"What the shit?" Negan turned to the man on his right. "When the fuck did you find this?"

This was a body.

Well, what remained of one, anyway. The kid, because he couldn't be more than fourteen or fifteen from the look of him, hung on the chain-link fence like some sort of decoration in a haunted house. He expected the kid to start swinging his arms and moving his legs any time someone passed in front of him.

The kid hadn't turned.

He didn't have any reason for why and didn't rightly give a fuck. The kid was dead. And I want to know why.

"Who found him?"

"Earl did when he came out to check on the horde."

"Did he put the kid down?"

"No." A frown marred the man's brow. "He said he found the kid just like this."

That confirmed he hadn't come back as one of the undead fucks. Why? he found himself wondering. What made this kid different from any of the others who died and came back?

His eyes narrowed as he studied the boy. Blood and bruises covered what remained of the kid's face. His right eye was swollen shut. The other stared at him, the final agonizing moments of his life forever etched in the dark green depths. Negan felt his gut clench with emotions he didn't think himself still capable of feeling.

Not after everything he'd seen this shitty fucking world do.

This shit, though?

This shit was worse than finding a fucking can of expired food.

His fingers tightened on the handle of Lucille, seeking comfort and calm from the woman the bat was named after. Negan was fully aware that people thought the bat was nothing more than an inanimate object. An inconsequential piece of wood wrapped with barbed wire. A tool he used to beat the heads of rule breakers with. They were dead fucking wrong.

He saw people die, one after another because they were too weak, too scared, too fucking... whatever they were in the early days of this shit. The only one that hurt him was that kid who put Lucille down. The rest? He felt... nothing. Not for them. Not for himself. Not for anyone. He wasn't scared. He wasn't sad. He wasn't angry. Well, he amended silently. Sometimes I was angry. Sometimes he was fucking furious. For the most part, though, he felt nothing.

It took him a long time to realize why that was: Lucille.

She protected him. She placed him inside a plastic bubble where nothing could get to him.

She made him stronger.

Helped him survive.

Lucille was far more than a baseball bat. She was his wife. His one true wife. The only woman he ever loved. Lucille, a pile of bones left on a dirty hospital floor because he was too much of a fucking coward to go back and lay her to rest.

Worst thing I ever did was leave her to rot.

He stayed near the hospital she died in for weeks afterward but never went back. He told himself it was because he couldn't see her like that. Couldn't see her with her dark hair matted with blood and brain matter, half her skull smashed in, and her milky white eyes staring sightlessly up at him.

I couldn't put her in the ground, put her to rest. She's a pile of dry bones rotting on a fucking floor because I'm a no-good son of a bitch.

Negan stopped his jolly jaunt down Bullshit Row before he even got a fourth of the way down the path. It wasn't that he didn't want to remember his beautiful Lucille.

He did.

Bash his goddamn brains in and he'd still remember his Lucille. She was his first thought when he woke up and his last thought before he went to sleep. She was the most important woman in his life. She always would be. Fucking fuck, he named a goddamn baseball bat after her so he could carry a piece of her with him forever. It was still just a fucking baseball bat at the end of the day. He didn't love it. Not really. For one thing, he could replace the bat.

There was no replacing his Lucille.

"Who the fuck beat the shit outta this kid?" Simon questioned as he materialized by his left side. "And left him hanging on our fucking fence?"

Murmurs came from the crowd lurking behind them. Negan ignored them and stepped closer to the body. The kid had gotten brutalized, there was no doubt about it. He suffered before finally succumbing to death.

Negan could claim he was many things, but he was no fucking detective — that title belonged firmly to Fin — but even he could see that whoever did this was an expert at inflicting pain.

The question was who did it.

There was any number of fucks out there who'd beat a kid to death and send them here as a message. Survival was for the fittest. Hurting another person, getting pleasure from their pain, that wasn't surviving. That's a fucking monster being a monster, he thought as he slowly turned towards Simon. A monster who needed to get put the fuck down in his opinion.

I've done unspeakable things since this shit began, but I've always had a reason. It's always been for a greater good. Never for pleasure.

Stopping whoever did this before they did it again became a top priority. The only way to do that was to ask little Miss Detective for help.

"Is Fin still at the Office Outpost?"

