Back To The Start Box Set: Five Full-Length Novels by Aly Martinez

That was the first question my captain asked me when he showed up in my hospital room at the burn center in Chicago. Not: “How’s your broken leg? Not: “You feeling okay after spending a full day in a medically induced coma while doctors monitored the swelling in your head?” Not: “How are those burns that cover the back of your skull and the back of your neck?”

  No. None of those were what he asked me.

  It was, however, why my answer was, “I’m sorry. What?”

  “You told her to climb up to the roof? Why?”

  I stared at him in confusion. My mind was still groggy from the medication, but I did the best I could to focus. “Because it was the only place that wasn’t on fire?”

  “Is that a question or a statement?” he asked, raking a rough hand through his thinning, gray hair as he began pacing the room.

  Movement at the door caught my attention. Careful not to move my aching head, I shifted my eyes to the side and saw two uniforms standing outside.

  “What’s going on?” I asked suspiciously.

  He stopped and gave me his full focus. “Why the roof, Levitt?”

  “There was nowhere else. She was gonna die.”

  And that’s when it hit me. My foggy mind finally caught up as, all at once, the pieces began to click into place. The last thing I remembered was the horrible creak of the house and the terrifying sound of her screams as it fell down on top of us.

  My aching body protested as I sat upright, bile igniting a path up my throat. “Oh God, did she die?”

  His head snapped back as he stopped pacing and fisted his hands on his hips. “What? No. She’s down the hall.”

  “Thank God,” I exhaled, relief doing far more to soothe me than whatever cocktail of pain medication was pumping through my IV.

  His expression turned hard. “Don’t be so quick to send up thanks. That woman you saved is Rhion Park. Sole heir to the Park Empire.”

  He stared at me as though he’d laid out the secrets of the universe.

  “Okay?” I drawled.

  “Okay?” he repeated.

  I winced as I attempted to shift in the bed. “I’m not following where you’re going with this.”

  He stopped at the foot of my bed and crossed one arm over his chest, his other hand going up to scrub his jaw. “Where I’m going with this, Levitt, is I’ve got the entire Park family legal team and every fucking news station in the country crawling up my ass, wanting to know why in the hell a cop—my fucking cop—would send a woman up higher when a fucking fifth-grader knows to stay low.” He threw his hands out to his sides and took an angry step in my direction. “But, more than that, they want to know why a cop—my fucking cop—was making this astronomically stupid call with alcohol in his system. So yeah, Levitt. I’m gonna need some goddamn answers. First up: Why the roof?”

  Suddenly, the air in the room became too thick to breathe. Reality crashed down on me harder than that three-story house ever could.

  I’d wanted to be a cop since I was eight years old and my father had nearly cut his finger off while trying to trim the trunk of our Christmas tree. Blood was everywhere and my mother wouldn’t stop screaming regardless that my father was cussing at her for calling 911 for a simple cut. I paced the front porch, praying that he wouldn’t die, because, when you’re eight, that’s what happens when you bleed even the slightest bit. A cop arrived first. He rolled up onto the curb in front, lights flashing and sirens blaring, giving me, along with the rest of the neighborhood, the whole emergency experience. I’d never forget the wake of tranquilly that trailed behind him as he jogged up the front steps.

  My mom stopped screaming. My father stopped cussing. I stopped worrying.

  Looking back, I thought that cop had probably been relieved when he’d walked in and seen my too-proud-to-ask-for-help dad holding a washcloth around his finger. No guns drawn. No vile human beings destroying lives. No wounded butterflies.

  But the little cut that ultimately earned my father eight stitches and an expensive ride in an ambulance changed my life. As I stood beside my mother, watching the cop drive away, I realized exactly who I wanted to be when I grew up. Donning on that uniform became my dream.

  Yet, as I sat in that hospital bed, my chest physically aching, I began to wish that it had been a firefighter to respond to my house first that afternoon.

  “Start talking, Levitt,” my captain ground out when I didn’t reply.

  I cut my gaze to the door, an ocean of regret churning in my gut.

