The silence already settled into the house for the night by the time I finally returned to my sister's. My stomach knotted a little as I looked around at the place. It could use a good cleaning and knowing Jacki, she didn't have time to do it. And tonight, Sergei was out hanging with his friend, the one that he hadn't seen in a long time, so I wasn't about to interrupt him. The talk with my parents hadn't gone so well, but it was a start and they were willing to meet Sergei.
My heart jumped hard as the lights had flickered in the front window. If Jacki said that she wouldn't be home, she probably had a change of heart, or change of man.
The loud knock just about brought me to my knees. I told her to call me if she did need a ride, but Jacki was Jacki and she was the wild child. When I opened it, Sergei had his arm leaning on the doorframe, his jacket unbuttoned and his shirt showing underneath. His hair was messed up and the smirk was spread across his face.
"Well I would have to say that you look like something that any guy would take over his shoulder and haul off to the bedroom." The alcohol poured from his breath as he rubbed his mouth with his hand.
"Sergei, get in here before you get hurt." Reaching for him, I smiled shaking my head. I couldn't wait to meet this Tommy if he had Sergei completely trashed. He better have been a good friend and not let him drive.
Stumbling in, he plopped down on the couch stretching his arms across the back. "Why not come here and give me a little something?"
"No, you are pretty drunk and I can't." Picking up the mail on the table, I piled it all on the kitchen counter by my sister's phone charger. At least it hadn't been that bad staying with her. Not after I cleaned up the place. Now, it was only a few minutes to get over to Sergei's place instead of a half an hour. "You can stay here with me. My sister won't be home tonight."
"My guess is that she will not be either." His eyelids were heavy as the blues swirled. This was a new look. A new one and it made me nauseous. My chest clenched hard as he pressed his lips together. I didn't know him when he was that drunk, but the clenching in my stomach that I was getting wasn't good. I could have Nikolay come and pick him up, but with that broken leg, it would be hard for him to get out to the garage.
"Come on. I will take you home." Waving my hand, I smiled as I looked at him. Something was different. A lot different. Something was... wrong. Reaching over to him, I caught a new smell, a feminine smell. A sweet and sexy perfume. My stomach crashed hard. That was what it was. He had been with another woman. My heart was pulverizing my chest and my stomach was clenching even harder, as if the muscles were ripping apart. I couldn't breathe. "Were you...were you with another woman?"
"And if I was?" His expression hadn't changed, but the dancing in his eyes told me that he was fine with it, that he was happy with having been with someone else.
"Sergei!" Taking a few steps back, I cupped my forehead trying to focus on breathing. In just a couple of days, we would have the first baby appointment and he had been so happy, so thrilled. Now, he was telling me that he slept with another woman and he wasn't even upset about it. "I thought that...."
"That I was going to stay with you?" Licking his lips, he shrugged as he glanced around. "This is a nice place your sister has. Fits her well."
"That is not... How could you knowing that I was here waiting for you? That we are going to have a baby..."
"Ah, two liars can make a life now?"
Wrapping my arm around my stomach, I felt everything crashing inside of me. How could he sit there and act like it was nothing that he had cheated on me? How could he do that after being so excited about the baby and urging me to talk to my parents? He knew that they wanted to meet him. He knew that I had talked him up and now I would have to look them in the eye and tell them that I was completely wrong about him?
Tears burned my eyes as I tried to swallow the hard lump in my throat. The pain was so bad that it had radiated through my body. After everything was starting to look up, he had to go to another woman? "You told me that I was the only one for you."
"Ah, that does not matter much now, does it?" Leaning forward, he rested his elbows on his knees as those blues had darkened to the point that they started to scare me. Maybe he was a mean drunk. I don't know. I had known him to drink, but that was to numb the pain from what his ex had caused him. He knew how it felt to be betrayed and he didn't have one care that he had done it to me.
"How could you! How could you do this to me?" Screaming, I let the tears and the cries out as my stomach had fallen even deeper into the empty pit of despair.
"At least I am not sitting here lying to your face." The smirk was replaced with the tight lips wrapped around his teeth. Those blues darkened even more.
"I never lied to you. Never. I loved you so much, Sergei!" Covering my face in my hands, I let my heart slowly break. I was pregnant with his child and now he decided that he didn't want me? He was the one who told me that no matter, baby or not, we would still be together. He even quit teaching so that we could be together. Maybe that was a lie, too. Maybe I was the fool that had fallen for all his lines when this was planned out from the beginning.
"Really, Jacey? You never lied to me once?" The soberness in his face appeared fast as he glared across the living room at me. "Not just one little lie?"
"I never have! I gave you my heart! I gave you everything I had, Sergei. I loved you more than anything in my life. I just wanted to be with you." Curling back into the oversized chair cushions, I held the throw pillow tight to me. How would my dad like this situation now? He was still furious that I had gotten pregnant, but at least he was willing to meet Sergei and see for himself that my love was not a bag guy.
"How come I cannot believe that, Jacey? Hmm?" Cocking his brow, he waited for me to answer.
"I love you. I do, Sergei. This hurts so bad..."
