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

by Aly Martinez

  My lips twitched.

  This. Woman. All shy, frightened, and innocent half the time. Then sexy, brazen, and greedy the other. I ached to draw my cock from my pants and see which side of her I’d get when I was driving into her. But there was so much of her I wanted first.

  “You want me to touch you, Rhion? Maybe my tongue teasing your clit?” I plucked her nipple and then stepped out of her reach.

  “Yes,” she breathed.

  I moved to her feet, her wanton gaze tracking my every step. “I want that too. But, first, I’m going to need you to tell me something.”

  “Jude,” she warned, her languid body suddenly stiffening.

  I pried the top of her jeans open and began tugging them down her legs. When I got to her feet, I used the heels on her silly feathered shoes to remove them—one by one. They hit the floor with a clatter as she hurried to help me get her pants off.

  Seconds later, she was in nothing but a pair of thin, black lace panties that spectacularly showcased the small cleft at the top of her sex.

  My whole body responded. And not just in the way a male naturally responds to seeing a gorgeous, nearly naked woman laid out before him.

  This was Rhion.

  I stood there staring down at her for entirely too long. Or maybe it was only a second. But even that was a sin to waste when it came to touching her.

  “You said that I was the only one who could heal you,” she announced in a soft, seductive whisper.

  My lungs seized. What was the old adage about a drunk man’s words being a sober man’s thoughts?

  But she wasn’t done yet. “You said you wanted to touch every part of my body, inside and out, so you could heal me too.” She shoved her fingers into the sides of her panties and shimmied them down.

  My mouth watered as she bent her legs and opened them wide, revealing herself to me.

  “Heal me, Jude.”

  I couldn’t heal her. She wasn’t damaged. Perfect, head to toe.

  I caught her legs behind her knees and dragged her to the edge of the table. Using my foot, I pulled a chair over, and the second my ass hit the wood, my mouth sealed over her clit.

  “Oh God!” she cried as I began to feast.

  My memories were correct: She was drenched, and I easily slipped a finger, then two, deep inside her.

  She draped her legs over my shoulders, and I ate at her like she was my favorite meal.

  And, with a single taste, that was exactly what she became. I licked and sucked as I pumped my fingers. Her body writhed beneath me, and my name whispered from her lips, drifting straight to my cock as though it were her hand.

  As her muscles tightened around my fingers, the orgasm building within her, she suddenly sat up. Her hands snaked into the back of my hair as she held me to her. I ached to remove her hand, but maybe I had been right.

  Maybe she was the only one who could heal me.

  Her fingers burned at the back of my scalp as her climax against my mouth seared me in a different way.

  Rising to my feet, I couldn’t get my pants off fast enough. She was still coming down as I retrieved a condom from my wallet and rolled it down my shaft.

  There were no words spoken as I prowled up the table and caught her mouth in a kiss. Her lips were lazy; mine were frenzied.

  “Look at me,” I demanded as I positioned myself at her opening.

  Her dark, painted lashes fluttered open at the same time her limp arms folded around my shoulders.

  With her burning gaze giving me all the permission I needed, I drove in hard, eliciting a blessed curse from both of us.

  Our bodies rolled together, a fluid rhythm the likes of waves joining in the sea. My every push, she met with a pull. And, each time I’d slide out, she’d welcome me back in. Her breasts pillowed between us as she held me tight, her hands mercifully staying out of my hair as though she knew I couldn’t take it.

  Not while I was inside her.

  Not while a wildfire blazed in my chest.

  When my knees began to ache, I climbed off her, standing at the edge of the table, and continued to fuck her.

  Hard but gentle.

  Slow but desperate.

  Punishing but apologetic.

  A sheen of sweat covered us both by the time she came on a reverent, “Jude.”

  As she milked me, my release slammed into me. I wasn’t done with her—not even close. But there was no way to prevent it any more than I could have stopped the massive amount of pressure draining from my chest for the first time in four years.

