Disclaimer: The characters and settings we all know and love belong to Janet Evanovich. The plot, such as it is, and anyone you don't recognize belongs to me. Written strictly for enjoyment – so enjoy!

Lost & Found

Chapter 1

It was mid-afternoon, and I was at the bonds office. I'd stopped in to turn in a couple of small-paying body receipts and get my check, and had stayed to kill some time chatting with Connie and Lula. Connie forgot what she was saying mid-sentence a moment before I got a warning prickle down my back. Ranger had arrived.

He gave me a nod with his almost-smile. I returned it, attempting to copy his barely-there movements, making his lips quirk. It was pretty subdued but it was our usual public greeting of late, since things had settled down after the Agreement. So far we'd managed to keep things strictly between the three of us and even the nosy twins Connie and Lula hadn't caught on. I'm not sure how. Before, I might as well have taken out a billboard ad any time I got laid. Everyone seemed to know almost as soon as I did.

I wasn't complaining. I wasn't all that eager to explain the Agreement to my mother. I think Ranger must have issued a gag-order to his men, because secrets usually don't last long in the 'Burg, and ours has been going a few months now.

Ranger seemed to be in a good mood, greeting Connie and Lula and actually making some small talk as he turned in several body receipts. He'd just picked up two new files when his cell rang.

"Yo," he answered. A moment later he went suddenly, eerily, still. "When?" he bit out. Then he snapped the phone shut in his fist and his hand went white around it, crushing it until something inside it shattered. I heard the crack across the room at the couch where I sat.

For another long heartbeat he was completely still. So were Connie, Lula, and I. Something was radiating from him in waves, something frightening and feral.

When he turned abruptly his face had gone blank and his eyes were flat and expressionless. He took two steps to me and dropped the new files on my lap.

"I'll be out of town. Call Tank if you need anything." His voice matched his face – expressionless.

And he was out the door, the Turbo laying rubber in a very un-Ranger-like departure.

Connie and Lula remained silent and frozen for several minutes, then it was if someone had turned a switch back on. They started speculating in hushed voices as to what Ranger's phone call had been about. They'd never seen Ranger react like that before.

I hadn't either, but I'd seen that look before, and it wasn't good. Whatever the call had been about, someone was in deep shit. The last time I'd seen that look was the night Abruzzi committed 'suicide.' I was worried. It was bad.

I left quickly before Connie and Lula could start quizzing me, taking along Ranger's files. I drove a few blocks, stopped in a parking lot and called Joe, telling him about the call Ranger had gotten and his reaction. Joe's interpretation was much the same as mine, but he hadn't heard anything. He'd keep his ears open, he said, and let me know if he learned anything. I did the same, and hung up.

Worry and curiosity aside, there was nothing I could do but wait. I might as well use my time constructively. I headed home.

The files I'd inherited were not my usual breed of skips. I normally took the small-time offenders – the drunks, shoplifters, and minor assaults. Ranger took the rapists, murderers, first-degree assaults, etc. Not that I couldn't find those types of skips – I could. I just couldn't make the captures, at least not without Ranger's help. I'd learned the hard way not to try these types of takedowns alone.

So, for these two files I did what I do best, what I'm good at. I used my natural nosiness and intuitive hunches to get a handle on the FTAs, track them down and locate their hiding place. But I'd wised up and now called for one of Ranger's Merry Men to do the actual apprehension. I'd act as decoy to flush the skip out, and Ranger's guys would catch him. Usually I managed to escape relatively unscathed.

Over the next three days I located and helped take in both skips, with only minor scrapes and bruises to show for it. Hal and Lester had helped with one takedown, and Tank had come for the second. He'd also stayed to help me capture Andy Vanelli, a slippery 'Burg native that unfortunately had gone to school with me, and so knew who I was. But Andy saw Tank at his back door and came at me at the front instead, trying to escape by shoving me off the porch into some roses. He didn't get away, but the roses did more damage than both the 'dangerous' skips combined. Figures.

I tried to call Joe to touch base with him, but he'd gone out on assignment and I just got his voice-mail. A few hours later I got a text message back that all he'd heard was that a black Porsche had been clocked going over 120 mph headed toward the airport the afternoon of Ranger's disappearance, but that the officers in pursuit had lost it.

