#thread: morgan

[doctorknightley]

WHERE: Main Street WHO: Morgan (@ofescapisms )

Knightley was fiddling with his watch, he was headed to the nursing home to meet up with Mo. He'd promised to get back to their stitching lessons, it wasn't like either of them could do much with how little power was in town. Glancing up from his watch when he felt a gaze on him, he spotted a familiar face. Bringing his hand up to give a small wave, "Morning, didn't realize they required you to be up so early as an officer." Part of him wondered if she was more of an early riser compared to Zarina, after seeing them together he was surprised more people hadn't realized the connection.

[chimiye]

Matthew Broome as less toxic Nick Leister My Fault: London (2025) Dir. Charlotte Fassler & Dani Girdwood

[disintegreate]

⋆｡ ⋆⭒˚🕆⋆｡ ⋆⭒˚

[killyridols]

harbinger of fantastical change by jenny morgan, 2024, oil & thread on canvas, 24 × 18 inches

[naughtyneganjdm]

Threads of Desire - Chapter 9

Summary: Negan convinces Y/N to come back home with him after the dinner with his family.

Characters: Negan Smith, the reader (OC), Daryl Jordyn, etc.

AO3 Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/61111030/chapters/171109378

Warnings: Swearing, Angst, Smut, Oral, Reader is a Smoker, pro weed discussions, etc.

Notes: I'm doing my best to finish this. Sorry that it's taking a bit. I appreciate the likes and the views that this gets, along with the comments. Thanks for taking the time to read to those that still do! If you want to read the other chapters since it has been so long, be sure to check them out here.

It took a while, but eventually the awkwardness of everything lessened at the dinner with Negan’s family. Surprisingly? There were no more personal attacks from Negan’s father and he behaved himself. Everything was civil which was hard for Negan to comprehend. In the past? His father never apologized, for anything. So this was a new experience he wasn’t used to. The dinner was longer than Negan thought it would be, but he was happy when they finally got to leave. More than anything he wanted to talk to Y/N about everything. After tonight? He felt like everything made sense between the two of them. Their feelings were brought to light about one another. How deeply she cared for him and his realization that he truly, whole heartedly meant it when he told her that he loved her. They just didn’t get to talk about it because they were in front of his parents.

Jordyn had fallen asleep in his arms while he carried her back to the car. Walking back to the parking garage was quiet for them, likely because neither of them wanted to wake Jordyn up. It had been a very busy day for Negan’s daughter and he could tell that she was exhausted. Getting her into the backseat, Negan tested the seatbelt after he put it on Jordyn to make sure it was correct. Quietly closing the door after he was done, he turned on his heel toward Y/N who was standing beside him.

At the same time they both went to talk but stopped when they realized the other wanted to say something. With an amused smile, Negan reached up to rub at the back of his neck contemplating if he was going to let her go first. Waving her hand about, she motioned Negan to go ahead and he gave her a weak smile, “I have a few things I wanted to say. First and foremost, thank you for doing all of this. Putting up with my parents and dealing with the shit my father said. I know that he talks like I do and I would be the kind of person to say heels to Jesus or pound town, but fuck, it’s not something you expect from your father. So I guess, second, I want to apologize for his behavior and the crazy shit he said.”

“You don’t have to apologize for him, I’ve heard worse,” she hushed him, noticing that a bit of color flooded into his face. What was funny was seeing Negan being embarrassed by something that he undoubtedly would have said himself. Considering Negan had the mouth of a sailor and never had a filtering system, she found it almost charming that his father got him in a fuss. “I’m not offended by the things he said and? I had a good time.” 

Swallowing down hard, Negan sighed and felt his heartrate quicken inside of his chest. There was a chill that surrounded them from the wind and thinking about things had him feeling bold in the moment, “I was kind of hoping that maybe you would come home with me tonight. I fucking know that you think I might be expecting more here, but really? I just wanna talk to you. Get some alone time with you so we can talk about everything. We can put the little one to bed and just hang out. I think we’ve needed to have a solo conversation for a long time now.”

“Negan,” she paused, a breath getting caught in her throat when he grabbed a gentle hold of her hands. Swallowing down hard, she looked to see his thumbs caressing at the back of her hands. Her throat went dry and she lifted her eyes to see the pleading expression behind his beautiful, hazel eyes. Fuck, she knew that she had a horrible time saying no to him. “Do you really think that’s a good idea with all that’s going on right now?”

“I promise to be a good boy,” he blurt out, taking a moment to think about that statement. A wicked smirk tugged at his features and he inhaled sharply. Tipping his head from side to side dramatically had her laughing. “As good of one as I can be.”

Even though she wanted to? She was still apprehensive. And he picked up on it. Releasing one of her hands, he reached up to tenderly palm in over the side of her face. Just the sensation of that took her breath away. How he looked at her in the moment made her heartrate quicken inside of her chest. Sweeping his thumb in over her cheekbone had her eyes fluttering to a close and he bit down on his bottom lip.

“Please?” he begged, his Adam’s apple bouncing in his throat realizing that he was so incredibly desperate in this moment. Every interaction they had in the last few days had been interrupted somehow and they didn’t get to really spend time with one another to work things out. “I know how you feel about the whole Maggie situation. And I know that you think the whole reason I am so attached you is because this thing going on between us is new, so it’s fucking exciting and what not. But it isn’t. And I think if you spend time with me, you will fucking see that I mean what I say when I tell you that I love you. And I want to be with you. My eyes have just been opened to things Y/N. That’s all this is. I don’t have a blindfold pulled over my eyes anymore. I see things as they fucking are.”

“I just…” she thought about what he was saying, finding there to be an ache at the center of her chest. Everything felt so dramatic and she knew that she was emotional about the topic of them and everything that happened. But how he looked? He looked pitiful at the idea of her potentially saying no. Having him wanting just to be near her this bad was something that pulled her to him. Realistically? With the way he looked at her? He probably could have gotten her to agree to anything. “You know what? Yeah, we can do that.”

“Awesome. That’s fucking fantastic,” he boasted, his smile expanding out over his handsome features. Seeing that made her heart skip a beat. There was something so attractive about his smile. Helping her toward the car, Negan made sure to open the door for her, allowing her to get in. No matter how vulgar or immature Negan could be at times, one thing he was always very good with was being chivalrous with women. That was something she noticed from the first moment she met him. He was always opening doors for women and it was charming.

When she was seated comfortably, he closed the door and made his way around the car. What was cute was that there seemed to be a skip to his step because she agreed to going home with him. Realizing that he was actually happy to be spending time with her had her swooning over him. All it took was something as simple as that. God, she was a fool for him and she knew it, but it was hard to change feelings that had been set in stone for over eight years when it came to him.

On the ride back, Negan seemed to want to keep holding her hand. The gesture was incredibly sweet and she knew she was falling way too fast. Surprisingly, the ride back to Negan’s home felt shorter than normal, which was astonishing considering they had to be quiet with Jordyn sleeping in the back. When Negan parked and turned the car off, Y/N almost instinctively got out of the car to immediately grab Jordyn from the backseat. Making his way around the car, Negan had stopped when he saw her carefully pulling Jordyn into her arms. Jordyn had woken up enough to wrap her arms around Y/N’s shoulders to brace herself, but just as easily cuddled her head into the side of Y/N’s neck to go back to sleep.

“Do you need some help?” Negan asked, impressed with how she fit so well into the position of Jordyn’s mother figure role. “I can take her.”

“We’re good. I’ve got her,” she assured Negan with a wink, heading for the stairs to Negan’s brownstone home. Waiting for him to open the door, she knew that this was easy. For the last eight years she had been carrying Jordyn around, this was nothing new for her. Heading for the stairs, she took her time carrying Jordyn up them. She’d done this so many times, but never in high heels, but she managed. Negan was quick to get into Jordyn’s room to set everything up for his daughter for the night. Together they got Jordyn into her pajamas and comfortably tucked into her bed. Only for a moment Jordyn had woken up, but swiftly had fallen back asleep after Negan had given her a loving kiss against her forehead. “She’s tired.”

“You wore her out,” he teased in a whisper, gazing back over his shoulder with a smile. Standing up slowly, he made sure to turn on Jordyn’s nightlight before urging Y/N to follow him out of the room. Closing the door quietly, he gave Y/N a small bob of his head. “I could use a cigarette. Would you be okay with that?”

“A cigarette? Are you stressed?” she muttered eliciting his thick eyebrows to bounce up and he let out an amused sound. “Of course you’re stressed. You just spent all night with your father. I don’t know why I asked you that.”

“There’s a lot going on,” he reminded her, holding his hand up motioning her toward the stairs. Following her down them, he grabbed a hold of her hand. Leading her out the back, he closed the door behind them and took a seat on one of the steps. Sitting down beside him, she released a long exhale and knew that she herself was very tired. It had been a long week for her. Beside her, Negan was digging into his pocket to grab his pack of cigarettes. And in that moment? She took the time to gaze upon what he had done with his backyard. Yards were hard to come by in New York City and when people did have them? They weren’t big. Negan’s yard was tiny, but what he had done with the space was very nice. It just showed how much money Negan truly had. A few rows of string lights lit up the yard that Negan likely turned on before they came out here. The light brought forth a yellow glow that put a spotlight on all the things that made the area charming. Releasing a long exhale after taking the first puff of his cigarette, Negan looked to her and could see that she was looking out at his yard with awe. “You haven’t been out here at night since I’ve changed everything, have you?”

“I have not,” she responded, taking her time to just observe everything that was new. There was a thick trunked tree that Negan had in his yard where he had attached a tire swing for Jordyn. At the back of the yard was a cute, little garden. Near the home was a nice sitting area with a bonfire that was no doubt for Negan. But he had made the area a nice place where Jordyn could play. Everything about it was magical, especially for a place like this in the city. “I don’t know why you would ever want to leave here.”

Finally giving her attention back to Negan, she let out a nervous sound when she realized that he was staring at her with the same amazement that she had expressed looking at the yard, “You’re staring at me.”

“Can you blame me?” he wondered, his right eyebrow arching in curiosity. Shrugging his shoulders, he pointed toward the back yard and sighed. “You see the beauty in the little things and I admire that about you.”

Nodding her head, she didn’t know how to respond to that. Holding out his cigarette, Negan offered it up to her and she accepted. Usually she wouldn’t try to smoke, but she’d be lying if she said she didn’t smoke when she was stressed. And these last few years she had been really fucking stressed.

“Do you still smoke weed?” she handed Negan back his cigarette causing him to choke after he inhaled. Laughing, Negan looked back toward the door with his eyebrow arching to make sure that they were alone. “I remember that one time I came over here with you and Lucille. You two were baked. And you weren’t stingy with your weed either.”

“That’s an interesting memory to bring up,” Negan snickered, the bridge of his nose wrinkling in amusement. “I actually remember that. Y’know what was funny about that? I distinctly remember Lucille being the one to offer you to come smoke with us. And when we woke up in the morning, when she realized you got high with us because you were sleeping on the couch, she started lecturing me about giving you weed because you were one of my students. She refused to believe that she was the one that offered you the weed. She thought I was the bad influence.”

“Seriously?” she bit down on her bottom lip, smirking at the large amount of smoke that Negan released from his lungs as he nodded. “No, that was definitely Lucille. She was very insistent about it. Kept telling me that Jordyn was at your mom’s place and I needed to have a night where I could just relax.”

“She never believed me,” Negan chuckled, handing the cigarette back to Y/N who looked at it for a long moment. “Why do you bring that up? Are you looking to get high? Because I may or may not have some stored away for the days that my injury flares up or my back hurts.”

“I might take you up on that offer at some point,” she answered with the cigarette between her lips making Negan smile. “Do you remember much about that night?”

“I hardly remember yesterday,” Negan claimed, his thick eyebrows bouncing up when he rest his palms back against the stairs. “Why?”

“That was just…a really good day,” she bit down on her bottom lip, handing Negan the cigarette back and he gave her an odd glance when he took it. Shaking her head, she swallowed down hard and shrugged her shoulders.

“I’m scared to ask,” Negan commented with a nervous breath, adjusting his positioning on the stairs beside her so he could look at her better. “Was that your first time trying weed or something? Did we turn you into a little pothead?”

“Stop,” she reached out to faintly smack at the center of his chest drawing him to snort. “Obviously, I had a crush on you, but Lucille was very, very hot too.”

“Oh?” Negan seemed surprised to hear that, clearing his throat when his eyes narrowed out at her with intrigue.

“Mhmm…” she debated whether or not she should say the next part of what she was thinking back on. “See, I was never jealous of Lucille. In fact? I found you two to be a very, very good-looking couple. She was already your wife by the time I met you, so how could I be jealous?”

“I’m very confused where this is going,” Negan told her in a slur, biting down on his bottom lip.

“I know you think that time with Maggie was the first time I saw you naked, but it wasn’t. That night with Lucille was the first time I saw your dick,” she informed him right when he was inhaling causing him to start choking again. Reaching out, she pat him on the back eliciting him to look to her with shock while he tried to gain his breath back. “You okay?”

“Why do you keep dropping bombs on me with every inhale?” Negan grunted, placing his hand in over the center of his chest. Taking a minute to consider things, he swallowed down hard and shook his head. “Are you trying to tell me that we fucked that night?”

“No Negan, we did not fuck that night,” she stole the cigarette back from him and rolled her eyes. “Do you think I would have been that disappointed with you if we had sex? Our first kiss was our first kiss and the first time we started having sex was the first time…well, you get the point.”

“I am so confused right now,” his voice was raspy and there was a very lost expression over his features.

“I came back here with the two of you, we hung out. And you two started getting handsy with one another. You were trying to get her to go upstairs with you and I was high so I asked if I could watch,” she educated him about that night realizing it was probably something stupid to bring up. “And the rest is history. I was just joking at first, but you both agreed. And I got a nice show. A very, very energetic show.”

“Fucking seriously?” Negan released a rumble of a sound, more so amused with what she told him over everything else. “I’d be okay with hearing further details. Anything you’d like to share? Like, did you just sit there watching us or…” he tried to get more information out of her, but she shook her head and tapped at her temple. “Come on, you can’t just tell me that you saw me go to pound town with Lucille and not give me the details. Did you like what you saw?”

Both of them burst out in laughter after he used the term pound town to be purposely silly and she shrugged her shoulders, “You both looked very pleased, and? I really enjoyed myself. In fact? I think it thrilled you to have me watching you two. You’d lock eyes with me when you were pounding the hell out of her and she loved it. I think it really turned her on that I was watching too. You guys were a lot of fun when you were high.”

“And you didn’t think I was the least bit attracted to you back then?” Negan pushed, noticing that she let out a loud exhale. “I may not remember it, but I obviously wanted you to picture that it was you underneath me that I was destroying the pussy of. I know the way my brain works, that’s what the eye contact was for. I just feel bad that you walked away from that without any kind of pleasure. That’s a little mean to make you watch us fuck and not get anything in return.”

“First of all, I thoroughly enjoyed watching, so don’t feel bad for me,” she gave him back the cigarette, gesturing that she was done, shuddering slightly at how cold it was starting to get. “And? Who said I didn’t get any pleasure? I was very happy by the time I went to sleep on the couch that night.”

There was a moment of silence where Negan swallowed down hard and tipped his head to the side, “Did Lucille and I…while we were…” a moment later his eyebrows bounced up and he saw her smirk, looking away from him and back toward the yard. “I thought that was something I dreamt. The next time I saw you, you didn’t say shit. You’re telling me that was real?”

“Oh, that was real,” she responded with a nod of her head. An involuntary groan fell from Negan’s lips provoking her to laugh at his response. “That’s why I thought there was something there. I just never mentioned it again because you didn’t. Either you and Lucille were so stoned you forgot or you were so embarrassed that I didn’t want to bring it back up.” 

“Goddamn,” Negan shifted uncomfortably where he was seated looking down toward the center of his pants. “Well, I do believe I’m starting to get an erection while we are talking about this, so thank you for that. My plans of being a good boy tonight are failing miserably.”

Heat flooded into her face and she rolled her eyes, “I know how I felt about it back then. With time, I just thought you were acting out because you were high.”

“Was that the first time you…” his eyebrow arched in curiosity with him clearing his throat. Smirking, she shook her head and he bit down on his bottom lip. “You should have just joined the two of us more than you did. I don’t think Lucille would have minded. I clearly didn’t mind sharing and she didn’t either. Here I was thinking I was having a sex dream about my wife and my student when in reality…”

“It wasn’t really sex with me…” she corrected him hearing the snort that followed. “It wasn’t. I stand by what we said. We never kissed and you never put your dick in me.”

“No, I never fucked you. You’re right about that. And you’re right, I didn’t kiss you on the mouth,” Negan grunted when she shoved into his shoulder evoking him to snort. “No wonder you were addicted to me. You got a taste of the mouth and my fingers. Have you seen these hands? You know what they are capable of?”

Holding his free hand out had her rolling her eyes again and he sucked in a sharp breath of air, “Now thinking about you and Lucille is gonna fuck my shit up tonight. It already hurts.”

