"Oh..."  She raised a hand to her forehead at the realization that she had a pounding headache.  She'd been sleeping with her head up against the passenger's side window, which hadn't helped, either.

The brunette glanced to her left to her brother in the driver's seat.  "Shane...?  Where are we?"

"We're almost there, Steph...Stamford is only a mile and a quarter away."

The young woman nodded, her hand still pressed against her head.  As she looked Shane over, she realized he looked pretty tired.

"Why didn't you pull over at a rest area or something?" she asked.  "You should have woken me up to switch places with you driving..."

"Steph, don't be ridiculous," Shane replied.  "You were absolutely exhausted - and by the looks of it, you still are.  It's no problem..."

"Like hell...You look like you're ready to fall asleep at the wheel..."

"I'm fine..." the dark-haired man insisted.  "Stopped at a drive-through McDonald's and got a couple of coffees...They've been keeping me awake and alert."

"I'm driving us back," Stephanie asserted.  "And I'm not taking no for an answer...at least I had some rest."

"Sure - you'll get no argument out of me..."

Within the next twenty minutes, the two siblings arrived at the prison.  Asthey left the rental, which Shane parked directly across the street, Stephanie had a horrible feeling of trepidation.  She didn't feel good about this at all.

Her stomach lurched uncomfortably as she and Shane approached a guard at the entrance.

The man asked them for their names and the nature of their visit.

"We're here to see our father," Shane answered.  "We called his attorney to set it all up..."

"What is your father's name?"

"Vincent K. McMahon..."

"All right...Go on inside, and someone will assist you..."

Stephanie followed closely behind her brother as they entered the massive stone structure, her eyes slightly widened in fear.  She'd never even been near a prison or a jail, much less been inside one.  She kept expecting an inmate to jump out at her and spook her - which she knew was just plain silly.  It wasn't your typical jail, where you had the prisoners all caged in a common area near the wardens and other people who ran the place.  Plus, this was a prison for uppity white-collar criminals - like her father.

Stephanie stood by uneasily while Shane spoke to a prison guard.  She glanced around at other civilians nearby, who were apparently there for the same reason they were - to visit loved ones locked up in this place.

Loved ones...

The brunette felt disgust and even loathing soaring through her as those two words echoed through her mind.  She could hardly think of Vince as a 'loved one' anymore, father or not.  Not after all the horrible things he'd caused and done.  He'd threatened her life!  His own daughter... He'd hired Paul to kill Adam.  He was the reason poor Amy had been shot, why she was now lying in a hospital bed.  My God... It was a difficult thing to comprehend when your father had orchestrated a would-be murder.

Stephanie suddenly came to her senses as Shane gestured to her.  They followed the guard down a stretch of hallway, which, to her surprise, was covered with a gray carpeting.

The brunette couldn't help but think of Kurt, and she held the image of his face in her mind as they continued on their way to their father.  The Olympian gave her great strength, which was ironic in the sense that Stephanie had always considered herself a pillar of strength.

The prison guard instructed them to stay right where they were, and then he entered an enclosed area through a set of double doors.  Just before them was an extra thick, long plexiglas window, chairs set up before a counter jutting out.  Attached to small barriers on each right side were telephones... This was where people would sit to talk with the inmates.

Stephanie's stomach did flip-flops as she dreaded the next few minutes.  She supposed the anticipation was actually worse than seeing him - but it didn't make her feel any better.

She took a deep breath and let it out on a sigh.

"Do you think he'll agree to see us?" she asked her brother, who'd been silent since they'd arrived at the communication area.

"I...I don't know..."

However, a moment later, they got their answer when they saw Vince on the other side of the glass.  Clad in standard orange prison wear, he was shackled and accompanied by another guard.

Stephanie's blue eyes went wide as she took in the sight of him.  It was truly unbelievable to see Vince McMahon like this.  It damn near took her breath away.  She looked at Shane and saw that he too was having a tough time seeing their father like this.  He visibly swallowed before gesturing to her with a slight tilt of his head, then slid into one of the two chairs across from the man on his side of the glass.

Shane's eyes remained on Vince as he reached for the phone, and Stephanie slipped into the chair beside him reluctantly, her eyes also glued to her father's face.  On his end, the billionaire picked up the phone, and before his son could utter a single syllable, he spoke.

"What the hell do you want?"

Somehow, Shane managed not to flinch, although his father's words and tone stung.

"We need to talk to you..."

"Yeah, that's what Riley told me," Vince said in annoyance, referring to his lawyer.  "What is it?!"

Shane decided to cut to the chase and not candy-coat their reason for the visit.  "We need to call off whatever else you and Levesque cooked up, Dad..."

Stephanie glanced from her father to her brother, wondering what Vince had said, as she couldn't hear anything on his end.  Judging by the look on both his and Shane's faces, it couldn't have been anything pleasant.  No "Hi, son, good to see you... How've you been?"  No way...

"I don't know if you're aware," Shane continued, "but Levesque's gone wild...He tried to shoot Adam Copeland in broad daylight a couple of days ago."  He felt the bile rising up to his throat as his father's expression turned to one of glee upon his words.  "He didn't succeed...In fact, he got Amy Dumas instead."

"Well..." the old man spoke.  "Sometimes, innocent bystanders get in the way."

Before Shane could reply and tell him what a heartless, nonchalant bastard he was, Vince went on.  "No...as a matter of fact, Miss Dumas is not innocent - she caused a great deal of the mess that put me in here...her and that ungrateful little bitch right beside you..."  He pointed to Stephanie with the forefinger of his right hand, eyes wild as he glared at his daughter.

The brunette grew positively terrified, nearly recoiling at her father's gesture.  She glanced from him to Shane.

"Wh-What...?"

Instead of responding to his sister, Shane merely stared at his father with an angry gleam in his own eyes.