Chapter 66: La Valencia

We drove into the little town of North Palmetto Point and found the rental office. I parked and we went inside. A little bell rang when we pushed open the door, and a tall and slim black man came out from the back. He was wearing lightweight slacks and a polo shirt and sandals. “Can I help you?” he asked.

“I certainly hope so. We’re Carl and Marilyn Buckman. We’re supposed to have a reservation for the next week. La Valencia?” I responded.

The man relaxed and smiled. “Yes, please come in. Welcome!” He came towards us and shook our hands when we met. “My name is Jonathan Finch and I’m the resort concierge. La Valencia is only a few minutes from here. Let me get the keys, and you can follow me out there.” Mister Finch spoke with a distinct English accent, but I could hear the sing-song cadence of the islands in his voice. He went into the back again and then came out with a set of keys and some papers. “Just follow me. We can do all the paperwork out there.”

We followed him out of the office and got back in our rental car. It wasn’t five minutes later when we were driving down a long driveway towards the beach. He parked and we parked behind him.

Well, it was simply gorgeous! It was done in a Spanish style. The place looked immense, and we could hear the surf from the far side of the building. It wasn’t clear to me if it had been a private home that had been converted to a resort or was custom built as a high-end resort, but it simply looked unbelievable. There was supposed to be a staff, but whether they were full time or part time wasn’t clear either. Either way, just standing there in the sunshine, it made me think this was precisely what I had asked Taylor to find for us!

Finch came over to us and said, “Let me have your keys. I’ll see that your luggage is put in the master suite. Will that be satisfactory?”

“Certainly. Thank you.” I handed him the car keys and let Finch lead the way. I took my wife’s hand and we walked up the path to the house.

Once inside, Finch motioned for us to stay in the foyer, and he stepped into another room, and I could hear him speaking to someone, and then he came back out. “One of the groundsmen will be along in a moment to unload your car. Here, let me show you the master suite.”

It was almost too much to take in at once. The foyer led into the living room and dining room combination, which was bright and airy, with tile floors and twelve-foot ceilings, and a variety of wicker furniture with cushions. It looked to be roughly the size of our entire town house! Down a short hallway to one side was the master suite, which was quite large, with a gargantuan four poster bed in the center, and plenty of dressers and cabinets. This room had a master bathroom that was simply sybaritic in detail, with a whirlpool tub, a shower large enough for both Marilyn and I and all our closest friends, and even a bidet.

“Perhaps you would care to freshen up before I show you around?” suggested Finch.

“Yes, please!” piped up Marilyn. She scooted into the bathroom and closed the door.

I simply nodded agreement and followed the concierge out into the living room again. “When she gets out, I’ll do the same.”

“Of course. Could I offer you something to drink? Coffee? Something harder?”

“Only if you will join us.”

He smiled. “It’s still early in the day, so perhaps just some coffee.”

“Well, you and Marilyn can have coffee, but if possible, I’d prefer tea,” I replied. After all, this place used to belong to the Brits, so maybe they still did tea.

He nodded and went off to the side room again. I just wandered around the room looking at things. When he came out, he said, “Mrs. Wilkes will bring it out in a moment.”

“Mrs. Wilkes?”

“Yes, she’s the caretaker. She’s normally here every morning, Monday thru Friday. I’ll introduce you both to her. Mrs. Wilkes actually runs the place. The rest of us are simply tolerated guests,” he said with a smile.

“I quite understand,” I said, laughing. Marilyn came out at that moment, and I excused myself and went into the bathroom. I simply had to take a leak and wash my face and hands. I noticed, however, that Marilyn had taken her panties off and had tossed them in the corner. I guess after sitting in them, ‘squishing’ as she called it, she preferred going commando after cleaning up.

I returned to the living room to find Finch and Marilyn sitting at the dining room table, as a very large and very black woman served coffee and tea from a tea service and tray. “Tea, sir?” she asked, in a much heavier dialect than Finch had.

“Please, and cream and sugar. Thank you.”

