I awoke in the middle of the night to Daryl trailing his fingers across my chest, circling my nipples until they hardened into peaks. I ran my fingers down his jaw, and traced his lips in the dark, and he pressed a kiss to my clavicle.

"How long?" he asked? "How long what?" I responded sleepily. "Ya said you'd been sure for a long time. How long?" he repeated, and I hummed thoughtfully. "I don't know," I began, and then stopped. "No, that's not true. It was on the farm, though I tried to resist it because I felt really guilty. Am I a terrible person? I was pretty judgmental of Lori, but I'd only been away from my husband for a month or so when I started dreaming about you."

He sucked gently on my neck and looked at me, face inches away in the dark. "No. S'different. Ya didn' do any'thin about it an' ya weren't supposed ta be grievin' a dead husband. And over month spendin' so much time together, with all the shit we were going through, felt like a year."

"How about you?" I asked quietly. He slid down to kiss my stomach and the soft underside of my breasts and I could feel him smile. "Wanted ta bend you over the hood of yer car in those heels," he said bluntly.

I tried unsuccessfully to hold in a laugh. "But you thought I was an uptight liberal snob!"

Daryl shrugged. "Doesn' mean I didn't wanna fuck ya anyway." He ran his fingers down between my legs, spreading the wetness there up and down my slit, drawing a moan from my lips.

"Fair enough," I said breathlessly. "I actually took a picture of you that day and sent it to my friend because I thought you were hot. But how long, really? I mean, not just because you were horny." He pushed two fingers into me slowly, then a third, and I whimpered but didn't let him off the hook. "You must know."

He sighed, "At the farm, when I tried to get away from everybody. Shoulda been pissed off when you wouldn't leave me alone but I wanted you there, even if it meant I couldn't sleep 'cuz I was so fuckin' hard thinkin' about what I wanted to do to ya in that damn tent. And even when I was pissed at ya 'bout Randall, after Dale I couldn' stop thinkin' about what would happen if I lost you. That's why I cut yer hair."

He shifted further down my body, pushing my knees up gently so he could lower his face to blow softly on my soaked center. "Ya think about this, sometimes?" he asked and licked the length of my slit, circling my clit with his tongue until I writhed underneath him. "Yes!" I moaned breathlessly, too aroused to worry about the scars I knew were there. "God, I wanted you to touch me so bad that night we were talking about the stars and tattoos. And I almost kissed you when you were cutting my hair." I gripped the bars of my headboard while he tortured me with his tongue. "Fuck, Daryl!" I half-moaned. "I can't be quiet!"

He laughed quietly, barely pausing in his ministrations. "Not really my problem," he murmured, lowering his head again. I grabbed a pillow and clamped it over my mouth, as he gripped my hips tightly to keep me from moving. It was almost unbearable, torturous pleasure, as he drew me to the brink of a climax over and over and then backed off, licking and kissing my inner thighs. I wanted it so badly, but I was unexpectedly turned on by this dominant part of him, and let myself submit to his control of my body.

Eventually, he pulled the pillow from my face and kissed me, letting me taste myself on his lips. "Ya need ta come, baby?" he asked, I nodded, a tear of frustration slipping down my cheek, and he licked it up. "Mmmm. Ya think you can be quiet?" I nodded quickly and he dropped his head to my ear to whisper, "I think you're a liar," before moving back down my body. This time he didn't let up, licking steadily around and over my clit, pulling me up to an incredibly high peak before I climaxed with a scream that I barely muffled with the pillow.

I was pretty sure anyone who was awake in our cellblock knew what was happening, but I couldn't possibly care at that moment. Daryl thrust inside and fucked me, pulling me to another orgasm within minutes, and tumbling over the edge of pleasure himself shortly afterward.

He pulled me into him, combing his fingers through my hair while I came down from the shuddering high. "I've never . . . let someone else take control like that," I whispered. "I didn't know I wanted to." "I knew you would," he murmured. "When you told me ya wanted me to boss ya around in here." I flushed at the memory.

"Yeah, I got turned on pretty quickly when you started talking about giving me orders," I confessed, "which kind of caught me off guard." Daryl bent down to kiss me deeply again and then dropped his lips to my ear. "I figured that out when I came back from jerkin' off and could smell your pussy," he whispered. I gasped and he laughed quietly, "You really thought I just went to take a piss?" he chuckled, and I nodded.

Daryl laid on his back and I turned to look at him in the dark. "Was that why you started avoiding me?" I asked quietly.

He shook his head. "Nah. I'd known we were gonna get there eventually, been lyin' next to ya for months, hard as a rock most of the time so I was more'n ready, jus' didn' know if you were, after everything you'd been through. But the next day that guy Ben started talkin' to ya about all the stuff you've done, yer old life, and I jus' realized you should be with someone like that, not a redneck who's never even been outta Georgia."

I traced patterns on his chest while I listened. Daryl didn't often share his innermost thoughts, but he had a way of opening up at exactly the right time. "I don't want to be with someone like that," I said firmly. "I hate it when he talks about all that stuff. Even if we get out of this eventually, I can't go back to a life like that. And to be honest, most of that stuff I've done was because of the family I married into. My own family didn't ever have the money to eat out, or travel, or go to the theater. When I got married I changed and learned to enjoy those things, but I can't imagine finding meaning in them now."

Daryl ran his hand up and down my back absentmindedly. "What about yer husband?" he said finally. "Ya took yer ring off, but I know ya still want to get home if we can. What happens then?"

"I don't know," I said honestly. "I know I won't go back to him, but I don't know how we'll figure everything out. But we're both reasonable people, and our kids come first. Maybe he's moved on too, and it'll be fine. Or maybe he hasn't, and it'll be awkward. Either way, our marriage is over and we'll need to figure out a way to move forward."

Daryl didn't say anything, so I cautiously pressed on. "Would you . . . would you come to Oregon if we ever get out of here?"

He turned to look at me. "I told ya I would get ya home, didn' I?"

I nodded. "Yes, but . . . would you stay?"

He looked back at the underside of the bunk above us. "Ya think that'd work? Me in yer old life?"

"It would be you in a new life with me, blending some of my old life in, I guess. I don't know. We'd have to figure it out as we went. And maybe others in the group would come too, depending on what it's like if we get out."

"Maybe," Daryl murmured but didn't give me any more of an answer before we drifted back to sleep.