This is the final chapter of this story :) I'll try to make this go out with a bang, I promise! Thanks for the unbelievable response to this story, it did very well, I feel!
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When all Hell broke loose on the prison, Daryl's mind went into murder mode. He knew someone was responsible for this and all he could think about was finding the son of a bitch who'd pulled this shit and give him a very deep Columbian necktie with his buck knife. So he ran full out and watched in disbelief as Rick practically lapped him in his terror fueled sprint towards the gate, screaming for Lori as he went. He called for the keys and Daryl forced his legs to stop running and turned to catch them as Glenn tossed them and then he threw them to Rick who had the gate open by the time he and Glenn caught up.
By the time they reached the prison yard, there was no one to be found. Then the alarms began to sound and walkers began coming again, the ones on the inside gathering towards the sources and the ones on the outside pressing into the fences. One of the prisoners, Oscar, explained that the back up generators controlled the alarm system and that they must have kicked on, so they found themselves running through the inside of the prison, just he, Rick and Oscar as their group of five split up to search for the others.
Finally, they reached the generators and they ran in, slamming the door behind them as the walkers pressed themselves against it. Rick went to shut off the generators while Daryl and Oscar held the door. Daryl heard the attack going on behind them in the next minute and he told Oscar he'd handle the door and that he should go and help Rick. So he pushed against that door with all his might and managed to take down the walker causing the most trouble and get it shut completely, locking it against the horde outside. Then he heard the gunshot and his blood ran cold as he turned, seeing Oscar holding Rick's Python in front of him, the barrel smoking slightly as he stared ahead. Daryl crouched, pulling his buck knife and approached carefully, ready to take out all this pent up stress on this man in front of him who'd been foolish enough to turn on them...but then he saw Rick standing there and he saw the body on the floor behind him. It was the prisoner he'd thought Rick had killed, the runaway, Tomas' little sidekick.
"C'mon," Daryl mumbled, straightening up and giving Oscar a nod of acceptance, "Let's go find our people."
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They found T-Dog's body at one of the entrances, and the only way they could really tell it was T-Dog was by the size of the bloody carcass that had once been their friend. Only T-Dog had that football player build...there was no doubt who it had been.
Then Daryl saw something off to the side near the door that made his rapidly pumping heart stop. He stared at it in silence for several seconds before he bent down and picked up the length of material he recognized as the head scarf Carol had been wearing earlier that day. He eyed the blood on it and felt his heart jump into his throat. God, no...it couldn't be, not her, anyone but her!
He saw the looks the others were giving him and he dropped the material and took on his usual firm look and they moved on, heading outside to the yard again. They found Herschel and Beth on the top of a stairwell behind a closed chain-link gate and they both came out with looks of relief upon seeing fellow survivors. Not too much later, another door opened behind them and they all turned in silent shock at the sound of a baby crying.
As soon as he saw them, Daryl knew something was terribly wrong...Maggie was sobbing and clutching onto the squalling baby for dear life and Carl...Carl looked haunted and cold. Lori was nowhere to be seen and it clicked in his mind. Lori was dead.
Daryl watched in silent brokenness as Rick collapsed into a sobbing pile, grieving over the woman he'd loved and lost...the whole time, all Daryl could think of was the woman he'd loved and never had the balls to let her know just how much. T-Dog, Lori...but most of all, Carol. Today, he mused, may have just driven them all to a whole new level of madness and insecurity.
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Daryl stood among the rest of them as they lowered the bodies of their comrades into the deep holes they'd dug for their final resting place. Hershel had been kind enough to cover Lori's shredded stomach, but there was nothing to be done to improve the look of T-Dog's remains and they were all too vividly reminded of the horror of the previous day. Daryl eyed the already filled grave with the cross that had Carol's name on it and he wanted nothing more than to rip that cross out and snap it in two. They hadn't even had a body to bury, just that damn blood-stained scarf.
After a long time, everybody departed from the gravesides to go begin moving bodies out of the yard to burn. It was a necessary form of stress relief that Daryl knew they needed. But he couldn't tear himself away from the grave in front of him yet and he glanced around to see if anyone was watching before he pulled the white flower from his pocket. A Cherokee Rose he'd found along the fence line that morning as he and Maggie returned from their baby supply run.
