‘’Maggie?’’

Negan looked to the woman after a stretch of silence but found that she didn’t respond at all to him calling her name. She hadn’t moved a single inch after resting her head upon his shoulder, and her eyes being closed did nothing to reassure the man.

Something’s wrong. Why didn’t I see it before?

There were ice crystals clinging to her skin and hair, and her breathing came out in ragged spurts. Seeing her in a bad state, Negan eased himself out of his loose restrains and held the woman in his arms.

Negan hurriedly wiped away the snow that clung to her hair before putting a hand to her blood-splattered cheek. He felt the coldness seeped into her fair skin the moment he made contact. 

She’s burning up bad. Damn it, Maggie.

Negan stood up from the chair with Maggie in his arms, but after a moment of hesitation sat her down before moving to bring the barrel burning with fire closer.

It’s not enough, but it should tide her through until I sort things out. It has to.  

Nightfall had arrived, and Negan was frustrated that nothing went as planned. He had meant to clear out the base and get Maggie in before sundown, but by the time he got to Sanctuary the rest of the way on foot, a snowstorm had developed.

He bit off more than he could chew, but nothing could have prepared the man for one of the enemy survivors to have a grenade. Before the Outbreak it was mandated by law that civilians couldn’t own weapons of mass destruction, grenades being one of them.

Larger groups like Alexandria and Kingdom of course owned a few of said weapons, but small groups like Gregor’s could barely afford pistols and knives. It didn’t cross his mind to think they might have something that could turn the tides so easily.    

Bad luck on my part, but it’s over now. What’s done is done. You’re alive and they’re not. It’s as simple as that at the end of the day.

Negan staved off on his frustration. Wouldn’t do well to dwell on what couldn’t be changed. He needed to stay focused and make sure they got through the night. Him and Maggie weren’t out of danger just yet.

Though the sun hadn’t been visibly out, it still abated the worst of the cold during the day. Now that it was nightfall, it would only get colder. That lone barrel of fire wouldn’t do much good for long in the face of the blizzard outside steadily making things worse.

First things first…

The grenade blast had made a mess of the ground floor, the pieces of shrapnel not caught by the corpses he threw atop it shattering a few windows of glass and tearing up dead bodies. Negan had been lucky, only a few having grazed him with but one lodged in his shoulder.

He felt it every time he moved his left arm, thus being the reason he used his right to kill off any who started to reanimate as one of the walking dead. He’d have to temporarily leave Maggie down here at the ground floor while he moved up, making sure his quarters at the third floor were clear before taking her over.

Not only that, but I have to go down to the lower levels to see if there’s enough fuel to power on the auxiliary generators. Should be able to reroute to only the third floor instead of the whole complex. It would be good to have electricity, ‘specially now that there’s a storm outside.

Negan stepped past the beaten corpse of Gregor, looking to the bashed in head of the man before sighing at the all too recent memory of Maggie using a baseball bat of all things to kill the poor bastard.

I have no idea what to make of the shit I just saw with her, but at least I don’t have to worry about you.

With all eleven of them put down for good, Negan took one last look at the unconscious form of Maggie before moving away from the main floor. He could only hope the fire close to her would be enough until he got back.

It didn’t sit right with Negan to leave her alone. He had just got done swearing to her he wouldn’t after all, but what he was doing now was the best course of action for their survival.

He told himself that as he started walking away, but the further he departed the more that feeling of wrongness weighed on his shoulders.

I say that, but it was a mistake to leave her out there in the car. By the time I got back it would be to a walker instead. Damn.

He thought about Lucille just as he made that thought. Negan had her wait just the same as he left to get her chemo, but when he returned home…

I was too late.

It was the best choice he could have made at the time, a smart one too as he’d be endangering Maggie had things gone differently, but it didn’t make the truth any less bitter. His choice would have gotten her killed, and that he couldn’t move past.

Negan promised to protect her, get her back to her people. He told her he’d return to her always, but it didn’t go down like that.

It didn’t happen how I wanted it to. She should have been there, smiling and joking about what took so long. Should have hurried sooner, maybe…maybe if I just got there sooner…

The man didn’t care that he had been put in an impossible situation with the odds stacked against him. In the end he failed where it truly mattered, and that was with Maggie.

With Lucille. Fuck!

Negan turned back around and picked up Maggie into his arms, taking her with him. He was risking the both of them by doing it this way, but…

I swore. I won’t leave her again, even if it kills me. I won’t make the same mistake a third time. I can’t…

If a problem arose, he could only put her down as quickly as possible before moving to deal with whatever came their way, but at least they would be together. At least they’d have each other from start to finish.  

Negan smiled when Maggie clutched at his shirt in her sleep, burrowed her nose further into his scarf wrapped around her neck. She let out this lovely little sigh of content despite the cold, and it pulled on his heartstrings to hear it from a woman like Maggie.   

Taking a closer look at the woman in his arms as he walked to the lower levels where the generators were housed, his smile faded completely the moment he caught the damage sustained to her fingers, the patches stained darkly with blood where her jeans met her knees.

He hadn’t noticed at first with how dark everything was, but now that he saw the damage, the older man couldn’t unsee it. Negan felt the need to hurry as both of them wouldn’t last too much longer, but he resisted the feeling as much as possible in place of caution.

There were moments in time where he felt lightheaded from all the loss of blood, bleeding out a trail behind him still as he carried Maggie. She herself was like a flickering flame spluttering against the cold, holding out but withering the longer things went.

Hurrying might be the final nail in the coffin. Steady, but not slow. Got to be steady.  

He didn’t know anything at all about Gregor’s group, whether they were here for long or how much of the area they cleared. From the way the man spoke before his death, Negan had killed all but their leader. There shouldn’t be anyone else here but them.

I can’t see for shit, but I should be able to hear for walkers before they get close.

It was pitch black without the light of fire, and Negan could only rely on his memory to guide him through the complex and into the bowels of the behemoth that was Sanctuary. He could almost taste the rust that clung to the frigid air, the dust that rested over every surface big and small from the abandonment.

The blizzard outside elicited looming creaks and groans, the howling wind only picking up outside as it slammed against the many windows and broken doors.  

It wasn’t easy traversing the old familiar path when years had passed since. There were moments where Negan nearly stumbled, pieces of debris or something of the like placed in the way that could only be felt as he went along.

A couple more steps…should be a door right about…now!

His boot stopped dead at the hard metal, and with a firm kick Negan was able to get it open. Though he couldn’t see it, he knew to hold his breath for a few moments from the dust kicked up. He made sure to hold Maggie as close to his chest as he could.  

Now for the tricky part.

Past the door were metal stairs taking him to the generator room. Without his sense of sight, Negan could only tentatively put down one foot at a time as he descended lower into the depths below. He’d have to set Maggie down once at the bottom to free up his hands.

Why does this have to be a pain in my ass? I swear to God if I break my neck, I’m coming back a ghost to haunt this place. Fucking stairs…dark as shit in here.

Negan knew to turn sideways as precaution, his back against the railing as he started down the winding steps. The greatest fear the man had was that he’d step wrong and tumble down, or that a step would be too rusted and collapse from the added weight of the both of them. It would be quite the drop, and not the way he wanted to go out.

Steady…Don’t rush.

Each foot he put down echoed; bouncing off the walls, the ominous creak of metal beneath their weight shoving the man’s heart into his throat.

It wasn’t until the last step that Negan let out a chuckle of relief, but then groaned with the sudden realization that he would have to do it all again, only this time going back up the way they came.  

Negan sat Maggie down on the steps, leaning her gently against the wall before draping his zip-up jacket over her shoulders. It wouldn’t provide nearly enough warmth compared to the leather jacket she was already wearing, but another layer was better than nothing at all.

As for himself, the cold never bothered Negan. Compared to the cruel winter in Bosnia during the Siege of Sarajevo, the winter here in Virginia could be said to be far warmer. At least for him it was.

And Maggie, she needed as much warmth as could be granted to her. He could last a little longer for her sake anyhow.

Just a little longer…  

Negan kept a close ear for any sound of walkers, but only silence pervaded the confines of the generator room. Without light he could only put a hand out to feel his way around, his knowledge of the place giving him a general sense of direction towards what he was looking for.

Should be right about here, right? Negan’s fingers reached out confidently, only to swipe at air where there should have been a button. Nope. Obviously not. Maybe…here?

His finger pressed once more against the darkness, and the man heard a click. The beauty of technology almost brought a tear to the man’s eye. With a push of a button, he was able to start the priming of the auxiliary generators. A few lights on the panel against the wall flickered to life, blinking red.

A column of red lights flashed and blinked, and to the right of each were the number indicating the sub-generators one through six. One and four flickered before staying a full red, indicating they failed to start.

Negan could only watch with bated breath as five and six blinked a couple seconds more before stopping red.   

That leaves only two and three…

The last of the six were taking the longest. With some shock and surprise the second generator started abruptly with a loud whir. It seemed like it was going to run, but moments thereafter started to wind down with a coughing stutter.

The light for the second generator had blinked green for a second before greying out, meaning it had broken down completely after the priming sequence and would need to be repaired.

Unfortunately,  that’s not possible anymore. Horvát was the only one who could get these to work, and even if he were here now, all the tools required are no doubt taken or lost.

Negan eyed the blinking light of the third generator, hoping that for once something of today would go his way.

Car ran out of gas just short of where we needed to be. Group of strangers in Sanctuary. Fucking grenade…C’mon. Three’s my lucky number.

The light began to flash green, and Negan dared to smile as it did. The third sub-generator was beginning to start up, and the man could only mutter a small prayer to any god willing to listen to please make the damned thing work.

It seemed his prayer was answered, as the last remaining light flickering turned a full green. The third generator moved at full power, and with it the room enshrouded in darkness turned bright as the lights came to life.

Had there been someone outside looking in, they would have been able to see the giant behemoth that was Sanctuary come alive like a giant bulb of light amidst the pouring rain of snow and billowing winds of winter.

