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The gunfire that had occurred that night outside of the bar had frightened the people who lived in town just as much as it had frightened Beth, that much was certain. It seemed as though everyone was too scared to even step outside of their homes for any other reason that wasn't absolutely essential - like for work or for school - and Amy, who worked as a cashier at the local supermarket, had told Beth about how her manager was currently considering closing up the store for at least the next day or two because absolutely nobody was coming in to shop, not even to purchase necessities.

Over the course of the last week or so, Beth had heard her fair share of whispers and gossip around town that related to the shooting and the reasons behind it. Beth might have been young, but she wasn't stupid, and she knew full well that most of the people who lived here didn't have the slightest clue as to what had gone on that evening, just like she didn't know, either. Of course everyone could have a guess - and somewhere down the line, one of those guesses would be close to accurate - but that didn't mean that it was true.

Amy was a different story altogether, though, and as sweet as she was, the girl had an awful habit of believing absolutely everything that she heard.

Despite the fact that Amy's parents were retired and living far away somewhere in Florida, Beth's closest friend still didn't have all that much freedom. In fact, Beth would go as far to say that Amy's older sister, Andrea, was far more controlling than her daddy had been before her mama had passed away, and it always seemed as though the older woman wasn't ever willing to allow Amy to do anything that she wanted. Andrea had a good thirteen years on Amy and whilst she didn't have any children of her own, she definitely treated Amy as though she was her daughter.

In all honesty, whilst Beth could perfectly understand her friend's frustrations, she thought that it was nice that Amy had somebody in her life who cared about her so much. Much to Amy's annoyance, Andrea's over-protective nature seemed to be becoming progressively worse as opposed to better, but Beth thought that it made sense considering the fact that their parents had left. Whilst Amy liked to think that she was responsible enough to look after herself, Beth knew her friend well enough to know that that definitely was not the case; and really, Beth had no idea how Amy would even survive if it wasn't for Andrea's guidance.

Smiling softly into the phone as she lay on her back on the double mattress of her bed, Beth began to trace over the subtle pattern of her ceiling with her eyes as she spoke. "I think that it's sweet," Beth said, stifling a giggle at the loud and frustrated sigh that Amy let out from down the other end of the line.

"Sweet?" her friend responded, her pitch suddenly much higher than before and her tone showcasing her irritation. "It ain't sweet, Beth. It's so damn annoying. It's a good job that I've been doin' all these shifts for Irma recently, 'cause I have a feeling that there's not a chance that I'll be gettin' to work in the mornin'."

Whilst the reason behind the shooting was still very much unknown, Beth had still heard the words 'territorial' and 'bust deal' being thrown around campus over the last few days. There wasn't really ever much to talk about around town except for a few pieces of idle gossip here and there, so a huge commotion such as this had caused a wave of both excitement and fear to wash over the population of the town. Since it had been accepted that the club - which Beth had recently learned were called 'The Brother's Arms', thanks to her friend Sasha - were involved in the shooting, most people around town (including Amy) had immediately jumped to the conclusion that this issue had arisen because of a rival gang.

Everyone around was theorising about the whole showdown and as much as Beth wished that she could just get on with her life and leave what had happened that night in the past, nobody else in town seemed to want the same thing as she did. The involvement of a rival gang was a theory that did technically make sense, Beth supposed; but unlike her peers - who seemed to be absolutely determined to find out near enough every single detail of what had happened that night and what the reasons for it were - all that she wanted to do was forget.

And when it came to the events of that night, it wasn't so much the shooting that Beth wanted to forget as it was Daryl Dixon - more specifically, Daryl Dixon's hands and his tongue and his mouth.

(She didn't want to forget them - not really.)

But the blonde had accepted long ago the fact that she would never really understand anything to do with gang matters, so there really was no point in attempting to start to understand them now. Above all else, Beth Greene was a good girl, and she had a feeling that even thinking about that club for too long would leave her with her head well and truly spinning.