“You kind of deserve it,” she thought aloud, biting down on her bottom lip feeling her heart racing. “But at least I had that to live off of. Two of the sexiest people I had ever known involved me in something very personal.”

“No wonder she was always lecturing me about giving you weed. She probably remembered and thought you and I were too high to remember,” Negan laughed, taking another puff of his cigarette before shaking his head. Putting the cigarette in the ash tray, he wiped his hands off on his pants and sighed. “Goddamn. I’m gonna need extensive details from you eventually. Like, really fucking descriptive details. Maybe we could put it in writing so I don’t forget. I mean the Lucille and you part is slowly coming back to me and something else is quickly rising…”

“I shouldn’t have told you,” she chuckled, her face growing hot. The wind brought about a chill that went straight to the bone and it made her shudder. “I always felt ridiculous for holding onto that. And I never told a soul about it.”

“No. That’s something special to hold onto,” he snickered, his nose wrinkling and the lines in his forehead growing deeper as the both of them laughed. “And? If you want, I have something that you could hold onto right now.”

“God, you are so…” she realized that even though it had her hot with embarrassment, she was laughing and smiling right now. Patting Negan on the knee, she gave it a firm squeeze and shook her head. “Authentically you.”

“And you wouldn’t want me any other fucking way,” he reached out to grasp her chin between his thumb and index finger. With a weak smile, she nodded her head and he felt a lump growing in his throat. “Being serious for a minute here though. Thank you for coming back with me tonight. I know it’s a big deal for you. But I really want to spend time with you.”

Noticing the way she tremored, Negan worked his suit jacket off. Helping her to put it on, he gave her a wink after they managed to do it. Smiling, he liked the way she seemed to cuddle it in closer to her.

“Y’know,” he began, thinking about everything he learned about themselves today and all that she did for him. “You saved me tonight with what you did. By not telling my parents that we weren’t together. They are going to be very disappointed when they realize that we lied, but it was a good night. I’ve never seen someone put my father in his place like that. Impressed the hell out of me. He’s such a fucking asshole.”

“I didn’t really lie to your parents. I just didn’t give all the details,” she corrected him, nudging him softly with her shoulder. Releasing a long exhale, she realized that it was starting to snow. How everything felt in the moment and how the yard looked, it felt like something out of a movie. “I didn’t confirm whether we were together or not. I just asked your father to stop talking about your past. I told them that I loved you and I didn’t want you to end up in a dark place again. Because I worked very hard to pull you out of that place and didn’t want you to end up there again. As far as I’m concerned? I didn’t lie to your parents at all. I was very honest. If they assume things? Well, that’s on them.”

“Impressive,” he snorted, his nose wrinkling in amusement with the way she blew off the idea that they even lied to them in the first place. A muscle flexed in his jaw with his eyes narrowing as he gazed upon her. “Why did you ever fall in love with me in the first place? I’m a fucking mess.”

“Why does anyone fall in love?” she countered, not really sure how to answer that question. Warmth flooded into her face at the idea and she shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know. At first it was a crush. Even you said that most of your students had one on you. You’re really fucking good looking and you know it. You use it to your advantage. There is this way that you look at someone. You do this thing with your eyes and then your smile with those fucking dimples?”

A breath caught in her throat when she realized that Negan was looking at her the exact way she mentioned, “You’re doing it right now. You know what you do to people. Those fucking dimples could make me do anything.”

Turning slightly toward him, she grabbed a soft hold of his chin and gave it a tiny shake causing him to chuckle with the bridge of his nose wrinkling in amusement, “It was hard not to be taken aback by you. The charisma, charm and arrogance that you have? It does something to a person. And you’re so goddamn touchy feely. You hugged me all the time or held onto my hands. That attention? It felt so good to have. Of course you are going to have everyone having a crush on you. People yearned for that. You make people feel good. But when I fell in love with you? That’s a more complicated question.”

Lowering her hand, she felt uncomfortable thinking about it and she simply shrugged, “I think it was when I started to get to know you. There is a side of you that people don’t know. A man that you hide behind the façade that you have built. A lot of what you show people is a performance. It’s the wall that you put up to protect yourself. There was a kindness to you. You were a man that was endlessly in love with his wife. Even if you fucked up in the past? You could see the way that you looked at Lucille that you were head over heels in love with her. It took your breath away to see. And how good of a father you were? You have no idea how sexy it is to see a good father in this world. I loved your passion for things you cared about. Even though you were an asshole to a lot of people, you were so good to those that you actually cared about. I guess I’m still rambling off about the crush, which really was innocent. I knew you belonged to someone else and I would have never attempted anything. Well, unless you two were insistent and both agreeing.”

Lifting her hand, she reached out to brush her fingers into his graying hair, noticing that his eyelids got heavy with him focusing on her, “And then when everything happened? I don’t know. I just felt responsible for you. It was presumptuous of me I guess with my actions. I just knew the promise you made Lucille in living for her and taking care of Jordyn. I wanted you to be able to keep those promises. And with everything else that already charmed me about you? I realized the feelings I was experiencing? It was me being hopelessly in love with you. Not just being attracted to you, but I saw everything that made you special and unique. Unlike anyone I had ever met. Spending all those nights lying in bed talking to you about the deepest shit, I had never opened up to anyone like I had you. And I don’t know if you ever did that with anyone else either. It was the closest I have ever been to anyone. You were going through so much. I saw what you thought was the worst of you, but I still loved you. I saw beyond all that.”

“Fuck,” he released a small rumble of a sound, damning himself that he did all the dumb shit that he did. “Y’know, I actually believe you when you tell me that you love me. Every word you say? I believe.”

“That’s because I’m honest with you. I always have been,” she pointed out, noticing that it seemed to get serious between them with the silence that followed. Capturing her chin between his thumb and index finger, he urged her to lock eyes with him. A shuddering breath followed when he dragged the rough pad of his thumb gradually across her bottom lip. “I may have skimped out on the details sometimes, but I never hid who I was from you.”

“No, you haven’t,” he agreed with her, leaning forward to close the distance between them. By the sound of her breathing, he could tell that it made her nervous. Giving a tiny smile, he hovered his lips in over hers. The contrast of the cool air and the warmth of his breath caused her to shudder. “I meant what I said at the restaurant. I love you. I think I’ve been in love with you for a long time, I just was a fucking moron and got blinded for so long.”

“I want to believe that, trust me I do,” she swallowed down hard with the sensation of his bottom lip dragging faintly across hers. Closing her eyes, she got chills when his forehead pressed in over hers. Goosebumps developed over her arms with him cupping her face in his large hands. “I have wanted to hear you say that for a very long time…”

“I promise you,” he began in a whisper, leaving feather like kisses over her bottom lip that took her breath away. “I’m gonna do whatever I can to show you that I mean it. To prove it to you. Show you that I’m worthy of your love.”

“It might take a bit of convincing,” she responded, hating to say it, but after everything she went through? It was going to take more than just a few promises. “I’ve been through a lot.”

“I know,” he slurred against her lips, his thumbs caressing at the sides of her face. “And I’m willing to put in the time. Even if it takes the rest of my life, I’ll do whatever I have to. I know you’re worried putting your faith in me, but I mean what I say.”

“It all sounds perfect,” she realized that her body was shaking in the moment. Not only because of the cold that was surrounding them, but also because of the emotions that she was feeling on the inside. For so long, she left her feelings locked up from Negan and now he was putting this all out on the table for her. “You have to understand why I’m so uneasy about things Negan.”

“I do,” he assured her, leaving another tiny kiss over her bottom lip that had her eyes coming to a tight close again. “And I understand why you feel the way you do. I put you through so much shit. If I wouldn’t have fucked up, the two of us could have been so happy together. I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry.”

“I can’t be mad at you for falling in love with someone else,” she confessed, pulling back just enough so she could stare out at him.

“Yes, you can be. Because you were there the whole time. You put up with me when everyone else gave up on me,” he reminded her, bringing their lips together this time in a lingering passionate sweep. Curling his fingers around the side of her neck while dragging his thumb along her jawline had her pressing in closer to him. Each caress of his mouth over hers had her heartbeat growing stronger inside of her chest. “I was such a fucking fool.”

Kiss after kiss grew in strength with her lips parting just enough for the warmth of his tongue to brush in between them. Humming out, Negan nuzzled his nose in against hers and swallowed down hard. Standing up slowly from the stairs, he held his hand out toward hers. The chill grew around them as she accepted the gesture. Allowing him to pull her up toward him, he led her back into the house and toward the living room.

Sitting down slowly, he kept his hand hooked with hers urging her to unhurriedly move in over him on her knees. Straddling over his hips, she lowered down to get comfortable with his large hands palming up over the lengths of her back. Tenderly cupping his face in her hands, she teased him with the idea of kissing him. A smile formed over his features with him picking up on what she was doing. Curling his fingers around the back of her neck, he led her to him to bring them together in another round of hungry, passionate kisses.

Kiss after kiss left them breathless with him breaking away, to nuzzle his nose in against hers, “You make me feel like I’m a teenage boy again. Sneaking a girl into my house to make out with her on the couch.”

Reaching for her hand, he placed it in over the center of his chest and released a long exhale, “My heart is pounding inside of my chest right now. I hope you realize the things you do to me.”

“So we’re making out, huh?” she snickered, brushing her fingers through his thick hair to tug faintly at it. Nodding, he gave her an arrogant smile before dragging his tongue out across his bottom lip. Sliding his hands down over her back, he palmed faintly at her bottom eliciting a tiny gasp to escape her lips. Biting down on her bottom lip, she dragged her hands down his body in a brazen movement to start opening the buttons of his dress shirt. “That’s what this is?”

“I’d like to think so,” he answered, sucking in a sharp breath of air. Truthfully? It was hard to focus with her pressing hot, wet kisses over the side of his neck. Chills flooded throughout his veins. A growl escaped him with her kisses following the movements of her parting his shirt. Getting his naked flesh revealed to her, she took a minute to lean back and appreciate the sight. How she looked at him was like he was a piece of art and it drove him crazy with desire. Working the tucked material of his shirt from his pants had him snickering with her struggling. Sliding her hands up, she moved the material away from his torso. Flattening her palms out over the center of his chest had Negan breathing in deeply, arching his back to bring his body closer to her. Negan’s pupils were dilated with a yearning for her while she took her time touching him. Tracing a long path down from the center of his chest, over his abdomen and toward his navel left a fire growing inside of him. Unhurriedly, she touched him wanting to take all of this in. Starting to deposit tiny kisses over the center of his chest had his breathing growing louder. Doing his best not to moan, he bit down on his bottom lip. “I promised you I would be a good boy earlier and I’m doing my best to be…”

“You can still be a good boy and do naughty things,” she slurred, nipping faintly at his flesh causing him to release that moan that he was working so hard to hide. Working his suit jacket from her body, he was quick to pull at the strap of her dress. With ease he was able to pull down the material to expose her breast to him and it made his heart rate quicken. Dropping his head down, his mouth eagerly covered her breast. Circling her nipple with the warmth of his tongue had her cooing out with her fingers sinking firmly into his hair. “Negan…”

Suckling at her flesh, Negan pampered her breast with the talents that his mouth and tongue were capable of before pulling away with a wet sound. Hissing out, he felt her moving away the material of his shirt to kiss over his freckle covered shoulder. Squeezing firmly at her bottom, he pulled her in closer to him and growled out, “Well that’s good because I have very naughty things in mind…”

“Jordyn isn’t going to wake up, right?” she lifted her head to look out toward the stairs after Negan’s mouth covered her breast again. Closing her eyes, she felt her pulse leap in her throat and she knew that her body wanted to focus on what he was doing, but her brain was panicking.

“My phone will alert me if she leaves her room from the camera in the hallway,” he hummed against her flesh, tipping his head back against the couch. Clutching tightly to her hips, he bit down on his bottom lip when he felt the first roll of her hips over his. “Fucking hell…”

Another firm rock of her over him had him arching up toward her to meet the movement. Something about the friction felt amazing and he was honest when he told her he felt like a teenager again. This kind of excitement wasn’t something he was used to.

“Are you hard?” she dropped her stare down toward the center of his lap. Not even giving him time to respond, she started to hastily work open his belt. Shifting to help her, Negan watched her opening up his pants next. Dipping her hand beneath the material had him moaning out with her touch connecting with his manhood. A wicked smirk pulled at her lips when she felt his rigid form beneath her touch. “Very much so.”

“I told you that I was getting an erection thinking about the idea of you and Lucille. I mean what I say,” he alerted her with an arrogant tip of his head, stealing a quick look down while she continued to touch him. Lifting up just enough he was able to kiss at her chin, dragging his kisses out over the side of her neck toward her shoulder, “You take my breath away.”

Biting down on his bottom lip, he winced when she jerked at his pants to loosen the material. Managing to pull them and the front of his boxer briefs down revealed his hard cock to her sight. Curling her fingers around his length elicited the raspiest moan from his lips that he tried his best to mute. Dropping his head back against the couch, he felt her nibbling at his jawline and he sucked in a sharp breath of air.

“You have no idea how many times I so badly wanted to suck your cock when we were together,” she slurred against his flesh causing a growl to escape his throat when she left tiny bites at the side of his neck. “For some reason, that fantasy of doing it in your lecture hall? I couldn’t stop thinking about it in those final two years.”

“I wish you would have,” he hissed out, his hands pushing up under the bottom of her dress. Gripping firmly to the warmth of her fleshy bottom had her purring out and covering her lips with his. Dragging his tongue over the inside of her lip had her cooing in response. “I would have never turned you away.”

With a tiny smirk, she managed to wiggle herself from his lap so that she could settle herself between his legs. Stroking over the length of his cock had his hips bouncing up toward her caress and she wet her lips. Leaning in, she dragged her tongue out across the tip of his cock, teasing him with the faintest of touches. Biting down on his bottom lip, he knew that it would be hard for him to be quiet in a time like this, but he had to be.

“Fuck,” he muttered, his fingers caressing the back of her head by the time she finally took him into the damp warmth of her mouth. Watching her, he realized that she was taking everything slow. The first time she did this to him, it was in a public place where they could be caught. Now? They were alone and it gave her time to focus on him. Slow bobs of her head over his length had him licking his lips and releasing a shuddering breath. Every pull back she would drag her tongue in an agonizingly slow way along the underside of his cock provoking the muscles in his thighs to flex. “You’re teasing me.”

Grunting, the vein at the side of his neck bulged as she pulled her mouth away from his manhood with a wet popping sound. Pressing hot, open-mouthed kisses over the swollen tip had his heart skipping a beat with his fingers clinging tightly to her hair, “You’re lucky you’re even getting this with the shit you put me through.”

“Touché,” he groaned out with the way her tongue flattened out over the tip teasing at the slit causing his eyes to slam shut. Right now she was licking at his body like he was her own personal lollipop and he was loving every second of it. “Fuck me.”

Wrapping her lips back around the tip, she circled her tongue along the underside of his erection before lowering her head back down over him again. Watching her pleasure him had a rush flooding through his veins, with his chest rising and falling repeatedly. Between her mouth, her tongue and her hands she had him a shaking mess beneath her. And as much as he was enjoying what she was doing? It looked like she was enjoying it just as much.

“Wait, wait…fucking wait,” he begged urging her mouth away from his body with a pleading sound. A wet sound filled the air with her mouth pulling from his length. Humming, Negan tried to keep himself focused with her wet lips still against his cock. Pressing kisses where the shaft met the tip had him panting and his thumb swept in over her cheek. “I’m going to come.”

“That’s kind of the point, isn’t it?” she slurred against his flesh, stroking her fingers over the sensitive tip having him arching up toward her. Gasping out, she felt him pulling her up from her knees. Standing up, he moved in behind her and bent her forward, forcing her to grab the back of the couch. Working the material of her dress further up her hips, he buried his nose against the side of her neck and started pressing wet kisses there. Sinking his fingers into her panties, he took his time pulling them down. When they got to her knees, he stepped back to help her move just enough to get them from her legs. Dropping the material, he helped in taking her shoes off so she could be more comfortable. Curling his arm around her waist, he stepped forward making her lower down to her knees on the couch. Panting out, she felt his hand palm between her thighs with him caressing over her sensitive flesh. “Negan…”

“You don’t know what you do to me,” he rumbled, nipping at her earlobe and giving it a gentle tug. Tipping her head back, she clutched tightly to the back of the couch. Moving in behind her had Negan’s erection pressed firmly against her ass. Almost instinctively her bottom rubbed up against him drawing out one of the sexiest moans she had heard from him yet. Firmly curling his fingers around her throat had her sucking in sharply. Nipping at her jawline, he let out a quiet tsking sound and he growled against her flesh. “You keep doing that and I’m going to fuck you raw. D’you understand that? And I’m doing my best here not to pound the shit outta you, but you keep rubbing up against me like that and I’m going to fuck you so hard that I’ll have to cover your mouth because you’ll be screaming out my name.”

