Author – PinPin [mciupin13 at yahoo dot com]
Rating – R : strong language, eventually some violent and sexually suggestive content (no smut)
Disclaimer – I do not own the characters, etc. I am only borrowing them from Janet. (plenty of originals will pop-up later) This is not for profit, just for kicks.
Notes – post EoT, directly following book 11. Babe, but Cupcake respectful.
***SPOILER ALERT*** Spoilers for all books, especially EoT.

Stephanie Redux - Chapter 7

When had it happened? When had this shitty little apartment become the only place I felt like I could fully breathe? It wasn't much more than a glorified dorm room. I was sitting in the corner chair, watching the shadows grow and creep across the faded carpeting as dusk descended. There was never enough light in the place. The cabinets were always bare; so were the walls. It was drafty. It had no security. It had a rodent. It had the ugliest bathroom I'd seen since my last stay in a third world country. But I wanted to be here. And as hard as I fought it, I needed to be here.

For a long time, visiting this tiny, simple, empty space was as close as I could get to her. I had to make do with it. I had to imagine her here and not in his home, not in his arms, not in his bed. It didn't always work, but it was the best I could do. I rolled my shoulders and grit my teeth. That wasn't true. It wasn't the best I could do. It was just all that I could do. It was all that I could do right now. It might be all that I could ever do.

I knew this place as well as I knew my own apartment, maybe better. I could navigate it in the pitch dark and if I closed my eyes I could smell its scent no matter where I was. Its aroma was an unlikely intoxicating mixture of meat sauce, frosting, and cosmetics. The grating squeak of the hinges on the bathroom door, which she hadn't bothered to oil in all the years I'd known her, was burned into my mind. I'd memorized the cracks in the kitchen tiles and could tell which of the dining room chairs had the wobbly leg before I sat in it. I even knew exactly how many dust bunnies there were beneath her bed at any given time. That one I'll probably never admit to anyone. I didn't even like admitting it to myself.

It was about noon when I returned to the empty apartment, hoping but doubting she'd be there, and I noticed the bullet holes immediately. There was new damage to the walls in her kitchen. I'd stopped dead in my tracks. Her cookie jar was gone. I just barely managed not to run out of there and start another frantic search, though I'm not sure how. She would have called. She called last night. She would have called me again if there was a problem. Yes, that was what I was trying to tell myself. It was easier to believe once I discovered that the broken pieces of the jar were in the trash bin. An attacker wouldn't have bothered to clean that up. Even so, it had been an unpleasant day, waiting for her to return. I had little else to think about except how far I must be falling behind at work and whether or not Stephanie was safe.

My heart skipped more than a few beats when I heard her voice call out to me from her answering machine. She'd acted strange all day, right from the moment she woke. And it only got worse later with unusual phone calls and odd declarations. Hell, she'd been acting strange for a while now. Leaving Vinnie's. A cello?

She kissed me today. Twice. She had me off balance.

I don't like being off balance. Maybe having her at the Haywood building all the time wasn't the greatest idea. I let my eyes fall closed for a minute and smiled my 'alone in private smile' to myself. I did, however, like the holster. [*001]

~POV~pov~POV~pov~POV~

My good mood had faded by the time I'd made it to the other side of the parking garage. I hated the range. I hated guns. I hated having to do this without Ranger. I knew I was going to make a fool of myself. At least I was pretty sure that I wouldn't shoot off any of my clothing again. I hoped.

The door leading to the corridor and elevator swung open as I reached for it. I was mid-step at the moment of impact. The force of the blow was mostly to my chest and it threw me backwards several feet. I landed roughly on my ass and then rolled over onto my side, curling in agony. Dark spots appeared on the back of my eyelids. My boob was screaming again. I didn't blame it. It'd seen a lot of abuse in the last 24 hours.

"Fuck, are you ok?" Lester Santos was crouched over me with concern in his eyes. I was lucid enough, despite the pain, to wonder if he was worried about my welfare or his own.

All I could manage was a high pitched cross between grunting and keening. At the sound, Lester's hands were on me. He sank his fingers in my hair to feel the back of my head and was pulling my eyelids open. He produced a flashlight from heaven-knows-where and was flashing it across my field of vision. I swatted him away.

"Stop that. I didn't hit my head." I gingerly sat up. Nothing other than my breast hurt. I had just enough natural cushioning on my ass for this sort of thing. It was a little sad that I knew that from frequent experience. "I'm fine."

"Are you sure? I can call a medic."

"I'm fine," I gritted out more forcefully and held a hand out for him to help me up. He did and I stood on steady feet, giving him a sharp look to impress my point.

"Sorry, Bombshell. I was coming down to meet you. You're headed for the range, right?"