"If I'd known...I would have told ya everything," he whispered as he laid the flower down next to the cross, "I wish I'd just fuckin' told ya I loved ya before this happened. And I wish I'd been there to protect ya."
He let out a shaky breath and shut his eyes tight as they started to burn with unshed tears. He refused to let them fall and he backed up from the grave and readjusted his crossbow before he turned slowly and made his way back to the prison yard to help clean up.
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Daryl knew something was up when he reached the yard, everyone looked far too happy for their current situation and he suddenly felt a surge of anger rise up in him and he walked through the gate with a squinting glare on his face.
"What's so damn funny?" he growled, "B'cause I don't see nothing to be laughin' about!"
Everyone turned to look at him with a smile and the group parted quickly and Daryl suddenly felt like he might faint for the first time in his life. Carol stood there in the center of them all, her eyes soft as she looked at him with a shy smile.
"Hi, Daryl," she squeaked, looking sheepish.
And Daryl felt something snap inside him and he felt the tell-tale wetness of tears on his face as they poured out of his eyes and down his cheeks and he covered the distance between them before he even knew what was happening and he pretty much plowed right into her, causing her to take a few staggering steps back to keep from falling backwards from the impact, but Daryl wrapped his arms around her and pulled her into his chest firmly, like he was terrified she was going to disappear again and he wasn't going to ever let her go.
And suddenly, he didn't give a fuck about anyone around them as he tipped her chin up and claimed her mouth with his, tasting her tears on her lips as his tongue slid along them. He couldn't stop himself, he assaulted her mouth with all the emotion he could muster. Then he buried his nose into her neck and rested his head on her shoulder, pressing kisses to the skin there.
"Carol, I thought...we all thought..."
"I know," Carol whispered, "I had to stay hidden, those walkers wouldn't leave and I was out of ammo. I had no way of protecting myself so I had to wait for the coast to be clear. I'm sorry everyone worried about me."
"I gotta tell you," Daryl stated quickly, "I shoulda told ya a long time ago, shoulda told ya every single damn day! I don't ever wanna lose ya, Carol, I...I love ya."
Carol saw the reactions of the group, the hands covering the mouths in surprise, the knowing smiles, the grins...but then she pushed Daryl back from her so she could look at him and she forgot all about the rest of them being there.
"You do?" she asked quietly.
Daryl nodded, blinking rapidly as his eyes dried up from his crying fit, and smiled slightly.
"Well then," Carol smiled widely, "I think we should get these bodies burned so we can find a little privacy."
"Don't bother, the rest of us have got this," Maggie stated firmly as they walked over to the others, she pushed them away from the bodies and towards the gate. "We won't be anywhere near the east guard tower. You two get out of here, there needs to be a little bit of happiness in this group after everything that's happened."
She gave Carol a wink and Carol smiled, grabbed Daryl by the arm and headed directly for said tower.
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Daryl's heart was thudding like Ricky Ricardo's conga drum, he swore it was going to beat right out of his chest as Carol pulled him along by his arm like an excited child towards the guard tower. He gulped hard when she turned and smiled at him sweetly and he knew there was no turning back now...the secret was out.
He sped up and opened the guard tower door and held it for Carol. She grinned and stepped through with a "thank you" and he watched her head up the stairs as he hesitated at the door...truth be told, he was terrified.
"You coming, Daryl?" Carol's voice drifted down to him and he closed his eyes tight, thinking back to when he'd jokingly asked Glen that same question and he wondered vaguely if she was joking too.
"Yeah," he called back as he let the door shut behind him. He took a deep breath and slowly headed up the stairs. Carol met him at the top and immediately pulled him into her, her mouth catching his with a fervor he'd never felt from her before, something almost desperate in the long, sensuous kiss she was laying on him. Then she pulled back and took his face between her hands, looking at him pleadingly.
"Please, don't change your mind," she whispered, "Please tell me you're ready for this."
