AN: A combination of the arrival of a brand new nephew and this week's Game of Thrones, have resulted in a lot of late nights, a super long chapter being completed, and another, regular sized one, on the cusp of being done. Thank you to everyone for your comments, I love them! All mistakes belong to me, but the characters belong to Janet.

I passed Ranger and helped myself to another cup of coffee.

"I'd go easy on that," Ranger said, nodding to the oversized mug in my hand, "Most of the guys around the office cut Hector's coffee with decaf or it keeps them up for days."

"Wimps," I said, "It's perfect; yeah maybe it's a little bit strong, but I need it today,"

"Missed me?"

"Missed your gun," I said, which drew a cocked eyebrow and a smirk, "Perv. I'm on to you, there was no emergency at work last night, you bugged out the minute you heard party."

"I'm assuming the party last night has something to do with the phone call I got this morning about the wifi being down next door and a virus that was introduced to the neighbour's network?"

"A virus?"

"Turned all of the music on the computers to chamber music," Ranger said.

"You have some real competition when it comes to Hector; that is some seriously perfect revenge. Not to mention he makes a mean cup of coffee," I said and topped up my cup.

"And you probably have the same taste in men, too," Ranger said.

"Well, while you were getting your beauty sleep, Hector and I went through torture by techno," I said.

"Are you going to tell me your plan?" Ranger asked.

"See, I dunno. I sort of want to do this by myself without telling you the plan. Because if I tell you the plan, you're going to want to plan it more, and next thing I know, we're doing it your way, which is usually really good for me, but the way I see it is, if we do it that way, then we can't test my theory that a total amateur with a little ingenuity can do this, without fancy gadgets and stuff. So I sort of really just want you to come along so I can try things my way, with backup and someone who can pick a lock, because even though I did look it up on the internet a couple of weeks ago and tried it, I couldn't pick the lock to my apartment and since a two-year-old can do it I don't think I've mastered it, you know? Oh and I want you to come along to make sure I don't do anything stupid."

"I understand your motives; a simple 'no' would have sufficed. How many cups of that have you had?" he nodded towards the cup in my hand.

"Umm, four?" I said, "Plus the coffee before I went shopping that I had with breakfast and the coffee ice cream. Which I suppose was more than just coffee ice cream because there was chocolate covered Espresso beans in it and what are you doing?" Ranger took the coffee from me and dumped it down the sink. I couldn't have been more shocked if he'd shot me. The next thing he did was get a big water glass and fill it with water and a dissolving vitamin C tablet.

"Drink that, all of it," he said.

"You dumped my coffee,"

"Live with it," he said.

"Just because I'm a little chatty doesn't mean you get to be all bossy!" I squeaked.

Ranger stared at me impassively; my outrage did not concern him at all. I stubbornly refused to drink the fizzing orange drink, for about ten seconds because I suddenly realized I was really really thirsty. Like more thirsty than I've ever been in my life. I pounded it back, and he refilled the glass with water. That done he steered me to the bedroom and threw some running shorts and a sports bra at me and changed into his own running clothes. When I hadn't changed when he finished, he began undressing me in an entirely clinical, unfun manner and yanked the bra over my head. The shorts were next. Followed by a pair of ankle socks and when he went to tie my shoes, I snapped, "I'm not four; I can do it myself, but if you think I'm running, you've got another thing coming."

He stayed crouched down as I tried to tie my shoes and failed because my hands had started shaking. He took over when I started panicking and then steered me out the front door. He prodded me into a run while I freaked out. A mile in I didn't care about being shaky anymore and was just focusing on not dying. We were jogging at noon, in Florida, it wasn't exactly cool. Five miles later and we were back in the house, and I was lying on the cool marble floor grateful for air conditioning and cold stone against my skin. Ranger let me stay there for a few minutes before he dragged me back to my feet and made me eat a banana and drink some more water.

The banana did a lot to restore my equilibrium.

"Feel better?" he asked.

"I can't believe you made me do that," I said.

"You kept a nice pace once you stopped freaking out about having Bell's Palsy," Ranger said, "Which I don't think is what you think it is."

"I'm not going to be able to move later."

"Yes you will; come on," he said.

"I'm not exercising anymore," I said.

"You're going to have a shower, and then I'm going to give you a massage you probably won't remember," Ranger said.

"I don't think that's likely; I'm pretty sure that if you massage my legs it's going to lead to some memorable events," I said. Ranger didn't say anything.

I didn't remember the massage. I know it happened because I remember lying down on the bed, and thinking that it was pretty fucking hot when he poured oil on the back of my thighs. Then I was gone, totally lights out, sound asleep, thanks to the biggest caffeine crash of my life. When I woke up, it was around four o'clock, and it wasn't because I just naturally woke up. It was self-preservation because I was suffocating.

Ranger was lying mostly on top of me, using his body as a shield against some invisible threat, and he was twitching. It wasn't the first time I'd woken up because of a Ranger nightmare. They only happened when he was exhausted. Usually, after he'd been awake for more than thirty hours. If our post-coital nap was the only time he'd slept since I last saw him, that would do it. The odds on that were pretty good, considering there was a crisis with a client and he probably went straight to work once he got set up here.

Now in most cases, when someone has a nightmare, you wake them up. That's simple, right? Call their name and shake them. In Ranger's case, this was an extremely bad idea. He didn't sleep with a gun under his pillow, it was in the nightstand, but he didn't need a gun to kill you in a second, and he had years of training that gave him scary reflexes. The best thing to do was let him sleep through them, as awful as they could be to witness, because you didn't know what he was dreaming about and touching him or shouting his name, could just make things worse. That is, if you weren't sharing a bed with him. If you were, it could be just as dangerous as trying to shake him awake. You had to wake him up just enough to get him out of the dream but not enough that he'd startle.

This wasn't information I discovered on my own; this was all thanks to an awkward conversation with Lester and Bobby one of the many times I'd done contract work for Ranger. Ranger was working a lot of long hours, and they felt it prudent to warn me since I hadn't experienced a nightmare yet and it wasn't exactly a secret that we periodically slept together.

