Disclaimer: Janet Evanovich is one clever lady. Characters and everything you recognize are hers. I'm just playing.

Chapter 12

In less than an hour, we were packed and on the road again. Carlos had tried to convince me to stay with a group of guards, but I was having none of that. We were going to handle everything together from now on, stalkers and wannabe killers included. Plus, after he'd ruined me for showers, I wasn't going to be able to stay away from him for very long or I'd have to start walking around smelly.

At least, that was my reasoning. He didn't seem overly impressed with my logic, but he let me get away with it anyway. I think he wanted me with him, the big softy.

"There's nothing soft about me, Babe."

Whoops.

The flight home felt not more than a few minutes long, possibly because Ranger had given me an intimate tour of the airplane's sleeping quarters. It had most certainly been worthy of the knowing looks and chuckles from the guys when I came stumbling back out in time to get a seat belt on for landing. I was pretty sure they knew what we'd been doing. Oh well, they'd get over it. Or not. I actually couldn't bring myself to care after that last orgasm.

We all piled into the SUVs that had been driven to meet us at the airport by Hal and Cal. I tried to greet them both and let them know that I was glad they hadn't had any problems apprehending our two guests, but Ranger just hustled me into the back of one of the SUVs and told me we'd catch up later.

I was mildly surprised at the fact that Carlos and I were just in one of the SUVs, but I guess, given the way I was crammed into the very center with Rangemen protecting me from all angles, Carlos wasn't keen on me being as exposed as I would be if I was "just" in the Porsche with him.

Personally, I thought I could be just about anywhere in the world with just Ranger next to me and I'd be perfectly safe. Carlos wasn't willing to take my word for that. At least he'd sat in the back of the SUV with me, leaving Tank to drive and Ram in the front seat.

I was sitting on the middle bench seat sandwiched between Carlos and Lester when my eyes began to slowly droop.

"Beautiful, how can you be sleeping again?! And honestly, this drive is so short it won't even be worth it to fall asleep- you'll wake up again before you even manage to get yourself a good sleep cycle."

"Lester, I'm tired. And I didn't get any sleep on the plane!"

All the guys in the car chuckled, and, surprisingly, Lester managed to fight back the comment that I'm sure he wanted to make about what had kept me awake on the plane.

Ranger just slipped his arm around me and pulled me into him. The arm that was around me bent up at the elbow and he ran his hand soothingly along the top of my head before pressing a kiss to me below my ear and saying, "you sleep if you want to, Babe. You don't have to wake up when we get there, I'll get you upstairs."

I gave a small humm of appreciation and squirmed around a little, putting my feet across Lester's lap giving him a wide-eyed puppy look when he seemed like he might protest.

Just as I was starting to drift off, Ram started yelling from the front seat, "get Steph down! We gotta Rabbit!"

I could hear Cal in the backseat calling the control room and telling them to get ready because we were going to be coming into the garage full speed and didn't know what we were bringing with us.

Simultaneously, Ranger was ripping my seatbelt off and he and Lester were pushing me down to to the ground having pulled off their seatbelts as well.

Only a few seconds had passed when the gunfire started, striking the SUV ineffectually in the bulletproof side panels. A lot of gunfire. I could hear constant popping as well as some bigger thunks in a slower, more rhythmic pattern.

Tank was getting directions from Ram and he was taking each turn at full-speed. Everyone, including me, had a gun in their hand in case we had to exit the SUV for some reason. I was really, really hoping that we didn't have to exit the SUV. There was no way that would end well.

Thankfully, we pulled into the Rangeman garage and the gunfire stopped. Tank pulled up right to the elevator, which was waiting for us, and Ranger hustled me out of the SUV and straight into the elevator. When he pushed seven in the elevator, I overrode him by pushing three. There was not a doubt in my mind that the troops were rallying in the conference room right now for a status update, and I was planning to be there.

We stared at each other for a few seconds, Ranger raising his eyebrow and me not wavering in my determination. When the doors opened on three, he didn't stop me as I got out, just put a proprietary hand on the small of my back.