How do these guys know these things? Even I didn't know that I'd be here. I hadn't decided to come until I was already in the car and on my way over with Ranger.

"Thanks, but I'm all set," I said dismissively. I didn't want his help, or anyone else's for that matter. I opened my jacket enough to show him that I was 'dressed.' His eyes flashed to the gun and then lingered farther south than I usually appreciated while conversing with a man. Why is it that men don't realize that if they are close enough to ogle you, it means that you're also close enough to him to clearly see that he is ogling you? I cleared my throat loudly and his eyes flew north to meet mine. I was almost surprised that he didn't blush. His adam's apple jumped abruptly, though.

"Are you sure you'll be alright?" he asked again.

I looked down at myself. Then I blushed. I was still protectively cradling my breast in a less than discrete manner. No wonder it had caught his attention. It looked like I was offering it up to him. I quickly removed my hand and pulled my jacket closed. "Yes, I'm sure." Especially now. And I had thought I'd be embarrassed in front of him before, but now I wanted to run from the building. My gaze strayed to the ceiling for a beat. That must have all been caught on camera. My mind fleetingly wondered who was on the monitors to witness that and if he'd have the proper sense of self-preservation to keep it to himself. "I can handle it."

"Never doubted it." Lester smiled. "Just thought you might want some company."

That was the last thing I wanted. "I'm fine," I repeated a third time with exasperation. "Don't you have some more important security things that need doing?" It was rude, but I was dedicated to discouraging him from accompanying me while I tried, for the very first time, to visit the gun range on my own and do it without fainting in the process.

His smiled slipped away and he gave me one of those RangeMan mini-nods before turning and heading back upstairs. I felt horrible. He had come down with the best intentions of helping me. Instead he had knocked me down, been pushed away, was given a little free show, practically scolded for it, and then summarily dismissed in a markedly impolite way. What was wrong with me lately? It must be the stress and the lack of sleep. And the mounting number of knocks and bruises didn't help. Yeah, that's definitely it. It's all of those things. What else could it be?

~POV~pov~POV~pov~POV~

Bobby Brown watched his friend and partner march testily through the control room on his way to their office. He'd seen the entire episode on the monitor as Plum fell back on her ass and Santos fussed over her. Please don't call me down there, he'd thought to himself. He could see from there that she wasn't hurt and he was already having an awful day. It was bad enough that Ranger and Tank had both gone offline at the same time, but then he'd been called in to work all of Hal's shifts for three whole days. Of course, Plum still managed to waltz in this afternoon to make use of the facilities and generally disrupt things. Terrific. Now Santos was in a pissy mood and the only other man on shift to help him with control room duties was Ram. He was capable, of course, and was very good at his job, but spending time with him was like passing the day with a hunk of Silly Putty; there wasn't much of interest to him there and what was there wasn't exactly fun.

~POV~pov~POV~pov~POV~

I made it down to the range without running into any other Rangemen or any other portions of the building's structure. I set myself up in one of the cubicles, encouraged by how much I remembered from my last visit. Lining up my shot and adjusting my stance, I tried to stop trembling. After my first rounds, I reeled in my target to take a look. It took a lot of effort to keep my lip from quivering. I'd barely hit the thing. What good did it do to be comfortable having it, if when I finally found the nerve to use the thing it wasn't even as effective as winging my purse at someone? Especially if the gun was in my bag; it's heavy.

I steeled myself for another go at it. Ranger required this and I had the hardest time saying no to him. My second attempt was better, but not anything that I wanted to parade around in front of people. Hands still shaking slightly, I repeated the process several more times. At first I had slowly improved, but then my aim deteriorated significantly as fatigue crept up my arms.

When I pulled the headset off and waited for my ninth target paper, I heard the footsteps behind me. To both my, and Ram's, unparalleled shock, my reflexes jumped up one hundred and eighty degrees. I grabbed the gun off the counter in front of me and whipped around.

Click.

It was empty. Never the less, I had just tried to shoot Ram. If the gun hadn't been empty, he would have taken a slug to his upper right chest. At close range. We stood for what felt like a thousand years, but were probably no more than a second or two, neither of us breathing.

My body wasn't shaking now. It was convulsing. I couldn't believe what I had just done. I had tried to kill him. It might have been a gut reaction, more bodily response than thought, but did that make it any less of a nightmare? It made it worse. It made it terrifying. Either way, I had come very close to substituting a gunshot for a flinch. That wasn't normal, healthy, or safe. And how in the world had I even heard him coming? I never hear them coming. The Rangemen are stealth personified.