Circling his fingers over her clit, he snickered against her flesh noticing that she was bucking her hips up against his touch and panting, “But something tells me you would like that, wouldn’t you? You’re fighting this so hard, but you want nothing more than to have my big cock pounding away inside of you giving you orgasm after orgasm.”

The grasp on her throat tightened and she whimpered with Negan’s touch growing stronger, “Speak when you are spoken to.”

“Yes,” she whined, her eyes slamming shut with how surprisingly good his touch felt in that moment. And there was something about the way that he was talking to her that turned her on more than she cared to admit.

“In due time,” he assured her, dragging his bottom lip up over her jawline. Pushing his hand further between her thighs, his rough fingertips drew a slow, unhurried line from her entrance toward her clit and then back again. Repeating the motion had her shaking and it made him smile. After multiple times repeating the movement, he took his time sinking a single digit into the warmth of her body. Just like she had done, he started off slow. Taking his time to lazily draw his finger in and out of her before adding a second. “Because I love you, I’m going to show you that I can hold off until I give you what you want. Which is all of me.”

Releasing her throat, his fingers slid up to cover her mouth. That allowed her to cry out against the center of his palm while he fingered her. Wet sounds filled the air with him quickening the movements of his fingers inside of her. Her thighs were tremoring with the way his fingers were plunging deeply within her body.

“Come on honey,” he breathed against her ear with one of her hands sliding down from the back of the couch to cling to his arm. She was tremoring in his arms, her cries vibrating against his hand. When he had found the right spot inside of her, he made sure to focus on it. Soon enough her tight canal was contracting and relaxing around his fingers with her thighs tremoring. “Good girl.”

Releasing her mouth, he grabbed a hold of her jaw, turning it just enough to capture her lips in a hungry sweep. Brushing his tongue against hers had her purring into his mouth with him bucking his hips up against her bottom again.

“Brace yourself,” he instructed, patting the couch. Obeying, she did as he said curling her fingers tightly around the back of the couch. Stepping back, he caressed over her bottom and smile when he realized that she was still shaking from the orgasm he got her to. Spanking at her bottom had her whimpering out, bouncing forward with the movement. Palming at her flesh, he hummed and lowered down to his knees behind her. Caressing up over the back of her thighs, he squeezed at them and clicked his tongue at the top of his mouth. “You really do have such a pretty pussy, don’t you?”

Yelping, she looked back over her shoulder to see an amused smirk tugging at his features after he had just bit her bottom a bit harder than she expected him too, “Jesus Negan.”

“Just making my mark,” he hushed her, caressing over the area he just bit before leaving tiny kisses over her flesh. Humming out, he leaned forward to extend his tongue out. Flattening his tongue he drew a line along the length of her sex groaning out at the taste of her. Repeating the motion several times had her letting out muted cries that she was trying to silence by biting her bottom lip. Amused, he started to lap at her entrance causing her sound to intensify. He knew that he should have been more careful with the sounds he was drawing out of her, but he honestly loved the way she responded to what he was doing to her. Every sensation brought out the sexiest sounds from her sending an ache right to his cock. Her hips rocked back against his movements showing she was eager to experience each sensation. Tipping his head back, he licked his lips and hummed at the taste of her lingering over them. “Sit down for me.”

Once again, she did as he asked of her. Shakily moving where he wanted her, taking a seat on the couch right before him. Working her dress up her body, she helped raise her arms to make things easier for him. Setting the dress aside, he tugged her toward the edge of the couch and smiled at the way she seemed nervous being completely naked before him.

“You worry too much,” he insisted, sweeping the rough pad of his thumb over her sensitive bundle of nerves causing her to whimper upon contact. Leaning down, his tongue circled her nipple before sucking faintly at the flesh. Focusing on the other breast had her whimpering out with her fingers stroking through his messy dark hair. There was a sense of vulnerability to her in the moment and he loved it. Peppering his kisses up over her chest, toward her collarbone and toward her lips had both of their breathing growing louder. In that moment it felt like both of them were fighting for dominance in the kiss until she pulled away with a gasp. Looking between them, she could see him teasing the tip of his cock in over her clitoris provoking her hips to bounce up toward the sensation. “Feels good, right?”

Swallowing down, she gave him a nod and watched him slightly rolling his hips to allow the length of his cock to drag over her sensitive folds. At this point? Her mind was in a whirlwind. Everything felt so good. Purring out, she felt his hand reaching out to cup at her full breasts and he moaned with the way that everything felt. Pushing his hips forward and pulling back had the length of his cock pulling and dragging over her clit. Keeping up the movement, the friction had the both of them breathing unevenly. At this point? She knew she had a certain set of morals, but with how good it felt? She wouldn’t have complained if he did fuck her. Right now, him teasing his cock just over her body had her core aching with want for him. Curling his fingers around the back of her neck brought her closer to him so he could bring their mouths together in another hungry kiss. Their kisses were messy and hectic with both of them moaning occasionally.

“Don’t whine,” he warned her when he pulled his hips back, snickering at the sound she made. Hooking his arms around her thighs, he pulled her closer to the edge. Starting to pepper kisses over her inner thigh had her fingers sinking into his hair. Humming out, the warmth of his mouth surrounded her clit with his fingers unhurriedly pushing back into her body. Everything was already so sensitive, so she was a mess by the time he got started. Pleasuring her brought him happiness. Paying attention to her body, learning everything that she liked…it was exciting. Between his mouth, his tongue and his fingers, he had her a shaking mess before him. And he loved every second of it. Humming against her flesh had her biting back a moan, her fingers sinking tighter into his hair. Slurping at her flesh, he took his time to lap at her body knowing she was right on the verge of another orgasm. And by the time she did come again, she released a muted cry that made him smile against her body. “You are something else.”

“You’re trying to kill me,” she panted, motioning him to her. Crawling in over her, Negan braced his hands beside her and hungrily kissed her allowing her to taste herself amongst his lips. Grunting, he felt her fingers curling around his body pumping her hand over his flesh steadily.

“Is this everything you dreamt it to be?” he wanted to hear how she felt and if he was living up to everything she desired of him. Behind hooded eyes, she looked drunk off him and he loved it. Bouncing his hips up toward her grasp, there was an ache in his cock. He wanted to come and he wanted to come so bad.

“It’s not too bad,” she chuckled when he growled at her response because she knew he was expecting more. Watching her hand pumping over his length, she could feel his manhood throbbing in her palm and it made her hum. “That’s it…”

“Fuck…” he buried his head against the side of her neck when the first line of his cum covered her lower belly. Continuing to pump her hand over his distended flesh had his moans muted with him kissing over her neck. Thrusting his hips up toward her caress, he allowed her to milk him of the rest of his release until the very last drop. Kissing up over the side of her face toward her lips again, Negan moaned out with her still touching him. “We made a mess.”

“I guess we did,” she muttered, looking between them toward his release that was covering her lower abdomen and chest. “Something tells me you don’t mind though.”

“Not really. There is something very sexy about the idea of you being covered in my cum,” he alerted her with a wicked smirk, a deep rumble of an amused sound escaping his throat when he pressed his forehead to hers. Licking his lips, he watched her reach between them to tease her fingers through the mess he made. Bringing it up to her mouth, she wrapped her lips around it and sucked at her fingertips. Hearing the sound she made elicited a deep rumble of a moan from his throat. “Now you’re gonna be the death of me.”

“That would be awful,” she tsked with him extending his arm out toward one of the corner tables to grab a few tissues. Cleaning her up, he tossed the used tissues in the trash while she got comfortable stretched out on the couch. Pulling his pants back up over his hips, Negan worked his cock back into the material and groaned. Leaving his pants both unbuttoned and unzipped made her smile.

Grabbing one of the blankets that he had folded up in the corner, Negan headed back over toward her and carefully laid down beside her. Pulling the blanket in over the two of them, Negan wrapped her up in his arms and she was surprised how affectionate it was with him urging her to rest her head in over the center of his chest. Gentle strokes of his fingers were felt at the back of her neck along with him pressing a kiss over her forehead.

“I never wanted to be a cheater,” she frowned, cuddling her head in over the center of Negan’s chest, listening to the sounds of his strong, steady heartbeat beneath her. “And I’ve already fucked myself over on that one a few times.”

“As soon as I realized there was something here between the two of us, I haven’t allowed anything to exist between Maggie and I. Hell, I know the first chance I get, I’m gonna break up with her Y/N. Because I wanna give you what you want,” he explained, his rough fingertips stroking down over her back and then up again. “I know you feel bad, but you shouldn’t. This has all felt too good for it to be something bad.”

“Just because something feels good, doesn’t mean it’s the right thing,” she thought aloud, pressing a tender kiss over the center of his chest. Lifting her head up, she gave him a glance that made him sigh loudly and she shrugged her shoulders. There was a silence between them when she lowered her head back down to the center of his chest. “You do have a very nice cock though. It’s big, thick and you come a ton.”

“I’ll take that compliment,” he snickered, wrapping her up tighter in his arms. “I’m glad you like it, because it certainly likes you.”

Taking a moment to consider everything, she traced small shapes over Negan’s chest and released a disappointed sound, “I’m not a good person. I think my feelings for you bring out the worst in me because I would have never done this when you were with Lucille.”

“Things were a little different when I was with Lucille,” he corrected her with a grunt hating to think that she thought of herself as a bad person when she was with him. “I know you think this is bad, but it’s not. I personally feel like you bring out the best in me. In every way possible. I think you always have brought out the best of me whereas…other people often brought out the worst.”

“How are we going to move forward?” she wondered, knowing that she loved the feeling of all of this. Being wrapped up in his arms, happy.

“I’m going to break up with Maggie and then it will finally give us the chance to be together,” he explained to her, knowing that he wanted to focus as much as he could on them since they missed out on so much time. “I want to be yours and I want you to be mine.”

“I was always yours Negan,” she felt his fingertips stroking over her bare shoulder and it had her swallowing down hard. “It was just whether you wanted me or not was the question. Because you always had my heart in your hand. That’s never changed.”

“And how could you expect me not to fall in love with you when you say things like that?” he blurt out, his heartrate quickening at what she had just told him. “With you? I can see a future. One where we end up together, happy…the closest thing to a fucking storybook ending. And I yearn for that shit.”

“You make it sound easier than it actually is,” she thought aloud with him huffing out. Looking up at him, he shook his head and sighed loudly. “What?”

“It’s actually not that hard. The hardest part is earning back your trust, but we are two people who already love each other. We’ve always loved each other in some fashion. You know me better than anyone. I know you. I’ve really dropped the ball the last few years, but I know what I want and what I want is you,” Negan assured her with a long sigh, curling his finger in underneath her chin to get her to look at him. Sweeping his thumb over her jawline, he gave her a wink and shook his head. “And I will do everything I can to prove to you that I deserve your love. I promise you.”

Her heart skipped in her chest. There was so much she wanted to say, but the sound of a knock on the door had the both of them lifting their heads to look toward the front door, “Are you expecting someone to come over tonight?”

“I can’t say that I am,” he stammered, getting up from the couch slowly. Motioning her to wait, he moved out of the living room and came back with a t-shirt and a pair of his sweatpants. Handing them over to her, she happily accepted them and worked to put them on haphazardly, rolling the material of his sweatpants to make them fit. “I’m going to lose it if Daryl Dixon is at my door…”

“That really would make…” she started to ramble hearing the sound of Negan groaning out loudly when he opened the front door. Moving for the door, she felt a chill flood down her spine with Negan clinging to the doorknob and Daryl standing before him. “No sense.”

There was a long silence with Negan throwing his hand up in the air frustrated. Originally he was just joking at the idea of Daryl being at his front door, but there he was. And she was equally confused why he was there.

“What are you doing here?” she blurt out, surprised to see her friend standing before the two of them. Daryl said nothing, just snorted when he looked her over realizing that she was wearing Negan’s clothes. Next, he gave Negan a long once over, grumbling something to himself with the way that Negan’s button-down shirt was left open and his pants undone. “Do you know what time it is?”

“That kinda shit never mattered before,” Daryl commented, his eyes staying locked on Negan. Shaking his head almost in disgust, Daryl’s nose wrinkled. Pointing at Negan, Daryl’s finger circled Negan’s revealed flesh evoking Negan to look down toward his body with an amused smirk. “Why are you always shirtless every time I see you?”

Unhurriedly lifting his head, Negan shrugged and let out a long sigh, “I’m not shirtless. I still have my shirt on actually,” Negan responded, an amused sound escaping his throat. Grabbing the material of his shirt, he tugged at it to insinuate it was still there. “It’s just open, but it’s here.”

“How did you know I was here?” she wondered, folding her arms in front of her chest when the cool air from the outside surrounded her. Since she was just wearing Negan’s white t-shirt it brought a chill throughout her body. “I thought you had plans tonight.”

“I did, but…I needed to talk to you,” Daryl grunted from where he was standing, pushing his hands into his pockets. Stepping away, Negan reached for his hoodie from the coat hanger that was behind him. Handing it out to Y/N, she gave him an appreciative nod and pulled it in over her body. “It wasn’t that hard to figure out. You weren’t at home. You went out to dinner with Negan and his family. You were likely here.”

“You could have just texted me or called me,” she reminded him, holding her hand up realizing the tension that was in Daryl’s body when he looked between her and Negan again. “Why are you here Daryl?”

“It’s cold, why don’t you come in?” Negan stepped aside, holding his hand up in the air to direct Daryl to come into his home. Scowling, Daryl made it very obvious that he had no interest in doing that. Sighing loudly, Negan brushed his fingers through his messy hair. “At some point the two of us are gonna have to get along. Y/N and I were thinking of starting a movie. Why don’t you come in and spend time with the two of us? We’d love to have you here.”

“We both know that’s bullshit,” Daryl scoffed, eliciting Negan to roll his eyes and fold his arms out in front of his chest. “You don’t want to spend time with me and I sure as hell don’t want to spend time with you. I just need to talk to Y/N about something. I knew where you lived from the little one’s parties.”

“I was actually very fucking serious. I have a spare room and everything. You could spend the night if you’d like,” Negan started, working together his pants when Daryl looked over his torso again. Pulling together the belt, Negan smirked with his dimples becoming more prominent. “I have a really nice shower in that room too. I think you’d really enjoy it. Relaxing, cleaning up…”

“Negan,” she piped in catching the shade that Negan threw in there about taking a shower since people were always giving Daryl shit about looking messy.

“What? I’m just trying to suggest that we should all try to be friends,” Negan reasoned with Y/N and she knew that it was his way of snapping back after Daryl was being rude to him. “The two of us are very prominent people in your life and I think it would be a good idea for us to get to know one another better.”

“You’re a prominent person in her life?” Daryl’s face scrunched in disbelief, releasing a rumbling of a sound. “That’s interesting. I don’t remember seeing you much over the last four years,” Daryl dragged out his words and that response had a flash of anger flooding into Negan’s features. It turned into an annoyed smirk as Negan looked to Y/N. In that moment Y/N shot Negan an apologetic expression that Daryl picked up on. “I don’t think us being friends is gonna happen.”

“Why not?” Negan shot back, folding his arms in front of his bare chest seemingly pissing Daryl off more now that he was insinuating that they should be friends. “What is it about me where you can’t picture the two of us being friends?”

“You really want to go there?” Daryl’s right eyebrow arched and Y/N stepped forward between the two of them pressing her hand in over the center of Daryl’s chest to get him to stop.

“Is this something that we can just step outside and talk about?” she realized that Daryl was not wanting to play nice with Negan. And the last thing she wanted was the two of them fighting. Especially since they both did mean a lot to her. Looking beyond her toward Negan, Daryl shook his head. Grumbling something under his breath, Negan huffed out and dragged his hand down over the front of his face. “Yeah, okay. You can walk me home.”

“Walk you home?” Negan blurt out, his eyes growing wide at the suggestion that she wasn’t going to stay the night. His eyebrows furrowed, his arms dropping down at his sides with her turning on her heel to give him an empathetic expression. “What about us?”

“We have Jordyn’s event on Saturday. On Saturday, we can spend time together,” she assured Negan, stepping forward to place her hand in over the center of Negan’s chest getting him to calm down. Lowering her voice, she wanted to keep the discussion between the two of them. “Plus? It gives you the chance to really decide if this is what you want. You have a day to weigh things out. Are you really ready to let go of things with Maggie? Four years is a long time just to give up so easily.”

“Not when you’ve been being played the fool for four fucking years. I don’t even know what was real. So I know how I feel now,” Negan stressed to her, shaking his head as he spoke. Lifting his stare, Negan could see that it looked like Daryl was eavesdropping on them. Grumbling something under his breath, Negan rolled his eyes and then turned slightly so Daryl couldn’t see the two of them talking. “I’m not going to change my mind by Saturday. I know what I want.”

“Then we will talk about everything on Saturday,” she promised, reaching up to place her hand in over the side of Negan’s face. Gradually, his long eyelashes fluttered to a close and he leaned into her touch. A shuddering breath escaped his throat with his eyes unhurriedly opening. Curling his finger in underneath her chin, Negan lowered down to press a tender kiss against her lips. A moment later the sound of Daryl scoffing was heard having Negan pull back with an irritated breath. “Ignore him. We’ll talk later.”

