A Random Life
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a/n: early in R & S's partnership, like...Book Six?
Three ~ Your Satisfaction is Job One
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Ranger A recently proposed memo to Rangeman clients: "Your Satisfaction is Job One". Some marketing guru's idea of cleaning up my usual line, " You pay in advance, in cash—no problem." I usually add an intimidating stare...and yeah, they pay. So I fired the marketing guy. Not that that has anything at all to do with tonight's job.
Jersey City NJ, 2100 hours
I sat in the stinking alley behind the JerseyPussycat Lounge, cuffed to Stephanie and my target, cold rainwater seeping into the ass of my jeans. Tonight's job was not going particularly well, obviously, although Stephanie, always the perfect decoy, had sussed out the target like the pro she is. Now she sat to my left, in her little working girl's suit, looking as miserable as I felt. On my right, the man we were picking up for the FBI was fuming and cursing under his breath. We were all wearing handcuffs and the FBI had, in their infinite wisdom, also used twist ties to link us together.
If we went anywhere, we'd have to go in a conga line. Or so they thought.
By working girl, I don't mean Steph was dressed like a hooker; no, the target was a sophisticated man who'd be suspicious of a call girl luring him out to this alley. Steph was dressed in her little black suit with the very short skirt and no blouse. If my ass in jeans was uncomfortable, her ass in the short skirt must have felt hideous.
Now she turned her head and stared at me. "Remind me why I am sitting here in a puddle of piss, honey."
We were pretending to be a couple tonight.
"I am going with it just being rainwater, sweetheart." I answered her, slurring my words to keep my cover as a drunken asshole husband.
She shifted and said, "Huh." But she was thinking, He doesn't pay me enough to put up with this kind of shit! Don't need ESP to understand that, I could read her eyes.
... ... ...
a week earlier, Rangeman offices on Haywood Street, Trenton NJ.
I pressed my intercom and said, "Babe, my office."
"What about your office, Ranger?"
Stephanie is trying to improve my phone/ intercom manners again. I sighed. "Can I see you in my office, Ms Plum?"
Giggle. "Please?"
"Now."
I took my hand of the little intercom device, sat back, waited. In a few beats she appeared in my doorway. "Knock, knock."
"I save please for emergencies, babe."
"A girl can only try." She sat down across from me and looked attentive.
"We have a job."
"We do? Good?"
I ignored that. "I've contracted a job for the FBI out of north Jersey, to help the locate and arrest this man." I showed her a poor quality surveillance photo. "We think he is working with the Jersey City OC families, as a weapons supplier."
"Organized Crime? Like the Sopranos?"
If I could go shoot HBO for that stupid series I'd do it in a heartbeat. I continued, "We believe the man is living in Patterson, pretending to be a regular guy, soccer dad, kids studying for SATs, family guy." I passed her another photo of a balding guy in khakis and golf shirt at a soccer game.
Steph compared the two pix and nodded. "Maybe."
"That's the problem, we aren't sure. But this guy—James Sullivan—stops every Friday at a so-called gentlemen's lounge near Grove Street. He comes out of the PATH train station, on his way home from his day job in Manhattan, and he watches the strippers and has a few drinks before he gets his car from the commuter lot and drives home."
"And you need me to decoy him?"
"You'll be wired with digital CCTV, very miniature. It will fit in your bra. You'll engage his attention and if we—myself and the agents on the case—feel he is the same man, I'll come into the bar, find you, make a scene, punch the guy out and so on. JCPD will come in and arrest both of us, you'll be whisked away by whoever I have behind the bar."
"Why not just get him outside like we usually do?"
"The feebs"—FBI—"want me to preserve my cover." I couldn't, well, wouldn't, explain the complexities of my own OC ties—genetic only!—to Stephanie, at least not right then.
She thought about the scenario. "I don't see the point."
"The pencil pushers at FBI headquarters want it that way."
"Well, here's to the pencil pushers. May they all get lead poisoning," she said sarcastically.
She was right but..."It's the job, take it or leave it." I told her the salary for the night's work.
Her eyes widened. She said, "Okay. You're the boss."
I stared at her. I didn't want to be the boss. I want to be—what? Her freakin' boyfriend? Her lover, um—husband? Stephanie makes me crazy. I love her anyway...or maybe because?
... ... ...
The following Friday, meaning earlier tonight, I picked Stephanie up at her apartment at 4 PM. I was on time, she was, of course, late. When I walked into her place, she sensed my presence and her voice emerged from the open bathroom door.
"Be right there!"
Ten minutes later, Steph appeared in the skirted business suit we'd decided on for the job. The suit was expensive and fitted well,but the neckline hinted of smoothly perfumed white skin and just a bit of cleavage. The skirt was a smidge tight and short, her black FMPs ridiculously high. She looked like every businessman's wet dream of the dominating female boss.
I must have examined her for too long because Steph's cheeks colored a little.
I said, "Ready, babe?"
"Do I look okay?"
"Yeah. Fine." I kept it short on purpose. I didn't want to get too involved. Or we'd end up in her bedroom instead of at the Jersey Pussycat Bar and Grill.
Defensively she told me, "It's not easy, Ranger. You don't know how hard it is being a woman looking the way I do."
"You don't know how hard it is being a man looking at a woman looking the way you do," I admitted. I refrained from adjusting my buttcrack jeans (my undercover disguise) and grinned at her.
Steph stared at me. "Roger Rabbit? Who knew Ranger Manoso would know lines from..." She giggled.
