Raging inside
She didn't hate him.
That was the problem.
She had tried and failed to hate him. In Alexandria; out there; here in the Kingdom. It didn't work for some reason. Hate started with rage, and she was furious towards him 90 percent of the time. And yet there was something about him that made things so complicated; something in his eyes that made her lower the gun every time she pointed it at his face.
She should've hated him for saving her. Instead, she found herself growing fond of him and yearning his presence from time to time. It was frustrating.
She had saved him once as well. Without asking, she had protected him from Rick and Alexandria finding out the truth. He had questioned her about it and she'd evaded him. Maybe because she didn't know why either. She was very close to finding out, though. And the answer only made her more angry.
But Morgan, he was repaying that one depth. Nothing else. He didn't care for her, and if he did, he was stupid. She had threatened to kill him more than once. A smart man would've responded the same way. Or at least kept as far away from her as possible.
When he first appeared in Alexandria he had intrigued her. And when he'd read her like an open book she'd known, instantly, that he wasn't the soft soil she had judged him as at first. He was a cave; dark inside and full of secret passages. And she'd done her best to shed some light in them, to find out what was hiding underneath. She had never asked him personally but she knew where he came from; what he'd gone through; what he'd done and been forced to do.
He'd had a child like hers. Little boy, too good for this world. Too weak to pull the trigger and defend himself. He had watched him die just like her. He had seen the monster in a person he once used to love. He had lost it like her. Lost his will to live. He had come back from it.
And now he wanted her to do the same. Would she dare defy him? Was it even worth it?
She couldn't hate him for hoping. It was endearing; foolish but sweet. He was like a child: looking at the world with big eyes full of wonder, unaware of the danger of his ways. She was incapable of hating that. Deep inside she knew she loved it. She knew she wanted to protect that vision from ever shattering in the man's head. His hope... she wanted to defend it.
He had somehow won. She was alive. And now they were both stuck together. God knew for how long.
And her feelings for him… this compassion, this fondness, this defiance and protectiveness she felt for this man she did and didn't know…
They just kept on raging inside her.