London was like a breath of fresh air for Elena. While she hadn't forgotten about Damon or everything they went through together, and of course she thought about it everyday, it was easier for her knowing he was 4,000 miles away and she wasn't going to run into him at the office, or the local supermarket or park.

Everything was a little bit easier. She didn't dread waking up and going to work, she found enjoyment in the things that she'd become hollow to and she was excited to be a mom. It was hard, very hard, but she had chosen to put her baby first and move on as best as she could because that's what her child deserved.

She'd lived with Jenna for three months and they'd become close. Jenna had even come to a doctor's appointment for moral support once or twice. She still didn't know the whole story behind Elena's 'mysterious' pregnancy, but she'd guessed that the man involved had ties to other women.

"I'm not going speed dating with you," Elena laughed as they walked back to the offices. "I'm pregnant, remember? Nobody wants to date a pregnant lady."

"That's a common fetish, y'know," Jenna said seriously. "Some men are really into it. Apparently the sex is better."

"Where do you find all this bizarre information?"

"I read a lot," she said. "I'll lend you my books. It might help you with your job."

"I don't think that's the sort of thing they're looking for, but I'll keep it in mind should the submissions run dry."

They'd gone out for lunch at their favourite cafe, run by some siblings who they'd become good friends with.

"Talking about your job," Jenna pressed. "You're telling Kol about baby Gilbert soon, aren't you?"

"Yep," Elena smiled. "He gets back from his honeymoon in three weeks time. I've got a meeting booked with him on his first day back. Lucky him."

"How far along will you be?"

"About five months."

"I don't think you're going to have to say much," Jenna grinned. "You can pass off as bloated right now but in three weeks time…."

"Is it already obvious?"

"No," Jenna laughed. "It just looks like you've eaten a bit too much pasta at lunch."

"Fuck," Elena rolled her eyes. "I'm wearing the baggiest stuff I own!"

Although it was starting to become a giveaway, and it did appear more as bloating, her swollen belly had become the thing she cherished most. She spoke to it, held it and read to it everyday. She even let the bump listen to her favourite music through her headphones.

And even though Damon knew not a thing about their growing bump, it kept her close to him, knowing a piece of him was always there with her.

"Doesn't your uncle get here tomorrow?" Jenna asked.

"He does."

"And?" She drawled.

"And I told my parents two days ago, so I'm sure they've already filled him in," Elena sighed.

Telling Miranda and Grayson wasn't easy but, to no surprise, they were as supportive as they could be. Grayson didn't believe for one second that she didn't know who the father was and so she told him the truth later in the evening, after Miranda had gone to bed.

He wasn't surprised, he told her. He'd felt like something had been going on between her and Damon for a long time.

'A boss doesn't look at his employee like that,' Grayson had said. 'A man in love, however, does.'

While they were a little concerned about Elena being a single mother, they were more hurt that she felt she couldn't tell them and that they were missing everything because she chose to move away from every one of them.

"I need the toilet, I'll catch you up," she told her friend as they parted ways in the office lobby.

It wasn't even a second after she closed the stall door that the bathroom door slammed shut and a breathless woman, sobbing, rushed in.

"Stefan, please," she heard someone plead through painful tears. "You can't keep doing this to me. I can't do this anymore."

Normally, she would have quickly excused herself and not nosey in on a private conversation but when she recognised Andie's voice pleading with Stefan, begging him to stop, she decided to stand on the toilet seat and listen in.

"Please," she cried. "I've done enough for you. I can't do this anymore, he'll find out. Damon already knows something fishy is going on, he'll-"

She stopped.

"Stefan!" She shouted. "Stefan!"

Elena jumped when she heard the phone smash against the bathroom floor and Andie's shadow shrunk into a corner as she continued to weep.

She carefully opened the bathroom stall door and peeked her head around to see Andie, Damon's head of finance, curled up in the corner with her head buried in her hands.

"Andie? Is everything okay?" Elena asked.

Andie's head snapped up. Her eyes were a deep red, bloodshot and clearly sore. It was clear that this wasn't just an argument, this was much much more.

"How much did you hear?" Andie asked.

"Enough to need to know more," Elena shrugged. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"No," she shook her head. "I can't. I can't get out of this. What have I done, Elena?"

Looking around, Elena decided that there was no way she was going to let Andie leave without telling her what Damon needed to be aware of and why she was begging for Stefan to stop. She turned the lock on the bathroom door and pushed the chair up against the handle, just in case the lock failed.

"Talk to me," Elena said. "I know Stefan better than you think, Andie. Talk to me."

"He'll know."

"I won't say anything, I promise. But it sounds like you could do with a friend right now. Maybe I can help."

Andie wiped her eyes on the tissue that Elena handed her and ran her hands through her messed up pixie cut.

"You can't help. I'm too far in," Andie said. "And he's relentless. He won't stop. He won't leave me and my family alone."