  “Butterfly,” I rasped as my release leveled me.

  I fell forward and rested my forehead on her shoulder as shockwaves coursed through me. I was vaguely aware of her toying with the ends of my hair as I jerked and twitched inside her.

  When I got my breathing under control, I hazarded a glance up.

  I was nowhere near ready for the emotion shining in her eyes, but I’ll be damned if it didn’t do some warm things to my soul.

  And when she smiled? Forget about it. That was a blast of heat to my entire fucking system.

  “Hey,” she whispered like she was seeing me for the first time all day.

  I touched my lips to hers. “Hey.”

  She began tracing the ridges of muscle at my sides. “So. Bad news. Your bed isn’t here yet.”

  “That certainly is bad news. You got any good news to follow that with?”

  She patted her hand on the wood. “You have a very sturdy dining room table.”

  I chuckled and kissed her again. “I gotta clean up. Any chance you can put that food in the oven?”

  “After that workout, I’m sure you’re ravenous.”

  I pushed up onto my hands and walked them down the table until I was hovering above her breasts. She gasped when I darted my tongue out to circle her nipple.

  “It’s you who’s gonna need the sustenance, Rhion. We didn’t get to the part on Friday night when you were straddling me.”

  A loud, life-changing giggle escaped her mouth, which was followed by a groan as I pulled out of her and an, “Oh. My. God,” as I felt her ogle my ass while I sauntered to the bathroom.

  Chapter Twenty

  Jude

  “Find it, Rhion,” I ordered, giving her nipples a tug.

  We were in my bed, which had thankfully been delivered while we’d been eating her grade-A chicken pot pie. After that, I’d shown her all twelve hundred square feet of my sprawling apartment. She oohed and aahed appropriately. She’d even managed to fake interest as I’d explained the finer points of IKEA furniture. The woman had probably never owned anything that wasn’t custom built specifically to meet her decorating needs. Though, as she listened to me intently, she wasn’t judging. Rhion wasn’t like that. Yes, her shoes clearly cost a fortune, probably her jeans too, but she didn’t wear them in a way that screamed for people to take notice. I’d lived with April long enough to know exactly what that looked like. But that was not Rhion Park.

  She was simple.

  Understated.

  Stunning.

  For the rest of the evening, we lay on the couch, alternating between making out and laughing. On that worn-out sectional, there was nothing but two people getting to know each other. We didn’t talk about the fire. Or her family. I didn’t bring up Friday night again. In those moments, with her staring up at me like I was the most amazing man she’d ever seen and me staring down at her knowing she was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen, everything else became inconsequential.

  When the clock hit midnight, I offered to take her home. I’d never forget as long as I lived the way her lips twisted adorably as she said, “And miss breaking in the new mattress? No way.”

  I laughed.

  And then I’d carted her off to bed, where we had officially broken the new mattress in.

  And, now, at five a.m. the next morning, Rhion was riding my cock like she’d been born to do it. I was perilously close to coming, and she still hadn’t gotten off yet.
But, if she didn’t speed it up, I was going to be late for work.

  Gripping her hips, I thrust up hard.

  “Jude!” she cried, but it wasn’t in ecstasy. It was in admonishment.

  I’d been inside her exactly three times, and I already knew that my Butterfly liked her control. She liked riding me. Working me over until I was gasping for air.

  And, truth be told, I liked all of that too.

  I also like keeping my job, and that entailed my being on time.

  After licking my thumb, I dropped it to her clit and rubbed a tight circle.

  “Jude!” she cried. This time, it was in ecstasy.

  I bucked beneath her again.

  Her hands flew to my shoulders, where she balanced herself. “Wait!”

  “Babe, trust me when I say I am in no rush to have you climb off my cock. But we have to leave in fifteen minutes. And I still have to shower and get dressed.” I couldn’t stifle the chuckle when disappointment hit her eyes. Using her hips, I ground into her and finished with, “That does not include the extra few minutes it’s gonna take for me to pack a bag to stay at your place tonight.”

