Disclaimer: Everything familiar belongs to JE.
Warning: Adult Language, Adult Situations, Smut
Chapter 2: New Alliance
Joe's POV
Yesterday was crazy. I woke up yesterday morning with Stephanie in my bed. We were laying with our backs to each other, on opposite sides of the bed. Huh. I never realized that I never held her while we slept. I used to find my arms wrapped around Terry whenever we would stay together when we were younger. Maybe that was a sign that we weren't in love. Then, her car blew up, no thanks to the ex-hooker Lula, and everything changed. Within fifteen minutes Stephanie and I were broken up, and she was with Manoso. When they drove away, I didn't even care that she went with him. Part of me was relieved. He said he loved her and she loves him. She looked happy. And she jumped in his arms, wrapping her body around his, something that she never did to me. After that display, I decided to try that new restaurant in town and met a beautiful woman. I mean, my heart stopped when I laid eyes on her. I never saw a woman that beautiful before. I asked her out on a date. I don't do dates. I never have. I've always taken pizza and sat on the couch watching a game or movie. Otherwise, we got right to sex. Where am I going to take her?
As I'm letting Bob out, I hear a car pull up in front of my house. I know that car. It's Manoso. What the fuck does he want? He won. He got Stephanie. Is he going to rub it in my face now? He parks his car and exits, walking up to my door. I open the front door up. "Manoso."
"Morelli."
Greetings aside, it's time to get down to business. "What do you want? You here to gloat?"
"No, but I'd rather talk to you inside where no one else can hear us."
I motion for him to follow me and head into the kitchen. "Do you want a cup of coffee?"
"No, a bottle of water, if you have." I get a bottle out of the fridge and hand it to him while I pour another mug of coffee.
"Morelli, the Chief asked me to look into some things that have been going down on Stark Street recently. Have you heard about the missing drugs and money?"
"Yeah, that's all anyone is talking about at the station. It seems that estimates have been coming in way too high. Let me tell you; I'm glad I'm out of Vice right now."
"There are a few dirty cops. I've been able to gather evidence that a few of your brothers in blue are the ones getting the drugs on the street, they are coming from Miami. They're going after their rivals, getting those guys arrested while their guys somehow are never caught."
"Shit, man. Why are you telling me this?" I ask Manoso.
"I need someone inside TPD to help me figure out who the players are; there are more than two cops involved. From what I have gathered, there are at least three uniforms and one or two detectives. One of the detectives is the point man. I need you to ask to transfer back into Vice, that homicide isn't working for you anymore. You miss the undercover work and the saving of lives. If you agree to this, the Chief will be the only one to know that you are going to be my CI. I ran the Chief, well, Stephanie ran the Chief. He is clean, beyond a doubt."
"How long have you been working on this case?"
"A year and a half. The case started out of my Miami office when Miami PD came to us for help. My brother Javier, who runs Miami Rangeman, kept me in the loop from the beginning. With my government work, I know who all the big players are in the drug world, and we know who the major supplier is for the drugs. The drugs are coming from Colombia, from Alejandro Baretto. The government is putting a team together to wipe out Baretto, but you don't know that. Before you ask, I'm not part of that team. My time going in the wind is over. I didn't re-sign my contract. I wouldn't do that to Stephanie. However, a few of my guys still have contracts. They will be the ones to fulfill that part of the mission. I started the investigation into the TPD about eight months ago. Hector is my main operative, as he is well known and trusted in the Trenton gangs. They are feeling the pressure, afraid that they will get busted for something they didn't do, so they are willing to talk to Hector openly. They feel no hesitation because they know Hector won't get them killed. He's refusing to give me their names, which I'm fine with and so is the Chief. He knows that his cops will bust them someday, but the dirty cops are the major problem. We have a short list of cops. You're not going to like some of the names. I need to dig deeper into their history. Unfortunately, Stephanie's going to have to do the digging. She's my best researcher company-wide. Silvio, who trained her, is damn good, but I know he missed things. It's going to kill her when she sees who they are, and I know it's going to hurt you too."
"If you know you're going to cause Stephanie pain and potentially put her in harm's way, why do it?" I ask, getting angry.
