Veriea Fornnan: A moped is a motorized bycicle…kinda like a motorcycle but way smaller….like a dirt bike sortof.

Sannaoo: I'm not a Joe OR Ranger fan, I'm just staying true to the books.

Three

Ranger came down for dinner around six, bearing pizza, soda, and beer.

"Can I have some?" Jazz asked, eyeing Ranger as he opened a bottle.

Ranger looked at her for a beat and handed the bottle over. Jazz took a generous gulp and gagged. "Oh-my-jolly-green-giant that stuff is GROSS! Why'd you let me take some?" she yelled at Ranger.

He shrugged. "You gotta learn the hard way, kiddo."

She glared at him and took a soda. "You're a bad parent, giving a kid alcohol. You should be arrested."

"I can give my kid beer if I want to. It's just other kids I have to watch out for."

"Why can you give me beer and not other kids?"

"'Cause I own you. You have no rights. I can do with you what I please."

"No you can't," said Jazz.

"Can too," said Ranger.

"Nu-uhn."

"Yeah-huhn."

"Nuh-uhn."

"Yeah-hunh."

That's basically how the rest of the evening went. I loved seeing Ranger interact with his daughter. This was yet another side to him I'd never seen before. This wasn't batman, this was Dadman. I could tell that he was Jazz's hero. She listened intently to every word he said, no matter what it was about.

Morelli called around nine. "Hey Cupcake, do you still like Miami?"

"I love it. I think I'm going to move here."

"Hmm…Bob wouldn't like that very much."

"Well in that case I'll stay in Trenton. Wouldn't want Bob to be all depressed."

"Yeah well Bob is pretty depressed right now what with you gone. Me and him are just sitting here, missing you."

"Tell Bob I miss him too," I said.

"How's the Jamie hunt?" Morelli wanted to know.

"We're going to snoop around some of Summer's properties and see what we can dig up."

"We? As in you and Ranger? I don't think so. I think you're going to leave the snooping up to him."

Not this again. "Hey she's my sister."

Morelli sighed. He knew he couldn't control me even when I was living with him. Much less me being 1000 miles away.

"Be careful at least. Stick to Ranger and don't go off by yourself. And have your gun."

Probably the one and only time Morelli is telling me to stay close to Ranger. I disconnected and went back out into the living room, where Ranger and Jazz were sitting on the couch, discussing the hypothetical event in which she got a boyfriend.

"What would you do if I got a boyfriend?" Jazz asked, looking up at her father.

"I would tell him to keep his slimy hands off my only daughter," said Ranger.

"You wouldn't!"

"Yeah I would."

"Why! What if he was perfectly nice?"

"I wouldn't know that."

"You would if you met him. And when you meet him you'll probably do a background check on his family and every person they've ever been in contact with in the last decade."

"Century. More accurate," said Ranger.

Jazz rolled her eyes. "Yeah, whatever. So I bring him to meet you and you do the whole stupid background check thing. Then will you let me date?"

"Not until you're sixteen."

"WHAT! NO WAY!"

"Kidding," said Ranger, "I know you're a smart kid and I know you are a good judge of character. But I'll still do a background check."

Jazz's eyes glowed at those words. She saw me coming out of the bedroom. "Hey Steph, who were you talking to?"

"My…er…boyfriend." It wasn't the same when you said it, was it?

"Oooooh what's his name?"

"Joe."

"Is he hot?"

"Absolutely. Not as hot as your dad though." Omigod I can't believe I just said that out loud.

Jazz burst out laughing and Ranger flashed me all 200-watts. "Nice, babe, real nice."

At eleven Tank came to the apartment and told us it was show-time. Ranger sent Jazz to bed and started gearing up.

"If you get shot I'll be really mad at you," said Jazz before disappearing into Ranger's bedroom.

Ranger and Tank buckled on big utility belts chalk full of handcuffs, stun-guns, and one or two guns.

"We're only doing a little B & E tonight, so we're probably not going to need and major weapons, but it doesn't hurt to be prepared," Ranger said when I eyed his guns.

Tank handed me a Sig Sauer. Just like the one I got when I worked at Rangeman. "Do you remember how to use it?" he asked.

"Uh…maybe," I said, taking the gun. And that was the truth. I had no idea if I knew how to use it or not. I pressed a button and the clip fell out and thumped onto the carpet. Tank grinned at me. "I guess not," he said.