Negan was quick to turn the dials and power off the nodes sending power to the entirety of the factory, minimizing the amount of fuel used and keeping the stress levels of the lone working generator to a stable level as he shifted the energy to only the third floor.

This meant the generator room illuminated by the lights above was soon returned to darkness, the giant factory turned lighthouse amidst the rolling waves of white in the night reduced to only a faint glimmer.

With the new changes made, the amount of fuel in the third generator would last them an estimated week.

Powering the entire factory on a single generator would run us out in an hour. A week is good enough time for me to extract the diesel from the others and put it to the third generator’s fuel tank. Combined, should be enough to last us a month, maybe more if needed.

With it only generating enough power for the third floor, Negan wouldn’t have to worry about overstressing the generator to where it could possibly blow out. All he had to concern himself with was the fuel.

Negan didn’t need the entirety of the third floor to be powered in truth, but there was no possible way to route the power to just his quarters. Best he could do was the entire third floor, a considerable waste but nothing compared to powering the whole of Sanctuary.

I only hope I was quick enough to reroute the power. I doubt there’s anyone outside still in this weather, but we were basically a neon sign in a dark room. Easy to spot for anyone in the vicinity.

With power now secured, he’d be able to draw a nice bath for Maggie. Heating and conditioning on the third floor would be available, and there’d be electricity to use the stove and other appliances in his quarters.

Looking to Maggie now back in his arms, Negan thought otherwise to the hot bath.

Might do more harm than good. A warm bath is probably best, slowly get her adjusted to the warmer temp. I only hope she doesn’t come down with something worse needing medicine. Got a few pills for pain, but nothing else…

With that concerning thought in mind, he began his perilous trek of climbing up the stairs back to the ground floor. To no surprise on his part, they were just as bad going up as they were down.

And I have more steps to climb as well. From the ground level to the second floor, and then to the third.

Negan never liked stairs. After a couple steps his legs always started to get a little wobbly from his age, and that shit could not fly as the badass leader of the Saviors. If he was moving, it was with a pep to his step, not looking like a granny that needed a cane.

Might need one after this.

 

---

 

There’s peace in water. Like it’s holding you, easing the weight that burdens one’s shoulders. A weightlessness that whispers to just let go.   

It was a subtle warmth that washed over Maggie, and with it every problem she had with the world began to fade away. The aches and pains began to dull and ease. Her heavy heart tense from the prospect of loss grew calm once she felt familiar hands roam her skin.

Hands course and calloused that held her like no one had before, cared for her where no one else could. Fingers swam deftly across her flesh, a trail of warmth left in its wake that sent jolts of pleasure down her spine.

Negan…

He was by her side like he swore he always would be. Opening her radiant emeralds slowly to her new surroundings, Maggie found herself soaking bare in a bathtub filled to the brim with warm water. Curls of residual steam would swirl just above the surface, some dissipating as they rose up and above.

Negan kneeled by her side in ill-candlelight. The sleeves to his dark blue button-up were rolled to reveal his strong and thick forearms, the muscles beneath the skin moving and tensing as he began to wash her.

Maggie didn’t want the man to know she was awake just yet, so she peered through her eyelashes like she had done so many times before. What caught her eye was the ink on his right arm, something she didn’t see too often.

She tried to make out the details of it, but the light coming off from the candles was far from enough.  

Forget it…Her eyes roamed away to other things. Better things, she thought as she took in the flexing muscles of his forearms as he started his work on her.

Negan lathered a generous amount of soapsuds onto her feet, which he held just above the water with his hand. In his other was a pumice stone that he used gently to slough away dead skin and remove any forming callouses. The man was careful not to be rough, avoiding skin bruised and hurt where he could.  

Negan dropped the stone to his side when he finished, using both hands then to massage her overworked feet. Strong, thick and manly hands held to Maggie’s dainty little feet, careful not to apply too much pressure. 

Maggie suppressed a moan and flushed with pleasure at Negan’s gentle ministrations. Seeing him in the candlelight made her feel butterflies, the dull glow only just illuminating his handsome features focused intently on caring for her.

Well, minus the scraggly beard, she thought affectionately.

Maggie remembered how she gripped his chiseled jaw not that long ago, and how great it felt to feel it in her hand beneath all that man bush. Maggie had been very reluctant to let go, and already her hand was itching to hold his jaw and cheek once again.

Maggie didn’t even know she had licked her lips at the sight of the man until she felt the wetness of her saliva coated on them. It didn’t help that she was just now remembering what happened after she had held his face in her palm.

I had been scared outta my mind at the thought of losing him. Even when he was right there in front of me, that fear makin’ my heart race didn’t go away. Not until I was in his lap and shoving my tongue down his throat. Oh god…   

Maggie felt like a schoolgirl all of a sudden at her impulsiveness. Negan seemed to have taken it in stride, but when did he not with whatever came his way? He’s probably bewildered as all hell, but he kissed me first! I was just…I just…

Maggie’s thoughts trailed off as she looked to the man taking care of her.     

The level of consideration the man showed took Maggie’s breath away. She had gotten used to him taking care of her basic necessities for the most part, but then there were times where he did things like this. Cared for her in little ways that weren’t necessary for survival, and it made her feel something. Made her feel everything at how intimate and personal it was.

It wasn’t something just anyone did for another either. Wasn’t something a spur of the moment fling or boyfriend could do, but something men and women did for their chosen other.  

A husband to his wife… Maggie shook her head at the notion after a moment’s thought, shook the smile off her face. She was getting ahead of herself and she knew it, but it didn’t stop her mind from turning back and clinging onto the feeling of utter joy that thought brought to her.

More than I’d like to admit.   

No one had ever done the things Negan did for her, let alone give her this level of thought and consideration. Maggie never understood what drove the man to trim and clean underneath her nails, wash and comb her hair or rub balm to keep her lips from cracking when he found some. To go beyond what anyone else would have done.

To sing and hum, tell jokes or talk away thinking it might very well be useless; that she wasn’t listening. To act regardless, knowing full well his deeds might go unheard and unseen.

It raised a question that she feared asking, but the truth was no longer hidden. He knew now, and it’d be stupid to try and pretend that nothing at all had happened. Maggie didn’t want to either now that everything was said and done.

I want to speak to him and know his answer. I want to know more than just what he says in passin’. I need him to want me just as much as I want him, and I want him to need me just as equally. I can’t do that being a human doll, not if I want any of this to work.  

Maggie had given in to her growing dependency on the man. Tried as she did throughout their journey to Sanctuary to resist, the real possibility of him never coming back after he left her in that automobile turned to be the breaking point.

I was still hesitating thinkin’ I had time. No one has time anymore. Not in the world we live in now. We’re all living minute by minute, so what’s the use of going back and forth when we could be dead the next day?

Maggie felt a love she didn’t know existed, one she didn’t think possible for her to experience even after all that had happened to her – caused by Negan no less. It was insane, right? She must have gone mad from the pain and the suffering, but she realized now that that was the furthest thing from the truth.

I did go insane, fell into madness. I didn’t care about nothing after seeing my boy the way I did, but then Negan found me. Healed me. With him I’m sane, holding on for the possibility of what’s been growing ‘tween the two of us.

The woman felt loved, and she was beginning to love…but it wasn’t love like she knew and had before. Not like the type she had for Glenn. With him it was innocent, pure and simple. Glenn was simple. An honest man with her being his only experience. 

What she felt for Negan – the love that was forming for the man – wasn’t pure. It was anything but simple. It was dark and unyielding, an obsession stemmed from profound hatred that twisted into something that looked like the love she knew and had, but only in appearance.

I killed for him. I’d kill anyone who tried to take Negan away from me. He’s my light. I won’t – can’t go back into the darkness.

It was a love unlike any other. One that was slowly gripping her, stirred emotions Maggie had never thought she could possibly have. Jealousy, possessiveness, dependency. A love both beautiful and dangerous.   

I need him. I know now that I can’t ever let him leave me. She had long decided not to kill the man. She might have reconsidered had Alexandria not fallen and history turned out differently, but it did fall and nothing was the same.

There was that time when he was asleep and she had her gun in her hands, but it was more so her need to know if she was actually changing; if she was truly beginning to let go of everything that she had held onto concerning the man for the past seven years.

To kill him or let him go after we found everyone else. It’s just not possible anymore, not with everything that’s happened between us since.  

Negan finally moved from her feet to the rest of her legs. He took extra care not to cause her pain as he held her calf, beginning to clean her mangled-looking knees with lathered soap and a smooth sponge.

Suddenly Negan stopped, and it took her a second to realize why. Maggie didn’t even know she was smiling from ear to ear until Negan had stopped completely, was looking her way with surprise and relief.

Oh shit.

‘’Hey there, Maggie.’ he said softly. ‘’How’re you fee-‘’

‘’What’s your last name?’’

Damn. I didn’t mean to blurt that out! It had been on her mind for the longest time, and it drove her crazy not knowing such a simple thing when everything she was starting to feel for the man was anything but simple.

‘’Wha – say that again?’’ Negan’s brow-line was pinched with concern as he thought he’d misheard her question.

Thank god for the candlelight hiding her blush. Maggie was tongue-tied now that she was actually beginning to interact with the man, and embarrassed at the slip of her tongue.

Negan lightly squeezed her calf in encouragement, a soft smile to his lips as he waited patiently for her to speak again.

Damn you and that handsome smile of yours that I can’t get enough of.  

Maggie sighed, not bothering to cover up her breasts or close her thighs as he looked gently her way. The man had seen and touched everything anyhow, and if she wanted things between them to develop further, then it’d only be counterintuitive to take a step back.

‘’Last name. What is it.’’ she asked a bit more clearly. Her vocal chords were strained just from the couple sentences she said earlier when he was on that chair, the frigid air she breathed on her way to Sanctuary no doubt making it worse.

‘’Smith. My last name is Smith,’’ said the man softly with a tinge of amusement, just enough for her to hear above the crackling of the burning wicks.

