Our Gentle Sin

by Bethgreenewarriorprincess

He might be the one that wore the wings on his back, but hers were the invisible kind and the only ones that really mattered. The stitches on his leather were there, he thought, to remind him that he couldn't fly, not really. At least not without her. - Daryl and Beth's first time (Redemption Revisited) - Rated M for Mature.

My lover's got humour
She's the giggle at a funeral
Knows everybody's disapproval
I should've worshipped her sooner
If the Heavens ever did speak
She is the last true mouthpiece
Every Sunday's getting more bleak
A fresh poison each week
'We were born sick,' you heard them say it
My church offers no absolutes
She tells me 'worship in the bedroom'
The only heaven I'll be sent to
Is when I'm alone with you
I was born sick, but I love it
Command me to be well
Amen. Amen. Amen

Take me to church
I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies
I'll tell you my sins and you can sharpen your knife
Offer me that deathless death
Good God, let me give you my life

No masters or kings when the ritual begins
There is no sweeter innocence than our gentle sin
In the madness and soil of that sad earthly scene
Only then I am human
Only then I am clean
Amen. Amen. Amen - (Hozier)

He didn't know how they got to this point so quickly. At least in his mind the time had passed swiftly, though in all other aspects of their lives time passed like the slow creep of a hot summer day. He knew though if you asked Beth Greene, that she would say it took forever. He supposed if he really thought about it, they had been working up to this moment since that moonshine shack. That's where it had started for him anyway. Ever since that night he'd told her things he'd never told another soul, not even Merle, he'd been pining for her in some way, least of all like this, here in his arms, hovered on the precipice of new territory that was far scarier, far more uncertain to him than clearing a building full of walkers.

They had talked about it now. Several times. She had asked him; always having to be in the know, his Beth. It had taken him damn near a whole day to answer her question but he finally did, waiting until everyone had bed down for the night and they were left alone.

"Do you want me like that? You know, like a man wants a woman?"

It wasn't that he didn't want to answer her question right away. It was that he didn't quite know how to put into words how it was he was feeling.

It was two weeks now after he found her. She liked to argue that she'd found him, and maybe she was right. Maybe. But them finding one another again, her coming out of the woods, just her knife and a pistol with four bullets, it had been damn near a miracle. Some of the others had been downright shocked to find her in one piece, but not him. He had trained her for just such an event at her insistence.

"You won't always be there to protect me Daryl. I gotta learn how to take care of myself."

That had been months ago now, back at the beginning of all this (whatever this was). That's when he had started teaching her how to track, to hunt, to kill. He knew she had never killed another living soul, not his Beth. It's why he had drilled it in her head, you do what you have to do.

Do what you have to do to survive.

It was kind of the mantra of their group. They'd all done the worst kinds of things just to stay alive. Rick had said it on more than on occasion. And she had stayed alive. She had. Thank god or whoever the hell was up there these days. Sometimes he wondered. Sometimes he found it didn't really matter what he believed.

But he'd finally answered her question. "Well." She had breathed as he came back to their room in the lodge where they had decided to stay for the night. He went and sat down next to her and met her eyes and nodded slowly.

"I do want ya Beth." He'd baredly been able to croak out the words. He'd known before he uttered them, before he walked into the room tonight, that this was it for them.

Even though Beth was the first one to make a move, her fingers so soft, so feather-light that if hadn't watched her reach out for him he would have thought that he imagined the ghosting of her fingers over the skin of his chest, threading her fingers through the smattering of hair there. He watched her as she never let her eyes stray from where her fingers touched, as if she was absorbing him through the pads of her fingers. It was exhilarating, it was torture, it was terrifying and he felt that familiar swirl of fear in his gut. But as afraid as he was, he liked it too, this exploration of hers. She traced her fingers slowly over each plane of muscle and he marveled as much at the reverence with which she touched him as the fact that he was able to even draw breath as she did it. He scarcely felt he was breathing at all but he must be, even if the breaths he took were shallow and his lungs felt full to bursting. Or maybe that was his heart feeling like it was too tight inside his skin. He found that with her fingers on him, it was hard to distinguish where all the feeling was coming from, only that he was full and sated and wanting for more all at the same time.

He'd moved the mattress in their room in front of the fireplace and built a roaring fire from the neatly stacked wood beside the stone hearth.

