The turn in to Rae's house was marked by a metal gate built between two fences. It was an ugly thing, pieces of scrap metal improvised together but despite appearances it was strong. At least strong enough to withstand any wandering dead that might think to walk the long road which led to Rae's people.

Rae said it should have been closed but it was wide open, a sign that Jacob's men had been here. Probably the same men that now lay dead in a ditch besides the apple orchard. He smiled, he was hard just thinking about the way Rae had looked at him and stroked his face so gently after he slaughtered all those men.

He never had any of his wives with him on the road to witness him in his glory or to fuck him when the blood rush pumped around his body untamed. Those bitches wouldn't like five minutes out here, Rae was different, he could take her on all his adventures.

The truck passed through the gate and he pulled over but before he could ask one of his men to shut the gate Rae was already jumping out the door. Negan followed, helping her push the barrier back into place with a resounding groan of hinges that needed oiling.

Rae pressed her palm against all the rusty pieces of metal, testing their strength like she had probably done countless other times. "Your men should wait here," she said eventually.

"Why would they do that baby doll?"

She glanced at him, "7 armed men and a big truck rolling up to the house. My people won't like it."

Negan grinned, if she thought she could get away now she was wrong, "and why the hell am I gonna care what people like?"

"If they don't trust you, they won't let you in." Rae scoffed and tested another piece of the gate, "it makes no difference to me, Negan."

Negan stepped close to her, his hand rested on her hip and his lips brushed against her ear until he could feel her tremble. Even after a night on the road she still smelled sweet, "if they don't let me in, then I'll just have to fucking break in and I might not give you back."

"You said you'd bring me home," her voice was sharp as she turned around so they were face to face.

Dangerously face to face, he could almost taste her, she was all freshly picked red apples. His mouth watered for another tangy bite as his hand reached behind her to brace himself on the gate, hemming her body in with his and enjoying every inch of her softness relenting to him. "I also said your ass belongs to me until I decide otherwise."

She didn't say anything, she just looked at him with those bottle green eyes, her chest heaving in slow frustrated breaths until he could barely stand another second of being this close to her without doing something about it. He swallowed hard and did the unexpected, compromised. "Mark and Donnie will come with us, everyone else will stay with the truck. But your people try anything stupid Red and they will sure as fuck be regretting it. Understood?"

Her smile was as fake as Kirsten's titties, "yes. Sir."

"Don't try to be smart Red. I'll always be smarter and I will always fucking win," Negan stepped aside, watching every swish of her ass as she walked back to the truck and grabbed her backpack.

For the a split second he considered that Rae might have been the predator, the little red wolf manipulating him into doing whatever she wanted. He was killing men for her, gathering her fucking apples and now he was going to walk into her den with tweedle dum and tweedle fucking dee. The idea was more thrill than fear. Rae was a woman who he didn't quite control. Sure, he could overpower her but he could never take full ownership over what thoughts processed behind those bottle green eyes. Besides which, Rae had such a pretty tail he'd chase it chase it like a rabid dog into the very jaws of hell.

Negan ordered the remaining four men to "keep watch, keep vigilant, the first sign of trouble you bring your asses to Red's house." The last thing he needed was to lose his men and ended stranded in the little house on the fucking prairie.

Rae was already a hundred feet along the road by the time he started following with Mark and Donnie. "When we meet her people I wanna play it nice and easy, understood."

"Yes sir," Donnie was quick to say and Mark just shrugged, lighting up his cigarette and accepting whatever fate lay ahead.

"You trying to run away?" he said when he finally caught up to Rae's long legged strides.

"Pretty sure I'm walking."

Negan laughed, that smart lip of hers was going to get her into trouble but fuck if he didn't like it.

On one side of the road were meadows with grasses growing long and uninhibited. On the other side was nothing but a mile of crops burnt to a sooty desert that still held the lingering stench of ruin.

Rae didn't look at it, not once did she glance at all that blackness and more than anyone he could understand why. Keeping shit together, keeping people together in this fucked up world, was a twenty four hour job. A loss like those fields was the ultimate nightmare. He thought about saying something but sentiments were not exactly his style.

