Standard issue disclaimer applies. They're not mine (bummer!) and I'm not making any money (ditto!) and people who are easily offended by other people thinking, talking and behaving like adults should probably refrain from reading.

Rangeday

chapter 21

The alarm went at 06:15 AM, and Stephanie felt a wave of disappointment when she found she was still alone between the luxurious sheets of the 7th floor apartment. She'd half hoped, half expected for Ranger to return during the night and silently slip into bed with her. That he hadn't, worried her. She grabbed her phone from the nightstand.

"Rangeman control."

She didn't recognise the voice, and then sleepily remembered that the control room would be manned by contract workers so that the regular crew was free for Rangeday.

"Hello, this is Stephanie," she said, "Is anything known about Ranger and Tank?"

"Good morning Ms Plum," was the polite answer. "Ranger called at six, and they were just boarding the plane. He said to proceed with your plans for the day, and he will call you when he lands."

"Okay, thank you."

She hung up and let herself flop back onto the bed. He was safe. He was flying back to Trenton right this moment. He might not make it exactly in time and he was likely to be tired, but she didn't give a damn.

"Moshi moshi,"

"Hey Tsuy, have you heard from Tank yet?"

"Goodmorning, Stephanie. Yes, he just sent me a text message that he's all right."

"Ah, good. Feel ready for today?"

"I suppose I do. How about you?"

"Now I know the guys are alright…" She realised she was feeling kind of hyper now that the worry was fading. No doubt the merry men were the same… probably worse, since they still didn't know what was going to happen.

"I know what you mean. Hey, here's a question. I have the dogs with me today. Is it okay if I bring them for a while? They're spending the night at Joanne's place."

"If you think they can handle it, sure."

"Great. I'll see you there."

Everybody had been asked to be in the meeting room at 7:00 to get route descriptions and be given the stuff that had to be brought along, so she got a move on. After a quick shower with her favourite shower gel she dressed in jeans and a stretchy, soft pink tee with a big white daisy on the front. No need to dress in black today, and she intended to make full use of that. Would the guys come in their own clothes or would they automatically dress for work? She hoped to see some individuals today.

Ella was in the kitchen when she got out of the bedroom. She'd prepared an omelette and some fresh baked bagels.

"Morning Ella."

"Good morning Stephanie. Ranger hasn't returned yet?"

"He's on his way. I hope he got some sleep."

"They have some apartments in the Boston office as well, so perhaps he slept for a couple of hours there."

"I hope so."

"Are you still nervous?"

"Just hyper. Whatever happens, nothing much I can do about it now."

"The weather looks good. It's predicted to be about 25 degrees Celsius, with a nice breeze. I'm sure you'll have a wonderful day."

"Thank you, I really hope so. Are you and Luis still coming?"

"Of course. I wouldn't miss it for the world. We'll be there around six."

"Gentlemen!"

The group quietened down, and she smiled because the black Rangeman clothing on Cal and Junior was the occasional island in a sea of jeans and T-shirts. Most of the guys had decided that Rangeday definitely called for informal clothing. Lester and Bobby had taken this a step further and were wearing the loudest Hawaii shirts she had ever seen.

Eager eyes followed her around the room as she handed out the sheets with directions.

"You're going to tell us now, right? Right?"

"Come on Bombshell, you've won. Just tell us."

"Yeah, we're dying here!"

She ignored them, having decided that she might as well let them discover when they arrived.
"This is where we're going."

"The beach!"

"Awesome!"

There would be twenty-one people including her, and she'd made teams of seven, trying to achieve well-balanced groups. She hadn't really planned a competitive element, but knowing the guys, that would develop anyway.
The boisterous group made its way to the garage and started piling bags and tents and other things into the cars, their voices echoing through the garage. She'd managed to convince them that carpooling would be a good idea. Why go to such a beautiful stretch of beach and then park it full of cars?

When the cars were packed and everybody was ready she hesitated. She'd planned to just load everybody up and go, but she hadn't heard from Ranger and Tank yet. What if they were too tired to drive, or something like that? She didn't like the idea of leaving without him.

She hauled out her mobile and hit the speed dial. He answered after three rings.

"Yo, Babe."

"Yo yourself. Where are you?"

"Just taxiing to the terminal. We should be at the office in half an hour."

"Are you good to drive? Did you get any sleep?"

"A couple of hours. We're good. You go along with the group, someone has to stay in charge of that lot."

She grinned at the idea that Ranger would consider her in charge.

"Okay. Ella has directions to the place. I'll see you when you get there."

"See you then," he said, and disconnected. She sighed. At least it was a step up from a complete sudden disconnect

"They good?" Lester asked.

"They're fine, they'll just be a bit late. We're good to go."

He turned to the rest of the guys and made a circular motion with his hand. She didn't know what it meant but clearly the others did, because everybody got in and seven engines roared to life. A minute later seven cars rolled down the street, each of them full of boisterous men. Probably most of them were arguing about what the activities would be, who won the book, and who got to control the CD player.

