Page 7 of What I Like About You

“Antwan is very creative with his pet names,” Zara answered defensively. She didn’t owe him anything, much less an explanation for whatever name she was called by her best friend. No, boyfriend—right now Antwan was her boyfriend. She turned to Cullen, hoping a change of subject would make some of the awkwardness disappear. “Hi, I'm Zara.”

“I’m Cullen Cruz,” he responded, shaking her hand.

“Oh, I know,” she said, laughing a little. “You’re Tripp's favorite player. Or well, at least you used to be.”

Cullen Cruz let out a deep, raucous laugh. For a moment, Zara was worried she had said something wrong, until she saw him throw his arm around Dalton and pull him close. “Oh, I’m still Dalton’s man crush! Don’t you worry, love,” Cullen teased in his British accent. Dalton simply rolled his eyes in response, pushing his buddy off him as he shook his head.

“You go by Dalton now?” she asked. He’d introduced himself to Antwan by his real first name, but she had just assumed he was keeping up the formalities.

“Well, it is my name,” Dalton drawled, his accent really shining through for the first time since she’d seen him.

“Does anyone still call you Tripp?”

“My father when he leaves a voicemail,” Dalton responded. Zara could see the clouds roll into his eyes at the thought of his father. It had been a tense relationship at best, even when they were younger, but it pained her a little to see that things really hadn’t improved between the two men. “Felicity dropped it when she was here last month.”

“She was here?”

“Yeah, that was a real treat,” Cullen muttered under his breath.

“She made an appearance,” Dalton shrugged. “Long story.”

Zara wasn’t exactly sure how to respond to his answer. He’d never been one to be overly forthcoming with information, but when Dalton Sutherland didn’t want to talk about something, wild horses would not have been able to drag it out of him. There were so many questions she was dying to ask him, but she had no idea where to even begin. Not that she had any business asking them anyway. She wondered briefly if he was thinking the same thing—that there was so much about her that he was curious about, but that just like him, she wasn’t willing to offer any of it up.

“So how exactly do you two know each other?” Cullen asked, finally breaking the silence.

“We grew up together,” Zara offered, right as Dalton simply answered, “family friends.”

Back in the day, they would have instantly burst out laughing at their near-miss of a jinx. However, time seemed to have made them more than a little unsure how to act around each other. Zara let an awkward smile form on her face as Dalton looked over at the pool, as if looking at her would turn him to stone or something.

“So, how long are you guys here for?” she asked.

“Well, I live here, at least for a little while,” Cullen answered easily.

“That’s right, I think I read about that online.”

“And I work here,” Dalton offered. “I’m the first mate for one of the boats.”

“You’re an employee?” she asked, taken aback. Not that he’d ever had an aversion to working, quite the opposite actually. He’d started working for his father in high school, and had you asked her, or anyone back then, they would have told you that he was much more at risk to fall into Big D’s workaholic lifestyle than he was of becoming part of the trust fund party crowd. Troublemaker was the role Felicity had happily taken to.

Zara saw movement out of the corner of her eye, and Dalton’s head whipped back toward the pool just as one of the exceptionally beautiful women hoisted herself out of the water. It was as if the water droplets slowed themselves as they ran down the length of her body, over all her perfect model-esque curves. Even from here Zara could tell that the woman’s nipples were erect from the cold water, the thin material of her bikini doing very little to conceal them. The woman adjusted the backside of her bikini bottoms, showing off her perfectly toned cheeks as she did so. Cullen glanced over to see what had caught his buddy’s attention but turned back toward Zara just as quickly, obviously not interested in whatever this guest wanted to show off. Dalton, however, had his gaze locked on her like she was the prize pig at the county fair. I guess some things never change, Zara thought.

“Well, I should go make sure Antwan got those drinks okay,” Zara said awkwardly, unsure of exactly how to excuse herself. “It was a pleasure to meet you, Cullen.”

Stepping around the men, Zara picked up her pace, taking off back toward the bar to find Antwan. This evening hadn’t turned out anything like she thought it would, and right now, she really, really needed that drink. And maybe a couple more after that.

“Zara, wait!” she heard Dalton’s voice call out, but she didn’t stop. She couldn’t. It’d taken her way too long to figure out who she really was and to love herself, and she wasn’t going to let a little run-in with him have any kind of effect on that. She’d walked away from Dalton Sutherland once. She could do it again.