Seth was pretty sure his face had stayed an embarrassed red for the last two days.

He paced his locker room, heart pounding as he worried about going on television for the first time since the pictures had been posted. Vince had been furious about it, although Seth had argued his case, he thought, pretty well. He had no idea how they had been posted, neither had Becky.

His hands shook a bit, even so. The comments he'd received over Twitter had been disgusting enough and, aside from Vince and Hunter, he hadn't spoken to anyone about it. These pictures were so much worse than the ones that had been posted online a couple of years ago.

Vince hadn't really understood it, Seth could tell. Oh, he understood some of it, but he would probably never understand why Seth would let Becky do the things she did and there were enough macho posturing backstage that Seth figured he wasn't going to have the best time with the other members of the roster for a while.

He'd already heard enough jokes about Becky being "The Man" in their relationship as well as the ring in the last two days to last him a lifetime.

The only people who hadn't made some judgmental comment, or at the very least looked at him weird, were Roman, Jon, and Becky herself. He was thinking about everything he was supposed to do over the next several weeks in a different light, really.

Like, he and Becky were supposed to go to his two best friend's wedding next week. Jon and Roman were cool with it, but he imagined Roman's family and all their mutual friends silently judging them and cringed. It was ridiculous but he couldn't help but to think about it. It made him wonder about his own family. Or Becky's.

When the door clicked open, he froze for several seconds while Becky slipped inside and shut the door behind her. Then he strode over to her and dropped to his knees in front of her, leaning forward so that he could wrap an arm around her waist and rest his head on her stomach.

They hadn't gotten to see each other much since the pictures had been posted but they didn't say anything for several minutes. Becky's fingers went to his hair, scratching along his scalp, her other on his neck, a thumb stroking along the side of his neck.

"Do you want to take it off?" She asked finally, voice quiet, measured.

Seth jolted at the question. "I…" He hesitated. "I don't…" Did he? Would it even matter if he did? It was already out there, but there was a part of him, a small part but a part anyway, that did feel like their relationship had been tainted…or violated in some way. This sort of stuff was only supposed to be between them.

He tilted his head down a little while still keeping it resting against her. Hiding under his jeans was the cage that the pictures had shown. It was a part of their arrangement, of their dynamic. Becky was in control, and he liked it that way.

He hated it that those pictures…pictures of him in a collar and caged up were making him doubt what they should do. He wished that he didn't care what anybody thought. Why should he? They were the assholes, whoever had gotten a hold of the pictures and posted them online. The people who were running him down over what type of relationship he had, too.

He liked what they were doing. There was a thrill, one unlike he'd ever felt with any of his exes, in knowing that he couldn't come unless Becky unlocked him and let him. There was a thrill in following her orders or facing some sort of punishment.

No, those people could fuck off. He tried to imagine having her take the cage off, imagined going back to a more "normal" relationship and grimaced. There was nothing wrong with the other types of relationships, but when he looked back over his and Becky's, he recognized that there was this…need he had for it to be the way it was.

He was only surprised it had taken him as long as it had to recognize it, and to realize that maybe that was why he'd been so dissatisfied with his previous relationships.

"No," he said finally, firmly. "No, I don't want you to take it off."

"Okay."

They moved together until Becky was sitting and Seth was kneeling at her feet, head in her lap. He supposed he would still feel embarrassed later, that he would worry about what some people thought.

But this…this was all that really mattered.