A/N: HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY! I gift you with...uh… angst?

Anyway. I want to make it clear that there are no legal authorities involved in this case at this time. No police involvement other than, I'm sure, whatever paperwork is required to close a missing persons case and to dissolve an illegal adoption. In cases like these, the authorities don't step in unless they have to, and all parties are cooperating (some of them are pissed off about it, granted ;) but they're all in agreement about what's happening ).

I realize it's easy to see this whole situation as a custody battle waiting to happen, but that is NOT the story I'm trying to tell. No one is FIGHTING for anyone.

That being said - this chapter is told from Jasper's PoV...which will be interesting, because I know half of you hate him. Let's take a look.

After Katie had cried herself into exhaustion, Jasper left her side only long enough to ask Edward and Bella to give them space. He promised them he and Emmett would talk to Katie as soon as she was calmer, and they would call if they were needed.

"Un-fucking-likely," Jasper muttered to himself as he hurried back into the house, eager to get back to his family.

His family had relocated, but Jasper knew where to find them. He took the stairs two at a time, in no mood to be away from his daughter. He found her in the master bedroom, fast asleep on Emmett's chest. He climbed onto the bed with them, resting a hand on Katie's back, so he could feel the rise and fall of her breath. Her head was turned toward him, her cheeks splotchy and tear streaked. He traced the shape of her pouty lips and tried not to start crying again.

A montage of memories flashed across his vision as he tried to memorize this moment. They all looked similar-this bed with his husband and daughter. The memories ran backward like a rewind.

The last year or so, Katie had a habit of climbing into their bed on Saturday mornings. She lay on her back between them and twisted her legs into various odd positions as she talked. She chatted about whatever struck her fancy-genetics, the kids in her class, what her favorite cartoon characters had gotten into that week and what they might be doing right that very minute.

It was in this bed, when Katie was four and noticed most of her friends had mommies, that they explained what adoption was and how they came to be her daddies. "You're our daughter, our baby," Jasper remembered telling her. "Always and forever," he'd promised.

Further back, he remembered how trying it had been when she was a hyperactive toddler. As soon as she was in a big girl bed, Katie would come into their room way too early in the morning. She was restless and relentless, bouncing around their big bed and climbing over their bodies as though they were her personal playground. Jasper remembered more than once, he'd pulled the comforter over his head, far too tired to make good on his threats to take her back to her room. But even when he was annoyed, he almost always took a moment to treasure Katie's high-pitched, baby girl giggles.

Even further than that was one of his most precious memories. The day they signed the adoption papers, when they got home, they ended up in this bed. They curled up together, their six-month-old daughter sleeping between them, a real family for the very first time.

He'd met Emmett's eyes, and they'd both grinned so wide it was a wonder their cheeks didn't split. They'd known going in that adopting through the foster system could be heartbreaking. The system did all it could to keep children within their biological families. Many other foster parents had to suffer the agony of giving a child they'd loved for months or even years back to their parents, grandparents, aunts, or uncles. But this baby girl. This girl was theirs. Their daughter.

Emmett's eyes had shone with tears of unbridled happiness. "We're daddies," he'd whispered.

Jasper had twined their fingers together, resting their joined hands on Katie's roly-poly baby belly. In his other hand, he clutched the birth certificate that listed baby Jane Doe's name as Katie Elaina McCarty-Whitlock and named them as her parents.

Now that birth certificate was null and void. There was a new one, Jasper knew. He hadn't seen it, but he knew exactly what it said. Katie Elaina Cullen, born July 1st-over three weeks before their original estimation. Hell, she wasn't even a Leo anymore. Mother: Bella Marie Swan. Father: Edward Anthony Cullen. There was no room there for the two men who had raised her from infancy; no sign they even existed except that Edward and Bella had kept the name Jasper and Emmett had decided on.

Officially, legally, they weren't daddies anymore.

"This sucks," Emmett muttered, his voice rough.

Jasper didn't need to look up to know he was crying again, too. He rested his arm over Katie's back, touching Emmett's side. Finally, he convinced himself to look away from their daughter. He opened his mouth, but he had no words. Not for this.

This was the beginning of the end. Soon there would be no new memories of being here like this; a family of three tucked together in the same bed. When Katie woke up, they'd have to try to explain that soon she would live somewhere else, away from them, and they were supposed to feel lucky that they could be beloved uncles.

