This chapter, if it's not obvious, I'm filling in time during Book 9. There's a bit more Ranger action, and yes, Dickie is still the scum bag you're all thinking, he's just hiding it better.

I was meeting up with Mary Lou for lunch at a diner near her work. We'd been discussing for the last week the possibility of her coming to work for Plum Lingerie. Mary Lou did book keeping, and wasn't happy at her current job. She also did the books for Lenny's plumbing business, squeezed into the hours after the kids were in bed. She didn't want to put the boys into more than three days a week of daycare, and wanted to keep a part-time job until the boys were at school.

"I've had enough, Steph, I'm ready to quit. I know I've been saying that for months but I mean it this time. The sales team are pigs, and since I'm only there part-time, the office staff leave me out of everything. I'm so sick of payroll. Lenny's business has improved, so there's more work for me to do for him. Maybe that would be enough money for us."

"I'm serious, Lou, come and work for me. I've been so busy since Val quit. I need someone who can keep on eye on my finances and stock levels, and keep me on track. And possibly work extra hours when it's busy."

"I guess my mom and Lenny's mom would babysit some days if I needed to work extra. I'm not sure about us working together though," Mary Lou said.

"It would be fun!" I told her.

"That's what I'm worried about! We'd have too much fun and get nothing done," Mary Lou told me. We both paused as our food was delivered and took a bite of our burgers.

"Please, Lou? I need you. I need someone to kick my butt and keep me on track."

"I am particularly good at butt kicking. You wouldn't have gotten through school without me," Mary Lou said. I grinned at her. When Mary Lou was focused, she was a steam roller, and nothing got in her way. She thought for a minute while eating.

"What hours did Val do?" she asked me.

"Five hours a day so she could drop the girls off and pick them up, usually three or four days a week depending on how busy we were."

"I could do 15 to 20 hours a week over three days," Mary Lou said. "Why don't I come in, and then we'll work out what you need? That's less hours than I'm doing now, so that would leave me time to do Lenny's accounts during the day and then I could actually have some time to myself at night. Or do other activities," she said, winking at me. Mary Lou had always been focused on other activities. I think she had a higher sex drive than most men that I knew, except for Morelli, Dickie and possibly Ranger.

Mary Lou texted me later that night saying that she'd quit her job and given two weeks notice. She'd start with me after her notice period was up. I attempted to tidy up the house before dinner. My work was taking over the place – my office, the dining room, the garage and sometimes it crept out into the living room when I got sick of my office and decided to work out there. I solved the problem by putting everything into the dining room and closing the door.

Val also sent me a text, saying that her settlement from Steve had finally come through and she was repaying the money that I'd spent on her legal fees. I was relieved to have the money back. Most of my profits from Plum Lingerie were still going into building the business up. I didn't want to have to ask Dickie for money, and having this money returned to my account would give me a buffer in case of emergency.

It was Dickie's birthday the next day and I was trying to make the day nice for him. It was a Wednesday so we'd both be at work, but I was hoping we could go out for dinner together. It would be nice to spend some time together. We were both workaholics at the moment, but I wanted to show Dickie how much I appreciated him. I didn't even want to think about where I'd have ended up without him this last year. Plum Lingerie wouldn't have been possible, and the job market was still so bad, I might have ended up at the button factory. Or living with my parents. Argh.

I decided to make a reservation for our favourite nearby Italian restaurant. We hadn't had a date night for a while. I told Dickie of my plans when he got home that night. He was looking stressed, and I was hoping that a night out together would relax him.

We decided to meet at the restaurant the next night, and I was sitting at the bar waiting for him and drinking a cocktail when I felt the hair on the back of my neck stand up. It felt like someone was watching me, so I turned around. Ranger was at the entrance to the restaurant, talking to the hostess. He nodded towards a table in the back, and smiled charmingly at the hostess. He walked up to the bar and sat down next to me.

"Hi," I said, feeling uncertain. I was waiting for Dickie, and he was the one running late, but it felt wrong to be talking to Ranger. I wasn't sure why Dickie didn't like Ranger, but I knew he wouldn't be happy if he showed up and I was talking to him.

"Hey babe. All alone?"

"I'm waiting for Dickie. It's his birthday. What are you doing here? Do you have a date?" I asked curiously. He was dressed up more than his usual black work cargoes, but a step below the business black I'd seen him sporting last time I bumped into him.

"Business meeting."

"How is business going?"

"Pretty well. Mostly word of mouth referrals, but it's growing," Ranger said.

