CHAPTER TWELVE LANA #2
The question catches me off guard. "What's the difference? Gabriel watched me. Jax watches me. Both involve invasion of privacy."
"I can’t believe I’m saying this, but Gabriel watched you to control. To catch mistakes, document failures, build cases for why you needed correction." She leans forward. "Does Jax do that? Use the surveillance to criticize you, to manage your behavior, to make you feel like you're failing?"
I think about the cameras with admin access. The transparency. The way Jax explains his monitoring instead of hiding it. The fact that I can disable every feed whenever I want and he's never questioned that power.
"No," I admit. "He doesn't use it that way."
"Then the methodology might look identical, but the dynamic is completely different." She refills both our glasses even though we've barely made a dent in the first glass. "Gabriel's surveillance was about possession. Jax's surveillance is about—what did he call it?"
"Protection. Threat assessment. Giving me agency over my own monitoring."
"Right. So the question isn't whether surveillance is happening. The question is whether you have power in the relationship or whether the surveillance removes your power." She holds my gaze. "Do you feel powerless with Jax?"
The honest answer requires examination I've been avoiding. "No. I feel seen. Which is different from feeling controlled. But I'm not sure if that difference is real or if I'm just better at rationalizing what I want."
"What do you want?"
The question is direct, and deflection would be pointless.
"I want him. I want the way he looks at me like I'm someone worth protecting instead of someone who needs managing.
I want the feeling of being monitored by someone who notices my strengths instead of my failures.
" I drain half my glass, needing the courage alcohol provides.
"I want to stop acting like I am recovering and just be honest about how broken I still am.
And somehow Jax makes that feel possible instead of shameful. "
Solange absorbs this, and I watch her calculate whether to support my terrible judgment or talk me out of it.
"You know this is complicated timing, right?
You're being threatened by Ezra. You're carrying five months of guilt about Gabriel's death.
You're rebuilding your entire sense of self after years of systematic dismantling.
Adding a relationship—especially one with someone who spies on you—might not be the wisest choice. "
"I know. Jax knows. We talked about it after the kiss." I set down my glass before I drink it too fast. "We agreed to wait until the legal situation resolves. Until I'm not dependent on his protection for survival. Then we can revisit whether this is real or just proximity and adrenaline."
"That's actually smart. More restraint than I expected from either of you." She picks up her wine, studies me over the rim. "But Lana? Waiting doesn't mean the feelings disappear. It just means you're trying not to act on them. That's going to be hard."
"I know."
"And if Ezra drags this out? If the legal proceedings take months? You're just supposed to exist in this space of acknowledged attraction without doing anything about it?"
I haven't thought that far ahead. The assumption was that Ezra's challenge would resolve quickly—either I'd accept his settlement, or we'd go to court and Mira would eviscerate his case.
But legal proceedings don't work on convenient timelines.
Discovery could take months. Depositions, motions, negotiations.
The whole machinery of estate litigation grinding forward while I try to maintain professional distance from someone I kissed this morning.
"I don't know," I admit. "We didn't plan for extended timelines."
"Then maybe you need to revisit the agreement. Figure out what waiting actually means in practice." She finishes her wine, stands, and heads toward the kitchen. "Come help me with dinner. Confession is easier while chopping vegetables."
I follow her into the kitchen—its small but functional, filled with the smell of garlic and herbs and something baking that makes my stomach remember I barely ate today. She hands me a cutting board and knife, points me toward bell peppers that need dicing.
We work in the kind of companionable rhythm that comes from years of friendship. She stirs something on the stove while I chop vegetables, and the domestic normalcy of it helps ground me after a day that's felt anything but normal.
"So yesterday at Marconi's," Solange says after a few minutes of comfortable work. "How did Jax manage to just sit there and watch? I kept wanting to cross the restaurant and tell Ezra to shut up."
"He had rules," I say. "From his mentor. Specific parameters about when he could intervene."
"Rules?" Solange looks up from the stove. "What kind of rules?"
