Disclaimer: I don't own these character, I don't make any money from wrighting. I just do this for fun.

Thank you to my wonderful beta Heather (txbabefan) for getting this chapter cleaned up and back to me.

Chapter 10

Mishap with Morelli

Carlos POV:

Morelli grabbed the back of my suit and slammed me into the hood of the Speedtail. "Not gonna fight back Manoso?" He snickered in my ear. "Is that blood on Steph's face hers? You hurtin' her?"

"I wouldn't hurt her, unlike you." I growled at him. I knew if I hit him, he would try and charge with me with assaulting a police officer. He dug his elbow into the back of my neck.

"Let him go, Morelli," Steph said. "He hasn't done anything."

"Babe, get back in the car," I ground out as he pushed my face into the car. I saw Steph's body tense. Shit, I wasn't worried that worried about Morelli anymore. I knew Steph was pissed and not just at him.

"I will not," She said. "I'm not a poor defenseless woman. Joe, get off of him. Your problem is with me, not him."

"He took you from me!" Morelli growled at her.

"No, he didn't. You shoved me away, Joe. You cheated on me, and you hit me. Do you really expect me to live like that?"

"We could have worked on it, Steph."

"No, we couldn't have Joe. You raised your hand to me."

"Just like Manoso did?" he said.

"What are you talking about?" Steph yelled at him.

The SUV slid to a stop ahead of the Speedtail. Tank, Taylor, Rage and Yates. "Detective Morelli, get your hands off Ranger," Taylor said.

"And just who are you?"

"Interpol Agents Reese Taylor. Mr. Manoso and Miss. Plum are a part of working on a joint investigation. You need to let them go."

"You have no grounds here." Morelli said.

"Why exactly did you pull Mr. Manoso over and search him?" Yates asked.

"He was speeding. He also has a cooler in the back seat."

"Detective Morelli, I will call the chief of police. You're impeding a joint investigation."

"Get the chief on the phone," Morelli snickered.

Taylor pulled out his phone and dialed a number. "Chief Harkin, this is Agent Taylor. I have a Detective Morelli who is trying to impede the joint task force investigation."

He listened for a moment until Taylor handed him the phone. "Chief Harkins," Morelli said. He listened for a moment before let out a growl and let me go. Steph made her way over to my side and wrapped her arms around me and walked me backwards, away from Morelli. Putting space between us was probably a good idea.

"Are you okay?" She asked me.

"I'm fine, Babe," I said leaning down to kiss her softly.

She let me kiss her, but she pulled back to look at me. "Oh, I'm still mad at you. Stay in the car, Babe. Wait for backup." She mocked.

I let out a breath. "I'm sorry, Babe."

"An I'm sorry, Babe isn't going to cut it." She said.

"This is a warning, Manoso. I've got my eye on you," Morelli said. We watched as he drove away.

Steph POV:

"Let's get this moving," Taylor said. Carlos walked me around to my side and opened the door for me. He went back around and pulled away.

We arrived at the meet a few minutes later. I picked up the cooler and we walked through the door. They brought out the bug sweeper and I watched as Carlos pretended to check his watch, shutting the feeds off. We were scanned before being nodded through.

Carlos turned the bugs back on as we walked into Perez's office. Perez held out his hands and I set the cooler in his hands. He opened it and looked it over. He nodded.

"Pictures?"

Carlos handed him the flash drive and Perez plugged it into his computer. The flash drive had a virus on it it held a keystroke tracker. We would be able to track everything he did on his computer. He looked over the pictures.

Carlos and I sat after he motioned for us to take the chairs. Carlos moved his chair closer to mine and his hand laid across my thigh. When Perez turned back to us, I took Carlos's hand and moved it farther up my thigh, barely inches from the promised land.

"You did good, Cara," Perez said his voice having a tone of admiration.

"I know," I said smiling. I ran my hand along Carlos's arm and made a purring noise.

