Free Real Mermaids Don't Sell Seashells by Helene Boudreau Page A

think?” Dad held a Hawaiian-type shirt up to his chest. He was also sporting a floppy straw hat.
    â€œI think the shirt is perfect, but that hat is going to make you look like even more of a tourist than you already are,” I joked.
    â€œWell, I need something to keep him from burning to a crisp,” Mom said, kissing Dad on the cheek. “Let’s see if we can get a cab back to the hotel, shall we?”
    We made it back to Rayelle’s mother’s booth to see if she could call Faye to pick us up.
    â€œI’m sorry but my grandma just called to say she had to run a really important errand and she won’t be able to pick you guys up after all,” Rayelle said.
    â€œThat’s okay,” Mom said. “Faye has been wonderful but we can always call another taxi.”
    â€œOr I guess there’s always the water taxi,” I said, remembering the water-taxi driver ready to shuttle tourists anywhere their hearts desired.
    â€œOh, can we?” Cori asked. She had turned into a bit of a water nut.
    Mom smiled and folded Dad’s shirt under her arm. “That sounds like a fantastic idea.”
    We walked back to the edge of the pier. I figured it was only fair to pick the same water-taxi driver who had given me his sales pitch the day before. Turns out his name was Raymond.
    We sailed along the island’s coast, back toward the channel that led between Nassau and Paradise Island, and passed half a dozen cruise ships docked at the shipyard. The Wonderment Cruiselines ship must have left port already because it was nowhere to be seen. A little farther down the pier, a much smaller boat bobbed in the water, looking like a thimble next to the massive ships.
    â€œHey, isn’t that Dillon’s speedboat?” I yelled over the noise of the water taxi’s outboard motor. Cori shot me a look, which I ignored.
    â€œWho?” Dad asked.
    â€œThat guy who was selling conches yesterday. He’s the one I was telling you about.” I turned to Raymond. “You know him, right?”
    â€œYeah, I know Dillon,” Raymond said. “He helped me untangle a rope from my propeller once. Dove right in and cut it free. That boy swims like a fish. I’m not sure if that’s his boat, though.”
    I remembered how Rayelle’s cousin said Dillon had tried to get her boyfriend to sneak onto the cruise ship the day before. Had Dillon come back to try to do it himself? Rayelle said he hadn’t been around the market. Had he been hanging around the shipyard since yesterday?
    But the cruise ship was gone.
    So, if that was Dillon’s boat, where was Dillon?

I could barely get to sleep Tuesday night, partly due to the hotel’s broken air conditioner, partly due to the balcony’s sliding glass door shuddering in its doorframe from the growing wind, and partly due to the college frat-boy party happening next door.
    Plus, my mind kept whirling with everything that had happened since we touched down in the Bahamas not even two days before, especially where that guy Dillon was concerned. What if that really was his speedboat at the shipyard? But maybe there was a simple explanation for his boat being there. Maybe (and I’m sure Cori would agree) I should just leave well enough alone.
    But when I finally fell asleep, I dreamed Cori and I were standing in a green speedboat bobbing in the middle of the ocean surrounded by dolphins. We both had Wonderment Cruiselines baseball caps on our heads with our beaded braids swinging in the breeze.
    â€œLook! They’re all around us!” Cori kept squealing and jumping around in the boat, excited that the dolphins were close enough to touch, but I kept screaming for her to stop freaking out as the boat bobbed wildly in the water, threatening to tip over.
    By the time I woke up the next morning to the sound of my cell phone’s Video Gab alert, I had a headache that felt like a harpoon had been embedded in my