This story is for Adriana-Q, but I do hope everyone enjoys my altered version of 'High Five'. The familiar characters and scene are Janet's. Before and after that is how I would've liked the book to have gone. Any mistakes are solely mine.

This Ramirez asshole has become a major concern of mine ... on top of all the other shit and danger Stephanie has found herself in lately. All of it has been causing me more than a few sleepless nights. The downside of loving someone is the agony you go through worrying about them. The upside is they make life more than just another thing to endure. To say receiving a message from her was a relief after not getting an immediate callback from her earlier, would be a gross understatement. Her saying she needs to talk to me is less reassuring.

I've been enjoying the flirty turn our friendship has taken which I did purposely initiate, and I'm already considering increasing the frequency and intensity of my attention. I quickly learned that touching her face, her neck, or her hair, isn't enough. It's not even close to enough. Plus Morelli could become a factor if I take my time to make a serious move. But Stephanie is unique. She appears to balk whenever anyone cares too much about her so I also run the risk of her running scared if I do what I'd like to. She's been a challenge, a complicated puzzle, and also a breath of fresh air, from day one and I wake up every morning anxious to see what she's going to allow me to tackle, solve, and enjoy.

Even though her needing to speak to me could involve the cop, I still didn't wait the half hour she said it'd take for her to get home. As soon as I finished listening to the message she'd left for me, I headed straight to her place. I parked my Mercedes in the shadowy section of her lot near the door and got out, waiting for her with my arms crossed and my back leaning against my car. As I stood there, I made mental lists of how I would take Ramirez out of her life, interchanging Morelli's face for his at times. Then I switched to picturing how I could make Stephanie's days easier and her nights hotter.

I make it a point to know everything about the key players in my life. And because Stephanie had became an instant one, I knew it was her best friend Mary Lou Stankovic's car that pulled into the lot fifteen minutes after I did. My lips twitched in amusement as the car jerked to a stop when the headlights revealed my position. My dark, mysterious, and extremely deadly, persona has been well-crafted. The fear I generate in people is as much of a defense weapon as my two guns and a knife are.

I obviously scare the piss out of Mary Lou, but Stephanie is made of much stronger stuff. She proved that again by getting out of the car after only a couple of minutes of back and forth speculation between the two of them. She walked over to me as Mary Lou burned rubber getting out of the parking lot. She shouldn't have left her best friend alone with me, but I'm glad she did. Steph looked exhausted and stressed, yet remarkably still in one piece. And still beautiful enough to make my gut clench and my dick harden.

"Where's the BMW?" I asked her.

For an answer, she dug around in her bag for a few seconds and then handed me the plates and a piece of what was once part of the dashboard.

"I sort of had a problem."

My eyebrow went up and I had to fight a grin again. "This is what's left of the car?"

She nodded and I could see her swallow nervously.

An actual smile escaped at that point. "And they left you the plates and registration tag. Nice touch," I told her.

Her expression said nothing currently going on in her life is close to nice. She's being terrorized, stalked, and threatened, by Ramirez. Morelli's sniffing around her and trying to mark his territory like the dog he is. Her Uncle Fred went missing, leading to a separate set of issues ... one being a flattened sports car via garbage truck. And now she's forced to admit that someone stole the car I had just given to her. All things considered, she is handling this better than most could. I can tell that everything has finally gotten to her, but she hasn't given up. And she won't. When the going gets tough, Steph digs her heels in and turns stubborn.

"Life sucks," she declared, while a single tear dropped from her lashes and slid down her cheek.

I'd been studying her face, looking for signs that she had reached her breaking point. That one tear affected me more than if she would have started bawling, because I know it fell against her will. I dropped the remainder of my BMW onto the backseat of the Mercedes and then turned back to her. The lot was eerily quiet, similar to the way it feels after a storm hits and it seems possible that you're the only person who survived it. We were inches apart, breathing in each others air, and neither of us felt the need to put any more space between us.

"It was a car, Babe. It wasn't important."

She wasn't convinced. "It's not just the car. It's everything," she told me in a half-frustrated, half-depressed tone as another tear escaped her blue eyes. "I have all these problems."

She's sexy as hell in just jeans and a t-shirt. Worn out and vulnerable took that to a whole new level. I don't know what it is about her, but I want ... no need ... more of it. My eyes dilated as my mind flashed a few promising possibilities involving her. I can't make her life perfect, though I will be helping to end certain threats to it, but I can distract her while satisfying a growing craving.

