All for This

by Lexi Ryan

  formatted by E.M. Tippetts Book Designs

  New Hope Series

  Unbreak Me

  Stolen Wishes: A Prequel Novella

  Wish I May

  The Here and Now Series (A New Hope Series)

  Lost in Me

  Fall to You

  All for This

  Hot Contemporary Romance

  Text Appeal

  Accidental Sex Goddess

  Stiletto Girls Novels

  Stilettos, Inc.

  Flirting with Fate

  Decadence Creek

  Just One Night

  Just the Way You Are

  Coming Soon…

  Something Reckless Series (A New Hope Series)

  Something Reckless (Coming December 2014)

  Something Real (Coming 2015)

  For Annie. You’re a great cheerleader, and when it comes to brainstorming, you’re the bee’s knees. But mostly, I’m just glad that, after all this time, I can still call you my friend. Love and miss you.

  All for This is book three in the Here and Now series. It is not a stand-alone and it’s intended to be read after Lost in Me and Fall to You.

  What if you would never remember the day you made the most important decision of your life?

  That’s what they’re telling me about the day of my accident—the day I put on Max’s ring and chose him over Nate. I’m counting on the wisdom behind a decision I don’t remember making.

  Max is amazing—sexy, sweet, and kind. I was starting to believe happily-ever-after might be in my future after all. Then the unthinkable happened and my world imploded. If I’m going to make this work with Max, I need my missing memories, or at least answers from about those five days before my accident.

  But what does my future hold if those answers aren’t anything like I imagined?

  SHE’S WEARING his ring.

  Hanna’s hand shakes as she presses it to her lips and her engagement ring flashes at me. She’s in a thin pink robe, her hair falling in wild waves around her shoulders. Max stiffens next to her, bare-chested and protective. It doesn’t take a genius to know what they were doing before they answered the door.

  The sucker punch to the gut is too much, and I take a step back despite myself.

  I shouldn’t have come here. LA is too insane right now and I need to lie low until this madness settles. But I never should have come to Hanna’s apartment.

  It was instinct. As soon as I talked to Vivian and made arrangements for Collin, I came here.

  “You’re supposed to be dead,” Hanna whispers.

  “I’m not.” But I can’t decide if she wishes I were.

  Our eyes are locked. I need to break free and leave—go back to Asher’s and hide from the world while I wait for Collin to arrive.

  Max turns to the living room, where he clicks on the TV, and while I’m trapped in the torment in her eyes, the news anchor tells the world that I’m alive and well.

  Hanna finally releases me from her gaze and whips around to take in the TV, as if it might provide her with better evidence than my standing in her doorway.

  “I just wanted to make sure you’re okay.” The lie scrapes across my heart as it passes my lips. I wanted so much more than to make sure she was okay. There’s something about discovering that you should be dead that changes the way you look at the world. Changes what you’re willing to risk.

  “I’m okay,” she says, her gaze still on the TV screen.

  Suddenly, she throws her hand over her mouth and runs to the bathroom, and the sounds of her retching carry down the hallway.

  Max throws me a look I don’t understand. Maybe he too needs confirmation that I’m really at their door. Then he follows her.

  When they return, his arm is wrapped around her shoulders, and she’s leaning against his chest. I want to rip him off her and take her into my arms, where she belongs, but she sinks into his embrace as if she needs him to stand. Another reminder that I don’t belong here.

  Hanna might be the best thing that ever happened to me, but maybe for her, that’s Max. Hell, Asher told me Max was no money-grubbing asshole after Hanna for the wrong reasons. And I already suspected that, didn’t I? It was just further evidence.

  And here he is—fucking Good Guy of the Year—holding her up when her lover stands at the door.

  My hardened heart threatens to crumble.

  Fuck. “I’ll be at Asher’s if you need me.” I nod and back away as Max stares at me, his face a mask, his eyes unreadable.

  I rush down the stairs before my heart can keep me where my brain knows I don’t belong.

  HE’S GONE. He came long enough to turn my world upside down and then disappeared.

  Max kisses the top of my head, and I’m so conflicted by the intimacy of that single gesture. I want to curl into his sweetness, let him protect me the way I know he wants to. And at the same time, I want to push him away and tell him that he can’t touch me like that anymore. Because Nate is alive.

  “What can I do?” Max asks.

  I shake my head and make my way to the bedroom to get dressed. “I need to go after him.” I pull on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt and slide into my tennis shoes. When I reach the front door, I sense Max behind me and stop. “Will you be here when I get back?”

  He’s silent for a beat, and for the space of a breath, I wish we could go back to the simplicity of the moments before Nate knocked on my door. The wish disintegrates the moment I think it. Even the part of me that loves Max and craves a life with him wants Nate alive.

  “Do you want me to be?” Max asks.

  “Is it that simple?”

  “For me it is. If you want me to be here, I will be.”

  I meet his eyes for the first time since our world imploded. “It’s not that simple for me.”

  “I love you,” he whispers. He hands me my car keys then reaches around me and opens the door. “Be careful.”

  I pocket my keys to appease him, but I have no intention of taking my car. I walk through the darkness, taking the path along the river and hoping the cadence of my steps might calm the riot in my heart.

