He noticed her favoring her right hand as they were finished loading up the dismantled camp.
She flexed her fingers with a grimace as he watched; bit the corner of her mouth and frowned down at her hand.
Daryl bit off a curse and stomped across the distance to Carol's side. She jumped at his sudden presence and instinctively jerked her hand back when he reached for it to inspect the damage.
"Dammit, woman," he snapped in his head, but the words came out softer, gentler at the sight of her bleeding again.
He felt the lectures on the tip of his tongue; an I told you so that itched to be uttered at her not getting the cuts stitched.
Her middle and index fingers had both bled through the bandages; the latter was a bit of a surprise as he hadn't thought it that deep.
"I might be willing to reconsider a stitch or two," she said after a moment of his intense scrutiny.
His narrowed eyes jumped up to hers and he saw her wince once more when he applied a slight pressure to the injured digits.
He looked to the others who were returning from the woods after answering nature's call in preparation for another long stretch in the cars. His eyes latched on Lori, but Shane caught his eye before he could call to her for help.
The other man's blackened eyes narrowed as they took in the scene and he stalked over to them; all puffed up and Officer in charge.
"What did you do?" the words came out with the snap and snarl Shane had clearly intended.
The man reached for Carol's injured hand like he had a right to it and her eyes widened as she jumped back. Daryl helped by moving to wedge his shoulder against the cop's thick chest to keep him away from her.
An exasperated huff of air blew from Shane's nostrils and Daryl took a moment to enjoy the man's visibly broken nose.
"If he hurt you, I can help."
Snorts of surprise and disbelief escaped Carol and Daryl simultaneously at that; followed immediately by his "I'd never" and her "he'd never."
"Carol, you alright?" Rick intervened before the moment could get weirder.
"It's nothing," she shrank away from the attention, hugging herself and tucking her fingers guiltily against her side.
Blood smeared on her shirt from the maneuver meant to conceal her injury and both cops reacted to the sight of the red stain. Rick took hold of Daryl's shoulder to pull him back while Shane hunched down to approach Carol with more caution.
"Let him look," the Deputy hissed in his ear when Daryl automatically snarled and moved to jerk away from the hand restraining him.
Even though the instruction hadn't been meant for her, Carol looked at Rick with her eyes wide before she hesitantly held out her hand to Shane.
Daryl was proven wrong at Rick's intervention as the scene got weirder before his watchful eyes.
Shane softened his stance, loosening limbs and muscle to reduce the intimidation of his build. He bent his knees to bring his eyes to her level and Daryl could suddenly see the good cop in the other man as he adjusted himself to handle a woman he assumed to have been battered.
He reached for her hand slowly to let her know she could pull it back again without him getting rough, but she kept it extended to watch suspiciously as the man took hold of her wrist.
Daryl watched her freeze at that hold, going deathly still and getting that same haunted look in her eyes that she had the day before when he gripped her wrist in a similar fashion. That expression was like a kick in the gut and Daryl knew he would have to ask where she went; what demons chased her when someone held her arm like that.
"These cuts are deep," Shane said with his voice surprisingly soft as he removed the bandages to probe the sliced skin.
"Get me some water and the kit," he ordered without looking away as fresh blood welled up from more of the cuts from his survey.
Rick moved to obey while Daryl stared at Shane as he led a dumbfounded Carol to a nearby log to sit down.
"What happened?" Andrea asked as the others gathered around him to observe the scene.
"Cut her hand," he groused, scratching at his neck without looking away from Carol's pale hand in Shane's tanned one.
No one bothered to ask more after that, seeing no story would be told by him.
Rick returned from the RV to go to Shane with a jug of water and the first aid kit.
Everyone settled back to watch after that as the big man proceeded to carefully cleanse away the blood.
Shane set the jug down then stared for a moment at her dripping hand. He looked around to the group as if he considered asking someone to get him a towel, but he just shook his head upon seeing the captivated audience. After a moment he whipped off his camo t-shirt to use it for drying the skin around her cuts.
Daryl shook his own head at the other man's love for flaunting his body. The bruises he saw on Shane's torso were encouraging, though, letting him know he'd gotten in more licks than he'd remembered in their skirmish.