"How are you settling in?" she asked Michael, who was riding with her in the Hilux.

He made a non-committal sound.

"Slowly," he finally said. "I still get the 'intellectual' cracks."

"I've been here half a year and I still get the 'Jersey girl' cracks."

"It's different in Boston. This is a much closer group."

"A lot of them served together in the army, so it just takes a while to become part of them, I guess. Today might help."

"Yeah, stuff outside of the normal activities."

She got the impression that he had been struggling to rebuild his life, with no time for relaxing. Small wonder if he had been released six months ago, with no support system to fall back on. He'd asked Tank for extra hours on the roster, and Tank had nodded and given him extra control room shifts. Michael could do with some activities outside of work, and a chance to become friends with his colleagues.

When they got to the beach she saw that Jake, Dominic and a third instructor were already there. She guessed that would be Malik. He was a tall, dark-skinned man with his hair in close corn-row braiding. His shoulders were wide, but he wasn't bulky like most of the Rangemen. He could have been Tank's brother, without the weightlifting habit.

Jake and the other men had put up a big army tent to store equipment and food in, and next to the tent, seven three-wheeled buggies were lined up. Michael leant forward in his seat as soon as they came within sight.

"Trikes?"

"They're for beach sailing."

His eyes gleamed, and she thought this could be the first genuine grin she'd seen on him since she met him. He would smile politely in greeting, but he was always guarded, reserved. With his pale blue eyes sparkling and a grin on his lips Stephanie found him devastatingly handsome. Since she didn't think Ranger would consent to her having a male harem, she idly considered if she had any friends to introduce Michael to.

When they got out of the car she found the other guys slapping hands together and talking about their bets. Apparently nobody had guessed beach sailing. She grinned inwardly because it wasn't the only thing she had in store for them.

"Let's put up the tents first," she said.

They proceeded to do just that, in a far more efficient manner than she would have. Stuff was transferred from the cars to the tents – bags, boxes, and Rodriguez produced a large cooler that disappeared into the army tent were the food and equipment was stored.

Bobby had brought a small igloo-model tent and a large package that turned out to be something like a modern tipi. Unlike the small and light sleeping tents, you could easily stand up in it.

"That's my festival tent," he told her when she asked what he used it for. "I thought it'd come in handy to store stuff out of the wind, and to change."

She thanked him for bringing it, though she highly doubted that any of the guys would have a problem with changing out in the open. It was for her benefit, and that was very nice of him.

Twenty minutes later there was a camp, complete with the tents in half a circle and a dug-out fireplace in the open space. The Merry Men were nothing if not good in the wild. Putting up her own tent, borrowed from the Rangeman store room, had been a struggle until Hector and Woody suddenly came over and took the fibreglass construction from her hands.

"Here, we'll do that," Woody grinned, assembling the poles with practised ease.

"We get to good stuff soon, si?" Hector said with a nod toward the landsailing buggies.

"Well okay then, if you insist…" she said, a bit unnecessary since they'd already erected her tent and were pinning it down with the tent pegs.

It was nearly 9:30 AM when everything was set up. She went to the waterline, watching the waves roll in. Before long the men surrounded her with expectant looks.

"Well!" Junior couldn't contain himself.

"So, get into your teams and we'll get started," she said.

It only took a minute of squabbling for the three groups to form on the beach. She'd put Ranger and Tank into the blue team because it would be easiest to step into that activity if they were late. She was in the White team together with Bobby, Hawk, Michael, Manny, Cal and Zero.

"We have three teams and three activities. We'll have lunch in two and half hours, and then you all change to your second activity."

"The red team starts with Jake; he is a beach sailing instructor."

Ram and Lester high-fived each other.

"…the white team with Dominic; he'll go surf kayaking with you."

"Yeah baby, yeah!" Manny did his Austin Powers imitation. Bobby, Michael and the rest of the white team were grinning.

"…and the blue team with Malik. He's a power kite instr—"

"Bárbaro!" Hector exclaimed.

She startled as a pair of huge arms lifted her off the ground in a giant bear hug. Lester, clearly liking the planning for the day. Everybody laughed while he put her down again.

"Awesome, Steph," he grinned at her. Then he was off, going back to his team to get ready for beach sailing.

"Kayaking?" Zero said to Dom. "You goin' to teach us the cool rolls and all?"

Zero was one of the fringe guys, usually working in nightshifts. She didn't see him much and knew little about him apart from the intimate details of his on-off relationship with a Philly stripper. Who ever said that only women gossiped? He wasn't tall, but built solidly and had a big tribal tattoo on his right calf.

"Yeah, we want all the tricks," Bobby agreed. Manny and Cal nodded in agreement.

"Sure," Dominic grinned at them. "Go get into your wet suits; the kayaks are in the big tent."

Walking through the soft sand toward the tents she found Cal next to her.

"Man, how did you arrange all this? The boss said the budget…" he made a vague chopping gesture.

