Everybody and everything familiar belongs to Janet. Mistakes are mine alone.

"Make it quick, Babe. I have three places I need to be in ten minutes."

This isn't the welcome I was hoping for, but I can't really blame him. Every time he tries to get closer to me, physically or otherwise, I run further away from him … literally and figuratively. I swear it's not on purpose, I even told him exactly that when I ended our dinner out right after the dinner. I wanted him then, and couldn't sleep because that need wouldn't go away and seemed only to intensify, but I was scared to find out that my mother and Morelli were right ... that Ranger would lose interest as soon as he gained an all-access pass to me.

I had everything crossed that the thinking I've done between the hours he kissed me briefly goodnight and this morning when I purposely dragged my stupid ass over here to see him, will fix not only what I screwed up last night but what I've repeatedly fucked-up since the first kiss we shared in my parking lot.

"Ummm," I stammered, not sure what I want to say first ... never mind with a timer ticking down minutes we don't have as I try to figure my shit out. "This may take longer than you have right now." I backed up towards the door. "I can just come back later."

"Stop," he ordered me, his dark eyes taking note of everything from my temperature to what my head is currently thinking. "What did you want to see me about?"

"I wanted to discuss 'us'. I did some heavy-duty thinking last night after you left, but I was so focused on what I'm feeling, I didn't factor your insane schedule into my plans for addressing what I've finally worked out."

He sat back down behind his desk, no longer standing like he's poised to take care of every kind of business except ours. He gestured to the chair sitting in front of his desk, indicating I should sit down instead of fidgeting while pressed tightly against his office door.

"Don't you have to leave?" I asked, moving in closer but still hesitant to actually sit down.

"Are your musings going to make me happy?" He counter-asked.

I thought about that. I honestly wouldn't wish me on anybody, but Ranger seems to be up to the challenge of loving me.

"I think so," I hedged, still not sure how to put us into words. "I guess that answer depends on how much of me you want in your life."

He did that hand wave towards the chair again, telling me to sit down already, even as he picked up his desk phone and I assume called his second-in-command.

"Reschedule all my appointments for today," he told Tank. He went quiet as he listened to what was being said. "Something more important has come up." Another pause I noticed as I sat down in front of him. "Yes. She's here. Express my apologies for any inconvenience this may have caused."

He disconnected from Tank and stared at me. Shit, now the only thing I can think is ... 'Oh crap, oh crap, holy frickin' crap!'

"Did I just make you cancel your day?" I asked him.

"No. I cleared my schedule because I want to hear what you have to say."

I sighed. That's fair. I have a history of rearranging at least two-hundred-and-eighty-five out of his three-hundred-and-sixty-five days. If he isn't busy saving me, he's hanging out with me for long enough to have me questioning everything I thought I believed.

"The floor's yours, Babe," he pressed, when I didn't say anything else.

I tucked my hands nervously between my knees, took a deep breath, and just went for it.

"I love you," I spit out and then went speechless again.

This time it was due to my own cowardice in not being able to explain exactly why he means so much to me.

"Okay," Ranger said. "You already know that I love you, so it would help this conversation if you would go on from there."

I buried my face in my hands, totally embarrassed. "I don't want to, because it'll show what a complete idiot I am."

He bent his muscled and deliciously-scented torso towards me. "You aren't an idiot, Stephanie. You were never shown what loving someone truly entails."

"Does it mean that you might forgive someone for running scared when she really wanted to be hightailing it straight to you?"

"It does. Is that what you were feeling last night?" He asked me.

I sighed. "Yes. I spent the night hating myself, but I didn't know how to explain why I wanted you to come back right after I sent you away."

"Do you know how to explain it now?"

I stood up and rounded his desk, setting my ass down on the corner of it. "I think so. I realized that I've been listening more to what the Burg says instead of paying attention to everything you do. They all told me that I'm a lost cause, unlovable beyond what my uterus may still be able to push out if I hurry, and am too opinionated and independent for any reasonable man to put up with."

"None of that is true."

