Chapter 9

Deciding that a mortal enemy would not have the decency to call ahead and announce his arrival, Stephanie took a moment to step into panties and put on a bra and tank top before pulling on the sweatshirt and sweatpants that Ranger had tossed on the bed. She stood in front of the dresser mirror and groaned at the sight of her hair. It didn't look awful but it definitely had that disheveled, 'just fucked' look. The wide collar of the sweatshirt did little to hide the love bites Ranger had left behind. Her face and neck also showed subtle signs of whisker burn. Shrugging, she turned from the mirror and opened the door.

Peering down the hall, her eyes caught on the man standing in the center of the living area. He was about Ranger's height and build, tan, and he had short, honey-blond hair. He was talking to Ranger in low tones but at the flash of movement, his pale blue eyes cut to Stephanie before focusing back on Ranger. She quickly ducked into the bathroom to clean up and make herself presentable.

When she stepped out, the men were nowhere to be found. She heard their subdued voices coming from the office so she hesitantly made her way to that door. Ranger was sitting in front of his laptop, facing the doorway and the other man was leaning over Ranger's shoulder reading something on the screen with his brow furrowed.

Sensing her presence, Ranger lifted his eyes to Stephanie and sat back in his chair. The man behind him stood upright and impaled her with glacial eyes.

"Stephanie, this is Jase Hawkins. Jase, this is Stephanie Plum," Ranger said.

The man gave off absolutely no warmth, no signs of a soul behind his emotionless eyes. Stephanie gave him a single nod and leaned against the wall near the door. The man acknowledged her nod with a slow blink, then leaned forward again over Ranger's shoulder, returning his attention to the screen.

Stephanie glanced at Ranger and his eyes held something she hadn't seen before. Trepidation? Regret? Before she could decide, Ranger looked back toward his monitor and sighed. He placed his hands at the edge of the desk and pushed back to rise from his seat. Jase took the vacated chair without a word and began working where Ranger left off.

Walking toward Stephanie, Ranger gently grabbed her wrist as he passed by, tugging her out of the room. Stephanie followed along toward the front of the bunker, pulling her wrist from Ranger's grasp as soon as they were out of Jase's eyesight.

Ranger went directly to the food cabinets, opened them and studied the contents. Stephanie stood in the kitchen, arms folded across her chest, leaning against the counter.

Ranger said, "We haven't eaten dinner. Spaghetti?" He reached in and grabbed a box of pasta and a large can of sauce.

"Did you know he was coming?" she asked.

He closed the cabinet and walked into the kitchen, placing the ingredients on the counter. Bending down, he pulled a large pot from under the counter and walked it over to the sink to fill with water. "Yes. But I didn't know exactly when he would arrive."

She watched him work; making note that he was withholding eye contact. "Were you planning on telling me?"

He went to the freezer and examined the contents. Pulling out a package of frozen ground beef, he unwrapped it, placed it on a plate and put it in the microwave to defrost. Once he washed and dried his hands, he turned to Stephanie and said, "I was planning on telling you tonight. I didn't think he would be here until tomorrow or the next day."

Stephanie shook her head in disbelief and pushed past him to the fridge. Grabbing a Coke, she popped it open, took a generous swig and set it down on the counter. "Why is he here?"

Ranger took the thawed beef out of the microwave and dumped the contents of the plate into a pan to brown. Without looking up from the task he said, "I can't leave you here alone."

It was as if the room suddenly became a vacuum. The silence suspended between them made the sizzle and spit of the meat frying sound obscenely loud.

"Where are you going?"

Shaking his head, Ranger added seasonings to the meat and said, "Steph."

"Where are you going," she repeated.

He sighed and turned down the burner. "I have to do my job."

"You have to go back to work?" Her tone was just short of incredulous.

Without looking up he said, "I have to make our problem go away."

Stephanie felt a chill run through her so deep it crept into her bones. "I thought that someone else-"

Ranger dumped the pasta into the boiling water and shook his head. "It's my mess, it's my responsibility."

"So now I'm your mess?"