"Ranger," I whispered. Saying his name resulted in him tightening his grip on me. Since I was already touching him, I gently stroked his chest, "Whatever you're remembering is over; I'm safe. You saved me. You have to let me go," He grabbed my wrist, hard. It wasn't painful, but it had the potential to be. One thing was clear, I wasn't going anywhere anytime soon.

I blew out a sigh, now what? Thankfully this wasn't one of his more violent nightmares; mostly I was just trapped. I'd have just relaxed and waited it out, only now I had another problem. I had to pee, and I was getting blowback of my own breath off of Ranger's shoulder, and it wasn't pretty. "Ranger, let me go. I need to get up," I said. His hand tightened again, okay now it hurt, "Please, Ranger?"

He let me go and rolled over, but he wasn't awake. He grunted in pain; his breathing was accelerated, and he let out a grunt of pain. I hated that I couldn't do anything for him, I hated that I didn't know what he was dreaming about. I wanted him to wake up more, but I needed to be far away from him when I tried.

I got up and did what I needed to do, and I made brushing my teeth making as much noise as I could, trusting that his other instincts would wake him up enough for him to determine if I was a threat. When I came out, he was resting peacefully on his back, looking like he usually did when he slept. Since I didn't have to worry about him killing me if I woke hip up now, I decided to get back into bed using a detour over him, paying a toll of a kiss on my way over.

He let me be in control for all of a second and a half before I wasn't on top anymore and you'd have never known he'd been asleep seconds before. "Those are the reflexes I like you waking up with," I said when he finished thoroughly kissing me, I touched his cheek, "Are you okay?"

"I will be," he said, "Did I hurt you?"

"No, you just weren't excited about the idea of letting me leave," I said.

"I never am," he said and kissed me again.

"How much have you slept since you left Trenton?" I asked.

"Exactly how much you think I've slept," he said.

"Then keep your weapon holstered soldier, and go back to sleep," I said.

"I'll go to sleep faster if I don't," he said.

"No, you won't. You can switch off like a light, and you're not the quickie type." He chuckled and rolled off of me and onto his back. I rolled with him and stayed tucked against him. I was thinking of getting up so I could work on my plan for the evening a bit more, but decided that since I was comfortable where I was, and I had no real desire to get out of bed, I could think about my plan where I was.

What I needed was more intel, and I needed an excuse to go to the guard station. My phone vibrated beside the bed, and I crawled over Ranger to get it. He chuckled again and started gently stroking my lower back. "Stop it," I said and kissed his nose, "You're just going to have to practice a little restraint. I know you can."

"I only have so much self-control. You're naked, you're on top of me, and we're in bed. You're going to have to get off of me if you want me to stop attempting to persuade you."

I did as he suggested and settled on my back next to him, using his arm as a pillow.

"Spoilsport," he said, and then was asleep two seconds later. I opened my phone and clicked on my text messages.

I had several from Morelli; the last one was the only one visible without clicking on his name.

-I am not kidding, Cupcake.

I didn't want to know what he wasn't kidding about. So I just ignored it and opened the ones from my grandmother. She was texting to tell me that Mary Lou had called the house a dozen times, she tried calling my cell, but her number was blocked or something because the call wouldn't go through. I read the ones from Connie, demanding full disclosure because she knew there was more to the story, and then some from Lula that were mostly hurt and made me feel guilty. The rest were mostly congratulatory and from people I hardly spoke to. I burned through those, deleted the crap and got out of bed.

Ranger was completely out; he hadn't even twitched when I moved. So I went to the bathroom to fluff my hair and put more anti frizz spray gunk in it and then found something fresh to wear. I chose a pair of baby blue shorts with pink palm trees on them, an oversized, light weight, white t-shirt and stuffed my feet into flip flops. Presentable, I went down to the pool and called Mary Lou.

The phone picked up after half a ring, "What the hell Steph!"

"Hello," I said pleasantly, "What's new?"

"Seriously, I've been freaking out. Why is my number blocked?"

"My phone had a seizure the other day. I'm gonna get one of Ranger's techs to look at it to make sure nobody else is blocked," I said.

"When did this start, I can't believe you didn't tell me! You just told me you had the best sex of your life and that he brought you dinner in bed,"

"That's all it was, but I dunno, something changed, for both of us and he wanted to give us a try," I said.

"But marriage? What about Joe?" she asked. So I filled her in on everything except for the fact that it was fake. When I finished, she was quiet. "Steph, I like him, you know I do, but are you sure?"

"Yeah, I'm sure," I said, "What's everybody saying?"

"Lula's pissed, Connie think's there's much more to this than you're saying and I've just been worried." She said.

"How is Morelli?" I asked.

"Oh he's pissed off, mostly at himself; he's totally convinced that you're going to come to your senses if you talk to him."

"Not going to happen," I said, "I've said it twice now, it's over, I'm not going back and I'm not telling him again. I'm ignoring him now, hoping he'll give up and leave me alone for a while."

"Oh, I've got a good story for you. Shirley was here (kids' were having a play date), so this is basically straight from Eddie. Morelli was working a lot of overtime on this case, big career maker with lots of time undercover collaborating with the Feds, that sort of thing. He just closed his end of it, last few days before the bust have been hell, and he's not been sleeping for all of it. So he tells Eddie he has big plans, he's gonna go home to sleep for a day, then he's gonna go visit you, see if you need keeping warm in this wacky weather we've got going on, then he's gonna come back and do his paperwork. He just says that and he gets the first call that you and Ranger happened, and I guess he just dropped everything. So he goes and has his little meltdown at you. Your mom chills him out, and he goes home to sleep for like two hours, comes in to do the paperwork, because he can't sleep, he's thinking too much. Course everybody already knows what's going on and keep coming to talk to him about it and then the call comes in that you've written off another car..."

"That was Lula. I was on foot," I said.

"Yeah, well. Morelli threw his chair through the break-room window. The Captain told him he was burnt out from the case, and unless he wanted to be officially reprimanded, he had to use up some of his sick leave, he's got a ton of it, and he's gotta speak to a departmental shrink. Eddie ended up driving Morelli home." Mary Lou said.

"Jeeze," I said, "I called him a lot over that week and he didn't even text me back."

"That's why he's blaming himself. He told Eddie that it was karma for saying that compared to being your boyfriend, the case was a cakewalk."

