AN: Thank you to everyone for reading! I love the reviews so keep them coming. Everything you recognize belongs o JE.

The last time I was at the library, things didn't go very well for me. I came in, I did some research, and then my car blew up. The girl working at the library was a young woman by the name of Gladys. She was extra friendly, and she was super helpful when my car exploded. She hooked me up with a library card and everything.

Gladys was not working the front desk at the library when we got there. The woman there was named Irene, and Irene could have been a stunt double for Maggie Smith. I say Stunt double and not stand in, because under the cardigan she had tied around her shoulders, she was wearing a sleeveless top, and she had pipes that impressed Ranger. Professor McGonagall was jacked, boys and girls.

When I'd been here before, Gladys had her desk looking a little whimsical with flowers, and stacks of books around her. Irene had books about cyber fraud and posters about avoiding being the victim of phishing schemes.

Ranger walked up to the desk, and she looked up. "Mr. Manoso, what can I do for you?"

"My mother-in-law was in here earlier today and was informed that a book she'd borrowed was significantly overdue. I would like to pay the fine, and cover the cost of replacing the book."

"No," she said.

"May I ask why?"

"Because you were not the one who lost the book, and therefore repayment for the lost book is not your responsibility. The fine is for the person who misplaced the property. You wouldn't serve time for someone else's crime, would you?"

Ranger gave her a look that pretty much said that yes, he had. She cleared her throat and squared her shoulders. "Be that as it may," she said, "I cannot allow this, because I don't know if your mother-in-law has authorized this debt payment."

"She's insisted upon it," Ranger said.

"Do you have a written request?" Irene asked.

"I don't," Ranger said.

"If you get me a written request, I can allow it. What is your mother-in-law's name?"

"Mrs. Helen Plum," Ranger said.

"No," she said.

"I can assure you, that she is," Ranger said.

"I mean no," Irene said, "Even with a written request, I'm not going to allow it."

"Why?" I asked.

"Because when I attempted to explain to her, that I need permission from my supervisor to access the records, she attempted to bribe me, and then her mother pushed a book trolly down a flight of stairs, and when I went to deal with it, she tried to hack into my computer. Quite frankly she's lucky I didn't press charges. If it were up to me, neither one of those women would be allowed onto the premises again."

I put my finger over my left eye to stop the eye twitch that had started. There was no way this was going to be an easy task. She wasn't going to give us the name of the book unless Ranger used creative interrogation methods.

"Would you please contact your supervisor and ask him for permission to release the name of the book to Mrs. Plum, so that she can go about replacing it if necessary?"

"I'm afraid I must disappoint you again, sir," Irene said. "I can't contact him because he is out of the country, and I don't have the name of the place he is staying. The other girl, Gladys, accidentally threw the information out. I mean you would think he would have given us an electronic copy of the information, but the man doesn't have an email address. I mean really. In this day and age."

"What is your supervisor's name?"

"Mr. Mark Duggan," she said.

"Thank you," Ranger said. We left the library, and Ranger called Minnie.

Minnie was his nephew and usually got the grunt research jobs around Rangeman. His name was actually Carlos Manoso and was all round Ranger's Mini-Me. "Stephanie's mother has a book that's overdue from the library, and the librarian, Irene Sporkle, is unable to access the records that will release the information about that book without permission from her Supervisor, Mark Duggan. Mr. Duggan is on vacation, and she isn't sure how to reach him. Get the information for Ms. Sporkle."

He hung up the phone and looked at me. "It might be a good idea to go to Morelli's to look for the book."

"I don't want to," I whined.

"There's a massage in it for you," he said.

I considered that and shook his hand. "Deal."

His phone rang, he answered he listened for a few minutes. "That's a problem. I'll be there in an hour."

He hung up and looked at me. "Julie's at my grandmother's. She's run away from home, and Rachel needs a break. She wants Julie to stay with us for the summer."

"Seriously?" I said.

