Page 127 of Fierce-Jax

He was positive that Dillion didn’t want to share her daughter and he couldn’t blame her.

After what she’d gone through with Alec, she’d thought she’d wiped it from her life and moved on.

He knew she was second-guessing everything and that didn’t make it any better.

“Jax is right,” Trent said. “At some point, you need to find out what they are hoping to get out of this. I know you want to keep Gianna to yourself. As a stepfather and a soon-to-be dad, I get it.”

“But as my mother said, there is more than one side to this. I’m being selfish, aren’t I?”

“You’re being a wonderful mother,” Jax said. “Don’t look at it any other way. Right now, it’s smart to reserve judgment. Your set of facts and theirs might be different.”

“Not so different if there were signs of domestic violence in the house,” she argued. “That means Alec was telling the truth.”

“Some of the truth,” Trent said. “Sure. I agree and I’d argue that. But their attorney will argue it was against his father, nothis mother. The letter came from Martha stating she wants to meet her granddaughter.”

“But she’s still living with Luke, you said.”

“It appears that way on paper,” Trent said. “That means nothing though. Things could have changed.”

“I won’t know it unless I have Zander do more checking or wait for their next move,” she said. “Got it.”

“I think that is where we are at,” Trent said. “Unless you want to make that move.”

“No,” she said. “Their letter was a courtesy in their eyes. I’m not playing nice. I’m not trying to be a bitch, but it’s my daughter’s life they are playing with.”

“Can I ask what she might know of Alec?” Trent asked. “If anything.”

Jax wanted to hear this too. They hadn’t talked much of it.

He could have asked more but chose not to at this point knowing that they’d gotten over the hump of their last fight.

“She knows her father died in an accident when she was a baby. I didn’t say he was shot. She’s still young. I don’t know how to explain that. To her, Daddy is in heaven.”

Trent nodded his head. “It’s something you’re going to have to think about most likely. I’m sorry for that, but it’s there.”

“I know,” she said. “I’ll figure it out. I don’t know if I should consider counseling for her either. It seems drastic if she’s a happy child.”

“As someone who has counselors in my agency,” Jax said, “I will say it’s never a bad idea. Counseling doesn’t need to be when you’re already experiencing issues. It can be there to help transition a change so that Gianna understands it’s okay to be confused and just talk about it with someone other than her mother.”

“Jax is right,” Trent said. “And if you’re thinking along those lines, Zander’s soon-to-be wife is a therapist and has a practice right across the hall next to Zander’s office.”

Dillion snorted. “They made it easy on the Fierces for that one.”

Trent laughed. “They did. You’ve got options and some time.”

“But not a lot of time,” she said. “Thanks.”

The two of them got up and left a few minutes later.

When they were in his SUV, he asked, “What’s going through your mind?”

“Too much stuff,” she said.

“Care to share some of it or do you want to process it alone?”

“I don’t want to be alone,” she said. “It’s hard for me to say that, but I’m being honest. I don’t even know where to start with anything.”

“All you have to do is talk and I’ll listen,” he said. “I promise not to judge or get upset. I’m here to support you.”

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