Dalt
“Wow. Whose is this?” Nikki stands on the dock gaping up at my sailboat.
“It’s mine. Did you think we were hijacking a boat?” Laughing, I climb aboard my thirty-foot Oceanis.
“Yours? Are you kidding me?”
She’s too damn cute standing there in those tiny gym shorts I love, black Tom and Jerry tank top, with the army surplus backpack she bought in a thrift store two years ago when we were together slung over one shoulder. Her hair is pulled up in a ponytail and the excited expression lighting up her face makes me want to skip the sailing, take her below, and shimmy her out of those shorts to show her how exciting the interior of this boat can be.
“Nope. Not kidding. She’s all mine. Can you hand me the cooler with the food?” When I brought Nikki back to her house to change her clothes, I remembered Dak still had a set of keys to my house on his keychain on a table next to Nikki’s front door. I used it to get into my house, change into swim trunks, and fill a cooler with some food for us. The refrigerator on the boat is already stocked with drinks.
“Food? Are we running away?” She hoists the cooler and her backpack up to me.
“Not exactly. I just thought we could take that camping trip out to the island we never got to take.”
“Camping trip?” She shades her eyes from the sun with the palm of her hand. “I told you I have to go back to the farm tomorrow. Remember?”
“I remember. But it still gives us all night tonight. Right? Or we can just have a picnic on the island and head back before it gets dark. Whatever you want. So, you coming aboard or you afraid Captain Jack here is going to pirate you away?”
She’s still standing on the dock, shielding her eyes from the sun and staring at me like I’ve lost my mind.
“You own a sailboat? I don’t think I can be with you after all, pretty boy. First a Maserati, then I find out you’re richer than Croesus, and now this.” She laughs as she climbs on board.
“I’ll give it all away to charity if you promise to stay in my life, soccer girl.” I turn on the engine to warm it up before we cast off.
“Maybe you can just keep the boat…for now.” She smiles. “When did you get this beauty?”
“Um…right after you left me. It was my refuge. Someplace to get away and think about everything, or not think about everything. It’s peaceful out here. It quiets the mind.”
Nikki walks around and explores the boat. She takes a few steps below deck to drop her backpack.
“You sailed her alone?” she asks, coming back up on deck but keeping her eyes pinned to the cabin below. I know by the tone of her voice exactly what she’s thinking when she sees the elaborate layout of the cabin, especially the plump, cushy white sofa benches. Wait till she gets a load of the bedrooms.
I know it’s a dick thing to do but I can’t resist stringing her along just a little. I mean, come on. As much as I love her, this girl had me strung out for two years. A minute of innocent retaliation can’t hurt.
“No. Not always,” I answer in a slow, taunting tone.
“Oh…right. You obviously have all the comforts of home down there. You could probably stay out here for days. Secluded, lots of privacy, no one to bother you and…whoever.” She’s still staring down below deck when I come up behind her and wrap my arms around her waist, causing her to jump in surprise.
“It is well stocked with provisions to spend days out here.” I kiss the soft skin behind her ear. “And it is very secluded, private and…”—I trail kisses down the length of her neck—“…the beds are pretty comfortable.”
She trembles in my arms. I love how I can make her respond like this.
“Hmmph. Your own floating lair of sin. How nice for you,” she jeers and twists around to face me. “On second thought, it’s probably better if I leave today to go home. I have a lot to do.” She tries to push out of my arms.
“Nik, baby. Stop.” I can’t hold back the chuckle, which I can see is getting her even angrier.
“Let go of me and don’t call me baby.” She punches my shoulder.
I close my hand over her fist. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t help myself. I’m just messing with you. I have never had another girl out here, just the guys.”
“You haven’t?”
“Nope.”
“Not ever?” she asks in a relieved tone while running her hands down my chest. If they move down one more inch my cock has decreed there will be no sailing today.
“Not ever.” I tilt my head to kiss her.
“You’re such an asshole!” She punches me again.
“Ow.” It doesn’t hurt but I pretend it does and try to hold back the grin, because I can’t deny I like that she’s feeling territorial and jealous. “Sorry, babe.” I continue to place kisses all over her face and neck. “Please forgive me. Just couldn’t resist teasing you a little.”
“That was mean.” She pouts, but I feel her melting into my arms.