"What a... a..."

"Dick? Yeah. He says it was just a joke; you know how guys talk. Anyway he said to Eddie that he was getting your messages but couldn't respond; so he thinks you thought you must have been in an off phase and Ranger swooped in, like he always does. So Joe tells Eddie, he's been working with the Feds because they see him as an expert on organized crime in Trenton."

"He is," I said.

"Yeah, so Morelli, he's getting video of these guys doing a dirty deed of some kind, four principal players in the group, there are hours of video. He's been through it all; there's nothing incriminating in it, but he has to Give it to the Feds anyway because it's procedure. Next thing he knows, they are telling him he can't talk to you until the case is wrapped. Apparently he turned something up in a video, and it's connected to the Bonds Office and could implicate some major players in some major crime families, but they don't want Vinnie tipped off. Not because they suspect Vinnie of being anything but a perverted rodent, but because of Vinnie's connections. They are worried that Morelli might let something slip to you, and Vinnie'll get word. That's why he's been talking to you through Eddie."

"Well, that explains a few things, but it doesn't change anything. I should have missed him right? I should have been annoyed that he wasn't answering me. I wasn't."

"Hey, if you've got Morelli in your bed and he's half as good as he's reputed to be..."

"He exceeds his reputation by about ten miles," I said.

"And you're not missing him? The relationship is dead."

"Now if he could only understand that," I said, "Hey, this thing with Vinnie, does it have to do with Harry?" I was thinking that if it did, I might want to cut my losses and just work for Ranger full time. If Harry was arrested, the Bonds Office would be going down, and I was going to be out of a job.

"Dunno, but it seems likely," she said.

"Shirley didn't say?" I asked.

"That's the best part! Morelli has no idea what he turned up on the surveillance footage; apparently it has absolutely nothing to do with his case, and it was a complete fluke that he caught it at all!" Mary Lou said.

"I'm guessing Connie has this by now?" I said.

"Nuh uh. You're the only one I've told and the only reason Shirley told me was because Eddie figured we'd be in touch. He thinks you might want to start updating your resume, just in case it has to do with Harry. Though if you're marrying Ranger, he's loaded so you don't have to worry about that anymore."

"But I might want to make sure he's got a lawyer handy," I said, "We might need it."

There was a loud crash on Mary Lou's end of the phone and then what sounded like a cat howling followed by the sound of rushing water. Then screaming kids. "Oh shit," Mary Lou said and hung up.

There were times where I thought about having a baby, then I would talk to my sister or Mary Lou, and I was glad I only had a hamster.

I went to the kitchen to get a cup of coffee and just about poured myself a cup when I thought, maybe that was a bad idea. So I opened some cupboards to see if I could find one of the giant water glasses Ranger had given me earlier instead. Instead of the water glasses, I found a cupboard with a shelf dedicated to a colourful array of metal water bottles. I grabbed a funky iridescent purple one and crammed some ice into it before filling it up in the sink. That done, I decided that now was the time to gather the information I would need for tonight.

I scribbled a note for Ranger on a post-it and stuck it to his gun, changed out of my flip flops into a pair of gladiator sandals and hopped into my golf cart for a cruise to the guard house.

I hadn't been to the front gates of the resort, so I wasn't sure what to expect from the guard house. I wasn't expecting it to be some ramshackle building, and I was right. There was a pleasant looking gate house with peach stucco walls and a red clay tile roof. It was big enough to seat two guards, who were in charge of all incoming and outgoing visitors. The gates were about twenty feet high and metal, that slid to the side. The fence extended down the edge of the property on either side. Weirdly, likely because of some geological issue, access to the boardwalk from this end was not on the resort side of the fence. To get through, you had to exit through a smaller gate with a five button combination pin lock. From there you walked down a path to another security gate where there was a larger electronic keypad.

The vegetation beyond the security gate was thick and bordered a large densely forested area. The guard house itself was a larger version of the gate house. It had a peaked roof and looked like it was big enough for a couple of offices and maybe a small holding area. I parked my car in front of the doors to the building and hopped out, an excuse loosely inspired by Mary Lou as my reason to be there. I opened the front door, and a cool blast of AC hit me as I walked in.

Billy was sitting at the desk in front of a computer, another man, his partner, was staring at a bank of monitors. The office was clean; the walls were a freshly painted taupe, on the wall behind the desk were the weekly schedule, shift rotations, and a patrol log. And right beside all that were signs prohibiting cell phones, cameras, and video cameras within the front office.

Billy was in the process of typing up an end of shift report and smiled that fake polite smile you give when it's the end of your shift, and you haven't done much all day, and someone finally comes in, just as you're ready to go home.

"Miss Plum, this is my partner, Phil." He gestured to the man staring blankly at the monitors, not really paying attention to what he was watching. I so knew his pain.

"Was there something we could do for you?"

"Um yes, my mother and father were thinking of coming for a visit," I said.

"Would you like us to add them to your proscribed list of visitors or let them in?" He teased.

"I have a proscribed list?" I asked. That was news to me, though given Reef Knot Security's surface attention to detail, I wasn't exactly surprised.

"Mr. Manoso filled out the form when he got here," Billy said.

"May I see it?" I asked.

He got the list out of a filing cabinet and handed it to me. The list was divided into three categories. The first was for those who were to be waved in, whether we were in residence or not. There were four names on the list, Hector, Tank (though his real name was listed and I giggled when I read it) Hal and Cal. The second section was for people whom the gate called the house first, but could have in and out privileges for the rest of the day, or until we said otherwise, whichever came first. There were a lot of Manosos on that list. It was a good thing we were eloping for our fake wedding, or I'd be having another panic attack. None of my family were on the list. That was just a good thing because they were insane and I didn't want them to leave, have me forget to tell the gate they didn't have in and out privileges anymore and have my grandmother burst in on us while we got it on in the pool. She'd probably take video and put it on Pornhub. I mean that would be my reason for not putting them on the list. Ranger's reason probably was because they weren't local and our possession of the house was temporary. I didn't really see the point of this list, if I was honest. Wouldn't this category apply to anyone who decided to visit? It felt redundant.