Despite his efforts, Jasper's eyes brimmed over with tears. He scooted closer to Emmett, resting his head on his shoulder and hugging his two most important people as close as they could. He wished with everything inside him that he didn't have to let this go.

~0~

It was hard to say how Katie was processing what she'd been told. A gifted child's mind was a conundrum. Mentally, she was advanced, which meant she understood some concepts that would have gone over the heads of most children her age. Emotionally, though, she was still a six-year-old child. Maybe her thought process was slightly more concrete, but that didn't mean she had the words to say what she was feeling.

She was clingier than normal, but Jasper had expected that much. He hadn't expected the sucker punch to the gut when she asked repeatedly if he and Emmett still loved her. Beyond that, she'd been unnaturally quiet and moody. She'd thrown a fit the likes of which neither of them had ever seen when they took her to school like normal that morning.

"I don't like my teacher," she had claimed, speaking of the woman who had taken Edward's place permanently in her class.

As near as Jasper figured after questioning her about it, Katie was mistrustful of teachers in general at the moment. Maybe she needed someone to blame for all this confusion, and she'd chosen the person who, to her mind, had been most deceptive. Despite the fact she had technically been testing for this very possibility, she was angriest at Edward for turning out to be her biological father when he was supposed to be her teacher.

But they wanted to keep things as normal as possible for her, so they'd dropped her off anyway. "How was she?" Emmett asked the teacher when they arrived to pick her up.

The teachers all knew what was going on. It was one of a million meetings Jasper resented having to sit in on-explaining to the staff what they wanted and what they thought Katie needed. He was glad, of course, that everyone was doing their best to make this as easy as possible on his little girl, but he hated that it was happening at all.

Ms. Ontiveros gave them a tight smile. "She was okay. She was a little uneasy whenever the children switched classes. I think she didn't want to see Mr. Cullen in the hallway. And you're right. She seems to be angry at me, but she was obedient. She followed instructions; she just didn't speak to me or answer any questions. I didn't push her today."

"Thank you," Jasper said, and he went inside the classroom to call Katie to him.

They were settled in the car, and Jasper didn't miss that Katie wasn't herself. She was usually eager to talk about her day, but she was quiet as they started for home.

Jasper cleared his throat. "Katie, your…" He had to swallow hard and try again. "Your mom and dad are coming over tonight."

He heard Katie gasp, and when he turned in his seat, he saw she looked frightened. "I don't want to go with them tonight."

"No. No, sugar. You're not going home with them tonight. Remember we talked about this? They want to get to know you first, and that will take a while."

She gulped several times-such a brave little girl-and looked at him with watery eyes. "How many sleeps?"

"You mean how many sleeps until they take you to your new home?"

"Yes," she said, her voice wavering.

"All the fucking sleeps," Emmett muttered under his breath, gripping the steering wheel and glaring at the road ahead.

"A lot, sugar. A lot of sleeps." He knew his daughter. She liked numbers. Usually, when something was about to happen, she liked to cross sleeps off her calendar and count the days remaining. "There's nothing set in stone. You know this is a unique situation, right?"

"It's not normal," she said. At other times, her solemn tone would have been funny. "You said sometimes kids get adopted because the people who made them didn't make good mommies and daddies."

"Yes, that's right. That's what happened with your friend Peter."

"The mommy and daddy who made him did a bad thing," she said.

"Yes."

"But my mommy and daddy aren't bad."

Jasper pressed his tongue to the roof of his mouth. He remembered Edward begging him not to make Katie hate them. "No, sugar. Your mommy and daddy didn't do anything wrong. You were stolen from them. You should-" He had to suck in a deep breath because it would have been less painful to stab a knife into his own heart. "You shouldn't have ever have been up for adoption."

Emmett reached across the console to take his hand.

She was quiet for a minute before she spoke again. "Do you think they love me?"

Not like Daddy and I do. Not like us. They don't know you. They can't possibly love everything you are. "Yes, Katie. They love you very much. They never stopped loving you."

~0~

It killed Jasper to see Katie so subdued. His pretty little space cadet was staring off, her expression far away. That was typical. What wasn't was the look on her face. She was anything but serene, and he doubted her thoughts were pleasant daydreams at present. Her brows were furrowed, her mouth set in a slight pout.

