless against the scratchy motel sheets.

It was hunger to know.

To see.

To find the blood, the body, and the man who did it.

And now he was standing in front of you, looking at you like he already knew all of it. Like he’d read the answer in your dilated eyes, in the way your breath had hitched when you first saw him, in the way you were still here, still trembling under his grip but not running.

Your mouth was dry, your body refusing to move, refusing to break free of his hold. Because the worst part wasn’t that you were afraid.

The worst part was that you liked it.

You made a small, broken noise, your fingers twitching, your whole body tight as a wire as you reached up, your hands sliding around his  forearm.

“Yes,” you whispered. It was barely a sound, barely more than breath, but his eyes flickered, something shifting beneath them.

The pressure released all at once.

His grip loosened from your jaw, tracing down the side of your throat with something slower now, something more deliberate. You let your hands fall, reaching for him instead. His thumb dragged along your cheek, wiping away the remnants of old blood he had left there. His lips lingered, the warmth of them stark against your skin, a slow drag over your jaw as he exhaled. The scent of him—smoke, sweat, the faint metallic ghost of dried blood—was thick in your lungs, wrapping around you, leaving no space for anything else.

His lips barely moved as they traced your jaw again when he spoke, the words slipping against your skin, low and quiet, like they weren’t meant for the space between you but meant to sink into you, settle deep, curl around something inside you that you didn’t even have a name for.

“I know, bunny.”

It was soft, almost affectionate, but threaded with something deeper. Something knowing.

Like he had been waiting for you to admit it to yourself first.

His fingers, the ones still tangled in your hair, tightened slightly—not rough, but firm, keeping you in place, keeping you still for him. He turned your head just enough to guide you, slow, like testing a skittish animal, like making sure you wouldn’t bolt the second he took what you were already offering.

You didn’t know him. You didn’t even know his name.

And none of that mattered.

Your hands, trembling but restless, lifted before you could stop them, pressing against the warm plane of his chest, feeling the steady rise and fall beneath your palms. He was solid. Real. Your fingertips brushed against the edge of the pink robe he still hadn’t bothered to shed, the soft, ridiculous fabric clashing with the rough scrape of stubble along your throat as his mouth continued its path downward.

You felt the shift in him before you even saw it, the slight pause of his breath, the way his grip in your hair flexed before tightening further. His tongue peeked out from his mouth, tracing the vein of your artery along the column of your neck. You shuddered against him, eyes fluttering closed, and he chuckled, low and breathless against your skin, the sound of it vibrating against your pulse.

“That feel nice, sweetheart?”

You opened your eyes to look at him, and his were darker now, heavy-lidded, focused entirely on you, taking in every shuddering breath, every small twitch of your lips, the way your pupils had swallowed nearly all of your color.

Then, he kissed you.

It wasn’t soft. It wasn’t sweet. It was ravenous. Not just hungry but starved. The slow, intoxicating drag of lips and teeth and heat blurred every thought, every warning screaming in your head turning into static. You felt one of his hands skim lower, tracing the dip of your waist, fingers pressing into the thin fabric of your shirt like he was debating whether to rip it from your body or take his time peeling you open.

His mouth moved over yours like he already knew you’d open for him, like he had been waiting for it, waiting for this.

Ever since you’d joined the group—a girl they found out in Atlanta around the same time they brought Rick back—you didn’t fully fit in with anyone. People never really knew how to talk to you, and every conversation anyone overheard was always short and clipped. Maybe you were shy, or maybe still getting over something lost when the world turned upside down. But Daryl watched you—always watching, weirdly drawn to you in a way that he couldn’t figure out.

That feeling, whatever it was, twisted his stomach every time he got close. He didn’t know what it was, only that he wanted to be near you, wanted to catch even the smallest glance or word. Hell, he didn’t even need to be close; the thought of you was enough to send his stomach into knots.

After a while, he even started to wonder what it’d be like to talk to you beyond the short words you’d exchanged about ammo or food or anything survival-related. He thought about what the hell he’d even say, what you might like to talk about, but every time he tried to picture it, he went blank. His older brother wasn’t exactly the type to teach him how to talk to women; Merle had his own ways that usually ended up with people pissed off or storming off, and Daryl wasn’t about to mess this up by being like that. He’d be careful. Real careful.

One night, the fire is burning low, and everyone else has already drifted to their tents. Daryl sits by the embers, debating whether he should finally head back to his tent now that he’s alone—just him and the dying fire. It feels odd not having Merle around to tell him where to be and when. He has to figure out what he actually wants to do instead of just being in the man’s shadow. Just as he’s about to call it a night, you appear from your tent, looking restless and rubbing at your eyes. When you notice him sitting alone, you pause, then make your way over to him and sit down—not across from him but, to his horror and excitement, right beside him on the log. His stomach lurches, something strange twisting as he glances at the way the moonlight catches the curve of your thigh, making him wonder—just for a second—what your skin might feel like beneath his fingers.

You sigh beside him. “Can’t sleep,” you mutter, groaning a little as you rub the heels of your hands into your eyes. When you drop them, you give him a tired, curious look. “What’re you still doin’ out here?”

Daryl swallows, caught off guard. You’ve never really talked to him directly before, and he peels his eyes away from your thigh, feeling his cheeks burn a little when he realizes you’ve caught him staring. He shrugs, muttering something about ‘keeping watch’ under his breath.

You just nod, and he figures the conversation is over. But then, you pull a near-empty pack of cigarettes from your back pocket and slip one between your lips, flashing a faint smile to yourself.

“Look what I found today,” you say casually, shaking the box, sparking his interest as you glance at him. “Still got that lighter?” You nod toward his jeans, and his hand shoots to his pocket, rubbing his clammy fingers against the fabric before pulling out his Zippo. He holds it up, flicking the fire to life, watching your lips purse as you pull the smoke from the cigarette into your mouth, igniting the small stick. He catches the faintest scent of you, something clean—crisp apples, maybe from the soap found on the run today—despite the dirt and sweat of this life. His hand shakes slightly as the flame catches, and the tip of your cigarette glows bright.

You pull back, taking a long drag and exhaling softly through your nose. “Thanks,” you say, the word quiet, almost lazy, savoring the feeling. You hold the pack out to him, and he hesitates for a second before taking one, avoiding the brush of your fingers.

He slips the cigarette between his lips and flicks the lighter again, but this time the spark sputters out before a flame can catch. He flicks it a few more times, his hand trembling harder now under your quiet gaze. “Shit,” he mutters under his breath, trying again. Nothing.

“Here,” you say, your voice calm but amused as you gesture for him to lean in. “Hold still.”

Daryl freezes, the cigarette twitching slightly between his lips as he says, “What’re ya—”

“I won’t bite, Daryl,” you tease gently, cutting him off with a faint smirk. The way you say his name, soft and easy, sends a jolt through him, like you’ve said something far more intimate. His knees would probably buckle if he were standing, but he stays rooted to the spot, barely breathing as you scoot closer.

You bring your lit cigarette up to his, the glowing tip inches from his mouth. He leans in stiffly, his lips fidgeting as he tries to hold still, but his hands won’t stop trembling, and the two cigarettes don’t quite line up. You huff a soft laugh, shaking your head slightly.

“Hold on,” you murmur, and before he can say anything, your free hand comes up to steady his chin. His breath catches as your fingers brush against the stubble on his jaw, tilting his face just enough to keep him from moving any more. Your touch is light, careful, but it’s enough to make him go completely still, his heart hammering in his chest.

As he pulls the cigarette to life, your eyes catch his, and suddenly your hand feels like it’s on fire. You wrench it away as quickly as you can, your body leaning back with it. His gaze, still fixed on you, is wide and unguarded, staring at you like he’s seeing you for the first time. The embers of your cigarettes glow softly between you in the dark night air, catching in his wild blue irises, and for a moment, the world feels far too still.

You clear your throat, exhaling a stream of smoke. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to make you feel…” You trail off, uncertain of the right word. Uncomfortable? Creeped out?

Daryl doesn’t move. He keeps staring at you, the cigarette held tightly between his lips, as if he’s stunned. Then, he pulls in another breath, his mouth opening slightly, like he wants to say something, but nothing comes out. You catch the faintest flush rising along his neck, and you feel yourself brighten under his gaze as well.

“It’s fine,” he finally mutters, his voice rough and low, though now he’s avoiding your eyes, not quite meeting your gaze. He fumbles with the cigarette, taking another drag just to give himself something to do.

The tension between you lingers, the fire starting to die softly in the background, but neither of you speaks again. You lean back, pretending to focus on the stars, while he shifts uncomfortably beside you, his eyes darting between the fire and your profile.

Somewhere in the quiet, he exhales slowly, the smoke curling lazily in the moonlight, and though he doesn’t say it out loud, he knows he’s never going to forget the feeling of your fingers on his skin—or the way you’ve looked at him like he isn’t just another face in the group.

Daryl’s knee bounces restlessly as he tries to keep his eyes fixed on the embers of the fire in front of him. It’s too damn hard to focus with you sitting so close, your scent mingling with the smoke and pine in a way that makes his head spin. He doesn’t get why it’s so hard to sit still around you; he’s usually good at disappearing into the background, staying quiet. But with you here, just inches away, he feels like he has a spotlight on him.

