SSL, Subdomains and multiple stores

I have been researching these issues for days now with some success. In fact I think I have answered a number of my questions already, but I was hoping to have a definite answer so I know where I am going.

Here is my situation:
I have one brand that will be selling 2 distinct product lines. That one brand will be under a single domain name https://www.lakeeffectsupply.com (my SSL certificate is issued to lakeeffectsupply.com)

I would like to have 2 stores (and 2 databases) on that domain name. I have considered using the multi-site contribution, however for a couple reasons I would prefer to not go this route (mostly because I tried my hand at the multi-site install yesterday and realized that at this point the software requires more technical savvy than I have available to me).

So here are my questions:

1. I would like each store to operate under its own subdomain i.e. wake.lakeeffectsupply.com and flake.lakeeffectsupply.com. Will my SSL certificate work using these two subdomains? My initial thought is no it will not work, so it would probably be easier to just have the two sites run as follows: lakeeffectsupply.com/wake and lakeeffectsupply.com/flake. I am pretty sure that everything would work then...

2. I would like to keep 90% of my site created as is and duplicate it with a second database. What is the easiest way to do this?

Thanks in advance for all of your help.

Installing as your described in folders(not sub-domains) will work.

An option is to get a more expensive "WildCard" SSL Cert that will work with sub-domains.