"Ranger told us that to balance the new bonus system, the budget for Rangeday had been cut in half," Bobby supplied, appearing on her other side. "He said to prepare ourselves for a barbeque and a game of football."

She smiled at them and shrugged. So that's how he'd tried to temper the expectations.

"Ranger is a sneak."

"Damn right," Cal rumbled.

She was just zipping up her wetsuit when a truck pulled up. That had to be the guys. She pushed through the flap of the tipi, took a split second to appreciate the sculpted planes and angles of Bobby's bare back, and walked to Ranger as he got out of Tank's truck. He walked toward her, and they collided in a hard hug, the force of worry and relief behind it.

He had wrapped her up in his arms, and she buried her face into the side of her neck. She hadn't allowed herself to think about it, but the worry had weighed on her mind all night.

"Hey Babe," he said finally, his tone light. She smiled against his skin, because his grip on her indicated that he definitely hadn't taken the situation lightly.

"Hey Ranger."

"Hey boss!"

They both looked at Lester, who had rolled one of the buggies onto the hard sand and was putting the mast in place together with Junior. Three buggies were already set up, their sails still down.

"Looks like she won the bet, alright!"

Ranger flashed a grin and gave her a brief, hard kiss on the lips. Then he let go, apparently deciding that that was enough intimacy in front of the men. She buried her disappointment. If she wanted to be part of the team, snogging the boss in full view wouldn't help.

"So what do I start with?"

"You and Tank are in the Blue team. Power kiting."

She gestured to the small group on the other side of the tent camp. Hal had Hector by the back of his belt to stop the smaller man from becoming airborne by the power of the kite. Ranger quirked a smile.

"Cool. What are you going to do?" he held her at arm's length, taking his time to look her over. His eyes grew dark.

Guess he likes the wetsuit.

"Surf kayaking."

At that moment the guys started to bring the kayaks from the army tent where they had been stored, working in pairs to bring them to the waterline.

"Give her up man, she's gotta come with us," Zero grinned. Ranger looked like he thought about smiling. After a moment he turned her to face away from him, and gave her a little push with his hands on her hips. She chuckled and went, leaving him to join the kiters.

After a brief instruction about the kayaks they went into the water, and even though a wave drenched her within the first five seconds in the kayak, she was grinning from ear to ear. Dom had taken them to behind the surf for some basic skills, like how to catch a wave and how to go against one. The trick was not to go completely sideways, apparently.

Then they went off to play in the surf, waiting for good waves, riding them to the white foam, struggling back out to catch another wave. It was great fun, and when she got tired she paddled to behind the breakers, where Dom was teaching some of the guys the beginning of the rolling technique. Apparently it was called eskimoteering.

She watched the kiters on the beach and smiled when Tank was given the strongest of the kites, big enough to take most other men flying. He took a few steps and then jumped, and she heard the guys whoop as he landed a couple of metres further in the sand. Seemed like everybody was having fun. Something eased in her stomach at that realisation; a knot she hadn't even known was there.

She was just beyond the breakers waiting for a good wave when an old army-green Landrover Defender entered their secluded section of beach. It had a zipped tarp-tent over the back. The car came to a stop some way from the waterline and a slight figure in a navy warm-up suit jumped out. Tsuy.

She looked around for a moment and zipped open the back of the car. Instantly it seemed as if the beach was filled with dogs. The two Stephanie had already met, and three smaller brown dogs. Miyo and two of the others stood at the waterline and barked at the waves and the kayaks, tails wagging hard.

They looked friendly enough, so she let a good wave carry her to the beach and got out in ankle-deep water. The dogs crowded around her, in the foam, wanting to lick her hands while she dragged her kayak onto the beach.

They were sleek, tan and red-brown dogs with light brown eyes and huge triangular ears. Beautiful, friendly and on the hyperactive side. Miyo stood back a little, more reserved. The larger dog greeted her with a soft howl.

She heard a camera click and looked up to find Tsuy, mirror shades on her face and a professional looking camera in her hand. She wore a fitted polo and warm-up trousers with poppers along the outside of the legs. Perhaps they covered up her riding tights. Her ball cap said 'Lundgren Endurance Horses'

"Hey! Glad to see you came. Where did you find these little guys?"

Her friend adjusted some things on the camera and didn't take it away from her face while she talked.

"They're Joanne's dogs, she breeds Kelpies." Click, click. Stephanie knew that Joanne Lundgren was the friend Tsuy went to when she went horseback riding.

"If they're too rowdy I can put them back in the car."

"Nah, they're cool, and it's hard to out-rowdy the merry men! Have you spotted Tank yet?"

Tsuy looked around the beach, shaking her head, and then a smile broke through when she spotted the large man. He was flying a smaller stunt kite and watching as Hal took a big jump with one of the powerkites, his face lit up with laughter. Stephanie found herself fascinated – it was the first time she'd seen the guys this open.

"You should go make some photos there," she said after a long moment.

"Definitely."

