Going to give you a little extra fast since I have been behind on posting and with this crisis. Dun, dun, dun! Most of you are seeing this scenario the way that I did as I was writing it, two ways. She and her new husband are experiencing what new married couples do in the first two years compounded by her pregnancy. We'll see how they get through it...

Previously -

About an hour later, there was knock on the door. I looked through the peephole and it was Bobby. I opened the door and looked at him. He was wearing his Rangeman issued blank face. "I'm here to request your presence in the conference room on four for a meeting. Come with me, Steph," Bobby said.

I just nodded and grabbed a key fob and shut the door behind. He hit the elevator button and we waited. Now, normally if I was a male Rangeman employee, I'm thinking that he would be leading me to the gym for an ass whipping by him or the other three boss's. I had no doubt that I was about to get the equivalent, just verbally and in the boardroom. This was happening a whole lot sooner than I had anticipated. Oh, well. I might as well get this out of the way. There was no hiding from any of them.

Chapter 14

Stephanie's POV

When we got to the conference room Bobby opened the door and motioned for me to go in. I walked in and looked around and the room was full of men and they were all wearing stone faces. Great. No sense of humor now that they were directly affected. Wimps. I could clearly see that it was Ranger and not Carlos that stood and pointed to the chair next to him. I walked over and sat down and waited.

He cleared his throat and said, "Stephanie, on behalf of these men, we have to address the prank you perpetrated yesterday. Some of the men were embarrassed and some offended. The nature of the prank was against the Rangeman code of ethics and in turn requires disciplinary action." He pushed a typed document towards me. "This is a written warning. In the case of another offense, the action would be suspension, docking of pay and depending on the severity, possible termination of employment." He produced a pen and held it out for me to take and sign the paper. I couldn't look at him and I would be damned first before I touched that pen and signed that paper. What is the next angriest a person could be past rhino? Hippo? Mother bear? I was that pissed.

Instead of taking his damn pen and signing the paper or sticking him in the eyeball with it, I slowly stood up and looked around the room at each man. "I apologize to all of you. I'm sorry if I embarrassed you or hurt you. I didn't consider each of you and your individual feelings. I just thought of you as a group. A group of men and the opposite of me. I considered you all the enemy because of the actions of a few. That thinking was wrong of me. The Rangeman business is guilty of the same. It's not conducive yet to integrating women into its numbers. This is a workplace where I don't fit and don't belong. I don't need to sign this. I'll be resigning as of today and will only move between the apartment on seven and the garage until I can make other arrangements. I won't be disturbing your work environment in the future. Again, please accept my apology for harming you." I looked at Carlos. "Last, Ranger, you can stick that fucking pen in your eyeball and shove that paper up your ass." I turned and walked to the door.

Behind me, an angry Ranger said, "We are not finished here, Stephanie."

I turned and glared at him. "Oh, I think that we are finished."

As I walked toward the door, I saw one by one all the stone faces falling in shock. What did you expect to happen when you singled me out and made an example out of me, you jerks?

Ranger said at my back, "Escort her off the floor and back to the apartment, Hector."

Right. Like I'm a criminal and not your wife. Mary Lou was right. This is NOT a home. Right now it's the farthest thing from it. Hell.

I walked to elevator and pushed the button and Hector reached out and snatched my fob. I turned and glared at him. He said, "This will need to be re-programmed."

I ignored him and got on the elevator when the door opened and Hector clicked the button and fobbed for the penthouse apartment.

He said, "Manny and I were both involved. Think about such a prank done on your man with a group of women. We were a group of gay and straight men and my lover was included. Our privacy invaded for a group to see. All of us were uncomfortable."

I turned and snapped at him. "It's not so funny when the laugh is on you is it Hec? All of you have been making fun of me for months, watching me on the monitors, sneaking around and waiting for me to entertain you. I can't believe that not one of you questioned an 'orthope-dick' dick sling. You just stuffed your chicken nuggets through it and lined up like a bunch of boobs and dropped trou'. You're all angry at me for not using your own noodles?"

He started to snap back, "Manny is…"

I made fists and yelled at him. "I don't care Hector! I care that my marriage is probably 'kaput' and I don't have a job and I have someone else to worry about too. Someone innocent! So just shut the hell up!"