"Stefan?" Elena frowned. "Does this have something to do with the business losing money?"

Andie nodded.

"So when Damon asked you if you knew anything, you lied?"

She nodded again.

"We were in so much debt, Elena. We were going to lose our home," Andie explained. "We'd already sold the car, my engagement and wedding ring, some old family heirlooms. The house was next, Elena, and I have a young daughter. I couldn't lose my house."

"So you stole from the business?"

"No! No I wouldn't do that to Damon. But my husband sells insurance. To help us pay a couple of months' mortgage, he pocketed a couple of cheques that he shouldn't have from his work. He was going to cash them in at work once we got back on our feet but we needed the money," Andie said. "So my husband embezzled money from his company to help us get back on our feet."

"What does Stefan have to do with that?"

"He and Trevor used to be good friends. Trevor confided in him one night. For a while, Stefan was caring and thoughtful but that all changed and Stefan realised he could use it for his own gain."

"He's been blackmailing you?"

"Yep," Andie nodded her head in defeat. "He wants what Damon has. He wants the business. So in exchange for not telling Trevor's work about what he did, I have been diverting the fund from the business into a separate account for Stefan."

"And he's planning on using that money to buy chunks of Damon's business when he is forced to sell," Elena realised. "And nobody has picked up on it because you can make it look like it's just normal expenditure."

"I know it's such a horrible thing to do to Damon, but Trevor can't lose his job, Elena. If he loses his job, we won't survive."

"Why didn't you go straight to Damon? He cares about you. He'd have helped you."

"Stefan has his eyes and ears on me at all times, Elena! How am I supposed to tell Damon?! And it wasn't my first thought if I'm honest."

"But you have to tell him now. You can't expect me to keep this from him."

"I can't tell him! And you can't either!" Andie snapped. "Stefan will destroy us. Damon will fire me."

"I can't keep this a secret, Andie. You're breaking the law. You're destroying a friend's life!"

Andie's hand was quickly around Elena's neck as she forced her up against the wall. Her eyes were wide with fear, not anger, and Elena could tell her violent reaction was solely panic.

"To spare my own," she hissed.

She gently rested her hand on top of Andie's and released her neck from her grip. Keeping a soft hold on Andie's hand.

"I'm sorry," Andie cried. "I'm scared. I'm so scared. What do I do, Elena?"

"Nothing," Elena whispered. "Just leave it with me for now, okay? Just give me some time to think."

Elena paced her bedroom floor with her phone pressed against her ear. She'd tried to call him a total of ten times before hanging up before it could even ring out.

She'd spent the day debating how she could help Andie and Damon without getting anybody in trouble or putting anyone at risk. But every outcome pointed her to being honest with Damon.

So, after ten failed attempts, she held her phone up to her ear and braced herself for a conversation nobody wanted to have.

"Hello?" He answered.

She stayed quiet because everytime she opened her mouth, nothing came out. With all these things she needed to tell him, it seemed impossible to string a sentence together. And while she knew she had to do it and let him know what his own brother was doing to him, she wasn't ready to hear his voice again.

She was still so madly in love with him but the distance and the radio silence had helped immensely. Hearing him say her name again would just push her twenty steps backwards.

"Hello? Anyone there?" He asked.

"Hi," she managed. "Damon. It's me."

"'Lena?" He breathed. "Isn't it midnight in London?"

"Sorry, but I saw on the system you were still at work and I… I need… I need to talk to you," she said.

"Is everything okay?"

"Not really, Damon. You're not going to like what I'm going to say."

"You're scaring me, 'Lena," he laughed uncomfortably. "What's going on?"

"The money the company has been losing, I know what's been happening," she said. "I know why you're losing money."

He was silent. Of course he was, she thought. The last thing he'd had expected her to call him about would be his company finances but it was obvious to her that Andie wouldn't say anything. The poor girl was terrified. If Elena didn't say it then Damon's business would crumble and he didn't deserve that.

"Elena, I appreciate it but the company is just—"

"Stefan is embezzling money out of your company, Damon," she stopped him. "Andie told me everything today. I'm so sorry but she was telling the truth."

"What?" He all but whispered. "How? I don't get— what are you on about?"

And so she told him everything that Andie told her. How her husband had pocketed some sales cheques to help pay their mortgage, how Stefan found out and blackmailed them to divert funds to his account and how Andie was terrified of the youngest Salvatore.

"You're not the only one being blackmailed it seems. Apparently Stefan has all he needs to get Trevor put away. So Andie has been diverting payments to Stefan for nearly a year."

"Fuck," he sighed. "My own fucking brother. Why didn't Andie come to me?! We've been friends for years, I could have helped her."

"She's terrified, Damon. It sounds like she's drowning in debt and they couldn't risk Trevor losing his job," she said. "She did what she thought was best at the time."

"And helped my brother embezzle money," he scoffed. "Fuck."

"What are you gonna do?" She asked.

