The Fever

by financebabe

Stephanie agrees to help Ranger after he contracts a dangerous virus on a mission. Unfortunately, neither of them are prepared for the way this will change their lives or their friendship.

21. Curiosity Killed the Cat

None of the characters are mine. Thanks to JE for giving me such great guys to work with.

Fredda (Rangergirl1234) thank you again for working so quickly and kindly as the beta on this story.

Chapter 21 – Curiosity Killed the Cat

Ranger's POV

The door closed behind me and even though I hated leaving Stephanie, I could tell by the look on Lester's face she was in good hands. I had seen my cousin in battle situations before and he is one of the few people I would absolutely trust to have my back, even if it meant his own life. She would be safe with him.

I saw Tank speaking to Cal and ran over to them. Cal looked at me and asked, "Why are you here? Who's watching Steph?"

"You need to get your head in the game of securing the parking lot, and stop worrying about what I'm doing. She's with Lester and he's got his game face on." I told him, giving all the explanation I was willing to give.

"You know her; trouble seems to follow her everywhere. We could handle this." Cal pressed.

I'd had enough of being second guessed by the tattooed man in front of me. "You can get to work and keep your opinions to yourself, or you can get in the truck and go home. Either way, I'm done listening." I barked out.

Then I shifted my look to Tank and said, "Report."

"We've got movement on the top of that building," he pointed to a five story office complex approximately a hundred yards to the north. "And there's intermittent movement around the cars in the lot to the east." He said without pointing.

I nodded and put on the mirrored sun glasses from my pocket so that I could look more directly without having my gaze followed. There were two men in the parking lot and their heads would appear at one vehicle only to disappear and reappear near a different vehicle. On the roof top, the presence was a single individual standing perfectly still, but it was nearly impossible to see if there was anything in their hand or lying on the roof. Until they moved, there wasn't a lot we could do to completely secure the area.

I checked the angle of the roof to the door and calculated if we kept her at a level lower than half the height of the truck, and we moved the truck to be a couple feet closer he wouldn't have a shot. The two people in the parking lot I thought we could block out by keeping Steph between us and them. I didn't want her sitting around waiting any longer than was necessary after our conversation in the surgical suite, so I told Cal to move the truck and explained the way I needed it to be pointed to offer the most coverage.

It's possible I was overreacting and neither one of the threats was real, but I wasn't willing to bet Steph's life on a possibility. Satisfied with the angle of the truck, I told Tank to keep the two feet between the door and the truck secure. His bulk was enough to do that just by standing there.

I used the mic at my throat to alert Santos that we were ready for them, and then I knocked on the door two times. Our protocol usually said the person inside the building or vehicle would open the door to exit but when the door didn't open I decided to go in and check out the hold up.

As soon as the door opened my heart fell. I've been in combat situations where bullets were flying and I began to think my time on earth had ended but I was never afraid like I was when I saw Santos on the ground unconscious with his gun in his hand. I forgot about the mic and keeping a low profile and yelled, "Santos is down, I'm going in!"

I heard Tank conveying the information and knew he and Cal would follow me but I wasn't willing to wait on them. As soon as I entered the hall I knew Stephanie wasn't there. The feeling that I had when she was close by was gone and my panic only grew.

Kneeling beside Les I saw a small yellow dart and pulled it out while checking for a pulse. He was alive but he was out cold. I looked at the object in my hand closer; it wasn't like a typical fast acting dart with a drug painted on the tip. This seemed to have liquid in it, like it had a time release mechanism to keep the victim incapacitated for an extended period.

I heard footsteps thundering around the corner and didn't bother looking up. I knew if it was someone who was armed, Tank or Cal would take them out. Bobby knelt by my side and repeated the process of checking his pulse. "It's slow, but it's steady," He reported to everyone's relief. I gave him the dart and explained what I'd observed before standing up and looking for any sign of struggle or any clues about where Stephanie was.

It was a sterile hallway with nothing on the walls or floors. It was clean so there was no dust or dirt to leave a trail for us to follow. There were two doors off the hall and I had to assume one of them had been used to get access to the hall. Bobby had sealed the area from inside the doctor's office to prevent anyone coming in, and they had been locked when we checked on our way to the exit. I knew Bobby needed to stay with Santos until he woke up to be sure it was only a sedative that had knocked him out and his condition didn't change. That left three of us to cover the two doors.

I took charge, falling into a habit that had been ingrained in me after years of planning missions. "Brown, take Santos to the truck and monitor him there, and keep watch over the back of the building. If anyone tries to exit call us on the comm unit." He nodded and Tank helped him lift my cousin in a fireman's carry over his shoulder.

"We need to see what's behind those doors. My guess is that's where they took Steph. If they are both hallways we'll split up with you two taking the first one, and I'll clear the second." Both men nodded their understanding without question.

Tank approached the first door and used his powerful size fifteen boot to kick it open. A quick glance with weapons drawn showed it was a small janitor's closet. The ceiling was solid and there wasn't an air vent. This was definitely not the escape route.

I caught their eyes and we all knew that meant behind the other door was the path someone had used to get Stephanie out of the building. If the sedative dart used to take out Santos was so fast acting he didn't have time to fully draw his weapon then we needed to be aware as soon as the door opened that the same drug might be aimed at us.

As if he understood what I thinking Tank spoke up, "I'll clear the door first. If I go down, then it will buy you time to take out the shooter and get to Stephanie."

I would have liked to disagree and take the danger upon myself, it was how I usually handled things, but I couldn't risk being taken out and miss something that could bring my Babe back to me. I nodded and hoped he understood how much his possible sacrifice meant to me.

"Hang on Babe, we're coming," I said quietly to the charged air around me.

Stephanie's POV

I didn't need to open my eyes to know what had happened. I'd been kidnapped again and the fact that my hands and ankles were handcuffed together told me my assailant wasn't taking this lightly. There was a gag in my mouth which made me panic slightly, but I could hear Ranger's voice in my head from my apartment telling me to calm down, so I took a few deep breaths and tried to relax. There was no point in revealing how upset I was to my kidnappers.

I was afraid to look around in case someone was guarding me closely. Instead, I listened and tried to figure out where I was. It felt like I was moving and the hard surface I was laying on made me guess I was in the back of a truck. Whatever I had been drugged with took me out right away, so without knowing where I was, I had no way of knowing how long I'd been missing. I wondered if the guys even knew I was gone yet.

Almost as if on cue, I felt the truck come to a sudden stop, and after a few seconds there were two distinct voices and the doors to the truck were opened. "Take her into the back and put her in the closet. Don't take the dart out until you are ready to shut the door. I want her to panic when she wakes up and has no idea where she is. Once we hear her screaming for help, then we'll begin to work on her to make a movie for Mr. Manoso that he'll never forget."

Someone grabbed my ankles and slid me to the end of the truck scraping my face and testing my resolve to be quiet. I had to force myself to go limp to keep up the act that I was asleep. If they thought I was going to scream for help, they had another thing coming. There was no way they were going to use me as a part of a sick plan to hurt Ranger. I just had to stay 'asleep', and then when he locked me in the closet, I'd work on getting out of the cuffs. I could use the circulation in my arms again.

Ranger's POV

We got to the end of the hall and it led us to a stairwell. We took the single flight of stairs and it opened to a mechanical room with a door to the outside at the side of the building. My hopes sank as the sun hit my face and I had to accept the reality that she was gone. She had been taken right from underneath me and Cal was right; I shouldn't have left her alone. She knew something was wrong and I left her. Now my cousin was unconscious and my heart was gone.

Tank pointed up, "There's a camera at the side of the building pointing to this exit. Let's go see if they use it."

I holstered my gun and nodded that they should go ahead and do that. I was having a hard time pushing my emotions away and I needed to get control in order to focus on my goal of finding Stephanie. Tank disappeared immediately and Cal hung back. I wasn't in the mood for a lecture, but figured I deserved one anyway so I didn't cut him off when he approached me to say something.

"Don't worry, man. We'll find her." He said with a slap on my back before walking back to the door.

"Wait," I stopped him. "That's it?"

"What were you expecting? Did you think I was going to blame you for this?" He asked. My silence must have been answer enough. "I told you, this kind of shit just happens to Steph. We've got to focus on getting her back. I know it's killing you that she's gone. I know what she means to me and how hard it has made it to focus. If I were in your shoes, I'd be about to fall apart. You didn't do this, but you are the one person that has the skills to get her back. Stay out here and get yourself together, and then come back inside to lead the charge."

With that he left me alone. I didn't know what to do next. I'd never been in a position before that I didn't know what to do. I knew Tank would find out about the tape, and if there was anything on it we'd get a copy to review. Right now Cal was right. I needed to get a grip so that I could find Steph. It's what I did and what I was good at. But there was a feeling in my stomach I'd never had before, and I didn't know what to do with it. I needed Stephanie here to help me channel that feeling. She understood me as no other had, and would know what I needed to hear.