She watched as her friend walked over to the kiters, two Kelpies ahead of her, Iseki the polar dog on her heels. Tank handed his kite to Vince and met her halfway, catching her up in a hug. Stephanie saw heads turn from all along the beach. Guess now everybody knew why Tank had been smiling of late.

Ranger hunched down to pet the dogs and Stephanie felt a wave of warm something-or-another at the sight of it. God, he was amazing. It was hard to believe that they were actually trying this relationship thing. She'd hoped for it, but she'd never been able to picture a future with him. She had never thought he would ever want that. Now she was beginning to think that a future with him wouldn't have to change the things about her life that she liked. There was no demand to quit her job, become a housewife, have kids. They could go on living their lives the way they liked best, only better because they would be living it together.

She'd been afraid of commitment with Joe because life as she knew it would be over. Committing to Joe meant his idea of growing up – the same idea her mother had. It occurred to her now that she wasn't afraid of commitment with Ranger. He'd never try to make her into something she wasn't. Life as she knew it would only get better.

That was, if he was actually willing to commit to her. Don't think about this stuff now. Today is a good day.

.

A pair of arms closed around her waist and she jumped, startled from her thoughts. Ranger turned her around to face him and kissed her forehead.

"Are you okay? You seem sad."

She buried her face in the crook of his neck and just breathed for a long moment, willing herself to let go of the fear and live by the day. The future could be full of misery, or full of happiness. It would be what it would be. No use spoiling the present by running ahead. And the present happened to be pretty damn awesome.

"I'm okay," she whispered, brushing a kiss to his throat, just above his T-shirt collar. He took a deep breath and his arms tightened a little. She half expected him to kiss her, but he didn't, perhaps because of the men. His hand was tracing circles over her upper back, reassuring. She wondered how he knew what she needed before she did.

"HEY! GET A ROOM!" someone bellowed from further along the beach. They startled apart and then grinned at their own reaction.

"It's getting time for lunch," she said, sad thoughts already fading. "Got to feed the savages."

"We'd better," he agreed solemnly

As they turned around they found themselves before Tsuy's lens. She was standing about ten paces away, and clearly had been standing there for a few minutes. One of her dogs sat beside her. Stephanie wondered if her 'moment' had been caught in glorious technicolour.

"Do you have to do that?" she asked as she let go of Ranger. He gave her side a little squeeze and went off to the kiting group.

"You'll have to trust me," Tsuy said. "Anyway, you did ask me to get all the good pictures…"

"Yeah, but I meant that sort of good pictures…" she nodded to the rest of the white team. They had dragged the kayaks onto the beach and started to peel themselves from their wetsuits as they walked up the beach.

Hawk, solid like a man used to hard work; Bobby, into weight training and with a more sculpted chest; Michael, leanly muscled with the full-torso tattoo she had suspected… there was plenty of eye candy.

"Artful," said Tsuy with the camera already up. She clicked away as the men came closer.

"Feels like I'm a wildlife photographer," she said, looking through the lens while adjusting the focus.

Stephanie grinned.
"You mean we'll get one of those photo series of an animal storming toward the camera?"

"Exactly. Found with a trampled body."

"For lunch we'll just toss them a big chunk of raw zebra."

The three men were a few paces away when they were swarmed by Miyo and the Kelpies, barking and tails wagging wildly. One of the Kelpies put down a tennis ball in front of Hawk. When the man ignored it, the dog picked it up and tried to touch it to his hand.

"Hey, where did all these dogs come from?" Bobby called out, stopped in his tracks to pet the excited dogs.

"There was a sale," Tsuy said from behind her camera. Click, click.

"Typical. Women…" Hawk grinned, accepting the ball and throwing it. Four dogs shot off after it.

Michael hunched down and tried to tempt Iseki, the dog that had stuck close to Tsuy, to come over. Both the women smiled because he was talking to the dog in a low voice.

"And who are you? Don't be shy…"

Iseki whimpered, torn between staying in safety and going to him. Its curled tail gave a plaintive wag at the friendly voice, and then it shied behind Tsuy's legs. One of the Kelpies barrelled past, eager to claim Michael's attention. He laughed softly and petted it.

"I'm very scary, obviously."

"Yeah, we all agree," Bobby interjected. "I'm Bobby," he introduced himself to Tsuy. "Scary here is Michael, and Beefy Spice there goes through life by the name of Hawk."

"Pleased to meet you. I'm Tsuyiko Yatsumi."

"Ah, the self defence teacher, right? You've done great work with Steph here."

Tsuy made a slight bow in acknowledgement. It seemed almost automatic, because the accompanying words deflected the compliment.

"Stephanie did all the hard work. I only showed the way."

Hawk threw the ball once more and turned to Stephanie.

"Are you going to feed us anytime soon?"

"I'm considering it," she teased. He gave a mock-growl.

"Well, consider quickly. I'm hungry."

He and Bobby went ahead to the camp, and Stephanie heard part of their conversation drift back as they walked off.

"So is that Tank's…?"

"I don't know man. We'll have to…" Bobby lowered his voice and the rest of the sentence was lost on the wind.

