"No, I live in San Antonio," she mumbled, relieved that he had let go of her, but still able to feel the heat burning into her fingers.
"Texas, interesting. So you've lived all over, huh? How long have you been in San Antonio now?"
Amy stared at him blankly. Why was he continuing to talk to her? Most people were completely put off by her obvious jitters. Most men, that is. "Just over a year, now."
"Not long then? What do you for a living?" Mark smiled at her, encouraging her to speak. She was so damn nervous, but he felt an undeniable urge to draw her out, get to know her. His smile widened as he realised how closely her colouring resembled his.
"I worked in an office for a company making auto parts," she said, not realising what she was giving away by saying that.
Vince's eyes narrowed at her words. "Worked? Past tense?"
Amy jumped when he spoke and she realised what she had said. "Well, I...I can explain," she said, staring at Vince warily.
"Mmm-hmm, this should be good. You've lost your job haven't you?"
"It wasn't my fault," she began, about to defend herself.
"Really? Were you laid off?"
"Well, no," she admitted.
"Did you quit?"
Amy bit her thumbnail and shook her head. Vince gave her a knowing look. "Were you fired?"
"Yes, but it isn't like it sounds!" she said, her voice getting stronger as she thought of the circumstances of her dismissal.
"Hmm, well, we'll have a little chat about that later on, okay? In the meantime, I have work to do. What you can do is go and get your stuff from that rat hole you're staying in and bring it back here. You can stay with me and Linda. No arguments!" he barked at her when she went to protest, waiting with eyebrows raised until she settled back in her chair and stared sulkily at him. "My God, you haven't changed a bit. Get that sulky look off your face, it won't work!" he said, smiling as she immediately wiped the look off her face. He tried never to be too loud with her, or too harsh when he tried to help her along in life, because he knew what she had been through in her young life and why she was so nervous all the time. He twisted his lips thoughtfully.
He hadn't seen her in nearly five years, not since she had buried her mother, although they kept in touch by writing and phone calls, and he had always felt like he should be doing more for her. She had never asked him for anything, ever, and he knew that she had been struggling to live for a while now. Losing her job could just be the boost she needed to let him help her. He started formulating a plan, continuing to talk to her and not showing what he was up to.
"How did you get here from the motel?"
"I took a cab," she said, clearing her throat when she noticed she was being observed carefully by the big man named Mark.
"Right, well, I'll get a Limo to take you back and wait for you," Vince said, reaching for the phone.
Amy's hand shot out and covered his. "No! Don't do that, I don't want to be any trouble. I'll just get a cab back, it's okay," she insisted, looking worried.
Vince turned his hand over and caught her fingers lightly. "You are no trouble at all, honey, and you never will be. Besides, I'm not willing to let you take a cab on your own, it's too dangerous. If I'd known you were coming I'd have arranged for you to be collected, I don't want you getting into any trouble when there's no-one around to help you. Take the limo, the driver won't mind, believe me!"
"I wouldn't feel right, though, turning up in a big posh car like that," she mumbled, feeling embarrassed at the other man's intent stare.
"I could give her a lift," Mark offered, leaning casually forward to rest his arms on the desk. "I don't have anything to do until later anyway, so a drive would be pretty good right now."
Vince smiled broadly and nodded. "Great idea, Mark, it'll be nice to know she's in safe hands." He turned to Amy, watching with amusement the look of horror she quickly concealed. "Linda's just down the corridor with Stephanie, why don't you go say hello?" he asked her, diverting her attention away from Mark. She nodded and left the room, aware of being stared at the whole time.
Mark waited until the door had closed and then turned to smile at Vince. "I thought her legs looked short. How tall is she?"
"About 5 ft, I think. A veritable midget. What do you think of her?" the older man asked, interested to know what Mark had made of her.
"Painfully shy, incredibly nervous, very pretty. Far too tiny for me, though," he said with a grin.
Vince frowned. "I wasn't offering her to you. Besides, why the hell would she want anything to do with an ugly old biker like you?" he asked, grinning at the expression on the other man's face.
"Less of the insults, old man," Mark drawled. "There is one thing I'd like to know about your goddaughter, though. Actually, two things."
"And they are?"
"How old is she? And who used to beat on her?"
Vince nodded and smiled ruefully. Not much got past this man's eyes. "She's twenty-two and her father used to beat on her. Pretty badly by all accounts. I got her and her mother away from him and brought them over here, but they wouldn't let me set them up. Proud women, both of them, never asked for or expected anything. I wish I could've done more for them. I intend to try."
"She lives with her mother?"
