Author's Note: Hope you guys like this chapter! And yes, it's going to be a bit dramatic. Please review!
Disclaimer: 1st chapter
Distribution: Ask first.
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Dangerous Business
Chapter XVI
Smackdown!
7:42 P.M.
Liz smiled as she ran her hand over the leather of the small, black Limo. She glanced outside the tinted window at the curling line of freezing fans, whooping and screaming at the Limo, wondering just which superstar it housed at the moment. Against the caution of the driver, Liz rolled down the window to another chorus of earth-shaking cheers. The brunette laughed and waved as the Limo rounded to the backstage area. She thanked the driver as she stepped out quickly and went through the general security.
"Welcome back, ma'am," one of the guards said as he slid her employment card through the slot. The computer gave a few affirmative beeps and bleeps, and then the guard handed back her card.
"Thanks," she said lightly, tucking the card back inside the black leather mini-backpack on her back. She sighed, pulling her hair into a ponytail as she walked quietly down the hallways, glancing at the labels on each of the doors. Liz suppressed a tired yawn as she found one of the male superstar's locker rooms. She glanced at the list underneath, confirming that it was the locker room that she was looking for. Liz knocked quietly on the door, and then harder, hearing the noise in the locker room.
"Come on in!" shouted a random voice. Liz rolled her eyes and leaned closer to the gray door.
"Are you guys decent?" she yelled back, waiting for a response. "Send Shane out here!" she demanded to the door. A few moments later, Shane Helms poked his head out of the room.
"Hey Liz!" he cried.
"Hi Shane," she returned his smile, "Listen, I need to talk to Brock for a second, do you think you could send him out here?" Shane stared at her quizzically, but nodded anyways.
"Okay," he said, shrugging. He paused for a second, and then disappeared into the noisy locker room. As she waited, Liz sat down on one of the black storage cases littering the small hallways. She dropped her backpack on the case unceremoniously as she waited for Brock to come out. A minute or so later, Brock stepped out of the locker room, in his usual sweatpants and "Here comes the pain" shirt. He sat down on the storage case opposite of her.
"You wanted to talk," he stated, arching an eyebrow at her.
"Yeah," Liz replied, shifting on the case quietly, "I just wanted to say thanks…"
"For what?" a puzzled expression crossed his face. He knew exactly what she was talking about.
"What you did to Evolution at the PPV last year," she said, smiling. "Well… Thanks," she muttered, feeling like she overstayed her welcome.
"You're welcome," replied Brock suddenly as Liz stood up. She smiled at him gratefully.
"I'll see you around?" she asked, and he nodded. She nodded back at him, stood up, waved, and headed back down the hallway towards the other locker room where Rob was. Brock sat on the case for a while, before starting to head back to the locker room, when he noticed the leather backpack lying on the case. He sighed, and looked down the hall. Liz was long gone.
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Liz yawned quietly as she walked down the hallways. Her eyes wandered over the pieces of paper attached to the doors as she walked slowly, as not to miss Rob's locker room. As she walked, she ran into another familiar wrestler. Liz stepped back, an embarrassed flush creeping over her face.
"I'm sorry," she said quickly, "I wasn't watching where I was going…" And then she noticed just whom she had run into. The egotistical and self-proclaimed King of the World. Liz shifted her weight to her other foot, unsure on how to act. When she returned from the hospital, she found a rather long message on the telephone from the King of the World himself, apologizing for his actions and giving a get well soon. And the most amazing part – there was nothing egotistical on the message. At first, Liz had thought it had been a prank – a sick joke, but then he had called again, this time while she was home. Oddly, Liz found that Chris Jericho wasn't that same egotistical jerk off-screen.
"It's okay," Chris Jericho replied, "I'm, uh… Glad to see you." Clearly she wasn't the only one who didn't know what to say.
She mustered a smile, "I'm glad I'm back, too. I, uh, have to get going though… Was supposed to meet Rob like 15 minutes ago," she explained.
"Okay… See you later?" he asked, shifting uncomfortably on his feet. If someone told him 16 months ago that in the near future that he'd be begging for forgiveness from Liz herself, and getting it, he would not have believed them, much less considered it. He had asked that phrase as a question, because he couldn't quite believe that she actually really forgave him.
"Yeah," Liz said quietly, smiling slightly, "Yeah," she repeated, stronger. Chris nodded, stepped to the side, and watched her head down the hallways. She stopped near a door, knocked, and, hearing an answer, went in and disappeared from Y2J's line of sight.
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"Hey," Rob said, lifting his forehead from his arm, which was rested against the wall as Liz stepped into the room. "I was wondering what happened to you…" he trailed off as Liz hugged him. He squeezed back half-heartedly. If you had been on time, I wouldn't have to hurt you like this.
As she pulled back, Liz cocked her head, her arms still set loosely on his shoulders, "What's wrong?" she asked.
