Paul was stunned by the announcement that Stephanie had just slurred at him but clearly he was expected to respond in some way. Trish was staring at him open mouthed, Stephanie was staring at him angrily and everyone else in the room was simply staring at him. But what was he supposed to say? This could not really be happening, could it? How on Earth could Stephanie be stupid enough to get pregnant? And how did she know that it was his anyway? That had to be the first question.
"How do you know it's mine?"
"Quite easy really," Stephanie snorted, "I've not been with anyone else. Trust me I would rather it be anyone but you but it's you."
Paul's response came automatically, "What the fuck were you thinking? How could you let this happen? Tell me you're not keeping it?"
Stephanie exploded, "I fucking knew you would say something like that. You're the most disgusting bastard on the planet." With that she stormed out and slammed the door. Trish was next to start on him. Her voice was a long way from a shout, it was more of a shocked or dazed mumble, "You got her pregnant? She's carrying your baby? Oh god Paul I can't do this." She hopped off the edge of the desk and hurried towards the door.
Paul felt his head spinning. What the hell had just happened? That stupid bitch was pregnant and Trish was blaming him and walking out on him? Hell no. He was not going to let Stephanie's stupidity ruin his marriage. He headed after Trish as fast as he could but of course it was slower than she was walking. By the time he made it to the door Trish was halfway along the hallway. "Trish! Wait! Come back!"
Surprisingly Trish did actually stop and then started heading back towards him but as she did so Paul noticed that she was crying. Great. Stephanie had caused this and now he would have to come up with a way to fix it and fast. Before he came up with anything Trish was speaking, her voice breaking as she did so, "I've been trying. I've been trying so hard to make this work but now this. You know how much this hurts me? Another woman, a woman who you cheated on me with, is carrying your baby. What am I supposed to do when it's born, when there's a constant reminder of what you did?"
Again Paul was left struggling for an answer. What was he supposed to say to that other than the obvious? "Trish you already knew that I slept with Stephanie and we've been fine these last couple of weeks. Why does the fact that she's stupid enough to get pregnant have to change that?"
"Just don't Paul," Trish sighed with a defeated shake of the head, "I'm going home." She turned and stormed away again but Paul asked, "What about us? We're okay, right?"
Once more Trish turned but all she could say was, "I don't know. I don't know anything any more." Paul realised that this time as she walked away she was not going to stop. He felt rage building up inside of him and it needed a release of some kind and the first idea was to find Stephanie and cut loose at her for her stupidity. He headed off to attempt to find her but failed as she apparently was not in the women's locker room or anywhere else that he looked. After five minutes of searching, growing more and more angry by the second he was finally unable to control himself and he punched the door that he had happened to be walking past as hard as he could which did not have much effect on the wood but it hurt his hand like hell. "Fuck! Stupid fucking bitch!"
"What the hell do you think you're doing?"
Of all of the voices Paul could have heard angrily questioning him at that moment this one was top of the list that he would have wanted to avoid. How did Laura always appear at the worst time? There was no way he was going to listen to shit from her now. His blood was boiling already and she was going to be the next target if she was not very careful. He turned to face her and issued a warning, "You'd better get out of my face Laura. Now is not the time for..."
"Shut the fuck up! Don't you fucking dare talk to me like that!" The explosion was the first time Paul had ever heard Laura scream at someone and it actually staggered him as she did it with a kind of immense fury that he had rarely seen from a person before, let alone a woman. She demanded, "Where's McMahon?" Surely she did not know already? How the hell could she? But it seemed that she did, her eyes were alive with too much anger for it to simply relate to his ill considered warning. Paul actually found himself trying to calm down in the face of it as anything could happen if she was this angry. "I don't know," he mumbled in answer to the barked question.
"My office, now!" With that Laura stormed off, presumably to find Stephanie. All of this was her fault and now he was going to have to take a grilling from Laura as well as try to mend fences with Trish when he got home. What an utter disaster. Why could she not have just done whatever it was that women did to stop themselves getting pregnant? Were they not supposed to take a pill or something? How could this even be happening? He did not even know where Laura's office was which meant that he had to ask directions on the way there. When he finally found it he made sure to knock before walking in just in case Laura had beaten him back there but the room was empty. Several minutes dragged by with Paul standing and waiting which led him to hope that Laura would be calmer when she arrived in the office. The door opened behind him and then slammed shut. Laura's voice came and it was no calmer at all as she approached him and then ended up standing in front of him, "Paul Levesque, Trish Levesque, Stephanie McMahon. Why is it that I have no issues with anyone that works in any of my companies other than the three names I just mentioned? Over and over I keep hearing them," Suddenly her voice rose to a scream again, even louder than in the hallway and this time directly in Paul's face causing him to take a step back, "And I'm starting to get fucking tired of it!"