Negan had turned away and started again on cleaning her bruised and bloodies knees, probably realized after a beat that her breasts were in full display for him to see. It was funny in a way to see him look so intently on just her knees, how he tensed knowing she had come to and was looking at him keenly.

Things were different now, but it was a necessary change.   

One long overdue. So look at me...

‘’Why won’t you look at me, Negan Smith?’’ Maggie couldn’t resist the urge to call him fully, taste the way his name rolled off the tongue. It felt good to say it, to hear it in her own voice.

‘’And why aren’t you in here with me?’’ she asked after a thought. He was still dressed in clothes dried with blood, his face dirtied with soot and littered with minor cuts.  

Negan looked up at her, only leveling contact with her eyes without straying to her more feminine parts. Maggie’s bottom lip trembled as she fought the urge not to smirk, because she could clearly see Negan was fighting to not stare and drink her in like he had been doing every day before.

I know he wants me. Hard not to see it when he’s practically droolin. He’s been nothing but a gentlemen through and through despite the circumstances, but his eyes betray what he wants. Not that he’s been bothering to try and hide it when he believed after some time that I wasn’t takin’ in anything that was going on.  

‘’Aren’t I your babydoll? Why are you bein’ quiet all of a sudden?’’ Maggie couldn’t help driving the knife deeper – not that the man needed to be stabbed again – but he did deserve it for kissing her and then freaking her out when all hell broke loose and she was nowhere near to help.

Made me drag my ass through the blizzard outside, suffer the torment of my own fears.

Negan gently put her knees back into the warm water before moving from his own to sitting down on the floor against the tub, looking away and into the distance where the candlelight failed to reach.

Chicken. I want to look you in the face. I need you to look. At. Me.

‘’First of all, I’m too dirty. I’ll muddle the clean water, and then you’ll be filthy. You don’t have as much blood on you, and you need the warm water. I don’t. I’ll be just fine with what’s left after you’re done and looking like a shriveled prune.’’

Maggie snorted at the remark. ‘’And two?’’ she said softly so as to not aggravate her sore throat.

‘’How much do you know? How long have you been…’’

‘’…Awake?’’ she finished after he fell silent. ‘’Since after the first week Alexandria fell.’’ Maggie didn’t want there to be any lies or hidden truths between them, so she decided to be open and honest regardless of how he might react.

She waited a beat, wondering and anticipating his reaction with bated breath. The silence was taut with tension, at least to her. Maggie didn’t know what she had been expecting as anxiety made itself known to her, but it certainly wasn’t Negan simply nodding. The man didn’t even sigh. Didn’t question her on why.

The young woman thought he might at least be a bit angry that she could have been up on her feet sooner, or that her continuing to pretend had set them back behind schedule to reach Sanctuary.

Him having his face turned at an angle away from her made it hard to see what he was thinking and feeling, but Maggie saw that it did affect him some type of way to know she had been listening and watching him for a long time now. Saw it in the way he held a hand to his right arm, gripping at the ink there.

Damn it, Negan.

A bad sign from what she learned. A tell that he was thinking dark thoughts or feeling a type of way.  

A type of way I’m probably not gonna like.  

‘’Maggie, I’m so sorry. Had I known I wouldn’t have…’’ Negan cursed beneath his breath and combed a hand through his hair in what looked to be guilt on his features.  

That is not what I wanted to hear. She had wanted him to joke and be playful. She was trying to keep things light between them at the very least.  

I know the full story and he doesn’t. He still thinks I’m the same woman who confronted him at the prison. Well, maybe not decidedly the same. She did straddle the man and kiss him with equal fervor to the one he gave her before departing.

Maggie moved her arm with what little strength she had left – still far from being at her best, but enough to curl her fingers around his hand gripping at the forearm inked. She could feel the strength he was exerting, the whitening of pink as his fingers clasped on like iron to flesh.

Negan didn’t seem to notice her hand on his until she tugged at him with everything she could muster, bringing Negan to turn his head to her in bewilderment as water sloshed, spilling over the dark blue porcelain.  

‘’If I didn’t want it,’’ she breathed out raggedly, ‘’you’d know, Negan. I would have killed you by now if that were the case. So don’t you start apologizing. You might be sorry,’’ at getting caught, she thought, ‘’but you don’t regret it either. Do you?’’

Maggie didn’t let go of his arm – his right arm tattooed where she couldn’t help but feel and touch with her fingers – even now that he was looking in her full direction.

What kind of marking are these? And are these words in Latin? I’ll have to ask later.

Negan looked hesitant, but then sighed and shook his head. The man looked her in the eye. ‘’No. No, I don’t regret it, but I shouldn’t have done it in the first place. It wasn’t right to kiss – ‘’

Maggie grabbed him by the beard this time and brought his head close just as he was speaking, shutting him up completely as she put her lips to his. Half of him nearly fell into the tub and atop her.

Negan was quick to hold out a hand against the edge of the tub to prevent just that. His left arm coiled around her smooth and unblemished waist at the same time to stop her from possibly hitting her head or worse from the inertia.

‘’Damn it, Maggie. I don’t want to hurt you.’’ Her emeralds searched his as she took in his words, realized the layers beneath that sentence and all that it entailed.

Maggie bit his lip just as she had done earlier on the factory ground floor in response, held his bottom lip between her teeth until she lapped at his blood that stained her own a dark red.

After a moment’s time she let the man go, but not before whispering into his ear, ‘’You won’t. I know you won’t, Negan. Not anymore.’’

Maggie let go, but Negan didn’t. He held her firmly by the waist, had her flush against his chest in his moment of panic to ensure her safety.  

The right thing to do would have been to let go, but the man just couldn’t. Not when he felt the stiff peaks to her full breasts press against him, saw the wonder of all the stars in the sky bespeckle those green seas bejeweled within her eyes.

Negan was but a man enraptured and enslaved, and Maggie knew it – smiled as he coiled a finger around a loose curl of hers that clung to her cheek before combing it back and away from her face.

‘’Thank you, Negan. For every-‘’ Before Maggie could finish her sentence, Negan put his hand against her open mouth, silencing her.

Her unfinished words wake the man from her enchantment, but Maggie needed to make it known. Needed to clear the air entirely before they both could begin anew.

‘’Don’t thank me, Maggie. I don’t deserve it. Any of it. I- I just…I’m not a good man.’’

Still with his arm wrapped around her middle, Negan moves to ease Maggie back into the warm embrace of the water before releasing her from his grasp.

With his hand and arms away and herself no longer pressed against him, Maggie only feels cold despite the warm water that envelops her. In that moment she’s never felt colder, with not even the storm outside comparing to the chill that seized her heart at her loss of his touch.

Negan slinks back down to where he originally sat, only this time pulling a knee to rest his arm across. There was a lot she needed to say, and a lot he needed to say.

But where to start?

The candlelight bathed the two in a warm but dull glow, but whereas Maggie was illuminated in it, Negan seemed to back away; hide himself in the shadows so that she could not see his face, his expressions.

‘’But you’re trying to be,’’ Maggie said after a beat.

A good man. For me…

‘’I saw everything, Negan.’’ The man seemed to tense at this, but it was hard for Maggie to discern what exactly he was feeling when he hid the majority of himself in the shadows. Still, she knew him just as he learned her on their journey together. These tricks of his wouldn’t last.

‘’I know you could have broken out, killed that man. You didn’t move, not even when you thought I was going to end it all right then and there. Why? Are you really so willing to die?’’

Negan turned his head to look at her then, a weariness to his eyes that bled straight from the soul. His long beard couldn’t hide the gauntness of his cheekbones, the ill-pallor of his bruised face. ‘’I used to think that the day would never end, Maggie. That the next would never come. Just kept up that march,’’ he whispered brokenly.

‘’Left right, left right. Just kept fucking marching…left right…left right. Like one of ‘em tin soldiers you wind up. I never asked to stop, never thought to break the rhythm. No matter where I went, what I did. Regardless of the pain and the sorrow and all the madness eating away at my sanity. Never once thought to just…stop.

‘’Just kept piling up, the weight. Right left, right left. Every step I took forward the weight just kept adding up. And one day…and one day, Maggie…I stumbled and crashed. Now I’m here, Maggie. Now I’m here…Why am I here? What for? Should I get back up? Try again? But the weight is holding me down, and I’m tired of marching. I’ve gone astray. Can’t remember when I strayed, babydoll.’’

Negan let out an empty chuckle, touched the black marking painted across his arm. Maggie kept silent thinking he would say more, but when he didn’t, she sighed. She wanted to hold him, comfort him as he did her, but she knew now wasn’t the time. Not yet.  

‘’What are you trying to say, Negan?’’ Her voice warbled from the fear at his sorrowful look, the pain that marred his features. He shook his head, rubbed the heel of his palm into his forehead as a tear hastily escaped him.

‘’I’m tired, Maggie. Tired of waking up every god damned day not knowing why. Tired of trying and failing at every turn. I failed to be the man Lucille needed me to be. Failed to be the man she saw in me. Failed to be the leader I promised I’d be. I’m trying…and failing. Everything I touch turns to shit. Everything I hold near and dear crumbles to nothing in my hands. It’s just…’’ Negan sighed lowly and shook his head. ‘’I’m tired, Maggie.’’

So consumed in his thoughts, he didn’t notice her movement until the shadow of her hand entered his sight. Negan turned his head to look at her.

The young woman held out her hand to him, and for a moment Negan looked to her in confusion before slowly taking her hand in his. Maggie twined their fingers together, hers blistered and bruised to his scarred and calloused.

‘’Maggie what are – ‘’

‘’ – Don’t look away from me,’’ she interrupted as she held his gaze. Maggie leaned forward and pressed her soft lips to his hand, peppered a kiss slowly to each of his knuckles. She never broke contact with the man, looking him straight in the eye as she pressed her lips to his scarred skin.

Negan shuddered slightly at her touch, and she felt him stiffen beneath her lips. Her other hand moved to hold his wrist, and with both hands Maggie brought his hand to rest flat against her chest.

