Disclaimer, etc., in part 1. Thanks to everyone that has reviewed/favorited/followed this one.

Part Sixteen

She made her way down the hall of the arena, a frown on the dark-haired woman's face as she tried to think up ways to avoid going to the divas' locker room... Mainly because she knew Maria Kanellis would be there and Eve didn't want to put up with the brat. To think that, at one point, she'd actually thought that Maria was her friend, but now she knew better. Much better. Maria had only ever been nice to her because Eve had been Jeff's manager and Maria wanted nothing more than to sink her claws into the younger Hardy brother. Well, the scrawny little bitch could have him, for all she cared. And after Maria had attacked her from behind on Monday? Hell, Eve pretty much thought the two of them deserved each other.

Shaking her head, Eve rounded a corner, then had to bite back a scream when someone reached out and grabbed her hand, tugging her into the nearest room. The bit of a scream she hadn't managed to prevent from escaping was smothered by the hand on her mouth, a hand that dropped immediately once the person that had grabbed her had tugged her around so she could see his face.

CM Punk.

Without thinking, Eve reacted, reaching out to smack the man on the arm, and he flinched slightly as he pulled the door shut behind them.

"Sorry. You were in your own little world."

"So you grabbed me?" she managed, not sure if she should laugh at him or yell at him.

"Yeah. Seemed like a good idea at the time." He glanced around at the room they were in. It was a storage closet much like the one she'd yanked him into back on Monday when she'd been furious with him for getting her banned from ringside. "Fancy meeting you here."

"You pulled me in here. So it's really not so fancy," she said, and he laughed.

"I always wondered why people said that anyway. 'Fancy meeting you here'. Whatever," he said, shaking his head, his expression growing more serious as he reached out, let his hand skim over her shoulder. "How is it?" he wanted to know, and Eve knew he was asking about the bruise he'd seen on Monday night after RAW... When he'd come to her hotel room to check on her. When he'd kissed her. When she'd kissed him.

"It's okay. It's not really sore, but... It's starting to fade, which means it's really kind of ugly at the moment," she said. "Kelly knows about it. Jeff and Maria don't. I won't give them the satisfaction."

"I highly doubt that Maria left that bruise on you."

"Yeah, but she'd probably try to take credit for it," Eve said with a roll of her eyes. "And Jeff's had since Monday to try and find a way to make what happened in that hallway my fault. I'm sure he'd do the same with the bruise."

"Maybe so. But there's plenty of people in the back that wouldn't buy his excuse."

"He's Jeff Hardy. They want to give him the benefit of the doubt. I'm just a diva search winner. I'm an outsider. I'm not one of them," the diva reminded him, and Punk snorted.

"Well, I'm an outsider, too. I'm not one of them. Not really."

Eve gave him a look. "You're the world heavyweight champion," the woman said, and he shrugged his shoulders.

"Yeah, I am. It's not the first time, either. Doesn't change the fact that I'm an outsider. Doesn't change the fact that the vast majority of fans are mad because I used the money in the bank contract in exactly the way it was intended: to get myself the title. Doesn't change the fact that a lot of the people in the back want Jeff to get the title back. For some reason, despite all the screwing up he's done, a lot of people still think that Jeff Hardy craps rainbows and puppy dogs or some shit. And me? I'm just the guy that spent years in the indies and refuses to go and have a beer with the boys because it's against who I am."

"Some people respect you for being straight edge," Eve said quietly, and he left out a sigh, looked down.

"A lot of them don't. Last year, when I had the title for the first time, JBL came after me as much because he didn't like my whole straight edge lifestyle than for anything else. It wasn't just because of the title. That was a bonus for him. So, yeah... A lot of people don't respect the straight edge thing because they just think it's weird-"

"I respect you for it," the diva stated, her words soft, and it took Punk a moment to register them. When he did, he stopped speaking, lifting his gaze to look at her, finding the pretty brunette just standing there watching him. After a moment, he smiled.

"You know, usually I don't give too much of a shit what people think about me," he told her, and when Eve started to look away from him, he reached out, his fingers on her cheek as he brought her gaze back to his. "I said usually. For some reason, I do care what you think of me. Not sure how I feel about that. Kind of weird. Not a bad weird or anything, just... different. I mean... I don't give a shit what the fans think about me, or the people in the back, but... But then there's you. So... That's kind of where I'm at, right now. Feel free to be creeped out by it."

Eve laughed softly, reaching up and grabbing CM Punk's hand, which had still been touching her face. "I'm not creeped out at all. It's nice to... It makes me feel like I actually matter to someone, which is nice, because I sure as hell know I don't matter to Jeff. Or to a lot of people. And you matter to me, too, so-"

Her words were cut off then, Punk tugging lightly on her hand and surprising her into stepping forward at the pull, his free hand coming up to find her face as his head lowered, his mouth finding hers, the man cutting off her words with a kiss.

Eve couldn't exactly say she minded being interrupted. Not by him, and definitely not when he was interrupting her in this way. In fact, she was pretty sure she liked it.

Without giving herself a chance to think about where they were or why she shouldn't be doing this, Eve acted on instinct, moving closer to Punk, her arms coming up, hands resting on his shoulders for a moment before she pressed closer, her arms wrapping around his neck as his arms came around her waist, holding her against him, one hand splayed across the small of her back, the other fisted in the material of her shirt. He was probably going to leave a wrinkled spot where his hand was fisted in her shirt but, at the moment, she didn't really give a damn. All she really cared about was kissing CM Punk.