  Her eyes lit, and my lips curled up in a smile.

  However, just as quickly, my lips fell because Rhion got busy.

  * * *

  Half an hour later, she was exiting my Jeep in the Guardian parking garage. I could tell she was nervous, but it was nothing like it had been the night before. She was smiling, and she didn’t even wait for me to come around to open her door before she climbed out.

  “What time do you think you’ll be off tonight?” she asked, looping her arm around my hips as we fell into stride toward the elevator.

  I was tossing my arm over her shoulders when I tagged a man lingering in the shadows of the stairwell. I quickly stepped in front of her, and she bumped into my back.

  “What the…” she cursed.

  The man slowly emerged, but recognizing him didn’t quell the unease ricocheting in my veins.

  His gaze was dark, and he looked downright malevolent.

  “Levitt,” Johnson greeted as he strode toward us.

  “Oh, hey, Aidan,” Rhion chirped behind me.

  I allowed her to step out around me, but I kept her close. Something felt off. And, if I’d learned anything in my years working security, it was to trust my gut.

  He scanned her from head to toe and then back again before asking, “Did your phone break?”

  She shook her head. “No. Why?”

  He took an angry step toward her and seethed, “Because I’m positive there has to be a reason you didn’t call me and let me know you were shacking up with Jude last night.”

  I didn’t have time to process it before I slammed my hand against his chest. “Back the fuck up!”

  His gaze didn’t flip to mine; it stayed leveled on Rhion.

  “Oh shit,” she breathed.

  I gave him a hard shove that shifted him back a step, but he still didn’t acknowledge me.

  “Yeah, Rhion. ‘Oh shit,’ is right,” he replied.

  I threw my arm out to stop her as she moved toward him, but she ducked under it and got right between us. “I’m so sorry. I…I didn’t—”

  He gritted his teeth and shook his head. And then, all at once, his shoulders rolled forward as relief rained down over him. It was quite possibly the most peculiar transformation I’d ever witnessed. One minute, there was no mistaking him as anything but a threat. The next, he was a man on the brink of a nervous breakdown.

  “For fuck’s sake, sweetheart. Use your goddamn phone,” he said, hooking her at the back of the neck and dragging her into his chest. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m good. I was with Jude,” she said, her words muffled by his shirt.

  His gaze finally lifted to mine, and his lips split in a cocky grin. “I’m not gonna hurt her. You can quit glaring at me, asshole.”

  “I’ll quit glaring when you let her the fuck go,” I shot back.

  He harrumphed but released her.

  Rhion didn’t delay in moving back to my side, and Johnson watched her closely as I slid an arm around her shoulders.

  “Jesus Christ,” he cursed to himself. “Get her upstairs. Then meet me in Leo’s office. We have a client briefing starting in five minutes.” And then he was gone, jogging up the stairs rather than taking the elevator.

  I looked down at Rhion and asked the rhetorical question, “What the fuck was that about?” It was only rhetorical because I knew I wouldn’t get an answer.

  So I nearly stroked out when I got one.

  “He sometimes pops in and hangs out with me in the mornings. He probably freaked when I wasn’t there.”

  Dipping down, I kissed the top of her head. “I do not understand your relationship with that man.”

  She laughed and—not surprisingly—didn’t bother to reply.

  When we got to her door, I kissed her indecently and for too long, so when I finally broke it, I was forced to take the stairs two by two to get up to Guardian without being late—or later, as it turned out.

  “How’s it going, Levitt?” Leo asked as I entered his office.

  He was leaning back, his booted feet propped up on the desk. Johnson sat across from him, his arms crossed over his chest, but a genuine smile curved at his lips.

  “Sorry I’m late,” I told Leo.

  “You’re welcome for last night,” he stated matter-of-factly. “If it weren’t for me, this guy would have been beating down your door at midnight.”

  Swinging my head between them, I asked, “What the hell for?”

  “Shut the door,” Johnson grumbled.