It wasn't as though Beth had necessarily thought that the dreams of him would get any better - well, definitely not after the way in which his hot mouth had been pressed against hers and his strong hands had been gripping tightly at the bare flesh of her hips - but at the same time, Beth had honestly not thought that they would (or even could) actually get worse.

The thought of him was intoxicating, though, and Daryl Dixon had crept his way underneath her skin. The two of them had never even had a real conversation and here she was, lusting over him as though he was some sort of teenage heart-throb.

And maybe he was.

But he wasn't, of course. Daryl Dixon was the Vice President of the local gang, for goodness sake; and as much as Beth was confident that he was hot, she knew that he was also the sort of guy that people crossed the street to get away from. He was the type of man that girls admired from afar - all rough and rugged and something close to dangerous - but never wanted to get themselves too close to.

(Not Beth Greene, though. Because right now, she felt like she would do most anything just to get a little bit closer to him).

The dark expanse of her reasonably sized bedroom was disturbed by a loud gasp that escaped her throat as Beth jumped awake, her eyes impossibly wide and her mouth hanging open as an orgasm took her by surprise. Both of her hands were balled in fists into the bedsheets by her side and her thighs were pressed incredibly tightly together, the muscles in her stomach contracting and relaxing at a quick rate as she rode out the waves of her pleasure.

Small whimpers escaped her mouth as her cum leaked through her underwear and spilled out onto her clean sheets, but Beth couldn't gather much coherent thought - considering the fact that she was currently having an orgasm combined with the fact that she had literally just woken up - in order to keep herself quiet, to keep her moans muffled. It seemed as though her pleasure ran on and on and on, almost as if it would never end (and part of her wished that it wouldn't, as she was quickly becoming addicted to this blissful feeling); and her entire body trembled violently as she came down from her high.

This was something new. Something that had never happened to her before - not even when she was younger, not even when her hormones were here, there and everywhere. Not even when she had been desperate for release but had had no choice but to go to sleep because her sister had been hovering around in the hallway. Not even when she'd been incredibly close and then had to stop because of some sort of interruption, like the sound of her phone ringing or her alarm going off.

It probably didn't really help that before she could really think too much of it, the dream was floating away in her mind; the fine details of it slipping through her fingers like sand, impossible for her to gather back up. The images of it were grainy in her imagination - the sound of skin slapping against skin and maybe even a hand firm hand roughly pulling at her hair with enough force to snap her neck - and Beth almost cried out in frustration as it disappeared.

But then, before she could think anything too much of it, she was disturbed by the sound of a knock on her bedroom door. This time, Beth's eyes flung wide open for a completely different reason and she quickly jumped up higher in her bed, scrambling to pull the covers over her bottom half as she did so.

It was her father's voice calling out her name as he pushed open her bedroom door that caused Beth to snap properly back into reality, her eyes focusing on the outline of his figure. Her bedroom was in complete and utter darkness, but the dim light from the hallway entered as Hershel stepped over the threshold of her room; and although Beth couldn't quite make out his facial expression, she could just tell that he was a little confused and concerned.

Not drunk, then. For once.

"Everythin' alright?" her daddy asked, and Beth's cheeks were now burning bright pink as she looked right back at him.

It wasn't as though her father could possibly know what had just happened to her body and what was going on in her mind, but still, Beth couldn't help but actually feel a little bit guilty. Not that she should, of course, and she knew it; especially after everything that he had put her through over the course of the last year, over everything that he was still putting her through even now.

But even so, that didn't mean that her dad needed to hear her having an orgasm.

Nodding her head quickly, Beth squeaked out a 'yes' in an attempt to reassure her father, but her high-pitched tone and overall strange behaviour just seemed to cause Hershel to be a little bit more suspicious than he had been before. And Beth would never wish for her father to return to the bottle, but she definitely did wish that he was distracted by something else - anything else (except alcohol) - right now.

