Disclaimer: The characters and their world belong to Janet Evanovich. I'm just playing with them for fun, and all mistakes are my own.

Chapter 1: Denial Land, where are you, my old friend?

My 34th birthday was pretty much like the last five or so birthdays, except for one thing: I got hit upside the head with a big old reality stick. My niece, Mary Alice, didn't mean to send my precariously constructed world tumbling down around my ears, but in hindsight, I'm glad she did.

Like I said, it started out like any other day. According to weather dot com, the sun rose at 7:05 AM on Sunday, October 12, and it promised to be a cool, crisp fall day. I'll just trust them on that, because I woke just shy of noon and didn't bother sticking my head out of the window to check the temperature. Instead, I sat up in bed and grabbed my phone.

I had a few birthday texts, and my Facebook wall boasted birthday wishes from a few dozen high school and college classmates that I'd lost touch with and about twenty invitations to play Candy Crush Saga. I ignored the game requests and hit the like button on the wall posts and called it done. Next, I told my co-workers, Connie and Lula, that I'd see them at the bonds office the next day. They'd wanted to take me out clubbing the night before, but I'd taken a rain check instead, since I'd been too pooped from chasing Homer Selznik around town all afternoon. Don't laugh – he's pretty damn spry for an old guy.

My best friend from high school, Mary Lou, wanted to take me out to lunch for my b-day. It'd been a while, so I texted her back and set something up for the next day while her kids were in school. I deleted the rest of the texts and voicemails, since they were most likely from people who thought I was a horrible person for stunning an eighty year old in front of the Tasty Pastry. I wasn't going to lose sleep over it, since the 'sweet' old man was wanted for bashing in the head of one of his poker buddies. Besides, it wasn't like he had a pacemaker or anything.

With the important correspondence taken care of, I stumbled out to my kitchen for some much needed caffeine. I was bummed to discover that I was out of coffee grounds, but at some point that morning, the coffee fairy had visited me. I blinked a couple of times and reached out to touch the Starbucks cup. Yep, there was a still-hot venti caramel macchiato sitting on my counter next to a single Boston crème donut - and a sleek black stun gun. I couldn't help but grin as I took my first sip of sweet caffeinated goodness; a lot of people could break into my apartment, but there was only one who'd consider a stun gun to be an appropriate birthday gift. At least I assumed he'd meant it to be a present, since it had a bow on it.

I took a big bite of the pastry and moaned as the perfect blend of fat and sugar hit my taste buds. Since my hamster, Rex, decided to come out his soup can to investigate at that moment, I dropped a bit of the Boston crème into his aquarium. "Compliments of Uncle Ranger," I told him. Rex twitched his whiskers and tucked the donut crumb into his cheek pouch before diving back into his home. Because I'm a good hamster mommy, I shook some hamster nuggets into his bowl before finishing my own breakfast.

Once Rex and I had both been fed, I tapped out a quick text to my benefactor: Thanks for breakfast and the taser – so much more appropriate than diamonds. A couple of minutes later my phone buzzed as his reply came in: Babe.

I chuckled as I made my way to the bathroom. I would've been disappointed if he'd texted anything else. After my shower, I spent the afternoon dozing on the couch while Ghostbusters played in the background; it was a good day. Around 5 PM, I made my first mistake – I changed into a nice blouse and my good jeans and drove over to my parents' house for dinner.

We have a long-standing tradition in my family – the birthday girl or boy gets their favorite meal and everyone is extra nice to them. In my case, that means that my mother refrains from telling me that I'm wasting the best years of my life by working as a bounty hunter and that my ovaries are about to shrivel up from lack of use. So, I went to my parents' expecting nothing more than my Mom's lasagna and pineapple upside down cake served without a side of maternal guilt; what I actually got was a big dose of reality.

My parents live in the Chambersburg section of Trenton, fondly known as the Burg. The houses are narrow, the yards are tiny and dinner is always on the table by 6 PM. I pulled up behind my sister's minivan at around 5:30, which was my second mistake. Nothing good has ever come of me showing up to dinner early.

