Hello! I am so sorry for the massive delay in this chapter. I've had massive writers block and just haven't known where to go with this chapter, I'm still not 100% happy with it but I really wanted to get something out to you.
Any comments/suggestions are greatly appreciated and I honestly take them all on board. Please hit that review button at the end of this chapter, I'd love to hear your thoughts and I'm sure they'll help me battle this stupid block I'm having.
Dean lay on his side with his legs curled up around him, his body ached to stretch out but no matter which way he lay the hotel couch just would not accommodate his 6"4 frame. Rolling onto his back with his legs scrunched up Dean ran his large hand through his dishwater curls and let out a long sigh as he decided on what to do.
He could keep trying to hopelessly sleep on the couch, he could fidget and toss and he'd eventually fall asleep, right? He tried to desperately think of why he'd offered his bed to Athena? He'd done it to show her he was a nice decent guy, but now he was sure he could have done that by just giving her a cushion to sleep on the couch with. That way they'd both win, he could stretch out in his bed and her little legs could sleep happily on the couch. Win Win!
As he lay there fuming with his decision to offer his room to her, he tried to tell himself over and over how it was for the best. How women like Athena needed to be romanced before they opened their legs, how he'd need to show her how different he was to Seth.
He was completely different to Seth, he thought. He didn't stab his family in the back.
Running a hand over his face Dean thought of what his next move should be. He could leave it a few days before offering another gentlemanly gesture, maybe a cup of coffee or a friendly face when she would need one, or he could make his move now. He stared at the door weighing his options, on one hand he could play the gentlemanly card and slowly win her over, on the other he could take a risk and slowly crawl into bed with her, his lips finding her delectable cherry ones and hope for the best.
If he could get her to open her legs for him now, he could be well rid of her sooner than expected.
Sitting up he swung his long legs around the side of the couch and heaved his aching body up. He took slow deliberate steps towards his bedroom, still unsure of what he was going to do before he gripped the door handle, silently turning it and slipping into the room quietly.
"What are you doing, Dean?" Athena whispered angrily.
Turning Dean saw her sitting up in bed, the sheets pulled tightly around her as she stared at him with narrowed eyes, her auburn hair ruffled. She looked as if she'd just awoken and her wide blue eyes were glassy with sleep, her plump round lips were pink and inviting, and Dean wondered idly if they would taste as delicious now as they had the week before.
"I need my gym bag," he groused, his hand still on the doorknob.
"Oh," she nodded quietly still holding the sheet to her.
He walked around the bed and he could feel Athena's wide blue eyes following him; Dean leaned down and scooped up his gym bag, tossing it over his shoulder before turning to leave the room.
"Dean," Athena called after him as he was about to leave the room. He turned and stared down at her. "Thanks for giving me your room again."
A genuine smile pulled at his lips. "Anytime, Red."
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Athena couldn't believe that she had ended up in the back of Roman and Dean's rental cruising down the highway heading to the next city for the Smackdown taping before the Money In The Bank Pay-Per-View. She'd bumped into Roman and Dean whilst checking out of the hotel that morning and as she'd spoken to Roman idly Eva-Marie had been screeching across the lobby.
"Come on, Attie," she'd yelled. Athena had turned and cringed inwardly as she'd continued. "Let's hit the road. All red everything!"
Athena had scrunched her nose up as she'd turned back to Roman and Dean. "She does that whenever we carpool," Athena tried to explain casually.
Dean had smirked down at her as Roman barked a laugh. "She sounds like a dream to travel with."
"You bet," Athena said with a forced smile. "See you guys," she'd turned with her suitcase only for Roman to stop her.
"Why don't you travel with us?" Athena's eyes instantly flickered to Dean who was tapping his hand impatiently against his thigh, his face looking completely uninterested.
Athena wanted to jump into the air and scream yes immediately, the thought of a four hour journey with Eva-Marie and Summer-Rae killing her. It's not that she didn't like them, they were nice enough, but she knew that there would be a Total Diva's camera set up forcing her to appear on the show. In all honestly, she couldn't wait for Naomi to return so she could travel with her again. Naomi had the decency to turn the camera off when people who weren't on the show were in the car.
