Chapter 1 – Intro to D's Story

Disclaimer: The characters in this story belong to Story Legend Janet Evanovich (apart from D, who is of my own creation).

[D POV]:

The stench was awful. Actually, it was damn near unbearable. And the darkness that surrounded me? Plain. Old. Creepy. I couldn't see a thing. Nada. Zip. Zilch. The thing was only a few metres long, couple of metres wide and yet I could still feel the walls closing in on me. I hate dumpsters, I really do. I mean, sure, they're useful and all. But with my odd jobs and pastimes, I tend to have to get a lot more close and personal than the average Joe. 'Close and personal' as in 'stuck sitting in one for hours on end for my own protection', like right now.

Maybe I should introduce myself. Hi, I'm Darcy, and I'm almost 17. My full name is Darcy Ellen Plum-Manoso. D for short. My life is kind of complicated, especially right now. So it's probably best to start from the very beginning.

Okay, so my mum is the (apparently) infamous Stephanie Plum of the Burg. I'm not sure why she's infamous. Grandma Plum seems particularly opposed to my knowing, so for the most part when I've asked the topic has been avoided. I assume the way my parents met is part of it too since they don't talk about that much either. Not that I'd ask. 'Cause I'm sure they'd embellish the story. Ergo the story would be phony. Well, to be fair, Dad wouldn't embellish it. He probably wouldn't say anything. Bastard.

Speaking of which, I haven't told you about him.

My dad is the mysterious "Batman" Ranger of God only knows where. Though some of his staff believes he's of Hispanic decent or something. I don't know and don't particularly care. A) Because history and cultures really ain't my thing; and B) Dad and I don't really get along. Like, at all.

My parents didn't get married, for reasons unknown. If I were a wagering person, I'd say it was probably because of my dad. Again, my families weren't exactly forthcoming with that information.

Anyways, a while after I was born, Mum married Trenton plainclothes cop Joseph Morelli. He's cool. And now I have two younger half-brothers and two younger half-sisters. The eldest, Matthew is 5 years; the twins William and Emma are 3 years; and the youngest Eloise is 8 months.

Dad never married. I don't know whether it's because he's in love with mum or because he just doesn't do relationships. You never can tell with him. I have another half sister on his side of the family and she's a lot older than me. Eight or nine years, I think. Her name's Kate and she's a real goody-goody-two-shoes. Once, on one of my first large distance runaway attempts, I turned up at her house for the night. When I woke up dad was there. Can you believe that? Seriously, it was going to be just for the night. It's not like I was planning on crashing on her couch for months and bumming food and stuff off her. It really sucked and I've soooo never done that again.

So, here I am, stuck in the middle of these two families. Making me the oldest in one, and the youngest in the other. This kind of isn't really an easy place to be.

Especially when you have to swap homes every week.

Every first week I spend with mum and Joe. The house is pretty small with all of us there. And loud. Though, I'm sure that my little sibs, being the shenanigans that they are, could be loud individually. They certainly have enough shouting matches with Mum and Joe. I am confident that none of them can shout or scream louder than me. Of course, I've never had the chance to fully test that theory, seeing as little baby Ellie was born after I left.

And then every second week I spend with dad. Getting up extra early to train in the gym. Having my days divided into a precisely timed schedules. Not being allowed to eat anything unhealthy, desserts included. It sucked, but unknown to him, Ella sneaks me unhealthy snacks. Not all the time, just every now and then. It's the only way I'd survive.

There are lots of rules I have to follow there that are different to the rules with Mum and Joe. It gets very confusing.

Now that you've caught up some I should probably get back to the present.

As you know, I am sitting in a dumpster. Why am I in a dumpster? I'm hiding from some guy I conned a fair chunk of money out of.

I kind of told him I was 19, and since I do actually look older than I am no one really argues that point. I also told him that he had to pay upfront for my services. Bodily services if you know what I mean. He did, and well, I of course had no intention of giving him those services. I didn't really think the slob was sober enough, healthy enough nor fast enough to come after me, let alone chase me half way across the town. I mean when the shit hits the fan, it really hits the fan.

Since I couldn't run to the police without exposing my con, I ended up running and running and running. Of course, things probably wouldn't be this bad if I hadn't inadvertently run into More-Sober-Than-I-Thought-Man's own neighbourhood where he has a lot more friends than I do. Who are a lot more sober and bigger and have more scars than he does. Not a good thing I can tell you. So I pulled my disappearing act. One of the more tricky protection tactics I learnt, since you have to get far enough away from whoever's following you to pull it, and I hadn't pulled it sooner because I'd underestimated him. Bummer, right?

Well, it was one of the things Dad (see: the Merry Men) taught me. And I happen to be good at. This disappearing act, unfortunately led me to hopping into the dumpster. Now I'm cramped, sore, completely freaked out. I hate the dark. Loathe it. I'm the only almost seventeen year old I know who sleeps with a nightlight. And to top this situation off, I have no freaking idea how I'm going to get out of this.

