Chapter 6
The knock at the door wasn't unexpected, but it still made me jump. I slid my hand under the cushion and touched my stun gun before I yelled a greeting.
"Who's there?"
"Open up, Cupcake. We need to talk," Morelli growled through the door.
"Get lost, Joe. There's nothing left to talk about."
A familiar clicking sound was heard a split second before the door swung open and Morelli stalked in. I watched him move into the room, remaining carefully still. I didn't get up, didn't even turn my head, just followed him with my eyes. He was mad. Furious mad. Dangerous mad. And the spectacular bruising around his left eye didn't help lessen the scary factor.
Maybe not such a good idea to screw with the Ducati? Fuck it; he screwed with my life, I could screw with his precious bike. I raised my eyebrows expectantly.
"Thought I made it clear before. We have nothing to talk about?"
"Where's my bike, Stephanie?" He stood there, towering over me. I have a tendency to forget just how big Morelli is. He's one of those guys that you just don't notice it until he gets mad and then it's too damned late. I tightened my hold on the stun gun.
"Back off, Joe." I held his eyes while I spoke, mentally calculating my odds in this situation. They weren't good.
"Tell me where the bike is first," he suggested. He didn't move back. In fact he leaned closer.
"It's safe unless you keep pissing me off like this," my voice was calm. "I don't appreciate the neanderthal tactics. I never did."
"And I don't appreciate the high school tactics," he growled.
"Then you should have acted like an adult all the fuck along," I shot back. "Doing Terri Gilman in public isn't exactly going to win you an award for maturity here."
"My mother saw the sheep picture."
I winced, feeling the smallest increment of pity for about a millisecond. Then I realized what that meant. "Shouldn't have had you mommy clean your house then."
Joe took another step toward me and I pulled out the stun gun. He laughed.
"You think that's gonna help you right now, Cupcake?" He looked down at me, his eyes sweeping over my entire body. "Cause I don't think so..."
He lunged toward me, I dove for the opposite end of the couch. He caught my legs, but at least he didn't land on me. Unfortunately I still lost the stungun. It went flying out of my hand, skidded across the floor and slid under the TV stand.
"Where's the damned bike?" he yelled, trying to pull me closer.
"Behind your house you dumbass. Get off me!" I kicked wildly, wishing like hell I'd gone running with Ranger more often.
"Telling the truth?"
"God, that is so typical! Just like the refrigerator rule: if it isn't right in front, then it isn't there." I yelled again as he finally caught both my ankles, and I found myself pinned under him, looking up at those famed melted chocolate eyes, technicolor bruises and all. Suddenly I was very aware just how pinned I was. His body was covering mine, pressing me into the couch. From the look Joe was giving me, he'd just realized it too.
The anger disappeared and a smile spread slowly across his face. "I think it's time we kiss and make up..."
I opened my mouth to tell him off but ended up getting thoroughly kissed. Joe has many faults, but being a bad kisser is not one of them. His lips worked their magic, igniting my traitorous hormones. I couldn't suppress the moans that came out of me, was barely aware of it as my back arched into him.
Joe pulled away with a very male groan of frustration. "Let's take this into the bedroom," he suggested, nipping at my ear.
That did it. Visions of him with Terri flooded my mind. "You didn't take it into the bedroom with Terri, did you? Get off me, get out of my apartment, and get out of my life, Morelli." I started struggling again.
We rolled off the couch, both of us cursing as various bits were slammed into the floor. Joe had a painfully tight grip on my left wrist, my legs were still pinned under him, but that left me with my right arm to use for punching and scratching. I was going to ruin my manicure.
"Stephanie, stop it! I'm sorry okay? Things got out of hand-"
"From what Haley said there were a lot more things in hand." He made some reply but I didn't hear it. We were only a foot or two away from the TV stand which meant my stungun was in reach. The prospect of stunning Morelli and dumping him out the window was almost better than fresh-baked Krispy Kremes.
"I love you, Cupcake. I'm sorry it happened." That froze me. I looked up at him, my jaw hanging open.
"Sorry you slept with Terri?"
"Yeah," he said quietly, holding my gaze. And then we were kissing again. I was caught up in another rush of hormones, so much so that I almost didn't notice when he grabbed my free wrist. I still didn't realize until it was too late. I was trapped.
I tried to pull free, but his hands only tightened.
"Nothing doing, Cupcake. You aren't getting out of this so easy." He was grinning now.
"Let me up," I suggested. "I won't attack you or anything. Please?"
Joe shook his head slowly. "No. I think where you are is going to work just fine," his voice was husky now, and he bent down to kiss my neck.
"We can't do this." I bit back another moan, and fought off the rush of heat.
"I said I'm sorry, Cupcake. Let me make it up to you," he whispered against my throat. I shivered, but I wasn't going to be so easily distracted.