"Here's something else to worry about," was all the warning I gave her.

Then I kissed her for the first time. My hand curled around the nape of her neck as I fitted my mouth to hers and did what I've been aching to do. I was gentle at first, allowing her time to pull away if she needed to as I eased her into the kiss. When she did nothing but kiss me back, I pulled her even tighter to me and deepened the kiss to the point I swear I'll be able to feel the imprint of her lips on mine for weeks to come. Our tongues met repeatedly, our hearts sped up, and our breathing became instantly ragged just from our mouths being joined.

What surprised me ... is that a single kiss from this woman had me feeling things I thought had been choked-out long ago. That she turned me on is a given, but it felt more like one kiss from her turned my emotions back on ... or brought them momentarily out of hiding. That scared me as much as it excited me. I hadn't expected to feel like Carlos ever again. From the day of my first deployment, I became 'Ranger' Manoso. In all the years since, I haven't been able to find my way back to the man I once was. Stephanie had me suddenly believing she might be the one who could lead me down the path to him again.

Her face was flushed and her body shaky and pliant when the kiss finally ended. "Oh boy," she whispered.

I know exactly how she's feeling, shocked and terrified. "Yeah," I said. "Think about it."

"What I think ... is that it's a bad idea."

She doesn't know the half of it. I'm feeling too much for her already. Once she lets me in, I won't be leaving.

"Of course it's a bad idea." Both of us could get hurt here, I thought to myself. "If it was a good idea I'd have been in your bed a long time ago."

And Morelli would be six feet under if he even thought of being in it with her ever again, but she doesn't need to know that yet. We're both shaken for different reasons from a kiss that should've just been an experimental one, but it turned into so much more. As a way to get her mind off that before she starts freaking outwardly like I am internally, I reached into the pocket of my jacket and pulled out a notecard.

"I have a job for you tomorrow," I told her. "The young sheik is going home and needs a ride to the airport."

That snapped her out of her kiss-induced fog. "No! No way am I driving that little jerk."

"Look at it this way, Steph, he deserves you."

I'm the only one who deserves her, but that little fucker does deserve the luck she's been having. If he got crushed by a garbage truck or murdered at the hands of a psycho, no one would miss him. Another thing Stephanie doesn't need to know is Tank will be playing chaperone to keep the prick acting respectful towards her. He's also there to deliver a beatdown if one becomes necessary. If I tell her in advance, she'll believe I see her as just a charity case and decline a job and money she desperately needs. I'd pay her rent for her indefinitely, or do one better and arrange for better living quarters permanently, but pride and a hamster is all that she has left to her name right now and I'm not taking anything away from her, not that I'd want the rat.

"Okay," she finally said. "I haven't got anything else to do."

"Instructions are on the card. Tank will bring the car around for you."

I was prepared to leave if she wanted me to, but I lingered when she made no move to step away from me or go inside.

"Omigod," she whispered. "What did I just do?"

"Are you talking about accepting the job or kissing me?" I asked.

"Shit. That wasn't said just in my head, was it?"

"No. So which are you questioning?"

"Honestly? Both."

"Are you scared of your feelings for me, or scared of me?"

"Again ... both."

I pulled her in for a comforting hug, not wanting to fuck up this moment. "We're even then, because you scare me."

"Yeah, because I keep almost getting blown up, attacked, or shot."

That wasn't what I meant, but for now ... it's better for her to believe that's what I had been saying. If only kissing me scared the shit out of her, she'd die of fright if she saw the current images flashing in my mind of us both naked with her hot, wet, and already reaching for me.

"This day isn't one I signed up for. I need a glass of wine ... or maybe a bottle," she said. And she then went quiet. I watched the different expressions play across her face as she completed a pro/con game in her head before speaking again. "I don't want to give you the wrong idea or anything, because I'm still not sure that kiss was as good for my life as it was for my hormones ... but do you want to come up and have a glass of wine or a beer with me? We could talk, watch a movie ..."

"Are you afraid to be here alone?"

"No. Yes. Okay ... sometimes now that Ramirez drops by for a visit. I'm not firing on all cylinders today and it'd be nice to just hang out with someone I trust and not have to worry about anything for a little while."