The final category were the proscribed people, the people that weren't to be admitted onto the grounds under any circumstance, save written consent by the person who put them on the list in the first place. I had an active stalker, he was on the list, so were two previous stalkers who were out on parole, a bunch of names I didn't recognize and then one I did, Joe Morelli. The dates and times, each person was added to the list were noted in a column to the right of the names; Joe's name hadn't been put on the list until yesterday after he called.

"Did you want to add anyone?" Billy asked.

"No," I said, "I was just wondering what the protocol was if we had someone come to stay?"

"Depends on how long they plan to stay," Billy said, "If it's just overnight, just check them in whenever. If they are staying for a while, say three days to a week, we'll issue them a temporary club card with a prepaid limit. If you are planning to have a big party with a lot of outsiders, we need a guest list and twenty-four hours notice so we can put someone on the gate. I'm surprised Roy didn't give this information to you in the welcome package yesterday."

"I didn't see a welcome package; he probably gave it to Ranger when I zoned out," I said.

"That happens a lot of people when they talk to Roy. I'll get you an extra one; hang on," Billy said.

While he was in the filing cabinet again, I watched the monitors. The cameras appeared to be fixed; there were four around the guard house, the rest were in the stores in the village, mostly pointed directly at the cash. The cameras cycled through four different loops on four different screens. Two of those screens suddenly morphed into split screen images of an Infinite SUV. One screen showed a close-up of the front license plate and slowly zoomed out to capture the whole front end of the car. The other half of the screen did the same for the rear. The other cameras focused on the drivers side and passenger side of the car. The passengers were asked to put their windows down, so the cameras could see through the tinted windows, and then the passenger side camera flicked to infrared and confirmed that there were three passengers and a small dog in the car, based on body heat.

"Okay, that's just cool," I said.

"It is," Phil said, "They switch to night vision after dark too. There's special tech in them so the cameras don't get washed out by headlights."

"What is protocol exactly?" I asked, "Say someone drops by for a visit,"

"Well, we ask them how many people are in the car; if they are old enough to have ID we ask for ID and log them into the computer. Then we call your house and let you know they are here, if you don't want them to come in, you tell us and we give them an excuse." Phil said.

"What kind of excuse?"

"The standard one is that your housekeeper answered the phone and said you went out for the day," Phil said.

"Any idea when your parents are coming to visit?" Billy asked.

"They said in a few weeks if my sister could make alternate babysitting arrangements," I said, "They won't stay long."

"Just let us know and I'll drive round the paperwork for the temporary club cards."

Billy handed me the welcome package, and I took it back out to my golf cart. I did a big loop around the parking lot looking at the property surrounding the guard house, once more, then I cruised over to the grocery store and picked up my ready made supper. We were going to have smoked salmon and veggies on a bed of rice. My job was spelled out for me in idiot proof instructions catered to my oven and stove models. The water for the rice was even given to me in a premeasured amount. I doubted that even I could screw it up.

I took it all home and once I was there, I began the process of putting together dinner. It seemed to work too. The rice was fluffy, the salmon wasn't dry, the veggies were perfect. I put it all on serving dishes and took it out to the table. I had just finished setting the table when Ranger appeared.

"I'm impressed," he said. He wasn't; he knew that my expertise was more toaster strudel than gourmet cuisine. Even still, I was pretty damned proud of myself.

"I have a guy," I said.

Ranger went into the kitchen and came out with a bottle of Pellegrino and a couple of glasses with ice and lemon in them. He poured while I served our food. We sat down, and I nearly asked him how his day was, and the question lodged in my throat as the normalcy of the situation registered.

Ranger and I ate dinner in restaurants to talk work. We ate late at night, standing in his kitchen, eating something Ella had prepared hours before and we'd reheated in the microwave after a stakeout. We ate Chinese on my sofa drinking beer, while trying to ignore that I didn't have eyebrows again. We didn't do this.

"Look at us, we're..."

"Domestic as fuck," Ranger finished. He picked up his plate and his glass of Pellegrino, and I followed suit. We carried it over to the pool and sat sideways on deck chairs with a side table each to act as dinner tables.

"Much better," I said, and he chuckled.

"That was just weird," he agreed.

"It's not that I didn't like it," I said.

"We aren't dinner table people," Ranger said. That was for damn sure. Dinner tables for me were stressful, with mom taking hits of medicinal booze, my father contemplating murdering my grandmother, my grandmother with whatever date she had over that night, and me waiting for something to catch fire. I had dinner table PTSD.

"I'm going to need some clues about tonight," Ranger said.

"What do you mean?"

"How advanced is this B&E?"

"I'm not entirely sure; I think it's just a regular deadbolt."

"Key card?"

"Nope."

"What are you thinking?"

"Well I think you're going to take me on a date; dinner, and a movie," I said.

Ranger gave his plate a pointed look, "If anyone asks," I clarified. He didn't say anything, but I could tell he was thinking something, "What?"

"I'm not Morelli," he said.

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"Do I look like the dinner and a movie type?"

Actually, he didn't. To be honest, I had absolutely no idea what Ranger would be like on a real date. And he had a point; Morelli was that type of date, or a hockey game, or really anything where you are a spectator and there was food involved. I had no problem with that sort of date, and they could be a lot of fun, but that wasn't the sort of thing Ranger would do. Maybe he'd go to a baseball game, but he wasn't a spectator.

"You want a reason to be seen leaving the gates because you want to establish an alibi," He said, and I nodded, "And a date is your idea."

"It's how you get me to come along every time," I said.

"Why don't you let me handle the date aspect of it," he said, "It will not interfere with your plan,"

"It's a pretend date, Ranger," I said.

"It doesn't have to be," he said. I opened my mouth to comment and closed it again. Well shit, now I was nervous for two reasons, I was going to be breaking into the guard house, and I was going on a date. With Ranger.

"Focus," Ranger said.

"Well, now I have to worry about what to wear," I said.

"You've got time; I'm assuming you want to wait until after 2100?"

"Yes,"

The slight lift of the eyebrow was telling me to get on with it.

"So I thought we'd find some place to ditch the car, and come back on foot through the bush. I know where the cameras are pointed and they are in a fixed position. Your jobs are going to be picking locks, standing lookout and preventing me from doing something stupid."

"Anything else?" he asked.

