Chapter 8

Closing her eyes slowly, Tressa tilted her head up towards the sky and began to cry, not believing this was happening. "I don't know why I'm shocked. I really don't. They never liked me. They never wanted us to get married and they only were okay with it because Joe told them he would choose me over them. They were forced to spend holidays with me and everything, but I know they've always secretly hated me. And now they think they're going to take me to the cleaners and try to blame his death on me." How much more would she be able to handle before completely falling apart? Maybe that was what Joseph's family wanted to happen. "Fine. Fine, whatever." She ALMOST wanted to tell her lawyer to just give them everything, but her stubbornness and pride wouldn't allow it. "I'm going to make them WISH they'd never met me when we're done with them in court."

"Are you sure?" Clementine asked quietly, wondering how much more Tressa would be able to handle. "They're not asking for anything you've earned, like your wages and stuff. They want what he left you." The insurance, house, truck, and a few other things of his, which was not fair, but grief did insane things to people. If the people were already bad to begin with, morally bankrupt, it just amplified that by a thousand. "I want you to think about what you want to do. I'll call you in 2 days, we have a little time with this. Make sure you can…handle the impact this is going to have on you, Tressa." And she didn't mean financially but emotionally and mentally.

Jon was on his feet, smoking his cigarette, arms folded over his massive chest, and his eyes were narrowed.

"All right, I'll give you my answer then. Thanks again, Clem." Tressa pressed the end button and looked down at her phone, drawing her brows together, not understanding why Joseph's family was being this way. The man was gone. Their brother, their son, their nephew, their cousin…he was gone and, yet, they wanted EVERYTHING he left his wife. "Fuck."

Maybe it wasn't worth it. Maybe Clementine had a point to just give them what they wanted and move on. It would destroy her to give up the house, the cars, and everything Joseph had bought and worked for. They hadn't signed a prenuptial agreement and Joseph had made her his SOLE beneficiary. Pulling out a fresh cigarette, she shakily lit it up and slowly turned around, seeing Jon standing there looking tense.

"I-I'm not eating." Not after that phone call.

"I ordered it to go, doll." He said quietly, having done so while she was on the phone, and slowly sat back down.

No point in them both being up and pacing. He had ordered her the soup of the day and a small sandwich, figuring maybe he would be able to get her to try attempting to eat it later in the day, when her nerves had settled. If they did. Her face had color, he just hated that it was an angry flush. Whatever was going on, it sounded like family business and the family was being a bunch of dick heads.

"Anything you want to talk about?" He asked, making sure to keep his tone neutral and maybe even a little careless, watching as she puffed on that cigarette like a chimney.

"I know you overheard all of that, Jon. You don't have to pretend like you didn't." Tressa hadn't put Clementine on speakerphone, but everything she said to her lawyer Jon had overheard. He wasn't eavesdropping either, but they were the only people at the moment in this outside area. It was hard for him NOT to overhear. "Joe's family blames me for his death. Even though it was from an enlarged heart he was more than likely BORN with, which his mother had NO idea about, for the record, they still blame me. They think because of my job with WWE, I stressed him out and made his heart give out. They're taking me to court, and they want everything he left me. I'm his sole beneficiary and they don't care. They want EVERYTHING and Clementine, my lawyer, is advising me to just give it to them. They only want what HE had and what he left me, not what I've made on my own."

"Darlin', Joseph was a long-distance semi-driver, that could have easily contributed to his death." Jon knew that sounded heartless, but it was also very true. "That's a lot of sitting in one spot for extended periods," And statistics said that that led to a stroke, heart attack, etc. for long-time drivers because of how sedentary their jobs were. "Not to mention the stress of carrying certain freight, and then when shit got bad with the weather. All of those things could have easily contributed to it. Wasn't there an autopsy done? Wouldn't that be able to prove he was born with it?"

Jon was a bit curious how this family thought this would play out. There was no way any judge was going to grant them whatever it was they were seeking, based on that argument. The fact of the matter was, Joseph had left her everything and it was there in the will, plain as day. If wills could be so easily overturned, there would be no point in them.