He looked stunned for a minute and didn't speak again as the elevator door opened. He clicked the fob to unlock the apartment door and I walked in without looking back. The sob came as soon as the door shut behind me. I started to the bathroom and then sidetracked to the quiet of the dressing room and found a dark corner and slid down and pulled my knees to me and let go. I was so stunned by what they had just done and so hurt that I could hardly breathe. I cried great wracking sobs that came from deep inside. My heart ached and my guts just felt sick. I reached over into the laundry bin next to me and grabbed a shirt and stuck my snotty nose in it. What am I going to do now?

Much later I heard the apartment door open and close and identified the footsteps as those belonging to Ranger the tyrant. I heard him come through the hall to the bedroom and then he turned into the dressing room. He stuck his hand out to me, "Dinner will be here in a few minutes. Come on."

I snapped, "Really? Just get up like nothing happened today? Like you didn't hurt me in that conference room? You can eat by yourself. For that matter, you can fuck yourself too."

He retorted sarcastically. "Babe, it's called growing up and admitting your wrong and moving on. You really need to work on the first part. That was some performance you put on down in that room for me and my men. All you're doing is overreacting to something that didn't go your way as usual. I was crazy to think that you might change and grow up after we got married and especially after you became pregnant. You're worse now than you were before. You're irresponsible Stephanie 2.0!"

I looked up at him. The anger back full force again and I yelled at him. "I'm pregnant you jerk! You have no idea how I feel! You obviously didn't read one single fucking pregnancy book out of all those you bought! It's hard and all everyone does is laugh at me and make fun of me. And, I can't believe you dragged me down there to publicly humiliate me. I really hate you and them right now. I didn't see them getting reprimanded for the videos and the things they've done that affected my privacy." The tears were back again now too.

He said, "Come on, Babe. Wash your face and get ready for dinner."

I sobbed. "Speaking of privacy, I'm begging you to please leave me alone. I can't talk to you, I don't even understand you."

He stood there for a minute and sighed and then walked out.

Sometime later while crying in the closet, I had fallen asleep and guess where I ended up again the next morning? I was naked and in bed and a big thumb was moving back and forth over my nipple. No way! I grabbed the hand and yanked that thumb back hard. "Oww! Fuck! What the hell, Babe?"

I rolled over and kicked him. He growled in pain and I stomped to the bathroom and used the toilet and got in the shower. He walked in and crossed his arms and smirked, "I have a good question for you? What was your car doing parked at Morelli's house yesterday?"

I really wanted to lie and hurt him. I couldn't even look at him. "He saw me in the neighborhood and offered to feed me leftover pizza. I accepted."

He snapped. "You have a history. He fucked you once and wanted to date you not that long ago. Stay away from him." I turned my back to him. This is me ignoring you and I'm so finished with the talking. He stood there staring for a couple of minutes and then growled and walked out. Good!

Ella was absent in the morning and I had no appetite anyway. I picked at some fruit and finally put it back. At lunch time she arrived with Ranger on her heels. She kind of made a sympathetic face at me and left. We sat there in silence until I just got up and left the table. I don't know why he even bothered to come up. Probably for show and intimidation. To make his men think that he has the little lady in hand.

It was pretty much the same at dinner time. The only difference was that he asked Ella if she would like to go house hunting with me for the next couple days and he would feed the men at lunchtime. Of course Ella said that she would love to do that. So, Carlos said he would hook us up with a realtor in the morning to help. I raised both eyebrows and looked at Ella. What was this move about? We hadn't talked about it, we weren't talking at all. I was still so hurt and angry at him and the guys. We finished dinner in silence after Ella left. I got in the bed on my side and rolled over and pulled the cover up and when he reached for me, I gave him a firm, "NO." He sighed and just rolled over too.

When I woke up the next morning, I was tucked under a warm armpit and my pajama bottoms and t-shirt was gone. This was really pissing me off! Another invasion of my privacy. If I choose to sleep in my pajamas and on my side of the bed, that's my durn prerogative! I pushed away from him and kicked him hard a couple of times with my heel as I rolled off the bed and out. He grunted and his eyes flew open. "Dammit, Babe. What do you keep doing that for?" I grabbed my clothes off the floor and shook them at him and stomped to the bathroom.

