Total pages in book: 112
Estimated words: 108846 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 544(@200wpm)___ 435(@250wpm)___ 363(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 108846 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 544(@200wpm)___ 435(@250wpm)___ 363(@300wpm)
“To start, sure, but as if they wouldn’t be clambering to hire Jeremy year-round once he’s proven himself.” He’s reliable, punctual, and the hardest worker Sea Witch has ever had.
Frank pauses as if in thought. “You honestly think he’d leave us for Wolf?”
“I never thought Dave would leave us, and see what just happened!” I throw a hand toward the door. “Jeremy booked Friday off. He never books time off.” Luckily, we don’t have any cruises scheduled for that day.
“No, he doesn’t,” Frank agrees reluctantly.
“What if he leaves me? We’ll be down to one captain.” AJ, who worked for us last year and is reliable enough, though not the most personable. Honestly, I wasn’t going to hire him again this year, but I’m desperate. “How am I going to replace someone as good as Jeremy? People ask for him by name!” I stab at my computer screen, to the notes section of repeat bookers. Whininess laces my voice.
“He still works here today. If he’s gone next week, we’ll deal with it then.” Frank gives my shoulder another comforting squeeze. “This isn’t the first time someone has quit on us out of the blue.”
“I knew this was going to happen. I knew that stupid hotel was going to swoop in to take all the best workers, and then what are we going to be left with? The lazy, untrustworthy plugs. Wolf is ruining Mermaid Beach’s entire vibe, and it’s not even open yet!”
Not that the feeling hadn’t already shifted for those like me who grew up here, casting fishing lines and running barefoot to the ice cream shop. Somewhere along the line, the quaint Florida cottages were replaced by looming coastal mansions and condos, and dozens of new businesses cropped up almost overnight—there are now three other tiki bar cruise companies to compete with ours. Popular travel magazines wrote articles about the area, throwing around comparisons to the Hamptons and Nantucket, and all these bougie Northeasterners who can’t afford to vacation in those areas flocked here, driving up the prices of everything—houses, taxes, food. A lot of locals can’t afford to live here anymore. So many of them are cashing out and leaving.
Some people argue the change has brought good things to the community, but I disagree. We were doing just fine. Change is what brought those surveyors to the land next door to my home—acres that had been sitting vacant for decades, not worth developing. Fast-forward five years and there’s now an eyesore where only swaying sea oats along sand dunes and a serene grove of bramble and copper woods existed before.
“Sloane … Don’t start up on this again. It does you no good,” Frank warns.
“I’m not. I swear.” Poor Frank has had to listen to me rant about all things Wolf Hotel for years. I dragged him to town council meetings to try to stop the build, but all those assholes care about is how much money and prestige the Wolf name will bring to Mermaid Beach. “But tell me it doesn’t bother you that it’s there. Right beside our home.”
“It is what it is. There’s no point fighting it anymore. You tried, and you lost. Now, it’s time to let go. Who knows, they could bring us more business.”
“People who pay a thousand bucks a night for a hotel room aren’t coming to the Sea Witch to stand in line for syrup-laced coffees and to rent beach equipment, Frank.”
He shrugs. “You could have sold to them. They made you a good offer.”
“I’m not selling!”
Frank’s eyebrows arch with reproach.
“I’m not selling Gigi’s house,” I repeat, tempering my tone. She bought that property back when you could still scoop up acres for cheap. And while she claims she prefers her nursing home now that her body is giving up on her, it would kill her to see the place torn down for more sterile mansions or, worse, an expansion on that hotel. “I’ve lived in that house all my life. You live there. A lot of our staff consider it their home over the summer.” In trailers Gigi collected over the years to provide cheap accommodations to the Sea Witch family, as she likes to refer to them. Hell, Dave and Teddy are supposed to stay there!
“And you don’t have to,” Frank says calmly. “Now, speaking of lazy, untrustworthy plugs, guess who I heard is applying at Wolf?” He waits a beat before relieving me of the suspense. “Cody.”
I snort, even as hearing that name makes my stomach clench with dread. “Good. They deserve that sorry sack.”
“They won’t hire him.”
“Please. If there’s one thing Cody is good at, it’s fooling people into thinking he’s a decent guy.” He sure fooled me. He had zero experience and yet I hired him as a captain, and then I dated the bastard for a year before saying yes to his proposal.