Tank gave me a thirty second crash course to jog my memory. Ranger, Tank and I met Jordan in the garage and piled into an SUV. Me and Tank in the back, Ranger and Jordan in the front. Jordan was holding a piece of paper and a map.

"Our first address is on the North side," said Jordan, reading the piece of paper

and looking at the map, "Colon Apartments. 229 NE 2nd Avenue."

The sky was dark but the city was bright. Clubs were opening and people were going out for a night on the town. The attire had changed from swim suits and shorts to hot dresses and jeans. After ten minutes Ranger turned onto 2nd Avenue and parked in front of Colon Apartments. It was redbrick, three stories, and had aluminum framed windows. Didn't look to cheery.

Ranger parked on the curb and everyone silently got out of the car and started suiting up. Nylon webbed gun belts, Kevlar vests, guns, knives, pepper spray, maglights.

"Do you think she's here?" I asked Ranger.

"No."

Oh boy.

I followed Tank, Ranger, and Jordan into the building. Summer was renting out room 214. Ranger rapped on the door once while Tank, Jordan and I stood to the side. No one and answered and Ranger knocked again. When no one answered the second time, Ranger pulled a long, slim tool out of his belt and inserted it into the lock and the lock clicked open. Oh boy. Now I finally get to see how Batman gets a chain off. My heart was beating a little faster than usual because the law-abiding part of my brain was screaming WE'RE GONNA GET ARRESTED! Then the sisterly part of my brain tells it to shut the hell up, beyotch, 'cause we gotta do anything to find Jamie. It turned out that there was no chain, so I was out of luck.

Ranger did a fast walk through of the apartment and motioned us inside. We all snapped on disposable gloves and congregated in the small living room/dining room.

Ranger told us to look for anything to clue us in to Jamie's location. An address, phone number, Polaroid camera, anything. Then we all branched off to search through different rooms.

The one bedroom apartment was small and had the minimum furniture. A card-table the dining room with two fold-out chairs, beat up couch, cheap TV on a shelf. There was a dorm-size fridge in the kitchen and a microwave on the counter. Jack Summer didn't live too well. Tank and I were assigned to the kitchen. We rifled through drawers and papers, looked through the fridge and cabinets. There wasn't much in the apartment. After half an hour we all met in the living room again.

"Anybody find anything?" Ranger asked. Shaking heads all around.

We left the apartment the same way we found it and locked up. Everyone was silent. The hollowness of my stomach was growing. I really wanted to find Jamie.

The next place was a house Summer rented out. It was currently being lived in by a family with two small children. Ranger explained the Cliff's Notes version of the situation to the mother and father and did a quick walkthrough, leaving the rest of us in the SUV. The couple didn't look too trusting. He came out of the house and shook his head at us.

"Fuck," said Tank.

Next up, the mother's house. Summer's mother was currently visiting her sister in Maine, so this was a perfect time. Ranger did the whole knocking-on-the-door-five-times to see if anyone was home, and picked the lock.

"Sometime you have to show me how to do that," I said to Ranger.

The house was one story and full to the brim with flowers. The living room was daisy-themed. Daisy-print slip covers, daisy art, daisy books, daisy pillows, daisy wallpaper. The kitchen had a more tulipy décor. The tiles that lined the backplash had tulips painted on them. The tea-pot cozy was decorated with yellow and red tulips.

The rest of the rooms in the house were roses, pansies, daffodils, and hydrangeas. The only thing it was missing was information. We came up with absolutely nothing.

The ride home was, as usual, silent. Silent was bad. That meant my mind went into overdrive, wondering what kind of horrible things were happing to my baby sister. Instinctively I reached into my shoulder bag and pulled out my cell phone, which I had turned off in honor of our search. I dialed Jamie's number and waited for an answer. Nothing. Her message greeting told me I had reached Jamie and that if I needed any more instructions, well that was just pathetic. "Are you ok?" I asked the phone and then disconnected.

Ranger unlocked our apartment door and I followed him in. He tossed his keys onto the side table and ambled into the kitchen.

"Hungry, babe?" he asked. It was almost two thirty in the morning. I hadn't slept all day. I just flew 1000 miles in not even twenty-four hours. I was exhausted, I felt like any second now I was going to topple over. And yet my stomach was growling.