“Yes, sir.” She poured me some tea. “It is Earl Grey, sir.” I nodded my acceptance, and she continued. “I am Mrs. Wilkes. I am the caretaker for La Valencia and supervise the ground staff. I am here in the mornings, until noon, during the week. If there is anything I can do for you, I am normally in the kitchen.” She pointed to a room to the side of the dining area, and I realized that when Finch had gone in search of somebody with our car keys, he must have gone looking for Mrs. Wilkes.

“Thank you.” I glanced at my watch, and it was almost two in the afternoon. “I’m sorry we got here so late. I hope it doesn’t mess up your schedule.”

She waved it off. “No problem, sir, no problem!” She left the service and lumbered back to the kitchen.

I stirred some cream and sugar into my tea. “So, Mister Finch, I’m curious. Is La Valencia an estate used for rental part of the year, or was it designed for rental to begin with? What’s the story about this place?”

He smiled at me. “Well, it’s a little of all of that. The original estate was built back in the Twenties by an Englishman who made his money smuggling rum into Miami during Prohibition.”

I smiled at my wife and the said, “Sounds like my kind of guy!”

Marilyn rolled her eyes. “Spare me!”

I had to laugh at her. Then I told Finch, “Keep going. After Prohibition?”

“Well, Sir Douglas - that was his name - died during the Blitz in the War. His son, an only child, died at Arnhem with the Paras. After that, the government took it over, and for the next twenty years it went through a succession of owners who all tried to turn it into a vacation resort or hotel. The original building was a Victorian monstrosity.”

“Not this place.”

“No, the current owner bought it in the Sixties, and about two weeks later it burned to the ground...”

I laughed at that. “We call that Jewish lightning back in the States.”

He smiled and nodded. “I have heard the term. Well, he built the current structure, along with several others in the area, and designed them specifically as resorts for those individuals seeking something above the normal thing you’d find in Nassau.”

Expensive and high end, in other words. Well, if what we were paying was any indication, it was money well spent, even if the clientele was limited to the rich. “Well, it’s really very nice. What is your job?”

“Well, the title is concierge, but I am really the manager of the various properties for the owners. Still, if you want to do something not here, just call my office and either I or my assistant will make the arrangements.”

I must have looked confused, and I glanced at Marilyn and noticed her brows furrowed as well. “Like what?” she asked.

“Oh, well, say you wanted to go deep sea fishing or snorkeling or set up a dinner party or something. Just call the office and we can help you.”

“Ah.”

He handed me a business card with his name and number on it. “Perhaps you would care to look around the grounds and the resort?”

“Sure thing.” I stood up and Marilyn stood with me. “Who owns the resort now?”

Finch simply smiled. “The staff at la Valencia prides itself on its discretion.”

I shrugged and waved it off. “Just curious.” We followed him through the house. The kitchen, where Mrs. Wilkes was, was large and spotless. There were some basics and staples in the refrigerator and the pantry, but that was about it. She could serve us breakfast and lunch, with an unspecified amount to be tacked onto the bill. Anything after noon, however, would have to be specially ordered. That seemed fine to us, since we planned to go out for dinner.

Beyond the kitchen, were two more bedrooms, each with their own bathroom, although these opened to public spaces. It would be very easy to split the resort into separate apartments; in case you brought a group of people down. Everything was done in white tile, with high ceilings and lots of windows and doors. It was very spacious and open.

Along the back side, facing the Atlantic, the various sections all opened onto a huge veranda and deck, with a swimming pool built in. From there you could walk down through a palm tree forest to the beach, or just wander through the palm trees. The beach was at least a thousand feet long and private, and the property was at least as large as our twenty-five acres back home, and very private. There was a groundskeeper in the morning who cleaned the pool and kept everything running and the grounds neat.

After lunch it would just be Marilyn and me. Hmmmmm...

When we got back to the house, Mrs. Wilkes had already left, as had the groundskeeper, and after inquiring whether we needed anything and signing some papers, Finch left us with a few brochures about island activities and his phone number. Then it was just Marilyn and me. However, before I could get funky with my wife, she said, “What are we doing for lunch?”

My own stomach growled as I contemplated the answer. We smiled at each other. “Maybe you should have asked Mrs. Wilkes before she left.” I led the way into the kitchen.

