A Lot Like Love by Julie James Read Free Book Online

Agent McCall, don’t bother to sweet-talk me first. Just ask.”
    “I assure you, Ms. Rhodes, when I sweet-talk a woman, she knows it.” He held out his hand, being polite. “You’re not going to get far in those boots.”
    She ignored his hand. “Watch me.” She turned in her heels and walked away from the car, heading through the semi-plowed, snow- and ice-covered parking lot toward the entrance of division headquarters.
    So help him, she didn’t slip once.
    Huxley stopped at Nick’s side. “You could’ve given me a sign that you planned to question her in the car. Why not wait to bring up Eckhart at the office?”
    “I wanted to catch her off guard. We needed to make sure she wasn’t one of the flavors of the month.”
    “You think it’s a good idea to piss her off like this? We’re about to ask her to work with us.”
    “She’ll cooperate.” Of that, Nick had no doubt. He’d known it about thirty seconds after walking into her store, when he saw the anxious look on her face when they’d first mentioned her brother.
    Has Kyle been hurt?
    Jordan Rhodes may not have liked him very much, but she was obviously concerned about her brother. At the end of the day, that was all that mattered.
     
     
    THE TWO AGENTS led Jordan to a conference room on the eleventh floor and told her to make herself comfortable while they “retrieved a file.” She suspected this was FBI code for something shady, but wasn’t exactly sure what. All she knew was that after Agent McCall’s not-so-innocent questioning during the car ride over, she had her eye on him. Two of them, in fact.
    She removed her coat, scarf, and gloves, and brushed the snow off her boots. Yes, fine, as McCall had annoyingly pointed out, her Christian Louboutins weren’t exactly hardy, all-weather footwear. And back at the store, when she’d grabbed her coat from the back room, she had thought momentarily about changing out of them. But the snow boots she’d bought last November—not having any idea she’d be in this predicament—were hardly business appropriate. The way she saw it, there were some matters of style that simply needed to take precedence over practicality, and right at the top had to be the rule that said one did not wear black dress pants and pink Uggs to a meeting with the FBI. Not anyone who didn’t want to look like a jackass, anyway.
    Jordan took a seat at the conference table. She watched the blizzard that raged outside the floor-to-ceiling windows, dreading the snow she’d have to shovel when she got home. Perhaps she should look into getting one of those power snowblowers, she mused. Or a man. Either could be quite handy in inclement weather. Then again, snowblowers took up a lot of garage space, and she generally liked to keep at least a three-foot buffer around the Maserati. Not to mention, most of the men she met presumably had even less interest than she did in shoveling snow—they likely would hire someone else to do that kind of thing. The downside to dating Italian-loafer types, she supposed.
    Maybe she needed to find more of a guy’s guy. One of those men who could start a fire with two sticks, could change a flat tire with one hand tied behind his back, and wasn’t afraid that a snow shovel would scuff his cashmerelined leather Burberry gloves.
    The door flew open and in walked Nick McCall.
    Someone, however, who at least knew what a razor was.
    “Sorry to keep you waiting, Ms. Rhodes,” he said.
    As Huxley followed Nick into the conference room, Jordan noticed that both men had shed their coats. She also saw that they were armed, catching glimpses of the shoulder harnesses and guns they wore underneath their suit jackets.
    “What happened to your file?” she asked.
    “Would you believe it? We couldn’t find the darn thing,” Nick said. “Guess we’ll just have to march on without it.” He gave Huxley a nod.
    “Everything we’re about to tell you is extremely confidential, Ms. Rhodes,” Huxley began.