No one questioned them being together. It just was. And so it was that he was sharing a room, alone, with the girl that had quite nearly stolen his breath (maybe it was always hers to take anyway. Maybe all of him was.)

The fucking world had ended, his old life was over, they had been to hell and back more times than any of them could count and here he was, Daryl Dixon, shacking up with Beth Greene.

Here they were now, a fire burning on a late March evening, the hearthstone glow casting the room in dancing shadows and painting Beth in a warm honey backdrop. She was absolutely fucking beautiful and it sucked the breath out of him sometimes to look at her. She was almost like an otherworldly being with her flaxen hair, now brushed to a fine sheen after the longest shower he'd ever seen her take. Not that he'd watched, though she had made him stay outside the door while she did, old habits dying hard and all that. He wondered idly when any of them would ever feel safe again and he concluded that they probably never would.

But now. Now he drew in a sharp breath as Beth's fingers skimmed lower, tracing the hard planes of his abdomen, splaying her fingers as she finally looked up at him and he should feel scared and unsure, but finally he felt sure. For the most part anyways. It was quite the learning curve, being intimate after a lifetime of starving yourself of such a sensation.

"You can touch me you know." She breathed, her face turned up towards his, her lower lip inviting. He felt a deep ache within him at her words.

"Don't know that I should." He knew his voice was gruff, couldn't be helped. It was true. He felt if he touched her he might shatter her, might shatter this moment, might shatter this thing between them. And if that happened, he didn't know if the pieces of him would stick back together again. It was just an unnamed powerful fucking force what he felt for Beth, as if all the life got sucked out of him while at the same time filling him back up with a heavy sweet nectar, weighting down his bones, seeping in and making him ache and want to his very marrow. It was overwhelming, intoxicating.

"You should. Do you trust me?" Beth's sweet voice had turned sultry like molasses in quicksand and he could feel her breath, warm on his neck and he might have shivered but he couldn't be sure.

He looked down at her, impossibly lost in her baby blues, and nodded. Of course he trusted her. In the space of a few months, it felt like he had sliced himself open a thousand ways and let her see in through all the cracks where all the darkest parts of him bled. But it was okay, because she was anything but squeamish, this girl, and she wasn't afraid of the darkness inside him that threatened to consume him at times. Instead, she seemed to welcome it. He thought maybe sometimes they were the perfect balance of light and dark, good and bad and maybe that's what this was. Something good to balance out all the bad around them.

He didn't know if God existed, but he knew one thing, if he did, he sent this angel to him. He might be the one that wore the wings on his back, but hers were the invisible kind and the only ones that really mattered. The stitches on his leather were there he thought to remind him that he couldn't fly, not really. At least not without her.

She knew all the ways to talk to him, soothe his soul and she knew all the ways to make him think and fight and act. She'd ignited more than one argument with him even since they'd been reunited. Most of the time it was over this very thing here; how far they could take it. How far he was willing to go before he pulled back, under the weight of his guilt. That he shouldn't be touching her. That it wasn't right for him to want the things that he wanted.

Which was everything.

He reckoned it would always be a mystery to him, something he'd never be able to figure out as long as he drew breath, why she had picked him. It just couldn't be real, that's what his mind often told him. That this wasn't real, that she wasn't real, hell that maybe even he wasn't real. Maybe this was all a damn dream and he was really back in his old life where everything stank of rot and death and decay, even though there was no such thing as walkers there.

He knew as much as he did want to dream away his old life that it was a part of him. It would always be a part of him, those sins of his old life had carried into this one and he wore them like a shroud; heavy, prickly, and damn near crippling.

Sometimes he felt like he might collapse with the weight of his past and felt he might topple over from the guilt that now, in the face of things, he was glad for what he had. Was it wrong to be glad the world ended, because you had it better now than you did before?

He needed redemption in the worst way but with no heaven, no hell and no certainty of any god, where was he to get it?

Beth climbed on his lap and straddled him where he sat propped against the back of the sofa, the mattress wedged between it and the wide heart. She moved her hands down to his and ever so slowly intertwined their fingers together, his work-worn hands sliding against her soft ones, like granite on satin. She moved their hands of one accord to her hips, dragging his flesh against hers. He remembered every inch of skin he'd ever touched on her and he'd memorized every curve of her hips where his hands now rested.

