The MC President's Forsaken Wife (Zara and Knox) novel Chapter 146

Chapter 83-2

Claim

I force the revulsion down, locking it away. “Which means we can map his entire financial timeline directly against his trips with her Right?”

Locke is already moving. Within twenty minutes, the chaotic table is restructured into an undeniable timeline. Dates, hotel stays, offshore transfers, and company incorporations align with terrifying, perfect precision.

“We have his entire framework,” I whisper, looking at the completed map. “We need to show this to Dad.”

Before I can reach for my phone, the office door swings open. My father appears in the doorway. And Willow is walking right behind him.

My hand freezes inches above my phone.

Willow looks noticeably different than she did the last time I saw her. She’s still dressed in soft, flowing fabrics, her dark hair resting loosely over her shoulders, maintaining that fragile, ethereal quality that makes her look completely out of place inside my father’s dark, violent world. But her skin is ghost-white, and she’s holding herself with an intense, guarded stiffness.

“Dad?” I ask, pulling my hand back. “You okay?”

He looks at the sheer volume of paper and screens covering the table. “Is this a bad time?”

“We just found the core link in Knox’s shell network,” I answer.

Locke quietly folds his laptop screen down halfway, effectively ending the business analysis. “The work can wait.”

Dad nods once, an abrupt, tight motion.

Willow’s dark eyes flick nervously toward Locke, then to me, before settling back on Locke.

Dad takes two deliberate steps farther into the office. “We’re clearing this up right now.”

Nobody moves. Nobody speaks.

He pulls out a chair, the legs scraping loudly against the floor. “Sit down, Willow.”

It’s clearly not a request. Willow hesitates for a fraction of a second before lowering herself slowly into the seat, her hands trembling. My father sits directly beside her, resting his broad forearms on the table. Locke doesn’t move away from me; he remains seated right at my side, close and watchful.

Dad looks at all three of us, his breath heavy. “I don’t do unresolved tension.”

I almost let out a dry laugh. That is objectively untrue… my father practically breathes tension.

“Not in my club,” Dad clarifies. “And certainly not in my family. When we have an active poison in the room, we put it on the table, cut it open, and deal with it directly.”

Willow folds her hands neatly in her lap, her voice barely a whisper. “I don’t think there’s a poison here at all”

Dad closes his eyes for a long, heavy second, as if gathering his strength. “There is.”

Willow’s delicate face falls so instantly, so pathetically, that a strange, uncomfortable pang hits my chest.

“Willow,” Dad says, his rough voice softening just a fraction. “Tell Zara what you told me in the car on the drive over here.”

Willow slowly turns her body toward me For several excruciating seconds, she studies my face. There’s zero hostility in her expression, and somehow, that lack of malice makes the situation infinitely more dangerous.

“I’m truly sorry that you were hurt, Zara,” she says, her sweet voice entirely sincere. “I really am.”

I sit frozen, completely unsure of how to respond to the gentle apology.

Before I can speak, she continues softly. “I never intended to cause you pain. The other night, when Locke and I were talking in the kitchen, I was just trying to explain the reality of the situation to him.”

Beside me, Locke’s jaw clenches so hard a visible muscle twitches along his cheek. Willow notices the reaction immediately, her soft features twisting into a sad, knowing expression.

“See?” she whispers to my father. “Look at him.”

“See what, exactly?” Dad asks, his tone dangerously flat.

“He’s fighting what he feels,” Willow says, looking back at Locke with absolute, unshakeable pity. “He’s hiding behind his duty to her.”

Locke’s entire face goes completely, terrifyingly blank. I know that specific expression intimately now: it means that he’s one word away from becoming utterly fucking lethal.

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