"Of course there needs to be some diversion."
"You read my mind."
"So you really think that everyone is buying everything?"
"Of course they are, I don't think that anyone would know it was us if they were hit over the head with a shovel, and even then I bet they'd have their doubts," Chris said, smiling over at Stephanie.
"Good, I want them all to be completely surprised, and by that time, it'll be too late to do anything," Stephanie said, giggling.
"So how did you get away from that dumb ox you call a fiancé?"
"Oh, I said I needed some much deserved 'alone time,' and since he thinks that means I needed to preserve my sanctity before our unholy nuptials, he agreed to let me have my own room."
"And your own room being?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.
"My own room being your room of course," she said slyly, "Just think of it this way, I save on the expenses if I share with you."
"And if he goes asking for a room number?"
"I'll tell him some bogus lie or something, you underestimate the stronghold I have over him."
"Could've fooled me with the grandma outfits."
Stephanie looked at her discarded outfit, "Yes, but sometimes you have to do what you have to do. And I've got a hold of him where it counts."
"By the balls, right Steph?"
Stephanie just grinned, with a hint of evil behind it and dipped her finger into the jar of peanut butter sitting between the two of them. She licked some of it off her finger and then offered the rest to Chris. He took her finger in his mouth and swirled it around, cleaning off the peanut butter.
"I have a new appreciation for pb&j's," Chris said as she pulled her finger out of his mouth.
"I thought you might, this is the only way to eat, don't you think?" she said, giving him a seductive look.
"I'd eat anything if it was served on you," he told her.
"Oh, aren't you the charmer?" she said, taking some of the strawberry jelly and running it down Chris's cheek and then leaning in to lick it off his cheek. They had been doing this for hours now. He was just in his deep maroon silk boxers and she was in her matching purple bra and panties. They just found it way more comfortable than being in those constricting clothes.
"I have been known to charm the ladies," he said, leaning in and gently touching his lips to hers.
"Yo Jericho, get your scrawny ass to the door and let us in, we want to party with you!"
"Fuck," Chris muttered against Stephanie's lips, "The one fucking night that I get to spend being devious with you and they have to fucking interrupt."
"Devious? Is that what it's called now?"
"Jericho, get out here!"
"Who is that obnoxious voice?" Stephanie asked.
"That would be Christian," Chris told her, getting up, "But I'll get them out of here right now."
"Or you can just ignore them," Stephanie said, taking some more peanut butter and sensually sucking it off her finger.
"They'll just keep banging."
"Yes, but you'll be too distracted banging something yourself," Stephanie said with a smirk.
"Let me get rid of the assholes and then you can give me some special treatment," he said, "Now get your cute ass in the bathroom."
Stephanie shrugged and got up, Chris giving her a slap on the ass as she walked away. Stephanie rubbed the spot where he had slapped her and waved her finger at him, telling him silently that he was a bad boy. She walked into the bathroom and closed the door. Chris made sure that he was presentable and opened the door.
"It's about damn time," Christian said, Torrie and Dawn with him, and Kurt hanging back behind them, "Let us in."
"I'm busy," Chris said curtly.
"You look like you were sleeping," Christian said, "Get dressed and come out with us."
"I'm really not in the mood," Chris said, trying not to lose his temper.
"Come on," Dawn prodded, "Come out with us, it'll be fun."
Chris could tell that they had already gone out and had some fun. They were all drunk, or well on their way to being drunk. These were the people he was getting revenge on, it seemed so pathetic of them to even try and get him and Stephanie apart. They may have done it for a little while, but they could not keep up that ruse forever, not with him and Stephanie.
"You guys, I'm not in the mood to go out, so I'm not going to go out."
Torrie looked over Chris's shoulder, "Oh, I think I know why Chris doesn't want to go out, he's with a girl."
Chris looked over his shoulder at Stephanie's clothes on the ground, "Yeah, so what?"
"Who is she?" Christian asked.
"Go out and have fun alright," Chris said, slamming the door, "You can come out now."
Stephanie walked out of the bathroom and walked up behind Chris, reaching around to rest her cold palms on his warm stomach, "What was that all about?"
"They wanted to party, they were all drunk…idiots," he said and turned to her, "So where were we?"
"We were making human sandwiches and then we were discussing how we're going to get the focus off us indefinitely."
"Oh yeah, let me go get the chocolate sauce," he said, giving her a cute look.
The next day, Stephanie walked into the arena, completely refreshed. She was back to being her dowdy self, but today would be better. Just because she'd get to further this plan just a tiny bit more. She walked into her dressing room and saw Hunter sitting there.
"There you are," he said, "I've been waiting for you to show up."
"That's nice of you," she smiled, then turned away, "Yeah, nice of you to wait for me too."
"What was that Stephanie?"
