I honestly have not been up to par with editing; I seem to be suffering a terrible case of writer's block. However, the number of new followers has motivated me to publish the next chapter of 'When Beauty Meets Beastly', so I will therefore allow all of you to enjoy this chapter. Hope you enjoy it!
P.S. RIP Wade's beautiful beard :'(
I have not gone soft. Wade Barrett is not soft, the Englishman thought furiously as he watched his opponent (or at least, his prey) for the night posing on the turnbuckle for his entrance. He secured his red elbow guards, stretching his shoulders and rolling his neck slightly. He was going to crush Justin Gabriel, that pathetic little spot monkey with a simple yet brutal Souvenir.
He was not going to let some doll-faced Diva occupy his thoughts tonight.
Wade groaned. He was thinking about Katona again. He was thinking about the one woman on the roster who wasn't looking to get some action from the men. She was one of his former partners back in their days at FCW, and he knew very well that she was far from the persona that she was so stubbornly putting up now. Yet something about her new character was drawing him towards her like a magnet.
No. Wade Barrett does not get lured by women easily. Wade Barrett is an accomplished, focused fighter in the ring. Wade Barrett is a bareknuckle fighting champion, not some lovesick teenager.
His music hit and that was his cue to make his presence known, to let the world know that he wasn't going to go all sappy over one Diva.
Katona stormed through the backstage hallway, knocking away every object in sight. Tossing chairs, shoving passing crewmembers aside, she seethed in anger, the steam practically shooting out of her ears. A loss was a loss, but losing to someone like Kaitlyn because of the stupid referee was nothing but embarrassing. Her foot was on the ropes; she swore it was on the ropes! Even a blind bat could sense that the count should've been broken.
It was definitely not a bad call by accident.
She'd won that match, fair and square. She had been the one launching the offensive throughout the whole match, and then suddenly she finds herself stuck in a rather awkward position with Kaitlyn on top (no innuendo intended). But her foot had managed to rest on the ropes. That damned referee, that fucking referee. She swore the referees in this company had just been randomly picked off from the streets at the last minute and had black and white striped shirts placed on them. Whatever it was, the fact that she'd lost because of the referee's stupidity put her in a rather pissed mood.
It didn't help that she later crashed into a rather solid chest, her eyes on a broad expanse of pectoral muscle. She sighed as the large figure loomed over her 5'7'' frame, mimicking her movements as she tried to step aside him.
"What the bloody hell do you want, Barrett?" Katona snapped, sneering at her fellow Englishman.
"Nothing, love. Merely a coincidence that you bumped into me," Wade Barrett replied in a relaxed manner.
"I'm in a rather pissy mood at the moment, so I don't feel like playing any of your stupid games," she retorted, attempting to walk around him, but once again he blocked her path.
"Don't bother trying to avoid me, love. I know exactly why you look like you've got a stick shoved up your arse." Katona's jaw dropped at Wade's statement, unsure whether to whip her palm across his face or not. "I watched your bout with the Divas Champion just now and I completely understand. The referees around here can't do their bloody job."
"I appreciate that you agree with me, Wade, but that's not going to help you get my phone number," Katona replied stubbornly.
Wade had the sudden urge to burst into laughter at the moment. True, she was bloody attractive that it was difficult not to look at her, but it wasn't like every man wanted to get into her pants. He chuckled, "why do you always think that I'm trying to hook up with you, love?"
"Because I want people to take me seriously," Katona suddenly felt herself letting her guard down, "you're a man, Wade. You don't know what it's like to be constantly degraded and looked down on because of your gender. All these years when I wrestled my heart out, I never realized that the only reason why people, men in particular, paid attention to me was because of my looks and not my talent. The truth is, Wade, no one cares about women's wrestling anymore, and it's my mission to get people to take me seriously. And in order to focus on my mission, I dumped my overly affectionate boyfriend, joined the Sisters of Destruction, and then left them because Beth and Nattie were too caught up in their own little catfight. And now I'm here rejecting your advances because I don't want to be looked at like I'm a piece of meat."