  I find Nate standing on the dock near Asher’s house, his hands wrapped around the railing as he looks across the water. I knew he’d be here. Did he know I’d come after him?

  The wind runs its fingers through his tousled hair, and I’m so overwhelmed with the need to touch him—to make sure he’s real and alive and healthy. I shove my hands into my pockets so they can’t betray me.

  “You lied to me.”

  He nods without turning to me. “Seemed like the right thing to do at the time.” His deep murmur floats on the breeze and wraps me in its embrace. Right now, Nate’s voice is the most beautiful sound in the world, the only thing I want to hear.

  “I understand why you would lie to me about taking my virginity if you thought I was going to marry Max,” I say, standing next to him at the rail. “I don’t agree with the decision, but I understand. But you lied to me about what was between us—about what you’d been willing to have with me. Why?”

  “You’d made your choice,” he whispers, his knuckles tightening around the wood.

  I shake my head. “Not when I came to LA. I’d called it off with Max, and you made me believe that you’d never changed your mind about us.”

  “Did you really call it off, Hanna? Did you tell people you weren’t going to marry him? Or was it a secret again?”

  “I…” I force my lungs to take air. “That’s not fair. You knew I couldn’t remember, and you lied.”

  He studies me for a minute. “And how much do you remember?”

  “I remember the day we made love. I remember you telling me that it was time for me to make a choice.”

  “After that?”

>   I shake my head. “Nothing.”

  He looks back to the water. “Let’s just say that by the time you left my place, it was pretty clear I couldn’t give you what you wanted. And after five days of you not answering my calls or texts…”

  “Yet a week later, you were at my house, climbing into my bed?”

  “Foolish optimism.”

  “What happened? Why did you have to lie?”

  “I was right, wasn’t I? It didn’t take you long to take him back.” His gaze flicks to my hand, and I realize his jaw is hard—angry. “You didn’t wait long to put his ring back on your finger. I’m not the only one who lied.”

  The wind whips my hair around my face and stings my eyes. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “You’re fucking kidding me, right? You took off his ring and told me you weren’t going to marry him. But what you really meant was that you wanted your rebound boy again. That’s all I am to you, the guy you like to screw around with when Max hurts your feelings.”

  “That’s unfair,” I breathe.

  “Is it? How long after my supposed death did you wait to fuck him, Hanna?”

  Hanna. Not angel. I’ve lost that label. “You walked away from me.”

  “I didn’t walk away. I let you go.”

  “What’s the difference?”

  He shakes his head. “Go home. I’m sorry I interrupted you. Go back to fucking your fiancé.”

  His words hurt. They make me feel dirty and ashamed when I’ve done nothing wrong.

  “Why did you even come here tonight? To hurt me? To make me feel guilty? Mission. Accomplished.”

  He turns and closes the distance between us, sliding his fingers into my hair and cupping my jaw in his hands. “I came because I thought you would be grieving me and I couldn’t stand the idea of you hurting.” His eyes dip to my mouth. “But I guess I didn’t need to worry about that.”

  I swallow hard and wait for my feet to obey my mind—to back away before he can kiss me. But they don’t. I’ve never had any willpower to resist this man, and I wonder if that weakness will be my undoing.

  “You have no idea what the last ten days have been like for me.”

  “No. I guess Max is the only one who knows that.” When he lifts his eyes back to mine, the pain there rips me in two.

  “I won’t apologize for loving him. He’s a good man.”

  “I’m glad,” he says. “I hope you two have a good life.”

  Another punch in the gut, but my gut’s practically numb by now, so I hardly wince. “So this is it, then? You’re just going to show up on my doorstep—alive when you’re supposed to be dead—make me feel like shit, and then walk away?”

  He leans his forehead against mine and our breath mingles. His hands tighten in my hair almost painfully. “Are you asking me to do something else?”

  “No,” I whisper, and that’s it. That’s all I have left. All my will and all my strength go into that single word.

  He releases me and steps back. I wait for relief, but it doesn’t come. His eyes are resting on my left hand, and I want to cut it off for the pain it puts on his face.

  “Goodbye, Hanna.”

  THE CLOCK’S second hand mocks me as I sit in Hanna’s otherwise silent apartment and wait for her to return.

  I wanted to tell her not to go, but I knew she needed to. I wanted to go with her, but I would have just been in the way.

  What the hell am I going to do now?

  I’m not a fool. I know she still loves him, and I know she wouldn’t still be wearing my ring if he hadn’t been presumed dead. What I don’t know is how this changes things. Am I supposed to step aside so she can be with the father of her children? Am I supposed to hold on tight and pretend it doesn’t kill me to see the way she looks at him—as if he’s some gift, a miracle from the heavens? As if no one and nothing exists for her when he’s near?

  In the cupboard, I find the wrapped jewelry box I positioned by the coffee and tuck it into my pocket. I have epically bad timing. I’d just gotten the ring and made plans to propose when Meredith decided to throw a wrench in my world, and tonight, I’d hidden the house key when Nate showed up at her door.

