Going With The Winds

Chapter Ten

Jake

Jim gave me a bemused look as I rejoined him by the wheel.

“Don’t say it.”

His lips curled into further amusement, if anything. “What?”

I snorted.

He chuckled but grabbed me by my shoulder, pulling me in beside him. “Hey, I know how it is when you're getting off regularly, and then you're not. You know it’s always the married guys away from their spouses that can’t help cheating almost right away. Guys who have been alone are used to their favorite hand. You just split up with Dan, right? How long since you had sex?”

“Just a few days.”

He was silent for a moment. “You had sex a few days ago but are splitting up?”

I sighed, debating whether to say more. On the face of it, it did sound a bit nuts, I had to admit.

“Let me see if I can explain it all in a nutshell.” I paused for a bit to gather my thoughts. Jim waited. He was patient that way, which was something I valued highly in such a good friend.

“Ok, basically, both of us went too far over the line into temptation with other men. That led to a split up because Dan actually fell for someone else, who, it turned out was scamming him. He and I got back together, but for Dan it was like the old boundaries didn’t apply. He’s fallen for another guy, and it was clear I was coming in second or maybe even third in our home. Our marriage didn’t seem like… well, like it meant anything. I mean I am not against an open marriage, if that’s what he wanted, and it seemed like he did. But it was almost like I wasn’t on his radar anymore, and I just couldn’t deal with that.”

“You didn’t feel respected.” Jim said, quietly.

“Well…” I said, not so sure that was it.

Jim shook his head. “Jake, I’ve known you a while now. You can put up with a lot. Sometimes I think you let things get out of control, because you have too much patience with bull shit, some of it your own.” He gave me a look that referred to my almost full-on tryst with that sexy fuck, Lawrence only a handful of hours before.

“But one thing you never tolerate is allowing others to disrespect you. Now, come on, Jake, from all you've told me, how is what Dan did respecting you and your marriage?”

I found myself wanting to defend Dan, but even though my mouth flapped around searching for a word, anything, nothing came to mind. Instead, I just nodded and looked ahead. The entrance to the C&D canal was coming up. It was getting on toward four in the afternoon. The strong wind from earlier had lightened up to a steady breeze and we were under full sail to maintain a nice clip at around nine knots. Up ahead a medium sized freighter was pulling into the canal.

I took a moment to check out position before saying, “We’ll follow that ship through the canal, and we should emerge out the other side within three hours and make it down the Delaware River into the Chesapeake by nightfall. Just another short night sail before pulling into Still Pond. Tomorrow we’ll head down to Annapolis and look around for a secure anchorage to ride out the Hurricane.”

“Still tracking this way,” Jim asked me.

“Yup.” I had cued into the radar map for the East Coast. “It's almost parallel to North Cuba and the Florida Keys, and on an angle to slide right up the East Coast. Unless it changes it will be ripping up the Chesapeake and Delaware bays over the next week. I do NOT want to be on the Atlantic seaboard when that happens. We can lay low either deep in Annapolis at dock or up the Severn River. The Severn’s high banks should be great protection for anything but a waterspout taking direct aim up that river.”

“What about tucked into the Maryland Eastern shore, like maybe at St. Michaels?” Jim asked me.

“Possibly. I’ll know more when we see if it’s tracked a bit more clearly.”

Jim just nodded. Should I rouse the crew to take sails?”

“Yup.”

Jim growled, “Aye, aye, Sir,” and then slapped my ass.

“Hey show some respect.” I muttered and he guffawed as he headed down and forward to get the crew together. I remembered Kieth had been massaging crew the passengers by turns through the afternoon, some of them, like Kent, getting far more than mere massages.

Jim didn’t seem to mind his partner’s sexual shenanigan’s. Maybe that was the kind of relationship to be in, I thought. No expectations of monogamy, just a promise to hold each other as the number one guy in our lives.

Was that something I could have done with Dan? Yeah, maybe. But then could he have done that with me… with Kean around?

Kean shared Dan’s business sense, was his partner in work and play too, sharing Dan’s love for art and music, not that I didn’t. I liked an occasional appreciation for such things. Hell, I loved playing a great symphony while sailing, letting the music turn into a beautiful soundtrack for the sea. But it was more like Dan had had to drag me to concerts, more than I really wanted to go. That was ok. We didn’t have to share every damn thing. But Kean did. And they had fallen in love, besides. It was no mere affair, not like what Dan had had with Dean.

Dean had been a mere affair. Dan had fallen for Dean, but not like he was for Kean. (funny how similar their names were, and their jobs working with Dan.) But Kean was like the responsible, honest version of Dean. Yeah, I sort of resented the way he had horned in on my man, but Dan hadn’t made Kean work for it, had he?

As the crew came on deck, including Keith, all of them in warm clothing to face the cold late day, I jerked myself out of my thoughts.

“Strike the genoa, the number one, leave the storm jib, and take down the fore, main and mizzen sails. We’ll go under engine power through the canal.”

