Quinn Ellington is an agent with the CIA.
Well, she will be. In time. Not when we first meet her, though. At that time, the description should be: Quinn Ellington is a librarian.
She loves being a librarian. She loves books and loves to read and loves to help others find enjoyment in books. She also loves the challenge of the odd question or two from those visiting the library she works at, like when the person talks about a book they vaguely remember from twenty years ago with this guy who did something cool with this woman that ... she would listen and then ask simple but inciteful questions and then usually come up with the solution. Her analytical mind and research abilities were impressive.
Youngest of six with the other five all being males, she grew up loving excitement and danger and thrills - just all of it was on paper. Well, surviving five older brothers, obviously there was a lot of danger and thrills just living with them, but most of what she experienced was in the pages of spy thrillers, a passion she learned from her grandfather. As she grew into an adult, her love of a good covert operations adventure only got stronger, especially those dealing with super-spy Edward Walker. She often dreamt of doing the sort of things that that fictional character did; she had no idea she would find herself in similar situations.
That would come about because of CIA operative James Anderson who came into the library where she worked to get some help identifying a broach - and one thing will lead to another and, well the 'another' is what makes the adventures in this series adventurous. Mind you, Anderson did not show up with the intention of pulling Ellington into danger, he just wanted a bit of help in research. And Ellington did not decide all of a sudden to force herself into the op that Anderson was on, she just liked the research challenge. Well, he was pretty darn easy on the eyes, too.
And once she got a taste of his world, she found she not only liked it in real life, she was not bad at it herself.