Chapter 27

His temper terrified her now as Emery kept her distance, seeing his face slowly turning red. "Because of me." She whispered, unable to meet his eyes when they snapped to her and shakily held out the video. "This is footage of me and Vince in his office from back in 99. I don't know how Batista got it, I wasn't aware Vince recorded his conversations, but…" She trailed off, feeling him snatch the video from her grasp and closed the locker room door, not wanting anyone else to overhear this.

Emery was stupid to stick around while he popped that video in and watched the footage pop up moments later. It was apparently on the video repeatedly, so there was no need to rewind it. She had PUSHED for this stupid line of hers and it hadn't shocked the fans, but that night only. The line, with his help, had fizzled the hell out because it had taken the mystery, the occult away and turned it into a giant joke.

"Any other surprises, Emery?" He asked tensely, not looking at her, afraid he would lose his temper and do something stupid again. "Anything else I need to know about?" His acidic gaze slid to the image: Do You Know Who's Pulling Your Strings? It was her all these years. "Anything else to tell the employee?"

Her mind raced, trying to go through 10 years' worth of storylines she had written up for Vince. She cringed at the word employee coming out of his mouth because it was condescending. "There probably is, yes." Emery admitted, keeping her voice and eyes lowered from him, her back pressed against the door. She wanted to tell him the Corporate Ministry had looked good on paper, but once it actually happened and fizzled, she'd realized what a huge mistake it was. It had single-handedly destroyed the Ministry of Darkness – his baby – his brain child. "Mark, there's 10 years' worth of storylines that I've given Vince and he's approved for you. I-I can't even begin to remember all of them…" Blinking the tears away, Emery refused to cry in front of him and trembled a little when his shadow fell over her. "Batista is going to show that tonight during your segment with him, just as he said on the video, which means there's more than one copy."

This was why he now had ultimate say over what these writing dicks tried pulling with his career. Mark had seen some potential superstars get stuck in stupid storylines and they had gone away, shucked under the carpet, and everyone pretended it had never happened. How many careers had Emery helped build and how many had she destroyed because of what looked good on paper?

"Brilliant. Eventually, Vince is going to send you out in front of a camera, you know that, right?" A lightbulb just went off and he smirked, staring down at her.

"W-What? No – NO! Get that smirk off your face right now, Calaway. I am NOT going in front of the camera, ever." Emery was adamant about staying behind the scenes, which is why she'd had a proxy to begin with. "I'm not even the lead script writer anymore." At his wide eyes, she nodded solemnly and fingered the braid over her shoulder nervously. "I gave the position up and told Vince to give it to Cheryl. She deserves it anyway. I'm just another member of the writing team and I'm sticking to the smaller Superstars to write for." It sucked, but it was Emery's way of making up for what she'd done. "So no, I'm not going in front of the camera. I want nothing more to do with this, but Batista is adamant about putting it out there for the entire fucking world to see." She hated David Batista. "Maybe I should talk to him…"

She was going out on camera. It was a bit late for her to be shy since Emery was winding up plastered all over the screens anyway. He bet he could talk Vince into it, knowing Vince would want to both utilize the current drama as well as squash it. And he and David were still hotly feuding… could be fun.

"Sure, you do that, Queenie." He said absently, no longer paying her attention. "Let me know how that works out for you."

"Mark…"

Vince sighed, knowing he had a lot to make up for all everything that had been spilled out for the world to see. Batista refused to talk, feigning innocence and claimed it wasn't him on the videotape when it clearly was. He didn't want to ruin his feud between Undertaker and Batista since the fans were eating it up. They were gearing up for Backlash – Last Man Standing match.

"The only way you'll get my approval on this is if YOU convince her. And don't use terror tactics either. She either has to do this willingly or no deal."

That sent Mark to Emery's hotel room and when she opened the door, flipping the light on, he sat in the far corner with a glass of some kind of liquor in hand. "What's going on?" She asked tiredly, dropping her bag lightly on the floor and kicked her shoes off.

"You're doing a storyline." He informed her flatly, having no intentions of asking; he was telling.

Vince was an idiot for even thinking he was taking any orders from him or Emery again. That hadn't played out well for any of them. Mark was of the firm opinion, those two were done getting together and making stories.