Her panties were drenched and it was so uncomfortable to sit there speaking to her father in her soaking wet underwear; her juices stuck to the insides of her thighs and on her bedsheets, too. Beth's clit was still swollen and gently throbbing from the aftermath of her intense orgasm, and as much as she her mind was trying its best to concentrate on everything around her (including her daddy), her body was still overcome by the feeling of pure and utter relief.

"Are you sure?" he probed, shuffling as though he was going to take a step further into her bedroom before he hesitated, changed his mind for some unknown reason. Clearing his throat, Hershel stood up a little bit straighter, and Beth didn't need to be able to see her father in perfect light to know the way in which his brilliant blue eyes narrowed in her direction. "I heard -"

"It was a nightmare," she said, quickly interrupting him before he went into too much detail and embarrassed his youngest daughter even further. Her excuse was quick - something that she had just made up right there on the spot - and Beth actually surprised herself at how easily the lie slipped from her tongue. "I... I had a nightmare. I'm fine."

Her words were stuttered and spoken too fast, almost too confidently, even; and Beth just knew that her father didn't entirely believe her. Not that she blamed him for that, because she was lying to him, but what else was she supposed to say? I'm fine, dad - it's just that I just had a wet dream about a man - who's probably in his mid-thirties, by the way - who I was kissing and grinding against in the back of a bar last week. That was before he went out into the middle of the shooting that his gang was involved in, though, and now I'm really sexually frustrated.

Instead of saying anything - although Beth had a feeling that he probably really wanted to - Hershel nodded his head at her and began to slowly back out of her bedroom. The blonde didn't breathe as she watched him leave, her heart pounding in her chest loudly as he pulled the door to a shut, murmuring a soft goodnight to her as he did so.

It wasn't until Beth saw that the light in the hallway had been turned off and when she heard the click of her father's bedroom door shutting that she released a shuddering breath, her heart still beating too quickly as she collapsed against her mountain of pillows. She was so, so humiliated by the entire situation, and she couldn't help but groan into the darkness - not out of pleasure, this time - as she pulled the covers over her face.

Maybe she could just stay in bed forever.

Another few days passed by before Beth saw Daryl Dixon for the first time since the bar, and she was shocked - to say the least - about the fact that she had bumped into him in the local supermarket, of all places.

Really, Beth didn't even know why on earth she was so surprised about the fact that it had been the supermarket that she had seen him. For some strange reason, the blonde had just never really thought to herself too much about the fact that grocery shopping was something that this man - like all other men in town - would actually have to come out and do. Of all of the places that Beth had ever imagined the two of them running into each other; the supermarket had most definitely not been on her list, although she wasn't quite sure why - after all, it was one of the places that actually made the most sense.

Her life was rarely ever simple though, and it rarely ever made sense, either. Today, though, it seemed as though the Universe had decided that it would.

Which was just typical, because her hair was a tangled mess of unruly waves falling down her back and there wasn't even a speck of make-up on her fresh face. At least she was wearing something she considered to be half-decent (a yellow sun dress that fell to the middle of her thighs matched with a cropped denim jacket and a pair of worn white converse sneakers), but it wasn't as though she thought that she looked her best, by any means.

Over the course of the last few weeks, Beth had found herself daydreaming about plenty of scenarios where she would run into Daryl Dixon.

Scenarios where she was always dressed up a lot nicer than this, where she was always wearing her best clothes and her best shoes and always wore plenty of make-up and had her hair styled perfectly. Scenarios where he actually looked up in her direction and noticed her standing there, staring at him, and stared back at her with an equal amount of intensity in his gaze.

Scenarios where Beth was on her way back from college, walking through the centre of town, when he would pull up alongside of her and offer her a lift home on the back of his motorcycle - only to pull over near her home and have his way with her, fast and hungry in the middle of her daddy's long fields. Scenarios where her truck had broken down once again and when she took it to the garage to be fixed, it had been Daryl who offered to work on it for her - only for him to end up taking her then and there, rough and hard against the concrete wall of his bay.

