The MC President's Forsaken Wife (Zara and Knox) novel Chapter 170

Chapter 93-2

“I’m doing it to protect our life!” Locke growls softly, leaning down so his face is inches from mine, his dark gaze burning into my soul. “Every single hour that lab stays active on Route 9 is an hour Knox gets to plan his next move against you.”

“Me?”

“Yes, Zara – you,” Locke says. “He’s sitting out there in the dark, gathering resources, waiting for an opening to strike at this family again. I am not waiting for him to come to our front door. I’m taking the fight to his.”

Before I can respond, a loud, violent sound shatters the heavy air of the room.

Jade slams both flat palms against the heavy oak table again, harder this time, the noise echoing like a gunshot.

“Look at me, you stubborn son of a bitch!” Jade screams at Mayhem, her sharp, glamorous composure completely shattering right before our eyes. “Now!”

The room goes dead silent.

Dad doesn’t speak. He stands at the head of the table, his arms crossed, watching his son and daughter-in-law with heavy, deeply shadowed eyes.

Mayhem freezes, staring down at his wife.

Jade’s breath is coming in short, ragged gasps. The fierce, terrifying rage in her eyes suddenly fractures, pooling with bright, unshed tears that shimmer beneath the harsh fluorescent lights of the war room.

I’ve known Jade for ten years. I’ve seen her handle dangerous club rivalries, drunk enforcers, and high-stress club politics without ever losing her cool, without ever letting a single tear slip past her

mascara.

Seeing her break right now terrifies me more than the satellite maps ever could.

“I am not doing this,” Jade whispers, her voice breaking on the edges, stripped completely raw of her usual razor-sharp sarcasm. Tears cut dark tracks through her makeup, but she doesn’t bother to wipe them away. “I am not sitting in our empty house, staring at my phone, waiting for a call from the hospital or the coroner telling me my husband took a bullet to the chest in some dirty ditch off Route 9.”

Mayhem’s hard posture falters. The angry tension in his broad shoulders melts away, replaced by a look of sheer, gut-wrenching pain as he watches her cry. “Jade -”

“No!” Jade chokes out, taking a step back as he tries to reach for her, her hands trembling violently at her sides. “Don’t you Jade me! You act like you’re invincible, Mayhem! You walk around with that VP patch on your chest like bullets can’t touch you, like you don’t have a wife who goes to bed every night terrified that today is the day you get taken away from me!”

“Jade, baby, look at me,” Mayhem steps forward again, ignoring her attempt to push him away. He reaches out, his massive, calloused hands gently grabbing her face, his thumbs sweeping across her wet cheeks.” I’m not trying to be a hero. I’m trying to keep us safe.”

Chapter 93-2.

Clam

“Then stay here!” Jade sobs, her hands clutching at the leather of his cut, her forehead pressing hard against his chest right over his heart. “Let the prospects do the recon! Call in the outer charters! If you die out there tonight… I don’t have a life anymore. Do you get that? I don’t have anything!”

The vulnerability in her voice is as surprising as it is agonizing, heavy and raw, hanging in the quiet air of the war room like a wound.

Mayhem closes his eyes, pressing a hard desperate kiss into the top of Jade’s red hair, holding her pinned securely against his broad chest. He wraps his heavy arms around her, burying his face in her neck, breathing her in while she trembles against him.

For a long, painful minute, nobody speaks. The silence in the room is suffocating, punctuated only by the sound of Jade’s quiet, shuddering sobs and the distant hum of the server rack running in the corner.

I look up at Locke, my heart aching for Jade, my own eyes burning with hot, unshed tears. Locke looks down at me, his expression tortured, but the cold, tactical iron in his eyes remains completely unchanged.

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