SUMMARY FOR THOSE WHO SKIPPED LAST CHAPTER: In the last chapter, Carol woke up and was really upset about nearly getting kidnapped. Daryl had slept next to her, was clean from showering, and held her to comfort her, but because all those things were so weird, she mostly convinced herself it was a dream. Thinking it was a dream let her give herself permission to be upset and not be okay for a second. She fell back asleep and when she woke up the second time, she saw Daryl very agitated and talking to Lori. When questioned, Lori said he was asking her how to help Carol, and urges Carol to "tell him what she needs" in regards to the attack and their relationship. Carol does some thinking and comes up with a plan about what she wants, but the chapter doesn't reveal what the plan IS.

Author's Note: So I'm going to do something a little different here. I want to toss in just a couple of Daryl POVs to give you guys a peek at his thoughts, but since we're all die-hard fans, I figure the best way to do it is in deleted scenes, little extras that don't need to be read along with the normal flow of the story, but are fun for those of us who want a deeper look. Because I know y'all are the kind who watch ALL the extras on the TWD DVD sets. The couple of deleted scene Daryl POV chapters will be marked as such, because the main story can be understood without them.

DELETED SCENE: Tracks

She wasn't mad.

Any woman in the world would be mad if you told them you were peeping on them nekkid, far as Daryl could figure. Hell, he'd knock a man halfway to Canada if he caught them watching her now. Merle used to watch, too, back in quarry camp. He had a thing for Andrea, but it still gave Daryl a nasty, twisted up feeling down in his guts to know Carol was down there when Merle would go to get his eyeful.

Carol didn't move like she was beautiful. That was part of his fantasy, back then. Part of what made his pants tight to bursting and kept him out in the trees for hours and hours when the group thought he was hunting.

She kept her shoulders curved inward like she was trying to hide her breasts, and she washed herself matter-of-factly. Like her body was an object, like she didn't even notice how her hands slid over slim hips and small, pert breasts. He pictured his hands touching her instead. Even in his fantasies, they shook. But they touched her like she was beautiful. In his daydreams, she always looked at him with a little surprise, a dawning affection, because he turned bathing from a chore into something that felt good.

He figured he was about one step away from grabbin' up Harlequins or getting packed off to the loony bin. But a man's fantasies were his own, and not a picture of it could be read out of his head, so it was safe enough.

He sat next to the motorcycle, changing the spark plugs while Rick rummaged through the cars they'd stolen from the group of rapists a couple of days ago. Siphoning gas, taking parts and belts they could reuse. It was honest work, kept the hands busy, but not the mind.

When Daryl had confessed he used to watch her, before he really knew her, she'd laughed. But then she'd gotten uncertain again, asking questions like she wasn't really sure why he'd been watching her and not the other girls. And now, she was smiling all the time. The more he touched her, the more she smiled, and he couldn't figure it. He fumbled it, half the time. Got nervous and did it too abrupt, or chickened out halfway through and pulled back.

But he couldn't figure those smiles.

There weren't no reason for them. With those men trying to kidnap her, the lack of food they'd had lately, the cold snap. There weren't goddamn nothin' to smile about. And he couldn't see any reason why his touch would make her happy.

He also couldn't see any reason she'd need to ask more questions, to be sure who he was watching.

But then, Carol wasn't a tracker.

Tracks told all the stories. Glenn's circling back to Maggie's. Maggie's, turning just partially away, then back again once she lured Glenn's back her way. Lori's, halfway to Rick's before she changed her mind and made herself busy with another task. Rick's, only a quarter of the way to Lori's before he turned the other way. Hershel's, around and around his daughters. T-dog's, off to the pissing tree then back to the food stash when he thought no one was looking.

His and Carol's tracks were harder to read than most. Coming off the motorcycle together at the end of the day. She always stumbled a little, when she first got off. He'd learned to catch her. Engine rumbled so loud, made your hands go numb, then your legs. He'd learned to trade off hands toward the end of the day, so both of his hands had full feeling in them when he caught her from that first stumble.

From there, they parted. Him to hunt, her to figure out how to make cans, spices and hope into dinner. They had spices for miles, and one pot still left to make stew, so that helped. Him and Carol'd come back together along with drips of blood from his game. His footsteps scuffing a few times because he got nervous when their conversation went longer than a couple o' back and forths. Then he'd retreat to the edge of the woods, checking how things had been since he'd been gone, or setting up a perimeter wire, trying for the thousandth time to teach Rick to make a decent snare. His tracks would come close to Carol's again when it came time to lay blankets.

Could have been innocent, their tracks.

Except for the way Carol's toes turned in when she talked to him. The way she always kept him in sight whenever he was near camp. The way his bedroll was planted between her and the trees. Not next to her, not exactly. But not apart, neither.

He plugged the last spark plug into the motorcycle, kicking his heel against the damp grass, a little dizzy at not having another job to do.

No one had ever looked to him. His mother had looked to boxed wine. His father, to beer and waitresses. Merle, to the Marines and meth.

If men kidnapped Carol and he was tied to a tree while she was stabbin' 'em, what the hell did she need him for?

He risked a glance across camp at her, and she was already looking his way, even though she was chatting with Lori and Hershel. She smiled at him.

His fingers all curled in on themselves.

That smile. God, he wanted it. Just like his fantasy, of swimming with her and his hands rubbing over her body and her liking it. He'd gotten to do it, after all those months of wanting, when walkers attacked in the middle of her bath. But there had been blood between his palm and her breast as he checked for bites. Too goddamn scared out of his mind to even enjoy her beauty or worry over how thin she'd gotten.

And then he'd just about kicked his own ass when he realized how he'd been grabbing at her. It was a wonder the woman hadn't crammed the knife he'd given her up into his own skull by now, grabby as he'd gotten with her after that attack.

Daryl put his tools away. Methodically, checking every one for cleanliness and placement, because if that motorcycle died in the wrong place, so would he.

When he was done, he wiped his hands on his red rag and walked into the woods, seeking solitude so he could think.

He weren't stupid. Merle had told him he was, plenty of times. But there weren't no arguing how he was the one who found the right creek when they was lost. How he followed the ruffle of leaves that led to venison jerky and the one Merle followed turned out to be the neighbor's dog, Beavis.

Merle knew animals as well as Daryl did, but he had a tendency to see what he wanted to see instead of what was really there. Daryl knew better than to let hope warp his tracking, but he could only see one thing that all Carol's signs added up to.

Now, he was left scrambling, trying to figure out how to not screw up the best thing he'd ever had going for him.

After those men attacked her, she looked to him. After Sophia got lost and the farm went down, she looked to him. He was pretty sure he'd have to run himself over with his own motorcycle if he let her down again, and that'd be a trick and a half considering the thing wouldn't hold itself up.

What he needed was to do something romantic.

He'd ask Rick, but if Rick knew how to romance a woman, his wife wouldn't have fucked his best friend, and she wouldn't be sleeping with their son instead of her husband. He'd ask Glenn, but if Glenn knew how to romance a woman, his balls wouldn't be in Maggie's right pocket and she wouldn't smile at him with that look of half-fond tolerance in her eyes.

He didn't want Carol to look at him with tolerance. He wanted her to look at him like she did when he said they should find a swamp house on stilts to fortify. Or that they should coax out the walkers before going into a store. He could live for a couple hundred decades on the way she looked at him when he'd out-thought everybody in their tiny group.

Not that it was hard. Bunch of NASA scientists, these guys weren't. He supposed he was lucky to come across a decent woman only after the end of the world when the competition weren't so stiff.

All he had to do now was figure how not to screw it up.