Page 9 of Two Is Better Than One

"Thanks for coming, AJ," Brooks said. "Allie wants to go to an art gallery today. You guys will have access to a driver. He's not going to wait for you, but you can call him when you need a ride somewhere, and he'll come pick you up."

Brooks handed AJ a card with the driver's name and number on it.

"Do we need a driver?" AJ asked. "I have my truck. And I don't mind driving us to the gallery, unless she doesn't want to ride with—"

"They might want it to be more official than that," Casey said to his cousin.

"I don't mind riding in your truck," Allie said.

Summer looked at Casey as if to ask what he thought about it. She trusted him already.

"AJ will take care of her," he said to her. "He's been all over the city. He'll get her where she needs to go."

"I'm fine with it," Summer said. She gestured to AJ. "He's got enough muscles to ward someone off if you do get hassled." Summer smiled at AJ when she said that. Allie gave a little smile, too, but she didn't make eye contact with him. He knew she didn't mind him, though. She had agreed to ride with him quickly enough.

***

"I heard your cousin say you had to ask off at work. What do you normally do for a job?"

AJ didn't expect Allie to strike up a conversation with him, but she surprised him by speaking up right when they got into his truck.

He adjusted the radio, turning it down. "I'll tell you in just a second, but I need you to type in the name of this place." He handed Allie his phone, and she took it from him and began typing the name of the gallery where they were going.

"I lug plants, trees, and sod around all day. I work at a landscaping supply place. I'm in Miami for only a year, and I'm working this job to have something to do while I'm having fun. I have a different job to go home to… one in sales."

"What kind of sales?"

"Farm equipment. Industrial farm equipment."

"Are you a farmer?" she asked.

"No, but selling that equipment is a good job. It's a desk job. I won't really have anything to do with a farm in my day-to-day."

"In what city will you be doing this desk job?"

"Chicago. That's where I grew up and where my family lives."

"When are you going back?" she asked.

"In the summer. After a trip to Arkansas. Casey's dad has a lake house there. Theoretically, I can stay in Miami as long as I want. I can live here and haul plants for the rest of my life if I want to."

"I can't," she said.

"Why not?"

"Because I'm on my sister's schedule."

"Are you a singer, too?"

She shrugged. "No, but we live together. We live in the same house back in South Carolina, and I almost always travel with her when she goes out of town. We've been apart only a few times in our life." She hesitated shyly. "I'm like her shadow, I guess. A shadow of her. I don't make a ton of money, but I do some work on my computer from the road. It gives me spending money when we go somewhere—like you, except I'm not a big partier. I spend my money on other things."

"Does your sister pay you for going along and helping her out?"

"No, but she pays for my whole life… food and shelter, and all that stuff. She's paying for you to be here with me right now. I don't even know what you're making."

"Five hundred."

"Five hundred for one afternoon? Really? Wow."

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