Chapter Twenty three

Stephanie was laying in her bed looking out the window. Ranger was right. She shouldn't have gone back to work yet. She hoped he wasn't too mad at her. She was always messing up and getting hurt. He always had to save her. She hoped she hadn't lost him. She wished he had been here when she woke up.

Tank had said that he had just stepped out. But he had been gone for a long time.

She made a decision, Ranger kept asking when they would get married and

she had been putting him off. Now she knew she loved him and she didn't want to wait anymore. She wanted to have Ranger's babies.

"Babe." He walked to her smiling. It was nice to see her awake.

"Ranger." She smiled at him. "I'm sorry...

He stopped her before she could say anything else. "Babe. You didn't do

anything wrong. Thomas was crazy. There was nothing you could have done." He

leaned down and gave her a very gentle kiss.

"Ranger, I've been thinking. I want to get married right away... I love you."

"Babe, are you sure? I don't want to rush you."

She gave a little laugh. "Yeah, I'm sure. I did a lot of thinking in the last few days."

"Okay, but I have a few conditions."

Steph looked at him and tilted her head. "What?"

"Number one. You talk to Liz. You've been through a lot and I want you

to have help working through it."

"Agreed, I had planned on that anyway. She really helped before."

"Number two. You continue your training when you're ready. I'm proud

Of how well you've been doing and I don't want to see you lose your edge."

"Are you sure? Ranger, I didn't think you would want me doing field work

after what happened."

"Like I said, it wasn't your fault."

"So it will be okay with you if I go back to field work?"

"Babe, I love you and the thought of you getting hurt bothers me. But I've

got your back and I always will."

"Okay I agree to number two, if it's what you want."

"Number three is the most important Babe. I don't want you to misunderstand

me. I want to wait to get married until you're healed. I love you and I want you. I want to take you away for a fabulous honeymoon and you won't be up to it if you're not healed. Oh, and I want to plan the honeymoon. You can do the wedding. I want to surprise you."

Steph looked at Ranger. She smiled. "Ranger, I agree to condition three. There is something I wanted to talk to you about."

Ranger motioned for her to continue.

"Ranger, I want to have a baby."

Rangers jaw fell open. He was shocked, he had hoped that they might have kids. But he thought that he would have to talk Steph into the idea.

"Babe, of course we'll have babies. Just let me know when you're ready." He

leaned down and kissed her. The kiss went from gentle to passionate, with

Ranger being very gentle with Steph. He didn't want to hurt her, ever.

Tank cleared his voice. "Get a room!"

"We had one, until you came in." Ranger grumbled.

"I see you two talked."

Both Ranger and Steph looked at each other and smiled.

"Tank, get the doctor, I want to take my wife home."

"Wife? Maybe there's something you might need to tell me."

Ranger looked at Steph and nodded. "We're getting married."

"Guys, you've been engaged for a while." Tank smiled.

"We're getting married as soon as the doctor says I'm healed."

"I'll go get the doctor. This sounds important."

Stephanie, Ranger and the doctor talked. The doctor stressed how important

it was for Stephanie not to walk for the next month. If she ripped the stitches, her recovery would be months instead of weeks.

They decided on a date six weeks away. The doctor said that she should be able to get around, and she'd be ready to start physical activities. He suggested that Steph should have physical therapy at that time. Ranger assured him that Stephanie would follow his orders, and she would receive physical therapy.

Six weeks later:

Stephanie had passed the last six weeks laying in bed. Okay, that's not exactly true. The first four weeks after her release from the hospital she had spent in bed, or on the couch. Ranger had done his best to keep Steph from going crazy. He had set her up with a laptop, and research files were brought to her. If he couldn't be with her, one of the men was.

More often then not they were arguing over who got Bombshell duty. Tank pulled rank often, so it wasn't unusual for Ranger to walk in to find Tank and Steph, heads together laughing over something. If he didn't know the two so well, he might have been jealous.

After four weeks Stephanie had her stitches removed. She was finally allowed to walk. Under orders not to overdo, she still had her own personal merry man every day. So she spent the last two weeks in the apartment.

Ranger had arranged to have a personal buyer from New York bring her dresses to look at. A florist came and talked to her about flowers. Mary Lou, Connie, Lula, and Valerie all worked together with wedding arrangements. They were getting married in a beautiful park near the beach.

Stephanie had also spent a lot of time with Liz in the past six weeks. Liz helped her with the trauma she had undergone as well as how close she had come to being raped. Liz was the only one who knew everything that Thomas had done to her. How she had felt and how ashamed of it she was. Until she had talked to Liz she had been feeling a lot of guilt. Liz had helped her come to accept that she had no control over how her body responded under the influence of drugs.

The doctor had been right. The drugs had worked their way through her system. The first few days had been difficult. After that she had been fine. She had been released from the hospital and gone home to their apartment.

Now, here she was six weeks later, getting ready to marry Ranger. She had her dress on. The music was playing. Everyone was ready, and surprisingly so was she. She had been nervous just trying on gowns when she had thought she would be marrying Joe. But here she was about to walk down the aisle, and she wasn't nervous at all. She was excited. She still did not know where they would be going for the honeymoon. Ranger was being tight lipped. The man could keep a secret. When she asked about packing, he replied that it was arranged. But it was fine with him if she didn't wear anything.

She had decided on a fairly simple wedding. Just her sister as maid of honor, and Tank as best man. Her father peeked his head in as she was putting the finishing touches on her makeup.

"Ready pumpkin?"

She smiled up at him and stood. "Oh yes."

Val gave her a quick hug before starting down the aisle. Steph heard the music change and took her father's arm.

The sight of Ranger waiting for her at the end of the aisle took her breath away. Everything else faded, the music, the guests, she was aware of none of it. All her focus was on the smiling man in front of her.

The ceremony itself passed in a blur. She responded in the right places, and every word Ranger spoke was crystal clear, but little else.

It wasn't until they shared their first dance that the rest of the world came back into focus. Ranger noticed, of course.

"You back with us Babe? You looked like you were daydreaming."

She smiled up at him before melting into his arms. "If this is a dream, don't wake me."

"No dream, just everything as it was meant to be."

She looked up at him, curious. "Do you believe in fate?"

He almost shrugged. "I do now."

As they left the reception, she had to ask. "So, you going to tell me where we're going on our honeymoon?"

He gave her the wolf grin. "Somewhere warm enough and isolated enough to

encourage nudity."

She laughed and whispered in his ear. "I will if you will."

"Done."

The End

Thank you. It's been fun.