Athena had desperately tried to gage a reaction from Dean, not wanting to annoy him by tagging along, but he'd looked bored and uninterested. He seemed to have mellowed in his disdain for her since Seth had betrayed them, maybe he was even beginning to like her! Maybe, they could be friends one day, maybe.
She'd shook her head at her rampaging thoughts before clearing her throat. "That would be great!" She knew she'd sounded relieved as she accepted the request. "You don't mind, Dean?"
His icy eyes snapped down to meet her and he shook his head slightly. "I'm riding shot gun."
Athena had rushed off quickly struggling to keep the wide smile off her face as she told Eva the change in plans.
Athena had walked behind Roman and Dean silently as they'd headed to the rental and waited patiently behind Dean as he'd stood in front of the trunk of the car arguing with Roman about who was driving. He turned quickly and scooped Athena's case up and planted it in above his own case before closing the trunk quickly.
"Oh, thank you," she said genuinely as he continued bickering with Roman, not acknowledging her thanks, eventually winning and slipping into the passenger seat.
The journey had been far more relaxing on what the journey with Eva and Summer would have been. Athena relaxed in the back with the window rolled down, enjoying the breeze as she read her favourite book, occasionally engaging in a mellow chatter with Roman. Dean was fast asleep in the front seat, he leaned face forward against the window, occasionally a snore escaping him.
Athena had always been able to relax easily around Roman, it was like the moment they met they became friends and although she'd only known him a couple of months it felt like they'd been friends for years. She hoped know that Dean was relaxing his mean attitude towards her, maybe she could travel with them more often.
"Hey, you awake, Attie?" Roman asked, looking into the rear-view mirror.
Athena's eyes snapped up, her bright blue meeting Roman's silver, and she closed her book as she realised she'd been staring out the window in a daze.
"Yeah?" Athena replied sitting up straighter and closing her book.
"You wanna' drive for a little bit, baby girl? My eyes are feeling pretty damn heavy." Roman said, finishing his sentence with a perfectly timed yawn.
Athena smiled. "Sure."
They waited until they could find a safe spot to pull over and Roman pulled the car slowly to a stop. Athena slipped out of the backseat and caught the keys that Roman tossed to her.
"Strap in, big guy," Athena said with a smile tossing the keys idly within her hand. She slipped into the driver's seat, turning and struggling to find the latch that would let her move the seat forward. "Aha," she mumbled as she moved the seat forward, finally able to reach the pedals.
Roman grumbled a laugh as he watched.
Athena had been driving for over an hour in complete silence. Roman had fallen asleep immediately and was a suprisingly quiet sleeper; occasionally Dean would let out an unexpected snore, making Athena jump lightly at the wheel. Moving her hand slowly she turned the radio on turning the volume down low so that it wouldn't wake Roman or Dean.
She wrapped her fingers against the steering wheel whilst she mumbled along to an old rock song that played in the background.
"My fuckin' grandmother drives faster than you," Athena snapped her head towards Dean's lazy voice. He yawned whilst stretching his arms behind his head. "And she's dead, red."
"Did I wake you?" Athena asked quickly, instantly regretting putting the radio on. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to wake you." She flicked her eyes back and forth between the road and Dean as she switched the radio immediately off.
Dean yawned again. "S'okay."
They drove in silence for a few minutes when Dean began stretching in his seat, twisting and turning whilst peering over into the backseat.
"You know if there's any water about, red?" Dean asked, not looking at her.
"In my bag," Athena replied nodding quickly at her large handbag that was placed on the backseat.
Stretching around Dean pulled the black bag from the back seat onto his lap; he looked down at it quickly before looking up at Athena. He didn't just want to dive into her bag and begin snooping through, wasn't that considered rude? Didn't that pretty much put him into the asshole pile that women like Athena didn't want to screw? Wasn't he trying already crawl out of that pile?
Athena glanced at Dean who sat holding the handles of her oversized black bag, his fingers gripping the material as he looked nervously down as he seemed to battle with some inner dilemma.
"You have to unzip it," Athena said, struggling not to look at his baffled expression.