Before he could go to her, the doorbell rang. Katie snapped out of her distraction in an instant. In the time it took her to scramble to her feet, Jasper was already over to her. He lifted her up, and she wound her skinny arms around him in a stranglehold, burying her face in his neck. He closed his eyes, splaying his hand over her back.

"It's okay, sugar," he whispered against her hair, kissing the top of her head. It was a lie that burned in the back of his throat. None of this was okay. There was no part of him that wanted to open the door and let this whole process start.

Emmett too was glaring in the direction of the door. He met Jasper's eyes. "No last minute reprieve, I guess," he said.

It was in Emmett's nature to joke even at the worst of times. This was the first time in Jasper's memory that his words fell flat. It was only what they'd both been hoping-that some miracle would stop this all from happening.

Once upon a time, Jasper's biggest fear was the day he and Emmett would have to tell Katie how her biological mother had died. He'd harbored some nightmares that she'd want to search for her biological father, but always, he'd known the odds were against that ever happening. This? This wasn't a scenario he ever could have imagined.

Another knock came, and Emmett blew out a long breath, visibly summoning every ounce of courage he had. He walked toward the door as though he was walking to the guillotine.

It was awkward. Of course it was awkward. The atmosphere was downright oppressive. Edward and Bella were nervous and uncertain. Jasper was well aware he and Emmett were radiating tension. For Katie's sake, they were trying their hardest to keep things light, but they were only human. The most they could do was keep a handle on the worst of their agony and anger. It was too much to expect them to pretend they wanted to make easy conversation with the people who would ultimately take their daughter away.

So conversation was stilted at best, mostly centered around dinner. They were going to have pizza, which should have been a treat for Katie, but when they asked her to help choose toppings, she wouldn't look up or answer. She clung to Jasper tightly, her breath hot against his neck.

"How about onions?" Jasper asked, bouncing her in his arms, trying to tease her. "You love onions, right?"

That drew a disgruntled noise out of Katie. She hated onions with the kind of passion only small children were capable of. Emmett and Jasper loved them on everything and frequently delighted in grossing her out, pretending to put them in her food.

"Ugh, onions are gross," Bella said, wrinkling her nose. Her eyes went wide, and Jasper could tell it was an automatic reaction; not something she'd meant to say out loud.

Katie rolled her head the slightest bit, peeking at Bella. "I hate onions," she said in a barely audible voice.

Bella smiled as though this tiny similarity was everything to her. Jasper tried his best not to grimace. Some part of him didn't want Bella and Edward to find any connection to Katie, vindictive as that was.

"I only like onions in soup," Edward said.

Katie turned her head, hiding again. "No onions," she mumbled.

They settled in the living room, which also should have been a treat to Katie. Predictably, when the pizza arrived, no one was hungry. Katie had wedged herself between Jasper and Emmett on the couch, wrapped in the armor of her baby blanket. She took a couple bites at their prompting, but otherwise she was unnaturally still. Katie wasn't a hyper child, but even when they watched TV, she was typically doing something else-coloring, playing with her Legos or her toys.

As uncomfortable as the atmosphere was, Jasper was glad Edward and Bella weren't forcing interaction. They were keeping their promise to go at Katie's pace, though Jasper wasn't oblivious to the fact they kept looking at her. The Little Mermaid was on TV, but he was sure no one was watching it. It was natural for them to look, he knew, though it made him defensive. It wasn't like they were creepers, though Jasper had the same impulse to scoop Katie up and get her as far away from them as he could.

It took him a while to figure out that Katie was glancing back at them. And that wouldn't have been surprising really except that Jasper realized Katie and Bella were playing a game.

No. They weren't playing. They were doing that thing where neither one of them seemed to want the other to realize they were staring. They kept glancing at each other and glancing away quickly when they realized the other had caught them.

It was almost the end of the movie when Katie sat up straight, looking right at Bella. "Do you have other kids?" The instant she asked, she ducked again, hiding behind Jasper.

Bella started. "Me?"

Katie made a soft, exasperated sound that only Jasper heard as her head was turned against his side. She peered up again. "Yeah. Are you someone else's mommy?"

"I...No. Just…" Bella swallowed, trying to smile. "Just yours."

