The anger had been boiling inside of Paul from the second he had realised what Laura Molinaro had done. He knew the bitch could be wild and he had known with absolute certainty that she would do something for payback but this was over the line, a long way over the line. As he made his way into Laura's outer office on his crutches he asked the secretary, who he thought without doubt had the worst job in the world, "Is Laura in? I assume she is."

The secretary looked up from her computer screen and Paul noticed the stress lines on her forehead and the fact that her brown hair appeared to be slightly darker than the last time he had seen her. She was having it coloured. Laura is sending you grey and you can't be over thirty five he thought with a trace of humor. He imagined that his own blonde hair would start to turn if he had to spend eight hours a day with that fucking dragon barking orders at him non stop. Actually he would not be able to make it through the first shift.

"She is but I don't have an appointment for you today?" The secretary had a slightly quizzical look on her face as if she was trying to decide whether the error was on Paul's part or her own.

Paul snorted, "Trust me, she's waiting to see me."

The next comment surprised Paul, "Well you're probably in luck, she's been in a good mood all day, ever since she hired her husband to replace you in fact. I've never seen anything like it, she hasn't even snapped at me all day."

Hired her husband to replace him? What the hell did her husband know about the wrestling industry. The woman was obviously bat shit crazy, firing people left, right and centre and replacing them with people who had no clue how to do the job they had been given. Stupid bitch, thinking she was so high and mighty in her plush office ruining who ever's life she felt like whenever she felt like it. Again the anger began to boil to the surface, "She's fucking with people's lives that's why she's happy, the sadistic bitch," Paul growled, "Just get me in there please."

The venom in his voice and presumably the angry expression on his face had caused the woman in front of him to raise her eyebrows prior to picking up her phone. She pressed a button and waited for a response for several seconds. When she spoke she sounded a little hesitant as if doing her job and informing Laura she had a visitor could easily cause her to be savaged, "Paul Levesque is here asking to see you Mrs. Molinaro."

Only a second elapsed before Paul heard, "Yes of course." As the phone was replaced he was informed, "You can go straight through." The tone seemed to imply that it was some great privilege he was being afforded rather than permission to walk into an office for an argument.

As he made his way to the door Paul reminded himself to keep his cool, an argument was not something to relish with this egomaniac, not today anyway as there was Stephanie to consider. If he went in and started shouting, raging and insulting Laura things were only going to get worse for Stephanie, this was not about his pride now it was about getting Stephanie's job back even if it meant kissing the ass of the woman he hated more than anyone else in the world. He knew that this could possibly be one of the toughest things he had done in his life to date as he would be tempted the whole time to tell Laura to go fuck herself. Hopefully the temptation would not prove too great although he could not rule it out as he imagined the smug expression he would find on the woman's face when he entered the office just a few seconds from now.

"Let me get the door," Laura's secretary's voice came from behind him and she walked over and helped him out as he took a deep breath to compose himself. He made his way into the office and there she was. Laura was standing to greet him with a smile on her face, "Hello Paul, good to see you." The smile may not have contained the smugness he had expected but the eyes did. Those striking green eyes always gave her away. Paul wondered if she knew that this was the case and if so did she even care? She more than likely wanted him to know that she was pleased with what she had done and that he had reacted and arrived in her office so quickly.

Doing his best to bite his tongue Paul made his way to the desk the large wooden desk. As he looked at Laura even despite his intense anger and hatred of the arrogant bitch he admitted that she looked amazing. He could not help looking at the silver necklace she wore and the small figure that dangled at the end of it between and just above her breasts as she leaned over the wide desk to greet him with an outstretched hand. It looked like it might be some kind of angel, he considered that to be least appropriate thing imaginable for her to wear. Try again Laura, buy one with a fucking devil on it or something. Tearing his focus away from the necklace and her breasts he managed a tense half smile and almost despite himself shook the offered hand which was warm, strange for such a cold hearted reptile. He wondered what kind of reptile would she be? A snake, definitely a snake. She was obviously low enough.

