Your Guardian Angel (A Daryl Dixon Story)

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter 18

"How's your eye?" Daryl asked looking over at Brielle.

They had stayed at the farm house for three days while Judith rested and recuperated from her illness. It didn't take her long to show signs of getting better once she got the right medication. The group was now finally back on the road and headed towards Brielle's home. They had crossed the border into Minnesota over an hour ago. Surprisingly, it hadn't snowed as much the further north they drove, so the roads were easier to navigate.

"Fine," Brielle said quietly.

She had a gash on the side of her eye and it was a deep purple. She noticed every time Daryl looked at her a look of anger and hatred flashed in his eyes. She hated that look. She knew Daryl wanted to kill that man that took them captive, but it would not have solved anything.

"Fine," Daryl said back and sighed putting his attention back on the road.

Brielle opted to not respond after that. She knew time was going to help heal this wound and she was going to sit back and allow that to happen.

The group had done well with mapping out their course to avoid any large cities and navigated their way through Minnesota with ease. The weather was cooperating with them for once and Brielle was started to get more and more anxious with each mile that they came closer to her home.

Daryl had noticed a change in Brielle's demeanor change as they got closer to his home. He smiled slightly as she sat up in her seat and leaned forward. He slowly saw that hope in her eyes that he noticed when he first met her and he could feel the anticipation in his stomach as well. It was addicting.

"We should stop just up ahead here. There is park we can pull into," she said motioning for Daryl to pull over.

Daryl listened to Brielle's instructions and pulled into the area that was once a roadside park. He turned the vehicle off and looked over at Brielle.

"We're almost there!" she said excitedly as she exited the vehicle.

Daryl smiled at her excitement, but it quickly faded as he started to think of all the possibilities that could occur in the next couple of hours. What if her family didn't survive? What if they did survive, but didn't allow for him and his group to stay? How would Brielle respond to that? How would he respond to that?

Daryl reluctantly got out of the vehicle to Brielle, Glen and Rick already talking about their plan of attack.

"I say we go in on foot from here. It's about a mile down this way," Brielle said pointing to the map. "Once we get to the house, we'll have to find the map that Stu left for me and then we'll come back and get the vehicles," she continued to explain.

"Map?" Glen asked confused.

"Yes, to the camp that my Mom and Stu are at. He said he'd leave me directions once I got home," she explained.

Glen looked disappointed. "I thought we were at our destination."

"Almost," Brielle said looking at him sympathetically. She took a deep breath and looked up at the sky. "We better get a move on. It smells like snow," she said walking away from the Jeep to grab her supplies.

"Great," Glen said folding up the map. "More snow."

Rick offered a smile to Glen's sarcasm. He was hopeful that their journey would be done soon. He was tired of traveling. He noticed Daryl standing off to the side quietly.

"You okay?" he asked watching Daryl's body language.

"Sure," he said nodding.

"Hey, we're going to be okay," Rick said trying to get Daryl to look him in the eyes. "We're almost done with this."