I didn't hear the thud when the gun hit the floor or notice that Ram was guiding me over to the bench along the back wall, but I did feel the difference in my head when it was pushed down between my knees. The pressure didn't get much better, but it had stopped getting worse. Somewhere in the back of my mind it registered that Ram had sat down beside me, about two feet between us, and was breathing deeply with his head leaned back. I guess that's one way to react to almost being murdered at work. I probably would have handled the situation a tad differently.

Several minutes passed, I don't know how many, before I recovered enough to speak. "Ram?" My voice was so quiet, I almost missed it. "I'm sorry," I choked out with a small sob. My cheeks were burning with embarrassment and guilt and horror. I swiped at the tears that had begun to fall. God, I need to get a grip. I've cried more in the last few days than I had in the last six months, and it wasn't even close to that time of the month.

After a whole lot more motionlessness from both of us, Ram had yet to say anything to me. My head was still lowered and I couldn't even tell if he had heard me in the first place. So I sat up and glanced at him. Ram was sitting silently, staring down the right lane of the gun range. His breathing was steady, but not exactly calm.

"I'm so sorry."

"It's alright."

I sat beside him in a mirrored posture, looking down range. I'd stopped crying and had almost stopped shaking at that point. "No, it isn't. It isn't alright."

"It's a common reaction, and there are plenty of situations when it's a good reflex."

"Good reflex?" I hoped he couldn't hear in my voice just how insane I thought he was. "It is not common for someone to try and kill their friends."

Ram's eyes shot to me then. When I turned my head to answer his gaze, he quickly shifted it back down the range. "There's a reason you were told not to work today."

"He said I should visit the range." I knew that Ram knew who I was talking about.

He was quiet again for a while. I started to wonder about him. How is he sitting there so stoically after what I'd done? Why would he be trying to reassure me? I'd almost killed him. I'd almost killed a man. I'd almost killed a Rangeman. Shit. I was about to start crying again.

Ram spoke louder than before but just as sedately. "Well, that didn't turn out to be such a great idea, did it?"

I breathed one small laugh. No, it certainly hadn't. Whatever mysterious powers that had been controlling my tongue lately pushed their way to the front and took over. "I shot my clothes off this morning and did enough damage in my kitchen to lose several security deposits. And now this. That's two gun related incidents and I haven't even had supper." So much for no one ever finding out about my ruined seat. I went and spilled the beans even before Mary Lou had a chance to.

The corners of Ram's mouth tipped upward ever so slightly and I bristled. "You think that's funny?"

"No, I don't." Ram was turning out to be an unexpectedly soft-spoken guy. "I was just thinking about all of the people who never have to worry about gun safety at the dinner table." He took a small breath. "And about how long it's been since I was one of them."

"I suppose I'm not one of them anymore either, am I?"

"I think not."

I looked over at my pile of folded, used targets. I could hate it and fight it is much as I wanted, but there was no denying that guns were a serious part of my current reality. "Do you think someone can go back to that?"

"I wouldn't know how."

I sighed for maybe the millionth time that day. "Me neither." I was exhausted again.

~POV~pov~POV~pov~POV~

Lester had taken up Ram's post in the control room when he sent him downstairs. He watched on the monitors as Stephanie startled and spun around, gun in hand. He jumped from his chair with a bark of surprise and momentarily couldn't breathe in the wake of the fear that washed over him. But it had been for naught. The gun wasn't loaded and he knew that Ram must have known that beforehand or he would have never risked startling someone while they were shooting. Still, the encounter was upsetting, and if the images on the screen where to be believed, they were most upsetting to Stephanie. Lester tried to fight the urge to go down there and lend some comfort. Ram looked to have the situation under control and he couldn't leave his post, but this episode combined with her attitude earlier had him worrying. Where the hell was Ranger anyway?

~POV~pov~POV~pov~POV~

Ram and Stephanie sat recovering for almost twenty minutes before it occurred to her to ask him why he'd come down. "Did you want to use the range, or did you need something? You never said."

"I was distracted."

She flinched internally. "I really am sorry."

"Don't be. Distraction is your specialty. And I fell for it."

"That's not –"

"- important," he interrupted and finished her sentence in a way she never would have. "I came to bring these." He handed Stephanie a large, thick manila envelope. "There are some legal papers that need to be signed today, but Santos can't get in touch with the Boss. He thought that you might be able to help."

"Oh." She tried to hide her surprise. She'd never been entrusted with something like this.

"Can you get in touch with him? Santos seemed to think you were the best person to ask."

Stephanie recalled their encounter in the garage and felt even worse. This day was very quickly turning to shit. And what a surprise, it was because of guns. Had Lester just wanted to illicit her help earlier? It would make sense if he were as equally mystified by Ranger's behavior lately as she and Tank had been, and still were.

"Why don't you get Tank to sign them?" She wasn't completely positive that telling Tank about the fact that she knew where Ranger was had been a good idea. She was positive, however, that telling his other employees anything personal about him would be a big fat no-no.

