Standard disclaimer applies.

Warning for mild language.

Thank you to everyone who has reviewed so far, and to Annie for helping me out with ideas. Thanks, Babe.

Chapter 33

"What do you want, Joe?"

"Why so twitchy? Don't you want to talk to one of your longest friends. And who's the goon with you?"

"Joe, shut up. We just came back yesterday and I'm in no mood for this."

"What do you mean, 'we' came back yesterday?" He was getting angry, Lil forgotten. Not a smart move.

"We were in the wind, as Ranger puts it." No need to give up further information.

"Yeah, I got that. Nobody has seen you for more than three months. Not even your mom knew where you were."

"I didn't tell Mom where I was going, because first, it's confidential, and secondly I didn't know it myself until we were flown out." I was getting a bad feeling. Joe was coming nearer and nearer and I was retreating.

"Who went with you? And why can't you stand still?" He was hovering above me, not a good idea in my current situation.

"The whole core team went, including Lil." Lil was standing slightly behind me, keeping an eye out for trouble, but not interfering in my discussion with Joe.

At the mentioning of the whole core team Joe looked up. "The core team? Shit." He was angry and yelling at me, drawing the attention of everyone around us. We had gathered quite a crowd, and Joe hadn't even noticed that his voice was rising. "You could have been killed." He took another step forward and grabbed my arms, shaking me.

That was when my training kicked in. He was holding me tight, but he wasn't the first to do so. I knew how to get out of his hold. I let my weight sag a little, changing his balance and was free. I followed it through with some fancy throw TK had taught me and had him to the floor, face down, gun to his head. I didn't think about what I was doing, I just did.

Thankfully Lil reacted before I could shoot Joe, but it was a close call. Lil was crouching down in front of me, whispering in Spanish to me.

"Moxie. Calm down. He's not the enemy. Let him go." He repeated it over and over, until I felt Ranger's presence in the room. He crouched down beside Lil, looking at me. When I finally met his eye he reached his hand out, waiting for me to take it.

I took his hands and he stood, pulling me up against him, engulfing me in the safety of his embrace. He pried my gun out of my fingers and let his hands run soothing circles on my back.

"What happened, Babe?"

I was snuggled into his chest, so my words were muffled, but he understood me. "I don't know. I've been feeling off, the whole day, I was totally overwhelmed in the office yesterday, and I freaked when Connie and Lula hugged me this morning. And then Morelli started yelling and he grabbed my arms and started shaking me. And then I just reacted. I...I could have killed him." I was sobbing, tears running down my cheeks. I didn't know what was wrong with me, but it scared the hell out of me.

"Shh, calm down Babe. You didn't shot him. Everything is okay. Nobody was hurt."

"But what's wrong with me? I didn't even know what I was doing until you came. It didn't even really register what Lil was saying to me."

"You're going to be fine. You have to readjust to civilian life again. Your senses are still tuned on combat mode. He was in your personal space and you reacted. It was your training kicking in. There's nothing wrong with that. That's what we were trained for. In a combat situation that could have saved your life. You'll get used to it again, and it gets easier. We all felt that way when we came back from our first missions." He had finally calmed me down enough that I felt strong enough to leave the safety of his arms.

"What the hell happened here Cupcake? Why did you throw me on the floor?"

I had no idea how to answer him, but thankfully Ranger did it for me. "Have you ever been on a mission, Morelli?" He had switched back to English I noticed. It didn't even cross my mind that we had been talking Spanish all along.

He shook his head.

"Ever been out of communication, nobody knew where you were, what you were doing? No social contact other than the members of your team?"

Again he shook his head.

"Then you have no right to judge her, or any of us. You have no idea how it is to come back and to be thrown in the normal life of people who can't even begin to imagine what happened while you were gone. Everybody expects you to act like you were on vacation, but nothing could be further from the truth. You can be thankful that Lil was with her or she might have followed through with it."

The guys around us were speechless, staring at Ranger. They had never heard him say that much, but one after one, they started nodding, understanding what had happened here.

"Cupcake, you mean to tell me that you've got the same training he has? You do the same fucking jobs for the government?" Joe was still pissed, but thankfully he kept his distance. I still hadn't left Ranger's arms.

"You remember when I left for more than a half year?"