"Does it now? JACEY? Does it? Now you know how I feel to be betrayed by the one that had your heart."
The air had rushed from my lungs. What had he called me? Slowly, I looked at him. Jacey. He had called me Jacey. Not Jay. Oh my God! I had lied to him. I was the liar. I switched places with my sister for that class. How could that have slipped my mind. "Sergei, let me explain."
"No. It is over. I do not even know who you are." Tears actually rolled down his cheeks. His cheeks for once. "You lied to me this whole time. Did you not think that I would find out?"
"I am sorry. Please, let me explain." Jumping up from the chair I caught him as he shot towards the door. Hell, he wasn't drunk. He just had the scent on him as if he had doused himself with booze.
"Did you think that you could just go on living someone else's life?"
"She's my sister..."
"I do not care! You lied to me!" His tone was sharp as it ripped out his throat.
"I just took her class because she didn't... I couldn't..."
His hand came up to silence me as the pain sunk so deep inside of him that it was ten times worse than what I had ever seen. And I was the one to shatter his heart. I hadn't just broken it, but I shattered it into tiny pieces. "After I tell you everything of what happened to me, you stood there still with the lie?" Shaking his head, he let a few more tears out. "I loved you. I loved you! You were my world! I wanted this all with you!" His eyes shot down to my stomach as the pain worsened inside of him. "I wanted to make all your dreams come true! I went through everything to make it happen!"
"Sergei, please let me..." Oh no. I was going to throw up. I was going to just die right there. We just were so good together and he called me Jay all the time. I had actually forgotten that I switched places with my sister for that class. This was all my fault that I was losing him.
"I see you in the club wondering what you are doing there. I see you there with another man and his tongue down your throat. I find out that my ex got rid of my baby because she did not know if it was mine. Then, I see you there. You, out with my baby inside of you, with another man!" The tears stormed down his face as he stepped away from me. "I do not know what to say. It is a bad way to find out that you have a twin. I damn near got into a fight thinking that you were out like she was, doing the same thing. But it was worse, Jacki... Jay... Whoever the hell you are. I see her and instantly I know which one is which. SHE is Jacki. She is the one that I was with!"
"No, it was all me. I just had her name..."
"I DO NOT CARE!" His voice shattered my heart into more pieces. "YOU LIED TO ME!" His lips pressed firmly together as he shook his head holding back his own cries. "You lied to me. I should go to the school and tell them that you are not the one who I had in class. I should."
"No, please. Just let me explain."
"No, there is nothing to explain." Taking a deep breath, he straightened his shoulders as he glanced around. "Now I do know why I had never seen you here. If you loved me like you say that you did, you would not have lied to me."
"And if I told you that we switched, what would have you done?"
"I would not have cared. I would have lied for you. I would have done everything for you. You would have been honest to me then. You would have shown me who you really are and we would not be in this place here." He pointed to my belly making it tighten harder. "I do not know you. I do not like you. You mean nothing to me. Absolutely nothing."
"Sergei, please. Just let me tell you..."
"No. You have said enough. Enough." Pulling out a photo from his back pocket, he handed it over to me. It was a picture of the horse that I lost, the one that had never had a chance to mend his broken heart. "Every time that you look at him, I want you to see what you done to me. I want you to see that you did this to me. You. Not my ex. I had my heart fixed, but you... this... I found him to bring him home to you. For you. To start your dream. I hope that every time you look at him, you see what it had cost you. I will not tell the school. I will tell nobody. I just never want to see you again. I want nothing to do with you, ever. He will arrive on Monday. I hope he was worth it."
"No, Sergei, please..." Reaching for him, he snapped away from me making my chest tighten to the point that I couldn't breathe.
"Nothing. You mean nothing to me. I do not know you. I do not want nothing to do with you. I go home now." His teeth had clamped hard together as he walked out slamming the door. Falling onto the couch, I cried as hard as I could.
Rubbing my belly, I felt the tightness growing. I lost him just like that. The best thing that ever happened to me just walked out on me, on what we had shared.
The door flew open and Jacki ran inside dropping to her knees beside me. Her hand smoothed my hair back as she shook her head. "God, Jay. I am so sorry. When I saw him in the class, I knew that he would be so good for you. I am so sorry, honey. This is all my fault. I just wanted to give you someone deserved to have you."
"You knew that he was taking the class over?"
The guilt spread over her face as she nodded slightly. "I did. I knew that Johnston wasn't going to teach the class and the way that he was looking at me, I knew you two would be perfect for each other. He was just like those damn horses you like so much and I figured that I would help you both out." The tears had trickled down her face. "I am so sorry. You're my sister and I just wanted you to be happy."
"It's not your fault. This is all my fault." I cried harder. This was all my mess. If I hadn't agreed to switch with her, we wouldn't have been tangled in this web. I just loved him so much. He was a part of me. He had given me a part of him and he walked away from us. He walked away as if we didn't matter at all. And it was all my fault that I just ruined the greatest guy in the planet. He had gone out of his way to find the one horse that still was on my mind knowing that I needed that horse, too. He did that to make my dreams come true and now, I lost him completely.
How could anything get any worse?