Simon nodded towards the Sanctuary. "She was heading up to your bedroom when I was coming out here to see what all was going on."

Excitement trickled through him at hearing Fin was here. Hot diggity dog, he thought.

"Is that fucking so?" A grin played about his lips. "Well, I guess I shouldn't keep her cute li'l ass waiting."

Simon jerked a thumb towards the boy.

"What do you want us to do with him?"

Much as he'd like to give orders to have the body gotten rid of, he knew Miss Detective would want to inspect his remains.

"Leave him there." He turned to head inside. "Once Fin has a chance to collect whatever shit she needs, then have the boys throw him in the furnace."

She wouldn't be coming down to take those samples for quite a while if he had his way. Gonna wear you down, baby doll, he thought as he made his way to his bedroom, whistling softly. I guarantee it.

He entered his private sanctuary and stopped when he spotted the woman seated on his couch, pretty as a picture in the green dress he got one of the women to sew for her.

"Well, shit, darlin', had I known your cute li'l ass was here waiting for me..." He walked — prowled was more like it — towards her. "I'd have hurried the fuck back."

"You were the one who ordered me to return with Carson," she pointed out as she shifted to face him. "Were you not?"

"I sure as shit did." He set his cherished Lucille beside his chair before sending her a long, smoldering look. "You were supposed to return two fucking days ago."

"I'm sorry I didn't come back sooner." Her soft sigh sent curls of heat throughout his body. "I was regrettably detained."

"Yeah?" He took a seat across from her. "And why the fuck is that?"

"Because the delivery didn't go as smoothly as we hoped."

"Yeah?" One eyebrow lifted. "And?"

Didn't require much thinking for her to figure out what he was asking her.

"And it's a healthy baby girl."

A sweet little cherub born in the middle of a nightmare. A precious life they must all safeguard and teach how to face the evils of this fucking fucked up world.

"And her mother?"

"I'm sorry, Negan." Fin glanced down at her hands, folded neatly in her lap. "We couldn't save her."

Fucking fuck, he thought, gut twisting into a knot. Fucking fuckity fuck. He kept his expression and his voice carefully, neutrally blank when he asked the question burning a hole in his gut.

"Who will raise the baby?"

Her head came up at that. Confusion deepened the green of her eyes and wrinkled her brow.

"What?"

"I asked who is going to raise her."

"Well," she said slowly. "I'm assuming her father will."

"Good." He hid his disappointment. "That's good."

"Who did you think would raise her?"

Negan ignored her question and nodded towards the bed not ten feet away.

"How 'bout we continue this conversation over there?" He sent her a playful leer. "I promise you'll wake up tomorrow with a big smile on those pretty lips."

Fin merely sighed and changed the subject. Like she always did when he suggested they continue their conversation in bed.

"Is there something going on outside?"

"There sure as shit is," he said with a nod. "Need your help in figuring out who the fucking fuck killed a kid and put a stop to them."

"What is it you want me to do?"

His lips curved into a smile at those words.

"Why don't you come over here and sit in daddy's lap?" he invited in a low, intimate tone. "I'll tell you what you can do."

"I'm fine right here, thank you."

"Party-pooper."

She harrumphed.

"You said you wanted my help?"

"First things first." He nodded towards a box on the table. "Open your present." He leered at her. "We can discuss all the ways you can thank me for it after."

…

He was nothing if not consistent.

It was the one thing she learned about him in the year and a half since she first started working with the foul-mouthed despot. Well, that, she amended silently, and when he sets his mind to something, there is little that can be done to derail him.

And what Negan decided was he wanted her.

To get her, he went above and beyond his normal method of obtaining a woman. Mostly because he had no other choice but to employ a different manner of wooing her. Why? Well, she didn't need Negan to provide for her for one thing. She did fine for herself. She was also comfortable with exchanging her skills as a therapist and former officer for what goods and items she couldn't get otherwise.

Trading was the way of life in this new world regime. She also didn't mind working for points. If she didn't want to work, she left. She had other places to go and plenty of other things requiring her attention. Negan had been flustered by her staunch refusal to become one of his wives. He saw it as him bestowing a great honor on her.

She didn't agree.

