Stephanie's Pov

When Carlos called me, I had just gotten out of the shower and was grabbing a fresh uniform to put on out of the dressing room. When I heard the phone start ringing, I ran out of the room, fell across our bed, and grabbed the phone answering on the third ring.

"Stephanie" I breathed out in a rush

"Babe" I heard as Carlos also breathed out

"Everything ok?

"Eden's here" he said and I didn't understand why her being here at RangeMan made him so on edge.

"And you need me to come down and baby sit her?"

"No she is alright its Santos I had to just deal with" he told me

"What has Les done now?" I asked getting pissed if he had caused a scene with Ranger involving Eden. I hadn't spoken to him since I heard all of them joking the other night and I was still bothered by it especially after spending time with Eden.

"Eden needed to come to use the office to get some work done. I'm not going to be in the office for most of the day so when she got here I was gonna set her up in the conference room, when we got there and opened the door Santos was already camped out in there doing his work."

"Ok"

"He gave me attitude about how they both could fit since the room held all of us when we use it" he said and I rolled my eyes. Was that a fat reference made towards Eden?

"I'll be right down" I told him. Ever since we had gotten together Ranger had made it a point to be open with me on how he was feeling and including me as his partner. Just a short time ago he would hold his thoughts to himself and I wouldn't know anything had happened.

"Thanks just do what you do" he told me

"I'll take care of it, be safe out there" I told him. As I hung up, I reflected back on his call and a warmth spread in my heart that he feels the level of trust he does for me and now knows to call and ask for my help when he needs it or to just hear my voice to calm and center him. He has the guys to always have his back, but it is a great achievement to allow me to come in and be so close.

After the moment I took was over, I flew around the room getting myself together so that I could get down there incase Lester decides he wanted to be a prick and harass Eden. I'll be damned if he tries anything while on my watch. I like Eden and she's really a nice girl, but knowing how she feels about herself and being around all these "perfect" men, joking or not Lester would hurt her feelings and I will not let that happen. Rushing out of the door I hit the button to call the elevator, when it arrived I hit the number five and watched as the doors closed around me.

When I walked onto the floor everyone as usual greeted me like they always did when I made my presence on the floor. I usually stop and chat with the guys on deck and then go get a cup of coffee, but this morning I was a little preoccupied. Hurrying off from Hal and Ramon, I walked down the hall and peeked in the windows of the conference room to see if Lester was behaving himself. What I saw was Eden on one end of the table typing and Lester on the other end typing as well, all seemed to be kosher at the moment between them. Bustling off to my desk, I smiled when I saw a hot steaming cup of coffee just they way I like it sitting on my desk as I walked into my cube.

"Thank you" I said to Hal who was standing with his shoulder propped up on my door way

"I saw you didn't go get it like you do every morning, so I thought I would help you out" he said

"Yea, I had something to check on"

"That woman that Ranger brought in?" he asked looking back towards to conference room

"Yea Eden, just making sure Lester was playing nice" I said looking over the tops of the cubes at the room

"I hear ya" Hal said knowing the reputation that his fellow co-worker had

I sat down at my desk when Hal went off to do his work and began to do the searches that appeared to fill my inbox. I had just hit print on the second search when Eden came up to me. When I looked up to acknowledge her my smile dropped at how frazzled she looked.

"Eden are you ok?" I asked seeing that her face was pale

"Yea, I'm ok" she told me and I looked behind her to see if Les had also came out of the room

"Ok" I said not wanting to make her uncomfortable incase Les wasn't at fault for her unease and also if he was I didn't want her to feel I was badgering her to spill if she really didn't want too "What can I do for you?" I asked

"Mr. Manoso, I mean Ranger told me that you could help me to use a printer here and get some supplies for my project"

"Ohh sure in fact my search just stopped printing you can use mine" I told her taking her lap top and hooking it up "After you print all you need we'll go to the supply room and you can help yourself"

"Thank you" she said and typed something into her laptop and hit the button that made my printer come to life

"So how did you make out with the storms last night? I know you don't like them"

"Fine" she told me and before I could say anything else on the matter the printer stopped and I handed her the pages she had made.

