The MC President's Forsaken Wife (Zara and Knox) novel Chapter 142

Chapter 81-3

“I did,” he says softly, his dark eyes searching mine. “I did do that.”

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He doesn’t pretend otherwise, and he doesn’t try to pivot the conversation away from the heavy admission lingering in the air between us. Outside, the snow falls steadily against the high penthouse windows, a softer sound than the harsh squall earlier, but the bedroom suddenly feels noticeably tighter, narrower, as though the room itself has shrunk around us.

“Do you want me to stop asking?” I ask, searching his face for any sign of guarded withdrawal.

“No.”

The response is immediate and absolute, though there’s a strained, uncomfortable edge to his voice that tells me how much this is costing him.

I carefully turn onto my side so I can look at him properly without straining my neck, but the sudden shift sends a sharp wave of dizziness crashing through my head. Instantly, Locke’s heavy palm closes securely around my hip, stabilizing me against his body.

“Slowly, baby,” he warns, his eyes instantly locking onto mine with quiet concern.

“I am moving slowly,” I mutter, closing my eyes for a brief second to let the room stop spinning.

“You almost fell over while completely horizontal,” he says dryly.

“Honestly, that takes a very specific kind of skill.”

“It takes aggressive chemotherapy,” he corrects softly, the humor fading into a grounded, somber reality.

As the dizzy spell slowly ebbs away, his hand doesn’t pull back. His palm remains anchored firmly against my hip, warm and grounding against the cold lingering in my bones.

“Tell me about your father,” I say. “Only what you want to.”

Locke shifts his gaze upward, staring at the muted light washing across the high ceiling. “My father firmly believes that affection and approval are meaningless if they’re just freely given away… including to his own

children.”

The sentence is delivered without a shred of theatrical emotion or lingering bitterness, as though over the decades he’s carefully reduced the man down to a single sentence that explains every interaction they

ever had.

“When I decided to go to college to study forensic accounting instead of running his corporate holdings, my father viewed it as a temporary rebellion,” Locke explains. “He assumed that I would eventually become bored with corporate crime, and quietly return to take my place at his firm.”

“You obviously didn’t.”

“No

“And that was what caused the estrangement between you?”

Chapter 91

“No.” he says flatly.

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And there it is again, that sudden, impenetrable stone wall rising between us. I trace the quiet path of my index finger across the back of his warm hand, feeling the pronounced tendons beneath his skin.

“The stalker did,” I say softly, laying the truth smack on the damn line. “Right?”

Locke’s breathing alters almost imperceptibly, a minor hitch in his chest, but because I’m resting against him, I feel the exact moment his muscles lock up.

“Her name was Evelyn,” he says after a long, heavy silence. “And yes – it’s because of what happened to her that I have no relationship with my family.”

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Chapter 82+

Chapter 82-1

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I remain completely still and quiet, allowing him to navigate the narrative at his own pace.

“She was my cousin by marriage,” he explains, “Her mother married my father’s younger brother when Evelyn was about fifteen years old, and I was seventeen.”

“Were the two of you ever actually together?” I ask. “Romantically?”

“Briefly, while I was in college,” he admits. “Then we both realized that we were better at being family and allies than partners.”

“Did your parents know about it?”

“They knew we were close. They certainly would not have approved of anything beyond a platonic relationship.”

“Because she wasn’t originally born into the same upper social class?”

“Because they believed that her mother had strategically married into the wealth, rather than belonging to it by blood.”

I make an involuntary face of absolute disgust. “Charming.”

“Evelyn thought exactly that,” he says. “She hated the mandatory family events, the curated photographs, the endless public performances. She recognized very early on that wealth makes people intensely interested in you, without ever making them actually care about you as a human being.”

“What happened with the man who stalked her?” I ask softly.

“She met him during her third year at college,” Locke says. “They dated for about a year. When she finally saw the red flags and broke off the relationship, he completely refused to accept that it was over.”

The bedroom seems to grow even colder as he speaks.

“He began calling her constantly,” Locke continues. “Sending elaborate gifts, showing up outside her house and her workplace, at all hours of the night. When she changed her phone number, he’d get the new one within forty-eight hours. When she moved apartments, he’d find her.”

“Did she go to the police?”

“She filed about six official police reports.”

“And I’m guessing they did absolutely nothing.”

“He was incredibly careful and calculated,” Locke says. “He understood the exact boundaries of the law, and knew precisely how to stay just beneath the legal threshold that would force the police to arrest him.”

“What did your family do when they found out?”

“They treated her safety as an inconvenience to be managed.”

I pull back slightly, staring at him in disbelief. “What?”

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“My father arranged for private security,” he says coldly. “My uncle got high-priced lawyers. My mother quietly relocated Evelyn to a family property well outside the city.”

“That sounds like they were trying to protect her,” I offer, trying to understand the disconnect.

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“It was not protection, Zara. It was gilded confinement.” Locke’s voice sharpens significantly. “She was forced to drop out of college, and stop working. She stopped seeing her friends. She couldn’t step foot outside without armed security standing over her. Every single aspect of her world was stripped away and made smaller, while the man terrorizing her remained completely free to walk the streets.”

My fingers tighten reflexively around his. “So you decided to investigate him yourself.”

“I did.”

“What did you find on him?”

“Huge hidden debts, offshore bank accounts, recurring payments to private investigators, and formal complaints from three other women,” Locke says. “More than enough hard evidence to legally establish a clear, documented pattern of dangerous predatory behavior.”

“And your family took all that evidence directly to the police?”

“No.”

The single word lands with the heavy, sickening thud of an executioner’s block.

“Why on earth wouldn’t they?” I demand, my pulse spiking.

“Because his father had extensive business relationships with my father’s company,” Locke explains, his voice turning icy. “Launching public criminal proceedings against the son would have exposed sensitive financial matters to public scrutiny. My family wanted to avoid all of that, and instead have a private agreement.”

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