“Oh, baby…” She didn’t often call him that, but he responded, pushing up into her, flexing his thighs in an attempt to get some movement and provide some stimulation. She started to rise again, slowly lifting herself up just a couple of inches, then dropping back down. Her breath whistled out of her and she did it again and again, her passion building. She rested her sweat-streaked forehead against his, their eyes locking on each other as she continued to fuck herself on him.
It wasn’t going to last long, they both knew that. She could feel the pressure building inside her as she continued to set the pace, but Max could only hold himself back for so long, and no longer. She was close but not close enough when he grabbed her hips and held her locked in place, her thighs squashed against his as he shot into her. She groaned, unable to stop her body shivering as she reacted to his orgasm, but not quite there herself.
“I’m sorry, hon…”
“Sshh… It’s okay. A woman’s not built to cum every time.”
“But…”
“No buts. There’ll be plenty of time later.”
“Don’t forget we’ve got the boat people coming at eleven.” They’d made the arrangements the day before, once she’d found out he really did want a sailboat. She’d said yes, as long as he let her pay for it.
“What time is it?”
“About ten.”
“Ten?” She almost panicked. “I need longer than that to get presentable.”
He shrugged. “Meet them as you are.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I am not greeting the first visitors to our cabin naked, with your spunk running down my leg.”
“Give them a shock, honey.”
“Give them a fucking heart attack.” She grinned at him. “And you a hard-on no doubt.”
“Eat your breakfast. After all, I did cook it for us.”
“Hmm…” Even so, she walked around to her side of the table and wolfed down the lukewarm bacon and eggs. The mushrooms, though, she left. “Cold, darling. I hate cold mushrooms.”
He laughed. “Not my fault that, is it?”
“I’m going in the shower and then somehow get my hair looking good in what little time you’ve given me.”
“Not my fault. You’re the one who wanted something else before breakfast.”
She couldn’t really answer that.
* * * *
The sound of the pickup’s wheels on the gravel in front of the cabin alerted them to the arrival of their visitors. They walked out onto the porch and stood arms around each other, watching as the truck neatly turned so the trailer it was pulling pointed backward down toward the slipway next to the dock.
“Good morning.”
“Lovely day for it.”
Neither of them were paying much attention to the man approaching them. They both had eyes on the sleek white painted boat on the trailer. Chris was nearer Max’s age than hers, possibly only a year or so younger than him. His weather-beaten face and deep tan told the story of a man who worked outdoors for a living.
“She’s a beaut, all right. A real beauty. I think it’s one of the best boats Marshall ever built.”
Max shook hands with Chris, the owner of the boatyard at the far end of the lake. “Well, seeing as you’re trying to sell it to me, you would think so.”
“No way. That boat was built right. It might be twenty years old, but they never built better than the Sandpiper.” He turned to Julia and grinned. “Almost as pretty as your wife, too.”
She rolled her eyes. “Stop it. Coffee?”
“Sure. Let’s talk over a few practicalities for a few minutes. I know you can’t wait to look her over, but there are a few things you need to think about, including some you won’t have considered. I’ve got a couple of my guys following on in half an hour or so to help get it in the water.”
Max frowned. “You can’t launch it single-handed then?”
Chris shook his head. “Nah. It’s a two man job, although it’s better with three—one driving.”
“Ah, that might be a problem, then.”
“Nope. I’ve got a solution for you folks that solves that. Same thing as works for most people around here.”
Julia led the way inside, and she was pretty sure Chris was watching her butt as she walked through to the kitchen area. “How do you take your coffee?”
“Hot, strong and black.”
“Sorry. We only have instant. We only got the keys last week, so we’re still settling in.”
“You about bought the prettiest cabin on the lake. A few years back they used to let this one out for honeymooners. We’d here tales about them, and see a few things too.”
Julia felt herself blushing as Max barked with laughter. “We rented this for our honeymoon. When it came on the market, I snapped it up.”
“Don’t blame you there, fella. I’d buy my honeymoon place too, but it’s a bit out of my price league. Can’t afford no thirty story hotel in Vegas.”
They all laughed and Julia handed him his coffee then Max his, before walking over to sit on the couch. Without thinking, she crossed her legs, only belatedly noticing the way the hem of her thin summer dress rode up. Max sat beside her and Chris took the chair opposite.
“Listen, before you go thinking about buying a boat, let’s talk about some of the practicalities.”
“Okay.”
“You’re gonna use this as a second home, come up several weekends a year?”
“A few more then several, but yes.”
“How far away did you say you live?”
Max shrugged. “It’s about a two hour drive.”
“So you’ll plan on coming up on a Friday night, and going home Sunday evening, the odd extra day sometimes.”
“About it. Maybe a couple of weeks at the height of summer, and a week in the fall. Shame we missed that this year, but I’ve heard it’s spectacular.”
“It is. Believe me, this is often called God’s Own Lake for that reason. I take it this place is for yourselves? You’re not renting it out?”
Julia shook her head. “No. This is our little bolt hole. If I get my way we won’t even bother to put a TV in…” She glowered at her husband “…let alone an internet connection.”
