"I really like her, man." Abraham said in agony.

"Yeah, she's cute." Rick agreed.

"She's more than cute, Rick. She's gonna turn me into the kind of asshole that picks flowers, man. I can feel it. Yesterday, I passed some wildflowers on the road and I almost bent over to grab some for her. You gotta help me, Boss. You're the man with all the answers."

Rick was laughing and shaking his head while Abraham's face was panicked and tense. "I have no answers for your Sasha problems, Abraham." Rick said frankly. "But thanks for the beer." He took another swig.

"We're supposed to be having a bro moment here. When Daryl comes in here and whines to you about Beth, I know you give him something more than this!"

"What? What are you talking about?" Rick chuckled and spat some beer back into the bottle.

"Come on, Boss. I know you and Daryl fucking lay in grassy fucking fields and look up at the fucking clouds and talk about how much he fucking loves Beth and then you fucking snap him outta that bullshit because we don't have time to be fucking falling in love around here."

"Ok, first off, man, me and Daryl don't watch the clouds together." Rick chuckled again. "And second he doesn't talk to me about Beth. Where did you get that from?"

Abraham darted eyes his and avoided Ricks gaze. He shrugged and threw back his beer bottle, gulping a swallow.

The baby monitor on the kitchen counter between them made a noise and Rick held out his hand to quiet Abraham before he could speak. Sure enough, Judith was waking up. He had just put her down for her afternoon nap when Abraham came over. Rick was pleased that he'd gotten her to sleep. Judith would go to sleep for almost anyone else: Michonne, Maggie, Glenn, Carl, Carol, even Daryl, but not for him. Michonne always said it was because he played with Judith too much for the little one to take Rick seriously. Now that he had finally proved her wrong and gotten her to sleep in her crib, he cringed at the thought of Michonne saying 'I told you so' when she came for her shift of 'Judy-watch'.

"Shit." Rick said as he put the bottle on the counter and started up to the baby's room. "Michonne." He whispered to himself in a peeved tone. Abraham followed. Rick looked back, half annoyed that it would be a bitch trying to get Judith back to sleep and half annoyed that Abraham wasn't leaving. "Look," Rick explained over his shoulder, "I think we DO have time to fall in love…" he added a disclaimer, "If one would be so inclined. We finally found a safe place. We got alliances with all the groups around us. We're trading. We're seeing walkers less and less…"

"Come on, Boss. What in the hell kinda shit-ass advice is that?" Abraham was frustrated but also ecstatic to hear Rick say these words. It was what he wanted to hear in his core but he had gone to Rick assuming that he'd get a swift kick in the butt that would knock some sense into him.

They both made it to Judith's room. She was sitting up smiling at her dad as he walked in. "No. Judith, nap time. Come on. Chonne's gonna bust my…"

"Chonne?" Abraham repeated. "Nicknames huh? Oh, Like 'Richonne'." He said proud for once to be in on the gossip.

"Who the hell's 'Richonne'?"

"That's what everybody calls you two. You know 'Richonne', like Rick and Michonne? Maggie made it up. She said it was like 'Brangelita'… not really sure what a 'Brangelita' is… but 'Richonne'…"

"What?" Rick said looking back at Abraham confused. He picked up Judith and bounced her in his arms. She immediately begin to play with his nose and eyes and he saw that she was wide awake and he was defeated. Abraham reached out to hold Judith, "Here, let me try." He said. Rick looked at him and found the thought that he would be able to get the kid to sleep when her own father couldn't laughable. So he handed her over. Judith looked back at him with wide uncertain eyes. Rick chuckled.

"It's cool, Bossman. You call her Chonne. Sometimes I call Sasha 'Sashie-cakes'. You know, not to her face but , like, you know sometimes when I'm jerking off…"

Rick scrunched his face, "Come on, Abe." He nodded his head to Judith.

"My bad, Boss. You're right." He stiffened his back. "But I mean seriously… Is it like racist to say black women are like fucking Goddesses?"

"I don't know. Maybe." Rick replied dryly.