Ranger pulled out the left-over pizza and shoved it into the microwave.

"Hey Ricky," I said, remembering what Jamie said in her last letter.

Ranger looked at me and raised an eyebrow. "Jamie told me to call you that," I said.

The corners of Ranger's mouth tipped up a fraction. I noticed he was looking more tired than usual. "You should go to sleep," I said.

"I can't yet. I want to eat and then I need to do some more searches. I'll come to bed at some point."

After eating the rest of the pizza I flopped onto my bed without changing. I was asleep before my head hit the pillow.

---------------------------------

I awoke to the wonderful smell of pancakes. I dragged myself out of the bed and looked at the clock. Eight thirty-eight. I shuffled into the kitchen to see Jazz standing at the stove, pouring pancake batter into a pan. She saw me and grinned.

"Morning sleeping beauty. Care for a pancake?" She gestured at the stack of pancakes stacked on a plate resting on the counter. I forked a couple onto a plate for myself and sat down at the counter, across from Jazz, facing the stove.

"Where's Ranger?" I asked.

"Asleep. He came back at four this morning and tried to sleep only until six but I made him go back to bed."

"And he stayed there?"

"Well I had to lock him in."

I looked over at the door to Ranger's room. The table from the foyer was shoved against it.

"I think he'll be able to get out of that," I said.

Jamie glanced over at the door. "He could, but he won't. I told him to sleep until noon."

Fat chance.

Ranger ended up sleeping until ten. He managed to get out of his room but before he went back up to the control room Jazz made him eat three massive pancakes drowning in syrup.

"Boy, you sure are whipped," I said to Ranger, watching him eat pancakes, "You'll just do everything she tells you to, huh?"

Ranger looked up at me. His face was serious, but his voice was hinting laughter. "Have you ever tried disobeying Jasmine Manoso? It can't be done. She'll eat you alive."

Jazz giggled. "In that case, I don't want to go to school today. I can't anyway, I'm already three hours late."

"You don't have to, but your mother will have my head if you don't." Ranger said to her. As if on cue the phone rang. Ranger grabbed it and answered. "Yo," he said. He listened. "She's going to school, don't worry. She can a couple hours late." He listened some more. "No, I didn't take her on any life-threatening missions last night. I never have, and I never will. I've told you that before." More listening. His eyes darkened. "I know," he growled and then he disconnected.

"What did she say?" Jazz wanted to know.

"She told me I better not let you skip school today. And she wanted to know if I put you in mortal danger last night." And she said something else that had pissed him off but I guess he wasn't going to tell us what it was.

Jazz scowled. "She's annoying."

"She's your mother, you can't blame her."

"It's not like she likes me. She justlikes to be in control.She's sorry she had me," Jazz added. I knew she didn't like her mother, but I could tell she was a little sad about not being wanted.

Jazz looked right at Ranger, her eyes boring into his. "Are you sorry you guys had me?" she said. Uh oh. Maybe I shouldn't be here.

"No," Ranger said firmly. "Not ever. Never will be. Never even thought about it."

Jazz grinned and launched herself across the table at him.

I was recruited to take Jazz to school. We took the Porsche because Jazz said it made her look cool. She gave me directions and we only got lost once. After I dropped Jazz off I had a little trouble finding my way back to the office. Finally I got so fed up I pulled over and parked in an empty spot along the curb and hauled out my cell phone.

"I think I'm lost," I said to Ranger when he answered.

"Babe, you're two blocks away. Just keep going straight and turn left into the parking garage."

"Oh."

"Don't get lost," Ranger said and disconnected.

I was about to pull away from the curb again when my cell phone chirped.

"Forget something?" I asked Ranger.

"You better hope you can find your sister soon, Stephanie, or she's gonna get it." Said Jack Summer. Definitely NOT Ranger.

"WAIT! Let me talk to her! Where are you?"

"Sorry. If you want to see her alive you'll bring 800,000 dollars to Mike's Auto tonight at twelve thirty. And you'll come alone, or she swims with the fishes."

As appalled I was to hear him saying that cheesy line, that didn't distract me from paying attention. I pressed the pedal to the floor and shot from the curb.

I'm going on a ten day cruise next week. (leaving the 22nd) so I'm probably only going to write one or maybe two more chapters and then I'll write some more