Timeline: This chapter takes place after Negan leaves Sanctuary to go to Bethesda in search of the medical supplies to help Carol, who unbeknownst to him has escaped along with Daryl, Carl and the rest of the captives from Alexandria except Rosita, who Negan had taken with him. Rick leads the allied group from Hilltop, Alexandria and Kingdom to rescue Rosita and try to take out Negan and as many of the Saviors with him as they can.The events at Hilltop and Alexandria in the previous chapter are occurring at the same time.

"The Workers of Iniquity"

"Deliver me from the workers of iniquity and save me from bloody men." Psalm 59:2, King James Bible

"What do you want from me?" Rosita asked, her voice strong, her chin up thrust in defiance. She knelt in the middle of the clearing, the vehicles parked in a semi-circle around the gathered group of men. Her anger and fear was only betrayed by the flush in her cheeks and the quick rise and fall of her chest.

The caravan heading for Bethesda had been keeping up a punishing speed, Negan pushing hard to get there and back to bring the equipment and supplies needed to help Carol and the baby. After twelve straight hours of driving each day, slowed by having to push abandoned cars and trucks off the highway periodically they had to stop to refuel and eat.

Pressed into service to help prepare the food, Rosita had been tending the fire at the center of the temporary camp when the cook had congratulated her on her upcoming nuptials. When she informed him in no uncertain terms that she would not be marrying the leader of Sanctuary, he had leered at her.

"You don't marry the boss; it means you ain't on the do not fly list."

"You won't touch me. I saw what he did to the men who tried to rape us. You don't have the balls to go against him... or if you do he'll cut them off..." Rosita scoffed, taunting him.

A big hand roughly closed over her upper arm, dragging her away from the fire at the edge and into the center of the clearing.

"On your knees." Negan ordered.

Rosita locked her jaw and her knees, glaring at him.

Negan backhanded her, knocking her to the ground and then hauled her up into a kneeling position.

"What do you want from me?" Rosita asked, more to challenge his authority over her than any real wish to know. She'd known what he wanted from her from the second he'd forced her to come on this mission.

"Would you die for your friends?"Negan asked speculatively, tilting his head to the side, insolently looking her up and down.

"Yes." Rosita said without hesitation. She would. She would give it as Glenn had done, as Carol had tried to do.

"Would you let all my men have a go at that luscious tight little body to save them?" he continued. "Or are you and I going to come to an understanding of the marrying kind?"

"I thought you didn't believe in rape." Rosita said through clenched teeth.

"It's not rape if you agree to it. I'm giving you choices." Negan smiled his crocodile smile, pointing at himself with Lucille and then caressing the barbwire wrapped tip lovingly, he hefted it menacingly, using the vicious instrument to point in a sweeping gesture over all the gathered men watching the scene intently.

"You, death by bludgeoning or gang rape? That's coercion not choice. Can't get it up without threatening a woman?" Rosita said, still defiant, but with a note of resignation underlying her voice.

The Sanctuary leader strolled over to stand directly in front of her, looming and threatening, his fly even with her face.

"You got a pretty smart mouth, Rosita." Negan purred, lifting Lucille up over his shoulder, "I'm gonna love seeing it wrapped around my big dick which is as hard as steel right now in anticipation."

Rosita continued to glare up at him defiantly, but didn't respond.

"I just lost two wives, sweetheart. I am in mourning. Nothing takes the edge off of death like a new wife and a wedding night." he leaned in, his mouth to her ear, saying in a low voice, "You make me happy n' I might just promise to forgo the pleasure of taking my little teen bride back there at Sanctuary until she's ripened a couple more years."

Sparing Enid from this man's depravity... that was why Carol had done what she had done... to spare them all. Could she do any less? Rosita thought. And maybe, just maybe when his guard was down and she was close enough...

Negan stared at her, raising one sculpted eyebrow.

"Your promise." Rosita said, blinking several times, fighting back the furious tears.

Negan grinned and then his face went solemn and he used the deadly bat to cross his heart.

In response Rosita nodded in agreement and then closed her eyes and dropped her head.

"Grub will commence after the nuptials, gentlemen." Negan smiled wolfishly, grabbing Rosita's upper arm to drag her back into a standing position and then called out loudly, "Dwight!"

"He's still out on perimeter patrol, boss." another of the men reminded him.

"Since Wade isn't here, he was gonna be my best man." Negan said, disappointed. "Fuck his ass then. Get the preacher over here."

"I have to get back." Dwight whispered hoarsely. "I'm only supposed go out two clicks on perimeter and then go back."

"Is Rosita safe?" Rick asked tersely.

"She was when I left them, man." Dwight said, a bit exasperated, "I had to get out and away to call you."

"If you're lying, you cowardly piece of shit!" Tara shoved at his shoulder, pushing him back before Jesus stepped between them and forced her back.

"Look, I gave you the exact camp coordinates." Dwight whined, "Just tell me when you're going to hit it so I can get her ass and mine outa there before then."

"Why didn't you just bring her now?" Rick asked, frustrated.

"I didn't know for sure you were out here, now did I?" Dwight snapped. "Tipoff that bunch too soon n' we both end up with our heads lookin' like bloody pancakes. Had to make sure someone from Archer's crew was waiting." he ran his fingers over his half burn-scarred face and paused to clear his throat, "Hey, is his missus okay? Their kid?"

"Don't know." Rick replied, a bit surprised to be asked, "They were heading for Hilltop. The Doc there is good with that kind of thing but we haven't heard anything yet."

"Carol's strong and she's got Daryl with her." Michonne said sounding confident. She exchanged a loaded look with Rick. They both knew what trials Carol and Daryl had already been through to be together. If anyone could get through this one, it would be them.

"Good... guess that's good." Dwight said quickly. "Look I gotta get back. We change up perimeter detail on the half hour."