"Oh that reminds you! Your website is a bit… mysterious."

"It's meant to be."

"I think it's too mysterious though. You need some more details on there. If you pull it up on your phone I could explain more," I told him. He glanced down at his watch.

"I don't have much time before my meeting. Would you have time to meet next week? I'll buy you lunch in exchange for your advice," he offered.

"I'm not sure it's worth that much, but sure."

"Call me," he said, standing up and leaving. He headed over to the table in the corner. Just in time, because half a minute later Dickie entered the restaurant.

"Happy birthday!"

"Thanks Steph. Sorry I'm late. There was something at the office that I needed to handle," he told me.

"That's okay, you get birthday immunity today. And I kept myself occupied with a cocktail," I said.

"Birthday immunity, hey? What could I get with that?" he asked, winking at me.

"Well hello, hello," a female voice purred nearby. I made a face. It was Joyce Barnhardt, my mortal enemy. Last I heard she was blackmailing my cousin Vinnie into a job so that she could try to crack on to Ranger. I wondered how that was working out for her.

"Argh," I said. Joyce had been a pain in my ass all through school. She tripped me over when no one was looking, threw water on me and told people that I'd wet my pants, and said that I had rat hair. My only triumph over her had been that I got to sleep with Joseph Morelli and she hadn't (it seemed Joe had standards), and that I'd grown to a B-cup while Joyce stayed an A-cup. However Joyce had taken matters into her own hands and now sported a perky C-cup which was threatening to spill out of her top.

"Hello Stephanie, nice to see you again Dickie," Joyce purred. "It's been too long."

"Joyce Anderson, how are you?" Dickie asked.

"I heard you're working for Vinnie," I said.

"Yes, I am. I'm a bounty hunter. Working for Vinnie has its advantages," Joyce said, sounding quite happy. I shuddered to think what those advantages could be.

"Well, nice seeing you again, but we're busy celebrating. Bye Joyce," I said, waving her off.

"I have a date that I need to make sure isn't getting lonely," she said, and stalked off.

Dickie looked over at me and opened his mouth to talk, but I cut him and got in first.

"How do you know Joyce?" I hissed at Dickie.

"She's a client, I handled her last divorce. I didn't realise that you knew each other."

"You didn't realise? That's Joyce Barnhardt! The one who made my life miserable at school! I've told you all about her."

"She was Mrs Anderson when I met her. I didn't make the connection."

The hostess came up and asked if we were ready to move to our table. I nodded, so she guided us to our table. It wasn't at the back of the room, but the restaurant was small, so I could see the table that Ranger asked to be seated at. And I could see that Joyce was sitting next to him. Ranger had said he there for a business meeting, but Joyce had mentioned a date, so which was it?

I sat down, with my back to them. I didn't need to see Joyce working her wiles on Ranger. If he fell for it, I might vomit. Dickie and I ordered our usual, a garlic bread to start with, sausage alfredo for me, and veal saltimbocca for Dickie. His came served with vegetables, mine didn't need any. We also ordered mine, and after another glass, I needed to use the bathroom. This took me close to where Ranger and Joyce were seated. I could see drinks in front of them, but no food.

"I don't do that Professor Higgings stuff," I overheard Ranger saying as I walked past.

"Jeanne Ellen Burrows says differently," Joyce said. She had her seduction voice on. She'd been working on since we were in middle school. Don't fall for it, Ranger! I wanted to warn him. She's evil!

When I walked back out, Joyce was rubbing her foot against his leg under the table, and he was looking amused. They walked out together soon after. Not even tiramisu could get my appetite back. And then once we got home, I had to put up with Dickie's sulking because I wouldn't do butt stuff. Argh. New cufflinks is a birthday present, butt stuff is not a birthday present.

My phone rang. Mary Lou. I answered it, expecting an update on her work situation.

"The word at the grocery store is that Joyce tried to crack on to Ranger," Mary Lou said.

"And?" I asked, dreading the answer.

"And Ranger told her no and left her on the side of the road! Sally Morrison saw her and said her mouth was gaping like a fish. She thinks that Joyce deliberately left her car at home so Ranger would have to drive her home and he refused and left her there."

I breathed a sigh of relief. That also reminded me that I was meant to call Ranger and arrange a time to see him this week. I brought his number up and dialed.

"Yo."

"Hi Ranger, it's Stephanie Plum. We were talking about your website and you asked me to call?"

"Hey Steph. Thanks for calling. Tank and I were just discussing the website, actually. Are you free for lunch today?"