"You don't know? Fuck if you don't."

"Abraham, if Judith's first word is fuck… I swear…" Rick warned.

"Sorry man." He looked down to the baby on his arm and spoke to her in a conjuring tone, "Sleep, my pretty, sleeeeeeep." Quickly he returned to Rick, "Come on man, I know you let 'Chonne' handle that 'python', and I do not mean your gun," He burbled at his own cleverness. "Everybody knows, man. All I'm saying is there's something about black women."

"You're a lunatic." Rick dismissed his allegations. But there was a slight reddening of his face that told he was hiding something. He had fallen thoroughly in love with Michonne. It kept him up at night. His body tensed when she was around him and his groin muscles convulsed when she gave him the slightest meaningless touch. His curiosity was peaked at Abrahams declaration that everybody knew something was there. "What the hell are you talking about- 'everybody knows'? What is there to know?"

Abraham who was looking down at Judith resting peacefully on his shoulder, now snickered at Rick, until he looked up and realized Rick didn't seem to be asking in jest. "Come on Boss. What? That's something only you and Daryl talk about? Well he must've told a lot of people because like I said everybody knows. Even if everybody wasn't talking about it, the fact that your face is redder than a country boy's neck right now is a dead giveaway."

Unbeknownst to Rick and Abraham, Michonne had walked into the house ready to take Judith off his hands for the afternoon. She was missing all the battle gear she normally wore out in the world as she enjoyed the day in the confines of the Alexandria Safe Zone. She walked about barefoot, wearing a red, spaghetti strapped tee and cut-off jeans that broadcast the suppleness of her ebony thighs. Since the day was warmer than usual, before heading upstairs for Judith, she went for a drink of water in the kitchen, where Judith's baby monitor was still on and spilling the beans of the entire conversation in progress upstairs. All she had heard so far was that Daryl was telling everybody something and Rick considered it sensitive information. She stopped mid-gulp and looked at the monitor's screen. She couldn't see their faces, only the crib and someone's elbow.

"Who is everybody?" Rick asked Abraham. Rick was wondering if Michonne knew about this rumor. She had never said anything to him. Considering he was the guy in charge, he had no knowledge of this and it was pissing him off a little.

"Everybody is everybody." Abraham blew through Rick's question and went back to his own concerns, "Look man. I just want to know how you do it. How you fuck Michonne's brains out without picking fucking flowers for her, man? How do you keep your Superman balls from turning into Clark Kent? I want to get with Sasha and still be the fucking man, like you are."

"Look," Rick reprimanded him whispering in a mocking tone, "I am not the 'fucking man', alright?" He took Judith, who much to his chagrin was sleeping on Abraham's shoulder, and laid her back in her crib carefully. She stirred a little and he patted her back, remaining silent until she was still. He continued to rub her back and continued quietly, "If I was really the man Michonne would be in my bed every night instead of hers."

Michonne leaned in closer to the monitor to hear better and her jaw dropped at Rick's words.

"I mean, I guess… if I was really the man." Rick concluded.

"You fucking are." Abraham whispered as he tilted his head making his point with sobering eye-contact.

"No. I'm fucking NOT." Rick countered, imitating Abraham's body language. He was irritated that Abraham's notion of him was being based on his belief that Rick was doing something he was longing to do but hadn't had the nerve to. In all honesty, this conversation really opened a door to emotions Rick was battling every day yet he only pushed them back further and further into the reservoir of his mind. He only released his frustrations in bullets at target practice or with his hatchet when he came across a group of walkers, but never in words. But now, thanks to Abraham, the dam was breaking.

"I mean, I think… you know… Michonne is maybe the most beautiful woman I've ever seen." Rick stuttered, groping for words. "I mean, you know… not just because she's pretty and she's got those lips that make me want to…" he trailed off, licked his own lips hungrily and resumed, "What I'm saying is- not just because she's beautiful on the outside. She's fucking strong and smart. Smarter than me." He pointed to himself, "I couldn't pull that. I mean… I wish I could. Believe me. Maybe… sometimes… I think about … I mean, I do… I do think about just…" he shrugged his shoulders unable to put his thoughts more gently and stared off into space. No longer acknowledging Abraham, he began to play out a familiar scenario in his mind, "just tasting her, you know? I want to go on a run… not for food or… or supplies but to find all the spots on her body that make her wet… So what?" He brought himself back to reality, "It's not happening."