When the house finally started coming into view Negan thought they must have crossed state lines they'd been walking so fucking long but any irritation he was feeling was quickly squashed. In fact he was grinning like a damn kid at christmas. It was like a life sized version of the wild west fort he'd got one year from good ol' Santa Claus. Wooden walls standing 15 feet high, crows nests on each corner and a big wooden gate wide enough to fit a stagecoach and a team of horses. The only difference between this and the old west was the 50 calibre machine gun mounted pride of place above the entrance and the glint of two sniper scopes watching their every move. He had a sudden need for a revolver and a black ten gallon hat, he'd always played on the side of the outlaws even when he was kid.

"You built all this, Red?"

"With a lotta help."

"She's a beauty." Fuck, this matchstick fort in a field of meadows made the Sanctuary look like the very ugly fucking cousin.

"Its Rae!" a female voice bellowed from atop one of the crows nests, "she's back!"

Show time. Negan felt an uncomfortable knot in his stomach. Usually at this stage in the game he would march in with his men and give everyone a run down of the new world order. Anyone who disagreed would die until everyone decided to agree. This was different. He wasn't demanding. He was earning.

Behind the gates he could hear indistinct chatter followed by several loud bangs and then they creaked open, offering the first glimpse of what lay protected by those high walls and it was a whole world.

"Come in," she said and he followed.

The area inside the wall was about half the size of a football field. In the centre sat the turn of the century farmhouse, buttercup yellow siding and a wrap around porch. It was the kind of house that he'd once imagined living out his retirement in, a rocking chair out front and a shotgun on his lap for scaring the neighbour kids with. Beneath the porch steps was a well trod communal area that had a BBQ pit set up on one side. On the other side was an old stone well with a cast iron pump and a pile of metal buckets sat waiting.

Along the left wall were three huge RV's, parked bumper to bumper and outside of them stood long washing lines. Almost every inch of land was filled with plant life; bushes and vines, stalks and shoots. Even the tops of the RV's had been covered in raised beds and the entire left hand wall of the fort had row after row of pallets nailed to its sides with cascades of peas and beans spilling from the pots to make a sea of foliage. l

Somewhere behind the house came the call of a cockerel and the kitchen window allowed the rich scent of supper to escape. Negan's mouth watered, onions and garlic, herbs and home.

He drank it all in and looked at Rae, standing tall and ethereal with her red hair offset by the backdrop of all that lush green. It wasn't just him, Mark and Donnie were gaping as much as he was. There was magic in these walls and by god there were women. Almost everyone weaving through the gardens to greet Rae was a woman. He counted at least 25 including a young mousy haired woman holding a scrawling baby. She was the first to embrace Rae, holding her so tight she might have burst her open.

The men were outnumbered ten to one but despite the candystore variety of women on offer Rae was like a rose amongst the thorns and Negan's sites were set firmly in stone.

"I knew you'd come back!" A little girl with two long red ponytails came bounding down the porch steps, her sneakered feet kicking up dust as she slammed straight into Rae's injured side with a thud.

He watched her wince in pain but she didn't cry out or reprimand the little girl she held her tight, burying her face into her hair before peppering her with a million little kisses. "I'll always come back, baby."

Negan's stomach had plummeted right to his feet. Oh Jesus fuck. Kids were complications he definitely wasn't fucking interested in. Fuck, fuck, why hadn't she mentioned a kid? He wouldn't have been letting his imagination sprout wings and take flight with a million and one red haired fantasies if he'd had known she came with a plus fucking one. It wasn't that he didn't like kids, actually fuck that, as a rule he didn't like kids. Snivelling, stupid, annoying.

The little girl looked at him in the way that only a kid could, big round eyes, bottom lip falling open in wonder. He pulled a face, sticking out his tongue and screwing up his nose so quick anyone else but the kid would have missed it.

She looked away quickly, burying her face into Rae before blubbering, "has the bad man come to take us away?"

Rae kneeled down, holding the girl's arms and smiling as she wiped away her errant tears, "no Zuzu, of course not baby, this is my…" she gave him a once over, her face a total contradiction to the word "friend."

