Chapter 11

Stephanie's POV

When we got back to the house, I was able to climb into bed and fall asleep within seconds. Although I didn't consider myself a light sleeper, certain sounds often filtered into my sleep to wake me. That was one of the reasons I'd chosen the master bedroom and then suggested to Lula that she wanted the room practically on the other side of the house from where I would be sleeping. The reason for that was simple. Lula snored. Not some cute, ladylike snore either. Nothing so mundane for her. No, Lula snored like a 747 taking off at the airport. Right now, another sound was filtering into my sleep—an annoying buzzing that reminded me more of a pesky mosquito than anything else.

I waved my hand to shoo the offending pest away, but the sound continued. Reaching out blindly, I grabbed the spare pillow and covered my ear with it. The sound was muffled, but it was still there. Fortunately, it was muted enough that I was able to ignore it and go back to the dream that I'd been having before the sound so rudely interrupted.

The dream morphed, though. A grumbly giant came in and told me it was time to rise and shine, but I studiously ignored him. The sound was muffled, yet somehow, I was able to understand everything he was saying. He wanted me to get up so I could have his breakfast fixed when he came in from the fields. When I told him that he could wake me when he got done in the fields and I'd fix his breakfast then, he laughed. It was a deliciously sexy laugh and made me want to pull him into bed with me.

I was a bit confused when he told me he'd love nothing better than to climb into bed with me but that he had a feeling I wouldn't be happy when I finally surfaced.

Smiling, I let out a sigh and turned over to my other side. My movements were halted by a hand telling me it was time to wake up.

It had been after midnight when we'd finally gotten back and I'd been able to go to sleep. After the day I'd had, I was exhausted. Now some giant wanted me to get up and do his bidding? I had to say this for him… Mr. Giant was persistent.

Reaching out to swat him away, my hand came into contact with something cold and made of metal. I wrapped my fingers around it and I realized the giant was wearing a gun. I was tired and just wanted the giant to leave me alone so I could go back to sleep. I told him, "You see this? If you don't leave me alone so that I can sleep, I'm going to use this. Now scram."

There was silence for several seconds, and I smiled before turning over and letting sleep take over. I felt a slight tug on my hand where the gun was, but there was no need for me to hang on to it anymore, so I let it go.

Ranger's POV

I leaned against the wall outside the master bedroom, trying to give the adrenaline rush time to leave my body. It felt like I'd already run ten miles in the last few seconds. Damn that woman was scary. The fact was, that her actions only made her more desirable to me. No one had ever gotten the drop on me before, and that she had been able to do it in her sleep was nothing short of miraculous. Right now, I wanted to be back inside that room, holding her in my arms…well, eventually. First there was something more that I wanted to be doing with her.

The cat-and-mouse game that Jeanne Ellen had been playing for the past eight months—playing innocent and wanting to wait for marriage, when I knew she'd had previous sexual relationships—had gotten old months ago. I should have known that marrying her wouldn't have changed the level of boredom that I'd been feeling with the relationship. The fact that I'd felt like a weight had been lifted from my shoulders when I'd told Les to give Jeanne Ellen her walking papers told me that what I'd been planning would have turned out to be disastrous.

I turned to the door I'd just walked through and thought about the blue-eyed vixen sleeping in my bed. I'd never met a woman who could keep me just as fascinated out of bed as in it. Although we hadn't made love yet, I knew by the electrical current racing through me whenever I was near her that we'd be explosive together.

Pushing away from the wall, I made my way through the house to the kitchen, where Tank would be waiting for me so we could start our run. On entering the room, I frowned when he was nowhere in sight. I moved over to the fridge and grabbed a couple bottles of water, setting one on the counter. I twisted off the cap on the other and downed the icy liquid.

Tank arrived as I was tossing the bottle into the recycle bin. One look at his wild-eyed look, and I had my hand on my gun while I scanned the area for unfriendlies. "What's up?"

"No sleep again. Every night since we've been here, them damn planes have been going crazy at night. How many flights can they send out a night? It's non-stop. You know how loud those 747s are. And they choose the middle of the night to send out the maximum number of planes. Oh, and there was no way I could wake Lula. That woman sleeps like the dead, man."

I let out a low chuckle before I admitted, "At least she didn't pull your gun on you while she was still asleep."

Tank did a double take as his gaze steadied on me. "You telling me that she was asleep when she took your gun off you and pulled it on you? And what were you doing that she felt threatened?"