“I’ll grab your dress,” Negan offered while she gathered her jacket from the coat hanger that he had grabbed the hoodie from. When he returned, he had folded her dress for her and he swallowed down hard. In his other hand was her dress shoes and she huffed. “You can keep the clothes until Saturday so you don’t freeze on the way home. It’s pretty fucking cold. I don’t even think those shoes are going to be good for you to walk home in.”

“She’ll be fine,” Daryl insisted from behind her, shrugging his shoulders as he spoke. “It’s not that long of a walk.”

“It’s not that short of a walk either,” Negan chortled, his brow line creasing as he spoke. Giving her a final hug goodbye, it was obvious that he didn’t want her to leave, but he realized he didn’t have a choice here. “I’ll text you later.”

“She’ll be fine, I promise,” Daryl repeated from behind Y/N who backed away from Negan and toward Daryl. Pulling her jacket closer together, she followed Daryl outside and down the steps. Following him down the street in the direction toward her home, she looked back over her shoulder to see that Negan was standing at the front door still watching them. By the time they rounded the corner, she could feel her heart hammering inside of her chest. It was a few minutes of silence between the two of them. For something so important, she was surprised that it was so silent. Truthfully? She hadn’t wanted to leave Negan’s, but she knew that things with Daryl were rough when he left earlier. How quiet Daryl was didn’t comfort her any either. It wasn’t until the sound of her getting an alert on her phone was heard that Daryl finally gave her his attention. Pulling out her phone, she saw that it was a text from Negan who had sent her a photo of him holding up her panties telling her she forgot them. Choking, she quickly closed up her phone hoping that Daryl didn’t see the text. “That was him wasn’t it? You haven’t even been gone five minutes and he’s already writing you.”

“Can we not do this right now?” she wondered, pushing her hands into her pockets since they were freezing. This feud that they had going between one another was not something that she wanted to be the focus of right now. “You wanted to talk and I’m here. Let’s talk.”

“You two had sex tonight, didn’t you?” Daryl ignored her request of moving on from Negan provoking her to release an offended sound. “You are wearing his clothes and he was next to naked. The two of you fucked, right?”

“That’s really none of your business,” she denied him an answer and by the sound he made? Her response infuriated him. “I thought something was wrong which is why I agreed to do this. Truthfully? I didn’t even think you wanted to talk to me anyways. So I’m shocked you’re here to begin with.”

“What d’ya mean?” he seemed annoyed to hear her say that, but it’s how she felt. “Why wouldn’t I want to talk to you?”

“Well, you were really fucking mad at me this morning. You weren’t being very nice,” she reminded him of the way he was acting toward her at work. Once he realized what she was talking about, he rolled his eyes. “I’m not used to you treating me like that Daryl.”

“Part of being someone’s best friend is telling them the truth,” he pointed out, putting a sarcastic emphasis on the words best friend. “I don’t think accepting a job at Vixen is good for you, neither is Negan. I want what’s best for you. That’s what a best friend does.”

“I want to focus on Vixen, not Negan,” she reasoned with him, a lump developing in her throat. There was no question that Daryl wanted to focus on Negan, but she didn’t. “I have wanted to work there for as long as I can remember. I’m now finally getting a chance to prove what I’m capable of.”

“I get that, it’s what you dreamt of,” he noted, his voice growing raspier as he spoke. “But sometimes our dreams aren’t what are best for us. You were at Vixen for four years. You were invisible to that dick. He wouldn’t give you the time of day. But then? You make his dick hard. Now he sees your worth? Don’t you value your self-respect?”

“I know why you feel the way you do, but I’ve talked to Guy and he understands things. I have stressed to him that I don’t want to have sex with him and I won’t,” she claimed to Daryl who bit back on his words and she knew that he was fighting to stop himself from saying what he did earlier. “I know you think I’m going to end up sleeping with Guy, but…”

“I know you will,” he corrected her, shaking his head and biting back on his teeth. “It’s gonna happen. I don’t doubt it. You like attention.”

“I don’t think you realize how offensive that is,” she pointed out, sucking at her bottom lip trying to keep it together with Daryl coming to a slow stop beside her. “I’m not going to sleep with Guy Vixen. My life is already complicated enough, I don’t need to throw another mess into my life to make it…even messier. You think I would fuck Guy in order to get the job of my dreams?”

“I don’t know Y/N. You like men that treated you like shit,” he spouted off, throwing his hand in the air and pointing back in the direction of Negan’s home. “You fucked Negan tonight. And I know he’s still with Maggie. That guy treated you like shit for eight years and the first time he gives you attention, you just go and fuck him like nothing happened.”

“Again, it’s really none of your business what I’ve done with Negan,” she stated with a hiss, her eyes narrowing and her head tipping to the side. If this was anyone else, she felt like she would respond much differently. “But? I didn’t have sex with Negan tonight.”

“Come on, don’t lie to me. I know by his smug expression that he fucked you,” Daryl snorted shaking his head in disbelief like she was purposely going out of her way to lie to him. “I don’t fucking believe you.” 

“What the fuck else is new?” she blurt out, throwing her hands up in the air. There was a group of people that were walking by and she stayed quiet long enough for them to get a decent distance away. “I have no reason to lie to you. I wouldn’t lie to you. I would expect you to be the same way with me.”

A strange expression flooded into Daryl’s features after she said that. He went pale and it was a weird reaction. It was something she had never seen before from Daryl and it made her shift on her feet uneasily, “What?”

“Nothing,” he shook his head, forcing himself to look away from her. Nodding in the direction they were meant to walk, she could tell something was different. Suddenly, he went from angry and furious with her to nervous and silent. “Come on. It’s cold. We should get you home before you freeze.”

“What are you hiding?” she reached for his arm to grab a hold of it to get him to turn to face her. “Are you keeping something from me? What are you lying to me about?”

“I ain’t lying about nothing. I just don’t buy it Y/N. I know how you feel about Negan. All you ever wanted was that son of a bitch and his attention. Now he’s throwing himself at you and you ain’t biting?” he started walking, with her doing her best to keep up with him. Something about him said he was avoiding her at this point. “Bullshit.”

“Even if I did have sex with Negan, which I didn’t, what does it matter?” she replied back, her chest aching at the thought of Daryl being so fucking mad about everything.

“What makes him so deserving? Huh?” he stopped to throw his hands up in the air, turning to face her. There was a sharpness to his tone as he approached her with his cold stare locking with hers. “What is it about Negan that makes him so damn appealing to you? Other than the fucking dimples and the big dick.”

“I don’t care about his dick,” she frowned, looking around hoping that the other people on the street weren’t hearing their discussion. Considering Daryl rarely spoke, this was pretty fucking loud for him and she didn’t need strangers to hear everything. “I liked him long before I ever saw his penis, Daryl.”

“But what is it then? He’s arrogant. He’s an asshole. He is…fucking annoying,” he growled out, his jaw flexing in anger when he thought of Negan. “What about that piece of shit makes you love him so damn much? He ain’t that special.”

“I know he can be all of those things. There is just something about him that connects me to him,” she tried to explain, her heart hammering in her chest while she tried to think of things to say. Unfortunately, Daryl had been there through everything so he had seen and experienced everything just as she did. “I see beyond the façade he puts up. And there is more to him. Something passionate, tender, sweet, caring…”

“It’s not a façade Y/N, he really is all those things I said,” he rolled his eyes over the fact that she thought Negan’s attitude was just a performance. “It’s not fake. He thinks he’s hot shit. He is an asshole. He makes crude jokes. He’s juvenile. He is a gamer and his gamertag is that of a teenage boy. He is so fucking annoying on average. Yet you are smitten with him. I can’t fucking stand him.”

“I understand that, but you’ve been around the whole time. You understand why I feel the way I do. I don’t have to keep pouring it on you to explain it,” she said in a rebuttal, her throat tensing up. Truthfully? She wished they waited until they made it back to her home to do this kind of discussion. “Plus? What we share with Jordyn…”

“She’s not your child Y/N, you don’t share shit,” he bit back, sucking at his bottom lip and releasing a popping sound. That hurt her. A reminder of what she knew to be true, but also something that bothered her because Jordyn did mean everything to her. “You’re just a glorified babysitter. No matter how much Jordyn loves you or how close you are. You’re not her mother. You will never be her mother. It ain’t as deep as you think it is. You share nothing with Jordyn.”

Considering what he said, she gave him a nod and started walking back toward her home. Groaning out, Daryl threw his head back and started to quickly follow behind her, “I’m not wrong. It just upsets you cus’ you know I’m right. Jordyn belongs to his dead wife. The wife you know he’d still be with if she was still alive cus’ that was the love of his life. Not you. Maybe you two woulda fucked cus’ we know he’s a fucking cheater, but you would have been nothing but the mistress.”

“You know? This is the most I think you’ve ever talked all at once,” she snapped at him, turning to face him having him abruptly stop before her. “I miss when you would just grunt and say a few words here or there.”

“I am just saying the truth,” he repeated, his hands holding out before him hoping to get her to understand that. “Shouldn’t you be with someone where you are the love of their lives? Someone that would give up anything and everything for you? Getting with Negan just cus’ you think you’re that little girl’s mother is a dumb fucking reason to wanna be with Negan. Real, biological parents get divorced all the time. You? You got nothing tying you to him. So that excuse? It don’t work on me.”

“Fair enough,” she continued walking eliciting another disappointed breath from him behind her.

“What makes him so much better than me?” he called out to her, refusing to try to keep up with her this time.

“Who said he was better than you?” she stammered, her eyes narrowing when she walked back toward him.

“You don’t have to say it in order for me to know,” he snorted, pushing his hands back into his pockets, giving her a shrug. There was a strong gust of wind that sent a chill right through her. “Is it cus’ he was famous? Is it the looks? Is it the money? The house? What is it?” 

With a shake of her head, she bit down on her bottom lip and sighed, “I love you Daryl. And the love I have for you is the purest form of love I have in my heart other than the love I have for the little girl that you keep reminding me is not my daughter. But you know that you and I don’t work as a couple.”

“You didn’t give us a long enough try,” he threw out, shaking his head defiantly. “A couple of months right after Negan and Maggie hooked up really isn’t giving it a real try.”

“You were always getting mad at me,” she reminded him, her chest aching that they had to go back to this. This whole time she knew that Daryl was in love with her, but she thought they had moved on in some sense, growing up to the idea that they were no good together. “Everything I did made you mad. If I was at work too long, you got mad at me. If I was spending too much time with Jordyn, you got mad at me.”

“You were with Jordyn and at work more than you were with me,” he recalled, his voice growing angrier with the two of them bickering. “You were killing yourself in a job that was gonna do nothing for you. I could have made you so much happier if you just gave up your stupid fucking dream of Vixen to work with Carol. You would probably be richer than Maggie and in a higher position by now at the other company. And with Jordyn? I like the kid. She’s my lil’ buddy, but again, she’s not your child.”

“The fact you don’t understand the thing I share with Jordyn is more than enough to show why we wouldn’t be a good couple,” she bit back the emotions that were building inside of her. He didn’t like that answer and she knew it. “I was always disappointing you. And you never let me forget it. You wanted me to stay with you at your apartment all day long doing nothing. I’m not a person that does nothing. I liked our friendship and I didn’t want to see us part ways because of a toxic dating moment.”

“You only liked our relationship cus’ I was the only person dumb enough to listen to you every time you had to whine,” his outburst surprised her once more especially since this was a rare thing for Daryl. In all of her time knowing him, the only time he got like this is when they tried actually dating. Other than that? Daryl was never like this. “No one would keep up with this for eight years.”

“You know, I just told you that you were the second most important person in my life,” she reminded him, a lump growing at the center of her throat with the irritation that was visible over Daryl’s features. “I do love you and I know you love me. But thinking you are in love with me? It’s only because you are in love with the idea of me. Because the real me? The me I want to be? You don’t like her at all. I want to work at Vixen. I want to be important there. I view Jordyn like she’s my own because I’m the only woman that she has had in her life that has been consistent since she was a baby. And she’s the thing in this world that makes me the happiest. And you? Negan isn’t better than you. There is so much good to you and there isn’t a human being on this planet that I like as much as I like you. Which is why this conversation sucks so much.”

“Imagine being in love with someone for eight years and having them never really seeing you,” he spouted off, pausing to swallow down hard. An amused sound escaped his throat with a shake of his head. “Oh, wait. You know exactly how that feels. And that makes you Negan in this relationship. Nah. You’re not Negan, you’re worse than Negan because Negan never fucked you to keep you hanging on.”

“Okay,” she swallowed down hard, accepting that view of her from him. “I’m sorry. The last thing I’d want to do is hurt you because I do love you. Whether you believe it or not, you are the second-best thing in my life and I wish I could make you happy. Again, I’m at a standstill because I don’t know what to do to make you happy.”

“You’ve always known what woulda made me happy,” he insinuated eliciting a warmth to flood into her face with what he was suggesting. “If you would have tried harder, we both coulda been happy.”

“But how much would I have to give up in order for that to happen?” she countered, biting down on her bottom lip with a rush flooding through her veins. “Obviously, I’m still very much attracted to you. And there is part of me that loves you more than just a friend. I’m not stupid. I’m attached you and we share a bond that I probably will never find again with someone. But if I’m going to have a relationship with you, I need you to accept me for me. I need that confirmation. Because the you that you are when we aren’t dating loves me for me. But the you that you are when we were together? I’m not sure there is anything that man loved about me.”

“That makes no sense,” he snarled, his nose wrinkling in disgust. There were tears burning at her eyes with Daryl shaking his head. “You’re acting like it’s only my fault that we didn’t stay together when we were younger.”

“No, I know I made mistakes. I was a very pathetic person and I was too blindly in love with Negan. I let Maggie walk all over me. I put up with shit for years that you always tried to convince me to stop doing. I’m well aware of the mistakes I’ve made. I’m not a good person Daryl. I know that. But I couldn’t give up everything you wanted me to in order to make things work. The difference between me and you is that I never wanted you to change,” she reminded him, tipping her head from side to side. “I didn’t care if you were antisocial. I didn’t care if you didn’t want to go out and would rather stay home. I didn’t care that you were an artist because you make beautiful pieces of art which makes you happy. I love you the way that you are. I don’t want you to have to change for me or give up the things that make you comfortable or happy. I wanted you to be the same way about me. I could never give up my dreams of my career or Jordyn.”

“And you think that with Negan you aren’t giving up a piece of yourself?” he countered, swallowing down hard as he threw his hands up in the air. “You were so insistent upon not wanting to cheat. You didn’t want to be a cheater. You didn’t want to be the reason someone’s relationship went to shit because you are so fucking pure. But you’re not. I know Negan didn’t break up with Maggie. And you sure as shit have fucked around with Negan.”

“You’re just in the mood to fight and missing the key components of this discussion,” she stated with an uncomfortable laugh, reaching up to wipe at her face, not wanting to show the emotion that she was undoubtedly feeling. “I told you that if you could promise that you’d accept me for who…you know what, forget it. I don’t know why you came looking for me tonight Daryl. You wanted to talk about something important. What was so important?”

“Nah, I already got the information I needed,” he commented in a muted tone, his Adam’s apple bouncing in his throat with him looking down toward the ground. “I don’t even know why I thought it was important enough to involve you anyways.”

“Well that’s vague,” she muttered with Daryl scoffing and starting to walk in the opposite direction of her apartment, likely toward his own. “So you could never accept me as I am? Am I right to assume that?”

“Assume whatever the hell you want,” he scoffed, waving his hand about and rolling his eyes. Giving her a final once over, he muttered something under his breath that she couldn’t quite understand. Turning on his heel, he continued his walk in the other direction leaving her standing alone as it started to snow again. At this point, she wasn’t even halfway home with the walk, but she knew that meant nothing to Daryl. Right now? He was disgusted with her and made it obvious that he wanted nothing to do with her. 

----

Tags: @slutlanna976​ @fuckthis-and-fuckthat @jennydehavilland @pixelb4rbie @ibelongtonegan

@smallsadjellyfish @labyrinthofheartagrams @msjamesmarch @thebeautysurrounds @hotfornegan

@redmercysugar @caprithebunny @tuttifuckinfruitty @emoryhemsworth @a-girl-interupted

@akumune @stoneyggirl2 @xsarcasticwriterx @haleygreen23 @xhannahbananax03

@sanctuaryforthelost @burningredaffair @killaweiser @dead-of-niight @ayumi-wolf

@promiscuousbarnes @peachihellcat @dilfsandmartinis

[firecaptainphoenix]

“Not officially, but sorta?” Phoenix said taking a sip of his beer again, “He's over more at mine's than his own nowadays, not a fan of leaving Jay on her own for too long. And she loves having Dodger around.” It was part of the reason he'd stayed single for so long, not willing to let just anyone enter his daughter's life like that. At the look on her face his brow furrowed before he chucked, “Turns out I'm an uncle again, surprise to all of us including him but Hawk's daughter showed up in town. He's setting up a lunch meeting with her for me, not trying to have the whole flock hit her at once, you know?” Nodding along he grinned at her as he shook his head, "Yea funny how that works, well least she seems to be a good mix of you two," the thought that he was grateful Jay had taken after Bradley rather than him briefly coming by. "Commune huh, weird think Hawk's kid lives there too. Starting to think Sunflower collecting them or something, maybe there's a support group," he joked.