"There's a boy involved," Ranger said. "Ron doesn't approve of him."

"Uh oh," I said. Ranger started the car and drove back to Haywood, and parked in front of the building.

"I have to make arrangements, and then I'm going to pick her up. I need to say something, and it's important."

I nodded.

"Morelli's guest last night is a client, and there is a personal connection to one of Rangeman's employees. If she is there, become blind and deaf."

"Why?"

"Because the other parties involved will go ballistic," Ranger said. "And I really don't have time for that right now."

"Got it," I said. "Do you think she's still there?"

"No idea," Ranger said, "But when she left this morning, she was only wearing one shoe, it was expensive, so she'll have made contact again to get it back."

"That was what you had to deal with this morning, isn't it?"

"Yes," he said. "I didn't want him to check her trackers when he got to the office to find out she was in Morelli's bed."

"Yeah," I said. "That would probably be bad."

"You're okay with this?"

"It's weird," I said. "But yeah."

Ranger gave me a fast kiss and jogged towards the building. "You're not taking the Turbo?"

"You need it," he said. "And we're picking up your car tomorrow morning."

"Ranger," I said, "No."

"I'm getting really tired of being told no," he said.

"You're going to have found me some super expensive car, and it's just going to die. I'm going to go buy a Buick or something."

"Babe," he said.

He went inside, and I got into the driver's seat of the Turbo, grumbling. Then I looked at the clock on the dash. Joe wasn't working, and it was Sunday, which meant that his mother would be at his place cooking and filling his freezer with food for the week. Joe was a busy guy, and he wasn't going to say no to prepared food, even if he was a better than decent cook himself and didn't actually need his mother to cook for him. If Joe was going to have a second night with a woman, he wasn't going to do it with his mother in the house. He would go to the woman's house. I cruised by Joe's place and didn't see his Jeep in the driveway. I didn't see his mother's car either, but that didn't mean she wasn't there.

Conundrum. Did I risk running into Angie Morelli without interference from Joe? What if Bella was with her, helping her cook? It's possible one of Joe's siblings drove her over. The light was on in the front room. Nope, I'd cruise by again later. It was safer that way.

I went back to Rangeman, and parked on the street, and entered through the front doors. Connie was playing Free Cell on her computer and sucking on a frappuccino.

"Busy?"

"I can't tell you how much I'm not," Connie said. Connie was a little older than me, a little shorter, with bigger hair and a bigger chest than I had. "I'm fucking bored Steph. B-O-R-E-D."

"Want to help me with something?" I asked.

"What?"

"Mr. Dickerson's wife hired me to see if he's having an affair."

"Really?" Connie said. "He seems like such a normal, stand up guy."

"Want to help me do some digging? I'm doing this for mom, so I'm not going to pull one of the guys off of something, but since you're doing nothing…"

"I'll start a computer search, and then I'll start making some calls," Connie said.

We spent the next three hours going through everything we could find about Mr. Dickerson. Most of it was just stuff about being a good teacher. His facebook was no help, it was all stuff about classwork and hadn't been updated since June, and it was about summer experiment ideas that could be used for extra credit. Nothing about his family, and no pictures of him with a girl.

He coached Little League in the summer and was the coach of the Mathletes in during the school year. He also was a member of a bowling league. That was all that the regular internet seemed to turn up about him.

A little further digging showed the insurance payout that had come from his great Aunt. It was to the tune of $150,000, and he'd used fifty grand of that to restock his classroom with school supplies and new textbooks. He'd used another twenty for a European cruise, he paid off his Volvo, and the rest he put into a savings account.

The insurance issue Ranger became involved with was under a different insurance provider, so there was no relationship between them that I could see. There were no weird purchases on his credit cards, no unusual bank activity. His credit history was excellent. So if he was having an affair, she was footing the bill. The gossip mill didn't turn out anything either.

