Ropes by MaddyM

Ropes by MaddyM 3/22/09 10:16 AM
Ropes by MaddyM
Summary: Cragen finally smiled. “Ropes course, up at a camp in Oneonta.

Maybe dangling thirty feet off the ground, you two will figure out whatever the
hell it is that’s ruining your partnership. Completing the course is an order.”
Categories: Law & Order: Special Victims Unit Characters: Elliot Stabler,
Olivia Benson
Genres: Angst, Comedy, Romance
Challenges:
Series: None
Chapters: 18 Completed: Yes Word count: 165331 Read: 32369 Published:
May 08, 2007 Updated: Apr 09, 2008
1. Chapter 1 by MaddyM
http://www.svufiction.com/viewstory.php?action=printable&textsize=0&sid=5383&chapter=all Page 1 of 305


Chapter 1 by MaddyM
A/N: I have ADD and the flu, so here we go. Construction's almost done, I swear. Will be up this week. I
was in the mood for a little romantic comedy, and while this doesn't seem comedic yet..well, it'll lighten up,
I promise. Have a few chapters done already. **Spoilers for Florida and Annihilated.** I'm taking the
episodes to be canon in the order they aired, not the order they were filmed. I'm also taking this AU, there
shall be no bebe. Thank you Jess, April, Brynn and Cat. You all rule.
They're not mine, or there would be no bambino for the Missus. Ever.
Enjoy!
_______________________________________________
The ache settled into the lower part of her back, and she knew this pain.
Lately, it was familiar to her. It would start early in the evening, and by the time she climbed into bed, it
would have crept up her spine and into her shoulders and neck. It would twist around her body, and when
she tossed sometime in the deepest part of the night, it would wake her, having finally settled in her throat
and making it impossible to breathe.
It would just be another night that she would need a Tylenol PM to help her sleep.
Olivia told herself it was from hurling herself into the bags of trash when Millfield tried to run her over. She
told herself she’d see a doctor soon. But she avoided it, day after day, afraid of the diagnosis.
That there would be nothing physically wrong with her.
She dropped her pen and rubbed her eyes, wondering if when she opened them, Elliot would be back. She
wondered if he would grab a sandwich from the vending machine and sit across from her, diligently
wondered if he would grab a sandwich from the vending machine and sit across from her, diligently
finishing the paperwork of their open-and-shut from the morning.
She didn’t think so.
He had gone to talk to Cragen for a few minutes. Then he’d go and work out upstairs. He’d take a shower,
head home.
Pack up his apartment because he was moving back to Queens.
She wondered if it was too early to take the Tylenol; if it would kick in before she could get all the way
home, and if it would make her legs any heavier as she trudged up the three flights of stairs to her
apartment.
“Liv?”
She pulled her palms away from her head and looked up in the dim light, meeting Munch’s inquisitive
expression. “Yeah?”
“We’re gonna go grab a beer. You want to join us?”
She thought of a hundred reasons why she shouldn’t. She was tired these days, so tired that she kept pushing
off Huang’s calls to come and see him. Nothing official, he had said. Just a talk or two off the record. She
was frankly surprised that she hadn’t been forced as yet to be officially shrinked. She was even more
shocked there hadn’t been a slew of reprimands, maybe even a suspension, or God forbid a lawsuit based
upon her meltdown three weeks ago.
Sometimes, when she was alone, she still felt Thatcher’s ribs connecting with her shoe. She still felt like she
might scream, like she might lose it. Sometimes, she still dreamed about it, those few days that had taken
her whole world and tossed it about as if she was simply a piece of glitter in a shaken snow globe.
But everyone around her had allowed her to go on, almost eerily so. Thatcher hadn’t sued, Cragen had let
her slip back into the squad room a week after she had taken leave, and Munch and Fin hadn’t said a word,
despite the careful glances they sent her way. Even Porter had mercifully stopped calling when she wouldn’t
return his calls.
His calls weren’t about anything official. Neither were Simon’s. Which was good because she wasn’t ready
for either of them yet.
The only one that hadn’t let her hide the effects of what had happened was Elliot. Of course, he hadn’t let
his anger affect their cases, not anything that involved work. She had even thought they were okay those
first few days after she came back. She had breathed a sigh of relief during the Royce case because they had
felt like a team again. But then he had snapped, and the morning after he had broken Royce into confessing
he had walked in, wearing his obvious irritation with her on his sleeve.
Since then, she could count on one hand the number of times he had looked at her. She couldn’t count the
number of times he had looked her straight in the in the eyes though, because it hadn’t happened. He had
walked away from her outside of the house in Florida, and she had known in that moment that there was a
part of him that had been just yanked back from her. A part of him he was done giving to her.
After the Royce case, she knew she had been right.
“Just you two?” Olivia asked, hoping her question wasn’t obvious.

It was.
“Elliot’s joining us,” Munch said quietly.
Olivia nodded. Maybe it would help if they just had a drink together. “Yeah, I’ll-"
“I’m shot, Munch. I’m heading home in a bit,” Elliot interrupted as he came back to his desk and overheard.
Olivia flinched and looked up, wondering if this would be the moment that he would finally look at her.
Would there be a hint of emotion from him, one way or another? She’d take his anger if that’s all he had;
she’d take anything at this point.
She had expected some level of anger. She had shut him out, and she knew there would be consequences.
But he was shuffling things on his desk, cleaning up for the night. And she knew just by the coiled tension
in his shoulders that he hadn’t expected her to say yes to Munch’s offer. He hadn’t expected her to go, and
when she had agreed he had changed his mind. “Elliot, I don’t need to go. You go, I’m sure you could use
one last night out-”
Before you move home, she almost said. Before you go back to your wife. The one who offers you a home
and stability, when I’m just a goddamned mess lately.
Elliot finally looked at her. Two weeks later, and this would be the first assessing look she received. It was
one she wished she hadn’t seen. “You think when I move home that Kathy’s gonna tell me I can’t go grab a
beer?” he sneered at her.
Munch discreetly left their desks and Olivia wanted to call him to come back. Almost as if it were a
defense, just to have someone else standing next to her when Elliot unleashed. “That’s not what I meant, El.
You know I don’t think-”
Elliot cut her off. “Save it,” he said dismissively, grabbing his coat off of his chair. “Night,” he muttered,
and then he was gone, his footsteps echoing on the stairs as he went up to the gym.
Olivia sat there, willing her hands not to shake. She thought that maybe she had come back too soon,
because she still felt like she was floating outside of herself sometimes. Like she was being carried along by
an undertow and she couldn’t sink her toes into the sand to stop the movement.
“You okay, Liv?” Munch asked.
She turned and looked at him, at the way his face had softened just for a minute as he asked. She knew
Munch wouldn’t pry, that there wasn’t any one answer he was expecting. Maybe it was the kindness that
ultimately did her in. “Yeah,” she answered, thinking that’s just one more lie she’d throw out there.
Her feet were moving before she realized it. She was at the top of the stairs before she finally stopped,
wondering what in the hell she was doing.
She froze outside of the crib, and beyond the door she could hear movement. Sounds she’d know anywhere
because they were Elliot’s. His footsteps, his frustrated opening of his locker. She pushed through the door
and stood there in the frame of it, watching him as he slipped a t-shirt over his head.
“Olivia, I’m not in the mood for this right now,” he said, sensing her presence.
He was back to the not looking at her thing.

She took a deep breath, resting her temple on the molding to her left. “I didn’t mean to imply downstairs
that Kathy wouldn’t-”
He whirled to face her. “Jesus, you don’t listen do you? Do you always just do what you want? I just told
you that I’m not interested in having this discussion.”
Olivia felt his words hit her, each and every one of them. Next to her, her fingers dug into plaster, the wall
not giving in to her attempt to breach it. She knew about impenetrable things. She stood there, frozen, just
watching him as he went back to pulling things out of his locker. Sneakers, socks. Tape for his fists.
He was going to go and use the punching bag. Vaguely, she wondered why he’d need it, when she was right
here and practically offering herself up. “You ever going to forgive me?” she finally asked, knowing she
didn’t have much time before he walked away, which meant there wasn’t any time to beat around the bush.
He paused mid-movement, finally grabbing the edges of his locker. She could see the white tips of his
knuckles even from where she stood. “You lied, Olivia. You lied to my face. You lied by omission and you
lied by keeping secrets. I risked my job for you, and you paid me back by never telling me about the fact
that you were helping Marsden.”
“Elliot, he's my-”she started.
“I swear to God, if you say he’s your goddamned brother one more time-" Elliot bit off a curse, shaking his
head angrily.
“No.”
He looked up at her, his eyebrows drawing together in obvious disbelief. “No?”
The flat part of her feet ached in her boots where they were pressed against the floor. Her elbows hurt, her
eyes burned. “I was going to say he was my problem, Elliot.”
Satisfied he had out what he needed for the gym, he slammed the locker shut. He turned his whole body
towards her. “That’s where you’re wrong Olivia. When you started lying to me about him, you made him a
problem for the both of us.”
She hadn’t really cried once, not through all of it. She’d thought about it, even sat down on her couch at
home a few times and waited for the tears to come. Olivia had stared at the pictures, the newspaper articles,
the mementos her father had saved of a child he had created by force, and she had given herself permission.
Nothing had happened beyond the numbness settling in. She thought it was ironic that despite the fact that
she had so carefully planned her cry, it was going to defy her and happen now, in the moment she least
wanted it to.
“I’m sorry,” she stammered. She didn’t know what else to say.
Olivia stared at the tiles that surrounded the rounded toe of her shoes. The tiny little ceramic squares that
made an endless mosaic throughout the room. They were in multiple shades of blue, and she thought that
she had seen Elliot’s eyes match almost all of them at one point or another. But there were no murky tiles in
the bunch. None that would match his eyes now.
He gathered up his things from the bench and then straightened, looking past her as if she wasn’t even there.
“We can’t keep doing this, Olivia,” he said roughly, resignedly.
She knew that voice, and it was the one that terrified her. It was the one he had used outside of Rebecca

Clifford’s hospital room over a year ago. The one that said he was done with her, he had had enough. She
thought that it was appropriate that her inability to properly deal with her father’s legacy would cost her one
more thing. Maybe the most important thing of all.
“You want a new partner, El?” she asked, the fear permeating the air around her.
She hoped she had been loud enough for him to hear her.
He had, and his resulting laughter was bitter. “That’s rich. When the going gets rough that’s always your
first choice, isn’t it? You can’t stick it out.” Elliot was moving towards her now, and she knew he’d need to
walk past her to get to the gym. She braced herself as he stopped directly in front of her, and it was her turn
to look over his shoulder instead of in his eyes. “I’m going to go work out. If you’re going to run
downstairs and tell Cragen that you want a new partner, at least finish the Dresden file before you walk out
the door this time.”
With that, he was gone, the door banging shut behind him.
She sank down along the wall right there, just inside the locker room. Olivia drew her shaking knees up and
dropped her forehead to them, her lungs suffering beneath the inferno.
Finally, two weeks later, she found her cry.
+++
His fists connected with the vinyl time and time again.
The bag would snap back into place every time, and it pissed him off, causing him to pummel the fake
leather even harder. He threw his whole body into the movement, desperate to feel the contact ricochet all
the way up into his shoulders.
Stay.
He closed his eyes as he attacked the bag, keeping a feel for its presence simply by listening for it, feeling
the air shift around him as it whooshed back at him. Kathy’s voice echoed in his head. He hadn’t stayed
after, and that scared the crap out of him. It terrified him that he had instinctively reached for his jeans, had
slipped his arms into his shirt, his mind already elsewhere although he had just gotten finished making love
to a woman that was not as yet his ex-wife but didn’t feel like his wife yet either.
His heart accelerated as he rammed his closed hands into the pendulum in front of him, opening his eyes as
soon as unwanted images assaulted him. He needed to deal with the aftermath at home instead of thinking
about Royce, about what happened when people lied. About what happened when lies caused people to be
hurt.
About what happened when lies caused people to die.
Olivia had lied. She had lied. She had lied.
He smacked his fist into the bag with as much force as he could muster, speeding up his movements.
She had thought Marsden was guilty at the time, and she helped him anyway.
His right hand was sore, but it didn’t matter. The bag bounced towards him again and he connected with it,
sending it rattling on the chain once again. And again.

She had trusted Porter with the truth.
His left fist drove into the bag, the movement uneven, the bag rocking unsteadily.
She hadn’t asked for his help.
He grabbed the bag as it hurtled towards him, steadying it, stopping it. When it finally ceased its movement,
he braced his forehead against it.
She could have gotten herself killed.
The fear for her smacked back at him and Elliot straightened. Breathed deeply. His anger at her
carelessness, her recklessness was getting the best of him, jeopardizing everything. He had snapped at Kathy
yesterday when she had pressed him to move home this weekend instead of next like he had planned. Kathy
was looking at him expectantly these days, rightfully so after what he had done, and it made his skin chafe.
He had practically yelled at Cragen when his Captain had refused his request to give them all a little space
by letting him catch with Fin on the next one instead of Olivia. And he had nearly outright pushed Olivia to
leave again.
The poster boy for rage.
Elliot sent his fists punching into the bag again, his punishing rhythm picking up speed, regardless of his
body’s protests.
Well, at least Olivia was right about that.
+++
“So we think he’s getting their addresses off the dry cleaning slips,” Cragen said, standing in front of the
illuminated map laid out of the East Village and the Lower East Side. “Munch, Fin, you two canvas the
cleaners between Houston and the Williamsburg Bridge. See if anyone has seen him lately. Benson, Stabler-
"
Her gut said the guy was moving. The noose was tightening around him and that meant he was going to
stick to what was familiar. “We should take it as far west as Broadway,” she interrupted.
“Based on what?” Elliot shot back in challenge.
She swallowed, chancing a glance at him. Since the locker room conversation two days ago, things had
changed. Whereas then she had thought she had wanted him to look at her, she now knew she was wrong.
For the last two days that was all he had done. Glared at her. Watched her. Everything a simmering
accusation in his eyes.
She was blistering under his gaze, and it was now she who couldn’t stand the scrutiny.
Olivia looked away, focusing instead on their captain. “His mother owns a restaurant in Little Italy. While
he’s not stupid enough to show up there, it’s where he is familiar with things. I think we should widen the
search.”
Elliot grunted as he folded his arms over his chest. “Great, you just added at least another twelve hours of a
wild goose chase to everyone’s schedule because of an unsubstantiated hunch.”
“That’s enough,” Cragen gritted.

Olivia looked at the floor. She knew the flooring patterns in every room of the squad now. “I’ll take the
expanded perimeter myself. I’ve got no problem with that,” she said. She knew it would mean at least two
days of additional work for herself if they didn’t find their suspect sooner. She knew it would mean she
wouldn’t sleep.
It didn’t matter. She wasn’t going home to anyone, and she wasn’t going to close her eyes anyway.
“Of course you don’t have a problem with that, because that’s how you like to operate,” Elliot continued,
unheeding their Captain’s irritated warning. “Why don’t you canvas all of it by yourself? Because if you
come across Parker, we all know you could kick his ass and take him down on your own. You proved that
when you beat the shit out of Thatcher, right?”
The silence that descended was ominous. She wondered if everyone was looking at her, but she was staring
at the scuffed patterns on the linoleum. Her jaw worked furiously, and she tried to control her reaction. She
wanted to just stay still, to just ignore him as if it didn’t matter. But the hurt was too strong, and even
though she knew she had earned his anger, she deep down wanted to believe that she had at least earned the
right to have him try to forgive as well.
Just as she had forgiven him for all his crap in the months after Kathy had left.
Olivia lifted her head, staring straight into his eyes. She knew about what had happened with Royce, and yet
there he was, hypocritically calling her out on something he had conveniently forgotten he had done a dozen
times before. “You’ve heard about the pot and kettle, right Stabler?” she said while cocking her head, the
words dripping with bitter sarcasm. She knew what she had just done, and yet she couldn’t have stopped it
if she had tried.
Olivia had just caused irreparable harm to their partnership right in front of everyone.
Elliot didn’t flinch. He was the only one who didn’t. Instead, the corner of his mouth lifted in a cold,
dangerous, half-smile, satisfaction evident on his face.
She knew why he had adopted that expression and it slammed into her hard. Cragen would split them after
her outburst, after his insults. They had been teetering on the edge of being split up for months, and this
would do it.
Elliot wanted to be split up and he knew she had just sealed their fate.
“Go to hell,” she whispered again softly, just for him. Just to him.
“My office,” Cragen hissed. “Both of you. Now.”
+++
Elliot lounged in the chair in his Captain’s office, his arms folded across his chest and his legs stretched out
in front of him. Olivia sat perched on the edge of the radiator, as far away from him as she could get in the
small space.
Cragen had sent them into his office over twenty minutes ago. As soon as they had all walked in, he had
ordered them to stay put until he returned. He wasn’t back as of yet, and Elliot’s levels of frustration were
climbing rapidly.
This was a waste of time. If their Captain thought that by simply forcibly locking them together in his office
that things would get resolved, he hadn’t been paying attention over the last few years.

Neither he nor Olivia had spoken at all.
Of course, she wanted to. He had caught her glancing nervously at him a few times, her mouth opening to
say something and then rapidly shutting as she thought better of it. Her fingers fidgeted in her lap; her feet
banged against the metal siding of the radiator. Both of them had let out deep breaths at varying times.
But that was it. Which was fine by him. He had nothing to say to her.
He was still so damned angry, he found himself unable to do anything when he went back to his apartment
at night. Boxes lay constructed yet unpacked. Nothing had been done because all he could manage to do was
work out, hit the bag, go for a midnight run. When he went home he’d down a single scotch, hoping that
would relax him enough to sleep.
It never did. Sometimes, he’d go for a second. Even that rarely helped.
He looked at Olivia, at her bowed head that was now following the movements of her own feet as she
pointed and flexed them nervously. Her ponytail was longer, hitting her back and curling upwards at the
bottom, and the short white puffy sleeves of her blouse under that black vest made her look far too feminine
for his liking.
She looked vulnerable when she dressed like that. He hated it.
Elliot closed his eyes for a second, clearing her from his vision. Goddamn, the woman made him crazy. He
didn’t trust her. His lack of trust wasn’t in regards to her protecting his life, it was that he didn’t trust her to
protect her own. Olivia went off half-cocked, following instincts that she had to have known were
compromised, and after eight years together she hadn’t even had enough faith in him to ask for his help.
She’d given a suspected rapist flee money when she knew it could cost her both her job and her freedom.
She’d nearly been run over by Millfield’s car. She’d walked into that room where Simon had been holding a
Police Captain hostage, and she had voluntarily left her weapon behind. She’d asked him not to shoot, when
at the time neither of them could have been sure that Simon wasn’t capable of murder.
Of course her brother had turned out to be innocent, but that didn’t excuse her questionable, reckless
methods. Not to mention the fact that Elliot still didn’t trust the little bastard. There was something about
Marsden that irked the hell out of Elliot.
He opened his eyes and realized his mistake. Olivia had chosen that moment to look at him, and now her
almond-shaped eyes were locked on his.
“You don’t trust me. I get it,” she said quietly. “But like you said, we can’t keep doing this, Elliot.”
That was another thing he hated. That new, low, breathy thing she did with her voice. The one that made it
sound like she was hurting, like she was afraid to make her voice any louder. It made him want to shake her
until she yelled. He didn’t want to admit it, but when she had been screaming at Thatcher it had almost been
reassuring just to hear her use her voice.
Elliot gritted his jaw tightly but remained silent. He had nothing to say.
A moment later, he wished he had found some words because she took it upon herself to fill the silence
instead. “You don’t understand what it was like, El. What it is like. I’d never had family before. I didn’t
know what it was to just need to put family first.”

