“And what if she’d said no?”
“Don’t worry about him,” Trip spoke up. “I’m happy to fool around. He’s weird about sex these days.”
“No,” Susan said, very deliberately, “he and Christy are still deciding what works for them. You and Wren have had more time to think about it.”
“If you say so.”
“You weren’t so sure last summer,” she said.
“I’m sure now, though.”
“Mmm,” she agreed noncommittally. Then she smiled at me. “Go ahead and eat. I won’t attack until later. I won’t attack at all if you don’t want me to.”
“I didn’t say that. I just… need some time to get used to the idea.”
“Really?” she teased. “I thought you liked it.”
“No, the idea that Christy’s okay with it.”
“Didn’t she tell you?” Trip said testily.
“Not in so many words.”
“Why not?”
“What’s it to you?” I snapped. Then I drew a deep breath and tried to relax. “Sorry.”
He accepted my apology and offered his own.
“Sometimes Christy hints instead of telling me outright,” I explained to Susan.
“She’s very traditional.”
Trip looked like he wanted to say something, but he decided to keep it to himself.
I raised an eyebrow.
“I told you,” he said, “I’m trying to do better. I guess I’m more like Wren than I wanna admit.” He thought about it and sighed. “Maybe that’s why you’re a better architect. You’re patient. And you take the long view.”
“You do too,” I said, “just not about certain things. We wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for you and all your planning and hard work.”
Susan grinned.
I sighed. “What now?”
“You. And Trip. I like hearing you work out your differences and come to a consensus.”
“We normally don’t do it in front of clients,” Trip admitted.
“But I’m not a client yet,” she said. “You still have to convince me.”
“I’m sure we will. Once we give you some personal service.”
“Oh, please!” I blurted. “You two are the worst. We all know what’s going to happen.”
“Yes, dear,” Susan said patiently, “but sometimes the negotiation is part of the fun.”
“And we still have lots of negotiating to do,” Trip added.
“Speaking of which,” I said, “do you mind if we eat first? And maybe talk about the actual project instead of all this flirting and innuendo?”
“I thought you liked flirting and innuendo,” Susan said. “But you’re probably right.” She glanced at Trip and changed the subject. “What kind of costs are we talking about with the initial phase, at the Retreat?”
* * *
After dinner we moved the conversation to the hot tub, where Susan dropped her robe and surveyed the steaming water. The little head twitched at the sight of her body, but the big head overruled him. We hadn’t finished talking about the project, and Susan clearly agreed. She climbed into the tub and immediately picked up where we’d left off inside.
“Do you think you’ll rebuild the clubhouse with the same layout?”
Trip hopped into the water, popped the top on his beer, and nodded at me to answer.
“I don’t think so.”
Susan sank into the water up to her breasts, and the bubbles swirled around them. She smiled at the direction of my gaze. Then she boldly returned the favor, and her eyes lingered on my pride and joy. She didn’t seem surprised that I shaved, which wasn’t exactly a surprise itself. She and my mom talked several times a week, after all.
“Have a seat,” she offered, and her eyes glinted with amusement as she watched me realize that she didn’t mean in the water.
I sat on the side, as requested. Then I casually spread my legs and adjusted my cock to give her a better view. Two can play that game, I thought at her.
Her eyebrow arched in reply. Then she tried to ruffle me by returning to business. “Why not the same layout?” she asked, curious instead of contradictory.
“It doesn’t make sense,” I said without missing a beat, “especially if we add bathrooms to the motel rooms. We’ll still need a bathhouse for the people in campers and RVs, but I think we should add a dedicated building up there.”
She gestured for me to continue.
“The clubhouse should be a social space,” I explained, “for meals and recreation. I don’t want a large, open space, either. We have that outside. We’ll also have to worry about acoustics if we build an open structure.”
“Acoustics?” She looked at Trip for confirmation, but he simply grinned and gestured for her to listen to me.
“Yes,” I said. “That many people get loud, and we’ll have to add acoustic tiles and maybe baffles to absorb it. Better to break up the space into smaller areas. Not with separate rooms,” I added before she could ask, “but with partition walls and planters and things like that.”
Trip gave her an I-told-you-so look.
She deliberately ignored him and said to me, “Go on.”
“I don’t want to build a simple steel box. I’m thinking about engineered wood instead. And I don’t mean plywood or fiberboard. I’ve been reading about a guy who’s using this stuff called Microllam. It’s laminated veneer lumber, and I think we can use it to…”
I talked for ten minutes and sketched out designs that had only been vague ideas up to that point. My excitement grew as the building took shape in my head, until Susan finally nodded that she was satisfied.
“I want to see something on paper,” she added, “but I like what you’re saying. And I like that you use the word ‘we.’ When you talk about camp. You don’t mean you and Trip and this project, do you?”
I thought about it. “Not really. I guess I think of the camp as my own. Not in any official sense, but…”
“You care,” she finished. “That’s why I want you and Trip to manage the renovation. It’s just a job to the other companies.”
“Christy said the same thing.”
“Yes. She mentioned that.” She turned to Trip. “She’s the one who finally convinced me.”
His eyebrows flew up.
“I was already leaning your way,” Susan explained, “especially after we talked about the second estimates, but Christy made the case that you and Paul love the Pines as much as I do.”
“I could’ve told you that,” he said, a little defensively.
“But you didn’t.”
“No, I guess not. It’s really Paul,” he added. “I like the camp well enough, but I didn’t grow up here.”
“You and I don’t have the same connection, either,” she said. “Not like Paul and I do.”
“No.”
She looked at me. “I’ll be honest, I wouldn’t give you the job if I didn’t think you could handle it. This is business. The other is personal.”
“I understand,” I said.
She turned back to Trip. “I also wouldn’t give you the job if Wren and Christy didn’t support you. I hope you realize that.”
“I— we do,” he said quickly.
“Do you?” She let the question hang in the air. “I don’t think you understand what kind of assets they are, especially Christy.”
“Of course, she—”
“Doesn’t like you very much,” Susan said bluntly. “Not at the moment, at least.”
“That’s my fault,” he admitted.
“Not entirely. But she argued in your favor. You specifically, not you and Paul.”
“She did?”
“Yes. She said no one else will work as hard as you.”
I spoke up, “She’s right about that.”
“So I hope you understand,” Susan continued, “that I’m not hiring just you. I’m hiring your team, all of you. Christy and Wren are as important as you are.”
“He knows,” I said in Trip’s defense. “He said the same thing to me.” I repeated his comment about silent partners.
“But they aren’t exactly silent,” Susan said, “are they?”
“No, not really.” Trip thought about it and added, “Wren is—at the moment—but only ’cause she’s busy with school.” He glanced at me. “And I probably need to give Christy more credit.”