Of all of the things that she had imagined happening between the two of them, Beth had never imagined that she would walk past him down one of the aisles of the supermarket, his eyes too busy skimming over the different bottles of shampoo before him to even bother acknowledging that someone - her - was right there, behind him.

Perhaps it was because of the fact that he had his back towards her that she was suddenly feeling brave - because Beth was usually quite a shy person, and his overwhelmingly intense eyes never really seemed to help her out with that issue - or perhaps it was because of the fact that he hadn't acknowledged her presence, and she really, really wanted him to. Or perhaps she was just being plain weird.

But either way, Beth spoke - her mouth opening and the words tumbling out - before she could even stop herself.

"Spoiled for choice?"

When she looks back upon her words in a few hours (because she really can't stop thinking about their interaction that day), then Beth will acknowledge the fact that as much as her statement was awkward, it wasn't nearly half as bad as it could have been. In fact, it was actually sort of funny, and when she is curling up underneath her covers that night, she'll laugh to herself about it and hope that maybe, wherever he is; he's laughing to himself about it, too.

But in that moment, Beth couldn't help but to be anything but absolutely horrified by the fact that she had even spoken to him.

At the sound of her soft voice breaking the silence, Daryl jumped - actually jumped, even if the movement was only slight - and his head snapped around so quickly that Beth was surprised that his neck didn't break because of it. The thought took her back to the dream that she'd had of him just a few nights before, and if her strange boldness wasn't enough to cause her cheeks to tinge a light shade of pink, then that thought definitely was.

Daryl's deep blue eyes were narrowed when he turned to face her and his shoulders were tense, too; as though his whole posture had gone from relaxed to defensive in half of a second. And there was something about his expression in that moment that had Beth thinking that the older man was about to snap out some sort of sarcastic (and probably quite aggressive) response to her. But as soon as his eyes met with hers, all of his features noticeably softened, and that had Beth feeling something towards him that she can only describe as complete and utter affection.

It doesn't stop her heart from beating rapidly inside of her chest and it doesn't stop her from holding her breath, either. Nor does it stop her from cursing herself over and over again in her head for even putting herself in this position, for even speaking to him in the first place. The thing is, it's not even as if the two of them know each other - not as though they're friends, or even acquaintances, really (although his tongue was just in her mouth only a week and a half ago) - and now it just seems to be all sorts of painfully awkward.

And for a second, Beth absolutely swears to herself that Daryl Dixon's cheeks are just as pink as her own.

Overall, he didn't seem to be all too bothered by her comment, and she just hoped to herself that he took it to be playful - after all, that was how she intended it to be.

"You sassin' me, girl?" he asked her in his low, gravelly voice; and Beth swallowed down her nerves - although that seemed to be almost impossible - and jutted out her chin almost defiantly in his direction. In her head it is as though there is a mantra occurring; repeating itself over and over again that she does not know this man. It's true - Beth Greene does not know Daryl Dixon. She doesn't know where his boundaries or limits lie when it comes to things like jokes and banter. She doesn't know whether she is crossing a line with ever lingering look that she offers to him or whether or not he takes it as her being curious, as her being flirtatious.

Which she is. Or at least, she intends to be.

Biting back the immediate urge to respond with a stuttered 'no, sir' (like the good girl that she is), Beth allowed her light blue eyes to dance over the bottles and bottles of shampoo that line up the three shelves in an attempt to distract herself from his burning eyes. There aren't all that many bottles and brands to choose from, really, and she notices that one of his large hands - one of the same hands that had been grabbing and pinching at the flesh of her hip - is hovering over a plain white bottle.

It's not a type of shampoo that Beth thinks she would ever really consider purchasing, but she supposed that just looking at the bottle it seems to be a lot manlier than her usual bright pink, strawberry scented option.