His fury won. “You hardly know the guy, Olivia. And yet you risked everything for him?”
She looked away, off to her left, pulling her lower lip into her mouth and lifting her chin. “It was mine to
risk,” she finally said, focused on a framed commendation of Cragen’s.
That had him out of his chair and stalking towards her before he could stop himself. “No, it wasn’t. When
you put yourself in danger, it affects everyone around you. And that’s not even the worst of it. At the very
least ask for help, for God’s sake! You just went off alone, doing whatever the hell you damned well
pleased!”
Olivia snapped her head back towards where he now stood, less than two feet in front of her. “I wasn’t
alone, Elliot! Jesus, when I went to meet Simon at the bookstore, Porter was there! It was only…” she
stopped, shutting her mouth as she her eyes widened and the dawning realization of what she had just said
manifested itself in her expression as he watched.
Elliot flinched, the anger within him immediately ratcheting up even further. He moved closer to her, unable
to stop himself. “Good thing you had him then, huh?” he whispered hotly, dropping the words into her ear.
He felt his fists clench, and he made a deliberate attempt to relax them. He had to continue to inhale, to
exhale.
When he finally stepped back, giving her some room, she raised her face to his. The expression she wore
punched him the gut, panic sliding over his skin. He didn’t know where it came from these days, the urge to
touch her. But it was there, exploding all around him in a far more powerful way than even his anger did.
The part that confused the hell out him was that he didn’t know how he wanted to touch her. He didn’t
know if he wanted to grab her arms and force her to listen to him, or if he wanted to simply tug that blasted
rubber band out of her hair so he could see what all that hair looked like, shit, felt like when left loose.
Either way, he returned to clenching his fists, because he was pretty sure his palms were going to indulge
the itch if he didn’t do something soon.
He took a deep breath, desperately shoving down the rogue voice in his head. The voice that the devil
owned that taunted him these days. The one that brought up the fact that he needed to figure out how to
want to touch his wife again, because after what he had done when he went home that night, it was
expected.
Goddammit.
Everything was just out of control.
Olivia was still just looking at him. Her chest was rising and falling deeply, her mouth pressed shut. It was
her eyes that always knocked him back a step. They were far too wide and these days they were far too
filled with indescribable emotions.
If it had been pain he saw in them, he could have dealt with it. Even guilt, or accusation. But this expression
twisted his gut.
It was a mix of both silence and loss.
Which seemed appropriate, because it silenced him too, leaving him at a complete loss.
Elliot rubbed his hand over his face, turning away from her. He couldn’t help her, she had already made it
abundantly clear over the last few weeks that it wasn’t his help that she needed. It was only his pathetic
inability to let her handle her own mess that had led him to New Jersey that first night. The night she was
stalking Marsden. It was only because he had followed her, unasked, that he had even been included in her
stalking Marsden. It was only because he had followed her, unasked, that he had even been included in her
discovery of her brother.
Even that night she had been adamant. We’re not partners. Not on this. This is personal.
It was an accident she had let him help her that first go-round with Marsden. And then she had likely lied to
him when he had asked if she knew where her brother was. She’d sent him money, for God’s sake. Aided
and abetted when her brother had been declared a fugitive. Kept secrets from him, from Cragen, from the
goddamned FBI.
Sonofabitch.
He couldn’t do this. He couldn’t go down this road with her. He was done thinking things had changed
between them, that they had found some new level of understanding.
He had to focus on his own issues, like the fact that he had to move home eventually.
Christ, his head was pounding. The jackhammer that lived there lately fired up again, decimating his temple
with a precision that always amazed him.
The door shot open, the blinds rattling as their Captain harshly shoved the door closed behind him, two
thick manila envelopes in his hands. “Sit. Both of you,” he ordered.
Olivia slid off her perch and Elliot sank into his chair. They were both careful not to bump into each other
as she settled into the seat next to him. They stared straight ahead, mirroring each other’s posture, hands
folded over their stomachs. Cragen descended into his chair behind his desk, the two envelopes dropped
heavily onto the mahogany surface in front of him.
“I think its damned ironic that less than two months ago, I was under the mistaken impression that you two
were too close,” Cragen started. “Although maybe it’s because you are that you now feel the need to
contaminate my squad room with your personal issues with one another.”
“Captain-” Olivia started.
Cragen held up his hand. “Save it, Detective. I don’t want to hear it. I’m done hearing it from the both of
you.”
Elliot wondered what was coming. He’d learned long ago not to expect any one thing, because when it came
to their partnership, or lack of it, anything was possible.
He breathed through his agitation, focusing on the fact that there was a bottle of Excedrin in his desk. He
was twenty feet away from some relief from the pain that was reaching the point where he knew it would
make him nauseous.
“Now you two have somehow, unbeknownst to me, managed to still remain my most effective team through
all of this nonsense. So while you may think that your problems would be easily resolved by my switching
up the pairings for a few weeks, “ he looked pointedly at Elliot, “I’m not willing to play the disruptive game
of musical chairs in here.”
Elliot stiffened, silently cursing Cragen out. Elliot knew that Olivia was now painfully aware that he had
requested the temporary switch just by the way her breathing pattern had changed. The way her short,
manicured nails had stopped picking at the fabric on her pants for just one horrible moment. It wasn’t how
Elliot had wanted it to play out. He had hoped that Cragen would have accommodated his request by simply
ordering the switch, making it seem like his own mandate.
ordering the switch, making it seem like his own mandate.
Elliot hadn’t wanted a long-term break, just one that would last long enough for his anger to die down, for
him to be able to focus on his job and at the same time be able to deal with the crapload of changes that
would be involved with moving home.
A few weeks apart at best. At most.
“You two were catching this weekend. Which means I know you don’t have any plans made that can’t be
canceled or postponed.” He tossed each of them one of the envelopes across the desk. On the front, in bold,
capitalized letters, was their last name. “I’ll expect you to report there tomorrow morning. You’ll be done
on Sunday. In the envelope, you’ll find all the information that you will need, including a list of what to
pack.”
Elliot fingered the envelope, biting down his frustration. “We’re in the middle of a case.”
Cragen leveled a glance back at him. “It’ll be handled.”
Olivia’s curiosity won out first. “What is this?”
Elliot stared at the letters that spelled out his name on the envelope, the image blurring as a result of his
headache. He knew, without a doubt, that whatever was contained within wouldn’t be good.
He looked up at his Captain, waiting for the verdict.
Cragen actually seemed a little bit pleased with himself. Smug, as if he was finally getting them back for all
the shit they had put the squad through. “When the brass asked me if I had anyone I thought needed to
participate a few weeks ago, I hadn’t known I’d need it. But you two are in luck, there’s still room in the
budget open.”
“Cap-” Elliot started.
Cragen finally smiled. “Ropes course, up at a camp in Oneonta. Maybe dangling thirty feet off the ground,
you two will figure out whatever the hell it is that’s ruining your partnership. Completing the course is an
order.”
+++
tbc
Back to index

Chapter 2 by MaddyM
Olivia glanced down for the twentieth time at the now slightly rumpled envelope that sat on her lap. They
had been driving for nearly forty-five minutes already, and for the most part, they had managed to do it in
silence. Elliot drove; she watched the scenery. The city in the first fifteen minutes, then the roadsides as they
cut through New Jersey and back up into New York.
He had picked her up at ten after six in the morning, and she had tossed her duffel into the back seat three
minutes later. As of yet they hadn’t said anything that didn’t involve good morning or reading off the
directions.
It reminded her of the car ride to the house in Florida only a few weeks ago. The one where she had sat
quietly, her forehead in her hand, her elbow on the window, while she prayed that he wouldn’t ask her any
questions about why she hadn’t included him in the investigation into her father and Simon.
He hadn’t. There hadn’t been anything to say. He’d asked if she was okay; she’d said yes. Echoes of her
reprimand that the case was personal had hovered around them, rendering them silent for the most part.
She pulled out the eight-by-ten brochure for Camp Susquehanna and fingered the smaller one that detailed
the ropes course in particular. Olivia knew the basics about a course such as this; it was similar to the day-
long one the NYPD offered a few times a year. The one she had never had time for, the one she had lost
interest in after her first year in SVU. The course facilitates the expansion of comfort zones by participants.
It teaches participants tools by which they can overcome fear as well as extend and build trust thereby
meeting both personal and group development goals. The course is ideal for couples, corporate retreats and
individuals, teaching skills ideal for unit building and teamwork.
Olivia lifted her head and sighed loudly, slamming her head back against the headrest.
“That makes two of us,” Elliot said, breaking the silence.
For the first time in days, she smiled just a little bit as she looked out the window once again. “I’m afraid of
heights.”
She didn’t know what made her say it. Maybe it was the images of the course itself that dotted the glossy
brochures. The ones where people were harnessed and walking along cables high in the air, the tension in
the tether reliant on the person that stood across from them on an intersecting wire.
But then again, maybe it wasn’t. Maybe she just wanted him to know.
“I know,” he said, staring straight ahead.
She turned to face him in surprise. “How’d you know that?”
A tense muscle jumped in his cheek. “When the girl was pushed off the roof and we went up there to check
out the scene on the balcony, you looked sick to your stomach.”
She remembered the case even though it was nearly three years old. Olivia had thought about that one for
days, wondering what it felt like to careen through the air knowing the ground was rapidly approaching. She
wondered how long a person knew that the end was approaching before they blacked out. Even recreating
the scene in Morales’ office she had been glad to be the one on the pushing end, not the one pretending to
go over like Elliot had been. The idea of free falling like that still made her stomach twist in a way that the
possibility of being shot never had.

“You used to climb those rock climbing walls all the time,” he said.
She knew there was a question in his statement, even though his inflection hadn’t indicated it. It was what
they did. They’d make a statement and leave it out there, never quite willing to commit to fully posing it as
a question, yet being curious nonetheless.
She knew why they did it. If the other didn’t want to respond, they had an out.
“I hated being afraid of something. I thought it would help,” she replied softly, watching the lush trees
encroach on the roadway, their branches rebelliously overhanging the pavement yet their trunks held back
by the punishing tar and concrete.
He swallowed, his fist tightening on the wheel. “But then you stopped going.”
Olivia rested her forehead on the window, the cool glass having absorbed the effects of the air conditioner.
She didn’t know what to say to that, to the thing he was asking without really asking. “I kept hearing all the
victims talk about knowing in the moments before they were attacked,” she said quietly. “Their instincts
always made them aware of the danger, but humans-” she let out her breath, wondering if she was speaking
to him or just thinking out loud. “We’re the only animals on this planet that rationalize away our sense of
fear and try to overcome it, you know? We tell ourselves that there’s nothing to be afraid of,” she paused.
“That danger couldn’t possibly be honing in on us. And that’s when we’re most vulnerable.”
“Just letting yourself by afraid of something doesn’t sound like you, Olivia.”
She looked at Elliot for a moment, but he hadn’t changed his position at all. He was still staring straight out
of the windshield, he was still tense. And yet he had just dropped words that somehow made her feel like he
had the slightest bit of faith or pride in her. “It’s not just letting myself be afraid, Elliot. It’s paying attention
to the fear, recognizing that something has the power to hurt and then reacting accordingly. Just like we do
in our jobs.”
He didn’t react. Not really. There was just the slow blink of his lashes, the narrowing of his eyes as if he
was looking straight into the sun although it wasn’t shining in from the front but through her window and
burning onto her skin instead.
Sometimes Elliot was so quiet that she felt noisy around him. She wondered if he ever felt that way around
her.
Olivia figured she was owed a fact about him in return. “What are you afraid of?” she practically whispered.
As soon as the question came out of her mouth, she regretted it. It was a loaded one, one that shouldn’t have
been asked.
It was moments like this she wished that either one of them would have been a music person, because then
maybe one of them would have remembered to turn on the radio.
She could feel the tension in the car escalate, could see his arms tense beneath the textured black pullover he
wore with his jeans and boots. “Sorry. You don’t have-” she started.
“Getting everything wrong,” he interrupted quietly, his lips barely moving as he focused even more intently
on the two-lanes of thruway in front of him.
She sat there, immobilized.

Less than two minutes later, Elliot Stabler became a music person, the strains of an old Bon Jovi song
filling the sedan.
+++
The air was cleaner up here, the trees a shade of green he didn’t think they would ever get in the city.
It was just after ten, and they were an hour early because they hadn’t needed to stop as he had anticipated
they might need to. He had miscalculated the drive, forgetting that this wasn’t a weekend trip up to the
Catskills with his family; there would be no multiple stops for McDonald’s or the bathroom necessary.
Olivia had brought a box of granola bars, the kind that looked like they came from the health food store, and
she had quietly offered him one around the time the second hour of the drive had begun. It had tasted like
cardboard, and he figured if that’s what she was eating constantly it was no wonder she was dropping
weight as she had been lately.
He wished she’d stop with the health food kick. He’d really preferred how she had looked when she had
returned from Oregon. Like she had been comfortable in her skin in a way that she hadn’t been as of late.
Elliot’s boots crunched on the gravel of the parking lot as he looked around, surveying the dense foliage of
the campsite and the brown lodge that sat forty feet in front of them. He reached into the back seat to grab
his bag at the same time that Olivia tried to grab hers through the open passenger door on her end.
He reached for her bag too. “I got it.”
She shook her head, not meeting his eyes. “No, I got it.”
He looked up at her across the backseat, cocking his head. “Olivia, let it go.”
He realized the irony of his words as soon as he said them. As if the woman would ever let anything go. She
glared at him, and he could tell the moment that she decided it wasn’t worth the actual argument. Of course
that didn’t mean that she was going to concede. Instead, she tugged forcefully on the bag, pulling out her
end and throwing the strap of it up and over her shoulder before closing the car door.
Gloria Steinem would have been proud; Elliot just rolled his head on his neck and took a deep breath.
It didn’t help.
He gritted his teeth as he slammed both the back and front doors shut on his side. By the time he came
around to the front of the car to where she stood, she already had her sunglasses on. She was taking in the
landscape in front of her, and even though he couldn’t see her eyes he knew that she wasn’t assessing the
layout for its aesthetic appeal, she was taking inventory. Categorizing, committing the place to memory as if
it were a crime scene.
“How are you gonna get through this course with me if you won’t even let me get your bag?” he accused
irritably.
She turned to face him, and all he could tell was that her chin lifted. “I’m perfectly capable of carrying my
own bag, Stabler. Next thing you know you’ll want to carry my gun for me too.”
He could have sworn she rolled her eyes, but he couldn’t see it behind the glasses. It didn’t matter, because
two seconds later he realized that he was still standing there while she had marched toward the registration
lodge, her army green duffel slamming against her ass as she walked purposefully ahead.

Elliot mentally calculated where the bottle of Excedrin was in his own bag as he forced himself not to look
at her. He had only watched her walk away for a second, but the damage had been done and the image of it
was branded into his idiotic brain. Her long legs were encased in fitted faded jeans that tapered over her
black hiking boots, her red spring jacket too short to even hit her narrow hips. He knew she had layered her
standard tight t-shirts beneath it, but what amused him despite himself was that she had her badge brightly
and glaringly clipped to her belt.
Out here. In the wilderness.
She’d forever be Detective Benson if she could help it.
Elliot fought the tiniest of smiles that threatened as he took off after her, for one single moment being able
to breathe without the weight of Manhattan resting squarely on his chest.
+++
“You have to be kidding me.” She turned around, looking at Elliot.
He just arched his eyebrows once, as if he was trying to keep himself awake, as if pretending to be bored.
But she knew better, he was bracing himself for her reaction.
She’d give him one.
“Are they seriously kidding me? What is this, Girl Scout camp?” Olivia let her bag slide off her shoulder
and fall heavily onto the wooden floorboard, staring at the inside of the very rustic cabin. Ahead of her was
the main room, a large, nearly empty expanse of space anchored at the opposite end by a huge stone
fireplace. The hearth of it alone was nearly as big as her kitchen. The floors were covered with worn Navajo
rugs placed intermittently and there was a smattering of chairs that someone seemingly thought it would be
clever to make out of logs with throw cushions placed on top. To the right of her were five doors, each
obviously opening up into small rooms that each contained nothing but a set of bunks made of the same log
framework. To her left, the same configuration of rooms. Above her a huge chandelier hung from an arched
ceiling, one that was made of deer antlers and on which she could have sworn she saw cobwebs.
“You said you camped in the damned forest in Oregon. How bad could this be?” he muttered behind her.
“That was different. I didn’t think about it then, it was just part of the job,” she shot back, turning to look at
him.
“So’s this apparently.”
Olivia tried to clamp down on her frustration. She failed. “But we could have avoided this,” she accused. As
soon as she said it she regretted it, knowing what he was thinking.
You could have avoided going to Oregon.
Elliot cleared his throat, instead ignoring her outburst. “I’m room one. You’re seven,” he said flatly.
She noticed the room numbers above the doorframes, each number made out of tiny branches nailed
together and painted red. She swiped her bag up off the floor and hooked the strap over her shoulder again.
“So where do you think the bathrooms are?”
There was a rustling as Elliot looked at the map that the older woman in the first cabin had handed them.
Joanie Upshall. Joanie, who wore a red plaid shirt and jeans that looked like they belonged to her husband
Henry. They hadn’t yet met Henry, but they knew that the couple ran the campground and leased the
Henry. They hadn’t yet met Henry, but they knew that the couple ran the campground and leased the
facilities out to Rope Adventures LLC. Elliot and she had asked the questions because that’s what they did.
The questions had been a relief, something familiar to grab onto out in this mosquito infested campsite.
“Across the field.”
Olivia turned on him again. “Did you just say the bathrooms are across the field?” she asked, suddenly
missing the city.
Elliot stood still, nearly unmoving. “Yeah. There’s a shower or two and the bathrooms in a cabin over there
somewhere.”
Olivia rolled her neck and sighed, finally staring at the second door in on the left that brightly declared that
it would be hers.
Room seven.
Well, there were supposed to be ten people in this session, she assumed that meant they would each at least
get their own rooms. “This is your fault,” she muttered loud enough for him to hear as she glared at him
quickly and headed over to her room, leaving Elliot behind in the main room.
It wasn’t until she closed her door loudly, dropping her bag on the thin navy bedspread on the lower bunk
that she realized that Elliot hadn’t moved after her little comment. He’d stood still, his eyes shuttered as he
watched her go with unnerving focus.
She thought about opening her door, checking on him for one quick second just to see if he had moved but
then she didn’t know what she’d do if he hadn’t. What if when she opened the door he was still standing
there, looking far too comfortable in his rugged surroundings but far too miserable because he was around
her?
She left the door closed, shoving her bag to one end of the thin mattress and climbing onto the bed. She had
thirty minutes to lie down, to just get some alone time after being locked up in the silence with Elliot all
morning.
Olivia closed her eyes, knowing she wouldn’t sleep because she hadn’t had the courage to open her door
and simply check on him one last time.
+++
“We’re partners,” Olivia said.
Elliot sat across from her on the grass, the late spring morning giving way to temperatures that were
unseasonably warm, even for this time of year. The sun warmed his shoulders through his long-sleeved
Henley, nearly making him uncomfortably hot in his jeans. They had started a little bit late this morning, the
final two participants to arrive a couple from just north of Buffalo that had taken an unexpected detour,
which meant Elliot was now extremely hungry.
Sitting out here in this circle with strangers was bullshit. They had a case back in Manhattan. One that
involved a bastard that had raped four women, and this kumbayah crap out here was keeping him from
pushing the investigation along faster.
“Elliot?”