As we'd worked together I'd asked Tank and Hal and Lester if they'd heard anything from Ranger, or if they could tell me what had happened. Hal and Lester gave me stone faces – either they'd been told not to talk, or they really didn't know. Tank unbent enough to tell me Ranger was okay, and that he checked in once a day, but that was all he was allowed to say. I didn't push.

Late afternoon on the third day after Ranger's call, I'd just arrived back at the office with the second of Ranger's body receipts and the one of my own for Vanelli. The light had gone golden the way it did in fall just before evening, and things were quiet. I turned in my receipts and waited as Connie did the math and wrote my check, talking to Lula about her plans for the weekend. They were gathering up their things to close up the office, and I'd dropped my check into my bag and was headed out the door when the van stopped in the street.

It was a beat-up blue panel van generously spotted with rust. It stopped just short of being directly in front of the office, and I hesitated as the door shut behind me. I'd never be as alert as Ranger or Joe, but something about the van felt off. As I watched warily, the side door shot open and a man wearing a ski mask leaped out dragging a child by the back of her jacket. Girl, I thought, registering the long wavy chocolate-brown hair. Not very old, maybe ten at most. Her hands were bound and a gag was tied across her mouth.

I saw the gun in the man's hand and before I could think I was charging into the street, yelling. The gun swung toward me and I dodged as it went off, swinging my purse with all my strength at his head. He staggered and dropped the gun at the direct hit – my gun was in my bag, along with a full box of shells – and the girl took advantage and twisted free, taking off hell-bent around the back of the van and out of sight. I must have turned to see where she went because the punch caught me blind, just under my jaw. I went down like a rock. I heard Connie shout from the door and the man jumped back into the van and it peeled out without even waiting for the door to close.

I picked myself up off the ground and brushed the gravel off my ass as Connie and Lula ran over, both with guns in hand. My purse was spilling its guts onto the pavement. I caught the check just before the wind could snatch it, then I shoved my stuff back in the bag and turned to reassure Connie and Lula that I was okay.

"Who the hell was that?" Lula asked. Connie shook her head.

"No one I know. You see, Steph?"

"Just a nutcase, I think. I guess we were due – it's been a little quiet lately." For some reason my internal alarms were all going off. I didn't want to tell them about the little girl. If they'd seen her they'd already have said something. I wanted to find her, make sure she was okay, but I had a strong suspicion she wouldn't come out of hiding if there were three of us. Especially with Connie and Lula waving guns.

I reassured them I was okay, got in my car and drove around a three-block square. By the time I got back a few minutes later they were both gone.

Before I got out of the car I got my gun out of my bag, checked that it was loaded, and tucked it into the small of my back. It was uncomfortable but I wanted it close in case the van showed up again. I left my bag in the car and locked it, shoving the keys into my pocket. I wanted my hands free.

Looking up and down the street, I tried to think like a child. Where would I have run to hide? Where would a child feel safe? One way down the street was mostly small storefront offices, all closed for the day. The other way had a small publishing company, a small office building, the deli, and a bookstore, already closed. That left the alleys.

The one next to the office was dimly lit but completely bare of hiding spots. The alley on the other side of the street stretched back between a publishing company and an office building. It was narrow and dim but relatively clean as alleys go. Dumpsters sat against the buildings, with additional cans dotted along the length. A stack of wooden pallets sat by the publisher's dock; some discarded, sad-looking office furniture was piled near the other building. Lots of places to hide.

I started slowly down the center of the alley, talking quietly, doing my best to sound reassuring and non-threatening.

"The man in the van is gone. I won't hurt you; I will help you if I can. Do you need me to call someone? Are you hurt? I know you're scared – I was, too. My name is Stephanie. Can you hear me?"

I probably looked like an idiot to anyone passing by, but I kept walking and talking, searching with my eyes, not going too close to any of the possible hiding spots. I didn't want to spook her.

She was so still and so well hidden that I almost missed her. She was under the steps of the loading dock in deep shadows, pressed tight up against the steps and the brick wall of the building. She was motionless, absolutely still. It was sheer luck that I saw her.

I stopped about twenty feet away, slowly going down onto one knee. Her eyes never left me, but they were the only thing that moved. I could see her only faintly but I could see her eyes. Large and liquid and familiar. I felt my stomach drop. I knew those eyes.