My face felt wet and I reached my hand up and realized I had allowed tears to escape. It had been years since I'd done something like that. I brushed them off, quickly realizing I was allowing myself to panic and fall apart; the very thing I drilled into the men that they should never do. I knew Castillo had Stephanie and since he probably wanted to make me suffer I doubted he would kill her right away. He had a reputation for teaching lessons in Columbia and I figured he wouldn't have left that skill at home. Steph was alive and I needed to find her before Mateo became bored with the game of taunting me.

Thinking of it that way made me angry and I finally had an emotion I knew how to handle. The door was still open behind me and without thinking I turned around and hit it with my fist. That was probably not the smartest thing I've ever done as the throbbing set in almost immediately, but the satisfaction of hitting something felt good. I was ready. The pain in my hand would keep me focused if I started to drift back into useless emotions.

Mateo had no idea what he had done. Only Stephanie knew how to handle the beast within me. Castillo had let it lose, and with no one there to tame it, my instinct to hunt and kill was itching to be freed.

Stephanie's POV

The creep carrying me let me fall onto the floor making no attempt to soften the blow. I was biting my tongue to keep from screaming when my hand hit the floor and I landed on top of it. The next time I ran into Joe Morelli I was going to hit him again for breaking my hand with his hard head. Hopefully, I'd still have a cast on, so it would do more damage to him than me.

I felt someone pull at my neck and assumed that was the dart they had used to drug me. I wasn't sure how quickly I was supposed to wake up once they pulled it out but I was going to be quiet no matter what. They took the gag out of my mouth and threw it over my face. I heard a different voice and realized there were at least three people involved in my capture. Neither of the two voices talking sounded mature nor in control enough to be Mateo, so I assumed he wasn't nearby.

The two goons decided to put a jar in the closet with me in case I needed to go to the bathroom because neither of them was willing to clean it up if I made a mess. I was actually grateful for their thoughtfulness despite the motivation. It would make staying in the closet quietly for longer possible. Then one of them with a softer voice added, "I'm putting some water in there too. I don't want her to get sick because we didn't take care of her. Enough has already changed from what this was supposed to be." Without any other explanation of what that was supposed to mean, they shut the door and I heard nothing.

The silence told me the door must be unusually thick because I knew they had been talking. That gave me the courage I needed to open my eyes. Of course it was pitch black in there with no light, so it didn't do me much good to try and look around. Not being able to see brought back the feeling of helplessness when Stiva had me in a coffin. I could feel my hands getting sweaty and my breathing was getting faster. I needed to get out of this closet.

'Stop it!' I yelled in my head. These emotions were getting me nowhere, except further away from my goal of getting loose. If they thought I was still out, I probably had some time before they checked on me again. I needed to get out of the cuffs and use that jar so I would be prepared to wait them out.

It was awkward and hard to move with my hands cuffed behind me but I eventually got myself into a seated position. Thank goodness I'd asked Ranger to help me learn this while we were stuck in my apartment. I never thought I'd look back at his illness as a good thing, but I suppose in many ways it was. It brought us together. Now I just had to find a way to get us back that way.

I needed something to pick the lock on the cuffs. I quickly thought about what I had on me. My earrings were small so they wouldn't work, and I didn't have a necklace on. My watch was a mechanical one so it probably had a post in it somewhere that would work. Unfortunately I had no way to get it off or open to get to the parts inside. Who was I kidding? I wasn't MacGuyver, and this was way over my head.

I allowed my head to fall back against the wall and took a deep breath to regroup. Then I scooted around letting my fingers comb over the floor trying to find something that could be a tool. Finally my fingers came across an object about three inches long and hard metal. It got bigger at the back and came to a very sharp point. The idiots had taken the dart out of my neck and thrown it on the floor. I knew it would work as long as it didn't break off in the lock.

It felt like it was taking forever, but in reality, it probably only took me fifteen minutes to pick the lock and get my hands free. The pain that flooded my arms when I was able to move them caught me off guard, but in the back of mind I thought I remembered one of the guys talking about that just being the return of proper circulation and if I'd move them despite the pain it would go away quicker. Thank goodness they were right and when the pain began to go away I tackled the job of getting my feet free.

With both of the restraints gone I felt around and located the wide mouth Mason jar the guys threw in the closet with me. This wasn't going to be my finest hour, but I knew it was a good idea, so I let modesty go and swallowed my pride.

