A/N Anything recognizable belongs to JE.
Thank you for your continued support and reviews. I truly enjoy hearing your thoughts. I seem to spend more time day dreaming about plot lines than actually getting my thoughts down, but that's half the fun in the process. Enjoy and be safe. The world is a bit crazy right now, but we're all in this together. Take care of each other and take care of you.
Chapter 16
The ringing of my alarm clock jarred me awake. I swatted blindly at the nightstand, hoping to connect with the snooze button. No such luck, so I pried open an eye and finally found my target. It felt like I had just closed my eyes when the damn thing went off again. Grumbling and cursing to myself, I reached again for the clock, this time turning the alarm off. I was tempted to roll over and sleep a while longer, but I knew if I did I wasn't likely to wake up until noon.
I felt like I hadn't slept at all. After seeing the headline about Chantelle last night, I had read through the Page Six article several times. According to the reporter, Chantelle had an early afternoon appointment with her attorney. When the attorney arrived, one of the staff went to let Chantelle know the attorney had arrived. The staff member had found her unresponsive on her dressing room floor. Emergency personnel attempted to revive her, but it was too late. The reporter went on to say that toxicology reports were pending, but there appeared to be evidence of drugs found at the scene. The article also mentioned evidence of a second person being present, and the police were asking anyone with any information on the identity of the second person to come forward.
All night I tossed and turned, wondering if Ranger had anything to do with Chantelle's death. I knew if he was the second person mentioned in the article, the evidence was left on purpose. If Ranger didn't want anyone to know he was there, they wouldn't have found a thing. Ever since I saw him walk into the room at the Plaza, it was like I was learning about an entirely different person. I knew Ranger the bounty hunter, the businessman, the lover and the protector. Now I was meeting Ranger the mercenary, the undercover operative, the assassin. This was the man he had shielded me from. The man he had tried to warn me about. In the dark of the night as I lay tossing and turning, I remembered what Les had said about each man being a part Ranger played and I realized none of it mattered. He was still the same man I had grown to love. Nothing I had learned about him changed that.
Now I understood the qualifiers, the need to keep me at arm's length. Ranger was doing what he had always done, he was protecting me. He probably thought a white girl from the Burg couldn't handle the reality of Ricardo Carlos Manoso. I was a little insulted by his lack of faith in me, but I suppose in his life it was hard to find people who could deal with the reality of his world.
Pushing back the covers, I plodded out into the kitchen to put the coffee on before I jumped in the shower. I tapped on the side of Rex's tank to say good morning and shuffled off to the bathroom. Twenty minutes later, I was scrubbed, shaved and shampooed, and standing in the kitchen sipping my first cup of coffee while I planned my day.
I still needed to pick up Bernice and I wanted to check in with Connie to see if anything new had come in. I also wanted to be able to get a workout in before my afternoon shift. It still felt strange to be planning gym time into my day, but I was already seeing positive results from my efforts, in both my skip chasing and in the way my jeans fit. Maybe I could see if one of the guys would be willing to show me some hand to hand or self-defense stuff. Cal had already texted me about meeting at the gun range at 5:30 when his shift was over, so I knew what I was doing after work.
Finishing my first cup of coffee and pouring a second, I took it in with me as I started getting ready for my day. I decided I'd stop at Bernice's home before I went to the office. This way, I could call Connie to have her meet us at the station to re-bond Bernice so she didn't miss any of her shows or have her busy bingo schedule disrupted.
Bernice lived in a small detached home in the Burg. Her front porch was swept clean, her windows sparkled in the sun and her serene Virgin Mary statue stood like a sentinel on the front lawn. I walked onto her tidy porch and knocked on the front door. Bernice opened the door and the scent of baking coffee cake wafted out from behind her.
"May I help you?" she asked before recognizing me from the night before. "Well I never. What are you doing here?"
"As I explained last night, you missed your court date and I need to take you down to reschedule. If you'll come with me now I will have someone meet us at the courthouse to have you re-bonded. That way you won't miss any of your shows or any bingo games." I explained.
Just then a timer sounded in the back of the house. Bernice turned toward the sound and I used the distraction to step forward into the house. Bernice looked startled when she turned back and saw me standing directly in front of her with handcuffs in my hand.
"You can come peacefully or I can cuff you and march you down the walk for all the neighbors to see. Your choice." I tried to look menacing as I said this, but I wasn't sure I succeeded. One thing about women in the Burg, they cared more about what the neighbors would think than anything else.
Bernice sighed. "Let me take the coffee cake out of the oven and then let's get this over with."
I followed her into the kitchen to make sure she didn't try to sneak out the back door. Once the oven was shut off and the cake was on the cooling rack, Bernice was good to her word and walked with me out to the car. I called Connie and asked her to meet us at the courthouse to get Bernice re-bonded as promised.
"So why did you miss your court date the first time?" I asked as we made our way through the Burg.
"I had a dental appointment the same day." Bernice explained. "Do you know how long it takes to get a new appointment if you try to reschedule? Anyway, I decided to go to the dentist instead of going to court." I wasn't sure which was worse, going to court or going to the dentist.
I left Bernice with Connie and took the files Connie had brought with her. I had two new FTA's as well as one for Rangeman. I stuck the files in my messenger bag and told Connie I would start working on the files tomorrow. Tank had texted me and asked me to come in a little early today to run some searches that were needed quickly for a new account. If I went straight to Rangeman I would still have time to get an hour in at the gym before I started my shift.