The C&D canal had some mild bens and turns. With the occasional freighter or even small tankers squeezing through it, I didn’t like dealing with whatever maneuvers or avoidance we might have to deal with, with sails interfering with lines of sight. The electric jet twin engines would keep us moving along at a steady six knots, and with that freighter ahead leading the way, we were less likely to be jammed by some even larger vessel in the canal.

The crew got busy under Jim’s watchful eyes and supervision, and within moments we were moving along under bare poles, with only the storm jib flying forward to add to the headway the engines were giving us.

It took me a moment to realize we had not four but five crew working, with a new platinum blond pitching in with the sheet lines, the roller furl lines, securing the three clubbed fore main and mizzen sails down into their roller furl booms.

That modern rigging was almost entirely roller furl, with new fat semi hollow masts equipped inside with furling rods. The whole rig my hearty approval. No longer did you need a bunch of bungy cords to control furled sails. The sails could be deployed or retracted to any point along the booms, as they were rolled up within each mast. The whole system was absurdly neat and easy compared to the old style of reefing or furling. It was all neatly tucked and rolled away. Add in the electric winches, a not so new technology, all if controllable by the ship's computer, made it so a vessel over a hundred feet in length with three masts and with all stay sails and jibs through genny flying, could all be handled by a small crew. In fact, at a stretch, I could single hand “Enchanter” all by myself if I had to, as all lines and sheets rang back to blocks set on the forward corners of the Helm deck rig control boards. Those boards were set on a carbon alloy steel bridge arch that supported the forward edge of the Helm station.

What I could NOT do was handle her with anyone else aboard who was not a trained crew. Keeping passengers safe, and served, were all part of the job. It was probably the main reason we had this crew, essentially at a ratio of one crew per passenger if one included Jim and myself.

And it was also, I reminded myself, sternly, why I had to keep my hands off passengers who were owned by jealous husbands, no matter how seductive they were, or how horny I was.

As my eyes wandered over the guys as they neatly struck the sails, I took note of the fact that Cass seemed to either know what he was about, or at least caught on damn quick. Beautiful, sexy, and even. if not to my usual taste as I tended to gravitate toward dark haired guys, he had an appeal that was downright striking and hard to look away from.

Not for the first time that day, i found my-self regretting getting on his bad side. For someone, who, as Jim said, demanded respect, I sure hadn’t given any to Cass. He deserved his own chance without any skeptical assumptions made by me, much less actually expressed to him.

Shit! I had really been a dick, hadn’t I? Looking back, I could see maybe I had more issues related to my marriage falling apart than I was realizing. But whatever the case with that, I better get my head in gear and keep my damn dick in my pants until I knew better what the hell and who the hell, I am using it with and why. Maybe this wasn’t the frigging military, but that didn’t mean I could just treat these passengers or crew like my fuck toys. Hah, as if the ship's owner, Marty Hill would let me get away with that for more than a split second.

As the guys finished striking the sails and Jim dismissed them to break out cocktails and appetizers for the passengers to be enjoyed in the salon, Cass looked back towards me. The sun was low in the sky, but I caught the flash of those beautiful blue eyes.

I gave him a nod and a thumbs up.

He looked around as if wondering who I was doing that to, but then, seemed to realize it was him. He nodded back, and I saw something like a gleam of a smile, short lived, before he went below to the open-air cock pit lounge area and from there into the salon cabin amidships.

At least I hoped that had been a smile. It hardly been anything. But whatever it was, maybe it was something.

Whatever it was, I fully intended to give him the respect he was due and more, from here on in. It was time to get my shit together, put my skipper’s hat on, stick to my fucking business, and be a professional, about it, dammit.

Cass

The ship was on even keel, only a slight slant to the way of things, that I figured had to be from the storm jib. It was hardly noticeable at all. I wondered if I might take the time to enjoy the wall mounted solo flex gym that was set up in the space just forward of the owner's stateroom aft. Maybe I would later, to work off dinner.

I’d had fun with the activity of helping the guys strike the sails, learning how the winches worked, particularly seeing how the fore main and mizzen sails were furled right up into the masts. Gone were the tie downs, and all the extraneous chords you found on older yachts I had seen in my uncle’s marina. You had "in haul" lines which pulled rolled the sails into the masts, "out hauls", which pulled them out along the boom tracks, both of which allowed you to reef the sails at any point, choosing just how much sail to have exposed to the wind. I’d learned how to open or close the blocks, so one could pull on the inhaul or out hauls, or the halyards, depending on your station.

Levring, the really hot red head had taken some extra time to get me two books from his cabin, one on sailing knots, and the other on basic seamanship, both of which I intended to read and practice up with.

Maybe the best part had been having the skipper give me a thumbs up as we were sent below to see to the passengers and get them cocktails. At least I think that had been to me. No one else seemed to notice, anyway.  