"I know they don't have a leg to stand on, but…Clementine is afraid they're going to drag WWE into this." That was a huge, HUGE possibility.

If they did, WWE would have negative publicity from it. Joseph's family would stop at nothing to drag Tressa through hell and back again to get what they wanted. His mother was always conniving, manipulative, and controlling, but since neither were rarely home, she didn't have nearly as much control over them, over her baby boy, as she would've liked.

"I just don't know if it's worth it. I don't know if fighting them is worth more heartache and pain, Jon." She took another long drag of her cigarette, really needing a drink right about now.

"Wait, what?" Jon was trying not to laugh, wondering if these people were serious. "She thinks they might drag the WWE into this on what grounds? They're your employers, not an accessory to a non-existent crime." Oh, he could just IMAGINE how the McMahon family would react to that, beginning to laugh despite his efforts not to. "Vince would send them…a cease and desist letter," He was going to cry, this was hilarious! Were these people out of their ever-loving minds? "And then he's going to sue the fuck out of them for wasting his time and slandering his company because they don't know their heads from their asses. They know you're a seamstress, right? Not a superstar, or do they just see dollar signs because of the WWE part?" Jon snorted, deciding he would smoke one more cigarette while waiting on their food, up and pacing now. "You should talk to Stephanie, let her send a lawyer there. That'd be hilarious."

"I'm glad you think this is so funny. And Stephanie already knows about it."

Besides Jon, Stephanie was one of the only people who knew about what happened to Joseph. Stephanie had actually flown in, with Paul, to pay their respects, much to the chagrin of Joseph's family. His mother, in particular, didn't appreciate any of Tressa's coworkers coming to the services. Tressa didn't give a damn and was very appreciative of Stephanie and Paul coming on behalf of the WWE.

"I think they see WWE and they think they can slander me and destroy me and make the company lose faith in me and fire me." That was her guess, anyway. "Don't ask me what Joe's mother is thinking because even I don't know."

"Yeah, that's not going to happen."

It was now glaringly obvious that Joseph had not only been the decent one in that brood, but also the smart one. These people were insane if they thought they were going to drag the WWE into something like this and walk away unscathed. He hoped he was able to at least hear about how this all played out. Karma had a way of coming back around and dishing out what people deserved.

"Now kitten," He wrapped his arm around her neck, she was damn short, and pulled Tressa into him, dropping a kiss on the top of her head. "It's not YOU I'm finding so funny, it's them." His eyes landed on the server bringing their to-go bags. "Also, I ordered for you."

"I told you I'm not eating, Daddy."

That phone call made her nauseous and she rolled her eyes when he shook his finger in front of her face. She didn't push his arm from her neck and walked with him over to where the server was. Jon paid for the food, grabbed the bag with his free hand, and guided them right back to the car. Jon TOWERED over her petite 5'4 frame by a full foot, but Tressa trusted him completely and knew he would never intentionally hurt her.

"I don't want them to win. I don't want to give up what my husband left me, and I don't think I can. I think I'm going to fight this, even though it's going to cost me to get a lawyer and shit."

This was a war and she planned on winning it, no matter what.

"Don't you have a lawyer, isn't that who you were talking to? Or is this person not that kind of lawyer?"

Jon knew the WWE paid their non-TV staff pretty decently, so unless she had been blowing through her money, she should've had a fairly decent bank account. Well…now that he thought about it, her drinking and smoking habits were pretty expensive. She had expensive taste in vodka, and he hadn't missed the various shot glasses in her bag when she had packed this morning.

"Anything I can do to help? Besides buy you food you say you don't want, but you're going to try anyway because it'll make me happy?" He fluttered his eyelashes down at her, snorting when he got a negative shake of the head. "Get in the car, Tres. And maybe it's time to turn off the phone." Because the deal had been no crappy calls and that counted as such.

