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Despite the merits of Samba, I've never had anything but headaches trying to get Windows to recognize file permissions properly. Perhaps the fault is mine, but it's always seemed to me that Microsoft's SMB implementation shoots itself in the foot -- the 9x kernel OSes tried to oversimplify it and the NT ones needlessly obfuscate it.
In any case it looks like both boxen in this setup are dual booting, so a separate network device still seems like the better option to me.
VNC will work, but is overkill for what you want to do. If you must must have access to your files from the outside world and are completely adverse to setting an FTP server up for the purpose, VPN is probably the best choice. Although if you're going to go to the trouble of setting that up you may as well just set up an FTP server anyway, in my opinion.
Another Option:
Find yourself an old box somewhere. It's not hard to do; any friends or family who've upgraded recently may have one kicking around, or if you have any geek friends they can probably source one for you. Throw your Linux distro of choice on there and turn it into a headless fileserver for the network. For Added Nerdiness, return the router you bought and exchange it for a good high-quality switch, along with an 802.11b/g(/n) PCI card, and use IpCop or something similar to turn your new toy into a wired/wireless router with built-in fileserver. For Even More Added Nerdiness, you can mess around with BIND and maybe even set up a caching-only DNS server. That's pretty hardcore, though.
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I wake up in the morning more tired than before I slept
I get through cryin' and I'm sadder than before I wept
I get through thinkin' now, and the thoughts have left my head
I get through speakin' and I can't remember, not a word that I said
- Ben Harper, Show Me A Little Shame
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