"Laura." He was pleased that his greeting contained no warmth and precious little respect as neither thing was deserved.

The smile on her face had changed, now there was humor in it and the corners of her mouth had turned upwards slightly, "You like my necklace Paul?"

Realising that he had been caught window shopping Paul felt his cheeks reddening but Laura let him off the hook by asking another question before he could fumble a response to the first, "How's the recovery coming along? Take a seat if it's more comfortable for you."

Paul had to admit that this bitch was good as he sat down and Laura did the same in her large high backed chair. If he did not know better he might have believed her concern was genuine but instead he felt himself begin to boil yet again as he wrestled with himself to keep his voice calm and the memory of Stephanie crying her eyes out came to him. This was no time for small talk or bullshit, this bitch had something to answer for and put right. Even so he had to answer the question she had posed.

"Actually I think Trish caused me to reinjure it. My physio work has been put back by at least a week and I've been recommended to have another scan on it."

"That's not good news," Laura grimaced, "That's not good at all. I'll have someone contact you and we'll get that scan done asap. What brings you here today?"

That's not good news. The comment made Paul grip the arms of the chair he sat in. It was obvious that she was not thinking that it was bad news for Paul as he would potentially face more time away from the job he loved or even that it was bad news that he was in pain. It was not even bad news that Trish had shown up at his home and assaulted Stephanie, leading to the injury being aggravated. No, the bad news was that she might lose more money and ratings with one of her prized assets unavailable to her.

Unable not to, Paul bristled although he did manage to avoid reacting to the comment that had pissed him off with it's underlying meaning, "Look let's not play games. We both know why I'm here, you had Stephanie released to get back at me."

"Excuse me?" One of her perfectly shaped eyebrows had raised a little. The fake innocence was infuriating.

"Come on Laura don't try to tell me you didn't do it. I know lying is not your thing."

"Stephanie has not been released... yet." She reached into a drawer in her desk and withdrew a sheet of paper. "She won't be released until I sign this." So that was the idea was it? Wait for him to rush over to the office and make him sit there and watch as she signed off on Stephanie's release with no consideration to how it would affect Stephanie. Paul had to try hard to resist jumping up in anger and hurting his knee even more. Instead it was only his voice which rose, "That's what this is? You wanted to have me sit here and watch you destroy the girl's life just because you heard that we've been spending time together? You're that low? I pissed you off that much?"

The sheet of paper sat on the desk in front of Laura and she picked up an expensive looking silver fountain pen but then she paused theatrically and looked him coldly in the eyes before asking, "You remember that day in here don't you Paul? I told you I would remind you of it. I don't know if you play poker but I'm holding one hell of a hand here and it looks to me like you have nothing."

She was a poker player? Really? With those eyes and her stupid outbursts of anger and aggression? Paul wanted to ask her to tell him how much she had actually won at the poker table but decided to let it slide.

Realising that this was the time to forget his pride and willingness to draw a reaction from the woman opposite him and instead attempt to live up to his promise to Stephanie and get her job back Paul managed to keep his cool, "What do you want from me? You want an apology? Fine, I'm sorry for running my mouth at you that day and I apologise for my bad attitude. Now can we leave Stephanie out of this please?"

A smug smile appeared on Laura's face but the pen remained in her hand, "That's a good start at least. I want something else from you, then we can try to forget all of this unpleasantness."

Paul sighed, "Fine, name it?"

The next question took him completely by surprise, "How much of the creative work that we're using right now is yours and how much is Trish's?" What the hell was she talking about now and where was she going with this? What did Trish's writing have to do with anything?

"What?"

Laura's eyes rolled prior to the sarcasm, "I'm fluent in Italian and I have some Spanish and German, would using one of those make this easier?"

Paul felt his jaw tightening again in anger but he was still winning the battle to appear calm, "Most of it is mine. She's making small changes but she's still using a lot of what I wrote before you fired me."