"He is?"

Rae stood up taking the little girl's hand and pulling her along, "Zoey meet Negan, and Negan this is my niece Zoey." She twirled the end of one of her ponytails, "but we all call her Zuzu."

Niece. Nice. "Auntie Rae," he let the grin slip across his face, he could definitely get on board with auntie Rae. He winked at the kid, "little red."

/

Zoey dived behind her, tiny hands bunching into her shirt. Rae could hardly blame her. Negan was a six foot something, leather clad macho brute. The barbed wire bat did absolutely nothing to soften him. The last man Rae had brought home was Jacob and now he was the boogeyman. The man who set fire to the fields while everyone slept, the man the grownups only mentioned in hushed whispers. No matter how much everyone tried to shield Zoey she was a precocious five year old and she understood more than even Rae wanted to believe.

"Any other tiny redheads running around the place?"

Like clockwork a stern old voice bellowed, "Rachel Eleanor Honey! You will come here and have words with your Grandma this instant."

The wrong side of thirty and her her stomach still dropped just like it did when she was Zuzu's age.

"I've been worried half to death about you child," Grandma held her arms out and Rae's folded into her embrace. She might have been almost eighty but Grandma Ellie was still strong, still indomitable and her arms still felt like a safety; all soothing and protecting.

"I'm okay," Rae peeled away.

"You said a couple of days and it's been almost two weeks."

"I know. I'm sorry. I didn't wanna make everyone worry about me, but," she shrugged her backpack off, opened it and held it out, "I found what I was looking for."

Grandma nodded with a relieved sigh that said she understood. "Seems you found something else too."

Rae looked behind her to see Negan and his men waiting patiently on the porch steps. He smiled at her and her stomach did a flip. "You could say that."

"Well, we don't have strangers in these walls so you better tell me your names and your intentions."

"The names Negan, this is Mark and Donnie. My intentions..." his eyes burned into her for the briefest moment before he looked back to Grandma. "I saved your granddaughters life and now i've returned her to you."

"I was cut, he helped patch me up," Rae added.

Grandma gave her the eye, the stern look that she had perfected over the last fifty odd years since she became a mother, "how many times have I told you not to go out there alone?"

Rae was going to say she had no choice. How could she let her people leave and die? She was the only person that she could guarantee Jacob wouldn't kill so for her the risk of leaving this place was smallest. But she couldn't say anything because Negan answered.

"You should listen to your Grandma Red." he stood on the porch, right next to Grandma like he was an authority on these things, "she's lucky we found her when we did."

"Well," Grandma gave Negan a shrewd eye, "I suppose you can call me Grandma Ellie, everybody does." She looked him up and down, "no boots in the house, mind your manners and you better wash up before dinner. Its nearly ready and I assume you and your men are wanting feeding?"

"The smell of what you have cooking in that house would make just about any man want feeding darlin'," he even had the audacity to wink.

Grandma gave Rae a look before heading back into the house.

"Flirting with my 78 year old Grandma?"

"Jealous?"

"Of course not."

"She's a beautiful lady. You obviously come from very good fucking stock."

"I don't know what game you're trying to play here Negan but let me make something clear. These are my walls, my people and in here your ass is mine."

God that felt good. Negan's eyes darkened.

"Auntie Rae, Mama wants to see you," Zuzu's muffled call came from the window above the porch despite being told a hundred times not to shout out of that window.

"Okay," Rae shouted up, her whole body filling with the strange mixed emotion that came whenever she thought about her sister.

"We're not done here Red," Negan smiled, his dark eyes still finding a way to mock her.

"Tim," she called and waited for him to bound up the steps, "show Negan and his men where they can clean up for supper."

Tim gave them a wary look.

"And if they give you trouble… shoot them," she said flippantly. She'd endured enough of his heavy handed dominance, this was her home and he should try playing by her rules.

/

Holy fuck. Rae scurried into the house and up the stairs in a flash of red hair. Negan's palm itched, he was going to spank her ass so fucking hard the first chance he got. No more fucking foreplay, now he wanted the soft fucking edge of Rae's tongue.

