AN: Some violence in this one...sorry it has taken so long to get this chapter up, been tied up with some family things this weekend. Enjoy! Oh, and if you don't like it, don't read it. There is no reason to leave ugly comments. Constructive criticism is one thing, but if you are just looking to flame, go somewhere else.

Beth

Beth had done a lot of thinking in the 2 weeks since she had been attacked. After talking to Carol in the yard that day she had been relieved to know that Logan hadn't gone through with what he had intended to do to her.

She had even gone to Rick and thanked him for saving her. He had tried to refuse her praise, saying if he had been there sooner she wouldn't have been hurt at all but Beth refused to hear any of that talk and had insisted that his arriving when he had was enough.

She had laid in bed later that night thinking about how terrified she had been thinking that she had been raped. She knew now that she wanted to share herself with a man, and she knew exactly who that man was. Getting him to see her as a woman wasn't going to be easy, though. Especially not since she hadn't even been able to speak with him since it had happened.

Daryl hadn't come inside for dinner for a few days after the attack and when she saw him outside he didn't even look at her. Then Merle had shown up and they had both been sleeping out in the yard in a tent ever since.

But today she was determined to talk to him. She would make him listen to her. She had no idea how to go about seducing a man but she was pretty sure he had to speak to you first.

She knew Daryl was in the tower on guard duty this morning so after breakfast she made a plate for him and headed that way. What she had not counted on was him not being alone. Daryl and Merle both turned to look at her as she entered the tower. She could tell Daryl was surprised to see her but he quickly looked away. Merle leered at her for a second, making her feel dirty.

"I didn't know there were 2 of you up her, I only brought one plate. Sorry"

It was Merle who answered her, with a chuckle.

"Well, since I am pretty sure it aint Ole Merle you came a lookin for, I will just scat on out a here and let you kids be."

"No, I didn't mean you had to…" Beth tried to protest out of politeness, but Merle just laughed.

"No, problem, Darlin, I know how to find the kitchen" Merle stepped past her, still chuckling as he closed the door behind him.

"I…I thought you should eat" she stammered, holding the plate out to Daryl. He took it from her, setting it down on the ledge without even looking at the food.

"I wanted to talk to you" she said quietly. Daryl looked up then, waiting for her to go on.

"I know you are mad about what happened with me 2 weeks ago."

"You're damn right I'm mad" he grunted, hitching his crossbow farther up on his shoulder.

"I…I know, and I'm sorry." That got his attention. She could tell she had surprised him by the way he raised his eyebrows at her. "It was stupid of me to go out there alone and I should have known better."

"What are you babblin about girl? Aint nobody mad at you. Now the bastard that hurt you…." He let the rest of the sentence trail off and Beth felt her stomach clench up in a knot at the tone of his voice. She gave herself a little shake and took a small step back.

Daryl's face looked like she has slapped him.

"Aw, now, little one, I would never hurt you."

Beth was horrified. "Of course you wouldn't! I know you would never touch me against my will."

It's now or never, chicken shit. Tell him you want him. Or forget him.

She stepped forward, close enough to touch him if she wanted. Taking a deep breath, she worked up her courage.

"But, Daryl, what if…

"What if what?"

"What if I did want you to touch me?"

His sharp intake of breath and instant rigidness of his body were the only indications that he had heard her for several long, torturous seconds.

"What are you talking about, girl?" His voice was rough, unsteady.

"I am talking about you, Daryl. I think about you all the time, hell I even dream about you. I …I want you. I want you to kiss me, to touch me."

She reached her hand up and rested it on his shoulder, leaning in to kiss him.

He wasn't frozen anymore.

He stepped away from her, eyes wide like an animal trapped in a corner.

"You don't know what you are asking for, you are just a kid." He sneered at her, trying to make her angry.

It worked.

"I am not a child, Daryl!"

"You keep sayin that"

"And I am trying to prove it, too, if you weren't such a stubborn ASS!"

"And how do you plan to do that? You aint ever even had a real boyfriend. What do you know about men?"

Beth stepped forward again and this time his back was against the wall. He couldn't move away without pushing her out of his way and she knew he would never do that.

"I will tell you what I know, Daryl Dixon. I know that you are an honest, hardworking man who never does anything he can't sleep with at night. I know that you fascinate me. Your smile lights up my whole day and your anger darkens it. I know that no one has ever made me feel like every nerve in my body is on fire the way you do just by walking into the room. You do things to me in my mind, in my dreams, and I want you to be the man who does those same things to my body. The first man…"

She stretched up to kiss him, but just before she could touch her lips to his he turned his head.

"I can't, little…Beth. Not after what he did to you."