Daryl swallowed thickly, but he didn't look away from her. He nodded silently, just once, and he felt his stomach do a strange little flip when she smiled at him, a bright, genuine, joyful smile. And to think, he was the one who'd put that smile there...it was totally new to him, this feeling in his gut. This wasn't like the past times, the quickies against the bathroom doors of run down bars, the emotionless faces of the girl beneath him, the complete lack of concern whether it was good for her or not...this was different, this was terrifying, this was so much more than anything he'd ever felt before.
"Carol," he whispered, feeling like he had to let her have the whole truth before she made this decision, "Just so ya know...I ain't never...it's been a long time and I...never did learn t' do this right. I ain't never cared about the girl I was with before and...god, I want to do this right."
She didn't laugh, she didn't look at him like he was crazy, she didn't get a look of disgust on her face...she just kept on smiling at him with this soft expression that was driving him crazy with desire.
"You'll do it right," she whispered, sounding perfectly confident about the whole thing, "And if you don't this time, there's always next time."
Good Lord, this woman...
Carol suddenly found herself pulled flush against the firm, muscled heat of Daryl's body and his lips were on hers once more, his tongue unhesitatingly slid between them and she let her teeth part to grant him entrance, which he took gladly and with much gusto. But she still felt the tenseness in his arms and shoulders, like he was still in defense mode, and she knew it was going to take some time for this to become their normal, but she also know he was worth the wait.
She slid her hands down those beautifully carved arms of his and gripped his palms then lifted his hands and slid them under the material of her shirt. She sighed at the feeling of his calloused hands, hot and firm against the skin of her stomach and she was delighted when he slowly slid them up and around her ribs, coming up to her shoulders in the back, thumbs tracing along her bare shoulders.
"You ain't wearin' nothin' under that shirt, are ya?" Daryl asked gruffly into her lips.
"Nope, not a thing," Carol giggled. She'd given up on bras a while back, her chest was small enough for her to get away with it.
"Fuck, that's..." Daryl didn't waste time explaining just what it was, instead he clamped back down on her mouth with his and slid his hands around to her front. Carol could feel his hands trembling as his palms slid over her chest and his kiss faltered when his fingers found the hard peaks and he pulled back to look at her face, his expression searching, like he was silently asking for permission.
Carol stepped back and pulled her shirt over her head before he could even register what was happening, revealing her entire top half to him, every inch of creamy pale skin and every light freckle that speckled her shoulders and chest. He stared at her for a long time before he pulled her closer and began tracing the outlines of her collarbones and her ribs, sharp and noticeable from the malnutrition they all lived with these days.
"I gotta start feedin' ya more," he muttered as his blue eyes scanned her slowly and calculatingly.
Carol slid her own hands up under the material of his usual vest and sleeveless shirt and lifted at it insistently until he raised his arms to allow her to pull them both off of him and he stood there shifting foot to foot in discomfort as she sized him up with those big, pretty blue eyes of hers. His mind went to those ugly scars that covered his torso, front and back, and wondered if she was going to ask about them. But she didn't, and she didn't even appear to be surprised, she just stepped forward again and wrapped her arms around his waist and leaned her head on his bare chest.
"I think I should probably start feeding YOU more," she whispered, her fingertips traced his side, up and over each rib that jutted out from under his pale, scarred skin.
He really had slimmed down a lot since she'd first met him in the quarry outside Atlanta. Every bit of him was lessened...except for those arms, good LORD those arms. She had imagined, too many times to count, that she'd been wrapped in those powerful arms and pulled into this firm chest...and now it was happening and she could barely believe it as she traced the muscles of his back with her fingers.
"We gonna do this or what?" she whispered, looking up at him from her spot against his chest. She decided she was going to have to be the one to take the first steps here, so she stepped back a few paces from him and locked eyes with him as she slowly undid the button and zipper of her jeans and shimmied them down her hips, she saw the obvious bulge in his pants twitch and she grinned as she let her jeans drop to the floor and she stepped out of them, completely bare to his eyes for the first time.
He stared at her with a hunger she would attribute to a half-starved coyote who'd just found a chicken coop and it made her a little nervous and she meekly looked away from the intensity of his gaze.
"Damn," she heard him mutter quietly, "Carol...you...just...damn."