He lifted his head, trying to focus against the sun to his right at the owner of the voice. Grant Ludwig was
exactly what he would expect someone that ran one of these wilderness retreats to look like. He was a
bigger guy, outdoorsy, their age, sporting a navy t-shirt and jeans and reminding Elliot of half the guys he
had served with in the Marines.
Only none of those guys would give a shit about sitting around making introductions, which was exactly
what Grant Ludwig was wasting his time by doing.
“Yeah?” Elliot said, knowing there was something he was supposed to answer.
Grant smiled patiently at him, and Elliot became aware of the fact that ten sets of eyes were now trained on
him, including Olivia’s. “Olivia said that you and she were partners. What did you want to add?”
Elliot blew out a breath, glaring at Olivia. Of course she took the obvious one. They were supposed to share
something with the group about themselves and the people they were with and now he had no clue what to
say. “We’ve been partners for eight years,” he said.
“Is it just that you don’t believe in marriage? We have heterosexual friends like that, who won’t get married
if everyone can’t. It’s an incredible show of support,” said a chipper male voice.
Elliot’s head whipped to his left, staring at the smaller man with the name badge that read Colin G. Jesus.
The man was wearing ironed jeans and a yellow polo shirt of which it looked like he had just ripped the
pricetag off. He had also come with his partner, Leo K., who jauntily sported a lightweight tan pullover with
a small alligator embroidered on the nylon. Elliot knew they were from somewhere around Albany but
hadn’t really listened. It was obvious that the two were together. He was trying to get back in the game, to
piece together what Colin had said when Olivia saved him.
“We’re actually cops. Detectives. NYPD,” she offered helpfully. So helpfully in fact that he bet she would
have passed around her badge for show and tell if she hadn’t gone back to lock it in the car before they had
walked over here.
He looked at her, somewhat relieved, and she just furrowed her brows at him. Goddammit he wanted to go
home. Especially now that she had spilled the beans. They both knew what was coming next.
It came from his left again, directly next to him this time. He knew this woman’s name because it was one
he had said for the last twenty years. Only this woman was in her mid-to-late twenties, with short blonde
hair and green eyes that brightened every time she looked at her fiancé, Jim. “Wow, like the show? We love
police shows. Jim and I both used to watch NYPD Blue every night when it was on reruns.”
“You just never got over Ricky Schroder, honey,” Jim teased.
He actually found himself biting back a smile because Olivia sat across from him, her eyes locking on his
and willing him not to laugh although she looked like she very well might do it herself.
“Not at all like the show,” Olivia finally said to Cathy With a C, sporting an enthusiasm only he recognized
as fake. She never took her suddenly slightly brighter eyes off of Elliot. “But trust me, if it was I’d work
overtime. I was a big fan of Silver Spoons,” Olivia added while turning to Cathy, practically winking
conspiratorially.
Elliot hadn’t done it in months, but that did it for him. He just laughed loudly, never minding where they
were, what had been happening back in Manhattan or what the hell they were being forced into for the next
two days.

Olivia darted her eyes to him one more time, then ducked her head as she grinned broadly too.
His smile disappeared when he realized she couldn’t hold his gaze while smiling. It was as if she was
embarrassed by the expression itself. He felt like he had just had the wind knocked out of him with the
discovery.
She finally looked back up at him as they moved to his right, onto the thirty-something foursome from
Kodak headquarters near Rochester that were on a departmental teambuilding exercise. Jessica, Hannah,
Tyler and Carl all went through their introductions, their flirtatious laughter bouncing off the wall of trees
that surrounded three sides of the soccer field size clearing in the middle where they now sat.
Olivia’s grin fell away somewhere around Jessica’s inside joke about them being the PR spin doctors of
Kodak. Her eyes pulled away from his sometime around Hannah’s quip about this being even more stressful
than a product launch weekend because she couldn’t bring her trusted laptop. By the time Tyler said that he
was the newbie to their team, Olivia was looking beyond Elliot, staring wistfully at the lake that he knew
glistened behind his shoulders, the water lapping at the short strip of sand and around the crude pier where
the three canoes bobbed, tied to the dock.
When Carl said they were testing the course as a potential corporate retreat for the company in the future,
Elliot realized he still hadn’t stopped looking at Olivia, still seeing the remnants of that smile that had
existed only moments before.
The sun was on her skin, her hair capturing the light, and when she blinked, just once, lost in thought, he
finally knew the answer to at least one of his questions.
He knew how he wanted to touch her, and the answer scared the living shit out of him.
He didn’t want to grab her arms and make her listen to him like he had thought he might in Cragen’s office
yesterday. That would be too easy.
What he wanted she would yell at him for, call him an asshole and wonder loudly what the hell he was
doing if he ever tried it.
Elliot grabbed at the grass around him, the blades a poor substitute for what he wanted to do.
He wanted to get her hair out of that ponytail and shove his hands deep into the silky strands, gather it in the
crevices of his fists and then demand that she smile like that again.
Just for him.
+++
“So are you two, like…you know.”
Olivia nearly dropped the apple she was selecting out of the basket on the picnic table, her plate in her other
hand wobbling dangerously. She looked up at the very pert, very inquisitive face of a very petite Cathy
Olmstead. “I’m sorry?”
She tried to be polite, to keep a smile plastered on her face as she selected a bag of chips from the next
basket. She grabbed the last package of Baked Lays and moved on to the large tin buckets filled with ice,
water bottles and soda cans.
“You know,” Cathy grinned conspiratorially. “I mean, neither of you has a ring on, so I was just
wondering…”
wondering…”
Olivia prayed for divine patience. This would be the one with all the questions this weekend. Not the
foursome from Kodak that reminded her of an episode of Melrose Place in all their Abercrombie gear, and
not Leo and Colin. Not even a rather attractive Grant Ludwig, though he had been giving her a still-as-yet
tasteful once over a few times. It would be this perky, enthusiastic woman with the glaring diamond on her
finger and the fiancé that seemed to indulge her every idiosyncrasy with his amused, rich laughter that
would be the one to ask more questions than the US Census Bureau.
Olivia wouldn’t make it easy on her. Maybe it would discourage her. “Wondering what?” she said
noncommittally and never making eye contact.
Cathy’s face lit up and Olivia inwardly groaned, realizing that Cathy wasn’t easily swayed; instead she had
just taken Olivia’s question as an invitation to pry further. “Well, see before NYPD Blue, Jim and I had
bought all the DVD’s of Silk Stalkings. You two remind me of that show. Did you ever watch it?”
Olivia grabbed a water bottle out of the now melting ice and shook off the excess moisture. She looked for
Elliot at one of the four picnic tables and realized he was already sitting with Jim. She didn’t think that had
been Elliot’s choice, if it had been up to him he would have taken his lunch and sat alone somewhere
beneath a tree in the woods. She knew that because it’s what she would have chosen too.
Socializing with others simply wasn’t their strong point.
She wondered if Jim was as much of a chatterbox as Cathy was. “No, I don’t think I ever did,” Olivia
responded, finally standing still at the end of the table and wondering if she was required to save Elliot or if
she could still make an escape and let him fend for himself.
But Cathy was behind her, practically prodding Olivia along, and for one brief second she wondered if
Cathy would always be this way. If she would always think of strangers as her friends, if she would always
assume there was the potential for romance when she was far off the mark. She reminded Olivia of someone,
but she couldn’t think of whom.
Olivia let herself be led to the table with Elliot and Jim, realizing that she couldn’t leave Elliot alone with
the both of them. Things had been strained enough between them without her adding to his list of
transgressions that he was accumulating against her by abandoning him.
Elliot looked up, and surprisingly he didn’t look desperate to escape. She sat down across from him, saying
nothing, but automatically handing over half of her huge submarine to him. He shifted the food on his plate,
making room for the extra.
Cathy laughed. “See? It is like Silk Stalkings.”
Elliot coughed. Loudly.
Cathy’s head lifted and her eyes widened. “You’ve seen the show, right? I mean, I’d think most men have,
it was all just so much tits and ass,” she sighed dramatically, rolling her eyes.
It was Olivia’s turn to cough loudly. She hadn’t expected the words tits and ass from Suzy Homemaker.
“I’ve seen the show,” Elliot said, his eyes focused on his plate, analyzing every bump and bruise on his two
apples.
“Honey, why don’t you let them eat-” Jim started, his admonition gentle.

But Cathy was on a roll. “See, on Silk Stalkings, Chris and Rita were partners who always ate each other’s
food.”
Olivia grabbed her water bottle. Quickly. The top popped off in her hands. “Chris and Rita?” She didn’t
know why she did it. Maybe she did it because Elliot was diligently peeling the wrapper off the cookie he
had taken. Taking twice as long as he should to complete the task.
Cathy nodded vigorously, sending her short locks bouncing. “Yeah, they were the two homicide detectives
in Palm Beach. Ridiculously good looking. They always wanted each other, and you could tell because they
were always doing cute things like that. Like, eating each other’s food. They were really touchy feely but
for five years they repressed everything.”
Olivia covered up a smirk, not well, but enough. “Well, I can assure you that Elliot and I are not touchy
feely. We’re strictly professional.” She was going to laugh, really she was. She didn’t know why, but
Elliot’s intense concentration on the picnic lunch had left her chest feeling less constricted than it had in
days. She took a swig of her water. “So what happened to them on the show?” Olivia asked, suddenly
feeling Elliot’s intense glare on her.
Jim just cleared his throat before taking a loud bite of his apple.
Cathy was not to be dissuaded. “Oh,” she smiled broadly. “They finally had some traumatic case where Rita
almost died. So they went home and had crazy sex. Of course, then they got married and she got pregnant
and then…” Cathy frowned, stopping midsentence.
Both Olivia’s submarine and smile had frozen mid-movement somewhere around the time Cathy was
relaying that these fictional characters had hooked up. She hadn’t known, or she wouldn’t have prodded.
Elliot didn’t look simply uncomfortable anymore, he looked downright pissed that she had pushed the
conversation in this direction.
He knew the show, she remembered, and she sighed in defeat.
Cathy shook her head, as if reliving something and took a bite of her sandwich. When she was done
chewing, she looked sadly at Olivia, her luminous green eyes practically watering. “It was awful what
happened after they got together.”
Olivia didn’t know why it mattered to her what happened to these characters. She didn’t know why she
wasn’t hungry and why Elliot seemed to feel the same way too. “What happened?” Olivia asked quietly,
because it was unstoppable, like a train that didn’t have the room to come to a full stop before it completely
wrecked.
Elliot heavily dropped his sandwich into his plate. He stood up, grabbing his plate of food. He shot a
frustrated, irritated look at Olivia. “They got distracted on the job and one of them ended up dying trying to
save the other,” he practically growled.
Olivia stilled, letting him walk away. Silence descended at the table, Cathy suddenly quiet too.
It was then that Olivia realized who Cathy reminded her of.
She looked like Lindsay Royce, the suburban housewife who when Olivia had last seen her lay dead on the
floor of her master bedroom from a gunshot wound to her head.
Olivia tried to take a bite of the sandwich, but it locked in her throat. She needed half her bottle of water
just to get it to go down. She looked at the lake, still in front of her, and let the sun beat down on her face.

She knew then that simply getting out of the city didn’t mean that they could let everything go, because
what they were trying to escape from lived far too deeply inside of them.
+++
tbc
Back to index

Chapter 3 by MaddyM
“Okay,” Grant smiled at the group assembled in the middle of the grassy field in front of him. “So the
purpose of this exercise is to get us all warmed up a bit. Get the trust juices flowing.”
Elliot folded his arms across his chest, his water bottle dangling from his fingertips, realizing that Ludwig
tended to smile at Olivia just a little bit too much. Ludwig’s gaze would dart over the foursome, reflect
patience when looking at Jim and Cathy and be polite as he acknowledged Leo and Colin. When it came to
Elliot, he barely made eye contact but when it came to Olivia he could barely tear his eyes away.
Elliot narrowed his eyes at him, hoping the guy would get the hint. He didn’t. Ludwig looked at Olivia again
and Olivia smiled back, not a lot, but enough that the instructor wasn’t discouraged.
Elliot tilted his neck to his right and his left, hearing it crack loudly. He widened his stance, trying to get
comfortable. He supposed Olivia had every right to smile at the guy, he just didn’t think he needed to be
forced to watch it happen. This was work for God’s sake, not The Dating Game. And the guy wasn’t right
for her anyway, so what was the point of…
He blew out a breath and rolled his shoulders. He couldn’t let it be his business who she flirted with
because it shouldn’t matter to him.
It didn’t matter.
At all.
Sonofabitch.
“So as you can see we have a ten-foot long beam here for each pair of you,” Ludwig continued, indicating
the rudimentary yet sturdy balance beams made of plywood and bricks that weren’t more than eight inches
wide and eighteen inches off the ground. “The purpose of this exercise is to get your blindfolded partner
across the beam and down using whatever method you find works for the two of you. When you’re done,
switch positions and try it in the reverse.”
“Is there anything we can’t do?” Jessica piped up, twisting her long dark hair into a bun and tucking the rest
of it into the back of her shirt.
Ludwig focused on her. “No. Just use whatever methods you’re comfortable with. Some people simply use
words; others need a little physical support. The key is to find out what makes your partner comfortable and
then implement those methods.”
“Can I carry her?” Tyler grinned devilishly at Jessica.
The girl scoffed at him openly, her sparkling eyes betraying her mock disgust.
Ludwig chuckled. “The board probably won’t take the weight of two people. I’d suggest you try the exercise
as I’ve outlined it.”
Elliot stared at the board, not sure who to blame anymore for this mess. The thought that Parker was out
there roaming the East Side at this very moment while he was supposed to walk across this damned board
made him mad as hell. He knew Munch and Fin could handle the case, it wasn’t their abilities he doubted, it
was the uselessness of where he was stuck that was starting to really annoy him.
At least he had finally had some food, enough to at least to absorb the pain relievers.

“So you want to go first?” Olivia asked, coming towards him.
She had stayed away from him since lunch, busying herself with eating or finally finding the bathrooms.
Even standing in the half circle during the instructions she had positioned herself three people away from
him. He knew he was being an ass, and yet no matter how much he tried to control it, it was always there.
The need to force her to understand what she had done when she had blindly taken on Marsden by herself
was overwhelming.
She could have gotten herself killed.
“No, you go first,” he said, setting his water bottle down.
Olivia nodded, pulling her lower lip into her mouth. She picked up the scrap of fabric that lay on the beam
and brought the blindfold up around her eyes, tying it in the back beneath her ponytail. She had a little bit of
trouble getting the material to stay up when she tied it from that angle, and he finally gave in the second
time he watched her fumble with it.
“Give it to me,” he grumbled, reaching for the fabric.
Elliot was so damned close to her that the wind could have lifted the strands of her hair and blown them into
his face as he grabbed the ends of the black blindfold. The ends of her hair teased his knuckles as he twisted
one end over the other, his fingertips accidentally brushing the underside of the ponytail against her scalp.
He couldn’t breathe suddenly, his hands closing around the fabric because he was sure he was going to take
one more swipe across her skin with his thumb, he was going to touch her right where the fine hairs tapered
off and left the smooth expanse of her neck only inches away from him.
“Christ, Elliot!” she flinched.
He had pulled the knot a little too tight. “Sorry,” he said softly. “I’m sorry,” he said again, knowing that if
she knew what he had just thought, she’d require a lot more than an apology.
Olivia turned towards him, the black band blocking her eyes. He could see the tension in her body too. The
way her fingers were opening and closing nervously, the way her breathing was shaky. He didn’t like this
one damned bit. He never wanted to see her like this, her vision taken away from her, her body vulnerable.
He didn’t know why just the idea of her being less than fully aware of her surroundings made him itch for a
gun that was locked next to hers in the glove compartment of their car. He reminded himself it was a wasted
instinct because she could handle herself. She didn’t need him, she’d proven that.
“Let’s get this over with,” she said quietly, her breathing shallow as her chin lifted just a little bit despite
her vulnerable state.
The movement sucked the air right out of his chest. It was her defiance at having been compromised in
some way, her defensiveness kicking in. For a cop, being visually impaired was bad enough. For Olivia, a
woman that knew too much about what happened when someone was weakened, it was everything.
The need to reassure her was overwhelming. The idea that he wanted to do it by touching her, by being able
to trace his thumb along her hairline and slide his hands over the slight trembling of her arms, that was
downright dangerous.
“Yeah, the sooner we get this done the better,” he agreed.

And he didn’t know if he simply meant this exercise or all of it. The weekend, this tension, hell, even a
partnership that had been falling to shit lately.
There was one thing he knew he needed to get over damned quickly though, or he was going to blow
everything into tiny little bits around him.
He had to get over the fact that he was now pretty bloody sure that he was a complete and utter moron.
He was an idiot, because the way his body had tightened just by the brief contact with her could only mean
one, dangerous thing.
He was attracted to his partner.
His goddamned, traitorous body wanted Olivia.
+++
Olivia struggled to keep her breathing pattern even so that Elliot wouldn’t pick up on her apprehension.
Then again she was blindfolded and she was still able to pick up on his, so she figured he already knew
about her anxiety.
She hated this, despised having her ability to see taken away from her when it was all she had. She hated
being at anyone’s mercy, even if it was Elliot’s. Maybe especially because it was Elliot’s.
His fingertips had touched her neck. Brushed along her skin for just a moment too long.
Again.
Only this time it was different than it had been that night in the car. That night he had been trying to
alleviate her stress, trying to relax her, calm her. That night she had sank into his touch, absorbing it and
drawing strength simply from his proximity.
Today, standing out here in the open field, his fingers had sent heat racing over her skin in a way that even
the sun couldn’t compete with. She was so dizzy she nearly thought she’d lose her balance.
“Easy, Liv,” he whispered close to her ear.
It was only then that she realized that she had actually swayed.
“You ready?” came his low, rumbling question.
Without her sight, everything else was sensitized. She felt the slight breeze of the wind on her nose and on
the portion of her cheeks left uncovered. She felt it slip over her neck and down her collarbone and yet it
wasn’t cooling her tingling skin. She innately knew where Elliot was, standing just to her right, his heat
suddenly apparent now that she had to rely on only her instincts to guide her.
And then there was his voice, dropping into her ear and making her draw air through her mouth.
She didn’t know what the hell was wrong with her.
“Yeah, I’m ready,” she acknowledged.
“How do you want to do this? You want me to guide you?”

Panic clawed at her. He was asking if he should touch her, if he should connect his skin to hers again in
some way and help her up onto the beam. Behind the blindfold, she squeezed her eyelids shut, unwilling to
indulge in figuring out where the panic was coming from.
It was just Elliot.
“Just talk me through it, El,” she finally managed. She didn’t want him to touch her, not when she felt as
helpless as she did. She didn’t want to need his physical presence when she was most susceptible to
allowing herself to rely on it.
“Okay,” he said, dropping his voice. “You’ve the got the beam behind you. If you turn around and go about
two feet it will be at one o’clock. Just test the height of it with your foot first before you try and step up on
it. I’ll be right next to you in case you need me.”
She froze for one moment, wondering why he was doing that. Why in hell had he just adopted that voice?
The low, soothing one. The one that she’d seen him use to calm a shaking witness or to steady a victim; the
same one she’d heard him adopt on the phone with one of his kids when something was wrong. She let the
baritone of it slide over her despite herself and she realized why he did it.
It did calm; it did soothe.
Her shoulders dropped a little bit, relaxing her slightly in the moment before she turned and heeded his
directions. It was when the beam was in front of her, her toes up against the brick that she finally nearly
reached for him.
Olivia instead rolled her fingers into her palm, her nails biting into the skin.
She lifted her right foot and set it down on the beam before doing the same with her left, getting a feel for
being elevated while blindfolded. She kept a mental picture of the beam in her head, telling herself it was
only a foot and a half off the ground. That was all. If she fell, she wouldn’t break. She’d just have to
remember to roll with the tumble so she didn’t twist anything. It couldn’t be that bad.
Then again, in the blackness that surrounded her, all her body was sensing was that there was only this beam
and air, and the height of it could have placed her five inches or twenty feet off the ground and she wouldn’t
have known the difference.
“You good?” Elliot murmured softly.
Olivia felt herself tune into the sound of him, just off to her right. If she lost her balance, she knew she’d
instinctively fall that way. Towards him. The idea that she knew this so clearly set her on edge again and
she told herself it was what anyone would do.
Anyone would fall towards where they knew there was safety.
Anyone would.
“’Kay Liv, I’m right here, only a foot from you and I’m gonna stay with you as you move. Just do it
one step at a time and don’t lean into the foot you’re lifting. That’s what’s gonna be different than regular
walking. You’ll have to hold your weight back on the foot still on the board."
Olivia anchored herself to his voice. He was calm, even, rational. Reassuring her and giving her directions
methodically.