Ram didn't answer immediately. He didn't want to tell her that, first of all, Tank never signed official papers like these, and that secondly, Tank was also AWOL since early that afternoon. He was actually a little caught off guard by the fact that she had even questioned the handling of RangeMan affairs. He had no idea how much she knew about the company, but the notion that she might know more than he did was a bit unsettling. So he really didn't know how to reply.

Stephanie saw Ram's reluctance and decided not to press the point. She wondered if she was right about Ranger and if he'd be waiting for her when she went home. What if he wasn't and then she was responsible for this paperwork? "I'll see what I can do."

He hesitated, but then nodded.

She tried to reassure him. "If I can't get hold of him I'll get the papers back here within the hour."

Ram seemed to hesitate even more at that suggestion. He was looking down at the envelope in her hands. But then he simply nodded again. Stephanie felt herself shrinking under his uncertainty. Maybe Tank was right. She needed to work on trusting the Rangemen more and showing them that she trusted them.

Step one, talk to them. So far she'd had a lot of success with that. First, she'd spent the afternoon telling Tank all sorts of things that should probably have been left unsaid. Then she went and confessed her ballistic wardrobe malfunction to Ram, of all people. Come to think of it, 'success' might be an overly ambitious description of what she'd managed to do. 'Attempt' might be a better word for it.

Step two, try her hardest not to injure, or kill, any of them. That one she'd had a bit more trouble with in the past, this afternoon in particular, but she could work on that.

Step three, play by RangeMan rules. Now that one was going to be more difficult. Either the rules were going to have to be relaxed a little, or she was going to be breaking them left and right. Did they really expect a woman to report to them about every part of her life? Tank must have been insane to have even suggested such a thing. They were all too used to the men's locker room, where they all let everything hang out. Ladies just didn't operate that way. And she wasn't about to apologize for that or change herself to accommodate them. Final answer. Her skin crawled when she unintentionally imagined herself in that RangeMan locker room. She'd have to be fitted for a straight jacket in order to keep her hands to herself.

She returned to reality when Ram stood. He made a move towards the door, "can't sit around all day."

She stood too. She didn't know what to say but after what had just gone on between them she definitely felt like she should say something. "I really am sorry."

He stopped and turned back to her. "And I really meant it when I said that it was alright."

"Ram –"

He cut her off mid-sentence again. "You've had a traumatic experience and not enough time to recover. You shouldn't be at a range or even carrying. Tell the boss."

If anything more emotional happened today she'd have a breakdown. Was this guy really telling her to take a stand with Ranger about her well-being and just how wrong he had been about it? She felt a sudden flood of appreciation for Ram and was hugging him before she had even finished the thought. She held him tightly and waited for him until he raised his own arms to stiffly return the embrace.

"I can't believe you aren't going to hold this against me."

Ram's spine straightened and Stephanie wanted to slap herself.

"That's not what I meant," she said quickly as she pulled back.

He tried to laugh, "I figured…"

Stephanie shook her head and laughed too. "My tongue's been a bit naughty today."

Ram's eyes widened ever so slightly and he bit his lip. He looked like he might be in some sort of pain.

"Wait," she sputtered, "that's not what I meant either!"

Ram's eyes found hers and his gaze made her blush and look away. It was penetrating and unsettling, like he could see into more than her mind or her soul; it was like he could read her past and see all that she'd ever been. She could still feel his eyes on her when he asked, "Did we meet in a previous life and it just slipped my mind?" (1)

She couldn't help but look up to meet his eyes again. "Maybe." She smiled. "I might have even killed you in that one."

Ram's full laughter was like a machine gun chortle. "I'd believe that."

Stephanie was even more surprised by his laughter than she normally was when one of the Merry Men let loose. A close call with death and this man is having fun! "You're sort of twisted, aren't you?" This encounter hadn't been a traditional introduction, but Stephanie was starting to feel like she was really getting to know Ram. Although, she'd be the first to admit that she'd been wrong before…

"Look who's talking." He smiled one last time before he turned and headed out the door. "I have to go relieve Santos. Later."

She stood watching the empty doorway for a minute before turning back to the task at hand and packing up her things. He was right. Stephanie and guns were having a bad day and it was best if she called it quits before anyone got hurt. Ranger would just have to understand.

A/N: Thank you for reading! Despite this story's longevity, it's still a WIP. (I work on it when I can.) Please R&R.
[*001 : Leona Naess - Ballerina]
(1: This Line is included as part of a group challenge from the 'Anna & Denny's NSTAA Challenge' at PerfectlyPlum, Jan. 2010.)
** One last reminder; anything I include in notes can be made available to the readers, just message/e-mail me for a link. **