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Everything she does mesmerizes me. From the way she curses to the slight smile she makes when I touch her just right—that’s how I know something feels extra good. Not the big gasps or the loud moans. It’s that little smile. Took me a while to sort it out, but that’s why I love to watch her face.
There is nothing else like knowing the woman I love is feeling good because of something I’m doing to her. It’s heady and addictive. When she bucks under me, whimpering and shaking, I am entranced by every sound and sight. Each one is something to savor. As her body tenses, I kiss her so her screams and sighs will forever echo in my mind. I want all of Autumn, whatever she will give me.
When she’s trembling in my arms, I hold her close until she stills again. I want to come, but I want her there with me when I do, and right after she comes, she’s no longer present. But she gives me that little smile again, and I know she’s back. She reaches up and touches my cheek. “I love you, Rowan.”
“I love you too, Autumn.”
She bites her lip and rocks herself under me, slowly at first. But I can’t hold back any longer. I need her. She rides me from underneath, giving as good as she gets. Pleasure becomes an undeniable scorching tide, coming to wash me away. I pant, “Close—
“Yes,” she groans as her body stiffens up again.
Knowing she’s close as well knocks me over the edge. I wrap myself around her and come in a roar. My body uncontrollably jerks into Autumn, taking me to new heights as she comes, too.
We pant in each other’s faces until we lay next to each other, wrapped up in cool sheets and one another for the heat of the afternoon. She laces her fingers with mine, and I whisper, “Goodnight, princess,” and fall asleep to her giggles.
29
Parker
The ocean is the only place where the world makes sense.
The tides come in, the tides go out. It’s storming, or it’s not. There’s a black and white simplicity to sea life that speaks to me. Everything else is ephemeral and gray.
As a charter yacht captain, I take people out on the water. We do whatever they hired us to do—usually fishing—and then I take them back. A lot of clients see it as an escape from the normal, and I could not agree more. Life is hard enough without the complexities of modern life.
Salt and seabird shrieks fill the breeze, while my crew readies the yacht for our trip to Bermuda. I scroll through the checklist, musing to myself. Another day, another person charters my boat. These particular clients aren’t weekend fishermen like most of them. They’re sightseers from the city, looking for a little rest and relaxation someplace beautiful for their fifteenth wedding anniversary. It’ll be a longer journey than most of our trips, but the length has its benefits.
We will be gone for two weeks, which means we will have plenty of time to spend in Bermuda ourselves, and I’ve always loved the area. Like many islands, Bermuda has a particularly chill vibe but it also has a strong sailing culture.
Another benefit is booking the yacht for that long earns the crew a hefty commission. Plus, it’s easier to plan for one trip, rather than the four or five that I would normally take in the two-week span. And two weeks out on the water is always better than two weeks in on the land.
Today is a good day.
My brother Rowan and his girlfriend, Autumn, walk hand in hand down the nearby dock to one of the other company yachts. Not that I have ever said it out loud to anyone, but even with his first wife, I have never seen him so happy. Stacy was a great person, and her passing was tragic, to be sure. But Rowan and Stacy never clicked as much as he does with Autumn.
Now, he seems more at ease, and I am glad to see it. He laughs a lot more these days. Rowan works hard between his fifty-hour weeks and two young children. He’s a good guy. He deserves all the happiness. Autumn is a catch and very down to Earth. I’d thought they would be right together, even when they were just best friends. They always meshed well.
But no one in the family ever listens to me when I tell them things like that. I’m just the baby brother who had to come along and ruin things for my three older siblings. As the family black sheep, I’ve never had much in common with my family.
String quartets play Vivaldi at their formal weddings, and they eat chef-prepared meals. I listen to zydeco and eat tacos over the kitchen sink. Not that I don’t appreciate my family’s culture—I do—but I’d rather have a good time than worry about impressing anyone.
When we were boys, the six-year age difference between me and Sawyer meant we had nothing in common, and that has not changed as the decades pass. We’ve never had cause to clash over me doing my own thing. Since he recently got married to Willow, he’s around even less than before.
Brooks is the second oldest, and he has a preoccupation with wealth and status that I’ve never understood. He likes to have the newest of everything, expensive cars, and sharp tailored suits. Not that there’s anything wrong with enjoying nice things. It’s merely that none of that is a priority in my life. I hate that I missed his proposal to Zoe at our last family clambake, but I’ll be damned if I’m missing his wedding.
Rowan is the most mature of us, which is not a condition I suffer from. He is nearest to me in age, but he got married right out of college and started his family, whereas I float from woman to woman, still searching for something that feels right. There’s no way Rowan is not heading down the aisle with Autumn at some point.
I don’t judge my brothers for differing from me, though I can’t say it’s mutual. They all work long hours. The three of them like to get together on the weekends sometimes, and since most people charter on the weekends, I don’t get to see my family as much as I’d like to. When I do, there are usually a few looks of, “Oh,heshowed up.” They think I don’t know, but I know. It makes coming to our family home feel like I’m invading it.
My brothers used to joke that they swapped me at birth. It doesn’t help that Mom always calls me her very special boy, singling me out. I know she means well, but it’s always bugged my brothers, which worsened our relationship as we got older. I wasn’t the tagalong baby brother—I was the weird baby brother who tried and failed to avoid getting picked on.
I’ve gotten used to it over the years, but differing from the rest of the family still grates on me now and then. The one thing we all have in common besides our family name is our family’s yacht club, where we each have an office. The Somerset Harbor Yacht Club was our family’s first business, so it remains the anchor for the rest of the Cargill Group.
I’ve always done my own thing and the thought of working in an office gives me hives. The sea has always been in my blood, more so than my brothers. I had meandered from job to job for a little while before I started this up. It doesn’t pay well but it keeps me out on the water and I don’t need much when I’m alone at sea for weeks and months at a time.
I cannot imagine a better career for myself. Boats are freedom manifested. Win-win. Dad raised us on the yachts, working from bow to stern. There has always been a standing invitation to take over the Somerset Harbor charter business but I wanted to make my own living on my own terms.
Before me, the guy who ran the charter service had embezzled a lot of money from the company, and it took a long time to sort out what he had done. When I came on board to run it, the family breathed a collective sigh of relief. Which also has something to do with why I said yes.
