Rise of the Formidable Ex-wife (Lucia and Alex) novel Chapter 172

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Chapter 172-

Chapter 172

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Marco sat alone in his car outside the hospital, watching people walk past in the late afternoon sun. Normal people living normal lives, going home to families who loved them, carrying grocery bags and holding hands with children who called them father without hatred in their voices.

The parking garage was quiet except for the distant hum of traffic and the occasional slam of car doors. Marco had been sitting there for three hours since Margaret fell asleep, unable to bring himself to go back inside and unable to face going home to an empty house.

His hands rested on the steering wheel, still stained with dried blood from where he had knelt beside Margaret on the marble floor. He could still smell the metallic scent on his skin, still see the growing pool of red that had taken away the last chanoe he had at rebuilding something meaningful from the wreckage of his life.

The baby was gone.

The thought hit him fresh each time, like a physical blow to his chest. His child. The one who might have looked at him with love instead of fear, who might have called him father without bitterness, who might have been his chance to prove he could be better than he was. Gone forever.

Marco’s vision blurred as tears began to fall. They came slowly at first, then faster, until he was sobbing in the front seat of his cår like a broken child. Seventeen years of marriage, three children, a successful business, a comfortable life. All of it gone in less than a year.

“What have I done?” He whispered to his reflection in the rearview mirror. “What have I become?”

The man staring back at him was a stranger. Gray-faced, hollow-eyed, with deep lines carved by anger and disappointment. This wasn’t the confident businessman who had once commanded respect in boardrooms. This wasn’t the father who had taught Lucas to throw a football or helped Ria with her design projects or bought Monica her first set of paints.

This was a shell of a man who had destroyed everything he touched.

Marco thought about Monica’s face in the video, so young and vulnerable as she described cutting herself. He remembered the shame in Lucas’s voice when he admitted to being hit. He could still hear Ria’s words about unconditional love, about choosing safety over a father who couldn’t control his anger.

“I was trying to protect them.” His voice cracked. “I was trying to hold our family together.”

But the words felt hollow even as he spoke them. When had protection become control? When had discipline become violence? When had love become possession?

The tears came harder now, months of suppressed grief pouring out in the empty car. He cried for the baby who would never take a first breath. He cried for the children who no longer wanted him in their lives. He cried for Lucia, who he had thrown away for someone who had never really loved him.

He cried for the man he used to be, before anger and pride and fear had twisted him into someone unrecognizable.

For nearly an hour, Marco sat in his car and mourned everything he had lost. The sobs wracked his body until his chest ached and his throat was raw. He cried until there were no tears left, until he felt completely empty inside.

And then, slowly, something else began to fill that emptiness.

It started as a whisper in the back of his mind, a small voice that said this wasn’t really his fault. That he had been a good father until outside forces tore his family apart. That he had loved his children until someone else taught them to hate him.

The whisper grew louder as Marco dried his eyes and straightened in his seat. Yes, he had made mistakes. Yes, he had lost his

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emper. But what father wouldn’t, faced with such deliberate sabotage of his family?

Alexander Kane.

The name formed in Marco mind like poison taking shape. The billionaire who had seduced his wife and stolen his children. The man who thought money could buy anything, including a ready-made family.

Marco’s grief began to transform into something harder, sharper. Anger burned away the softness of sorrow, replacing it with a cold fury that felt more familiar, more comfortable than the crushing weight of loss.

“This is his fault.” Marco’s voice came quiet now. Steady. “All of it. Alexander Kane destroyed my family.”

The logic felt clean and simple. Marco had been happy before Alexander appeared. His children had loved him before Alexander taught them to question his authority. His marriage might have survived its problems if Alexander hadn’t provided Lucia with an alternative.

“He stole everything from me.” Marco’s hands gripped the steering wheel tighter. “My wife, my children, my reputation. And now my baby is dead because of what he started.”

Marco’s mind began to work more clearly now that he had found someone to blame other than himself. Alexander had orchestrated everything from the beginning. The convenient rescue when Lucia was at her lowest point. The immediate attraction between them. The way he had opened his home to Marco’s children and turned them against their biological father.

It was all too perfect to be coincidence.

“He planned this.” Marco’s eyes hardened as the pieces fell into place. “He wanted my family, so he took it. Step by step, piece by piece.”

Marco pulled out his phone and scrolled through his contacts until he found the number he was looking for. Louis Dubois, the private investigator who had helped him dig up dirt on business competitors before. The man who owed Marco money and favors and would ask no questions about what information was needed or why.

The phone rang twice before Louis answered. “Dubois Investigations.”

“Louis, it’s Marco Hart. I need your help again.”

There was a pause on the other end. “Marco, after what happened with the court case and those kids’ video, I think it’s better if we don’t…”

“I’ll pay you fifty thousand dollars.” Marco interrupted. “Cash.”

The pause lasted longer this time. “What do you need?”

“I need to know where my children are living. Alexander Kane moved them somewhere, and I need to find them.”

“Marco, that sounds like…”

“Like a father trying to reconnect with his children after a public misunderstanding.” Marco spoke smoothly. “Nothing illegal about wanting to know where your own kids live.”

“The court gave him custody…”

“The court was lied to. My children were brainwashed into saying things that weren’t true. Now I need to find them so I can explain my side of the story.”

Louis was quiet for a moment, and Marco could hear him thinking through the moral and legal implications. Fifty thousand

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dollars was a lot of money for a simple address.

“Just the address.” Louis spoke finally. “Nothing else. I don’t want to know what you’re planning to do with it.”

“Just the address.” Marco confirmed. “That’s all I need.”

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“It’ll take a few days. Alexander Kane has serious security, and his properties are well-protected. But I can find them.”

“How long?”

“Give me a week. Maybe less if I get lucky.”

Marco smiled for the first time in days. “Perfect. And Louis? This conversation never happened.“

“What conversation?”

Marco hung up and leaned back in his seat, feeling more like himself than he had since watching his children’s video. The emptiness in his chest was gone, replaced by purpose and determination.

Alexander Kane thought he had won. He thought his money and his lawyers and his fortress-like homes made him untouchable. He thought he could steal another man’s family and face no consequences.

But Marco was going to prove him wrong.

He was going to find his children, and he was going to bring them home where they belonged. Away from the man who had poisoned their minds against their father. Away from the toxic influence that had turned them into weapons against the man who had given them life.

Marco started his car and pulled out of the hospital parking garage, his mind already working through plans and possibilities. He would be patient this time. Careful. Strategic.

He wouldn’t make the same mistakes that had cost him everything before.

This time, he would get his family back.

And Alexander Kane would learn what happened to men who thought they could steal from Marco Hart and walk away unscathed.

The setting sun painted the sky blood red as Marco drove home to his empty house, his phone burning in his pocket with Louis Dubois’s contact information and the promise of answers within a week.

Seven days to find his children.

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