  I gave it a shove and then mimicked Johnson’s posture by crossing my arms over my chest, refusing to move to the empty chair next to him. That unease I felt in the garage slammed into my gut once again.

  Leo dug through a pile of papers on his messy desk and said, “Before we get started, I wanted to let you know I got great feedback on you from Senator White’s family. They had nothing but incredible things to say about you, so I’ve decided to assign you a more permanent position.”

  A huge smile split my face. I’d been hoping for something steady rather than the revolving door of odds-and-ends security jobs. Read: the shit work none of the other guys wanted.

  “That’s good fucking news,” I stated.

  “You and Johnson will be splitting duty. You two can work out your own schedule based on when he’s needed with Slate and Erica in Indy. This is not going to be a nine-to-five position, Levitt. And sometimes you’re gonna have to be on shift for well over forty hours a week. But I’m not thinking you’ll mind, considering your new assignment is with Rhion Park.”

  My spine shot straight. “Come again?”

  Leo looked to Johnson and grinned. “You’re up, my man.”

  I took a step deeper into the room. “I’m sorry. Did you say my new assignment is with Rhion?”

  “Don’t get excited. It doesn’t pay overtime,” Johnson said, grabbing a thick file folder off the corner of Leo’s desk. Then he offered it my way. “Last night was the first time Rhion has willingly left her apartment without me in two years.”

  I blinked, and that familiar unease didn’t just wash over me—it flooded me like a tidal wave. “What?”

  He shifted lower in his chair and kicked his legs out in front of him.

  Cool. Calm. Composed.

  Everything I was not.

  “She has her groceries delivered,” he said. “A lady who does her clothes shopping. A stylist who comes and does her hair. Hell, her tattoo guy even does house calls after she set him up a station in one of the bedrooms.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

  There’s no way…

  Flashes of her freaking out on the way to my house the night before crashed into me.

  “You’re lying,” I accused.

  But, in my gut, I knew he wasn’t.

  My mind was reeling. I was fin
ally getting the answers I so desperately wanted about Rhion.

  But these were wrong. All fucking wrong. My Butterfly wasn’t supposed to be broken anymore. She was supposed to have been flying free over the last few years, basking in the fact that she’d survived. She absolutely was not supposed to be locked up in an apartment, hiding from the world.

  “Explain,” I ordered.

  “We’ve been working on it recently,” Johnson said. “Actually, just the other night, before we ran into you at the bar, it was the first time she’d been able to walk across the street alone. Though it took her two hours to build up the courage, and that’s saying something, considering she knew Devon was stationed at the front of the bar and Alex and Lark were at the front of our building.”

  My mouth fell open. I shot Leo a questioning look, silently pleading for him to tell me that Johnson was full of shit.

  But his short nod confirmed it.

  “Why?” I asked. “What happened two years ago?”

  “Apollo happened,” Johnson sighed. “He got out of jail, cornered her at a charity event. Rhion’s been convinced ever since that he set the fire.”

  My head snapped to the side as if he’d hit me. No one knew who had started that fire. Arson was clear, but they’d never been able to pin it on anyone.

  “Wait. Wasn’t he in jail?”

  “Yep,” Johnson replied.

  “Then why would she think that?”

  “Um…because Apollo told her he set the fire.”

  I sank down into the chair next to him and scoffed. “That’s crazy. She can’t possibly believe…”

  The air in the room suddenly chilled. I looked to Johnson and found an ice storm radiating off his shoulders.

  “She is not fucking crazy,” he seethed.

  I cocked my head to the side, my confusion flashing to a whole lot of pissed off. “I didn’t say she was. I’m not sure if your eyes failed you this morning or what, but Rhion and I are together now. She’s got issues—those issues just became mine.”

  Johnson and I glared at each other until Leo waded in.

  “Okay. Okay,” he said. “Everyone take a breath. I think we can all agree that she means something to both of you.” He snapped his fingers. “Let’s keep this conversation moving forward.”