"Do you mind if I grab a quick shower and change before we leave?"
"No take your time" Ranger responded
Ranger waited till he heard Steph in the shower before he entered her bedroom. He reached into her closet and grabbed out her duffle bag. He packed the bag with a change of clothes and the necessities. He knew that Ella had some hair products and makeup in the apartment so he would not need to grab any of those. Making quick work he grabbed the bag and Rex's cage off the counter and headed down to put everything in the car. By the time he made it back in the apartment he heard the shower just shutting off. Taking a seat in the chair that was angled slightly towards the hallway he waited to catch a glimpse of Steph walking towards the bedroom. A few moments later Ranger was not disappointed as he watched Steph open the door with one towel wrapped around her body and one around her hair.
Steph shuffled into the bedroom shutting the door over. She figured there was no point in locking it since Ranger could just pick the lock. She pulled a matching baby blue lace bra and panty set from Victoria Secret on. Steph than grabbed her favorite pair of faded blue jeans that made her ass look great. She pulled on a form fitting cream color shirt and a hoodie from her closet. Lastly she laced up a pair of her cross trainers. She walked back towards the bathroom where she made quick work of blow drying her hair and applying a light coating of makeup. She did not want to look like she was trying to hard after all it was just dinner and a movie at his apartment.
Meanwhile the phone rang in the apartment while Steph was using the hair dryer. Ranger could hear the answer machine kick in, "Stephanie this is your mother, what is this I hear that you were seen walking in the park holding hands and kissing that bounty hunter guy. What will Joe think? Joe is your last chance of getting married and having kids. You better call him and apologize. I don't hear about Mary's daughter having sex in the park in the middle of the afternoon. Call me, I am making coconut cream pie for desert and you better be here to explain yourself."
Range just shook his head at the message. He could not believe how Steph's mother acted. Just than Steph walked out of the bathroom, and said "you ready?"
"Yeah lets get out of here." He figured he needed all the help he could get and did not want Steph's mother giving her second thoughts about the marriage so he did not tell her about the missed call.
Steph grabbed her coat by the door and they headed down the stairs to the car.
A few minutes into the drive Steph could hear a noise. It sounded like metal rattling or rubbing. She looked over towards Ranger to see if he noticed the noise also. She could hear it happening again while she was looking at Ranger. He still did not seem to notice. Finally speaking up "umm Ranger?"
"Yeah Babe"
" I think something is wrong with your car"
Ranger's eyes left the road to look in her direction, "Babe nothing is wrong with this car"
"Are you sure? It is making noise and I am not going to be blamed for anymore of your cars being destroyed."
"Babe again nothing is wrong with the car, why do you think that something is?
"I keep hear a metal on metal noise. I know cars, at least expensive cars like yours should not be making that kind of noise. Now if It was my car it would be normal."
"Babe it is not the car, look in the back seat"
Steph turned around to look behind Ranger's seat, not seeing anything she pivoted back around.
"I don't see anything"
"Behind you seat" Ranger responded without taking his eyes off the road.
"Why is Rex in your car Ranger?"
"I was hoping you might spend the night and this way you would not have to worry about feeding Rex in the morning."
"And when were you going to ask me? I have my own apartment for a reason." Steph could not believe him. Here Ranger was making decisions for her without asking her first. Regardless if they were going to go through with the marriage for the job or not, she was an adult and could make her own decisions. She hoped that he did not expect her to sleep with him just because of this fake marriage. Steph felt that she still would have to protect her heart. Ranger might have told her that he loved her while at the park earlier but he also said that he was not free to give his whole self so if it was not for the job he would not have any inclination to get married for real.
Ranger sighed, "Babe, I was hoping that we would be able to take some more tonight. We need to work out some details for the job and I figured if it goes late you might prefer to spend the night instead of having to drive home. Plus I know you have what five skips you need to bring in by Sunday?"
"Yeah I have five outstanding and I was going to do them tomorrow."
"I figured but I was going to offer to help you to hopefully make it go easier."
"Ranger only two of the five might give me a problem. I done my research on them so finding them should be pretty simple."
"Well I was hoping that you would still be going out to dinner with me tomorrow night and if I help it would give you extra time to get ready."
"Dinner? What dinner?"
Ranger sighed again; Steph must be rubbing off on him. "I asked you earlier today before you stole my Porsche. You do remember taking the Porsche right?"
Not sure if she should be afraid to be sent to a third world country she throw her innocent wide eyes at Ranger and answered "Was that today that I took the Porsche?"
"Yeah Babe right after you agreed to marry me. Don't think I will let you forget that."
"Oh so where is this dinner going to be and what time?"
"If everything goes well tomorrow how about 7pm and it is a surprise."
"Ranger you have to give me a clue so I know how to dress."
"I prefer you in nothing but sexy and classy would work great also."
"Fine I will figure out something to wear. But don't forget you have to break the news to my mother. That was part of the deal. And beware I warned you, if you don't want to have a reception at the VFW hall with the entire burg invited you better plan fast and sweet talk my mother even faster."
"Fine we will figure it out." He responded as he pulled into the underground garage at Rangeman. He reached in the back seat and grabbed the duffle bag and Rex's cage. Steph exited the car and meet him at the back of the car. Together they walked to the elevator and headed to the 7th floor apartment. Once inside Ranger set Rex on the counter and dropped the duffle bag in the bedroom closet. Coming back out he placed a call to Ella asking for dinner for two.
