Standard disclaimers, blah, blah, blah.

No visible scars on any of the Merry Men, I know because I've checked.

Thanks to Jaime, Kate Manoso, Luisa and Melody (yes, you are all in alpha order) – You are women of merit – I am just curious which merit badges you all have!

"Sure. But this is your month, your horizons. I found the note you left in my bag. It said something about 'gentle horizons' and 'no pressure, no expectations'. Did you have something in mind when you wrote that?"

He didn't answer me as he directed me to the car. He started it and began to drive.

I decided that since my 'horizons' had previously been stretched pretty far, I wasn't going to push him.

Maybe Batman needed a day away from the rest of the world himself.

Stephanie's Gamble

By Alfonsina

Chapter 17 ♣ May Begins Part 1

What the heck? We were heading back to my apartment. Weren't we just here? What about the beach? The mall? The Batcave? Why the hell was I going home now?

"Babe, I need to know how far you are willing to open your horizons."

"Ranger, it sounds like you have something definite in mind. Want to share?" I asked.

"If you are open to what I have in mind, you are going to get dirty, hot and sweaty and spend considerable time on your hands and knees," he said with a completely straight face.

'Oh boy,' I thought. I was thinking about doing a happy dance, mentally anyway. It sounded incredibly tempting, but only if it came with some kind of a commitment. Ok, so maybe not the completely happy dance, but more likely the dance of frustration and confusion.

Before I could form a sentence, he said, "Not that kind of dirty, hot and sweaty, but I'll keep it in mind. The kind I have in mind is more along the 'dirt' kind of dirty."

Oh. Glad I hadn't put my dancing shoes on just yet. I was really hoping it wasn't going to end up being one of his 'redecorating' projects. I'd only done one and wasn't so sure how I felt about doing another one. At least if that's what it was going to be, I knew most of the guys who would wind up on the 'redecorating' team.

"Hey, when this whole 'Expand Stephanie's Horizons' business got started in January, you were the person I knew I could turn to if things got out of control or were too much for me," I said.

"True," he said.

"Well, now that it is you and me, who do I turn to if I'm feeling like I am in over my head or if I get uncomfortable," I asked.

"Same person, still me," he said with a smile.

Oh boy. "Do we need a password or something so you'll know and stuff doesn't get awkward?" I asked.

He just looked at me and said nothing. He was really good at saying nothing. He'd had a lot of practice at it.

The rest of the ride to my apartment was in silence.

When we got back to my place, he sent me to dig in the closet for some 'appropriate' clothes. I went began the treasure hunt in my closet for clothes that were almost raggedy enough to have been retired from bounty hunting. I made sure there were no holes in the butt of the shorts and that they weren't too short. The hot pink top was Grandma Mazur's Sweet Potato Queen's shirt that said, "Be particular". It was a good motto for me to adopt in my own life. I bundled all the clothes together and found a ratty pair of sneakers and socks. I was actually glad I hadn't done all the makeup and hair thing this morning, no one would appreciate it.

"You are messing with my mind. You started out with comments about 'dirty, hot and sweaty', and now you are leaving me hanging. It's not fair," I said with a sigh.

As usual, he said nothing in response to that.

He held my hand as we walked out of the apartment building and across the parking lot.

"You know, I found the note you left in my bag. It said something about 'gentle horizons' and 'no pressure, no expectations'. Did you have something in mind when you wrote that?" I asked him. I knew had already tried to broach this subject once, but damn it I really wanted an answer.

He just smiled and said nothing. Again with the whole saying nothing thing, jeez. It was almost like he had to pay for each word he used and he was being cheap about it. You'd think for a guy with as much money as he had, he could afford a few words once in a while. Was I going to have to introduce him to Vanna and the Wheel of Fortune or something?

He directed me back to the car and then he drove us to the office. The office? What the heck was going on? This was not a part of any plan I could formulate about getting 'dirty, hot and sweaty'.

I wasn't ready to face all of the guys yet and I really didn't want to know what Rodriguez had left for me in my inbox. It felt like years since I'd been here and wasn't sure I was up to it today. I had sort of hoped we'd be up to something fun, looked like it was going to be work. I needed at least one day of pure denial on my side and it looked like I wasn't going to get it.

My face must've told him about my inner turmoil because he answered my question about the office before I'd had a chance to form all the words.

"Not here to work, Steph. Got some stuff to do with you. It's all OK. Bring the clothes in with you," Ranger said.

OK.

He pulled his cell phone out of his pocket. He hit a number and said, "I'm offline all day today and probably tomorrow. No emergency is big enough to interrupt today unless someone has actually died and you are at the mortuary. She's with me. She's offline too. Later."

OK, he's offline and isn't going to be messed with. This was good, right?

Ever since last night he'd looked a little different to me, still chiseled and handsome, but something seemed off. I couldn't quite put my finger on what was unusual about him. He looked a little uncertain, distant, maybe haunted by what or why there was no telling. This weekend had been a trial for everyone.

Maybe Bobby was right, maybe I had scarred all the males for life. Was it possible none of them would ever want to date or get married? God, I hoped not, some of the kids were great and I'd hate to be responsible for limiting their futures.

The apartment looked picture perfect, like always. The only time I'd seen any clutter in it was when I stayed with him. I tended to bring my clutter in with me like a whirlwind.

"Make yourself comfortable in the living room Babe, I'll be right back," he said as he went back to his bedroom.

He emerged a few minutes later with a DVD case in his hands. He went to the entertainment center and pushed some buttons and flicked some switches.

"Comfortable, Babe?"

"Yeah. It's kind of early in the day to do a movie, isn't it Ranger? I am really hoping it's not a blood and guts kind of a thing, not really my style," I said wishing I had a box of Milk Duds or Raisinettes or how about some Red Vines, hmm.

"Well, there is some of that in it but not too graphic. You can cover your eyes if you want to, I'll let you know after the bad parts are over," he said in a teasing voice.

"Smart ass."

He did something with the remote and the movie came on. The Lion King. What in the world was this about? He saw the confusion on my face and said, "It was one of Julie's favorite movies when she was little and it'll tell you some things about me. Just hush and watch. We'll talk about it after it's over."

I decided I could take a hint. So I did. I was quiet.

I always loved Disney movies; I felt like a kid whenever I watched one. So I sat on the sofa, enthralled until the credits rolled. I laughed and I cried and I felt like all had been righted in this cartoon world when the whole thing was over.

"So, what does this movie tell me about you, Ranger? You like Disney? You secretly have a thing for cartoons? You like Elton John songs?" I asked. I didn't want to have to answer any questions from him; I had watched the movie strictly as entertainment. I thought I'd beat him to the punch and question him first.

"Do you remember the song Circle of Life?"

"Yeah, what about it?"

"Well," he said with a grin, "that's your horizon with me."

Huh?

"It's how I look at pretty much everything. There is a beginning, a period of growth, a middle, a decline, and an ultimate ending to each and every life, all kinds of life, not just human or animal.

"I've seen a lot of this circle. I haven't experienced them all directly, of course, but I'm well aware of how it works and that not everyone gets to come full circle. Some people die young, some people last far longer than anyone expects. You never know when you are getting off the circle."

OK. Long sentences and complex thoughts, a rarity I shouldn't get used to from Ranger. It looked like he was using up some of those words he'd been saving. How many more words would he be spending on me today?

"I've seen my fair share of death and destruction. I need to counterbalance that. At this point in my life, I am looking to the act of creation to bring me peace," he said.

I must have looked worried because he continued, "Babe, I am not looking to 'create' children. I know you aren't planning on that any time soon either. There are other ways to create and find peace."

I wasn't feeling too articulate at this point. Ranger as a philosopher? I had expected a lot of things from him, but this wasn't one of them.

He took my hand to get me off the sofa. I followed him out of the apartment. Normally I don't look around, just go to the door of his apartment and either knock or go in. This time, I followed him about three feet to an unmarked door. The door that had the mandatory "EXIT" sign over it. When I took stairs in the building it was always to go down and not up, so I'd never really paid a lot of attention to them. So I had never even thought to see if there were stairs going up to the roof.

"Ranger, where are we going?"

"Some days you ask a lot of questions. Today, let's just sort of let this flow like water, OK? We're going to the roof."

