"So do you just want me to stand in the corner menacingly, or do you want me to take part in the conversation, or like, do you want me to wait outside the door?"

"Why would I have you wait outside the door?" Stephanie asked.

"I don't know, like as your bodyguard or something, standing out there, not letting anyone in. In case you've forgotten, I had a security guard when I was in WCW so I know how the gig goes."

"Plus you were actually a bouncer for a while," she said offhandedly, and he took pause at that. Sometimes, it astonished him how much information he'd given up to Stephanie without really thinking about it. All this time, he'd been divulging all his secrets to a woman he thought of as only a warm body to sleep next to every night, and instead, he was building this foundation.

He could see himself with Stephanie for the forseeable future, and for him the forseeable future was from now until the end of time. It was something that was scary and exhilarating, this creeping feeling of something incredibly permanent. He wasn't really thinking engagement right now, but he could feel it lurking around the corner. It was something he would have to think long and hard about, but the more time he spent with Stephanie, the more he saw this as his future.

One thing Stephanie did that no other woman he'd been with ever did was challenge him. Stephanie was his equal in everything, and from the moment he met her, she never was ashamed of who she was or the choices she made. That was never more evident than the day they met and ended up in bed together.

He was getting ahead of himself though. Even if he and Stephanie had been together unknowingly for months, and sleeping together even farther back than that, marriage was a major step that he didn't know if they were ready to take. Maybe someday, he though as he squeezed her hand. She looked over at him in question and he just shrugged, taking her in for a long moment. She was so beautiful in such unexpected ways, and everything about her surprised him, from the very moment he'd met her until now.

"What?" she asked, furrowing her brow and looking almost annoyed at him. "Why are you looking at me like that?"

"I just can't believe that you remember that," he told her.

"Why wouldn't I? You told me like the entire story of how you got to this company, that was a pretty big thing for you to tell me," she was looking at him like he was stupid or something.

"It's just not something I would have figured you remembered, it wasn't a huge part of the story."

"Yeah, well, I'm unexpected like that," she winked at him as they came upon Paul's dressing room. "Okay, here we are, I think that the best option is the looking menacing in the corner one. I think I can handle the rest, and I don't know, maybe if we can get a video camera to record the moment, that would be great, it would be like revenge porn or something."

"You're so weird sometimes."

"You like me like that."

"So you think," he laughed as he leaned forward to knock on the door. He took a step back and let go of Stephanie's hand in order to loosely wrap his arm around her waist, his thumb playing with the top of her pants. She almost swatted him away for trying to tease her like that, but before she could, Paul opened the door. He immediately smiled upon seeing Stephanie, but his expression instantly turned sour when he spotted Chris next to her. Chris could even see his grip tightening on the door, and that alone made Chris want to laugh then spontaneously make out with Stephanie right there in the doorway. It would go against his plan of standing there menacingly, but it would be worth it.

"Stephanie, hey," Paul said, again with a smile, "Chris," and this time his voice was gruff and annoyed. "What's going on?"

"I was talking with my dad about the storyline," Stephanie nearly pushed her way into the room, Paul barely getting out of the way as she squeezed past him, dragging Chris behind her. Chris just shrugged in Paul's general direction with a smirk that apologized for his girlfriend's behavior. In all honesty, he didn't really care.

"Oh yeah, it's been so fun lately," Paul said, and Chris could denote a tone of haughtiness in his voice, like he was trying to make Chris jealous. Yes, Chris hated that Paul was kissing Stephanie, the caveman in him wanted to take possession of her, but in reality, Stephanie could take care of herself, and she knew the line between character and real life, unlike Paul. Chris wondered if Paul, at the beginning, before he and Stephanie came to realize their relationship, had ever thought he stood a chance with Stephanie. She could imagine that he did, that he sat there and thought of all the ways he could ask her out.

It kind of tickled him that he'd never actually had to ask Stephanie out in the first place. There was no first date, no nervous waiting outside her door, no pondering whether or not she was having a good time, no contemplating whether or not to kiss her on the first date. It had been more like him making sure they had a condom before having sex. Falling into a relationship with Stephanie was like slipping into a warm bath at the end of the night.

"Yeah, sure," Stephanie told him dismissively, "but there are going to be some changes."

"Changes?" Paul asked, and Chris wondered if he could feel the tide shifting.

"Yes, my father has put me in charge of the storyline, I'm sure you know," Stephanie told him, leaning back against the table sitting against the wall where Paul had set down some of this things, "and I've been thinking about it, and I really want to make an impact, show something the fans have never seen before."

"I thought that's what we were going to do with the whole match at Fully Loaded."