So I tell her about Elias. About Jax asking him to have veto power over the protection because external accountability prevents obsession from becoming possession.
About the specific rules Elias gave Jax for Thursday: document instead of defend, let me fight my own battles, text first before intervening.
"That's actually impressive," Solange says when I finish. "Most men in Jax's position would just trust their own judgment. He's actively seeking accountability from someone who'll tell him when he's crossing lines."
"That's what makes it different from Gabriel. Gabriel never questioned his own judgment. Never asked anyone whether his monitoring was justified or excessive. Just did what he wanted and called it care."
"Exactly." She hands me cherry tomatoes to halve. "So what are you actually afraid of? That Jax will become Gabriel? Or that you're making good choices and don't know how to trust that?"
The question lands harder than she probably intended. What am I afraid of?
"Both," I admit. "I'm afraid Jax's protection will escalate into control the way Gabriel's care escalated into abuse. But I'm also afraid that I'm so conditioned to expect control that I won't be able to recognize healthy attention when it's offered."
"Those are valid fears." She's adding vegetables to the pot now, building something that smells like it might save me.
"But here's what I know about you, Lana.
You left Gabriel. Maybe not in the way you planned, maybe not with the clarity you wanted, but you left.
You rebuilt your life from nothing. Started a foundation.
Fought back when Ezra tried to intimidate you.
You're not the same woman who married Gabriel five years ago. "
"I don't feel different. I feel like I'm constantly acting like I’m strong while barely holding together underneath."
"Everyone feels like that. The difference is you're actually doing the work instead of just saying you are.
" She points her spoon at me for emphasis.
"You're in therapy twice a week. You set boundaries with Jax and held him to them.
You negotiated surveillance terms that give you power instead of removing it.
That's not someone who's repeating old patterns.
That's someone who's learning new ones."
I want to believe her. Want to accept that growth is happening even when it feels like I'm just surviving increment by increment.
"What if I'm wrong about him?" The fear arrives fully formed. "What if Jax's protection is just better marketing for the same control Gabriel used? What if six months from now I'm trapped again and can't remember how I got there?"
Solange stops cooking, turns to face me fully. "Then you leave. The same way you left Gabriel. Maybe not perfectly, maybe not cleanly, but you leave. Because here's what I know for certain—you're capable of leaving. You've proven that already."
The reassurance helps fractionally. Leaving Gabriel cost me five years and a death I can't fully remember. But I did leave. Whether through planning or accident, whether by pushing or failing to save him, the outcome remains: I'm no longer in that marriage.
Maybe that capability—the ability to leave when staying becomes unbearable—is the real difference between who I was and who I'm becoming.
We finish cooking together, and by 7:30 PM we're eating pasta with vegetables and bread that's still warm from the oven. Normal food, normal conversation, the kind of evening that reminds me life exists beyond legal threats and complicated attraction.
My phone buzzes at 8:14 PM. Text from Jax: Meeting with Lucien finished. He found something on Ezra you'll want to know about. Can I call?
I show Solange the text. She reads it, raises an eyebrow. "He's asking permission to call instead of just calling. That's good boundary management."
"Or it's an act. Asking permission in ways that make refusal seem unreasonable."
"You could test that. Say no. See how he responds."
The suggestion is logical. If Jax's respect for boundaries is genuine, he'll accept refusal without pushback. If it's performance, he'll find ways to pressure or guilt me into compliance.
But I don't want to test him. I want to know what Lucien found.
I text back: I'm at Solange's. Can you text the information instead of calling?
His response comes within thirty seconds: Yes. Give me a few minutes to type it out.
I show Solange his reply. She nods approval. "He accepted the boundary without questioning it. That's a good sign."
Three minutes later, my phone buzzes with a longer message:
Lucien's investigators found something. Ezra is planning to run for state assembly next year—hasn't announced publicly yet. His campaign finances show donations from entities connected to The Glasshouse. Same criminal network Gabriel was involved with.
Another message follows: