Free Wet: Part 1 by S. Jackson Rivera Page B

wall.
    “What’s wrong?”
    “A potential customer I’ve been working on decided on another destination. We only have one group of tourists on the books right now, and that’s next week. We have nothing after that. We need more customers. The students are good money while they’re enrolled, but they don’t leave when they’re finished. They stay for months and once their instruction is done, they get to dive at a very good discount. It’s killing our bottom line.”
    “Is the shop in trouble?”
    Claire glanced at her and then looked around to make sure no one lurked within earshot. “Not really, but sort of. Like I said, the students are good money but once they’re done . . . It would be best if we could just keep a steady stream of real, paying customers coming in. Right now, I think Paul is subsidizing the shop from his personal bank account.”
    The thought of the shop not doing well made Rhees sad. She’d fallen in love with it and the island. Except for Paul, and maybe Shelli, she really liked it there.
    “So how do we get more tourists?”
    Claire shook her head. “I don’t know. Paul is supposed to be some toff, the dog’s bollocks in the business world, but for some reason, he hasn’t put his heart into this. He would rather dive, ride jet skis, surf, parasail, and shag every woman on the island. You name it—anything but work. Oh, did I mention, shag every woman on the island?” They both laughed.
    Later, Rhees thought about what Claire said as she wrote the daily post for the shop’s blog. She still needed to post the dive pictures for the day, one of her Dailies. While she waited for the computer to load the pictures, she scrolled through past posts, the ones Paul had posted before she took over. Every post looked the same, a picture of some sea creature, a picture of a wreck, a picture here and there of divers diving. She looked the website over and started surfing the Internet and various social media sites.
    She went back to the shop’s site and read through the comments. She noticed one past customer, a female, had posted a comment with a picture. Rhees stared at the picture for a minute. Paul stood next to the woman, his arm around her and there was no doubt in Rhees’ mind that he had slept with her. The comment read, “This is my dive master. Can you see why I can’t wait to go back to Paradise Divers?” Rhees rolled her eyes.
    Nothing else really stood out. She searched the Internet again. She searched other dive shop sites and studied them. There were a few things she thought would be nice to incorporate into Paradise’s web image, but she was under strict instructions from Mr. Grumpy Pants on how he wanted it done. She sighed.
    oOo
    Rhees walked into her apartment, happy to be home. It had been a particularly stressful day, so she’d left the shop a little early. She strolled into the kitchen and opened the fridge, trying to decide what she wanted to do for dinner. She settled on a quesadilla in hopes of saving a few pennies. 
    She turned and noticed Regina’s laptop on the table. Regina had apparently left her camera to upload pictures to the computer, and Rhees watched as pictures of Paul flashed one after another on the screen. She moved to the table, sat down and watched mindlessly at the sheer number of pictures running across the screen. When it finished, the file sat open, revealing a folder devoted entirely to Paul.
    Regina walked in and froze. “What are you doing home too early?”
    “You mean so early.” Tracy wasn’t around to correct Regina’s English, and Rhees couldn’t believe how easily she’d stepped into the role. She pointed to the computer. “What is this?”
    “Nothing!” Regina raced over and shut the screen.
    “Why do you have so many pictures of Paul?”
    “That is not none of your stupid business.” Regina scowled.
    “Regina, really?” Rhees asked. Though she knew the answer, she couldn’t understand why. “He’s a spoiled