"I don't know. I need to talk to Andie first, find out what Stefan really has on them and show me how she has been diverting money. I don't imagine Stefan is the only one involved, he doesn't have the brain capacity," he almost snarled.

"Do you think you're going to come here?"

"I probably should," he sighed. "But I, uhm, I can't."

"Damon, this is business," she said. "We can be professional and civil if we bump into one another."

"No, it's not that," he paused. "I, uhm, I get married in 2 days time, Elena."

The line went almost dead. She knew he hadn't got married because nobody had mentioned it at work and Kol would have definitely been invited, and so she'd forgotten that making Katherine a Salvatore was in the pipeline for him. She closed her eyes and gripped the comforter beneath her.

"Congratulations," she said as positively as she could. "How's the planning gone?"

"I don't know. I've not really got involved, I've been working a lot," he said. "I just know I need to show up at 1pm."

It went quiet again. She looked down at her little bump, poking through her PJ top and rested her hand across it. She wanted to tell him so badly, and hear his reaction. She knew he'd find out sooner or later, the system would show that she'd be going on maternity leave at some point. Would he assume it was his? Would he think she had a one night stand?

"Everything is falling apart," he whispered. "Why did you leave, 'Lena? You weren't just the love of my life, you were my best friend too. I need you."

"Damon," she almost cried. "I couldn't stay. You know that."

"I miss you."

"Damon-"

"I miss hearing your wacky work ideas," he laughed. "I miss watching you trip over the steps in your office every single time and I miss seeing you tuck your hair behind your ear whenever you're feeling shy."

She giggled and fell back on her bed, slowly releasing the comforter in her hands and relaxing to the sound of his voice.

"I miss your laugh."

"I miss your terrible jokes," she said.

"My jokes are not terrible. I'm hilarious."

"You think you're hilarious," she smiled. "There's a difference."

"Do you regret us?" He asked. "Do you wish you'd never met me?"

"No," she answered quickly. "Never. Do you have any regrets?"

"Yeah, I have many but you aren't one of them. In fact, you're the best bad decision that I've ever made and god knows I've made a few."

She smiled up at the ceiling and softly ran her nails across her chest, picturing him sitting at his desk, his sleeves rolled up and his top few buttons undone, revealing a glimmer of his chest that she once loved to fall asleep on.

"It's late for you, 'Lena," he said.

"I know, I've been having a hard time adjusting to sleeping so far away."

"You always fell asleep so quickly," he remembered. "What's changed?"

She looked down at her growing bump and the main cause of her insomnia. The doctor said it was relatively normal to suffer from sleepless nights in her stage of pregnancy, but she wasn't going to tell him that.

"You wore me out," she joked.

"It's not my fault you couldn't keep your paws off me."

They were quiet for a while as they listened to each other breathe. Her eyes began to feel heavy and a warm sensation slowly sailed through her veins. The drizzle of the rain fell against the window as the memories of falling asleep next to Damon, soothed by his deep breaths, lied with her.

"I'm sorry about Stefan," she said through a tired yawn. "How are you feeling about it?"

"It's just a business, 'Lena," he went quiet. "Losing that doesn't quite compare to what I've lost with you."

It'd been a long night at the office. Another one. With the wedding just a couple of sleeps away, Damon had been finding every excuse to avoid going home. He was broken, everything had fallen apart and there wasn't much that made him smile.

He thought his baby would be the one thing that held him together, that the excitement of becoming a father for the first time would be enough. It wasn't. And he felt awful for it. Looking at Katherine's small bump, feeling it or even talking about it did nothing for him. There was no spark, no joy, and it pained him to say so, no love there.

It was as if all his emotions had been turned off. He didn't even care about his brother embezzling money - what did it matter? If he didn't have any money left, maybe Katherine would let him go. She wouldn't want him if he had nothing to offer her.

By the time he got home, Katherine had already fallen asleep.

After talking to Elena and hearing her voice, he couldn't bear to crawl into bed next to his future wife. Instead, he chose to go over the invoices and see if he could find out where Andie was diverting his money to.

Pressing every button, his laptop refused to turn on. He plugged it to the power, he tried rebooting and doing all the things his IT guys told him worked, but nothing. He knew it had been on the blink for a while, but he'd not got round to buying a new one.

Fuck," he groaned.

Katherine's bright pink Macbook sat on the kitchen table. He could use that, log into the cloud and print the things he needed.

He reached for the laptop and as he pulled the screen up, a website opened automatically - .

Pictures of women holding their bellies were everywhere. The word 'fake' on every page, blogs about women needing help to connect with babies during adoption or surrogacy. Bumps available for medical training, he read.

Made to order.

Worldwide delivery.

His heart raced in his chest as he clicked the shopping basket in the corner of the screen.

"Foam fake pregnancy belly," he read out loud. "Five to six months."

It hit him like a freight train.

It was all a lie.

Katherine wasn't pregnant.