The kitchen was modern and had just about every appliance known to mankind. In fact, the only drawback that I could see was that it was all electric; my preference was for gas. Regardless, I could work just fine in an electric kitchen. The fridge had the basics - eggs, milk, butter, and the like - so I asked Marilyn, “Omelet?”

“Sure. Anything I can do?”

I grinned. “Get undressed.”

“Carling!” she protested.

“It was worth a try.” I turned away and started searching through the drawers to look for a frying pan or skillet to use. I found a small pan and then went back over to the fridge. “I think it’s just scrambled eggs. No ham or cheese...”

Marilyn was standing there in her high heeled sandals and a smile ... and nothing else! “Is this what you had in mind?”

“Uh, yeah, yeah...” For once my big mouth was speechless. Marilyn just looked amazing. She had lost almost all her baby weight, except for her tits, which were larger. Her pussy was puffy and moist looking. Her legs looked perfect, and you could see where she had been working on her tan. She was now twenty-six, and damn near perfect.

“Well, you did tell me to get undressed, and a wife is supposed to obey her husband, isn’t she?” she asked teasingly.

“I always liked that portion of the vow.”

I pulled the eggs and milk out of the refrigerator and dug out a mixing bowl, all the while trying to keep an eye on her. It got to be a problem when I tried opening the refrigerator door from the wrong side. “Problem?” Marilyn asked.

“Yeah, why don’t you come around over here, so we can talk.”

“Talk? I though you wanted to look.”

“Po-tay-to, po-taht-to.” Marilyn laughed at that and came over, and I lifted her up onto the counter. “Now isn’t that better?”

“Are you going to return the favor the next time I cook?” she asked.

“Aren’t you still under a court order from the Fayetteville Fire Department prohibiting your cooking?”

“Very funny! Maybe I should get dressed and let you cook by yourself?”

I chuckled and leaned in to kiss her on the lips. “I cook better when your oven is hot!”

“You’re disgusting!” she said with a smile.

“Maybe I need to check the oven temperature. I prefer a moist heat, too.”

That earned me a raspberry. Still, Marilyn sat there on the counter, inspiring me, so to speak, as I whipped up some eggs and poured them into a hot buttered skillet. Even better, her pointy little nipples and wet bare pussy made me think she was enjoying her part of the meal. I poured a couple of glasses of milk and set them on the kitchen table, and then split the eggs onto two plates. And then I scraped them off one of the plates onto the other, leaving a pile on a single plate.

“What’re you up to?” asked my wife.

I pulled a chair away from the table and sat down on it. “Come here, take a seat?”

“Oh?” Marilyn hopped down off the counter and came closer. “What did you have in mind?”

I set the plate down on the table at my side, and then pulled her closer. I kept tugging so that Marilyn was forced to sit on my lap, facing me and straddling my legs. “Well, I was thinking...” I forked up some eggs and held them to her lips; Marilyn opened her mouth, and I fed her the eggs. “ ... that if I was feeding you, you’d be free to use your fingers elsewhere.”

Marilyn moved her hands into her lap, between us. A moment later, I felt her fingers tracing across my belt and zipper. “Is this what you had in mind?”

I ate some of the eggs and smiled as I chewed them. After I swallowed them, I answered, “Yeah, I think you’re getting the idea.” I fed her some more eggs, and we traded bites for a bit. After a few minutes, I felt my belt getting loosened. Thankfully, I had adjusted myself before sitting down, so that Carl Junior was pointed north. Just after my zipper was tugged down, Marilyn’s hand slipped inside and began stroking me.

I quickly fed Marilyn and myself the eggs, without even drinking the milk. As soon as I could I set the plate and fork on the table, to put my hands elsewhere. My left hand went around her waist, and down to caress her rear and hold her against me, while my right hand began playing with her tits.

It was Marilyn’s turn to be aroused. Her back arched and I lowered my face to her chest, lifting her breasts up one at a time to begin sucking on her nipples. Marilyn continued to tug on my cock, but her efforts became quite distracted. She pressed her lips against mine, and as our tongues played with each other, I could taste the scrambled eggs again. Marilyn hurriedly unbuttoned my shirt and began rubbing herself against me.

I lifted and Marilyn helped me push my pants down, and then she sank down onto me. “I love you so much,” I whispered to her.