His palm was pressed just above her left breast, leaving the man without words at the contact. He tried to pull away – the heat of her skin seemingly burning him – but she wouldn’t let him.

‘’Now close your eyes.’’ Her tone left no room for argument or doubt.

Negan let out a deep breath and did as she said, his head dipped low as he closed his eyes. Silence permeated between the two as Maggie held his hand firmly against her, wanting to convey to him what she couldn’t with words.

‘’What do you feel, Negan?’’

His features began to soften before her very eyes, the pain that held him gradually uncoiling. When he opened his eyes to her after a moment’s silence, they were anew; gone was the fatigue and weariness. Replaced within was a purpose that burned bright against the long and cold night.

‘’I feel your heart, Maggie. I feel you.’’   

She smiled. ‘’Alone we have no future, but together…’’ Maggie snaked her hand through the opening of his shirt, placed her palm onto the single place that can balm her tattered soul. Maggie closed her emeralds the moment she felt the beating of his heart beneath her touch and sighed softly in peace at the unwavering steadiness held within her hand.

The young woman rested her hand against his chest and over his heart all the while pressing his against hers. The sound of their heart’s desire spoke in tandem, one and the same.  

‘’You’ll rise and fall again and again, but you’ll get back up, Negan Smith. You’ll get back up and keep moving forward. My soldier always comes home. To me, because I need you just as much as you need me.’’

Negan laughed and smiled, nodded his head at the certainty to her tone that left no room for question.   

‘’Always,’’ spoke the man with a finality to that single yet profound word that shook her very soul and heart.    

The two looked to one another, neither letting go of the other’s heart. Eventually it was Maggie who broke the silence, a question that lingered in her heart finally making its appearance.   

‘’When you danced with me beneath the stars, cared for me like you are now…even saving me – well…’’ Maggie let out a huff of frustration. She was trying to say it subtly, but she was never good with being subtle.

Just say it.

‘’I’m not her, you know,’’ she started with hurt to her tone. ‘’What am I to you? Has it ever really been me? That day ever since you found me, took me away and cared for me. Feedin’ me, helping me to wash an relieve myself, was it me you saw and did it for, or were you seeing her? Was it me you were singin’ and dancin’ with and kissin’, or were you…were you wishin’ it was Lucille?’’

It physically hurt to even ask, but she needed to. It took everything in her to keep the poison out of her tongue, the bitterness at the possibility and the jealously that threatened to sour her tentative mood. Everything depended on his answer, but Maggie didn’t know what she would do if the truth broke her, or if he tried to sell her a lie.

I know you better than that, Negan. At least enough to see when you’re bullshittin. So please, don’t lie to me.

Maggie would know. His heart could tell no lies. Not to her.  

Negan cupped her cheek with the hand not resting on her heart. He could feel the racing of her heart beneath his touch, knew how important this was to her.

‘’In the beginning you reminded me so much of her, Maggie. Lucille was dying of cancer, and I couldn’t do anything at all to help her, and I felt much the same way with you. Just hopeless and tired, not knowing what to do but fearing failure all the same.’’

He stroked her cheek with the pad of his thumb, drew circles over her cheekbone and wiped away at the rivulets of water that clung to her fair skin as he considered his words carefully.

‘’I failed Lucille, and I feared failing you too. All my life I failed in damn near everything, but I promised myself I wouldn’t fail you. I’d pay any price, do whatever it took, so long as I didn’t fail you. You’re my hope, Maggie. The light of everything that’s still good and beautiful. All that’s left worth fighting for in this empty world. So yes, it’s always been you. Only you. For everything.’’

There were moments in time where he thought of his late wife, how what he was doing for Maggie reminded the man of her. But he never mistook the two women for the other, never tried to make Maggie into Lucille.

To do that would be to fail.

Negan’s heart told no lies. Maggie’s throat hitches at the weight of that certainty, of the sight of Negan; for there, etching across his handsome and rugged face is a love and adoration – and worry – for her. Always and only for her.

 I love you.

The words danced on the tip of her tongue, but it was too soon to speak them into the cruel world. Not until she was absolutely certain. Not until he was hers utterly and completely.

Not yet, she told herself. Not until all the walls come tumbling down.

Maggie bobbed her head up and down, not trusting herself to speak just yet. Negan let go, took her hand off his chest and instead held it up to his mouth where he laid a single kiss in the middle of her open palm.

‘’I’ll be right back, Maggie. I’m going to go bring you some clothes to wear.’’ He stood up from his knees and grabbed the sponge and soap, putting it in her hands before moving to leave.  

Just as he turned however, Maggie grabbed his wrist in a strong grip, surprising the man at the fierce strength she exerted. He could feel the bones in his wrist groan beneath her squeezing fingers.

‘’Maggie?’’ Negan glanced back at her; his brow-line pinched with concern.

Maggie herself seemed surprised at her own actions, but something in her told her not to let go.

Don’t ever let go, or you’ll lose him again.

The young woman couldn’t help but frown as a trace of uneasiness wormed it way throughout her heart, something that made her grip him tightly with her damaged fingers despite the ebbing pain.

‘’Where are you going exactly?’’ Maggie asked as she hesitantly let go of his wrist, letting her hand fall back into the warm water where she had dropped the soap in her hurry to grab the man.

‘’I’ll be just outside the door. In the bedroom,’’ replied Negan. ‘’I just thought to give you a little privacy to wash up while I go and grab a fresh set of clothing for you.’’   

Now that she was up and about, Negan didn’t have to clean her more private parts. And though they had cleared the air in certain regards, there was still a lot left unsaid. Maggie and himself were desensitized to the workings of their relationship on the road, what he had to do in her stead, but everything was different now.

In Negan’s mind it was time to take a step back and give Maggie back her privacy. For the moment he’d still have to carry her here and there until her legs were healed back to par, but everything else would return to normalcy.

Maggie nodded uncertainly at his words, but still that trace uneasiness in her heart didn’t go away. It grew the moment she let go, but the young woman tried to tamp it down. ‘’I-I mean you don’t have to leave. You can stay here, dry me off when I’m done and lay me down on the bed while you get the clothes.’’

She would have blushed saying her proposal out loud, but all Maggie felt as she spoke was that niggling fear that she couldn’t make heads or tails of. Couldn’t put her thumb on as it weaved its way out of her grasp, but not out of sight.

No. No, I do know. Moment he turned his back on me and started walkin away I felt this way.

Maggie hoped Negan would agree and instead stay with her where she can see him, but she won’t voice this. Maggie’s trying with all her residual power to stave off the swells of fear and dread that spill into her at the mere idea of separating.

Negan smiled but shook his head. ‘’I’m not one to pass up a good show, but there’s a couple things I need to make sure are still where I left ‘em. Didn’t have much of a chance until now. I won’t be long. Promise.’’ The man was out the door before she could get a word in, and Maggie could only stiffly turn her head back and away from where he just was, try not to focus on his quick departure.

It bothered her that she couldn’t hear anything from the man as soon as the darkness beyond the candlelight swallowed him, couldn’t see if he was actually just beyond the door or not. All she could hear was the small trickle of dripping water from the bathtub faucet, the burning crackle of the candle wicks.

A couple moments passed, then a minute turned to two. Maggie could feel that trace of fear beginning to bloom something dark and terrible with each passing second that Negan wasn’t where she could see him; feel him and his warmth. Maggie couldn’t help but move her hand to grasp at the scarf around her neck like she always did to breathe in his scent of leather and rain, but realized belatedly that it wasn’t on her.

He’s just going to be outside the door. What’re you gettin’ so worked up for?

Maggie breathed a deep sigh and opted to close her eyes as she reaffirmed that thought in her heart, used it to pound away at the terror that was beginning to spread from the base of her heart to the rest of her body. She even smiled a bit as she enjoyed the soothing warmth of the water on her bruised skin, lathered the bar of soap onto her skin before using the sponge to thoroughly wash herself clean.

For a time all was well and good, or so Maggie thought. It wasn’t long until she opened her emeralds to see the empty space beside her where Negan had just been.

He’s right out the door.

This illogical fear and craving swelling within for Negan is beginning to trouble her; it lays so resolutely atop her shoulders, as though her brain is oozing the nightmares she maddeningly dreamt up of his lifeless body when she waded through the blizzard outside mere hours before.

Maggie scrunched her nose as the terrible image of his lifeless body rose to her mind’s surface. The flower of dread stubbornly began to bloom once more in her heart, but the young woman decided to ignore it. Instead, Maggie huffed and dipped her lithe body lower into the warm waters to clear her mind free of the troubling thoughts that wanted to manifest themselves.

The woman closed her eyes once more, trying to settle into the depths of the water that submerged her, but still it didn’t last. Couldn’t. Maggie opened her eyes for the second time at the popping crackle of one of the candles, the light dimming further as one of the wicks burned itself out. Her eyes cut across the dim lighting and toward the open door shrouded further in darkness.  

He’s right outside the door…right?

A gasp hitches in her throat as her inner monologue chews on what awaits, once the midnight hours bore on and her heart yields to the parting of ways; when the horrors that linger are certain to catch her trail like a beast hunting its prey. When the beast composed of all that is cruel and terrible tracks her down and captures her in a waking nightmare of screams, blood and agony.

When she’s well and truly possessed by it and loses the handle of reality to loss itself.   

A twinge of pain washes across Maggie’s features as the weight comes crashing down. The young woman swallows, leverages her breath and tries again to block it all out – but it’s of no use. It’s too late, and no longer can she ignore the dread bloomed and blossomed, the terror that consumed her entirely.   

I can’t hear him. Where is he?! Negan?

‘’Negan!’’ Maggie let out a heart-wrenching scream as she jolted abruptly from within the bathtub and thrashed against the water that held her, spilling much of it over the edge as she wrought herself over – crashed harshly onto the cold hard floor.

‘’Negan…’’ Her voice is lower than a hush, swelling from pain and so afraid she can hardly breath.

He’s there in less than a breath, his arms around her.

 

---

 

Why didn’t I notice sooner? Fuck! The signs were all there.