My right eyebrow raised as I told him, "It's not like that. I was trying to wake her up, and she was dreaming."

He nodded. "That better be all, or my fist would be getting acquainted with your face."

"That's saying something, since the only time you were ever able to take me was when you were pissed off because I let Jeanne Ellen move into the apartment at the hotel."

Tank grimaced. "I thought you let her move into RangeMan."

I shrugged. "I meant what I said about the only woman I'd ever take there would be my wife."

He nodded. "Too bad for you I didn't know you were talking about a hotel instead of our building."

I checked my watch. "We need to get started if we want to get back here on time." I paused before indicating the water I'd set out for him. "You might want to drink your water. Oh, and don't count on breakfast being ready when we get back. I think we'd be better off just asking the ladies to make dinner and keep the house cleaned."

Tank grinned. "Sure, boss. Wouldn't want you to get shot trying to wake someone up."

"Ass."

Tank let out a chuckle before downing the water and tossing the bottle. His hand connected with my gut as he said, "Race you."

He beat me out of the house by a fraction of a second, but it didn't take me long to catch up and then pass him. When we were once again in the kitchen downing bottles of water two hours later, I was feeling a whole lot better. And just as I suspected, there was no sign of life in the house, other than the two of us.

I started the coffee, and we went our separate ways to shower and dress. I sent a text to Lester before heading into the shower, and once I was dressed, I headed back into the kitchen, where I put together an omelet big enough for the two of us to share.

Tank asked, "What's on the agenda for today?"

I let my gaze move from my plate to meet his. "I've been thinking about that bomb on the Cayenne and what Stephanie had to say last night. I think someone didn't want us showing up at the office today."

"I was thinking the same thing. You know, we might be putting Lula and Stephanie at risk by letting them stay here."

I grinned. "Stephanie's already considered that. She did something on the computer before she went to bed last night, and she told me that I'd need to remember my nickname for her. It's my guess that she reprogrammed the whole damn shooting match so if anyone tries to get in here using the old codes, they'll be denied access."

He shook his head. "I think there's more to that little girl than either one of us knows. I like her." His gaze turned deadly serious. "If you were to hurt that little girl, I might have to school you on the proper way to treat a lady."

With my blank face firmly in place, I told him, "Duly noted."

It didn't take long for us to finish breakfast, and then I left a note telling Stephanie when to expect us back. With the Cayenne gone, there were only two other vehicles to choose from, and I'd already loaned the Porsche Turbo to the ladies. That left us with the F150 truck. We headed into the office. I was hoping that the asswipe who was responsible for the explosion last night would have a tell, letting us know he was surprised to see us still alive.

We arrived at the office just before the night shift would be leaving. This would give us the opportunity to observe the night crew, who would have been on when the report of the explosion came in, as well as the day crew. Since there were two shifts, this would ensure that all hands would be on deck when Tank and I walked into the building.

The moment we entered the building, I knew that this was going to be harder than I'd originally thought. There were two men at the front desk, and both of them looked as if they'd seen a ghost. There was a file in my hands with the name and photo of every man that worked at the Miami office. I'd spent some time studying it the night before so I would have a good idea of who was whom. The two in front of me were brothers Hans and Freederick Swanson. Hans had been a Marine and Free—as he was known—had been Army. Both men had decent records while in the service, but that could have been because they did what they could to blend in.

I nodded to them, and Tank and I gave nothing away as we made our way to the stairwell. As we passed them, I pressed a button on my keypad to scramble the feed to the monitors as well as the phone lines so they wouldn't be able to warn the others.

We took the stairs at a fast clip and were exiting on the fifth floor in no time. The minute we stepped out of the stairwell, several of the men gathered there looked just as shocked as the two downstairs. Tank and I made our way to the conference room, where we would be sitting in on the morning meeting. After taking our seats, I went to work, making notations into the file as to which men seemed the most startled at our presence.

Chan joined us, taking the seat beside mine. He leaned in to whisper, "There are three men missing. Hickory is in the hospital, Drake was in a car accident and has a concussion as well as burned hands, and Jolson has a court date with his ex-wife."

"Did you hear any chatter this morning? Anyone seeming to be more confident that our trip here would be over before it started?"

Chan nodded. "There was lots of chatter when I came on the floor. Sanderson and Deets were telling me how I should watch my back and how they had it from a good source that you two had been taken out like a couple of girls."

I looked in the file to remind myself what Deets and Sanderson looked like so I'd know who I'd be talking to before the day was out.