Michonne pulled up a stool to the counter and sat down. She felt a little lightheaded. She began to grin uncontrollably. She couldn't believe what she was hearing. She buried her face in her hands, placing her elbows on the counter and she just held her head in her hands.

Abraham opened his mouth to speak and Rick cut him off, "I know what you're saying, ' You can lead all these people but you can't even lead your fucking feet over to the woman you love and tell her how you feel?"

"Love?" Abraham repeated in disbelief as though the word was a profanity to dirty for even him to say.

"You don't think I think about that," Rick continued, "every time I look at her… or… or look at Maggie and Glenn and wish that could be us?"

Abraham opened his mouth again to stop this conversation from becoming anymore awkward than it already was but Rick kept on whining in a depressing tone, "I mean. She smells so good, man… and last week we went to the Hilltop to see Jesus and while we were loading up some things, she got hot and put her tank top in a knot… and, Abe, man… I wanted to kiss her stomach and just unbutton her jeans and… just have her in the back of the car…"

Michonne sat up and lifted her hair off her neck. She remembered the exact day he was talking about. She had lifted her shirt on purpose to get his attention. But he would barely look at her. His aloof behavior hurt her feelings a little. She was in an irritated mood the entire ride home. Rick had thought the quick yet carnivorous glance he'd given had offended her. But Michonne never even noticed him leering. Now she suddenly felt an inferno rush through her. It made her armpits sweat and she giggled quietly as she reached for an old magazine on the counter and lifted her arms one at a time and fanned herself with it.

Rick was still saying something but she could barely hear him. She picked up the monitor and increased the volume. It didn't help. She smacked it with the palm of her hand. She couldn't hear anything. So she stood up, desperate to hear more, and started walking out of the kitchen to strengthen the signal by getting relatively closer to the other monitor upstairs. She strained to hear as she held the monitor up to her ear. And just as she was coming out of the kitchen, Rick and Abraham came down the steps and saw her, with a concentrated face and her ear trained on the baby monitor.

"Hey, Michonne." Abraham said nonchalantly. No one really understood what they were seeing for a second. And then… it dawned on everyone in the room. Michonne slowly lowered the baby monitor from her ear and her distressed face fell into an innocent smile as she sat the monitor on the sideboard next to her.

"The baby monitor." Abraham pointed out as he stared blankly at Michonne.

"This fool…" She mumbled to herself. His calling attention to it made her eyes big and she closed them and wished very hard that she was somewhere else.

Rick gave a nervous, unconvincing laugh and asked, "How long you been here?"

She simply raised her eyebrows and tucked in her lips, taking a vow of silence. A vow that everyone seemed to have taken momentarily, until Abraham broke the awkward silence.

"I'm gonna go." he muttered as he quickly reduced the seven paces needed to reach the door to three, leaving Rick and Michonne standing there staring at each other.

"I came for the… Judith… to watch Judith." She managed to say, pointing upstairs and swirling her finger in a pitiful attempt at casualness.

"She's upstairs asleep." They spoke to each other as if they were in a trance or a dream where, if they remained very still and said as few words as possible, they could rewind time from this moment and fix this whole embarrassing encounter.

"YOU got her to sleep?" She asked playfully.

"Abr…" He started to say, but to prove himself to her he answered, "Yeah. It was me."

She smiled at him and nodded her head in approval. "Good job, daddy." She immediately winced at the sexually provocative title.

He blushed, "Could you umm… hear… what we…"

"Not… I mean…" She looked down at the table to run from his relentless blue eyes that were making it hard for her to breathe as usual. "The monitor kinda spazed out. Maybe it needs batteries or…" she mumbled.