The way her eyes never left him, no matter what he was doing or where he was going. It was unnatural, how she’d always be tracking him, those emeralds of hers cutting to his exact position. Always needing to see him.

What were her first words? He hadn’t heard her voice since Alexandria, her tone full of fury and wrath. And when he did hear it again after all that time, what was it that she said? Her very first words to him after everything?

You ain’t going nowhere unless you’re takin’ me with you, Negan. And that’s final, you hear me? Don’t ever leave me again.

Don’t ever leave me again.

I should have known…

Negan had rushed back in the moment he heard Maggie screaming his name. Looking at the woman trembling and sobbing, frightfully clutching at his arms as he held her wet and naked body on the bathroom floor, the man was lost for words. All he knew was that it rocked his very core to see her so fragile in his embrace.

Maggie was rocking back and forth in his arms, muttering beneath her breath, ‘’You said you wouldn’t leave me. You swore you wouldn’t. You promised me, so why…’’ She was beginning to hyperventilate, and Negan could hear the pounding of her heart so loudly the man thought it would burst if he didn’t do something quick.

‘’Maggie – babydoll. Look at me.’’ Negan tilted her head up so that she’d see his face. ‘’I’m here. I’m right here.’’ He tried to speak as calmly and soothingly as possible, but his voice cracked at the sight of her.

Tears were streaming down Maggie’s face, those glimmering jewels quaking with fright. It broke the man’s heart to see, and it took damn near all he had not to fall to pieces when he saw himself reflected in those pools of deep green. Only him and nothing else, like he was all that mattered.

Negan pulled her even closer to his chest, stroking her dripping-wet hair. It seemed to calm her down some.

‘’I didn’t leave you, Maggie. I’ll never leave you. I swore to you. Always, remember? I was just outside the door like I told you I’d be,’’ he whispers into her hair, his lips so close Maggie trembles from the heat of his air.

Negan tightens to her, coiling his arms around her to try and calm her shivering, shaking frame. Maggie begins to relax, revels in the heavy weight and presence of him as Negan’s arms wrap around her small frame. His are like strong, solid oak growing around her – thick and purposeful and deadly, his and now and forever only hers.

Still, Maggie finds the silence cannot last. She knows the man doesn’t do well to dwell in silence for too long, and she finds she doesn’t want to worry him any more than she already has.

After neglecting to answer him the first time she tried for a second, opening her mouth to voice the words in her heart, but found that all she could do was weakly nod. So she does. She bobs her head up and down a few times to tell the man that she knows.

She knows. Maggie knew. Yet, not seeing Negan did terrible things to her heart. Not hearing him and being all alone without the man at her side terrified Maggie to no end, dropped her in the lowest pits of despair without a thread for salvation.

To be alone in the light without him tore open all the wounds, pierced her at her weakest until her very soul bled at the realization that she was all alone in a cruel and dark world. That she was in a place she knew not, in a world that took and kept on taking until she had nothing left to give.  

Maggie recalled the nightmares that plagued her during the waking hours of the day, the terrible fears she wrote in her mind of all the terrible tragedies that awaited her when she finally got through the storm outside and into Sanctuary.

Fearing the loss of the only thing that kept her standing, still going. The young woman resonated with the words Negan spoke about being tired, stumbling and crashing and not knowing whether to get up and try again or stay down for good.

Those same questions that plagued him festered within her too, but then Negan found her. Picked her up and cared for her every second, minute and hour. Day and night without rest. Pieced her back together whole, gave her reason and purpose to keep going.

I need you just as much as you need me.

Maggie touched the side of his head where she dreamt it happened, the parts of his skull she thought had been bashed and crushed. She wasn’t in the right of mind when she conjured such nightmares, but still she holds to his head like a relic to be worshipped all the same. And for her it is. All of him is.

Negan tried to pick her up, wanting to put her back into the warm waters but she doesn’t let him; still didn’t let go of his arms, her nails digging halfmoons into his skin hard enough to draw a trace amount of blood.

Maggie shifts to settle down atop his lap, forcing the man to sit down to allow for her purchase. She wiggles to fit his form, to conform to his figure wholly. Entirely.  

Maggie didn’t care that she was naked and dripping wet with water, and Negan didn’t seem to mind either, only looking to her as she turned to straddle him, connect her ankles to one another at the rear of his back before burying her head at the crook of his neck.

Negan put a hand to her back as Maggie took in the scent of him in deep breaths. In and out. She’d inhale and exhale, breathing in the leather and rain that never left, never strayed from the man who gripped her heart and soul entirely.

Only now I know my mind was taken too.

At that thought she kisses him. A short and gentle touch of her lips to his jaw before another at the corner edge of his lips. Maggie waits a beat, but at his stillness she angles further, another and another until finally her lips connect fully with his.

They kiss, and both take solace in the other. Maggie closes her eyes, yearns for more as she’s beginning to lose herself to him. And just as she’s about to push past the seams of his mouth with her tongue, Negan releases a hand and uses it to tilt her head up to meet his gaze, leveling her emeralds to his dark coals.

‘’Talk. Tell me what’s on that mind of yours, baby girl.’’

His is a command, not a request. She can’t refuse that firm gruff tone that sends sparks of heat down her spine nor those eyes of his, those orbs of onyx that strip her bare at the core for only him to see. Maggie pressed her jaw to the palm that held her, and looking at the man before her she finally finds her voice.

‘’Can…can we just go to bed?’’ she asks brokenly. ‘’I don’t think I can – well think right now. It’s been a long day, don’t you think?’’ She can barely speak above a whisper, her heart-wrenching screams nearly making her mute.

Negan’s chest caves inward at the hurt held in her voice, his lungs deflating – not from defeat but rather a final straw of relief and reluctant acceptance. An absence of trouble that once appeared to be vividly on the horizon is now, for the most part, out of sight.

But not out of mind. Not really gone…

‘’In a minute, okay? I haven’t finished washing you clean, an I need a wash myself. Is that fine with you, Maggie?’’

It didn’t go unnoticed by Maggie that Negan was backtracking on his intention to give her the privacy to wash herself, and she was relieved to know. When it came to bathing and washing, she would prefer it to be done by his hand, to wash away the exhaustion and weariness brought about by the day; the cruelty and coldness of the world replaced by the warm caress of his firm yet gentle touch.

Maggie looks at him and nods, but then shakes her head after a thought. ‘’Come in with me. It’ll be faster that way, and…I don’t want you to leave me alone on the bed while you’re in here where I can’t see you.’’ 

He opened his mouth to argue that he’d dirty the water like he told her before, but then closed it when he saw the fragileness in those emeralds that quivered, felt the edge of her nails start to pierce his skin again when she saw his hesitance.

Negan knows Maggie’s not physically harmed from what just happened, but it revealed a flaw to her psyche, a fracture to the barely put together piece that was her soul. Like a loose thread just found, a thread that threatened to unravel the whole damned thing.

And he was that loose thread. It’d be pulled and she’d be well and truly broken if he left. Tonight it seems the discovery is enough. Too late in the night for any cause of speculation or wondering. It’s fine for the moment so long as he remains right by her side.

A problem not at all.

He swore he’d be with her always, only now there was a very real weight behind it beyond what he initially thought. Beyond what any of them could have imagined.

It’s enough…if only for tonight.

‘’Whatever you want and need baby girl, it’s yours. Just give me a minute to undress, and I’ll be right there with you.’’

Negan doesn’t even ask if she can walk. He’d seen the state of her feet and knees, and so instead just picked her up like he did the days before and carried her back into the warm waters held in the dark-blue porcelain bathtub.

He stayed by the side of the thing, undressing plain in sight next to her so that she could see him. And she did. Watched his every move with those emeralds of hers, a very real intensity to them that spoke of her fear of separation, of being left alone in this world without him.

Maggie watched him like a hawk, saw how he pulled apart the buttons to his dark-blue shirt and revealed the wiry hair to his broad and well-defined chest. Negan’s every move is focused, muscles rippling underneath marred, naked skin, the shadows of the flickering flames painting a wild and wicked pattern on his body.

With heartache Maggie frowned at the protruding ribs that seemed to want to pierce his flesh, bruised sickly in blue and purple hues.

What caught her gaze and refused to let go was the grievous wounds incurred from battle. Negan sported many small cuts that bled and dried, the beard of the man still matted a dull red with a particularly nasty stitch to the left and bottom of his waist.

So many scars. So much pain and sorrow.

Maggie bit her lip to the point of breaking skin at the dull pain that only grew within her breast the longer she looked, the more she remarked in her head at his words of weariness and the hopelessness that tinged his voice when Negan spoke and shared his thoughts aloud to her.

The man dropped his shirt torn and soaked through with blood to the floor before moving further south. For a moment Negan caught Maggie’s staring gaze, and he winked her way as he started to unbuckle his belt.

Maggie swallowed at this and felt that she should look away. Yet, at the sound of his belt sliding off and the buckle hitting the floor, the young woman found she didn’t dare to look away from the sight of the man. Felt the need to see him whole and bare before her just as she was for him, and to watch him every step of the way.

Her overeager emeralds dropped to the thatch of dark hair revealed between his legs as he slowly pulled down his boxers, watched with intensity as his long and thick cock was freed and exposed.

The candlelight shrouded much of him, but his proud length couldn’t be hidden as it stood proud for her to see. Maggie gulped, the apex to her thighs throbbing at the sight of Negan in all his glory.

She had seen him many times before at a distance, but never so close. Never had she dared to look the man directly in the eyes, roam every inch of him from head to toe so openly as she did now.   

‘’Like what you see, babydoll?’’

Maggie snorted and scrunched her nose in mock displeasure, but then smiled softly. He was doing it again, making her at ease through his playful nature.    

‘’And what if I do, handsome?’’ she replied teasingly.

Negan puts a leg over the tub, then another before easing himself down opposite her at the other end. He let out a soft groan as he submerged himself, the water near the man turning a shade turbid as some of the soot and blood came free from his skin.