Hot shame and rejection flooded through Beth. Of course he didn't want her. He thought Logan had raped her and he didn't want something someone else had broken. Fighting back tears she stumbled away from him.

"I get it. You don't want me after he…you think I am damaged."

Daryl

Daryl couldn't breathe. She could have kicked him in the balls and he would have recovered faster.

Damaged.

Sonofabitch.

Sonofabitch, you stupid sonofabitch.

She thought he didn't want her because she had been raped.

She had no way of knowing that the reason he kept stepping away from her was because his traitorous body DID want her. Even now he had a hard on throbbing so hard he had to adjust his pants.

But she didn't know that what he meant when he said he couldn't wasn't that he didn't want to, but that he didn't want to scare her and he knew that women who had been raped had a hard time with men afterwards. He would never hurt her on purpose, but he had no experience with a woman who was traumatized and would never forgive himself if he made that fear worse out of his own ignorance.

If he tried to give her what she was clearly asking for he could scare her even more. He didn't know how to be gentle. He didn't know how to coax a frightened woman into relaxing.

He knew how to give dirty, rough, sometimes painful pleasure to a willing partner who wanted to fuck. He knew nothing about making love, and something told him that was what Beth wanted. She didn't just want his body; she wanted him to open up to her. And that he could not do.

Damaged.

That word kept coming back to him. He knew exactly how it felt to know that you weren't wanted because someone thought you were broken. And he would be damned if he would allow Beth to feel that because of him.

He didn't know how he was going to make this right, but he had to.

The first person he saw in the yard when he came out of the tower was Glen.

"Stand guard" Daryl snapped at him. "Got something to take care of"

"Daryl, I saw Beth leave out of there just a few minutes ago and she was obviously upset. Maybe you should just …

"Didn't ask you for advice, just stand guard."

Glen clearly wanted to say something more but the look on Daryl's face made him hold his tongue.

Daryl's mind was so focused on finding Beth when he walked into the main hall that it took him a couple of seconds to take in the scene that was playing out in front of him. Merle had one of the young men from Woodbury up against the wall, his good arm over his throat and the knife cover over the stump that used to be his right hand pressed into the guy's stomach. He was face to face with him, begging him to move.

"Give me a reason to cut ya, boy….I thought ya woulda learned your lesson back in Woodbury but I see you are still dumber than a stump. These girls don't want nothin to do with ya"

Daryl didn't see Beth on the other side of them, her arms wrapped protectively around a younger girl, no more than 14 years old, until she started speaking.

"I can't believe I protected you. I should have known you wouldn't only hurt one person. Well, you will never hurt another girl here like you hurt me"

It was then that Daryl realized exactly what had just happened. This was the piece of shit who had raped Beth, and Merle had obviously caught him trying to mess with another little girl.

Red rage washed over him and he never stopped to think about the crowd of people around them. The only thing he could think of was the torn pink shirt he still had in his bag, the bruises that had only just healed on Beth's face and arms, and one word.

Damaged.

Well, he had some damage of his own to inflict.

He shoved Merle out of the way, grabbing the boy by the hair and shirt, dragging him outside into the yard. Blood was a bitch to get off the floors. He heard Beth screaming something behind him but couldn't think clearly enough to make out her words and when he looked up at her he saw that Merle had blocked most of the doorway with his body, holding her inside.

So he turned back to the dog at his feet.

"You like to hurt little girls? I got something for you, you piece of shit"

"I don't know what you are talking about you dumb hillbilly, everybody here knows it was you hurt that girl 2 weeks ago. We all saw how you treated her in the kitchen." The boy was talking fast, at the same time trying to crawl away from Daryl.

Daryl jerked him up off the ground and began to swing at him, one punch spinning his head and body in one direction, the next one bringing him back.

After a few blows the boy fell to the ground and Daryl went down with him, holding his shirt in his left hand, still swinging with the right. He felt bones breaking under his blows….ribs, the boy's nose, and then his jaw. When he tried to hold his arm up to fight Daryl off, he broke that too…After that the man underneath him didn't move anymore. The pain had overcome him, causing him to pass out.

Daryl finally stood up, wiping the sweat and blood off his face with the sleeve of his shirt, backing away from the unconscious figure on the ground.

He felt someone grab his left arm and jerked away, only realizing after she jumped back that it was Beth, not Merle, as he had thought. Her eyes were wide with fear and unshed tears. He couldn't take her looking at him like that, not now.

"You still think I am a good man, Angel? I may have just beaten him to death and let me tell you something, I won't miss a minute's sleep over it"

Daryl picked his crossbow up off the ground where he had dropped it and strode away, towards his tent on the opposite side of the yard.