Disclaimer: JE owns all of the characters except for Xander…and I'll be happy to loan him out on request. Sadly, I'm not making any money.

A/N: I'd like to thank Alfonsina.d for her amazing Beta prowess. She gets Xander first.

Yes, Sir!

Many couples have fond memories of the precise moment of their engagement and the first few idyllic days that follow. Some couples spend hours in bed cementing the promise. Others spend the first few days after the event on the phone with family or visiting with loved one in order to display the ring and share their happiness. Some couples spend the weekend poring over calendars and palm pilots trying to hammer out a date for the nuptials.

But not me. Ranger and I have been engaged for a little over 24 hours and where am I?

Why, I'm sitting at a bar in a BDSM nightclub, of course.

RangeMan had recently been hired to provide security for a new "lifestyle" club in the bowels of Trenton called Slap-n-Tickle. The club was only open Friday and Saturday nights. The account required two men on the front door, four men on the inside and two on the back of the building. The four on the outside were expected to be "dressed" as were two on the inside. This meant not only were they to present themselves as security in their tight Rangeman shirts, body hugging cargo pants and black military issue shit kickers, but they were also to be armed.

But that leaves two other people on the inside, right? The other two on the inside were acting in the roles of "silent security"; think Air Marshall with a dog collar. Those two should be dressed accordingly to blend with the club patrons. Their job was to mix and mingle and to be alert for undesirable shenanigans. This had me stumped as I thought clubs like these had an "anything goes" type of mentality, but apparently the management frowned upon fornication in the bathrooms (they had rooms you could procure for such activities) and drug dealing on the premises.

So here I sit on my size eight ass in size six ass-crack revealing leather pants, a matching black lace up bustier and…a freaking dog collar (Ranger informed me this signifies that I'm "taken"), sipping a beer and trying to be aware of my surroundings. My only weapons were my ear piece and a wire and a pricey set of cuffs Ranger had gifted me with this afternoon. He'd had 'My Babe' engraved on them. He especially enjoyed hooking each side from belt loop to belt loop so they glittered across my pelvis. I was having a hard time imagining myself doing this every Friday and Saturday night for the unforeseeable future but the only other option was for RangeMan to hire on another female employee. I'd heard rumblings about Jeanne Ellen Burrows at the last staff meeting and I was having none of that. Not that I'm jealous. Much.

I really hope we lose this account.

Tonight, we had Hal and Tank on the front, Bobby and Cal on the back, and Lester and Manny on the inside in "uniform". Ranger was up in the manager's office monitoring the cameras placed around the club and listening in on our wires. We hadn't heard a peep from him yet and we'd already been here an hour. That left me and Xander, our recent Boston transfer, on the inside, as patrons.

Xander looks as if he came off the assembly line as a Dom. I'm guessing his mother had him pierced when he was circumcised and that he had a cat-o-nine-tails as a crib toy. Xander was huge, even by Rangeman standards. He looked to be at least 6'5'' and about 280 pounds of sculpted, sinewy muscle. His complexion was dark, but not as dark as Ranger's. His hair was black, tipped in platinum blond and shaved close to his skull along the sides and the back. He had sharp, masculine features and sensual, sinister pale blue eyes that looked straight through you like he was mentally calculating ways to corrupt you.

He had tribal band tattoos cuffing both of his massive biceps. Both nipples were pierced and connected by a chain. His sculpted chest and abdomen were smooth and devoid of hair. He had a barbell ring in his tongue. Simply put, he scared the crap out of me.

I sat nervously at the end of the bar, scanning the room and listening in on Rangeman chatter through my earpiece.

Hal said, "Jesus, some of these S&M chicks scare the hell out of me."

Manny snorted, "That's the point. They're aroused by your fear. They feed on it. They can smell it."

Lester piped in, "That's not all they can smell."

Hal retorted, "Give me a break. It's like a furnace in here."

Lester said, "You got a flop sweat goin' on, my brother. What's the matter? Scared of the idea of being mastered? Intimidated by raw sexuality? This shit is beautiful. I think I've had a hard-on for a half hour now."

