The characters belong to JE. I receive nothing from this, but it sure is fun.

Chapter 1

SPOV

Two days before Halloween

I sat in the floor of my apartment watching Ghostbusters and sorting the Halloween Candy. Okay, maybe I was eating the candy instead of sorting it. I had planned on picking out a few of my favorite candy and taking the rest to my mom's house so that she and my Grandma Mazur could hand it out to trick-or-treaters. I made the mistake of letting my mind wander to the two men in my life, Joe Morelli and Ricardo Carlos Manoso, street name Ranger. Personally, I prefer to call him Carlos. Unfortunately, I'm not brave enough to call him that to his face. Ranger is my mentor, teacher, best friend, an on very rare occasion, lover. Ranger is a Cuban American and the most beautiful man I've ever laid eyes on. He is former Special Forces and currently owns Rangeman, a security company that I occasionally work for. Anyway, the next thing I know the bags of Kit Kats, Nerds, and Sweet tarts were empty and I was feeling sick.

My name is Stephanie Plum. I work as a bounty hunter for my perverted cousin, Vinnie. As far as my bounty hunting skills, I have none. I hate my gun and on the few occasions that I carry it with me, I usually forget to load it. Forgetting to load which would probably be okay if I could ever remembered to charge my stun gun. Despite my lack of abilities, I have an hundred percent capture rate. I'm proud of my capture rate, but it's only that high because the majority of my Failure to Appears are over 80 years old and use a walker. I still end up cover is garbage on a almost daily basis.

My thoughts return to my relationships, or should I say lack thereof, with Joe and Ranger. I am distracted from my thoughts by a knock on my apartment door.

"Cupcake!" I know you're in there. I can hear you television." I hear from the other side of my apartment door.

I roll my eyes. I'm really not in the mood to deal with Joe tonight. Joe Morelli is my on-again/off-again boyfriend. Currently Joe and I are in the off phase and I plan on keeping it that way. Joe wants me to quit my job to be his housewife and mother to a bunch of little Morellis. The thought of that makes me break out in hives.

I stand up, walk over to my door, and let Joe in. He's carrying a take-out bag from Pino's. Pino's has the best meatball subs in the world. Unfortunately, I'm so full of candy that I the smell of Pino's is overwhelming and making me sick.

"Cupcake, I brought dinner." Joe says holding up the bag of take-out.

I instantly turn green and take off running to the bathroom, where I lose every bit of candy that I stuffed myself with. I'm still praying to the porcelain god when Joe walks in to hold my hair away from my face.

"Please tell me that you didn't eat all of the candy on the coffee table today, Cupcake."

"Try the last hour." I say standing up and walking over to the bathroom sink, feeling much better. I grab my toothbrush and begin brushing my teeth.

"No wonder you got sick." Joe laughs. "I guess that means that I get to eat your meatball sub."

"Think again, Morelli. I never turn down Pino's." I say rinsing off my toothbrush. "Why are you here, Joe? And before you answer that question, I should warn you that if you tell me that the boys miss me, you can just leave now. But don't even think about taking the Pino's with you."

"I…uh….well, the boys do miss you, but that's not why I'm here." Jow says shifting his weight from one side to the other, like a little boy in trouble for throwing a baseball through the neighbors window. "Can we go back into the living room and talk? This is not a conversation that I want to have in your bathroom."

"Sounds serious."

Joe swipes his hand over his face. "It is serious, Cupcake."

I follow Joe into my living room. As soon as we sit on the couch, I grab the Pino's bag and pull out a sub, before handing the bag to Joe. Joe sits the bag on the coffee table instead of taking his sub out.

"I don't know how you can eat so soon after getting sick." Joe comments, shaking his head.

"It's Pino's." I say, simply. "Well, whatever you have to say, it must be serious. You're not eating your sub." I stop to think for a moment. "Oh my God, Joe! Are you dying?"

"No Cupcake, I'm not dying. You may want to kill me after I tell you what I need to say."

"Why would I want to kill you?" I ask.

"Terry's pregnant." Joe says putting his hands up over his face like he's trying to protect himself.

"So?" I ask before taking another bit of my sub.

Joe waits until I swallow before he continues, "It's mine."

"Oh, Thank God!" I say before taking another bite of my sub.

Joe lowers his hands. "You're not mad?"

"Why would I be mad? You always wanted a wife and kids and we both know that I'm not cut out to be a wife and mother, at least not as this point in my life. I'm happy for you, Joe. How far long is Terry?" Joe and I broke up about a month ago, so Terry is probably just a couple of weeks along.

"I…uh…see this is where you're going to get mad. Terry is two months along." Joe explains.

"Two months? Joe, we were together two months ago."

"Cupcake, I'm sorry. I didn't mean for this to happen. It happened the night of Carl Constanza brother's bachelor party. We were all at Sky Night Club. I was already drunk by the time Terry arrived. I remember Terry walking in and the next thing I remember is waking up in her bed the next morning. I don't remember anything in between. I asked Carl if he remember what happened and he said that I told them that I was headed up to the bar to get another beer, but I never came back. They have no idea that I went home with Terry."

"Joe, you need to leave." I tell him quietly.

Joe doesn't argue, instead he stands up and walks over to my door. Just before he leaves, he turns around. "You have every right to be upset, Cupcake. I hope that one day you will be able to forgive me."

"Maybe… one day… but not today." I tell him

"I understand. Maybe you and Manoso can work something out." Joe says before turning to leave.

Once the door shuts, I walk over to lock it. I turn around and lean against the door, before sliding down to the floor. Talk to my empty apartment, I say "There's one problem with that. Ranger has made it clear that he doesn't want me.

A/N: I plan on updating tomorrow.