“No! Go! My lawyer will be in contact.”

“Piper—”

“You leave me alone Erik Titov or I will call Elli so f**king fast and tell her that we’ve been lying to her from the beginning. Leave me alone!”

“You think I care about that? I care about you. Open the door, talk to me. I don’t want to leave like this,” he pleaded, but Piper didn’t care. She couldn’t do this. This wasn’t okay, and she refused to let him try to talk his way out of it.

“No! Go! You want us to be done, we’re done. Now go!”

He let out a roar before something crashed in the hall and then his footsteps disappeared down it. Piper closed her eyes and heard the front door slam. She had no intention of calling Elli or anyone else, for that matter, but she needed him to go. She couldn’t look at his beautiful face and hear the words that would haunt her for life.

He didn’t want her.

She didn’t understand his reasons. She thought they were f**king stupid and a part of her was sure that even he didn’t understand them. The only thing she did know at that moment was that she was done with Erik Titov.

No matter how much it hurt.

Chapter 23

Piper was done.

Leaning back in her chair, the first smile in a week came across her face. She couldn’t believe it. Seven months of living in the world of Mrs. Octopus and she was finally done. She was done with drawing for authors. She had let Emmaline know and, thankfully, she understood. Piper already had three murals lined up to draw after Dimitri came, and she couldn’t have been more pleased.

The only thing that was keeping her from being happy was that her heart was still breaking for Erik. She had never experienced such heartbreak in her life. She felt numb all the time. Her eyes hurt from crying and her heart felt as if it wasn’t beating.

She just hurt.

Piper hadn’t been anywhere, hadn’t done anything since he left, and she knew that was part of the problem. She also hadn’t lied as much as she had since he left, which made no sense in the world. She used to feel horrible lying to her family and friends, but now she didn’t care. She missed her baby shower and all of the other events her sisters had planned; all she wanted to do was to stay in her house and cry about losing Erik. It was selfish but she didn’t care.

She did make it to her doctor’s appointments for Dimitri. He was healthy and staying put; all was good with her and the baby. But she had skipped all of her Lamaze classes and realized she would pay for that later. She couldn’t attend class without Erik, especially with Fallon, Audrey, and their husbands all there—they’d all ask questions and at this point she didn’t have answers, nor did she want to talk about it. If Erik wanted to explain what happened, then fine.

Nothing outside of Dimitri mattered; she was too heartbroken to care.

Packing away the sketches for Mrs. Octopus’ Eight Tentacles, she wrote out Emmaline’s address and then one for the publisher before sealing the boxes. Throwing them on the counter for FedEx, she made her way back to Dimitri’s room. The nursery was completely done, and beautiful. The colors were bright and Piper was convinced that Dimitri would love it.

She walked over to the corner where her presents from her baby shower sat, and sat down cross-legged on the floor to open them all. Harper had dropped off the presents the day before with well wishes from everyone. The lie of being sick and too tired to go seemed like a good idea at the time, but now Piper was completely annoyed with herself. Everyone kept popping by, bringing her stuff and fussing over her. The sad thing was she didn’t want them.…

She wanted Erik.

With a sigh, Piper began opening the presents. She got the cutest things, sweet little outfits and all the necessities she would need for the baby. The coolest gift was the one Elli had gotten her. It was a monogrammed baby bag with Dimitri’s name on it that also was filled with shirts, socks, hats, burp cloths, and bibs, all with D’s on them. They were so precious and Piper couldn’t wait to see Elli to thank her in person.

Moving to the rocking chair in the corner of the room she sat down and rested her hands on her stomach.

“Everything’s going to be okay,” she whispered as she rubbed her extended stomach. She said it more for herself than for the baby, because she needed that reminder. She was nervous, scared, and unsure what her future held. Reaching for her Kindle, she started rocking as she read out loud. She had gotten so used to reading that way when Erik was there that she decided to keep doing it. She knew that Dimitri enjoyed her reading Harry Potter. He was her kid, for goodness sakes.

She was well into the book when the doorbell rang. Laying her Kindle down, she made her way down the hall. She still got a little anxious thinking it might be her husband coming to confess his devotion, but that wasn’t likely to happen. He hadn’t been back since he left. He only called or texted, saying that they needed to talk. She was pretty sure that everything they needed to say had been said, so really, she had no clue what they needed to talk about. He wasn’t calling to say he loved her or wanted her back; he only wanted to know that she was okay and he could hear that from everyone else.

Reaching the door, she was surprised to see that it was Alla and Cooper. They hadn’t called, because if they had, she would have made up some kind of excuse as to why they couldn’t come over. Opening the door, she greeted them with a small smile and said, “Hey, I wasn’t expecting y’all.”

Alla smiled, wrapping her arms around Piper for a big hug. She pulled back, cradling Piper’s stomach as she said, “He’s getting big.”