Like the others, I took the time to change out of jeans and the heavy shirt and sweatshirt I wore for the crew work on deck, and into some form hugging white knit boxers, and pulled on a zip fronted hoodie I could leave unzipped. Below decks the ship cabin works were warm. Debating a bit, I decided to pull the shorts down and slip on a stretchy tennis wrist band over my balls and cock as a cock ring. It was much more comfortable than the usual but did the same job of maintaining that blood filled heavy feeling as well as thrusting out my goodies to make an extra nice showing. Yes, I was feeling horny, and didn’t care who knew it.

I was about to leave the cabin when the door slid aside, and Alajandro stepped in wearing nothing but towel and a smile.

“Well, hello. What have you been up to, handsome?” I teased.

“Caro Mio, whatever do you mean?” He shrugged, with an exaggeratedly innocent expression.

I gestured to the towel, and he tossed his handsome head, nose in the air. “Only a workout, annnnd …a shower with Mr. Lawton. We assisted each other with the workings of our muscles.”

“Ohhh myyyy.” I drew out, jaw hanging open on purpose. It had been pretty clear all afternoon that the two of them were headed for more than law education talk.

Alejandro giggled, smirking, and winked. “He is not as big as you are down there, but plenty big enough, and oh so good. These older ones, you know they know what they are doing.”

Just for a moment I felt a twist of a knot in my gut, the small jealous twinge, but… I knew it was really just envy. I loved Al, but we had decided long ago we were more good friends than anything serious.

As if reading my mind, or maybe my face… I hoped I hadn’t given that away he snapped my ass with his towel. “Don’t you worry, sexy, I won’t leave you to be alone in your bed, all by your self. I have plenty for more than one.”

I rolled my eyes. “Hah, you don’t have to tell me that. If I didn’t have to insist on us getting some sleep, we’d be going at it all day and all night. Your insatiable.”

He sighed and moved in, kissing my nose. “You know me too well. Besides… I know better than to move in with him. He will think I am after his money, or something, becoming… too clingy. I told him, you and I were very much in love, but as friends who were more than friends but not, how you say, committed.” He winked. “I didn’t want to move too fast.”

“I’d say you moved pretty fast.”

“I let him move fast. There is difference.”

I looked at Alejandro and he looked at me, before we cracked up laughing.

“Did he fuck you?” I finally asked once I got control of myself.

Alejandro gasped with mock outrage. “Of course not! How could you think such a thing? I have my boundaries. I told him I could not let him fuck me… until you approved, of course.”

“Me!” I gawped at him. “Why did you put ME between you two?”

He looked at me. “Well, why not? Anyway, I needed a reason, and you seemed like a good one.”

I just stared at him, shaking my head, while Alejandro looked calmly back at me, as if wondering why I was making such a fuss.

“Well hurry up and get dressed… unless you need more of a shower to clean out.”

We did not fuck!” Alejandro insisted, glaring at me. His eyes, however, held that twinkle that told me he was in high good spirits, like a cat who got the cream.

“Ok, ok, but they are having cocktails and serving dinner while we motor through the canal. You should get dressed.” I told him.

“Motor? I don’t hear any motors.”

“Waterjets. They are very quiet. You don’t hear that soft whine? That’s the electric turbines spinning,” I said, knowledgably. Hah, I hardly knew anything about electric motors.

“Ohhh, yes, si, I do, now you say it. Ok, I will not be long. But I must dry more and brush my hair. What should I wear?”

“Get comfortable. I am.” I said, shrugging. I caught him ogling my crotch and grinned inwardly.

“By the way, just a word of advice about your lawyer, Will. While we were cuddling earlier in the cockpit, and Will Lawton was talking to Jake, back by the wheel and I don't know but it seemed like he was really into Jake.”

“So, who is not into Jake?” Alejandro countered with a shrug.

“Me!” I said hotly and instantly regretted it as Alejandro’s dark eyes lit on me, the fucker.

“Oh Caro, what is wrong?” He said quietly, eyes intent on me, and I could feel myself flushing.

“Nothing.”

“Not nothing. Come now, out with it.” My friend was on me pulling me in and hugging me, smelling clean and fresh and wonderful.

“Oh, just, Jake seems to think, I don’t know, like I had some ulterior motive for getting aboard here, like as if I was chasing him, and he let me know he wasn’t having it. It was insulting.”

Alejandro stiffened, radiating his fury for me into my body, as he fumed into my ear. “That bitch! I will kick him in his very big, sexy, big, bulge!”

Ok, I tried. I really tried, in the ensuing silence, to stay insulted and mad. But it was too much like cuming with a big cock pressing one’s prostate, the need to release rising like an unstoppable tide.

Exploding with laughter, I ended up on my back on my bunk giggling as Alejandro kissed me all over, particularly all over my swelling cock through my cock hugging boxers.

I felt much better after that. While he went about dressing, brushing his hair, I left to go see what was up in the salon, ready to face my fellow ship mates with a big smile on my face.

I wasn’t thinking about Jake. I was thinking about Alejandro, and what a wonderful friend he was. Whatever happened with this cruise, I wanted to keep Alejandro in my life. Friends like that were too wonderful ever to lose.