“We better get on the water or I’m going to have to give you a personal tour of my sleeping quarters and then this boat won’t be leaving dock today.”
“Sailing first, then surfing,” she draws out the word and grinds her hips into my obvious erection, making my cock twitch in anticipation.
I let out a hungry growl and she giggles. I suppose I deserve her reciprocal teasing in payback for what I just did to her. Whose stupid idea was it to go sailing when I could have her underneath me right now?
“Come on. You take the helm. I’ll get the bow and stern lines,” she directs and pushes out of my arms.
It takes me a minute to get my thoughts back up to the head on my shoulders.
“Wait, you know how to sail?”
“Duh. I grew up in Maine, hockey boy,” she mocks, one hand placed on her hip, her lips pursed and quirked to one side. “Learning to sail is like learning to walk.” She gives me a slight grin.
Why is it every expression this girl makes is like a work of art for my eyes and a catalyst for my dick?
“Uh. Helllooo, Walker. You in there? You going to take the helm or you want me to?”
“Huh? No, I got it.”
I wait for Nikki to release the lines and I move the boat forward away from the dock and out into the harbor. I keep it under engine power until we get out into open water. Nikki is sitting on the bench seat to the left of me and the whole time we’re cruising out into Frenchman Bay I can’t take my eyes off her. I’ve dreamt of this scenario so many times in the past few months, I can’t wrap my head around it now. She’s real and she’s here.
Damn. She’s beautiful. If the manufacturer of this boat could see what I see right now, they’d want to use this scene of an angel sailing on one of their boats for an advertising campaign. Watching her face beaming with happiness fills me with an inner peace I haven’t felt since we were together. I’ll never let anything take the joy out of her eyes or the happiness out of our lives again.
“You’re staring at me, hockey boy.” She tilts her head and the corners of her mouth tip up slightly.
“Just thinking how beautiful it is out here and what a perfect day it is.”
She knows I’m totally bullshitting about the thoughts running through my head. She can read the longing in my eyes like a book. But besides being with the only person in the world I want to be with right now, it is a perfect day for sailing around the lush green islands off the coast.
It’s unusually warm for this time of year. April weather in Maine can change in a blink of an eye. One minute a chilly forty degrees, and eighty the next, which is about where it is today. The cool wind coming across the ocean is keeping it a comfortable temperature.
“I thought we could sail around the bay before we dock at Stave Island. You good with that?”
“I’m more than good with that. This is amazing. I haven’t been sailing since high school. One of my friends’ fathers had a boat. I’m remembering how much I miss it.”
“You’re too good to be true, Nik. A girl who likes hockey, sailing, could probably nutmeg Ronaldo on the soccer field, and has an ass and tits like yours. I knew you were my soul mate the minute I saw you.”
“Right. I know exactly what you mean,” she says indifferently. “Remember the time you stripped out of your hockey uniform and stood in front of me naked except for your hockey pads?”
“Hey, that was on your request. I don’t do a hockey strip for just anyone, you know.” I laugh at the ridiculous memory. I have to admit though, it got Nikki so hot and bothered she dropped to her knees right in front of me and gave me a blow job which, on a scale of one to ten had to be about a ten thousand. Hmmm. Maybe I should get my gear out when we get back home.
“No. It was totally hot. I’m just sayin’, when I saw you like that I said to myself, ‘O-M-G I’m gonna marry this cock. He’s totally my soul mate,’” she says in her best Valley Girl imitation and then slants her pursed lips to one side.
“Har har. Very funny, Bud.”
“What? You’re not the only one who can find their soul mate based upon the objectification of the person’s body.”
“I’m not complaining. Objectify away. If you want to stay with me based solely on the size of my cock I’m completely down with that. Just as long as you stay with me.” I give her a devilish wink.
“Ugh,” she groans. “You’re a complete cave man.”
“Yeah, but I’m your complete cave man.” I laugh. “You ready to hoist the sails, soccer girl?”
“Aye, aye, Cap’n.” Nikki salutes and moves to the halyard to pull up the main sail, cinches it with the winch, and then cleats it off. Then she does the same with the jib. The way she maneuvers the sails it’s like she was born on a sailboat.
We tack around the harbor, me at the helm, Nikki at the sails. As I take in the sight of her working the sails and the environment around us I heave a sigh of relief. The hell I’ve been living the past months without her is gone. Everything about her and this day is heaven.