He watched, unable to take his eyes off her graceful, fluid movements as she grasped the hem of her t-shirt and pulled it over her head, leaving her breasts bared to him. It wasn't like he hadn't ever seen her tits before. He had. Plenty of times. You didn't come to live in one another's pockets for months on end and maintain any shred of modesty you had started out with. He was sure she'd seen more of him than she'd ever bargained for as well, especially during their time together before. Alone.

As she traced a line down the center of his chest with one delicate finger, her alabaster flesh so pale, so slight against his own ruddier complexion, he'd never be able to figure why she'd want to touch him, why she'd want him to touch her, but in the end he was just grateful for it. He knew he could spent a thousand nights like tonight pondering it, touching her, ghosting his fingers over her hips and tracing light lines back and forth over her skin and he'd never have the answer he desired. Not one that made sense leastways.

All at once he just had to know what the bare skin of her back felt like. His fingers moved like they had held her like this a million times before and he slid his hands around to her back, feeling her draw in breath, deeply, but slightly shuddering. She uttered a tiny gasp, pleased he thought, as he slid his palms over her delicate ribs.

He knew the Bible, it might be the only thing his dear departed mama ever taught him was the ways of the word of god. He remembered hearing what it said about the body being a temple. He figured that was what Beth was. She was a temple and his fingers were tiptoeing their way around her like arranging candles on a shrine.

It felt as if his very fingertips had been lit with fire because they suddenly seemed to move as if a fuse had been lit, wanting to burn their way all over her body like a brand. He slid his hands slowly down her back, working his fingers side to side a bit to slide their way under the waistband of her sweat pants, pressing in a bit more at the top of her ass before sliding down to cup her flesh, so firm, so supple beneath his touch.

He felt her answering moan, feeling the hot puff of breath at the hollow of his throat and it incited a rush of chills all over his body. He didn't even think about the fact that his fingers had never strayed below the waist. Not before now. He also didn't think about the fact that this was new territory.

It was as if once he entered the temple, this sacred ground, he was helpless to cross the threshold. Now, here he was, undressing Beth Greene, slowly, her hips writhing a bit under his fingers, impatient for him to finish this. To start this. He wasn't sure what it as, all he knew was as he looked down at her, he was lost, his eyes feeling heavier than they'd ever felt with any drug Merle had once talked him into shooting into his veins.

As if she was sensing his thoughts she whispered, her voice hoarse, almost strained. "Need to take these off." Her fingers went to the fly of his pants. Within a few seconds, they had, together, worked his pants and his boxers from his body, leaving him bare, his cock traitorously throbbing between them as they were laid out side by side, limbs intertwined and his gaze locked on hers.

He hadn't even realized how turned on he was until this moment. Hadn't realized how much he wanted her, desired her, and wanted to give himself to her. He knew he'd really given her his body long ago, had bent the knee on that field as he looked her ankle over and vowed that no harm would come to her again.

Now he pledged his fealty, but in a completely different way. Now, completely armor-less yet clad with a strength he barely even recognized, he pulled her into his arms as if they had always been thus. He knew with every pore of his being he wanted to give himself to her, to do with as she so chose. Hell he knew he'd give his life for her, why not his body and soul too. Might hurt less to look at her that way.

He let his eyes slide over her again, her lithe form so impossibly small but curved in all the places that mattered, in all the places that begged for him to touch, caress and shape himself to. He wanted to pour himself into her from the inner well of all he felt that just never seemed to run dry, no matter how much he thought about her, no matter how much he held her in his arms.

He looked back up at her and met her gaze and those pale blue eyes were leveled on him, just like they always were. Her expression was open, searching and he was lost all over again because for the first time he saw himself so clearly in her own eyes. He saw her faith in him, saw her trust. Saw everything he felt for her and she felt the same. He looked at her and wanted to weep with the sudden realization that came over him and he couldn't believe it took him this long to figure it all out.

"Love." It came out as a gasp and he got choked on that one word that was ripped from his throat with the force of his emotion. Love was not an easy word, that elusive one meant for other people. Not for him.

"I was nobody. Nothin'."

He couldn't say it and he looked at her helplessly.

