Disclaimer: I do not own the characters created by Janet Evanovich. I just really really wish I did! I am just using them in this story. I only own Carmella, but you can have her if you want her!

Two weeks later…

Carmella opened her mouth to say something to her father as he walked past, but before she could think of anything to say, he was gone. She hated Steph for this. Carmella had been the one who'd had to go and tell her father that Stephie had left to go back to Joe Morelli. Maybe he blamed her for Steph leaving. Maybe he thought that Carmella could have stopped her from leaving. Ella hustled into the room, beaming at her warmly.

"Hello Carmella. Looking forwards to going back to school?" She asked. Carmella sighed and nodded.

"I actually am. It's like sharing a house with the Grim Reaper with dad moping round." She muttered. Ella laughed softly and handed her a mug of coffee. There was a loud crashing noise outside and Celia fell through the front door, quite obviously drunk. Lester pranced in after her, and the pair of them were laughing hysterically. Carmella glanced up at the wall clock and saw that it was eleven in the morning. She set her mug down on the side table and walked into the hall. They were leaning against each other for support and there was a smashed vase on the floor. Ella was already hurrying with a dustpan and brush. Ranger stalked into the hall with a thundercloud look on his face.

"Don't do it dad, murder is still frowned upon in this state." Carmella smiled.

"He's armed; I'll say it was self defence."

"Was that a joke? Good lord, he is human!" Celia giggled. Ranger glared at his sister

"What the hell are you doing in this state? It's not even midday!" He shouted. Celia sighed, tried to take a step forwards and almost fell over. Lester grabbed her round the middle to steady her. After a half hour rant, Celia and Lester stumbled up the stairs to her bedroom and Ranger retreated to his office. After a while, Carmella decided to go and talk to him, first making sure that she did in fact have life insurance. He was sat at his desk, frowning at the computer screen. She sat in the chair opposite him and waited for him to say something. After sitting in silence for five minutes, he finally looked up at her.

"What's up?" He asked. She smiled at him.

"Are you ok? You've hardly said a word since she left." She asked, straight to the point.

"Sweetheart I'm sorry, I've just been busy. Steph moving in was just temporary; we always knew that. I really am fine." He said adamantly. Then he went back to work.

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Carmella wandered around the RangeMan offices, looking for someone who would actually talk to her. With the exception of Lester, all the guys were in totally foul moods and were refusing to communicate like human beings. Lester couldn't communicate because he had his tongue down Celia's throat. She drifted into her father's office, knowing that he was out on an apprehension of some variety. She sat down into the large leather chair and started rooting around the desk out of boredom. Nothing of interest until she opened the bottom draw and found a bundle of letters addressed to her. Her father had been screening her mail. The post mark was from Florida. What if they were from her mother or her friends in Florida? They were all open already. This was a gross invasion of privacy, what did he think he was playing at? She pulled the letter out of the first envelope and felt sick as she read it

Carmella

You need to make the appropriate arrangements for your death; I'd hate for your relatives to be left in the lurch. Have you thought about the afterlife? I think of you every time I see flames, knowing that soon your soul will be burning in hell. I know they say everyone has a chance to repent, but I will personally make sure that you're in no state to get into heaven when your time comes.

Carmella knew there would be no finger prints, her dad would already have checked. The rest of the letters were the same, threatening death and torture. It was the last one that made her stomach lurch.

Carmella

Soon we will become one. Keep yourself pure for me.

This was sick. She could feel tears pouring down her face. What had she done to deserve this? How could someone have that much hate for her? The office door swung open, making her jump out the seat and let out an involuntary scream. Ranger and Tank were stood in the doorway, looking at her in surprise. She tried to stuff the letters back into the desk draw without either of them noticing, but knew that they'd already seen she had them. Her dad stormed over to the desk and grabbed the letters.

"What the hell do you think you were doing? How dare you go through my desk!" He yelled. She'd never heard him so angry and cowered away.

"I'm sorry." She whispered, feeling more tears fall down her face. He walked around the desk, grabbed her by the upper arm and pulled her out the office. The door slammed behind her and she could hear her dad yelling. She ran down the stairs and out the office building. Before she knew it, she was outside Harry's apartment building. He opened the door for her straight away and rushed her into his room to avoid any awkward questions from the other boys. Carmella sat on the edge of the bed, crying quietly.

"All this time I thought it had just stopped, that they'd just got bored. But they're still after me. They're going to kill me Harry." She whispered. Harry sat next to her looking deeply confused.

"Carmella who's going to kill you? What are you talking about?" He asked, wrapping an arm around her protectively.

"Those guys that broke into my dad's building. They've been sending me threatening letters, saying what they're going to do to me. Dad had kept them all so I wouldn't read them but then I found them today. Why do they hate me so much?" She sobbed. He gently pushed her head to rest on his shoulder and held her tight.

"They don't know you. They couldn't possibly hate you if they knew you." He assured her. She sniffed and laughed

"Either that or they'd have more reason to want to kill me!" She joked lamely. They finally went to sleep, after talking and…other things.

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Steph's POV

I hadn't seen Ranger or Carmella properly for almost five months. If Ranger happened to be in the bonds office when I popped in for a girlie chat then he'd just walk out or go into Vinnie's office. Sometimes he gave me a nod of acknowledgement, but then most of the time he just ignored me. I occasionally saw Carmella in the mall but either she didn't see me or she just ignored me. I didn't blame her. Things at home were…strange for lack of a better word. I wasn't really up for any physical activities with Joe given my condition. Strangely he didn't seem to mind. He was a bit frustrated for the first few weeks but then he found the local porno store and settled down. I didn't mind, as long as he was content and had his stress level down to the minimum. I was doing some last minute baby shopping in the mall when I spotted Carmella. She glanced across and caught my eye, but started walking away and pretending not to see me. Luckily, she was easy to spot being dressed in a black mini skirt that had several layers of black and red net skirts, black boots, a black corset and lace gloves. I followed her through the shopping centre and finally caught up with her in the car park. She spun around to face me. I noticed her hair was now jet black. She glared at me.

