The MC President's Forsaken Wife (Zara and Knox) novel Chapter 89

Chapter 58-1

By the time I pull into the clubhouse lot, my hands have finally stopped shaking.

Mostly.

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I’d called Locke from the car because knew if I waited until we both got back home, if I let myself walk off the elevator carrying those glossy black shopping bags and pretending everything was fine, I might lose my nerve and decide not to tell anyone at all.

That old instinct still lives inside me somewhere, the one Knox spent years carefully cultivating.

So I called, and Locke answered on the first ring. I said his name, and he just knew.

I hadn’t even managed to explain properly before his voice changed, all warmth gone, replaced by something so calm and cold that it frightened me almost as much as Knox had.

He told me to drive straight to the clubhouse.

He told me not to stop.

He told me he’d stay on the phone the whole way.

And he did.

Now three motorcycles are parked crookedly near the front entrance as though their riders arrived too fast to care about neat lines, and the clubhouse door is already opening before I’ve switched off the engine.

Locke comes out first, and he doesn’t walk. He crosses the distance between us with the controlled speed of a man who’d run if running wouldn’t frighten me, reaches my door before I can open it, and pulls it wide.

For one second, neither of us speaks.

He simply looks at me, at my face, my hands. The shopping bags on the passenger seat. Every inch of me.

“Did he hurt you?” His voice is low enough that I feel it more than hear it.

“No.”

That’s not quite true, of course. Knox’s fingers left marks, and my arm aches where he grabbed me.

“Zara. Tell me the truth.”

I close my eyes. “He grabbed my arm again.”

Everything in him goes still. “Let me see, baby. I mean right now.”

I slowly roll up my sweater sleeve, slip out of the car, and he takes my arm with both hands, turning it gently beneath the late-afternoon light. The marks are already surfacing, faint purple shadows where Knox’s fingers pressed into my skin, and Locke stares at them for so long that I feel something twist painfully beneath my ribs.

His thumb moves once, carefully, beneath the bruising without touching it, then

143

Chapter 58.

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steps closer and pulls me into him. One arm wraps around my back, the other cradles the base of my skull as though he needs to feel me breathing against him before he can trust what his eyes are telling him.

I let him. God, I let him

I bury my face against his chest and feel his heart pounding beneath my cheek, much faster than the rest of him would ever admit.

“I’m okay,” I whisper.

His hand tightens in my hair. “I know.”

“You don’t sound convinced.”

“I’m trying.”

Before I can answer, movement in the doorway catches my attention. Dad is standing there, Mayhem beside him, Jade just behind them. Nobody looks relieved, not really.

Jade reaches me first. She practically runs across the lot, throws both arms around me, and nearly knocks the shopping bags from my hand. “I’m sorry, Zara.”

“Jade -”

“I left you.”

“You went with your husband.”

“I left you alone.”

“You didn’t know.”

“I should’ve known.”

I pull back enough to look at her, and the guilt on her face hurts more than I expect. “No.” My voice comes out firmer than I feel. “Knox ambushed me. You didn’t hand me to him.”

Her eyes fill. “I should’ve walked you to your car.”

“Then he would’ve just waited for another day.”

The truth of it settles heavily between us, because that’s the part nobody wants to say aloud. This wasn’t chance, Knox had planned it.

Watched. Waited. Chose the moment I was alone.

Mayhem swears behind Jade, and he’s pacing now, one hand dragging through his hair, the other opening and closing at his side as though it can’t decide what to break first.

“I let you walk down there alone,” he snarls.

“You didn’t let me do anything.”

“I should’ve picked you both up.”

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Chapter SB

“You were picking up your wife to bring her to work,” I point out. “Why would you pick me up?”

“I should’ve gone inside.”

“You had no reason to”

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“I’m your brother.” He stops pacing and looks at me, and beneath the fury is something younger, something that remembers every year I spent drifting away from him and every time he wondered whether he could’ve stopped it. “I should’ve made sure you were safe.”

My throat tightens. “You can’t follow me everywhere.”

“I can try.”

Despite everything, a broken little laugh escapes me.

Mayhem doesn’t smile. He steps forward, cradles my face, and presses his forehead against mine for one brief, fierce moment.

“I swear to God, Zara, if he touches you again -”

Dad cuts in quietly. “He won’t.”

Every head turns.

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