“So what do you intend to do with the boat when you’re not here?”
“Well, until you just told me it’s a two-man job to get it out of the water, I was planning on storing it next to the cabin.”
Chris shook his head. “What about security? What happens if someone took a shine to your boat and then you weren’t up here for a month or so? They’d be long gone.”
“That sort of thing happens?” Julia knew she looked shocked.
“It can happen. Not often, but not rare either. That’s a big chunk of money invested in something that’s easily portable. Okay, you can insure it, and we’d recommend that anyway.”
“I guess I’d have to leave it in the water then.”
Once again Chris shook his head. “Not a good idea either. It can get cold up here in January. The lake don’t ice over every year, but about one in three. If that ice is thick, just a boat pushing through the ice fifty yards out could push a slab of ice through the side of your boat like a knife through butter.” He shrugged. “Nobody here, nobody to salvage it, it’d be a write-off.”
She could feel Max almost slumping next to her as if Chris had just cut off his dream. She felt she had to step in. “Well, seeing as you’re here to sell us a boat…” She chuckled and Chris nodded “…you clearly have a solution to that problem.”
“For people like yourselves, we offer a secure environment at the marina to store your boat when you’re not using it. Only authorized people are allowed in, the whole thing is CCTV monitored, and it’s a fenced compound. You saw it yesterday. Then we can throw in an additional service. As long as you give us twenty-four hours’ notice, we’ll deliver your boat back here the morning you’re due to arrive, and put her in the water for you, tie her up and she’s ready to go. We’
ll collect her afterward and put her back in the compound.”
Both Julia and Max fell silent and looked at each other. It was Max who finally responded to Chris. “I suppose that solves those problems, but I guess that level of service costs quite a lot of money.”
Chris shook his head. “Not as much as you might think. It has two huge advantages as well.”
“It does?”
“Yep. Firstly, because your boat is stored in a secure compound, your insurance costs will be about half, and secondly, we’ll maintain the boat for you. Keep it in perfect order, and service the motor as well. In fact, we also keep the fuel and water tanks topped up. All you have to do is turn up and sail her.”
“Okay, so how much does it cost?”
“Well, annual insurance for keeping the boat next to the cabin would be close to a thou a year. Previous owners of this boat kept it in my yard. Their insurance cost was just under six hundred. We’d charge you the difference for the storage and, say, thirty dollars a time to ferry and launch then recover the boat each time, and about two hundred for the service and maintenance unless there’s anything major.” He laughed. “As you’ve never owned a boat before, let me tell you, there’s always something major. If it’s not the engine, it’s the propeller, or the hull will spring a leak, or the sails need replacing. All told, I’d say you’d be looking at the best part of fifteen hundred a year, plus the insurance. Sorry to burst your bubble, but it’s an expensive hobby. You need to know what you’re getting yourselves into.” He finished his coffee and stood up. “Thank you kindly for the coffee. Now do you still want to look at the boat?”
Julia didn’t need to look at Max to know he hadn’t been fazed by Chris’s spiel. Actually, she felt a lot happier with the proposed solution and, having checked things out on the web using her phone, they’d been aware of something like those numbers for themselves. She laughed. “I guess you do it this way round to save having to launch a boat and then recover it for nothing.”
Chris shook his head. “To be honest, sometimes yes, sometimes no. For people who seem to waver more, I tend to do it the other way round—let them get enamored with the boat then hit them with the numbers.”
Max nodded. “So, let’s go and have a look at her.”
Another truck pulled up just as they walked back out the front door—Chris’s crew to launch the boat.
* * * *
Julia stood on the end of the dock, watching as Jim and Liam helped Max pilot the boat out into the lake. They’d both fallen in love with the craft, even before the three men—with Chris driving—had reversed the trailer down the slip and floated her across to the dock. Now, with the engine burbling at the rear, they slowly backed the boat out. She could see Max’s eyes shining as he waved and then swung the wheel over at an instruction from Liam.
“She’s a good sailer. Your husband should be able to manage her just fine.”
“I hope so. He’s wanted one for a while, and now we have the chance…” She stopped before she said too much. It had been increasingly obvious that Max couldn’t contain his excitement about the Sandpiper. It was a bit bigger than she’d expected, but that was better from her point of view. She didn’t fancy going out on nothing more than a rowboat with a sail. This one, at fifteen feet, was slightly shorter than the dock and just looked calm and collected on the water. She hugged herself and watched as Liam and Jim talked Max through the process of raising the sail. A moment later, the burble of the engine cut out and she gasped.
Behind her, Chris chuckled. “They switched it off. Don’t run with both sail and engine. There’s a speed limit out there with the engine running.”
“Why?”
“The wake erodes the shore, especially on the far side, where it’s not so built up. There’s a ranger who lives on the shore too, and he’s out and about on the lake in summer. Not a good idea to cross Mike—he writes a mean ticket. His uncle’s the local judge so you don’t get no sympathy much if you challenge it.”
“Ah, right.”
“You’re okay under sail—not so much wake.”
