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Breaking Free

Chapter 27

PART THREE


“Search and you'll find the answers
To be the change that you want to see
Grant the serenity reclaiming honor and dignity
Can't you see what's going wrong?
Don't you feel it growing strong?
Don't let go, keep holding on
Working forces kneel you down
Authority and power ruling out.”


Queensryche “Redemption”



Later that night, Daryl restlessly paced the dimly lit space between the living room and the foyer as he anxiously waited for Mia to come downstairs. They had yet to talk about what had happened that morning, opting to wait until they were certain that there was no one around to eavesdrop on their conversation. The decision had been Mia's, but at the time Daryl had accepted her choice. The fewer people that knew what they were up to the better.

But, his patience was quickly running out, having been made to wait all the way through the day and well past dinner, when they had walked Lucy back to her place. Now, he was still having to wait, as Mia was upstairs helping Micah clean up from yet another bloody nose before settling him in to bed. Daryl was honestly shocked that she hadn't insisted on her brother and Blake being present for the conversation, but he also figured that she wanted to see what he brought to the table before including anyone else in the operation. He knew she still didn't trust him, which was fine, because he didn't exactly trust her yet either.

While Lucy had insisted that she had heard Mia scheming with Blake about getting the girls, and Ollie, out of the compound and settled somewhere safe, Daryl couldn't bring himself to put a lot of faith in what Lucy had heard and been able to comprehend fully. She was only twelve, thirteen at the most, and could have easily misconstrued what they were discussing, since she had been listening on the sly, otherwise known as from the other side of a cracked window, and had very likely missed a word or two here and there. Mia and Blake could have easily been planning on stealing the children and selling them to the highest bidder themselves. Of course, now that Daryl had spent the better part of a month with Mia and Blake, he wasn't entirely certain they would do something so despicable, but appearances were often deceiving, so he planned on keeping his guard up until he was absolutely certain they were trustworthy.

The sound of someone coming down the stairs caused him to stop wearing a path in the flooring and turn towards the foyer in time to see Mia in the opening between the living room and the kitchen. Illuminated by a small scattering of candles, the room wasn't exactly beaming with light, but the flickering golden hue was bright enough to not only show him who was entering the room, but to highlight just how fucking attractive she was. He didn't want to admit it to himself and he most certainly had no intention of telling her, but the longer he spent around Mia Carter, the more he found himself attracted to her. A fact that hurt his heart, as it most certainly still belonged to a woman it could no longer have. In Daryl's mind, once his heart had fallen in love with Lily Richards, not even her death meant that his heart could belong to anyone else. Illogical, sure, but for someone who had never been in love before falling for the troubled redheaded dancer, he didn't know how to move past what he felt for her.

But, damn, if he thought for half a fucking second that he could act on the pure, unadulterated lust he felt for Mia without it meaning he didn't still love Lily, then he would be hard pressed to not give into what his body wanted. That thought was impossible though, as his heart wouldn't allow it. No, couldn't allow it. So, instead of shoving Mia against the wall, stripping her of her clothes and pushing his hardened length inside of her hot, lithe body until they were both screaming with pleasure, the way he used to with the nameless women of his past before the outbreak, Daryl shoved the desire he felt for Mia aside and buried it in the cold, dark recesses of his mind. ]

He was in this town on a mission, to save Lucy and the other innocent children from whatever darkness that hunted them and to give the guilt that lived inside of him over Lily a tiny bit of relief. He was not in this town to fuck the woman in front of him like their lives depended on it. Nope, that was so far off his list of things to do that it was stupid to even let his mind wander to the thought of how it would feel to have her legs wrapped around his waist as he ploughed into her over and over. Absolutely, positively stupid. And yet, as Mia walked into the dimly lit room wearing a pair of painted on blue jeans and equally as tight tank top, Daryl could think of nothing else until she spoke.

“Alright, tell me what your plans are,” Mia said, getting straight to the point as she sank into the overstuffed cushions of the chair across from the couch that was his bed. “Sell me on this, make me believe that you're one of the good guys.”

Daryl hadn't missed the pistol in her hand, the one that was recently cleaned given the smell of gun oil on it and the way the metal of the barrel glimmered in the candlelight as it laid on the table beside where Mia sat. She didn't believe him. Wouldn't believe him straight away and obviously wanted to protect herself if what she believed about him was true. But, her distrust and pistol didn't faze Daryl as he lowered himself onto the couch and tossed the black and white speckled notebook from his backpack on the table. While Mia and Blake had both went over the contents inside the notebook upon his arrival, there were scribbles and notations that had likely not made any sense to them at that time and could possibly help him convince Mia that he was, in fact, out to do some good, instead of the bad she no doubt thought he was up to.

“It's all in there,” Daryl said gruffly as he pushed the notebook towards Mia. “What I've been doing. How I got here.”

“Yeah, I know,” Mia cut in, annoyance tinging her voice. “I've already been through that, Daryl. I know pretty damned well what you've been doing before you ended up here. I want to know why you did it and what your plans are for this place.”

“Quit interrupting me then,” Daryl growled in response, equally as annoyed as she was. He hated being interrupted. Hell, he didn't speak up often and damned if it wasn't aggravating as shit when what few words he said a day got cut off. “You know where I went. You want to know what I did there, right? Where I took the girls? Well, what am I gonna get in return from you for that information?”

“This isn't a quid pro quo situation, Daryl.” Mia squirmed under his stare, obviously thinking that he wanted something a bit more naughty in return for the information he had that she wanted, but Daryl had no intentions of asking for her body in trade for what his plans were. He should, obviously, because he wanted it, but he wouldn't. He wasn't that type of person. Well, not anymore. Maybe before the outbreak, but not now.

