Lethal Temptation (by Michelle Ray) novel Chapter 17

17 So What You Saw Meled Episode

Mara

+25 Points

I woke up with a knot in my stomach, the memory of last night burning at the edges of my mind. I didn’t need confirmation–Lucian had seen me. The amusement in his eyes this morning gave him away. He hadn’t said a word, but the silence was loud.

Fine. If he didn’t bring it up, I could pretend nothing happened.

“We’re going hunting,” Lucian said gently.

I nodded. It had been too long since I shifted. Too long since I’d run wild in the woods, free of rules, names, and the mess of this marriage. I wanted the escape.

“Maybe we should eat first,” he added. “So we don’t hunt like savages.”

I blinked at him, surprised. That was exactly what I’d been thinking. Hunting on an empty stomach was just asking for chaos.

“I know you can’t stand Martha,” he continued, “so I asked Austin to bring breakfast to our wing. We’ll eat in the lounge here.”

Another surprise. I raised an eyebrow.

“How’d

you manage that? I thought eating as a family was non–negotiable.”

Lucian smiled–slow, easy, devastating. He really was too handsome for his own good.

“We’re newlyweds,” he said simply. “We’re supposed to want time alone.”

I nearly laughed. If only they knew. We weren’t even pretending to be intimate. But it was a believable excuse, and that was all that mattered.

Breakfast came. The food was warm, but the silence between us was cooler than usual. Awkward.

Charged.

I couldn’t take it anymore.

“So…” I said, breaking the silence, “you saw me last night.”

He looked at me calmly. No guilt, no apology. “I liked what I saw. And what I heard.”

I

My stomach flipped. I frowned, trying to play it off, but my skin prickled.

“Do as you like, Mara,” he said. “You deserve pleasure. If you ever want me, you can link me. But I’ll never touch you without your say–so.”

6

G

&

|||

+

1/4

17 So What You Saw Meird Episode

I tilted my head. “You mean you won’t touch me at all. You said it yourself.”

He gave a half–smile and bowed his head slightly. “As you wish.”

Then he added, softer this time, “You looked beautiful last night.”

+25 Points

His words caught me off guard–not because they were flattering, but because they felt genuine.

Too genuine.

I tried to brush it off, but something inside me stirred. I reminded myself he was just being polite. Civil. Maybe even trying to manage the awkwardness with kindness.

Still, the way he said it stuck with me.

Lucian’s POV (Why He Sneezed).

I’d got home late, long after the moon had taken its rightful place in the sky.

My walk in the park had been long and pointless, but I needed it. I needed the air. The silence.

Mara was already asleep when I returned.

The television on her side of the suite was still on, flickering softly across the room. I didn’t cross over to turn it off–I didn’t want to risk waking her. Instead, I switched off the lights in my section

and laid down, staring at the ceiling.

I couldn’t sleep.

My mind kept circling back to breakfast, to Darian’s pathetic stunt in the room, to Mara’s silence,

her wall–pulled up, locked tight.

I’d hurt her that day I visited her family with my father. Maybe I hadn’t meant to, but I had. I saw it in

her eyes, felt it in the shift of her posture around me.

Maybe I should’ve handled things differently. Asked questions. Investigated, quietly. But I’d let emotion guide me, and the words I said that day couldn’t be unsaid. And Mara… Mara wasn’t the

kind to forget.

She was sharp. Wiser than most. She’d read Martha’s games at the table during breakfast and

stepped in for me without hesitation. She didn’t owe me that, but she did it anyway.

The truth? I wasn’t with Tina. Not anymore.

She’d kept calling, texting, asking to meet–but I hadn’t responded.

I respected Mara too much to keep someone on the side. Even if I didn’t love her–even if we were

strangers thrown into this mess–I wouldn’t insult her like that.

0

64

2/4

T

III O

<

< 17 So What You Saw Meled Episode

If I had to suffer through this union, I’d at least share the misery honestly.

+25 Points

But friendship… I wanted that. And maybe, eventually, something more. I wasn’t foolish enough to

think it would happen overnight, especially not after Darian’s display in my room. But I could wait.

I turned on my side and looked across the suite.

She stirred. Woke. Quietly turned off her television and went to the bathroom, not even glancing

my way. She probably didn’t know I was home.

And then she returned.

And what happened next… burned itself into my memory.

She touched herself.

At first, I froze, unsure if I was invading something too private. But I couldn’t look away. Her legs, her fingers, her soft, breathy moans–there was something raw about it. Unapologetic.

Mara wasn’t putting on a show. She wasn’t trying to seduce. She was claiming something for

herself. Pleasure. Power. Control. In a life where she had so little say, this was hers.

Until that moment, I’d always seen her as… younger. Smaller. Not fragile, but distant. But in that

moment, Mara was every inch a woman. Sensual, confident, and devastatingly real.

I was aroused. No sense denying it. Watching her was the most beautiful kind of torture. She was

my wife, and yet I couldn’t touch her. Wouldn’t–not like that. Not unless she wanted me too.

I didn’t believe in forcing things. If something ever happened between us, it would be mutual. It

would mean something.

But still… I watched. And just as I thought I could contain myself, a tickle in my nose betrayed me.

I sneezed.

Damn it.

I rolled over and faked sleep instantly, but I knew she’d heard. She had to know I was there.

In the morning, when she confronted me, I was honest. I told her I liked what I saw. Because I did.

Because she deserved the truth, not a shy deflection. I knew it wasn’t the reaction she expected.

Maybe she thought I’d be embarrassed. Maybe she thought I’d pretend it never happened.

But I wasn’t going to pretend.

She was beautiful.

And I wanted her to know.

6

O III

<

< 17 So What You Saw Meled Episode

+25 Points

Not because I expected anything.

But because if the time ever came, if she ever changed her mind, I wanted her to remember that I didn’t just see her–I wanted her. Not as a tool. Not as a title. But as Mara.

Even if I had to wait a long time for her to see me the same way.