With a heavy sigh, Tania tapped her foot against the cement. She had been leaning against the wall with her arms crossed against her chest for close to ten minutes with no sign of Shane. He had explained that he had to track down one of the management members in order to get copies of the papers she’d have to sign and would return faster then a blink of an eye. In the last second alone she had blinked twice.

Rolling her eyes, she briefly wondered if Randy was at the arena yet. At least then she’d have a bit of company until Shane returned. Though Shane had assured her the whole thing was only going to take a few minutes, Tania was starting to get the impression that it was going to be much longer.

“Excuse me, are you Miss Bailey?” In hearing her name being called, Tania’s head shot up to notice her visitor. Though she had never really bumped into him or actually spoken to him, she recognized him to be the newest edition to the roster - Chris Masters.

“Please, it’s just Tania.” She had always despised formality.

Chris gave a small nod of acknowledgement followed by a smile. “Well then Tania, Shane asked me to come and get you. He would like you to wait for him in the locker room. Mentioned something about taking longer than he thought so wanted you to be able to wait in comfort.”

That definitely sounded like Shane. In a way, she was almost starting to get annoyed with the way that he was doing everything he could to make her comfortable. To treat her like a princess. “Did he say he was going to be long?”

“I’m not sure, he didn’t say.” Chris shrugged. Glancing down at his watch, he gave a small frown. “Come on, I’ll show you where it is.”

Unfolding her arms, Tania jogged up so she was behind Chris and followed him down the hall. In all actuality, she probably could have found the locker room on her own. They had turned down two corridors before Chris finally held the third door on the left open for her. “Here we are.”

“Thanks.” Slipping by Chris, she made her way into the locker room. Frowning, Tania turned to try and find the light switch on the wall. “Little help here Chris?” Her only response was the closing of the door leaving her in total darkness.

Cursing under her breath, Tania fumbled along the wall in hopes of finding the light switch. Up and down then side to side, her hand still continued to feel nothing but the brick wall beneath her touch. When she decided to turn back to the door and use the light from the hall to help her, panic suddenly struck. Jiggling the door handle again, her worse fears were confirmed - it was locked.

“Somebody help me!” Tania screamed as she pounded as hard as she could on the door with her fist. It was her hopes that in passing by, someone would hear her and open the door. “Please! I’m locked in!” Seconds passing and no help arriving, Tania gave the door a final kick. It appeared that she would have to wait until Shane showed up before getting out of the room. “Just my luck. As if being all alone in the hall wasn’t bad enough.”

“Who said that you were alone?” The sudden sensation of his voice made her jump. Even in the dark Tania knew that the voice belonged to Adam.

“Fuck you Adam! Open this door right now.” She wasn’t in the mood to play his sick and twisted games. All she wanted was to sign the papers and leave with Shane. Go out for dinner like he had planned for the evening.

Adam laughed. “So have you fucked him yet?”

“Excuse me!” Tania couldn’t believe his audacity. “How dare you-”

“I mean, a slut like you can’t possibly go more than a couple of days without spreading your legs for someone.” He didn’t even give her the chance to finish before cutting her off. Tania even wondered if he was talking to himself more so than her. “Isn’t that right?”

When Adam’s hand reached out to brush her hair off of her shoulder, Tania knew she had enough. “I don’t think my sex life is any of your business, Adam. As far as I’m concerned, your just jealous that Shane has something you don’t.”

This brought even more laughter from him. “See, that’s where your wrong. If I want you, I’ll get you. You can consider that to be a promise little girl. See, McMahon had to learn that he can’t have everything that he wants. That eventually money and seduction aren’t going to work anymore.”

“You’re delusional!”

“Am I?” It sounded more like amusement from Adam than anything else. Reaching out he gripped Tania’s shoulder and began to back her into the wall. With the sudden burst of light that flooded the room when Adam turned on the lights, she was both blinded and defenceless. “Okay.”

“When Shane shows up…”

Adam laughed at her all to empty threat. “Haven’t you figured it out yet? Shane isn’t coming. I paid Chris to lie to you.”

The expression on Tania’s face suddenly faded away. Here she was, locked in the locker room with Adam, and no one even knew where she was. “Adam, let me out now.” As hard a she was trying, the panic was still slipping into Tania’s voice.

Reaching out, Adam twirled a lock of her hair around his finger. “Oh my silly little slut. It’s going to take a lot more than that for me to let you go.” Laughing, he glanced over her face. “You never did answer my question though. Have you fucked him yet?”

“I’ve made it clear already that I’m not answering that.”

Adam laughed a little louder this time. “I’m going to interpret that as being a no. I mean, come on. If you had slept with him you’d be throwing that in my face right now just to piss me off.”

“A lady never kisses then tells.” It was a lame comeback, even Tania knew it, but she was running out of options. Adam had her pinned to the wall and was far too close for her comfort.

“And you are far from being a lady.”

“What do you want from me?” Tania finally demanded. She was sick and tired of these little games that Adam was playing. All she wanted was an answer as to why he couldn’t leave her and Shane alone.

