Back To The Start Box Set: Five Full-Length Novels by Aly Martinez
He stared at me for several beats, his eyes heating despite our ridiculous conversation.
My chest heaved impatiently.
Kiss me.
As though he’d heard my silent plea, his face split into a gorgeous grin.
A nanosecond later, in front of a food cart, while a dozen hungry drunks stumbled around us, Roman Leblanc changed my life.
But it wasn’t with a kiss.
“Marry me,” he breathed.
My eyes popped open.
“Say the words,” he growled into my face.
“Roman, please.” I pressed a hand to his chest and shimmied up the couch so he was no longer looming inches from my face—and my mouth. His eyes were still scary, but the way he watched me held more than just anger.
That might have been the most terrifying part of all.
“Look, I didn’t mean that you couldn’t be involved. I only meant that you didn’t have to be involved. You know…because—”
“The kid wouldn’t be mine,” he finished for me.
Yes. Exactly that. “No. That’s not it.”
“Then. What. Is it?”
Um…the kid’s not yours, and you didn’t exactly stick around after the first one.
“We aren’t together anymore. I didn’t figure you’d want to get—”
“I swear to God, if you say involved, I’m going to lose my mind.”
I’d seen Roman lose his mind, and it was not pretty. I valued my coffee table, so I bit my lip.
His jaw clenched as he sucked in a deep—and, I hoped, calming—breath through his nose. “I’m well aware of the fact that we aren’t together anymore. I’m also aware that we used a sperm donor. Not you. Not me. We. So whatever child was or wasn’t produced from that cycle of IVF is very much ours.” He arched an eyebrow, daring me to argue.
This was, in fact, the truth. But it wasn’t as simple as he made it out to be. There were a lot of factors in play, the biggest being my heart. I feared I wouldn’t be able to handle it if I gave him the only morsel of trust I had left only for him to turn his back on me—again.
But he looked really pissed, so I didn’t dare fill him in on that.
Instead, I kept my mouth shut and nodded in agreement. I could write him a letter informing him of such after I’d moved to an undisclosed location where he couldn’t find me and pin me to a couch.
“That means I’m involved in this one hundred percent,” he stated.
I nodded again, fighting the urge to amend with, Until you get too busy at work to worry about anything else—including, but not limited to, me.
“So I’ll repeat. My people are looking into it”—he paused and studied my eyes—“for us.”
I had a million things to say to the man who had broken my heart and was now claiming he wanted to be involved. None of them were going to get him off me so I could think clearly though. So I went with, “What’s for dinner?”
He stared for a moment longer, and then a huge grin broke across his face. “Gyros.”
Chapter Seven
Roman
“Are you insane!” she laughed.
There was a strong possibility that I was drunk, but I wasn’t insane.
I also wasn’t kidding.
I’d known Elisabeth for a matter of hours, and I knew with an absolute certainty that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her.
Sure, it was crazy and impulsive, but it was so fucking right.
So I repeated, “Marry me.”
“I don’t even know you. We’ve had one date, and you fed me the wrong chicken parmesan. That doesn’t exactly scream husband material.” She shot me a gleaming, white smile.
“It was only wrong because you gave up. It’s not my fault you called it quits after plate number seven. I was committed to the cause.”
“Your cause was wasting seven plates of chicken parmesan. You know there are starving kids in Africa, right?” She giggled and buried her face in my neck.
“Is that a yes?” I asked, sifting my fingers through the back of her hair.
Her head jerked up, those deep-green eyes smiling nearly as much as her lips. “Um, no. It’s a definite no. However, despite the fact that I now think you have mental issues, I will agree to a second date.”
I teasingly squinted at her, and she bit her lips to stifle a laugh.
“Fine, but you should probably head home and pack your belongings, because that date starts now and it’s going to be so long it lasts a lifetime.”
She barked a laugh. “So, like, say…a marriage?”
“Yes. Exactly like a marriage. Phew. I’m so glad we agree.”
She shook her head and whispered, “Insane.”
I trailed my lips up her neck to her ear and whispered, “Say yes.”
“No.”
I grazed my teeth over her earlobe. “Say yes.”
“No,” she gasped, throwing her head back. The ends of her long hair tickling my hand at her back.
Unable to stop myself, I placed a kiss on the soft flesh at the base of her neck. As chills spread across her skin, I murmured, “You know you feel it, too.”
Fisting the back of my shirt, she moaned. “I’d like to feel more. Let’s go back to my place.”
I could give her more.
But I was taking forever.
I glided my hand from her hair to cup her jaw and drank her in. She wasn’t particularly tall, even in heels, so at six two, I had her by several inches, but the way her body fit against mine was nothing short of perfection. Her makeup had started to melt, and her lipstick had been left on the lips of the wineglasses at the bar. But she was still stunning. I couldn’t explain why I’d fallen head over heels for that woman as quickly as I had, but I knew I was never letting her go. Whether it took a month, a year, or a decade, I was going to make her say yes.
Sweeping my lips across hers, I murmured, “Fine. I’m not above coercing you into marriage with my sexual prowess.”
