Disclaimer: JE owns the characters. If you get the chance go to Napster and find the song that I mention in this chapter. I'm totally in love with this song right now!

Pulling a monitoring shift in the control room is like sticking long needles in my eyes. Nothing happens for eight hour. And I mean nothing. It's like everyone in Trenton knows that I'm in the control room and no one does any B & E that night. The worst part is that it's a fourteen day stretch of nothing. Yep! Fourteen days straight of night monitoring. Fourteen days that I have to spend with Ram, Lester, and Bobbie. Two in the control room and two out on the street. My fourteen nights are spent trapped in the control room while the guys rotate out. No one trusts me to go out.

Tonight, I'm with Lester in the control room. He can be my favorite person to be trapped in the control room with. He likes to make up little games. One of the stores that we monitor has a camera outside that also shows the main entrance to an adult store. I like to play repeat customer. We track how many people are regular customers and how often they come back.

We were in the middle of trying to figure out if this guy that was loitering outside the store was a regular when my boyfriend walked into the adult store. I almost had a heart attack as Lester started busting up laughing. I was completely mortified! What in the hell was he doing in there? He walked back out of the store a couple of minutes later and waved at the camera. He waved! Like he knew that we were watching! I looked around the room for something to hit Lester with. He was still laughing and it was really starting to piss me off. I settled for my stun gun and smiled when the room went silent as he slid out of his chair and hit the floor.

"Babe."

I whirled around to find Ranger leaning against the door frame. He gave me a half smile as he nodded his head.

"He asked for it," I said as I pointed at Lester.

"Don't make me take your stun gun away."

"It's my only line of defense against these guys."

"Apologize to him when he wakes up," Ranger said and then he disappeared.

I sat back down in my chair in front of the screens. I cut my eyes back to the screen that had previously held my attention. I saw one of my regulars head in and shook my head. What on Earth is my man up to now? He is as mysterious and patient as Batman. That's how he wore me down to go out with him in the first place. I'd find little things laying around that would, for one reason or another, remind me of him. Then, a few weeks later, the flowers and little gifts started showing up. He had managed to weave himself into every thought that ran through my mind. I found myself asking him out on a date. Yeah! Try to figure that one out.

I apologized to Lester when he woke up. He said that I owed him breakfast tomorrow. He had a feeling that I might not have time this morning to do breakfast. The bag that my man had in his hand when he walked out, was rather large. The size of the bag had piqued my interest at first. As the night wore on, it started to worry me. We had only been together for a few months. I thought that we didn't have any issues in the sex department. The man was incredible. He did things to my body that Ranger had never done, and Ranger had done a lot.

I guess I had been pretty lucky in that department since I left the Dick. Joe was pretty damn great. Short in the time department, but he made every minute count. Ranger had been explosively intense. Every one of the five encounters that I've had with him had taken over the list of my top five sexual experiences. Until I found him. The first time with him had blown Ranger out of the water. He held the same intensity as Ranger, but there was an under current of raw emotion. Like all of his walls had been striped away. That first night had me coming back for more every night since.

As the clock crept closer to six, I started to get nervous. The nervousness was quickly swept away by horror as a stray thought entered my mind. What if I was the problem? What if I wasn't good enough? Oh! My! God! What if I'm terrible in bed? Wait, that can't be it. I don't think that Ranger, or Joe, would have kept coming back for more if I was bad in the sack. This is driving me insane! What in the hell is in that bag?

"Probably a blow up doll and some porn," Lester said.

"What?" I asked as I looked over at him.

"You asked what was in the bag. I was assuming that you were thinking about what we saw earlier."

Damn It! I was thinking out loud again! I normally only do that when I'm stressed out. Great! Now I'm stressed out! Could this get any worse?

"How was your night?" Tank asked as he walked in.

"Do not say a word," I hissed at Lester as I glared at him and pointed at the stun gun in my lap.

"Last night was pretty quiet," Lester said as he inched away from me. "Nothing happened all night."

"Are you recovering from the stun alright, Lester?" Tank asked as he walked over to look at the monitors.

"Yep. Steph is going to make it up to me by buying me breakfast tomorrow morning."

"Next time you might want to hold the laughter in."

I glared over at Tank. How much did he know? How much did Ranger know?

"Only that you stunned Lester because he wouldn't stop laughing. We haven't figured out what he was laughing at though," Tank said with a grin.

"You won't," I said as I glared over at Lester and tapped my stun gun. "Lester's taking that little secret to his grave."

"Slow night," Bobbie said as he walked in with Ram.

"I don't care what anyone says. I'm taking Steph out on patrol with me tomorrow night," Ram said as he flopped down in the chair next to me.

"I'm game," I said as I smiled at Ram.

"Check with Ranger and her old man first," Tank muttered under his breath.

"I heard that," I growled as I stood up. "I can make my own decisions, ya know."

"You made your bed, Ram," Tank said as he waved his hands in surrender. "If you get shot tomorrow night, it'll be your own fault. Now, every body get out before I make you all pull doubles."

I took the hint and ran out of the control room. I took the stairs down to the fourth floor and ran to my apartment. I stopped short in front of my apartment door. I could hear music playing from inside. I smiled as I faintly heard him singing along with the song. Kingdom by Dave Gahan. I leaned my head lightly against the door and sighed. He's an incredible man in every way. What did I do to deserve him?

I slowly opened the door and stepped inside. There were candles all over the room. I slowly shut the door as I took in the transformation that my room had gone through. He was standing in front of my bed. The only thing that he was wearing was a smile and funky red underwear. From where I was standing, they looked kind of waxy. He threw a small box at me and I almost didn't catch it. I was still in hormone over drive by the sight of him.

I looked down at the box. For a moment, I couldn't read. None of the words on the box made any sense. Then they started to settle in. I felt my tongue involuntarily run across my upper lip. Cherry Flavored Edible Underwear! I slowly looked back up at him. He had gotten closer and the smile had turned devilish.

"I got a pair for you, too," He whispered as he bent his head down to kiss me.

I broke the kiss in an effort to regain my breath. I whispered against his lips.

"Hand them over, Hal."