Closing his eyes for a moment, Ranger said, "You're not my mess, you're my—this is what I need to do."

"So you're just going to leave me here with," she flailed her arms around searching for words, "Mr. Personality?"

"I trust him with my life, and yours."

"Because?"

"Steph, he's the best at what he does."

"Which is?"

"Classified."

Of course it is. "So you're just going to leave me with some psychopath while you go out to play executioner or whatever?"

She saw his back stiffen and wished she could retract her words. In economical movements, Ranger turned off the burner and removed the pan from the heat. Turning to Stephanie with hard eyes, he said, "This is my life. Remember? The one I told you doesn't lend itself to relationships? This is it."

"I'm sorry. That was uncalled for. I didn't mean-"

"No, this is good. We need to talk about this. Maybe while I'm gone you can think about what I have to offer you and what you're willing to live with."

"You don't have to-"

Ranger cut her off. "I can give you cars, clothes, jewelry and houses. I can give you fidelity. A child is a risk, another target for an enemy, but if a child is what you want, I'll give you one. I can't give you total freedom. My enemies are vast and they have long memories. You'd have to deal with constant security and with that, a lack of privacy. At any given moment, you or I could be in danger and would have to go into hiding just like we are now. You'd have to live with the fact that I have blood on my hands that will never come clean. I have no doubt there will be more blood spilled in the future."

Jase strolled in and forked up a strand of spaghetti from the bubbling pot, blew on it a moment, then ate it. He shook his head, determining it wasn't done and said to Ranger, "Is this your spiel where you ask her to go steady? 'Cause I gotta say, you're not making yourself sound very attractive, Carlos."

Ranger ignored Jase and bent to get a colander to drain the ground beef. Jase turned his flat stare to Stephanie and looked her over dispassionately. When his eyes took in the marks on her neck he said to Ranger, "Have you spent any time in the last two weeks productively?"

Turning with the drained beef, Ranger tossed it back in the pan, opened a can of sauce and dumped it in. Nudging Jase away from the stove, he resumed stirring the pasta. "I've been training her."

Jase cocked an eyebrow at Stephanie and said in a bland tone, "To do what?"

His back to the room, Ranger missed the nasty connotation of the question. Stephanie scowled at Jase and said, "Defensive maneuvers."

Eyeing her neck, one side of Jase's mouth quirked up. "You won't mind if I give her an evaluation in the morning?"

Ranger pulled the pot of cooked pasta off the burner and turned to dump the contents into the colander in the sink. He smacked the empty pot down on the counter and turned on Jase. Arching his brow, Ranger said, "An evaluation of her defensive capabilities?"

Jase barely bit back a smirk. "Of course."

"Fine. Just keep in mind we've only been training a week."

"How long has she been in your life?"

Ranger sighed, "Three years."

Jase turned back to Steph. "And how are you getting away with being untrained this long?"

"It's complicated," Steph muttered.

"Shit. How could you be this irresponsible, Carlos?"

Ranger said, "Steph, would you mind setting the table?"

Stephanie's eyes shifted between the two men. She didn't like Jase. He was cocky, arrogant, and while he was very good-looking, his face was completely unreadable. She realized that it was like watching two Rangers stand off against each other, only the white one was bitter and snide.

Stepping between the two men, Steph walked to the appropriate cabinet, pulled down three plates, grabbed some utensils and left the kitchen without saying a word.

They ate in silence. Ranger seemed tense and angry and Jase was giving off annoyed vibes.

Polishing off his last bite, Jase kicked back in his chair and asked, "So what's the plan?"

Ranger paused mid-twirl of his pasta and said, "I need to talk to Stephanie first."

"You haven't told her? Jesus."

Stephanie had to agree there.

Ranger said, "I was going to talk to her tonight. You're early."

"You've been on the run or underground for nearly two weeks. What's the holdup?"

Ranger dropped his fork with a metallic clang and sat back, glaring at Jase. "What the fuck is your problem?"

"My problem is that my principal," nodding to Stephanie, "is untrained, unprepared, and completely oblivious."