"Nothing sweetie," she answered sweetly, "I missed you last night."
He got up and walked over to her, putting his hands on her shoulders from behind and rubbing them lightly. Stephanie grimaced at his touch, and then he had to make it worse by leaning in to kiss her neck. She shuddered lightly, which he thought was due to arousal.
"So what did you do last night?" Hunter asked.
"Nothing," Stephanie said with a little laugh, "Nothing at all."
"Yeah, me too," he said, "I felt so lonely."
"Yeah, I was so lonely," Stephanie said, smirking to herself. She was far from lonely last night. It was the best night she'd had in months, but that was mostly due to the fact that she wasn't around her asshole of a future-husband.
"Your dad called me this morning."
"What'd he want?"
"Well, they pressed charges against Brock and he's in prison right now."
"Oh, that's nice."
"Yeah, so he won't hurt you."
"I'm going to go get some coffee or something," Stephanie said, smoothly detangling herself from Hunter's grasp, "See you in a bit."
"Ok," he said, kind of confused that she would leave as soon as she had gotten here, but he wasn't going to question her desire to get coffee.
"Bye," she said, blowing him a kiss.
When she was out the door, she pretended to spit the dirty taste out of her mouth. She walked furtively down the hall and to Chris's locker room, hoping that he was alone. She slipped inside and saw him there, lacing up his boots quickly. He looked up and seemed surprised to see her there.
"Brock's in jail," Stephanie said, "Pending a trial and all that."
"Hope he doesn't drop the soap," Chris laughed, "Although the thought of him being someone's prison bitch is oddly appealing."
"Isn't it though, instead of him doing the pummeling, he's getting pummeled, it's like poetic justice."
"Trish is thinking about quitting the company," Chris told her, "Heard it this afternoon. She's so humiliated, she's thinking about going back to medical school."
Stephanie laughed softly, "That's great, who knew she'd be so sensitive. Ok, but I have to go and get coffee or something, remember the exchange at exactly 7:38."
"Yes, I've got it, don't worry," he said, "It'll work just fine."
"I know, see you," she said, giving him a wink, before slipping out silently.
Stephanie went to get the aforementioned coffee and returned to Hunter's side. She sat there silently, staring at the clock. She had worked this out with Chris to a tee, and this had to go off as planned or they would miss the opportunity. She was sure another one would come along, but she hated when things didn't go her way the first time. Seeing that the time was drawing near, she scooted closer to Hunter.
"Hunter, baby, will you come with me to see my mom about some wedding arrangements."
"Why do you need me?" he asked gruffly.
"Well, it's for our first song, Mom and I have narrowed the list down to ten, and we needed your opinion on it, since you know, it'll be your song too," she said sweetly.
"Ok, let's go."
"Oh, you know, this may run into the show and you have a promo first and you know, I don't want my ring to get ruined, so I'll leave it here," she said, slipping her ring off her finger and putting it directly in the center of the coffee table.
"Good idea, I don't want you to lose it in the ring or something."
"Yeah, that would be terrible!" Stephanie said, putting a hand to her heart, "It would break my heart if I lost it, since it's the symbol of your love for me."
She was about to gag at the words, but as he kissed her, she swallowed back the bile. She needed to act like this to get Hunter to be lulled into a false sense of security. It was better this way, in the end, for when he got what was coming to him. She smiled to herself as she thought about the day when Hunter would get his just desserts. Oh, it would be beautiful.
They got up and Stephanie let Hunter get a half-step ahead of her and as his back was turned, she snatched up her ring off the table. Holding it tightly in her hand, she caught up with Hunter so he wouldn't know that she had fallen behind a little bit. She let him exit first and then walked out after him, making a point to slam the door shut. She grabbed his hand with her free one as they walked down the hallway to her parent's office. She pretended to be engulfed in looking at him, but was really on the look-out.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Chris walking down the opposite side of the hallway, towards them. It was right on schedule and she mentally commended his punctuality. They were getting closer and closer, but paid no attention to each other, or else that would cause suspicion. She just laughed and looked up adoringly at Hunter.
Finally, Chris was only a few feet away. She held her hand out a little farther than usual. They walked by each other and Chris reached his hand out quickly and Stephanie slipped him the ring. She didn't even look at him, and Hunter didn't even notice since he was talking about himself. She smiled to herself; that had gone perfectly. Now when they got back from her parents, the ring would be missing. And since she had passed the ring off herself, and Chris didn't have to go get it, nobody would've seen anything suspicious going on.
She walked into her parent's office and sat down where her mother was looking over a binder, "Mom, I got Hunter and we wanted to talk about the song."
"Great," Linda said, "We've pretty much narrowed it down."
"Yeah, I was thinking about something totally romantic," Stephanie said, "I mean, it is our first dance."
