The MC President's Forsaken Wife (Zara and Knox) novel Chapter 25

Chapter 24-1

Zara

Dad stands in the doorway, and for one horrible, suspended second, nobody says anything.

Locke’s hand is still cradling my face, his body still angled toward mine, his mouth close enough that my own still remembers what almost happened even though it never did. I sit very still on the couch, trying not to look like a woman who was half a breath away from kissing one of my father’s men in a club back

room.

Dad looks at me, then at Locke, then back at me. His eyebrows lift.

“Well,” he says mildly, “this looks cozy.”

Heat rushes up my face so fast I almost get lightheaded.

Locke doesn’t move quickly, because of course he doesn’t. Men like him apparently don’t get caught or caught out, they just decide the moment is over and return to control like it never left them. He leans back slowly, puts space between us with deliberate calm, and stands.

“Cobra,” he says.

Dad’s eyes glitter with amusement, which is somehow worse than anger. “Locke.”

“I can leave,” Locke says, his voice even. “If this is family business.”

“No.” Dad steps inside and closes the door behind him. “Sit down. This involves you.”

Dad crosses the room and takes the chair opposite the couch, the amusement fading from his face as completely as if someone wiped it away. In its place is Cobra Callahan, President of the Grinning Skulls, the man other men lower their voices around.

But beneath that – my father. And my father looks furious.

“I talked to Knox,” he says.

“What did he say?” I ask.

Dad leans back in the chair, but there’s nothing relaxed about it. “He forged your signature.”

The words are not a question.

I nod once. “Yes.”

“He put properties and businesses in your name without you knowing.”

“Yes again.”

Dad’s mouth tightens. “I’ve done a lot of bad shit in my life, sweetheart, and I won’t insult you by pretending otherwise. But using my daughter as a shield without her knowledge?” His black eyes go flat and cold. “That’s the kind of thing a man answers for.”

Something in my throat tightens. I look away first, because it’s one thing to be angry for myself, and

<Chapter 74.

another entirely to sit in front of my father while he understands exactly how thoroughly I was used.

“I don’t want this becoming a war,” I say.

Dad’s laugh has no humor in it. “Then Knox should’ve kept his fucking hands clean.”

Locke speaks for the first time. “What entities?”

Clam

Dad turns his attention to him, and I see the shift immediately. The president looking at his man, the man who handles what most people never even know exists.

“Yeah, I thought this might interest you,” Dad says.

I look between them slowly. “You’ve worked with Knox?”

“I have,” Locke says. “I do lots of bridge stuff between our two clubs – almost all to do with money.”

I sit back slowly. “What exactly does that mean?”

“It means that I’ve handled transfers connected to companies he controlled,” Locke says. “Transport payments. Holding accounts. Cash movement between clean businesses and less clean ones.”

“Less clean,” I repeat.

Dad’s gaze flicks to me. “Locke didn’t know about the signatures, Zara.”

I look at him. “Are you sure?”

“I’m sure,” Dad says.

Locke’s voice drops. “I don’t use women as paper cover.”

The words settle between us, hard and quiet, and I/believe him. I don’t know why that matters as much as it does, but it does.

Dad leans forward, bracing his forearms on his knees. “Knox showed you the documents today.”

“He did,” I say.

Locke glances at me then. “Did you take anything that you could show us?”

“No,” Dad says. “She didn’t need to.”

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