Stephanie blurted, "What's a principal?"

Jase rolled his eyes and said, "You, sweetheart. You're the principal. My only focus is to keep you alive. My life for yours and all that shit."

Stephanie retorted, "Well that just makes me feel all warm and fuzzy."

Ranger gritted out, "I said I was training her."

Folding his arms across his chest, Jase said, "And I have my doubts you've been doing it effectively."

"Fuck you."

Jase shook his head and made a tsk-tsk sound. "My guess is you coddle her. Carry her around on a tufted pillow. Don't tell her the real deal because you're afraid it will offend her delicate sensibilities."

Stephanie stood from her chair and turned on Jase. "He's been training me just fine, you asshole, and I have the bruises to prove it."

Jase glanced pointedly at her neck. "I can see that."

Spinning away from Jase, Steph stalked toward the hall with intention of going to the bedroom and slamming the door for emphasis. The next thing she knew, she was pinned face-first against the living room wall. Her right arm was twisted up behind her and over two hundred pounds of aggressive male was pressed intimately against her back.

Stephanie whimpered at the sharp pulling pain in her shoulder and then she heard the distinct sound of a gun being cocked from a few feet away.

Ranger growled, "Get the fuck off of her."

Jase squeezed her wrist until it was numb and said, "If you're training her properly, she should be able to get out of the hold."

He ground his pelvis into her bottom, making Stephanie feel sick to her stomach. She choked back a sound of frustration and tugged ineffectively at her trapped wrist.

"Get. Off. Of. Her."

Ignoring Ranger, Jase said, "Come on, chica. Try to get out. Just remember if you wiggle, you might turn me on."

Ranger hissed, "Jase, you fuck, I didn't ask you to come here to terrorize my woman."

Jase blew out a sigh of disgust and stepped back, leaving Stephanie to lean against the wall boneless and clutching her arm. Ranger re-engaged the safety of his gun and tucked it at the small of his back. Moving between Jase and Stephanie, he sent a lightning-quick elbow into Jase's nose and pulled Stephanie into his arms.

When Ranger turned with Stephanie clutched to his chest, Jase was squatting in the middle of the room with his hands to his face. "Fuck, man. That was unnecessary."

"And assaulting Stephanie was necessary?"

Dropping his hands to reveal an already swollen and probably broken nose, Jase swiped at the blood and said, "If it scares her enough to want to learn how to fight, then, yeah."

"She doesn't have to be scared to learn how to fight."

Jase snorted and winced, swiping again at his bloodied nose. "Right. Cause they taught us how to fight in the military with such gentle loving kindness. Shit. If she thinks she's really going to get hurt or raped, she's going to try harder. Fight harder."

Ranger ran his fingers through Steph's curls as she pressed into him. "You're not going to rape her," he said softly.

"No. But I'll hurt her if I have to. If that's what it takes to teach her to defend herself effectively, I'll do it. You can't train her objectively. You don't want to scare her and you're not willing to hurt her."

Ranger said nothing for a moment, but Stephanie assumed he was glaring at Jase. "I asked you here to take care of her."

Jase stood up and walked toward the kitchen. She heard the water run briefly, then drawers opening and ice shuffling in the freezer. He came back to the living room with a wad of paper towel and a zip-lock bag filled with ice against his nose.

Dropping onto the couch, Jase said, "I'll take care of her. I'm just going to do it my way."

"I don't like it."

"You don't have to like it. You need to do your job and let me do mine."

Ranger swore under his breath.

"Man, you know if our roles were reversed, you'd be saying the same shit to me."

Ranger tugged Stephanie with him as he sat in a chair across from the couch. He pulled her onto his lap. Rubbing her arm gently, he placed a kiss on her head and said, "You okay, Babe?"

"Yeah." She wasn't. She really didn't like the man sitting across from them, but surely Ranger wouldn't leave her alone with Jase if he couldn't be trusted.

Jase said, "I don't suppose you've implanted a tracker on her?"

Stephanie stiffened and said, "A what?"

"Jesus Christ, Carlos. Seriously?"