"Because, really… we were just talking about him and Sasha." Rick explained.

"Oh."

"He really likes her…"

"Ok."

"He wanted my advice."

She went back to his eyes sending him running from hers, "Did you give him any?" She put the question to him longing for him, now, to repeat the things he had said upstairs.

"What advice could I give him?" he said searching her face for any positive sign.

His secrecy annoyed her so she shrugged, unsure of what to say, "It's hot in here. I'm here now. So you can get going." She said as she looked around for the source of heat that seemed to be bearing down on her from nowhere. She flapped her shirt up and down to cool herself, this time unconsciously exposing her mid-rift. Rick ignored her words and took her body language as a sign.

"You really want me to go?" He asked her with intent, catching her eyes with his and staring her down. She shook her head no with a movement so small that he squinted to be sure. He knew if she really wanted him to leave she would have no problem telling him. He never knew her to play coy. But if she welcomed his attention, why hadn't she said so before. "People think we're a thing. Have you heard about this?" he put the question to her, treading lightly.

She diverted her eyes now as he walked toward her, his eyes moving over her lips, her neck, her collar bone, the rising and falling of her breasts… his movement seemed magnetized and before he could exhale, he was face to cheek with her, she still nervously refused to look up and let her hands drop to her side. "Chonne?" He demanded an answer. She closed her eyes and her body jerked when he reached out and grabbed her by the hips and squeezed while he caressed the smooth dewy skin of her belly with his thumbs. She slightly shrugged her shoulders and braced herself, placing her hands on his torso.

He slid his hands from her hips upwards and under her shirt. She didn't protest. She raised her arms at his leading, recognizing she was finally under his control, right where she had fantasized being so many times. She let out a sigh as he lifted her shirt over her head and placed it on the table over the baby monitor she was so fixated on. He leaned in to her, "So you don't have anything to say?" He interrogated her as he drank in the curves of her breasts and the scars on her skin. "I'm disappointed." He said in a subdued, serpentine voice, "I thought we were partners."

"We are." She spoke up to confirm as her heart banged in her ears.

"Look at me." Rick commanded. And she did. He was so close to her that his words traveled through her ear right down into her belly, making her knees weak.

In this moment she was literally struggling inside herself to take back control of this situation but her mind seemed slow to understand what her body apparently already knew: She belong to the man before her. Michonne stood ready to be devoured. To her, Rick Grimes was supernatural. She had seen him do things that an ordinary man would have known better than to try. He had certainly made her come alive again. He could make her docile in a way that she had never experienced before. She felt feminine again when he held her in his sights. She had long understood that she was a new woman in a new world, but when it came to Rick, she'd morph again. She was someone more than she was before the walking dead. She was still the soldier she had become but he was definitely her General. She had seen Rick handle every situation they'd come into. He didn't ask permission. He didn't apologize. He simply took what he needed and everyone resigned to his command. Now she wanted her trembling body to be the situation he handled.

She suddenly swooned, a feeling that confused her and she grabbed him by the shoulders to steady herself. She rested her forehead over his heart and he brought his hands around her and enveloped her body in his arms, bringing her close to his wall-like chest. He indulged in her fragrance as she lingered just under his nose and he opened his hands wide palming her back, he pressed her to himself, thinking 'She smells like spearmint roses' and he lifted her chin upward and hovered over her lips and her cheeks taking in her scent unashamedly. She extended her neck reaching for his lips with her own. But he pulled his face away from hers.

"Fuck, Rick. Kiss me." She was humbled to beg.

"Mm-uh" he shook his head, pulling her hips closer to his, reaching behind her and grabbing handfuls of her thickness, he concluded that he would harass her body until her walls swelled and dripped with desperation. "So, you've been making me wait?" He asked her.

She didn't reply, instead she sucked her teeth playfully with a smile and tried to snake her fingers into his hair, his dark curly hair. The scent was so intoxicating to her. Sometimes when she babysat Judith she would nap with her in his bed and Michonne would put her face in his pillow and breathe deep. She often wanted to sweep those curls out of his eyes and kiss his mouth passionately. But now that she tried, he let her go and, with a tight grip, pulled her hands away.