“You’re quiet,” you say, your voice jolting him from his thoughts. “What’s on your mind, Dixon?”

His head jerks slightly at the sound of his name, and his lips twitch like he’s trying to come up with an answer. “Nothin’,” he mutters, glancing away quickly. “Just… thinkin’, I guess.”

You arch an eyebrow, leaning back slightly against the log. “Thinkin’ about what?”

He knows he should say something to brush you off, but his mind goes blank. The way you’re looking at him, like you’re waiting for him to crack—it makes him feel trapped and exposed all at once. Heat creeps up his neck even hotter, and he curses himself for it.

“Am I making you nervous, Daryl?” you tease, your voice soft but playful, and he hears the smirk in your tone.

He opens his mouth, then shuts it, looking down at his nails as if they might offer some kind of answer. “I just…” He pauses, breathing in sharply. “Ya make it hard to think straight.”

The words come out rough, almost like a confession he hadn’t meant to say out loud, and he feels his whole body tense, waiting for you to laugh, to pull away. But you don’t. Instead, you sit up, and he catches a faint smile on your lips.

“Yeah?” Your arms graze against each other as you lean forward, and he sucks in a sharp breath, trying to keep from shivering at the touch. “And why’s that?”

He clenches his jaw, his fingers twitching against his knee, and he’s got half a mind to just stand up and walk away, leave you here with your questions. But the other half of him is rooted in place, feeling like if he gets up and leaves, he’ll never get this chance again.

He doesn’t say anything, just shrugs and continues staring at you, his gaze flickering down to your lips for a fraction of a second before he catches himself and looks away. But in that brief glance, something shifts, and you suddenly realize…Daryl’s actually kinda… beautiful, and maybe it just took you being this close up to realize it fully. It wasn’t the obvious kind of beauty that shouts for attention—it was quieter, layered in ways that drew you in the longer you looked. The roughness of his features, the sharp angles of his jaw, and the slightly crooked bridge of his nose that was imperfectly charming. His eyes, a deep, piercing blue even in the low light, carried a depth, like he could unravel you with just one glance if he let himself.

And then there were the softer details—the curve of his lips, perpetually chapped from him always chewing them, but so inviting; the faint freckles scattered across his sun-kissed skin, like a map of every moment he’d spent under the open sky. There was a rugged cuteness in the way his hair fell across his forehead, messy and untamed, framing his face in a way that made you ache to reach out and brush it back. He was all contradictions—rough and tender, guarded and vulnerable—and somehow, that only made him more beautiful. He’s rough around the edges, sure, all grit and wary glances, but there’s something genuine about him that you haven’t seen in anyone else since the world fell apart.

Unlike the others, he’s the only one who doesn’t bristle when you’re a little short with him, the only one who just lets you be, never pushing too hard, never asking for anything. You’d caught him glancing at you more than once, his cheeks turning red as he quickly looked away, and it had left you wondering what it’d be like to close the space between you, to see if he’d keep up that quiet shyness even if you got a little closer. So far, it seems he would.

Before you feel yourself hesitate, you lean in and press your lips to his. 

Whatever had come over you in that instant, Daryl has no idea. His mind reels at how you could possibly want this from him. People didn’t look at him like that. Hell, they barely looked at him at all unless they needed something. He isn’t the kind of man anyone leaned into, let alone kissed like this.

The kiss is soft, tentative, testing, but the moment your mouth meets his, it’s like something inside him snaps. He goes still, his breath catching, and for a second, you think he might run for the hills.

But instead, he kisses you back, a little clumsy, his lips pressing against yours like he’s not sure he’s doing it right. But you don’t pull away, don’t dare laugh, and slowly, he finds himself leaning into you, his hand rising to rest lightly on your leg, the touch electrifying your core. You make a soft noise against his lips, and it sends a shiver down his spine, his fingers tightening a bit where they’re touching you.

When he finally pulls back, his mind’s spinning, like he can’t quite wrap his head around what just happened. Your eyes meet his, and there’s this soft look on your face, like you’re amused and happy all at once.

“I… uh…” He stammers, his voice rough, and he feels his face burning.

“You maybe wanna mess around?” you ask, breathless, the words slipping out before you have time to second-guess yourself. There’s a growing need deep in your belly that you can’t ignore, a heat that’s been building ever since you noticed the way his eyes kept flicking to you, his gaze soft yet uncertain.

Daryl’s cuteness catches you off guard every time you look at him—especially now, with the moonlight casting shadows across his face, highlighting the angles of his jaw, the softness in his eyes, the way he almost looks like he doesn’t know he’s handsome. 

His eyes go wide, and for a moment, he just stares at you, like he's not sure he heard you right. He is absolutely sure you can hear his heart pounding against his ribs, the blood pumping harder in his veins as his mind short circuits. His mouth opens, then shuts again, and he looks away, eyes on the ground as his brows furrow. He pulls the cigarette to his lips again, smoke sucking in between his teeth before he exhales sharply. He quickly looks back up to you, your eager, warm face still waiting for his response. 

"Uh..." He clears his throat, the tips of his ears turning red. "You... you serious?"

You can't help but smile, the shyness in his voice only making him more endearing. "Only if you want to," you murmur, letting your fingers trail over his kneecap, feeling the way he tenses under your touch. "Could be fun. Don't have to overthink it."

Your body was practically begging him to jump your bones, but he doesn’t seem to realize that. Didn’t seem to know the signs of clear hunger and want and need. Your fingers brushing his leg itched to feel more, but you kept yourself still–careful with him. 

Daryl swallows and lets out a shaky breath, his hand trembling slightly as it pushes his cigarette into the earth, snuffing it out and unsure of what to do next. His eyes dart up to yours, and there's a vulnerability there as he nods, unable to form the words.

He brings his one shaking hand up to cup your jaw, the rough pads of his hands sparking at the feeling of how soft your skin is. You smile again, leaning into his touch, gently closing the space between you while still letting him decide if he wants to continue on.

He does. God, he does. But as he looks at you, there's a flicker of hesitation as he feels the supple skin of your face under his touch, and he's afraid of what you might think if you knew the truth. That he's never had anyone like this before, never been this close, never had anyone look at him with such open want. The only thing he knows about sex is what he's seen in crude memories from Merle's old tapes, scenes filled with empty noises and rough images that look nothing like this.

Nothing like the way you're watching him, with warmth and softness, not a hint of demand.

He brushes his lips against yours, tentative, as if testing his limits. He's nervous, so unsure, but you lean in a little more, feeling his hand tremble as he holds you close, his fingers curling gently around the curve of your jaw. When you let your tongue push out to graze his top lip, he goes utterly still, a shuddering breath escaping him as his restraint crumbles. He deepens the kiss with a sudden hunger, his grip steadying, his hand anchoring you in place, and you’re not sure if it’s to keep you from pulling away or to keep him from running for the hills.

You feel his heart pounding under your hands as you bring them up to rest against his chest, the beat wild and frantic. You fist your hands into the thin fabric, trying in vain to pull him closer, even if you want to let him set the pace. His movements are unpracticed, but there's an intensity in the way he touches you, like he's pouring everything he doesn't know into this moment. You can't help but smile against his lips, his eager, clumsy attempts endearing in a way that only makes you want him more.

His hands shift, and you feel his fingers press against your waist, steadying himself as he moves closer. He's beautiful like this, his strong arms flexing with the movement, shadows tracing along his muscles under the moonlight, and the warmth of his touch sends a surge of heat pooling low in your belly.

The kiss grows more heated, messy, with tongues and teeth clashing as he grows bolder. It’s a little clumsy, but you don’t care. There’s something intoxicating about the way he’s so eager, so intent on exploring your mouth, every hesitant touch of his tongue making you melt further into him. A soft moan slips from your throat when his tongue slides against yours, the sound spilling out before you can stop it.

The noise seems to snag something in him. His breath hitches sharply, and he pulls back, his chest heaving as he struggles to catch his breath. His forehead rests against yours, warmth radiating between you, and his breaths are hot against your lips, still so close you can feel the faint tremble in him.

When he finally looks at you, pulling back just enough to meet your gaze, the sight of him sends a shiver through you. His pupils are blown wide, dark and searching, his mouth slick with shared wetness, lips parted as if he’s about to say something but can’t find the words.

But it’s you who nearly undoes him. Your flushed cheeks, your lips wet and swollen, the half-lidded haze in your eyes—he almost busts right then and there, his previous semi now throbbing from your lips connecting with his. The realization hits him like a lightning strike: he made you look like this. He made you moan. And the thought that you’re enjoying this, maybe enjoying him just as much as he’s enjoying you, leaves his head spinning even more.

Your lips curve into a lazy, teasing smile as your hand finds the nape of his neck, fingers tugging gently at the short strands of his hair. “Let’s move to your tent, yeah?” you murmur, your voice soft but full of intention.

Daryl nods enthusiastically, and without hesitation, he jumps to his feet, his eagerness on full display. For a brief moment, you’re level with his lap, and your gaze flickers to the growing bulge beneath the zipper of his jeans. The sight makes your breath hitch, heat pooling low between your legs as you glance up at him, catching his gaze. He sees where your eyes went, and for the first time tonight, something unbidden sparks in his expression—an almost bold glint as he reaches down, taking your hand and pulling you up with surprising firmness.