"You got a watch?" Rick asked, looking down at the one Carol had returned to him after Terminus.

"Yeah." Dwight said, his hand going to the thin banded cheap one Sherry had worn now resting in his pocket.

"Two hours." Rick told him. "Be next to Rosita when we come in and we'll get you both out."

"Got it." the turncoat replied, hoping he could keep her away from Negan long enough to do so.

"Is there a problem?" Negan asked, looking over the shoulder of the man wearing headphones sitting at the electronic equipment in the back of the van.

"Main camp missed check in." the shortwave operator frowned, twisting some dials, trying to isolate a signal. "I've tried the relay station at the five mile marker, but they say they can't get through either—they sent a team back to see what's going on."

"How long until we hear back?" Negan said in a cold controlled tone.

"Depends on what they run into. If it's a herd or raiders—"

"Or an attack?" Negan fumed. He knew that just as he kept watch on the other communities in the DC area, they had spies tracking his movements. Leaving the compound had been a calculated risk. He'd believed it was worth it to get Carol the things she needed to deliver the child safely.

"Do we head back?" the operator asked.

"Not just yet. Give the relay station team an hour to check back in. Then we decide." Negan said, his eyes narrowing, but his mouth broadening into an anticipatory grin. "In the mean time my bride awaits."

The radio operator continued working through the night to reach the other outposts to find out why Sanctuary had missed the check in. When he finally got through to someone who had learned the story, he called in his boss and relayed the message. They needed to return to the main compound as soon as possible. It was surrounded by the dead and Carol and the others couldn't be found.

Negan was stunned. She was gone. Had she left him? Had she been taken? His doctors and other wives were missing. And what about Archer? In the chaos of the attack on the compound no one was sure if he'd been killed trying to stop them, taken by the herd or had left with Carson and the women. Had he been betrayed? If so, by whom?

One person with them probably knew the answer.

Climbing up into the caravan that served as his private sleeping quarters, Negan stared at the bound sleeping woman he'd spent the last several hours owning. Only the possibility that she now carried his child kept him from dragging her out of the bed by her hair.

"Get out." he muttered to the guard watching her, Dwight.

"Boss?" Dwight asked softly, frowning, looking down on Rosita. He'd returned to the camp to find he'd been too late to even try to stop the sham marriage's consummation, arriving only in time to tend to the aftermath. It was apparent that when she'd fought his attentions despite her coerced vows, her new husband had not used Rosita gently. The sight of the damage done to her had sickened Dwight. Her wrists and ankles were chafed and swollen from being restrained, a necklace of bruises circled her throat where his big hand had closed over it until she'd passed out and there were others over much of her body.

Negan was spiraling out of control.

"I said get out." Negan repeated the order. "I need some more alone time with my wife before we break camp."

"She's... she's pretty done in..." Dwight said hesitantly, glancing at Rosita and moving protectively in front of her and then looking back to Negan. The scratches on his thick neck and jaw line showed that the young woman had fought the Sanctuary leader hard before being restrained.

Negan stared at him as if he couldn't comprehend anyone questioning his orders. He tilted his head to the side slowly.

"Getting one side of your fucking asshole face burnt off wasn't enough for you, Dwight?" he asked mildly, raising Lucille and studying the traces of hair, blood and brain matter imbedded in the barbwire wound all around her surface.

With one last despairing look at the woman in the bed, wishing he was a better man, Dwight fled the camper.

Before dawn Rick and his allied forces from Hilltop, Kingdom and Alexandria surrounded the Savior's encampment using the cover of night for the element of surprise. Ducking under the waist high double strand of barbed wire around the perimeter of the camp, meant to snag and slow walkers, Jesus led the advance reconnaissance group through. So far they'd encountered only one sentry, his head down, asleep at his post, which had been suspicious. Even though they had timed their foray to the changing of the guard, there should have been some more signs of movement.

Two abandoned vehicles, probably the most expendable, sat alone in the middle of the clearing. On closer inspection they saw that they'd been stripped of tires, gas tanks drained and any other useful parts removed, monkey-wrenching them so as to be unusable by anyone else.

"What the fuck!" Tara exclaimed, lowering her gun and turning in a circle looking around the smoldering campfires. Walkers had been tied and propped up around them, posed to look like men sitting warming themselves at the fires. Their throats had been ripped out to keep them from making any noise, gouts of black blood and bile running down the front of them.

Negan and his men were gone.

"Rick, we have a situation." Jesus said into the short range walkie talkie he pulled from his back pocket while the others took care of the walker decoys including the dead sentry.

"What is it?" Rick asked, agitated.

"They're in the wind." Jesus explained.

There was a long pause on the other end as Rick absorbed the information.

"Can you track them?" the former sheriff asked, his voice flat.

"On it." Jesus replied, relived Rick wanted him to just get on with it. He'd been prepared for an emotional outburst. "Should have some answers by the time you get here."

When Jesus returned from scouting ahead to check for tire tracks and any other signs, he looked angry and anxious.

"They're not heading for Bethesda any more. And they're not all doubling back to Sanctuary either. Half are heading in the opposite direction." Jesus gritted out.

"Hilltop?" Michonne asked, Carl and Judith were there. Maggie and the rest from Alexandria... Daryl and... she looked over at Rick, stricken.

"Most likely." Jesus said.

"Shit." Rick swore. "He knows Carol's gone."

AN: Finally got back to this one. Thanks to those who have been asking for it to give me the push to continue.

Negan is a hypocrite, murderer and a rapist. Rosita is his victim, like so many others have already been, including Dwight, Sherry, and the other wives, including, in this story, Carol. I hope that the show portrays the depths of his degradation in a way that makes it clear he truly is a worker of iniquity.

Thanks for reading!