Ah...still don't own anything 'cept for Jamie

Fourteen

I sighed and got up to put the phone back on the receiver. I noticed the little red light was beeping so I checked Morelli's messages for him. There was only one. From Jamie.

"Ah…listen I might be gone for a wh—shit." Then a disconnect.

I stood, rooted to the spot. Crap. Gone for a while? What was a while? Forever?

I picked up the phone and called Ranger again.

"Jamie left me a message saying she's going to be gone for a while." I said when he answered.

"I got a message, too."

"What do we do now?" I asked.

"We wait. She'll show up sooner or later." Ranger said and disconnected.

Shit. I can't wait. Waiting is bad. Waiting meant thinking. And I didn't really want to think right now.

I had nothing better to do, so I drove over to the office.

"Where's Jamie?" asked Lula when I swung through the door.

"I think she's been kidnapped." I said.

"Bummer."

It struck me suddenly that I wasn't as worried as I thought I'd be. Jamie had survived this long with Jack Summer trying to kill her so I hadn't a doubt in my mind that she would live through this episode. She had said herself that even if he does get a hold of her, he can't hold on for long. It was like worrying about Ranger. He was smart and knew what he was doing. I suspected that was the same case with Jamie.

"Any new skips come in?" I asked Connie.

Connie looked up from filing her nails. "Nope."

"Damn."

Now what? I asked myself. Jamie is missing, Joe is at work, Lula is filing, Mary Lou is doing God knows what. I had nothing to do.

Lula suddenly stopped filing and looked beyond me. Ranger must be here.

He came up behind me, hand on my neck, his body skimming my own. "We need to talk," he said quietly.

I followed him outside. "Any news?" I asked anxiously.

Ranger leaned back against his Mercedes, arms crossed, and shook head. "We had a tracking device on Jamie's cell phone, but it seems to be malfunctioning."

Damn.

Ranger watched me for a beat and then pushed off his car. "You shouldn't worry," he said, drawing me close, "She's been through worse than this."

I looked up at him. "Like what?"

He considered me for a moment. "If she hasn't told you than it's not my place to say," he said. He let go of my jacket and took a step back. "I have to do surveillance on an apartment building on Sloan. Want to come along?"

Well there goes my day. I nodded and joined Ranger in his car, wondering what the 'worse' things were that Jamie had been through.

We parked in front of Sloan and Ranger slid into his relaxed-but-aware-panther state.

A half hour went by and I couldn't wait anymore. I meant to suppress it, but it just popped out. "Did you love her?" I asked Ranger.

Ranger's eyes flicked my way but he remained silent. After a few minutes he answered, and if I hadn't been expecting it, I wouldn't have heard it.

"Yes."

"But not anymore?" I asked.

"Not in the way you're thinking of."

"Like how then?" I really needed to straighten these things out.

Ranger turned his head and looked at me for a full minute before answering. "She's like a little sister now," he said quietly. He turned back toward the window and I knew this discussion was over.

Ranger's pager beeped. He checked the readout and turned back toward the window. I guess it wasn't a now! call. His cell phone rang a minute later. He picked it up, checked the LCD, and decided against answering.

My cell phone chirped a minute later. I didn't recognize the number, but I answered anyway.

"Why isn't Ranger answering his goddamn phone?" Jamie asked.

"Jamie, where are you?" I asked.

"I tried his pager, his home phone, and his cell phone! It was hard enough 'cause I had to punch the stupid numbers with my tongue. The least he could do is answer. Are you with him?" This was coming from someone who had just gotten kidnapped.

My curiosity got the better of me. "Why did you have to dial with your tongue?"

"'Cause my hands are tied behind my back, dumdum. Give the phone to Ranger, will ya?"

I handed the phone over to Ranger. He smiled and answered. "Where are you?" he asked. I sighed deep with relief. She's okay, I told myself.

Even from where I was sitting I could hear the gunshots over the phone. Ranger's face went blank and he dropped the phone without disconnecting, gripped the wheel with a vengeance, and pressed the pedal to the floor. The Mercedes jumped from the curb and lurched forward. Ranger pulled a U-turn and headed for the Burg. I was stunned. I had always seen him cool, calm, and collected in a crisis. The mask that had come over his face was slowly fading, slowly and subtly being replaced with a look of terrified worry.

"White house with red trim on Cherry Street," he said, voice tight.

I knew that house. It was a duplex. My grandmother's friend Ellis Wells lived there and rented the other side out. It took us about three minutes to get onto Cherry Street. Ranger was driving too fast for me to notice the color of the houses, but he seemed to be able to see them just find. Suddenly he screeched to a stop, and I was pitched forward, catching on the seatbelt. Ranger was out of the car in a flash, not bother to close the door or take the keys out of the ignition. I was pretty sure he'd forgotten I was there.

I watched him put his foot to the door, gun drawn. Then he disappeared into the house. Sirens wailed in the distance. I didn't want to wait. I jumped out of the car and crept cautiously toward the house. I peered inside and saw Ranger bent over the couch. He had taken his shirt off and was holding it as a compress tightly against Jamie's shoulder. She was unconscious, arms tied behind her back, lying on the couch. There was a phone on the table next to the couch, and the handset was lying on the table beside the base.

Her side was bleeding as well, so I took off my own flannel shirt and handed it silently to Ranger. He looked at me like he forgot I was there, took the shirt and pressed it against her side.

"Is she—" I started to ask, but Ranger cut me off.

"Alive," he said tightly, "But barely."

None of us spoke again until the police and ambulances arrived. Ranger's face was once again blank, but I could see some emotion in his eyes, and it was scaring the hell out of me.

don't worry, she doesn't die.