Hal said indignantly, "There's no way I could perform under these circumstances."

Tank piped in, "Not your cup of tea?"

Lester chimed in, "I'm thinking about getting a membership. You think we get a discount?"

Ranger's deep rumble barged in. "Ladies, can we cut back on the chatter?"

I let out a snort.

Apparently the wire picked it up because Ranger said, "Babe, how you doing down there."

My ass was sweating but I didn't really want to share that information with the team so I said, "My dog collar is chaffing."

Ranger replied, "You'll get used to it."

I was treated to a huge round of guffaws and snorts from the peanut gallery.

I bit my tongue and scooted away from the bar to head toward the bathroom. Once inside, I turned a faucet on full blast to camouflage my tinkle. Under no circumstances was I to switch off the wire, but a lady needs a little privacy.

As I headed out of the stall I nearly ran into girl coming out of the stall beside mine. She looked like Dominatrix Barbie.

I shut off the water after washing my hands. Just as I turned to leave she called out to me over her shoulder, "Hey sweetie, can you help me out? I need those hands of yours."

Oh, those are words you never want to hear in a public restroom.

I turned back to her to see what she needed. She had her back to the mirror and was attempting to adjust the straps of her silver metallic g-string to peek "coyly" above the low rise of her leathers.

She made a face at me in the mirror and said, "I have to get the strings just right. They need to look symmetrical." Right, so it looks like she's symmetrically unaware that her underwear is on display. Are you kidding me?

I walked over and examined her predicament. I reached over and gingerly tugged up on the left side. She studied the results in the mirror and frowned. "No…see, the left side's too high now and the thong is really cutting into me. Let me just pull down my pants and we'll see if we can't get it right."

At this point, I'd noticed that all RangeMan chatter had ceased. Had my wire cut out?

"Okey dokey!" I used my assigned code word to check in. It seemed a benign enough phrase to use in the presence of the patrons, and when the other guys heard the word, they were to acknowledge that the wire was active and that they were listening.

I heard a gruff round of throat clearing, then, "Check" and "Here."

Ranger spoke last in a bedroom voice. "Babe."

What a bunch of pigs.

At this point, BDSM Barbie was bent over in front of me, and wiggling her ass as she pushed her leathers down her thighs. She "accidentally" stumbled back a little and rubbed her rump against my abdomen.

Well, alrighty then.

She stood back up and readjusted her shiny thong. As I took n the lack of material it occurred to me that Barbie had to have been waxed to within an inch of her life. Yowza!

Xander piped in, "Need some help in there, sexy? I'd be happy to offer my assistance."

Ranger bit out, "Xander, you and me on the mats at 0600 tomorrow."

Xander cleared his throat and said, "Yes, sir."

I heard Tank snickering.

I hadn't moved since I was concentrating on the voices in my ear, and BDSM Barbie interpreted this as consent. She took both of her hands and reached behind herself to clutch my leather clad hips and attempted to grind her ass into my pelvis. Oh, this was so not happening.

I grabbed her hands firmly and placed them back at her sides.

"Um…I don't swing that way."

She swiveled around coquettishly to face me as she slowly tugged her pants back up.

"You sure?"

Again, utter silence from the peanut gallery.

"I'm sure."

"Have you ever been with a woman?"

"Nope."

She eyed my dog collar. "Your Dom doesn't like to share?"

"Uh, no…he's pretty possessive."

Ranger said in a graveled voice, "I could make concessions."

He is so dead. He is so not getting laid for a week. Well, make that four days. Or two. Oh, I'll come up with something.

Barbie looked me up and down and asked, "How do you know you wouldn't like it unless you've tried it?" She stepped closer to me, tossed a hank of hair over her shoulder and winked. "I'll bet I could make sure you liked it."

Bobby piped in, "That's what I'm sayin'!"

"Um…sorry. I'm just not attracted to women."

Barbie turned back to the mirror and smoothed back her bleached hair. "That's too bad."

I heard a round of male sighs and someone said, "Amen".