You’re silently grateful for the distance Daryl and Merle always kept from the others, their tents off to the side, a little more secluded. You’d still need to be quiet, but at least there’d be no direct neighbors overhearing the sounds you were sure to make.

Inside his tent, the air feels warmer, heavier with anticipation. Daryl sits down quickly, his legs splayed in front of him, uncertainty flashing across his features. He looks at you like he’s bracing himself, his hands fidgeting at his sides, unsure of what comes next. The hesitation in his gaze makes you think this might…all be new to him. You can see the way his throat works as he swallows hard, the thought of what’s about to happen clearly overwhelming him.

You don’t let him overthink it. Your heart pounds as you climb into his lap, straddling him. The heat of his body, the hard line of him pressing against your core through his jeans—it all sends a jolt of need straight through you. Your hands fly to his shoulders for balance, and he groans softly at the friction, his fingers automatically finding your waist, gripping you tightly as if to keep you from pulling away.

The first slow roll of your hips makes his breath stutter, and when you rock against him again, the friction has you both gasping. He leans forward, capturing your lips in a messy, desperate kiss. His tongue is eager, pushing into your mouth like he’s trying to memorize the taste of you, the feel of you, and you let him, your hands threading into his hair. The pull of your fingers against his scalp makes him groan, the sound muffled against your lips as his hands tighten on your waist.

When you pull back, panting, you pause the sway of your hips just long enough to reach for the hem of your shirt. Daryl watches, wide-eyed, as you pull the fabric over your head and drop it to the side. His chest heaves as he stares at you, his gaze flicking between your face and your bare skin. Even though your bra is still on, it’s enough to make his brain stop working.

He doesn’t wait. His lips are on you immediately, pressing against the valley between your breasts, the space his hands haven’t dared to touch yet. His mouth is warm, tentative but eager, as he kisses along the curve of your ribs, moving wherever the fabric of your bra doesn’t block him. When his lips find the sensitive spot at the base of your neck, just where it meets your shoulder, you grind down against him, a soft moan slipping from your lips.

“Daryl,” you whimper, your voice barely above a breath. His lips pause, hovering against your skin as he murmurs against you.

“Yeah?” His voice is a rasp, raw and hoarse, like he’s barely holding himself together.

“Please take off your clothes,” you whisper, your words trembling. You pull back slightly, giving him space, and he nods fervently, his hands fumbling to strip himself. His shirt comes off first, revealing the toned, scarred planes of his chest, and then he pushes his jeans down just far enough to free his cock, his hand fisting around himself in relief.

Your eyes drop instinctively, and when you see him, your breath catches. He’s big—almost too much—and you can’t help the way your mouth falls open, the sight making heat bloom through your body. When you finally meet his gaze again, his eyes are locked on you, dark with unspoken hunger. He doesn’t look at your face, though. His attention is fixed lower, on your chest, where your hands are already reaching behind you to unhook your bra.

“C’mere,” you beckon, laying back as you pull the rest of your clothes off. He uses one hand to push your legs apart, to settle himself between your thighs, but as he brings your legs apart, the glistening of your pussy stops him in his tracks. He’s overwhelmed with the primal instinct to bury himself in you one way or another, and he falls in a lying position between your legs, his arms wrapping around your thighs to bring your core to his mouth, his hot breath on your clenching lips. You lean up, propping yourself on your elbows as you watch him. You thought he was beautiful before but this…this view was breathtaking.

His eyes find yours, and he can’t even stop the groan that escapes him when his tongue attaches to your pussy. You throw your head back, a sigh slipping from you as he tries a lot of different menuevers, flattening his tongue and dragging it up and down, flicking it against the hole that he so badly wants to feel inside, but when he simply purses his lips and sucks on the engorged nub at the top of your folds, that’s when you fall from your elbows, and your loudest moan rocking through you. 

You can tell he’s more inexperienced than you expected, but it doesn’t matter to you, because once he got the hint, he went straight to exactly what you needed and craved. His lips were so surprisingly soft against you, his facial hair tickling the insides of your thighs as you clenched your legs around him. You rocked your hips into him, but you needed more. So much more.

You look back down at him then, your chest heaving as you bring your hand up to show him. "Please," you breathe, voice trembling with need. "Finger me–just like this." You curl a finger, then two, demonstrating the movement with a slow, deliberate ‘come-hither’ motion.

His blown-out blue eyes are locked on your hand, his breath catching before he brings his own between your legs. His fingers slip inside so easily, the hot wetness of your walls making him groan low in his throat. His cock twitches against the rough fabric of the tent underneath, but he doesn't touch himself—he's too focused on the way you react to him. When he adds another finger, curling them just as you showed him, your back arches violently, a ragged moan tearing from your throat. Your hand flies to his scalp, fingers digging into his hair, pulling as your hips buck against his mouth.

Daryl's groans grow louder, vibrating against you as his teeth graze your clit, sending shockwaves through your body. He doesn't hold back now-there's something primal in the way he devours you, the sounds he's making raw and desperate. His mouth works you relentlessly, tongue lapping and slurping at your slick heat, each growl reverberating through your core. He's losing himself in you, completely unguarded, no longer caring about keeping quiet or holding back.

The pressure building in your belly snaps all at once, and your vision floods with stars as the orgasm crashes through you. Your body locks into an arch, trembling as your jaw falls slack, a wordless cry spilling out of you. He doesn't stop, doesn't relent, even as you twitch and convulse beneath him. His mouth and fingers work you through your high, dragging every last wave of pleasure out of you until you're trembling from the overstimulation.

"O–okay, okay, okay," you gasp, your voice barely audible as you try to push him away, "you gotta stop, s’too much."

He slows his tongue, dragging his fingers out gently to settle your trembling limbs and presses soft kisses against your sensitive cunt before shifting up, laying himself over you. His arms cage you in on either side of your head, his face hovering close as his lips curve into a lazy smile. His arms tremble slightly, the strain of his own need barely contained, but he doesn't rush you. He just looks at you, drinking in the sight of what he's done to you-your flushed skin, mussed hair, and glassy, blown-out eyes. He searches your face, wondering if this was even real or if it was just a very, very vivid wet dream, and tomorrow he’d wake up to a mess in his pants.

But you lift your head just enough to capture his lips in a slow, heated kiss. He leans on one forearm beside your head, his other hand moving down to his cock, pumping it slowly, dragging the head of it through the slickness he created between your legs. The sensation pulls a soft whimper from you, your sensitive body twitching at the contact. His head falls into the crook of your neck, and you hear his breath stutter, thick and ragged, as he rubs himself against savoring the feeling. Before he follows that animal in him that needs to push into you, he picks his head up, eyes finding yours once again.

“Are—“ his voice breaks, thick with arousal but as he looks down at you, he wants to be sure. Needs to be, “are ya sure ya wanna—?”

“Daryl, if you don’t fuck me right now I might lose my goddamn mind,” you groan, your hands pulling at him in earnest.

A dark chuckle escapes him as he licks his lips and he guides himself into you, taking a moment to find your hole with his inexperienced aim. Your fingers trace over the valleys of his arms, hooking behind his head as you become impatient.

“Dare…” you whimper softly, rolling your hips in frustration as he keeps dragging the head of his cock along your folds.

Daryl’s brow furrows in concentration, his lips pressing into a tight line. You’re just about to reach down to help him when he finally catches the right angle. His breath hitches, his movements clumsy but determined as he pushes forward, the tip of his cock slipping into you.

His jaw goes slack almost instantly, a deep, shaky groan spilling from his throat. Nothing, absolutely fucking nothing he’d ever imagined—not his hand, not spit, not even the filthy images burned into his mind from Merle’s videos—could compare to this. The heat of you, the way your walls grip him, hot and wet and so perfect—it’s almost too much. His forehead drops to your shoulder, and he shudders against you as your back arches to meet him, adjusting to his size. He stays still, whether to let you adjust or to keep from losing himself, you’re not sure, but you’re grateful for the pause as your body stretches to accommodate him.

When you can’t wait any longer, you shift beneath him, rolling your hips slightly. The subtle movement makes him gasp sharply, his fingers tightening on your waist. His forehead presses harder against your shoulder, his breath ragged as he tries to keep control. He pulls back slowly, dragging his cock out of you inch by inch before pushing forward again, his thrusts tentative and uneven.

His groans are low and guttural, spilling out against your neck as he sets a slow, deliberate pace. Each movement sends sparks of pleasure shooting through you, and as you grip his shoulders tighter, he seems to take it as encouragement, his rhythm growing a little more confident with every roll of his hips. The way your body responds to him, the way you clutch at him like you don’t want him to stop—it’s overwhelming, almost too much for him to process. Your breath in his ear is hot and heavy, urging him to give you more, to go harder, faster, your begging almost throwing him off so much he nearly cums at the sound of your voice in his ear.

“Daryl, please–” you begin again, but his hand clamps over your mouth.

“Shut. Up.” he growls, squeezing his brows together, jaw tightening. The tension in his voice is raw, desperate. He’s holding on by a thread, trying to make this last, but your pleas are unraveling him too fast. In any other circumstance, you might’ve hit a man for talking to you like that. But the way Daryl is rutting into you, his movements so desperate and hungry, it only causes you to gush around him more. And it seems like he felt it, too.

