Free The Resort by Bentley Little Page B

you later.” She waved to Curtis and David. “Bye, guys.”
    They watched as she climbed out and padded across the cement, disappearing into the throng of guests.
    Curtis was jealous, he could tell, but David high-fived him. “Way to go, bro!”
    Owen grinned.
    â€œDon’t get too cocky, though.”
    â€œThat’s exactly what I’m going to get.”
    â€œCock?” Curtis snickered. “I always had my doubts about you.”
    â€œAsshole.” He kicked his feet, splashed water on his brother.
    Suddenly, Curtis grimaced. “Oh no,” he groaned, his eyes focused on a point past Owen’s shoulder.
    He turned around to see their mom marching toward them, Ryan out in front of her.
    David grinned. “Looks like it’s babysitting time for you fine young ladies.”
    The three of them looked at each other, then, without speaking, simultaneously leaped out of the Jacuzzi and sprinted to the big pool.
    Owen dived in. “Cur—” he heard his mom call out in the split second before his head hit the water, and then the three of them were speeding through the pool as quickly as they could away from Ryan.

Seven
    I was misinformed.
    The line from Casablanca kept going through his head as Patrick Schlaegel checked in. Around him in The Reata’s spacious lobby he saw old couples and young families. Through the glass doors and picture window that overlooked the main pool, kids were playing in the water while middle-aged Middle Americans lay whitely on the padded lounge chairs soaking up sun or idly flipping through mass-market magazines.
    Where were the singles, the hot babes, the scenesters? He’d been under the impression that this resort catered to a young hip crowd, had been led to believe that he would be among his people here rather than stuck staying with a bunch of refugees from Branson and Orlando.
    I was misinformed.
    Townsend had been the one to put that idea in his head, and Patrick would not be surprised to learn that the misconception had been intentional. It was just like the editor to play a joke like that on him, and Patrick vowed that if that was indeed what had happened, he would pay the man back in spades.
    It wouldn’t have been so bad if he’d at least been somewhat close to Tucson. He’d come out west for the Tucson International Film Festival, and his plan had been to spend the week alternately checking out the films and getting in a little R and R. At the paper’s expense, of course.
    But The Reata was way the hell out in the Far Country, the Big Country, the Wonderful Country—his mind supplied endless descriptions from the golden age of westerns—and that pretty much ruled out the flexible schedule he’d had in mind. After the hellacious trip out here, just attending the festival seemed like far too much work. He dreaded the thought of driving fifty miles through the desert to watch some pretentious art film, then driving fifty miles back here to sleep at night. There was nothing more excruciating than sitting through a bad avant-garde movie. At least with a failed comedy or a crappy genre flick a viewer could be distracted and sometimes entertained by the plot, as simplistic, predictable and pedestrian as it might be. But when you were stuck with something like The Depth of Aphis, which he’d seen at the Cutting Edge Festival last month and which consisted entirely of a grotesquely overweight woman stacking and restacking building blocks in a badly lit room while an infuriating piano played the same note endlessly, there was very little entertainment value to be had.
    And from everything he’d heard about the new organizer for the Tucson festival, that’s exactly the type of movie he was likely to encounter.
    An elderly man in an embarrassing hat and plaid Bermuda shorts nodded at him in greeting on his way out to the patio.
    I was misinformed.
    The desk clerks were all cute, though. Three young