We didn't have time for any more conversation as the men started arriving, each one taking the seat farthest from where the three of us were sitting. The last men in the room had the bad luck to have to sit the closest to where we were.

Chan called the meeting to order with one word. "Report."

There was silence for several moments before Leery fidgeted and said, "No break-ins during the night, no alarms going off. Nothing much happened from eighteen hundred to zero six hundred."

Chan stiffened. "Nothing much happened? No explosions? No reports of any RangeMan vehicles going off the grid?"

Leery shook his head. "Nothing."

Chan's eyes narrowed. "Then consider yourselves on report for dereliction of duty."

Every pair of eyes bored into Chan. He in turn stared each of the men down. "For your information, there was a vehicle that did, in fact, go off the grid at twenty-one hundred last night. The fact that none of you are aware of it tells me you are either lying or you aren't doing your job with the efficiency required."

The others in the room never made eye contact with us or each other, which told me there was more than one person involved. And the ones who weren't involved knew about the incident. Whether they were keeping silent because they supported the action or they were too scared to say anything, whatever the reason, I knew that these weren't the type of men I wanted working for me.

My phone vibrated, and I pulled it out, making sure it stayed out of sight under the table. I knew what the message was, and I didn't need to look at the phone in order to answer it. Pressing the send button, I put the phone away, then flicked a glance at Tank to let him know I was ready to act.

Pushing back from the table, I stood. "As of now, you're all fired. Get your gear and get out. You have one hour."

There were sounds of outrage and stunned disbelief. A big, burly man—who'd come in just after Chan—stood, his hands clenching as he smirked. "You think you're so badass. You just wait. What are you going to do without a team to work for you? All those clients are going to go elsewhere, and you'll be left with nothing."

I had Jones in the air by my fist at the neck of his shirt. "Anytime you're ready, Jones."

The look in his eyes told me his act was pure bravado. He didn't have the guts to face someone. His answer would be to ambush them.

I tossed him, and he fell a couple feet from me. "You now have fifty minutes to get out of my building."

It wasn't until the last man left the room that Chan shook his head and said, "I'm sorry, Ranger. This is my fault. I know you trusted me to come in here and find out who was working with Franco, but the truth of the matter is that I'm no closer now than the day I found out Franco was dirty. He stocked this building with people he could trust. I should have done what you just did."

I shook my head. "I sent you here to find answers, not to confront the men or fire them. We'll still get the answers. We're just going to get them another way."

Chan nodded. "I'll take over monitors."

"You'll have help soon enough."

"What are you going to do? Hire another complete crew in under an hour?"

Grinning, I said, "We don't need a complete crew. What we need is already here and on their way down." Turning, I looked at Tank. "You and I need you to go unlock the stairwell to the roof."

Tank nodded. "How many more will be arriving?"

"We have the initial team that's here already, and the rest of the core team will be here in thirty minutes."

Tank shook his head. "Leave it to Santos to lead the cavalry."

I gave a miniscule nod. "He's leaving Hal in charge of Trenton until we return."

Tank chuckled. "Good choice. The guys won't know what hit them. Hal might seem shy and unassuming, but he's one hell of a drill sergeant. Wouldn't surprise me if, when we get back, the men are in better shape than they've been in a while."

Although I made no comment, I knew there was probably quite a bit of truth in what Tank had said.

Lester's POV

There was a storm heading our way, and from the tingle that I was getting, it was going to be a bad one. The sky was dark with the angry clouds that had already rolled in. A buzzing had me reaching for my cell phone, and I looked at the text I'd just received from Ranger. My jaw clenched as I looked at the sky once again. Charlie wasn't going to like flying in the storm. There was only one pilot better, although I'd never tell him that.

I dialed the number I knew by heart, and when it was answered, I said, "Hey, Red. I need you to fly us to Miami. Can you arrange it?"

There was a pause, and then: "Sure. Be on the roof in ten."

Smiling, I sent Bobby a text, then put the phone in its compartment and moved to give the order.

The fifth floor of RangeMan Trenton was much like the fifth floor at any of the offices. As you stepped off the elevator, there was an open walkway leading to a seating alcove, where there were several comfortable chairs with a coffee table in the center. Although not many people saw this part of the building, when one of the guys messed up, Ranger would have them cool their heels sitting there where they'd be the most uncomfortable.

They didn't have just Ranger to worry about when they were in the hot spot, as the guys like to refer to this little space. I had the corner office, and Tank had the third office that cut the alcove off from view so the other men had no idea what was going on here, which ended up adding to the tension they felt when called to cool their jets here by one of us.