"I do it because innocent people are going to lose their lives. Other cops are going to get killed; my guys could wind up dead. Stephanie could stumble across this while she's going after her skips. I need to get her trained; I need to get her working with my men. They will have her six; they will keep her safe. Morelli, I know you don't trust me. I know you think I'm a thug, a criminal, and crazy, but I'm none of those things. That's just the persona I have to project to keep myself and my guys safe, to keep Stephanie safe. Think about all the times Stephanie has been alone on Stark Street at all hours of the day and night. She was never hurt, never harmed, never raped while any other white woman would have been in minutes. Do you want to know why?"
I think back to what Manoso is saying, and I know he's right. She's always walked away in one piece, only coming to harm because her skip didn't want to go with her. Aside from the Slayer incident, even the gangs leave her alone. I'm afraid to ask the reason. "Why, Manoso?"
"She has not been harmed because I let it be known with the scum of Stark Street that Stephanie was my woman, right after her first encounter with Benito Ramirez. I along with my men have told the gang bangers, riff-raff, and pimps that under no circumstances were they to harm Stephanie Plum or they would be answering to me. She was under my protection all these years, even while she was with you."
Now, I was seething. How could Ranger disrespect me like that? "You know, I get that when you met Stephanie, she was single, but why did you never retract it after Stephanie and I became a couple?"
"Why, Morelli? Do you need to ask me why? Think about it for a minute." I pause and think. I can't see any logical reason. Then it hits me.
"You have more street cred then I do as a cop. If you retracted that your woman now belongs to a cop, you'd lose your street cred, and Stephanie would have a target painted on her because now she belongs to a cop. What would you have done if we would've gotten married?"
"I'd push for her work for me. Why do you think I keep pushing her work for me. As my employee, I can still claim her as mine, under my protection when she was with you. They know not to fuck with my men. They wouldn't fuck with my woman either. Ella goes about freely through all parts of Trenton. She's visited Hector at his brother's house in the heart of Stark Street and has never been accosted, because they know she works for me. She goes there with her Rangeman uniform on, with her gun at her hip, knife on her ankle, and they treat her with respect. All because she works for me. It was the only way that I could ensure Stephanie's safety. Listen, Morelli, I have loved Stephanie since the moment I met her, and it threw me for a loop. Never, in a million years, did I ever think that I would want to settle down, have a wife or family. But since the moment that I've met Stephanie, I've often thought about that. I know that Stephanie claims she doesn't want to get married, nor have children, and if that's the case, I'm fine with it. Having her in my life, with me, is all I need to be happy. I have Julie, and now, with Stephanie, hopefully, Julie can come and stay with me more often. Living in a building with men and a beautiful teenage girl is not a good idea on either side. Some of my men are twenty years old. Julie's fourteen but looks eighteen. You know what they are thinking because its what we were thinking. At least with Stephanie around, I can take Julie home, and when we go to the office, she can be with Stephanie and Ella. She loves Stephanie. Scrog bonded them together in a way I'll never understand. I told Steph a lot of bullshit over the years about my life not lending itself to relationships and how I'm not a ring kind of guy, but a condom would come in handy. I'd offered to get her pregnant. I wasn't a saint. I poached, I pushed, I pressured her time and time again, but I can tell you, Morelli, aside from a few stolen kisses, she never strayed from you."
"You mean you never fucked her?" I ask, incredulously.
Manoso paused before answering, "we did, more than once. But never while she was in an "on" period of your relationship. Always when you were off, always with me initiating, except for when you're Grandmother cursed her with vordo, whatever the hell that is, I'd like to thank her. Look, you already know about Hawaii."
"Yes, I do. But clearly, that wasn't the first time."
"No, it was the third. The first was during the Abruzzi case, the second with the curse, then Hawaii, and one other time after that, in Florida."
"Fuck man."
"Well, you did buy a pool table for your dining room," Manoso told me. "Not the sign of a man who's serious about settling down and getting married. Even though you claimed to be engaged to be engaged, whatever the fuck that means."
"What do you have to offer her besides that apartment of yours?" I counter, now angry.
"A house in Lawrenceville, one on the beach in Point Pleasant, a house in Miami, and a condo in Boston. I also have estates in St. Lucia, Hawaii, and Spain."
Holy shit, he's fucking loaded. "You support a mortgage on all those properties?"