We did a quick search about Steveston and that more than tracked. It was an exceptionally affluent neighborhood. Think upscale Stars Hollow from the Gilmore Girls. Instead of quaint New England houses, you had a lot of colonial mansions.

"Well it's a good thing I'm getting a new car," I said. "I think we're going to need it, so we don't stand out there."

Connie nodded. I looked at my watch, and it was a little after five. Angie would for sure be gone from Morelli's by then. She would be at home cooking for whichever of her children would be coming over for dinner that night. Connie looked at her watch and yawned. "I'm calling it a night."

"Are you in tomorrow?"

"Yeah," she said. "I'm taking Thursday and Friday off, so I get an extra long weekend."

She walked outside, and I followed her to Ranger's car. A little while later I pulled up in front of Morelli's and saw his Jeep in the driveway, and I could hear the sounds of a ball game coming through the open window at the front of his house. Good deal. The Mets were playing, which meant that he was probably not upstairs with a woman.

I went to the front door and knocked just in case, and didn't get an answer, which might also mean he was sleeping in front of the baseball game. I could smell his mother's spaghetti carbonara, and my stomach rumbled. There was little in this world that tasted better than that, and a small part of me wondered if it was bad form to ask for leftovers. I let myself in the front door and said hello to Bob.

"Joe?" I called.

The television was on in the living room, and I was about to walk through, when I heard an echo of the game coming from upstairs, and realized it was coming from the television in his bedroom. "Not to be rude," a woman's voice said, "But get rid of her; I'm horny, Detective."

Abort Stephanie. Abort. You don't want this information. You want this information deleted from your brain. You don't want to know that, that woman was upstairs. Maybe if I poked at my brain through my ear with a Q-Tip, I might be able to press a delete button or something.

Joe came down the stairs, sporting a lipgloss that wasn't his own on his lips, and his hair looked like someone had been running their fingers through it. I knew who the someone was, and I wanted to un-know it.

I'm not sure exactly what the hell I said, as I stumbled through the conversation, wishing I'd just decided to hell with it when it came to the book. But I couldn't. It was there now. Joe handed me a laundry basket of my stuff, and I left.

I went out to the car, and put my head against the steering wheel. Damn. Damn. Damn. Damn. It would have to be her. It made total sense really. It would have to be her. I punched Ranger's number on my phone, and he answered on the second ring.

"Are you in the car?"

"Yes."

"Are you on speaker?"

"Yes."

"Is Julie with you?"

"In a manner of speaking."

"What does that mean?"

"She's wearing noise-canceling headphones, and she's refusing to acknowledge that I exist."

"So it's safe to talk?"

"Yes."

"MOLLY?!" I shouted into the phone.

"I take it she's at Morelli's?"

"Oh yeah, and do you know how much I didn't want to know that? Do you know how much I don't want to have a conversation with Lester about this? He's going to want to know what the hell Joe is probably doing to her, so he can use it to fuel his revenge when he slowly kills Morelli."

"Babe."

"What am I supposed to do Ranger? There is no way this is going to be secret. My mom has probably already heard. Molly is exactly the sort of woman that Angie Morelli is looking for in a daughter-in-law, and she'll be bragging. Lester is going to have kittens. Little deranged psycho kittens that he'll train to castrate Joe for touching Molly."

"Babe."

"You're enjoying this far too much."

"Pretty hard not to. The images you're conjuring are somewhat entertaining."

"Okay," I said, "You're going to do me a huge favor. MASSIVE."

"I'm listening."

"You're going to tell Lester that you're keeping it from me, so I don't do a massive nutty and get all jealous. You're going to tell Lester he's protecting me until I'm ready to hear it."

"What's in it for me?"

"Whatever you want…within reason."

"Done."

My phone beeped letting me know he'd disconnected.

AN: So Molly and Joe... there's a whole story that takes place at the same time as this... if you're interested...And if you're not, just know that it's what Ranger has to deal with on the side later.