My mom and grandma met me at the front door, as usual. "Thank God, you're early, for once," my mom exclaimed, her eyes wild.

"Are you OK?" I asked, worriedly. She had a huge tomato sauce stain on her usually pristine apron, and her hair was in disarray. One of my cars usually had to explode before she was this upset.

"I need you to go to the store." She shot a patented Burg death glare at my grandma. "Someone used up all of the ice cream without telling me."

Grandma shrugged. "You were out of whipped cream and I had a date." She grinned at me. "It sure was cold, but Elmer Lubowski said it was the hottest sex he'd ever had."

My mom and I both shuddered as we tried to suppress the mental images brought on by Grandma's words. I took a quick peek into the living room. My sister's youngest was screaming at the top of her lungs, my brother-in-law Albert was trying to sponge baby spit-up off of his shirt, and my Dad was staring fixedly at the television, ignoring them both.

"Sure, no problem." I would've milked a cow and made ice cream from scratch if it got me out of that madhouse. My second oldest niece, Mary Alice, was galloping around the front yard, so I asked her if she wanted to go with me.

She paused in mid-prance. "Do I get to pick the flavor? Golden Palominos can't eat just any kind of ice cream, you know."

"Youbetcha," I told her, as I did my best not to laugh. Boy, did I ever love that kid; MA wanted to be a horse more than anything. I could relate, since I'd wanted to be a superhero or an intergalactic princess at her age. Of course, MA was way smarter than I'd been because she'd never wanted to be a flying horse – I can tell you from experience that it's a long drop from the roof of my parents' garage.

MA was uncharacteristically quiet on the way to the Shop n' Bag, but I bided my time until we'd paid for the large tub of Vanilla Bean and the pints of Ben and Jerry's. I'd gotten Cherry Garcia and MA had wanted New York Super Fudge Chunk. Apparently horses needed extra chocolate.

"Hey, you're awfully quiet over there," I told her as we stowed the bags in the back seat. "Anything you want to talk about?"

MA bit her lip, nervously. "I don't know."

I patted her arm as we buckled ourselves into my latest POS, a mostly blue 2006 Ford Escape that I had high hopes for. The interior was still in good shape and it had less than 100,000 miles on the odometer. "Well, I'm here if you need to talk."

MA's brow was scrunched in thought. "I heard something that I didn't understand." She turned toward me as I put the car in gear. "Aunt Steph, what's a hot mess?"

I hid a grin. "It depends on the context, could you fill me in?" I asked, figuring she'd overheard it at the park or something. I glanced over at her as I pulled out of the parking lot. She was chewing on her lip again.

"Well," she said, hesitantly. "Mom was on the phone with Grandma, yesterday." She looked over at me with innocent eyes as we pulled to a stop at a light. "Then she laughed and she said, 'Well, Stephie's always been a hot mess, and she'll never learn.'"

I suddenly felt as if all the air had been forced from my lungs and a dull ache settled in the pit of my stomach. I was just glad that we weren't moving at that moment. According to the Urban Dictionary, hot mess is 'a derogatory term describing a situation, behavior, appearance, etc. that is disastrously bad. Think "faux pas" but times ten. Possible origin is literal (think, steaming dogpile).' Sure, I was used to being gossiped about and God knows that I'd gotten into my share of scrapes over the last few years. But that my own mother and sister thought of me like that….

"Aunt Steph?" MA tugged on my sleeve, bringing me back to the present. The light had changed and the driver behind me was leaning on their horn, which reminded me that I was supposed to be driving. I took a deep breath and pulled on my big girl panties. I had a nine year old in the car with me, and maybe I was a hot mess, but I was going to get us back to my parents' safely.

I was pulling up behind Valerie's minivan again when I realized I'd never answered Mary Alice's question. I turned to her as I cut the engine. "I think a hot mess is someone who hasn't quite figured out what they want to be when they grow up," I finally told her.

