Fire & Desire: 5 moments that led to the rise and fall of the team

#2 Mandy and Otis

Otis began his quest to woo Mandy in December 2019.

The romantic storyline involving Fire & Desire's Mandy Rose and Otis was pitched directly to Vince McMahon by Rose herself.

The pair had worked together in NXT and had become friends. Rose felt that the two could play off their real-life chemistry and create an engaging story for the audience.

"Otis always was around in NXT and posting pics of me and talking about how much he liked me. In a cute way, not a creepy way. This continued on and I thought it would be great if this became a storyline, especially once Otis entered Wrestlemania. I actually went to Vince McMahon myself and pitched the idea and he loved it."

The angle kicked off over the Christmas period of 2019, when Rose revealed she was Otis' Secret Santa. Rose gifted Otis a ham and kissed him on the cheek.

The following week, a smitten Otis presented Rose with a homemade cake made by his mother. Shortly after, Dolph Ziggler deliberately destroyed the cake. Otis would then find its remains splattered across the floor backstage. The seeds for an eventual Otis Vs. Ziggler feud had been planted.

Segments teasing a romance between Rose and Otis continued to air each week on Smackdown. These never ran to more than a few minutes each, but perfectly told the story of its two featured performers.

Otis was clearly smitten with Mandy Rose from their very first encounter

The focus during this period, though, was on Rose and Otis - as opposed to Fire & Desire. Subtle hints were occasionally dropped as to Deville's annoyance at the budding relationship, but Fire & Desire continued to team as usual.

The story picked up pace when Rose agreed to go to dinner with Otis on Valentine's Day. Otis could barely contain his excitement over the prospect of finally spending some quality time with Rose.

However, the big man would receive a text, allegedly from Rose, saying that she was running late - prompting Otis to delay his arrival at the restaurant.

Dolph Ziggler gatecrashed Otis' Valentine's Day date with Mandy Rose.

When he did arrive, though, Otis found Rose sat down to dinner with his arch-rival Ziggler. He was crushed. Rose would later deny having texted Otis, insisting that she had bumped into Ziggler at the restaurant - after Otis failed to show up on time.

Following their dinner, Rose would enter into an on-screen relationship with Ziggler. A heartbroken Otis firmly believed that Ziggler had sent the misleading text to try and sabotage his date with Rose - and challenged The Showoff to a match at WrestleMania.

It was not until the SmackDown before Wrestlemania that the truth about what occurred on Valentine's Day was heard - as a mysterious individual played footage of the night in question.

In this footage, it emerged that Sonya Deville had sent the anonymous text message, having hatched a plan with Ziggler to ruin Rose's date with Otis.

Deville tried to explain her actions to Rose, but Mandy simply walked away from her. The team of Fire & Desire was on extremely shaky ground heading into the biggest show of the year.