"I'm starting to see that. And without even having to say that, you've proven the opposite is true of what they keep trying to shovel onto me. You appear to really enjoy my particular kind of crazy. You haven't pushed for marriage let alone demand that I give you three kids inside of three years before my eggs turn powdered. And you purposely call me just to ask my opinion on a case or a person you're questioning the behavior of, so you clearly respect what I say and feel. It hit me around three-forty-one this morning, that I've subconsciously been doing exactly what my mother wants. I've been sabotaging myself by listening to people who don't really care about me, rather than sticking close to the one man who loves and accepts me because of who I am."

"You've always been meant for a life bigger than the Burg, Babe. They know it, which is why they doubled-down hard on anything you wanted that didn't fit with their idea of 'normal'. If they didn't crush your spirit, yours was going to grow too big for them to contain or control."

"Last week, I may have questioned that being true. But not today," I told him, when I could actually speak without crying. "Even keeping my distance from Chambersburg, I let their 'advice' almost ruin us. I was at the point where I was fully convinced that I would run you out of Trenton if I let you all the way in, even though I know that the threat of death can't even scare you off if you love someone. I still can't think about how I felt when you went FTA and I didn't know where or how you were. And I would've jumped between your body and Scrog's bullet if I hadn't been attached to a chair at the time. So if what you feel for me comes anywhere close to the emotions you stir up in me, I'm sorry for holding myself back from you for so long."

"That was the only time I was happy that you were restrained. I wouldn't have survived if Scrog had shot you instead of me. I can recover from any physical wound, it's the other kind that's nearly impossible to bounce back from without shutting completely down. I don't allow myself to love easily," he told me. "When I do, it's a lifetime commitment whether or not it's reciprocated."

I finally gained some traction. "It's definitely reciprocated in this case. It dawned on me that I was trying to prevent a predicted hurt, not realizing that you and I have always been partners on the job and we can work together off the clock to make sure our relationship doesn't hurt either one of us ... like we do when we're providing backup for each other during an arrest. I want you, I love you, and I don't want a life that doesn't have you standing squarely in the middle of it. So nothing can stop us unless I let my fear of you eventually getting sick of me, like everybody else in my life appeared to, corrupt the life we can have here."

He got up and stood in front of me, causing me to also stand up just to be on an even playing field.

"Do you believe that I would completely abandon you if I had to leave town?" He asked me.

"No. Whenever you do have to leave, you put the guys on Stephanie-duty. It's widely known around here that you want me alive and well when you return. And you've always returned."

"I look forward to coming back because I knew this moment would happen someday," he said, pulling me close. "Are you ready to put yourself above the expectations placed on you?"

I put my hands on his waist and looked up at him. "Yes. I wanna live in a way that makes me wake up with a big 'ol stupid smile on my face. And when I try to picture myself being happy, you're always right there ... in my thoughts or in the flesh."

He lowered his head and teased my lips with his. "I love you, Babe."

"I understand that now, and realized last night what that actually means when you say it. I'm not perfect ... so I'm bound to drive you insane more than I inspire you to declare your love for me, but I want to be there everyday to love you or drive you nuts. You've always given me that option … and I'm taking it now."

"Consider it done," Ranger told me.

I stared at his beyond-handsome face. "Just like that?"

"Yes. You know I don't give a shit about those who've been doubting this. I'm only interested in us and how you're feeling about us."

Despite the heavy nature of this particular conversation, I felt myself smile at him. "Right now I'm feeling happy, optimistic, and so in love with you ... I can feel it spilling out into the room. Since your day's now free, do you think we can spend it together?"

His mouth settled on mine. Only after I felt boneless and relaxed under the remarkable skill of his lips and tongue, did he pull back and answer my question.

"We're together for better or worse and against our better judgment, so we can spend every day together as soon as you give me the word."

"Word," I said with a playful poke to his pec.

In the six hours of alone-time that I spent thinking instead of sleeping, I prepared myself for being half of a happy couple instead of remaining one of the two people who believed on some level that we deserved to be alone.