I thought about it. Let's be honest, working for myself meant that my schedule was wide open. I was getting hungry, there was no food in the house, and my orders for the day were packed. I told Ranger I'd be over soon, packed up and left. The weather was good so I decided to ride my motorbike over and park it outside Rangeman. I recognised Hal on the front desk and greeted him as I got my name tag. He told me that he'd buzz me up to Level Five and let Ranger know that I was on my way.

The elevator automatically took me up to five. I stepped out and could see Ranger nearby, watching a monitor intently over a black-clad Rangeman employee's shoulder.

"Vince, send out Cal and Zero to check it out," he said.

"Yes, boss," Vince said, and picked up the phone. Ranger looked around and saw me.

"Hey babe. Sorry, I've got to handle this. Manny, can you take Steph to the break room for a coffee?"

The Rangeman sitting nearly in a cubicle with paperwork stacked up next to him stood up and extended his hand to me.

"Hi Steph, I'm Manny. Come with me."

I followed him into the break room. "Thank you for saving me from the report paperwork. I'm happy to have a break from it. How do you take your coffee?"

"With lots of sugar."

"Just don't tell the bossman where the sugar stash is. He's a health nut. I think he only eats paleo," Manny said as he got a small container out from a cupboard. I could smell food coming from a nearby room.

"What's the delicious smell?" I asked.

"That's the slow cookers going for the dinner shift. Lunch crew gets salads and sandwiches, dinner crew gets a hot meal. One of the many perks of working here. Night shift still sucks but dinner makes it better."

Ranger walked into the break room.

"Thanks Manny. Sorry about that babe, all done now."

"Nice meeting you Steph," Manny said as he left.

Ranger and I walked into his office and pulled the Rangeman website up on to his screen.

"Who did your website?" I asked him.

"Hector built the website, but Bobby and Tank wrote the content," Ranger said.

I clicked around and pointed out a few things to give him my ideas. "The main issue is that your website doesn't show what sort of a security company you are – it doesn't mention video monitoring at all, or what areas you service."

"We don't want to give too many details away on how we do things."

"There's a difference between giving away details and explaining what you do. You should think about what sort of customers you want to attract and put information for them on the website," I said.

We chatted for a while longer about website until my stomach decided it had enough of waiting for food and let out a loud grumble. Ranger looked up from the computer screen over at me.

"Was that your stomach?"

"Yes," I said defensively.

"Babe. We'd better feed that before it rises up and attacks us."

"It's not going to be salad, is it?" I asked suspiciously.

"Do you like pizza? I know a great pizza place called Shorty's."

"I thought you only ate paleo," I said to him.

"The body is a temple, but sometimes it takes a day off," he said.

Mary Lou started off her first day right by bringing coffee and doughnuts for both of us. Mary Lou knew her way around my house well, but had only been over once since it exploded into the Plum Lingerie warehouse.

I gave Mary Lou a key in case she needed it, and showed her the alarm system in the garage.

"This is the alarm system. If you set it off, I'll get a call on my phone, but if I don't answer, they send someone out."

"Do you have to pay a callout fee?" Mary Lou asked.

"I think up to five callouts are included as part of the monthly monitoring fee," I said, trying to remember. I did read over the paperwork before I signed it, I swear.

"I've heard you have to be really good looking to be hired by RangeMan," Mary Lou said.

"I don't think that's an official policy, but most of them do seem to be ex-military and in quite good shape."

Mary Lou looked around the garage and dining room. "This is really taking over, Steph. Have you thought about getting a space that isn't your garage?"

"Yes but I haven't looked into it. I don't know how much it would cost either," I said.

"I'll add it to my list. We might be able to find somewhere cheap."

"That would make Dickie a lot happier. He hates the boxes in the garage, and all the stuff over the dining room."

I needed to pick up a parcel of my final samples from the post office, so I left to go and do that at the same time that Mary Lou went to pick-up lunch. There was a long line at the post office, and I realised that I'd left my phone at home, so I couldn't even check my Facebook to fill in the time. Finally I got my package, and headed home, looking forward to the meatball sub that Mary Lou was going to pick up for me.

When I pulled into the driveway, I sighed. Mary Lou's car was parked in the driveway, and a Rangeman vehicle was parked next to it, with Hal and Vince standing in the driveway talking to Mary Lou. She waved to me.

"I set off the alarm accidentally. I couldn't remember the code," Mary Lou said, but from the way she was eyeing off Hal and Vince, I wasn't really sure on that. She licked her lips as she looked Vince up and down. I sensed that Lenny was going to get a workout tonight.