Morgan smiled fondly hearing him talk about his new relationship, it really was so nice to see him happy like this again. “That’s so sweet, so you two are living together? But yeah…I know what you mean, that storm was horrible for being separated from loved ones.” She raised a brow at his remark and laughed. “I haven’t been keeping up with the news, there’s other kids showing up around here like that?” she asked curiously. “She looks like me but I swear she and Hank talking to each other was like looking at clones,” she laughed. “She’s been living at the commune though, so I only ran into her a couple times before.”

[biomic]

komura: im about to make my haunted doll twins as fucked up as i possibly can

ms inoue: oh yeah? watch this.

[gemmaismss]

where: castillo-fiori home when: late evening, set after this thread who: THE WHOLE FAM @gabrielismss @sclviagant @ofreardcns @retrospectral

he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive –

She’s drives past no man’s land once, twice, three times – reckless as all hell in the jeep her fathers bought her. No wait. Can’t go there yet. You can’t just barge into a notoriously violent warehouse, she’s got enough sense to heed Adrian’s command to stay the fuck away from there. And she’s got to tell Gabe! God that would be so, so viciously cruel of Gemma to not tell her twin Gael’s alive!! He was so distraught, haunted by guilt that mirrored Gemma’s own profound grief. She’ll go home, find Gabe, and then they will find Gael and everything will be as it was, everything will be right again!

he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive ( but is he? Vampires technically might not be fully dead because they are walking and talking and killing, and what will happen when Adrian finds out – it will be fine, it will be totally fine ) he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive he’s alive.

She parks down the street and goes in the backdoor, teenagehood spent sneaking in and out of this house and she’s an expert at which creaks to avoid, even as hysterical as she is. Gabe’s in his room – packing a bag – but that doesn’t register immediately, she’s talking too fast.

“He’s alive – Gabe – daddy is alive, he’s not dead, he’s not in the grave. I went today and I had a witch try to contact him and like so much happened because I’m also –“ she cuts herself off suddenly, glancing at the door, then tucks that revelation away for another time. “Nevermind, he’s alive and she said he was like with the reardons? I don’t know but we have to go right now, we have to go find him – Gabe everything is going to be fine, it's going to be perfect and we are going to be happy and it's going to be like just before.” A knock at the front door interrupts her near hysterical rantings.

And Gemma knows. Knows with more certainty than she’s known anything else all day, or perhaps even in her whole life. He’s alive, and he’s come home. Her hands tremble as she moves wordlessly to open the door and invite her father inside.

[johnnyxwagner]

starter for @donnymorgan

location: cedar grill and lounge

Having served with Donovan, their paths often crossed since his return to Kismet Harbor a few years ago. Life had changed drastically for Johnny as he exited the army life and jumped right into being the family man he should have been from the start. Right now, with newborn twins in the household, Johnny and Stevie took their opportunities to step out when they could, whether together or separate. Knowing that his younger sister was over and keeping Stevie company, he stopped by Cedar Grill and Lounge for a drink and to get the family take out. "Hey, Donny," he smiled as he approached the bar, "not often I see you down here, how're things?"

[hazalxalpman]

starter for @archiemorgan

location: his place

Hazal was sitting on the couch, petting the dog waiting for her boyfriend to return from the kitchen with their drinks. In doing so, she was scrolling through her email and she was a bit surprised. Her hand fell still on the dog and her eyes grew wide as she stared at the five emails sitting in her inbox for commissions. Hazal had them before, but they were few and far between and truthfully, most were requested by her friends. However, clicking on one of the emails, she saw that the person wasn't even in the state of Oregon. "Archie?" She furrowed her brows, "Can you look at this for me? This has to be a scam, right?"

[doctorknightley]

WHERE: The Sasquatch WHO: Morgan (@ofescapisms)

Knightley sighed as he walked into the bar, he didn't drink much but this is where he had the highest chance of running into Zarina's mother. He'd been to the bar when Xander gave him the initial tour, as well as some ration cards. Up till now he hadn't had much use for them, mostly sticking to the Commune. Spotting Morgan, he slid into the stool next to her, though he kept his eyes on the front of the bar, before glancing at her. "This might be a stupid question, but are the drinks here worth the ration cards? I've only really bought coffee with them, it's that's already hit or miss if I'm honest."

[painofhumanity]

@crowsalvation gets a semi-plotted starter

It wasn't the first time Morgan had a client with certain unusual needs, but he hadn't been with a vampire in a while, and he was excited. Being fed on was sensual on its own, but being fed on while having sex was something else altogether. When he first saw the man, his breath caught a little, caught off guard by how handsome he was--despite what teenage girls thought, vampires were not inherently pretty. Still. Morgan was a professional, and he collected himself quickly. "Well, hello. I'm Morgan. I'll be your companion for the evening, Mr. Salvatore. Or do you prefer Damon?" He'd had all sorts; clients who wanted to be referred to by a title, some who just preferred sir/ma'am. Hell, once he had a client who wanted Morgan to call him God. It was all part of the service.

[disintegreate]

⋆｡ ⋆⭒˚🕆⋆｡ ⋆⭒˚

[autumnshowell]

who: @retrospectral where: retrocity arcade, late

Hungry still, even with meat in her belly. But tiring out. So much energy and effort to run around under the moon, the glass and brick and concrete of a city she's lived in her whole life and yet never seen the way she sees it now; like a whole palette of colors she never knew existed have been wiped across her eyes. Safety. Tired. Hungry. She follows her nose, finding all of nothing until there is a faint hint of familiar. She follows it. People see her, or almost see her, but she is too tired to fight. The scent leads her here. Like Arias place, like the bowling alley, its familiar. Lights look strange through these new eyes but she follows her nose across the street and towards the door, even as it opens and a person that reeks of the familiar comes out. She knows her. Cares so deeply for her. She comes with other scents, scents that before now Autumn could never have know for what they were - but this new nature provides new context, too - all of them with names that don't make sense pass through a mind that hasn't figured out how to understand things. Kevin. Morgan. ...Laure. That one makes Autumn feel something. Pries a memory out of her mind like a letter hidden in a book. Its the most human thought she's had all night. Flashes of blood and drinking and lies. Oh the lies. Autumn pads out of the shadows, slowly at first, towards Morgan, growling, snarling, trying to speak with a maw that isn't made for the work. I have something to tell you, it is awful. She pads closer, new memories flooding into her mind like she's tapped a vein, making her emotions seethe with frustration.

[naughtyneganjdm]

Threads of Desire - Chapter 5

Summary: Upset about the conversation that he had with Maggie, Negan shows up at Y/N's house hoping to convince her to quit her job and a lot of their feelings come to light.

Characters: Negan Smith, the reader (OC), Daryl Dixon, etc.

AO3 Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/61111030/chapters/158656765

Warnings: Swearing, Cheating, Angst, Smut, Heavy Touching, Unprotected P in V, etc.

Notes: Real sorry about taking a break on this. The holiday season is nuts, but I'll do my best to put up the rest of the story as soon as I can.

It had been a long time since Y/N had been this exhausted. Sure, it had been a rough few days, but this was not what she was accustomed to. Maybe it was from all the stress of everything going on. Stress was something she had grown used to, but never at these levels. When she got home today, she just crashed. She laid down on the couch and that was it. She didn’t even eat. All she remembered was walking in the door, tossing her stuff aside and falling onto the couch. Next thing she knew, she was out cold and didn’t even wake up until she heard what she thought to be the sound of someone knocking on her door.

Groaning out, she lifted her head and looked back over her shoulder at the door. Whoever was there was impatient. Laid out on her stomach, she realized that she had been sleeping face first with her head buried into the throw pillow that was at the end of the couch. All around her, the apartment was pitch black except for the small glow of the automatic light that turned on in the dark in her kitchen and the light coming from her clock.

More than anything, her body wanted to go back to bed. It needed the rest and it longed for it. Everything had been brutal on her body lately. From the lack of sleep to the destruction of her mental health. It wasn’t doing her any favors.

That wasn’t going to happen with the continued knocking though. It wasn’t just a light knock, it was an emotional knock. Which told her whoever was at the other side of the door thought they had some important reason to be there.

Pulling herself up into a seated position on the couch had an involuntary groan escaping her. Sleeping on the couch was not the best of ideas. Everything hurt. Curling her fingers around the edge of the cushion, she tried to coach herself into standing up. Sighing, she managed to gather enough strength to stand. A rushing sensation went to her head and she needed to take a minute until she was steady on her feet. Moving across the apartment, she turned on the light switch and winced at the bright lights flooding her vision.

Hearing another loud sequence of knocks had her looking to the time again. It was two in the morning. What the hell was so important that someone had to be here? And who the fuck was it?

A sense of anger was flooding her veins. It was probably over the fact that she was tired and that she had been woken up from her deep sleep, but she couldn’t control that tired rage. Heading for the door, she unlocked it and then irately pulled it open, “What the hell do you want?”

Exhaling loudly, she felt her throat tensing up with the familiar hazel eyes locking with hers. That was a time where she should have held in her emotions again. Clasping tightly to the door, she gazed over Negan. He was completely disheveled wearing his pajama pants, a bulky winter coat and a pair of boots. What he was wearing was completely mismatched and it looked like he had thrown it on quickly. His hair was messy and he looked extremely fatigued himself.

Straightening up her posture, she noticed that Negan was breathing heavily as he stood before her. His shoulders were slouched and he looked incredibly upset. Stepping into the hallway, she looked both ways realizing that he was alone.

“Negan?” she breathed out, her eyes locking with his in a state of panic. It struck her in that moment what it could have been. Coming to her home, dressed like this? Emotionally banging at her door like he had been. “What are you doing here? Is Jordyn okay? Is something wrong?”

“Jordyn is fine. She’s alright!” Negan was quick to calm her, holding his hands up in the air. By the expression over her tired features, Negan could tell that he had her worried over his daughter and that was the last thing he wanted. Fear obviously ate away at her because she had no idea why he would show up at her apartment at this time of night. “She’s back at the house sleeping in her bed. I checked on her before I came over here.”

“You left her alone?” she wondered, her fingers curling around the handle of the doorknob. She was perplexed why he was there so late. “She’s still a baby Negan. She shouldn’t be left alone. What were you thinking?”

“She’s not alone,” Negan assured her trying to ease her worries. Reconsidering it, Negan tipped his head to the side and huffed. “Maggie is there. I mean they are both sleeping, but I’ll be back before anyone can get in trouble. You know that I have the security cameras in my home linked to my phone. If anyone gets up and starts moving around, I’ll know.”

“Leaving her with Maggie is pretty much the same thing as leaving her alone,” she frowned, hating the idea that Jordyn was at home alone with Maggie. Leaning her shoulder against the doorframe, she knew she just wanted to get to the point. There was a tension in her head that likely came from the lack of sleep. “What are you doing here Negan?”

“I uh…” Negan paused, looking down the hallway of her apartment building. His face scrunched up and he shrugged his shoulders. “We really need to fucking talk. I want to talk to you.”

“And this couldn’t wait until tomorrow? Or you couldn’t just call me?” she wondered, her hand sliding down the length of the door. In the past? She was desperate for Negan’s attention. Now that she had it, she wasn’t so sure that she wanted it. It was only making things more complicated.

“Would you have answered?” Negan asked, a muscle in his jaw flexing expressing to her that he was stressed. After all the years she had spent around Negan? She easily learned what he was thinking or feeling by his expressions. Taking a moment to consider things, she stepped aside and motioned him into her apartment. Giving her a weak smile, Negan entered and started to pull off his jacket once he did. Under the jacket he was wearing an old rock band t-shirt. Holding out her hand, she requested him to give her his jacket so she could hang it for him. Turning toward him, she saw that he was taking off his boots so he didn’t get her apartment messy. After he finished, she realized that he was gazing over her body. By the way his thick eyebrows furrowed, she knew that he was perplexed. “When did you get home?”

“Hours ago. I was just exhausted,” she admitted knowing that he was referring to the fact she was still wearing the dress that Guy had requested her to wear earlier. “I just laid down and I crashed.”

Nervously flattening out the material of the dress against her body, she pointed toward her bedroom and yawned again, “Can you wait here so I can go change? Unless this is urgent.”

“No, I can wait,” Negan responded with a quick nod, pushing his hands into the pockets of his pajama pants. Standing before him a moment longer, she didn’t even know what this was about. Part of her wished that she did so it didn’t make her feel so awkward being around him. 

“Can you?” she turned away from Negan, pointing toward the zipper for help. Hearing him moving behind her, she knew she could have managed to get it down herself, but having Negan’s help was just easier. Closing her eyes, she felt the warmth of Negan’s fingers dragging across her shoulder. Tugging at the zipper had the material parting with her looking over her shoulder. Giving her a small nod, Negan backstepped trying to give her some space. “Thank you.”

Heading toward her bedroom, she pushed the door open when she entered. Working the material of the dress down her body, she knew that she wanted to be careful with this. Earlier she had caught a glimpse at how much this dress cost and she didn’t want to ruin it. Especially since Guy Vixen himself had bought it for her as a gift of some kind.  

Walking toward her closet, she glanced over at the partially opened bedroom door to see Negan standing at the back of the couch. The way that he was standing was in such a fashion that he could watch her change. His weight was balanced on his hand that was braced on the couch. When their eyes locked, he let out a panicked sound. Pulling his hand away from the couch had him falling forward to the point she no longer saw him but heard the sound of him hitting the ground.

“Jesus!” she moved out of her room, holding the dress to her chest in attempts to cover up in some way. Not that it mattered considering he had already seen her naked earlier. When she got into the room, Negan was already pushing himself up onto his hands and knees. Immediately nodding, Negan scrambled to his feet and brushed his fingers nervously through his messy hair. Already he was incredibly red from being embarrassed. “Are you okay?”

“Yes, yeah. I’m perfect. Fucking great,” Negan assured her, his voice raspier than it normally was. Forcing himself to look away from her, Negan growled under his breath and a slew of curse words followed. “Totally meant to do that.”

“Right,” she couldn’t help but laugh with the prominent vein at the side of his neck bulging. This was a time where she could have teased him that she caught him watching her change, but he was already upset enough as it was. She didn’t want to push her luck. “I’m going to finish changing. And then I’ll be back. Try not to knock anything over this time, okay?”

A fake laugh was forced from Negan’s throat with him moving around the couch to sit down. Burying his head in his hands, she could tell that Negan was talking to himself but she couldn’t hear what he was saying. Shaking her head, she moved back to her bedroom and was quick to hang up the dress. Throwing on a quick pair of pajama pants and a t-shirt, she knew that she wasn’t out to impress. It was two in the morning. He would be fine if she was in pajamas since he was in his too. When she was done, she headed back into the living room to join Negan.

“Can I get you anything?” she offered, moving around to her Christmas tree to turn the lights on. The living room area lit up with all the things she had decorated making a weak smile tug at Negan’s features when he was surrounded by the glow. Preferring that to the actual lights, she moved over toward the switch to turn the main light off. There were enough decorations for them to be able to see one another underneath the glow of them. “Water? Hot chocolate? Some ice for that fall?”

“Fuck me, you’re not gonna let that go are you?” Negan scoffed, his nose wrinkling in frustration when she started to laugh. “It was a miscalculation of where to balance my body weight. I’m tired. I’m fucking sorry.”

“Yeah, okay,” she made it obvious that she didn’t believe him. And he knew that his lie was a shitty one. Really, she didn’t want to make things weird. Pointing out that she caught him staring at her changing was not going to enhance their friendship. Moving around the coffee table that was in front of the couch, she took a seat at the opposite end of it. Getting comfortable, she tucked her leg underneath her so she could face him. “So, what are you doing here at two in the morning? What couldn’t wait?”

“Did you have sex with Guy?” Negan stammered causing her to choke at the immediate question he so simply blurt out. That was not a question that he was embarrassed of. It was one that he was obviously worried about because his eyes seemed upset. “Tonight, when Maggie came over, we were talking about you. This whole job thing. She also stressed to me that she thinks Guy is only doing what he is because he wants to have sex with you.”

“I didn’t realize my sex life was so important to yours and Maggie’s relationship,” she chimed in, smirking at her smartass remark. Negan however was not impressed with what she had just said. Rolling her eyes, she tipped her head to the side and knew that Negan wanted a genuine answer from her. “I did not have sex with Guy. If you would have asked Maggie that question, you would have known that I left before Maggie and Guy did today. He dismissed me when they were still finishing something.”

Relief flooded throughout Negan’s body and it blew her away how easily she could tell that a weight had been lifted from his shoulders, “That’s why you came all the way out here in your pajamas? To ask me if I had sex with Guy Vixen?”