After that we visited the supply closet where Eden selected some white poster boards and some tacky stuff to mount her stuff with. I got one of the guys to help her and to take her back to the house when she was done. When Eden was gone, I was still thinking Lester had to have said something to cause her to look and act the way she was, so I turned on my heels, went into the conference room, and sat my sights on Les.

"What did you do?" I asked him

Eden's Pov

When Mr. Santos told me how to find Stephanie, I got up, opened the door, and found my exit blocked by two very large men standing in front of the door with their backs towards us. I was hoping that they would notice that the door had opened and there was someone standing behind them, but they were so engrossed in what they were talking on that they didn't. As I was about to say excuse me, what they were talking about got my attention and caused a wave of paralyzing fear to go through me and root me to the floor where I stood.

"You ok?" I heard a voice beside me ask

"Huh?" I asked nothing really registering, when I turned toward the voice I found Mr. Santos was standing closely next to me, his emerald eyes were warm and friendly which was odd to me, because I knew he didn't like me since he learned of the relocation plan and when near him I could feel the contempt rolling off of him.

"Everything ok?" he asked leaning in closer

"Yea" I told him. I wasn't about to embarrass myself and admit to him that I was scared of the storms that I'd heard was coming. I am over thirty years old and kids are usually the ones scared of thunderstorms "Where's the bathroom?" I asked him hoping he wouldn't think anything or question me any longer.

"Straight down that way" he pointed and then told me that I had to knock, because other than Stephanie there were only men in the building.

I quickly knocked on the bathroom door and heard nothing come from inside, I pushed open the door, locked it behind me, and leaned against it to have a mini freak out. Knowing that I couldn't stay in here forever I splashed some water on my face and went out to find Stephanie. I retraced my way back to the room that I shared with Mr. Santos and then went the way he told me to find Stephanie.

"Eden are you ok?" she asked me the moment she looked up and saw me standing there. I thought by splashing some cold water on my face that I would look better and you wouldn't be able to tell I was just freaking out.

"I'm fine" I told her, but I'm not sure she bought it.

Stephanie didn't press me for anymore details which I was happy about, because I didn't want to bring up again that I was scared of storms like I had when we went shopping. She knew I didn't like them, but she had no idea how terrified I really was.

Stephanie asked me a few more questions and I told her how Ranger has said that she could help me when I needed a printer. She smiled, nodded her head, and plugged my lap top into her printer and I began to print off the stuff that I needed. She then led me to the end of the hall to another room that was packed ceiling to floor with supplies. Stephanie nudged me after I stood there gawking into the room and told me to get whatever I needed. I went around the room and picked out a few white poster boards for my papers and some sticky mounting tape to mount them with, I came back to the door where Stephanie was still standing.

"Ramon will take you back to the house if you're finished for the day"

"Yes I think this is all I needed to do today" I told her really wanting to get back to the house so I could check on the storms that were supposed to be coming tonight.

They guy Stephanie said was Ramon came up to me and took everything I had in my hand and carried them to the elevator with me following behind him. He loaded everything into the back seat of a big black SUV which must be the vehicle that everyone here uses and helped me into the passenger side seat. As we drove back to the house, Ramon was trying his best to chit chat and I was politely answering him, but my mind was swirling with thoughts of the storms that were coming. Ramon pulled into the driveway of the house that I was staying in and I hopped out to help him with my things. As I waited for him to open the back door, I looked up and scanned the sky.

"Everything ok ma'am?" he asked. When I looked over at him he was standing there staring at me with the back door open.

"Oh yea everything's fine, here let me help you"

"I've got it just open the door for me and tell me where you want this to go" he said grabbing my computer, the white boards, the tape, and my bag

"Ok" I said shocked at how nice he was being to me. I usually go to work, stick to myself, and am often overlooked, so I'm not really spoken to all that much unless someone needs something done, that's how I've gotten good at doing my job by observing people and knowing their likes and dislikes and I figured all of Mr. Manoso's men hated me like Lester did.

Ramon stopped long enough for me to grab the key out of my bag and I ran up onto the porch and opened the door for him. He came in and I told him just to lay everything on the table. When Ramon left, I thought on how nice he was towards me, but then remembered the weather and rushed over to the couch, sat down, hit the power button on the remote, and waited for the local forecast.

"Ohhh Craaaap" I said when I heard and read what could possibly be on the way.