“Yeah?” he breathes, “You like when I talk to you like that, you dirty whore?” he moans, guttural and breathy. You whimper against him, and he’s surprised the dirty talk even worked, only hearing it in some video he saw once. His mouth finds your neck, his teeth nipping and his lips pressing bruising kisses down your shoulder. One hand clamps tighter on your waist, his grip sure to leave marks, while his other remains firm over your mouth, stifling the moans spilling from you.

His thrusts turn harder, deeper, his hips driving into you with a roughness that has you gasping against his hand. He doesn’t realize how hard he’s biting and sucking on your skin, marking you in a way that will surely leave hickeys. You lift your hips with every push into you, his cock now overwhelmingly bottoming out into you every thrust, skin slapping and animalistic groans coming from both of you. 

When your hand drifts down between your bodies, he sits back on his heels, gripping your hips and pulling you with him to watch. His thrusts slow for a moment as his wide, awestruck eyes follow the trail of your fingers pinching your nipples, then slipping lower to rub your clit.

His jaw drops, his breath coming in sharp pants as he watches you. “Fuck,” he mutters, his voice hoarse and shaky, his pace faltering. The sight of you touching yourself while he’s inside you—while your body stretches to take him—is almost too much for him to handle. He’s never seen anything so fucking perfect, the way his cock slides in and out of you, your juices coating him as you continue to pleasure yourself. To pleasure yourself to the act of him fucking you. Him.

You pick up the pace of your fingers, circling your clit faster as his thrusts grow erratic, his control slipping. He shakes his head slightly, pulling your hand away and replacing it with his own. His rough fingers rub your clit in messy circles, and the look on his face—sweat beading on his forehead, his eyes dark and glassy with need—is enough to send you over the edge, writhing and arching and mewling in ecstasy. The way your walls tighten and flutter around him pulls a strangled sound from his throat. He stutters out one final thrust before following you, a high-pitched moan spilling from his lips as he collapses onto you. He buries his face in your neck again, his body shaking as he empties himself inside you, riding out the waves of his climax with unsteady thrusts. 

Your bodies stick together, sweat mingling as you both fight to catch your breath. He doesn’t move, his weight a comforting pressure as his lips brush lazily against your shoulder. You tilt your head, planting soft kisses along his jaw until you find his lips, kissing him gently, lazily.

“That was…” you breathe, your voice still uneven, “amazing.”

His half-hooded eyes meet yours, a small, almost bashful smile tugging at his lips. “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” you whisper, your fingers brushing through his damp hair. “Hopefully not the first and last?”

𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐭𝐬

Inexperienced Daryl ✭

Teach You ✭ pt II ✭ pt III ✭ pt IV ✭

Your Lips, My Lips ✭

Don't Scream Pt II✭

Third Time's the Charm

Dust Bowl✭

𝐫𝐞𝐪𝐮𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐬 (closed)

𝐟𝐢𝐜 𝐫𝐞𝐜𝐬

𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬

✦ Family Matters ✭ (no outbreak, brother in law!joel x tommy's wife!reader x tommy)

✦ That House in Nebraska (dark!raider!joel x reader)

✧ Paloma (retiredpornstar!rancher!joel x reader)

𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐭𝐬

The Hope of it All (jackson!joel x reader)

Fix It ✭ (jackson!joel x shy!reader)

Joel Meeting Your Parents (no outbreak, olderbf!joel x reader)

Pretty Baby ✭ (no outbreak, jaded!joel x mercurial!reader)

Somewhere I Have Never Traveled ✭ (jackson!joel x insecure!reader)

Cherry Picker ✭ (jackson!joel x virgin!reader)

Bound and Unbound ✭ (alpha!joel x omega!reader x alpha!tommy)

Sweetheart ✭ (no outbreak, neighbor!joel x pervert!reader)

The Night Has a Thousand Eyes (knight!joel au)

𝐡𝐨𝐫𝐧𝐲 𝐦𝐮𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬 & 𝐝𝐫𝐚𝐛𝐛𝐥𝐞𝐬 ✭

|| 69 || choking || breast aug || ice ice baby || taste the high life || dating young joel || just peachy || watching him

𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬

✦ Xoxo (harry castillo x socialite!reader) ✭

⤷ I'll Be Home For Christmas ✭

𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐭𝐬

quid pro quo (ted garcia x reader) ✭

divinize (obsessed!frankie morales x catholic!reader) ✭

mercury falling (marcus acacius x reader) ✭

Key: ✦ complete ✧ in progress ✭ smut

updates blog: @millermouthupdates

𝘱𝘳𝘦𝘷𝘪𝘰𝘶𝘴𝘭𝘺 𝘥𝘢𝘳𝘺𝘭𝘵𝘸𝘥𝘪𝘹𝘰𝘯

BLACK LIVES MATTER // SUPPORT UKRAINE // FREE PALESTINE // FUCK ICE // SUPPORT LEBANON

STOP THE ANTICORRUPTION OF PUBLIC MORALS ACT

I post explicit fics, so please do not follow or interact if you are a minor. However, I cannot control individual choices, and it is ultimately the responsibility of the reader to determine what content is appropriate for them.

Everything is also on Ao3 (including all deleted from masterlst)

if you see me interacting from my main blog, @plzlou it’s because this is a side blog. There are some features that side blogs don’t have, so tumblr assigns certain things to a main blog like liking posts & following. 

I post about The Walking Dead and The Last of Us. Please expect when you read for there to be canon-type violence (aka walker/infected deaths, gore, smaller character deaths, etc). I will leave warnings for anything outside of the usual realm of the show like s/a, major character deaths, extreme gore. Please read with caution if that is not something you can handle!

All moodboards & banners are made by me. Photos taken from Pinterest unless otherwise noted. I do not have a beta reader, all writing belongs to me unless specifically mentioned to be inspired by another. I do not consent to any work being copied, translated, or reposted elsewhere. I do not consent to my work being fed to AI.

And lastly, thank you so much for your love & support!! It means so much to me !!!

tik tok / twitter

being as dumb as you are leads to many dangerous situations. it’s not your fault—you couldn’t help being stupid. life was shopping, salons, boys, parties. for you, anyway.

for daryl, life was fear, anger, pain, fight, flight, freeze. find your own meal, wait for merle to come back from jail, take care of your drunk father.

that’s why this was so messy. why daryl told himself he hated you, wanted nothing to do with you. but oh god, he wanted somethin’ to do with you. to do to you. he’d always tried to be better than his roots, tried to be better than his pain. you made it impossible.

so… maybe he’d just ignore the fact that he’d come up behind you. that he’d groped your ass while he told you your car was fucked. you didn’t know any better, all the terminology went over your head.

daryl wiped his morality clean when he had you. hands all over you, insisting your car needed to be scrapped. you tried to ask why, how it could’ve happened.

“cause you’re a dumb fuckin’ whore who can’t take care of a rock, let alone a machine,” daryl growled in your ear.

he bent you over your own car, in the garage, where his boss could walk in at any moment. lifted your skirt, spanked your plump ass. you squealed, whined about not having money for a new car.

“you think i give a shit?” daryl barked. “turn around. suck my dick, maybe i’ll give ya a discount, bitch.”

you did, because of course you would. he could tell by the way you mouthed his bulge that you fucking loved cock. he didn’t praise you for doing a good job—he didn’t give you the satisfaction. he smacked your cheek with his dick, before fucking your throat without mercy. your poor makeup was ruined in minutes, and he tugged your pigtails hard enough to wreck them, using them as momentum to stretch that pretty mouth wider.

“stupid slut,” daryl snarled like a rabid dog, teeth clenched, eyes dark. “take it. whore. you love it, don’tcha? fuckin’ idiot. take my cock, bitch.”

it was sick and twisted and daryl would hate himself for it later, but right now, his balls tensed listening to your gagging and coughing.

when he filled your throat with cum, letting it dribble down your chin, he thought he’d be done. let you go.

nah. he had one more.

“fuckin’ heaven sent, doll,” he chuckled, picking you up by the hair and forcing you back over the hood of your car. “god made you ripe fer the pickin’, ain’t he? you like that? bein’ a dumb fuckin’ whore?”

you gurgled, a small whimper coming out. but daryl didn’t care if you said no. didn’t care if you said anything at all. he shoved your panties to the side and smacked your puffy cunt. he could tell you liked it, at least a little, what with how soaked you were for him.

“you tight, er no?” daryl scoffed. “bet you let everybody in here. hope you got room for another.”

without ceremony, daryl shoved himself in you. didn’t take more than five minutes, his oversensitive cock pulsing inside you. he groaned, held your head down by the back of your neck, letting your gasps and cries send him over the edge.

“fuck! ah, fuck. gonna fill this cunt. gonna get your dumbass pregnant. ‘n you’ll never fuckin’ hear from me again. gon’ be alone an’ full, like the stupid bitch y’are…”

the words came out, demented and cruel, and immensely untrue. daryl knew it in the back of his mind, but fuck, it made him cum.

he started to cum inside you, but pulled out halfway through, weak spurts landing on your ass. he smacked it again, watching his second load drip down your soft skin.