"Well, look pretty," I said, "I want the benefit of your experience, but I really want to do this as much by myself as possible,"

"It's your show; I won't step in unless I feel I have to," he said.

We finished dinner and loaded the dishwasher. When that was finished, Ranger and I went over everything I'd found so far, and he took notes to put into the official audit report. "What's Hector finding with their network security?"

"It's outdated," Ranger said.

"That's what he said?"

"The language was more colorful, but that was the gist," Ranger said.

"I need to learn Spanish; I have a feeling I'd enjoy Hector's colorful language," I said.

"Ask Hector," he said, "He's a pretty good teacher."

"You won't?" I asked, "I happen to know you're an excellent teacher."

"I have a very good reason why," Ranger said.

"What reason is that?" I asked. He just half smiled in response.

"I have to go out for a few minutes, I won't be long," he said. He wasn't gone long, probably about twenty minutes at the absolute most. We watched CNN for a while, to kill time and at 8:00 he went into the bedroom and changed into his commando look.

"Umm that's not date like," I said.

"It is if our date involves a shooting range," Ranger said.

"Not really romantic," I said.

"Babe," he said.

"Well...wait that's the fake date isn't it?" I said, "You want me to have a reason to wear something more geared towards the break-in/stakeout."

"Six-inch heels aren't exactly practical or covert," he said.

"I thought you liked my shoes," I said.

"Did I say I didn't like them?" He asked.

I went to make sure I had everything I needed and changed into my own commando gear. At 9:15 we got into the 918 and pulled out of the driveway. It turns out we didn't need to have an excuse for our state of dress because nobody saw us leave except the cameras at the gate, but they couldn't tell what we were wearing beyond black t-shirts, so we were okay.

Ranger had driven a mile down the road before it forked and he hung a left. A mile down that road and he pulled into the parking garage of a hotel and pulled into a parking space.

"How long do you expect this to take?" Ranger asked.

"I dunno, three hours, not including walking," I said. Ranger pulled out his phone and dialed, "I'm going to need a reservation for midnight." he said, waited a beat and then hung up.

"That was all very impressive, but we don't need an alibi. If we get caught, it's a good thing," I said.

"The restaurant here just serves dessert after ten," Ranger said, "If you get caught you're going to need comfort food; if you don't get caught you're going to want to celebrate."

"How do you know that?" I asked.

"We've met."

"Not about the food," I said and rolled my eyes, "I mean about the restaurant."

"I know a guy," he said and reached across me to pull out a parking pass that he tossed onto the dash. Also in the glove box was his big mag light. He grabbed that too.

We walked the mile back along the road, past a forest on our left, and then turned down Reef Knot Drive, which would lead us to the gates and Reef Knot Road. I knew just how far the cameras could see but just in case, I decided to cross the ditch about 100 feet from that point. I was about to do it when Ranger caught my hand and pulled me back. He drew a gun that wasn't his usual 9mm. It was a fucking enormous revolver with a long funky barrel and looked like it took ammo that would make an atom bomb go, "Dude relax, the firepower is a bit much."

"What?" I asked.

Ranger didn't have to overcompensate for anything, and he didn't carry a big gun just for the sake of carrying a big gun; weapon size depended on the job at hand. Since the worst that could happen was that we could get detained for a couple of hours while Chase informed security and maybe the police that this was a sanctioned security audit, the gun was excessive.

"We're in Florida; that was a mangrove forest back there," Ranger said.

"What do pretty trees have to do with packing a fucking bazooka?"

He shone his Maglight down the ditch in either direction, and he stopped when it glinted off of something, about ten yards back the way we came. He held the light steady, and I realized the glint was coming from a pair of eyes that were glowing back at us.

"Is that an alligator?" I asked.

"Crocodile," Ranger said, "It's just a small one; probably about six feet. Stay out of the water and we'll be fine crossing here."

"Yeah, thanks. Good tip," I said, "That definitely qualifies as preventing me from doing something stupid. And for the record, you and I have very different definitions of what constitutes a 'small' crocodile."

He crossed the ditch first and then helped me so I didn't become lizard food. The whole time I was very aware of the eyes that were staring at us and I thought were maybe getting closer.

I led the way back towards the guard house, through the foliage (by led, I mean I stayed glued to Ranger and his rocket launcher and pointed him in the right direction), until we came upon the spot I picked out earlier for the purposes of our stake out.

I knew from the schedule I'd seen posted that at 9:45 they were due to patrol the boardwalk. When they left to patrol, I was going to time them to see how long they took, so we'd know approximately how long we had for our heist. When they got back, I was hoping that I could catch them entering the combination the same way I'd gotten the garage door codes. IF that didn't work, that's why I had Ranger; I knew, he could work his magic and get around that kind of lock. I'd get him to pick the locks to the guard house, and since we had the master alarm codes, I'd use those to disable their security.

I was about to get down in the brush when Ranger tapped my shoulder and pointed to a different vantage point. I followed him, and we got settled. "What was wrong with my spot?" I whispered.

"There is no wind tonight; the bugs will be out, and the mosquitoes will be drawn to the carbon dioxide from our breath." He picked a blade of grass and handed it to me, "This is Citronella, it's a natural insect repellent, and it's planted all over the resort, likely for that reason. Your spot was fine otherwise, and we can go back if you think this counts as expert level stakeout knowledge."

I pondered that and decided that it did qualify as professional league experience, but I reasoned that even if you were getting chewed alive because you didn't have an encyclopedic knowledge of insect repellent vegetation, you would be able to stop swatting long enough to avoid detection while security went down to the boardwalk. I didn't need to be bug bait to prove a point.

At 9:46 the door to the gate opened and the two guards, men I hadn't met yet, were joking with each other as they armed their security panel, let the door swing shut behind them and walk down to the gates. What I hadn't seen during my scouting trip was that they had a narrow golf cart style buggy for cruising down the boardwalk. They both got in and the cart drove off.

They returned at 10:20 and Ranger cocked an eyebrow. They were still joking as they punched in the combination, which was done quickly so thank god for slow-mo on the iPhone, which captured it all.

Once they were back inside, I looked at Ranger, "What now?"