She caught my eye in the mirror. "Got any blow?"

Huh? Okay…I've seen movies. I think she means cocaine. "Umm, no. I, uh…I don't blow."

I heard Lester snort.

Too late, I realized how that might sound. I waited for Ranger to make some smart-ass quip but he remained wisely silent.

Barbie cocked a perplexed eyebrow at me, shrugged her shoulders and left.

I am so out of my element.

Ranger's steady voice came over my earpiece. "That was a very enlightening conversation, Babe."

"Bite me."

He chuckled softly. "Later. But listen, you handled that fine. In the future, if someone in the club asks for or offers you drugs, its best if you act interested. Ask questions about who you could talk to in order to score."

"I couldn't think! She was hitting on me! She had her pants down and was rubbing her…Ugh!"

"What did she look like?" This, from Cal.

"Like Lita Ford in a silver thong."

Manny asked, "Can you estimate her bra size? More than a handful? Cantaloupes? Tea cup sized?"

Bobby chirped in, "Did she smell good?"

"Why do you people need to know this?!"

Ranger answered, "It's for the report, Babe."

Report, my ass!

I left the ladies room in a huff and headed over to the bar to order a new beer. Club rule #1 for women: If you are forced to leave a drink unattended, never return to said drink; order a new one.

Another couple of hours passed and I wiled away the time avoiding direct eye contact, watching people dry humping in groups of twos and threes on the dance floor and sipping at my luke-warm beer. The crowd had thinned out considerably. I had to assume people were either availing themselves of the private rental play rooms or had "paired up" and were heading home for a night of whip and chain style debauchery. These people should be ashamed of themselves.

Every now and then I would pick up a thread of conversation over the wire. I heard Lester humming idly, "Another One Bites the Dust." Ranger must have mentioned our engagement to the guys at some point today and Lester was trying to get Ranger's goat.

"Shut your pie hole Santos," Ranger snarled.

Lester said, "Don't be that way man. You know I love you."

Bobby cut in, "Hey, bro, when's the wedding?"

Deep sigh from Ranger. "We just got engaged last night. We haven't set the date yet."

Hal chimed in, "I think spring weddings are lovely."

Snorts all around.

Tank said, "Lula wants to get married in N'awlins. We're thinkin' Fat Tuesday."

Lester said, "I can see that. Hey, Bossman…I wouldn't set that date too far out. Don't want to give Beautiful too much wiggle room."

I wanted to scream, "I can hear you, you boneheads," but clearly they had forgotten I was privy to this conversation and I wanted to see where it would go. No grass growin' here!

"Nobody is wiggling anywhere," Ranger said dryly.

Lester said, "Dude, your woman is wily and unpredictable. You can't even get Steph in a safe house when people are trying to kill her. How you going to get her up the aisle?"

"Oh, I'll get her up the aisle."

Manny piped in, "Is that one of those double entendres?"

Lester snickered and said, "Beautiful doesn't strike me as a woman who will 'take it up the isle'."

"Santos! Mats. 0700."

"Oh, come on!"

Dead silence from Ranger.

Lester let out a dejected sigh. "Yes, sir."

"Tank?"

"Yeah, Boss?"

"Best Man?"

"Be an honor."

They were quiet again for a while. I looked at my watch. Only twenty minutes until closing time.

Suddenly Cal spoke up. "Ranger, you given much thought about a bachelor party?"

Ranger was quiet for a moment before he said, "I haven't. I'll have to talk to Stephanie."

Lester said, "And so it begins."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean, Santos?"

"You've got to ask your old lady whether or not you have her permission to have a bachelor party? Next thing you know, every other word out of your mouth is going to be "yes, dear." You'll be doing midnight runs for Kotex before the month is out. Mark my words."

"Lester?"

"Yeah, Boss?"

"When did you last get laid?"

"Uh…it's been kind of a slow month for me."

Manny cackled.

"What? I've been working a lot of hours!"

Ranger said, "Would you like to ask me the last time I got laid?"

"Not really."

"First Kotex run is on you, ass wipe."

"Yes, sir."

