Previous Chapter: "Girlfriend, it's going to take a lot more than Benito Ramirez to take down this Queen Bee. Now get out of here. You look awful. You're making me nervous with how tired and sickly you look. I can tell you've been here all night. Besides that orderly that brought my breakfast this morning was scrumptious. I can't have your skinny ass ruining my chances with him."

I shook my head in amazement before walking out the door.

"Oh and one more thing, Alyssa…you better believe that asshole's going to jail. I'm not going to be like the other girls and keep my mouth shut. God knows, no man will ever keep this mouth shut."

I nodded my head in agreement.

Benito Ramirez is definitely not going to get away with this.

CHAPTER 20

I spent the beginning half of the day packing up Suzie Oz's house for donations. I held onto a few of her photo albums of her travels with her husband. I know that she wasn't an actual part of my family but the photos let me pretend if just for a moment that I was.

Even when my parents were alive, we never took family vacations together. My father was a workaholic and never found enough time for us to spend together. So, even though I was a privileged child with all of the spoils a little girl could ever imagine with our big gated home, private swimming pool, and servants to boot, I never got to experience trips to the beach as a family or venture to the Magic Kingdom.

My father was simply too important and successful for his own good. My mother was the one who'd take me to the beach on special occasions. It was always me and my mother. My father was always absent. He would often travel to exotic places for business and return with lavish presents for me such as dolls with fine silk hair from Asia but not once did he bring his family to enjoy the spoils of travel.

He was a man who knew nothing about me. If he had known me, he'd known that I didn't want beautiful dolls with silk hair, I wanted the latest and greatest toy robot from Japan. He'd had known that the one way to my heart were exotic desserts not color hair pins. But he passed away not knowing who his daughter was and in return his face has faded from his daughter's memory. I closed the photo album and placed it inside of a box and labeled it Suzie before taping it up.

Connie had agreed to hire Lula as she was swimming in files already even after I had helped clear out more than half of it last week. I was able to bring in my three skips for the day and only landed on my ass once. I successfully avoided running into Joe at the station all day along with a dozen phone calls from him.

I was about ten miles away from my apartment when I could feel something off with my car — other than my doors. It started to slow down and steam began rising from the hood. I slowly guided the car to the shoulder before choked and died.

Smoke rose from under hood clouding the entire car. I knew today was too good to be true. Life just doesn't seem to want to cooperate with me. Grabbing my purse, I decided not to fight it anymore. Why bother trying to save this POS car?

"Fuck!" I shouted loudly at my phone.

The battery was dead. I kicked the tire of my car and kept screaming at the top of my lungs. People could honk their cars and think I'm some crazy woman all they want. I didn't care. After my satisfying tantrum, I began my journey stumbling upon a gas station about a forty-five minute walk later. Tired, I trudged up to the pay phone and dropped in fifty cents. What happened to when pay phones were only ten cents for a call?

Lifting the receiver to my ear, I got ready to dial Misty's number but there was no dial tone. I pressed down on the hang up button several times but nothing happened and it didn't even return my change. I began slamming the receiver down on the phone several repeatedly and screaming at the top of my lungs.

"Piece of shit pay phone! AGH!"

"Beautiful, I don't think beating it will make it work any better."

I jerked my head up and smashed my face into Lester's chest to muffle my screams.

"Beautiful, this is the twenty-first century. There's a thing called cell phones. Why are you trying to use this ancient contraption?"

"Because my piece of shit car broke down and my phone is dead," I replied hoping he'd understand my muffled voice through his shirt.

"Well, good thing Uncle Lester's here to the rescue," he patted my head.

"Uncle?" I looked up at him.

He shrugged, "First thing that came to mind."

"Can you call a tow truck for me?"

"I'll offer you something better — Rangeman services," he smiled. "Let's get you home."

"Home," I sighed.

Carl had told me that they were finished with my apartment and had locked it up and sent a cleanup crew over to my place this afternoon so it was ready for me to go back to but my bed was not salvageable as there was too much blood to get out.

"You know you're welcome to stay at Rangeman if you need a safe place to hide out. In fact, Ranger would probably prefer you stay there. It'd be much easier for us to watch your back."

I scrunched my nose following him to a lime green Mustang, "Thanks but I'm not looking for a hide out. This is your car?"

"Yep. She's a beaut isn't she?"

"What about the black SUV?"

"That's a company car. This is my personal car."

I slid into the very masculine car. "It's nice."

A few short minutes later Lester pulled into my parking lot, "I'll walk you up."

I nodded my head accepting. This is one of those times that I wasn't going to fight someone for being overprotective. I didn't know what to expect walking into the apartment and sure as hell didn't want to do it alone.

