Thanks for your wonderful words and apologies for taking little longer to write this chapter. I found this really hard to put down on paper. There's so much to say in it...

So dark, so cold, so wet. Dios! If I have to die, please don't let it be here in this twisted hateful Gangland war, he thought... Please God, let me make it home. I have so much to live for. A woman who warms my bed, who warms my heart. Perhaps even a child if our timing was right. His thoughts turned to images of Steph cradling her belly, firm and round with his child... Focus! Snap out of it Soldier and FOCUS!

He turned to the man as his side. He couldn't see him or feel him but he could sense the tension he was giving off. He motioned for Hector to work his magic. In the darkness he felt his partner smile and then the bomb went off...

o0o0o0o0o0o

Steph lay on her bed, looking at the clue from Carlos. What on earth did it mean?

"how do you normally open them? Babe, if you understand this clue you'll win the prize. R xxx"

She sighed as she turned it over in her hand once more. The light from her bedside lamp reflected off her ring and made her stare up at the ceiling at the bright blue and white circles that danced as she moved it. Her 'real' engagement ring had arrived that morning and she had wasted no time in putting it on. It slid onto her finger and felt so right. The other one had been beautiful but this one felt like it was part of her. Now all she needed was to put its partner next to it.

"Please send him home to me, whatever it takes and no matter what state he's in. I'll heal him if I have to" she whispered as she rolled the jewels round her finger and back to the front again.

She picked up the love puzzle "Right. You! I've had enough now, let's get you opened" she said glaring at it. She sat up and turned it in her hand. It reminded her of... a chocolate orange! Of course! What was the strapline? - Whack it and unwrap it* - Surely it wasn't that simple? Perhaps, wherever he was Carlos was laughing. He'd know that she would get frustrated and agitated and would resort to violence... he knew her too well. Now, where did her fiancé keep his Maglite? She thought determinedly as she got up off the bed.

o0o0o0o0o0o

"Tank?"

"Yo"

"1400 hours, Wednesday. Be ready. We're going on your stag do. You'll be taking Ranger's place too so expect twice as much humiliation..."

Groan...

"We'll take that as a yes then" said the caller grinning. Lester hung up on the big man before he had a chance to say anything in reply.

Tank lowered his head to the desk and began banging it softly on its surface. What the hell had he just let himself in for?

o0o0o0o0o0o

Steph looked at the pieces strewn about the kitchen work surface and giggled triumphantly. She'd done it! The damn puzzle was complete and the prize lay in the middle of the mess of brown segments.

She put down the maglite and picked up a small key nestling in the mess she'd just created and turned it over in her hand to examine it. It was gold in colour and old fashioned looking with a soft dark green tassel hanging from the rounded bow. She knew exactly where it belonged as she'd seen its partner in the dining room of Ella's apartment. Hidden in plain sight.

She looked at the clock – 8.15, not too late to call?

No, in fact she'd wander down and knock on the door. She'd been cooped up in the apartment for too long and she needed to get out.

Minutes later she stood outside the Guzman's front door. OK, Manoso, what has this all been about she asked rhetorically. She knocked and Ella answered.

"Hello Dear!" Ella smiled, looking a tad confused.

Steph silently held up her hand containing the key.

"Ah!" said Ella, smiling and turning back into the apartment, pulling Steph gently behind her by her hand. She led her to the dining room where a small, beautiful, antique brown box sat, pride of place, in the middle of her sideboard. It had two locks on the front and in one of the holes was a key matching Steph's.

"May I?" Ella said gesturing for Steph to give her the key. She slid it home "I've always wondered what was in this box. Carlos told me it contained something special but I'd have to wait until the time was right. Should have known it was to do with you. I've had it a couple of years or so. In fact, I think he gave it to me just after Julie was kidnapped."

She moved out of the way and Steph stepped up to it and gently turned the keys, one after the other. Opening the lid she looked inside to see a DVD nestling on the sumptuous cushioned interior. Taking it out she looked at the writing on the front which said "Babe."

"Do you want to watch it here, Dear?" Ella asked after a little while. Steph had been holding it as if she couldn't decide whether it was friend or foe. "It won't be anything bad, Steph" Ella reasoned out loud. "After all, he loves you so much and wouldn't want to hurt you."

Steph nodded in agreement. Ella was right. All she had to do was sit down and watch it. Perhaps Ella should be there. She handed it over and followed her into the lounge, sitting down on one of the sofas as Ella powered up the DVD player.

Whilst she waited for the machine to finish saying "hello" she popped into the kitchen and came back with two bottles of water and a large box of tissues, just in case, obviously.

The two women sat, holding hands on the sofa as Carlos came into view. He was sitting in his study, all bandaged up after the Scrog affair.