Its times like these I wish that the Merry Men would find me and take me home. I suppose if I hadn't run away quite so often I wouldn't get into these situations. In my defense, I would like to state that I only run away when I'm staying with dad. Call it a silent protest if you will. He deserves it.

It was a few years ago when I was at Mum's house, and I had actually been responsible for doing something incredibly stupid but also incredibly hilarious that Joe had told me that sometimes he wished I was his daughter. Of course at the time I laughed it off telling him that 'he lied, not to lie, and lying is wrong'. Joe being Joe responded that I lie more than he does. Which isn't true, you know. I don't lie; I fabricate tales dissimilar to the truth. Then he told me that when I was a baby and Mum was about to marry him, he had asked Ranger to let him adopt me. All so I didn't have to go through the whole two homes, split holidays and custody crap, and could have a normal family life as Joe's daughter.

Obviously dad said no. This probably, though I'm not absolutely certain, had something to do with him not being able to raise his first daughter Kate. I got kind of pissed over it 'cause I really wanted a normal life. I was tired of being bounced from one house to the other. I wanted to be Joe's daughter. To always be around to play with my baby bro, and later my other baby sibs too. I ran away next time I was at Dad's.

Needless to say, I didn't get very far. Obviously it was not the last time I ran away. And each time I did it I got dragged home by Dad's Merry Men. And each time I got better at it and managed to disappear for longer. I've been gone for almost two years now and still no Merry Men to drag me home kicking and screaming.

Of course this last time I got smart, and just a tad cruel. I figured out a way to avoid being put on the missing persons list.

Emancipation.

Basically it's a divorce from your parents making you your own legal guardian. I didn't want to do that to Mum. But it was the only way to stop Dad from controlling my life, with the added bonus of; if I decided to leave the cops can't come after me. Which might not be a good thing, currently, considering this situation I'm in.

A situation that just got worse.

The light poured in as the dumpster's lid was thrown open. An evil, grinning, much scarred face looked down on me. It was not a pretty sight either, I can tell you, I'm talking really mangled. Before I could say oh shit! I was hauled out, quite unceremoniously if I do say so myself, and dragged to my feet. Scar Face held me up, my tippy toes barely touching the ground. He then thrust me out to More-Sober-Than-I-Thought-Man. Well to be honest I couldn't actually distinguish him visually because my eyes were still adjusting to the light outside the dumpster, but his voice gave him away. It was very gravelling, but not in a sexy way. Just gross. And to tell the truth I wasn't really listening to what he was saying, or maybe I just couldn't understand. He was slurring words really badly. My God, how on earth could he run if he couldn't talk? Even without the words to confirm it I could tell something bad was going to happen to me. People don't just chase you across town and have scarred thugs drag you out of dumpsters for a light slap on the wrist, especially if you have their money.

Then, More-Sober-Than-I-Thought-Man grinned evilly. Not a pretty sight, with his rotting teeth and all.

My eyes had half adjusted to the light when the first punch hit me. In the stomach. It knocked the air out of me and stars danced before my eyes. Then second punch hit me, which wasn't quite as hard, but it still kept the air from filling my lungs. It kept going like this, with punches to my face included now and then, until I was barely conscious. I'm not sure how I kept my eyes open. They felt swollen and gritty, but I saw what happened next anyway. More-Sober-Than-I-Thought-Man fell down it a crumpled heap in front of me, and Scar Face dropped me suddenly as he fell too.

Just before my head hit the ground, rendering me unconscious, a single thought flew through my mind. Please God, let it be the Merry Men.

###

The moment I opened my eyes again, quite the feat since they were swollen and the blood had almost dried them shut, I realized I was in some fancy hotel. Hospitals aren't this pretty. I should know, I've been in them enough from some of my stupider stunts. Then it hit me. It sent me reeling almost as much as the punches had. I was in deep shit. The Merry Men wouldn't take me to a hotel. And if they did, they would have at least cleaned up my face. I could feel the dried blood cracking as a grimaced in pain.

I tried to sit up, but couldn't. Pain traveled around my body again and again. Unbearable, agonizing pain, that left me breathless. Catching my breath again I waited for the pain to die. I sat up slower this time, stopping before the pain got unbearable. And by the time I had fully sat up, a man had strolled into the room and was watching me. I recognized him instantly, and knew from the expression on his face that I was in deeper shit than I could ever imagine.

"Good morning, Darcy dear".

[AUTHOR'S NOTE:]Hey, howdy, hey. This is a reworked story. I was talking with my bestie Svendances (author of "Twice as Much as Half", it's really awesome, you should read it) the other day about fanfics and we started talking about D Bomb which I'd written YEARS ago but never finished. I went and found it so I could continue, but before I did I reread what I had. "Ye Gads!" I thought "I can do better than that!" So now instead of just continuing it as planned, here I am re-editing, re-writing and re-releasing the whole thing.

Tell me what you think. Lay in all on me. Review, I dare you!