Stepping out of the car, I was knocked back into the side of the car suddenly from being startled by a loud explosion coming from the apartment building. Lester wrapped his arms around me and shielded me from the second explosion. I regained my balance pushing away from Lester's grasp and looked up watching flames dancing in the window on the second floor — my kitchen.

"No!" I cried out dashing towards the building.

"Alyssa, stop!" Lester shouted out after me.

I crashed through the front doors and hurried up the stairs dodging a few of people trying to make their way down the stairs.

"Dear, the building's on fire. You shouldn't go up there," Mr. Woleski shouted at me over the wailing sound of the fire alarm.

"I have to get something!" I cried continuing towards my apartment.

Reaching my door I pushed it open slightly burning my hands on the scalding hot doorknob. Smoke filled the living room. I coughed as making my way through the room towards my bedroom. The flames were quickly spreading into the living room.

Pushing on, I reached my closet and dropped to my hands and knees searching for the only thing that I couldn't live without. My fingers wrapped around a hard square-like object. Clutching it close to my chest, I ran towards the window and grabbed Monster with my other arm and turned to run back out into the living room but the flames were dancing in the door frame.

Smoke was filling my lungs and I began coughing uncontrollably. A large figure hurled itself through the fire into the bedroom. He didn't say a word just grabbed me and carried me to the window. Kicking out the window, he threw me over his shoulder and made his way down the fire escape.

I clutched onto my shoebox and Monster tightly. After running several feet away from the building, Lester finally set me down slowly.

"What were you thinking running into a burning building like that, Alyssa?" he shouted at me but not in a menacing way but more out of concern and fear. He grabbed Monster from my hands allowing me to have a free hand.

"What took you so long?" I coughed over the sirens.

He grabbed me and held me tightly, "Don't fucking scare me like that!"

"Alyssa!" a voice boomed a few feet behind me.

I turned around slowly and to face the music. "Joe," I croaked out.

"Why haven't you been answering your phone? I've been trying to reach you all day. And I hear over the scanners that there's an explosion at your apartment complex. You should've been under police protection. With this contract on your head you shouldn't be running around town especially with what happened in your apartment the other night. You have three—I repeat—THREE psychos after you! You know you could've been killed!" he shouted furiously at me waving his arms in the air with his Italian gestures.

I stood silently watching him throw his tantrum.

"You're coming home and staying with me until this is all over," he grabbed my am.

I yanked my arm back from his grasp, "I'm not going home with you, Joe."

"And why the hell not? And who the hell is this guy?" he demanded.

"This guy is my friend! I'm not going home with you because I don't want to experience another chance encounter with your family."

"My family?" he asked confused.

"Oh I guess you haven't had a chance to talk to your mother or grandmother yet."

"Is that why they keep calling me? I've been working double shifts, Cupcake. I haven't been home in days. What did my mother say to you?" his voice came down a notch.

"First of all, they didn't know who I was which I'm not really too surprised since I don't even know what's going on between us anyways. So I don't blame you for not mentioning me to your family. Secondly, you should consider teaching your family that the politically correct term to refer to 'people like me' as 'Asian.' But to be even more specific, I am a fucking American. I was born in the U.S. of A. and I shouldn't be judged by the color of my skin!" my voice was echoing through the night sky loudly. "Thirdly, just because I don't currently have a set of parents doesn't mean that they didn't teach me right before I lost them," I exploded into tears.

"Cupcake," Joe stepped closer to me.

"Don't!" I held my hand up to him.

"Cupcake, don't listen to the things that my mother and grandmother have to say. They're a bunch of old loony kooks."

I shot him a sharp glare, "You shouldn't speak about your family like that. You're lucky that you have people who care so much about you that they would question and attack people who they believe may hurt you."

He gave me a shocked look not knowing how to react to my Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde attitude. Honestly, I wouldn't know how to react to my outburst either.

"I want you to come home with me, Cupcake, so that I can keep you safe. I can't keep you safe when you're running around doing god knows what for that asinine job of yours. Just look at your apartment!" he roared pointing at my burning apartment.

Tears continued to pour down my eyes.

"You don't even know this guy and you're putting your trust in him? Why? Because he's one of Ranger's thugs—"

"—Don't you dare say anything further about Ranger or his men, Joe," I cut him off.

"Fine," he held up his hands. "But you could've been killed. What if you were in there when the explosion happened?"

"Well, I wasn't and I'm fine," I dug my heel into the ground and said firmly. "I'm not going home with you, Joe. I'm going home with Lester."

"You don't even know him!" his eyes filled with rage.

"But I trust him. You need more reasons for me not going with you? Here's more reasoning," I tossed the manila envelope from my purse on the ground in front of him. "I don't need you to get hurt too because of me. Come on, Lester. I want to go now," grabbed his arm and walked towards his car.

