ALL FAMILIAR CHARACTERS, PLACES, THINGS, ETC (STEPH, TANK, MERRY MEN, ETC) BELONG TO JANET EVANOVICH! This is just for fun, no money to be made.
As the stranger stepped forward, I heard the envelope crunch under his foot. It must've fallen to the floor during our retreat to the wall my back was now plastered against. After glancing down at it, he threw Ranger a sickening smile that I definitely didn't like the look of. He bent down to pick it up, taking his eyes away from us, so I decided to take the chance to do what I thought Ranger should've done by now and raised my gun to shoot the bastard. It's unlike me, I know, but it seems necessary right about now.
In the brief second that he was bent over, just as I was about to pull the trigger, I saw the tiniest movement over scar-face's shoulder but it was gone when he stood back up straight. I realized it was Tank at the same time Ranger fired a shot aimed directly at the heart of the man in front of him.
Almost as if the man knew it was coming, he moved slightly. It wasn't fast enough to get out of the way of the bullet, but enough for it to land in his shoulder as opposed to the heart. To make things even more bizarre, the man only LAUGHED. He turned around a took a shot at Tank, somehow knowing he was approaching from behind. Ranger turned and pushed me to the floor before firing again, this time missing scar-face as he moved out of the way. The bullet lodged itself in the door frame instead.
I was scurrying to take cover behind the desk when I heard his chilling voice again "Come on Manoso, I know I taught you better than that." Taught him? Who the hell was this guy?
"Your beef is with me, leave her out of it." Ranger growled. So maybe all this wasn't my fault?
"Don't be mistaken, I'll settle that one with you and you alone, I haven't forgotten. I'm here for an entirely different reason." His gaze traveled towards where I still sat on the ground. I'm not sure what frightened me more, the hungry look in his eyes or what he said next. "I can see why you protect her like you do. She's one to lock up for sure". I could've sworn he licked his lips and suddenly the urge to throw up was overwhelming. So maybe this was my fault.
I didn't get the chance to find out because the room was in motion again. Ranger had lunged at the man with more anger radiating off of him than I think I'd ever seen. I needed to get out of here. Clearly whatever this was has Ranger in a mental place I've never seen him in. While the Ranger and Scar-face (his new Stephanie appointed nickname apparently) were busy throwing punches, I figured I'd try to stay low and sneak my way out the door. Maybe reconvene with Tank and come at this from a different angle. Oh shit. What happened to Tank.
I made it to the door way and peeked out in the living room, catching a glimpse of black pants and blood on the floor, when I was yanked up by the back of my shirt. All it took was the cold steel barrel of the gun to my head to know who had grabbed me.
I opened my eyes that I didn't even realize I slammed shut and saw Ranger on his knees with blood on his face. The words that I heard from behind me cut the air like knives as they were spat towards Ranger, "If you're any kind of smart, boy, you'll keep your beef with me and stay the hell out of this. You know good and well what the big dogs will do if they hear you tried to stand in the way of what they ordered". His free hand that had been around my waist traveled slowly up my torso, raising every single hair on my body. I locked eyes with Ranger and saw nothing but rage. If I didn't know any better it looked like a little bit of self-doubt, but that didn't seem like the Ranger I kew, so I quickly wrote it off. I could feel warm, nasty breath on my ear as Scarface spoke again. "And I think they're gonna like what they're served".
That did it. I've had a fair share of creepy men say things to me that this was no different. I took the opportunity to lean into him to distract him for a moment hoping he'd take it for compliance. He chuckled when he took the bait and I raised my foot, unbeknownst to him, and brought it back hard into his knee cap. Not enough to hurt him, I'm sure, but hopefully enough to put him off balance.
The second I felt his grip release I dropped the floor, hoping Ranger would act as fast as I had hoped. This is really when I need that ESP to kick in.
Sure enough, the instant I hit the floor I heard a shot ring out and I was scared to look. I looked first out the door of the office and saw Tank had crawled towards us, planning some sort of sneak attack maybe, and I noticed a trail of blood behind him. Looks like a shot to the leg.
I felt a hand on my back and jumped, trying to move away from the hand. I had landed on my butt with my back against the door frame when trying to get away from the stranger's hold, but thankfully the waft of Bulgari told me that suddenly came told me it was Ranger. He was squatting down in front of me, saying something, but I didn't hear him as I looked past him and saw blood pooling on the floor, seeping through the evident hole in the middle of Scarface's skull. Clearly dead with his face turned towards me, his piercing, empty stare was drilling a hole right through me. I tried to stand, stumbling while doing so, just trying to leave the room.
I didn't feel scared, more-so just curious and entirely overwhelmed at what the hell just happened. There were so many questions going through my head it's like they were fighting over which one took precedence. Who was that guy? How the hell did Ranger know him and what kind of "beef" did they have? What did he mean by he "taught" Ranger? Ranger wasn't anything like this guy, right? Who on earth ordered me? Was this the mob? Junkman's crew? Someone I pissed off my bringing their brother in as an FTA? How on earth did he get past Ranger and all his men? How did he get through Rangeman? What had Ranger so spooked that someone actually snuck up on him? WHY DIDN'T HE SHOOT THE GUY SOONER?
