The difference matters. Even if it shouldn't.
"You're monitoring my phone," I repeat, making sure I understand. "Reading my texts. Listening to my calls."
"Monitoring for keywords and patterns. I'm not reading everything—just flagging potential threats." He pauses. "But yes. I've been invading your privacy systematically since you first came to The Dominion. If you want me to stop, I will."
It's the offer that undoes me. Not the surveillance itself, but the fact that he's giving me choice. Admitting what he's done and then putting the decision in my hands.
Gabriel never gave me a choice. He just took what he wanted and called it care.
"If you stop," I say slowly, "will I be safe?"
"No. You'll just be unmonitored." His eyes are steady, unflinching. "Ezra is coming for you. Maybe not physically, but legally, financially, whatever leverage he can find. And if what I suspect is true—if Gabriel was involved in the kinds of things that get people killed—then you're not just dealing with a disgruntled brother-in-law. You're dealing with people who can't afford for you to exist as a complication."
"What things? What was Gabriel involved in?"
"I don't know yet. But Lucien does. Or suspects." He pulls his phone back out, pulls up something and shows me the screen. It's a news article about The Glasshouse—the same name Solange mentioned this morning. "Private intelligence network. Operates in legal gray zones. Serves clients who need information or action that traditional channels won't provide. Gabriel had connections there. Financial ties, meeting records, encrypted communications."
I read the article, my pulse accelerating with each paragraph. The Glasshouse isn't just corporate espionage or background checks. It's the kind of organization that makes problems disappear, that trades in leverage and blackmail and consequences for people who become inconvenient.
"You think Gabriel was working with them," I say.
"I think Gabriel was funding them. Or funded by them. The financial trail is complicated." Jax takes back his phone. "But yes. And if he was, then his death threatens to exposeconnections that powerful people can't afford to have exposed. Which makes you a liability. They see you as someone who knows too much, even if you don't know you know it."
The coffee shop suddenly feels too exposed. Too vulnerable. I look around at the other patrons—students on laptops, couples having quiet conversations, the barista making drinks—and wonder if any of them are watching me. Documenting me. Building cases against me.
"I can't live like this," I say quietly. "Constantly looking over my shoulder. Wondering who's monitoring me and why."
"Then let me help." Jax's voice drops, becomes almost gentle. "I'm already watching. Already monitoring. Let me use that information to keep you ahead of whatever Ezra and his people are planning. Let me be the surveillance you know about instead of the surveillance you're afraid of."
It's seductive, the offer. The promise of protection wrapped in admission of violation. But there's a cost to accepting. There's always a cost.
"What do you get out of this?" I ask. "Why do you care whether Gabriel's widow survives his brother's legal challenge?"
He's quiet for a long moment. Then: "Because watching you for two weeks showed me something I haven't felt in years. Purpose that isn't just following orders. Investment that isn't just professional obligation." He meets my eyes. "I don't know you, Lana. Not really. But I recognize fracture when I see it. And I'd rather help you hold the pieces together than watch you shatter."
The admission costs him. I can see it in the tension around his mouth, the way his hands curl slightly on the table. He's revealing more than he intended, more than is safe.
I understand that impulse. I've been living in strategic revelation for five months.
"Okay," I say finally. "Help me, monitor me. Do whatever you think is necessary to keep me safe from Ezra and whoever else is watching." I lean forward, make sure he's listening. "But Jax? If this becomes control instead of protection—if you start making decisions for me instead of giving me information—I walk. Understood?"
"Understood."
"And I want transparency. No more discovering you've been tracking my phone or monitoring my apartment after the fact. You tell me what you're doing, why you're doing it, and you give me veto power."
His eyebrows rise slightly. "Your apartment?"
I realize my mistake too late. "You haven't been monitoring my apartment?"
"Not yet. Lucien wants me to install surveillance there. Said it was for your safety, that you'd be more secure if we could monitor threats in real-time." He tilts his head slightly. "I was planning to ask your permission first. Or at least tell you after installation. You just saved me a conversation."
The fact that he was going to tell me—that he wasn't planning to install cameras secretly and let me discover them later—shifts something. Gabriel's surveillance was always discovery. Punishment disguised as surprise.Did you really think I wouldn't notice? Did you think you had privacy in our home?
Jax is offering me agency. Limited agency, conditional agency, but agency nonetheless.
"Install them," I say. "But I want to know where they are. And I want a monitor so I can see what you're seeing."
"That defeats the purpose of covert surveillance."