Beth took one look at him and immediately began to croon to him. "Shhh, Daryl, it's okay." She always knew what to fucking say. But he was helpless then and the sob that was torn from his throat by the sheer force of the realization that he loved her was guttural. He buried his face in her chest, great hiccupping sobs pouring from him. He didn't know if he cried from relief of the feeling or relief of the realization, all he knew was that it was indeed the sweetest oasis and that well of feeling he was certain would run dry, still hadn't.

He knew this was about the least manly thing a person could do was break down and cry on a girl but it's exactly what he did. Daryl Dixon cried into the naked bosom of Beth Greene and he wasn't even ashamed because somehow he felt like he'd been bled of all the bad, stripped raw and bleeding, but somehow healed.

Somehow in loving her, he'd found it. He'd found the redemption that he had never knew he needed, that he didn't think he deserved. It wouldn't do now to keep it from her another second. She deserved to know. Even if he was afraid, she needed to know it. "I love ya Beth." The words tumbled out of his mouth on top of one another and he barely recognized his own voice, so raw, so pulled out of him, like it had been waiting there all along to come forth.

"I love you too, Daryl. I love you too." Beth whispered, nodding at him solemnly, tears bright and shining in her own eyes as she put her hand on either side of his face, her palms so soft on his hardened jaw and she smiled at him. "I know you do. I've always known." She brought her lips to his and he could taste their tears, intermingled, just like the rest of them, as if they were one and suddenly the one thing that she'd been asking of him and he'd been unable to give was something he desired more than anything. He needed to have her, to claim her, to worship her, revere her.

Become one with her. Finally and completely.

As much as he wanted to take her, just take her, he wanted to give to her as well. He'd sacrifice his soul to give her what she deserved. Which was the same thing he desired from her. Everything.

He pulled his lips from hers even as he moved his hands from his safety net position, her hips, and pressed his palms against her skin as he glided his hands upwards, coming to rest on her breasts. She moaned and gasped as he pulled his hands away slightly to brush the pads of his thumbs over her hardened nipples.

In scarcely a moment's space, he dipped his head and took one nipple in his mouth, drawing the pert bud between his teeth ever so slightly, scraping against the firm flesh, drawing a hiss from her as he suckled and kneaded her other breast with his hand. He ran the flat of his tongue over her nipple tracing an imaginary wavy line with the tip over to her other breast, laving her with his tongue, teasing the pert buds, and repeating the whole process again on the other side. Her hands were wrapped around what she could grasp of his hair, pulling her to him as if she couldn't get close enough and he thought he knew exactly how she felt.

He had a sudden desire to see her lying completely naked beneath him, needed it like he needed air and he had the brief thought that it was the probably one of the most natural human responses to have, predator to prey or worshipper to goddess, it didn't matter, the result was the same. Just to look upon her countenance, fully and as God intended between a man and a woman. For surely, in this life and this land that God had seemingly already forsaken, it could not be a sin. Not something this good. And certainly not with someone as good as her. As innocent. And though he was anything but that, he knew there was innocence in what they were about to do together.

He laid her down gently on the bed and she peered up at him, watching him, her eyes turned to curious pools of lust. It was if she was drinking in every moment. "I love ya, Beth". He just felt the need to tell her again, and she echoed it in a breathless whisper as she watched him take her in, her skin all milk and honey in the glow of the fire, each curve deliciously licked by the dancing shadows.

Daryl meant to follow the path the fire traced with a fire all his own, starting with his lips and he lowered them to her hips, pressing his mouth to that curve, that perfect dip between her hip bone and the gentle swell of her thigh. She pulled her legs up slightly and she reached down to thread her fingers through his hair. He ghosted his lips over every surface of her petal-soft skin, stopping along the way to kiss her nipples and then traveling upward before resting on her mouth again, where she sighed, breathless beneath him.

He flitted his tongue out tracing the seam of her lips until felt her open her mouth, ready, waiting, accepting his tongue, giving and taking. He skimmed his fingers down lower to the perfect flat of her belly, hovering there and pulled back to look at her at the same time and he tilted his head. She pulled her eyes up to his and met his gaze, and time itself seemed to suspend in that moment. He saw the raw desire reflected back in her eyes, the unabashed want raked him over with their blackened orbs and suddenly he didn't feel the need to ask. Permission to touch her this way; it was implied as he dipped his hand down, his fingers seeking to part her wet folds, even as she spread her legs wide for him, just for him, and he slipped his fingers into her wetness.