"Babe. We gotta get going."
"Almost ready." She twirled in front of the mirror on her foyer wall. She seemed satisfied. "I'm not bad..."
Not bad was putting it mildly. I took another mental step back and held up the tiny camera we'd attach to the front clip of her pushup Wonderbra. (How did I know the brand? Rangeman footed the bill for her entire outfit, of course. It was a uniform of sorts, tax deductible. I always paid for her clothes when she had to wear something specific for a job). I said, "Let's get you wired and try this camera out."
I knew how to wire her and attach everything. I always made sure I was fully trained. Normally Hector or Vince might do the pre-job wiring, on a male agent. But no way was anyone but me gonna touch Stephanie like this.
I focused on my task, my fingers gently sliding between lavender lace and sweet breast and and...and...and, uh...
"Ranger? Is there a problem?" Her voice quivered a bit.
I jerked to attention and took my knuckles off her breast. "No, you're good to go."
... ... ...
Jersey City
At the Jersey Pussycat Lounge, Steph made a gag-me gesture when she saw the name. I told her, "I think it's ironic, the name I mean."
"God, I hope so," she answered and off she went to find he mark.
All went as planned, at least in the beginning. You know the deal: the wobble, the catch, the frustrated cubicle workers sharing a moment and a beer with tequila chasers...
Stephanie told James Sullivan, possibly aka Mario Donatelli,mob gunrunner and all around scumbag, that she was a bank vice president, "Marketing of course. Because I, like, have boobs?"
Yes, he looked. "Boobs?"
"You must know about the glass ceiling for women, the pink ceiling? Women can make it to VP positions but only in advertising or HR."
Sullivan licked his lips, "HR?"
"Human resources? But enough about me and my, well, issues. What do you do? And what brings you here on a rainy Friday night?" She dumped her shot of tequila [tea, poured by Manny tending bar tonight] down her throat, and smiled.
How Steph can make a phrase like rainy Friday night sound like a porn soundtrack is beyond me. It is so far from her normal Jersey girl-Burg self it seems she's suddenly a stranger to me, or an alien.
Sullivan drank too. He told her, eyes still below her face, "It's not my job, it's my home life that gets to me. My wife just doesn't understand what I go through every day. And my kids! Gimme, gimme, gimme."
And so on.
"Facial recognition survey says 100% definite that he is Donatelli. You can go in, sir." A disembodied FBI agent spoke in my ear bud.
"Ten four." Good thing their computer worked fast because Sullivan/ Donatelli's hand was creeping waaaay up Steph's thigh and his other hand was unsubtly playing with her fingers, atop the bar.
"Jenni!" I stomped across the busy lounge, shoving my way up to the bar. "Jennifer! What the fuck!" I yelled.
"Uh oh, my husband," Steph said, also in my ear as well as to Donatelli.
I grabbed her and feigned a slap."The kids need you at home, you slut!" I screamed.
Donatelli, what a hero, scooted away, made no attempt to help Stephanie. Instead he stood up and threw a couple twenties on the bar. I pushed Steph aside and grabbed him before he got away. "The fuck you think you're doing, hitting on my wife!" I punched him gently in the face. and he backed up. So I grabbed him and beat on him a little, mostly shoves and cursing. Finally the tequila and his temper got the better of his good sense and he fought back.
It was vaguely absurd because even as I tried not to really hurt him, I could tell he was trying not to hurt me either, not really. He wanted "low profile", he just wanted to disengage. But finally he pulled his gun and I took him down, across a couple tables, rolling on the smelly, beer-sticky floor.
Sirens, cops, fast onto the scene. All planned, all choreographed, except somehow, Stephanie decided to come to my defense when Donatelli pulled the gun. She was behind him, hitting him with her big Coach purse (ouch!) when the cops arrived.
And we all were cuffed and dragged out to this alley. To sit, for what seemed like hours, in the rain, in a reeking puddle of piss.
I knew it was piss, Stephanie wasn't dumb, but I tried to calm her, told her it was just rainwater.
"You just hope it's rain, honey!" Stephanie told me. "You idiot! I work all week while you stay home and collect disability. And you are so fucking lazy you can't watch the kids for an extra hour?"
I shrugged.
''So now I am sitting here in a puddle of piss! What the hell is wrong with you, you stupid bastard?"
Donatelli looked at me with sympathy in his eyes. Steph burst into tears.
And an FBI agent in a trademark blue FBI windbreaker came over, read Donatelli his rights, and led him away. "Hey! What about me?" yelled Stephanie, her face now dirty and tear streaked. I wasn't sure if she was still acting but while everyone was watching Donatelli's arrest, I slipped my hands free of the cuffs and pulled her close, kissed her drenched curly hair, "You smell good, babe," I stupidly murmured.
"Huh?"
"Here, let me just..." I turned her and undid her cuffs too.
She narrowed her big blue eyes at me. "You took your own cuffs off?''
"It's a godgiven talent, babe."
" You mean you could've taken your hands out of the cuffs at any time?"
" No, not at any time, only when it was funny."
"I'm not laughing!" And she burst into tears again.
I stood up, pulled her up beside me, and wrapped her in my arms. She pulled back from my hug and we watched the FBI's black Suburban pull away with Donatelli inside.
I whispered in her ear, "Mission accomplished, babe. Macy's shoe sale, tomorrow. Spring extravaganza, I hear.''
"So—it's just a job?"
"Yeah."
"Okay. I forgive you."
It's just a job. Satisfaction guaranteed...
the end, series tbc
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