“Ain't everything done in exchange for something else? Especially now? People don't do shit out of the goodness of their hearts, sunshine,” Daryl said in return, pointing out the obvious in life. Everyone wanted something. Didn't matter who you were. Good or bad, everyone wanted something. “I want information, too. I gotta trust you as much as you gotta trust me, right?”

“Fine,” Mia huffed out after a staring session, each one seeing who was going to bend first and no doubt hating that she gave in first. “But, you start. No deals on that, you give me what I want and then, and only then, will I give you anything.”

Jesus Fucking Christ, Daryl thought to himself, mentally willing away the hard on that was pressing painfully against the zipper of his pants. This whole damned conversation was just one big sexual innuendo, for him at least, and he couldn't help but wonder if Mia was thinking the same thing. Once again shoving his dirty thoughts about Mia Carter to the back of his mind, Daryl nodded in agreement to her demands and leaned over to open the notebook to the very beginning of his story.

Pushing the nearby pillar candle closer to the open page, he pointed to the list of names that Nate had scrawled in exchange for medical supplies and alcohol. “That's where it started. Lucy was traded and her sister, Mary, was left with the fucker that killed their dad.” That wasn't where his mission truly began, of course. It had begun all the way back to when the prison had fallen and Lily had been left behind to end up in the clutches of a madman, but Daryl wasn't about to lay all of that on Mia. There was no need for her to know about his Lily and how he had failed her, as the mission could be explained with that part of the story left out, so he moved right past it.

“I found Mary a couple months after the trade when I took out the ones holding her hostage. She told me about her little sister that night, talked me into finding her and bringing her home.” Daryl paused when Mia leaned closer to inspect the section of the page he was pointing to. Her scent wafted over him, strawberries with a hint of womanly musk from the summer heat, and the combination wasn't altogether displeasing. Scooting away from her, he leaned back against the couch and continued, “Took Mary back with me, like the others I'd found. Took them back to where I used to live...to my family.”

“To where you used to live?” Mia inquired with a crinkle in her brow. “Why don't you live there anymore if that's where your family is?”

Of course she would be curious about that. He probably should have left the family part out, but too late now. “Just don't. I stay there occasionally, when I ain't out here.” Uncomfortable, he ran a hand through his sweaty locks and shoved back the bangs that were sticking to his forehead, before explaining where it was exactly that he was talking about. “We got a place north of Atlanta, a lodge. Found it a couple years after the outbreak. I take them there, where they'll be safe, then I head back out.”

He could see she wanted to ask more about why he didn't stay, but that nugget of information really had nothing to do with what they were talking about, so she obviously sat that curiosity aside for the time being. Moving on, Mia flipped through the first few pages of the notebook and asked, “So, that's what you've been doing? You rescue these girls? You don't take them for your own, or...like sell them or something?”

“I just make it so they don't gotta stay with the one's they’re with. That's all.” Daryl lifted a hand to his mouth to satiate some of his anxiety by chewing on the edge of a frayed thumbnail, an old habit that would never be broken. “Just ain't found one that didn't want to go somewhere that was guaranteed to be safe is all. If they'd wanted to go off on their own, they coulda. I didn't make none of them go back with me.”

Mia studied him, silently scrutinizing him for what seemed like an agonizingly long time before finally speaking. With the notebook in her hand, opened up to one of the pages where he had scrawled out a map to one of the locations he had studied before cleaning it out, and asked, “So, you're the hero in this story then?”

“I ain't no hero,” Daryl replied grimly as his heart was pierced with the painful reminder of just how much of a hero he truly wasn't. A hero would have saved the woman he loved, not let her down and watched her die in his arms. Nope, in Daryl's heart, the last thing he would be was a hero. “Ain't never been, ain't never gonna be one. Just doing what's right is all.”

“I don't know about that,” Mia said softly, her hazel eyes warm as she stared at him. Chewing on her plump bottom lip, he could see her mind turning as she dipped her head to flip through the notebook once more to quickly study the entries, before meeting his gaze again. “You've saved what? Like thirty people? And just for their sake? You got nothing out of it? That sounds like a hero to me.”

Yeah, well, it would, Daryl thought to himself. Killing the bad guys, rescuing the innocent? Sure, sounds like the stuff hero novels were written about. But, what Mia didn't know was that he did get something out of it, something he hoped to one day achieve...

Redemption.

Notes

A big thank you to lewis7 and Grimesgirl63 for leaving me a review on last weeks chapter. Hope everyone likes the start to phase III. Also, as I will be out of town next weekend, the next chapter won't be posted until Monday night.

Comments

@Serenity
I look forward to it....always was one of my favourite stories on Fan fiction.

Lewis Lewis
6/5/18

@lewis7


Glad to see you under any name! Thanks so much for all the comments! I am hoping that my muse shows back up, so I can write some more. I have had some ideas about writing short, one shot stories with Sam and Daryl from Need You Now. There were several scenes I had sketched out that didn't make it into the actual story, so I would like to write them out and post them if muse cooperates.

Serenity Serenity
4/25/18

Back to signing in as Lewis 7 as mel2a has stopped working!!
Love this story and really going to miss it and your brilliant Daryl story telling.
Will keep an eye out for you for future stories.
Thank you for your stories and writing talent.
xx

lewis7 lewis7
4/22/18

@Arubaredx


I'm glad you enjoyed it! Thank you for commenting and good luck with the move!

Serenity Serenity
4/19/18

In the middle of packing to move so everything is crazy, but managed to finally catch up on your final chapter:) A very joyful ending, and very deserved for them too. Very much enjoyed this journey.

Arubaredx Arubaredx
4/18/18