"Sooooo," Cal said, "About that bachelor party…do you think, if Stephanie approves, we could maybe have it here?

Lester crowed, "Dude! I am so there! Can't you just see it? We could hire some dominatrix chicks to subdue the Boss on the stage! They could strap him to some medieval torture device. Maybe they make you beg for mercy. I wonder if they have twins working here. Do you think if we paid extra, they would give Ranger a little flogger action?"

I cut in with a bold pronouncement. "Nobody flogs Carlos but me!"

I swear if the industrial house music weren't so loud, you could have heard crickets chirp.

"Er…not that I'd ever flog you, Carlos. I …I don't flog." God, I am such a dork.

"Good to know, Babe."

Xander sidled his big, beautiful body up next to me and sat down. He caught the attention of the Amy Winehouse look-alike bartender and indicated he wanted a beer.

He turned to me and our disparity in heights put my eyes at pierced nipple level. I wanted to look away but I couldn't. I was both horrified and mesmerized by the silver horse shoes glinting against the brown discs of his nipples. It was as if he had a nine car pileup happening on his chest; I couldn't turn away.

Noticing my inspection, he asked, "You pierced?"

"Uh…"

He scanned down my body and his eyes rested at my belly. I sucked in.

"I don't see a belly ring."

I looked down to confirm his observation. Nope, still no belly ring.

"You know, belly rings on women are very sexy."

My eye twitched. I'll just bet I know the Cuban who put him up to this.

"So I'm told."

"You know, you can do all sorts of accessorizing with a belly ring."

"Do tell."

"Well, you can get a hoop that comes with interchangeable charms. I can see you with a little pair of handcuffs. Draws the eyes down, if you know what I mean."

"I think Ranger knows where my parts are by now."

He took a sip of his beer and nodded sagely. "You can get a belly chain that loops through it. Ranger seems like a discriminating man. I'm sure he would appreciate that look. I know I would."

This guy is worse than Lester! Doesn't he realize the mics are live? I cut my eyes over to his and saw he had both eyebrows up in an expression of utter innocence. Freakin' Eddie Haskell.

"And," he added, "If your nipples are pierced, you can get a "Y" chain that would hook to the nipple piercings, meet below your sternum and then the rest of the chain drops down in a line to attach to the belly ring. Very hot look."

I think I heard Lester groan.

"Uh-huh."

"Your nipples pierced?"

My tongue was glued to the roof of my mouth. Why wasn't Ranger saying anything? Had he left? Was he at my parents' house as we speak, smoking a cigar with my father?

Had he fallen asleep?

His eyes dropped to my chest as if he were trying to detect any tell-tale lumps beneath the leather bustier.

Lester stated, "She's not."

Ranger bit out, "Excuse me?"

"She's not pierced."

"Excuse me?"

"Well she isn't. You of all people should know that."

Ranger replied in a steely voice, "I'm more concerned with the extent of your knowledge, Santos."

"What? Hector called me yesterday telling me your woman called for assistance on 7. He wasn't on the premises so I went."

Oh boy. The bat shit's gonna hit the fan now.

"And at what time was this occurrence?"

Like an idiot, Lester plowed on. "I don't know…maybe 5:30 or 6:00. It was like an hour after Tank went up there."

Lester is such a tool.

"Explain."

"What's to explain? I get up there, Beautiful's all trussed up to the shower rod in all her splendor and glory-"

At this, Xander arched a brow at me and mouthed, "Naughty, naughty."

"Shut it, Santos. I'm talking to Tank."

"Uh…shit," Tank said hesitantly. "Look. It's like this: Bombshell wasn't answering her landline or her cell. We hadn't heard from her all day. I just went up to make sure she was okay."

"And?"

I could just see Ranger sitting at a desk chair gripping the armrests, his knuckles bone white and his brown eyes narrowed furiously.

"Man, if I could un-see it, I would."

"Hey!" That was me jumping into the fray.

"All due respect, Bombshell. I done told you I thought you put together right nice."

"Tank. Mats. 0800."

Deep sigh. "Yes, sir."