Perez looked at me with a clear look of lust. "Mr. Perez, although I would like to do business with you, I don't appreciate you looking at my fiancé like that," Carlos said next to me. "My fiancé is very comfortable and confident in her sexuality and our relationship, but I don't share and neither does she."

"Ricky baby..." I started trying to interfere, almost panicking. I knew I couldn't let it show though. No sign of weakness. Perez was a shark and wouldn't hesitate to bite if he smelt blood.

"I meant no offense Mr. Gonzales. Ari is a gorgeous woman and no doubt a strong and independent one at that. I truly admire her beauty and the fact that she is able to do this job since it does take a lot out of a person." Perez said.

Carlos nodded and I relaxed. "We've got a shipment coming this week. You're looking to be a distributor, correct?"

"Yes. I have people who are willing to pay for untraceable guns," Carlos said.

Perez nodded. "What type of weapons are they interested in?"

"Rifles and pistols. They would also like ammo," Carlos said. "As many as they can get their hands on."

Perez nodded. "We'll see what we can do," he said. "I'll be in contact. You can come down to the waterfront to view the shipment."

Carlos nodded and we stood. He wrapped his arm around my waist. "We'll be seeing you soon," Carlos said.

Perez nodded and we walked out of his office. Carlos opened the door for me, and I slid in the Speedtail and he walked around and did the same. We drove back to the taskforce warehouse

I made my way to the office to change, and Carlos followed soon after. I was mostly dressed when he came in. I sat to lace my combat boots up.

"Babe..."

"Carlos, can we talk about it when we get home?"

"Home?" He asked.

I let out a breath. "The penthouses Carlos."

"You think of the penthouse as home?" I heard the smile in his tone and shot him a glare.

I left the office and walked to my desk. Rage raised an eyebrow as I sat down and laid my arms on the desk. I put my forehead on my arms and groaned.

"Something wrong?" He asked. I groaned in response.

"With the boss?"

I looked at him. "Tell me what's going on," he said.

"Did you listen to the recording?"

He nodded. "He told me to stay in the car, Rage. To wait for backup."

"And?"

"He promised not to sideline me," I said.

"That wasn't sidelining, Steph. He knew Morelli would get even more uncontrollable if you got out. He would rather something happen to him than you," Rage explained.

"I don't want anything to happen to him, Rage. I want him to trust me to back him up," I said.

He let out a breath that sounded a lot like a sigh. "You've got to understand it from his standpoint. He's a protector and you're his woman. He needs to protect you. If something happened to you... It wouldn't be pretty, Steph."

Carlos POV: Across the building

Tank stood next to me as I watched Steph talk to Rage. "What's going on?"

"Steph's mad at me," I said, deciding to open up to him on the topic.

"Why?"

"When Morelli pulled us over, I told her to wait in the car for backup."

He chuckled. "She was your backup. When you're out in the field with Steph, she doesn't take to that very lightly. I tried to pull the over-protective routine and got my ass chewed. When someone goes out in the field with her, she expects to be treated the same as we would any of the other guys."

"Tank, I was trying to protect her." I sent him a look.

"We both know that, but Steph is going to see it as your putting her on the sidelines, and that you don't trust her."

"But I do, Tank."

"You've got to tell her that. Remember she's got training now. She was trained by us." I nodded. "Sit down and talk to her tonight."

"I've got a better idea," I told him. "We're leaving for the rest of the day."

"Alright," he said, slowly.

I walked over to Steph, and she looked up at me. I took her hand. "Come on Babe. I've got a surprise for you."

"Where are we going?"

"I'll tell you when we get in the car," I said. I brought her out to the Turbo, and she got in without too much grumbling. I slid in and revved the engine before pulling out of the lot.

"Where are we going?"

"Point Pleasant," I said. The look on her face read confusion. "We need a little time away, Babe. Time alone together."

She smiled softly. "I'd really like that, Carlos.

I kissed the back of her hand and smiled at her. An hour later we arrived at Point Pleasant, but we stayed in the Turbo. "Babe. You know I trust you right? To cover my back."

