If You Should See Me…
It was 8:30am when Stephanie and Paul finally arrived at Titan Towers and Stephanie's heart started to beat wildly. She had thought she'd be fine coming back to work but entering the car park, she wasn't so sure. Silently she reached across the car, trembling hand taking hold of her husband's hand tightly, squeezing slightly as they drove in.
"Baby, are you sure you're okay?" Paul asked softly, glancing over at her as he deliberately drove to the furthest space along the car park. As two of the top executives, both their spaces were within the first row of parks but instead of going to Stephanie's usual park, they'd taken one car and parked in Paul's spot instead.
Stephanie took several long, deep breaths before nodding unsteadily before answering. "No," she shook her head. "But I don't know how ready I'll ever be. I just, I need to do it," she told him firmly, with a precise nod of her head. What she'd said was true, she didn't think she'd ever be okay about it but she could start moving on and that included facing her current fear. Still, even being so close to where her attack had happened was nerve-wracking; she knew nothing would happen, her father had doubled down on security and most importantly, Paul would never let anything happen to her. Not again.
Pulling into the parking space, Paul sighed. It had only been three weeks and he honestly didn't think Stephanie should be back at work yet. He's told her as much and while he'd tried not to have an argument, that was what had happened. The executive had felt terrible for raising his voice at his wife – he always did during arguments – but this had felt worse. Eventually he'd given in, realising how stubborn his wife was and knowing there was no talking her out of it. He couldn't keep her wrapped up in cotton wool and protected forever like he wanted. So here they were, sitting in the parking lot of their office while she tried not to hyperventilate.
"I know you need to do this but just…take your time, okay?" He told her with a sigh. "I love you Stephanie, I know you can do this and I'll always be right here if you need me," he told her sweetly, giving her hand an encouraging squeeze.
They both stayed there for a moment, holding hands before getting out of the car and making their way into Titan Towers. Walking past her usual parking space, neither Stephanie nor Paul glanced towards the empty spot and as they walked inside, Stephanie finally started to feel like things were going to be okay.
Detective Eric Southward was frustrated. It had been three weeks since he and his partner, Detective Maggie Cohan had been assigned what was considered a high profile case. He had been confused at first, as to why the case was supposedly 'high profile', there didn't seem to be media attention around the woman and he'd never heard her name before.
That was until he and Maggie actually went to speak to the woman. It had been at the hospital, the day after her attack and as he and Maggie approached her hospital room with a nurse leading the way, that he saw three tall men arguing by her room. One of the men, clearly gone grey and wearing jeans and a tight black sweater had his back towards them. The other two were in rumpled suits and he could see both their faces, instantly recognising one. Triple H, a wrestler. A former wrestler at least if the buzz cut and suit was anything to go by.
Maggie had spoken first, gaining the attention of all three men. Eric had watched the WWF as a teenager and as the men turned it hadn't taken long for him to identify the other two men either. With two McMahon's and a Triple H, it didn't take long for him to piece together who their victim was likely to be.
Stephanie McMahon. Or, now married, Stephanie Levesque rather.
Either way, three weeks they'd been working on this case, trying to figure out who could have possibly raped the former Billion Dollar Princess. Their first thoughts had been a stalker, or an over zealous fan who couldn't separate fiction from reality. But they'd found nothing suggesting either of those things.
The husband had been the next suspect, violent assaults were usually perpetrated by someone the victim knows, but over a dozen employees and a flight crew could attest that he'd been in Florida. It left Eric and Maggie with basically nothing, no leads and no idea who could've attacked Stephanie McMahon.
"There's nothing," he murmured, looking over the case file once more. Every lead they could think to look at was dead and unless the DNA from the rape kit gave them anything new, the case would have to be put on the back burner. It wasn't something either of them really wanted to do, especially when such a brutal and horrendous crime had been committed but without a lead, the case was dead.
"I wouldn't be so sure about that," Maggie Cohan, the voice of his partner spoke up from behind him.
Eric swung around in his chair, leaning back as he looked up at her. She had a folder clutched tightly in her hand as she stood in front of him, tapping it with a barely restrained smirk. "The DNA came back from the lab and…I think we've got something," she told him, dropping the folder on his desk and flipping it to the page she wanted to show him. "Read that," she pointed to the results, arms crossed as she leant against his desk.
Eric frowned but leant forward, eyes scanning the words, skipping over the scientific jargon he didn't understand. Until he got to a sentence that made his eyes widen, looking up at her in shock.
"Does that mean what I think it means?" He asked seriously, hands tightening on the table.
Maggie nodded, eyebrows raised. "Yeah, it does. The lab checked it three times. I think we've finally got a lead," she told him seriously.
"Yeah. I think we do. Let's go have a little chat," Eric nodded, grabbing his coat as he stood and following his partner out of the station. They'd finally caught a break in the case, a disturbing one but a break nonetheless.
AN: Guys. I wrote this on my iPhone cause I broke my laptop screen. I'm not sure how often I'll be able to update my other fics. But I'll give it a go.
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed. Please review. :) LT.