Title: Living Life

Summary: Ed hires on a new person to work in Security. Will Danny keep his relationship with her professional, or will the boundaries between co-worker and lover get blurred?

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the Las Vegas Characters. I do own Julian 'Julie or Jules' McCarthy.

A/N: There is extreme bad language included in this story

A/N: I know that Las Vegas is not the way I'm portraying it in this story, so I'm making it up for the purpose of my writing. That, my friends, is what they call a Creative License.

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As I look around my Las Vegas home, I see pictures of a happier time, a time where things were so much less complicated. Danny and I were still together, and having a great time. I look at that picture, and my heart longs for those easy days. It's been about ten years since it was taken, and so much has changed. Danny and I were living closer to the base where he was stationed. I was only sixteen, and he was eighteen. He was leaving soon, and it was the day he finally left, that I found out I was pregnant. When Danny got back, we tried to make things work for the sake of our unborn child, but soon discovered that things almost never work out as we plan. The more we fought, the more apparent it became that it was impossible to give our child a good life while we were still together. Danny and I split up about a month after my seventeenth birthday, when I was six and a half months pregnant. Two months later, our baby was born early, with both parents around her: Emma Rose McCoy, 5 lbs 6 oz, 19 inches long. Emma may have had my blue eyes, but her facial structure was just like her daddy's. Not knowing when and for how long Danny would be gone with the Marines, the two of us decided it would be best for Emma to keep living with me, so she could have the stable home life that neither of us really had while we were growing up. I haven't seen Danny since that day, when I was seventeen years old. I've heard that he's working at some casino in Vegas as the head of security, and I'm happy for him. Emma hasn't seen her father, but asks about him often. It's so hard to believe that she is ten years old already. It seems like just yesterday that I was cradling her small body in my arms. I just moved back to Las Vegas recently, after getting a new job at the Montecito as a member of the security personnel. I don't have the first clue what to expect, as I walk into Ed Deline's office, but I know from what I've heard about this casino, it's going to be something big.

"Julie, please take a seat."

I sit down in one of the chairs on the other side of the desk from Ed.

"I need you to realize that at the Montecito, we function like a family. You may not fit now, but give it some time, and you'll be a vital piece in this well-oiled machine."

"I understand."

"I also need to review some personnel forms with you. Are you flexible on your hours? I see that you have a young daughter."

"Yes, her name is Emma, she just turned ten. My mother lives in town, and she's offered to take care of Emma while I'm at work."

"Ten years old is a good age. They're still so young and not tainted by the world at that age."

It's as if Ed senses that I didn't mention her father for a reason and doesn't push the topic any further.

"You graduated from Western Las Vegas University, with a degree in audio/visual analysis. That's quite impressive, Miss McCarthy."

"Both of my parents were involved with surveillance and that type of thing when I was growing up, and I guess I just knew that I always wanted to be involved in this when I was old enough."

"Well, I think that you are extremely qualified for this job."

Before Ed can go any further into my history and qualifications, a man walks into the office in a hurry, carrying a file in his hand.

"Ed, we have a lock…"
He stops mid-sentence when he sees a person sitting in front of Ed's desk.

"Danny McCoy, meet one of your new surveillance and security techs, Julie McCarthy. Julie, this is head of security, Danny McCoy."