Stephanie hoped this didn't intend to pester Tsuy, because her friend might not be ready for the Rangeman Inquisition. The other woman seemed comfortable enough right now, but it had occurred to Stephanie that the dogs were an excellent way to redirect attention her friend wasn't comfortable with. Questions about the status of Tank and her would definitely fall in that category.

Michael had stayed behind, still playing with the dogs.

"You have dogs yourself?" Tsuy asked him, taking a photo.

"Used to, when I was a kid. I miss it."

Especially since he wouldn't have had the chance to have dogs in his life over the past few years, Stephanie reflected. Prison time deprived people of things you took for granted when you were free. Like the chance to pet a friendly dog. She studied Michael's tattoo, wondering what had brought him to get such a huge design. It had a lot of smaller designs and words and random pictures incorporated into it, and a lot of detail that made little sense to her. Probably it all had its own story, but she doubted he would be willing to tell it.

Michael smoothly rose to his feet and extended his hand to Tsuy.

"I'm Michael, by the way. But you already knew that." He flashed a smile and Stephanie could swear she saw her friend give the tiniest gasp.

"Nice to meet you. Tsuy."

"You're from England?" he referred to her accent.

"I'm not really from anywhere."

Michael nodded as if he understood the sentiment.

"Hello Tsuy-Chan! You must be Tank's new squeeze!" Lester loudly greeted Tsuy as the women joined the rest of the group. Every face in the vicinity turned to look what was going on. Tank, standing on the other side of the camp, observed the exchange with a blank expression on his face.

Stephanie grimaced. Not exactly how she'd hoped for things to start out.

Apart from a slight hesitation in her pace, Tsuy gave no indication that she'd even heard it. She turned to Lester, extended her hand, and introduced herself in a polite, level tone.

"Tsuyiko Yatsumi."

Her voice projected aloof politeness, and Stephanie felt every bit of posh-boarding-school, stiff-upper-lip upbringing reflected in it. Then the tone disappeared as fast as it had come.

"You must be Rude Spice."

Lester barked out a laugh, accepting the offered hand and raising it to his lips. Tank's expression relaxed, and everybody turned back to their conversations.

"Ranger, you have a bad influence on the Bombshell," Lester declared. "There's green stuff on this!"

Ranger grinned, biting into his smoked salmon and salad sandwich. All around him, men were opening up the buns to check what was inside.

"Cucumber!" Ram said. "That's it, she's gone over to the dark side."

"Thought it was the light side," Hal mumbled with his mouth full. "Jedi food."

"Yeah, aren't we the dark side?"

"Okay, but 'she's gone over to the light side' doesn't have the same ring to it," Zero said.

"We can't be the light side, not after all that running around with Darth Maul light sabres." Tank interjected.

"Except Zero – he had a Jedi sabre," Cal pointed out.

"Only because the Darth Maul ones had sold out," Zero defended.

"No excuses!" Hector called out. "It is so:" he gestured to the right with both hands, one of which was holding a ham sandwich. "Salad. El jefe—"
"Tofu!" someone called. Hector nodded solemnly. Ranger was hiding a grin.

"Tofu. El Zero. Y la Stephanie." His hands went to the left. "On other side: El Rangemen. Darth Maul. Dodge Viper."

"If there are only two sides, where do people like officer Gaspick go?" Stephanie grinned. "Cause he sure as hell doesn't belong on the light side."

"She's right," Woody agreed. "He can't be on the light side, and he doesn't get to be on the cool side either."

"The grey side?"

"That's in the middle. Loser like that don't get to be in the middle."

"There's nothing else. Maybe ultraviolet."

"Too cool," Manny said. "Ultraviolet is for Ford GTs."

"You and that race toy," Ram said. "That's not a real car, it's a train! If you're going to get a race monster, at least get one that can take a corner, like the McLaren." This bold statement was met by murmurs, but Ram barrelled on, "And Gaspick is anti-dark side. Not cool at all, and not good either."

Approving nods all around.

"Anti-dark it is."

"Did Hector just put me on the light side?" Ranger asked Stephanie under his breath as Zero opened his mouth to protest his light side status. Stephanie grinned. "I think he did, Batman."

"Just wanted to check." He turned to the group and just looked at Hector for a long moment. It had to be an intense look because the smaller man turned to meet the gaze in seconds.

"Ah, I just remember. Naturalmente, El jefe is honorary dark side," he suddenly spoke up. Some of the men nodded in agreement. If the dark side was bad-ass, then Ranger clearly couldn't be left out. Even though he ate rabbit food.

"You can't be on the light side and blow up cars," Manny said, giving Stephanie a thoughtful look. "On the other hand, she feeds us salad."

"Very sneakily, too," Zero added to the offence. He hadn't been able to negotiate his way out of the light side and clearly didn't want to be left alone.

"Hey, if I stealthily tried to feed you salad, wouldn't that be more of a dark side thing to do?" she pitched in, feeling she ought to have a say in this.

"She has a point."

"Nonsense!"