I was looking him straight in the eye, willing him to understand how important that was for me. He nodded.

"I went to get training, Seals and Rangers. And yes I do the same fucking jobs for the government as Ranger, because we are a team."

"Fuck. Do you even know what kind of contract you signed? You can't get out of a contract like this until they throw you out. Are you fucking insane?" He was yelling again and I fought to keep my cool.

"Actually Joe, I know damned well what kind of contract I signed, and I can end it whenever I want to."

"You believe that? The shit he keeps feeding you?"

He had crossed a line and he didn't even realize it.

"Sorry to break it to you, but I'm not stupid. I can read and I read the contract before I signed it. And yes, I can get out of it whenever I want to. Now let me alone, I'm done with you. You're wearing my patience thin. I came back yesterday, dead tired on my feet. I do my job and bring Mooner down to reschedule and you all you do is yell at me. You should be fucking happy that I didn't shoot you. I'm not afraid of my gun anymore, and I don't miss. I went through fucking sniper training you stupid bastard. Now let me the hell alone."

"But this job will get you killed! When are you going to come to your senses. Your incapable of doing this job."

"When are you going to stop with this shit? You should know by now that I'm damn well capable of doing my job. You should be freaking thankful that I', a bounty hunter, that it was me Vinnie gave your file when you went FTA. I helped you to clean our name you maroon. Had it been Ranger's job to bring you in, he would have brought you in, no questions asked and you would be rotting in jail now for a homicide. Don't you get it? I love my job and I'll continue with it. And now shut up."

I felt better after my rant, but now that the adrenaline was wearing off I also remembered that Mooner was still lurking around somewhere. And my arm started to hurt again.

"Let's go home." Ranger said from behind me.

"What about Mooner?"

"Lil, can you take him?"

"Yeah, I'll find his house and the way back."

He nodded, grabbed Mooner's arm to steer him out and was off.

Ranger tugged me into his side and we walked out to his car. I stopped and looked up at him. "How did you know what was going on?"

"Eddie called me. He told me that you had Morelli down on the floor with a gun to his head and Lil squatting in front of you. I told him to keep the rest at bay and I went down. I was in the area anyways."

"Thank you. I heard that Lil was talking, but I had no idea what he was telling me. It was like a annoying fly you can't shake off, but it didn't register what he said. Without your showing up I have no idea what I might have done to him." I was actually pretty calm about it now, although slightly embarrassed.

"I got you, Babe. I love you."

"I love you, too." And I stood up on my tiptoes and kissed him, with passion and heat.

Ranger was the first to pull back. "Let's go home. I know just the thing to get your mind off of things.

We drove home in silence each of us in our zones. I was still mulling over the day's events, trying to wrap my mind around what happened.

"Ranger, why did I freak like this and you and Lil didn't have these problems?" Sure, he was in his zone, but I had hope that he would maybe actually answer me.

"Two reasons. One, we're used to this kind of shit, we've out on a lot of missions, so that makes it easier when the mission wasn't too bad. Two, we've had two more days to adjust to normal life again. While you were out of it, we had time to socialize and change our mind sets back. You'll get to it. You just have to be a little patient."

We had reached the garage by now and he was giving me his wolf grin. We got out and made our way up to the apartment, using the elevator.

"Did you have lunch yet?"

It was actually after 2pm, and I was starving, but stupid Morelli had distracted me.

"No. Did Ella bring something up?"

"No, but there's enough in the fridge to fix sandwiched. That okay with you?"

"As long as you make them."

Ranger made the sandwiches and we ate them, sitting at the breakfast bar. He cleaned up and told me to go ahead and get settled on the bed. I didn't know what he had in mind, so I just made a trip to the bathroom and then settled down in my thinking position.

When Ranger walked in his eyes darkened. "Not what I had in mind, but we'll get to it. Undress and I'll give you the massage of your life." Damn, there was that wolf grin again.

I undressed as he shed his clothes too.

"Settle down on your stomach and relax." He got up and turned the radio on, switching to some soft jazz. Not loud, only barely audible.

He came back to bed with a bottle of massage oil in hand, warming it up a little. Ranger settled down on top of my butt, legs astride my hips.

He poured some oil down my back and began massaging me. He was right. This massage was the best I had ever received and it didn't take long for me to fall asleep.