"What do you want?" She asked "I've got nothing to say to you."

"Carmella, please just talk to me. I've missed you. You and your dad." I added, remembering how much I had wanted to talk to the pair of them. She glared and turned to walk off again. I felt a surge of pain ripple through me as she began to go. Woah, I hadn't realised how much I'd missed her. I did a shuffle run after her and grabbed her upper arm.

"Carmella hear me out. I'm so sorry that I left but I was just trying to do the right thing for everyone. I thought it would be better this way." I said sincerely. She stared at me with a look of disbelief.

"Better? How is this better? For almost two months after you left, my dad hardly said a word to me. Those threatening letters having been flooding in, making him more tense and me terrified. I get scared to go out of the house at dark. I used to take walks in the evening to clear my head and now I can't even do that because I'm so scared of what could be waiting in the dark for me. And you just abandoned us. You were the closest thing I ever had to a mother and you abandoned me, just like Madre did. After all this time all you can say is you're sorry and it's not enough. I was looking forward to getting to know my dad better; I thought that at least with you gone I could talk to him properly, but no. The only times he ever really speaks to me is when I do a distraction jobs. I'm beginning to wish more people would skip, just so I can talk to him about something, even if it's some psycho's past convictions. Isn't that pathetic? Then on top of all of that, he keeps bringing Jeanne Ellen back home to do goodness knows what." She hissed. Another wave of pain. Suddenly, Carmella looked at the ground in utter shock.
"Uh Steph…you could have said something…" She muttered. I followed her gaze and suddenly the waves of pain made sense. My waters had just broke, all over the parking lot.

"Oh this is so embarrassing…" I murmured. Carmella looked appalled, shocked and scared all at once. She grabbed my handbag and pulled my car keys out.

"Come on, we're going to the hospital." She commanded and ran to start my car up. She swerved to a stop in front of my and motioned for me to get in. Metallica were blaring out of the car speakers. I pulled my seatbelt on as we squealed out of the lot. It was really starting to hurt now. Why had no one warned me about this? Damn. These babies had better be cute. As we drove, Carmella pulled her phone.

"Damn…pick up…pick up now!...Oh hello Mr Morelli, it's Carmella. Yeah I'm fine but Steph's gone into labour so I'm driving her to the hospital…Ok, well I'll see you there." She hung up and dialled another number.

"Hi Dad, I might be a bit late home tonight…I'm fine, but Steph's gone into labour so I'm driving her to the hospital…oh don't worry, if any cop pulls me over then they'll be more concerned with the woman in labour then the teenager without a license…ok…bye!" She hung up and threw her phone into her bag. I stared at her.

"You don't have a license?" I asked incredulously. She shrugged.

"There was a slight misunderstanding. Its ok, I'll have it back soon. Well at some point in the future." We swerved into the parking lot and screeched to a stop. Carmella jumped out the car, ran round to my side and helped me out. I waddled into the reception area with Carmella supporting me and flopped down onto the nearest chair.

"Hi, Steph's gone into labour so…do your stuff!" Carmella said to the nurse at reception. The nurse nodded and hurried round to me with a wheelchair. I was rushed up to the maternity ward with Carmella running next to me. I was shifted onto a bed and my legs were hoisted up into the stirrups.
"Ok Stephanie, we just need to make sure things are ok here. When's your due date?" One of the nurses asked.

"In a couple of weeks." I gasped, wondering how long it would be until I could get some pain meds. The doctors and nurses hurried around, doing whatever it was they were doing. I just lay with my legs in the air, breathing and grasping Carmella's hand. Time seemed to slow down, then speed up and then slow down again. A nurse came in and announced that Ranger and Morelli were here but that they weren't allowed to come in as there were already too many people.

"Do you want me to go out so Morelli can come in?" Carmella asked. I shook my head and kept hold of her hand. I couldn't imagine Morelli wanting to be here, he was slightly squeamish about this kind of thing. Carmella spent the next hour trying to take my mind off the labour by playing I-Spy. Finally, the nurse looked up at me.

"Ok Ms Plum, you're ready to start pushing." She said in an annoyingly happy voice and a big smile. I was going to kick her ass when I got these babies out of me. Oh now this was real pain…My grip around Carmella's hand tightened. The nurses were all telling me to breathe and push. I totally lost track of time with the rhythm 'push and breathe, push and breathe, push and breathe…' running through my head. Suddenly the sound of crying filled the room. A few minutes later, there was more crying from another baby. Carmella grinned and I let go of her hand.

"You did it Stephie!" She giggled. The nurse handed her the babies and the smile slid off her face. My heart seemed to drop.

"What? What's wrong with them?" I asked shrilly.

"Nothing, they're totally healthy. It's just…how sure are you that Morelli is the father?" She asked. I swear my heart stopped. Carmella continued "It's just that I've seen a lot of Cuban babies and these…well these are Cuban babies." She smiled apologetically and handed the babies to me. She was right. These babies were definitely Cuban, their skin was a shade lighter then Carmella's which meant one thing; Ranger was the father.

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Many thanks to everyone who read this chapter, I hope you all approve! Love it? Hate it? Please Please PLEASE review! As always, any suggestions and/or comments are welcome. I just wanted to move time on so…meh! Apologies if anyone is confused by this change but all will be resolved/revealed! Do you guys want a sequel? If you want one, I'll write one but if no one does then I'll end it with this story. Thanks to everyone who reviewed to the last chapter! I'll try to update ASAP. Arigato!