She started to walk, one step at a time, testing the air, testing the solid beam in front of her before putting
her weight on the foot that was moving. When her foot lifted up every time, there was only the air and the
darkness and she felt the sweat bead and slide down on her lower back. Olivia parted her lips, trying to get
air into her lungs faster.
“Liv, it’s not high. Don’t let yourself go there. It’s less than two feet and I’m right here.”
The inside of Olivia’s left foot connected with the side of the beam as she miscalculated. She felt her
balance slip for just a second.
His voice was immediately closer than it had been a second ago. “You got it. There you go.”
Olivia steadied. His voice remained casual and assured, and she was grateful for it. He was minimizing her
body’s reaction to the exposed nature of the exercise, building her confidence.
“About seven more steps; you’re doing great. When I tell you, just stay still and then we’ll get you down.”
It was as if they were on surveillance and his voice was coming over the wire, into her ear, the words meant
only for her. It was odd that these directions, these few words, were the most he had talked to her in weeks.
That it was now that he had finally realized that she needed him to speak.
Her head played a dangerous game with her, flashing to the images she had seen only hours ago in the
brochures. People dangling thirty or forty feet above the ground, no solid surface beneath them. She had to
remember this was just a children’s game of balance.
An adult’s game of trust.
There was the soft cushion of grass if she fell. That didn’t scare her. Maybe it was the hard planes of Elliot
that did.
Olivia froze on the beam. “El?” she said, her voice stalling just a bit.
“Yeah?”
She flinched, the sound nearer than she expected. “How are other people doing?”
There was just the tiniest hint of laughter in his voice. “It’s not a race, Liv. But everyone else is about
where you are.”
She had never really paid attention to his voice like she was now, but she noticed how he kept letting it free
fall without restraint. It was so deep at the moment that she wondered if anyone else would have even been
able to hear him in her position.
“No,” she paused, wetting her lower lip. “I mean, how are they doing it?”
There was quiet for a second. “They’re all just holding onto their partner.” Silence again. “Just hold onto
me, Liv. It’ll be easier,” he said quietly, each word strained, nearly forced.
It’ll be easier.
Something on her skin tightened as he said it; something in her throat wanted her to protest out loud.
Nothing would ever be easier if she let herself hold onto him. Nothing. Because when he was gone she’d
know what she’d had and that would be worse than not knowing at all.

Olivia had learned from experience. She had held onto him once even though he hadn’t realized it. He had
walked into her apartment and she had told him the mess with her brother didn’t have to bring them both
down. He’d smiled at her and casually shrugged, as if throwing his job away was nothing when she knew it
was everything. Elliot had sat on her couch, mementos of a family that was hers but she didn’t know all
over her coffee table, and he started rifling through a yearbook because he thought she needed company.
In those moments she had given in and let him in just a little bit.
She’d had someone and it wasn’t because of her job, or because someone needed her. It had simply been
because Olivia had needed someone. All of her constants had been snatched away except for Elliot.
She’d needed him.
Of course, he’d decided to go back to his wife.
“It might be easier,” she said quietly. “But I have to learn to do this on my own.”
She hadn’t expected him to respond with anything more than further directions. This was about a ridiculous,
childish balance beam after all.
But then his fingers were firmly on hers and he set them on the curve of his shoulder. “You don’t have to
learn when I’m standing right here,” he said, the sound tinged with impatience.
Without thinking, her hand responded to his presence, settling around the hard, unyielding bulge of his
shoulder. Her stomach suddenly ached and she willed her fingers not to close too tightly on him, struggled
not to grab onto the fabric of his shirt. For the first time she was glad she was blindfolded because she
didn’t want him to see the way her eyes were burning.
He felt good next to her. She didn’t know how else to describe it. It was like that moment in the car when he
had rubbed her neck all those weeks ago. There was this growing urge to lean into him and she tried to tell
herself it was silly. Elliot was just the only familiar thing while the rest of her world was changing.
It was the only reason she was hyper-aware of him these days.
She had to use that heightened awareness to keep him at arm’s length. She was feeling too much and she
knew she was guilty of it because in the moment he had nonchalantly dropped that he was moving home she
had almost made a sound of protest out loud.
Olivia knew better than that. He was moving home, and in some ways that she had no right to spend time
contemplating that in the first place. Dwelling on that fact meant she couldn’t relax around him. It meant her
skin hurt because it was always stretched over her bones.
She had been standing still for long moments before he spoke.
“Olivia,” Elliot said, and she could feel him turn towards her just a little bit because his shoulder shifted
under her hand. “Just trust me, okay?”
Olivia knew he felt her fingers dig into him because he flinched.
His impatience was gone, replaced by the slightest tinge of desperation. Or maybe it was frustration, she
didn’t know. “At least for this just trust me, okay?”
She started moving on the beam because she wasn’t even thinking about the height or the blackness
anymore. At least not the kind of darkness that had to do with her feet right now.
anymore. At least not the kind of darkness that had to do with her feet right now.
This was just the first exercise and she was already unable to breathe through the knot in her chest. She
could only imagine what the rest of the day was going to bring.
“Don’t go too fast,” she pleaded as he moved along with her over those final few steps and then down and
off the beam.
“I’m not going anywhere,” he said and stayed right alongside of her until she was on solid ground again.
+++
The hike would take less than ten minutes to get to the first high ropes exercise, and yet Cathy needed only
two of those minutes to find Olivia and seek her out on the trail.
“So what about Without a Trace? Have you seen that one?” the younger woman asked, her curls bouncing
as she walked. The sling holding her water bottle made the liquid slosh loudly, the sound overpowering
even over the cracking of the branches beneath their feet.
Elliot was on her right, and he was determinedly not paying attention. He was less than four feet away from
a conversation that he was now pretending was not occurring.
Olivia blew out a breath, bracing herself, and wondering if she adopted the surly attitude Elliot had if she
would seem less approachable too.
“Hm?” Olivia responded, raising her eyebrows disinterestedly.
She hadn’t learned. Cathy with a C needed no encouragement. If her audience had a pulse, Olivia was sure
the woman would continue on uninterrupted.
“Without a Trace. Jack Malone and Sam Spade.” Cathy tilted her head, considering something as she
somehow kept pace with Olivia’s long strides despite the fact that was nearly half a foot shorter. “Though
they aren’t technically partners, and they’re fed’s.” She looked up at Olivia her eyes narrowing as
menacingly as she could get them, which wasn’t much. “Bet you don’t like the feds, huh? Bastards always
getting in on your territory?”
Elliot had chosen that moment to take a sip of his water, and he practically sputtered it, coughing and
covering it up in the space of two strides.
Olivia grinned despite herself. “The rivalry is exaggerated on television. The feds are fine most of the time,”
she responded. “We do our best to work alongside them and get the job done.”
Elliot recovered and bit off a curse next to her. “Yeah, Olivia is really good friends with the feds,” he added
helpfully, still not looking at either one of them. “She spends a lot of time working with them whenever she
gets the chance.”
Olivia shot Elliot a look. “El-”
He looked back at her, his eyes clouding. “Whatever,” he muttered, shaking his head and going back to
ignoring them again.
Cathy missed the obvious tension that had seeped into the moment. “You should watch that show,” she
continued on, watching her footsteps and unperturbed by the undercurrents. “Jack and Sam would make a
great couple, and they got together once. But then his wife left him and took the kids and meanwhile she
great couple, and they got together once. But then his wife left him and took the kids and meanwhile she
hooked up with this other FBI agent Martin.” Cathy sniffed loudly with disgust.
Olivia didn’t respond. Neither did Elliot. It was just the three of them and the sound of crunching branches
beneath their feet. Olivia gauged how far ahead the rest of the group was and she decided they were twenty
feet ahead. Twenty steps. Maybe Olivia could close the distance if she picked up her pace.
“Of course,” Cathy cocked her head, peering off into the distance thoughtfully. “Just recently Sam had this
huge secret from her past come up and when she went out of town, Jack followed her. He was the only one
there for her. He really covered her ass because she should have lost her job for what she did. But Jack
risked his job to save her. It was really romantic.” The woman sighed loudly. Dramatically.
Olivia saw Elliot crack his neck to both sides, inhaling and never exhaling. He was doing a lot of that lately.
Olivia wondered if Cathy had an off button, and if Jim might know where it was.
No such luck.
Cathy relentlessly kept on, and Olivia made a mental note to distract Cathy anytime she saw the woman
holding any drink involving caffeine in the future. Maybe the less soda Cathy drank, the quieter she’d be.
“I think they never got together because after his wife took the kids, Jack just became impossible to work
with and Sam gave up on holding out hope. He was brooding all the time and taking out his anger-” Cathy
looked up suddenly, perplexed. “Is everything okay with him?” she asked, tilting her head as she watched
Elliot slightly jog ahead to where Jim was walking with Grant.
Olivia’s eyes raked over Elliot’s back, wondering if Cragen had finally taken a misstep when it came to his
squad. She didn’t think that this weekend was going to get things settled back to where they had been
before.
Somehow she thought that this weekend would change them both forever and that scared the hell out of her.
“He’ll be okay,” Olivia said quietly, more to herself than to Cathy.
For the first time since that morning, Cathy took the hint and kept silent.
Olivia watched Elliot’s back, absorbed the way his posture was stiffer, his head held up a bit more rigidly
than usual. When it had been his turn on the balance beam she had stood by him, waiting for him to set his
hand on her shoulder as she had finally done with him. But he had tied the blindfold himself, telling her just
to tell him when he was nearing the end of the beam.
She’d tried once to help him, to give him directions, and he’d gritted his teeth and told her he could do this
on his own. He’d bit off that he had learned to easily navigate in the dark during his days in the military,
when the danger didn’t lie simply in falling a foot or two but rather in setting off a landmine in the pitch
black heat of the desert.
Sure enough, he had recklessly forged ahead on the beam, nearly falling once but correcting himself
immediately. Olivia had watched the other participants, stared at their easy ability to touch, to laugh, to
fumble through. Yet around their beam the tension was sharp, nearly brutal. She’d been scared to rely on
him and he’d thrown himself into the activity without any regard for his safety, and Olivia had figured that
both approaches were typical for them.
As Elliot had reached the end, he’d whipped off his blindfold before stepping down, instead of asking her
for help. That was him too. He’d rather break the rules than have to ask for help. He’d rather do it himself
than do anything that required talking to her, yet he nearly pushed her to lean on him in the reverse.
than do anything that required talking to her, yet he nearly pushed her to lean on him in the reverse.
She wondered if that was really the crux of their issues. She was terrified of relying on him yet he demanded
that she do so. He had never learned to talk to her, and when she wanted him to, he shut down.
So there they were, trying blindly in the dark to find some way to bridge the gap, to give the other what they
wanted, and miserably failing most of the time.
Cathy and she were almost at the end of the path, nearly at the clearing with the others. The floor of the
woods here was padded in a thick bed of dry leaves left over from last fall. In front of them was a web of
ropes that was strung between two sturdy trees. The top rope and the bottom rope were horizontal, but the
rest of the ropes intersected intermittently and on diagonals, forming haphazard, odd-shaped openings
between them. Some were larger and closer to the ground; others were higher than her shoulder and smaller
in diameter.
Olivia stopped, finally catching up to the group. Instinctively she stood to Elliot’s right, grateful Cathy had
finally sought her fiancé’s side as well.
“Okay. So onto our first real exercise of the day.” Grant smiled enthusiastically at all of them. “This is what
we call the Spider Web and this is a team building exercise. You'll have to learn to trust each other on this
one. The goal of this is to get everyone through the maze of ropes. The trick is that once you use an opening
to get someone through, you can’t use that spot again."
Olivia counted, seeing exactly ten openings. She practically shivered despite the warm temperature. This
was going to require lifting people through the higher slots.
Elliot looked at her out of the corner of his eye.“There’s only four spaces on the bottom,” he said quietly,
his words a simple matter-of-fact statement.
She knew what he was saying. She knew why he was saying it that way. As if he was preparing her for
something that he knew would make her sick, but trying to methodically explain it to her in a way that
would ensure she would calm down.
There were four openings on the bottom. Three in the middle and three up high. Who went through what
spot would be determined by weight and size. With six men in the group, and Hannah having a broader,
muscular frame, Olivia knew that she’d be one of the three that had to go through the very top.
Which meant people lifting her, touching her. Her safety dependent upon strangers in a moment when she’d
be completely vulnerable.
“El-” she whispered, automatically backing away just a little bit.
His hand came up and rested on the back of her neck immediately, and for a moment she was back in that
car with him weeks ago. Elliot’s fingers rubbed into her skin although he didn’t look at her.
“I’m gonna be on the other side by the time it’s your turn. So when they lift you through, I’ll be the first one
to get you,” he whispered, the sound left only between them as the anticipatory chatter around them picked
up.
Elliot finally looked at her as she lifted her face to his.
Out here in the woods, people they didn’t really know surrounding them and being forced to complete an
exercise that went against every instinct they had honed over the years on the job, the only thing she
recognized was him. He was looking at her solemnly, seriously, his eyes empathetic yet urging her to shove
recognized was him. He was looking at her solemnly, seriously, his eyes empathetic yet urging her to shove
the fear down.
Elliot was tense though, far more agitated than even she was. For a moment she didn’t understand why.
Elliot was easily the biggest one here, he’d be able to step right through one of the bottom openings and
then help the rest of them through to the other side. No one would touch him; the ground would be solid
beneath his feet the whole time.
And then it hit her without warning, the dawning recognition so stunning that she almost backed away
again. His anxiety was entirely on her behalf, his understanding of her apprehension so intuitively complete
that every nuance of her fear was evident in his eyes.
“Just focus on me when they lift you,” he said, his fingers stilling on her skin.
Olivia nodded silently, her throat constricted as she acquiesced because there was no other choice. “Cragen
must hate us,” she muttered as she glanced back at the web in front of them.
Next to her, Elliot laughed just a little bit. “No,” he said, his voice lighter than it was only a moment before.
“I think the old man actually might know what he’s doing.”
It was the wry humor in his words that caused her lips to lift as well. It even kept her sane as she noticed a
flash of bright blonde hair making its way over to her again.
Elliot must have noticed too because his fingers dropped away.
Only Cathy didn’t stop next to Olivia, she sidled up on the other side of Elliot instead. For a brief second
Olivia felt the need to warn the younger woman that Elliot wasn’t one to be sidled up to. It was like
watching a small, clueless rabbit heedlessly sauntering up to a sleeping lion.
But Cathy either didn’t have a single ounce of self-preservation or she was wholly fearless. Olivia hadn’t
decided which one yet.
“So,” Cathy said cheerfully, nudging Elliot playfully with her elbow as Olivia watched in horror. “Seems
like Olivia is gonna have to go through the top with me,” she grinned.
Elliot grunted in response. Olivia should have helped him out. Really, she should have. But she was frozen
in place, watching Cathy practically flutter around Elliot’s coiled form.
Cathy was not to be deterred. With Elliot’s lack of response, she came around and stood right in front of
him, personal space be damned. Her small hand came out and lightly batted at Elliot’s arm, which was now
folded tightly with the other across his chest.
“Come on, Elliot. I’ll bet Olivia tells you that you’re awfully grumpy. Besides,” her eyes widened, sparkling
with mischief, “this might be your one and only chance to get your hands all over your partner,” she
winked, a tiny devilish bull devastating the fragile china shop. “C’mon. I’ve seen the way you look at her,
there has to be something there. Just admit it,” she laughed unabashedly.
Jim must have overheard the conversation, because mercifully he was there in that moment, dragging his
pouting fiancé away by the hand while he shot Olivia and Elliot horrified, apologetic looks.
But the damage had been done.
In the moment Cathy had started in, Olivia had made eye contact with Elliot. And by the time Cathy had
teased him about the looks she swore she saw on his face, Olivia’s heart had stopped mid-beat.
teased him about the looks she swore she saw on his face, Olivia’s heart had stopped mid-beat.
She had expected to see annoyance in Elliot’s expression, maybe even anger or tense frustration. Instead,
the one thing that she hadn’t expected to see was there, glaring at her in its breathtaking clarity, the mind-
numbing ramifications dancing over her skin.
Elliot was staring at her, frozen, his face offering up only one single, raw, pure, emotion.
Guilt.
+++
Back to index

Chapter 4 by MaddyM
A/N: Brynn, Cat, Jess. Without you guys I would have found a rock at Camp Susquehanna and climbed
under it. Thank you to you, and to everyone who so very generously reviewed. You've been absolutely,
positively amazing.
+++
Elliot tore his eyes away from Olivia’s.
Jesus H. Christ!
He was finally relaxing just the slightest bit and that talkative woman had to come over and stick her nose
where it didn’t belong. He wanted to be angry with Cathy, but if he was honest he was more pissed off at
himself.
What the hell was he going to do around the squad? He finally recognized that he was attracted to Olivia,
and it was already glaring as bright as a neon billboard for everyone to see. If that woman could see it on
his face, then he didn’t have a prayer against Fin or Munch or damn it all to hell, Cragen.
And worse, based upon the stunned look Olivia just gave him, she saw it too.
Elliot took a deep breath, grinding his jaw as hard as it would withstand just to distract himself. He wanted
to ignore Olivia, to counter whatever she thought she saw on his face with a dissuading silence, but she was
now such a compounded bundle of anxiety that he swore under his breath.
He couldn’t very well ignore her when she was imploding.
Between the exercise ahead of them and his admission by default, she was practically bouncing off the
ground, her fingers flexing and closing repeatedly.
Shit.
He was four hours from being able to take any more pain relievers, and yet his headache was starting a slow
build already.
He chanced a glance at Olivia as he watched Jim take the lead on organizing the group for this one. She was
blinking rapidly, her own jaw tightened, and her eyes wider than they normally were. He knew she was
trying to focus on Jim’s instructions, not because she needed them but because it was something to do, yet
she was failing miserably.
Olivia wasn’t looking at him, so he looked at her again, hoping it would give him a bloody idea of what the
hell to do now. Her chest was practically heaving because she was breathing so hard and he cursed himself
out as his gaze dropped guiltily onto her waist. He wondered if she was going to let him help her through
the exercise now or if she was going to be so pissed off at him that she’d prefer anyone else’s hands on her
than his.
He let himself look too long. As Jim was outlining suggestions as to who would go through where and in
what order, Elliot caught Olivia’s eyes. She seemed apprehensive, searching his face for something,
anything that would settle her again.
Elliot moved closer to her. “Olivia,” he started. “What she said…” he began quietly, for her ears only.

He was going to lie. He was going to outright lie to her if it would calm her before they went into this
challenge. He was going to tell her Cathy was clueless just to set things right, because God forbid Olivia
remain this jumpy and jerk out of someone’s grasp when she was being held six feet off the ground.
But her face lifted to his, her eyes shuttering as if he was going to inflict pain.
What the hell?
“Liv,” he said again, hoping something would come out of his mouth this time.
Olivia visibly braced herself. “Yeah?”
“What Cathy said-” There were words, there had to be.
The group was breaking to start the activity. Olivia waited for a moment, trying to be patient and waiting for
him to finally speak.
He must have taken too long, because she filled the silence, already preparing to participate. “I know,
Elliot,” she said moving past him.
He felt like he was in some alternate universe because she sounded annoyed, disappointed, let down?
All of that instead of glaring at him with fury because he might be attracted to her?
He didn’t know why he did it, but his hand snaked out of its own accord, grabbing her by the elbow. She
smelled good, dammit. Even out here in the fucking forest, Olivia smelled good. Like apples and summer
and damned coconut sunblock. Elliot was too close to her, his lips practically on her ear. He wanted to turn
her all the way around and pull her towards him. He wanted to know what she’d do if he grabbed her hips
and forced her look at him, gave her no other choice because he’d be so close to her that she wouldn’t know
where else to go.
“What the hell do you mean ‘you know’?” he said irritably, trying to ignore the whisper of her breath on his
skin.
Olivia’s huge eyes were the color of dark walnut, her pupils dilated as she stared at him. “I know what
you’re going to say. Cathy likes to see things where there isn’t anything.” Olivia tried to shrug casually, but
she gave up on the gesture mid-movement. Her shoulders simply fell instead as she licked her lips and
looked away from him and towards the net.
Elliot wanted to punch something, and if Grant Ludwig didn’t keep his damned nosy glances to himself in
the next two minutes, Elliot was going to nominate him as the recipient of a well-needed right hook. He
needed to think, he just needed to be able to think, because Olivia’s voice was too small, too fragile to have
him believe she was sincere about her casual, dismissive words.
Without thinking his thumb started moving on the inside of her bare elbow, drawing small circles on her
skin. “Olivia, I’d never be inappropriate with you,” he finally managed, trying to make her believe it. Or
make himself believe it, one of the two.
Christ, he was rubbing her as he said it.
She pulled out of his grasp, never looking at him.
Terrific. He was declaring he’d never be inappropriate with her while touching her inappropriately.

