Leave Out All The Rest (Bethyl AU)

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****This chapter is shorter than the others. I just didn't want to leave you guys with that cliff hanger without explaining it, so here's this!

It was the next morning after the police took him away and Daryl was put in holding cell on the bottom floor of the police station. They hadn't interviewed him or questioned him, they just sat him in the room for the night and he wondered if anyone would ever come for him. The only thing that made him feel not numb was thinking about Beth. He tried to imagine her seeing him the way she did before after all this but doubt she ever could. Her family would resent him more now and she would never want to be with a criminal, even if he was innocent. He heard the cell door open and saw Rick waiting for him to follow him. Daryl stood up, his hands still cuffed, and followed Rick to the cafeteria. Rick had requested for Daryl to stay in the police station holding cell until his hearing in court. Daryl didn't know this but Rick thought Daryl was innocent and was investigating his case nonstop.

            "Meatloaf today." Rick said letting Daryl pass him and grab his tray. Everyone else in the cafeteria was dressed in police uniforms and Daryl could feel their eyes and judgment bare into his skin. Daryl took his tray over to the table and sat across from Rick. He slowly ate his meal not looking anywhere but down.

            "Your hearings tomorrow, you ready for it?" Rick asked him.

            "Won't make no difference if I am or not," Daryl mumbled and took another bite of his food.

            Rick leaned towards him putting his elbow on the table.

            "Your father is dead, Daryl. I saw you with him at the hospital, you didn't want him dead. So that makes me think you didn't kill him. I'm gonna find who did and your gonna get to go home."

            "Why you care so much?" Daryl said looking Rick straight in the eye.

A smile played on Rick's lips and he shook his head, "I don't know... I have gut feelings and I follow them, that's what makes me a good cop and my gut is telling me your innocent."

            "Can your gut prove my innocence in a court of law?" Daryl asked sarcastically and he saw Rick unable to say yes. "Then your gut don't mean shit."

            Rick sat back and let him finish his food in peace.

As Rick was walking Daryl back to his holding cell he took another turn and walked Daryl into the interviewing room.

            "Guess now is a good as time as any for questioning." Rick said and motioned Daryl to sit across from him. He pulled out the folder for Merle Seniors murder case and sat it between them. "Let's walk through this. Your father died of a gun shot to the brain. The gun was found with no fingerprints in the woods just a few miles from your father's shack. It says here that he died anywhere from six p.m. to nine p.m., which is the time between when Jax saw you at the garage and when you were with Beth. The only thing tying you to this thing is your fingerprints on the bud light bottle they found smashed on the front porch of your fathers shack." Rick explained and Daryl could feel his heart beat quicken as he looked at the photos of his fathers dead body. He remembered seeing his father only a day ago. He remembered grabbing that bud light bottle from his fathers hands out of rage and knocking it to the ground. Rick leaned forward and looked into Daryl's eyes, seeing the frustration and sadness inside them. "You didn't do this did you?"

            Daryl looked up at Rick and just starred straight at him. "I wanted my father dead everyday, every damn day of my life, but I didn't kill him."