Chapter 23

I was still sitting in the nursery when I heard movement from the doorway.

"Ranger, do you think we will find him?"

He came over to me, pulled me out of the chair and wrapped his arms around me before speaking.

"Stephanie, I want you to listen to me. We are going to find Jake no matter what it takes, I have pulled in some guys from Boston as well as Miami to handle the day to day stuff here. The guys that are here have no other priorities except finding Jake. Something else I want to talk to you about, Val and Jack. Stephanie, you can't blame yourself for what happened. You had no idea that someone was going to break in and take Jake, please stop blaming yourself."

"Don't you think I know that? Val is pregnant, they could have just as easily shot her like they did Jack. I can't help but feel responsible, I don't even know how I am going to face either of them."

"They love you and I am sure that they don't blame you. Now, how about we get out of here and go see them so you can see that for yourself."

"Thank you, Ric, for everything. Just give me a few minutes to pack a bag and then can we go back to the hospital before Rangeman?"

We made it back to the hospital by 11 am, reporters were camped out there as well and they tried to get me to comment but Ranger pushed us right past them. I saw a newspaper on the way in and Ranger was right, it was front page news. Val was on the fourth floor and Jack was on five, I figured I would go see Val first. My mom spotted us as soon as we were off the elevator.

"Stephanie, where have you been? I have been worried sick about you."

"I had to go to the house and meet with the police to answer questions. How are Val and Jack?"

"Valerie and the baby are fine, she has been asking for you. Jack is stable, the bullet didn't do much damage and he should be out of here in a couple of days. He just left your sister's room to go for tests."

When my mom was finished she pushed me into Val's room.

"There you are, I have been so worried. Steph, I am so sorry."

"Val, you have nothing to be sorry about. I am the one that's sorry..."

"Stop it right there, you had no idea that this would happen. Do you have any idea who could have done this?"

Neither of us heard Jack come in and he scared us both when he spoke.

"I'd like to know the answer to that myself."

"Jesus, you scared the shit out of me. How are you feeling?"

"I'm going to be fine, it's you I am worried about."

"We don't have any leads right now, the police are still at the house trying to find something that will find Jake."

I didn't want to start crying again, but I felt the hot tears rolling down my cheeks. We had talked for a while when the door opened again and Ranger came in.

"Glad to see you are both okay. I hate to break this up but I really need to get Steph to Rangeman."

We said our goodbyes and I told Val to fill Jack in on what I told her yesterday, we arrived at Rangeman in no time.

"Come on, every one is waiting for us in the conference room on 5."

The elevator finally stopped on 5 and the only thing I wanted to do was find Lester. We went to the conference room and found Tank, Bobby, Lester, Hal and Vince waiting for us. Lester had me in his arms as soon as the door was closed. I noticed that the guys in the room were staring at us.

"So what do we know, please tell me that there is something to go on?"

"We haven't found anything from your house yet, but we did find a few suspicious things around here." Tank explained.

"Like what?"

"We found a few well place listening devices in the control room and a few in here as well as Lester's office. There was also some sort of bug planted in our computer systems that would enable the user to shut us down at anytime, including our security services."

"You are telling me that everything is connected?"

"Yes, we just need to find out who did all the planting."

"Tank, I think we all know who..."

I was interrupted when I heard someone yelling outside the conference room.

"I want to see Lester, and I want to see him now!"

We all knew that it was Courtney, I looked at Lester and he sat there with an angry look on his face.

"I guess I better go and talk to her, Ric can you get someone over to her apartment to check things out? I will try and stall her here as long as I can."

"No problem, Hal and Vince, I want the two of you to get over there now. Check things out and look for anything that seems out of the ordinary."

They were gone in a flash and Lester went out behind them to speak with Courtney.

Ranger started to speak when we heard a lot of screaming going on between Lester and Courtney. He got up to see what was going on and I followed him. They stopped yelling when they saw us and Courtney turned to look at us.

"You bitch!" She screamed, while lunging for me. Lester grabbed her before she even reached me.

"What the hell is your problem?"

"You are trying to take him away from me, well let me tell you that will never happen. We are happy together, he doesn't even remember you. While he was in a hospital bed, you were having an affair with his brother. What kind of person are you?"

"We were told that he was dead and didn't survive the crash, how was I supposed to go to him, and how the hell do you know so much about me? What kind of game are you playing, Courtney?"

"I have no idea what you are talking about. I was the one he woke up asking for not you, I am the one he wants to spend the rest of his life with. Isn't that right Lester?"

Everyone turned to look at Les and waited on his answer, knowing that whatever he said was going to set the tone for how the rest of this was going to play out.

TBC

I know it has been forever since I updated, real life always seems to get in my way of writing...that and my muse (who has been punished) decided to run away.