“I see.”
They stood in silence on the gently bobbing dock as the sail inched its way up the mask. She could see Max winding a winch as hard as he could.
“A Sandpiper can be worked single-handedly, but if it’s a problem you can always install a motorized winch. To be honest, most of the fun of sailing is in controlling the sail, and the motor don’t give the same feel.”
The sail reached the top of the mast, and Max sat back on his haunches. Even from fifty yards away she could see he was sweating and out of breath. Nevertheless, he was grinning from ear to ear as he listened to Liam giving him some more instructions. He played out another rope and the sail slowly swung out. A moment later, it caught the wind with a hollow boom. Julia once more gasped, then watched in awe as the boat swung around and the stern seemed to settle a little in the water. From fifty yards away, it was quickly seventy-five and then a hundred, gaining speed. Max turned and waved again and then turned back to face the front. The boat seemed to shrink as it sped out toward the middle of the lake.
“Well, from the look on his face, I guess it’s pretty obvious your husband is sold on the boat.”
She nodded. “I think you’re right.”
“I’m surprised you didn’t want to go out there too.”
She shook her head. “No. My husband is an engineer, he likes to fiddle with things, work out how everything works. I’ll let him get all that out of his system before I go out with him.”
“I kinda understand where you’re coming from. I guess that gives us a chance to go over the paperwork. I think you mentioned yesterday you were the purchaser here.”
She turned to look at him. “That’s right.” She looked over her shoulder. The boat seemed a lot further away already. “I guess they’ll be a while.”
“We usually say two hours for a familiarization class.” He laughed. “Longer if your husband really wants to test everything on the boat. Don’t worry. These kind of trips are like a break for my guys. Normally they’re either teaching crowds of holidaymakers in little Swifts, which can be a nightmare, or painting hulls.”
“And you?”
“For me, I get to do what I love—selling boats to people who really want to own them.”
“If the price is right.”
“But of course.”
“So how about another coffee while we talk about that?”
“Best idea I’ve heard all day.”
He stepped off the dock onto terra firma and stood to one side, letting her lead him back to the cabin. It had been a little cooler down by the water’s edge and that slight chill had hardened her nipples. At least with him walking behind that wouldn’t be obvious to him. She was sure, though, that he’d noticed them a few seconds ago. No doubt his eyes would be on her ass swinging from side to side as they walked up the garden path. She put a little extra into her walk, in the hope it would give her a slight advantage in the negotiations.
* * * *
Julia sighed as she looked at the set of figures Chris presented her with. It wasn’t as much as she’d expected after his earlier spiel, but at the same time, it was higher than the figure she and Max had agreed as a budget.
Despite the boat being over twenty years old, Chris still insisted the 1990 Marshall Sandpiper was worth more than the eleven thousand dollar asking price.
When two thousand dollars for the Yamaha motor was added in, and another thousand for the trailer, the total was already over their agreed twelve thousand five hundred dollar budget. Given Chris wanted money for keeping it in his yard, maintaining it as well as delivering the boat and fetching it back, the whole thing was getting expensive. Factoring in the insurance just pushed it over the top.
She hated to disappoint Max, and she knew they actually had the money to pay top dollar. That didn’t mean she intended to. When they’d walked into the Lexus dealership and boldly stated they wanted not one but two
brand new cars, she’d been surprised just how hard Max had bargained for them. He’d expect her to do the same.
She looked up at Chris, knowing it was time to play hardball. “So that’s your first price. How low are you prepared to go?”
He laughed. “No, lady, it’s not like that at all. That’s my price for the boat. Remember, I’m brokering this for someone else. They have a floor price and I’m contractually bound not to drop below that.”
She smiled back at him. “Chris, we both know your opening price is not your floor price. So, give me the floor price, and if that’s still too high, give me the owner’s number and I’ll call them myself and make an offer.”
He rocked back. She guessed she was playing a little harder hardball than he’d anticipated. He didn’t seem that fazed by her approach, though. “Let me guess. You work in sales?”
She nodded, not intending to elaborate and weaken her hand. Sales admin wasn’t exactly sales, but it wasn’t far off. Julia wasn’t exactly lying.
“Good on you.” He paused. “Okay, I can play with the numbers a little, give you a better deal.”
“Good.”
“Maybe I can come down to ten seven fifty for the hull itself.”
“That’s just chicken feed, nothing more.”
“I have to make a margin too.”
“And you’re also raking in a commission for selling it, so I’d see the boat at no more than ten.”
“I can’t come down that far. As I said, I have a floor price.”
“Come down to your floor price, and give me their number. I’ll call them, right here, right now.”
“You really do know how to play hardball, don’t you?”
“Yes, I do. Now, there’s the question of the motor. I see it’s actually ten years old, so may only have another five years on it.”
“They last a bit longer than that.”
“According to the average on the web, it’s about fifteen to twenty years.”
“But if it’s properly maintained and you only use it occasionally, they’ll run for upward of thirty. Remember, these are marine engines—they’re built to run in the wet. Far more so than that car engine you’ve got out there.”
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