He led the way and I was a couple of steps behind so I could enjoy the view. I always enjoyed that particular view; it never ceased to take my breath away. I wasn't out of shape. I promise. Really. I just tended to pant whenever I watched that glorious posterior moving. Yeah that's it. I could watch his ass for hours just flexing and releasing, this was to say nothing about watching his pecs flexing and releasing. Ahh. Yep, pretty much I could just watch him all oiled up posing for days on end and I would be highly entertained, though more than a bit frustrated.

We arrived at a small landing and he opened the door to the roof. What I saw absolutely took my breath away, I mean in addition to Ranger's fine hind end. I had never expected that there would be a full garden on top of the roof. It had a series of raised beds, pots and a small shed for supplies in addition to a greenhouse. It looked like everything had been there for quite a while. As we walked around, I noticed there were several benches and even a couple of fountains, actually I heard the fountains before I saw them. It all looked and sounded peaceful, you know, tranquil.

He smiled and the stress from recent days visibly came off of his face. He looked more relaxed than I had ever seen him. When he was relaxed and dropped his guard, he actually looked more handsome than normal. This side of Ranger was something I didn't see very often, usually just when he was asleep.

"This is my circle of life, Babe. This is where I go and what I do to counterbalance some of the absolute shit in my life. I help to create life every spring; I get to nurture it through the summer and harvest as the plants bear their produce. In the winter I do some stuff in the green house, but I miss the rest of it. In winter I start the planning for the next spring," he said smiling.

"So what's the best part?"

"The best part is seeing a tangible change in a plant. Watching it become something from almost nothing. Being able to nurture it along and coax it to be its absolute best. When things go well, I can enjoy the harvest or the flowers. If things go poorly, I review what I did wrong or how Mother Nature got the better of me so I can make better plans for the next growing season. I get a tremendous amount of satisfaction from this garden.

"The next best part is that it is like meditation for me. I don't like to sit still and do the contemplative stuff. I do find myself thinking about things when I weed one of the beds, when I mix the compost or when I prune a plant. I get tremendous satisfaction and feeling of peace from the whole process and I'm productive at the same time.

OK. I had never thought of Ranger as being Mr. Green Jeans, but it seemed that the shoe fit.

"So what about all of the times when you have to go out of town? What happens then?"

"Luis is what happens, Babe. He is a master gardener, this is as much his baby as mine. I make the ultimate decisions about what will be planted and he helps to execute my vision. If I am off base, he brings me back to reality."

"So basically you like to do this alone and hide from the world?"

"Not necessarily, sometimes I'm alone, but not always. I'm not really the lone wolf you seem to think I am, I crave people and company, too," he said as he dropped a distracted kiss on my nose.

"So give me the nickel tour. What all do you have here?" I asked. This conversation had been a little heavy and I was hoping things would lighten up.

We went to the far end of the roof to the raised beds.

Ranger went into 'teacher' mode; he hadn't really done much of that since I started bounty hunting. I guess he thought that this was a new chapter in my life where I should learn something.

Obviously when he was saving his words it was so he could spend most of them talking about gardening. He told me the reason he used smallish raised beds opposed to long traditional rows was that you could actually grow more in less space this way. It was something he called square-foot gardens and evidently no space was wasted, in fact the things that supported each other grew together. He took an idea from Mexico called 'the three sisters' where corn, squash and beans were grown together; they all gave something different to the soil while taking something else out.

There were other beds where other vegetables were grown but flowers were in the mix. I had never imagined Ranger growing flowers; probably not for the aesthetic value, probably for what they could give back to the soil or so they could be like insecticide. Was it marigold or gladiola? No matter, one of them was a natural at keeping bugs away and he had a lot of those planted in the various squares, to think I liked flowers because they were pretty. Silly me.

In the greenhouse, he had all kinds of greens growing for salads. He also had the seedlings and starter plants. It gave protection from the elements and ensured a safe place for some of these things to grow. No wonder he was always eating salads, from the looks of the greenhouse he'd never get through it all unless he became a bunny or a vegetarian.

There were several paths between each of the raised beds and they were laid out kind of artistically. It was a pretty place to walk and just think; too bad I was going to spend a lot of time getting dirty up here in the 'dirt' sense of the word.

"So do you use everything that you grow?"

"We use a lot of it when it's fresh, some gets canned or dried for the future and the remainder goes to the local food bank," he said.

"We? Who is we?" I asked. I was starting to wonder who was involved in this whole production.