She laughed so loud that I would have been offended—if I hadn’t already been in love with her.
“Where’d you get beer?” Elisabeth asked as she scrambled from the couch.
“Seth,” I replied, hanging my head and rubbing my eyes.
Jesus, I’d wanted to kiss her. She was being a bitch, spouting shit she didn’t mean just because she was too scared to let me in.
But, even through it, those plump lips were calling to me.
I’d never been able to resist that woman. Despite that we’d fallen apart, it hadn’t changed. The hum for her was still in my veins. It never went away, but for two years, it had been dormant. I’d packed it down so tightly that I’d hoped it had died. But, with one look, my body began thrumming like a live wire.
“Seth?” she asked as she bent over to straighten her tight, black pencil skirt.
It was a rare occasion to catch Elisabeth in something other than a perfectly pressed skirt and a pair of heels. But she’d been sleeping all day. It was wrinkled all to hell and back. The only thing her efforts succeeded in was drawing my attention down to her legs.
Legs that had spent many nights wrapped around my hips as she came while crying my name.
Shit. I should go.
But, after the way she’d latched on to me that morning, I wasn’t going anywhere.
“My assistant,” I answered. “I had him pick you up a bottle of wine, too.”
She blinked. “You have an assistant? Who delivers you beer? And your ex-wife wine?”
“No, I have an assistant who does whatever the fuck I need him to do. And, luckily for us, beer and wine happen to fall into the whatever-the-fuck-I-need-him-to-do category tonight.” She fought back a smile as I finished, “So do gyros.”
“Damn. I need to get one of those,” she mumbled to herself.
I smirked. “Cash my checks and you could afford one.”
It was a dick move, bringing up the money right then. But, despite her expert hand in decorating, that little starter house we’d
Her back shot ramrod straight, fury crinkling the corners of her eyes as she snarled, “I’m not cashing your checks.”
I shrugged. “Guess you’ll have to figure out how to get your own wine and dinner after tonight.”
“I think I can manage,” she fired back.
“Suit yourself.” I pushed off the couch and meandered to the kitchen.
I went to the fridge and leaned in, searching for anything I could snack on. With the exception of at least a dozen Tupperware containers, she didn’t have much in the way of a quick bite.
Snagging a handful of grapes from the drawer, I made a mental note to send Seth to the grocery store after he’d delivered dinner.
Popping the grapes in my mouth one by one, I felt her watching me in what could only be defined as silent awe. I decided my best move would be to ignore it. “You know, I should have invented Tupperware. You alone could keep me in business,” I told her, retrieving a beer and then shutting the door.
She scoffed then muttered, “At least then I would have benefitted from you abandoning our marriage.”
Lava fresh off the volcanoes in Hell boiled in my veins.
I cocked my head to the side and questioned, “I’m sorry. Come again?”
“You should go,” she snapped.
Think a-fucking-gain.
“Nah, I’m good. Got any movies?”
I tipped the bottle to my lips, doing my best to calm the storm brewing within me, all while still fighting the desire to take her to the floor, plant myself between her legs, and remind her how that fucking attitude affected me.
Clearly, she had forgotten.
My cock had not.
“Roman, it’s been a crazy day. Please don’t do this tonight.”
“Do what?” I asked, leaning back against the huge, granite island.
She threw her hands out to the sides in frustration. “What you always do.”
“What do I always do, Lissy?”
“This!” she yelled.
I frowned and took another pull from my beer. “Haven’t been in our kitchen, drinking beer, in a long time. I hardly think it’s fair to say I always do it.”
Her eyes nearly bulged from her head. “My kitchen, Roman. This is my kitchen. Not ours. And you know good and damn well that is not what I’m talking about.”
My lips twitched as I pointed the neck of my bottle at her. “No. What I know good and damn well is that I have no idea what the fuck you are talking about. Or why you’re slinging unnecessary and, might I add, undeserved attitude at me like a short-order cook at the bitch house.”
“He did not say that to me,” she whispered to herself.
When I lifted a shoulder in a half shrug, she swung a pointed finger toward the door and yelled, “Get out!”
I grinned, crossing my legs at the ankle. “You always were cranky when you were hungry.”
And that was the exact moment her head exploded.
“We are done here!” she declared, aiming her finger back at me. “Not another word more. I’ll hire an attorney tomorrow, and he’ll be in touch with yours regarding whatever our next step is with the cops. Hopefully, we can file something with the courts and get them to issue a DNA test or…whatever. But, in the meantime, you are not standing here in my kitchen, drinking my beer.” She paused and sucked in a deep breath. “Yes! My beer, I don’t give a shit if your fancy-ass assistant did deliver it. It’s in my fridge. In my house. It’s my beer!”
I moved. And I did it so fast that she didn’t have a chance to react before she was up against my chest. “I don’t give a damn whose beer it is.”
“Let go of me.” She fought in my grasp.
“Not until you listen. While you were busy crying into my chest. And holding my shoulders like you couldn’t get close enough. Then falling asleep in my arms like it was the only place you ever fucking belonged.” I gripped the back of her hair and tipped her head back, leaning in close as I added, “Which it fucking is.”