He groaned at the slick velvet feel of her sliding against his fingers. "Jesus, girl." Her heat was dripping wet and it was all for him. He didn't even think about the full implications of what he was doing as he brought his fingers to his lips, watching her eyelids drop even lower and her mouth followed suit, her breath coming in pants as she watched him lick every single drop of her juices from his fingers, her tangy, musky taste sending a fresh jolt straight to his groin. Later, he vowed to taste her properly.

With a growl he didn't even recognize, he placed his hand back to her heat, pushing one finger inside her, slowly, and watched her head fall back again, and her mouth drop open, her soft moan floating out between them. He flicked his finger inside her slightly, sliding against the smooth and finding the rough, crooking his finger back and forth. He knew it must feel good, and therefore he was doing it right, when her hips started coming up off the bed, meeting his thrusts, and her fingers had come to close around his wrist, maybe to hold him there, maybe just to hold on, because then he felt her start to tremble as he continued what he was doing like it was something he did every day.

He reached one hand behind her head, wove his fingers through her silken locks and pulled her head to his, making her taste herself on his mouth. She groaned into his kiss and he swallowed her cry as she came apart beneath his fingers. He was torn in that moment between wanting to kiss her through it and wanting to see her in all her rapturous pleasure.

In the end, he broke the kiss, and pulled back to watch her, her breath coming in short raspy pants and she was much quieter than he imagined she would be (because yes by this point he had imagined it plenty of times). Her cheeks appeared flushed in the firelight, mouth pinkened and plumped and kiss-scorched from his own lips against hers and he found that he liked it.

He liked it very much.

She looked as if she had been well and truly fucked and they hadn't even gotten there yet. He knew watching her come out of her orgasmic haze that she would likely be the death of him, her being a mere 19 years old and he being an old as dirt redneck, but it'd be a death he'd gladly welcome.

He positioned his body over hers and looked down on her as he braced himself. She spread her legs wide leaving herself open to his lust-starved eyes. And it shouldn't have come to mind to ask. It should be obvious that this is where this is going. That he was indeed going to put himself inside of Beth Greene and he was going to make love to her. And still he felt compelled to ask. Because it's who he was. Because it's who she was.

"Is this okay?" He was asking more than how his arms were positioned or whether he was holding his body weight off of her enough. He was asking if it was finally okay for them to do this, to go there. Because he knew once they did, there would be no turning back. But maybe there hadn't ever been. Maybe this was what it was always going to be. The last man standing and the prettiest girl he'd ever seen, loving each other to the end. Wherever that might be, beyond these four walls or anywhere else in this godforsaken world. Within her arms would always be his choice. His fate.

And she knew, fuck she knew it. She knew it like she always knew everything else, just by looking at him. He knew he only showed this side to her and that no one else in the whole entire universe would ever see this side of him; he knew it was because it only existed in her presence.

She nodded at him fervently. "Yes, Daryl. It's more than okay. I want this. With you." He knew she was a virgin, it was one of her go-to's for convincing him to take the very step they were taking now; that she didn't want to die a virgin.

"We may as well do somethin'."

She placed her hands on his chest as he reached between them, grasping his painfully hard cock in his hand and guiding it to her center. He ran the head of his dick up and down her slick folds, lubricating it for easier passage. He didn't want to hurt her, but knew she would likely feel it a little. He dragged his cock back towards her opening, slowly easing himself into her, stopping every second along the way and it was aching and maddening, the tightness enveloping his cock, exquisite pressure and pleasure. As he pressed forward and met that unmistakable barrier, he leaned down and pressed his lips to Beth's as he pushed through, feeling her gasp a little into his mouth and he instantly stilled his hips. And though it was torture, he'd wait there an eternity if it meant easing her discomfort.

He kissed her slowly, languidly, sucking her bottom lip into his mouth. He pulled back to look at her for a moment. She nodded at him and she wiggled her hips beneath him. He experimentally pulled his hips back and she stopped moving and groaned and then moaned as he slid himself back inside her again. He repeated this a few times until his rhythm found purchase and she brought her hands up around his neck as he held himself off of her. She was so unbelievably tight he didn't know how long he could last.

