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

by Aly Martinez

  My heart had been in my throat the entire drive over. I’d alternated between all-consuming fury and paralyzing panic. The two emotions had shifted so rapidly that they’d often overlapped. As we’d driven, Alex had been on the phone with the police while they mobilized local law enforcement in search of Pete’s car based on the description Leo had gotten off the security footage from the garage. Meanwhile, Lark had sat on the phone with Leo’s brother-in-law, Caleb Jones, a detective with the Chicago police department, and given him everything we knew about Apollo. We still had no idea whose side we were on, but none of us were willing to trust either party in this equation. All we knew was that neither Rhion nor Pete was answering their phones and Apollo had followed them to an empty building on the edge of the city.

  “Don’t fucking touch me!” Apollo yelled as Johnson stormed toward him, every step heavier than the last.

  “I will fucking kill you if this is one of your games,” he rumbled, snatching him by the front of his T-shirt and shoving a finger in his face.

  Busting it up between the two of them, I pushed Johnson out of the way, but only so I could get my own hands on the kid.

  “You got me here. Now, where is she?”

  “They’re up there. If you give it a second, you can see her pacing the balcony. Top corner office used to be my dad’s. A bike messenger just left. It appears the building isn’t locked.”

  I gave him a hard shake before releasing him to look up at the building.

  Using my hand to shield my eyes from the sun, I stared up, desperately searching for a single glance of the fiery tips on her blond hair.

  But it wasn’t the sight of her that made time stop.

  “No!” Her shrill voice echoed off the building and the pavement.

  I sucked in a deep breath, and it felt like acid was coating the inside of my throat when I caught sight of her folded backwards over the railing, her hair whipping in the wind behind her.

  There was no smoke.

  No burning house.

  No fire at all.

  But the sight of my Butterfly teetering on the edge, barely clinging to life, was more than enough to send me up in flames.

  Every muscle in my body began to hum as something inside me exploded.

  All at once, we took off. Johnson and I were shoulder-to-shoulder at the front of the pack, Lark and Alex behind us, Apollo bringing up the rear.

  “We’ll take the stairs,” Johnson barked at me. “Alex, Lark, take Apollo and hit the elevator.”

  My legs never slowed as I snatched the emergency stairwell open, taking the steps two by two.

  My heart was racing and my lungs began protesting the higher we got, but I would have had to drop dead before I gave them any respite.

  I pushed myself harder. Faster. Visions of fiery butterflies flashed behind my lids, fueling me with every step.

  When we finally reached the tenth floor, I stopped as Johnson shoved through the final door.

  Pete wasn’t stupid. The door was going to be locked and we’d have no way in. It was going to take precious moments to get through it. Kicking a door down wasn’t as easy as they made it look in the movies. I had faith that the five of us could do it—eventually.

  But, much like the first time I’d tried to save Rhion, I didn’t have time to wait for eventually.

  For reasons I’d never be able to explain, my mind drifted back to that night of the fire.

  Drawing in a smoke-filled breath, I made a decision that would haunt me for the rest of my life. “You need to climb up to the roof.”

  “I can’t!” she shrieked.

  My stomach twisted, but I gentled my voice. “Look, I know you’re scared. But I’m right here. I’ll help guide you up, but, sweetheart, it’s bearing down on you. You gotta move, and I mean now.”

  Rhion would probably claim it was fate.

  And, as long as she was alive, I’d let her call it whatever she wanted.

  “Keep him distracted,” I said to Johnson as I rounded the corner to the very last flight of stairs.

  Rhion

  And just when I thought things couldn’t get any worse.

  I was barely holding on to the man I considered a father, who was apparently trying to kill me for the second time, when I heard his voice.

  Not Jude.

  Not Johnson.

  Not the police.

  Not even Tight Pants McGee.

  My brother.

  My. Fucking. Brother.

  Probably there on standby to light my body on fire when Pete had finished with me.