The ringing in my ears I didn't even notice until now had raised to a deafening level as I came back to reality and a sharp pain on my face. The ringing stopped as I quickly tuned back into the real world. I was standing in the kitchen leaning on the counter for support and Ranger was standing in front of me, his hands on my neck. Ow. My face hurt. Wait a minute. Did Ranger just slap me?
"Steph, snap out of it! We gotta go." I heard him now. He did slap me. "We'll sort through this later, I promise. There are two duffle bags in the bottom of my closet. Go grab them and whatever else you need to last you away for a few days. You have two minutes. Go". I didn't question him although more questions filled my head. Are we leaving? Didn't we just eliminate the threat? WHAT IS GOING ON?
Later, Ranger had said. Two minutes is not enough time, so I put all questions aside for the moment and got moving. I went into the closet and grab the duffles, stopping briefly unzipping to ease my curiosity because I deserve it at this point, right? In the first one I saw black, black, and black. Ranger's clothes obviously. The second one I opened and saw some female toiletries on top and some clothes underneath that were just my size. Ranger had prepared for this at some point. I didn't know whether to be flattered or flabbergasted. Flattergasted? Ugh, eyeroll at myself.
I don't think I had anything else there at the moment. Then it hit me that there was one thing I couldn't live without if we were going somewhere for a while. I ran and snagged Ranger's shower gel and threw it in his duffle just as he walked through the doorway. I was waiting for his signature "Babe" but there was no amusement in his eyes.
He grabbed the bags from me and turned to walk back to the living room. Something seemed to make him think twice as I heard him drop the bags before I looked up and saw him take two big steps towards me. One hand was on the back of my head while the other grabbed my waist and his lips crashed down on mine. It was intense, passionate, and only lasted a couple of seconds. He put his forehead on mine and said "Babe" before he headed out of the room picking the bags up on his way. I took a second to pull myself together because any kiss from Ranger is like magic, but that one held a lot more fire than I was used to.
I walked into the living room a minute later to find that Tank had made his way up on the couch with Bobby wrapping his leg while Ranger was on the phone in the kitchen. I went to Tank first to make sure all was good there. He gave me a thumbs up and said, "Just a scratch, Little Girl". It may be just a scratch for a man aptly named after a tank, but I still hated that it happened. Bobby reassured me by saying "it went through clean and missed all the important parts. He'll be ignoring my medical advice and fully functioning in no time". Since Bobby was making jokes, I knew Tank would be working on helping solve this mess as soon as Bobbly left the room.
He finished up with Tank and turned to me. "Do you need anything from me while I've got my kit up here?". I didn't even think to check, everything happened so fast. Somehow, the only kind of injury I got was to my pride when Ranger slapped me. Granted it was to bring me back to earth after I spaced out to Mars, but it still stung a little, but I was grateful all the same.
"No, I'm good Bobby, thanks though". I gave him quick smile headed towards Ranger, pretending that I hadn't heard Tank mutter "Like she'd tell you if she did need something". I watched him and Bobby fist bump out of the corner of my eye as I made it to Ranger who had just put his phone down.
He seemed a little more in control and a lot more like himself. "There's a car in the back alley we're gonna go for, do you have everything?". That's when I remembered.
"What happened in the garage? Is Hal okay? How did Scarface get through?" I didn't miss the flicker of amusement in Ranger's eye as I realized he caught onto my nickname for the stranger, but it was quickly replaced by his blank face.
"Bobby has already taken a look at the rest of our men who were down there and sent them home or back to work. Hal got the worst of it, but he's already at the hospital and he'll be just fine, I promise." That didn't answer all my questions and I saw Ranger had hoped I wouldn't notice. "A grenade went off and we were unprepared. He was strategic, I was distracted, and he hit us at right second. I'll explain more in the car, but we gotta go."
At that moment Lester came through the door with keys in his hand. He passed them off to Ranger before giving a quick bro hug and then turned towards me. He came up and gave me a once over, making sure I wasn't hurt. He kissed me on the forehead and pulled me into a hug "Don't drive Ranger nuts, save some crazy for us". I punched him in the shoulder and followed Ranger out the door.
We took the stairs quickly enough that I almost didn't notice the few blood marks along the walls. We exited on the second floor landing, followed the hallway all the way to the end and out a fire door I hadn't noticed before. We took the fire escape down a level and there was a black Porsche Cayenne waiting for us. I settled in the passenger seat while Ranger stowed the bags in the trunk and then got behind the wheel.
"Give me 30 minutes to get my thoughts together and then I'll answer your questions." Wow. I thought I was going to have to speak first.
"Fine, but I get to pick the radio station". I think he was probably too shocked that I didn't argue to even say "babe.". He just shook his head and we set out to God only knows where.