A/N – I apologize for the delay. Life has been complicated. Hector has been yelling at me for a while, we just had to sort his thoughts out so they make sense to you. I think this is the fifth version of this chapter I wrote and he's finally shut up. All of the characters are going to be darker and I know where I want this to go, I just haven't gotten the full picture yet. I'm also working on a couple of other pieces, but I am not abandoning this. It takes a lot for me to let these walls down and I want to do it right, so please stay with me. Right now, I doubt I will be giving Steph's POV, I tried, and it was awful, she fought me the entire time. I have six Rangemen who want to be heard and I'm letting them out of the box.

Hector POV

A year ago, Stephanie Plum asked for my help. She asked me to teach her to survive like I had. She asked me to teach her about electronics and aliases and knives. She asked me to teach her about forensics and death. She told me she knew death and pain and war were coming and she needed to be ready. And I couldn't tell anyone.

I thought she was joking.

I laughed in her face.

She decked me, kneed me in the balls, stunned me and tied me to a chair.

If anyone else had done that, they would be dead right now. I cut la gatita a lot of slack. She also knows that I speak perfect English, I just use the guise of only speaking Spanish for intelligence gathering. I never told her that, she figured it out by watching my eyes.

She also had some pretty impressive information tucked away. She had only been gathering it for a short while but it would turn our world upside-down.

I sat and listened as she explained what she knew and how she knew it. Turns out, she speaks fluent Italian, has since she was a little girl. And the only people who knew that were her father and me.

She had taken her recordings to him and had him confirm what she was hearing. She didn't want to believe it, wanted to hide her head in the sand, but she pulled herself up and began to plan a counter offensive. It changed everything for the two of them. He gave her information about his military career that she wouldn't disclose to me and then he started her training. From what she said, I figured he was teaching her the mental aspects of covert ops and hand-to-hand combat. She was learning to shield her emotions from the world and from herself. And she was learning fast.

She told me that I could stand beside her, or I could die. It was my choice. And I believed her.

I took her through everything I knew. I trained her to hack and program. I trained her to collect evidence and what the police look for at the scene of a crime. I introduced her to some of my contacts, some of the best forgers and hackers in the country. I taught her disguise and defensive driving. I taught her every damn thing I could think of that she might need if she didn't have us at her side.

And then I brought out the blades.

She was quite talented and graceful with the blades. I taught her kill zones, damage zones and defensive moves against a blade attack. Her hand-to-hand skills were showing, but she was a natural.

Then she asked me to teach her torture. I almost walked away from her but the look in her eyes stopped me. There was a monster in there. And I didn't create it. I had just never recognized it.

I taught her how to fillet a man, how to remove body parts without the target bleeding out, how to decimate a target, how to degrade a target, how to de-humanize a target and how to dig the heart out slowly and painfully.

And for the first time since I was a child, I prayed. I prayed that she would never have to take a life. And I prayed that she would never use any of the things I taught her monster. I had helped strip away her innocence and I hated myself for it. But I knew as the months passed, I could just feel that she would need this. I hated myself, but my instincts screamed at me to take this monster that had so long been caged and teach her how to be everything she would need to be.

I watched as she interacted with the people around her. If I didn't know about the training, I would never suspect it was happening. Her father was teaching her deception very well. I knew that Ranger had wanted to start something serious with her about seven or eight months ago and I watched closely. She seemed to be feeling all the right things, but even I couldn't tell if it was a lie or not.

We had talked about how she wanted to handle her personal relationships. She refused to let me in on the plans she was moving into place, but she did tell me I would know when the war began. She said I had to be above reproach and my reactions had to be genuine. She told me that while she's in love with 'certain people', she can't let that get in the way of the upcoming battles and she would back away if things got too complicated.

So having her call Tank today told me Rangeman was about to join the fight. I knew which side I was on, and I would walk away from my brothers here if I had to for her, but I didn't think that would be the case. I knew she'd been setting up her moves for the last six months, keeping Rangeman above reproach for as long as possible. I knew she'd bring us in when the timing was right. I also knew that human trafficking was involved and I wanted it stopped.

Morelli was target one. I knew she'd gotten all she could when she told Tank that's where she was. Listening to her act through that scene, not being able to reassure the guys that she would be alright because she was so well trained, I seethed.