"Thanks," Carol laughed lightly, "I'm sure you're not so bad yourself."
And she saw the bright red blush creep into Daryl's cheeks as his eyes dropped to the floor, he suddenly looked terribly nervous and she smiled softly as he shifted his weight from foot to foot in his usual fidgety way. But she waited silently for his resolve to come back and he finally raised his eyes back to her slowly.
"Come on, Daryl," Carol pleaded silently, "You can trust me."
He nodded and hesitated a few moments longer before his visibly shaking fingers finally made it to the button of his faded, ripped jeans and undid it with a bit of fumbling and then he slid the zipper down...but then he stopped, eyes closed and he sighed heavily while shaking his head. Carol waited, knowing it would probably be easier on him if she just took it all in her own hands and ripped those damn jeans off of him, but she was going to make him do this...make his see he had to make some of the effort in this. He must have understood that stubborn look in her eyes because he bit his bottom lip and hooked his thumbs on the top of his jeans and slid them down painfully slow, that bright red flush coloring his cheeks again as he did.
And Carol discovered she was right...not so bad at all. Carol couldn't stop the grin that spread across her face as she scanned every last bare inch of the man she'd given her heart to so long ago, she never thought this moment would come and yet...here they were. And she was done waiting.
She closed the considerable space between them in a flash, her arms going around his neck and her right leg hooking around his left hip as she pulled herself as close to him as she could. Daryl tensed up and then chuckled deeply in her ear as he put his arms around her to steady her after her attack, the heat of his hands on her lower back felt like fire against her skin and Carol felt a familiar pooling in the lowest part of her abdomen as her body responded to the feel of him pressing against her...into her.
"Mph," Daryl grunted as she bucked her hips against him, "Take it easy!"
"But..."
Daryl silenced her with his mouth, kissing her firmly but slowly, trying to figure out what to do next. He slid his hands slowly up from her hips to her shoulders and then down again, loving the feel of her soft skin under his calloused palms. And he felt like his brain would explode when Carol's hands suddenly embedded themselves in his hair, tugging just enough to hurt a tiny bit, but mostly enough to drive him crazy and make his dick twitch and grow harder than it had already achieved, he wondered vaguely if he was going to be able to even hold on long enough to let this happen.
"You alright?" Carol's whisper brought him back to reality and he smiled at her.
"Yeah," he said quietly.
Carol stepped back, lowering her foot back to the floor and then she surprised him even more than she had yet by laying down their clothes in a rectangle shape and dropping down to them and sitting there looking up at him with those big doe eyes of hers. She smiled and patted the floor next to her, beckoning him to join her. So without any hesitation, Daryl dropped to the floor beside her and waited on pins and needles for her next move.
"I'm not doing all the hard work here, Daryl," Carol said cheekily, reaching out to lay her hand on the side of his face, her thumb traced the scruffy prickles of his mustache and along his jaw...maybe she was just odd, but she loved the feel of it when she kissed him and her mind was going haywire imagining that scruff...somewhere completely different.
She was snapped back to reality, such a good reality too, by the feel of Daryl shifting his position and turning to face her. She smiled and laid back as he put his right palm on the floor next to her and hovered half way over her. His left hand threaded into her short hair and he sighed as he just...looked at her.
"I don't know what the hell I'm doing," he whispered, then he leaned down and kissed her again, softly, carefully and simultaneously moved to where he was fully over her, his weight supported on his right elbow. Carol opened her eyes when the kiss ended and found herself looking right into those gorgeous blue eyes of his and saw a look of determination and trepidation in them.
"Daryl, if you don't do this soon, I'm gonna get right up off this floor and find someone willing," she teased, pretending to try and get up.
He must have thought she was serious because he got a panicked look on his face and he straddled her hips firmly and pushed her shoulders back to the floor with both hands.
"Sorry," he mumbled when Carol rubbed the back of her head where it collided with the floor, but she was giggling despite the little stars in her vision. "Don't say that again."
"What?" Carol asked, a little confused.
"You wouldn't...want someone else, would ya ever?" he asked, fearfully.
"Oh, Daryl, of course not," Carol replied seriously, reaching up and placing her hand on the back of his neck to pull his closer, "Never. You're all I want, you're all I've wanted for so long."