Brilliant.
“I know,” she said, her back straightening. She cast one last glance at him before heading off to join the
group. “Trust me. We’re just partners and you don’t have to worry because I’m very clear on that,” she said
flatly.
Before he could ever recover, before he could process let alone decipher the defensive tone of her voice, she
was off.
In seconds, she was already surrounded by the strangers they sometimes seemed to know better than they
even knew each other.
+++
Olivia watched Elliot and Carl easily step through two of the bottom openings, leaving Jim and Leo as the
largest participants on their side with the right and left bottom webs open for them to go through at the end.
She knew how this would work. Tyler would be next, going through the middle, giving them three men on
either side. Then the three of them; Jessica, Cathy and Olivia, would go through the top. Finally, Colin and
Hannah would be put through the middle before Jim and Leo would step through the bottom.
Tyler stepped up to the ropes, smiling broadly and crossing his arms over his chest as they lined up on either
side of him. “Crowd surfing paid for by Kodak,” he laughed, winking at Jessica.
Jessica rolled her eyes. “Yeah, too bad the last crowd you surfed almost dropped you on your head,” she
said dryly. She looked at Olivia for some reason, as if Olivia’s non-response begged for Jessica to explain.
“We went to the Buckcherry concert two months ago, and idiot over here just falls into the crowd without
thinking and ends up being passed eight rows before they forgot about him and practically dropped him
headfirst.”
Olivia didn’t know how she was supposed to respond to that, but she felt everyone’s eyes on her. Why had
Jessica sought her out for this tidbit? She had enough spinning around in her head right now without the
added burden of conversation.
She tried to smile, tried to pretend she knew who the hell Buckcherry was. “Bet that was a total bitch,” she
said finally and then looked at Elliot.
He was staring at the ground smiling, amused by her lame attempt to participate in a conversation she knew
nothing about. Olivia was mesmerized by it, by the way was he was entertained when she said something
only he knew was completely out of character for her.
He must have felt her eyes on him, because he looked up and the tension was gone. This terrifying exercise,
Cathy’s insane comments, the moment of guilt she had seen on Elliot. The ramifications of all of it fell away
instantly as he looked at her.
Don’t forget I’m gonna catch you. The sooner you let them send you over, the sooner we are on the same
side again.
Just like that, Olivia calmed.
“It was a crazy bitch,” Tyler said, laughing loudly and drawing the same reaction from Jessica, whose face
immediately softened as she locked eyes with him.

Olivia didn’t get what was so funny, but she didn’t care. The look passed between Tyler and Jessica had
shut her up, slamming into her with recognition. It was a look of connection, of something far deeper than
friendship. It was a shared memory, an innate understanding. It was silent communication, an entire
conversation said only with a look.
It was talking.
She had always thought Elliot didn’t talk to her.
She had been wrong.
Olivia stepped forward as all of them stretched their arms out, not touching but aligning their arms as if they
were the teeth of a zipper. Tyler finally dropped back into the cradle, his lean yet muscular body stiff yet
relaxed. He wasn’t worried about this game; his safety had been entrusted to drunk strangers in the past so
this meant little to him.
She wondered what that was like. To easily offer trust, to believe in it until it was proved wrong instead of
the other way around.
They passed Tyler through the middle slot, Elliot and Carl bracing him on the other side and easily setting
him down. Tyler brushed his hands together, bouncing a little bit on his toes from the surge of adrenaline as
he prepared to help the next one through, his smile never wavering.
Olivia was glad he had gone first. He had made it look easy, made this exactly what it was. A game. This
wasn’t about letting people touch her; this wasn’t about taking her life in her hands. It was simply supposed
to be about finding a small bit of trust for people she didn’t know.
But that’s where the game had failed; because five feet away from her was the single person she trusted
most of all. She didn’t have to worry about having faith in anyone else, because she wouldn’t need them.
Not really. If push came to shove, Elliot would handle this on his own.
“Okay,” Jim grinned. “Who’s next?” he asked, looking at his fiancé.
Olivia glanced at Elliot again. His face was impassive, seemingly without expression. There was no panic on
his face, no anger. There was just his unwavering confidence, his expectation that she would toughen up and
do as she was asked and he’d have her back while she did it.
The sooner you do it, the sooner we’re on the same side.
There were three guys on the other side, and yet she’d only really need one of them.
“I’ll go,” she heard herself say.
Elliot’s lips curved upwards in pride just a little bit.
‘Atta woman, Benson.
Olivia found herself actually smiling as she backed up to the line of people who would have to be
considered her teammates. She could do this. She could. If she just slammed her eyes shut, it would be over
before she knew it.
Behind her, she heard Jim give her the go ahead to fall back into their waiting arms as soon as she was
ready.

She swallowed back the twinge of nausea, forced herself to breathe as she did this. Her body was stiff
already, and she knew that it would help them get her through.
“Top middle,” Jim instructed to the group assembled on her side one last time.
Olivia had goose bumps, and although her back was to the net as she crossed her arms over her chest, she
wished she could steal one last glance at Elliot.
There was no time. No way to do it without being obvious, without betraying her fear.
“You’re good, Liv,” came Elliot’s voice.
Olivia closed her eyes and let herself fall back into the outstretched arms, realizing that while Elliot
sometimes talked to her silently, there were other times when he heard her loud and clear although she
hadn’t said a word.
She felt herself being lifted, felt hands on her back, her thighs, her ankles. Some grips were stronger than
others, some shook and some were steady. The ground was farther and farther from her, and she could feel
her grasp on her equilibrium slip as she was jostled. The rope bumped into her left arm and then it was gone
and she knew this was where she was going to be passed through.
She ignored them touching her. It didn’t matter. It didn’t matter.
She was headed for Elliot.
It was then that she felt it, a set of hands that her body recognized.
“Almost done, Liv,” he said softly, the sound coming from beneath her to the right. “Almost done.”
His strong hands settled on her lower back, and because he was touching her she didn’t feel anyone else.
Elliot’s fingers were strong, collapsing as she was lowered, the flat of his palm connecting with skin where
her shirt lifted slightly from the movement.
His hands were on her skin.
Bare, naked skin.
And he couldn’t do anything about it, because shifting now would place her balance in jeopardy. His entire
hand was on her lower back, just above the waistline of her jeans. Open. Hot. A brand that marked her. She
squeezed her eyes shut, trying not to flinch from the searing, shattering contact. But Jesus Christ, Elliot’s
hand was wide open, pushing against her body and she could feel his rough fingertips move slightly as she
was lowered.
She was warm; she was far too warm. Her cheeks were scalding, her skin achy. Elliot was taking her weight
now, taking responsibility for standing her upright. Tyler and Carl were letting him bear the brunt of her for
the last moment, allowing him to be the one to help her stand.
But it meant that his hand slipped up her bare back just a little bit. Higher. Sliding along her lower spine. It
meant when Tyler finally let go of her legs that Elliot wrapped his arms around her, pulling her fully against
him until she was steady.
Her breasts raked along the hard wall of his chest, her hands immediately fisting in the material of his shirt
around his waist. Olivia’s feet connected with the ground but she didn’t have her balance back yet so she
stumbled for the briefest second.
stumbled for the briefest second.
It was enough. Her eyes finally flew open, met with the darkened, smoky depths of his only inches from her.
Both of Elliot’s hands were on her skin now, holding her waist, half covered by her shirt. “You good?” he
growled softly, both of them already seemingly being ignored by everyone as they prepared to put Cathy
through.
It was the slightest movement, but she felt it. In the second before his hands fell away from her body, his
thumb swiped determinedly higher, rubbing purposefully against her lower back and nearly pushing into her
skin to urge her towards him.
Heat flooded her, knocking her breath away. “Elliot…” she managed, nearly protesting in the moment he
finally, nearly reluctantly, slipped out of her shirt.
But he was still looking at her as she found her footing, his gaze hungry. Oh God, this was Elliot for God’s
sake. Her partner.
Her partner who had just had his hands on her bare back. Who was looking at her almost drowsily. Who
was so close to her that his breath was on her skin, the memory of his fingers still imprinted on her as if
staking their claim through pure heat alone.
Her partner.
The one who was moving home. To reunite with his wife.
Every single sensation her body was capable of was on alert. She didn’t want to know why everything hurt,
why she wanted to step forward again and pray he’d touch her like that one more time. She didn’t want to
know why there was a slow throb building in places it had no business to build and why she felt dizzier now
on the ground than she had moving through the air.
She didn’t want to know why Elliot’s suddenly dark, possessive eyes had just fallen to her chest for one
second.
But she knew.
It had only taken a single moment for not knowing to suddenly become a luxury of the past.
The evidence of her arousal was probably obvious to him because he knew too, he had felt her on him, had
likely heard the startled hitch of her breath and the way she had stayed against him for a split second too
long after she had been set on her feet.
She knew what he could see on her face, only he wasn’t avoiding looking at it like she had done to him only
minutes earlier before this little game had begun.
Elliot was looking at her, his jaw rigid and his eyelids lowered dangerously. He was taking it all in, and if
anything he seemed a little too satisfied with what she was fully aware he saw on her face.
Guilt.
+++
He wanted her.

Ever since that exercise in the woods earlier this afternoon he had been trying to comprehend what the hell
it meant that he had to consciously try and avoid flaunting a complete hard-on for his partner.
He wanted her. Beneath him, over him, in front of him. It didn't matter. His want wasn't picky, so long as it
involved her.
Which meant he was fucked. Royally. Fully. It was the kind of fucked that came with a marching band and
dancing girls, a banner blowing the breeze that read You’re a Jackass, Stabler.
He was relieved that today was entirely about building rapport with the group and that the high ropes
weren’t until tomorrow because he couldn’t deal with the intensity of those exercises yet. Balance beams,
that charade in the woods, this damned scavenger hunt Ludwig was droning on and on about, those things he
could manage.
Watching her deal with her fear of heights, having her need him, needing to touch her - those things he
didn’t know if he could be entrusted with yet. He was bound to fuck them up because he wanted her.
Sexually.
As in, he wanted to fucking touch her again.
As in he wanted to get his hands on her skin, wanted to feel those maddening breasts pressed against him,
wanted to get his blasted mouth hard on hers so that he wouldn’t have to wonder what Olivia tasted like.
What Olivia Benson tasted like. Detective Benson. His partner.
Elliot closed his eyes and tried to breathe. He couldn’t panic. Not yet. He couldn’t fall apart just because he
finally realized what most of the crap between them for the last two years had probably been about.
Couldn’t combust just because his body finally clued his head in. Couldn’t implode just because he had
been a complete idiot for not realizing sooner that his frustration with her, his anger towards her, was
because he needed, wanted something more from her.
He wanted to think this was about pure, straight raw sex. He had tried to sell himself that bill of goods as
they had walked down the trail back to the campsite. In the moments that she had pulled away, when she
had actually initiated a conversation he couldn’t hear with Cathy simply to get away from him, he had tried
to tell himself that he was normal. He’d been living as a single guy for almost two full years, and single
guys, hell, men in general, would be attracted to Olivia.
She didn’t possess a normal type of beauty. She was exotic, dangerous, sexy. Her eyes were seductive, her
lips too full, her body…her body…
Well, fuck.
Maybe it hadn’t been normal in the years he had seen her strictly as his partner. A beautiful partner, but his
partner nonetheless. Kathy had pressed him a few times, tried to seem casual as she teased him with no
humor that he must think Olivia was attractive. He’d denied it. Emphatically. And then as time went on,
maybe too emphatically. A year before their separation, Kathy had asked him again for what amounted to
the last time and he’d glared at her angrily, telling her the shtick was getting old and she had flinched,
walking away, knowing the pretense of kidding about it was over.
Maybe he hadn’t simply been annoyed by the repetitive conversation; maybe he had finally been guilty of
the no-longer playful accusation.

Maybe when Kathy stopped asking, it was because she had already gotten her answer.
There had been a moment in a case a few months ago when some drunk kids on FaceSpace had left a video
blog where they had hurled insults at both him and Olivia. He had been in Judge Donnelly’s office, trying
to remain impassive as he stood next to Casey and enduring the teens speculation over whether or not he
and Olivia had ever had sex. He had been angry, irate, furious that they had taking a shot at Olivia. He’d
been pissed that those punks had accused them of the gossip that flew around the NYPD.
It was a blog Kathleen had found. One of which she had never mentioned the content, though she usually
wasn’t shy at all when it came to calling him out on shit.
Elliot’s back hurt now, the tension seeping down his spine. Christ. Did even his kids know he was attracted
to Olivia?
He was supposed to move home, dammit. He’d slept with Kathy. God, he couldn’t even properly think of
her as his wife these days but he’d still had the gall to kiss her, touch her, fit himself inside of her and then
walk away.
Even worse, as he had climbed out of bed that night, Kathy hadn’t stopped him from leaving either. There
hadn’t been a single question; she hadn’t repeated that one word.
Stay.
He wondered if two people could make the exact same mistake at the exact same time.
He looked at Olivia. She was avoiding him, returning Ludwig’s too frequent smiles while talking to Cathy,
suddenly attached at the hip to a woman she probably didn’t even like.
Sex. Avoidance.
Yeah, he told himself, two people could make the same mistake at precisely the same time and fuck it all up.
“You want to be partners?” came the voice from his right.
Elliot looked at Jim, trying to figure out what the man meant. No, he had a partner, thank you very much.
Even if she was avoiding him like the plague, she was still his.
His partner. Not simply his.
He had to keep this crap straight. Hell.
Jim smiled easily, displaying the same patience for Elliot that he had offered Cathy earlier. It pissed Elliot
off that this man seemed to have the disposition of Dalai Lama when he himself was feeling a bit more like
that wrestler Dickie always watched on WWE. Elliot almost laughed out loud as he recalled the huge
wrestler, the one that went by the name The Alpha Male and who was famous for heedlessly pouncing on
his opponents.
“Ludwig said we have to split up for the scavenger hunt, can’t be with our normal partners. Looks like
Cathy and Olivia are going to do this one together. You want to pair up?” Jim explained.
Elliot nodded once. “Sure.”
He liked the guy. Well, as much as he could for not having put in much effort to get to know him. In their
few brief conversations at lunch or on the hike, he had learned the basics and that was enough. He was
few brief conversations at lunch or on the hike, he had learned the basics and that was enough. He was
thirty-one, a corporate financial advisor, graduated from Yale. Had been on the crew team and had just
bought a four-bedroom house north of Buffalo although Cathy wasn’t going to move in until after the
wedding. He was patient. Solid. Uncomplicated.
Jim was also the least irritating of all the other possibilities. He wasn’t Tyler who seemed to think he would
eventually get in Jessica’s pants. He wasn’t Carl who spent half his time texting on his Blackberry. He
wasn’t Leo, who didn’t say much and he wasn’t Colin, who couldn’t say enough.
Elliot grimaced. Then again, Leo and Colin were now purposefully making their way over to where he and
Jim stood.Their pending arrival didn’t bode well for the next one point five hours that were scheduled for
this ridiculous scavenger hunt.
“So,” Colin said brightly, smiling enthusiastically and very pointedly at Elliot as they approached. “Looks
like Team Rah Rah Kodak over there is splitting up amongst themselves. With your two women already
matched up, seems we need to split you two or Leo and I will be stuck together. Which, as you heard from
Grant,” he paused, his eyes widening for effect, “is against the rules and of course we can’t have that.”
Elliot glared at him. He widened his stance and arched an eyebrow, wondering where Olivia was and why
she wasn’t protesting about this activity. He spotted her then, off to his right. Ludwig had walked over to
her and Cathy and was now trying to be overly helpful in pointing out places to look for the items on the
scavenger hunt list. Of course the bastard was looking at her chest half the time instead.
He couldn’t beat the shit out of him. He couldn’t. He was pretty sure kicking Ludwig’s ass wouldn’t let him
qualify as having completed the damned course, and that would be disobeying Cragen’s direct order.
Shit.
Colin was staring at him expectantly. He needed to give Colin the okay on the joyous little bit of news, but
no words would come out of his mouth.
Jim glanced warily at Elliot’s silence and then filled the space. “Okay. You and I can pair up,” he said to
Colin.
Colin dragged his eyes away from Elliot, seemingly disappointed. Elliot narrowed his gaze at the smaller
man. Did the guy have a death wish? Did he really think he would have been better paired off with Elliot?
Elliot folded his arms across his chest. He was losing his effectiveness when it came to intimidation if even
Colin wasn’t at all frightened of him.
It was just one more thing he was going to need to work on.
Leo was the quieter of the two at least. Maybe the two of them would manage to do this without having to
really speak much at all.
By the time Leo handed him the list that was stapled to the envelope for the game, Colin and Jim were
already off, heading towards the trail on the northbound side.
Leo glanced at Elliot. “Have you seen what they want us to find?” The tone of his voice was tinged with
disbelief.
Elliot skimmed the list. There were the normal things, and then some not so normal. He scanned down,
processing some of the things required. A fern, a feather, berries, a wishbone shaped twig, a piece of water-
worn green glass, a forget-me-not.
worn green glass, a forget-me-not.
“What the hell does a forget-me-not look like,” Elliot muttered, never lifting his eyes from the list.
“I’m gay. Doesn’t mean I’m a damned florist,” Leo grumbled back.
Elliot’s head whipped up. He was surprised by what he saw there. Leo seemed to be as annoyed on this
camping trip as Elliot felt. Aside from Olivia, Elliot had thought the rest of them were voluntarily on this
retreat. “You seem about as happy to be here as me,” Elliot offered as magnanimously as he could.
The side of Leo’s mouth twitched. “I’m being dragged here by my balls. Something about how I don’t
communicate and I need to learn to play nicely with others.”
“You too?” Elliot said, absently thinking that he needed to thank Jim for volunteering to go with Colin.
Colin had been more than Elliot could handle right now, but he got the impression that Colin was more than
Leo could handle right now as well.
Leo shrugged. “Hey, I’ve been through boot camp. I figured this weekend would be easier than sitting home
learning to open up about my feelings.”
“Boot camp?” Elliot repeated, suddenly interested. “Army? Marines?”
“Marines. Boot camp in San Diego then stationed at Camp Pendleton.” He nodded towards Elliot’s tattoo,
visible ever since Elliot had pulled his sleeves up a few hours earlier. “What about you?”
“Parris Island, then Quantico.” Elliot let the envelope dangle from his fingertips.
He didn’t like the feeling that he had stereotyped Leo and even worse was that he had been proven wrong.
He had assumed things to be one way, although in reality they were really another.
There was something unsettling about realizing that what he had expected wasn’t at all close to the truth.
It made him feel like despite the fact that he was a detective, when it came down to it, he could miss the
signs.
Jesus, if that was true, he didn’t want to begin to think of what else he could be missing. And he definitely
didn’t want to be wondering about why he was suddenly thinking of Olivia.
“You still in the Corps?” Elliot asked, the growing knot in his stomach filling him with unease.
Leo shrugged, looking past Elliot and towards the eastbound trail. The one they’d probably take. “No.
Apparently the ‘don’t tell’ part of the policy should have included my mother. When I was close to being
shipped out to Iraq, she freaked out and spilled to my CO about Colin to get me discharged.” His voice was
hard, bitter, hollow. “Never got to serve with my unit.”
Elliot rocked back on his heels. He didn’t know what the hell to say.
When he had first assessed Leo he had seen the logos on his clothing, taking in Colin’s personality and
made the assumption he wouldn’t have anything in common with the man. It wasn’t about the man’s sexual
preferences. He didn’t judge Leo’s lifestyle no matter what the Catholic religion said. He’d seen too many
fucked up heterosexual relationships, including his own, to judge any two people who made the choice to
stay together, no matter their gender.

