Page 35 of Caught Up In You (Indigo Royal Resort)
“I know, Menina. Very few people do. It’s not something that I have let the world in on,” he confided.
The subject of his father came up next to never now, but when he first started to gain some attention on the pitch and the media wanted to profile him, the question of his parents was always one of the first ones they asked. Keeping it simple and generic was surprisingly easy—only talking about his mum, never mentioning his father at all. Though it had originally been painful to leave him out of it, since Cullen knew that the man would have been incredibly proud of him, he knew it was for the best and would stop them from traveling down an even more painful path. The tactic had worked, too, since fairly soon the reporters just started referring to only his mother, often by name, whenever they asked questions. Soon enough after that, they took to focusing on a different aspect of his personal life altogether.
"Can I ask how it happened?” she whispered.
“I was out playing with some neighborhood kids. We used to like to kick around this old cricket ball that someone had found. It was the closest thing to a football we had. I saw him round the corner onto our block, carrying his toolbox like always. I was excited to see him. I was a nine-year-old kid—my Dad was my hero,” he said, pausing. He swallowed hard before continuing. “I started to jog towards him, leaving my mates behind, and I saw these men come out from an alleyway. They started harassing him, pushing him around. When one tried to grab his toolbox and my father wouldn’t let go, one of the others hit him on the back of the head with a piece of wood from the street. When he fell to the ground, they all just started beating him and kicking him, calling him names, slurs. They were just as poor as we were, but weren’t immigrants, so I guess they thought themselves better than him.”
Pausing again, this time to collect himself, he noticed her tears had started up again, beginning to fall quicker. He hadn’t intended to make this such a sad moment, but he was finding that confiding in her about this felt safe. Like she understood just what all this sharing meant to him.
“I ran closer to it, I guess thinking I could take them. Thankfully, all it did was make them run away. I yelled for my mates, and they came running, and at some point someone called 999. But by the time the authorities got there, the guys were long gone, with the toolbox. He bled out on the sidewalk.”
Leona was full-on crying now, and he wiped away a long trail of tears from her face.
“Oh, Menina, don’t cry. I didn’t tell you this to upset you.” He reached out and pulled her closer. Allowing her to decide how close, he slipped his arm loosely around her waist as he did so. In return, she snuggled close, looping her arms around his neck, placing her head on his shoulder. She felt so damn good in his arms, he wondered what he had to do to keep her there. He tightened his arm just slightly, stroking her back, trying to comfort her.
“This is why helping your brother is important to me. I see myself in him.”
Sitting up, she leaned back, her arms still around his neck, smiling at him. His stomach did a little flip taking in that big beautiful smile. It wasn’t her customer service smile that she’d been forcing herself to give him for forever, either. This was a true, genuine smile. The kind that he always saw on her face from across the resort when she was talking with others. The one she had let slip the other night in the car. And here she was, giving it to him now.
“You are not the man I thought you were, Cullen Cruz,” she said just above a whisper.
“Is that a good thing?” he asked.
“I think so.” She leaned back in, but instead of resting her head back on his shoulder, she pressed her lips to his. She kissed him soft and slow, the same way he had started out last night. He had no idea what he had done to deserve this, but he wasn’t going to fight it. When his tongue found hers, she let out an itty-bitty moan, one that he hoped only he could hear. Knowing full well that any of the others could come and find them like this at any moment, he tried to pull away, but she kept her lips firmly on his. Well then, if she wasn’t worried about being seen, then he wouldn’t either.
Moments later, when they finally came up for air, he noticed that her smile was even bigger than before. Forget the feeling of scoring the winning goal on the pitch—knowing that he put that smile on her face might just be the best feeling in the world.
“You, Leona Filipe, might not be the girl I thought you were,” he said, kissing her lightly.
“Good.”
The rest of the afternoon was filled with swimming, laughter, and rum punch. At one point Kyle had suggested a game of truth or dare, which Drea shot down. However, it got everyone in the mindset to start sharing stories. Even Dalton, who according to the girls was notoriously tight-lipped, got in on story time, sharing a few select tales of drunk adventures with his fraternity brothers. Both Drea and Leona tried to ask follow-up questions, but he expertly dodged each and every question they lobbed at him.
By the time they got back to the resort, all of them were exhausted. Maeve excused herself before they had even finished docking the boat, heading back to what Cullen assumed was her room in the staff dorms.
“She’s so shy,” Drea said as they watched Maeve walk down the jetty. “I don’t know what else to do to bring her out of her shell.”
“Just give it time. She’ll warm up to everyone, I’m sure,” Kyle told her, kissing her lightly on the top of her head.
Even though they hadn’t discussed it, Cullen was hoping that Leona would be coming back to La Isla Bonita with him after this, rather than heading to her own dorm. He wanted more time with her, time alone, away from others who could insert themselves at any moment. Leona’s friends had done
a great job at leaving them be unless they sought out the group, which he guessed was the work of Drea. But nonetheless, he still wanted the privacy that a locked door provided.
The sun wasn’t quite setting, but the soft afternoon light had started to take over the sky as the five that were remaining disembarked from the boat and headed toward the resort. Still relaxed and yet charged up from their afternoon together, Cullen had slung his arm around Leona and was a little bit giddy inside when she leaned in closer rather than push him away.
Standing at the end of the jetty, right before the path that led back to the main building, was a tall, dark-haired guy, standing with his arms across his chest. Cullen wasn’t entirely sure who this was—he wasn’t even sure he’d seen him before—but whomever he was, he did not look happy. His eyes narrowed in on Cullen’s arm that was holding on to Leona, scanning between the two of them. Leona had been laughing with Drea for most of their walk down the pier, and he had no idea if she’d seen this man or not. He would guess by her lack of reaction that she hadn’t.
“Hey, Lee,” Dalton said. She turned to look at him and, in the process, caught sight of the grumpy individual waiting for their arrival.
“Carlos!” she said, her tone suddenly changed from the carefree one that she’d had just a moment ago. Without any kind of hesitation, or even a glance in his direction, she pulled away from Cullen and walked toward this new guy. “What’s up?”
“Vaughn was asking if you all were back yet. He wanted to go over with you how the changeover went today,” he said, still not uncrossing his arms. “I didn’t realize you were even out on the boat.”
“Yeah, Vaughn asked us to accompany Mr. Cruz on an excursion,” she answered him. “I’ll go find him now.”
“I’ll walk you up there.”
“Sounds good.” She turned toward the rest of the group and gave a quick wave. “See you guys later.”