"Ah, but what is more…" Hector lobbied. "On one hand—" he gestured, "—salad." He gestured with the other hand, "On other hand, coches going BWAAAAOUM!"

Faces around the circle nodded that this was a clear case. The stealth salad was negated by the exploding cars. Welcome to the Dark Side, Stephanie Plum. She grinned at Tsuy, who was following the discussion like a tennis match, a look of bemusement on her face.

"I have a Sith Academy t-shirt, but I think to these guys, the tofu weighs heavier," she said to Stephanie.

"Oh, I would say," Tank butted in from Tsuy's other side, "that you're good enough at living double lives to qualify. You had me convinced you didn't know a thing."

"So she knew." Ranger turned his head, pinning her with his eyes. "For how long?"

Tsuy glanced at Stephanie.

"About… since the beginning?"

"Let me get this straight", Hal interrupted, sandwich in hand. "You've been seeing Tank 'the Interrogator' Foster for months… and he never suspected you knew about this?"

"Man, I don't know if this reflects good on her or bad on him," Lester grinned.

"Or both."

"She knew?" Cal said suddenly from next to Tank. "She knew? I waste a day tailin' Ms Stankovich and you been sleeping with the enemy and din't even get it out of her?"

Stephanie winced at the way he put that, but Tsuy didn't react. Tank shot Cal a look that had him shut his mouth with an almost audible snap. Perhaps it was the memory of Bill that did it.

"Hey, we all got up to some weird stuff trying to find out," Eddie said with unusual tact. "I listened to enough Burg gossip to start my own Reader's Digest."

Lester broke into hysterical laughter. Everybody gave him puzzled looks except Bobby, who was sporting a wide grin.

Stephanie looked from Eddie to Lester and back.

"Major feeling of impending doom," Eddie said. He glanced at Manny, who shrugged.

"We have—" Lester choked out, "photos!"

Eddie's expression said 'uh-oh'.

"Of you in that hairdresser place," Bobby said with a shit-eating grin.

"Getting your head shaved—" Lester gasped for breath, "between little old ladies getting purple rinses!"

Stephanie burst into laughter. It was such an absurd image. Big tough Eddie, the kind of guy who gave skips a menacing look and they were ready to hold out their hands to get cuffed, in the Clip and Curl. The image was killing her.

Eddie gave Manny a pissed-off look.
"You were supposed to keep watch."

"I did! I don't know how they got close enough to make photos," Manny defended.

"Got a report from Steph's grandma and borrowed my brother's car to check it out," Bobby grinned. "Hey, it was a good shave, right?" He ran a hand over his own close-shaved head and ribbed; "I'm thinking of going there myself."

Stephanie choked on her laughter and spluttered for a moment. Ranger reached out to pat her back, sporting a wide grin.

"Dolly would make a killing," she whispered harshly. "My grandma and all her friends would come in daily!"

"Man, at least I had the guts," Eddie grumbled. "You just skulked about searching cubicles."

"Yeah Bobby, me too," Lester added, ignoring the cubicle comment. "My sister has this magazine with an article about how to be a metro man. Apparently you have to get ridiculously expensive head shaves. I'm thinking of a metro-man make-over." He schooled his face in what he thought was a metro-man expression.

"And pink polo shirts," Roy added helpfully.

Lester nodded.
"That's the next step. Then I'll learn to almost-cry during chick-flicks and take a facemask every night. Chicks dig it, man."

Someone coughed 'facial' but a glance from Ranger ensured that the conversation steered free from gutter-talk.

Stephanie traded a glance with Tsuy, who seemed to have the same mental image of Lester in pink polo, and they both tried to contain the giggles. Lester in pink polo would still be a big, handsome guy with a rakish grin and the bad-boy sex appeal of an entire rugby team. Women were already falling over him.

"What?" he turned to them, mock-hurt. "You don't think I have feelings?" he faked a sniffle, and Stephanie burst into laughter.

"Sure you do, Les," she finally managed. "It's just the mental image of you in a pink polo, crying over Bridges of Madison Country."

He let go of the act and shot her a grin.
"Sure I can do that. I'll just be crying with laughter."

"It's okay Les, we know the sensitive-guy thing isn't an act," Tank said seriously. "Why else would you be found at Build-A-Bear?"

Heads whipped around. Tank raised an eyebrow.

"It was just to find out if a reservation had been made, man."

"Ah, that bear you walked out with was a gift from the shop you couldn't refuse?" Ranger seemed to rather enjoy this. Lester winced.

"Man, we're gonna need an extra long Christmas party this year," Tank announced. "I have a lot of material for the video."

"You got that on tape?"

Tank nodded his head at Ranger.

"He did."

Lester shook his head in disbelief.

"Man, sometimes I think you really are smoke."

Ranger quirked a grin and said nothing. He liked to reinforce that idea.

"Much as I enjoy hearing about this…" Stephanie said, "it's time to get going again. Red team will go to Malik for power kiting, Blue goes surf kayaking with Dom, and White to Jake for beach sailing."