Ranger's POV

Tank had succeeded in getting the tapes from the security office of the doctor's building. I went to the truck at the back and we agreed since there was no trace of her here, we'd go back to the building to watch it and get a plan of action. Cal had called Woody, Binkie, Hal and Ram in and they were in the parking lot ready for orders. All the guys wanted to be a part of trying to find Stephanie. I had to remember this wasn't just my pain; losing her was a blow to all of us.

I told them to divide into partners and talk to the patients in the doctor's office and anyone in the area to see if they had any information. Knowing there was still someone in the neighborhood in case something developed made me more comfortable about leaving for Haywood.

When I got in the SUV, Lester was sitting up drinking a bottle of water with Bobby eyeing him carefully. "All of it, man. You need to flush it out of your system," the medic instructed.

Lester's jaw was set and there was a dark color in his eye I had only seen a few times in my life. It usually came out right before the knife left his hand- being thrown with lethal accuracy. My cousin was pissed, and at the moment I knew exactly how he felt.

"You okay?" I asked him.

He nodded and then his head dropped slightly. "I'm sorry man. I tried. Steph knew someone was there. She saw the movement, and by the time I turned and got my gun at the ready, he was already firing. I put myself in front of her, but in the end it didn't do any good if he took her anyway."

"Of course it did some good," I told him, wanting to end his taking the blame for her abduction. At the moment I saw the guilt over her kidnapping as mine alone and I wasn't willing to let him shoulder that for me. "It gave her a minute to see the guy that did this. She's had some training and should be able to keep herself going for a while. If she is able to identify who did this, she may be able to reach us with the information and it will make finding her that much easier."

"She was telling me to look out when he shot the gun. She was worried about me." He added softer.

"Of course she was," Bobby chimed in to my relief. "She's always thinking about other people. But Ranger's right. There was nothing else you could do. You bought her some time and you sacrificed yourself to try and save her. You know she'll remember that when we get her back." You could always count on Bobby to look at the brighter side. I wouldn't call him an optimist; he'd seen too many horrors in the Ranger's with us for that. But he did believe in Stephanie. I guess having patched her up so many times when she'd survived the impossible had taught him to never give up on her.

When we got upstairs, Junior and Vince had set up the largest conference room as the control center. Hector had brought in some laptops and hooked up a projector for us to view the disk immediately. They'd also gotten some more information on Castillo who we all assumed was the one responsible. It was a visible reminder that my men were the best at what they did.

The security footage didn't offer much. The door we suspected he'd used to get her out of the building opened and a man that was definitely not Castillo came out with her thrown over his shoulder. He practically threw her into the back of a van and I heard Bobby hiss, recognizing how much that would have hurt. Her hands were cuffed behind her and there was another set around her feet.

Then the man that fired the gun got in the passenger side of the van and it drove off, turning right at the end of the parking lot. So there were at least two men involved. Hector began clicking away at the computer and I saw he was trying to enlarge and enhance the picture of the driver.

It was grainy, but the man had darker skin and a beard. I couldn't guarantee it, but my gut told me it was Mateo.

"I'll kill him," Lester growled from behind me.

"You'll have a hard time doing that if he's dead when you get there," Cal bit back implying he wanted to be the one to take Castillo's life.

It wasn't the first time they'd heard me say something like this, but I felt the need to be sure they understood me, "No, when Mateo comes face to face with his maker, I'll be the one to make the invitation. You can teach him whatever lesson you think is necessary, but the last voice he'll hear on this earth will be mine."

I made eye contact with every man in that room to be sure they heard me. No one looked away and no one said a word.

Stephanie's POV

The trouble with being in the dark was that you had no way to know how much time had passed. I was bored and I didn't know if the idiots on the other side of the door should be expecting to hear from me at any moment, or if this was going to take a while. I stood up slowly, trying to keep from hitting my head if there was a shelf in the closet, and smiled when I was able to stretch fully. It felt good to move so I raised my hands and wiggled my legs.

I wondered what the guys were doing. If I had to guess, I'd say one of the conference rooms had been converted into a central control room for the purpose of finding me. I envisioned Hector running a series of complicated programs, trying to dig up information on Castillo, and Ranger sitting perfectly still ready to spring into action.

I thought back to yesterday when he'd attacked me, practically vibrating from having controlled his emotions for so long, and then being unable to shut down the jealousy that crept in. I wondered if he was being short with the guys and if they'd understand and let it go, or if they'd gotten in his face and challenged him to do more to find me. I hoped Cal wasn't being an ass. I loved him, and appreciated his friendship, but he'd gotten into a bad habit of speaking his mind to Ranger and I hoped he would control it for a while.