"If you're my mommy, why did you let a bad lady take me when I was a baby? Babies are supposed to be watched extra special good."

Bella reared back as though she had been slapped. The blood drained from her face, and tears came to her eyes.

"That wasn't B… your mother's fault, Katie," Edward said, his voice soft. "She-"

Katie lifted her head again, and Jasper was startled to see she was glaring. "If you're my daddy and you were looking for me all this time, why didn't you tell me at school? Why were you my teacher? Teachers aren't the same as daddies."

Now it was Edward's turn to look as though he'd been punched. Bella reached out, automatically taking his hand-an interesting tidbit Jasper filed away to think about later. Edward swallowed hard. "You were new when the bad lady took you. Brand new babies look very different from big girls like you. I didn't recognize you."

Katie grunted and hid again at Jasper's side.

"I think it's close to bedtime," Emmett said, and Jasper was relieved. He was drained. He wanted to be alone with his husband and daughter again. He wanted to forget all this was happening for a few hours.

~0~

In the hour and a half from the time Edward and Bella left to the time Emmett and Jasper put Katie to bed, she hadn't said a word. She nodded or shook her head at their questions, but she didn't say anything out loud.

"Daddies?" she said, her voice small and shaky, calling them back just before they left her room.

Emmett and Jasper each sat back down on her bed. "Yeah, baby?" Emmett asked, smoothing her hair back.

She worried her lip between her teeth for a few more moments before she looked at them. "Do you like my mommy and daddy?"

They both winced. That wasn't a question they wanted to answer because, hell no, they didn't like Edward and Bella. Most days, Jasper got pretty damn close to hating them.

"Yeah, baby," Emmett said, the words coming out thick and wrong to Jasper's ears. "We like them. They're nice people. You liked Edward when he was your teacher, remember?"

She scowled but then took a deep breath as though she was trying not to cry. "Do I have three daddies?"

And there it was. The worst question.

For a time, when this all began, Emmett and Jasper had hoped Edward and Bella would consider joint custody. But while they were both eager to keep Emmett and Jasper in Katie's life, they all agreed it was conducive to Katie's new reality to make a clean break. Emmett and Jasper weren't her parents anymore. They wouldn't be legally responsible for her, and it would be easier for her to understand the situation if the language was clear. Kidnapped children didn't have four parents-they had two.

It took a considerable amount of strength for Jasper not to react Katie's words as much as they were a knife to the heart; twisting, twisting, twisting deeper. Emmett opened his mouth, but no words came out.

Jasper closed his eyes, counted to ten in his head, and reminded himself that he needed to say these things for her sake. She would be happy again, content with her biological parents. It didn't matter that the words were ash and poison in his mouth; he needed to say them for Katie's sake. "You have one daddy. Edward is your daddy." He had to stop and swallow hard, watching as Katie's lower lip began to tremble. His voice was shaky. Close to cracking. "But it's okay, sugar. It's fine. You remember how we talked about how some people make a family in their hearts instead of by blood?"

Emmett turned his face away, and Jasper was sure he was crying again. Katie nodded, her eyes glassy as she looked up at him.

"All that's happening is we're putting together a new family. Da-" Jasper closed his eyes. Everything in him was screaming. He couldn't say these words. He couldn't. They were the blackest kind of blasphemy, and he was sure they would kill him right there. "Emmett. Emmett and I are going to be your uncles. You know what that means?"

Katie shook her head the slightest bit, sniffling.

"It means we're still going to be here for you. You're going to see us all the time. When you have plays and exhibits at school, we're going to be there." His voice cracked, but he took Katie's hands, and kept going because he needed her to understand this. Some desperate part of him wanted to beg and plead with her not to forget them, because he couldn't say that wasn't one of his greatest fears. "You can still come help me at work sometimes. And Emmett and I are still going to love you. Nothing in the world could change that."

She sat up, struggling to throw off her blankets, and flung her arms around his neck. Jasper rocked her, hiding his tears against her hair. He felt Emmett's wide arms around them both, and they all rocked together.

"Can I sleep with you?" Katie asked.

"Yes," both Jasper and Emmett answered together. Jasper was glad. He'd wanted nothing more than to never have to let her go again.

A/N: I hope all you mothers are having a great day. Much love to you!