Shrugging her shoulders, Beth quips out a soft "maybe", trying her best to sound cool, calm and collected - which honestly, she is not - as she slowly allowed her gaze to trail back over towards him. And Beth has never been all that glad about the burning heat in Georgia before (mostly because she is so fair and pale and her skin just burns and she sweats something awful in it), but the sight of Daryl Dixon's bare arms on show because of that crippling warmth suddenly makes her incredibly thankful for it.

(She wonders what he wears in winter, and hopes that it's something similar).

Daryl doesn't necessarily smile at her nonchalant response, but Beth immediately notices the way in which his lips quirk upwards ever so slightly at her response - as though he naturally wants to smile, but also as though he is fighting the reaction as best that he can. It might have really just been nothing, but the blonde takes it as a small victory all the same.

Nodding his head in her direction, his deep blue eyes trail over her appearance - lingering on the smooth, pale skin that's on show from her freshly shaved legs - before he lazily picks up the bottle of shampoo that he had been hovering towards. Without giving it much care, Daryl throws the bottle into the cart that is resting beside him, and her light eyes cannot help themselves but to wander over it and take in the contents of it.

It's not necessarily all that shocking to Beth that the cart itself is mostly empty. The basket that she is carrying in her hands (which is actually quite heavy, come to think of it) probably contains more items in it than Daryl's shopping cart does, but she doesn't comment on it - knows that she's not that brave, not now that he is actually facing her direction and his eyes are actually resting on her.

Not wanting to appear as though she is being intrusive or nosey, Beth suddenly stops herself from peering into his cart and her eyes dart back up to his face once again. The blonde tries her very hardest to memorise all of the details of Daryl Dixon's handsome face as best that she can, knowing deep down that she truly never will be able to estimate how long it will be until she sees him again.

Although their general interaction wasn't necessarily filled with life and bubbling conversation, Beth still feels a little bit disappointed that she knows that it has to come to an end. In all honesty, she would absolutely love to stand and talk to him all day, but it isn't as though the man has much to offer her in terms of words and Beth also has a class that she needs to attend in just under two hours.

Not wanting to be the one who is stuck around waiting like the last time, Beth clears her throat and straightens her back, suddenly returning from where she had been lost quite deep in thought and becoming present in the moment once again. "I guess I'll see you around, Daryl," she says; a smile in her voice as she slowly begins to walk past him, her eyes staying locked onto his as she moved.

Daryl then allows himself to smirk at her words, and goodness, she has never seen anyone who looks so sinful and heavenly all at the same time. Just his expression alone makes her want to melt into a puddle on the floor; and once again, Beth's cheeks are burning as she looks directly at him. "Yeah," he says, nodding his head once at her at she passes him. "I'll see you 'round, Greene."

As she walks away from him, Beth uses everything in her power to resist the urge of turning her head over her shoulder and glancing back to take in once last look at him. This man is driving her crazy enough without her going and making it even more obvious to him than it already is; and even though she still thinks to herself that she is stupid and embarrassing and generally just mad for even approaching him today, Beth feels a lot better for getting the chance to see him once again already. These chance encounters are hit and miss, and Beth doesn't know when the next time that she will see Daryl will be, so she takes every single drop of it that she can get and tucks it in tightly to her chest.

It's difficult to not look back at him, especially when Beth can practically feel Daryl's deep blue eyes staring into the back of her as she walks off. As soon as she turns away from the aisle, the blonde breathes out a shaky sigh of relief, but she knows that she isn't safe from him - not even now. If anything, things between the two of them just seem to be getting more and more intense; and the throbbing between her thighs has already started again as she walks towards the checkout despite the fact that she came over the thought of him having his head between her legs just this morning.

Not for the first time in the last few weeks, Beth silently wonders to herself whether she will ever really get enough of this man, or whether he will always be there - whether he is actually there or whether he is just in her mind - to haunt and tease her.

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