Ranger turned around towards Stephanie who was just watching as Ranger went about his business. "Babe I am going to grab a shower, make your self comfortable."
"Actually I was thinking of running down to five to get my purse."
"Ok I will see you in a few."
Ranger headed for the shower while Steph took the elevator down to five. She walked to her cubicle to grab her purse and saw the massive stack of files that have been added to her in box. Between working on the other files and being out of the office half the day she was really far behind. She picked up the stack of files and flipped through them to make sure nothing was marked urgent. A couple of the names looked familiar but she was not sure where she had seen them before. Figuring she had a few minutes she powered up her computer and started to plug in the first file. While the first file was printed she started the second file running. Steph started to put the papers in order when a something caught her eye. She took the whole file with her to the conference room she commandeered earlier in the week. She started looking around at some of the other papers up on the wall then would refer back to the most recent file that she found. She started to highlight the new some facts on the new documents and added some of them to the wall with the others. She thought that she found a connection between a number of these individuals and she did not think this was what Ranger or Tank would be expecting. She headed back to her computer to see if the other search was finished. She started to print that file also when Ranger appeared at her doorway. "Babe"
"Oh hi, give me a minute I want to check something"
"Is that the Mathews file you are working on?
"no, this was one of the files in my inbox but a couple of the names looked familiar so I wanted to run the searches real fast. I just took the other file to the conference room and came to check if this one was done yet. I think it is connected to the Mathews file though."
Ranger pulled Stephanie to him and kissed her forehead. "Good work Babe, but let it wait till Monday. Ella will bring dinner any minute"
If as on cue Stephanie's stomach let out a deep growl. Ranger chuckled when her heard the beast let itself known.
Steph turned off the computer and took the file in her hand and placed it in the conference room on the way to the elevator.
Ella was just closing the door when the elevator opened up to let them off. After exchanging hello and thank you they headed into the apartment. The heavenly smells meet them at the door. Heading toward the kitchen Steph grabbed some plates and utilizes from the cabinets while Ranger brought out a bottle of red wine and two wine glasses. "Body not a temple tonight or are you trying to get me drunk to try to talk me into more commitments?" Steph asked chuckling.
"Maybe both" came the response also chuckling.
They sat down and ate dinner in quite. The both enjoyed a glass of wine with dinner. After they both were finished they rinsed their plates and placed them in the dishwasher. Ranger grabbed the bottle of wine and refilled both of their glasses. Grabbing the bottle he directed Steph into the living room to the couch. Placing the half full bottle on the table along with their glasses he pulled Steph down next to him draping his arm around her in an tempt to keep her close.
After a few minutes of quite Ranger asked "are you going to be able to go through with this? You know I would never ask this of you if I thought there was another option and I would not consider doing this job with anyone else?"
"You know I already said I would. I won't back out on you. So what happens now?"
"Well we have dinner out tomorrow night in a public place where people are to notice the proposal. That will help get the word out. The only people who will know anything of this situation will be Tank, Lester, Bobby and of course us."
"Okay so dinner tomorrow night I can handle. What else, I don't want any surprises."
"We really still need to be in Miami in about a months time, I know it seems rushed but I would like to be married and than we can say we are visiting my daughter before taking a honeymoon."
"You expect to plan a whole wedding in less than a month? You can't. Invitations have to go out at least six weeks before the date, you have to get a photographer, a reception hall. It is just not possible."
"Babe, we can do a small ceremony. Only invite immediate family and friends. This will eliminate the whole burg from being invited. You don't want a really big wedding do you?"
"No I had one the first time and I hated it. But you still have to give people notice."
"Well what if we say that due to security issues we want to keep it a small gathering, and to have it so soon to prevent any kind of media or risk due to our professions? Would that work?"
"It might, do you know what you want to do about a wedding party? Do you have anyone specifically you want or need to ask? I don't even know if you have any brothers you would ask?"
"Probably my brother and Tank if we are going to keep it small. Lester and Bobby could be ushers. Apparently Lester is only concerned with the Bachelor party."
"Yeah he would be. He is a really is a slut. At the rate he gets around I am surprised no one has called him to tell him he's going to be a daddy." Steph stated shaking her head. She could feel Ranger slightly laughing as her head was resting on his shoulder.
"Do you know who you are going to ask to be your maid of honor? You asking Valerie?"
"I think I would ask Marylou to my by matron of honor and I guess I should ask Val to be a bridesmaid. I am going to have bribe Lula not to get upset for not being in the wedding. Maybe she will be fine with it since Tank is going to be in the wedding party. I know things are still weird between them."
Sometime over their talk they both had another two glasses of wine finishing the bottle. They had been sitting on the couch and talking when Ranger noticed it was already eleven o'clock. "Come on Babe time for bed"
Steph feeling no pain simply nodded and stood up following Ranger. Ranger sent Steph in the bathroom first with one of his t-shirts to get ready for bed. Ranger used the same time to change in the bedroom and waited to use the bathroom. Steph came out and climbed into the bed pulling the blankets up to her chest. Ranger was out of the bathroom a few moments later and headed to the bed. Stephanie rolled over and curled into his body. Ranger took advantage of this situation and wrapped his arms around her. Before falling asleep Steph mumbled into Ranger's chest, "just because you fed me half a bottle of wine don't think you are getting lucky, you better keep your hands to yourself."
"Babe you are already draped all over me you keep this up and I will take it as consent." By the time Ranger got that sentence out of his mouth Stephanie was already fast asleep against his chest.