  “Get your fucking hands off her!” Apollo screamed, pounding at the door.

  My heart was already working overtime. Adrenaline was burning through the mental effects of whatever Pete had used to drug me, but my sluggish body was slower to snap out of it.

  Either that or the fifty-seven-year-old man had been putting in some serious time at the gym, because no matter how hard I fought, I couldn’t get out of his grasp. And slowly, inch by inch, he was overpowering me.

  However, I refused to give up. And not just because a human’s natural instinct was to fight for survival. But because I wanted to live.

  I wanted the life I’d been promised I’d have only hours earlier.

  A ring on my finger.

  Little green-eyed babies.

  Rocking chairs.

  Jude.

  No one. Not some expensive arsonist. Not Pete. Not Apollo. Was going to take that away from me.

  Though, as my toes started slipping and my center of gravity came closer and closer to being forced over the railing, I feared that it was no longer in my control.

  I needed a hero.

  I needed Jude.

  But this wasn’t like the last time. There was no silent alarm going off. Jude probably didn’t know I was missing. And, even if he had figured out what had happened in the garage, he’d assume I was safe with Pete.

  No, this time, I was on my own.

  Pete growled as I clawed at his face, giving it all I had left in me.

  “Let. Me. Go!” I choked out as the ground disappeared below my feet and the edge of the railing bit into my butt.

  Only a few more inches and I wouldn’t be able to hold on any longer.

  My brother’s voice screamed in the background, the sound of the wood splintering on the door scaring me almost as much as the cool, empty air at my back.

  I gave up on my fight and frantically began clinging to Pete’s shirt and shoulders. I did my best to hook my legs around him for leverage, but I was going down. Fast.

  With the cold wind whipping all around me, more air than railing, I screwed my eyes shut and sent up one last plea to the universe.

  I’d been saved from the claws of death once. Maybe…

  “Butterfly.”

  Hope exploded in my chest as I popped my eyes open.

  Jude. Standing like a goddamn superhero on the edge of the roof only one floor above us staring down. His eyes blazing with primal rage.

  I blinked.

  He wasn’t real.

  No way.

  But the possibility of him being there enabled me to keep holding on.

  Pete kept his fight up, trying to forcefully remove my hands from his shirt.

  And I kept mine up, my fingers becoming numb from squeezing so tight.

  My pulse skyrocketed as I caught sight of the figment of my imagination swiftly lowering himself and then dropping to his feet beside us onto the balcony.

  “What the fuck…” was all Pete got out before he suddenly disappeared.

  I saw it happen, yet I still couldn’t believe it.

  Jude grabbed my arm at the same time he wrapped his bicep around Pete’s neck. The ground reappeared beneath my feet as Jude swept his leg out, sending Pete crashing down hard.

  I couldn’t move.

  I wasn’t even sure I was breathing when Jude shoved a knee into his back and twisted Pete’s arm behind him.

  It felt like a dream, whispers o
f details my brain had made up as I plummeted to my death.

  This was proven when I heard a loud bang and looked up. The broken door swung open and Apollo stormed in with Johnson, Alex, and Lark—and they weren’t even carrying his lifeless body.

  Definitely not real.

  “Oh God,” I cried, sinking down to the ground and wrapping my arms around my legs. “I’m dead.”

  Johnson moved straight to Pete and lifted him off the ground only to slam him back down.

  Jude’s muscular body suddenly filled my vision as he squatted in front of me. “Rhion,” he whispered.

  Tears streamed down my face and off my chin as I looked up at him. “Are…” I croaked. After clearing my throat, I finished with, “Are you real?”

  A slow smile pulled at his lips as he replied, “I am. And so are you, my beautiful Butterfly.”

  A sob tore from my throat. “Oh God, you’re not. The real Jude would never say that.”

  He chuckled and dragged me into his arms. “He does now.”

  I blinked.

  And then blinked again.

  But he never disappeared.

  “This can’t be real,” I whispered against his neck.