Paul's plan had been to tell Laura to calm down but that now seemed incredibly ill advised so he remained silent and listened to the rant continue, noticing that despite Laura's dark skin her face was turning red with anger. "I've got you going around fucking anything that moves, your wife in my office crying or asking for a new job every other fucking week and now I've got McMahon, one of if not the best talent in our divas division showing up here pregnant and drunk. And do you know what the common problem is in all of this?"
The answer was obvious but Paul had no intention of providing it. She was attempting to blame everything on him. Again he decided to remain silent and Laura continued, "You! I'm sick of all the crap I have to deal with that you cause. You'd better sort your life out and do it fast because I've had enough. I gave you the job that you asked for and this is what I get in return?" Again her voice rose to a scream, "This shit will stop!"
"Laura I didn't even know..." Paul began to defend himself but he was cut off but more screaming, "Get out! Go home. Fix things with Trish, leave Trish, go move in with Stephanie, go walk in front of a train, I don't give a fuck what you do but don't show up in my offices or at Raw again until you can guarantee that I don't hear a word about any of you. Is that clear?"
"Yes, clear," Paul mumbled, just glad to be able to get out of the office. "Send Stephanie in here." With that he was dismissed. He was glad that he was not the one who had shown up for work drunk. If Stephanie kept her job with Laura in this mood it would be a miracle, not that he cared. It would serve the stupid bitch right if anything for putting him in this spot with Trish and Laura.
Despite being drunk Stephanie realised that she was in deep shit as she waited in the hallway outside of the boss' office because she could quite clearly hear her screaming at Paul. If that was how she reacted to Paul what was the reaction going to be to her showing for Raw drunk? It had been incredibly stupid to spend all day in the bar at the hotel after finding out that she was pregnant. How could this be happening to her? Paul Levesque had used her, fucked her a few times and then discarded her like yesterday's garbage and not only that he had gotten her pregnant. There was always the option of abortion but she could not do that, no way. The baby might be Paul's but it was also her own and she could not kill her own child. She would never be able to live with herself if she did that. The poor child was going to have to grow up with Paul as a father or more than likely with no father at all. Paul's first instinct had been that she should not keep the baby, just as she had suspected. The guy really was the lowest of the low. His only interest had been to try to prevent Trish from leaving him. She was going to be a single mother with no help from her parents. Only Shane and Marissa would be there for her but even with their help it seemed that her wrestling career was likely to be over almost before it started. Paul Levesque had ruined her life and he did not even care. Just then Paul came out of the office with his cheeks red, presumably embarrassed at being screamed at by Laura or angry, or both. "She wants you in there. Really good job you fucking idiot," was all that he had to say. Stephanie summoned the courage to speak her own mind and spat at him, "You've ruined my life you bastard."
The reaction she got was not what she had expected. Paul got in her face, intimidating her and growled, "News flash you stupid little bitch. I didn't rape you, we fucked each other and you've gone and got pregnant. Don't come crying to me about it. I don't want anything to do with you or your stupid kid. Stay away from me and stay away from my wife." With that he walked away as fast as his bad knee would let him leaving Stephanie shaking. She felt scared for more than one reason; not only had Paul just frightened her she had never been screamed at like Paul just had by Laura before in her life and she was afraid of it happening now. She imagined that showing up drunk gave Laura the right to fire her on the spot. What on Earth had she been thinking? Despite hating the guy she had to admit that Paul was right, she was a fucking idiot. She could be about to be out of a job as well as pregnant. There was only one choice; tell Laura the truth and hope for mercy. As she walked into the office tears already came to Stephanie's eyes as she spoke before Laura could start into her, "I'm sorry. I'm really sorry. I know I shouldn't have been drinking but he's ruined my life."
Laura had been ready to deliver another mauling and possibly fire Stephanie but as she studied and listened to the pathetic sight in front of her she considered what her husband constantly told her; There's more than one way to lead people. You can earn respect through kindness as well as intimidation. Was it really the correct course of action to give this naive young woman both barrels when she was clearly distraught? No.
"Stephanie stop crying," Laura tried to sound sympathetic and figured that being as unaccustomed to it as she was that she had not done a bad job, "Sit on the couch."
Still on the brink of bursting into tears Stephanie did as she was ordered and sat down. She was surprised when the boss sat next to her and continued to speak kindly, "Paul's a bastard Stephanie, okay? He's the worst human being I've ever met and you're pregnant with his child. I understand why you feel the way you do but your life is not ruined. You're going to be a mother and that's an amazing thing. You're going to bring a life into the world and whether Paul is there for you or not you will both be happy. I'm not going to fire you for what happened here tonight..."
"Thank you, I really am sorry," Stephanie cut in as tears now escaped her eyes, "I'm scared. I don't know anything about being a mother."
