The silence that followed was bone-deep.

Mike Richard stood at the threshold of his own bedroom, sweat trickling down his bare chest, muscles tense, a flush still riding high on his cheekbones. Behind him, Isla’s trembling body was tangled in silk sheets, the evidence of their savage union unmistakable in the way her wrists bore faint red marks, her thighs glistening, her eyes dazed and barely open.

And in front of him stood the one woman he had never expected—or wanted—to witness him like this.

Isabella.

His mother.

A vision of control in a blood-red gown that clung to her body like seduction, her perfectly painted lips curved in an...