“No. Well, yes. But…no?” even Negan didn’t seem to know the answer to that question. His face twisted with frustration, his fingers sinking nervously into his messy hair while he tried to slick it back. Gathering his thoughts, Negan swallowed down hard and considered what the best thing to say next was. Shaking his head, he inhaled loudly with his back becoming straighter with the way he was sitting. “I think you should quit your job.”

“And why is that?” she breathed out, biting down at her bottom lip as Negan turned his body to now face her at the opposite end of the couch. This was something that seemed to be weighing heavy on him and she didn’t know how to approach the conversation. “I thought you said this was a good thing. That I should take advantage of what was happening.”

“Well I changed my mind,” Negan asserted, holding his hand up to silence her from reminding him of what he had said to her earlier. “I don’t think Guy is doing this out of purity. I don’t think he cares to see your talents. He just wants to fuck you. And I think him taking advantage of you while holding the promise of the job you want over your head…”

“Do you think I would sleep with someone in order to get the job that I wanted?” she wondered, reaching for the throw pillow that was between the two of them to hold it in her arms.

“I don’t know,” Negan was honest with her, his jaw flexing. There was a sense of worry that flooded his veins that she would get mad at him for saying that. “You are really depressed and upset. If someone offered you everything you wanted just by asking for sex from you…I think most people would take that deal. Don’t you?”

“I think that’s a very debatable topic,” she suggested, throwing one of her hands up in the air and it had Negan shifting uncomfortably. “I can handle Guy Vixen, Negan. You don’t have to worry about me. I know he wants to have sex with me, but I won’t act on it. I’m not someone who will have sex with my boss to get the job that I want.”

“Okay,” Negan sucked in a sharp breath of air, his thick eyebrows furrowed. A nervous expression flooded his features before he licked his lips nervously again. “It’s really not that simple though. I just…I don’t think you should be working for Maggie anymore.”

“Oh?” that one was a surprise to her. Truthfully? She didn’t know what to say to that. “And why is that?”

“It doesn’t matter why,” Negan thought back to the conversation that he had earlier with Maggie. Ever since they had it, he wasn’t able to put his brain to rest. There were some things he didn’t feel like he had to tell Y/N in order to get her away from that job. “I’ve been thinking about things with my career. And there is this person that has been coming to me a lot about a job. I kept telling him that I had to think about it. I didn’t know if I wanted to get back into the movies. But, I was thinking that if you want, I can take the job under the stipulation that if I sign on they have to hire you as the lead in the costume department. Or whatever job you want. I don’t even know if you want to focus on costuming. Whatever you want though, we can be a packaged deal.”

“Wait,” she waved her hands about to get him to stop rambling on about things. “You’re offering me a job now working in the film business?”

“I’m offering you a job in the film business if I’m able to sign onto something with the stipulation I bring you with me,” Negan stated, giving her a firm nod that had her muttering something under her breath. “It’s what you were asking me for the other day. A way into the film industry. So you can get away from Maggie and Vixen. A new chance at a life you always wanted.”

“You can offer me that today, but you couldn’t do that the other day?” she spoke up, her chest aching hearing what Negan was attempting to offer her. The other night at the event the college was holding he was pretty insistent that it was impossible for him to get her a job. “What changed in two days Negan?”

“I was looking at my options and I decided I agreed with you. You deserve to have a life doing something that you love,” Negan responded, his hand lifting to press in over the center of his chest. There was a sincerity in his eyes where she knew he was being honest with his answer, but she was still confused as to where this sudden job had come up now, but not before. “I care about you and I don’t want you suffering over something that you hate.”

“I thought you hadn’t worked with me in over four years. You had no idea what my work ethics were like,” she reminded him of the things that he had said to her and it made him cringe. Since she was so drunk that night he was kind of hoping that she didn’t remember the things that he had said to her when they were bickering. “What’s changed?”

“Me,” Negan blurt out, the lines in his forehead growing with him throwing his hands up in the air. How could he explain to her that he learned so much in the last few days? Things that she never needed to hear. Things that he felt horrible about himself for. Being in love with someone blinded him to the way things really were. At least someone he thought he loved. “I’ve changed. I’ve had time to think about things since the other night. And I’m willing to throw myself out there if it gives you a chance at happiness. I really don’t fucking like what Guy is doing to you. You’re being sexually harassed and with Maggie? I realize the things you were saying to me are true. I think she’s really fucking awful for you.”

Hearing that made a nervous smile tug at her lips, “What’s with the sudden negativity about Maggie? If I remember correctly, you were stressing to me that I should open up to her about things. You thought she would be a good friend and help me.”

“Well it finds out I’m an asshole,” he reasoned with her and it had her adjusting on the couch, lowering down the pillow that she was holding onto. That was a strange thing for him to say. “Maggie’s a terrible friend. And so am I. So I’m trying to make things right.”

“Where is this coming from?” her heart was pounding away inside of her chest as Negan forced himself to look away from her. Again his Adam’s apple bounced in his throat and he sighed loudly.

“You opened my eyes to a lot of things. And I started talking to Maggie and I realized…a lot,” Negan huffed, lifting his hand to pinch at the bridge of his nose again. Squeezing his eyes shut, Negan didn’t know what he should and should not say. Right now he was incredibly disappointed in himself. How he had grown so blind to things was awful and he didn’t understand it. “I don’t want you hurt by Guy and I don’t want you hurt by Maggie. You deserve better than that. And I’ve let it go on for far too fucking long.”

“And you don’t care to elaborate?” she pushed for details, and it looked like he wanted to tell her. But he paused, his lips parting and he shook his head.

“I just want to take care of you the way you took care of me,” Negan admitted, reaching out to grab a firm hold of her knee to give it a squeeze. “You made my life better and you didn’t need to. I want to make your life better and I owe it to you. We share a daughter together. I don’t care if you’re not the person that gave birth to her. You’re the only mother Jordyn has ever known. And I want fucking better for you.”

“That’s very nice of you,” she started, her hand lowering to place it in over Negan’s. Giving it a tiny squeeze, she considered what he was offering her and she shook her head. “Right now? I want to give this a shot and see what happens with Guy. If I feel uncomfortable, I’ll let you know.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Negan exclaimed, his hand becoming tense beneath hers. “I don’t think Maggie is ever gonna let you come out on top. And I realize now that sounds fucking sexual, but you get what I’m saying.”

That was the Negan that she was used to. It felt like in the last few years Maggie had neutered the naughty, cheesy side of Negan that he once was. So to hear him talking like that again made her smirk. That was the kind of guy he was. Always turning everything sexual even if it was unintentional.

“I know that,” she agreed with Negan, her eyes locked on his when she gave him a weak smile. Even though things seemed more relaxed between them, she didn’t see this as a time to completely unleash her feelings about Maggie. “Did the two of you fight?”

“We…” Negan paused, clicking his tongue at the top of his mouth. This was where he could have lied to her, but there was no reason to. She was his friend. She was honest with him, so he should have been honest with her. “Yes. We fought. And I didn’t like the things she was saying and insinuating about me nor you.”

“Ah, so you finally discovered the side of Maggie you turned a blind eye to,” she mused sighing loudly. There was a time when she thought Maggie was a good person to and it hurt like hell when she realized she was wrong. Especially since she considered Maggie part of her family growing up. When she said that, Negan seemed extremely upset. His whole body language showed it and so did his big eyes. “I was wondering how long she could keep you blind to it.”

“I don’t know what to say to that,” Negan admitted, taking his time to consider everything that happened during his talk with Maggie. “She’s not the woman I convinced myself that I was in love with. Because I was dating her, I applied certain qualities to her that other people I loved had. And I’m not sure she has those qualities at all. Which fucking sucks.”  

“Yeah, it hurts when you realize the people that you love aren’t who you thought they were,” she pulled her hand away and slid back further into the corner of the couch.

A loud exhale escaped Negan’s throat with his eyebrows scrunching up, “Fuck that surprisingly hurt. That was directed at me.”

“Was it?” she watched him slouch forward on the couch and he let out a tense breath. There was that chance it was directed at Maggie. Considering Maggie was her best friend. Someone that Y/N had grown up believing cared about her. But she knew better than that now. In reality though, it was directed at Negan. He was someone that she saw as perfect. Someone she admired and was head over heels in love with. How easily Negan picked up on the fact it was directed at him surprised her since he had been blind to things so long. “Who said I loved you?”

“You love me,” he spoke up, still keeping his head down. A chill flooded down her spine and she stayed silent. “And I love you. It’s a very pure love between us. I just never realized you were in love with me and that makes me a fucking moron.”

“So now I’m in love with you?” she realized that she sounded like a bitch right now, but she wasn’t denying it. What was the point in lying? She never did that with Negan. Sometimes she just didn’t tell him everything. And that made things easier. It helped her avoid lying to him about things.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Negan spoke faintly, his breathing growing louder when he finally gathered enough strength to look to her again. “I wish you would have told me.”

“Negan, I tried every way possible to let you know how I felt. I don’t know what else you expected me to do,” she cussed to herself realizing that she did just admit to him that she did indeed love him. Obviously, the first two years it was just a crush and a friendship. Something that she would never act upon since he was married. But after that? She couldn’t imagine that she didn’t do everything possible to let him know how she felt. She just never straight out said the words. “You just didn’t feel it back.”

“But that’s not true,” Negan corrected her with a firm shake of his head. “You were my favorite person to be around. Even before Lucille died. I looked forward to every fucking moment we spent together because I loved talking to you. There was no one I felt like I could completely be myself with when it came to you.”

“I would love to think all of that was true, but your actions and your words don’t coincide,” she declared, having a hard time not focusing on everything that went wrong in the last four years. “I thought you loved me, but you didn’t. There was something in the way you looked at me that last year when I was your student teacher and I think it’s like what you said. I was attributing certain factors to you because I loved you so much that I just wanted to believe you.”

“I’m not lying to you,” Negan seemed frustrated that she wasn’t listening to him in the way he wanted her to. “I loved spending time with you. Even before I lost Lucille. Think of all the hours outside of class we spent talking. It was inappropriate then, especially with the age gap between us. And I knew it, but I liked you so much.”

“You liked your ego being stroked,” she recalled what it was like in the time that they were talking back then. “Anyone with half a brain could see I had the biggest crush on you. And the fact you were giving me attention? I was so immature. I loved it.”

“Come on,” Negan grumbled under his breath, holding his hand out to try to get her to stare out at him. “You’re selling our relationship short. Even Lucille knew that we were close. And Lucille loved you. You know that. We both did.”

“Now that’s a different kind of love. Lucille looked at me like I was a kid and I feel like she latched onto me because she knew I had no one. The woman wanted to take me under her wing and it didn’t hurt that your daughter always had a comfort with me,” she thought back to the way things were with Lucille when she had been around her. “You’re talking about a love that is completely different than the one that we are talking about here.”

“I’ve always been very open with you about things,” Negan started, the lines in his forehead growing deeper as he spoke, “you know that I cheated on Lucille when we were together. It was so fucked up that I did. It’s not like I didn’t love her because I did. She was everything to me. But I was so arrogant and stupid…”

Negan had to take a moment to pause and he let out a scoff, “I hated the man that I was when I did that to Lucille. You know how hard we tried to have Jordyn. For so fucking long. She was our little miracle baby and once we had her? I felt like the luckiest man in the world. She was everything we fought so hard to have. I promised to never be that man again that hurt her.”

“Which is amazing. I know Lucille was the love of your life and I think she deserved that,” she didn’t understand where this was headed, but she could tell that talking about his late wife had Negan emotional. “Where is this going?”

“I’m trying to prove a point here,” Negan stressed to her, his body tensing up. “I never thought of cheating on my wife again. Because my life was perfect. But you? You’re the only person that made me consider it again. Maybe I did like the way you inflated my ego. And yeah, maybe I did know you had a crush on me back then.”

“Oh fuck off,” she laughed at what he just told her, standing up from the couch in disgust moving across the room to pace.

“Why do you never believe the shit that I say?” Negan snapped at her, a deep rumble of a growl escaping his throat. “You don’t remember that time that the two of us were sitting in the front row of my class with me sitting beside you?”

“We did that all the time,” she chuckled with him trying to draw forth some kind of memory between them that she didn’t think existed.

“You touched my hand and it was just innocent, but the way you touched me? It made me feel things that I shouldn’t have. I asked you that night if you had a boyfriend while stroking the back of your fucking hand because I was considering fucking you right then and there. Because you touching me made me…hard,” Negan continued on, finding his heart hammering inside of his chest with the way she stopped to stare down at him. “You made me feel good about myself with the way that you liked me and looked up to me. I loved spending time with you. But then I realized what an asshole I was and I left immediately. The next day I brought Lucille and Jordyn around so I could remind myself that things were perfect.”

Rolling her eyes, she turned away from him and couldn’t contain the amused sound that she made, “If that were fucking true, it’s been six years since Lucille died. You didn’t try to kiss me once. You never tried to have sex with me. You never even spoke of feeling that way toward me.”

“I’ve been thinking about that and maybe I shut that feeling down because of how I felt about you in that moment when Lucille was alive,” Negan reasoned, but sounded like he was trying to make sense of things himself. “You were the only person that ever made me think like that and…”

“I don’t…I don’t want to hear any more of it,” she cut him off from even going any further in that direction. “So having a relationship with me was bad because I gave you a boner by touching your hand when you were married?”

“Well now that you say it like that, yeah of fucking course it sounds stupid,” Negan stood up from the couch himself trying to appeal to her, but she held her hand out to stop him. “I don’t understand why you find that so fucking hard to believe.”

“Because it was Maggie your hard cock found its way into, not me!” she snapped at him causing him to swallow down hard with his expressive eyebrows furrowing. “It was Maggie you were showing up at my apartment for with my favorite fucking flowers. You shattered my fucking heart that day Negan. How do you not fucking see that? And then you kept fucking hurting me. Fucking Maggie with me in the apartment consistently forcing me to hear that shit? And then walking around naked all the time. How do you not realize that was you fucking tormenting me?”

A broken breath escaped Negan’s throat and he threw his hands up in the air trying to come up with something to say, but he was falling short, “You can say whatever you want, but your actions speak louder than your words. I would have done anything for you. And when you showed up at that fucking apartment that day, I thought it was me you were there for. I thought it was me you were coming to admit your feelings for and you were there for fucking Maggie. So feed me all the bullshit you want, but I know it’s not true.”

“I’m sorry,” Negan apologized, his voice broken with him shaking his head.

“For what? Liking someone else? Do you know how fucking pathetic I would have to be to expect you to apologize to me for loving Maggie?” she shook her head refusing to accept that apology. “You didn’t want me. And I wasn’t the person you liked spending the most time with because if I was? You wouldn’t have stopped doing it after you got with Maggie. We would have still been spending time together. Instead? We acted like divorced parents that hated each other only seeing each other here and there when I came to pick up Jordyn.”

Swallowing down hard, Negan lowered his head and it looked like there was a massive amount of guilt that was eating away at him, “I am the luckiest girl in the world because you allowed me to be in Jordyn’s life and I love that little girl like she is my own. And I will always treat her like she is because she means everything to me. Even when I feel like allowing this world to swallow me whole, I remember that I’m still here because I love her. She’s the thing that keeps me going every day. But I’m also the dumbest woman in the world because I’ve been in love with a man for eight years and he never felt the same way about me. Now he’s feeding me some kind of bullshit because he feels guilty about the way he treated me.”

“I wasn’t thinking right, okay?” Negan finally spoke, his eyes damp and his voice rasp when he dropped his hands down at his hips. “I had lost Lucille and I was a fucking mess. I hadn’t been with anyone since Lucille and when Maggie started throwing herself at me…”

Dramatically dropping her head back, she released an amused laugh. It seemed to infuriate Negan when she headed over back to her side of the couch to drop down on top of it, “If you would have made your move, it would have been you that I fell for. But it was Maggie that was laying it on thick. It was Maggie that kissed me first. It was Maggie that…”

“Fucked you purposely on the couch in our living room knowing that I would be coming home? Yeah. You’re right,” she blurt out, frustration flooding her veins when she just let that information drop. “You know she promised me that night when you came here with the flowers that she wouldn’t let it go any further. When I walked in on the two of you having sex, it was a real fucking shock.”

“Then why remain loyal to her this whole fucking time?” Negan hissed, throwing his hand up in the air with the vein at the side of his neck bulging. “You should have fucking told me the kind of person that she was! I didn’t know who she was.”

“You know what the better question is?” she stood up from the couch, stepping before him to shove into the center of his chest to get him to stumble back giving her a shocked expression. “Why the fuck did I put up with you the whole time? Maggie, I have an excuse. Maggie’s father asked me to watch over her and keep her safe because he was worried his daughter would fail at life. But you? You’re the one that fucked Maggie. It wasn’t my responsibility to let you know the person she was.”

“No, you just waited four years to tell me,” Negan scoffed in response, his nose wrinkling with a firm shake of his head.