Raya Kean wasn't a one of a kind woman. She was either an only or a not happening at all sort of woman.

Not that Negan gave up his pursuit.

Persistently consistent, he continued his pursuit of her. It started with little things like bottles of perfume. Then it became candles, soaps, and bath oils set around a diorama of a bathtub full of rose petals. Next came body lotions. All items meant to entice and appeal to her feminine side. She couldn't deny their effectiveness. She just didn't allow the items to cloud her judgment.

Giving in wasn't something she would do.

Not without Negan making a few concessions, first.

Number one being the dissolution of his harem. Every time she told him that was what he needed to do, he refused. So did she whenever he suggested that they adjourn to the bed for a little tango in the sheets. Such became the basis of their relationship. Negan continued giving her conspicuously wrapped presents, flirted outrageously with her, and she refused his advances with some quick, clever reply.

For over a year it worked.

Then Negan left her his last present. Everything she thought, indeed, that she felt for the wretched man, changed. The shimmering silk sheath dyed a vibrant shade of green knocked her for a loop. The simplicity of the design said he put an inordinate amount of thought into its selection. There were no frills, no fancy adornments, nothing sheer or otherwise inappropriate about it.

It was the sort of gift a man gave to a woman because he wanted her to feel, and know, she was beautiful.

Raya didn't consider herself a vain or frivolous woman. She didn't have any need or desire for pretty trinkets and trappings. Flattery didn't get a man anywhere with her. Her love and affection couldn't be bought with meaningless tokens and empty promises. However, she couldn't deny the small kick the dress had given to her feminine side. It is nice having a man pay such special attention to me, she admitted as she turned her attention to the gift he indicated.

She hadn't noticed it while waiting for him. Whatever it was, it was set beneath the covers of a miniature bed fashioned much like the one Negan slept in. The construction of the bedposts and deep oak frame showed an immense amount of time and effort. Even the bedding had been stitched with a certain amount of precision that a novice like her could appreciate. It was the type of work only a master craftsman would possess. Who here has this level of skill? she wondered as she uncrossed her legs and leaned forward. I want to know because I can use people like that.

In this new world they lived, skills, after all, were the new money.

"For me?" She queried as she traced her fingers over the coverlet. "A book?" Her lips curved upwards. "You're appealing to my intellect and not my feminine vanity this time?"

"Who says I'm not appealing to both, hm?"

One brow lifted.

"Are you saying you have found a gift that appeals to both?"

"Pull back the covers on the bed, baby doll." The gleam in his eyes had warning bells going off in her head. "You'll wanna meet Santa's little helper after you see what he's brought you." His lips stretched into a miles-wide smile that brought out the dimples in his cheeks. Raya felt a flash of an almost forgotten heat pool in her belly. Curls of keen-edged longing raced through her system, making her feel hot in places she didn't want, and cold in places she didn't need. "Well, he's not so little, if you know what I mean..."

There was little doubt in her mind about what little helper he wanted to introduce her too.

Same as she suspected that the book he got her was not one she would choose for herself.

"Am I going to find the Kama Sutra for Beginners beneath the sheet?"

"Shit, darlin', I can teach you everythin' you need to know."

Raya tried to form some rational sort of reply but found her brain and mouth refused to comply. Disconcerted by her response, she turned her attention to her gift. Despite her misgivings, she was curious to see what he was giving her this time. The book - at least she assumed it was a book - was tucked into the bed. Subtle, she thought as she slowly peeled the piece of silk back. And consistent. She drew a breath to settle her unsteady nerves before glancing at what was beneath the coverlet.

It was a book, she saw with some surprise, but not the one she expected.

"Washington's Spies: The Story of America's First Spy Ring," she read as she slowly lifted the paperback from its pillowy nook. "How did you know that I am interested in this particular part of American history?"

"I saw your cute li'l ass reading George Washington's Secret Six." He pointed to the one she held. "That one is a lot fucking better than that piece of shit was. There's more historical accuracy in Washington's Spies than Secret Six. And Rose looks more closely at how them British fucks lost the war and the Colonies through their own stupidity."

"You've read both?"

"Why is that such a shock?"