"Later," he said. At 10:45 they came back out again and Ranger shook his head almost imperceptibly. We waited five minutes and then we went to the gate where I punched in the combination and the door unlocked. Ranger jogged up the steps and produced his picks. Less than ten seconds later we were in the guard house, and I was entering the master code to disable the alarm code. Ranger looked up over the door to a security camera and cocked an eyebrow in question; I pointed to the monitors, and sure enough, the room appeared on one of the screens within a few seconds. He actually sighed.

"Now I have to test something," he said.

"Go ahead," I said. He pulled a roll of black electrical tape from one of his pockets and created a patch, which he then stuck to the camera lens.

"Go do your thing," he said. I tried Roy's office door, and it was locked.

"I need you for this bit," I said. Ranger came over to me and handed me his pick set, "I can't do this."

"Yes you can; you just don't know how yet. This is a good lock to learn on, and you want to prove an amateur can do this," Ranger said. He pulled a tool out of the kit that looked like a mini crow bar, "This is a tension wrench, you're going to put it in the bottom of the lock and apply light pressure." I crouched down to the lock and did as he said.

Next, he handed me a pick that looked like it had little-peaked waves at the end, "This is a rake, you're going to put it in the lock, you should feel the pins move as you do."

I did, and he was right I could, there were five of them. "Now you're going to wiggle the rake, back and forth in the lock. The idea is to get the top pins to align above the breech, the tension will hold them in place, if you push them too high, the bottom pins will move up above the breech, and the lock will remain engaged and you'll have to start over."

I nodded and tried, after about thirty seconds I became frustrated and he crouched down behind me. He wrapped his arms around me and put his hands over mine. I could feel his breath on the back of my neck, and I was suddenly finding it hard to focus.

"You need to relax," he said, "Too much tension is as bad as not enough."

He made me relax the pressure on the tension wrench, and I felt the pins drop back to square one. With his right hand, he guided my hand, moving the rake in and out of the lock at various angles, the movement smooth and rhythmic. I felt a hit of adrenaline as the lock gave way under my hands, but I hardly noticed it because all of my other body chemistry was acutely aware of Ranger. I had sudden flashbacks of hiding in Joyce Barnhardt's closet and how the proximity had led to a very satisfying but unprofessional act and wondered if we had time for a similar act now.

"That," He said behind me, his breath hitting me just behind the ear, sending my already raging hormones into overdrive, "Is why I'm not an ideal teacher for you anymore." He snagged my earlobe between his teeth and tugged gently. I just about orgasmed. Fuck this cat burglary thing was hot. He hauled me to my feet, kissed me with very little control and then shoved me away.

"Right, we're on a clock," I said. Which was all very well and good but thanks to my acute awareness of my doodah, I was having difficulty remembering what I wanted to do next.

"If you do what you need to do in five minutes, we'll have time to desecrate Roy's desk," Ranger said. That sharpened my focus up real quick. Talk about a security breach. We were both probably sick in the head for thinking that was an excellent idea. It gave me new determination, and I remembered my plan.

I figured that since Roy was old and complacent, the chances of him remembering his password easily were pretty slim. So I started rooting around his office. Sure enough, stuck to the underside of his keyboard was a piece of masking tape with an alphanumeric password written on it. There were several layers of tape, and I was betting we could find every password for the last year if we wanted to. I turned on his computer, his login was already filled in for me, typed in his password and presto, I had access to the system. A keyword search took me to a spreadsheet with all of the residential access codes on it, and I clicked print. A laser printer in the corner of Roy's office came to life and started spitting out pages.

Ranger came over to the desk and took control of the keyboard and was able to access the central server, with no difficulty. No password required. He entered the date and 2245 into the search parameters. There were seven entries for approximately that time, and based on the addresses listed, none of them were for the guard hut. A little searching later and we found the system that tracked the use of the master codes and that's where we found both the activation as the guards left the building and then our re-entry minutes later. It seemed the database automatically generated a reason for the activation if the keypad was used at the guard house.

Ranger scrolled back six months until he came to a notation that the annual change of the master codes had taken place. He printed everything from that date to present. Then he picked the lock on Roy's desk and after a quick search we found a box of manilla envelopes. We each took one and put our printouts into them. While he locked the desk back up and wiped away our fingerprints, I shut down all of the programs and logged off of Roy's computer. Unfortunately, it had taken longer than five minutes, but the mood was gone anyway. Ranger was radiating anger, which was sexy in a scary way, but I had never been a big fan of angry sex.

Not that I could blame him for being pissed. Chase spent a fortune on security for this place and on the surface it looked good, the reality was that it was as easy to crack as the crust of a creme brule.

With everything shut down, we took our documents, took the tape off of the camera lens, re-armed security and left. Before he closed the door, Ranger pressed the button that stopped the door from automatically locking behind us. Instead of just leaving we went back to wait until the guards came back. They were engaged in a heated conversation about baseball, and neither of them noticed that the door they were shoving their key into, was already unlocked.

Ranger made a call to Hector, planted a small camera aimed at the door, and waited until Hector confirmed it was active and positioned correctly. "I want to see how long it takes them to notice," he said.
Once that was done, we retraced our steps back to where we crossed over the ditch the first time, and I swore. There wasn't one Croc, there were two, and they were bigger than six feet, and they were lying across the road.

"What now Steve Irwin?" I asked. Ranger chuckled.

"Now we walk past them on this side of the ditch and cross up there," he said, "If we don't piss them off they won't come after us."

"What if they are hungry?" I asked.

"They are pretty small, we're too big for them to think of as dinner, out of the water." he said.

"Those aren't small," I said.

"Yes they are, the big one is back there." He shone the light back down the ditch towards reef knot, and I practically climbed Ranger's back. The light hit the back of the animal, who was stretched out in the mud along the bottom of the ditch, he had to be twenty-five feet long.

"That's a fucking dinosaur!"

"He is pretty huge; they don't normally get that big." He reached into his pocket and pulled his phone out.

"What are you doing?!" I hissed at him.

"Calling animal control; they get concerned when a croc that big is this close to a residential area. They will come to relocate him." What pissed me off about this was that Ranger seemed supremely unconcerned; as if there weren't a monster fifteen feet away from us. In the meantime, any composure I had was completely gone, and I was hanging off of him in an involuntary piggy back. He wasn't supporting me in any way either; I was just stuck to him like velcro. I stayed like that while he casually called animal control using a fake name and put his phone back in his pocket.