“I love you! I love you! I love you!” she told me. Marilyn was pressing herself against me tightly, her arms wrapped around me as she humped herself up and down on the cock deep inside her. “Fuck me! Fuck me!”

I moved against my wife as she rode me. Her eyes were closed, and a blissfully intense expression suffused her face. When I finally exploded and blasted into her, Marilyn’s back arched again, and she gasped in orgasm.

Afterwards, she sagged down against me. “I love you,” I whispered in her ear.

It took her another couple of minutes to rouse herself, at which point Marilyn climbed off my lap. “I think I need a nap,” she said, holding out a hand to me.

“Dishes can wait.” I got to my feet and kicked off my pants and stripped off my shirt, and then allowed her to lead me to our bedroom. I figured an encore in a more comfortable setting was in order.

We took a nap, a real one, after our ‘nap’, which while quite enjoyable, hadn’t been all that restful. Marilyn fell asleep with her head on my chest, and I had to ease her off me so I could get a little sleep myself. We cleaned up when we woke, and I drove us up to Governors Harbor to a small restaurant that Mr. Finch had recommended. Afterwards, we drove home, took a quiet walk on our private beach, and then went inside. We made love one more time before falling asleep.

The next morning, I woke at about seven. My kidneys were telling me I needed to get up now, despite it being a vacation. I went to the bathroom, and left my wife snoring, face down on the bed in the zillion count sheets. This place was pretty nice. I pulled on my swim trunks and padded barefoot out through the patio door to the ‘back yard’, the immense veranda and porch that looked out over the pool and on down to the beach. The sun was already up, and it was very pleasantly warm. Charlie was probably buried in snow in upstate New York right now, but he was welcome to it!

I felt like I was moving very slowly as I wandered around the veranda, looking at things in the morning sunlight. I remembered a line from The Electric Horseman, with Robert Redford and Jane Fonda. In it, Redford played a broken-down rodeo cowboy, and Fonda once asked him why he looked like he was hurting in the morning. His reply was that some parts just took longer to wake up than others. I felt like that some days, more now than before.

I was out of shape. I wasn’t fat, but I was starting to get soft. It was easy enough to stay in shape in the Army because the troops usually had some form of PT every day, and I would join them for it. If the ‘Old Man’ can do it, they can do it without bitching, too, and it will be a very bold and stupid lieutenant who complains when his captain is working out.

Now, the only exercise I had been getting was with the rehab program, and that was effectively over. I had been doing some weights and swimming, but that had really been on hold. I had been thinking about putting in a pool at the new house, but that might not be until next year, and the pool at the town house complex wasn’t open during the winter. My knee really prevented me from running, and I hadn’t joined a dojo since moving home. Hell, I could probably get pushed around by an underdeveloped Brownie Scout right about now.

As I thought about it, I realized that I hadn’t even practiced either aikido or tae kwan do since last summer before I had deployed to Honduras. Prior to that I had kept up with my practice, even joining the clubs to be had on any large army base. I wasn’t the toughest guy on the base, not by a long shot, but I certainly held my own and often managed to surprise an opponent.

I moved across the patio and down to the palm forest and on down to the beach. I looked up and down the beach, but it seemed empty. I didn’t have my glasses on, but I couldn’t even see a blur of activity. I wondered if I could even do a kata still. I moved into the trees and found myself a flat piece of sand. I needed to at least try something. I began to slowly go through the motions of the most basic kata I could imagine.

The kata is a combination of training and exercise. It is common in almost all eastern martial arts, although often to different degrees depending on the art. There are different types, from slow and simple movements that act as a warmup, up to quick and furious combat maneuvers. Done properly, it is a balletic dance of precision and skill. Done improperly, you look like an arthritic Parkinson’s patient.

I moved like the latter.

I focused on simply loosening up and getting my muscles used to the movements again. I tried to bring back my old precision, although at the expense of any power or strength. Some of the poses required strength, though, and I found myself pushing to hold them, though it was for less time than I had previously been able to work. I kept the speed down and tried not to push the knee too hard. After about thirty minutes of this, I found myself shaking with exhaustion and nerves. Brownie Girl Scouts would be able to knock me on my ass - easy!