"You said you were sorry about Terri," I gasped as he nipped my collarbone.
"What more is there?" he asked, his lips travelling up my throat again. I was getting lost in a foggy, hormone-induced haze so it took a minute more for his words to fully sink in. When they did, my happy forget-it-lets-have-sex state of mind disappeared entirely.
He thought this was only about Terri? He thought that was the only problem in out so-called relationship? And more than that, he thought a simple 'I'm sorry' was going to fix it. Ugh.
"Get off me, Morelli."
"Loosen up, Steph. You know you want to..."
"Get off me!" I yelled, and resumed my efforts to extricate my arms. A feeling of panic was starting to set in deep inside me. If I could just get my arm free, I could get the stungun...
"Get up, Morelli. Don't make me shoot you." The voice was low, dangerous. I could have cried in relief, if I wasn't so pissed off myself.
Joe shifted his weight to look at the door. I took the moment of distraction and used every muscle I had to pull my leg up, scoring a direct hit on his groin. His breath rushed out and he rolled off of me. I watched him curled up in the fetal position for a moment before I launched myself upright and took off in a mad dash for the cookie jar to retrieve my gun. Not too surprisingly, I ran smack into Ranger's chest.
"Babe, you okay?" One of his arms wrapped around me protectively. I rested my forehead against his shoulder for a second.
"Yeah. I need my gun, though."
"Don't think that's a good idea. It's messy if you shoot a cop."
"I'm not going to shoot him!" I looked up at Ranger's face to see his usual blank expression. The flare of amusement in his eyes was easy to miss, but it was there. "I'm not!"
"Stay out of this, Manoso. It doesn't concern you." Joe was standing now, albeit with slightly hunched shoulders. Ranger didn't seem willing to dignify this with a reply, he just narrowed his eyes and any hint of emotion disappeared from him.
I turned to look at him, but I didn't step away from Ranger. "Door, Joe. Now. You know the way."
"Look, Stephanie, can't we just-"
"Leave, Morelli." I pointed the way out.
Joe's finally quit glaring daggers at Ranger to turn on me. "What's he doing here in the middle of the night? You really move that fast, Stephanie?"
"Just because you're a slut, Joe, don't think the rest of us are so easy." He did have a point though- what was Ranger doing here? "Now pleaee leave."
Joe looked ready to argue again until I felt Ranger shift his weight behind me. I don't know what it meant, maybe it was some secret guy warning signal, but Joe's mouth snapped shut and he left. Just stomped through the door and was gone, slamming it behind him.
"Thanks, Ranger," I whispered, staring at the door and wondering what the hell had just happened.
"Anytime, Babe."
He turned me toward him and pulled me closer, wrapping both arms around me tightly. I slid my arms around his waist and leaned into him, burying my face in his shoulder. We stayed like that for several minutes, neither one of us speaking. The cold pit of dread that had formed inside of me disappeared gradually, but even when it was gone I stayed still enjoying the feel of being wrapped up in a Ranger hug.
I was the one to pull away though, because if I didn't I was probably going to jump him and I wasn't sure I liked where that would lead just now.
"You okay?" His eyes had their armor-piercing ESP look in them. I nodded.
"Shook up. Wierded out- what the hell was that, by the way? I mean, I got the him being mad part but just thinking that 'I'm sorry' fixes everything? Is he really that dense? Why do I always get the guys like that? Did you know Dickie thought the same thing at first? He thought if he got me that stupid necklace it would all be fixed, well the necklace and marriage counseling. I'm a magnet. I need chocolate.
And then 'what more is there?' . Where's my gun, I need to go shoot him! What more is there.. "
"Steph," Ranger's voice broke in. "No shooting cops. Too much paperwork."
I glared at him and went in search of the Milky Way I had stashed in the freezer for emergencies. The frozen nougaty chocolate carmel goodness was a welcome relief. It calmed the roiling sense of outrage, or at least distracted me from it. In my newfound chocolate-induced nirvana I looked back at Ranger. He was in SWAT mode and armed to the teeth. No wonder Joe decided on leaving.
"So what brought you here? I didn't send up a batsignal or anything..."
Ranger shook his head, his look turning serious. "I got a call from Tank and Bobby. They were at Underground tonight and there were some problems."
Images of Wild West show barroom brawls sprang to mind. "They start too many fights?"
Ranger gave me a look. "There was a drive-by."
"As in shooting?" I felt the knot of panic reappearing. Ranger nodded. "Where's Haley?"
"ER."
I stared at Ranger like I didn't understand what he'd just said. "Oh my god. How bad is it?"
"Bobby said it wasn't bad. Just a flesh wound."
I felt nauseous. The RangeMan guys' idea of a light wound was probably anything short of losing a limb. Ranger shook his head.
"Bobby is about to finish his medical degree. He would have said something if it was serious. Come on, I'll give you a ride."