“fuckin’…. christ,” he huffed, stepping back to admire his work. he nodded, and then pulled his pants back up. “clothes on, doll. can’t let nobody see a hooker in my shop.”

You were hovering above Negan's lap, back to his chest, hands on his thighs as you danced, ass doing circles right on his face as he held on, hands on your thighs. His hands were gentle, and incredibly warm on your naked skin. They felt good and your eyes fluttered shut, feeling the music thrum in time with your heartbeat. The warm air and rays of colours drenching your body in a layer of haze, like you're swimming in a loud dream.

At some point you can't even think of anything, mind empty and feeling like you're outside of your own body. It was intoxicating, especially when you finally settle on Negan's lap, letting your whole weight rest on his strong thighs, leaning your back on his chest, his expensive crisp white cotton shirt felt like a cool balm on your hot naked back.

Slowly bending your head back, resting it on his shoulder as his hands settled on your belly, you realised he was shoving more bills in the waistband of your tiny teeny jean shorts. You try not to giggle as the fifty dollar bills tickle your skin when you arch your back and gently push your ass firmly on the bulge between his legs.

He notices, because of course he does, and grabs your chin, pulling it to face him, and your eyes blink open, eyes focusing, and when you meet his dark ones your belly flips flops and your pussy sharply throbs in anticipation. Your lips part, you breathe, and you think he may kiss you, even if it's totally against the rules.

His eyes fall to your glossy lips, and then back at up to look into your eyes.

You don't know what to say, or do, but your heart was beating fast in your chest and Negan tightens his hold on you, hands wrapped around your belly. The change in pressure sobers you a bit, and you look down at his massive hands on your skin, pinky almost brushing the inside of your thigh, too close to your crotch.

You lift your eyes, thoughts of harming him pulsing under your skin. Imagining how blood would look splattered against those cheekbones. A burst of anger rises in your chest, at this old bastard managing to somehow melt you in his hands, in the club no less. It was against everything you've taught yourself not to be, certainly not in the club and not while working.

And he was work.

He catches on to the change immediately, relaxing his hold on your belly and leaning a little in, "Hey," He speaks right against your mouth, smelling faintly of tobacco.

And like inhaling a drug, you breathe him in, shoulders relaxing.

You look away, over his shoulder, around the club until your eyes land on one of the other girls, Diana, trying to storm off, and you know she's trying to make her way out of the club.

"I'll be back," You quickly say, getting up and feeling cold all of a sudden, grabbing the dollar bills out of your shorts and shoving them in your bikini while making your way towards the other dancer.

Negan blinks, and turns to look at you leave, watching you part the crowd with ease. He runs both hands in his hair, sighing, and his eyes land on Daryl, sitting on the corner like a shadow, untouched drink sitting in front of him, "Follow her,"

Daryl gets up without a word, following the two women.

When you reach Diana, you grab her arm, "Hey, hey, what happened?"

Diana looks like she's about to cry then, she pulls, trying to free her arm but something on your face must've told her to come clean because she puts a hand to her forehead, hand shaking, "He—"

You watch her intently, waiting for her to speak.

She huffs, frustrated and you could practically smell the shame and embarrassment radiating off her, "He— He told me if I gave him a— I know it's against the rules but I did it! I did it and he said he'd give me 300 but gave me 30 and he doesn't want to—"

"What is he wearing?" You ask, breath steady in your lungs.

"Green shirt," She answers, shoulders slumping, and biting her lower lip to try and stop herself from bursting into tears.

"What room?" You ask, letting go of her arm.

"Room two—"

You turn around then, a woman on a mission, leaving her standing there.

You're vaguely aware that you're being followed by Daryl, but he's the least of your worries when there's a bastard waiting for you in one of the VIP rooms to give him a beating he'd remember for the days to come.

He's easy to spot once you barge into the VIP area that was divided into multiple smaller rooms. He's standing in front of room two, wallet in hand, trying to buy something from one of the other girls. You don't even know which one he's talking to, only that you push yourself between the two, the other woman yelling at you for disrupting them.

You don't hear anything when you're sworn at, probably called a bitch, but once you slap him across the face the woman shuts up and steps back, leaving you be.

You slapped the man so hard his wallet fell to the ground. You don't wait for him to react, so you grab his thin hair and drag his head down, kicking him in the face with your knee.

Doors slam open and there's girls coming out of them, it's starting to create a small crowd as the man tries to get his bearings, you can't tell if he's been drinking or if you've really fucked him up with your knee. He's bleeding from his nose now and you snatch his wallet, taking out all the bills he had in there. You shove them in your bra and throw the wallet to the floor.

It's in that moment that he lunges for you, trying to punch you in the stomach, but you've danced to this tune before and grab his arm, pulling him in hard enough for him to lose his balance, and with a jump and spin, you end up on his shoulders, knee locked around his neck, choking him out as he tries to crawl away.

You've never felt so alive in the club before, as if life has been breathed in you again. You can feel his slowing heartbeat against your warm skin, and you laugh when he wheezes, high pitched like a balloon. Some of the girls are gasping, shouting for someone to go call the floor manager.

The only thing that gets you to let up is the sight of Negan standing behind Daryl, staring at you with a small smirk. He looks amused and you're not sure why, that makes you relax your hold on the man that has now passed out on the floor. You gather your hands under you, about to get up when Daryl sticks his hand out.

You take it without hesitation, getting back on your high heels.

Diana pushed her way in the VIP room, staring at the man on the floor then back at you. You don't say anything, instead, you take the cash out of your bra, counting it, he only had $195 in there, so you add to it with your own earned money to make $300 and hand them to her.

The floor manager comes in, frantic and hair askew, "What the fuck, Serafim!"

You don't say anything, you're not even looking at the man, instead your eyes are fixed on Negan's while Daryl picks up the wallet from the floor and looks for an ID, once he finds it, he takes out his phone and casually takes a picture right in front of everyone.

"How did you do that?" He asks, running a hand through his hair.

No one says anything.

"How did you do that? You a fed, Serafim?" The manager squints his eyes at you, hands on his hips and the girls quiet down, stepping back a little.

"I'm not a fed, Jerry," You answer, deadpan.

"I don't even care how you did it— Why would you put your hands on a fucking customer?!" He seethes, stressed out, then looks back down at the man on the floor, "Is he even breathing?? Has anyone checked?!"

"He's breathin'," Daryl murmurs, having thrown the wallet on the unconscious man's belly.

You shrug, "He started it,"

Jerry looks at you, frustrated and stressed, "What if he talks to the cops and charges us for assault?!"

"He won't talk," Negan finally speaks and Jerry glances at him, frowning.

You reach into your bra and take out the money you've made, straightening it and folding it into a square.

"How do you know— Never mind, Serafim, go home, and you," Jerry points a finger at Negan, "Stay out of my club's business,"

"Good night," You say and turn around, your shoulder brushing past Negan's as you make your way to the changing rooms.

Negan looks back at you, his eyes landing on your ass. You can feel them there but you don't care. You don't look back.

.

.

.

"What does it mean?"

"Hm?"

"Serafim," Rick glances at you, hands in his pockets, the two of you sitting on a bench by the sea, facing a sea of yachts, each one bigger than the one next to it. "It's an odd one for a dancer's name,"

You smile then, "What do you know about strippers and their names?"

Rick cracks a small smile, "I've had my fair share of them, when I was young and stupid,"

"Hm, you should come over once in a while, there's a few girls who'd eat you right up, with the sexy cowboy look and all," That one makes him snort, the two of you knowing full well that he'd never step foot anywhere near your place of work, for safety. In case things go to shit.

"Alright, enough, what does it mean?" Rick shifts in his seat, getting a little closer, his jean clad thick thighs touching yours on the bench.

"It's the name of one rank of angels," You say and he hums. "It also means burning in Hebrew, at least that's what I was told,"

"You didn't choose it yourself?"

You shake your head.

Rick turns his head to glance at you, and when you don't say anything else he asks, "Who gave it to you?"

You could shut him down. Keep that information to yourself. But you've known him for two years now, have been part of his crew of thieves, cons and killers, and he's been nothing but reliable and a true leader with a hunger akin to yours.

So you lick your lower lip, hands clenching into fists inside your own hoodie's pockets.

"This man gave it to me. He was into poetry and literature, y'know. He said I was young and beautiful, but I was also angry. He uhm— Said I had as many faces as the Seraph's wings. I think he saw through me. He knew what I was,"

Rick stares at you for a long time, analysing your face slowly, and he looks back at the sea, the yachts and the obscene displays of wealth before his eyes, "What happened to him?"

"I killed him,"

.

.

.

You never meant for this to happen. To be so captured by a customer at the club to the point where he became your regular, and only your regular.

The bastard came to the club once, to meet up with someone, and saw you walking between the couches all slow and careful, almost lazily.

You were not even looking at any of the customers, not meeting any eyes. And he watched you make your way to one of the poles, taking the place of another dancer.

Negan watched you do your thing, twirling around the silver pole, glitter smeared on your skin and your tiny bikini top and your barely-but-not-really there shorts. And at some point he sees your face split into a small smile when the music changes, and he doesn't even recognise the melody or the lyrics, but he finds himself entranced by the way you're dancing, running your hands down shiny skin he'd like to feel for himself.