I really have wanted to kill Morelli for a while now. But she said he was a pawn she needed to control. That was our last conversation about three months after she cut the rest of the guys off. She had me keeping her informed of the cases we were taking on. I'm not sure why and I'm not sure why she stopped needing that information, but she told me I would know.

And I know now is the time.

Following Tank and Lester through the front door, I wanted to vomit and kiss her at the same time. She was ripping his heart out of his chest. And she was smiling and whispering that he would never hurt anyone again.

She turned and made eye contact with me, completely ignoring Tank and Lester.

"Hector," she grinned, "it's on."

And with that she was up and moving for the door.

"I need to get off the grid so the cops don't realize they can't hold me for this. I'll get in touch with you."

All of that was addressed at me. In perfect Italian. I learned, just like she learned Spanish.

When Tank tried to move into her path, she just stared at him, monster peeking through.

"I'll call you too, Big Guy."

And she was gone, sirens closing in from the distance.

I stood there in silence with the other two, not really knowing what to say and hoping I wouldn't have to fight with them before we got back to Haywood. I still had a tracker on her and I would use it if I had to, but I didn't want to betray her trust.

"What do we do about the cops?" Lester asked. "I heard her say something about them but I don't speak Italian."

"We tell truth," I said. I kept my English broken and heavily accented. I know Ranger and Tank had figured out it was a ruse, but they let me keep it.

They both turned to stare at me. Their blank masks were completely gone and they looked incredulous.

"She untouchable. Trust her."

They both relaxed at the second phrase and nodded. Ranger would be pissed, but I knew she had worked hard for the privileges that she had and I had a limited understanding that everything she would do would be swept under the rug by several very important people who were hurt by this war that was about to break out on the streets.

She was a central player, key witness, lead investigator, chief tactician, undercover operative, and personally motivated. They were trusting her and she was doing whatever was necessary. She had a few other people from the outside working for her, but she was the puppet master of the powers that be and the enemy. And doing a fine job from what I could guess, since the first puppet's strings were just severed.

Another Explorer squealed onto the scene. Ranger, Bobby and Cal jumped out and stared at the taillights of her SUV as it sped away.

"Bobby. Cal. Tail her," he ordered

"There's no point, Ranger. She'll lose them. She's had the training. I've got her tracked," I said. I was hoping to sooth him a little but he was staring at me like he wanted to kill me.

Fuck. I hadn't meant to tell them all that I had a tracker on her. Now he'll demand we use it and I'll have to slice him open when I refuse. Some days I hate how driven by testosterone these men are.

I looked over at Lester and he nodded. He would help me protect her. He had just seen her elbow-deep in Morelli's chest. Sometimes I loved Lester a little too much for my own good. Now was definitely one of those times. He was confused and turned on and a little terrified of her. He was adorable.

Tank just looked halfway between confused and furious. I'm pretty sure he had seen her monster rattling her cage a little and was pissed about her loss of innocence. If only he knew.

Ranger made it to the porch with Cal and Bobby and they were all looking around us into the living room when the blue and whites started rolling up. It looked like the entire police force.

My phone rang, "Brave" by Sara Bareilles. It was a little feminine for me, but it suited la gatita so very well.

I put it to my ear while the five other men in black glared at me.

"Chica," I said.

"Speaker please," she said.

I pulled the phone back and hit the button. Her voice came out in perfect Spanish, perfectly emotionless.

"Hector has a tracker on me. He may activate it once you have all been cleared from the scene and are able to slip the surveillance that's been on you the last three months. It's just the DEA and ICE. Two men on each of you, four on Manoso. Tell the cops the truth as you saw and heard it this afternoon. Meeting me is risking everything. Make that choice before you go to Hector once the police release you. Death is highly likely. But survival, makes you untouchable. Your choices. Your instincts. Call me before you leave the grid to let me know ETA and troop status, Hec." She took a deep breath and then said the words that sent us all to her side later that night. "No matter what, I love you all."

She was safe for now, we would follow her lead. Every man met my eyes and Ranger's eyes. We were hers. Our monsters told us that her fight was ours. Our instincts told us to protect her. We were all hers.