"You've been making me wait, huh?" he repeated. He brought her hand up to his mouth and gently bit then kissed the inside of her wrist. She shook her head no in answer to his question because she felt she couldn't move her mouth to speak until he kissed her. "You have." He corrected her and chuckled menacingly, rubbing his bottom lip across her forehead and pressing his body into hers. She managed a huffish smile. She could feel him through his denim, hard against her abdomen and her nipples drew tight and ached as they lightly touched the softness of his t-shirt.

Even though Rick was ready and overdue for the carnal feast that awaited him, he was dueling with a mischievous scheme. He couldn't relinquish a need to see her beg now. How many times had he been torn to pieces after a day full of her presence and smell dizzying him? He wanted to return the favor and watch as she was clutched by the same irascible craving that he had tended to so many nights with a grip on his tingling manhood that, at least, permitted him to sleep but never gave him true satisfaction. He remembered how many mornings he could hear the shower spraying her prime physique and he imagined milky suds slipping and trailing her soft sable skin. He was holding her now and could fully grasp what an outrageous abuse of power she had wielded over him. Out of regard for her exceeding judgment of what their relationship should be he had held his feelings at bay. Even though he led their group, Michonne led Rick. Rick knew it and Michonne knew it and Rick knew Michonne knew it. This led him to the implicit understanding that if they were to ever be where they were in this moment, she would call the play. But she never did.

He let her go and leaned back against the furniture where the monitor sat, "What's going on in that head of yours?" He asked with a tired smile. He really struggled to understand what she could have been trying to protect by keeping this secret from him.

"Rick…" Michonne covered her breasts with her arms and called his name but she really had no words to say to him, she was still struggling to understand why she hadn't told him how she felt, herself. She knew he wanted her physically. She could always feel his eyes on her, coveting her curves, especially when she walked away. There was always something about the way he'd look into her eyes- the rest of his face may have been reading fear, frustration or dismay- but his eyes were always smiling at her. She knew him. She saw every tell that no one else could see. She often catalogued them mentally in the middle of the night while she lay in her bed contemplating how she might help him in any way.

But the truth was Michonne wasn't sure that a 'friends with benefits' scenario wouldn't compromise everything they had built together. Michonne knew Rick was a passionate man, but passion is not always love and Michonne was in love, terribly in love. A sexual relationship with Rick would have been euphoric, but not nearly enough. But now that baby monitor had given her life and there was nothing she wanted more in this setting than sex with Rick. She would have traded the feeling of him inside her- claiming her, for all the air in her lungs.

"Well," Rick stood up abruptly, "I gotta go see Deanna."

"What? Now?" trepidation in her voice.

"I'll be back soon." He picked up her shirt and slipped it back over her head. He held an arm-hole open for her.

"What the hell, Rick?" She stood there defiant.

"Come on, now." He nudged her lovingly.

She complied, still objecting, "Deanna can wait."

"You're real good at deciding who should wait, huh?" He said raising his brow with devilish grin. "It's your turn now. You'll be sweet enough to wait a little while till I get back. Right?" Rick caressed her chin and pinched her cheek playfully then turned to leave.

"No kiss goodbye?" she entreated.

Rick shook his head and picked up his gun belt from the couch on the way out the door. He turned to her in revelry, "Nope."

She sighed deeply and smiled, "Rick…"

"How you like them apples?" He called back to her with his steamy southern twang as he exited.

"I love apples!" Michonne shouted as she smiled to herself and rolled her eyes. "Asshole." She whispered and began to swell the edge of her shirt again for reprieve from the heat of the day… her desire… this setback? "Ok." She said out loud to compose herself. He could run out the door all he wanted. She'd still heard Rick fucking Grimes say that he loved her and she smirked as she plopped on the couch. No sooner than she'd put her feet up, Judith's cry came through the speaker of the baby monitor. Momma's coming she thought to herself and she beamed again uncontrollably.