Hi guys,

Thank you to all for your patience and understanding for my extremely long break.

Thanks to my beta Someryn for being awesome as usual and picking through my many many mistakes.

Disclaimer: I do not own the Vampire Diaries.

Breaking the Boundaries Chapter 12

As I slowly regained consciousness the next morning, I thought that either the fight of last night was in fact a nightmare, or Ric had forgiven me and climbed back into bed during the course of the night. Either way, I was just happy that he was here, we weren't fighting and I could feel the weight of his body on the mattress next to me.

I stretched and snuggled into his chest, relishing the feeling of home and comfort before I had to open my eyes to the harsh light of day.

He felt strange however, his muscles more defined and compact and much less comfortable. The words he spoke were soft, as though coming from a great distance. "Rise and shine, sleepy head."

The voice was mocking and definitely not Ric's. Damon!

I sat up faster than I knew possible and threw myself away from him, towards the other side of the bed. My side of the bed.

"Aah! What are you doing?! Get out!" I yelled at him, breathless from fright.

"You know you were dreaming about me. Explains the drool," he taunted. Cocky bastard. He was hot and he knew it. It almost made him unattractive, so I should be grateful for his overinflated ego, I supposed.

" Ugh. Oh my God," I stuttered. There were no words for how disgusted I was at him. Hadn't he heard of a little thing called privacy? I was grateful that Ric hadn't stayed with me last night or we would have been caught red-handed.

Oh my God, Ric! I needed to get Damon out of my bed before Ric realised that he was here - for both his sake and mine. Imagine being caught in bed with the man who had been the cause of our fight in the first place.

I looked over at my alarm, partly for a reason to look at anything but Damon, partly as an excuse to kick him out.

"6:00 A.M., seriously? Do you really have nothing better to do at 6:00 A.M.?" I protested. I congratulated myself on timing and delivery. I think I managed to infuse indignation and frustration into my voice, keeping the fear and panic back. No need to blow our cover.

Damon looked simultaneously smug and childish and said, "Fine, don't come with me to bring Stefan home. See ya."

He made to get up and leave but being the idiot that I was, I couldn't stop myself from rising to his bait.

"Wait. Wait, wait, wait. What? What are you talking about? Where is he?" I demanded, less worried about being caught now and more determined to end this with Stefan forever and return him to normal.

"Let's go to Chicago!" Damon sang as he rushed me out of bed.

After ditching Damon, I packed my bags as fast as I could. This was my second chance to see Stefan! Hopefully I could convince him to come home and get back on his bunny wagon. Worst case scenario, I could at least break up with him so that I was no longer technically cheating on him.

The road trip to Chicago was not exactly fun. Although Damon's wit was usually enough to defuse a bad situation, this time he was definitely not helping. His constant insistence that I read Stefan's diary was rude and annoying. Even if I were still dating Stefan, technicalities notwithstanding, I wouldn't feel comfortable doing this. There was no way that I was going to read Stefan's private thoughts and experiences now, especially considering the likely contents. I didn't need to get any worse visuals in my head than those I had already.

I lied to Damon, I knew I hadn't seen Stefan at his worst but I just couldn't bring myself to picture him like that. There was still redemption for him in my eyes, and I didn't want to destroy the last of my good memories of him by replacing them with these.

Arriving at Stefan's apartment, I couldn't have been more shocked.

"Stefan could live anywhere in Chicago, and he chose this?" I asked Damon.

Seriously? What happened to moody and broody Stefan, with his old world boarding house, priceless relics, dusty old books and the kind of class that comes with being born into money? This apartment was just...tacky. A sixties and un-renovated kind of tacky. No way I could imagine Stefan living here.

Damon shot back some witty comment about an all girls high school. Amateur.

"If you're trying to scare me into giving up and going back it's not going to work," I told Damon.

In truth I couldn't be more scared if I tried. Klaus was just about the worst creature that I had ever encountered and Stefan was shaping up to soon be just as bad. Let Damon think what he wanted about my motivations behind this.

Walking around his apartment, I couldn't imagine the Stefan that I knew living here. I was already beginning to rethink my faith in Stefan when Damon showed me the wall.

"Are these all his victims?" I let out on a gasp, but I was surprised this didn't make me feel worse. The list of names scribbled crudely on a wall was shocking to be sure, but there was a sense of finality that there were no more victims than this finite number, except for the recent ones, of course.

The fact that I was just relieved that it wasn't worse was a pretty good indication of my current feelings towards Stefan.

"Still handling it?" Damon remarked, obviously trying to shake me. I knew his purpose, or had at least limited the reasons down to a list of two. Either he was trying to scare me off Stefan to present himself as the safer and more humane choice, or he was trying to help my relationship with Stefan by helping me to brace myself for what I might see here in Chicago. His technique was working, but not in the way that he had intended it to. I would not be turning to Damon out of fear for his brother, nor would I attempt to tame the beast created by Klaus and bring him home into my arms.

My reasons for helping Stefan were simple. I loved him and I didn't want him to get hurt. Not by Klaus and not by his own actions. But I didn't want him back for myself.

I couldn't believe that Damon would leave me in an old smelly apartment to hatch a plan. Especially one that his brother owned and had access to!

Which brought me to my current predicament - hiding in Stefan's forbidden cupboard, holding my breath and sure that my frantic heartbeat would give me away any second.