"I told you, that WAS my lawyer." Did he not hear her or did he just have selective hearing? "You're doing what you can to help me, Jon. You're fine. And I'm not turning my phone off because my lawyer could call again. I told you, I won't answer any other ones unless it's Stephanie." The boss, so to speak, had been checking up on her lately.

Tressa hadn't been blowing through her money, she did have a nice bank account, along with savings, but the fact Joseph left her everything of HIS, she didn't want to let that go. She didn't want his family to win. Jon fired up the vehicle and pulled away from the sandwich shop while she just stared out the window, pinching the bridge of her nose.

"Will you stop at a liquor store before we go to your house?"

Okay, his confusion came from her line about it costing her to get a lawyer, so yeah…excuse him for being somewhat confused by the whole deal. Jon pushed it out of his mind, not his business and he was interfering enough. "Nope."

He had a bar at his place, pretty sure she could probably blow through it very easily. Jon even had vodka, probably some Absolut, definitely some Grey Goose, and some other name-brand stuff. The bar thing had been his idea of a joke when he had 'made it big', being brash and cocky, a bit stupid. Now he just had a well-stocked bar that he wasn't even putting a dent in because he hadn't been able to drink while taking all those pills.

"Wait, yes." He needed cigarettes; she probably needed a carton. "You're not going to buy another shot glass, are you?"

"Yeah, actually, I am. I don't have a Vegas shot glass and I'm developing quite the collection." Most were in storage at the moment, besides the ones that were in her bag currently. "I buy one in every city and town WWE goes to and I know, eventually, they'd go to Vegas for a show, so I'm just jumping the gun a bit. No big deal." She shrugged, preferring a shot glass to a tumbler or straight out of the bottle. Last night had been different because she'd been talking to Jon and it was easier to just drink from the bottle instead of pouring shot after shot. "Look, I didn't mean to confuse you about the lawyer bit. I DO already have a lawyer, so what I meant to say is it will cost me to HAVE one, not get one. It's going to cost me to KEEP her as my lawyer until this whole mess and ordeal is done."

"You don't have her on retainer?"

The only reason he even knew that was due to something Paul Levesque had explained to him when he had made a remark about the PG rating and some other such bullshit. The WWE kept lawyers via retainer by paying a set monthly fee meant to cover any expenses incurred. Lawyers sounded ridiculously overpriced for a few court dates.

"Do you even wash those glasses before you put them away, after using them?" That was his brand-new phobia surfacing, trying not to think about everything that could be living on unwashed glasses that traveled a lot, in a bag, with other things, potentially dirty things. "Here." Jon gestured to the building, the liquor store. "This is the last stop, darlin', after this it's straight home." So she'd better grab whatever she wanted now.

That was a weird set of questions he just tossed her way and Tressa was starting to see just how much this MRSA scare had affected Jon. "Yes, I clean them after I use them, and then I wash them again before putting them in storage until I get my own place. I already bought a curio cabinet, which is in storage as well, for when I get my own place, eventually. And no, I got my own lawyer separate from the WWE. I don't want them involved if I can help it."

Stepping out of the car, she flicked her cigarette away since she lit another one up and finished it just as he pulled into the parking spot to the liquor store. Maybe she wouldn't buy a shot glass here since Jon's phobia was on high alert. She'd just wait until WWE was in Vegas again and then buy one.

Well if her husband's family was going to draw the WWE into this mess, he figured that she might as well use the benefits of being a WWE employee and come out swinging. Idiot people. He let it all drop, browsing the aisles, and wasn't getting liquor since he had plenty if he wanted to get messed up. Jon was looking for trash bags, and a few other things he knew he needed at home. His house was clean, but she was definitely going to notice all the small bottles of that antibacterial handwash that didn't require water everywhere, and the cans of Lysol, the tissues…he wasn't overly panicking about it. Tressa knew he had issues now and she wasn't exactly in a place to be judgmental about it either. He just shrugged when they met at the cash register and her eyes swept his purchases. She didn't say a word and he didn't comment on her two bottles of Absolut and lack of a shot glass.