Slamming the door behind her, she collapsed against the door, her cries so loud and heart-wrenching as she shook with sadness. How could he do this to her? Why didn’t he love her? What had she done wrong? She gave him everything, promised him everything, and he still would not believe her. He wouldn’t trust that she was not his mom and wouldn’t leave. Well, what else could she do except tell him to go? Maybe he’d figure it all out on his own.
When the knock came at the door, she cried, “No, Erik, go.”
“Piper, please open the door, let’s try to talk this out.”
“There is nothing to talk about, Erik. I’ll always be yours. I’ll always be the one who loved you unconditionally. And I know that if you looked deep in your heart, you’d see that you love me, too, but until you see that, we’re done. You’ve made your choice and it is without me. I won’t let you continually hurt me like this.”
“Piper, you are overreacting; talk to me. This doesn’t have to be like this.”
“No! Go! My lawyer will be in contact.”
“Piper—”
“You leave me alone Erik Titov or I will call Elli so fucking 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 fucking 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.…