For the first time, I was truly scared of Stefan. What would he do if he saw me? Would he kill me in front of Klaus? Omigod, what would Klaus do to me? When this had all been hypothetical I hadn't realised just how terrifying hiding could be.

I could hear their voices getting nearer and nearer, and somehow I just knew that they would look in the cupboard. How they hadn't heard me so far was a miracle in itself.

I took a deep breath when the wall opened next to me. Surely this was close to the last breath I would ever take.

When it was Stefan I came eye to eye with instead of Klaus, I knew I had been saved. His expression said everything. His eyes showed surprise, then understanding, and I relaxed a little. But then he took in a deep breath and froze, cocking his head to the side a little as though listening intently for something.

Any trace of softness left his eyes and he stared pointedly at me, mouth open with shock and betrayal. His eyes narrowed and his jaw clenched.

I had no idea what was going on. Why did he look so mad? Hurt and betrayal flashed across his face for a second more before he smoothed his face into an expressionless mask. "Look what I found," he said to Klaus.

I think my heart stopped in that moment, my disbelief and feeling of betrayal warring with each other. I couldn't believe that Stefan was so far gone that he would give me up to Klaus like this. I thought his reaction had meant that he still cared and was trying to protect me.

Stefan pulled out a bottle of whiskey from the shelf next to me, passing it over to Klaus with satisfaction.

I sagged against the wall with relief, not sure how much more tension my body could take. I felt like I wanted to be sick, but held it in to avoid being caught.

I waited five minutes after they had left to be sure that they wouldn't hear me before dashing to the bathroom to empty my stomach of all contents.

By the time Damon returned my nerves were so strung out that I wasn't sure whether to be relieved or angry.

I settled on angry when I learned that he had been out buying me clothes for some hare-brained scheme of his while I was being practically discovered by Klaus.

"I had an hour to realise what a bad idea it was to leave you here alone, process it and move on," he growled between clenched teeth. I knew that he really did mean it and was probably more angry at himself than even I was.

I couldn't hear exactly what Damon and Stefan were arguing about after Stefan attacked him outside the club, but I knew when they both turned to me that it was my turn to do the convincing. Damon disappeared and I was left all alone to talk to Stefan.

Again, he had that stone-cold look in his eyes, and he looked at me with disgust and contempt. I think I even saw his lip curl a little.

He strolled towards me in a predatory way. "You shouldn't be here," he said casually. Almost too casually.

"Where else would I be?" I asked in confusion. Surely he knew that I would come looking for him?

"What do you want?" he asked coldly." Damon won't be able to distract Klaus for long."

"Come home," I whispered, edging closer as I tried for the best angle to stab him with the vervain dart.

Unfortunately, I wasn't fast enough. He grabbed my wrist, almost breaking it with his strength. "How much clearer can I make it?" he growled menacingly. "I don't want to come home." He turned away from me, running his hands through his hair in frustration while I stood there in stunned silence.

His rant continued. "What do I have to come home to, huh? You have more than obviously moved on." He sounded so broken, so desolate.

But how had he known? I couldn't say a thing, I was too shocked. He continued anyway. "At least I know it wasn't Damon. There's one humiliation you've spared me." He was pacing in front of me, working himself into a rage.

"How could you do this to me, Elena?" he suddenly bellowed, looking like a madman.

"At least you'll have the children you always dreamed of - even if you are a knocked-up high school whore," he spat.

This was the point where I lost him completely. OK, so I had technically cheated on him, and he could be pissed if he wanted to. But that last comment really threw me. "What are you talking about Stefan?" I asked him in a would-be calm voice, as though speaking to a particularly confused child.

He started laughing manically. He really had lost it. "You really don't know?" he asked incredulously.

"Know what, Stefan? Yes, I haven't been faithful to you. I know that we can't be together anymore. But that doesn't mean that I don't love you and I don't want you to come home," I told him in a voice that I thought was calm and polite, with a touch of humility. After all, I was admitting to infidelity.

The mad grin was still on his face. "'Know what?' Oh, this is classic."

He turned around still chuckling darkly. "Elena, I knew you had cheated on me the second I saw you today. I could hear the heartbeat, faintly but still present. You're pregnant."

I gasped and looked down at my stomach. No way.

"Yes way. I can't believe you cheated on me with a human," he spat venomously. I must have said that out loud.

I was speechless. Pregnant. What the hell was I going to tell Ric?

I was so lost in my thoughts that I didn't realise that Stefan was still talking, well yelling, really. When I looked up at him with confusion and tears in my eyes he seemed to deflate a bit. Lost in my own misery and guilt I hadn't noticed the tears in his eyes, too.

"I just want you to go," he let out on a breathy whisper, as though his voice might break if he raised it any louder.

I had never felt worse in my life. I had hurt him - I had really, really hurt him. I knew that he had wanted this for me, though. A life with children and growing old together. The comment about humans wasn't lost on me, and although it hurt, I knew he was just lashing out.

"So," said a cold voice from behind me after Stefan had left. "While we've been out looking for your boyfriend all over the country, you've been getting yourself knocked up, is that right?" Damon said scathingly, looking betrayed himself. "Who exactly do you deem worthy enough to cheat on Stefan with, huh?"

You would think that I had cheated on him from the look of revulsion he was shooting me.

"I-" I began.

"Save it, Elena. We're going home."

AN: Thanks for reading. If you really want to read more, a review is the best kind of motivation a writer can be offered ;)