The gym is generally busy early in the morning before normal people wake up and at the end of day shift. During the work day there may be one or two guys that wander in at different times, but I generally had the gym to myself at the beginning of my workout. Lester was working on the heavy bag when I walked in and started up the treadmill. I could now jog at a decent pace for a full thirty minutes and still be able to function when I was done. As I finished my run, Lester was unwrapping the tape from around his hands.
"Looking good, Steph." He smiled and winked as he said this.
I laughed at his flirting. Flirty Lester was hard to take seriously. "Thanks, Les. I was wondering, would you be interested in teaching me a little self-defense?" I asked. "Maybe show me how to break out of some basic holds and such."
This brought out a megawatt smile. Lester was no Ranger, but the man was no slouch either. My feelings for Lester were nothing beyond those of a trusted friend and partner, but damn, I am only human after all. The thought of spending a little time up close and personal with Lester had some appeal.
We went over to the mats and Les spent the next half hour walking me through some very basic escape techniques. We practiced being grabbed from the front and then from behind. Each time, Les walked me through the steps slowly and then repeated the moves in real time. I was probably going to have some bruises from breaking out of his grip, but I felt really good about what I learned.
Once I was cleaned up and dressed in my Rangeman uniform, I made my way to the break room to grab some lunch before I got busy with my searches. Checking over the offerings but not finding a meatball sub, I grabbed a turkey with mustard on multigrain and a container of yogurt. I stopped by Tank's office to let him know I was getting ready to start on the searches and he motioned me in. That reminded me that I had a file for Rangeman, so I set my lunch on the edge of his desk so I could pull the file out of my messenger bag.
"You hear about Chantelle Chagal?" he asked as I flipped through the files to make sure I handed him the right one. It would be my luck to hand him the drunk and disorderly and keep the manslaughter file for myself.
"Yes, I saw that online last night. Do you think that was Ranger?" I knew I shouldn't ask, but the question slipped out before I could stop myself.
Tank dropped his blank face in place and didn't respond to my question. Instead, he said, "I wanted to let you know your portion of the capture fee on Marcel Chagal was deposited in your account this morning."
I smiled at the thought of finally being financially secure for the first time in a very long time. Knowing I wasn't going to get any information on Ranger out of him, I handed him the file for Rangeman and replied, "Thanks, Tank." I still hadn't decided what I was going to do with the money. Working part-time at Rangeman ensured I was no longer living FTA to FTA, and with the capture money and a steady income, I finally had options.
I took my lunch and headed to my desk. I ate my yogurt while I booted up my computer and sorted through the search requests from the new account. The first name was entered and soon I had a very thorough and somewhat invasive amount of detail on the woman. As I entered name after name, I wondered what kind of business this new account did. All of the employees were women and between the ages of 21 and 26. All had a college degree, were single and none had children. Looking back through the driver license pictures that were added to the files, I realized all of these women were extremely attractive, even in their license photos. By the end of the day, I had completed all of the searches and had the reports organized with my notes added to the front of each file.
As I was gathering up the files Cal stopped by to let me know he was just getting off his shift and would meet me at the gun range in ten minutes. That would give me just enough time to drop the files off to Tank before I headed out.
"Hey Tank, I finished running the searches on that new account. What does this company do? Their employees all seem to meet a very specific criteria." I asked, setting the folders on his desk.
Tank looked pained. "They are a brand new company that advertises themselves as a service offering in-home care and companionship. Something seemed off about the account when the sales team signed them on, that's why I wanted you to run the searches so quickly. What did you find?"
"I think the emphasis here is more on companionship." I said. "All of the employees are beautiful, college educated women without husbands or children. Your new client feels more like an escort service."
That brought an uncharacteristic sigh from the big guy. "We can't have Rangeman associated with an escort service. Not to mention I would have guys fighting to take the call any time they needed assistance. I'm going to turn this back over to the sales department and let them deal with it. Why does this shit only happen when Ranger is out of town?"
The rest of my evening passed quickly. Cal was waiting for me in the gun range and we worked on killing paper men for half an hour. On the way home I stopped by Pino's to pick up the meatball sub I had been craving since lunch. The lights were off in my apartment when I pulled into the parking lot and I let out the breath I didn't realize I was holding. I decided then and there that I was going to start looking for a new, more secure place to live. It would be nice to come home and not have to worry about finding someone in my apartment. I could use a chunk of the capture money to make a decent down payment on a place of my own and have something besides a rent receipt to show for my payments each month.
I took the stairs up to the second floor and let myself in. I dropped my purse on the floor in the foyer and flipped on the light. It took a second for my brain to process the sight of a man sitting in my arm chair with a gun in his hand. He flipped the safety on and tucked the gun into his shoulder holster. Once the gun was away, I moved into the kitchen and grabbed a couple of beers from the fridge. I set one on the coffee table in front of him before sitting down on the couch and asked if he wanted half of my sandwich. He declined with a shake of his head. I cracked open my beer and took a long pull from the bottle.
I told myself I wasn't going to be the first to talk this time. He broke into my apartment, pulled a gun on me and scared the crap out of me. I figured the least he could do was offer some sort of explanation. I could be patient. I was going to wait him out. I took a bite of my meatball sub and continued to stare at him as I chewed. I swallowed the bite in my mouth and then, damn him, I couldn't help myself.
"What are you doing here, Joe?" I asked before taking another bite.