Rolling his eyes, Adam pulled his hand away from Tania’s hair causing her to flinch. “Isn’t that obvious already? All I want is to piss Shane off. Take the one thing that he thinks I can’t have. That and ring rats are starting to get boring. Always the same type of thing…expecting more than just a one night stand.”

“You won’t get me Adam. Just because you want me away from him doesn’t mean it is going to happen.”

“That’s where you’re wrong.” Holding a finger up to her lips Adam didn’t want her talking again. He had heard more than enough from her end. “I have a lot more friends around here than he does. You’ve seen that. If I want to piss him off bad enough then I will. Like it or not, the only way to accomplish that right now is through you.”

Knowing she had to do something and quick, Tania slipped her hand down and into her pocket. Gripping her cell phone, all she had to do was get a hold of either Shane or Randy. She was no match for Adam, and if he tried anything then she would be unable to stop him.

She was more than thankful that the last person she had called was Shane. Now all she had to do was press a single button without Adam realizing what she was doing. “You’re going to get what’s coming to you.” Tania threatened against his finger. Adam was going to regret ever walking into the locker room and interrupting her and Shane.

“Oh yeah? Humour me as to how that’s going to happen.”

Hoping that Shane had picked up, Tania slid her cell phone further out of her pocket. “Just because you decided that you could convince Masters to lock me in this room with you, you think you’ve won? You think you’ve proven to Shane that you could take something he wanted? Like I said Adam, you’re delusional.”

Adam watched her curiously for a moment. He had picked up almost at once by the tone of her voice and sudden attention to detail that something wasn’t right. Much to her disbelief, Tania was transparent. “What are you doing?”

“What?” He could tell by the way she was moving that she was hiding something. That’s when it started to come together.

“Let me see your hands?”

Cringing, Tania let the phone fall back into her pocket and held both of her hands in front of her for Adam to see. “Not like I can open the door, you locked it remember?”

Adam gave a slight nod before giving her a quick up and down. Turning Tania around, he pushed her against the door and plunged his hands into her pockets. Pulling her cell phone out, he gave a chuckle. Glancing down at the screen, he could clearly see that she had called Shane and that he was still on the other end of the line.

Reaching out, Adam grabbed Tania by the shoulder and spun her back around. Holding the cell phone up he shook his head. Holding it up to his ear, Adam gave a smirk. “You still there McMahon?”

“Copeland.”

Adam couldn’t contain his laughter, Shane’s voice sounded almost like venom. “I must say, you’ve managed to snag a bright one here. How long has the clever little slut had you on the cell phone for?”

“Long enough. Security is already checking the place locker room by locker room for you. It won’t belong until they find you two.” The moment he had heard Adam’s name he had yelled at the head of security to get his team moving.

“And what about you? Are you looking for her?” Adam questioned. “You know you made it all to easy to get a hold of her by leaving her on her own. She thought she was coming to see you…”

“All I have to say is that you better hope it is security that finds you before I do because I swear to God I’ll rip you apart.” That was one threat that Shane would pull through on. He hated Adam more than anyone else in the business, especially after this little stunt. “You won’t have to worry about having a job.”

Looking up through his eyelashes, he watched Tania keep herself pressed again the door. It was almost funny to see her try and get as far away from her as possible. It wouldn’t be that way for long. “Is that a promise McMahon? Either way, you or your boys better not make it here to late…”

“If you lay a single finger on her…”

“Wow, I can’t believe this! In hearing you right now one might think you actually care for her.” There was no response from the other end of the line. “That’s right Shane. Don’t think I haven’t seen through this little charade of yours.”

“I mean it Adam. If you so much as touch a single hair-”

“Yeah yeah, we’ve been through this already.” He was getting rather board of the conversation. “I’m going to have to let you go now, since you’ve given me such little time to work with and all...”

Not even waiting for one last response from Shane, Adam disconnected the call and handed Tania her cell phone back. When she began to reach for it, Adam backhanded her right clear across the face. “If you ever pull a stunt like that again you will be sorry.”

Cell phone dropping to the ground, Tania reached up to hold the stinging flesh. Biting her bottom lip, she fought to keep the tears from flowing free. The last thing she needed to do was cry in front of Adam. It would be the ultimate revolution of her weaknesses, something she just couldn’t afford to have happen.

“So now you hit women too?”

“I tend to reserve it for sneaky little sluts, actually.” Adam snapped back. He wasn’t going to have her thinking that she could get the upper hand on him. As far as he was concerned, she had deserved it if she was stupid enough to think that he wouldn’t eventually figure out that she had called Shane. “Now if you were smart, you would keep your mouth shut before I really give you something to cry about.”

“Might as well do it because when I get out of here you can bet that I’ll be calling my lawyers.” She was going to charge him with assault one way or the other. She was not at all prepared when the second slap came from Adam.

It was in that moment of desperation that Tania turned back to the door and began pounding her fists against it. “Somebody! Help-” Within seconds Adam had his hand cupped over her mouth to muffle her screams.

“Now that was just stupid…” Adam laughed in her ear. His grip over her mouth suddenly tightened as he heard the unmistakable sound of the door handle being turned.

>>