“You know what? I’ll give you the floor,” she dramatically waved her hands about, drawing his breathing to grow louder. “Why don’t you tell me what it is that Maggie did to have you be a pathetic fucking puppy dog toward her with those flowers. What was it Maggie did that had you fucking her in my apartment? And what made you think it wouldn’t hurt me? Because if I had a crush on you and you knew it in those first two years, why wouldn’t I have it when you fucked Maggie?”

“There was nothing to love with me. I was a mess. You saw me at my absolute worst. You had to take care of my daughter when I couldn’t. I was a fucking mess, why would you ever want to love someone like me when you had to endure the kind of person I was?” Negan countered visibly upset, but she uncomfortably scoffed under her breath.

“Because I loved you,” she sighed, her chest aching at the thought. “You made a promise to Lucille that you would live life for her because she couldn’t and you had a beautiful daughter. I wasn’t going to allow you to break that promise and I wasn’t going to let something happen to you or Jordyn because you lost the person you loved more than anything. It wasn’t fair that the world took Lucille away from you, so I understood why you were the way you were. Which is obviously me answering my own question as to why I put up with you for so long. That and because I love your daughter.”

“You love her, but not me?” Negan didn’t like what he was hearing causing her to shake her head again in frustration.

“You want to hear that I love you for what reason Negan? So it makes you feel better again and I’ll be that one person that makes you consider cheating again? Yeah Negan, I love you too because I’m a very pathetic girl,” she confessed placing her hand in over the center of her chest. “So why don’t you tell me what it was that Maggie did to make you want her and not me? When did she kiss you and you realized that you wanted to be with her? What did she do to make you have sex with her in the home she shared with me? Maybe I can take some pointers for the next man I fall in love with. That way I don’t lose out and make the same mistake I made last time.”

“Stop,” Negan requested, his jaw flexing with them obviously emotional from this discussion. “You can’t be mad at me for not making the first move. I didn’t make the first move with Maggie either. I didn’t do anything wrong. You’re acting like you were honest with me about things and you weren’t. If you would have said something…”

“I know men are stupid Negan, but come on…” she frowned, giving a glare before moving back to drop down on the couch again finding herself exhausted with this conversation. “This whole I never made the first move thing is bullshit.”

“I feel like I owe you this massive apology, but…” Negan’s hand was shaking when he pointed toward himself, but she held her hand up to silence him. An apology was not something that she wanted from Negan.

Unhurriedly Negan moved back to his spot on the couch and dropped down. Sliding down on the couch, the two of them sat there together in silence for a while. It took a while for her heart to calm down with how hard it was pounding with the adrenaline rush this whole thing gave her.

“I can’t stop thinking about you,” Negan finally broke the silence, his breathing growing louder. After their fight, his chest hurt fucking bad and he knew that was the guilt of everything. “Ever since we talked the night at the event, I can’t stop thinking about you. You’re all I think about.”

“It was the tits,” she spoke quietly making Negan snort and then start to laugh. Looking to her, they both laughed at how bluntly she said it. He thought she was joking, but she was being serious in a cheeky way. “I promise you Negan, it was nothing more than that. I cover them up most of the time, I finally let them out and it has both you and Guy Vixen foaming at the mouth.”

“It’s not your tits,” Negan forced his laugh down, trying to look away from her since this was a serious moment that he was trying to approach. “Yes, you have nice breasts, but what happened earlier at the store…”

“Was a mistake,” she finished his sentence, reaching out to grab at Negan’s arm to get him to look at her. “You were emotional, you were trying to make me feel better. I was at that event. Everyone that came up to you stressed to me how much you loved Maggie. I never heard the end of it. If I was Maggie? I would have fallen in love with you so much more hearing how much you loved me. Unfortunately, I’m me. And it was her these things were about. Not me.”

“Yeah, but I’m starting to think that I don’t even know the real Maggie,” Negan declared, visible confusion flooding into his features with his admission. “And I’m not even sure I fucking know who I am. So there is that.”

“I don’t know what to say to that Negan,” she professed, her heart sinking at what he said knowing that a while ago she would have loved to hear that. “Nothing I say to that is going to make this situation any better.”

“Why…” Negan began, scoffing to himself knowing that this would likely go nowhere. “Why didn’t you try to kiss me though? If you would have kissed me before Maggie did, I know things would have worked themselves out between us.”

“Because I was worried that after Lucille passed away it would have been wrong for me to kiss you because it would have been me putting a nail in the friendship I had with her,” she had thought for a moment what to say, but when she did say this it was so emotionless that it had Negan looking her with an arch of his eyebrow.

“You’re mocking me,” Negan recognized that she was using the thing he said earlier against him.

“Little bit,” she tipped her head to the side understanding that it wasn’t the nicest of things to do in the moment. Even with her smart ass attitude, he was still waiting for an answer. “I don’t know Negan. Why didn’t you just kiss me?”

“In my mind I had to be thinking I was your professor,” Negan kept up with that defense provoking her to groan loudly. “It would have been a conflict of interests and I could have gotten in trouble.”

“Maybe I just wanted to know that I was worth the risk,” she suggested, rubbing her hands out over her thighs hating that they were bickering about the past again. “It’s nice to play a game of what if Negan, but you really fell in love with Maggie. She was what you wanted.”

“I think I fell in love with Maggie’s version of you,” Negan countered, drawing her to give him a look that showed she had no idea what he was saying. “Maggie listened to you talk about me for four years. She knew what you told her about me. She knew what I liked. She listened to someone who loved me talk about me. And she kissed me first. Like a typical fucking male, I thought with my dick. And I continued to let my dick think things out for way too long.”

“What does it matter now?” she truly wondered, a tense laugh escaping her throat. This was all nice to hear, but it didn’t change shit and it sure as hell didn’t make things better. “It doesn’t change what happened.”

“What we did together in that dressing room…” Negan focused on what happened earlier at the store with her trying on the dress. It was something she wanted to avoid talking about, but he was still locked in on it.

“We didn’t even kiss Negan. It was a moment of tension that will never happen again,” she promised him, swallowing down hard. Truthfully? When she closed her eyes she could still picture the way everything felt. “If we kissed, then maybe, but we didn’t.”

Thinking about what she said, Negan slid in toward the middle couch cushion and bit down on his bottom lip, “Then maybe we should kiss once. We never kissed. I don’t know how I would feel if I kissed you.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” she alerted him with a long exhale realizing that she was already hooked on Negan. The last thing she needed right now was something else like that. Something that would pull her further into him. Especially when he could never be hers. “It’s only going to complicate things more.”

“But maybe when we kiss we will realize that there is nothing there,” Negan thought aloud, shrugging his shoulders simply. “It could be for the best. That way we really know and don’t have to lay awake at night wondering about the what ifs.”

“Negan…” she whispered his name, her throat going dry with him pressing in closer to her. After the way they had been bickering, she couldn’t see this working itself out.

“Please?” Negan begged of her, his hand lifting to sweep his fingers in over the side of her face. For so long this was the kind of attention she wanted from Negan, but in the moment she knew that it felt wrong. Yet she didn’t push him away. Just his touch alone had her eyes fluttering to a close. Having the roughness of his fingertips caressing at her skin had her breath hitching in her throat. Palming down over the side of her face, Negan allowed his thumb to drag faintly across her bottom lip. The slightest of whimpers escaped her throat eliciting a chill to flood his body. It was so quiet, but since the room was too it was easy to hear. He hadn’t even kissed her yet and he had her trembling before him. It took his breath away. Pressing in closer, Negan closed the distance between them. The warmth of his breath lingered over her and he was keen to pay attention to her reactions. Considering what he was putting on the line, he wanted to pay special attention in the moment. Sweeping his fingers down over her jawline toward her neck, Negan captured her jaw between his thumb and index finger. It had her lips parting with her breathing growing broken. Part of him wondered if she would stop him from doing this, but she hadn’t. And he was thankful for that. Faintly brushing his lips over hers, he took his time to allow her the chance to refuse. Their lips barely touched. It was when his eyes closed that he finally brought their lips together in a passionate sweep. It was one that lingered, innocent at first. Her hand settled at the center of his chest with her fingers stretching upward. Gradually the kiss grew stronger. It was just supposed to be one simple kiss, but with her lips parting he took advantage by brushing his tongue delicately against hers. One kiss turned to many with her fingers curling loosely around the back of his neck. Pressing a final kiss at her bottom lip left them both breathless. Lazily, his eyes fluttered to an open with them still so close to one another. “How do you feel?”

His eyes were locked on her, enamored with the way she responded to him kissing her. Slowly her eyes opened, her pupils dilated showing that the kiss had undoubtedly had its effects on her, “I don’t know,” she knew she couldn’t say what she truly felt. With him still touching her face, it wasn’t helping. “It’s hard to explain.”

“Then maybe we should do it again,” Negan commented with his thumb stroking down over the soft fleshy part of her throat. Stealing another fervent kiss from her lips, Negan brought them close together. One kiss turned to another with their breathing growing broken and labored. This time when Negan’s tongue swept against hers, she eagerly returned the gesture. Everything about this was intoxicating having her desperately wanting more from him.

“Shit,” she stood up from the couch, panting when she pulled away from Negan’s kisses. Moving toward the corner of the room gave her that chance to put some distance between them. It felt like everything was spinning with how intense things started to get between them. Finally looking to him again, she gave him a nod, but it was hard looking him in the eye. “Well we kissed and I think we can both agree that you should probably be headed home.”

Taking a moment to think about what she was saying, Negan gave her a single nod. Getting up from the couch, he approached her and felt his heartbeat leaping in his chest, “I guess we’ll talk again soon?”

“Sure,” she realized that he was going to hug her goodbye and she allowed him that. Squeezing her firmly in his arms, Negan buried his head against the side of her neck and sighed loudly. Chills flooded down her spine and she tried to keep her head on straight.

“I’ll just go then…” Negan spoke, leaning back ever so slightly to look down upon her. “If that’s what you want from me.”

Staying silent, she knew it was for the best. Kissing him was addicting and she didn’t want to stop. With a wicked smirk, Negan stepped back acting as if he was going to leave. Reaching for his wrist had him chuckling. Cupping his face in her hands, she hungrily pulled him back to her having his lips crashing down upon hers. The force of him stepping forward had her back pressing against the wall. Dropping his hands, he caressed them in over her hips giving them a firm squeeze. Kiss after kiss took her breath away, her body growing limp with her falling in against his chest.

Gasping out, she felt Negan’s hands palming down over the backs of her thighs. Hooking his arms under her knees, he lifted her up from the ground and braced her weight against the wall. Closing the distance between them had her heart hammering inside of her chest. Every part of her felt like it was on fire with Negan’s lips upon hers once more. Kissing her with all the passion and desire that had been building up between them over the last few days.

Wincing, she tipped her head back when Negan’s kisses tampered off down over her chin and across her jawline. Sinking her fingers into his messy, dark hair she knew that she should have let him leave but this all felt way too good to let go of. For years she longed for this kind of interaction and now that she was getting it she felt like she was drunk off his kisses.

His mouth left a hot, wet trail against the side of her neck when he eagerly returned to meet her lips in a fiery kiss. What started off innocent was growing into something hungry and passionate. Something that she never thought existed between the two of them. How easily Negan took her breath away was scary. Negan held her in the palm of his hand and she knew it. An involuntary moan escaped her lips with the sensation of Negan’s hips lightly bucking up against hers. In return he rewarded her with a throaty moan. Tipping his head back, his eyelids were heavy as he tried to make sure that she was comfortable with where this was going. Another roll of his hips had her head tipping back. Repeatedly, his hips bucked up against hers with his mouth stealing kiss after kiss from her lips.

“Fuck,” Negan hissed at the liquid warmth that was flooding his body. Sucking at her bottom lip had her mewling out and he pressed his forehead to hers. Every part of him felt like it was on fire. The way she caressed at the back of his neck had chills running down his spine. Carefully bringing her in against his chest, Negan turned on his heel taking his time to carry her over toward the couch. Dropping down on top of it, Negan fell in over her but made sure to brace his weight so he didn’t hurt her. Hovering his lips in over hers had her caressing down over the side of his neck toward the center of his chest. A smile tugged at his lips hearing the anxious sound that she made with him over her. “Don’t be nervous.”

Lowering himself between her thighs, Negan kept his weight braced on his right arm while his left caressed down over the side of her body and up again. Teasing his lips just over hers, Negan’s eyelids grew heavy when the warmth of her mouth radiated against his. It had her purring out and it sent a chill right through his body. There was a rush flooding his veins. This wasn’t where he expected the kiss to go, but here they were.

Feather like kisses pressed over her lips with him taking his time to get comfortable with her. With each kiss, the passion and hunger grew with them exploring each other. Making out with Negan on the couch was not something she expected and she was surprised they let it get this far. But right now she was feeling butterflies in her stomach. Having him pampering her with kisses was addictive and it was hard to pull herself away from it. There was an electricity between them that both of them could feel the longer they kissed.

Grunting, Negan lowered his head to look down with him hooking his arm underneath her knee. Getting her to loosely wrap her leg around his waist drew out the most delicious moan from his lips and it had her panting. Palming down over the side of his face had Negan leaning into her touch, his lips parting and his eyes coming to a tight close.

By the time his long eyelashes fluttered to an open, she felt lost in him. The way he stared down at her showed a sense of affection. Licking his lips, Negan dragged his thumb across her bottom lip and sighed. Kissing at the pad of his thumb had a tiny smile tugging at his handsome features, “You are so beautiful.”

Nuzzling his nose in against hers showed tenderness in the way he was desperate to be near. Stroking down over the side of his neck, she liked listening to the way that he was breathing. At this moment? They were just taking the time to cherish the warmth of their bodies near. Hooking her fingers into his messy hair, she caressed at his scalp and liked the tiny kisses that he was pressing at the side of her face. A lump grew in her throat with the feeling of Negan caressing down in over her thigh and then up over her side. Having her arch up into him like she did only made him smile further.  

“Do you trust me?” Negan slurred, kissing softly at her bottom lip allowing it to linger in that moment.

Maybe she should have said no, but instead she just nodded. Adjusting his weight made her panic when he got on his knees above her. Reaching for the bottom of his shirt, Negan took his time pulling it up the lengths of his abdomen. Getting it over his head, he dropped it beside the couch on the floor. How she looked at him fueled him. Maggie had never looked at him like that. Reaching for her hands, Negan brought them toward his torso urging her to touch him. Tension was evident in her body, but it was from her being nervous. Flattening her palms against the center of Negan’s abdomen, she did as he wanted. Sliding her hands up his slender torso toward his chest and then down again. Just touching him had Negan sucking in a sharp breath of air, tipping his head back and pressing in closer to her. Teasing her fingers through the dark curls of hair that covered his flesh had a thick rumble of a sound falling from his throat. Forcing himself to watch her, Negan could see the awe in her eyes. Instead of rushing things, she learned the lines of his body. Learning what he liked while also enjoying the moment herself.  

Lifting up, her eyes stayed locked with his at first when she started to pepper affectionate kisses at the center of his torso. Every caress of her lips over his flesh was delicate with her still touching him. His heartrate was undoubtedly high with him curling his fingers around the back of her neck. Lowering her stare, she kissed at the lines over his hips following the v-line toward the top of his pants. Biting down on his bottom lip, Negan sighed loudly. It felt good having someone pampering him and admiring him like this.

Dropping his hands down, his fingers tugged at the material of her shirt getting it partially up her body. Stopping at the area right under her arms, he gave her a tip of his head when she looked up at him. Lifting her arms allowed him to pull it from her body and drop her shirt along with his. Underneath she was not wearing a bra and he knew that. Hell, he watched her change. The way her breasts bounced with the movement made him groan.

Motioning her to lay back again, Negan laid in over her permitting the warmth of their bodies to press together. That alone felt better than he could have ever imagined. It had her frozen beneath him with him dragging his bottom lip over hers. Lazily dragging his lips over her top lip had her purring out and he loved it. They should have said more, but they didn’t. The roughness of Negan’s fingertips caressed down over her side and it felt like her heart was going to pound out of her chest. After a while Negan’s fingers dragged down further, teasing in over the waistband of her pajama pants. Locking his eyes with hers, Negan pushed at the material having her a tremoring mess beneath him.

“It’s okay,” he hushed her, lifting his hips enough to get the material of her pajama pants tugged down to her thighs. With them getting locked up there, he balanced his weight enough for him to use one of his hands to get them pushed even further down her legs. Laying back in over her, Negan reached behind him to push at his pajama pants getting them down over his ass toward his thighs. Swallowing down hard, Negan’s muscles tensed with the sensation of their bodies pressed together. The way she shuddered had him breathless with his fingers tracing down over the side of her face. “You take my breath away.”

Attempting to look between them, Negan stopped her by curling his finger in underneath her chin. Hushing her, he urged her to tip her head back against the pillow, “Keep your eyes on mine. I don’t want you looking anywhere else.”

Every part of her felt like it was on fire with the warmth of his naked body lying in over her. This felt more passionate and sincere in the moment. Less sexual even though the two of them were both naked. There was a vulnerability between the both of them that Negan was enchanted by.