"No, her mom died a while back. She's been alone since she was seventeen, no family. The useless piece of shit that was her father drunk himself to death, and she's well rid of him. How did you know, by the way?"
Mark raised his eyebrows. "About the beatings? I've seen that look in the eyes before, seen that sort of nervousness, it didn't take a genius to work it out. What was her father like?"
"Big, really big. Not as big as you, but a hell of a lot bigger than her. He was pounding on her the day I went to get them and I walked in on it," Vince said, anger making his face stiff as he remembered the sight of Amy cowering in a corner while the huge man punched her as hard as he could, Amy's mother trying to pull him off her.
"What did you do?" Mark asked, feeling angry himself at the thought of such a delicate creature getting beaten.
"I broke his arm and a few ribs as well, then I got the two girls to the hospital. You know, she actually asked me to tell him she was sorry for whatever it was she had done. I couldn't believe it, her face was so badly beaten she could barely talk at all, and that was what she chose to say. I think that even now, buried somewhere inside her, she still feels that it was her fault." Vince sighed and tightened his lips at the memory. "As for him, I don't know what happened to him after that, and I don't care. When I heard eight years ago that he'd died, I was glad. Amy took a long time to recover from that experience physically, not to mention all the ones before. Mentally she hasn't recovered at all. It'd be nice to get her to open up a bit more. She used to be a talkative little thing, but now she's scared of her own shadow, and she won't go to counselling," Vince said, shaking his head. "Believe it or not, but that girl has a fiery temper to match all that red hair. Sometimes I get a tiny glimpse of it in her eyes, but it never gets any further than that. I guess she's afraid to let it go."
"You said you intended to help her. What are you gonna to do?"
"I'll offer her a job, first off. She can travel with us, so she'll start feeling safe again. I have a feeling though, that she isn't telling me everything. I'll get it out of her tonight," he said grimly.
"You're not gonna yell at her?" Mark asked, feeling quite concerned.
Vince's eyebrows shot up. "What do you care?"
"She doesn't seem the type who would enjoy being yelled at, especially by an evil old man like you!" Mark shot back, grinning.
Vince chuckled at his words, enjoying the camaraderie they shared. Not that anyone would know it, from the way they acted in the ring whenever there was a confrontation. "Yeah well, I'm not going to yell at her, don't worry." He raised an eyebrow and smirked at the other man. "You liked the look of her then huh?"
"Who wouldn't, she's a pretty little thing," Mark mused, contemplating what it would be like to hold her against him. He liked small women, but they were invariably afraid of him. "I'll take her to the motel and wait, then bring her back safe and sound."
"Good. I don't know that I'd trust her care to anyone else," Vince told him.
Mark stood up and smiled wickedly. "Don't place too much trust in me Vince, I'm a man like any other."
"Not quite like any other, and I do vividly remember what you were like a few months ago, so I'll give you fair warning. You touch her and I'll break your neck," Vince said amiably.
"I'm just shaking in my boots," Mark told him, turning as the door opened and Amy stepped back into the room. His eyes roamed up and down her body. "You ready, ma'am?"
Amy looked as if she were about to step into the jaws of hell, but she took a deep breath and nodded, her eyes darting to her godfather.
"You'll be fine with Mark, honey. I'll see you later okay?" he said, stepping out from behind his desk to plant a fatherly kiss on her flushed cheek.
"Okay," she said softly, resisting the urge to tug her arm away from Mark as he gently took her elbow to guide her out of the room. Vince threw his car keys at Mark before he left. "Not the bike, Calloway, got it?"
Mark nodded and grabbed the keys, urging Amy ahead of him out of the building. He unlocked Vince's car and handed her inside like a true gentleman before moving around and sliding under the steering wheel. He didn't talk much as they drove to her motel, leaving the city behind and moving out into sprawling wilderness and sparse housing. He merely nodded at her directions until they stopped outside the seedy, rundown place. "This is where you're staying? Christ, no wonder Vince wanted you to stay with him. This is no place for a young lady like you, sweetheart," he said, walking with her to the door of her room.
"It was cheap," she said in defence of the place. She had hated it on sight, but she didn't have enough money to worry about such luxuries as doors that locked properly or rooms that were cleaned.
"Yeah, it sure was," Mark murmured as she opened the door and walked inside. The smell of stale beer and cigarettes assaulted her nostrils, relics from the previous tenant and she shot a look at her companion, noticing the grimace he couldn't disguise.
"Maybe you should wait in the car?" she asked him, not feeling comfortable being in such a small space with him.
Mark pinned her with a dark look and shook his head. "Nah, you'll be safer with me here whilst you pack your stuff. Don't worry, I'll be just fine," he said, seating himself gingerly on the edge of the bed.