"Neither do I. I'm not a mother myself. Talk to your mother or something. What I was about to say is that although I'm not going to fire you Paul, Trish and the whole creative office apparently saw and heard your little display so it's going to need to look like I've at least suspended you. Two weeks at home but I'll still have you paid and you'll be looked after during your pregnancy. You can continue in your role as General Manager for the time being. Fair enough?"
Stephanie realised that she was very lucky to get off without punishment for what she had done. People were wrong in what they said about Laura, everyone called her bitch, dragon or all kinds of other insults behind her back but really she was kind and understanding. Stephanie thanked Laura again and made to leave but Laura had something else to say. "Stephanie you do realise that if anything like this happens again I'll have to let you go?"
"Yes," Stephanie nodded, "But it won't. I have a baby to think about and I need this job."
Laura gave a nod of her own, "Very well. Go." The door closed behind Stephanie and Laura let out a deep sigh and closed her eyes. Relax. That was what she had to do before she had a stroke or something. These people were something else. If she had known that working with wrestlers would be this much stress she would have turned down the chance to take over from her father and told him to give control of the company to one of her sisters. With a shake of the head she told herself that it was not wrestlers in general that were the problem in this place it was just one man. If Paul Levesque was not one of if not the best wrestler that the company had and one of the best writers too she could easily fire him and be done with it but sadly that would be financial suicide and in any case the board of directors would block it even if she tried. The problem that was Paul Levesque would continue regardless of what she said or did and it infuriated her like nothing before.
Glad to get the night over with Laura left the arena as soon as possible as usual and headed for the airport. During the journey she had called her husband and he had managed to calm her as he always seemed to and now rather than kill someone all that she wanted to do was get home. Immediately upon getting out of the limo she noticed something and yet again her blood pressure began to rise as she stormed up the steps and into the cabin of her private jet. The two pilots were standing in there which added to the initial problem that she had noticed, the planes engines were not running. "What are you waiting on, Christmas?" She demanded as she glared at the two men, "Move your asses and get this thing in the air."
It seemed that there had been a disagreement over which of the two men would speak. It mattered little to Laura as she had never bothered to learn the names of either of them. The older of the two, a small man with greying hair took up the challenge and addressed his boss who was half his age and taller than his five feet eight in her heels, neither of which made him comfortable, "Uh... Mrs. Molinaro we can't leave. We can't take off."
Laura moved closer to the man and looked him in the eye, "I'm going to need you to repeat that."
Rather than obey the command the pilot provided more information, "We have pressure warnings on one of the engines. It's almost certainly a minor fault that we can have fixed tomorrow morning but for right now we're grounded."
Wondering what she had done to deserve this day from hell Laura found herself yet again with her eyes closed, attempting to resist tearing into someone. After a long moment she trusted herself to speak, more in hope than expectation, "We have two engines, no? You have a fault with one of them."
"Ma'am even if I was happy to fly on one engine, which I'm not, we don't have enough power to take off."
Before Laura could come up with a response her stewardess spoke gently from behind her and when Laura turned around she saw that the woman must have fetched the limo driver because he was also standing there. "Mrs. Molinaro I figure there are two options. We can get you on a regular flight out of here, whenever the next one is, or you can stay in a hotel and fly out with us tomorrow morning when the engine is repaired."
This decision did not take long to make. The thought of sitting next to some fat guy who stank of sweat or someone's screaming kids was repulsive so it had to be the hotel. Without thanking any of her staff Laura ordered the pilots, "This problem will be fixed by the time I arrive here tomorrow." She then gestured to the limo driver to leave the cabin, "The Hilton. Andiamo!"
Another limo ride and another phone call with her husband calmed her a little before the limo pulled up outside of the hotel and five minutes later, thankfully without any hassle she arrived in her room but that was when another realisation hit her. She had no luggage and no change of clothes for the morning. This was without doubt the worst day ever. Alcohol, that was what she needed. With the decision made she headed out of the room and down to the bar.
"Fucking great. That's just fucking great," Paul raged as he walked into his hotel room and saw that Trish had indeed taken her things and gone home. Stephanie McMahon had a lot to answer for tonight that was for sure. What was it going to be like when he arrived home tomorrow and tried to fix things with her? Shit, that was what it was going to be like. Shit just like tonight had been. What he needed was a drink to take the edge of it.
Now intent on getting drunk he walked into the bar two minutes later but froze as he noticed who was sitting at the bar staring into what looked like a coke. "No fucking way," he breathed to himself, "What's she doing here?" Laura was sitting in the bar looking depressed and if what she had was something like a JD and coke she was drinking too. She had not gone home and Trish had. If he was ever going to get an opportunity to make a move on her this was it.
"You wouldn't know what to do with a woman like me Paul." The whispered words repeated themselves yet again in his head as they had so many times before over the previous weeks.
"Let's find out shall we," Paul smirked as he headed towards the bar.