Everything. Rob sighed, running a hand through his hair and sitting down on one of the benches, a cold feeling of dread ensnaring him. He didn't say a word, just set his elbows on his knees and pressed his forehead onto his palms. Liz knelt in front of him, her gaze never leaving his face. He looked down at the tiled floor, remembering the pain that Big Show had put him through.
'…You minus well get that ambulance ready for her…'
"I…" Rob looked up, trying to wipe the pain off of his face. His stomach clenched and rolled as Liz looked up at him, the soft skin of her hand against his leg, reassuring him to go on, her jade eyes warm and so unlike the steel green eyes that she had during matches… Rob hesitantly dropped his hands to rest along his thighs. Liz took her hand off her his leg and pressed her elbow on her thigh as she stared at him.
"You what?" she asked quietly, innocently.
I love you.
"I think…" he took a breath, ignoring the icy cold pain spreading through him, "I think that we should break up," he said slowly, his jaw clenching to hide his pain as he watched her reaction.
'I think that we should break up,' the words were like bricks, crashing against her. She blinked once, twice, and considered to rub her ears.
Because she thought she heard her heart breaking.
"Why?" the word came out as a strangled croak. Liz looked up, ashamed at the water fighting to run down her face. "Why?" she repeated, much liking to simply disappear.
Rob closed his eyes tightly and pressed his palms against them, knowing that when he opened them, the same pained image of Liz would be sitting before him, her jade eyes blurred by tears.
Because I love you.
"I…I don't think that we're right for each other," he whispered, his voice cracking.
We aren't right for each other. We're perfect.
She stood up abruptly, but her jade eyes never left him. Slowly, painfully, he met her gaze. He swallowed the lump in his throat as she shook her head quietly. "I wish," she murmured, "that I will wake up in a minute, and know that this," she motioned with her head, "was all a dream." She laughed – not the joyous melody that Rob knew and loved, but a cracking burst of sadistic pain, "But instead I find that this – us – was just a dream…" She bit her lip as the first tear rolled slowly down her face. "And – " she croaked, bowing her head in pain, "I find that you thought it was a nightmare."
It wasn't a dream, it was real, and it was the best thing that ever happened to me.
Instead of voicing his thoughts, Rob stayed stonily silent. Liz shook her head again, ashamed at herself, blaming herself. In her mind, she'd expected the silence. But, she realized as a second tear joined the first, her heart had been hoping otherwise. Liz lifted her head once more, and took a shaky step to the door, her hand resting on the handle. She paused, risking a glance back at Rob.
"Good-bye," she said, trying to fill her words with spite and anger, but the pain showed. She opened the door, staring at the bland hallway, and found herself hoping against fate, that this was all some sort of sick joke. But at the silence between them, she knew that it was a foolish hope – and wasn't about to be granted. As she stepped out, she let the tears flow freely – a sixth tear joining the fifth, a seventh tear following the sixth…
She jogged blindly through the hallway, the tears blurring her vision, and only the instinctive need to run pushing her to get away, as if the situation only existed at the arena. Liz ran straight on into someone – she didn't take a glance to look. She jerked backwards, this time going to run past the person, but warm, strong arms engulfed her into the embrace. She didn't even hear the leather backpack that he'd been carrying drop to the floor. Liz didn't care who the person was – she was too delirious with pain to care or know – all she did was cry against him.
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Author's Note: I'M SO SORRY IT TOOK SO LONG TO UPDATE!!! I started this the moment I uploaded the last chapter, had it finished, and then I went on my trip to Massena in NY. When I got back (yesterday) I found that the computer had deleted every single file on it! I was ticked off, to say the least, and said some very colorful words. So, I retyped the entire thing this morning, changed a few things (some things probably got worse) and saved it on a floppy disk. I'm also sorry that I didn't put an Author's Note up to tell you that I went on vacation. It slipped my mind, and I'm sorry about that. Anyways, the next chapter should be up soon, and from now on I'm going to back my files on floppy drives, and hopefully it works good. And another thing that I'm sorry about is that this chapter was so short… Okay, so technically it was only like 300 words less than usual, but I try to hit 2,000 without the Author's Notes…
I would like to know what the reviewers think I should do with a few things in the story… A) What should I do about Dominique? I really don't want her to become a main character – as in one equal to Liz, but I don't really wish to drop her out of the story with only a mention or two. What do you guys think? B) So it's not that big of a secret – I'm thinking about adding some romantic feelings between Liz and a Superstar that she knows. By this, I mean that she can know him as well as Edge or as well as Brock, but people like the French people (I can never spell their names right), I wouldn't want her to be involved with. Not like their personalities or anything – just that she knows squat about them.
And here are a few ideas that I plan to intervene with this story. I'm going to have Evolution come back into the story before Hunter comes back into the WWE. I'm going to have "the French people" come into the story (be warned – I'm not a fan). Also, Goldberg will play a small part.
Okay, I'm done rambling on and on… You can go review now, LOL! Please do! Love you guys,
-LK08-
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