Chapter 29 Living Under Surveillance

Chapter 29 Living Under Surveillance
Dante's POV

I was burning my journals when Iris knocked on the door.

Not knocking, really. She walked right through it like the wood was made of smoke. I jumped, dropping the leather journal into the kitchen sink where I'd been about to light it on fire.

"Destruction of evidence," Iris said flatly, pulling out a small device that looked like a crystal hourglass. It glowed red as she pointed it at me. "That's suspicious behavior, Dante Rossi. Day one of observation, and you're already trying to hide something."

"They're personal," I said through gritted teeth. "Journals I wrote to myself before I lost my Cupid memories. They're private."

"Nothing is private during a Council investigation." She picked up the journal, flipping through pages where I'd described three thousand years of creating love matches. Her copper hair caught the morning light as she read, her expression giving nothing away. "Interesting. You documented every doubt you had about falling for Maya. Every moment you tried to resist. Yet you fell anyway."

"What's your point?"

"My point is that even knowing the cost—knowing you'd lose everything—you couldn't stop yourself." She set the journal down carefully. "That's not control. That's obsession. And obsession with power always ends badly."

I wanted to argue, but Maya's scream cut through the house.

I ran to her studio, Iris right behind me. Maya stood frozen in front of her easel, paintbrush trembling in her hand. The canvas showed our backyard—except in the painting, everything was on fire. Lily stood in the center of the flames, crying, her hands glowing with out-of-control wish magic.

"I didn't mean to paint this," Maya whispered. "I was trying to paint flowers for a client. But my hand just... moved on its own. Dante, why am I painting the future?"

Iris's device glowed brighter red. "Uncontrolled precognitive magic. This is exactly what the Council feared." She pulled out a different crystal and began recording. "Subject Maya Rossi is manifesting abilities beyond her stated gift. The family magic is evolving in unpredictable ways."

"It's because you're watching us!" I snapped. "She's stressed because you're treating us like criminals!"

"I'm treating you like what you are—unprecedented magical entities under evaluation." Iris moved closer to the painting, studying it. "When does this fire happen?"

"I don't know," Maya said, tears streaming down her face. "I can't control it. Every time I try to paint since you got here, I see terrible things. Yesterday I painted our house collapsing. This morning I painted Lily disappearing into a dimensional tear. And now this."

"Mommy?" Lily appeared in the doorway, holding her backpack. "I'm ready for school. Why are you crying?"

Maya quickly turned the easel away. "Just frustrated with a painting, baby. Go wait in the car. Daddy will drive you."

After Lily left, Iris photographed the painting from every angle. "I'm required to report this to Magistrate Theron. Uncontrolled future-sight combined with reality-altering art is a significant escalation."

"Please," Maya begged. "Give us time to figure this out. It's only been one day."

"Time is what the Council gave you. Thirty days. But if you're manifesting dangerous new abilities—"

"She's manifesting them because she's terrified!" I shouted. "You moved in next door. You walk through our walls. You record every conversation. You're making everything worse!"

Iris's expression flickered—just for a second—with something that might have been guilt. But then her face went cold again. "The Council chose me for this assignment because I understand the danger of uncontrolled family magic better than anyone. I won't make the same mistakes my parents did."

She left through the wall, and I pulled Maya into my arms.

"This is my fault," I whispered into her hair. "I fell in love knowing what it would cost. I thought losing my immortality was the price. But it wasn't. The price is watching you suffer because of choices I made three thousand years ago."

"Don't," Maya said fiercely. "Don't you dare regret choosing us."

But I did. Looking at that painting of our daughter surrounded by flames, I regretted everything.

That afternoon, I found Lily in the backyard talking to Iris through the fence.

"You seem sad," Lily was saying, offering Iris a cookie through the wooden slats. "Like you need a friend."

"I'm here to observe, not befriend," Iris said, but she took the cookie.

"That's what Mr. Dante said when he first moved here. That he didn't need friends. But he was lying to himself because he was lonely." Lily tilted her head. "Are you lonely too?"

Iris's crystal device fell from her hand.

For just a moment, her controlled expression cracked. I saw raw pain underneath—old grief, fresh fear, desperate loneliness.

Then her face hardened again. "Go inside, child."

But as Lily skipped away, I saw Iris stare at that cookie like it was a bomb she didn't know how to defuse.

That night, I couldn't sleep. I stood at our bedroom window, watching Iris's house. Through her window, I could see her sitting at a desk, recording notes about us. She never stopped. Never rested. Just observed and documented our lives like we were experiments.

Maya curled against my back. "Come to bed."

"I'm going to figure out what happened to her family," I whispered. "Whatever went wrong with their magic—that's why she's so afraid of us. If we understand it, maybe we can convince her we're different."

"Or maybe," Maya said quietly, "we're exactly the same. Maybe every family with combined magic thinks they'll be different. Until they're not."

I turned to argue, but the words died in my throat.

Because through our bedroom window, I could see Iris's house clearly.

And in her window, watching us right back, Iris was crying.

But worse—much worse—was what I saw behind her.

A shadow that shouldn't exist. Something tall and dark and hungry, standing in her room where she couldn't see it.

And it was reaching for her throat with fingers made of smoke and broken dreams.