But here he was, being shown that he was wrong about the person that stood in front of him. That he had
been blind not to notice Leo’s posture, his stance, the capable look in his eyes that only military training
would give him, and the haunted look in those same eyes that conveyed a sense of futility.
Demons seemed to come in all forms, affecting all of them. Maybe happy-go-lucky didn’t exist anymore.
Maybe it was hard for everyone, and maybe he wasn’t as different from the general population as he always
felt he was.
Leo, like him, wasn’t interested in sharing much. “Did you get to the part on the list where it says we need
to find evidence of animal life?” Leo asked dryly, changing the subject.
Elliot glanced back at the list, seeing it listed at number nineteen. He grinned. “What do you think Ludwig
would say if we showed up with a pile of deer shit?”
The other man cracked a smile. “If you find the shit, I’ll carry it. Because honestly, seeing that prick’s face
when we dump it in the middle of his Circle of Love might just make this whole bloody weekend
worthwhile.”
Elliot found himself chuckling a little bit as they headed belligerently for the east trail, although he kept the
newly forming thought to himself.
He didn’t know what Olivia would say if he told her what he was thinking.
She’d probably look at him with disbelief, maybe even with betrayal that he no longer shared her irritation.
That he was no longer annoyed with Cragen, that he had actually stopped thinking about that bastard Parker.
That he wasn’t as miserable as maybe he should have been, stuck out here in the woods and looking for
some goddamned flower that he couldn’t forget because he didn’t know what it looked like in the first place.
He might be a bastard for not wanting to care about anything back home for a day or two, but it felt good. It
was as if Manhattan was a continent away, the rush of traffic replaced in his ears by the quiet rocking of the
lake, the stale air of the squad room replaced by the heat of the sun on his neck.
There was a sense of freedom out here. Freedom to finally breathe, to think, to feel something other than
fear and terror and anger.
Freedom to figure out this thing that had been innocuously haunting him with Olivia, and to decide how he
wanted to handle a life he had likely already left behind in his heart.
Of course, first things were first.
And right now, dropping a pile of deer shit on Ludwig’s lap was starting to sound like a damned good idea.
+++
Back to index

Chapter 5 by MaddyM
A/N: Okay, so of my three tasks this weekend: post Construction epilogue, post next chap of Ropes and
respond to reviews, I've done two of the three. :-) Reviews up next tonight. Thank you endlessly for the
encouragement on this one, I am beyond thrilled that this is being received as a lighter one. There will be
high ropes soon, I promise.
Thank you Brynn for beta-ing this so thoroughly and wonderfully while my beta (grin) is out of town. Jess,
hurry home, I miss you. Thank you Cat for being you and Pooks, because your notes always make me want
to write. And thank you to Timmy, because this girl needs some M/S in her life apparently.
"Do you watch General Hospital?"
Olivia tried to focus on the task at hand instead of encouraging Cathy. She was crouched down in a patch of
weeds looking for a clover that was at least an inch across. This couldn't be that hard, although it could be
that ridiculous. She was used to crouching at a crime scene, looking for clues.
She was presently sorting through weeds instead.
Olivia sighed. Her only consolation was that somewhere not too far from here, at this very moment, Elliot
probably was doing the same thing too.
She smiled a little at that thought as she stood up; convinced this particular patch of weeds wouldn't yield
any clovers. "Can't say that I have," Olivia said absently, scanning the ground for another potential source.
Cathy was looking for a red flower of any kind. "There were these two characters, Robert and Anna. Maybe
you're more like them. Although they were WSB super-spies at heart. Both of them had also been Police
Commissioner at some point. They always had each other's backs, you know? Even when they were off with
other people, in the end, it was always about coming back to the other one."
Olivia wondered if Cathy was told that she had to pay by the word if she would use so many. She was also
oddly annoyed that she had just been downgraded in Cathy's mind from a primetime crime fighting duo to
one on a daytime soap opera. The startling realization the she was becoming desensitized to Cathy's
outrageousness snapped her out of her fog.
"Yeah, Elliot and I considered the whole super-spy route, then decided against it," Olivia said casually.
"Something about him not being able to get home to his wife and kids enough."
She figured that tidbit ought to do it. It would take Cathy at least a few minutes to ponder that turn of events.
Which would mean a few moments of silence. Awkward silence, but silence nonetheless.
Olivia would take what she could get.
She had underestimated the woman. "He's married?" she practically sputtered, freezing in place, her mouth
forming a perfect O.
It had been a flip comment, a way to stop Cathy's speculation. It wasn't supposed to sound like that when
said so starkly, so incredulously by someone else. It wasn't supposed to hit her in the gut when repeated
back to her. It wasn't...
It wasn't supposed to make a difference.

Olivia shrugged. "Yeah."
Cathy had dropped all pretense of the scavenger hunt. She walked over to where Olivia had just sat herself
down on the huge, formidable fallen log, looking for the stupid clovers. "But he doesn't wear a ring," Cathy
said dejectedly.
Olivia leaned back, forgetting about the clovers and letting the sun seep into her cheeks. The
damned clovers were depressing anyways. One out of hundreds would be good luck, which meant what
exactly about all the others? That they would lie in patches, ignored, forgotten about, never celebrated
because they hadn't managed to grow an extra leaf?
The four-leafed ones were mutants, Olivia decided. Mutants to be avoided at all costs.
"Olivia," Cathy repeated, her voice dropping into a serious tone Olivia hadn't heard from her before. "Does
he just not want people to know he's married? Is it for his family's safety?" She came around and sat next to
Olivia, apparently not knowing the first thing about personal space.
She was tired. Out here, in the woods, away from Elliot for a few moments, Olivia realized how exhausted
she was. How she didn't want to think about Elliot and Kathy and work and the victims. She didn't want to
think about Simon, about her father, or even about the way she had lost it with Thatcher. She didn't want to
think about her small apartment, or the noise, or the traffic.
She just wanted to have something away from all of that. A moment of normalcy so mundane that it would
border on the absurd.
She wanted to tell someone.
What exactly she wanted to tell, she didn't know. But she wanted to speak, to let some of the constriction
out of her chest, to say things that wouldn't surprise someone listening simply because extended
conversation in the sound of her voice was typically unheard of.
Olivia thought of the old saying about trees in the woods and wondered if it pertained to her as well. If a
woman talks in the woods but no one really hears her, has she really spoken at all?
She looked at Cathy, wondering if she was betraying Elliot by talking. But then she got the feeling that she
was betraying herself if she didn't. "He was separated for awhile. They're working it out."
Cathy's green eyes calmed. The bright zealousness faded into something akin to sincerity. "Oh," she said.
Oh.
For all of Cathy's non-stop chatter, in the moment Olivia finally wanted to participate, the woman had
nothing to say. Olivia sighed, and went to push herself up, determined to find the blasted clover.
But Cathy stopped her. She reached out with her hand and gently touched Olivia's wrist from where she was
still sitting. "Must be hard to watch him go through that," she said almost quietly.
It had been a mistake to talk because this hurt like hell. She didn't need sympathy or understanding from a
woman she didn't know. She didn't even deserve it because she didn't have any rights when it came to Elliot
anyway. His hand could scald her, her body could pull a Benedict Arnold and react to his, but in the end, he
still didn't owe her anything.
Olivia shrugged, stiffening internally yet finding herself collapsing back onto the log. "Just want him to be
happy."
happy."
"For what it's worth," Cathy started, picking a daisy that had sprouted near the log and beginning to pick its
yellow petals off one by one. "He's obviously really protective of you."
Olivia knew this was a mistake. To sit here and do nothing with a stranger when she had been assigned a
task was straight out foolish. Lazy. But she wasn't getting up, and that unsettled her more than anything.
"It's his job to be. And vice versa," she dismissed.
Cathy smiled indulgently. "So what kind of detective are you?"
She turned to face Cathy, seeing a new side to the younger woman. For the last few minutes Cathy had
quieted, her voice dropping an octave and all of her extraneous movements stilling. Her face was bright,
earnest, her eyes full of hope and potential. Olivia wondered what it would be like to be her. To see
strangers as future friends, to insist on caring about someone else's life when it wasn't essentially because
they were a victim and required help.
It would have been like killing Bambi's mother at this point if Olivia lied to her. She just couldn't lie to a
woman like this, not to one who still represented enthusiasm and promise.
"SVU," Olivia said. "Special Victims."
Cathy's small nose wrinkled. "What does that mean? Like celebrities?"
Olivia let out a small rueful sound as she watched Cathy's pink nails slowly pick apart the flower. "No.
Sexually based crimes. Child abuse. Rape. Those sort of things."
She knew the moment she saw the fingers still what was coming, yet she couldn't believe it. It was almost as
if she wanted to run, to not hear the words, to let something, someone be untouched. She didn't want to
think about the fact that even hope wasn't perfect, that even earnestness wasn't enough protection.
"I went through that for four years," Cathy offered, her fingers once again playing with the petals. She didn't
look at Olivia, but she didn't sound choked either.
Olivia was the only one choking. She didn't want to hear what had happened. Not to this woman. Not to
someone who carried innocence on her sleeve, who elicited tender smiles from her fiancé, who was
determined to make friends and approach every task with a childlike excitement.
No.
Jesus, no.
"My step-father," Cathy continued. "I was eight when he started coming into my room at night, and it took
him dying of a heart attack for it to end. I was too young to even know what rape was in the beginning, and
by the end of it, he had me convinced that's not what it was. "
"Cathy," Olivia started, her chest tight again, suffocating her even here, even away from the city. "I'm so
sorry. I had no idea." Her eyes were burning, the helplessness taking over.
Even here, even in the woods. Even amongst freedom, there was a hidden price.
"Don't be." Cathy looked up at Olivia, her eyes devoid of tears, of horror. She was still clear, solid, and
unshakeable despite her confession. "Everyone told me he had a heart attack, but I pretended it was that his
body finally realized he didn't have a heart at all." She smiled. "In any case, I wouldn't be me today if he
body finally realized he didn't have a heart at all." She smiled. "In any case, I wouldn't be me today if he
hadn't taught me who not to be."
Olivia knew about denial, about covering things up, about repressing things. But Cathy wasn't fitting into
any of those categories. She wasn't wavering, and it didn't make sense. For everything Olivia knew about the
after-effects on children who suffered through that kind of trauma, Cathy was the antithesis. Children of
abuse were often times more withdrawn, socially cautious, secretive. Or they went the other way and
became promiscuous risk-takers.
Cathy was genuinely open, exuberantly getting married, unafraid.
"You okay?" Cathy asked.
Olivia nodded, not having words. "Yeah, I mean, I usually only deal with the victims immediately after we
find them, but I guess I just didn't expect, I didn't guess that..."
"I talk too much to fit the profile?" Cathy said bluntly, smiling knowingly.
Olivia found herself smiling too. "Yeah."
Cathy finally picked off the last of the petals. The specks of yellow fell onto her khaki pants and she
brushed them off, standing up and facing Olivia. "He told me not to talk, Olivia. Not to say anything, that no
one would listen or believe me even if I did. And I did what I was told. For four years I hid, I stayed silent."
She looked at the ground, her eyes crinkling a little as she smiled gently. "After he died, I told myself never
again would I hold back. If I had something to say, I was gonna say it. Because you know what? It was the
silence that kept me vulnerable. It was my inclination to stay silent that made me weak. If I had spoken up,
someone, somewhere would have heard me and I would have saved myself a lot of pain."
Olivia blew out a breath, dragging her eyes away from the truth in Cathy's. She scanned the ground, seeing
patches of weeds she had ignored before and wondering if one of them would have the clover.
"So yeah," Cathy continued. "I might talk a lot, or too much, but it's better than not saying anything at all.
No one hears you if you stay silent," she concluded emphatically.
"You learned all that at twelve?" Olivia asked quietly.
Cathy shook her head. "No. It took time. I didn't want to trust anyone." She lifted her chin belligerently,
even now, even after all these years, needing to stare the alternative in the face with defiance. "But then all I
knew was that I didn't want him to have that. If I let him take my trust then he had everything. And he didn't
deserve anything. So I trust people, Olivia. Maybe to a fault. I trust them time and time again until I'm sure
they don't deserve it anymore. It's the ultimate insult that I can give him. If I end up happy, then he failed.
He gets nothing, and I get everything."
Olivia had never felt her jaw lock like it was now. No one had ever rendered her this silent, this humbled.
And yet the startling words were being delivered by a woman Olivia had dismissed as both flighty and
shallow. Olivia thought about the legacy her father had left with her, with her mother. She carried on that
legacy every time she shut down, every time she walked away from hoping or needing something.
She thought about how much influence she had given her father in her life, how much she had let him take
away. She looked up at Cathy. "You think you'll end up happy?" Olivia asked, her heart having dropped into
her stomach.
Cathy smiled. "Maybe. Nothing's a guarantee, right? The best I can do is stack the odds in my favor."

Before Olivia could stop her, Cathy took four steps into a patch of weeds, yanked out a clover nearly double
in size from what they needed, and stuffed it into the manila envelope.
"You ready?" Cathy asked, tilting her head to the side.
Olivia's head hurt as she thought about all of the things she kept silent about over the years. Her mother's
drinking, her lineage, her nightmares. She kept silent about her fears, the ways in which the cases affected
her, the loneliness that wouldn't let her sleep some nights.
And then she thought about Elliot. She thought about all the things she had never said to him before she had
run to Oregon, and the way she had so desperately wanted to ask him to help her when Simon had come to
her looking for money. She thought about his casual confession that he was moving home and the way it had
ripped her lungs out. She thought about his hand on her skin and the terrifying knowledge that lurked deep
within her that she wouldn't give voice to, and the way that some nights, in the darkest part of them, she
would wake up and only be able to sleep again by pulling her pillow against her chest. She'd pretend she
was back in a car weeks ago, surrounded simply by him, by his fingers on her neck, by a sense that she'd get
through it because he wouldn't let her do anything less.
"Hey Olivia, you ready?" Cathy prodded again.
Olivia pushed herself off the log, taking the list from Cathy's outstretched hand. "Maybe," she said under
her breath. "Maybe."
As they made their way farther down the trail, Olivia felt like she owed Cathy something in return.
"Mulder and Scully," Olivia said.
Cathy's eyebrows raised. "Yeah?" she said, a tinge of excitement in her voice.
Olivia grinned. "From the few episodes I saw? Yeah. Just minus the aliens."
+++
"So how was your hunt?" Elliot asked, holding his plate and standing awkwardly across from where she
was sitting at the picnic table.
Olivia looked up at him, smiling a bit. "You make it sound like we went looking for wild boar."
The corner of his lips rose, but he didn't make eye contact with her. "Probably woulda been easier," he
muttered, seemingly making a difficult decision and settling down on the picnic bench across from her. He
dropped his plate heavily onto the worn wood slats of the table. "I'm surprised you two didn't win."
Olivia set her hamburger down, reaching for her bottle of Gatorade. "Why us?"
Elliot stabbed his plastic fork into the mound of potato salad that filled half his plate. Behind him, Harry was
still animatedly grilling up hotdogs, hamburgers and chicken breasts slathered in a honey barbeque sauce.
The sizzle of the grill stood out in her ears, unfamiliar and calming all at once. "Well, you pair an
overachiever with an overly enthusiastic -"
"Don't say it, El." Olivia said, pulling the bottle away from her lips and cutting him off.
His eyes lifted in surprise. "What, you're best friends with Chatterbox over there all of a sudden?"

Olivia suddenly didn't want to talk about it. She changed the subject. "Never mind. So what about you? How
come you didn't win? You didn't want to take home the stunning pair of Camp Susquehanna backpacks?"
Elliot's half-grin was rakish. "We spent too much time looking for shit."
Olivia instinctively grinned back at him, not knowing where either of their smiles were coming from, but
feeling the glow of them on her skin. All afternoon he had avoided looking at her as much as possible, but
he had also made the decision to sit with her just now, so she was beginning to think they'd be able to move
past that jolt of electricity that had rocked them both back at the Spider Web exercise earlier this afternoon.
"Any one item in particular that stumped you?" she asked, feeling an odd sense of relaxation seep into her
shoulders as she picked at the leftovers of her burger, then decided better of it and wiped her hands off
instead. They didn't talk about casual things. Ever. Yet here they were discussing an afternoon game, as if
they did this every day. It was a relief, but one that brought an unsettling feeling of boundaries being
breached as well.
"The shit," he said again. "Apparently there are a lot of constipated deer around here."
Olivia just looked at him blankly.
He smiled this time. Brilliantly. Fully. It crumbled the hard planes of his face and sent his lips high up into
dimples she didn't really know he had. Around his eyes, his skin crinkled just a little bit and when he
blinked, his lashes looked so damned dark against the unfettered blue.
She couldn't breathe, and she knew she was staring at him. But she hadn't seen this on his face in years. It
might have flashed once or twice in the early days of them being partners, but she didn't think it had ever
been this startling, this complete, this...mischievous?
"Spill it, Stabler," she commanded, her fingers stilling on the bag of Fritos she had been opening. She
wanted to tear her eyes away from his face but she couldn't. She wanted to drink this expression in,
memorize it because she didn't know when she might ever see it again.
He shrugged. "Leo and I were looking for a very particular present for Romeo over there." He finally took a
bite of his overloaded burger, pretending he had said something that made perfect sense.
He was trying too hard to brush off his cryptic answer.
Olivia narrowed her eyes. "Romeo?"
Elliot made a huge show of swallowing first. "Ludwig."
Cathy was waving at her from near the grill, waiting for her chicken to be finished but making a motion to
let Olivia know she was coming to sit with her. For some odd reason, Olivia wasn't half as annoyed by the
prospect of company as she had been this afternoon.
"Why is Ludwig..." she trailed off, realization dawning. "Elliot," she chastised, popping a few of the salty
corn chips in her mouth.
"Well, it's not like he's getting any discouragement from you. All those smiles for him, Olivia? Really?" He
followed her gaze, seeing Cathy smiling at them. "Now her? You feeling okay, Benson?"
Olivia knew his question was supposed to be a tease, but it hit too close to home.

