Page 16 of Two Is Better Than One

"Yeah, I'm doing better."

He held out his arm, showing me the thin, stretchy fabric brace that started at his elbow.

"Does it hurt?" I asked, touching his arm. "Do you like working for my sister?" I quickly added when my body reacted to touching him.

"Yes, I do. What other job do you get to do things like this? I've lived here my whole life, and I've never been to this monastery."

"I heard you mention that to Brooks. I can't believe this is your first time here"

"It is. I've heard about it, but I've never come over here."

"No kidding? I've only been to Miami twice, and I regret that I haven't seen this already."

"You don't really go to all the tourist places when you live somewhere. In my case, I don't even do the touristy things when I'm traveling. I'm not much of an attraction kind of guy."

"Don't you see the appeal in this place, though?" I asked.

"Yes, I do."

"Do you want to go walk around the garden again?" I asked.

"Sure. Whatever you want to do. I'm along for the ride."

"Oh, yeah, I forgot, we're paying you to be here." I felt a little shy and I stood up when I said it.

It was so nice being alone. I looked around and only saw people who were there for the church and weren't following us or looking at me. I made my way out with Casey following me. I held eye contact with a few people as we left the chapel, and none of them seemed to recognize me or know who I was.

I felt so pumped up and inspired by the privacy that I wanted to get close enough to Casey to kiss him. I could take advantage of the brief moments of complete solitude and make that happen today—while we were out—maybe in his truck. What had my life come to? I was suddenly making all sorts of plans in my head regarding a time and place where I could secretly kiss my bodyguard.

There were others in the garden of the church. We had partial privacy, but there was no hope for complete privacy until we left. I used the time at the church to ask Casey more questions. I found out that his parents were divorced and neither of them had remarried, although his mom frequently changed boyfriends. He told me all about his two brothers and their wives. Of the three, he was the last remaining single brother.

We walked slowly around the ancient-looking garden as we talked about his family. He told me about their lake house in Arkansas. It had belonged to his grandparents before his father bought it. It was a gigantic, multi-million dollar home that Max could not afford on his government salary. There was a substantial amount of land involved, and part of it was used as a secret facility for their work.

"Why are you telling me all this?" I asked a while later as we walked.

He shrugged. "Because I'm a good judge of character, and I know you won't tell anyone."

"I won't."

He smiled. "I know. I'll only be working with you for another week, so I figure it's fine to let it all out there—since I probably won't see you after that."

"I was thinking the same thing," I said, wanting to kiss him. "It feels good just to get to know you and be able to have a little secret connection and not have anyone need to know about it."

He laughed.

"What?" I leaned back and pushed at him, feeling defensive and embarrassed.

"What kind of secret connection are you talking about?" he asked.

I shrugged shyly. "I don't know. You're single and I'm single and I… I never get to kiss a guy." I shook my head, blushing and feeling nervous and sorry that I said any of this. "Ugh, never mind."

"I'll gladly kiss you. I've got no problem with kissing you. I'm just shocked that you came out and asked like that."

I glanced at him. Both of us were speaking so quietly that there was absolutely no chance of being overheard.

"I'm sorry," I said. "Even as I say this, I'm horrified by how it sounds. But all I'm saying is that from a logical standpoint, you can tell me your secrets about being a secret agent, secret billionaire, and then we can kiss and then forget we know both things."

"I'm not a billionaire."

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