"Would you feel better if you were holding the gun?" he asked.

"No!" One that would involve potentially using a gun that would likely break my arm if I tried to fire it, and two, that would mean I had to get down.

Ranger carried me like that passed the crocs on the road, and once we were clear, I climbed down. We both pretended that I still had some dignity left and that the last ten minutes hadn't just happened.

"So how did I do?" I asked brightly.

"I'm impressed with your thigh strength," Ranger said. Okay, maybe he wasn't completely ignoring the past ten minutes.

"I mean before that," I said and rolled my eyes.

"It was well thought out and well executed. I'm proud of you, Babe," he said and slung his arm around my shoulders. If anyone drove by now, they'd probably think we were going to rob something. Given the sudden increase in crocodiles in the road, Ranger had decided to keep his gun out, which was fine by me, but still, given our state of dress, if a cop saw us, he'd definitely be curious.

It didn't take us long to get back to the hotel, and we entered it through the front lobby. It was an upscale building with a Moroccan feel to it. I wasn't particularly surprised when we were stopped by the concierge.

"Thank you," Ranger said and handed the man the large gun.

"No problem Ric," he said and handed Ranger a room key, "How much are you going to give me to keep my mouth shut about the rock?" He nodded to my hand.

The Concierge was probably not much older than we were, had Ranger's complexion, but was smaller, not nearly as broad in the shoulders and not as tall. His features were softer too, but there was definitely a family resemblance.

Ranger sighed and handed him a fifty, "That'll buy you twenty-four hours Primo," The concierge said.

"Club M-"

"That's enough! How do you even know about that... you know what? Doesn't matter... keep your money," The concierge handed him back the fifty, "Introductions please."

"Stephanie Plum, meet Riel Manoso," Ranger said.

"Ah, of course! I should have known; Tia Alita described you perfectly," Riel said. I looked at Ranger.

"My mother," he said.

"Right, I didn't get her name," I said. I met her when Ranger was in the hospital after Scrog. To me, she was Mrs. Manoso, and I was so preoccupied that if you asked me to, I wouldn't be able to pick her out of a lineup. Ranger gave my hand a squeeze.

"Your reservation is set, bar closes at 2:00, Champagne Bar is open until 4am. I'm on duty all night, so if you need anything, provided we're not talking condoms, I'm your man."

Ranger rolled his eyes, hard. He was doing New Jersey proud with that one.

"Come on, Babe," he said, and with a little wave made by me to Riel, we made for the elevator. Ranger hit a button for the 6th floor and took me down the hall to a king room. It wasn't a big suite, but the room was nice, done in soft creams and greens. It was very Florida. On the bed were two garment bags, one with my new gold leg breaker high heel sandals and make up bag on top.

"Get ready," Ranger said.

"How did you get this stuff here? When you left earlier, all of this stuff was in the closet!"

"Hector," Ranger said.

I grabbed the garment bag, my shoes and makeup and went to the bathroom. Given that we'd just spent time hanging out in a bunch of undergrowth I'm surprised my hair didn't look worse. A few minutes of fluffing, a few swipes of mascara and some lipgloss later, I figured the makeup was good enough, anything more would probably just melt off anyway, and I stripped out of my clothes to see what was in the garment bag. In it was the black dress I wore when I got here. In the bottom of the bag was a small parcel wrapped in pink tissue paper with a post-it stuck to it. I picked up the parcel.

-This is a thank you present. Boss is more forgiving with you here.
Love Hector.

I unwrapped the tissue paper, yelped and dropped the contents into the sink. "Holy crap!"

Ranger didn't respond, probably because the sound of me freaking out in the bathroom wasn't exactly an uncommon occurrence. I peeked into the tissue again and pulled out a card with the picture of a lingerie model wearing what could generously be described as a bra and panties. On the back of the card was a diagram showing me how the hell the damn bra was supposed to go on.

Having never owned underwear that required instructions I was a bit intimidated. The thong was easy; there was a small strip of fabric to cover the critical bits, and the rest of it was just a couple of strings. Pretty standard really, except that the fabric was completely sheer and black. The bra took about five minutes and some cursing to get on. It consisted of the same sheer black lace that made up the thong, which went in a thin band that barely covered my nipples and offered very little by way of support. The rest were a series of silk straps that crisscrossed over my shoulders and down my back and under my ribcage. The straps perfectly outlined the shape of my breasts and the pattern they made on my back, once I sorted it all out, was actually really flattering. The whole getup was surprisingly comfortable, but even though it covered much of my torso, I still felt like I was pretty naked.

The low neckline of the dress, surprisingly wasn't going to be a problem. Once I put the dress on, you could only see the band that went across my chest and it looked like it was part of the garment. I added the shoes, fluffed my hair, blotted the sweat from my face and went out to the bedroom.

The hotel room had a balcony, and that's where I found Ranger. He'd changed into a lightweight, perfectly tailored black suit and he was on the phone. He turned when I joined him outside and stared at me so intensely I had serious doubts we were going to make it to our reservation. He didn't say anything as he listened to whoever was on the other end of the conversation, his hand did however lightly explore the neckline of my dress without actually dipping past the fabric

"Handle it." He said and disconnected. He dropped his phone into his pocket and drew me close. "I felt I didn't show this dress nearly as much appreciation as it deserved."

"I feel naked in it," I said.

"That part comes later," he said, his voice was deep, and he was smiling softly, "Right now, I owe you a date."

He took my hand and led me off of the balcony and back to the elevator, we were only going up one floor, but he was saving me the stairs in deference to my shoes. We exited into an elegant open-air restaurant. Ranger gave his name to the hostess who gave him a serious once over, Not seeming to notice I was there. She flashed him a winning smile and led us back to a table.

He declined the dessert menu but accepted a smaller gold leather menu. I took the dessert menu and eagerly cracked it open. It seemed, according to the menu, that if you loved chocolate, you wanted to eat at this restaurant. The entire menu was chocolate.

I was completely overwhelmed; there were fifty different chocolate desserts to try. "I don't know where to start..."