"I'm sure I'll love whatever you decide," Hunter told her, "Because all that matters is that I'm dancing with you."
Linda sighed and smiled, "Stephanie, you're lucky to have found Hunter."
"Oh, I know Mom, I know," Stephanie said, smiling as if she were actually happy, "So I think the old staple, you know, 'At Last,' I think it'd be best."
Yeah, Stephanie thought, At Last she would be getting revenge on Hunter, and it would be so good. She could hardly wait for it. She tuned out her mother and Hunter's conversation, knowing they were probably just agreeing on the song. It wasn't until Hunter tapped her on the shoulder did she stop thinking of ways she'd love to kill Hunter.
"What?" she snapped, but then realized what she had done, "I'm sorry baby, I was just picturing how beautiful our wedding would be."
"I was wondering if you wanted to go back to the dressing room?"
"Oh, do we have time before the show?"
"Your mom just informed me that I'm going to be going on in the middle of the show and they're moving a match up to the first slot."
"Oh, so there's time to go talk," she said, "That's wonderful."
"Great, see you Linda."
"Yeah, bye Mom, thanks for all your help," Stephanie said, hugging her mother.
They got up and walked out, Stephanie mentally planning how she was going to react when she saw her ring missing. She'd have to turn on the waterworks, that was a given. Maybe she'd throw in a little whimpering. Anything to seem authentic, she thought as Hunter opened the door. She walked inside.
"I think I'll put my ring in my purse," she said, walking over to the coffee table and then stopping abruptly as she looked at the table, "Hu-Hunter…."
"What is it Steph?"
"My ring!"
"What about it?"
"It's gone!" she said, looking around frantically, "I put it right on the table and it's not there!"
"What do you mean?" Hunter said, coming over to her and looking down at the table, "Maybe it rolled off."
"How, you saw me put it on the table," she said, "Where could it be!"
Stephanie got down on her hands and knees and started searching maniacally around the room, crawling around, searching under chairs and in her bag and Hunter's bag. She started crying, looking around, and saw Hunter looking as well.
"I bet someone stole it!" Hunter said angrily standing up.
"No! No, why would someone do that!" Stephanie said, the tears streaking down her face.
"I don't know what the hell is going on around here, but I saw you put your ring there and somebody must've stolen it. I bet it was the same pervert who put all those posters up of Trish."
"I can't believe they'd steal my engagement ring," she said, scanning the room, "That was the ring you gave to me."
"Bastard!" Hunter said, punching the wall, "Whoever the asshole is, I'll take care of it Stephanie, I swear to God."
"I want my ring," she sobbed.
Hunter came over and hugged her, "We're going to go tell your dad what happened right now, and he'll demand whoever stole it to give it back."
"My beautiful ring," she said as Hunter walked her out of the room. He led her down the hallway, where she just clung to him and sobbed hysterically. She was trying to make herself look as sad as possible.
"What's going on?" Vince said as Stephanie and Hunter came in, "Is this about Brock?"
"Somebody stole her engagement ring," Hunter said, fury lacing his voice, "Can you believe that, she left it on the table in our dressing room because she didn't want to wear it to the ring, we were gone ten minutes and some asshole stole it!"
"What?!?" Vince said, incensed, then got up to go the doorway, glaring at one of the production people, "You! I want you to tell everyone there's an emergency meeting in catering, and whoever doesn't show up is fired! Do you hear me! GO!"
The guy scurried off in search of everyone to tell them about the meeting. No more than seven minutes had passed and everyone had gathered in the large eating area. They all looked around, wondering what the impromptu meeting was about. They had no idea except for the fact that Vince was pissed.
"What do think this is about?" Torrie whispered to Chris.
"I don't know," Chris said, playing dumb, "Whatever it is, sounds pretty dumb."
Vince walked into the room, with Stephanie still holding on tightly to Hunter. Chris looked at her, wanting to smile, but not wanting to give anything away. Stephanie looked up momentarily at Chris and he saw that spark in her eyes and he gave a slow nod of recognition.
"Everyone, I'm here because somebody had committed a crime," Vince bellowed, "Somebody walked into my daughter's dressing room and stole her engagement ring."
Everyone started talking among themselves.
"Whoever took it, I expect you to return it as soon as possible or suffer the consequences. If you give it back you won't be charged, my daughter just wants her ring back."
"Please," Stephanie said, her voice clogged with tears, "I just want my ring, it means everything to me. Everything."
"You're dismissed," Vince said.
Everyone streamed out of the room, still talking about what had happened, everyone speculating as to who would take someone's ring. It seemed so absurd. Chris got up slowly and deliberately walked past Stephanie, who was leaning against Hunter, who was engrossed in conversation with Vince.
Stephanie looked over at Chris and mouthed, "Thanks."
Chris walked out of the room.
Everything was going beautifully.
Bring on the next target.