  One night, one call, one decision—and I was going to lose it all.

  “I think I need an attorney.”

  When I awoke, blinding lights poured into the room, making it impossible to open my eyes. For the way my retinas ached, the sun might as well have been in the same room. A marching band was playing in my head. Okay, maybe not an entire marching band, but definitely the drum line.

  I attempted to swallow, but my mouth was so dry that the action only made me cough. I threw my hand out to the side and blindly patted the nightstand down, praying that, in my drunken stupor, I’d had the foresight to grab a bottle of water.

  In my search, my hand landed on a glass.

  I lived in a hotel, and not a nice one, at that. I didn’t have cups at all. Much less a glass.

  “Oh God,” I breathed as I pried one eye open.

  Pale coral-and-white vertical-striped walls greeted me. My stomach rolled as I slowly sat up. Squinting, I attempted to take inventory of the spinning room. White, distressed dresser. Dark mahogany wood floors. A canvas painting of a starfish. And the salty smell of the ocean wafting in the air.

  How the hell did I end up at the beach?

  The last thing I remembered was staring down into an empty bottle of Jack at Park Hill.

  I glanced down and saw that I was still in the same slacks I’d been wearing the day before, but my chest was bare. Where the hell is my shirt? My gaze dropped to the floor, where I spotted my white undershirt folded on top of my shoes, but my button-down was MIA.

  I looked to the nightstand and saw my keys, my phone, and my wallet neatly stacked on top of each other. I was no detective, but it didn’t take any special skills to deduce that, if I couldn’t remember taking my damn shirt off, I probably hadn’t been the one to organize the contents of my pockets. Clearly, I hadn’t come to the beach alone. But who…

  “Oh God,” I whispered to myself.

  It came back in a rush. But none of the memories were complete. I only caught the tiniest bits and pieces.

  Pale-blue eyes barely peeking through a cracked door. My mind sloshed as I stood up, dread settling in my stomach.

  Fiery-red-and-blond hair brushing against shoulders as she led me inside. I shook my head while I tugged my shirt and my shoes on.

  My index finger tracing the intricate tattoos covering her shoulders. Pressure built in my chest when I reached the door and slowly twisted the doorknob.

  Her back flush against my chest as I stared down at the delicate curve of her neck. I swallowed around the lump in my throat and sent up prayers to every god in the universe that I was wrong.

  Maybe this was another nightmare. That’s where she usually found me.

  But, as I opened the door and caught sight of her sitting on the ground, her knees tucked to her chest, her colorful arms wrapped around her legs, and her eyes aimed up at me, I knew there would be no waking up from this one.

  “Hey,” she whispered, scrambling to her feet.

  Scrubbing my hand over the scruff on my jaw, I muttered a cursed, “Jesus Christ.”

  She toyed with the ends of her hair, and like a shock of electricity, a mental souvenir from the night before assaulted me. Her hair smells like coconut.

  She cleared her throat uncomfortably and then rushed out, “Um…so, good morning. Can I get you some coffee, breakfast, toothbrush, memory eraser, anything?”

  I cringed and pinched the bridge of my nose. “I’ll take the memory eraser with a side of coffee.”

 
; “Excellent choice,” she mumbled under her breath before taking off at a speed just under a sprint.

  Mentally chastising myself, I followed after her. The narrow hallway opened up to a living-room-kitchen combination. It might as well have screamed money for as nice as everything appeared. Two tan couches with carved wooden legs, covered in countless throw pillows of all colors and patterns, sectioned the living room off, while a long, chocolate-and-taupe-veined granite counter served as a barrier for a kitchen with stainless-steel appliances lining the wall. It looked a lot like Guardian, but it felt oddly familiar in a different way.

  Confused, I asked, “Are we at the beach?”

  Her head snapped up while she was filling two mugs with coffee. “The beach?”

  I jerked my thumb over my shoulder. “That room. Seemed…I don’t know, beachy.”

  She stared at me blankly for several beats. “You said you loved the beach.”

