I finally noticed the two visiting area guards staring at me. Embarrassed, I straightened and stepped away from the wall. How long had they been standing there? When I realized the erection in my pants was out for the world to see, I immediately tried to surreptitiously hide it with my briefcase, but ultimately failed to do so. If anything, it drew attention to it. 

"Are you the lawyer?" One of the guards asked. 

"I-" I cleared my throat. "I am." 

"You're late," the guard growled, then glanced down at my briefcase. A knowing grin split his face wide open. He added, "Though I can probably guess why." 

Against my will, my cheeks reddened as the memory of what I just saw flashed before my eyes, still too fresh and vivid for my liking. Aggressively, I shoved it to the back of my mind and straightened. 

The grinning guard motioned for me to enter one of the visiting rooms. Hurriedly, I did so, if only to get away from their prying eyes and knowing grins. The door slammed shut behind me.

My client wasn't here yet, thank God. 

I went to the metal table, tossed my briefcase on it and collapsed on the metal chair. A hand reached for my tie and yanked on it, loosening it. I fished out a handkerchief from my pocket and proceeded to wipe my face and neck. Then, I was forced to face the elephant in the room. Begrudgingly, I looked down at my bulge with renewed misery.  

This was not how I pictured this visit would start. 

I was still reeling from what I was made to watch. This kind of thing was not supposed to happen in a so-called maximum security prison. I reviewed what I'd seen and the facts presented before me. Were the two, no three guys fucking security guards? Or were they...? No, impossible. It was simply impossible for inmates to be doing such a thing with one another in a place where anyone could chance upon them , and with the presence of a security guard and multiple CCTV cameras. Granted, the security guard that personally led and forced me to watch their such a thing was not much of a ...well, security guard. He'd allowed it to happen, so he was, in one way or another, in on it too. Was he not afraid of the consequences? 

I doubted anyone would believe me if I complained. At least, not without the camera footage as proof. 

My best course of action would be to forget all this happened. It was not my business. Unfortunately, forgetting this would be extremely hard. 

Not as hard as your cock right now. That same annoying voice in my head interjected snidely. 

Right. 

Why the hell did I get hard from seeing a man take it up the ass and then be substituted for a toilet? I closed my eyes and tried to force all the damning  images currently plaguing my mind to the back of my head. 

This was not how I pictured this visit would start.

Had I finally bitten more than I could chew? 

Finally, ten minutes later, my blood simmered down and my incriminating erection subsided. It was then that I started to take note of the room I was in. The room was colder than I remembered it; it seemed that they'd fixed the air conditioning since last time I was here. As I sat on the cold chair freezing my ass off, I suppressed a shiver.

"Where the hell is he?" I growled out of frustration and barely-capped anticipation.

I glanced at the camera hanging in the corner of the cell trained straight on me and wondered if someone was watching and listening to me grumble to myself like a lunatic. But would they blame me?

They'd accused me of being late to the visit, and yet the inmate I was meant to represent had yet to arrive. 

I started tapping my fingers on the metal table in annoyance and seriously contemplating leaving with every passing second. Except that I'd come a long way to just simply head back. And my boss expected me to walk out of this godforsaken place with a representation agreement and my newest client's power of attorney. 

Three days ago, I received a rather unexpected message from convicted super felon Schneider Cross asking me to represent him in place of his former lawyer. His former lawyer was none other than Christopher Evans, the infamous criminal defense lawyer working for cartels, the mob and the like, making him infinitely more knowledgeable of playing the law to free even a convicted felon at a maximum security prison than anyone. Why he'd ever want me, practically a wet-eared novice, was beyond me. But my boss had jumped at the opportunity to include Schneider, son of infamous mob boss Alaric Cross, to our firm's portfolio. It helped that the 'opportunity' came with a big, fat check only an idiot would turn down. 

If I was being completely honest with myself, I wasn't annoyed because I was being kept waiting, or that I was currently in the world's most corrupt and notorious prison, the aptly-named Prison From Hell, but because that request for representation was made specifically for me. 

Schneider wanted me, a lawyer with less than five years experience, to represent and prepare him for his upcoming parole hearing. 

My mind recalled a pair of captivating grey eyes and I nearly shuddered. 

The way he'd looked at me on my first visit here to close a deal for a former client still haunted me some nights. He'd strutted into the visit room like he owned the place while I was informing the party the deal was for of its intricacies, and since then, I hadn't been able to forget him, much to my chagrin. How an inmate had even been allowed to enter the visit room while it was in use still baffled me. He'd also carried a phone with him. Now that I thought about it, this prison was not as secure as people were led to believe. 

And while I was being honest with myself, I had to admit that part of the reason why I was here was because I was... curious to know why he chose me specifically when he could have asked for my boss, or kept fucking Christian Evans. Heck, I'd wager that someone like him could get anyone in the world to represent them. 

So why me? 

The metal door buzzed open and in walked Schneider Cross. His large frame filled the entire door. I'd forgotten how large he was; at what I approximated was six feet three, he easily towered over a great many people and things. When his brilliant grey eyes met and held mine, the cold shudder I had attempted to suppress erupted, spreading goosebumps across my skin in its wake. 

My God, he was handsome. 

No, not handsome. Beautiful. 