On one side of the walkway, there were several cubicles set up, where the majority of the men worked. Each man was assigned his own cubicle, and no one else worked there. The opposite side was where the break room and comm room were located. The break room had several tables and chairs, as well as a stocked fridge, sink, and cupboards, where there was a variety of food provided.

The comm room was where the monitors were that showed all the places that RangeMan provided security for. There was room for two men in the room, and for their eight-hour shift, they would sit and monitor what was going on at each site. Trenton had the highest success rate of all the RangeMan offices. With everything that was happening in Miami, I had a strong feeling that we'd need to look at hiring soon if some of our team decided to stay in Miami to fill the void that would be opened when Ranger fired the team there. Chan was a good man, and if the crew refused to straighten up when he took over, there was definitely something very wrong going on. Now it was up to us to see how far-reaching it was—that, and to redecorate. I doubted that all of the guys would want to leave their cushy residence.

Stepping out of my office, I looked around, picking the other men that would go with me in the chopper. The whole process took only seconds, and then I said, "Listen up."

Twenty-three men suddenly came to attention, as if waiting for inspection with the unanimous answer, "Yes, sir!"

"Hal, you are now in charge of Trenton RangeMan until further notice."

Hal nodded. "Yes, sir."

There were a few groans from a couple of the new hires, probably because they'd been giving Hal an especially hard time recently, and when they'd gone too far with their pranks, he'd schooled them on proper respect. I didn't bother saying anything, but a look told them more than my words would have. The tinge of pink in their cheeks told me they'd received my message.

I turned to the others. "Bones, you'll be in charge of medical until Bobby's return. Cal, you'll be second in command, and you'll be responsible for a special little package that will be arriving very soon. Rodriguez and Rambo are with me. Get your gear and be on the roof in five." I paused for just a moment before adding, "Dismissed."

Hal and Cal were the only two to remain behind. Hal's next question to me told me why he was the obvious one to put in charge. "Who do you want following you on the jet?"

"Ram, Junior, Binkie, Erik, Manny, Zip, Zero, Diaz, and Terminator."

He nodded. "They'll be there thirty minutes after you land."

I handed him my key fob. "You'll use my office."

"Yes, sir." Taking the fob from me, he went toward my office, and I was left with Cal.

"I take it Red is flying you?"

I nodded. "I need you to keep an eye on Peanut."

He grinned. "You know I will. She's the most important thing in my life."

"I know."

Cal's eyes narrowed. "I expect I don't have to tell you what will happen if Red gets so much as a scratch, right?"

My eyebrow rose as my gaze met his. "Duly noted."

As I went to get my own gear, I texted Ella. She sent me an answer a moment later, and I had to smile because, even through the text, I could see her excitement. When I got to the roof, Red was there with the chopper. I made my way over to the front passenger seat, and my eyes met hers as I unbuckled the special package that Cal would be watching over…that is, if he could get her away from Ella. I looked down at my little Peanut and grinned. "How's my girl?"

Her eyes lit up as she held her arms up for me to lift her up. "Lester!"

Red caressed the baby's hair and said, "Come give Momma a hug first, Ava."

Ava climbed over to her mother's waiting arms, and I watched as Kirslyn hugged her daughter to her. She kissed her forehead before whispering, "You be a good girl for Uncle Cal and Ella, okay?"

Ava looked up at her mother. "I will, Momma."

My heart hitched as Kirslyn smiled down at her baby girl. When those big, trusting eyes turned to me, I fell like a ton of bricks just like every other time I'd been around her. Watching Ava was like seeing a miniature of Kirslyn.

Ava climbed back over to me, and I lifted the three-year-old into my arms. Her arms wrapped around my neck as I carried her over to where Cal was waiting. He would take her down to Ella's apartment, and between the two of them, they would watch over Ava until we could return.

Ava smiled on seeing her uncle.

Cal wasn't an honorary uncle like the rest of the RangeMan crew. He was the real deal. Kirslyn was his sister-in-law. When his brother Travis had been killed in Afghanistan three and a half years ago, he'd moved Kirslyn here so he could watch over her and the baby that she was expecting. I would forever be grateful to him for that because it was his actions in bringing her here that allowed me to meet the love of my life.

Once I was in the passenger seat, I turned to see the other three already in the chopper waiting. I grinned at Kirslyn and said, "Let's get this show on the road."

She rolled her eyes at me before powering up for takeoff.