"It didn't seem like it today," she said truthfully.

"I know and I'm sorry. I'm just trying to get to the point that I know I don't have to be as worried when you go out in the field. Used to be when you went out, I was terrified, something would happen to you, I wouldn't get there quick enough, were you going in without backup? I'm working on it. Now that you have training it is taking some getting used to."

She nodded. "Come on, Babe. Let's go walk on the boardwalk." I told her. She smiled and we got out of the Turbo. It was the middle of fall, but it was a warm day, not too hot. I took Steph's hand as we walked down the sidewalk. Her eyes lit up as she took in all that was going on.

She drug me over to a ball toss game, to knock over the cans. "Let's play," she said.

I handed a fifty over to the guy running the booth and he handed me a bucket of baseballs. Steph picked up one and threw it taking down the half of the pyramid. She squealed and jumped up and down.

"You try," she said. I smiled at her and threw the ball at the next pyramid. It took the whole stack down. She glared at me, with no heat behind it.

"Show off," she grumbled. I kissed her temple.

We ended up winning a bunch of prizes, but Steph had her heart set on one thing: a big black panther stuffed animal. I raised an eyebrow when she told him that was what she wanted.

I held it as we walked away from the booth. "Why a panther, Babe?"

"It reminded me of you," she said, smiling up at me. I smiled as I kissed the top of her head smiling.

We stayed out on the boardwalk until sunset. We walked back to the Turbo and placed everything we had bought and won in the car. "Want to get something to eat?" I asked her. She nodded.

I walked us down the street to a small restaurant. One we were settled at a table I took her hand in mine and kissed the back of it. "Proud of you babe."

"For what?" She blushed.

"Handling yourself with Morelli, with Perez, everything Babe. You've come so far, gotten your wings." I told her as I reached up to stroke her cheek with my thumb. She nuzzled into my hand with her face and kissed the palm.

"I love you, Carlos."

"I love you, too, Babe." I told her. I leaned over to kiss her. "Today was perfect."

I woke up with Steph on top of me. It was four in the morning, and something had woken me up. Then I heard it; footsteps walking through the apartment. I rolled Steph under me as I pulled the gun that was strapped to the headboard behind the mattress.

"Wha..."

"Shhh," I said in Steph ear. "Stay behind me; someone is in the apartment."

She sat up as I did and backed herself against the headboard . A few second later I felt her arms snake around my stomach and looked down to see her Sig pointed towards the door. She plastered herself against my back.

"Don't move Babe," I whispered as the foot steps got closer.

The door was pushed open, and Tank appeared. "Tank!" Steph yelled.

"Get some clothes on, we've got a situation," Tank said.

"What kind of situation?" Steph asked. She gathered the flat sheet and wrapped it around her body, putting the gun on the table. She stood and tossed me my boxers.

"Taylor said he needed us to come in. He said Perez is looking into you two. You both need to go undercover and live the life you're supposed to be living."

"Shit." I cursed. I followed Steph into the dressing room as she started looking for clothes to blend in, with our undercover identities. She pulled on a pair of combat boots, skinny jeans and a tight black shirt that hung off her shoulder. I followed her lead pulling on a pair of slate gray slacks and an emerald green silk shirt. I slipped my feet into a pair of loafers as Steph went into the bathroom.

"Fifteen minutes Bomber!" Tank yelled.

We both watched as a middle finger appeared out of the door. We chuckled and walked to the kitchen. Apparently, Tank had brought us McDonalds. I sent him a glare and he opened the fridge to pull a tray out.

"Had Ella make you something. Do you really think I would try and feed you McDonalds? I would never hear the end of it." Tank said rolling his eyes.

Steph walked out of the bedroom with three minutes to spare. Tank slid her a cup of coffee in a to go cup as she grabbed the bag of McDonalds.

"You're a god." She told him.

I shook my head. "Let's get going,"