The fight left her. Her body sagging in my arms, even as her eyes flashed wide.
Trailing my thumb back and forth over her cheek, I finished with, “I got some information from the cops. I’m not here to fight with you, so calm down, share a meal and a much-needed glass of wine with me, and let me fill you in.”
“Roman,” she exhaled, her eyes flooding with tears.
I wasn’t sure what part of that had softened her—or I would have repeated it.
Again.
And again.
And maybe a hundred times after that.
Because, with just the sound of my name, she gave me my innocent angel back.
And it was that moment when I realized it had been a God’s-honest miracle I’d been able to breathe a single breath in the two years I’d lived without her.
It was also then that I decided those days were done.
“You know we could be civil to each other.” I smiled. It was only a half lie. Because there was nothing civil about the things I wanted to do to her.
She would, however, enjoy them all.
“Fine. Fill me in. Eat your gyro, but then you have to leave. I seriously can’t do this with you tonight.”
My hand flexed on her back as I dropped my lips to her ear and murmured, “No. Then I’m sleeping on your couch.”
“Roman!” she objected just as there was a knock at the door.
I kissed the top of her head and released her. “Dinner’s here. Get out the plates.”
She complained behind me as I sauntered to the front door before pulling it wide.
Only it wasn’t Seth on the other side.
Chapter Eight
Clare
Walter had been gone when I’d woken up.
Like I did every time he walked out our front door, I’d prayed that he wouldn’t come home. Accidents happened. And, in his line of work, people died every day.
But I was never that lucky.
Walter Noir would crawl a million miles through broken glass, bleeding and dying, just to make sure he took me to Hell with him.
I’d put on my workout clothes and packed my bag first thing that morning, strategically placing it on the table closest to the door, along with my water bottle and my car keys. Then I’d gone about my day, playing with my daughter while simultaneously listening for his car to pull through the iron gates of my prison.
Around five, I heard the rumble of his BMW, so I rushed to the bag, threw it over my shoulder, grabbed Tessa off the floor, and darted out the door.
He wasn’t happy that I was leaving just as he was getting home, but it wasn’t as if I’d planned it that way. Or so I swore as he kissed me goodbye before I made my getaway to the gym.
Tessa was tired, so was I, but I had two hours of quasi-freedom ahead of me.
Two hours he wouldn’t be around Tessa, and by the time we got home, I could feed her dinner, give her a bath, and put her straight to bed. Minimal contact was the best I could hope for when it came to Walt.
A rush of relief washed over me as I pulled into a parking spot at the gym. I slowly climbed from the car, my ribs only protesting mildly, a huge step up from the day before. My injuries were still visible, but they were thankfully starting to heal. The real agony was in the memories—and my reality.
I was unbuckling Tessa from her car seat when I heard a man call my name. I turned and found two uniformed police officers closing in on me. Panic slammed into me like a runaway truck.
In my life, the police were the only entity more frightening than Walt.
Walt could kill me, but cops could take my life by locking me away, leaving Tessa alone in the care of a monster.
I spun away with shaking hands, scrambling to get Tessa out of her seat.
“Mrs. Noir,” one of them called as I collected her bag off the floor and sped toward the gym door. “Mrs. Noir,” he repeated more firmly before a hand on my bicep suddenly halted me. “Mrs. Noir, a
Doing my best to keep the tremor out of my voice, I replied, “I’m sorry. I don’t have time.” I pulled my arm from his grasp and started away.
I came to a sharp stop when the young officer smiled and reached out his hand as though he were about to touch her.
“This must be Tessa.”
My soul caught fire.
The panic was gone in a blink, and a feral blaze overwhelmed me. Instinctively shifting her to my other hip, I twisted so my body was between her and the officer, blocking any possible contact.
“Don’t you dare touch her,” I spat.
“Jesus, Marco. Don’t touch the baby,” a different man scolded from behind him.
I glanced up to see an older man prowling up behind the uniforms. Salt-and-pepper hair. Potbelly. Shiny, gold badge showing from underneath his sports coat.
Fuck.
He looked professional.
Flashing my eyes back to Marco, I stumbled back a step as the men closed in around me.
“Calm down, Clare,” the older guy urged while I backed away, feeling like a caged animal. “We’re not here to cause any trouble,” he assured.
“Then back up,” I returned.
He lifted a hand and both officers came to a sudden halt. I was able to put a few more feet between us before he spoke again.
“Better?”
“I’d be better if you left.”
He pointed toward the now scabbed-over cut over my eye and said, “I don’t doubt that’s the truth, but we need to have a word. You’re a hard woman to track down.”
That’s because I wasn’t allowed to leave our house and it would have to be swallowed by a sinkhole in order for Walt to allow emergency personnel through the front gate.
“Not hard enough, apparently,” I shot back.
He grinned and then gave a chin lift. “Boys, give us a minute.”
They didn’t delay in following his order.
I was far from in the clear, but I instantly felt better now that I wasn’t boxed in anymore.
“Now, is that better?” he asked.
I didn’t answer his question, but with no one at my back, I once again started toward the door.