"Would you like a recommendation?" Ranger asked.

"No, offence Batman but your taste-buds are broken," I said.

"Babe, my taste buds aren't broken," he said, "I have a refined pallet. The difference between you and I is that I've been in more than one situation where being picky wasn't an option, so I can disregard taste if the occasion requires it."

"What is your favourite thing to eat?" I asked. He smirked and cocked an eyebrow and my body temperature went up, "Food, what's your favourite food?"

"My mother makes a mean strawberry rhubarb pie," he said. Well that stumped me, I thought he'd pick something a bit more exotic; he's been everywhere there is to be and eaten practically everything. Then again my mother's pineapple upside-down cake was my favourite food so who
was I to judge.

"Okay, surprise me then, Ric, pick something good," Ranger took the menu without looking at it and signalled our waitress. He turned to a page in the menu, and pointed to something.

"She wants to be surprised," he said.

"My favourite," She wasn't looking at the menu, and I rolled my eyes.

"We'll need the Veuve Rose, as well," he said.

"One glass or two?" she asked. Ranger's look changed from polite disinterest to cool and a bit scary, and she coughed, "Two glasses and two forks. Right away Sir."

"Does that happen to you every time you go on a date or is it just when you go out with me?" I asked.

"My last dates have all been with you," he said.

"Those weren't real dates; they were work. I'm talking about real, get to know you dates," I said, "Where you go out for the pleasure of someone's company, not with a job in mind,"

"The last real date I went on was about a year before I met you," he said.

"And, did the waitress hit on you?" He nodded.

"And I used the number she slipped me with the bill," he said.

"How soon after the date?"

"I used it during the date," he said.

"Oh boy, the number of ways I could take that are overwhelming, all of them make you look very baaad." I said laughing.

"I never said I was good," he joked.

"Not in that department anyway," I said. Then I thought about it, no he was right, he wasn't good, "I take that back, you aren't 'good' in any department; 'phenomenal', 'amazing', 'fucking awesome,' yes, but 'good' is an undersell,"

He chuckled.

"The bad part about that is you know it too, you arrogant bastard," I said, grinning, "This is where you shower me with compliments, Batman."

"Not my style, Babe."

"One adjective," I said, holding a finger up, "Just one."

He shook his head and considered me for a moment, "Astounding," he said.

I laughed, yup that did it. The number of times I've left people shaking their heads and speechless were too many to count.

"So tell me, is it a coincidence that your cousin works here?" I asked.

"Yes and no," I said, "Chase comes to this restaurant a lot and Riel told him that I was looking for real estate in the Keys. Chase contacted me, and I told him the search wasn't that serious, but if something came available, I'd be interested in seeing it."

"Wait you were actually looking to buy here?" I asked.

"I already have a place in Florida," he said, "You wanted to know where the Batcave was? It's here,"

"But you want to sell it?" I asked.

"I do, if the right property comes up," he said.

"And this house?" I asked.

"I'm on the fence," he said, "Not with the security as it is. When we take over the contract, I'd be more interested. Chase would like me to take it so it doesn't have to get out that he hired auditors, he'd give it to me for a good price."

"He'd lease it to you, you mean," I said.

"No, I told him the only way I'd take property is if I own it," he said, "I like the house but there are other factors to consider."

"Such as?" I asked.

"I don't like the proximity to the neighbours, but it is something I can learn to live with. Julie will be pissed because the second bedroom is small, and because the walls are glass she won't be able to paint her room."

"What colour is her bedroom in the Batcave?" I asked.

"Hot pink and neon green," he said. I was enjoying this getting to know you session when a pair of servers came over, one bearing a high hat, with a frosty bottle of champagne and two flutes, the other server, not our waitress, placed a plate in front of me and I had to check for drool.

It was a layered chocolate cake, instead of icing between layers there was melted caramel with pecans. I was aware of a cork popping and the pink champagne being poured, but I was staring at the cake, really glad that my dress was stretchy.

Ranger picked up a fork and leaned across the table to cut into the cake, and turned the plate so I could watch the molten chocolate ooze out of the layers and mingle with the pecans and caramel; it was so decadent it was erotic. He held the fork up for me to take a bite, and that's when I'm pretty sure I nearly died.

Ranger chuckled, and I opened my eyes. "There's only one other thing that makes you moan like that, and it's not something considered acceptable in public."

"This is incredible," I said.

"I know; I've had it before."

"But not tonight?" I said.

"I like to watch."

I stifled a laugh because my mouth was full.

The cake was small but any bigger, and I wouldn't have been able to eat it. It was rich, and it was sweet, and each bite was as good as the first. It was even better washed down with good champagne.

"This is a really good date, Ranger," I said.

"You're just saying that because you have afterglow from publically making love to a piece of cake." He said. He pushed his chair back, stood up and walked around to my side of the table. He pulled my chair out for me, and I looked at our barely touched bottle of very expensive champagne.

"We'll be back," He said. Curious I followed him to the opposite side of the restaurant where I discovered that what I thought was the edge of the balcony, actually wrapped around the roof of the building to a bar and a dance floor.

The song we danced to was irrelivant. I've danced with him once before, but we were more focused on the people we were supposed to be guarding. I'd been aware of his hands on my body, and he hadn't been immune to me, but like I said, there wasn't much we could do about it. That night, however, dancing on top of that hotel, in his arms, I was only focused on him and how he was holding me close like he didn't want to let me go. Like the night we made love after the Dip incident, this was different; this was a turning point that neither of us was expecting, and I was exhilarated and happy. That smile that hadn't been far away after that night was back, and I forgot that while we were taking a night off, we were her for work, and for a little while at least, he was mine.

Ranger was looking at me with that look I couldn't read and because I was feeling brave and he was as talkative as Ranger ever gets, I asked him.

"What are you thinking when you look at me that way?"

He smiled and pulled me closer in response. I was grateful for the height of my heels because it put my nose right at the hollow of his throat, and I was able to become intoxicated by the heady scent that was his alone.

Then the world stopped spinning because he told me what he was thinking.

"I love you," he said.

AN: Totally have no idea if Ranger's mom's name is in the books; I've looked in a few and couldn't find it. If it is in canon and anyone knows, let me know and I will change it!