"He's good at this," Rick told him as the Deputy moved to his side. "Always used to patch things up when we were kids. He probably would've become a vet or doctor if puberty and sports hadn't gotten hold of him in junior high."
The insight into Shane's past was interesting in how much Daryl wasn't interested, but Rick seemed on a roll and the rest of the group was in the mood for a story.
Daryl kept his focus on the man playing doctor with his woman, letting the story of Shane Walsh's rise to high school all-star fade to the background.
He saw Shane's mouth moving, but he spoke too low and calmly for the words to carry over Rick's chatter. Daryl wanted to move closer to hear the words the man said to Carol, but it would have been too obvious.
It made him twitchy, though, the way that shaven head bowed over her to tend those wounds. There was an intimacy to it with them both seated on that fallen tree. Daryl should have been the one doing it. He wasn't too good with the idea of stitching up her skin, though, which had been his reason for not doing it the night before.
He watched Carol's lips curl in that little half-smile of surprised amusement he'd only seen twice before. When she'd smiled like that from something he had said or done. The rough edges of his gnawed fingernails dug harder at the old scar on his chest as he felt his teeth grind.
Jealousy wasn't something Daryl felt over a woman.
He'd felt jealous years ago when the Triumph was restored and given to Merle by their asshole father, but aside from that he'd never really had much experience with the emotion.
It was the kind of feeling that fucked with your Zen; messed up your mojo. It distracted focus from more important things like getting the hell over it and doing something productive by way of killing or destroying shit.
Daryl had a serious want to break those thick fingers that so nimbly threaded closed the deeper wounds on Carol's hand.
If that asshole lingered any longer over the task then he'd need some sutures of his own.
As if sensing the venom of his train of thought, Carol looked up suddenly and gave him that smile and the jealousy just fucking left.
His fingers slowed in their nervous picking, stopped, then fell to his side.
He drew in a deep breath and felt his own lips curling in a half-grin to match hers.
Her smile changed as a light entered her eyes that made the breath shudder from his lungs.
His feet began to move without conscious thought until he found himself standing over her. She tilted her head back to stare up at him and his fingers went to the fragile arch of her neck, felt the warmth and pulse there.
There was a weight on him from the attention they had from the group, but he was more concerned with the weight of the knowledge within him that this was a moment that he couldn't blow.
Shane made some noise that distracted him for a moment and his head jerked toward the other man.
"Might want to be more careful with your toys next time," the cop said as he pushed himself to stand from straddling the log.
"It was an accident," Carol and Daryl snapped in tandem as she jumped to her feet and his defense.
"Well, hell, I've never heard that one before," Shane chuckled as he grabbed up the supplies and moved to return them to the RV.
"Sorry," Carol said to draw his attention back from glaring after the other man. "I actually think he meant well."
She raised her hand and flexed the fingers. Daryl took hold of her to inspect the stitches himself, careful to grip her palm rather than make the mistake of going for her wrist to ruin the moment.
"Not bad," he admitted with a light touch to the three separate cuts that now sported tight, even seams tied with a neat little knot to draw the skin together.
Her fingers fluttered at his touch and he looked up sharply to see if he'd hurt her, but there was no grimace upon her face.
"Tickles," she admitted with a sheepish expression.
He looked back at her cuts; the skin angry and red around the new stitches and asked, "Does it work?"
"Does what work?" she asked with a frown he heard but didn't look up to see as he pressed a kiss to the slice across her palm.
"Kiss and make it better?"
Her breath caught and her fingers fluttered against his cheek as he rubbed his lips over the pads of her fingertips.
"Doesn't hurt," she exhaled and slowly raised her hand to skim over his hair.
"Guess I shoulda tried it last night," he husked, lifting his head into her touch.
"I think you were doing pretty good this morning."
"Till Tweedles Dumb and Dee moseyed in," he snorted with a glance back toward the group that tried to pretend that they were all focused on the final preparations for leaving and not at all aware of anything happening between Carol and him.
Her fingers ghosted a path from his head down the side of his face in a faint caress.
"We can always try again later," she pressed uninjured fingertips to his lower lip. "If you want…"
The path of skin she had traversed on the way to his mouth fairly tingled and his lip felt singed under the simple touch of her index finger. He raised his hand to remove the burning touch and looked into her eyes as he tangled his fingers with hers.
"I want."