He leaned into me and whispered in my ear, "what happened? You used to tremble when I gave you that look?"

With a knowing smile, I just turned my lips to press against his ear and whispered back, "you can still make me tremble, just with a different look these days." Then, not being able to resist, I allowed my tongue to sneak out and give a quick lick around the outside of his ear before drawing the lobe between my teeth for a playful nibble.

Carlos groaned in response and I felt his hand twitch on my back before we were interrupted by Tank clearing his throat further down the hallway staring pointedly at the floor with a grin on his face.

"Let's get this meeting over with!" I said, laughing at Ranger's strangled agreement and the way he pulled me in front of him as we walked into the room. Guess he was trying to hide something from the rest of the guys.

My suspicions were confirmed when he led me over to his seat before sitting down and pulling me onto his lap. I could feel him under me, and Carlos's ESP kicked in, causing him to tighten his hands on my hips to prevent the little wiggle I was planning to give him as I settled into his lap. I chuckled to myself and then pinned the blank face I'd been working on onto my face.

"That's actually pretty good, Little Girl," praised Tank. I figured it was even more so when I managed to not react to his praise, and by the twinkle I could see in his eyes, I knew he agreed as well.

We started the meeting by going around the room and getting brief status updates from the men who had been in the office for the past few days. Briefly we went through everyone who had been on the road tonight and what they had seen. I wasn't able to contribute much there, since I'd only seen the insides of my eyelids followed by the SUV floor mat, but I was okay with that.

A few of the men were out trying to gather information about tonight's shooting on our way back from the airport, but we were going to need to wait at least a couple of hours for there to be any useful information. To finish up, Hal, Cal, and Ram provided us with an update of the capture they made in Hawai'i as well as the interrogations they'd completed when they returned.

After an initial show of solidarity, the men they'd captured hadn't really taken very long to give up the person who hired them. Turned out it was a cop. They claimed not to know his name because he hadn't told them before arresting them for possession. Rather than taking them to the station, he'd offered them an opportunity.

He was going to give them an out for the charges, not even processing them or making them informants. They'd also get an all-expense paid trip to Hawai'i. All they had to do was lay in wait for an opportunity when the group they'd be watching might be separated or have their guard lowered and grab a girl. They were to bring the girl back to Trenton and deliver her to the cop.

He didn't care what happened to any of the men who would be with her, so long as they brought him the girl. Similarly, he didn't care what happened to the girl en route, as long as she was alive and able to spread her legs for him when she got to Trenton.

I thought about being sick at that, but Carlos just whispered soothing Spanish in my ear and ran a comforting hand up and down my back. Apparently the cop had gone on more than one rant, which these men had been more than willing to give the details on, about the girl and how she had cheated on him and betrayed him and he was going to teach her a lesson so she wouldn't do it again.

They were given GPS tracker information and figured when we'd been stopped at the plantation for overly long and the staff had left that we were camping there for the night. I laughed at that; clearly they didn't have much information on me. Regardless, they'd decided that was their best chance to make a move, only to be captured by the trusty Rangemen we'd left behind.

Apparently the hired thugs were most displeased about this turn of events for a few reasons. The key one seemed to be that they weren't given appropriate information about the men Stephanie had been traveling with. They'd been led to believe any men who were with her would be tired from sleeping with her and were over-sized lap dogs rather than guard dogs- their barks would be worse than their bites.

I snorted out a laugh at this. Yeah right, only if your idea of a lap dog was a viciously efficient, trained military police dog.

The men preened and I guess I said that out loud, but it was true, so I just let it go.

When pressed, the men had been unable to give a name for the cop, but they did give a thorough description. Six foot tall male. Thin scar through his right eyebrow, muscled, brown eyes. Looked like he'd been on a bender and badly needed a haircut. Mostly black hair, probably Italian, since that was the language in which he invariably finished his rants cursing.

Yep. We all knew who that was.