  I awkwardly scratched the back of my head. “Okay. So we talked last night. Good to know.”

  Her body jerked and her face paled as she gasped, “You don’t remember?”

  Dear God. I was seriously an asshole. “I’m sorry.”

  Her back shot ramrod straight, and something strange—and surprisingly painful—sifted through her features. “Nothing?”

  Oh, I remembered a few things. All of which I wished I could forget.

  “Any chance you could fill me in?” I asked.

  She quickly turned away to put the coffee pot down, her shoulders hunched over in defeat.

  And then she lied to me. Plain as day.

  “You’re not missing much. You showed up drunk. I was half-asleep. I put you to bed. Went to bed myself. Now, we’re drinking coffee.”

  I opened my mouth to apologize only to clamp it shut when she continued to talk.

  “That was my ocean room you were in. When I moved to Chicago a few years ago, I missed the beach. So I had a guy come in and set it up. It has special lighting to mimic the afternoon sun, a scent-infused humidifier installed in the wall, and a strategically placed surround-sound system to add the natural echo of the waves.” She turned back to face me. “I turned that off when I heard you snoring. I hope that’s okay. It’s really loud in the room next door, which happens to be my bedroom.”

  Her whole body turned solid, and her face slid through three different shades of red. “I mean, not that you needed to know where my bedroom is or anything. Well, I mean, unless you want to take a bath. I have an amazing jetted tub in my bathroom. The other two only have showers. The showers are really nice though. I had the contractor add these kickass showerheads. It’s quite the experience. You should give it a try. Oh, that reminds me. I laid out an extra toothbrush in the bathroom.” She paused only long enough to suck in a huge gasp of air. “The bathroom in the hall—you know, with the shower, not mine… You know, with the tub. Anyway—”

  When it became abundantly clear the woman had no intention of stopping, I attempted to wade in. “Rhion,” I called, stepping toward her.

  “I also put a hairbrush in there. You know, for your hair. Which I have to say is really nice. It looks good on you. Not all guys can pull that off. It’s the perfect mix of bad-boy and clean-cut.” She squinted her eyes closed as embarrassment contorted her face. “Not that I’m saying you’re either of those things. I wasn’t checking you out or anything.”

  I took another step in her direction, making yet another attempt to cut her off. “Rhion.”

  Her nose crinkled adorably, and she began worrying with the diamond hanging from a silver chain around her neck. “Don’t get me wrong. You’re a handsome man. I just—”

  “Rhion,” I repeated, closing the final few steps between us.

  “I can’t stop talking!” she exclaimed a second before she ducked around me and burst into tears.

  Chapter Ten

  Rhion

  The knock on the door startled me awake. My upper body was on fire, but not the kind that could be extinguished. The doctors had tried, but there wasn’t a medicine in the world strong enough to ease the pain. For a full week, it had been excruciating. And, from what the nurses had told me, it was going to be a while longer before it finally started to fade.

  The knock came again. I lifted my head off the pillow and glanced around the room, finding it surprisingly empty. Katie and Pete had been fixtures at my bedside since they’d arrived in town.

  “Come in!” I called out in a scratchy voice. It was no doubt another doctor or nurse coming to torture me under the guise of help. My body tensed in anticipation.

  “Rhion?” His voice filtered into the room, causing my heart to stop beating just before it went into overdrive.

  I froze, my emotions stuck somewhere between shock, dread, and exhilaration.

  He’d come.

  I’d been hoping he would—almost as much as I’d hoped he wouldn’t.

  I’d been dying to see him, but I lay in a hospital bed, my arms spread out at my sides, third-degree burns covering nearly every inch. That was not how I wanted him to see me.

  Yet there he was.

  A family of hummingbirds took up residence in my stomach as his tall body emerged. My breath hitched as I raked my gaze over his muscular frame. The outline of his chiseled chest showed through the straining fabric of his plain, black T-shirt while a pair of dark washed denim hugged his tapered waist. His dark-blond hair had been shaved and large, rectangular bandages covered the back of his head and his neck, but he was still gorgeous. I shyly swept my gaze to the other side of the room. I couldn’t imagine what I looked like after a week of sitting in a hospital bed. Not that it really mattered. Judging by the burns on my arms and my chest, the days when vanity had any place in my life were officially over. But, deep down, I still cared.