"It's not really." She heard his snort and harrumphed. "Okay, it is a bit of a shock to hear that you are as knowledgeable about history as you are in psychology and philosophy. I can't help but be a bit surprised since I always imagined your interests falling more towards sports related things. Especially since you told me that you were a high school gym coach before all this happened."

"Yeah." He gave a slight nod. "I was. Billiards and ping-pong mostly. Sometimes girls' softball or volleyball if they needed someone to pitch in because people were out sick and shit."

"I always preferred archery, horseback riding, and gymnastics myself."

She didn't add, and martial arts, swordplay, knife throwing, javelin, wrestling... That was all need to know information that Negan did not need to know.

"There's a goddamn shock," he drawled as he slowly got to his feet. "Could shoot a tick off a dog's dick from ten feet away."

She rolled her eyes at his gross exaggeration of her skills.

"I wouldn't put it quite like that..."

"Fucking truth."

"And you're nothing if not honest."

Bluntly so, she mentally added as she flipped the book open and read the inscription he scrawled on the inside of the front cover. Dear Wife had been written in extra big lettering. She sniffed delicately. Persistently consistent...

"Keep reading," he told her as he walked over to perch on the arm of the couch. "I wrote something extra-fucking-special for you."

Pinpricks of alarm about what he might have wrote shivered along her spine. And melted what little of her brain hadn't already been fried.

"I've got something special waiting for you under the mistletoe." She lifted her eyes to his twinkling ones. "First off, you don't have any mistletoe."

"Ahem." He held up a piece of paper for her to inspect. It was a page from some book, she could see that. A page that contained a picture of mistletoe.

Of course.

"You were sayin', baby doll?"

"And second," she said, breathless now. "I've told you that I won't become one of your mattress playmates until you get rid of the other ones."

"I'm trying to make you see the benefits of us forming an alliance that gives us both what we want." His fingers slid through the curls at her nape to rub the back of her neck in slow, soothing circles. "And need."

"I want and need to be more than a man's trophy," she murmured as the knots and pressure accumulated over these many months slowly started to unravel at his gentle massage. "Or a toy he can cast aside when he's done playing with me."

I won't let myself become my mother. I won't let my heart cause me or my children that much pain and misery.

"Goddamn it, Fin," he grumbled. "You fucking know you're not some fucking toy."

"Prove it then, Negan," she challenged in a moment of recklessness. "Prove I'm worth more than a notch on your bedpost. Prove that you want me and only me. Prove you won't tire of me and toss me away when you're done with me. Do all that and I'll gladly stay here as your wife."

Whatever he was about to say got cut short when there was a sharp rap at his bedroom door.

"What the fuck is it?" He barked. "I told you sorry shits I didn't want to be disturbed!"

"Sorry, Boss," came Fat Joey's gravelly voice through a small crack in the door. "Simon said I was to come and get you."

"What the fuck for?"

There was a momentary pause. Then he mumbled the last thing either she or Negan wanted to hear.

"We found another body."

Negan let loose a long litany of curse words that would have made even the saltiest of sailor's blush. Raya coughed and set her book back inside the box he wrapped it in.

"Just not Christmas for me," she said as she got to her feet, "without a little murder and mayhem to kick off the festivities."

"You want to jingle my balls?" He tossed the picture of the mistletoe on the table before stalking over to retrieve Lucille. "Catch the muther fucking fuck doing this shit." He swung the bat in a sweeping arc. "I've got something we can ring his silver bells with."

He turned then to stalk from the room. Raya made to follow him but paused when she spied the picture of the mistletoe. The book, as well as the picture, had been a lovely gesture.

He could have demanded a kiss in return for his gift.

Instead, he tried to cajole one out of her by appealing to her romantic side. Sweet of him, she thought as she took the picture, folded it, and slid it between the pages of the book.

There had been many times these last few months where he showed he could be more than a barbaric despot.

"Are you fucking coming or what?"

And then there were those times when he was a royal pain in the ass...

"Yes, I'm coming," she grumbled as she made her way from the bedroom. "You, jackass."

A/N: Hello, all, and welcome! Legal out of the way, I own nothing that belongs looks like it belongs to DC or Robert Kirkman and AMC.

This story is set after my crossover piece, Days Gone Bye and three and a half months before my open work, Burn.

Please, if you like this piece, follow/favorite it!