Half an hour later she was racing along the beach, barely 20 cm from the sand. The wind was rushing around her face, whipping her ponytail, and she was resisting the urge to whoop. It felt like she was going faster than any car could go. That couldn't be true, but she was so close to the ground that it seemed about right.

The buggy itself was little more than a fabric seat suspended aboard three fat little wheels. There was a bar for her feet to go on, and which doubled as the steering control of the front wheel. Jake had given them some explanation on how to steer, turn, and especially how to stop. Essentially it was like dinghy sailing, and she had done that a few times in the past. Only this went a lot faster.

To her right another buggy moved into view, and a moment later the green Defender Tsuy had arrived in moved up on her left. She glanced to the side and found Tank driving, Tsuy in the passenger seat, camera at the ready. The car paced them for a long moment, and then pulled ahead to where Michael was tacking to begin the stretch back to the camp.

She hadn't really seen them together yet apart from their greeting. Tsuy didn't like to demonstrate in front of others. Tank, like Ranger sometimes, probably felt the need to show the men they were an item and that she was off limits. He wasn't wrong – a couple of the men seemed to consider getting dates a competitive sport.

There was a gust of wind and she felt the buggy hurtle forward, leaving Bobby to her right behind. There was a roar from the wheels on the damp sand and the wind around her ears, and she found herself grinning hugely. This was more fun than the Miata… it actually came close to the Porsche.

What a rush!

She was back at the camp not ten minutes later, unable to wipe the grin off her face.

"That was SO cool!"

"Were you okay with the slowing down?" Dom asked, grinning in return.

"Yeah. It was a little scary to steer straight into the wind, but it worked okay, I slowed down enough that I felt safe tacking."

"Cool. Just make sure you have enough space to do it in and it's dead easy. You going again?"

"Is the pope catholic?"

"Man that was cool. I never expected it to go that fast, you know?"

Stephanie smiled because that was something, coming from Tank. He was dragging a buggy to the storage tent as the third round of activities wound down. It was getting time for dinner, and Hawk was building a fire downwind from the camp. The cook had arrived with a couple of big coolers full of various delicious things, and the barbeque was warming up.

Tsuy, who had left mid-afternoon to go horseback riding with her friend, had returned half an hour ago, sans dogs this time, in time to snap some photos of the last round. Stephanie was already looking forward to seeing the photos of Tank and Ranger beach sailing, Ram, Lester and the guys kayaking – herself in mid-air as a powerkite took her for a short flight.

When one of the buggies had gone unused Dom had cheerfully talked Tsuy into it, and the smaller woman had returned ten minutes later with windswept hair and sparkling eyes.

Her stomach said it was nearing dinnertime, and Stephanie found that the guys were beginning to gravitate toward the camp. The Red team was changing out of their wetsuits and the last of her own group were putting away the kites.

Junior and Cal were hovering near the cook while she worked, reminding her of Bob. Bob didn't beg, he just hung around in case you decided you didn't want that piece of pizza.

It was clearly making the cook a little nervous. Time to do something about it… create a distraction. Well, she was good at that.

"Hey Babe, what's up?" Ranger smiled. She loved the way his voice sounded when he was at ease. A little lower, a little warmer, a lot sexier. That was a thought for another time.

"Cook says it'll take about half an hour before we can eat, so I thought we'd play a game."

Ranger looked around the camp, spotted the guys near the cook, and nodded. He gestured for Tank to come over.

"What did you have in mind?"

"I brought a really big inner tube. Thought we could play rugby with it."

Tank arrived just in time to hear that, and smiled widely.

"Tugby? I haven't played that in ages."

Ranger and Tank exchanged a grin.

"You thought of everything, didn't you?" He said to Stephanie. His smile racked up her heart rate. The entire organisation had been worth it just to see him look at her like this.

"Is the tube ready?"

She snapped out of her daze.

"Malik has a compressor in his van, I'll go inflate it."

"We'll round up the guys."

Five minutes later she rolled the tube up to the playing field the guys had set out. The tube was huge – on its side, almost as tall as she was. The hole in the middle was wide enough to hold two medium-sized Rangemen or three normal people.

Ranger and Tank had each created a team of six, from the looks of it pretty evenly matched. The rest of the guys were standing off to the side, ready to cheer and comment on the game.

"Hey Steph, you gonna play with us?" Lester called from Tank's side.

"Course not! She's with our team!" Woody bellowed across the field.

"I think I'll pass," she called back, laughing. "Maybe next game."

No way could she keep up if the guys played rough, and she didn't want to be the little girl that screwed up the game because she couldn't take the heat.

That was exactly why she'd made sure the main part of the day was non-competitive. It wasn't fun to be the dead weight of a team. That wasn't to say she wouldn't enjoy watching …

She rolled the tube up to where Hawk was waiting. He would be the referee, his knee not yet ready for this kind of rough-play. Together they scraped a little trough in the sand and put the tube into it, so it would stand upright. The teams were gathered behind lines, each ten paces away from the tube.

