Page 56 of Silence and Surrender

I claimed her mouth again, swallowing her protests. “Then let me have this. Let me have you. No barriers. Nothing between us.” The raw ache in my voice surprised even myself. I never lost control like this. Never took risks. Never let instinct override careful planning. But with Isabella, all my rules seemed to crash and burn. All my carefully constructed walls came crumbling down.

“Yes,” she breathed, and that one word shattered what little remained of my control.

Her explicit permission undid me completely. When she guided me to her entrance, her panties pushed aside, all reason fled. I thrust into her hard, swallowing her cry with my mouth. The feeling of her, hot and tight around me with nothing between us, was almost too much. I moved quickly, knowing that this couldn’t last long. I wouldn’t last long.

I’d never had unprotected sex. Catherine had been paranoid about getting pregnant, always ensuring I wore a condom, even though she was on birth control. Of course, later I realized it was because she never wanted to be with me and was sleeping around with someone else.

Isabella thrashed against me, and her release ripped through her. A second later I felt myself pulse within her, hardening even more, and then I was coming, pouring everything I had into her with a shuddering groan.

I couldn’t believe what I’d just done.

I was always careful. Always controlled. Always followed every rule. The man who planned every detail, who never left anything to chance, who kept emotional distance as carefully as he maintained his precise filing system—that man would never have done this. But Isabella had changed everything. Made me want things I’d sworn never to want again after Catherine. Made me feel things I’d thought were permanently locked away.

Here I was, possibly being chased, coming inside her against a wall in a maintenance tunnel. Some distant part of my mind knew we’d have to deal with the consequences, but right now, with her wrapped around me, her heat gripping my cock, her breath ragged against my neck, I couldn’t bring myself to care. All that mattered was this moment. This woman. This complete surrender to something bigger than my careful rules and controlled desire.

It wasn’t soft, it wasn’t tender.

But it was real.

I held her there for a moment, both of us trembling slightly in the aftermath. My face buried in her neck, breathing in her scent. Her fingers gentle in my hair, soothing even as her other hand still gripped my shoulder hard enough to bruise. Everything felt raw, exposed. Like we’d crossed some line that could never be uncrossed. But damn it, I didn’t care.

For the first time in years, I felt completely, terrifyingly alive.

“We need to move,” I managed finally, though every instinct screamed to keep her here, safe in my arms. To never let her face what waited outside these shadows.

She nodded, straightening her dress while I fixed my clothing. But something had changed between us. Something fundamental and irreversible. I could see it in her eyes when she looked at me, in the slight tremor of her hands as she smoothed her hair.

I’d broken every rule I’d made after Catherine. Crossed every line I’d drawn. And somehow, none of that seemed to matter anymore.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Isabella

The maintenance tunnel felt different now, charged with the aftermath of what we’d just done. My legs were still shaky as we moved through the shadows, and I could feel the evidence of Colton’s release slowly seeping between my thighs. The material of my dress caressed my sensitized skin, a constant reminder of how completely we’d just shattered every boundary we’d set.

The tunnels themselves seemed to breathe with horrid, ancient secrets. Water dripped somewhere in the darkness, echoing off century-old pipes. The air was thick with dust and the lingering scent of Colton’s cologne mixed with the headier smell of our passion. Somewhere far above, water was ruining fake paintings and expensive tuxedos. Down here, emergency lights cast everything in shades of red and shadow, turning Colton’s features even darker.

I couldn’t quite believe what had just happened. The cautious, rule-following Colton Moreau had just taken me against a wall without protection. Had come inside me with a desperate intensity that still made me shiver to remember. Had completely abandoned his need for control in a way that both thrilled and terrified me.

Those women at The Dorchester had seen a different man entirely. I remembered their words about his controlled passion, his emotional distance, his careful rules about protection and procedures.

But there had been nothing controlled about how he’d taken me in this tunnel. Nothing calculated in how his hands had shaken as he touched me, how his kiss had been almost desperate, how he’d lost himself so completely he’d forgone protection entirely. The man who never slept over, never showed weakness, never let anyone close—that man had just broken every rule he’d made for himself.

It wasn’t just the physical act that shook me, though god, the memory of how he’d felt, how he’d gripped my hips with those masculine hands, how he’d groaned my name like a prayer...No. What truly undid me was how completely his defenses had crumbled. The man who measured his coffee with precise scoops, who color-coded his legal briefs, who maintained distance from everyone—that man had just lost himself entirely.

In me. For me.

No carefully prepared hotel suite, no perfect orchestration, no practiced distance. Just hungry and desperate passion and something that felt dangerously close to devotion. The man who never kissed his lovers had devoured my mouth like he was drowning. The man who never lost control had come inside me with a stunning intensity, marking me in the most primal way possible.

A momentary flash of panic hit as I realized the implications. I’d need to stop at the pharmacy on the way home, get what I needed to prevent any complications. It wasn’t the right time for anything permanent to come from this encounter, but I needed to be one hundred percent sure.

But hell, the way he’d looked at me in those final moments. Like nothing else in the world existed. Like I was the culmination of everything he ever wanted. I’d seen behind the mask he showed the world—the suits, the measured words, the tight control. I’d felt the intense desire beneath it all, the desperate passion he kept locked away. And now I wasn’t sure how to go back to seeing him as just the bank’s chief counsel. Just my colleague. Just the man who brought me coffee and discussed case files.

His hand stayed on my lower back as we navigated the dark passages, protective and possessive in a way that made color flush in my cheeks. Every step reminded me of what we’d just done, of how he’d felt inside me, of how his seed was still warm and wet against my skin. The rough stone walls seemed to hold echoes of our passion—my stifled cries, his primitive groans, the sound of silk against wool as we’d come together with shocking clarity.

Steam hissed from an old pipe, casting the corridor in a momentary fog. In that brief whiteout, Colton pulled me closer, his body sheltering mine from whatever might lurk in the artificial mist. The gesture was instinctive, protective—so different from the man I knew a few months ago. This wasn’t the lawyer planning his next move. This was something deeper, more real. Something that made my heart race for reasons that had nothing to do with danger we were in.

“Almost there,” he murmured, his voice still rough in a way that made me want to moan. His lips brushed my ear as he spoke, and I could feel the barely contained tension in his body. Not just from our situation, but from what had just happened between us. From the lines we’d crossed. From how completely we’d changed everything. “The kitchen exit should be—”

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