Lester pulled out of the lot and drove about a block away. "Thanks for standing up for me back there," he said breaking the silence.

"I shouldn't have had to stand up for you," I muttered. "You can drop me off at the corner over there," I pointed out at the next intersection.

"Why? You have a friend that lives there?"

I shook my head, "I just don't want to involve you any further than I already have. Ramirez is after people that are seen with me. I'll find a motel to stay for the night."

"Like hell you are!" he said quickly and sped down the road.

"Where are you going?" I panicked.

"The bachelor pad," he smiled.

I scrunched my nose.

"Trust me. You're going to love it there."

"How do you know that?"

"Because I'm there," he grinned.

I took quick glimpses over at Lester while he drove. His eyes were focused on the road. His presence was uncanny to Ranger especially when he was serious. He was slimmer than Ranger like light Ranger. Don't get me wrong he had an impressive body and you could tell he had rippling muscles. The difference was that Ranger had muscle bulk.

"He's my cousin."

"Huh?" I looked at him confused.

"Ranger."

"Oh," I replied quietly. And obviously ESP runs in the freaking family.

He grinned, "Beautiful, you're gorgeous when you have arguments with yourself in your head. Your face is very expressive."

I smacked him on the arm.

"Ranger and I grew up together. We joined the Army Rangers together too but we served in different platoons. We're more like brothers and now we work together or more like I work for Ranger. He's always been the one with the business sense. I can't get serious enough to take on the responsibility," he grinned at me.

"What about Tank, Hal, and Bobby?" I asked. At least this Ranger version seemed to be open and spoke freely.

"Beautiful, I'm a thousand times better than my cuz so you shouldn't be comparing us," he chuckled.

Damn that ESP.

"Tank is Ranger's best friend, right hand man, and second in command at Rangeman. Hal is an employee of Rangeman. I don't know much about him, he just started about a month ago, but he seems to be a pretty good guy. Bobby and I served together in the same platoon, he's a good man. He's the Rangeman medic. We go way back. So what's with you and my cousin?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean exactly what I asked. What's going on between you and my cousin?'

"Uh, he's my friend," I hesitated flushing red thinking about the last kiss I shared with him in the alley.

"That's it?" he raised an eyebrow. So Ranger-like.

"And he's my mentor. He's been helping me to become a better bounty hunter."

"Beautiful, you must learn pretty fast because what you did with Curtis the other night was phenomenal. But are you sure there's nothing else going on between you and my cousin?"

"Why do you keep asking that?"

He shrugged, "He's never invested this much attention into someone before especially one of the female variety."

I scrunched my nose.

"Beautiful, every time my cousin talks about you to the men he gets as serious as a man can get and all of us are scared of what he would do if we were to fail to protect you. I've never seen him care about anyone this much before. My life flashed before my eyes when I saw you go into that burning building. Ranger would've killed me!"

"Whatever," I said rolling my eyes.

"I'm serious, Beautiful. The man has it bad for you. He's made sure every man at Rangeman is on call to ensure your safety. He's exhausted every resource we have to make sure that we cover the little Bombshell Bounty Hunter. We have strict instructions that not a single hair on your body is to be harmed."

Ranger's exhausted all of his resources to ensure my safety? Why would he do that? "By the way, how is it that you guys always know where I am and seem to just pop up out of nowhere?"

"That's a trade secret, Beautiful," he smiled. "Ta-da! We're here," he gestured to a quaint brownstone.

"Cute."

"Beautiful, a man's home is not cute," he grabbed Monster from the backseat and stepped out of the car.

Lester's apartment was definitely a guy's home. The décor was covered in neutral grays and blues, nothing too personal was set up in the apartment just the essentials and of course the Xbox 360 in the living room and big flat screen TV.

"Let's get you cleaned up. Because frankly, Beautiful, you look like you were at a bbq and you were the meat," he bared a toothy grin.

"You don't look so hot yourself, Santos," I shot back sticking my tongue out at him.

"Why the hell would you risk your life running into a burning building to save a dying plant and a shoebox?"

"Monster is not dying," I defended. "He's just adapting. And you have to promise not to look in this box. In fact, don't look at the box much less think about the box."

"Ok."

"Promise!"

"I promise, Beautiful. You can trust me."

I nodded my head adamantly, "Can I put it in your closet then?"

"Sure," he led me to his bedroom. His bedroom was the same color scheme as the living room.

His bedroom was surprisingly clean with a large king size bed that you could fall into and get lost in.

"I see you're checking out the best part of the house," he leaned into my ear and said in a low deep sultry voice.