Apparently that was all Daryl needed to hear to finally spur him into action, because next thing Carol knew she was caught in another, very passionate kiss and she felt his hand slip down between them and she closed her eyes as she waited for the feeling of him entering her. And when he finally did, after a few mumbles and a miss, she gasped loudly and bit his bottom lip a little harder than she planned.
This is going to take a little getting used to, she mused to herself. She'd never been with anyone else since she married Ed and, well, Ed wasn't much to speak of in any department. She had never been stretched this far and never been filled this deeply and it was quite a shock to the system after all that time.
"Ow, what?" Daryl asked quickly, his tongue tracing his now tender bottom lip, "Did I hurt ya?"
Carol shook her head quickly to reassure him, but her breath was still knocked out of her. She felt him moving to pull out and she pushed her heels into the backs of his thighs to keep him there and shook her head desperately.
"Yer lyin'," Daryl hissed, his eyes were clenched tight as her strong legs forced him forward and even deeper.
"I'm...just...not used to you yet," Carol breathed finally, "Doesn't meant it hurts. Please don't stop."
Daryl nodded and gulped loudly as her heels slid down his legs and settled on his calves. Good Lord, everything this woman did drove him to near madness! With that thought, he slowly bucked his hips back and forth in an experimental movement and nearly came right then and there from the sound that issued from Carol's throat. The memory of hearing her in the shower flooded over him and the knowledge that HE was causing those sounds this time made him feel a confidence inside he never imagined he possessed and he did the movement again...and again...and again until he fell into a rhythm that felt right, so fuckin' right.
He didn't last long...he knew he wouldn't. Not with those whimpers and moans she was making in his ears, not with the way she was wiggling and moving beneath him, not when she was so much tighter than he imagined she would be. He released after a short amount of time and he immediately felt like a complete asshole for his "two-pump chump" move as Merle would have called it. Once again, he rolled off of an unsatisfied girl, no, not a girl, a woman this time. He sighed and ran a hand down his face, wondering how she was going to react.
She's probably disgusted by your eleven year old boy moves, you jackass.
But damned if she didn't let out a happy little sigh and roll over onto her side to smile at him. She was fucking smiling at him for this shitty little roll on the floor? And then she did the weirdest thing...she laid her head on his chest and put her arm around him and whispered:
"Stop beating yourself up, Daryl."
He raised his head and looked down his nose at her, she had turned her head to look at him from her spot on his chest. How did she always know exactly what he was thinking? She raised herself onto her elbows, looking down at him with a stern expression.
"Don't do that to yourself," she whispered, "You're not perfect, so stop being so disappointed when you realize that. I don't want perfect, I want genuine."
"But...that wasn't even..." he searched his overloaded, post-orgasm brain for a rebuttal but it wasn't coming to him fast enough.
"Ssshh," Carol pressed a finger to his lips and he fell immediately silent, "You think it had to last forever to be good for me?"
He felt his cheek twitch as he squinted at her questioningly and she smiled.
"I won," she said slyly, "I finally got you right where I wanted you and seeing you satisfied is good enough for me right now."
Daryl eyed her with amazement. She didn't even care that he'd totally messed this whole moment up?
"You...you don't even know how awesome you are," he whispered.
"Neither do you," Carol replied, a little sadly as she look him in the eyes, "But I'm going to show you. We're together now, Daryl, and we've got plenty of time to work on us. We won't always be as awkward as we are right now."
"Yeah we will," Daryl chuckled, "We always have been."
Carol laughed and rubbed her nose against his, Eskimo style.
"Well then, we'll just learn to harness the awkward and make it work," she replied with a wink, "I think we make awkward look good."
"I think..." Daryl said, with a gleam in his eye, "I'm up for another round of awkward sex with you."
Carol thought she'd never had a better offer in her life.
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Tada! Sorry this is the end, folks, but I have a lot to focus on lately and more story requests to work with so I figured short and sweet would be a great way to go with this story. Thanks for all your awesomeness and reviews and keep an eye out for my new stuff and check out my old stuff too if you haven't already :)
Peace out!