He looked genetically engineered in a lab into the image of prime male perfection, his face made to seduce and attract and to be sat on. He had the most beautiful pair of grey eyes I had ever seen sitting under a pair of arched eyebrows. His black hair was unusually long for someone in prison and it glowed raven-black under the bright light. I was suddenly consumed by the abrupt urge to run my hands through his hair just to see if it were really as soft as it looked. My eyes traveled down the length of him to his ghastly orange uniform; on anyone else, it would have been tragic, but on him, it looked like a fashion statement. It hugged a body that looked primed to do battle on a moment's notice; he was muscled in places I never knew a guy could have muscles in. His rock-hard abs and biceps of steel were clearly defined and outlined by the cotton fabric, like steel wrapped with velvet. He could easily overpower me and the thought, for some fucking reason, did not scare or at the very least trouble me.

I felt something in me stirring again, and whatever the hell it was, it had happened to me before when I first laid eyes on him. 

I didn't like it. 

I was now even more annoyed than I was before -partly because of my unsolicited reactions in response to him. 

Get it together. You're on the clock. 

"I apologize for keeping you waiting; I myself was waiting on some news." He came into the room, a magnificent presence that filled the small four-by-six space, and sat at the metal table opposite me. Him being this close -our knees practically brushing the faintest bit- was disconcerting to say the least. 

This wasn't my first client; I couldn't be acting this way! 

In an effort to distract myself, I asked curiously, "Was it good news?" Then I mentally kicked myself for asking, immensely regretting the question. Why the hell did I care? I was here to do a job and then leave. Nothing more, nothing less.

His smile made my toes curl. "Yes, it was." 

I had a feeling that not much interested someone like him, so I found myself wondering what he'd been waiting for. It was highly uncharacteristic of me to be curious about a client's private affairs; I'd always prided myself on my ability to stay neutral and separate my work from... pleasure. 

Yet I stared at him for a moment or two expectantly, waiting for him to share something of him with me. When I realized that he wasn't going to tell me what it was he'd been waiting for, I felt my cheeks color with embarrassment and cleared my throat before I hurriedly recited from memory, "We at BB&B thank you for your trust in us and hope to-"

"Are you single?"

I blinked. The deeply personal question had come out of nowhere like a sucker punch. "What?" 

"Do you have a boyfriend?" 

"D-Don't you mean g-girlfriend?" Flabbergasted, I stuttered. 

Why the hell is he asking me something so intimate? I wanted to ask him that, but I couldn't quite get the words out of my mouth. 

He didn't look apologetic in the least. Nor did he bother to amend his question like someone who'd blurted out something inappropriate on a whim. Instead, he simply stared at me expectantly with a small, irritating smile at the corners of his lips, looking like I owed him the answer. 

Nervous, I shifted in my seat and muttered, "Ah, no... I don't." 

And why the hell did I answer him?! 

He smiled, looking extremely pleased by the revelation. "Good." 

I frowned at that. 

Power of Attorney. Do it now. A voice in my head commanded, seizing control before I humiliated myself in front of a potential client. I was glad for it. 

Desperate to get things over with so that I could get the hell out of this condemned prison -and, most importantly, escape his piercing gaze- I reached for my briefcase under the table and placed it over the cool surface. 

"Before we can formally start representing you, I need you to read and approve our representation agreement and assign us power of attorney." I pulled a stack of papers from inside the briefcase and arranged them before him. 

He reached across the table -I froze- and plucked the Mont Blanc pen from my suit's pocket. Without even sparing a glance at the content of the papers, he signed each and every one of them with my pen. He didn't even check the five-figure bill. All the while, he held my gaze, refusing to let me go. I couldn't look away; I was being held captive against my will and there was nothing I could do about it. 

Once he was done signing the papers, he pushed the papers toward me and surprised me by abruptly getting up and saying, "I have a feeling this is the beginning of a flourishing relationship." He reached out a hand for me to shake. Flustered, I quickly rose and took it, completely forgetting the warning I received about touching or allowing the inmates to touch me. 

It seemed that they warned you for a legitimate reason.

Before I even had time to register what was going on, I was forcefully pulled into a kiss that melted all my defenses, plunged molten lava through my veins, and set ablaze my skin. Heat suffused my cheeks and shot down my front like a spear straight to my nether region. I gasped against his mouth like an untried virgin; I'd never in my life been kissed like that before. It lasted a moment or two, but to me, it felt like a lifetime in which time and space ceased to exist and it was just the two of us in a sea of white. When his lips abruptly left mine, they immediately missed the warmth of his mouth upon my own, much to my chagrin. 

"We'll meet again," he promised in a gruff voice that made my toes curl. 

He left the room and took my pen with him, leaving me to pick up the papers strewn all over the table and ground. 

My breathing labored, I collapsed into my chair. My heart beat so forcefully against my ribcage that I was afraid it would dislocate it. 

"What the fuck?" I breathed once I gulped down the lodge in my throat. Those three words were quickly becoming my motto. 

My eyes flew to the recording camera. Surely they had seen what Schneider had done, so why hadn't the guards interefered and taken Schneider away for violating the visit rules? 

Exactly what kind of prison had I walked into? 

The shadow of his lips upon mine still lingered over my mouth like a phantom ghost. Unconsciously, I touched my lips and shuddered again. His kiss had been so possessive, so primal. It was unlike anything I'd ever experienced. 

Once I had my bearings with me, I started to gather my things and got up to leave. 

Before I could open the door, a terrifying alarm began to blare throughout the prison. Justifiably, I jumped fifty feet into the air, startled.

"What is it now?" I growled. I was already jumpy from what I'd witnessed only an hour ago, and Schneider's unexpected kiss had made me more so, so my anxiety levels did not appreciate the sounding alarm.

I opened the door and stepped outside just in time to see some guards running past the room. 

"Hey, what's going on?" I called them. 

They ignored me and disappeared around the corner. Luckily, my question was still answered. 

From within the bowls of the prison came the horrifying roar, "RIOT!"