The weather was once again boiling hot, but I'd chosen to dress a little better this time – a white top, black short dungarees and some black and white converse. I still felt like I was going to overheat and pass out, but I had to get over that and do my work. There would eventually be a time where it cooled down and possibly poured with rain, and I'd be so happy to see it after this monstrous heat wave.

"Come in." Steph's voice called from behind the large wooden door and I pushed it open, walking in and taking a seat opposite Steph at her desk.

"Hi Stephanie." I smiled and she returned one. Hopefully I was beginning to go into her good books! "Ingrid told me you wanted to speak to me?" I remained positive, hoping she wasn't calling me in because she was going to send me back to Court. I had annoyed Nikki Bella to the point of nearly fighting with her on numerous occasions and I'd originally said some bad things to Stephanie too, it would only make sense that she'd get rid of me.

"Yes. I had a chat with Nikki." A lump appeared in my throat almost instantly and I sucked in a sharp breath. Please don't send me back there. "She has apologised for her behaviour. As we previously discussed, she was just a little irritated that you could come in here and trash this place without any consideration for the people inside it. Then when I introduced you to everyone and you began to talk back, she thought you didn't appreciate the decision you'd been given when it could have been a lot worse. She's promised me she isn't going to bother you anymore." I smiled and nodded, happy that at least it wasn't her breaking bad news to me that she was letting me go or taking back the job offer or sending me back to court. Relief washed over me and I let out the breath I'd been holding in.

"Thank you. I completely understand her reasoning." I said, once again trying to remain in her good books. I didn't want to tell her what was on my mind because no doubt I'd end up in huge trouble for saying it. I don't understand how Nikki could get away with saying that, I angered a lot of people but no one else was coming at me and attempting to beat me up every time we were in the same room. There was a lot more to it than what she'd told Steph and I knew that more than anyone. She'd picked on Paige and picked on me so there must have been something about new people that she didn't like...

"Now that is sorted, I had another issue to get to." Steph's tone lowered again and the lump in my throat only grew bigger. My stomach began to tug and pull with nerves. Was she now going to break some awful news to me? "I first off wanted to apologise for what happened with the ring, I can see it caused quite a few injuries to you and I've spoken to your Offender Manager about that..." She started, clasping her hands in front of her on the desk. Her face showed an essence of care towards me and I loved that. I didn't have many women in my life that thought I was acceptable – although Steph didn't know the real me and if she did I probably wouldn't be sitting here having this conversation with her.

"Honestly, its fine. I call it karma. I broke the ring and it collapsed as I fixed it. These injuries wouldn't have happened if I hadn't have wrecked it in the first place." I said, as perfectly as I'd rehearsed when I got home because I knew someone would come and discuss it with me and hope I wasn't going to sue anyone.

"Well I appreciate that, thank you. That could have gone a lot worse." She smiled shyly. She quickly wiped the smile off her face to seem professional again and flicked through a pile of papers beside her on her desk. "Anyway, I had a look at the ring and you've done an excellent job in clearing it all up. I've called in some guys to come and put it back together today so you won't need to be in there, but I do have some other jobs for you if that's okay?" I nodded enthusiastically. That was exactly what I wanted to hear. Baring in mind just how bad my face looks, I didn't want to be anywhere that Roman, Dean or Dolph could see me because they'd take one look and know half of these injuries weren't there yesterday. I bit my lips together and clenched my fists as I remembered what Reece had done yesterday, thinking it was ok to take over a fight he wasn't asked to be in. "I've got a couple of jobs that need doing so I'll let you pick, then when you've finished that one you've got another one lined up for you. I've just had all the furniture taken out of our meeting room because we are redecorating it so if you could paint that for me, that would be fantastic. The second job is just the gardening out the front of the building. Quite a few of the plants were trampled on by yourself the night you broke in so we've invested in some more, also the hedges need trimming and we need to get rid of weeds so it's entirely up to you which you begin with." I sighed and desperately held back from rolling my eyes right in front of her. I know I was here to do community service but did I really need to get given all the menial jobs?

"I guess I'll start with the gardening, at least I can be outside for a little while." I said, attempting to make it sound like I wasn't extremely bored by the sound of both of those jobs. "It shouldn't take me too long either and then I can get on with the painting." I put all my energy into seeming happy with what I'd been given. Just think of the job at the end, Chloe.

"Thank you Chloe. Just speak to Ingrid and she'll give you the keys to the shed." Steph grinned. Supressing all my anger, I stood up and shook her hand with a fake smile glued to my face. This was going to be a long day...

"See you later, thank you." I said fakely as I left the room and headed back towards Ingrid, once again acting happy as I got the keys from her and got the tools out of the shed. I stepped out into the sweltering heat and stared up at the clear sky, nothing but the sun shining in the sky, not a cloud in sight. It was quite beautiful, although blinding, and I quickly focussed back to my task at hand. I knelt down and began digging out the plants that I had trampled into the ground a couple of days ago. I used a small trowel to dig into the soil and pull up the plants from the roots, shaking the rest of the soil off before throwing the plant in the bin. With each plant I pulled out, the guilt grew. I had caused so much damage that would cost money to replace. How could Eli not feel the guilt I do? All he could think of was causing even more damage.

I pulled the last of a bunch of yellow flowers out of the soil and shook it, the soil falling down and blending back into its natural habitat. If only I could do such a thing.

"Hey." A shadow fell over me and I looked up, the sun blinding me too much to work out who it was. I squinted and put a hand above my eyes to try and block the sun out and see who this person was that was towering over me as I knelt down. I could make out a large male outline but nothing more than that.

"Hey whoever you are." I said as I put my trowel down and stood up, suddenly coming nearly face to face with someone I was most definitely not expecting to see today.

"Yusuf?"