Your time on the pole doesn't last long when you had to switch with another girl, gathering the cash you made and shoving it in your pocket. You walk in front of Negan, going somewhere else when he gets up and stops you with a, "How much?"

You frown, and you're about to ignore him when your eyes scan him from head to toe, noting the expensive fabrics and the shoes and the watch. The grey hairs and those dark, green eyes.

He's handsome, but you kind of wanted to get back to the changing room and eat the crisps you had in your locker room waiting for you.

So you smile a little, looking up at him, because he was stupid tall, "For a dance?"

"For a dance," He repeats, staring at you with his eyes half lidded, he looks so amused, so endeared with your presence that it makes your stomach flip.

"A thousand,"

You're being annoying.

No one will pay that much for a dance, not even a rich man, because in your experience, those where the ones that were stingy. Especially to dancers and sex workers. For some reason they liked to haggle. You realised, years ago, it got them off, because it was a power play, they liked knowing the person who they're buying is desperate for the money. It was horrible but it was true.

Negan shoves his hand in his pocket, and takes out a black leather wallet, and hands you ten hundred-dollar bills without blinking. You accept them, the crisp notes between your fingers as you stare at him suspiciously. You don't even check the bills to see if they're fake, at this point you have enough money in the bank to last you a year and some, so you shove them in your pocket, and put a hand to his chest. You push and he lets you, walking backward into his seat until the back of his legs hit the velvet couch, he lowers himself on it, eyes fixed on you and only you.

You didn't even think of taking him out back to the VIP rooms, and you don't really want to anyway. He'll get his dance and you'll get to see what's his deal.

You throw a leg over his hip and hover above him, your hands on the back of the couch, staring down at his handsome face.

"What's your name?" He asks and your core throbs against your will.

His voice sounded even better this up close, coming from under you. It's deep, landing heavy in your guts. He sounds like he's seen some shit in his life, he sounds like a bad, bad man.

"Serafim," You answer.

He hums, caressing you up your thighs with his knuckles, ever so slowly, making you shiver, "Like the angels," He says, smiling, flashing those wolf sharp teeth at you.

"You believe in God?" You ask without thinking, looking at those sharp canines, at how they'd feel buried in your neck, or on the skin between your legs.

"I do now," He whispers, turning his head to the side and nuzzling your arm with his nose, his lips brushing against your warm skin all the while looking at you, daring you to do something about it.

You slowly raise your hands and grab his shoulders, pushing him flat against the back of the couch, "Stay still and don't touch,"

The man smiles, and heat spreads from your belly to your toes, he looks amused. His eyes were soft, like he's looking at some tiny animal, like you're being adorable. He nods, "Yes, ma'am,"

.

.

.

"Tinkerbell, get up," The officer said, keys jingling in her hands as she opens your cell. You were sat on the hard bench, head in your hands, when you looked up, very confused.

"Come on, go get your stuff," The officer urged, her shift almost over with the early morning dew setting in as the clocks hits four in the morning. You stand up, getting out of the cell and following the officer, "Who paid off my bail?"

"I don't know," The officer shrugged, walking behind her computer to type something and pull out some papers, "Sign this," She slides a clipboard in front of you. You grab a pen from the counter and sign at the bottom of the paper. The officer then hands you your duffel bag back, black in colour with a small bunny keychain hanging off it.

By the time you leave the police station, you're standing outside wearing a zip up hoodie and a pair of joggers, not even a coat to protect you from the cold weather. But you stand there, dark duffel bag hanging off your shoulder as you breathe in the cold air.

You stand there for a moment before you finally move, heading for the bus stop. That's what you were trying to do, initially, before a man decided to follow you and things went to shit. You could've ran and got into a shop until the creep left, but instead, for some fucking reason, you decided to lure the man in a dark alleyway and beat the living shit out of him with your stripper heels in your hand. You only stopped because someone called the police and that's how you ended up in a cell. You were lucky enough that a witness did see the man follow you and what you did was just self-defence. If the man decides to charge you for assault, which he probably won't considering he was a registered sex offender, you'll have to go to court.

You could've been out much sooner if not for your angsty, shitty mood. All it would've taken was one phone call to Peter, your amazing roommate, who'll bail you out with your card at home, or your floor manager at work, Jerry, who you'll just pay back as soon as you're out.

But then you spot a black Mercedes Benz parked on the other side of the street. S-Class, five seater, you can't make out the exact model but it has to be a car from this year. But you do know it's the type of car that exceeds the $100k mark on the market. It's pretty inconspicuous too, not the sort of flashy, loud cars some of the patrons at the club like to drive around in.

You panic for a second, then the panic turns to heat in your belly when someone comes out of the car, tall and familiar.

You remember you're still smeared with glitter under your clothes, your hair a mess, and you've got new scratches on your neck from that piece of shit trying to fight you off, and your skin was tacky with sweat and spilled alcohol and lotion and all sorts of liquids. You don't want him to see you. You want to go home.

Spinning around, you head straight back to the police station, but it was too late because he already saw you. He calls out your name and you ignore him, trying to pry the door open, but the thing was locked from the inside. So you knock, "Hey! Let me in!" At the lack of answer, you glance over your shoulder and see him standing there, in a black leather jacket and black jeans paired with boots. He's staring at you with his arms crossed, and he looks quite entertained, watching you embarrass yourself.

You close your eyes and take a deep breath, then step back, turning around and walking up to him. You have to face him, tell him to fuck off and leave you alone.

But when you're there, standing in front of him, you can't say anything.

You feel so shitty about everything tonight. You feel extra tired, much more than usual, but that's just because it's the week before your periods and working night is unhealthy and takes a toll on you. But also because of that bastard bothering you on your way home. You feel frustrated with yourself. You should've killed him. They'll just put him back together in the hospital and he'll be released again. You can take him to court and sue him for attempted assault or something, but you don't have that much faith in the justice system. Especially with the lack of physical evidence.

"They told me you assaulted someone," Negan says.

Of course he's the one who bailed you out.

"He followed me and tried to rape me, I didn't let him," You say, exhausted.

Negan stays silent, "He do that to you?" He points at his own neck and you know he means the scratches. You nod.

"Where's he?"

"In the hospital," You say.

Negan nods, "I'll deal with it,"

You just stare at him, your breath clouding above your head with every exhale. Negan doesn't break the eye contact when he sticks a hand out, "Give me your bag,"

You give him your duffel bag and he moves to place it in the trunk. Then he opens one of the doors at the back and waits, you get in, grateful to get out of the cold.

The car was warm, and you moaned in relief when you sat on warmed up leather. You get comfortable as Negan closes the door, and you press the little button on your door to up the heat of your seat, letting your eyes close as you rest your head on the back of your cosy seat.

Negan gets in on the other side, at the back with you, leaving the driver, Daryl, alone at the front.

"Don't blame me if I leave glitter in your car," You say, voice low and tired, turning your head to glance at the other man.

"I literally don't care," Negan chuckles, reaching to move a strand of hair away from your eye, you allow him, too tired to fight back.

"Can you take me home? I don't want my roommate to worry about me," You ask and Negan smiles at you, fond and all soft. It scares you to be honest.

"Daryl, you heard the lady," Negan says and Daryl immediately starts driving.

"And can you—" You start to say but stop to yawn big and long. Negan watches you all the while until you look at him again, "Can you make sure that man doesn't get away with it?"

Negan nods, "I said I'll deal with it, didn't I? Don't worry your pretty little head about him, alright? We're almost home,"

"Oh, okay," You mumble, eyes heavy as you almost doze off in his cosy, warm car.

And just like he said, you reached home in the blink of an eye, or maybe you did actually doze off in his car. Negan wakes you up very gently, with a big warm hand on your cheek as the wind from outside slithers under your clothes, kissing your skin and waking you up.

"Wake up, we're home," Negan says with a small satisfied smile.

You whine, unhappy at being woken up, trying to curl up on yourself to get warm again, but Negan stops you, grabbing you by the armpits and lifting you out of the car like he's done it a hundred times before. And he hasn't, not even once. He's grinning now, from one ear to the other.

"Get her bag," He nods at Daryl.

The two men walk to your apartment building, opening the door with the keys they found in your duffel. Negan walks up all the flight of stairs to your flat, and when Daryl offers to swap with him, because you're a whole limp adult woman in his arms, and they're on the fourth floor and they're not even there yet, Negan glares at him. Daryl shuts his mouth and continues following his boss with your bag hanging off one shoulder.

They unlock your door and Daryl stays outside as Negan steps inside and easily finds your bedroom. He doesn't even look around, he just places you down on your mattress and puts your bag by the door. His heart is beating fast in his chest and he wants nothing more than to tuck you in bed, but he doesn't. He looks at your peaceful form, sleeping with your mouth open, and he smiles and leaves.

"You notice how nice she gets when she's tired? Ain't that precious?" Negan says to Daryl once they're out.

Daryl blinks at his boss, "She's not being nice, she's trusting you,"

.

.

.

Negan wasn't the strip club type of guy. He never stepped a foot in one to spend the night. The only thing that made him go to one is if he was looking for someone, or meeting with another.

He thought that the whole idea of it was horribly hollow. And the music, the bodies and the look of pure lustful hunger on the customer's faces wasn't something he looked forward to. But that was before he met you.