"With me, and Batista."

"No, I'm not. Vince hasn't called me into a meeting or anything. No, not happening." Emery was standing firm on this and squared her shoulders when he stood up, folding her arms in front of her chest. "No amount of torture, ridicule and terrorizing is going to change my mind either, Mark. Get out, you're wasting your time." She had a raid to do in an hour on WoW and he wasn't going to ruin it. "Find someone else, slap some glasses on them and go crazy."

"Because, darlin', this was decided tonight and you don't call those shots anymore, Emery." He smirked, not bothering to move and had all the time in the world as far as he was concerned. "You're just a lowly little writer now." Cheryl was lead writer and she knew better than to toy with him or his lines from here on out. Mark had no more trust for people with pencils and paper or laptops. "Besides, it's YOU I want, not someone else."

"Still not doing it. I'll leave the company before I'm brought on television for any kind of storyline, especially one involving you and Batista." This man was out of his mind. Mark had truly lost whatever was left of his sanity if he thought for a second she would be bullied or coerced into doing this. "And I don't take orders from you. You're just an employee with the WWE, you're not my fucking boss." Emery's temper was rising fast and his smirk did not help quell it any. "So, take your storyline and shove it up your ass, Deadman! I'm NOT doing it."

Sighing, he got out his cell phone and hit the number. "I quit, effective immediately."

"Wait, what?" Vince blinked at the dial tone.

He hung up. Sighing, Mark finished off his drink and stood up. "You're right, I'm not your fucking boss. I don't know why I bother with you. You don't care about anything but yourself, you've already proven that time and time again. You'd rather just jump ship than face this head-on with me."

What the hell had just happened?

"What the hell did you do that for?! Call him back right now! You're insane!" Emery shouted, not believing he just quit his job because she wouldn't do this line with him. "I'm so sick and tired of you throwing that in my face, Mark! Boohoo, you didn't like the lines I provided and had Vince sign off on! You're not the only one I did lines for, jackass! And now you're forcing me to do this! You're forcing me to go out on national television with you against Batista!" Tears streamed down her cheeks as he stared stoically at her, no emotion or anything in his eyes or features. "I hate you. I hate you so fucking much! You call him back right now and tell him you're not quitting and I'LL DO THE GODDAMN LINE WITH YOU!"

By the time he was done with his phone call, Emery was looking ready to castrate him and Vince seemed like he had had a mild heart attack. The Undertaker put asses in seats, with or without stupid storylines. She could hate him all she wanted, but Batista was the one who had stuck her in the spotlight. Soon enough, it would be Batista dragging her out to put a face with a name. They needed to beat him to the punch.

"Well thank you, darlin'." He said, fully prepared to catch a fist or dodge a knee, not about to lose another ball to her.

"Screw you! Screw you and this whole damn company! And thank you for showing and proving to me just how low of a human being you really are. Now get the fuck out of my room." Emery had nothing more to say to him, not even wanting to look at him and stormed into the bathroom, slamming the door so hard, the walls shook.

She was LIVID, not believing Mark just tricked her into doing this storyline and shook her head. Ripping the blouse off along with the skirt, she threw them in the corner along with her undergarments and took a much-needed cold shower to soothe her boiling blood. A half an hour later, she stepped out, wrapped a towel around her body and walked back out, gritting her teeth at the sight of Mark. He was STILL here.

"What did I say? Get the fuck out of my room! I have shit I have to do and you're not wanted here."

"What shit do you have to do, my Queen?" He asked, genuinely curious. She wasn't lead writer anymore and knew she didn't have as heavy a workload as before. "Prospective positions with TNA?" Mark would burn that company to the ground before he allowed her to leave his territory. "Not amusing when someone destroys everything you've worked for, is it?" It kind of sucked, actually. "So, curious, who does Batista have helping him?"

"Keep it up, Calaway…" Emery growled through gnashed teeth, taking a pair of cotton shorts and tank top along with bra and panties out of her bag to change. Fine, if he wanted to stay then he was getting a show. She proceeded to dress in front of him, without showing anything, keeping the towel securely fastened until she had to turn her back to put the bra on. "I don't have a fucking clue who is helping Batista. I wish I knew." Her tone was full of snark as she plopped down on the bed and grabbed her bag, not surprised when he joined her moments later. "And for your information, not that you care, but I have a raid to do on my online game and it starts in about 15 minutes. And I'm not your Queen, not anymore." He'd made that abundantly clear when he left Sedona and didn't contact her for the past 2 weeks.