He turned to Tim, a weedy looking dweeb with his big wire rimmed glasses and straggly blonde hair. He looked like a child playing with his Daddy's rifle and there was not a chance in hell that he would actually use it on them.

If Negan had learned one thing it was how to read people to see who were the killers, who were the followers and who were the wildcards. Tim was all follower, Rae, hell that redhead was all wildcard but the fucker who was marching over with a face like he was gonna either shit or have a coronary was all fucking killer.

"Weapons!" coronary shouted, "you're on our land. You don't carry in these walls."

"We're Rae's honored guests," Negan twirled Lucille onto his shoulder. There was no fucking chance he was handing her over to this asshole.

"Fuck Rae!" coronary squared up to him. "I don't give a damn who's sniffing around her pussy this week. Hand your shit over or leave."

"Miguel!" Tim pleaded for Rae's sake or his own Negan wasn't sure but it was too late. Negan was already seeing blood, he might take the edge of Rae's smart tongue, fuck he enjoyed it, but this fucker needing squashing the only way he knew how.

His fist clenched at his side and it didn't take a single moment's consideration before he slammed it full force into Miguel's nose. Crack, the outpouring of blood was instantaneous and Miguel's crazy expression got a shade crazier.

It wasn't every day Negan fought with his hands like this but he didn't want to risk using Lucille. When Lucille got a taste for blood she didn't stop at the first drop and he wasn't exactly planning on killing Rae's people. Just making sure they knew how to fucking respect her. It was a new idea for him, helping another person hold onto power, fuck he usually just helped himself to the reins.

Miguel reacted quickly, clipping the edge of Negan's chin. He was surprised by the strength of it and vaguely impressed that the asshole wasn't just all talk. Negan swung again, straight to the stomach, hitting so hard Miguel's eyes bulged. Miguel wasn't finished, he shoulder barged Negan knocking him off balance before swinging for his face like he was on a fucking mission to make him toothless. Negan ducked, grabbing Miguels arm before twisting it at an awkward angle and forcing him towards the floor. He cocked his elbow, slamming it to the sweet spot between his shoulder blades and Miguel fell.

There were shouts outside of his own personal wrestling ring and suddenly he was being pulled back.

"Sorry sir," Donnie muttered as he helped Mark hold him.

Rae's people grabbed Miguel who was kicking and screaming, blood still pouring from his nose.

Grandma Ellie and Rae pushed their way out of the house and the cluster of people who had gathered on the porch.

"That bitch is gonna get us all killed," Miguel shouted, his eyes set on Rae.

Negan didn't need to say a single word, Donnie and Mark released him to land one final blow, quick as lightening, to the side of Miguel's skull. He was out, his body falling limp.

Negan's knuckles were bloody and burning, he shook his hand out, looking over at Rae. Those bottle green eyes unreadable as she moved towards Miguel, "someone help me get him to Doc's before he wakes up and does something stupid."

Grandma Ellie stood next to him, her eyes were the exact same shade of bottle green as Rae's, "you finished Negan?"

"I didn't like the way he talked to her."

"My granddaughter didn't ask for you to fight for her honour."

"All due respect Grandma Ellie, but I'm not a man who asks permission to defend your granddaughter."

"Your men will hand their weapons over to Hamish," Grandma Ellie gestured to a white haired man who looked even older than she was.

"And you," she pointed to Negan, "take your boots off and lets go clean up the mess you've made of yourself."

Negan looked at his bloody knuckles and laughed quietly before nodding to his men.

If Grandma Ellie only knew the mess that he made of every fucking situation he ever encountered. But he had to admit that this was nice, he wasn't the wolf blowing down all the sticks to get to the little piggies, he was being let into the house like he was just a man.

A/N- Thank you for reading and all my new followers! I hope you like Rae's community I was feeling inspired by my love of George Clarkes Amazing Spaces and a Pinterest board filled with vertical gardening.

I'm a Nerd and Proud and Guests- Thank you for my feedback :D