"Gee, thanks red, I thought I had to open in with my mind," he said sarcastically as he unzipped the zipper as a small laugh escaped Athena's plump cherry lips.
He shoved his hand within the bag and began searching through old gum wrappers and receipts, finally pulling out an unopened bottle of water. He took a deep swig of the water before re-sealing the cap tossing it back into the bag, throwing the handbag back onto the backseat carelessly.
Turning back into his seat Dean reached forward and picked up Athena's phone from the dash; she flicked her eyes quickly to him before returning her bright blue eyes to the road. "What are you doing?" She asked quickly looking once again to find him staring at her screen.
"I'm putting music on; my phone's dead," he grumbled deciding if she didn't mind him rooting through her bag, she wouldn't mind him going through her music.
"I have a password, you know," Athena said, looking over her shoulder before pulling into the next lane.
Dean scoffed before furrowing his brows as he stared at the screen. Athena smirked as she glanced at his baffled face.
"Ta-da," he groused turning the phone so that she could see he was on her main screen. Athena parted her lips in shock about to ask how he'd done that when he spoke. "Your birthday, red, really?" She narrowed her brows in at him. "So predictable," he said in an almost sing-song voice.
"The question I'm wondering is how you know my birthday?" She said with a smile. "Have you been creeping on my Wikipedia page?" Athena threw him a mock shocked expression.
Dean let out a scratchy laugh. "I don't have that much time on my hands, red." She threw him a questioning look asking him once again how he'd known her birthday. "I remember that fucking sell out saying your birthday was only a couple of days after mine. Just stuck with me."
They fell into a comfortable silence, the first comfortable silence they'd ever shared. Dean began flicking quickly through her albums occasionally grunting at artists he'd see as he scrolled by. Athena tucked a strand of autumn red hair behind her ear as Dean plugged the phone into the car's USB and music began to play through the car.
"Man, I'm really into Shooter Jennings right now," Dean said, continuing to scroll through her music.
"Tell me about. I think I might just be a little bit in love with him."
Suddenly Dean let out a gravelly laugh. "You've got you're entrance music on here?"
"Yeah," Athena snorted. "It's a great song."
"They let you pick your own entrance music?" Dean almost added 'who's dick did you suck?' but knew that would only make her hate him more than she probably already did. He finally putting the phone back onto the dash before turning in his seat slightly so he was looking at Athena.
She rolled her eyes as if the story she was about to tell was completely ridiculous. "There was this guy from Talent," she narrowed her eyes as if she was thinking deeply. "Or maybe it was Creative," she paused again. "Anyway doesn't matter, I think his name was Mark and he said he was a huge fan of me when I wrestled for PWG-"
"You worked for PWG?" He interrupted shocked that the WWE wasn't her first wrestling company she'd worked for.
She nodded her head. "You thought I was a model or a dancer before I came here, didn't you?"
Dean thought quickly about how he was going to reply. He didn't want to admit the truth and possibly make her mad when she seemed to be warming to him. He didn't want to shit all over the progress he was making with getting her to like him so he could get her into bed resulting in him being able to rub it all over Seth's smug sell out face.
"No," he lied.
"Liar," she laughed calling him out. "Anyway he was like a really big fan and was so desperate to get me to sign the contract he kept adding loads of stupid things into the contract, like how I got to pick my own entrance theme and loads of silly things like that."
Dean stared at her as if he was seeing another side to Athena. He'd always assumed she was a model who'd never worked in a ring before she'd got to the performance centre; he'd thought that the only reason she had a contract was because she had a nice rack and big blue eyes. He'd never thought for a minute that she could have worked her way into the company the same way he had, through hard work and great matches. He'd never taken much notice of her matches to note whether she was talented in the ring or not. Dean had just assumed blindly, and he'd hated her because of it.
Athena snorted. "I was like sign me up; I'd been dreaming of working for the WWE since I was a kid. Even if they'd tried to make me dress like two dollar whore I would have given it a try for the WWE."
"Nah, you're too good for them to even try to change you," Dean said quickly causing a blush to creep over her cheeks. "I won't lie to you, red. I like you more and more every day," he smirked as he watched her eyes widen and turn away, as embarrassment washed transparently across her face.
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