Disclaimer: I do not make any money from this story. Most of the characters are JE. Allie Jo is my creation.

Chapter 10

SPOV

Sunday morning I wake up at six. I quickly dress in my workout clothes and head down to the Rangeman gym. I'm not surprised that Allie Jo is already in the gym. I am surprised by what she's doing. Allie Jo is sparring with Cal. She is holding her own, although Cal without a doubt has the upper hand. Woody is at the side of the mat coaching her while the rest of the guys are cheering her on.

"How long has this been going on?" I ask Lester.

"About a half hour." He answers. No sooner that he answers me, Cal pins Allie Jo. When Cal helps Allie Jo up, he wraps her in a bear hug, telling her, "That's mighty impressive for your time."

Lester growls as he watches Cal swing Allie Jo around.

Allie Jo smiles at Cal, spots me, and walks over. "Morning, Steph!"

"Why on earth were you sparring with Cal?" I ask.

"Woody says that all of Rangeman spar for practice. Ranger offered me a three month probation to work at Rangeman. It wouldn't be fair to the other guys if I'm not held to the same standards as they are."

"That's great, Allie Jo!" I say giving her a hug. "Ranger's been trying to get me to work here full time over the years. I occasionally work part time doing searches and background checks. Maybe I will take his offer to work here seriously if there was another female around here. Maybe Ranger would let us be partners. I love all the guys that work here, but when Ranger assigns one of the Merry Men to help me they're actually babysitting me. If you are my partner, maybe I would at least feel some independence."

"I love that idea. Can you imagine seeing a skips face when they see both of us. They'll think they're seeing double." She laughed.

"Maybe you can help me train with my gun. The Merry Men use all the technical terms, and it's intimidating. I might be more comfortable learning from you."

"I'd be happy to." Allie Jo says as we climb on the treadmills. Since I am completely out of shape I did a brisk walk while she ran. We talked the entire time we were on the treadmills discussing our families and childhood. Turns out we have a lot more in common that we realized. Allie Jo was even a majorette in high school.

We were deep into trading fire baton stories (apparently Allie Jo set the entire football field on fire during the halftime show of the homecoming game), when I noticed Lester looking intently at Allie Jo. Lester walked directly into the gym mirrored wall. I couldn't stop myself from laughing.

"What's so funny?" Allie Jo asks.

"Nothing," I smile. "Absolutely nothing."

RPOV

I'm watching the Babe on the monitor in my office. I can't believe she's actually in the gym of her own free will. Usually, I have to break into her apartment and drag her out of bed. Well, I don't have to break into her apartment. I just like to watch her sleep for a while before I drag her out of bed.

I watch Babe and Allie Jo leave the treadmills and head over to the punching bag. Allie Jo is demonstrating the proper way to throw a punch, making Babe mimic her in slow motion. It looks like Allie Jo is getting Babe to take training seriously. Well, maybe not seriously, since they are spending as much time laughing as training, but it's more that my men have been able to get Stephanie to do.

Babe and Allie Jo did so well with Babe's disguise last night. I can't believe I couldn't pick Babe out in crowd, so much for being aware of my surroundings. They don't know it yet, but I plan on sending them out to test their disguises again today. It would be beneficial to see if they could pull it off for a longer period of time. Also, if they can do this with one of Babe's closest friends without her catching on there's no way Valentine will figure out that Allie Jo is not Babe.

I grab my cell phone to call Tank.

"Yo." He answers.

"Think Lula would want to go shopping with Stephanie and Allie Jo?" I ask.

"It's Lula. What do you think?" Tank answers.

"Tell her to meet Stephanie and Rosa at the mall food court at one o'clock." I tell him. Lester had told Tank about the disguises while we were working out earlier this morning.

"Who's going with them?" He asks.

"I plan on sending Bobby. Why?" I usually put Lester on Bombshell duty, but given his attraction to Allie Jo, he may be too easily distracted.

"Between Lula, Bomber, and Allie Jo, you may need to double his hazard pay." Tank laughs as he hangs up.

I call Bobby and ask him to come by my office. Tank's right, I probably need to offer to double his hazard pay. I may even have to triple it before the days over since Lula is going along.

SPOV

After our workout, Allie Jo and I run to our apartments to get cleaned up agreeing to meet in the break room for breakfast. After breakfast, I show Allie my cubicle. I figure that I can show her how to do searches so they won't pile up in my inbox. I was logging onto my computer when Bobby came by.

"Bomber, do you and Allie Jo feel like testing out your disguises today?" he asks.

"What do you have in mind?"

"Ranger thought the two of you deserved a shopping trip for doing such a good job on your disguises." He tells us.

"Bobby, I can barely make rent. I can't afford to go shopping, as much as I would love to." I inform him.

"Ranger said to give you these." He hands us black AMEX cards. Allie Jo's has my name on it and mine says Rosa Santos. "He said to tell you to buy more clothes for you disguises. It's a business expense."

"Well, since it's a business expense." I grin. "I just gave him the name of my fake identity last night. How did he get this made so fast?" I say looking at my Rosa Santos card.

"It's Ranger." He replies.

"Enough said."

"Be ready to meet Lula at one o'clock." he says.

Allie Jo chimes in, "Ranger said that we had to take a bodyguard to go out. Who's going with us?"

"Me." Bobby grins.

"He's giving you hazard pay, isn't he?" I ask.