When I woke up it was getting dark outside. I got up, did my business in the bathroom and was about to walk into the living room when I heard that there were people talking. Oops, better got dressed before I joined them.

Wearing sweat pants and one of Ranger's shirts I walked out to find the assembled core team sitting on the dinning room table.

Ranger walked towards me. "Hey Babe, decided to join the living again?" He kissed me.

"Yep. I'm hungry. But what are all the guys doing here?"

"We had to discuss some business." Before I could start he added "I'll fill you in later."

The guys nodded their greeting and left. We had dinner and got back into bed. We talked a little about the day and I fell asleep again.

The next morning we got up to go running. After our shower which was surprisingly only to clean up, Ranger dropped the Bombshell on me. "There's a cookout Saturday afternoon."

"What do you mean?"

"The guys thought it would be fun to have a cookout, so they organized one."

"Who's invited?" Somehow I had a bad feeling about this. A very bad feeling.

"Don't look so scared. It's only my family and your family, as well as the guys on stuff who don't have to work."

"Damn. I have every right to be scared. And where will the party be?"

"On the roof of this very building. We've had this kind of party here before."

"Who's gonna prepare all the food? My family will want to see where I live and Val is going to nag. Albert will annoy the hell out of everybody and I've got nothing to wear. And what about Lula and Connie and Mary Lou and the families of the guys?" I was freaking a little bit.

"Stop. Ella's going to cook, as well as your mom, Momma and Abuela. You don't have to cook. We can invite Connie and Mary Lou as well, Lula was coming anyways. Do you want to invite only Mary Lou or her whole family?"

"Her whole family? Lenny could use some time off, and Mare would have some hot guys to look at."

"Hot guys?" The corner of his mouth was slightly tipped upwards. Great, I was amusing him again.

"All your guys are hot." He started to scowl at me. "But you're still the hottest." He grinned and kissed me.

"Good to know. So back to your freaking, nobody has to come into this apartment if you're uncomfortable with it. It's your decision, but you don't have to decide now. As for Val and the Kloughn, we'll find a way to shut them up. Maybe we can deposition them in one of the holding cells for the time being. Angie will just be herself and MA is pretty comfortable around the guys. As for the families of the guys, only a few of them are married, but some have girlfriends who have to clearing to come into the building. Fears lessened?"

"Yeah. Thanks. But that was the most I have ever heard you say when you weren't talking about a job."

He kissed me again and we made our way downstairs to get to work. Ranger went to catch up on paperwork and I started to spread the word. That was when Lil caught up with me.

"Hey Moxie, how ya doin'?"

"Better than yesterday, that's for sure. I've decided that maybe we should stay in today."

"Fine with me." He looked a little sheepish. "I know that the guys are calling you Bomber or Bombshell on occasion. Is it okay with you when I do so as well?" That explained the look.

"As long as you stay with Moxie when we're on the street it's okay. You already heard about the cook out?"

"Yeah. You up for it?"

"Should be. I'll probably go in lighter armed as yesterday, and besides Val the people who come should be pretty supportive, although my mom will me an earful because I was shot."

We had settled down in the break room to chat, mugs of coffee in hand.

"Who was the guy yesterday?" I looked interested, like it mattered what I told him.

"Joe Morelli, vice cop, former fiancé and ex-boyfriend. I broke up with him the day I left for Mexico. He always wanted to marry him, pop some bambinos out for him and cook for him. He never understood, that I would be going nuts living like this."

"So he has given you shit for how long now?" He seemed to be a little angry.

"A little longer than four years."

"How long do you know each other?"

I told him about the history that tied Joe and me together, about the choo-choo incident and the happenings behind the éclair- case, everything.

"You said that you were engaged at some point?"

"Yeah, I was staying at his house and we were about to get it on, when his mom and Grandma visited. They wanted to bring us something to eat and he just wanted to get me into bed. So he told them that we were engaged. He had neither asked me, nor had he a ring. He didn't mean it seriously, so we broke it up."

He nodded. "And through this whole time, Ric was right behind you?"

"Yeah, he caught me, whenever I fell.

The days went by, and before I knew where the time had gone it was Saturday, the day of the cookout.

Thank you all for reading.Please tell me what you think.