"I haven't any intention of making advances towards you, Katona, love," Wade said gently. It was difficult not to quote a cheesy pick-up line, though. The fact that she was giving him that look with her baby blue eyes didn't help his urges. She may have her head stuck up her ass, but hell, he never thought anyone could look that good when they were angry.
Katona rolled her eyes. "The fact that you're taking the time to approach me, when you're technically supposed to be focusing on the World Heavyweight Championship, gives it away."
Once again he watched her go. He hadn't a clue why she'd suddenly opened up to him at that moment, but as she confessed to him her true feelings about being around here he could tell that she was beginning to crumble into a mental breakdown. He knew that she was a woman of importance that was to be taken seriously as a wrestler, something that she wanted more than anything else. He knew that the women around here were treated like—as she put it—pieces of meat for show; they were given only two minutes to roll around the ring and hopefully experience a wardrobe malfunction.
Wade had known Katona for years, and he knew that she was far from the typical standard that the WWE hired to become so-called 'wrestlers'.
She's more, he thought, she's much more than that. And I want to be the one to get her to realize that.
But he was Wade Barrett, a fighter, the Prince. He was a man who showed no mercy, yet he found himself unable to escape his thoughts of the High-Flying Angel.
She's right; I should be focusing on Orton and that World Heavyweight Championship that he's been lugging around for far too long. I am not to be wasting time on her if all she does to me is reject me.
As he made his way down the ramp, Wade did his usual entrance, strutting down in his usual cocky manner, giving his former Nexus partner the nastiest glare he could. He was going to use Justin Gabriel to send a message to the World Heavyweight Champion. No longer would he be stuck in the mid-card; when his quest to defeat Randy Orton succeeds, he would rise to the top where he belonged.
The bell rang and soon Wade Barrett's head was in the game, focusing on overpowering the lighter yet speedier Justin Gabriel with his looming stature and muscle. Easily he managed to break the grapple and push Gabriel into the ropes. Barrett then knocked the South African Sensation over the ropes effortlessly with a clothesline, sending him crashing onto the concrete floor outside. Noticing Justin Gabriel wincing as he arched his back, Barrett decided to take advantage of his nagging injury. He was going to make sure Randy Orton saw every strike onto Gabriel's back, to give Gabriel a feel of what he was going to do to that damned Orton when the time comes.
I am not soft. I'll show her that I'm anything but soft.
Hopping off of the ring apron, the Bare-Knuckled Brawler took advantage of Gabriel's injury and Irish-whipped him into the ring post. Gabriel shrieked in agony, the cold, metal pole hitting him right on the spine. Barrett then proceeded to kick and stomp at his opponent's abdomen until he was crouched to the ground, panting heavily and shuddering from the pain. Wasting not a single second, Barrett grabbed Gabriel by his hair and tossed him back into the ring like a rag doll. He later made the mistake of taunting the crowd, however, as Gabriel managed to get back on his feet and hit a running dropkick.
The tables turned on the cocky Wade Barrett, as Gabriel launched a barrage of attacks. Getting the crowd pumped up, Gabriel then made his way over to the turnbuckles to launch an aerial attack. However, the time that Gabriel took to do so—because of his very strained back—allowed Barrett to recover in time to hit Gabriel with an uppercut. The Prince then easily tossed Gabriel off of the top rope and took his place there, leaping off the ropes for a diving elbow drop. One last Souvenir was all he needed to secure the easy win.
"Here is your winner, Wade Barrett!"
Wade refused the referee who was just about to raise his hand in victory. Instead, the bare-knuckled fighter had something else in mind. Pulling Gabriel by the ankles, Wade locked his already incapacitated opponent into an innovated submission maneuver that greatly resembled Charlie Haas's Haas of Pain. Demanding the referee deliver him a microphone, the Prince proceeded to jeer at his opponent's pain.
I'll show her that what I am is certainly not soft.
"You see this, Randy Orton? Listen to his cries of pain, those cries of suffering. Come the day I face you for the World Heavyweight title, this will be your fate. I'm long overdue for the gold, and Orton, neither you nor anyone else will get in my way of achieving what should have been mine years ago."
Yet as Wade Barrett finally released Justin Gabriel and cockily headed towards the back, the World Heavyweight Championship was not the only desire that remained on his mind.