Mary Alice's brow instantly cleared. "Is that all?" She leaned over and hugged me. "I still think you're the coolest Aunt, ever."

R&S~R&S~R&S

I made it through dinner, somehow, even though the pineapple upside down cake tasted like cardboard in my mouth. If I didn't contribute much to the dinner conversation, no one really noticed since Grandma was regaling us with a slightly edited account of her date, and Albert kept dropping lasagna on himself. Between that and Valerie's two youngest taking turns crying, all I had to do was follow my dad's example and keep my head down while shoveling in the food.

I pleaded tiredness and skipped out just after dessert was served. Mom must've noticed that I'd barely touched my food, because she sent me home with the rest of the cake and an extra-big helping of lasagna. Helen Plum might disapprove of my life, but she'd never let me go hungry.

When I got home, I tossed the leftovers into the fridge and flopped down on my bed in my thinking position. I knew I wasn't the best bond enforcement agent out there, but was I really a hot mess? I wanted to just roll over and go to sleep, but I forced myself to think logically. I'd hauled in hundreds of bail jumpers over the last few years. A lot of them had been shop-lifters and drunk and disorderlies, but I'd gotten a whole bunch of really bad guys off the street, too. Murderers, rapists, and recently, I'd even helped Ranger capture an international terrorist. Sure, the terrorist had ended up falling off of a parking garage roof accidentally-on-purpose, but the important thing is no innocent people were poisoned.

So, I'd done some good over the years. Of course, I'd lost countless cars, been stalked and kidnapped more than I'd like, and my apartment had been firebombed more than once. And though I tried to forget, just about everyone in my life had been hurt at some point by one of my skips. Val had been kidnapped, which probably explained her why she thought I was a hot mess. My stomach roiled as I listed the names in my head. Ranger, Joe, Lula, and a whole string of Ranger's employees had been shot, kidnapped, or otherwise harmed while helping me with my job.

I took a deep breath to calm my stomach and thought about my private life instead. Surely that would be more pleasant. It wasn't. To put it baldly, I was in my mid-thirties and all I had to show for it was a hamster and an apartment full of second and third-hand furniture. Don't get me wrong, Rex is the greatest pet ever, and I didn't really mind the lack of worldly goods – my divorce from Dickie Orr had taught me not to get too attached to things. But the fact was, I was sort of alone, and it sucked.

That's right, I had a whole town full of friends and acquaintances, a family that loved me, and I was pretty sure that some of them even liked me. But the facts were, despite having deep feelings for two men, I didn't really have anyone to share my life with. And I much as I tried to deny it, I wanted that.

My sort of boyfriend, Joe Morelli, and I had been on and off so much over the years that I practically needed a spreadsheet to track the status of our relationship. I thought we were in an on-phase, but we'd argued shortly before he'd left town on a case a couple of weeks ago, so I wasn't entirely sure.

The other man, Ricardo Carlos "Ranger" Mañoso has never been my boyfriend, but he's been my friend, hero, mentor and even sometimes lover. He's ex-Army Special Forces, and even though he's crazy busy running his security business, RangeMan, he's somehow never failed to swoop in and save me when I needed it. He's also the most beautiful man I've ever met, and he's magic in bed. Of course, he's told me time and time again that his life doesn't lend itself to relationships and that his love comes with a condom and not a ring. I guess that's understandable, since no one ever gets to marry Batman.

I groaned as I turned over on my side, punching my pillow repeatedly in frustration. I hated to admit it, but yes, my life was a bit of a train wreck. My sister was right. I, Stephanie Plum, am a hot mess. The million dollar question was, did I purchase a one-way ticket back to Denial Land, or did I do something about it?

AN: I was toying with writing another AU, but the idea that birthdays are a time for reflection got into my head and wouldn't let go. I have to confess that I had originally thought that this would be a Steph/MM pairing, but Ranger stepped in and ordered me to rethink my position.