Shattered Hearts

Chapter One

It was very quiet at the arena when Rain arrived with Eva. Her little girl looked around curiously and then up at her mother.

"Why is no one here?" she asked. Rain smiled.

"It's early yet sweetie," she said. "Mommy has a meeting with JR and you're going to crèche with Miss Amanda, ok?"

Eva clapped her little hands. She loved crèche and Miss Amanda, who travelled with the crew now having been employed by Steph to take charge of the number of young children who accompanied the tours. Steph had utilised it herself with her youngest child who was a year older than Eva. Rain found her way to the room Amanda had set up and was in awe of how the woman could create a child friendly space in a short time. Amanda had a crate that followed her around everywhere with her resources in, which included more craft materials than Rain had ever seen in her life. Most arenas would set her up with a table and some chairs and though these were generally not child height Amanda could still create a stimulating environment for her charges. A couple of children were already there and so Eva rushed into the room, giving Amanda a big hug of welcome.

"Bye Mommy!" she called over her shoulder, before changing her mind and rushing to give Rain a cuddle. Rain smiled across at Amanda and exchanged pleasantries before she headed to her meeting with JR.

JR was rubbing his hands over his face when she came into the office, clearly unhappy with something and Rain felt a tremor of doubt. Had she done something wrong? Had he called her in to give her a telling off? But then he looked up and she saw relief cloud his expression.

"Thank the Lord you are here, Rain. Please, take a seat. I need some sort of miracle to make this damn disaster work."

"What's wrong?" she asked, sitting down opposite him and sliding her iPad out of her bag. JR shook his head.

"I've had an email from Vince wanting to put the big strap on Goldberg," he said and Rain's eyes widened.

"Instead of John?" she asked and he nodded bleakly.

"But we've been building that storyline for months! Is he crazy?"

"Crazy about a man who has definitely got the look," JR replied grimly.

"But surely John has the look too?"

"Yes ma'am he does but Vince is taken in by that whole intensity that Goldberg has."

Rain was silent, digesting this, seeing her months of work with John all going down the drain. She knew in her heart that John was the better choice; he appealed to the kids and adults were more likely to spend out on their children for merchandise than on themselves. The year before John's action figure had been a sellout Christmas toy. She knew this from talking with Lily who had taken in some of the accounts work.

"I'm concerned as well that at some point we could have a major injury on our hands. He ain't always careful, Rain," JR said meeting her gaze. Rain shifted uncomfortably in her seat. Goldberg's match against Bret was hanging just on the horizon and she was very anxious about it. It seemed every match he had the big man injured someone in some way or other. And it was hard because she liked him. Goldberg was friendly and gentle outside the ring,  nothing like the intense monster he portrayed in matches.

"I'd have thought a spell in development would have been more appropriate than putting the strap on him," she finally said.

"Agreed and I've had that conversation with Vince but he just won't buy it. I wondered if we might persuade Bret to do some work with him maybe? Like some private tuition just to help him out a bit. Maybe I could persuade Vince to let us play this out with John and hold fire with Goldberg?"