He dipped his head low, pressing his lips to hers, shakily, barely holding it together, his desire thrumming through every pore in his body. He pulled back again and looked into her eyes as he pushed back into her again. "I love you." He whispered, again an offering, giving her his all, burying himself into her, burrowing his very soul into all the safeness of her.

"I love you." She whispered back and she began to move her hips in earnest, meeting his thrusts and he gathered her up in his arms as she started to tremble. The changed angle had her panting his name after a few seconds and he felt her second orgasm coming all around him. Suddenly it was too, too much, her inner walls squeezing his cock.

It was seconds later when he followed her over that edge, spiraling out of control and she pulled her hands from around his neck to cup his face in her palms. He looked into her eyes as long as he could until he was pulled under by the weight of his release, spinning, spinning until he was sated. It might have been seconds, minutes or hours when he pulled himself from her, and feeling the absence of her warmth made him unbelievably sad and he pulled her into his arms, burying his face in her hair, breathing her in, intoxicated on her scent, on their scent; sex minced with a hunter's prowess and an angel's stardust.

He laid back and she leaned up on one elbow, smiling at him lazily. "Now that wasn't so bad was it?" She was looking very pleased with herself.

He smirked, not wanting her to see how right she was but unable to hide how happy he was that he had finally been able to get to this point. To this point where all this made sense to him and didn't feel like such a mind-fuck that numbed everything he tried to feel. Somewhere between them escaping the prison together to where she found her way back to his side, he'd been letting go of the past and he didn't even realize it for what it was. A purging of his old self and the ache of his past to a future. With her. Somewhere in this fragmented space of time he had let go of any preconceived notions about him and Beth and what they meant to each other. Now they just were.

He cleared his throat, finally finding his voice. "Just cause you ain't gotta die a virgin, don't mean you can go getting sloppy." He said, his voice coming out much rougher than he wanted to. He swallowed past the inevitable lump. He didn't ever want to think about being without her. Not ever again. It was not even a fucking option in his mind.

She giggled and laid her head down on his chest, in that one spot that seemed to be carved out to fit her perfectly. He pulled his arm around her and pulled the covers up over the both of them, his legs tangled in hers and every inch of them touching the other. All these years of sensory deprivation suddenly evaporated and it was as if he couldn't touch her enough. He didn't know how it would be in front of the others but he figured they could deal with it when the time came.

"I ain't goin' nowhere. You plannin' on gettin' rid of me?" She said coyly, her sex strained voice about the best thing he'd ever heard pass her lips. Except when she sung. But that was a different story altogether.

He shook his head and hummed his response and then followed with. "Guess you're stuck with me." He brought his other thumb up to his lip and wondered at how long they would have. Would they have the next week, the next month. He marveled for a minute that his brain had even allowed him to think that far ahead. He figured it must be her and her unfailing hope, worked its way under his skin again.

"Forever." She'd raised up on one elbow again and she was looking at him. He turned to look at her, taking in her watery pools of blue.

He leaned up and kissed the corner of her eye catching her tears on his lips. "Forever." He whispered against her skin.

She folded herself into him and they laid there, soaking it in, their love combined seeping into the marrow of their bones, strengthening their bond.

He knew there would never be another sweeter night in his entire existence that could compare to how he felt right now. He felt lighter somehow, like the haze of regret and sorrow and guilt over his past life had lifted and he was left in this crystal place where he felt like he was emerging from a long deep sleep.

He was awake. He was alive. He was in love. He had come from a place of despair and sick and now he felt like he was well and whole. He looked down at her, feeling her breathing even out, sleep slipping her into that blissful place where nothing real could hurt you.

Nature hadn't just cracked a window in the hell of his life when she'd come walking back up to him. It'd busted down the walls that had always been around him as long as he could remember, and let it in the light. The light that was Beth Greene.

For the first time in his life, Daryl felt like he wasn't just nothing, nobody. He felt like in giving his whole self to Beth he was given something even greater in return, something even better than love. Something even better than pleasure. She had given him absolution from a self-imposed prison of shame. He shed it all with her. All that was left now was him, Daryl Dixon in love with Beth Greene and nothing else mattered.

I decided to rewrite this story for whatever reason and I hope you enjoy it. I wrote it while listening to a ton of Mark Lanegan because well, FEELZ! Until next time, xoxoxo