“CARLING!” I heard Marilyn calling for me and slowly moved in the direction of the beach, where her voice seemed to be coming from. I found her calling my name on the beach and heading towards the northern end. She looked like she had pulled on a bathrobe and flip flops.

“Here!” I called back and kept moving towards her.

“Where have you been?” she asked, concern in her voice.

I pointed back behind me. “Just down there.”

“I’ve been calling for you for ten minutes! Where have you been? What’re you up to?”

“I just needed to get out and clear my head for a bit. I was just doing some exercise.”

Marilyn smiled and looked relieved. “Oh, okay. I thought maybe you had gotten lost or something.”

I had to laugh at that. “Marilyn, this island ain’t all that big! It can’t be more than a mile or two wide in most places. All I have to do is walk towards the sun and in less than an hour I’ll find myself someplace wet and salty!”

She smiled at me. “You think you’re so smart. What if you were walking the length of the island, not the width?”

I smiled down at her. “Then if I haven’t hit the water after an hour, I’ll just make a hard-right turn and find the water after another short walk.”

“You’ve just got all the answers, don’t you!” she protested.

“And I’ve got an answer for you!” I replied, crudely grasping my crotch.

Marilyn squawked and laughed and moved backwards away from me. “That’s not an answer! That’s a problem!”

I advanced towards her, but she kept dancing backwards away from me. I was just beat enough that catching her would probably leave me breathless before I had my way with her. I stopped and stood there with my hands on my hips and looked around at our surroundings.

“Carl, what’s wrong?” she asked.

I turned back to look at my wife. “It’s me. I tried to do some katas and they damn near killed me. I am so goddamn out of shape it’s not funny.”

Marilyn gave me an odd look. “You’re fine. It’s not your fault your knee is shot. You’re already moving way better than the doctors thought you would ever move. Look at you! You didn’t even bring your cane out here!”

I chuckled at that. “A cane in the sand? I don’t think so.” I took her hand and walked back down the beach. “I was thinking earlier, I haven’t done any training since last summer before I went to Honduras. I need to join a gym and a dojo. I have to get back into shape.”

“You’re not out of shape!” she protested loyally.

“Well, I’m certainly not in shape,” I told her.

“Why is this so important to you?”

I led her up towards the palm trees and found a spot on the sand and sat down. Marilyn sat down at my side, facing me. I looked out at the sea rolling in for a moment, and then turned to face her. “You’ve never seen me not in shape, but it’s not a pretty sight. I’ve told you before, but I don’t think you believe me. Back when I was a kid, right up into my teen years, I was always the smallest kid around. I was short and skinny and weak. It was pathetic! I used to get the crap kicked out of me on a routine basis. I finally just cracked and had enough of it. You heard the story. When I was thirteen I just said enough was enough; they can kill me, but I’ve had enough. That fight on the school bus - it was like I was out of control almost.”

“I can’t imagine you like that. Normally you’re so much in control!” she commented.

“I think it’s because of that. Ever since then if you think I’ve been successful, it’s because of the control, the discipline. Physically, it was the workouts and the running and the aikido. Mentally it was always the preparation and homework. I can’t control the world around me, but I can control myself. So much around us is so totally random. I can’t control my family - God knows I would like to! - and I can’t even control you and Charlie, but I can control myself.”

“You worry me, at times, always trying to be in control. Some things you can’t control.”

I just nodded. “I know that. It’s like I said, though, the discipline and control are about me, not anything else. I can’t change how the world is going to behave or what is going to happen to us. I can only change what I have control over. I can control myself, my thoughts, my actions, my behavior. Whenever you have seen me at my worst, it’s been when I have lost that control. I have to fight that constantly. It is so easy to give in and lose control.”

“I have never seen you like that!” Marilyn protested.

“Oh yes, you most surely have! Don’t you remember that weekend when I got into it with Mark and your parents? I lost control then! I was so out of control I damn near lost you! You were the one who kept me in control then. You rescued me that weekend.”

Marilyn looked startled at that, being reminded of that Thanksgiving weekend all those years ago. “One time!”

“One time too many. There have been other times as well. What I’m saying is that I function better when I don’t lose control.”