When I came out he was dressed in gym clothes and sitting on the bed. "Stephanie, this is our first big fight as a married couple. We need to work it out and get past it. Together. I love you and I want you to be happy. I want us to be happy."

I sniffed. "I don't know how we can fix this. We're so different and our lives are way different. You don't even care that you hurt me."

He said, "I care and I think that this can be fixed. I talked to Mary Lou yesterday. She reminded me that being pregnant is hard and that she might not be happy in your situation either." He smiled. "She reminded me that you're getting ready to nest and you don't have a comforting place to do it. I should have started looking for us a house close by before the wedding. I'm sorry."

I grumbled. "I'm not a bird and I still feel like you all ganged up on me. It hurt."

"Babe, we had to do that. You were an employee of this company and Tank reminded me that we can't be biased in doling out punishment."

I snapped back, "Bullshit, Ran-ger. You usually take guys to the mats. You wrote me up and publicly embarrassed me. This company has always played by its own rules. You are the boss. What about all the embarrassing video of me that they pass around to each other? What about the booty shots of my distractions? You can go downstairs and tell Tank to go shit in his hat and pull it down over his ears!" Grrr! I pushed past him and stomped back to the bathroom to shower.

He followed me with his arms crossed. "Babe, we wouldn't take you to the mats even if you weren't pregnant. The men wanted to make sure that you knew that you crossed a line. You're right about jokes and the video of you. Turnabout is usually fair, but you went over a line. I don't want you to quit Rangeman and neither do my men. I think they're thinking hard about their own parts in this and pretty remorseful right now."

I grumbled, "Yeah, see? I don't want to work for this sexist company and I sure as hell don't want to work here just because I'm your wife. I'll find something to do. You can run your ship any way you like Craptain Blackbeard. You and your three stooges and the rest of your cartoon characters beating the crap out of each other daily. Just like I told Hector when he wanted to shame me with his little speech about the other men seeing his precious Manny's kibbles and bits, I can't believe that not one of those bozos questioned an "orthope-dick" dick sling. They just stuffed their franks and beans of all the colors of the rainbow through the thing and lined up like a bunch of boobs and dropped trou' in unison for Bobby to ogle their junk. How many beefcake brains does it take to make a whole, Ranger? Jeez! And, one of those geniuses is one of your leadership. Duh!"

He suddenly burst out laughing. "Babe..."

I snarked at him, "Oh, and for that conference room shit, their junk is going on a calendar for next year minus their stupid heads to raise money for charity. A charity for the mentally challenged."

"Stephanie..?"

When Ella brought breakfast, she asked us both what we were looking for in a home. Carlos said, "Whatever she wants."

Ella looked between the two of us and obviously picked up on our non-communication problem and asked, "What are your needs, sobrino?"

He said, "I would like it to have some acreage so we can secure the property and make improvements if necessary like a larger garage, a pool, etc. For this house, the closest we can get to Rangeman would help. I want to be able to get to work and home quickly in an emergency."

He wiped his mouth with his napkin and said as he was walking out, "The realtor, Sylvia Bell, will be here in an hour. I suggest you do some research on the internet while you wait."

I looked at Ella and snarked, "I would say thank you and that's a good idea honey, but I refuse to talk to a man's ass."

Ella burst out laughing. She said, "I see that there is still tension between you. It won't last forever. This is normal in a marriage and how you handle it is important. I think this is a positive move. You need a home together, a sanctuary all your own to raise your children."

I looked at Ella. "Children? Nuh uh. Do you think he's ready to give this up? The military mentality? He's more comfortable with his men than me, Ella. Doesn't bode well for a marriage. He helped them slaughter me. This place is not ready for female employees or even significant others. No way. I was significantly singled out."

She touched my hand. "I think they learned a lesson. They are different today. Maybe it's good that you make them think. Hmmm?"

I grinned at her. "And, this is why I love you, Ella. Ready to check out some houses?"

She smiled and we went to the dining room and opened my laptop and began looking through local listings.

TBC -

Next chapter you will get to hear from Ranger and his thoughts on the prank mess.