Silence descended on the office. Paul watched as the fountain pen began to twirl in Laura's fingers which he correctly figured was a sign of irritation. Had Trish been trying to pass off his work as her own? He certainly hoped so, he really hoped she had been lying to Laura. As if to emphasise what he was thinking the silence was broken by a quiet but menacing question.

"You know what will happen if I find out that you're lying to me?"

"It's true. There's another couple of weeks worth of storylines up to the next pay per view that are mostly my work," Paul laughed before continuing, "Then we both know what is going to happen. You're going to be relying on Trish's creativity which means your ratings are going to sink faster than the Titanic. Great decision to give her that job by the way, a real stroke of genius that was."

Laura was seemingly unaffected by the sarcasm, "I didn't give her the job, I gave her a trial. I suspected that she was trying to pass your work off as her own therefore this is what I want from you in return for this sheet of paper to go in the trash."

For the next two minutes Laura explained what she wanted Paul to do and he was left stunned and hating every second that he had to look at the smug, arrogant bitch sitting opposite him. Of all the things she could have had him do this was the worst he could have imagined. Actually that was not true because he never could have imagined it. After a few moments of silence Laura sighed, "I need a decision on this, it's late and I'd really like to head home. What's it going to be, do we have an agreement or not?"

Stephanie had made herself busy cleaning Paul's condo since he had left, hoping that it would also occupy her mind while she waited for him to return. Of course it had not worked and all she could think about was what she was going to do if he returned and told her that he had failed to get her job back. Naively she had almost convinced herself that he was wrong about Laura, she would not do something like this to get back at Paul. Hopefully there was some misunderstanding that had caused her to be released and Laura getting involved personally could clear it up quickly.

She was hoovering the floor of the living area when she glanced out of the window and saw a cab pull up outside. A few moments later Paul awkwardly climbed out. Stephanie turned off the hoover with her foot and muttered under her breath, "Please, please, please, please," as Paul made his way towards the door. Surely he would have good news, surely her dream was not really over? She walked over and opened the door before Paul got there and pleaded, "Please have good news?"

Paul said nothing as he entered the condo and Stephanie could not read anything from his expression. Desperate for good news she pleaded, "Paul? Talk to me!"

Stephanie closed the door and looked expectantly at Paul. She was still unable to read anything from him but after a moment a smile began to appear on his face, "I spoke to Laura and she's going to see to it that you're not released. She looked into it and luckily it hadn't been finalised as yet so she's blocked it. Not only that, I decided to push my luck and tell her that she should offer you an improved contract in return for what she wanted from me and she went for it."

A shriek of delight escaped Stephanie as she hugged Paul as tightly as she could, "Thank you so much! Oh my god! How did you do that? How did you do it, huh? Oh my god!"

Paul returned the hug as best he could while holding his crutches and trying not to put any weight on his right leg, "You're welcome. Look at me."

Stephanie released her embrace slightly so that she could pull back a little and do as he asked. Paul saw what he had hoped for, the reason he had agreed to what Laura wanted him to do. There was sheer joy and also relief in Stephanie's beautiful green eyes and then they began to fill with tears as the relief was obviously hitting her, "I really can't believe this. What did you say? What did she want from you? What did you do?"

Telling her what he had agreed to was definitely not something that Paul intended to do right now as it would spoil the happy mood for sure. Therefore he decided to keep his cards close to his chest, "I jumped through hoops, just like I promised."

"I don't know what that means but thank you." The relief was so obvious in Stephanie's voice and with that they shared a long, slow kiss and for the first time it contained genuine passion. However even as they kissed doubts began to eat away at Paul. Stephanie had only been placed in this awful position to begin with and Paul had only had to agree to Laura's sick demand because of the fact that Laura and Trish thought they were in a relationship. Maybe the best thing for Stephanie, for both of them in fact, would be for him to break it off with her before it got a chance to go that far and get serious?