"Hi Steph, if you're watching this I'm either dead or I finally got up the courage to tell you how I feel about you. I hope it's the latter." Carlos smiled gently before continuing. "So, why tell you this way? Easy, I knew I'd get your undivided attention plus being round you tends to affect my ability to think straight. I once said I had the muscle but that you had all the power. It's true. I just hide my feelings for you better than you hide your reactions to me."

Steph looked at Ella and grinned, so much for ESP...

"You always thought I had ESP. Wrong! You're just the most amazing woman I've ever met. Strong of heart and mind, but also strong of facial expression. You literally wear your heart on your sleeve and it's one of the many things I love about you, Babe."

He looked down at his hands and Steph could see a wry smile spread across his face as he lifted his eyes back up to the camera. "Babe, I hope that I've made you as happy as you've made me and that I am as precious to you as I can promise you are to me. If I am dead I hope we got our someday and that I didn't waste too much time getting round to telling you much I really love you. In my own way, yes, but that's the only way I know. You brighten my day, my life, my heart and I hope that I have been able to tell you this. I hope you love me too."

He smiled again and Ella gently squeezed Steph's hand for reassurance.

"I'm waffling, I know, but I mean every word. You are my everything. Always have been, always will, Babe. You are the Batcave – wherever you are is where my heart lies. As I said once before it's not on any GPS system, that's because it's inside of you." He coughed as if slightly embarrassed.

"If I am dead and gone I hope I got to take you on the holiday I always promised myself I would organise for you. Montreal, London, Barbados, Singapore, Mumbai... the list of places I wanted to show you is so long. I also hope that I organised it for our honeymoon, Steph, and that you enjoyed it as much as I would have done, revisiting my past and sharing it with you. I hope you agreed to marry me and to have our children. I want nothing more than to be the centre of your and their lives." He smiled indulgently at the camera before taking a deep sigh.

"I built Rangeman with the help of my partners, Pierre Dupres who you know as Tank, my father Luis Manoso, General Harris who signed me up into the Rangers and Senator Brackley who is a long standing family friend. I am the major shareholder. I am proud of what we have achieved and hope that it has grown from strength to strength and that you have been a part of that growth. I'd like to think that you used your wonderful spirit to charm our clients into loving us even more. You're good at making people love you, Babe. I'm sure your spidey senses are helping us out too. If only I had half your uncanny ability to know when something's not quite right..."

He looked wistfully at the camera before continuing. "I know that if I am dead and gone, the business will be safe in your hands and so I am giving you all of my shares in Rangeman. 65% - which makes you a very wealthy woman. Why? Because I know you are up to the task of running it with my other partners who will come to love and respect you as I have. Please speak to my attorney for all my other business activities. Nearly everything I have is yours, including 11 properties and my boat. I do hope I've taken you to Miami to enjoy it. You might even enjoy the name too." He smiled again. "Julie has been well taken care of and will never want materially for anything – unless she manages to blow the $18 million I've set aside in a trust fund for her!" He looked a little pained as he made that joke. "I've also left a couple of little things for other people who I care about but it's all documented in my will."

Steph gasped and turned to look at Ella. Holy Cow, Batman!

"The code for my safe is b9a8b7e6, please go and investigate. I think you'll be surprised at what you find, including Binkie, my teddy bear...

o0o0o0o0o0o

The time was 9.32, Carlos had just finished updating Steph on his life history, his immediate and not so immediate family, the past that made him the man he was, the real reason he sent her back to Joe. The whole shooting match. Some of it had really made her laugh, some had made her understand him more. All of it made her heart ache with love.

"... so in conclusion, Babe, all that's left to say is that I give you everything that I am but most of all I give you my heart. Forever. No qualifiers. "

"Now, either make me the happiest man in the world and let me look after your heart too or if I am dead, move on. Please. Take the love that I send you through this message and live again someday with someone else. If I am dead, know that you made me a very happy man and that I will do all that I can to persuade the Dumpster God to give you better car karma." He flashed a huge smile and then the screen went black.

Steph sat with huge tears running down her face, dropping onto Ranger's t-shirt. It still smelt of him and wrapped her in his warmth.

After a few moments, Ella stood up, patted her on her arm and headed silently off to the kitchen. She returned moments later with a big tub of Ben and Jerry's and a spoon. "Don't worry, Dear. He'll be back, he's got so much to live for. How far along are you, by the way?"

Steph looked up blankly.

"How pregnant are you, Steph?" she asked again.

"How-how did you guess?"

"Easy, you glow." She smiled smugly before sitting down and producing another tub of ice cream and another spoon. The two women sat in companionable silence, thinking about what Ranger had just told them. He had to come home, surely, now that he had another person to love. And she had a wedding to prepare for.

*here in the UK anyway! The original was tap it and unwrap it but as anyone who's ever tried it knows more brute force and ignorance is required and so the ad men realising this, decided humour was the better option and went for whack and unwrap instead.