Amy made quick work of packing her things, using her body to block his view as she emptied the drawer holding her underwear into a bag. A few minutes later she dumped the last of her bags on the floor and did another quick check of the room, satisfied that she had everything.
"All set?" Mark asked, levering himself up and picking up all her bags before she had a chance to take them.
"Yes, I'm ready. You don't have to carry my bags..."
"What sort of a man would I be if I let a tiny thing such as yourself try and struggle with them?" he asked reasonably, walking out of the room and leaving her to follow him. Amy stared at his back warily. She wasn't used to any man being nice to her, except maybe Vince, but she said nothing and moved out to the car, going to open the door as he stashed her bags in the trunk. A large hand covered hers before she could pull the door handle and she involuntarily gasped in shock. He moved quickly for such a big man.
"Easy there, honey. I'm just gonna open the door for you, is all," he said softly, doing just that and helping her into the car again.
When he was sitting next to her once again, she swallowed and cleared her throat. "I could've opened the door myself," she said quietly.
His eyes swung briefly in her direction, glinting as he smiled. "Not while I'm with you."
He drove for a few minutes in silence. "So tell me, you ever watch wrestling?"
"I used to, when I was younger," she admitted.
"But you don't now?"
"No, I haven't watched it for years."
"Even though Vince is your godfather? Isn't that a bit disloyal?" he probed, teasing her.
"I just...I just never really got back into it," she mumbled.
"I see. So did you have a favourite wrestler back then?"
She found herself smiling as she thought of the men she had watched wrestle years ago. "Yeah, I used to love The Undertaker and also Hulk Hogan. I don't suppose they're still wrestling now though."
Mark beamed at her. "As a matter of fact they are," he told her, concentrating on the road.
"Really?" She thought about that for a moment. "I don't suppose they look the same anymore."
"You don't think you'd recognise them if you saw them?" he asked her, trying to smother his grin because he knew she didn't recognise him.
"I might, I guess. I've never really thought about it," she shrugged.
"What did The Undertaker look like?"
"Well, you know. He used to wear a long dark coat and sometimes a hat. He had long dark hair, sometimes it looked black and sometimes it looked sort of...dark auburn? Oh, and a beard, sort of like yours. Come to think of it, he had a couple of tattoos as well, not as many as you have though, you've got hundreds," she said and he felt a small thrill run through him that she had actually noticed things about him.
"Anything else?"
"He wore weird makeup on his face, sort of pale and had these shadows under his eyes and over his eyebrows, stuff like that, so I never really saw what he looked like. Oh, and he had white eyes sometimes."
"White eyes?" Mark asked, raising his eyebrows.
"Yeah. He used to do this gross thing where he rolled his eyes up into his head when he was taking someone down. But sometimes there were photos of him, in wrestling magazines, and his eyes were white, but looked different. He was wearing contact lenses, of course, but when I was young I thought his eyes were really like that!" she said and a small laugh escaped her, surprising both of them.
Mark chuckled. "I think a lot of people thought that, too."
"So do you know him then? What does he look like now?" she asked him, starting to feel quite comfortable with him all of a sudden.
"Mmm, I know him. And Hulk Hogan of course. The Undertaker looks a bit different from the way he looked back then. Hulk doesn't though, he looks pretty much the same."
"Really? Wow, it'll be weird seeing them wrestle again after so long," she said. "When are they fighting next?"
"Taker's got a match tonight as a matter of fact, but Hulk isn't up until tomorrow night," Mark told her, his lips curving in a secretive smile.
"I think I'd like to see that," she said, looking out of the window as they neared the arena again.
"Well, I'll make sure you have front row seats," he offered, pulling smoothly into a parking space.
"Oh, no, I don't...I wouldn't feel comfortable out there. I'll watch it on the television if I can," she said, shuddering at the thought of being stuck in amongst thousands of people.
Mark saw her reaction and carefully smoothed his features to show no expression. "That's no problem, there's a TV in Vince's office that should do you." He saw her visibly relax and got out of the car, telling her to stay put until he got around to her side and opened the door for her.
"You really don't have to..." she began, taking his hand as he pulled her gently out of the car. He put a large finger over her lips. "Yes I do. I, ma'am, am a gentleman, despite the fact that I may not look it!"
Amy was so shocked at the feel of his big callused finger on her mouth that she couldn't respond, and he sent her a dazzling grin before grabbing her bags out of the trunk and leading her back into the building.
He shocked her even more a few minutes later when, having deposited her once again in Vince's office, he took her hand and raised it to plant a soft kiss on her knuckles, making her completely speechless with the olde worlde charm.