  “It’s real, Rhion,” he replied with a tight squeeze.

  “It has to be a dream. Pete just tried to kill me. Apollo is here and he has hasn’t tried to kill me. And you appeared out of thin air on a roof seconds before I fell. This definitely isn’t real, Jude.”

  His arms spasmed around me as he breathed in deeply, his chest expanding between us to bring our upper bodies flush.

  And then Jude proved he was better than any version of him I could ever write.

  “I only said it was real, Butterfly. I never said it wasn’t a dream.”

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Jude

  “You son of a bitch!” Rhion screamed as she dove across the Guardian dining room table after her brother.

  “Little help, guys?” Apollo called out as most of the crew stood around watching them, a smile on our faces.

  Mine was a mask for the emotional upheaval going on in my chest, and I suspected that Johnson’s was too. My pulse had slowed and the adrenaline was ebbing from my system, but I didn’t think I’d ever be able to calm down again.

  I’d never forget seeing her on the ledge the night of the fire. It had haunted me for years.

  But the moment I had seen her on that balcony, so perilously close to going over, I had known that, if she fell, I’d never be able to close my eyes again.

  Not to blink, and certainly not to sleep.

  If she fell, I was going down with her.

  Luckily—or, as Rhion liked to say, as fate would have it—I’d gotten there in time.

  But having saved her didn’t feel like redemption for the night of the fire.

  Not all scars faded with time.

  During that brief second when I’d stared down at her, my Butterfly fighting a monster off, I’d finally realized that not all scars were bad.

  Without mine, I never would have met her.

  That crazy, crazy woman who had lit my life up in a million shades of vibrant color.

  And, for that alone, the moment I’d gotten her safe, I’d made my peace with the past.

  “I did it for you!” Apollo yelled, dodging Rhion’s tiny flying fists.

  “You scared the shit out of me for two damn years.”

  “Yes, and it was time consuming. I’m looking forward to a vacation.”

  It could be said that either Apollo had a death wish or he wasn’t the brightest crayon in the Park family box, because he’d been goading Rhion for over twenty minutes with shit like that.

  But, if his wide grin or her twitching lips were any indication, it was only pent-up sibling torment they needed to work out of their systems.

  “Gah!” she huffed, diving back after him.

  Shaking my head, I looped an arm around her hips and lifted her off her feet. “Okay, Ronda Rousey. It’s been a long day. Let’s save the fight club for another night.”

  She turned her angry scowl on me, but when I smirked and arched an eyebrow, it transformed into a glowing smile.

  After the police had hauled Pete off, an ambulance had come for Rhion.

  We had no idea what kind of drugs Pete had given her, and while she seemed to be snapping out of it, I wasn’t taking any chances. Bruises covered her body, and it terrified me to think of what could have been going on inside. A few-dozen blood tests later, she was given a clean bill of health and we were on our way before the sun had set. Apollo was waiting for us at Guardian, and while I wanted to lock her away in her apartment for a month, Rhion wanted to talk to her brother.

  It wasn’t an easy conversation for anyone, and Apollo asked if they could talk in private, but there was no fucking way I was leaving her side. Good guy or bad—I didn’t trust anyone with Rhion anymore.

  Rhion cried as he recounted the things Pete had done to him as a kid. I didn’t even know Apollo, but it was all I could not to drive down to the jail and destroy Peter Higgins.

  “Tell Apollo goodnight and let’s go home,” I ordered.

  “Fine,” she said to me before swinging a glare to her brother. “But this is not over.”

  He shrugged and then looked around the room. “Anyone want to go for a beer?”

  Johnson took a step toward him, cupped him on the shoulder, and gave him a hard shove toward the door. “I wouldn’t press your luck, kid. Just because none of us have decapitated you doesn’t mean we don’t still have the thirst for your blood.”

  Rhion giggled as Johnson hauled him to the door, but before they made it out, she called out, “Thanks, Apollo.”