"You'll always be my Queen and think about it. Someone who obviously has been… keeping tabs on you for a very long time." Mark had no idea; people came and went, he was always there it seemed. Obviously, whoever this was really wanted them to hate each other or just embarrass her. "As much as it wounds my ego, I don't think this is about me." He stood up when there was a knock on the door, going to retrieve the cart of food he had ordered. "Hungry?" He figured she might need some sustenance for her… raid.

"Why are you doing this? Why are you even here? Why do you care? You haven't spoken a word to me in 2 weeks and now suddenly, you want to talk and act like everything is fine? You want to eat together? Forgive me if I'm a little fucking skeptical right now. And yeah, I'll eat something." Logging into her online game, Emery scratched her forehead, her long wet black hair hanging down her back since she hadn't done anything with it. "Don't call me your Queen because that's not who I am to you. All you see when you look at me is a conniving, lying bitch and I've accepted it." Snatching the plate of food from him, she set it down beside her and began to eat, staring directly at the screen waiting for all the guild members to logon.

While she did that, he reclined on her bed, after kicking off his boots and ate his own food, listening to the raid through her speakers. He heard Orton in there, wonder how that little stoner was doing. She had made assumptions again, she was good at that. Mark already knew, eventually, more skeletons were going to come tumbling out of her closet. Things she had 'forgotten' and he had tried giving her space to clear his own head, to hopefully let her get over her fear of him. He began snickering, that had worked out quite well actually, the mouthy bitch.

"Orton, one on your left! Now on your right!"

"Son of a bitch, they're all over the fucking place!" Randy crowed through the speakers, groaning. "Come on, how many more of these cocksuckers are there?!"

Emery was being mouthy with Mark because he'd forced her to do this line with him and Batista. She was pissed at him, her fear of him long gone. All she wanted to do was strangle him and then kiss him, missing him more than she'd ever care to admit. Him being in her bed again and eating with him felt good, not that she'd ever admit that either.

"Okay boys and girls, we're almost at the destination. Stay focused!"

"Gotcha, Boss."

"Right back at ya, Boss." They were co-founders of the guild and therefore, both were bosses.

An hour later, the raid finally ended with everyone congratulating each other and Emery wished them all well. She shut her laptop, finishing her food and set the plate on the tray alongside Mark's. Then she set her laptop on the floor and leaned back against the headboard, looking down at her midnight blue painted fingernails.

"Thanks for the food." She muttered, slowly turning her head to look at Mark the same time he did, their eyes locking.

"You're welcome." He rumbled, hands laced behind his head. Mark had simply lain here, once he was done eating, listening and he did not understand a single bit of it. It sounded like… they were waging battles on the computer. "What's the point of that? Your game." Staying up this late, just to meet other people, on screen… seemed kind of… not his thing. Nerdy, actually, but he would not be saying that out loud.

Not when it seemed like she was calling a truce.

Emery turned to face him further and shrugged, cracking a small smile. "Just something to do. The game itself is war, basically. You assemble a guild, team, or whatever you wanna call it and you destroy everything in your path. It's called World of Warcraft. Randy and I started a guild on there about 2 years ago and he's the one who introduced me to it. We have a raid once a week because of the hectic traveling schedule and whatnot." She sat up a little, looking down at him and hesitantly reached out to touch the side of his face. "You shouldn't judge it unless you give a try. You might like all the chaos and violence it has."

"I didn't judge anything, Miss Assumption, I was asking because it is something you're interested in and I am interested in you. I'm not interested in trying it, however, I got enough going on without trying to add online warring to that menu."

Mark was fixing to go to real war with Batista and whoever his partner in crime turned out to be. There clearly was one, he had determined that today. There was no way Batista was getting his hands on materials from back in 1999 and 2000. The prick hadn't even been in the business then. This was someone who had been around a long time, was familiar with Emery and had access to tech. Catching her hand, Mark pulled her up and over so she straddled his lap.

"I see you're not afraid anymore. Good."