“Is this an Army thing? Is this because you can’t be in the Army anymore?”

I had to smile at that, but it also made me think. “No, but it’s related. I think one reason I did well in the Army is because the Army is all about control, control and discipline and purpose. It was easy to stay controlled, and that control allowed me to control my men and my unit.”

“And now you don’t have it anymore.” It was a statement, not a question, and I just nodded.

“And I don’t know what I’m doing anymore. I suppose I always knew the day would come when I couldn’t do it any longer. I mean, I always knew that sooner or later the Army would catch on and hoist my ass out the door, but until it happens, you just don’t think it will happen to you.”

Marilyn took my hand. “Well, this week you’re on vacation! We’ll worry about the future when we get back home. Maybe we’ll just have to find you a job after all!”

I laughed at that. “God forbid! It’s bad enough that I have to put up with my own bullshit! There is no way I could ever put up with someone else’s!”

“So, the exercise? It’s not like you’re fat! My God, Carl, you are in tremendous shape! I wish I was as in shape as you are!”

I grinned at that. Marilyn was sitting there on the sand and her robe had shifted enough for me to realize that it was all she was wearing. I liked her shape, just like it was! I shook the thought off, at least for the moment. “It starts out slowly. You ease off and slow down. Maybe skip out a day a week. The next thing you know it’s two days, then three. Eventually you notice that you are goofing off more than you are exercising, and your pants are a bit snug. Then you’ve put on five pounds, and you need the next size up. So, you decide to lose the weight, and end up killing yourself to lose the weight, and it never really comes off, and you get tired of the fight and gain another five pounds. After a while, you’re fat!”

This was precisely what had happened to me the first time, although I had never been one for exercise then. My natural lankiness and wiry build had kept my weight in bounds until I hit my thirties, but after that, it was always a pound or two a year, and it wasn’t a positive thing. It’s one thing to be 5’11” and weigh 185, it’s quite another to weigh 245.

“It translates into other things, too. Do you know the quickest way to make a small fortune on Wall Street?” I asked.

“How?”

“Start with a large fortune!” Marilyn groaned at that, so I said, “So I study. Every day at home I read the newspaper and the Wall Street Journal and magazines. It’s a discipline, so that when an opportunity comes along, I can react first.”

Marilyn nodded, not understanding perfectly, but nodding regardless. “I worry about you. Nobody can be in control, not always.”

I reached over and took her hand. “That’s your job. You keep me sane. I’ll control everything else; you control me. Listen, don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. I’ll get to the gym and a dojo when we get back home. Maybe I can get back in trim and learn how to move again.”

Marilyn leaned over and hugged me, and in doing so, her robe shifted and gaped open in the front, exposing her tits. SPROING! Carl Junior popped to attention! I held onto her and leaned backwards, pulling her with me to the sand. I slipped a hand inside her robe and began fondling her breasts.

“Carl! We can’t do that here?”

“Why not? Who’s going to see?” I tugged loose the belt holding the waist of her robe closed, although Marilyn tried a pro forma protest. “You’re the one who came out here in nothing but a little silk robe!”

“I was looking for you!”

I peeled her robe open and lowered my face to her chest and began flicking my tongue over her nipples. “You found me.”

“Carl! What if we are seen?” she asked me this even though she was starting to pant.

“By who? Mrs. Wilkes? You think she hasn’t seen crazy Yankees doing this before” I sucked her tits some more and slipped my hand between her legs. For all her complaints, Marilyn was quite wet.

“Carl!”

“Just don’t scream my name loudly!” I teased. “We wouldn’t want them investigating!” I reached down and pushed my swim trunks down around my knees and then pushed Marilyn onto her back. She automatically spread her legs and I crawled over her and sank down into her. She moaned and I whispered to her, “I think you actually came looking for me so I could give you a good fucking!”

“Oh, God! Don’t stop, don’t stop!”

I pounded into her pussy, praying to God that the sand didn’t get into anyplace inappropriate. That would be very unpleasant. Marilyn had her arms and legs wrapped around me and I fucked down into her, driving my cock into her as I whispered how she wanted it so much. Her moaning was constant and incoherent by the time my back arched and I spasmed my jism into her.