Unexpected Love | Daryl Dixon Fanfic

Chapter 39 - Love Triangle

Hey guys! Bit of a long filler chapter. Starts off slow but I promise it gets a whole lot better!

Jpynch27 Just for you my lovely ;)

><><><

Daryl's POV

The morning came quicker than I expected as I was rudely awoken by somebody. All I could feel was something jabbing into my arm over and over, and I peeled open my eyes to find Carol kneeling over me with a bowl of food in her hand.

"Rise and shine sleepy head. Brought you some breakfast." She said with a mischievous grin as she poked me one final time. All she got back as a reply was a grunt as I rolled over onto my back, fully feeling the effects of roughing it on the floor.

It really wasn't like me to sleep in this late. I was usually the first one awake and up at the crack of dawn, but it seemed everybody else beat me to it today and was milling about already. I obviously must've needed the extra hours, but now I practically felt hungover from sleep and my eyes were heavy.

"What happened to your perch?" She quizzed, as she placed the bowl on the ground beside me. I sat up, rubbing my eyes and stretching out my sore muscles, looking to my left and fully expecting to find Emma next to me but her spot was completely empty.

Her backpack and gun were gone, plus the dogs were nowhere to be seen. I furrowed my brow as slight concern seeped into my groggy mind.  "Where's Emma?" I asked, my voice still laced with sleep.

"Ohhh now I see why you're on the floor..." Carol replied, fully sidestepping my question. She seemed highly amused by the fact that I had kept her company last night, but I just stared back blankly as I really wasn't in the mood.

She eventually grasped that I wasn't asking a rhetorical question and her smile receded. Her eyes dropped to the floor and she looked as though she was lost in thought, trying to remember when she'd seen her last.

"I don't know where Emma is. I haven't seen her all morning." She admitted, glancing around the cell block as if she was just going to randomly emerge out of thin air.

"Carl?" She shouted, causing the kid to pop his head out from behind the bars of his cell. His hair was disheveled and he looked about as tired as I felt so I knew straight away he was going to be none the wiser.

"Do you know where your Aunt is?" She asked, to which he just shook his head. He didn't seem too concerned that we hadn't seen her and I knew that I shouldn't be either, but I just couldn't shake this unsettled feeling.

The kid picked up his sheriffs hat and lazily shuffled out of his cell with it in his hand. He stopped just in front of us and rubbed his eyes with his free hand before saying "It's Aunty Emma. She could be anywhere."

Just as I started pushing myself up off the ground, fully intending to go and find her, a set of keys jingled to my left and we all turned to find Rick opening the gate with lil' ass kicker fast asleep in his arms.

Beth seemed to come out of nowhere and looked quite low-spirited as she scooped his daughter from him. She shot me a death stare which really wasn't scary at all, before spinning around and taking Judith back into her cell.

I glanced at Carol who had clearly seen the strange exchange as she frowned, but all I could do was shrug as I didn't have a clue what was happening. That girl had been acting weirdly for the past few days and I couldn't for the life of me figure out why.

I shook my head and turned to Rick who had also seen her glare at me. He had his hands rested on his hips and one of his eyebrows raised high, giving me a questioning look as if I had just cheated on his sister in front of him.