He was right.
She was out of sorts here. The moments with Elliot were incongruous with what she knew of her life with
him, but there was a sense of ease here that she couldn't explain. The smell of the barbeque, the grass
beneath their feet, his big hands wrapped around his burger and the faint hint of sun on his nose. Combined,
there was something healing about it.
Manhattan was gone; she should have been crawling out of her skin.
But then again, maybe she had brought with her the only part of the city she really needed.
Maybe, Christ...maybe he was sitting across from her.
The bag of chips fell from her hand and back onto the edge of her plate.
Elliot was looking at her oddly. "Liv, you okay?"
She couldn't say anything, her heart racing in a way she couldn't explain, in a way she didn't want to
understand. She didn't want to be okay out here when the only thing she had was him.
He couldn't be enough. He couldn't be everything. He couldn't be anything really because he wasn't hers.
She needed to say something. Elliot had set down his hamburger, had wiped his hands hastily on his napkin.
His eyebrows were drawn together, and he was staring at her.
"Hey," he said gravelly, reminding her of sandpaper. "Liv...you don't look okay."
She didn't feel okay. Her skin was prickling uncomfortably, making her want to run her hands over her arms
to get the sensation to dissipate. She was content out here with him. They hadn't as yet been here even a full
twelve hours and she liked it here already. She was already used to meals with him at these tables and they
had only had two together. She was, hell, she was...
She was watching his hands.
His forearms rested on the table on either side of his plate, and she couldn't pull herself away from his
strong, commanding hands. The ones that were close to her own, the ones that if he simply moved a few
inches closer to her, would be touching her.
"Olivia," he demanded, the sound emanating from his throat. "Look at me."
It was back. The need was back, and it was ruthlessly, arrogantly sliding up her body. Her shins were numb,
her thighs actually tensing, her lower back burning where his hand had been hours ago. She drank in the
sight of his fingers, the rough flat tips of them so close to her, and all she could think of was that she
wanted to know what it would have felt like this afternoon to have had them slide around her torso and onto
her stomach. Open. Moving. His palms a furnace that would make the muscles beneath them contract
violently with the heat of anticipation.
They were open now. And moving. One hand was slowly making its way towards her, his fingers slipping
onto her arm just above her wrist. And then upwards, heading for her elbow. She could have sworn she
flinched, but she couldn't breathe, mesmerized completely by the sight of it. She watched it happen, watched
his thumb track gently over her small black freckle, over the faintest remnants of the scratch that had slipped
across her arm when she dove out of the way of Millfield's car. Slowly scraping along her skin. Higher and
higher. Deliberate. Inching along, smoothing and learning. It rendered her both still and raging, frozen on
the outside and her blood thrusting through her veins on the inside. His fingers were oddly soft though they
the outside and her blood thrusting through her veins on the inside. His fingers were oddly soft though they
looked hard, or maybe that was wrong. Maybe it was just his movement that was being conducted softly.
He was breathing hard, too. The gesture was simple, meant to comfort, meant to soothe. He had wanted her
attention, and now that he had it he seemed a bit lost by his own actions.
For one moment he stopped. She still hadn't lifted her face to meet his eyes. She couldn't. Not when his
hand was curved possessively around her forearm. Not when his skin was lighter than hers, but had never
been close enough to compare before now.
"Look at me," he gritted. "What just happened, Liv? Tell me you're okay."
On the inside of her elbow his thumb pressed into her. Olivia shuddered. It moved back and forth, trying to
draw her attention to his voice, but failing. She was focused on the movement, the caress of it. She didn't
want him to stop.
A sound was going to break from her chest. She had to move. Cathy was on her way over here, and she
would notice far too much.
"I'm fine," she managed, her voice cracking.
She finally looked up at Elliot. He hadn't removed his hand from on her, and he didn't look like he was
going to anytime soon. The look he was giving her was dark, brooding, lethal. She had seen this particular
expression on his face dozens of times before. Only those times he had been in the interrogation room, his
sleeves rolled up and his steps deliberate, calculated. He would methodically stalk around their suspect, his
face impassive except for the predatory gleam in his eyes. It was the look he wore in the seconds before his
voice dropped into a whisper, before he closed the distance on personal space and hissed words promising
that his prey would soon be consumed with the need to break.
Olivia had never expected to be on the receiving end of that look, but she now knew why they always
caved. She had sympathy for those that broke.
"I'm...I'm gonna go relax for a bit," she choked out, wondering if those would be the magic words that made
him release her, made him withdraw his heat from her skin.
In the end, it wasn't her words at all that forced him to stop staring at her like he was going to devour her. It
was Cathy's, her cheerfully polite request to sit with them startling the both of them. Elliot pulled his hand
back, nearly clenching his fist and then flexing his fingers instead.
Cathy climbed over the bench and next to Elliot. Olivia took in a deep breath, suddenly noticing her
surroundings again. The silence in her ears was replaced by the hiss of the grill, the wind had picked up a
little bit, cooling her clammy skin, and she could hear Hannah laughing at the table to her right.
Olivia tried to smile at Cathy as she stood up, grabbing her plate to throw it in the trash. "I...I need to just
go relax a bit," she repeated.
Elliot's eyes shuttered, the muscle in his jaw jumping.
As Olivia threw her plate away on unsteady legs, she heard Cathy's voice behind her, talking to Elliot. "So
we finally decided you two were like Mulder and Scully. You know, from the X-Files? Did you watch that
one?"
Elliot didn't say anything.

He didn't need to.
As Olivia began to walk away she heard Cathy interfere once again, despite what she had told her earlier
about Elliot's personal life.
"Of course, Mulder and Scully always had a thing for each other. They always exchanged these long heated
looks, so everyone knew long before it ever even happened on the show that they would eventually have to
hook up. But they tried so hard to avoid it. When they finally kissed, Mulder even joked around that the
world didn't end."
Olivia was two steps away, but she was so thirsty, and she desperately wanted the rest of the bottle of
Gatorade she had left behind. She stepped closer to the table, reaching for the still half-full plastic bottle
and prepared to move quickly away when she caught Elliot's still-darkened gaze.
Olivia didn't know what to say. She tried to smile reassuringly at him, but couldn't truly make it happen. She
was allowing herself to be aware of him far more than she should. Allowing it to the point of distraction.
Dangerous, dangerous distraction.
Cathy continued on, unperturbed by Elliot's complete lack of response, even as Jim came up behind her with
his full plate, angling next to Olivia for a seat across from his fiancé. "So I guess that's the part that's
different about you two. No long looks. Right, Olivia?" Cathy didn't wait for a response, tilting her head
thoughtfully as her eyes sparkled deviously. "Well, that and the fact you both aren't trying to prove whether
or not aliens exist."
Olivia heard Cathy's words, saw the other woman wink playfully at her and thought that it was too bad their
job wasn't as easy as trying to prove extraterrestrials existed. Because in the last second before she finally
walked away, she caught the oddest expression on Elliot's face.
He looked shaken, confused. He was assessing her as if he didn't know her, as if he was learning her for the
first time. As if he didn't quite believe what he was seeing.
They would have been able to prove mutant life existed because in that moment, the stunned, startled way
he was staring at her made her swear she had just grown two heads.
+++
If his hands would just fucking listen to him, they wouldn't land on her every two point five seconds.
He was about as smooth as a teenager in a movie theater pulling the good old yawn trick to get an arm
around his girl. But this was Olivia he was talking about. He had no right to be smooth, no room to make
her his.
Partner Olivia Benson.
Jesus, he cursed himself out, stick to the script, Stabler. She's your partner. You're supposed to be working
things out with your wife. Yes, you're still technically married. Try and keep your hands off of her.
Well, fuck, at least try.
This was pathetic.
He wanted to go and sit by her, but he stood there by the serving tables, nursing the cold beer instead. After
dinner she had gone back to her room while he and the guys had been asked to drag a bunch of wood into
dinner she had gone back to her room while he and the guys had been asked to drag a bunch of wood into
the fire pit for a campfire. They had ended the day early so they'd get some rest for the high ropes
tomorrow, and supposedly it would give the participants a chance to "bond."
He didn't need to bond with her anymore. He was bonded damned enough.
He was too bonded.
Shit.
Olivia sat less than ten yards away, and with Cathy helping to lay out the fixing for s'mores, Olivia was left
to sit at the campfire alone. She had changed into a lightweight velour sweat suit, but of course it didn't have
to be a normal baggy sweatshirt and pants. No. Hers had to be some light green thing that clung to her
body, the wide band of the pants sitting on her hips and the hoodie unzipped enough to give him a glimpse
of the top of her breasts.
And she had pulled her hair out of the rubber band. He wondered what she would do if he went to her room,
dug the band out of her bag, and asked her to please, for God's sake, put it back in.
No one needed all that hair left down like that.
Instead he stood there, a class A prick, thinking that she looked fucking stunning sitting there with the fire
reflecting off her skin.
He took a long sip of his beer. He wondered if when he went to hell if he'd be at least allowed a cold beer
now and then.
She doesn't need you, Stabler. Think about Marsden. About Oregon. Christ, she picked Computer Crimes
over you.
Olivia lifted her head then, dragging her eyes away from the fire, as she looked for him. He watched her
scan the darkness beyond the blaze, and when she finally saw him, she stopped. Her expression didn't
change, she just blinked, and he noticed that she wasn't fidgeting.
She had slowed down out here.
A surge of protectiveness swept through him. He wanted to keep her out here, far away from the city, in a
place where she pulled that rubber band out, where she wore brighter colors, where he didn't have to see her
eyes cloud at a crime scene and know he couldn't take back the visual from where it would then live in her
head. He wondered what she would have been like if she had been raised upstate, if summer camp and
s'mores had been her childhood, if she had been given even one parent that would have fulfilled the role of
guardian, so that she hadn't been forced to so vehemently guard herself.
She had never had a s'more before. He'd had dozens, nights in the backyard with the kids filled with the
sticky, gooey marshmallows and the too sweet sting of chocolate. But he had heard her say to Cathy that
she had never had one, and for some reason anger had swirled in his chest at the newfound knowledge.
Olivia deserved goddamned s'mores. She deserved things in general. And as he watched her sit there
quietly, captivated by the dancing flames, he thought that most of all she deserved to have someone love her
unconditionally.
Sonofabitch.

Had she ever known what that was like? Had she ever known, for one single moment, what it was like to
look at someone and know that she could screw up, could make mistakes, could still count on someone to be
there when the shit hit the fan?
Her back was rigid. Even as she sat there at a campfire, her body likely lulled by the beer and the heat, she
sat up straight. She had tried to handle Marsden alone when he had needed money, and Elliot had been
infuriated that she hadn't let him help. But maybe the aberration wasn't that she hadn't let him help when
Marsden had jumped bail, but more that she had even let him in as much as she had in the first place.
He didn't want to think about why that was. It was far too much to figure out right now. There were so
many questions to be asked. He still needed to talk to her about his frustration that she had placed herself in
that much jeopardy, but right now wasn't the time. He was tired, and she looked exhausted too.
Some things could simply wait.
Olivia tipped her beer bottle to her mouth, her gaze unwavering, focused intently on the plumes in front of
her. Strands of her shiny hair hit her shoulder and then fell farther down, tilting up slightly at the ends. She
was safe out here and maybe that's why his shoulders were slowly relaxing. Here there was no Marsden, no
Gitano, no White. He didn't have to wonder if today was the day someone would take a shot at them, if
tonight would finally bring the case that even they couldn't handle. He could let his guard down, just a little
bit.
Of course maybe that was why he was suddenly unable to keep his hands off of her. Maybe his guard had
been a good thing after all.
The blasted thing was he had seen the most dangerous thing of all in her eyes across that picnic table. Want.
Want.
She was his, dammit. He was the one who had stood by her, who did his best to protect her, who was the
only one that really knew her. He was the one who was proud as hell of her when she had snuck into a
men's bathroom to take down corporate America; he was the one that would have given his career up if it
meant she'd find some closure about her father. She had to be his because the idea of anyone else touching
her made him want to drive his fist through a wall.
You asked Kathy if you could move home, asshole. Whaddya want to do? Ask if you can set Olivia up in the
guest bedroom?
Panic clawed at him, closing his throat. He didn't want to think of his bed in his apartment, the one that he
had laid in for nearly two years. He didn't want to think of the months he had lay there after he signed the
divorce papers, nearly completely free and clear to do what he wanted. He had tossed and turned on those
sheets so many nights in those months that he had been surprised he managed to stay awake through the
days at all. He had never let himself think of Olivia in the dark, when his body most needed release. He'd
inevitably hear her voice or recall a flash of her skin, her breath too close to him and he'd shut it down,
never, ever, letting himself go there.
But now that's the only place he was.
He was there.
He thought of his bed in the nights after the papers had been signed. Free. Clear. He could imagine what it
would be like to have her hair sprawled on his pillow, her long, smooth, bare, legs tangled with his and her
huge eyes focused on his in the dark. He wondered if his sheets would smell like apples, if she'd simply take
a deep breath, or if she'd make an audible sound the first time that he slid -
a deep breath, or if she'd make an audible sound the first time that he slid -
"You want to take it to Olivia?"
Elliot's head snapped up, startled. He swallowed hard as he looked at Jim. "What?" he croaked.
Jim thrust his hand out, two small ziplock bags with all the fixings for s'mores dangling from his fingers.
"Do you want to take Olivia's to her? There's a pile of sticks for roasting by the fire."
Elliot nodded, grabbing the bags out of Jim's hand's and murmuring thanks.
Not that he needed to venture any closer to the fire.
He was so close to it already that he could feel the white, hot, relentless burn of it quite clearly from right
where he stood.
+++
Back to index

Chapter 6 by MaddyM
Thank you Jess, Brynn, Cat, Tammy, Pooks and Kel. You're sustenance in my day-to-day. Thank you to
everyone whose reviews I am starting to make my way through finally. I'm overwhelmed, I've even lost the
ability to say anything except for that I am grateful beyond words.
The campfire blazed in front of her, sending trails of smoke into the night air. She looked up, following their
shadow as they disappeared, disintegrating as they gave way to the black sky above. The sound of the wood
burning soothed her, the orange haze it was emitting reflecting off her eyelashes and the tops of her cheeks.
The stars were visible out here and she wondered when the last time she had actually noticed them was.
Unease crept up her shoulders as the memory crystallized, and she realized that the last time she had
actually stopped to look for stars might have been as far back as college.
She didn't tear her eyes away from the night sky, even when Elliot silently came and stood by her. He
hesitated for a moment before finally sitting down on the grass, a beer held in one hand while he set down
two sticks and two full Ziploc bags with the other.
"Can actually see ‘em out here," he mused, although she knew he wasn't looking up.
Olivia dragged her gaze down, sending him a sideways glance and lifting her own beer to her lips. The
bitter liquid was cold, the label already disintegrating from the ice and water the bottle had been floating in
just a short while ago. "Never really look for them, you know? Just always assume they're there."
She finally fully looked at Elliot, at his bent head, at the way his arms rested on his knees and his fingers
picked at the label on his bottle.
He must have felt her eyes on him because he looked up too, meeting her gaze. He smiled for just a brief
second, the emotion never really taking root in his emotion-filled eyes. "Can't really see them in New
York," he said softly. "Everything else gets in the way. It's been years since I've really looked at ‘em."
Olivia's chest hurt. They were only talking about the damned stars, yet she was aching in places she didn't
want to think about. Places within her that she had been able to quiet in a city that was loud enough to
drown out all else.
"I would have figured you could see them in Queens," she said quietly, watching Jessica laugh loudly across
the campfire, leaning to the side and playfully nudging a grinning Tyler. She wondered if it had ever been
that easy to simply be around someone else.
She didn't think it had been, not for her.
Not for him.
Next to her, Elliot shook his head. He almost laughed, but the sound culminated as merely a faint rattle in
his chest. "Last time I really saw them was in Baghdad, believe it or not. All those damned nights in the
desert, doesn't leave you with much else to do."
Olivia's heart stopped. He'd rarely mentioned his Marine days, and she'd never really asked. But here he
was, opening himself up to being asked questions. In some ways, it made her nervous. "What was that like?"
she whispered, feeling her breath stop, maybe in anticipation of the idea of conversation itself.

He looked at her. "You mean being there?"
Olivia nodded. "Yeah. Being in a war."
His lips flattened in a sardonic smile. "You already know. We're in one every day in the city."
She was quiet for a few moments. For as much as human nature would make people seek comfort, seek
companionship and belonging, it would also ensure that there would be wars, pain, and suffering. She
wondered which one was the determining factor for the other's existence. Was it the desperate goal of
finding solace that made people struggle, or was it the perpetual struggle that created the eventual need for a
place to finally rest?
"It was hard to be away from the kids, from Kathy, during Desert Storm," Elliot murmured. His voice was
so deep, so luring that she found her eyelids becoming heavy with it. Out here, the smell of the burning
wood permeating the air, they were talking. Maybe not about work, or the things that had been going wrong
lately with their partnership, but they were using their voices.
Across the fire she saw Leo finally smile broadly at something Colin had said, and she realized that she
hadn't seen any emotion from Leo before now. She watched, fascinated, as whatever Colin was saying built
on Leo's face until Leo finally turned to him and laughed fully. Olivia almost smiled herself at that, an
expression on a man she didn't know washing over her and drawing her in.
She wanted to tread carefully when she spoke now, not wanting to break the fragile spell that was allowing
Elliot to talk. Olivia looked at him, taking in the way the orange haze warmed the color of his skin until the
grit and pallor of the city was gone. "What did it do to you, though? The war itself?"
He glanced at her out of the corner of his eyes, the slightest flash of a rueful smile playing over his lips. "In
a lot of ways, for our guys it was kind of an innocent war, if there is such a thing," he mused as he turned
his attention back to the blaze, his eyes reflecting the flames.
She drank in his stoic profile, thinking he would always do that. He'd always shrug off his experience as
being less than it was if simply to spare her the details. "War is never innocent, El," she said quietly.
He shrugged, frowning a bit. "Yeah, but back then their guys were surrendering left and right. We weren't
really fighting hand to hand, or even trying to kill. Our unit was recon, so we'd scout before the S3's would
do a final air surveillance and then the Hornets would come in and blow the missile site up. We even
warned ‘em before we'd blow the place up so everyone would evacuate." His lips curved upwards with the
melancholy memory. "There were nights we sat in wait in the desert, playing cards, listening to the radio,
watching the anti-aircraft fire light up the sky. Kathy and the girls would send me letters and care packages,
and I'd tear them open looking for the photos and the baby wipes."
Olivia finally grinned. The air had been warm all day, but this was the first time she could remember feeling
the heat actually penetrate her skin. "Baby wipes?"
Elliot turned to her and mirrored her expression. "In the desert, when showers are few and far between, you
crave those damned baby wipes. Trust me."
She shook her head and looked down, unable to keep eye contact with him. Something was shifting between
them, and the new easiness actually made her uneasy. It was becoming uncomfortable to sit next to him, to
keep ten inches of space between her hip and his thigh. There was a kind of exhaustion that had nothing to
do with sleep that was enveloping her, making her tired of holding herself up. "It couldn't have been easy,
Elliot."

"No, I don't mean to make it sound that way," he said lightly. "There was still a danger, and lives were
inevitably lost. But it was harder on the people we left at home. Kathy had Maureen and Kathleen then, and
I still thank God her mother was close enough for her to move in with them, simply because Kathy needed
the help." He paused. "But it's not like it is now, you know? Those kids heading over there every day?
Jesus, a kid that grew up two streets over with Maureen was killed in Iraq six months ago and..." His jaw
tightened and his eyes narrowed. "It's a totally different war. That kind of terror I..."
"You wish you could go, don't you?" she said quietly.
Elliot nodded, peeling the label from his bottle. "Yeah. I'd take the place of one of those kids if I could. But
the course of the war itself scares the shit outta me." Elliot's body tensed, his fear nearly palpable. "Dickie,
he's got this idea that he wants to be a Navy SEAL, you know?" Elliot laughed, the sound a mixture of
pride and sadness. "I mean, I guess a lot of boys his age do. But Dickie's a really strong swimmer, and he's
so determined. He's already pushing himself to get better in the water. I mean, he's thirteen but he's all gung
ho about applying to the Naval Academy. He's got this idea that he's gonna save the world."
Olivia let out a gentle smile. "Wonder where he gets that from."
Elliot looked at her, his eyes haunted. "God, Liv, don't say that. He talks about it, about my Marine days
and I think he's got this notion that he'd make me proud by following in my footsteps and he would, I just..."
"The war's not over, you're scared he's gonna have to go one day," she breathed, her eyes scanning his face,
seeing the weariness and the fear he was living with. The terrors that belonged solely to Elliot as a father,
not the ones that belonged to him as a cop, as her partner, as a protector to the city of Manhattan.
Elliot nodded, dropping his head and dragging his beer bottle to his lips. "It's one thing to stare down the
barrel of a Sig; it's another to have your kid doing it."
The air smelled clean, fresh, somehow whole out here. Bits of ash were being pulled upwards into the sky
and there was a tinge of laughter carrying over to them from Hannah, who had just watched her
marshmallow fall off her stick into the fire. Olivia didn't know why she had this urge to touch him right
now. Why she wanted to feel Elliot's face under her fingers, why the muscles of his shoulders suddenly
seemed like they had been holding him up for too long. But she wanted to soothe him, and for the first time
she didn't want to do it with words.
Olivia wanted to touch him. She wanted to scoot closer to him on the grass and lean backwards, she wanted
to hear his voice dip as his hands found her skin. Over the course of the day, her imagination had taken on a
life of its own, breaking through the barriers and walls she had so carefully constructed over the last few
years. Around dinner time she had indulged in imagining what it would have been like to have his hands
open on her as far as her stomach. But in the last few hours his hands had kept moving, trailing upwards
ever so slowly until Elliot's thumb was now slipping just beneath the bottom edge of her bra, stroking the
underside of her breast.
Her immediate physical response to the image scared the hell out of her. Elliot. It's Elliot. She couldn't want
him. She didn't want him. She had learned that lesson in the nights she had tossed and turned in Oregon. The
night that she had crawled into her bed, after showering off the filth of a warehouse in which Gitano had
held him hostage, she hadn't been able to shake the image of Elliot's face. It might have been the shock, the
horror, the post-traumatic stress of it all, but her exhausted body had begged for a release that terrifyingly
belonged only to him. In the moments that she had found herself, it had been Elliot's eyes, his hands, the
deep pitch of his rasping voice that had sent her body wildly careening over the edge and then finally into
sleep.