You were gorgeous.

And that wasn't anything new, the girls had to be, but on that night, and every night he saw you working, you always looked bored until the DJ played your favourite tracks.

Negan realised you didn't even bother with approaching customers, you never did, actually. And only would give them dances if they asked. When you weren't floating through the night in the music, you were people watching, analysing them with smart eyes.

At first he thought you were an undercover agent, but a quick background check revealed not only your actual birth name, but your previous jobs and everything Negan wanted to find out. Where you were born, where you went to school, how you served in the marines and had to be discharged of your service for physically assaulting a superior. Negan had access to classified documents, to things no average person should get their hands on, and Negan was anything but average.

So you were not a fed. But a disgraced ex-soldier. A woman with no known family or relatives, not even a husband, or ex-husband.

Negan wondered then, about how you could've possibly ended up in the club. Because your records were mostly clean, a few minor fights during your time in school, and your grades were just fine, and then it all went to shit during your service, and then after that, there's no records of any other jobs you've taken, but he supposes that's to be expected for working in a strip club. It was more difficult to keep track of cash-only jobs. He knows a thing or two about that. Considering he runs an arms deal business that's highly lucrative as it was highly dangerous and illegal.

Then one day, instead of Negan coming to you, you came to him.

It was all pure luck, or perhaps faith, that he happened to be present in one of his warehouses and a customer showed up with a duffel bag full of cash and a list of things they needed, ranging from a wide selection of firearms and explosives. Negan barely interacts with his customers anymore, the business deals closed by his employees instead. And he was just passing through, about to head out when he heard your voice.

Negan thought his age must've gotten to him — he's fifty, okay?— because how in the world did he remember how your voice sounded when every time you've spoken to him it was in the club, noises muddled by the wall-shaking music? But there you were, wearing a leather jacket over a small black dress paired with some boots, hands full of a M16 assault rifle.

Negan barely registered the man standing by your side, or anything else for that matter. Only that you were standing in the middle of his warehouse, delicate, pretty hands holding one of his weapons. The sight made his dick throb in his trousers. Especially when you somehow sensed his presence and turned around, meeting his eyes with your own. You didn't react, instead you slowly raised the rifle, pointing it straight at his chest and your gorgeous lips mouthed the sound of a gunshot being fired, 'Pang!'.

Negan's never been more turned on in his life.

.

.

.

So your day job, so to say, was a criminal, a thief, a killer, and your night job, was a dancer. And it made Negan even more obsessed with you.

His pretty dark angel, who kills for cash during the day, and dances for it at night.

He just wonders what your role was in Rick's crew, were you the honeytrap? Surely a face and a body like yours had to be put to good use. But that can't be it. Your fingers were too familiar with a gun. It seemed like you knew even more than Rick, because he barely looked at their order, he handled the money as you checked every single piece of arsenal, eyes focused and fingers methodical. You were sure of yourself, confident, and the dumb part of Negan wishes you'd touch him like that one day. Like you knew every nook and cranny of his existence.

Your short, exciting encounter with him in his warehouse gave Negan the push to be more audacious with his approaches with you. As much as you liked to pretend he didn't excite you, that he was an annoying old man who wanted to get his hands on a woman half his age, you couldn't deny your attraction to him as much as it troubled you.

Negan was trouble, you knew it, smelled it the second you laid your eyes on him. But now you know him, and he knows you. You're truly two peas in a pod. Two criminals pretending to be something else. You pretend you're a woman dancing for a better life, and he pretends to be a sleazy business man looking for excitement in the middle of the night.

It doesn't take long for Negan to start throwing money at you, outside business hours no less.

And also for you to realise he was stalking you. But you didn't expect anything less from a man like him. The fact that he still had all of his fingers and his organs inside his body, just goes to show you were no better than he was. You let him. Finding it a little pathetic how much he looked and digged for you. You should be worried, perhaps. But very little scares you, especially since you realised how much violence you were capable of. You had a shitton of money saved up, thanks to Rick and his jobs, you could up and disappear from the face of the earth and Negan would never see you again. But you didn't, instead you stayed where you are, in NYC, in your shitty little flat you shared with your roommate.

"How do I look?" Your roommate asks, wearing a dark green suit that looks like it has seen better days. Clearly a hand me down, not that it was a bad thing, it just looks like it was meant for someone else, not him. The tailoring was a little off and you frowned, "Peter, tell me you have another option,"

Peter's shoulders slumped, "Do I really look that bad? It's for my post-grad job interview—"

"Okay we're going shopping, go change," You pushed yourself off the couch and started walking to your bedroom.

"I haven't got my paycheck yet," Peter says.

"I'm paying, just take that suit off, please," You sigh, leaving your bedroom door open as you slip your shorts off and put on a pair of jeans. Peter walks in the moment you take off your t-shirt, your back to him, "I don't want you to spend money on me, I can just find something at the thrift, okay?"

You slip on a cardigan, buttoned, over nothing but your bra, the V neck deep but not deep enough that it was showing your bra. You turn around, "Peter, no offence, but you're a college student who's broke as shit, you make enough to pay the bills and that's it. I get paid way more than you do delivering pizza,"

Peter flushes, "I'm fine, though, I manage—"

You walk up the younger man, putting your hands on his shoulders, "You're my friend, I like you, okay? Let me take care of you like how you take care of me. You'll graduate soon, let this be a graduation gift from me to you?"

Peter sighs, nodding, his messy brown curls falling over his eyes before he pushes them away with his fingers.

You've been living with Peter since he started school, studying on a scholarship, but he still needed a part-time job to pay for the rest of the bills his scholarship didn't cover. He was a great roommate, and you liked him. He makes you soup when you get ill, and he pretends to be your boyfriend to keep creepy men away from you, even though you're more of a danger to them than they are to you, but Peter doesn't know that. He only knows that you work as a stripper, and you're saving money by living with a roommate so you can get your own place in the future. It was half-true, considering you had enough money to buy a house, but not enough to afford the lifestyle you really want. And anyway, you liked him, he grew to become your friend. It was nice having a friend that wasn't in your criminal social circle, or affiliated with your job at the club. He was a breath of fresh air, a reminder to not let yourself go to the deep end.

Peter was kind and honest. He never made you feel bad for your lifestyle and he has never made you uncomfortable. And he happened to be cute like a puppy, so you were a little more inclined to like him.

You were by the side of the road, waving down a cab with Peter right next to you. It barely took a minute for a cab to stop for you two, you hop in. "Where to?" The driver asks.

"Hudson Yards, please," You tell the driver and Peter almost snaps his neck when he looks at you, confused.

You smile, the driver driving to your destination, and you refuse to look at Peter.

There's a little traffic as usual, the driver opening his window and shouting at a man trying to take a dump in the middle of the road, that's NYC for you. But your attention wasn't really on the traffic ahead, instead you were looking at the rear-view mirror, realising the same car has been following you for the past ten minutes. And your gut tells you it can't be coincidence.

You lean forward, "Can you pull over to the left, near the dumpsters? Just for a second,"

"Alright, lady," The man shrugs and pulls over.

Before Peter can say anything, you pat his cheek, "Stay here, I'll be back in a sec,"

"Wait—" He calls after you get out of the car and walk inside the alleyway with dumpsters on both sides. A few steps in and someone is already following you on foot, and you realise they're trying to match their footsteps to yours. At the first sight of a dark corner, you get your back to it, waiting for the person to appear. And he does, a man you've never seen before. You jump on him, slamming his back hard on the dirty concrete, knocking the breath out of his lungs. You pull your fist back, about to mess up his face when he wheezes, "Mr Smith sent me—"

"Who?" You don't know any Mr Smith.

"Negan! Negan Smith sent me!" The man covers his face with his arms, flinching.

"Oh," You lower your arms and step back.

What a doozy, you didn't even know the man had a last name, or cared enough to go find out. Yikes.

"What does he want?" You cross your arms over your chest.

The man slowly gets up, fixing up his clothes and shoving a hand inside his pocket, taking out a small envelope. You accept the plain white envelope, there's a card inside that you pull out. It's white and it has a drawing of a cherub on the cover, and instead of holding a lyre or a crossbow, it had an assault rifle. You don't know how to react, so you flip it open to be met with neat text on one side, and on the other a black Amex card. The text was handwritten in black ink. It said 'Buy yourself something pretty, and send me pictures when you're done. Please? - Negan S' And right underneath it was a mobile number. You stare at it for a while, then look up, "He could've just mailed this to my house,"

"Mr Smith instructed me to go with you and your friend to assist you and carry your bags," The man said.

"Did he also say to keep him updated throughout the whole thing?" You sigh and he nods.

"Okay, fine," You turn around and head back to Peter, who must be getting worried now at how long you've been gone.

"Wait, where are you heading?" The man calls after you.

"Hudson Yards!" You shout over your shoulder.

.

.

.

"Who's this?" Peter asks, confused, standing right in front of the mall with you and the stranger.

"Well, turns out you don't need to feel guilty about me spending my money on you today because we'll be using someone else's money." You say and Peter is even more confused now, "Who?"

"A patron," You answer simply then turn to the other man, "What's the limit?"

"There's no limit," He answers without missing a beat.

"Alright," You shrug, linking your arm with Peter's, "Should we do suits first?"

