Hello again. Sorry this chapter is a little short. I've been finding it a bit hard to write lately. But better a short chapter than none at all, I always say.

The research for this chapter was a curse, a curse I tell ya. I had to check out all these pictures of Michael Rooker with his shirt off. It's a dirty job but someone's got to do it. All in the name of fine literature…

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Merle stepped over to the far side of the blanket and sat down facing her, knees bent, feet flat on the floor, and leaned forward to pull on the laces of his left boot. Carol wondered briefly at a one-handed man that was determined to still wear laced-up boots (how did he do them up?), and reached over to tackle the other one herself. In moments she was kneeling at his feet, pulling off the untied boots one after another, easing them carefully around his heels, to drop the boots behind her well out of the way. His socks followed swiftly.

Looking up Carol found Merle had raised his hand up over behind his head and swiftly hiked off his wifebeater, tossing it over by the boots. She was a little disappointed at that; she had been looking forward to stripping it off him herself. She took a long frank look at his bare upper body. There was no denying the man had an impressive physique.

His stomach was not flat, but the curves were well-defined heavy muscle, rising into a solid chest sprinkled with a few sparse wisps of greying curly hair. He had prominent collarbones, and his body was topped by a pair of burly shoulders with nicely moulded deltoids, offset by powerful arms that had clearly defined biceps and strong shapely forearms. His skin was pale and smooth, inviting to the touch. He seemed considerably thinner and more toned than when she had known him back at the quarry. That seemed so long ago now. They were all leaner and fitter; nothing like surviving an apocalypse to get you in shape.

His chest had a few small scars, and there was a long thin silvery one that ran across his stomach just above the waistband of his pants. But the one that really caught Carol's eye was just below his ribs on the right side of his torso; a small round scar embedded in a circular sunk-in section of flesh. It looked much like she would imagine a… "Is that a bullet wound?" she asked incredulously, her hand going out to finger it lightly. He did not flinch, but she gained the impression he had steeled himself to her touch. She slid her fingers around to his back, and sure enough felt a matching larger scar there. The exit wound.

Merle shifted a little uncomfortably under her hand. She'd not seen him look uneasy before.

"T'aint nuthin. Through and through."

Although Carol was tempted, for his sake, to drop the subject, she found it intriguing, and given how scathing Merle usually was of feelings and all that pussy shit, he could hardly use his discomfort now as an excuse to avoid talking about the scar.

"How did you get this?"

Merle said nothing for a long moment, his head moving back and forward a little, then, uncharacteristically terse, "Gulf War."

"The first one?" She sought clarification.

"Yeah."

"Desert Storm." She said, just to be sure.

"Yeah. Didn'tja know," Merle said sourly, "I'm a genuine goddam war hero."

"No," Carol replied softly, looking open-eyed at Merle, "I didn't."

"Well now ya do," his tone was curt, "and I kin think of lots better things for yer hand to be doin' than that." Merle promptly removed her hand from his side and placed it firmly on his pants front, pushing her palm into his erection which had flagged somewhat from earlier. A few steady strokes quickly revived it, and Merle's demeanour perked up considerably in response to her ministrations.

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To be continued…

Ok almost none of the above was planned initially, but if you google-image "Michael Rooker shirtless", about the fourth image that appears (which comes from MR's twitter posts), shows a damn fine bod for anyone, especially a man in his fifties. He has an odd little circular dent right where I've described it. Maybe it's just a trick of the light, but it gave me plot bunnies for Merle.

Aaaand… then… on with the smut.