  I shouldn’t have signed the lease, but it seemed like the perfect surprise. We spend more nights together than apart, and I hate the idea of her using those stairs several times a day. And with the babies coming…

  The door groans softly as it opens. Hanna’s face is pale, her cheeks wet with tears.

  I stand without thinking.

  What a fucking asshole. It’s all I can do not to track him down and punch him in the face. Because she’s standing here pale and limp, and he did that to her. He showed up on her doorstep without warning and then walked away like he didn’t just turn her world upside down. And whatever he said when she went to find him made her cry. Asshole.

  I wrap my arms around her and she clings to me—her nose against my chest, her hands curling around my arms. I stroke her hair and wait for her to break down, for these quiet tears to turn to sobs. But they don’t. She just holds on, her slow and steady breaths warming my chest.

  “How did my life get so screwed up?”

  “Are you okay?”

  When she lifts her eyes to mine, there’s so much sadness in them that it makes my chest ache. “Can you forgive me for loving him too?” she asks. “Can we really survive this?”

  Relief hits me center mass and splinters out through my limbs. Because there’s still a we. I bring her hand to my mouth and press my lips to her knuckles. If I could package the intensity of my love in a single gesture, if I could prove to her how hard I’m willing to hold on, she wouldn’t doubt us for a second.

  When she settles her head against my chest again, I squeeze my eyes shut and say a prayer that I’ll be enough for her.

  “I’m not going anywhere,” I whisper into her hair.

  “FUCK, IT’S good to see you.” Asher pulls me in for a hug and slaps me on the back.

  “You too.”

  Maggie waits behind him, half sniffling, half smiling, and when Asher doesn’t release me soon enough for her liking, she pulls him off me and curls into me. “You scared the shit out of us,” she growls into my chest.

  I grin and stroke her hair. “I think your girl likes me, Asher.”

  He grunts, and Maggie says, “Shut up, Crane. You couldn’t handle me.”

  “No doubt,” I mutter.

  She pulls out of my arms, grabs me by the wrist, and leads me into the kitchen while Asher takes my bags up the stairs.

  After pouring herself a shot of tequila, she hands one to me. I throw it back without question. I haven’t had anything alcoholic to drink since the night Hanna showed up at my house in LA, only half of her memory intact. I relish the warmth of the alcohol as it sinks to my stomach.

  “What the fuck happened?” she asks. “How was it that you weren’t on that helicopter?”

  Asher joins us and stands so Maggie’s back is against his chest. They’re so damn good for each other, it eats at me.

  “I was supposed to be,” I begin. I pour myself another shot because, fuck, if anything calls for alcohol abuse, it’s finding out that you’re supposed to be dead and the woman you love—the woman who’s the only reason you aren’t dead right along with the rest of your tour—has moved on with another man. “I decided I couldn’t do the tour and chartered a private plane to get me to Janelle in India. She was at this spiritual retreat and I was staying there, but they don’t allow technology, so I…I had no idea the helicopter went down until someone arrived to deliver the news of my death to Janelle.”

  “Where is Janelle?” Maggie asks.

  “She’s still there. I told her to stay, and she was shaken enough that she didn’t feel like she wanted to be anywhere else.”

  “Why couldn’t you do the tour?” Asher asks.

  Maggie says, “Because of Hanna, I bet.”

  I look to Asher, who shakes his head. He didn’t tell her.
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br />   “Why would you say that?” I ask Maggie.

  “I know about you and Hanna. Everyone knows.” She digs through a stack of magazines and hands me one.

  My gut burns when I see it. “Fucking privacy-invading assholes,” I growl. My gaze snaps back to Maggie. “Max knows too?”

  “Yeah,” Maggie says.

  Then she smacks me on the right shoulder. “That’s for scaring me.” Then again on the left. “And that’s for screwing around with my sister and not even telling me about it.”

  Asher grabs Maggie’s wrists and pulls her back against his chest. “Quit beating on the company.” Then to me, he says, “You can stay as long as you want. When will Collin get here?”

  “Vivian’s bringing him in the morning.”

  Maggie’s eyes fill. “That poor kid. I can’t imagine what a rollercoaster this has been for him.”

  My throat is too thick, and I can’t risk speaking, so I only nod. Vivian said Collin never cried. He insisted Daddy wasn’t dead because Daddy would never leave him without saying goodbye.

  One impulsive decision is the only reason my son still has his father, and that fact makes me feel so insanely helpless I want to scream.

  “I’m ready for him to be here,” I finally say. “And thanks for letting us stay awhile. LA is a madhouse. Vivian’s been hounded by paparazzi since the helicopter went down.”

  Asher nods. “Of course. You’re welcome as long as you want.”

  We all say our goodnights, and the happy couple makes their way to their bedroom, leaving me with the bottle of tequila and memories of Hanna’s mouth under mine.

  Five Days Before Hanna’s Accident

  “STAY ONE more night?”

  She rolls to face me and runs her fingers over my stubble. I need a shave, but I can’t bring myself to have a smooth face when Hanna’s around. She can’t keep her hands off my face when it’s a little rough.

  “You’re sure you want to be with me before I’ve made my choice?”