"Luis and Ella, and of course me. Any of the guys who want fresh, organic produce can have it for the asking," he said. "Babe, didn't think you cared all that much for vegetables."

"I don't unless there's a great cream sauce being served over them. Just looking around and it looked like even a lot of veggies for you, that's all," I said. I was relieved for no good reason. I don't know what I had imagined the answer was going to be, but this wasn't it.

"Now that the nickel tour is over, it's time to go back downstairs and change. There is work to do," he said.

Lovely. In the past there have been countless times when I had imagined myself on my knees more or less at Ranger's feet, but for some reason weeding a container of squash wasn't something that went with that image. In my mind the words 'hot, sweaty, dirty, and bed' with Ranger had nothing to do with gardening. I guess my horizons were expanding in ways I hadn't really planned. I sighed deeply as I thought about that, at least this was something someone else could witness.

We went back down the stairs. He changed in the dressing room and I changed in the bathroom. He grabbed a couple of bottles of water from the fridge.

Even in his gardening togs he looked great. The old shirt had the sleeves cut out and a pair of old cut off jeans for shorts. Like always, he was yummy to look at. I hadn't realized he also had a floppy hat, probably for me, and some gloves in his hands when we left the apartment.

After about 10 minutes of gardening I was utterly, completely and entirely bored. I was supposed to take dead flowers off the plants 'dead head' them so that new stuff could grow. But some of those flowers were pretty darned low. I was bored and I decided to book a trip to Denial Land and see if there were any Merry Men in their teenie tiny Speedos at the beach in Bermuda; nope no one there except me, but I was going to keep looking.

He did this to relax? This was fun? Had no one taught him the thrill of the hunt at a Macy's End of Season Shoe Sale? Had he never known the powerful rush that came from wrestling the only thong in your size out of the hands of a much larger woman who obviously wasn't going to fit into it and definitely didn't need it? Hadn't he ever known the absolute joy in making the ultimate decision: Boston Crème or Jelly Filled?

Evidently not. It seemed my horizons weren't the only ones that needed expanding.

It was warm up here. My back was getting sore and I was getting cranky. Plus I was bored.

"Need some help here, Ranger," I said.

"Babe," came the voice, "something wrong?"

"Stuck and can't get up good enough for you?" I asked. I was feeling like one of the TV commercials for old people who have that button thing they push when they can't move. "My back hurts and so do my knees. What do you say?"

He didn't say a word. He just rescued me from myself. I guess he decided he had enough because he took me to the door and back down the stairs.

"Didn't I tell you that you'd get 'dirty, hot and sweaty'? I try to be a man of my word," he said with a wink.

'I had been sort of hoping for the other kind of dirty with Ranger,' I thought to myself.

"Of course you are, I never would have doubted it," I said with a smile. Thank God I hadn't said the other part out loud.

"Let's get you cleaned up so I can feed you and you can relax a little," he said.

We went back to seven to pick up my clothes and then I was escorted back to four so I could do my thing with all of my stuff. It would have been more fun to have 'conserved water' with Ranger, but Aunt Flo was still here and we still had things to work out, maybe.

He said, "I'll call Ella for an early dinner, is about 45 minutes from now enough time for you? I'm going to go back to seven to clean up. I'll come back for you when it's time."

I didn't take too long in the shower. I wanted to make sure I could get my hair blown dry; it had been a while and I wanted to look like myself again. I did what voodoo I could do in such a limited amount of time. I decided to go with what I had worn earlier today, I didn't want to look like I was trying too hard. But there was makeup and hair gel, I looked much more like me, I thought.

I finished with five minutes to spare so I decided I'd try to read a little something. I couldn't concentrate. I mean it wasn't a date, but this just wasn't typical for us. Ranger and I had dinner together on a semi-regular basis but usually it was after a job and there was no clean up required, just the food.

Dinner was a bunch of grilled veggies in marinara sauce over some kind of pasta with a salad. Turned out that Ella used the stuff from the rooftop when she made up her menus; tonight with the exception of the pasta everything had come from the garden.

"What got you started gardening?" I asked.

"A couple of things. When I spent time 'away' from my family, all the kids in juvie had to work in the community garden. I discovered I had a talent for it. Plus, I think it's a genetic thing," he said.

"How can gardening be 'genetic'?" I asked.

