The MC President's Forsaken Wife (Zara and Knox) novel Chapter 350

Chapter 171-2

Chapter 171-2

+25 Powit

Every single page,” I say, pulling a bright yellow highlighter from the desk drawer. “Knox’s chemical supplier is hiding his illegal orders inside real business deliveries. To find where the chemicals are, I have to look for small mistakes. Things like wrong weights, strange delivery times, or fake

company names.”

Jade shakes her head in disbelief, looking at me with wide eyes. “You’re sitting in a room full of paper trying to outsmart a drug lord. Thank Christ you’re smart.”

“She’s smart as hell,,” Locke says. “There isn’t another person in this club who has the patience to sit here and spot the patterns. She sees things the rest of us miss.”

My face feels hot, a sweet, warm blush spreading over my cheeks. I look up at Locke, finding him staring right at me with so much love and pride that my breath catches in my throat.

“See?” I tell Jade, trying to sound playful to hide how fast my heart is beating. “Locke appreciates my brain.”

“Locke appreciates everything about you,” Jade says pertly, turning back toward the door. “I’m going back to the bar before you two force me to carry another box of paper in here. Good luck with your research.”

“Bring more tea in an hour, please,” I call out after her.

“No promises,” she says back through the hallway. “You might be buried under paper by then, in

which case, RIP.”

As the door clicks shut behind Jade, the room falls back into a cozy stillness. The printer keeps humming in the corner, spitting out another batch of shipping receipts.

I take a long sip of the green tea Jade brought, feeling the bitterness awaken my senses. Locke watches me over the top of his screen, his chin resting in his palm.

“You really think you can find it in all this chaos?” Locke asks me. “The smoking gun that will bring down everything around Knox’s ears?”

“I know I can. It’s going to take time, though. Weeks, maybe. It’s like trying to find one specific grain of sand on a giant beach.”

“Then we take our time,” Locke says. “We do this right. Knox doesn’t know we have his files. He thinks his paper trail is safe.”

“Good,” I say. “Because I intend to make you sit right here and help me organize every single box.”

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Chapter 171 2

+25 Pain

“Yes, boss,” Locke snaps a salute, and reaches down to grab a thick blue binder from the floor.

“What do I do with these?”

“Group them by month,” I instruct, pulling a fresh stack of paper off the printer tray. “We start at the beginning. Two years ago.”

Locke sits back, opening the binder and starting to sort the pages. Watching him – this huge, dangerous man who can take down an enemy in seconds – gently sorting thin sheets of yellow paper just to help me, fills my chest with warmth.

“We need a system,” I tell him, tapping my chin with the highlighter. “We can’t just throw things into

A binders blindly. I want one stack for shipping manifests, one stack for receiving signatures, and

one stack for internal weight logs.”

“That’s three different stacks per month,” Locke points out, holding up a thick pile of paper. “That means thirty-six stacks on the floor… and that’s just to start.”

“Then we’d better start making room,” I say, nudging his boot under the desk with my foot. “Move your Bigfoot feet, handsome.”

“My feet are fine right where they are,” Locke grunts, but he pulls his legs back slightly to give me space to lay out three fresh manila folders.

We work side by side for another hour, the silence between us easy and full of shared history. Every now and then, Locke hands me a sheet with a crooked smile, pointing out a funny note a driver left in the margins, or teasing me about my obsessive color-coding system.

“Red is for red flags,” I explain for the third time, waving my red pen at him. “Yellow is for general order info. Blue is for weight logs.”

“And what’s green for?” he asks, pointing to a green pen sitting near my empty tea cup.

“Green is for when we finally catch him,” I say, looking right into his eyes. “That’s the color I’ll use when we find the smoking gun.”

Locke stares at me for a long moment, then he nods.

“I’d trust you with my life, Zara. You tearing through piles of paper to find Knox’s weak spots and mistakes is nothing. He’s a dead man walking, and he has no fucking idea. Making you his enemy was the first mistake – and it’s a fatal one.”

I smile, and feel a surge of confidence move through me. “All right, handsome. We start at the beginning… so page one. Let’s get to work.”

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