Hawk nodded at her and they both turned and joined the rest of the Rangemen who weren't playing. Rodriquez, the man who had filled up her in-tray when she had just started in her job, grinned at her.

"Very wise, Stephanie. We're too sensible for this stuff."

He was an office worker, and though he was in decent shape for a man pushing fifty, she understood why he left this game to the others. When the boys played, they played hard.

Hawk joined them, and put two fingers to his mouth to whistle the starting sign. A terrible cave-man roar rose as the teams went for the tube, and as one man the spectators stepped back a few paces to make sure they were out of reach.

"By God, I think they're having a flashback to a few thousand years ago," Tsuy said softly, watching with wide eyes.

Stephanie grinned.
"I'll never again call a man 'uncivilised' for not putting down the toilet seat."

On the field, Bobby had managed to end up inside the tube and was running full-tilt to the other side of the field with it, Ranger clearing the way for him. Junior jumped in Bobby's path but bounced off, and the small crowd howled with laughter.

"One point for Ranger's team," Hawk declared officially.

Tank, who had been unexpectedly tag-teamed by no less than three of the rival team, brushed the sand out of his millimetred hair and called his team for a strategy meeting. Tsuy directed the long lens of her camera at the huddle of men and whispered 'look up… look up' to herself. A moment later the men did, and she took the photo.

"Are you doing close-ups?"

"Yes. If you want some wide shots, there's a simple digital Canon in a case on the passenger seat in the Defender."

"I can use it?"

"Sure. Just don't drop it into the sand."

The 'simple digital' turned out to be a Canon EOS 350D, with more settings that she knew how to handle. In the case with it were three different lenses and a clear plastic casing that closed all the way around the camera. The lens currently on the camera seemed the default one, so she left it.
There were three more aluminium flight-type cases in the car, travel worn on the outside, well padded on the inside. Four camera's, and the EOS was the 'simple' one. She briefly wondered if Tank ever felt daunted by the differences in background and situation between him and Tsuy.

She put the strap around her neck and returned to the playing field.

"Not sure how this works."

Tsuy turned the camera on for her, checked some settings and put it in its plastic casing. Stephanie idly wondered if this was the thing that had caused the argument between her friends about going to New York.

Her friend set the camera in sport setting.
"This is fun. Just hold this down and it makes four photos," She made a chopping motion with her hand, "tac-tac-tac-tac."

She looked through the lens just in time to catch Cal diving into the tube. Michael and Ram each grabbed hold from the outside, like tugboats and a cargo ship. Cal set into motion and the rest of Tank's team cleared the way, Michael and Ram helping to keep other hands off the tube. Tank, clearly not feeling subtle, tackled Ranger to the ground. Both men were grinning as they struggled in the sand. Stephanie walked around the field to get a better angle.

"One-one," Hawk called out a moment later. Tank rolled to his feet and offered Ranger a hand up. Stephanie expected a pull-down trick, but Ranger accepted the hand and rose with a grin.

Not long after that shirts started to come off and the eyecandy-factor rose considerably. Sweaty, buff bodies and fierce grins. She hoped Tsuy was getting a lot of close-ups.

The cook approached her and glanced at the battlefield with wide eyes.

"We're ready to eat in five minutes."

"Great. I thought it'd be best to keep everybody busy until you were ready."

"Thank you. I had something to eat for them at that point, but I thought it'd be best that we could go straight into a full meal instead of having to wait between dishes."

"Five minutes!" Hawk announced after she'd told him.

The teams immediately seemed to grow more fanatic. Within sixty seconds both Hal and Junior were stuffed in the tube, back to each other, each trying to push to opposite sides. It was like something straight out of a cartoon. Half a moment later they were surrounded by the rest of their teams, all pushing and pulling at each other and at the tube.

Hawk shook his head with a wide grin. There was no way the tube could go anywhere like this. The teams were too evenly matched. Zero was circling the mess, tripping people up where he could, and soon it was a big pile of bodies, the air full of yelling, cursing, encouragement from the spectators and – she couldn't tell who it was – hysterical laughter.

Stephanie checked her watch. One minute left. She didn't want to break things off while they were far from a conclusion, but this could take a while. She glanced at Hawk, and he nodded his head at the ongoing battle. All of a sudden Tank and Ram scooped the tube from under the pile of people, shook off Hector who was hanging on to it, and passed to Michael. The latter made a break for it, dragging the tube along. Zero spotted him and moved to intercept, but too late.

"Score for Michael! Tank's team wins!"

A roar went up, and the body-pile started to disassemble. Tank's team celebrated by pounding each other on the back, and most of the men wandered to the sea to rinse off the sweat and the sand before dinner.

"You'll make photos of that too, right?" she asked Tsuy.

Her friend hesitated.

"Seems a bit… indiscrete."

"These guys are the embodiment of indiscrete. Nobody will care."

Tsuy still hesitated.

"Do it as a public service. For the good of the female population of the planet. Besides, it's art, right?"

"If you put it like that…"

to be continued