"Yeah, and that's going to be great, Chris is amazing in the ring and he will carry you to a great match," Stephanie said it so nonchalantly that it didn't even register with Paul at first that Stephanie was implying that Paul was the lesser wrestler between the two men. Chris had to hold in the enormous smirk that threatened to split his face in two.

When it did register with Paul, he flinched noticeably, "Um, it'll be a great match."

"Yes, and it will really set into motion what's going to happen after that," Stephanie's tone started to shift slightly, and it had gloating written all over it.

"What's going to happen after that," Paul echoed, not really asking the question, but acting like a parrot. He could tell this wasn't going to be something that he wanted to hear.

"Chris and I will be getting together onscreen. We've run our course, Paul, but this is wrestling, the land of a thousand swerves, if you will," she told him, "nothing lasts, and you and I, we were supposed to be over ages ago, we weren't even really supposed to be a thing in the first place. It was only supposed to last like a month, and its run its course."

"I don't understand, we're good together," he argued.

"But have you heard the reaction for me and Chris," she told him, "he and I are tearing the crowds apart, and if there isn't any payoff, what's the entire point?"

"So we move on," Paul said, "we move on to another feud."

"We both will, just in separate directions," Stephanie said, "the culmination of this storyline will be me turning on you and being with Chris. I'm thinking that we reveal that Chris and I have been sleeping together, we'd get so much heat for that."

"But Irvine is a face," Paul tried to point out. "I'm the one who's the heel."

"But wouldn't you want to be a face for a little while? You've been on the other side before, haven't you? I mean, DX was kind of like that, the goofy whatever you were trying to pull," Stephanie purposely downplaying what DX was to this company.

In a lot of ways, Stephanie was more like her father than she ever wanted to admit. Chris knew that she aspired to be like her mother, not docile necessarily, but calmer, more rational than her father, but Stephanie showed traits of Vince all the time, and it was a sight to see. She could manipulate someone so fluidly that they didn't know they were bamboozled until she left the conversation. He could see that happening right now. She was twisting and turning Paul into such a pretzel, it might take him hours to straighten his brain out and figure out just what she'd done.

"I'm better as a heel," he tried to argue, his tongue suddenly feeling like sandpaper. He glanced over at Chris to see if Chris had anything to do with this. Paul fancied himself a good reader of people, but Chris gave nothing away.

"Yeah, but that's exactly why you should play a face for a while. You wouldn't want to become stagnant, would you? The best wrestlers always reinvent themselves every once in a while."

"I don't know that it'll work."

"People hate me, and Chris was an awesome heel in WCW," Stephanie smiled a little over at him. "I remember because I saw it with my own two eyes."

"Just the way I like it," he winked at her, and she laughed, turning back to Paul. "I think he deserves that chance again, don't you think? I mean, when he came into the company, it was as a heel, and I don't know, I don't think he got a fair shake at it. That's my final decision. So that's what I wanted to tell you, we'll nail out the details a little bit later, but I wanted to give you advance notice, so I think you could incorporate more face type behavior from here on out."

"Stephanie, do you think I can talk to you…privately," he slid his eyes over to Chris, who shrugged and looked expectantly at Stephanie. He didn't particularly trust Paul with Stephanie, but he also knew that Stephanie could handle herself.

"Okay," she nodded. Chris walked in front of her, squeezing her shoulder as he passed, giving her a supportive smile. He walked out the door and stood right by it in case she needed him. "So what is it?" Stephanie asked, "we're alone now, like you asked."

"I really don't think this is a good idea," Paul came to stand directly in front of her. "I don't think that breaking us up is the right thing to do. I think that you're acting on impulse here rather than thinking about what's good for business, what's good for the show."

"I don't think I am at all," Stephanie said, "we were never supposed to be together this long at all, and this has nothing to do with my relationship with Chris."

"Doesn't it? And what happens when you two break up and then what, you're stuck together in this uncomfortable position?"

Stephanie cocked her head to the side as she gazed at him. "So you think Chris and I are going to break up? Is this because you want us to break up or because you want to plan something to break us up?"

He acted aghast at the suggestion, "I wouldn't—"

"Wouldn't you? Haven't you?" she wondered. "Paul, look, this is how it is, and maybe you think it has to do with the fact that I'm with Chris and that I'm just being a selfish, little brat who wants her way, but I do not care. I know more about this business than you could ever hope to know, so butt out. I'm putting our on-screen relationship on notice, and if you don't like it, well, that's just too damn bad."

"Stephanie—"

"Goodbye." She walked confidently out of the room, nearly bumping into Chris when she walked out.

"What did he want?" Chris asked.

"Pleading," Stephanie rolled her eyes.

"What did you do?"

"I shut him down."