  “Rhion,” he said softly, drawing my attention back to him.

  My vision swam as our gazes locked.

  What do you say to the man who saved your life? The man who literally pulled you from the hands of death. The man who protected you with no regard for his own safety. The man who now wore the scars from the most frightening moment of your entire life.

  My first words to him should have been some variation of “thank you” laced with profuse gratitude, but as I stared into his emerald-green gaze, which had soothed me when my entire world had been burning down around me, I only managed to get two words out.

  “You’re real,” I whispered.

  His eyes flashed wide, but a sexy grin pulled at the corners of his full lips. “So are you, my beautiful Butterfly.”

  I shyly glanced at the bed and allowed myself to smile for what felt like the very first time.

  “Rhion, wait!” He caught my arm before I could make my getaway.

  And, God, if I’d ever needed to make a getaway, that was the moment.

  This can’t be happening.

  I’d spilled my deepest, darkest secrets to the only man I’d ever wanted to share them with.

  And he’d woken up thinking he was at the beach.

  It shouldn’t have hurt as much as it did, but the searing pain still tore through me.

  I’d expected awkward when he woke up. For God’s sake, he’d passed out in the middle of some pretty hot, heavy action. But never, not once, had I considered he wouldn’t remember.

  “I’m sorry,” I choked out, doing my best to wipe my tears off on the shoulder of my shirt. “I’m not always a basket case, I swear. It’s just…”

  I couldn’t finish that thought. Well, at least not out loud.

  It’s just you’re Jude.

  I didn’t tell him that.

  And, in that moment, as he stared back at me, clearly horrified to have woken up in my apartment and even more horrified by what memories he’d retained, I’d wished I hadn’t told Jude a lot of things.

  But, I guessed, the good news was that he didn’t remember any of them.

  Only it didn’t feel like good news.

  It felt like a sledgehammer to t
he heart.

  “I’m sorry,” I choked out again.

  “Hey. Hey. Hey. Stop.” He released my arm, slid his hand up to the back of my neck, and forced my gaze all the way up to his. “You have nothing to be sorry for. I’m the one who should be apologizing. Christ, Rhion. I don’t even remember how I got here.”

  My breathing shuttered as his fingers flexed on the back of my neck, a chill radiating down my spine.

  I hypnotically stared up at him and stuttered, “You…you said you took a cab.”

  His eyes flashed dark and his intense gaze became tangible. Like a feather, it swept down my throat and over to my shoulder, completely unnerving me.

  Well, more than I was already unnerved. Which was a hell of a lot, considering that it was Jude and he was currently standing in my apartment with little to no memory of the night before, while I would never be able to forget it.

  “I had too much to drink,” he stated.

  “I gathered that,” I replied while watching his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed hard.

  For several seconds, neither of us moved. He scanned my face as if he were searching for something. And then his eyebrows pinched together and his face contorted into a picture of confusion.

  Beautiful, beautiful confusion.

  “Why does your hair smell like coconut?” he rasped.

  “My shampoo,” I replied breathily.

  He closed his eyes and shook his head. “No. I mean why do I know you smell like coconut?”

  Because, when you showed up at my door at four a.m., I wasn’t able to get a single word out before you yanked me into your arms and slurred unintelligible apologies into the top of my hair.

  However, that was not a night I was willing to relive any time soon. It had been hard enough to keep my shit together when I’d confessed four years’ worth of guilt and secrets to him the night before. And that’s assuming that I could consider “keeping my shit together” stripping his shirt off and throwing myself at him until he eventually passed out beneath me.

  No. Evade was the word of the day until I had time to regroup, reorganize, and rethink—my entire life.

  “I’m… Well, I’m not really sure,” I lied.