‘’Then let me know if you need a closer look.’’ Negan chuckled, but it was cut short when Maggie kicked him square in the face with her foot.

It wasn’t hard, but she wasn’t gentle neither when she kicked him. Maggie moved to retract her leg, but Negan caught her ankle in his hand before she could. The man smirked and laid a kiss at the arch of her foot.

Maggie quivered from the kiss, the bristles of his beard tickling her. Her delicate feet were sensitive, and from the look on the man’s face, Negan knew full well.

More so, the sight of him kissing her foot so reverently and holding them gently in those large hands of his did unspeakable things to her. The way his rough and calloused palms touched her smooth skin sent ripples of heat straight to her core.

Negan gave her little foot a gentle squeeze before putting it back down in the water. Maggie looked at him resentfully, but she didn’t try anything else. Instead she moved to get closer, removing the distance between the two until she sat mere inches from him. Her legs went over his, just slightly curling around his waist beneath the water.

Maggie tried not to think about his cock mere inches away from her pubic bone, instead focusing on looking to his face and chest only.

A thought spurned in Maggie’s heart.

I want to wash and clean him just as he’s done for me. I want to feel him beneath my touch, make sure he’s not going anywhere. I won’t make the mistake of ever letting him go again.

Maggie moved her arms tentatively up and towards him. Negan looked to her in confusion from beginning to end, but he merely watched with curious eyes. At her hesitance, he gave a small nod for her to do whatever she wanted.   

It was the right choice, the man thought. Maggie had a little smile to her lips as her emeralds glimmered with joy.

It was a breathtaking sight for Negan, one he’d do anything to see for the rest of his life. That little curl of her lips and eyes bright with happiness, looking only to him. A selfish thought, one he couldn’t help but indulge in.

Maggie threaded her fingers through Negan’s matted beard, breaking apart the hairs stuck together from blood and spittle. She’d lather a handful of soap from the bar and wash away with water until she saw his fine salt and pepper return once more.

Somewhere along the way Negan rested his large hands over her hips, holding her steady as she began her ministrations on him. Those hands of his were heavy and hot on her skin, but the firm weight of them were everything she needed and more.

Maggie looked to the rest of him after having finished with his beard, and upon the sight of the stitches on his shoulder and waist, she frowned deeply.   

‘’I’m going to have to restitch these. They’re not supposed to be opening up like this.’’

Not supposed to be gettin’ wet neither.

Flecks of emerald glitter in the low candlelight of the bathroom, but the woman’s voice sounded tired and weary now that she took a real look at his wounds.

‘’Wasn’t too concerned about myself, baby girl. Had to make sure you were alright first.’’ Negan gave her waist a small squeeze in reassurance, but it did little to quell the sickening pit in her stomach.

‘’I need you to take care of yourself more, Negan. Starting now. I don’t know what you were thinkin’ taking on so many survivors by yourself. It’s a miracle you didn’t get away with worse than this.’’

The man smiled slightly when he heard the worry in Maggie’s tone, felt like it was a dream to be worried about by the woman before him. He’d do whatever he had to, pay whatever cost was required of him so long as she was safe.

‘’Yes ma’am.’’ said the man sincerely. Negan nods despite such thoughts, strokes the sides of Maggie’s waist in reassuring strokes in an effort to keep her from getting too worked up at the sorry sight of him.

Maggie dips the same sponge she had used to clean him into the warm waters by her side and gives it a tight squeeze, grimaced as diluted bubbles float to the surface and break apart at their end; a tint of salmon spreads throughout the lukewarm pool of water, the color light but very much there.

The young woman twitches as a stray droplet of red sinks like a broken heart, disintegrating and holding less and less of its former shape as it descends and falls into nothingness below the water.

Maggie’s never been one for blood, but her distaste for it now after her lapse in panic and fear for the loss of the man opposite her has made her distaste grow like a wicked weed. It’s this familiar part of everyday life she wants to erase – droplets of blood she longs to pour back into the veins from where they came.

The young woman aches to physically put his blood back into him so that she’s no longer forced to face the harsh sight of it. Not ever from him. No more.

No more…I don’t want to see him suffer a second longer. I just want…

Every time Maggie taps the wounds and they swell with fresh beads of scarlet, there’s an echo, a sense of malice hellbent on tormenting her. As though a wraith is tethering to the very spine of her soul; she feels its darkness closing in and the agency of her power failing with every crimson drop that Negan loses.

Drips or liters, it doesn’t matter. It’s all the same to her in her heart.

And it must stop.   

I just want it to stop. I need it to end.

‘’Maggie?’’

She raised her head in confusion, his questioning tone bringing her out of her reverie.

‘’I – ‘’ A knot swelled in her throat, and it was only then that she realized her sight had long gone blurry from tears.

What little distance there was between the two closed as Negan held her by the waist and lifted her up to completely straddle him.

Maggie held to him, and she laughed brokenly. ‘’You must think me a weak woman, that I’ve lost it. Going from happy to sad to back again and…’’ The young woman sighed and let out a short sob as she rested her forehead against his shoulder.

Negan cradled the back of her head, brushed the small of her back in soothing strokes with his fingers.

‘’When we’re alone like this,’’ he began softly, ‘’just the two of us – it’s okay to be weak, baby girl. It’s perfectly fine to just let go. You’ve been holding strong since the very beginning, I can tell. You’re just that type of woman, but trust me when I say it’s okay. I swore to always be by your side, and I promise you now – I’ll always be there to pick you right back up. So cry if you need to. Scream if that’s what you need. Because I’m here now, and I ain’t leaving.’’

Maggie looked up to him and smiled against the tears that cascaded down her cheeks. For the first time in her life she let her shoulders drop, let herself be weak and rely on another. All her life she carried the weight of her burdens alone. Even when she was with Glenn she couldn’t let go, rely and depend on another entirely.

Maybe it was pride, or fear of being seen as weak. There were moments in time when she couldn’t recover fast enough, let her tears show to the rest of the world when the pain was too great and the loss more than what she could carry.

But always there was an urgency to get back up and wipe away the tears like they never occurred. To stand tall and show that you’re fine, that you’ve recovered. Maggie never showed the true extent of what she was feeling, just how damaged and tired she really was to anyone. Not her family, not her loved ones or friends. She had no one, and part of her was too fearful and prideful to ever reveal the truth.

But Negan, he’d seen everything. He saw her truly at her weakest, and he didn’t disparage her for it, didn’t take the opportunity to rub salt in the wound.

I love you, damn it. I love you. I love you…and only you, Negan.

Maggie brushed her little nose alongside his prominent one before moving to whisper in his ear, ‘’Kiss me.’’

You’ve seen all that I am. I can’t live without you. I won’t.

Without breaking from her jewel-green eyes wet with tears, Negan shifted his weight a little so that he could reach out and press a thumb to the notch of her throat. The slight pressure caused Maggie to part her lips with a breathy moan, swallow visibly at the heat of him and his hard length that pressed against her mons.

Maggie swallowed visibly, a little rise and fall of her throat, then quickly wet her lips still faintly stained with his blood from when she first kissed him. The sight of her small tongue wetting her finely sculpted lips caused Negan’s heart to race, made Maggie mewl as his cock throbbed at the seductive image she blessed him with.

This moment was unlike any other that came before, taut with tension long built and still building. In this moment, away from all that was cruel with the world and held in one another’s embrace, their hearts exposed and in harmony.

Maggie’s lips remained slightly parted for the man. Her jeweled eyes were wide and her breathing was shallow and sweet, and Negan knew what to do. What their heart’s yearned for and needed.

Negan brushed his palm over her hair, then slowly lowered his face to hers and brushed her nose with his. Maggie’s breath caught in a tiny gasp, and she lifted her chin. Then, finally, Negan kissed her.

The older man kept the kiss light at first; a simple press of his lips to hers. He purposely kept it so, wanting to savor the feeling of her lips pressed to his; the narrow bow of her upper lip, the delicate plumpness of the lower.

Negan tilted his head slightly, parting his own just a little and coaxing her lips to meet more firmly with his mouth.

Maggie threaded her fingers deftly through his now clean beard, cradled his jaw and pressed for more. Demanded everything and anything he could possibly offer.

A burst of feeling spanned through her chest; a warmth, a tightness, a breathless sort of swoop. Giddy with emotion and alight with the warmth of his love, Maggie touched her tongue to his lower lip.

She made a tiny sound, like a short intake of breath, and a shiver of heat coursed down Negan and caused him to groan breathlessly. That tiny sound, the heat of her slick tongue brushing against his lip and the pleasure of it – all that she was and did tested his restraint. Took all of his will not to give in to the urge to lift her up once more and sit her atop his cock.

Negan’s cock throbbed as Maggie lapped at his tongue, nibbled on his lower lip and slightly grinded against his length placed firmly against her belly.

The man kissed her again, more firmly this time, sealing his lips over and over again across hers, twining his tongue with hers in breathless passion.

Maggie was left a panting mess by the end of it all, a never-ending need and ache in her heart for this moment in time to never end. For him to never stop nor let go of her.  

‘’Negan,’’ she mewled and pawed, raked her nails against his broad chest. Even still in her state of clouded arousal, Maggie was careful not to press against any of his wounds.  

The man was quick to rest his forehead against her shoulder, tighten his hold on her waist as she attempted to rub his cock through the sway of her hips as she tightened her hold on him.

Negan was still hanging on by a thread, but oh how he yearned to drag his tongue over those delicious peaks tipped with rosy buds, feel the soft warmth of her skin in his mouth. He wanted to rake and squeeze those stiff and rosy nipples with his teeth, pull at them and suck until she begged for more.

Just the sound of his name in that voice, how she called for him in such a breathless moan.

Say it again, he thought fiercely. Say my name again.

For better or worse, Maggie didn’t. Negan was able to catch his breath and take back the control that was fast slipping from his hands.

Maggie had begun to rake her nails across the back of his shoulders, nipped at his neck and marked him with kisses and love bites down his throat.

Negan grimaced and sighed as he reluctantly pulled back from her.