"No, I own them all outright. They are paid off." He said before continuing, "Rangeman is very profitable. I run a good company. I have skills that very few men have, one being a natural ability to learn languages. I can read, write, and speak English and Spanish, of course, but also Italian, Portuguese, French, Greek, Farsi, Arabic, Hebrew, Hindi, and Bengali. The government paid me well for my missions. In the last eight years, I never accepted a payout of fewer than two million dollars. That was for two weeks. The longer I was expected to be away, the more they would pay."
"What exactly did you do for the government?" I ask him. He looks like he's battling whether or not to tell me.
"Black ops, Morelli. You were in the Navy. You know what I mean."
"Yeah, I do. How many missions?"
"Thirty-two. Every one of them a success." He states smugly.
"Damn. Does Stephanie know how wealthy you are?"
"No, and I know that she will not be comfortable with it. How else do you think that I was able to get her a Turbo overnight?"
"You got her the car already?"
"Yup, it's waiting for her when she wakes up. As I said yesterday, whatever she wants, I will give her. As long as she gives me her heart, I will give her everything I possess. Nothing is too good or too much for my Babe." He said before pausing, "Now, back to the reason I came here. Are you willing to work with me to flush out the scum in TPD?"
"Look, I believe in the law, and I believe in the badge. I'm a good cop, and I follow the rules. I suspected something was up back when I went FTA, after being accused of killing Carmen. That was one of the reasons I transferred to homicide. I'll help you, but you better have my back. I don't want to wind up in the morgue. Depending on how things go down, I may not be able to continue working as a cop here in Trenton or anywhere else for that matter."
"Morelli, if you work with me, share all your information with me, and help me close down this investigation, I'll give you a job in my company, not necessarily in Trenton, though. Maybe Boston. I like visiting Miami too much." He said with the hint of a smile.
I can't believe I'm going to do this, that I'm going to work with Manoso. God help me. "Okay. I'm in. Who do I need to look into?"
"Come by Rangeman tomorrow at ten. There will be a full briefing at that time. Stephanie should have the results of her searches done by then."
"Okay. Do I need to sign in?"
"Yes, you will sign in, and someone will escort you upstairs. The two of us can't seem too friendly. I'll give you a key fob to get into the garage and the elevator tomorrow with limited access within the building. Feel free to use the gym if you want. It's open 24/7. When you come, you'll have to go through the process of signing in, but won't need an escort after tomorrow. When you get to the garage after tomorrow, stop in front of the gates, then open the gate with your fob. That way, anyone watching will think you are being buzzed into the garage. My guys in the lobby and on the monitors will know the drill. See you then, Morelli." Manoso said as he got up to leave. When he reached the door, he turned back to me, "I'm warning you now; Stephanie is mine. I don't share. No poaching. There are cameras everywhere in my building except in the locker room, the bathrooms, the apartments on four, six and seven. But everywhere else is monitor 24/7. I will find out, and it won't be pretty." With that, he walked out my door to his car then drove off. What the fuck am I getting myself involved in by working with Manoso?
Author's Note: Thank you for the overwhelming response to both this story and "The Night That Changed Everything." I will expand upon "THe Night" when I finish this story. I know that you were unable to comment on the completed Chapter 1 if you commented on the teaser, stupid FanFiction rules. I plan on updating this story on Fridays and Tuesdays. I have upt to Chapter 9 written. Now that I'm back at work, my writing time is decreased. I can no longer stay up until the wee hours of the morning/night to write, considering I wake up at 5.
Once again, a special thanks to Susan, my wonderful Beta who keeps me on track and who is helping me to create a better story, you rock, Babe. Your reviews mean the world to me, and someone took offense because I offered to post additional chapters for reviews. It was not done to be egotistical, as you claimed, but to help motive me to continue to write. Writing longer, multichapter stories is not an easy undertaking. Writing a one-shot is easy, constructing a story that flows and makes sense is not. I find that, especially when I hit a slump or writers' block, your reviews are what motivates me to continue. If you take offense to offering an extra post for reviews, then I apologize in advance, you don't have to review. If you reread my last story, "I Should Have Known Better" i deleted all my author's notes except for the one introducing Diaries and my ending note. I will continue to do that.
Remember, us FanFic authors get nothing in return for sharing our imaginations, only your comments as payment. Thanks once again for joining me on this journey into PlumLand.
