Protecting Holly. Lynn Bulock

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СКАЧАТЬ was just that most of the time…routine.

      Holly knew that she went to work in a regular office building like most of the population. She spent hours on the computer and a lot of time just like this, queuing up for one of the printers or copiers in the suite of offices, processing a document for her boss, Jake Montgomery. The khakis and sweater she wore on her slender frame weren’t any different from the work outfits of any of her friends. Television, she decided, had overplayed the image of working for the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

      Of course there was the fact that Jake could easily have played one of those TV FBI agents. His dark-blond good looks would make him a casting director’s dream. But Holly knew that personally, she’d never make the cut on a television casting call, and neither would most of the people working in the Colorado Springs office.

      Sara leaned on the side of the copier and sighed. Holly thought she looked much younger than twenty-five some days, with her spiky hair and clothing choices that always skated to the limit of what the bureau would allow its support personnel to wear. Today her slacks were gray pinstripe, but tailored in such a way that one wrong move would have exposed the tattoo that Holly knew covered the small of her friend’s back. Watching Sara made her feel even older than the twenty-nine she was, and like a much more seasoned veteran of the bureau.

      “Maybe you do the same things,” Sara said, waggling deep burgundy polished nails. “But consider how you do them, and who you get to do them for. If either of the special agents I worked with were half as cool as Jake Montgomery, I’d be so happy.”

      Holly picked her own documents out of the print tray. She hardly knew what to say to Sara. Jake probably did seem like the coolest guy in the Colorado Springs office. With his specialization in computers, he didn’t have some of the same restrictions or duties as the other special agents, so he was a little more fascinating than the rest of the professionals on staff. On top of that, he was a Colorado Springs native with plenty of history behind him. Most of the other agents were transplants from somewhere else, some still serving their first assignment probationary period with the bureau.

      Still, it was hard to believe that working for Jake could be perceived as that big a plum. Colorado Springs wasn’t even that big an FBI office to begin with. There were only eleven people in the FBI offices in the brick building tucked away on a downtown side street, and six of those people were support staff like her, or other non-agent personnel.

      “So you think working for Mr. Montgomery would be a cool thing, huh?” He might look handsome and glamorous, but Holly wondered how Sara would handle Jake’s constant flights into programming language. Most of it didn’t begin to resemble English when he started discussing the complex computer work that he did. Of course, most of it made sense to her, because she’d been assisting him for two years now. And the lingo wasn’t even the most challenging part of working with Jake.

      Sara wrinkled her nose. “Well, usually. Not right now, though. I have a life already.”

      Holly didn’t even have to ask what that reference was about. “I know. And thanks so much for reminding me that I don’t have one.”

      Sara’s cheeks colored. “Hey, Holly, I didn’t say that.”

      Holly smiled. “It probably wasn’t even what you meant. But if Jake really has to find all that information on the computers they took in the drug raid, and find it before the trial starts later this month, neither of us is going to have a life until it’s finished. And we all know that’s going to be harder on my boss than it is on me.”

      Any casual reader of the Colorado Springs Sentinel’s society pages could tell you that normally, Jake Montgomery had a life. He had, in fact, one of the most glamorous and best documented lives in Colorado Springs. As the mayor’s son and one of the most eligible bachelors in the city, there always seemed to be pictures of Jake’s handsome face in the paper, getting out of his bright-red Viper for a charity event, or partying in a well-tailored tuxedo somewhere.

      Holly wondered how much of that would go by the wayside between now and Alistair Barclay’s trial. The shady hotel tycoon was accused of everything from racketeering to running the biggest drug ring the city had seen in over a decade.

      The FBI had given Jake the job of going over the computer files taken from Baltasar Escalante, head of the Venezuelan crime family Barclay had been accused of working for, in order to nail down Barclay’s prosecution. From what little her boss had told her, they were going to be working some unbelievable hours until all the information was deciphered. That didn’t really go along with Jake’s usual round of holiday parties and charity events right before Christmas.

      It was hard for Holly to feel sorry for him on that score. If anyone had asked her—which no one was going to—she would have said that Jake Montgomery spent too much time flitting from one party to the next with a bevy of escorts. Surely at almost thirty-five he was getting ready to settle down.

      “Hey, you still in there?” Sara teased, waving a hand near Holly’s face.

      Okay, so maybe thinking about her good-looking boss led to a little daydreaming once in a while. Holly gave a wry grin. “Sure am. Just thinking about all the stuff I’m going to be doing around here in the next month. Of course, I might be talked into trading jobs with someone who only had to organize the office party and the gift exchange on top of a normal schedule.”

      Sara shook her head emphatically. “No way. Like I said, Holly, most of the time I envy you because you work for Jake Montgomery. Now isn’t most of the time.”

      “That’s true.” Holly knew what Sara’s answer would be even before she gave it. And in truth, that was the only reason that Holly offered to switch jobs with her friend, even in fun. Because when it came down to it, Holly Vance knew that her time every day with Jake was what kept her going. Prayer and her faith held her together through the dark nights, and working with Jake kept her going through the long days.

      No matter how many hours of challenging work she put in, she wouldn’t trade for another job. There were cushier jobs out there, and there were better paying jobs out there, but none of them had the fringe benefit of working side by side with Jake eight to ten hours a day. There wasn’t a benefits package out there anyplace that could take the place of watching her handsome boss do what he was best at.

      Holly finished her last bit of copying. “Tell you what. I’ll ask you again when this trial is over some time in January. Once you’ve watched Mr. Montgomery pace around snarling for a couple weeks trying to decipher all those files, we’ll see if you still want to trade jobs.” It was an easy offer to make. Jake might be charming to look at, but he growled like a tawny tiger when things didn’t go his way.

      Sara’s smile was a little faded. “Sure.” She picked up her papers and headed toward her office down the hall. “But for now I better get back to planning the party.”

      For a moment Holly wished that Christmas parties were all she was planning. But she already had an idea how much this prosecution meant to Jake, and to so many other people she knew. This might not be the most festive Christmas she ever had, but if the government won its case against Alistair Barclay, there would be plenty to celebrate later.

      “You want this guy as badly as I do.” There was a note of surprise in Rose D’Arcy’s voice. The petite assistant district attorney seemed to be taking a fresh look at Jake. It always amused Jake that one of the toughest legal pit bulls in the county came packaged in this tiny redheaded person.

      “Why do you look so surprised? Thanks to him and his crew I could have lost my brother. I know it’s not like Barclay pulled the trigger, СКАЧАТЬ