‘’Negan?’’ Still hazy from arousal, Maggie was slow to take in what was going on until she saw the look on his face. It was like a stone being thrown, breaking her to pieces.  

‘’There’s no easy way to put this, so I’ll just say it outright. Maggie…where do we stand, you and me? Are we…’’ The man sighed and shook his head, his hold on Maggie’s waist loosening. ‘’I don’t deserve – ‘’

‘’Don’t,’’ her accent drawled harshly. ‘’It ain’t about that, Negan. I don’t give a damn whether you think you deserve me or not. All that matters is what we have now. Who we are right this moment. I need you, and you need me.’’

She put her hand over his chest and across his heart, held Negan’s wrist and made the man do the same to her.

‘’I belong to you, and you belong to me.’’ Maggie declared sincerely, if not a little darkly as her nails dug into his chest – as if trying to claw and grab his heart.

Negan looked her in the eyes, and for a moment Maggie feared he’d reject her, or try and distance himself. It was only a moment, but it felt like forever to the young woman until he nodded his head.

Before she could speak again, Negan untangled her from where she straddled him and turned her around until her back was pressed against his chest. The man eased them both to lay down in the bathtub rather than sit, with her laying atop him.

‘’Negan what…’’ her words trailed off into a moan as Negan put his lips to the nape of her neck, pressing firmly a kiss to express what words would fail to achieve. He kissed and threaded his fingers through her hair to gently massage her scalp, eliciting a low moan in response and Maggie to close her eyes.

All of his actions help to finally calm her, and with her atop him and his arm firmly held across her middle, Maggie comes to realize in her heart that this is her home. Held by him. Cared by him. Loved by him.

Home is where the heart is, she thought fondly. Maggie remembered how he kissed her back in the car, told her that a soldier always comes home.

Home is where the heart is. I am his, and he is mine.

For a time, Negan simply holds her. It isn’t until the water is no longer warm and some of the candles have dimmed and died that the man opens his mouth to speak the question that’s been on his mind.   

‘’When I left the bathroom for that brief moment…did you know what would happen?’’ He wasn’t being specific, but Negan didn’t know exactly what it was that led to Maggie’s violent reaction.

Maggie shook her head. ‘’No, I didn’t. I just knew that I needed you with me, but I didn’t know about this. Maybe somewhere in me I did, but no…’’

Negan kissed her shoulder before angling to press his lips to her cheek, eliciting a faint sigh of relief from Maggie and stopping that conversation short before it hung on the both of them. It could wait for another day. A better day.

Not like it’s been all bad, Maggie thought as she looked warmly to Negan’s arm held securely across her belly, his broad chest pressed against her back and giving her a warmth the water never could.   

‘’C’mon, baby girl. Let’s finish up and get some rest.’’

He releases her from his hold and Maggie wades through the water with reluctance, twisting and turning until she’s facing him again.

Maggie grabs the sponge and soap and continues where she left off, this time no longer stopping to pause and think on his blood. She has to be quick however so as to not allow her mind to fall to the brewing thoughts that threaten to swallow her, giving her no time to appreciate the finer details regarding her man.

When Maggie moves to clean him further down south, Negan grips her by the wrist and gently attempts to take the sponge and soap from her hands.

‘’I can handle it from here, sweetheart.’’

Maggie frowned and raised her head to glower at him, gripping tight to the soap and sponge before he could pry them away from her hands.

Negan could only sigh as the sight of her narrowed and piercing jewels pointed at him, could only pray in his heart he wouldn’t do something stupid.

Maggie scrubbed around his thighs and the rest of his legs before setting the sponge to the side. She lathered the soap between her hands, and when she felt there was enough, she put down the bar of soap as well.

Negan couldn’t look away from Maggie, his hands gripping tight to the edge of the bathtub as her dainty little hands and slender fingers wrapped around the base of his cock. She needed both hands just to wrap around his length, and the sight of it nearly turned the man insane from the swelling lust that yearned for him to take her. Claim her and impregnate her.  

Maggie looked up to him with a slight smirk, watched with fascination as Negan began to breathe roughly; his eyes darkening with something wild and primal that made her pussy throb hot with need.  

Pride settled within her heart knowing she did this, made him like this with just her touch. That it was her and no one else. That he only looked to her, desired her. Needed her.

Maggie needed it all and more. His warmth and the security he brought to her, his lust and love; all that he was, both good and bad. She yearned for everything. Desired it all.

The young woman cupped his balls in the palm of her hand, the heavy weight of them in one hand and his length held in the other making her want to do more than just clean his manhood with soap.

Men like those type of things, don’t they? A blowjob, but I’ve never…

There were many things she had never done, didn’t have the time to learn and practice as the world around tried to kill the living at near every waking moment.

But here and now before Negan, Maggie wanted to act on the impulse and instinct to pleasure the man she loves, and to gain his praise and satisfaction.

The only thing that stopped Maggie and caused her to hesitate was her inexperience, and that she might make a fool of herself. It didn’t help that Negan’s figure was towering over her own, the shadow of the man making him look like a feral predator on the verge of attacking.

The light of the few flickering flames remaining made his eyes blacker than coal gleam, and Maggie whimpered despite herself at his imposing figure barely composed because of her.

Negan looked away for a moment and sighed, his jaw clenching and unclenching until finally he was able to look back at Maggie.

‘’It’s getting late, baby. C’mon,’’ spoke Negan hoarsely as he lifted himself up and out of the bathtub, and Maggie bit her lip in resentment the moment Negan turned away to grab the towel he had dropped to the floor when he heard Maggie scream his name.

Maggie looked to her hands now free of his cock and hated that she had hesitated too much. From the corner of her eye, she could see that Negan was still hard and throbbing, and the young woman could only take solace in that perhaps this was his punishment for all the times he aroused her on the road, and she could do nothing to relieve herself.

Still, it was only a slight comfort from the glaring fact that her inexperience had ruined the moment, let the man slip away from her grasp.

I had ‘em right where I wanted him too, damn it…

Maggie took a deep breath and gently exhaled. She didn’t think she was getting ahead of herself. To Negan it might seem that way, but from her side of things the pace of things was natural. She had ruminated every minute and hour of the day for an entire month with regards to everything. Most days and nights Negan alone occupied her thoughts, and everything between him and her.

Maggie hadn’t rushed at all but taken her time step by step. A careful consideration from the start to pretend and see, realize the truth of the man now that she was no longer blinded by her hatred for him. If anything, she now believed she was too slow.

Slow…If I had been any slower than maybe… Maggie quickly discarded that train of thought before it could fester, break her down again like it had when Negan left her alone in the bathtub. The sight of him before her now and his smirk when he caught her looking as he finished up drying the only reason she was able to.

Her thoughts left her then as Negan coiled one arm around her back and the other under her legs, carrying her out of the bathtub before slowly putting her down to sit on the curled edge.

Maggie looked up at the man as he began to dry her, starting gently with her feet before moving up her calf and then to her thighs. She noticed him pause just as he reached the apex of her thighs, but Negan couldn’t resist putting his hand between her legs.

Maggie’s toes curled at just the mere touch, the soft bristles of the towel rubbing against her now glistening folds aching for more.

‘’J-just leave it be, Negan. Or you’ll be swiping away forever trying to get t-that place dry.’’ Maggie scrunched her nose in displeasure at how he grinned roguishly at that, but he didn’t press her.

Maggie did entertain the thought of picking up where they left off, only this time to succeed where she previously failed and to go further – but exhaustion was quickly pounding away at her lust and yearning. Negan was right when he said it was getting late.

Negan began to comb her curls after drying the rest of her off, the feeling of his gentle ministrations lulling her to close her eyes and enjoy the peace he brought. His words from before rung in her mind, of it being okay to be weak. To be vulnerable.  

I’ve denied myself so much in an effort to be strong. I don’t think I can allow myself to be cared for, to let go and share my burdens with anyone but him. I don’t want to.

‘’Negan,’’ she called out softly.

The man paused when he heard his name upon her lips, and he immediately answered back, ‘’What is it, Maggie? Something wrong? Am I hurting you?’’

The young woman shook her head and leaned into him. ‘’Can we…stay like this? Can you…take care of me just as you have been? I-I don’t want any of this to end.’’

Maggie lowered her head the more she spoke, fearing what she’d see on Negan’s face – but the man surprised her by taking her into his arms like she was his bride to be carried, and the action alone was his answer to her.

‘’Always. I swear. To you. For you. My answer will always be just that, Maggie. Always.’’

She smiled at him then, not a soft curve of the lips or a gentle one – but a bright and joyous smile with pearls and all. It was the smile you gave to only one, and Negan felt like the world stopped when she gave it to him. He’d never seen anything like it, never thought such a gorgeous smile would be for him.

‘’You’re beautiful when you smile. You’re beautiful, Maggie. Everything about you is just…divine.’’

Her heart clenches suddenly with love, warmth washing over her at just how sincere he is when he says that to her, the way he looks at her like she’s a goddess to be worshiped; and in his eyes she is his.  

‘’Only for you,’’ she replies softly, a sudden wistfulness coloring her tone. Negan leans down and kisses her, brushes his nose against hers before moving to carry her to bed.

Maggie rests her head against his chest as he carries her away and into the bedroom and thinks to herself once more than this is home. In his arms she is home.  

His warmth and embrace are gone too soon, however, as Negan puts her into bed. The man moves to grab at the pile of clothes to dress her, but Maggie shakes her head at him.

‘’I sleep better naked.’’

It was a lie. She’d always slept in her underwear at the very least, but now she was reluctant to do so. She didn’t want pieces of clothing to get in the way of what she needed, and what she needed was his bare skin against hers. To just have each other bare and exposed for the other. One heart embracing its significant other with nothing held between.

It was a gamble that would have been ruined had he put on some drawers, and then she’d have to admit that she just wanted to be naked with him. Thankfully for Maggie, he didn’t question it, or seem to want to cover himself up.  

No. For the man named Negan, clothes were the last thing on his mind. Even after all she said and did – all that he had said and did – Negan still had his reservations. It all seemed too good to be true.