  His smile widened, but his eyes filled with regret. “Anything for you, Rhion.”

  Her body sagged as she pressed into my side, never tearing her gaze off his back until the door had closed behind him.

  “You okay?” I murmured into the top of her hair.

  “Surreal,” she whispered back.

  And right then, four years after the night that had nearly ruined us both, with her tucked in my arms, an entire future ahead of us, I couldn’t say she was wrong.

  Epilogue

  Rhion

  Two years later…

  “You look beautiful,” Jude whispered in my ear as we swayed together on the dance floor, waves crashing on the beach behind us.

  I was. I knew that much. I’d spend six hours getting dressed. Two hair stylists. A makeup artist. A sleek, white backless gown complete with thousands of tiny, red crystals streaming up from the bottom. The most incredible black-and-red heels that had ever been made. But it was Jude’s wedding ring on my finger that made it all pop. Beautiful wasn’t a strong enough word.

  “I know,” I whispered back, my smile so huge that it was almost painful.

  For the first few days after Jude had saved me—a second time—I had done a damn fine job at keeping my shit together. I hadn’t missed Jude’s wary glances. He’d been worried. And rightly so. I’d been through hell. But the world had kept spinning.

  Pete was facing a plethora of charges, and Sandy had been arrested at her home in New York after my so-called will had been recovered from Pete’s office, her name on the bottom line as a witness. She wasn’t even to the police station before she’d flipped on him, revealing everything from the name of the man Pete had paid to set the fire all the way to the attorneys he’d used to swindle my father’s estate from me.

  It wasn’t until four days later, on Christmas morning, when the reality of it all crashed down on me. There would be no phone calls or visits from the people I’d considered my family for so long. I’d lost not only my real parents, but my surrogates as well.

  I was in the process of shattering all the pictures I had of them when Jude stopped me. Wrapping me in a bear hug, he’d whispered into my ear, “Breaking them won’t erase the past, Butterfly. All we can do is fill the frames with new pictures. New memories.”

  He
was right, but I still cried for most of the day. Around five that afternoon, the men of Guardian flooded into my apartment, along with Apollo and Sarah’s sister, Emma, a local photographer. I looked like death with swollen eyes and a puffy face in every one of those pictures. But, the next day, I’d grinned like a maniac as Jude had hung them around our apartment.

  Peering up at my husband, I smiled at the memory and slid my hand up the back of his neck to trace my fingers over his scars.

  He smiled; the pain and torture that used to paint his face at my touch had long since vanished. They weren’t his scars anymore. They were ours. Together.

  “You want to see something interesting?” Jude asked, his eyes flashing over my shoulder.

  “Depends. Is it something sexy interesting?” I asked.

  “Not for you,” he replied.

  He turned us in step with the music until I saw Braydon and Katie standing around the bar, only inches separating their bodies. Her cheeks were bright red, and his smile was aimed at the ground, her shoes dangling off the tips of his fingers.

  “Oh hell,” I breathed. “That is not going to end well.”

  Jude chuckled. “You never know. I thought the same thing about Alex and Brianna.”

  “Where are they anyway?” I twisted to the tables flanking each side of the dance floor but never found my maid of honor or her boyfriend.

  “Probably having sex on our bed.”

  “Ew… Hopefully they at least use one of the guest rooms.”

  “I put a fucking padlock on Val’s room.”

  I patted his chest. “Smart man.”

  Apollo appeared beside us, asking, “Mind if I cut in?”

  “Actually, I fucking do,” Jude grumbled, and I rolled my eyes.

  He was so overprotective.

  Apollo had been back in my life for the last two years, but I suspected that Jude would never trust him completely. For that matter, I wasn’t sure he would ever trust anyone with me. Only a few hours earlier, he’d given Johnson the evil eye as he’d walked me down the sandy aisle.

  “Next song,” I told Apollo, not yet ready to let my man go.

  He lifted his hands in surrender and slowly backed away, a giant smile splitting his lips.