I was still stretching my arms over my head when the door opened suddenly, catching me off guard so that I squealed in response.

I didn't recognize either of the faces in front of me, but the man behind them was definitely one I knew from the picture I saw on-line. "Mr. Castillo," I said, letting him know I knew who he was and I tried to hide the fact that seeing the evil in his eyes made me thankful I'd used that jar earlier.

"Miss Plum, I'm glad you're awake. I have to say I was surprised we didn't hear from you, so I had my associates double check that you were still alive. I see now that you were busy getting out of your restraints which shows your resiliency. I think I'm going to enjoy breaking you." Castillo's deep voice said.

I didn't want to rise to the bait, but I figured the longer I kept him talking the longer I had before he did something to hurt me. "What makes you think I can be broken?"

He laughed softly before responding, "Everyone can be broken; the challenge is to see what it takes to do it. You see, I already know there is no physical pain on earth that will break Mr. Manoso, but I believe seeing you endure the torture that should have been his will do the job nicely. Then all I have to do is sit back and wait for him to come after me. The rage will have him so blinded to his surroundings that eliminating him will be easy."

"Other people have said eliminating Ranger would be easy, but none of them are alive to testify to the ludicrous nature of that statement." I responded, trying to sound defiant.

He laughed once more, which began to irritate me. "I am sorry for what we are going to do to you. I like your spirit, and I believe had we met under different circumstances, I might have enjoyed getting to know you. As a favor, once you have served your usefulness and Mr. Manoso has been eliminated, I will personally see to it that you are terminated quickly to avoid any unnecessary suffering."

What did one say to that? 'Oh wow, thanks Mr. Bad guy with a gun. That is really something to look forward to.' Instead I went with, "Somehow I doubt that we would have hit it off. I've known for Ranger for several years and it has made me a much better judge of lesser men."

The snicker left his face, and even though I was glad to see it go, a nagging voice in the back of my head told me making him angry probably wasn't a good idea.

Mateo gave a command and the two guys that had opened the door rushed at me at once, each grabbing an arm thus making my new self defense techniques difficult to use. I figured since there were three of them, and they each appeared to have guns tucked in their waistbands, I shouldn't resist too much. Maybe if an opportunity to fight them came up later I could handle them one at the time if my skills were a surprise. Cal told me to fight dirty and that anything was appropriate if I was defending my life. My mind began to race with some of the dirty tricks I'd like to surprise these guys with.

I allowed the two goons to lead me to another room. We were in a small house but there were curtains drawn over all the windows so I had no way of knowing where the house was located. I thought I could see some light coming in around the windows and since my stomach wasn't growling yet I figured we hadn't been here too long. It must be just a few hours since they got me. I just needed to keep them distracted.

"So how, exactly, are you planning on using my torture to break Ranger?" I asked walking slower down the narrow hall.

No one answered, but when they opened the door to what I assumed was the master bedroom I figured it out on my own. The only furniture in the room was a twin bed with clean white sheets and an iron headboard with slats, a little table that had a cloth covering something, and a complicated looking camera with cables running to a series of laptops. I knew from Hector someone could create a server loop with multiple computers which would make tracing the signal much harder. Still, if he was smart he could only send blasts of less than two minutes or Hector would be able to figure out where we were. At least what ever they were going to do wouldn't last that long each time.

Apparently the plan was to chain me to that bed, torture me with the tools under that cover, and send the footage they were recording to Ranger. I needed to stay tough and in control. I needed to find a way to let them know that I was in a house in order to help them find me. I knew that any clue would be helpful and I was going to stay focused on being a part of my own rescue.

Just as I suspected, the goons pulled out new handcuffs and spread my arms to attach them to opposite sides of the bed. My feet were left alone for now. I wasn't sure if that was good news or not but I was choosing to believe it was a good thing.

Castillo was looking at the camera, sizing up the image I made on the clean sheets. "Now Miss Plum, we can do this easily, or not. The choice is entirely yours. I need Mr. Manoso to believe you are in intense pain. So if you give me what I need, we will stop hurting you. But if you decide to play tough then we will continue to increase the pressure until I get the results I am after."

While I was thinking over his words he looked at the man to my right and said, "Begin,"

The towel was pulled back from the table and I saw a tray with an assortment of objects. Some of them were easy to identify and others confused me completely. I guess if I tried to stay strong I would eventually get to see what they all did. Ironically, my usual sense of curiosity was completely gone at the minute.