So I don't really know if anyone is still around...but I had completely forgotten about my account and this story during all my crazy life changes over the past years. But after a random thought of it late the other night I found my login and I've decided to finish up the story, even if its just for me and no one else reads it. But if you are here leave me a review and let me know what you think. I appreciate all of the people who chose to read through up until now!

Rpov

"Damnit getting this bird in the sky took way too much fucking time. And now we're just sitting ducks unable to do a fucking thing."
All the guys sat in silence staring at me. I knew they were just as much on edge as I was. The months had weighed on them nearly as much as it had me. But it finally felt like the end game was near and I had, and needed, to finally do something.

I was forbidden to go stay anywhere near where they had housed my Babe. The intel made it clear that any sight of me would be fair game on Steph and our child, and I just couldn't risk it. So I had covered my tracks better than I ever had in the middle of any other op and set men around the town to keep an eye out for me. They were already running point on tracking down Maria and trying to figure out what the fuck was going on, while I was stuck thirty four thousand feet in the air for another hour.

"Ranger…we're going to get her…we're going to have your back and end this shit. But you gotta get your head on straight." Tank had some big cojones speaking to me like this in front of my men, but I know it needed to be said and they needed to see me take it and put it into existence. I was trusting them with my child and my woman's life…but they were trusting me with theirs in return.

"I've got an hour to get my shit straight. Don't be worrying about me and focus on the task at hand. Shane's got our ammo and shit locked and ready to go once we land. Start going over who is taking what so I don't have to here high school girl bickering on the ground."

Spov

Jesus Christ what have I done…

It's been only a little over an hour and I feel like it's been days since Maria left. I didn't even know if she'd made it out with my baby, but I'd heard no gunshots, no commotion, and I was hoping that was a good sign.

Grrrrr….
Man my stomach was growling up a storm. Who would have thought birth could take so much out of you. I didn't realize how thin I was looking until then and I wished I had a whole box of Tastykakes to fill the growling hole of my stomach.

Damn a girl wants to lose 20 pounds and the universe sure does deliver.

I know the whole humor thing was just getting me by, I must be in shock, because this is nowhere near funny. But I was stuck in this horribly bare room, with nowhere to look but the ceiling knowing that my whole world was being carried out by a stranger while I was stuck in here cold, sore, and hungry.

And just like clockwork the door decided to swing open right as I was ready to give into my pity party and cry.

"I hear we have a congratulations in order Miss Plum"

Now that I wasn't so sensitive to the light I could make out the features on my walking talking nightmare more clearly. And my first assumption wasn't wrong. He was a decent looking man. Tall, with longish dark blonde hair that looked perfectly tousled and made to look messy, but you know was fussed over for at least half an hour to perfect, and he had the brightest green eyes but the deepest tan that would make the girls back in The Burg jealous after all the money they'd spent at the tanning salons. If he wasn't the horrible low life piece of shit I knew him to be I would even say he was good looking.

"Actually no, a congratulations aren't in order. But if I'm getting them I feel like I should at least know who from…Mister…?"

"Well I do declare, how rude of me. You can call me Mr. Davis. And why, pray tell, are a congratulations not in order? From what I've heard you've delivered your perfect little baby boy."

I felt the air leave my chest, the pain was so palpable coming off of me from longing for my child that I knew my lie might be believed next.

"That's because, Mister Davis, my perfect little baby boy was not born breathing. And nothing Maria did could bring him back."

I paused and was holding my breath hoping against hope that it would be the one time my lie wouldn't come off immediately as phony. And I think dreams do come true because Mr. Davis looked whiter than Grandma Mazur's hair the one time she bleached and toned it wanting to go platinum silver.

"Where's the body?"

"Excuse me?!" My hysterical voice was not hard to put on a show with.

"I refuse to let your husband know that it was a still birth. No, that won't happen. You're going to need to pretend that your little bastard child was born alive and we're going to have a nice little photo op to send to him so he can see. Then I'm going to have to come up with some poor horrible story about how the mother couldn't cope and never wanted this child after the hell you've been put through because of Range…Mr. Manoso…and that you smothered it."

My ears were ringing and my already empty stomach was starting to retch once again. My heart felt like it had stopped beating ten times through that whole speech.

"What THE FUCK is wrong with you. I would NEVER-"

"Well guess what. Yall were my insurance policy…and I can NOT have Mr. Manoso knowing that in my care his child died. You're going to have to take the heat for me on that one sweetheart. Now the body…where is it?"

He was turning looking around the room like there was so many places I could place my child.

"I sent Maria out to bury him. I couldn't stand the thought of him being in the room with me like that one more minute."

"YOU WHAT?! Whatever makes you even think that at any point you can give orders around here!? I have been good to you Miss Plum, but your time is running out."

Mr. Davis apparently was done with the conversation because he was already turning on his heel and slamming the door shut with a louder bang than any gun at Rangeman had ever sounded off with at the firing range.

I knew Maria had a nearly 2 hour head start, and I was hoping that would be more than enough for her to get safely away with my life she had carried away with her. But one thing was for certain, Mr. Davis was scared. He was scared of Ranger finding out that anything had happened to me or our child while we were here. And I had to hope I could play on that fear and get myself out of this mess and back home.

Rpov

My men and I hit the ground running after the jet landed and I was walking into a shelled out adobe style home not long after.

"Hey boss man…" I looked up to see Shane standing there looking more sheepish than I'd ever known him to be capable of.

"Shane, what the hell are you doing standing around, go out to the SUV and grab some shit, we've got too much to do and not enough man power as it is to do it."

"Yea about that…We won't have to be doing too much recon for half of our problem…"

My eye twitched from the lack of sleep and my irritation with his half ass attempts of getting on with whatever he needed to tell me.

"Shane I suggest you spit it the fuck out because I am not doing this and you'll be regretting later how you're handling this conversation."

I heard another pair of footsteps then, much too light to be that of any Rangeman, and looked up.

A woman I had only seen on a black and white monitors for the past months walked into the entry way of where I had been standing.

"Mr. Manoso…I'm Maria…and I have something I promised to give to you."

I looked down and saw a wrapping of material, that looked strangely familiar to what I had seen years ago, lifetimes ago, with Julie….

"Meet Ricardo Carlos Manoso Jr. His Mama named him right after she fought to bring him into this world and I believe she blessed him with his name perfectly."

It was then that everything registered, and the coos coming from the swaddled up material in her arms met my ears. I stepped forward and pulled back a layer and saw Steph's eyes staring back at me, but on such a tiny face that had my complexion…tiny dark curls were already formed at the top of his head….

His…I have a son….we have a son…Dios mio Stephanie….please don't leave us…please be ok….please hold on until I can get you safe…