That's all I need to hear. She's asking for help in her own way and I'm more than happy to provide it, especially since it gets me even more time with her.

"Sounds good," I told her. "But I don't recommend you down an entire bottle of alcohol. You could end up losing control of yourself and decide to kiss me again."

"I can barely manage a glass without passing out, so that was said more for effect. Your virtue and your lips are safe."

I smiled down at her and tucked a misbehaving curl back behind her ear, letting my fingertips skim slowly along her jaw and down her throat before my hand returned to my side.

"That's too bad. Because you do trust me, Babe, I promise to stop you at three sips," I assured her, chancing a brief kiss just to feel and taste her again.

This one was more of a sweet kiss than a hot one, but it was potent nonetheless. I'll be an addict by the end of the night if I don't start controlling myself.

"You need to stop doing that," she said against my mouth.

I drew back. "Do I?"

She paused for a full four seconds before answering. "I haven't decided yet."

"Keep thinking about it then," I told her, getting the lobby door for her.

I followed Steph into the elevator, and the short ride up to her floor was spent in comfortable silence. When I saw her shoulders slump under the weight of all those problems she'd mentioned earlier, I wrapped an arm around her back and tucked her along the side of my body. I'd never push for more than she can give me at that time, but she doesn't know me well enough to understand that yet. Still, she let me take some of the weight she's carrying around onto my own body and didn't take back her offer of a glass of wine. She's brave in her own right, willing to risk the rumors and danger that come with being associated with me just for a few hours spent getting to know each other better.

When the elevator stopped and the doors opened, Steph got a renewed burst of energy and rushed out as a different type of 'What did I just do?' nerves hit her. Before I could tell her to wait so I could clear her apartment before she walked into it, she was already making a beeline for it.

Ramirez had been biding his time, eager to get his hands on her again. "Hello, Stephanie," he said in that psychotic tone he's mastered. "The champ's been waiting for you."

He made a grab for her hair when she screamed and started backing up towards me. Fortunately for me, the stupid fuck didn't pay attention to his surroundings or notice anything beyond her until I came out from behind Stephanie and grabbed his throat.

"And I've been waiting to do this," I informed him, squeezing my fingers around his windpipe. "Go into your apartment, Stephanie, lock the door, and call Tank. His number's on the card I just gave you."

She looks rattled, but also determined. "I'm not leaving you alone with him. He's insane. Damn it! This is why you keep telling me to have my gun loaded and on me."

"I don't need it. I'll be fine. Go!" I shouted, as Ramirez started to struggle more aggressively against my hold.

She hesitated, but she's seen what I'm capable of doing. And calling in reinforcements for me gave her a purpose and a much needed sense of control. I don't want her to see what's going to happen now, so when her door clicked shut, I moved Ramirez out of her peephole's range in case she couldn't resist checking to make sure I'm alright. I'm more than alright right now ... our enemy just walked himself right into my sights. I don't even have to pull my weapon out. My hands, and the rage I feel towards what he's done, are weapons enough.

"You may get your rocks off hurting women, but you're completely fucked now because you've just been left alone with me. The woman you were planning on killing is the only one who could've saved your life, but she's not out here to stop me, is she? I'm doing what should've been done long ago," I told him, watching with no feeling at the colors changing on his face as I applied more pressure ... and even more after that.

I could've made this a quick death, but the sick piece of shit doesn't deserve it. So I made him suffer, differently than he hurt Lula and threatened Stephanie, but he felt the pain and helplessness regardless. Despite his size, I'm still far stronger. And every ounce of crazy-juice his body fed on, I had countered with red-hot fury. All his kicking, flailing, and jerking, accomplished nothing. He knows he's going to die right here in the hallway of a shitty apartment building. As he stared directly into my eyes while he took his last breath on earth before going straight to hell, a chilling smile from me told him that I'm happy to be the one sending him there.

Tank and Brown arrived minutes after Ramirez went from a sadistic rapist to just a corpse. I left my second-in-command to arrange for waste removal while I went to give Stephanie the facts before the police showed up. Ramirez's death is a justifiable homicide in my mind, and I carry enough weight in the TPD to not be questioned about whether or not deadly force was needed. The conversation with the cops will be wrapped up faster due to everyone and their Burg mothers knowing the fucker had been stalking Stephanie. Our impromptu date won't end in any of the ways I was hoping it would, but what I have in store for My Babe is just beginning.