“No one looks at me the way you do,” Negan whispered, starting to pepper kisses against her bottom lip. How he had been blind to it this whole time was something he couldn’t wrap his mind around. “I should have seen it all along.”

Closing her eyes when Negan’s kisses tampered off over the side of her neck had it feeling like the room was spinning around them. Quiet whispers surrounded her with Negan praising her, saying all the things that someone would want to hear. Wrapping her arms around his shoulders, she buried her nose against the side of his neck.

Turning his head, Negan brought their lips back together. Reaching for one of her arms, he lowered it down on the couch with his fingers hooking firmly with hers. Truthfully they could have spent an eternity like that, just kissing with them pressed up against one another.

“Do you still want me?” Negan wondered, his words vibrating against her flesh having her whimper at the feeling of it. His fingers squeezed firmly with hers and he wanted her to answer honestly. “After everything, is there a chance that you still want to be with me?”

“I don’t know,” she spoke quietly, unsure of how she was feeling or how things were. More than anything she wanted Negan, but she didn’t know how it would work. “I know how you make me feel.”

“How do I make you feel?” Negan wanted to hear her answer, wetting his lips. There was desperation in her eyes with his mouth hanging just in over hers.

“Like my heart is beating wildly yet capable of stopping at the same time,” she stammered drawing him to smile with a tiny nod. That probably sounded stupid and she knew it. “No one makes me feel like you do.”

“Okay,” Negan licked his lips adjusting his body over hers and releasing her hand. “That’s all I need to know.”

Wiggling his hips a bit more got the material of his pants down to the bottom of his thighs. Dragging his hand down over her side toward her ribcage and then over her breast had her panting. Circling her nipple with his thumb, he worked to bring it to a hard bud and growled.

“Do you have any condoms?” Negan questioned and it had her shaking beneath him. There was a sense of shock in her eyes with his eyebrows bouncing up.

“I…I don’t,” she responded, her head tipping back with Negan’s thumb tracing over her jawline, down over the length of her neck and toward her collarbone. “I don’t really have time to bring men back here for sex.”

“We can work with that,” Negan slurred, reaching down between them, his raspy moan following when she assumed that he was touching himself. Nuzzling his nose in against hers, he adjusted himself over her. Curling his arm around her waist, he brought her closer to him and it had the warmth of his body near hers. Licking his lips, he reached between them again to curl his fingers around the base of his cock. Teasing the swollen tip over the length of her sex had her cooing out. Dragging a line down her body with the tip and then up toward her clit had her bouncing up toward him. “You are so fucking perfect.”

Repeatedly he teased her with the same motion, until he brought his fingertips up toward his lips. Licking at them, he lowered them down again touching himself. By the time a bit of pressure was being pushed at her entrance, she heard the sound of what she thought was another knock at her door. Closing her eyes, she assumed that it was just her mind letting things stir with the thick tip of Negan’s cock prodding at her warmth.

“Look at me,” he demanded and she obeyed. His lips hovered over hers with him working just the tip through the tight ring of muscle having the both of them moan in unison. Pulling out had her whimpering before he repeated the same movement causing them both to be a panting mess. Another knock at the door drew both of their attention this time with Negan looking to the door. “Just ignore it. It’s late.”

Nodding her head, she winced when he got just a bit more inside of her this time. He was starting off small, getting her used to him. Pressing her hand against his lower abdomen had him swallowing down hard. Even though he knew better, there was a sense of innocence to her. Lifting, she watched him pull his hips back letting her gaze upon his rigid manhood that took her breath away. Again, the way she looked at him turned him on more than he could have ever imagined. She did stare at him with awe and affection. In her eyes? He was perfection and he could see that. Cuddling in close to her, Negan got comfortable between her thighs and helped lead the tip back to her ready opening. Pushing forward had her crying out and he nipped at her chin. At this point it was only the tip that had entered her a few times but knowing that it was Negan had her body craving so much more.

“You feel so good,” Negan slurred, doing his best to brace himself pushing his hips just a bit more forward. This time allowing his body to enter hers further. Dropping her head back, she cried out with Negan kissing down over the side of her neck. There was a stretching sensation with her body parting to his girthy length. “So wet and tight…”

And there it was again, the returning knock, “I’m going to kill myself if that’s Maggie.”

“It can’t be Maggie, the alert didn’t go off on my phone,” Negan breathed against the side of her neck having a sense of realization flood through her mind. Firmly bracing her hand over the center of Negan’s abdomen, she pulled her hips up and away from him having him moaning out. “Did I hurt you? We didn’t even get half of it in yet.”

“You’re still with Maggie,” she reminded him having a flood of guilt rushing through her veins. By his expression, she could tell in that moment the only person that mattered to was her. Working her pants back up over her body, she knew that every part of her was screaming at her to continue, but she couldn’t let that go. “You’re still with Maggie and we just started to have sex.”

“Barely,” Negan stammered, his chest rising and falling heavily with his unsteady breathing. Grunting, Negan looked down to see his cock twitch with the ache that it had with not being allowed to continue. “I think I want to leave Maggie. I want to be with you…”

“You don’t know that,” she frowned, standing up from the couch leaving him to fall back against it. Dragging his hands down over the front of his face, Negan groaned and she wished he would have pulled his pants back up. Seeing him laid stretched out on her couch almost completely naked with a raging hard on was not helping the situation. “I should have never let things get that far. It makes me just as bad as her if not worse. You’re hers. And I would have had sex with you, I started to…”

Wincing, Negan reached down to squeeze at his rigid length and lifted his head to look at it. Growling, he reached for his pants and arched his hips to pull them up over his body which she was thankful for, “Maggie is in your home right now. Sleeping in your bed and I’m here with you…”

“I don’t like the way I feel when I’m with Maggie,” Negan explained to her, the muscle in his jaw flexing when he brushed his fingers throughout his hair shakily. “I like the way I feel when I’m with you. The way you look at me, the way you touch me…the electricity between us…”

“The other day people were coming up to me talking about how much you loved Maggie. How can you change your opinion of her in two days?” she had a hard time believing that with her reaching down to grab her shirt to pull it back on.

“Because my eyes were opened to how things really are. I was blind to things,” Negan stood up from the couch, attempting to approach her, but she held up her hands to stop him from coming near. With how her body felt? She knew that she needed to keep some distance between the two of them. “Please, okay? All I think about is you.”

“You’re still with Maggie,” she stressed to Negan the words that hurt, but were still so undeniably true. Right now that didn’t seem to bother Negan, but she knew eventually it would. “You’re hers. And she is yours. This? What we’re doing. It’s wrong.”

“How could it be fucking wrong when we both want it?” Negan wondered, his Adam’s apple bouncing in his throat. “Isn’t this what you want? What you’ve always wanted?”

“To have an affair with you while you’re still with Maggie?” she snorted, causing Negan to frown and fold his arms out in front of his chest. “There are some things that need to be worked out before we could ever be something. You were very anti cheating and now…”

“I just…” Negan started only to hear the knocking turn to rapid, continuous hits that was having the door shaking. “What the fuck?”

Heading for the door, Negan reached for the knob and pulled it open angrily, “Whatever the fuck you want I promise we don’t want it…”

It was in that moment Negan came face to face with Daryl who was holding a few bags in his hands staring out at Negan with his cold, blue eyed stare. They both knew each other and they knew each other well. Especially since they were both a big part of Y/N’s life. And neither one liked each other all that much.

“Daryl,” she breathed out his name with a shirtless Negan standing before him at the door. Looking to the clock on the wall, she shook her head and sighed. Why was everyone suddenly showing up so damn late? “What are you doing here?”

“I figured you didn’t eat since you weren’t texting me back,” Daryl lifted the bags that he was holding giving them a small wiggle. “Since neither of us sleep much, I figured I would stop by like you did the other night and bring you something to eat.”

“At three in the morning?” Negan scoffed with Daryl pushing through into the apartment toward the kitchen area. There wasn’t a care in the world that Daryl had right now interrupting the two of them. And he was making that clear. Which infuriated Negan who stood at the door tense as can be. “Excuse me, we were in the middle of something here.”

“Were you?” Daryl simply asked looking between the two of them. Setting some of the things out on her counter, Daryl brought his fingers up to his lips to suck at them. Shrugging his shoulders, he took note of the fact that Negan was half naked. But he didn’t say anything. Just acted like everything was completely normal. “What are you doing here anyway? Don’t you have a child at home? Jordyn is too young to be left alone.”

“Maggie is there,” Negan answered with Daryl smirking and moving back around the counter toward them in the living room.

“Like I said, leaving her alone isn’t smart,” Daryl gazed upon Negan who was still breathing loudly, his eyes locking with Y/N who was standing a good distance away from the both of them trying to catch her breath. Bringing his attention back to Negan, Daryl circled his finger around Negan’s torso area. “What happened to your shirt?”

“I lost it,” Negan snorted with a roll of his eyes heading over toward his shirt that was still on the floor. Snatching it, Negan haphazardly tugged it back on. Displeasure flooded Negan’s features with his hands settling in at his hips. By his body language, he was angry and he wasn’t hiding it.

“Do you need something cold for that?” Daryl slurred getting Negan’s eyebrows to furrow and his head to tip to the side. Pointing toward the evident tent in Negan’s pajama pants had red flooding into Negan’s face. Reaching for the pillow that was on the couch, Negan placed it in front of himself. “Don’t you have to leave?”

“Daryl,” she snapped at her friend causing him to dramatically shrug and move back toward the kitchen. Daryl was going out of his way to be a shit to get Negan even more upset about things.

“He’s right,” Negan swallowed down hard looking upon her with a saddened expression. “I shouldn’t have left Jordyn alone. But the two of us need to talk. About…us…”

“Sounds serious,” Daryl spoke up with a mouthful of something getting an immediate glare from Negan having Negan’s dimples becoming extremely prominent. It looked like Negan wanted to kill Daryl in that moment. Daryl was playing oblivious to things, but she knew he was just doing it to be an ass to get under Negan’s skin.

“Daryl!” she repeated his name with Daryl throwing his hands up in the air again.

“We’ll talk later,” Negan stepped forward, lowering down to press a quick kiss against the side of her face. Even him doing that felt wrong. There was a sense of affection in the way that he kissed her face that shouldn’t have been there if he was with Maggie. “I’m sorry.”

“It was nice seeing you,” Daryl called out, wiggling his fingers about. It had Negan stopping and looking back over his shoulder at Daryl with his cold hazel eyed stare. By now? She was surprised Daryl hadn’t started a fight. Tossing the pillow back onto the couch, Negan reached for his boots and stumbled to pull them back on. By the time he got his jacket on, Negan headed for the door, but stopped. It looked like he was considering saying something else, but he just shook his head and left, leaving her alone with Daryl. Once she knew they were finally alone, she looked to Daryl shooting him a glare herself with the way he acted. “What?! I was being nice!”

Heading over toward the couch, she dropped down on top of it and buried her head into her hand, “Personally? I think you should be thanking me. Cus I stopped whatever sex the two of you were about to have. And you would have regretted it if I didn’t.”

“I know,” she agreed with Daryl who looked surprised when he dropped down on the couch beside her. “You’re absolutely right.”

“I am?” Daryl replied showing her that he didn’t even think she would agree with his comment. “You’re not angry?”

“At myself. Not you,” she confessed, her breathing still uneven with her body aching in the worst of ways. Huffing out, she felt Daryl’s hand placing in over her head and she gave him an awkward glance. “What the hell?”

“Just making sure you don’t have a fever or nothin’,” Daryl explained, pulling his hand back and rubbing at his thighs. “Since I just stopped you from having sex with the man of your dreams. He was walking around with a raging boner. I thought you’d be furious.”

“I’m not,” there was a warmth that flooded into her face with how embarrassed she was over this whole thing. Right now she was upset and it was probably a good thing that Daryl showed up, but she didn’t really want to admit what happened or talk to Daryl about it. “It shouldn’t have happened anyways.”

“You okay?” Daryl’s nose wrinkled, scoffing in the process. “I really thought you’d be throwing things at me.”

“Daryl…” she repeated his name, forcing herself to look away from him. Truthfully? Her body was screaming. More than anything it wanted Negan, it wanted to keep having sex with Negan. But her mind kept thinking about Maggie. Maggie went after Negan knowing that she was head over heels in love with him, but Negan wasn’t dating her. She started having sex with Negan knowing that he was dating Maggie. And she was furious with Maggie for cheating on Negan with Guy. “I don’t know why I let things get that far.”

“Cus you were always obsessed with that asshole,” Daryl scoffed, getting comfortable and stretching out his legs while he sat beside her on the couch. “The guy smiles and he just has you in the palm of his hand.”

“It’s a little more than that,” she reasoned with her friend, standing up from the couch and feeling her legs tremoring beneath her. Moving over toward the kitchen area, she grabbed herself a water. Looking out, she could see that Daryl’s head was turned watching her.

“Was it everything you ever hoped for?” Daryl felt like he was mocking her in that moment, but she couldn’t blame him. “Was his cock glorious and the moment you knew that he wanted to fuck you, you just creamed your panties.”

“Christ,” she muttered after taking a long sip of the water that she grabbed herself. Looking at the bags, she tipped her head to the side when she saw one of the things that was in them. Pulling out the box, she lifted it and saw Daryl grimace once he realized she grabbed the box of condoms that were there. “What were you planning?”

“I was horny and thought you might be again,” Daryl got up from the couch, shoving his hands into his pockets. Giving her a shrug, he bit down on his bottom lip and moved closer to the kitchen area of her apartment. After she tossed the box on the counter, he assumed that she wouldn’t be interested in that at all tonight. “Guess I was right.”

Bracing his hand on the counter, Daryl noticed the silence that was between them and cleared his throat. Heading over toward the corner of the kitchen, she rest herself back against it and she looked disappointed in herself.

“I really wanted him to have a small penis,” Daryl blurt out provoking her to spit out her water after she had taken another sip of it. Involuntarily she laughed with how dramatically Daryl said that. “All that arrogance and being blessed with a big dick. It’s not right.”

“What are you complaining about? It’s not like you are a lacking. At all,” she reminded Daryl who simply tipped his head from side to side. “And it’s not about dick size with Negan. I wouldn’t have cared what size it was.”

“You’d be disappointed if he had a baby penis,” Daryl insisted, leaning forward eliciting another laugh from her again. “I’m right. You know that.”

“Can we talk about something other than Negan and his penis?” she asked of Daryl having him shrug dramatically and then reach for the bag of food that he brought for them to start opening it up. “Thank you for coming over with food.”

“Well, someone has to feed you,” Daryl pointed out, dropping what looked to be noodles into his mouth and chewing loudly. Gazing around her apartment, Daryl grunted noticing that she had gone a bit overboard with the decorations. “You’re barely home. Why do you have so many lights?”

“It helps relax me,” she suggested, liking the setting that it gave her apartment. It felt more magical than just being the bare, plain apartment that she was used to.

“Being here reminds me we don’t spend a lotta time at your apartment,” Daryl swallowed down what he had in his mouth and turned to face her again. Through the years they knew each other, it was mostly his place that they were always at. Unless she had Jordyn, then it would be occasionally spent at her place. “Why is that?”

“Because I want to escape my life most of the time,” she noted, setting her water bottle down and moving across the room to the side of the counter opposite of him. “Being at your apartment gives me a different environment.”

“So…” Daryl went to reach for more of the noodles and she swatted at his hand. Grabbing a fork, she handed it over to him making him roll his eyes. Using the fork like she wanted of him, he tipped his head back and dramatically ate the mouthful of food that he grabbed. “Do you wanna go back to my apartment and have sex?”

“Daryl!” she raised her voice with his blue eyes getting big like he didn’t understand where all the excitement was coming from. “I don’t think I should be having sex right now. My body needs to chill out. And I would love to relax instead with you. We can eat, sit down and watch some movies.”

“Boring,” Daryl frowned with her reaching out to shove into his shoulder. A muted laugh escaped him as he moved around the counter to get himself a plate from her cabinets and one for her as well. “I can do that. As long as I get to pick the movie. I ain’t watching no romance films. Or any of those cheesy Christmas movies.”

“Deal,” she agreed, thankful that Daryl was there, but was still ill at ease.

Part of her wondered if Daryl was more upset with her than he was allowing her to see. Truthfully? She told him about what happened at work and how she was tired, but she left out the Negan parts. And she felt like there was a reason for that. Now he knew something was going on between her and Negan.  Yet he was more so joking about it. Daryl and her had always been friends. Well, a little bit more than friends, but nothing beyond that.

Right now she didn’t want to overthink things though. Daryl seemed fine and after all the stress she had been dealing with over the last few days, she just wanted to relax. Spending the rest of her night hanging out with Daryl watching movies sounded better than anything else she could have considered. And that was the honest truth. Really she just needed time to let her emotions die down so she could think clearly. Before she fucked her life up completely and became someone she hardly even knew.

----

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Morgan Holly Moore