You didn't expect to have this much fun when you told Peter to get ready to go out. I mean, you knew hanging out with Peter was going to be great, but there was something thrilling knowing you were spending someone else's money. And on top of that, you found it fun to try and guess what the assistant was messaging Negan on his phone. You wondered if he was relaying something you must've said, or that you were trying on shoes yourself or looking at a wall of fancy ties to get Peter.

You could just save the phone number on the card on your phone and message him yourself, but you didn't want to give him the satisfaction just yet.

After paying for two suits for Peter, including a pair of shoes for each and ties to go with them, you started getting distracted by some high heels behind a display window.

"You should get them," Peter gently nudges your shoulder with his.

"You think?"

He scoffs, glancing at the assistant standing behind them, carrying Peter's bags. "I think they'll look nice on you, just get them on this patron's dime. He said no limit, remember?"

You smile big at Peter's words, "Yeah, exactly,"

Peter smiles big, linking his arm with yours and walking inside the shop, "What does he do, anyway?"

"He's a business man," You answer and he hums, "He's kinda weird,"

"You've never met him," You smirk, not trying to defend Negan.

"Yeah but only a weirdo will send his people to follow us because he wants you to spend his money," Peter says, the sales assistant overhearing him, her eyes widening before she quickly recovers and walks up to you two. "Welcome to our store, do you need any help today?"

"Oh, yes, I'd like to try the pumps in the display window, the black ones, please," You say and she nods, leading you to take a seat while she fetches the shoes, and another sales assistant comes over, asking you two if you'd like anything to drink.

You look at Peter, who shakes his head, trying not to laugh at the absurdity of it all. "Still water's fine, no ice," You answer, amused and Peter snorts.

.

.

.

After a whole day of spending Negan's money on clothes and pretty, shiny things for you and Peter, you end the day in a high-end restaurant for steak, the type where it has a dress code to eat in, but all it took was one phone call by Negan's employee and you and Peter were immediately welcomed in, led straight to a private room just for the two of you. The shopping bags were taken by the man to go put them in the car as you and Peter got settled, ordering whatever you wanted.

The whole dinner was spent talking and giggling over the food and the plating, but it was mostly Peter giggling and you doing the talking. Then when you were done, you left the restaurant with two unopened wine bottles for $400 and went straight for ice-cream, getting one for yourself, for Peter, and Negan's employee.

Negan's man drove you two home, with the trunk of the car, and the back of it overflowing with bags and boxes. You sat in the passenger' seat, showing the man the directions to your flat until you realised he already knew where you lived and so you give up, leaning your head against the window and closing your eyes.

Once you get home, the man carries your bags up the stairs with Peter without asking and you don't try to stop him. Instead you wait at the bottom of the stairs for him, and when he comes down, you smile, grabbing his hand, "Thank you for your help today," And place the card on his palm.

He looks down at his palm to see the card wrapped in bills.

You step back, grabbing the stair rail, about to go up, "Your tip, for today,"

He looks back at you, nodding with a polite smile, "Thank you,"

.

.

.

In your bedroom, you're laying on your back on your bed, in a stretched out t-shirt and underwear. Your shopping bags are left untouched by the wall as you stare blankly at your phone in your hand. The little card is sitting next to you on the bed, the numbers staring back at you like a challenge. You take a deep breath and save the number in your contacts, under the name 'Negan Smith'. No emojis, no nothing. You probably spent upwards of $20,000 of his money and yet, you don't believe he deserves an emoji with his name, not like Peter does. You've got him as 'Peter P 🧪🐶'

You open messages, thinking of what to send him. But you can't think of anything smart to say, so you put your phone down and reach for the bags.

It takes you less than ten minutes to choose and wear a dress and a pair of heels to go with, including a Swarovski choker for good measure. You barely do anything to your hair, and you don't bother with makeup. That's all he's getting.

You pose in front of your full length mirror in your room, the edge of your bed and bags all over the floor seen on the background. You snap two pictures, one from the front, and another from the back, with you looking over your shoulder, and you don't think before sending the two to his number.

You: [2 images attached]

You: Thank you for today

You kick off the heels and start actually putting your purchases away, picking up the bags from the floor and shoving one into another, so you can shove the lot in the recycling dumpster downstairs. Negan messages you back less than five minutes later.

Negan Smith: My money looks good on you. You look gorgeous!

Negan Smith: You're welcome. But surely you bought more than that. 😉

You roll your eyes, sitting at the edge of your bed.

You: If you want to see the rest, take me out

Negan Smith: You really want that? I was joking. You already sent me the pictures.

You: yes, I want you to take me out

You: and I don't want to be your sugar baby btw

You: btw = By the way

Negan Smith: I know what BTW stands for, smarty pants. 🙄

You: okay, just making sure lol

Negan Smith: I'm not looking for a sugar baby either.

You freeze at the words. If he's not looking for a sugar baby, then what the hell is he looking for?

You: then why do you want me?

Negan Smith: Because I do. Let's go for dinner soon. I'll message you a date and time some time next week, OK?

You: ok

Negan Smith: BTW I'm not opposed if you want to send me more pictures. 👀

You: omg you freak.

You: you've already seen me without my clothes on, why do you want pictures of me?

Negan Smith: You're beautiful and I like knowing you can kill me but choose not to.

You: does it make you feel special? Is that your fetish? girls with guns?

Negan Smith: Don't make fun of me. I'm sensitive :(

You: Pervert <3

Negan Smith: Aww you like me!

You: It's a heart emoji.

Negan Smith: From you? It's my lucky day!! 😁

You: I need to go. I'm tired

Negan Smith: I hope so, you spent $35k of my money.

You: and you let me

Negan Smith: I did.

You: Good night, Negan <3

Negan Smith: Good night, baby <3

.

.

.

Dates with Negan are surprisingly fun.

Dates. As in multiple. One for each outfit you've purchased on his dime.

First he takes you to one of the few restaurants he likes, fancy place, the kind where everything is stupid expensive and the menu is on constant rotation with the servers literally performing while serving your food. You're not a big fan of the theatrics, but you stay quiet, smiling politely as they do their thing and tell you some story about the mushrooms.

Negan isn't paying attention, instead he's watching you with a big smile. Like he's having the time of his life.

Once the servers leave, you giggle, unable to hold it in, "You did that on purpose,"

"What? What did I do?" He tilts his head to the side, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Why was my dish foggy?" You burst out laughing in the restaurant, the other patrons glancing at you as you laugh openly, almost crying. Negan soon joins you, laughing with hearts in his eyes. "It's good, though, if you ignore the fog," He grins and you laugh even harder, making even more patrons turn to give you a dirty look. You don't notice, because you're busy laughing, and because before anyone even gets the itch to complain, Negan nods at one of the employees, who full on starts telling people to mind their damn business when they call him over to complain in his ear about you laughing and disrupting their dinner.

On the next date Negan takes you to one of his favourite diners, where they serve diabetes inducing true American food. That's where you learn that he's a little of a health freak, he genuinely believes that his body is a temple that deserves to eat good, clean food. But once in a while, he loves to indulge, he's not crazy.

So both of you are dressed to the nines while enjoying a milkshake each, sitting on a booth by the window. You look incredibly out of place, too polished and fancy for the diner, but that was the deal, a date for each outfit, not matter the setting.

Negan takes you to a dog park with his dog — he has a dog! — an adorable german shepherd named Maisie. You're in your red bottoms, Alexander McQueen mini dress and GUESS bag to match in the middle of the park with dogs running amok, he's in a perfectly tailored suit and a trench coat to match. He reminds you of those stylish ads you'd see in the mall, of men in suits with Hugo Boss printed at the bottom.

He looked outrageously handsome. His hair was fluffy and swept back, black with sweeps of silver. His beard and moustache were trimmed to perfection, also containing bursts of silver hair. And worst of all, when the wind picks up just a tiny bit, his manly, pleasant perfume hits you, and worst still when he moves around you, to put his back to where the wind was coming from, shielding you from it.

The weather forecast did say it'd be warm enough, but you were still in a pretty little dress, the lengths of your legs naked. At some point Negan just puts his warm coat over your shoulders, the bottom of it dragging on the floor with your height difference.

His scent and the warmth of his body seeps into your skin like a drug, making you a little stupid. So you don't feel guilty when by the end of your little date, you bend down and give his dog a little kiss on the head. Then you grab Negan's collar, dragging him down until you're eye level and you give him a little kiss on the side of his mouth. You've never seen him smile so much before, and you get front view of his ears turning red in real time. What a sight that was.

And as the dates happen, Negan is really taking you everywhere.

He even takes you to a local high-school basketball game with some other team from outside the city. You've never seen Negan so animated before, he's hollering, getting up from his seat and cheering the loudest when your local team scores a point. You laugh, because it's funny seeing him so passionate about fourteen year olds playing basketball.

Later you find out that he's sponsoring the team. For no other reason than one of his employees' kids plays with them and Negan recognises talent when he sees it.

"They'll get into the NBA one day, I'm telling you," Negan tells you and you believe him.

And whenever the date includes food, which many of them do, you always make sure to bring some to Peter. Never to be one to leave him out of the fun. Negan thinks it's cute, but you just think it's courtesy.

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