And what if it is? The thought was sudden and harrowing, one he couldn’t get out of his head now that it occurred to him.

Maybe whatever got into her was making Maggie say and do all these things just to please him, keep him from leaving. The older man didn’t know, but if that were true…

‘’Negan?’’   

The man didn’t hear her. He just stood there hesitantly, lingering a little too close to the couch that rested off to the side.

Maggie moved to sit at the edge of the soft and inviting bed, more than enough for the both of them.

The young woman understood after a stretch of silence what he was thinking, and then the dread began to settle in her bones. She didn’t want to be alone in bed without him, didn’t want to even try to fall asleep without him by her side. Negan had always slept by her side ever since that tragic day Alexandria fell. Be it next to her, one cot to the other, or with her atop him to spare her from the cold and unforgiving ground.  

Dipping her head low, Maggie closes her eyes as she digs her nails into the soft edge of the bed, knuckles shining white from exertion.

Negan snaps out of his thoughts when he sees Maggie looking so fragile, like glass about to fall and shatter, and doesn’t think before moving with haste to get to her side; reaching out and rubbing his palms atop her fingers in an attempt to loosen her fervency and aid in some measure of relaxation.

‘’I got you, ok? You’re safe with me. Whatever it was, ain’t nothing going to hurt you so long as I’m here, baby.’’

The man didn’t know it was his hesitation that caused her to nearly fall, still thinking in his head that what she was going through now was from before when he left her alone in the bathroom. Negan underestimated the severity of her need.

It wasn’t just that she needed him in her sight, but with her. To see him consider sleeping on the couch instead of with her on the bed was a blade that cut Maggie deep, a blade with the poison of all her fears and pain.  

The tension to her iron hold falters however at his soothing voice, releasing at Negan’s declarations. Maggie’s emeralds open to glimpse Negan right before her, kneeling and looking to her with those eyes blacker than coal.

He’s waiting. Waiting on her, waiting for what may or may not come next. Maggie realizes the man would wait there forever if need be, if she desired or asked this of him.

Maggie’s throat hitches at the weight of that certainty, of the sight of Negan; for there, etching across his handsome and rugged face is a love and adoration – and worry – for her. Always and only for her.

The permanence of Negan Smith is ethereal and otherworldly.

Maggie swallows thickly before asking, ‘’Lay with me?’’

Negan licks the length of his bottom lip as he considers her request. If it was the night before there’d have been no question or hesitance on his part, but that was then and nothing like now. The woman before him was awake, and a chasm of unsaid words only grew in his heart with everything she did and said.

To spare him once more from death, to keep him in her embrace and say that she needed him. To see the change in her eyes not knowing how it came about, or what it meant to see it directed at him. Where there was once a molten fury and endless hatred, he now saw a swirl of emotions he knew to be love, joy and peace, and other colors darker that he couldn’t put a thumb on, and the man wasn’t sure if he wanted to assume.

Damn it. How can I say no when she looks at me like that? When she’s so goddamned beautiful? How can I ever resist what this woman wants? This woman…my woman…

It was a crazy thought; one he still couldn’t believe to be true – and yet…just maybe...

He’d seen her at her weakest, but that was then when she couldn’t hide it, nor did she try to. Maggie was a broken shell then, not caring much for anything. For her to not only continue to show her vulnerableness, but to look at him with such frailty at the notion of rejection enslaved the man from ever thinking of saying no. At least not tonight, not when he was still muddled in the head.

Negan nods and moves, climbing onto the bed and tentatively sliding behind her. Negan spoons Maggie without a word, laying his left arm protectively over her middle, albeit loosely.

Maggie takes notice and attempts to hold his arm closer, tighter against her middle, but Negan hesitates to let her; to enact that level of intimacy.

That hesitation proved to be a mistake, however. It doesn’t take but a solid minute for the older man to feel the tremor that snakes through the younger woman by his front. So Negan does what he should have done in the beginning – what he knows Maggie wants but couldn’t say aloud at this moment – and brings her closer.

I can’t be hesitating right now, damn it.

Negan can hear the faint sigh of hers as the tension to her body slightly relaxes, but it isn’t enough. The level of intimacy is still a far cry to the days before. To the promises and actions enacted moments earlier in the bathtub. Of whispered words and solemn vows.  

And so, Negan pulls Maggie tightly to his chest and presses his chin to her bare shoulder as their lower limbs intertwine beneath the duvet. From there, Negan adjusts, anchoring more of her to more of him; he eases the rough part of his palm into the concave between her hip and her rib cage and grips it just tight enough to ground her, to affirm his presence.

Negan’s other hand slips below their shared pillow to reach around and enfold Maggie’s searching fingers. Maggie sighs fully, the tension in her body finally released as they weave together in a hallowing noiselessness save for the wintry winds beyond the paned glass.

As Maggie seats herself into this state of togetherness, it occurs to her how natural it feels to be with Negan in this way. Never in her life had she felt this wholeness experienced, but now and in this moment she understands that there was always a missing piece.

Until now. 

Two pieces to a whole. Never to be complete without the other half. Intertwined in body…

But not yet in heart. I’ll have that too soon enough. I’ll have everything…

Maggie’s other hand trailed over his arm across her middle before stopping just above where her womb was located.

You said you’d given me all you had, but you haven’t. You’ve taken everything. My heart, mind and soul. Without you I’ll break, but it’s not the same for you…

She noted his hesitancy, and though he acquiesced moments after it drove a knife through her heart, raised her fears that perhaps even after what had occurred in the bathtub, he still had the mind to reject her. That even after everything, he perhaps still had the mind to leave.

Maggie understood his hesitance, she did despite her fears; knew as to why he would consider rejecting her. She knew it when he told her he didn’t want to hurt her, that he wasn’t even deserving of her thanks for all that he had done.

Negan believed he didn’t belong, that he didn’t deserve. And maybe he was right, but it didn’t matter anymore. She had said just as much, but the man was still not truly convinced. He accepted taking care of her, swore to be by her side when she needed. At that he had no hesitance, but this intimacy – the way they intertwined with one another like this, Maggie could feel the fear seeping off of his skin, like he’d burn her if he was too close. It was a fear of hurting her, and a fear of losing himself to her wholly. To give in and be her man, to give her his heart thinking it to be worthless.

I’ll have it all, Negan Smith. It’s not just your presence I need by my side. It’s everything. All that you are just as all that I am. I can’t live without you anymore, and I’ll ensure you can never live without me.  

Bare in body and intertwined, Maggie felt a peace that eluded her long before even the outbreak occurred. A peace she never found no matter how happy she seemed to be. Maggie just felt so small and safe curled up in his embrace, and it was perfect.

In his arms I am home, and at peace.

Natural and good. A balm to all that wounded and pained her. Negan’s almost as close as he can be without being damn near inside of her and it’s both life-giving and…life-altering.

Inside of me? Did I – did I really just think that?

A small spark ignites in her belly and it’s a shift, a something-new she dares not name or examine. Not tonight at least. Already so many revelations, and so many more to uncover tomorrow.

Maggie scooted up against Negan’s side and put her head on his chest, and his arm naturally moved around her back to accommodate her before he could realize it. It had been ingrained in the man since he did this every night before, his body moving faster than he could think.

In the darkness, Negan could still hear the winds outside, the howling nothing but a faint whisper beyond thick glass – wasn’t a fearful bell in his ear ringing with alarm that death was approaching now that they were out of harm’s way, safe and warm and together whole.

Only…

‘’Your heart’s beatin’ really fast,’’ Maggie observed, whispered into his chest just enough to where he could pick up on it.

Negan could feel it too, feel her listening in on his heart and prying it open just as before to bare its dark secrets. She’d seen the ugliness then, how weak and willing he was if it meant his death by her hand. She’d seen his heart black as sin, and Negan couldn’t understand why she’d ever want it. Why she’d ever want and need him.

‘’Course it’s beating hard, baby girl. I got a smoking hot babe in my arms,’’ whispered Negan playfully.

Maggie snorted at that, but he could see the smile on her lips and knew she was pleased at his compliment. Negan smiled too, but then he thought about the thoughts lingering on his soul. Weighed heavily on him.

His heart raced then on the factory floor as he prepared himself for death. Now, it raced because it yearned to have her. Maggie’s words lingered, swayed and brewed in his mind like a siren’s call.  

I need you, Negan. I belong to you, and you belong to me. Can you…take care of me just as you have been? I need you, just as you need me…

Negan kept thinking ‘any second now.’ Kept thinking he’d wake up and for it all to have been a dream just like the one he had before. Too good to be true, he kept thinking. Can’t be real.

These things…none of it for me. Among monsters do I bleed, broken and torn…  

‘’Can you pet my hair like you always do? It – I’m able to ease into sleep when you do.’’ Maggie broke him out of his reverie, made him realize once more that this was real – that here in his arms was the woman of his dreams.

Maggie was real. And she needed him. Wanted him.  

Negan began to gently stroke her hair, her long chestnut curls twining around his fingers. Her curls were softer than silk, and it felt like sin for him to touch with his hands wicked and stained. Hell, he felt that way about all of her. Like he was dirtying the purity of Maggie just by being near, dimming her light with his darkness.  

Thoughts such as these had kept him up at night, but touching her the way he did now with such intimacy was making him relax despite himself. It was a gentle gradient that lulled him, and it was all because of her.

Negan knew in his heart he would have no nightmares so long as he had her. He’d sleep peacefully in the night, dream of better things than the wretched past.

Maggie was beginning to fall asleep at Negan’s gentle caress, the scent of leather and rain distinctively owned by the man alone filling her lungs and lulling her to peace. A scent that was marking her as his.

There’s a subtle exhale by her throat and a heat permeated from her head to her toes the moment she hears, ‘’G’night, babydoll.’’

Maggie’s emeralds glow with love, and the young woman smiled as she settled further into his embrace.

‘’G’night – ’’ she whispers tenderly.

– my love, she adds in her heart.