"I'm getting double." He tells us. "With Lula going I think that I'll deserve it. I'll be in my clinic. Let me know when you're ready to leave.

We met Lula at the mall food court at one o'clock. Allie Jo introduces her to "Rosa" immediately.

"So you're Santos' sister." She asks. "Older or younger?"

"Younger?"

"Nice to meet you. I'm hungry. Let's eat before we get our shop on, White girl." Lula says.

While we eat, we decide to plan our shopping strategy. When we're done eating we head straight to Macy's looking for a dresses. Allie Jo finds a green halter dress that will be perfect for her date with Lester. It has a plunging neckline and the dress flares when she spins around. I found a simple spaghetti strap royal blue dress that stops about 3 inches above my knee. Lula tried on dresses for over an hour and finally found a lime green strapless dressed that she liked. I still don't know how she kept her chest from popping out of it.

We headed to the show department were Lula insisted on forcing her size nine feet into a pair of size seven FMPs. When the salesman was trying to squeeze her foot in the heels, Lula leaned down to help and knocked him in the face with her large chest. I'm pretty sure that poor man will have a bruise tomorrow. I found a pair of royal blue and rhinestone FMP's to make my dress. Allie Jo bought the same pair in silver. We finally decided to drag Lula away from the shoe department and go to Victoria Secret.

Allie Jo POV

The entire time we were in Macy's I pretended to be Stephanie. I kind of felt bad about lying to Lula, but she never had a clue that I'm not Stephanie.

When we head into Victoria Secret, we try to convince Bobby to come in with us. He waits outside mumbling about Lester and Ranger gouging his eyes out on the mats. Lula is trying to make him suffer yelling, "Yoo hoo, Bobby! Do you think my Tankie would like this thong?" I swear he looks like he may throw up.

When we're done making our purchases Lula says good bye and heads to the other side of the mall where she parked. Steph, Bobby, and I were halfway to Bobby's SUV when there was an explosion in the parking lot. Bobby's SUV is in flames.

"Not again!" Steph and I say at the same time. Bobby immediately gets on the phone calling Rangeman.

Stephanie sits on the curb, but I'm ranting and raving about how this is the entire reason I left Arkansas in the first place. Now I can just add Trenton to the list of places I can never show my face again when Stephanie starts laughing.

"This is funny" I tell her.

"Yes, it is" she responds.

"I don't see how."

"Woody hasn't told you my car history has he?"

"Not really, Why?" I say shaking my head.

"I've destroyed about eight to ten cars a year since I started bounty hunting." She tells me.

"No way and I thought my two cars were bad."

"Just another thing we have in common." She laughs as the fire trucks and the police drive up. I notice Morelli is here with a huge black eye. I don't think he'll be coming over here today.

Woody and Hal drive up in separate SUVs, as Bobby walks over to us. "Both of you head back to Rangeman with Woody. Hal will give me a lift back to the office after I give a statement to the police."

We climb into the backseat while Hal loads our shopping bags in the back. Woody climbs into the driver's seat, turns around and says, "I knew the two of you together would be trouble." I stick my tongue out at him and Stephanie gives him an Italian hand gesture.

When we get back to Rangeman, Ranger and Lester are waiting in the underground parking. As we get out of the SUV Ranger walks over to Steph and says "Babe."

"I'm fine, Ranger. I'm used to this by now." She replies. Ranger puts his arm around her and walks over to the elevator and pushes the call button.

Lester comes up to me and asks "Are you okay?"

I nod "I'm fine."

"Can I hug you?" he asks.

"Hug me? Why" I question.

"Just so I can feel that you're okay. When I saw the tracker in the SUV went offline I think my heart stopped."

"I could probably use a hug right now anyway." I tell him.

Lester pulls me into a tender warm embrace. His hug is firm, yet gentle. I feel….loved. When I start tearing up I realize the explosion must have shaken my nerves more that I originally realized.

Then Lester starts whispering in my ear. "Creo que el momento que primero miré a los ojos, ha capturado mi corazón. Será protegerlo a toda costa. Mi mundo hubiera detenido si estuviera herido."

(I believe that the moment I first looked into your eyes, you captured my heart. I will protect you at all costs. My world would have stopped if you were hurt.)

I stood there in his embraced shocked. He doesn't realize that I speak Spanish. I briefly consider telling him that I speak Spanish, but decide against it. He obviously isn't ready to tell me how he feels, otherwise he would have told me in English. That's when it dawns upon me that regardless of the fact that we haven't had our first date yet. I'm falling for Lester Santos.

SPOV

I assume when Ranger and I get on the elevator that we would head up to five. Ranger surprises me when he hits the button for seven. He holds my hand the entire ride up in the elevator only letting go to use his key fob to unlock his apartment.

Ranger places his keys in the silver tray by his front door and removes his utility belt placing it on the table next to the tray. We walk into the living room standing just a few feet apart. He doesn't say a word, so I finally ask, "Ranger what are we doing up here?"

He looks at me so intently and finally answers. "I'm doing what I should have done, instead of sending you back to Morelli." He reaches for me, pulls me close to him and kisses me. When he finally pulls back, he looks deep into my eyes saying, "I love you Stephanie. No qualifiers. I love you." As he brings my lips to his again.

When I finally have a moment to catch my breath I look at him and say "I love you too, Carlos."

"Say it again." He demands.

"I love you Carlos." Then he picks me up and carries me to his bedroom.