Read Online Her Cowboy Protector by Roxie Rivera - Free Book Online Page A

the desk. Her face seemed unnaturally pale.
    "Are you all right?" He took long strides into the office. "You look like you've just seen a ghost. What is it?"
    "Come look at this." She waved him closer. "I was looking for this ranch management program I picked up at a conference, but when I opened file I found this. It's just pages and pages of numbers and letters."
    "I'm not sure how much help I'll be," he admitted as he came around the desk and crouched down beside her.
    "Because of your dyslexia?"
    He rocked on the balls of his feet. "How did you know?"
    She gestured to the piles of paperwork with a nod of her head. "I've worked with enough dyslexic students to know it when I see it. Were you diagnosed young?"
    "Hardly!" He snorted at the very idea. "Early intervention didn't exist when I was in school. I struggled a lot." He didn't know why but Niall felt the need to give her a brief view of his childhood. Maybe it was those earnest brown eyes or the way she touched his arm. "My old man used to beat the crap out of me for bad grades. There isn't any better motivation to figure out a way around something like that—"—he pointed at the stacks of paper—"—than your daddy's belt and being called dummy by your teachers."
    She grasped his hand and pumped his fingers. "Niall, I am so sorry."
    "It was a long time ago."
    "That doesn’t make it any less mean."
    He shrugged as if he didn't care even though those experiences as a child had hurt him badly. Old defenses were hard to abandon, he supposed.
    "I managed to muddle through school all right. I went into the Army because there was no way I could get a scholarship with my so-so grades. The Army treated me right. They recognized my skills and taught me to be successful. The GI Bill put me through school and I got some help there with tutors who taught me some techniques."
    "But you still struggle with numbers?"
    He nodded. "If I'm in a rush or frustrated, it's worse."
    "Understandable." Cruz pointed toward the computer screen and showed him the columns of numbers. “Look at these.” She scrolled slowly. “This looks like data of some kind.’
    "Wait." Niall touched her arm. "Go back up a little. There. Right there." He pointed to a string of letters and numbers. "That's an IBAN."
    "A what?"
    "An International Bank Account Number," he clarified. "They're used to do wire transfers." He touched a second column of numbers and letters. "These are SWIFT codes. They identify the bank."
    Cruz shot him an amused glance. "You make a lot of international wire transfers?"
    "No, but we used to come across stuff like this all the time when we'd raid terrorist strongholds. Those guys used huge international networks to move cash." Niall scratched his head and scowled. "Cruz, this is probably evidence of money laundering or worse."
    "Money laundering?" She scrolled through the seemingly endless pages of information. "But that doesn’t make sense."
    Niall begged to differ. His brain was working overtime as he snatched her backpack out of the chair, dropped it on the floor and pushed the chair closer to Cruz. He straddled the seat and rested his forearms on top. "Where did you get this flash drive?"
    "A math conference in Houston last October."
    Niall did the math, but just in case Cruz hadn't gotten there yet, he asked, "And you were assaulted—?"
    "A week later," she supplied. "Oh, God, Niall! Is that what he wanted?" She stabbed a finger toward the flash drive. "Is that why he came after me?" She inhaled sharply and quickly maximized the internet browser. "What about my roommate?"
    He didn't follow. "What about her?"
    "She's the only other person who touched this flash drive, Niall. She wanted a copy of the program so I tossed her the drive on my way out the door to meet friends for dinner. She must have gotten my drive mixed up with hers."
    Niall wanted to talk to this roommate. If nothing else, she needed to be in protective custody. "Can you get a hold of her?"
    "I don’t have