As he tilted his head slightly, changing the angle of the kiss, deepening it, his tongue brushing over her lips, he shifted their positions, her back hitting the wall, her shoulder knocking into the side of one of the shelves in the room and Eve couldn't help the hiss that slipped from her lips at the contact... Couldn't help the way she flinched slightly at the impact. For his part, Punk noticed it immediately and broke the kiss, still holding her close as he stepped backward, drawing her away from the shelf. His hand skimmed up her back to her shoulder, and he frowned as he looked down at her.

"You said your back was okay."

The diva frowned. "I thought it was. But then again, I haven't been knocking it against anything, so... I guess I shouldn't hit it against stuff," she said, the woman still standing in the circle of CM Punk's arms. He didn't seem inclined to release her and, well... She found that she didn't really want him to.

"Have you even looked at it since Monday?" he wanted to know, and Eve arched a brow at him.

"I told you that it's starting to fade. That means I've looked at it," she told him, and, when he didn't look convinced, she let out a sigh. "What?"

"Let me see it."

"What? You want me to take off my shirt and show you my bruise?" she asked, and he flinched at that, probably realizing that if he said yes to that, then she'd get really annoyed with him. And besides that, this wasn't about getting a free show. This was about making sure that the bruise didn't look worse than he remembered.

"No. I just... If you can move the shirt off your shoulder enough that I can see the bruise... Eve, I just want to know you're okay," he told her, his eyes on hers, and because she actually believed he was just concerned, the diva heaved out a sigh, turning her back to him before reaching up to unbutton the top few buttons of her shirt, loosening it just enough that she could push it back off her shoulder. She stood very still as he studied the bruises, not moving even when his fingers skimmed over the skin. "I guess I didn't see the full bruise on Monday."

She sighed. "I guess it hadn't fully shown itself when you came to my room and saw it," Eve said, shrugging her shirt back into place, quickly buttoning her shirt back up as she turned around to look at him. To his credit, he didn't even try to get a glimpse of anything as she worked on the buttons, the man's eyes instead on her face.

"Sorry I hurt you," he said, and Eve arched a brow at him.

"Yeah. Um... I'm pretty sure that I wasn't thinking about the bruise until my back hit the shelf. I'm fine. And you didn't hurt me. Jeff did. You've never hurt me, Punk," she told him, and he looked at her for a moment before leaning down, pressing a quick, fierce kiss to her lips before he pulled away and stepped back, putting some distance between them. When she frowned at that, he gave a self-deprecating laugh.

"The closer I am to you, the harder it is to keep my hands off of you, and really... That's not why I grabbed you. Not saying I'm not glad that all of this happened, because... Well, yeah, but... I didn't grab you just so I could attack you or whatever."

"Trust me, Punk, I don't feel like I've been attacked. But, uh, if you didn't pull me into this room to kiss me senseless - good job on that, by the way - why did you grab me?" she asked, watching the way his smile grew at her words, most specifically the part about kissing her senseless. And to be honest, she was kind of smiling about that as well.

"Two reasons, actually. First, I wanted to find out how your shoulder was, which, you know... I did. But I was also wondering if you had seen the match listing for tonight," he said, and Eve gave a slight nod of her head.

"I have. Jeff is facing Jericho. I also saw that you're wrestling Rey Mysterio," she said, and Punk nodded, heaving out a sigh.

"Yeah... Don't really have a problem with Rey, but... We've got a match, and Chris Jericho has already stopped by my locker room and informed me that he's going to be out there doing commentary during my match. He kind of hinted that he intends to make sure that I win." He paused, frowning, then shrugged. "I guess I shouldn't be too surprised. Jericho and Rey pretty much hate each other, so... There it is. I don't know if Jeff is going to insist on being out there for Rey-"

"I doubt it. Jeff doesn't much care about anyone but himself," Eve reminded him, then tilted her head to the side. "What about you? You going to insist on being out there in Jericho's corner when he faces Jeff?" she wanted to know, and Punk snorted.

"Wasn't planning on it. I'd kind of like to win my match against Rey if I can - otherwise he'll probably claim that he deserves a shot at the title, too - and Jeff and Jericho's match is scheduled to start the show, so... I'm not going to be out there to put myself at risk. I wouldn't put it past Jeff to attack me. Of course, if he does something stupid and attacks you, well... I guess I'll have to go out there and beat the ever-loving shit out of him, so-"

"He won't. And that's not because I think he's noble or anything. He knows people saw what happened on Monday. People in the back saw it, and maybe they're looking at him a little more closely than usual," Eve said, then shrugged. "Besides that, I'm guessing that Rey might have gotten wind of the fact that Jericho will be commentating for your match tonight. I'm not sure what he intends to do, but he made it pretty clear that he's going to be around, and I know that if he's out there, Rey won't let anything happen to me."

"Well, now I kind of feel bad about intending to beat the guy later."

"It's a match. You're supposed to want to win," she told him. "And I want you to win, so... Good luck tonight."

He gave her a look. "How about a kiss for luck?" he said, and she rolled her eyes, then shifted closer to him, pressing a light kiss on his lips before pulling back and giving him a wink.

"That will have to tide you over for now. I'll see you later."

"Count on it."