"Ok, not genetic. More like it is a family trait. My abuela lived with us when I was a kid. She hated housework but loved to cook and work in the yard. Abuela Rosa grew beautiful plants. Even though we were poor, our little yard looked rich and lush. I always figured if she could do it I could do it too."

"Wow," I said. I guess it was my turn to embrace some silence.

After a couple of mouthfuls, I asked him, "Why garden on the roof?"

"Well, I'm here a more than anywhere else. The guys are here a lot. I don't have to pay any more money for the space to grow the plants. If I have a bad client meeting or if a takedown goes wrong, sometimes the gym isn't the best place for me to get my frustrations out. When things are totally FUBARed, I need to get my fingers back into the earth and feel like I am making something, anything, better."

OK.

We talked a little about the growing season, but it left one pretty big hole in the calendar. What about winter? How did he decompress during the winter? I mean there was the greenhouse, but surely it wasn't enough to keep him occupied all winter.

"Take a look around, do you see any themes?" asked Mr. Aware-of-His-Surroundings-at-(Almost)-All-Times.

I looked around and saw the usual, the standard furniture, bookcase full of pristine looking books, some empty wooden vases and a couple of artsy looking wood bowls. Nothing stood out at me, so I told him that.

"Either I've done a really good job or a really bad one," he said.

He had me walk with him to look at some things: the vases, the artsy wood bowls, even the salad bowls. Ranger was showing them to me with a considerable amount of pride. Turns out that he converted a storage room that was in the garage for his 'other' hobby, woodworking.

"I like the idea of creating something out of a blank thing. Michelangelo has been credited with saying he would chip away at the marble until the figure was exposed. He would see the finished piece in his mind when he saw a given piece of marble. I try to do the same thing with wood. I usually just do functional things and I work on a form until I feel that I have perfected it and then I move on," he said. "Unless I have a special request, usually from a family member, then I do that."

Huh?

"I've got all the lathes, grinders and other tools in a storeroom in the garage I converted several years ago. I love the smell of the wood chips and the feel of the chisels in my hand. Anyway, I make several of an item, like the vases or bowls, until I feel like I have done it to the best of my ability."

"What do you do with all of them?" I asked wondering just who he gave them to in the first place. Jealous much Plum? Evidently and more than I wanted to admit to myself.

"Mostly they are used as gifts. I tend to keep the initial attempts for myself and the rest are given away to family and friends for holidays. I've got all kinds of bowls and vases that are just sitting waiting for homes," he said.

"You've never given anything like that to me," I said feeling a little hurt.

"Actually I have, you just didn't know it."

"How could I possibly miss a big wooden bowl, Ranger, even I am aware of that much of my surroundings," I sniffed.

"Did you bring your purse back upstairs with you?" he asked. I nodded. "Go get it," he said.

I retrieved my purse from the front hall.

"Do you have your GPS pen in there?"

Again, I nodded and I dug it out. One of these days I was really going to need to clean out my purse.

He took it from my hand after he cleaned it off a little. He handed it back to me with a smile.

"I made the pen case that the unit is sitting in. I knew you didn't do the fancy dinner parties so you wouldn't need a large bowl. I also knew that most of the flowers you get are from stalkers. I didn't want you to have something in your apartment you wouldn't be using. I only made two attempts at the pens and you have one of them," he said quietly.

"Who has the other one?" I asked.

"Me."

Wow.

"Oh. I had no idea, but I always did think it was pretty. Thank you for making it for me, it will make it even more special," I said and I kissed him on the cheek.

We listened to some classical music, his preference, while drinking a little wine after we tidied up from dinner. After a little while he told me that it had been a long weekend and he was still needing to catch up on his sleep. He gave me a choice of sleeping either with him or on four, he was too tired to take me home.

I decided to stay on four, I wasn't tired yet and I knew I was going to have to get used to sleeping on my own again. As much as I liked sleeping with Ranger the more I did it, the harder it would become to go back to my own lonely bed. I had stuff to think about anyway.

Before I left, we decided that my nerves had been soothed enough to go back to work the next day. I would have enjoyed a couple of additional days away but I figured if I didn't I'd never catch up on my inbox. Rodriguez seemed to revel in the times I was gone so he could stack my box high and deep. Besides, Ranger would probably have me doing more stuff on the roof and given the choice I'd rather exercise.

A/N: thanks for reading! Alf