I blushed. He took the box out of my hands and placed it on the shelf inside of his walk-in closet.

"I'll be a gentleman and let you get cleaned up first. Towels are in the linen closet," he pointed to the door next to the closet.

"Thank you."

The hot shower was exactly what I needed, and Lester's showerhead was a godsend. I stepped out of the shower toweling my hair and looked down at my sooty burnt clothes crumpled on the floor. There was no saving those clothes so I picked them up and stuffed it into the trashcan. Wrapping the towel tightly around my body I carefully stepped over to the door. I stopped myself from opening the door when I heard Lester talking.

Leaning my ear to the door, I tried listening in on what who he was talking to.

"She's staying with me, man. She's perfectly fine — Yeah she ran into the burning building for a dead plant and shoebox — What's with the shoebox? — No, she wouldn't tell me — Hey man, if you don't call it, I will. I'd call dibs and snap her right up…"

My face burned. Lester was obviously on the phone with Ranger and talking about me like I was some sort of object.

"Hey, man, because you're my cousin and all, I'll back off. But she's one hell of a girl…"

I heard enough shoving the door open and stepped into the bedroom. "Les, I don't have any clothes. I had to throw them out on account that they were all tattered and torn," I said loudly hoping Ranger would here.

"Look man, I gotta go. There's a gorgeous naked woman standing in my bedroom and I need to tend to her," he grinned hanging up the phone.

"Oh shit, did you just hung up on Batman? You're a dead man now."

"Yeah but it was worth it," he grabbed me around the waist and pulled me and kissed me on the forehead. "Mmm…mmm…mmm…the things I would love to do to you, Beautiful!" he disappeared into the closet and returned with a large black t-shirt and tossed it towards me.

"Make yourself at home. I'm going to jump in the shower real quick and I'll call out for dinner," he called out to me before disappearing into the bedroom.

I pulled on the oversized black v-neck t-shirt that hung about an inch below my butt with the neck stopping short of my cleavage. I grabbed the throw off of the back of the couch and wrapped myself in it and settled into his comfy oversized couch.

I flipped through the channels trying to find something to take my mind off of seeing Lula's body dangling from my fire escape and the explosion. What was I going to do about Ramirez? Who blew up my apartment? Was it Ramirez or was it the Slayers? If my car hadn't broken down in the middle of the road, I would've been home by the time the apartment blew up.

My mind was reeling with "what ifs" and then drifted to the thought of Ranger. Was he really bleeding money for me? How was I supposed to react to this? Do I feel flattered because he cares that much about me or should I be offended that he thinks I need protecting?

What was with the kiss in the alley? Ranger was like this unattainable dream. The women of Gotham City swoon at the thought of being a part of Batman's life but in truth he never is capable of settling down with anyone because of his inner demons and the dangers that come with his life. What were Ranger's inner demons?

My mind lingered back to the kiss...

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

I woke up to the smell of greasy cheesy goodness, "Mmm…that smells great."

"Sleeping Beauty awakens by the smell of food. Good to know," Lester chuckled.

"How long was I out?"

"Not long, maybe an hour."

"Sorry, I didn't realize how exhausted I was until now."

"You know you mumble in your sleep."

"Really?"

"Yup, you're in my apartment, with your naked body pressed up against my shirt, and you'll be sleeping in my bed, but all you can do is keep mumbling my cousin's name? It hurts my ego, Beautiful."

I blushed, "I did not!"

"God's honest truth, Beautiful," he raised his right hand.

"Geez, it's just that I was thinking about why he would be trying so hard to protect me earlier while you were in the shower so it must've been floating in my mind."

"The answer's obvious. The man's got it bad for you. That's the only reason why a man would go to those great lengths for a girl other than their family."

"And you guys are doing it because you're following orders?"

"I can't speak for the others but I'm doing it because there's something special about you, Beautiful. Saw it the moment I laid eyes on you. You've captured my heart."

"God, you're a smooth talker," I teased.

"Is it working?" his eyes twinkled.

"Possibly," I replied stealing a slice of pizza. "God…" I moaned loudly after taking a bite.

"Beautiful, you could give a man a heart attack from those sounds."

"Sorry," I blushed. "It's just so good. Where's it from? Cause I didn't think any pizza could be as good as Pino's."

"Shorty's it's better than Pino's."

"That's blasphemy! But I will admit it's pretty close to being on the same ranks as Pino's. So do you live here alone?"

"No, Bobby lives here too," he waved his beer in the direction of the other door.

I chugged my beer and had another bite of pizza.

"What do you want to watch, Beautiful?"

"Terminator," I answered without hesitating.

"Seriously?"

"Yeah, what's wrong with that?"

"Nothing. I think I'm in love," he kissed my forehead.