In Oregon she had taught herself about how wrong she was. Wanting him wasn't fair, it wasn't okay, it
wasn't allowed.
Jesus, Olivia, get a grip. He's your partner and he wants his wife.
She must have taken too long to say something, because he finally spoke again, his tone no longer
reflective, but rather unsteady, tinged with apprehension. "Liv?"
He wasn't looking at her. His eyes were trained on Cathy and Jim across the way. Jim was carefully,
methodically spearing a marshmallow on each of the two sticks in his hand while Cathy laughed at him,
trying to get him to do two or three at a time.
Cathy reached over Jim, trying to grab the big bag of marshmallows as she batted at him, insisting
boisterously that she wanted to do more than one per stick. Jim was chuckling, trying to hold her back and
failing.
"Yeah?" Olivia answered, the sound barely making it out of her chest.
"Why didn't you tell me Simon had contacted you?"
She knew he hadn't looked at her, and it was just as well because she couldn't look at him. It was easier like
this. To talk into the fire and the dark, watching everyone around them but never looking at each other. She
wondered if this was what it was like to go to confession, to be able to speak and drop the words into the air
and know that forgiveness would eventually be granted.
"You risked your job once, Elliot. I couldn't let you do it again." Olivia took a long sip of her beer, trying to
ease the dryness in her mouth.
Jim acquiesced, and he threw two marshmallows at Cathy's nose as he laughed. Their playfulness had
created the opposite effect on Olivia's movements. She stilled, her fingers no longer picking at her bottle.
She was drawn into their world, knowing Cathy's secrets and watching her live despite them.
It was watching fear lose, watching it succumb to a stronger will. It was seeing a place where fear no longer
held the trump card.
"You weren't letting me. I chose to do that," Elliot whispered.
Olivia nodded. "I know. That's what scared me."
His head turned abruptly towards her as his voice rose. "What do you mean?"
She glanced at him warily for one second, and then used the fire as an excuse again to extract her gaze from
his. "I gave Simon money, Elliot. I knew where he was. And as pissed as you would have been if I told you,
you would have tried to help, to fix it. To cover my ass like you did before."
"Did you know where he was the night I told you he jumped bail?"
Olivia felt something tickling the top of her foot. She shifted, putting her feet out in front of her, her dark
pink toenails set against the gray of her flip flops. A tiny ant crawled across her skin, illuminated by the
glow of the fire.
Before she could reach down and shoo it off, Elliot's cold, damp fingertip brushed over her skin, dragging
across the top of her foot and sending the ant back into the grass. His finger had left a moist trail on her
skin. She shivered, her eyes nearly closing from the sensation. They had become accustomed to touching so
skin. She shivered, her eyes nearly closing from the sensation. They had become accustomed to touching so
quickly in just a day, whereas in the eight years prior there had been so little contact.
She knew what he was asking. Had she lied to his face or had she lied in the days following by omission?
She didn't know if one was worse than the other.
"I didn't know where he was that night, Elliot," she said, her chest tight. "Not until over two weeks later."
His shoulders relaxed a little bit, and she knew then that omitting things was less of a transgression to him.
It didn't really matter though; she knew how she had felt keeping it from him and how she had wound
tighter and tighter with the secret until she found herself unable to sleep. A few nights she had sat on her
couch, her feet tucked beneath her, staring at her cell phone and wondering if she should text him. If she
could simply send Elliot a note that said she needed help, that she had screwed up, that she had a secret and
she needed him to keep it.
He was quiet. "Why didn't you trust me?"
The fire cracked loudly, sounding like the uneven staccato of gunfire as the flames tore through an air
pocket in the wood. Olivia flinched in the second before she found the courage to look at him. His fire-
focused eyes had narrowed into hollow slits, and as she looked at his profile, she could have sworn that his
top and bottom eyelashes were so close together that they were nearly touching. The only thing keeping
them apart was the faint sheen of moisture, or maybe it was the will evident in the hard flexing of his jaw.
She lost the battle. Her hand came up and gently brushed his arm, her fingers feeling the light dusting of
coarse hair as her hand slid down his muscular forearm. Even in the dark she could see the faint scars from
the window he had been thrown through only months before. War wounds that were dismissed in the line of
fire, but that remained despite time's promise that they would fade. Her fingers were moving downwards,
towards his wrist, but she wanted to go the other way. Up, past his biceps, underneath the edges of his
shirtsleevs and over his shoulders. "I trusted you too much, Elliot. I trusted that if I told you, you'd help me.
You'd risk everything. I knew that and maybe that was the only thing I knew."
"Then why didn't you tell me?" he groaned. His pain was evident both in his rigid posture and in the way
his muscles contracted beneath her fingers.
Olivia's breath hitched as she trailed over the brown, thick leather band of Elliot's watch, her eyes drawn to
the dance of flames that reflected in the glass face of it. "El, you had decided to move home, to be with your
family," she said gently, realizing she shouldn't be touching him like this. She could learn him tonight with
words, but she couldn't do it with touch. Reluctantly, agonizingly, she drew her hand back into her lap. "It
wasn't right for me to include you in my mess when you were trying to rebuild your life. You would have
helped me, and it would have put everything you were working towards at risk." Olivia shook her head. "I
couldn't let you put me first. You had enough to worry about."
He slammed his bottle down on the ground. "You didn't know, Olivia. You didn't know if he was guilty or
not. As a matter of fact, all the evidence said he was. And you know, I get the fact that you needed to figure
it out. I even...fuck." He picked up his bottle again and took a long sip, seemingly trying to relax before he
tore it away from his lips again. "I even get the idea that you'd give him money. But the fact that you didn't
know if he was dangerous and you kept up this secret when your safety, your goddamned safety was at
risk..." Elliot's chest rose and then fell harshly as the back of his other hand swiped angrily across his lips.
"El..." she began.
He whirled his head to face her, and his hungry, furious eyes could have taught the fire things about
glimmering with heat. "It's my job to protect you. My fucking job, Olivia. I told you once that you and this
job were all I had left and you sacrificed both of them for me without letting me have a say."
job were all I had left and you sacrificed both of them for me without letting me have a say."
Olivia felt her stomach fall at the same time that she drew her knees farther up towards her chest. "That's
not true, Elliot." She wrapped her arms around her knees and kept the beer bottle dangling from her fingers,
unwilling to let it go.
There was silence. A heavy, oppressive silence marred only by the crisp crackling of the fire as it
parasitically ate the dry wood. The flames consumed the fuel, and by morning Olivia knew there would only
be ash left in the pit. Remnants of a night that they had finally talked.
Olivia knew his eyes were on her, and seconds later he was inexplicably touching her again. He reached
over and captured a few strands of her hair in his fingers, setting them behind her ear. She froze, terrified he
would do more, and even when he didn't, she felt her skin break out in small, tingly bumps. No one had
ever tucked her hair back like that before. She had seen it done of course, had even watched it being done
by Elliot when he had talked to Kathleen one day.
But not to her.
She wanted him to do it again. Want was a demanding, petulant motivation.
"Olivia," he dropped his voice into an urgent, insistent whisper. "You might have believed you were saving
my job by not telling me, but if something happened to you, you think I'd be able to do our job without you?
"
She wanted to listen to him, to hear what he was saying. To mull over what he meant, and what that meant
about them. But she didn't, because all she could think was that he had gotten it wrong. That's not true,
Elliot, she had said. She hadn't been referring to the fact that he would still have his job even if she were
gone.
She had meant that things had changed. She and the job weren't the only two things he had left anymore.
"You've got your family again," Olivia said softly.
Elliot straightened, staring at her curiously. "Are you even listening to me?"
Olivia wondered how so much could change in a day. Yesterday she would have killed to have Elliot talk to
her, to stay still long enough to just hear her, and now he was accusing her of tuning him out. She didn't
know when it had changed or what had changed it - the scenery, the exercises, the distance from the city.
Yet something had shifted so profoundly between them and she knew she owed it to this place.
She didn't know if what she owed was a debt though, or if it was an accusation.
"Olivia," he said, exasperated. "Just tell me one thing. Why is any of it truly worth it? Why would you risk
your job, your life and your freedom for a man you don't even know?"
Because I wanted to know him, Elliot. Because the only other person who I would risk all of that for doesn't
belong to me. I just needed one person that was mine.
Just one.
The explanatory words were there, on the tip of her tongue, the way they always were. "He's my brother,
Elliot," Olivia mumbled, unable to look him in the eyes.

His irritation ratcheted up a notch. "Christ, you keep saying that!" He dropped his voice in deference to
where they were. "You don't really even know him. He's practically a stranger. So why the hell do you keep
saying that?"
The blunt words hurt. They pressed on her, stealing the air from her chest. They made the ground feel harder
beneath her, they made the fire feel far too strong. Her skin burned and her eyes blinked against the sudden
presence of gritty ash. "Because...because I like the way it sounds," she managed.
Elliot was suddenly quiet. He practically recoiled, as if assimilating the news. As if the answers would be
found in the shimmering blaze. Long, drawn out moments passed before he spoke and when he did, his
voice was even with understanding, no longer agitated with frustration. "When Kathy and I first got married,
she used to tell everyone I was her husband, as often as she could. When I finally asked her one day why
she deliberately announced it to people we didn't even know, she said it was because she liked the way it
sounded when she said I was her husband."
Olivia nodded numbly. Her eyes fell to the two unused bags of s'mores and the sticks that sat between them.
"Bet she still does," she said quietly, before wrapping her hand around her beer bottle and getting up.
She needed some air that was free from the heat. As she headed for the lake, Olivia didn't think he moved at
all behind her as she walked away.
+++
There had to have been a sale on stupid things to say at Prick's R Us.
That had to be the only explanation. There had been a sale, and Elliot had stocked up so that he could dole
out brilliantly stupid things at the most inopportune moments. Olivia finally opened up and told him that she
had been alone her whole life and he came up with the wonderfully insightful line family is everything. She
struggled with the fact that her brother was potentially a rapist, like her father, and he managed to dole out
We've got a family of rapists here as they arrested their suspects. They were in the middle of a case and he
managed to just drop I'm moving home between them with about as much grace as a dog would while
dropping shit from its ass.
And now this.
His stupid head managed to finally figure out that Olivia might actually feel something for him, too, and he
went on and on about his ex-wife. Shit. His wife. His possibly ex-wife. His eventual ex-wife.
His...
Fuck.
Elliot speared his hand into the silver aluminum bucket, the icy water numbing his fingers as he searched for
another beer. He wondered if he got drunk out here in no man's land if it would qualify as drinking on the
job. He stared at the two unused bags with the marshmallows, crackers and chocolate that now sat on the
table, and he swore again under his breath. His hand closed around a bottle and he yanked it out of the ice,
twisting the cap off and downing a third of it before stopping to breathe.
He was such an asshole sometimes.
Olivia wore dark pink toenail polish. Her toes flexed when he touched her foot. Her breath caught when he
had trapped strands of her hair between his fingers.

She was hellishly, sinfully responsive to his touch.
Shit.
Elliot closed his eyes tightly and pulled another sip from the bottle, recalling her fingers on his arm, feeling
the heat of her close around his skin, hearing the soft cadence of her voice as it drowned out the sound of
the fire.
Jesus Christ. Cragen was going to be pissed if the only thing Elliot came back to Manhattan with was a
raging hard-on and the crystallized knowledge that he wanted to get Olivia beneath him. He was supposed
to find some even ground with her out here and all he was damned well finding was that his frustration with
her over the last few months was sexual. Was emotional. Was anything but the one thing that it should have
been.
Professional.
Where the hell was Ludwig when he needed him? One grin from the moron and Elliot was going to shove
his fist into Lothario's nose just for sport.
Elliot gritted his teeth, adding another thing to his mental checklist of things to tell Cragen he had learned
while being sent to summer camp.
Cursing.
He suddenly really, really liked to curse. A lot. Silently. Out loud. At people. At himself. At her. Hell, it
didn't matter. Cursing had become an equal opportunity event today, and it only seemed like it was going to
get worse as the weekend progressed.
Shit.
"That good, huh?" Jim asked, reaching in for another beer himself and coming to stand next to Elliot.
He hadn't realized he had let that particular curse make its way into becoming one of the out loud variety.
Elliot grimaced as he watched the campfire from where he stood, taking in the four from Kodak and their
easy rapport. As if those four needed teambuilding. They had made this place look like Club Med so far,
and pretty soon, if the look on Tyler's face when he leered at Jessica was any indication, it was going to
become Club Hedonism.
"That good," Elliot muttered.
"So I'm guessing that the NYPD didn't send you out here just for a little R and R, huh?" Jim twisted his beer
cap off and took a long sip, leaning back against the table behind him.
Elliot scoured for Cathy, wondering if this conversation was about to become a group effort. Mercifully, he
didn't see her. He relaxed a little bit. Jim wasn't so bad. He was refreshingly normal in a way, and he
reminded Elliot of the people that had lived in his neighborhood a lifetime ago.
"No," Elliot responded, the single word hanging in the air.
Great. Now he was being a prick to Jim too.
Elliot sighed, aiming to put in a little more effort. "No, it certainly wasn't because my Captain thought I
needed a vacation."

Jim smiled, his beer never far from his lips. "Yeah, Cathy's sister and her husband came out here two years
ago before they got married. The night I heard Cathy on the phone with her and overheard the nine hundred
questions Cath was peppering Paulina with, I knew my bags would be packed for this place eventually.
According to Paulina, Cathy and I are supposed to enhance our team approach to marriage while out here."
Elliot had already worked through half of his beer, but he didn't think it was the alcohol that had him
relaxing just a bit. Maybe it was the normalcy of the conversation, maybe it was the fact that while Jim was
supposed to be working on his marriage and Elliot his partnership, the goals of the two weren't actually that
far off.
"Apparently I'm a real asshole and that's why I've been dragged out here," Elliot said, finding himself
almost smiling.
Jim grinned. "Did Olivia sign you up for this?"
Elliot laughed out loud. "Hell no. She probably hates this more than I do. She's a city girl through and
through. Our Captain decided completing this thing was an order."
There was a silence, and Elliot knew Jim was figuring out the best way to pry without seeming like he was
prying. If Elliot was decent, he would have helped the guy out, but as it stood Elliot just sipped at his beer,
waiting for Jim to figure out how to ask him because it required less effort.
It took just over a full minute.
"So I'm assuming the NYPD doesn't send all its detectives out here. Something happen that made you two
targeted for this?" Jim asked quietly.
Elliot had to give him credit. He was polite, direct, and there was no bullshit. There was no morbid curiosity
either, no hidden agenda. Maybe that's what made him answer. The way that Jim phrased things, it was like
Huang without the degree, without the official report sent back to the brass.
"Olivia and I haven't exactly been the pillars of trust and honesty between partners lately," Elliot finally
managed.
Jim nodded thoughtfully. "Well, you said eight years together, right? I'd imagine there would be some
tougher times. Especially being in a male, female partnership."
Elliot frowned. "What's that mean?"
The other man shrugged, undaunted by the accusation in Elliot's voice. "Just that it's got to be like being
married in a way. Men and women have totally different communication styles and therefore interpret
things differently." Jim's expression furrowed. "Shit. Cathy's got me reading so many of those Men Are
from Mars books, I could swear sometimes that she's sleeping with Dr. Phil on the side." Jim clutched his
beer tighter, shaking his head as he stared out at the fire.
"My ex-wife tried to get me to read that book a few years ago," Elliot said in commiseration, without
thinking.
But then he heard himself. Ex-wife. It had just rolled off his tongue like that, without the pang, without the
confusion. He closed his eyes briefly, filing away that bit of knowledge for later. He couldn't deal with that
now. Not just yet.
Jim laughed. "We should just hand over our dicks right in the middle of the wedding ceremony," he joked,
but there wasn't any irritation in his voice. He almost seemed content with the idea of it.
but there wasn't any irritation in his voice. He almost seemed content with the idea of it.
Elliot remembered feeling that way in the beginning of his marriage. He'd been glad to let Kathy run things
around the house as long as she hadn't interfered with his work. Maybe it had been the absolute line of
demarcation he had established between the two spheres of his life that had eventually brought the two sides
into a war with each other.
Jim cleared his throat. "So, not to meddle or anything and you can tell me to go to hell, but Cath didn't say
you were divorced. She actually mentioned that you were separated and were working things out with your
wife?"
Elliot's head swiveled to Jim. "How'd she know that?"
Jim looked visibly uncomfortable, obviously realizing his gaffe. "She and...she and Olivia were partnered
during the scavenger hunt, so I'm assuming..." his words trailed off as he finally just decided to take another
sip of his beer and intently analyze the Kodak Kids. It was his turn to swear. "Shit."
Elliot didn't know what to think, what to say, how to react. How had his personal life come up between
Olivia and Cathy? Olivia would never volunteer that information, and even if she did she would had to have
been pressed relentlessly for it. Even then, he had seen Olivia remain stoic through the worst kinds of
pressure. Through IAB interrogations, through suspects trying to push her buttons. Except for the incident
with Thatcher, she had never really broken down.
Which meant she had been asked and then nearly volunteered the information. Which meant she wanted to
say it, to talk about it, to...
Fuck.
What did that mean?
Elliot's fingers practically bit into the nearly empty bottle in his hands. He knew what it meant; he just didn't
want to know. It meant that his attempt to work things out with Kathy bothered Olivia. It meant that she was
still thinking about it, that she wanted to talk about it, that in some way, shape or form, his marriage or lack
thereof was of concern to Olivia.
Stay.
Goddammit. He had slept with Kathy and he hadn't told Olivia. He wondered how she would react if he told
her. Would she hate him? Would she be impassive? Would she pass it off like she didn't give a shit?
"Elliot, hey man. I'm sorry, didn't mean to pry or anything," Jim finally said.
Elliot had forgotten he hadn't responded to the man a few minutes ago. "No, it's no big deal," he tried to
pass off dismissively. "To be honest, I don't know if I'm working things out or not."
It was a relief to say that. It was calming, easing, truthful. Just like that he felt himself relax again.
Jim nodded. "I was married once. In college. Lasted six months before we both realized we were just kids.
Couldn't imagine how we would have made it through the last ten years, you know? So much changes from
then until now. I didn't know who the hell I even was back then." Jim tilted his head a bit, watching Cathy
come out of the building where the bathrooms were and head towards them. "Cath on the other hand knows
me better than I know myself. Couldn't imagine life without her."

Elliot watched Cathy smile at the two of them too, her steps light and her eyes crinkling brightly as she met
those of her fiancé. He found himself watching her intently, wondering if Olivia had ever looked at him like
that, as if she was excited to just be closing the distance between them.
As Cathy came upon them, Elliot realized she had. The look had been in her eyes only a few moments ago
when he had been telling her about Desert Storm. He wanted that look back. Now.
He had to get that look back.
Elliot threw his bottle away; tossing it into the huge garbage can and hearing it clang against the other
bottles. He reached into the melting ice and grabbed two more, thinking he needed to find Olivia, to just talk
to her without shoving his foot into his mouth, or his tongue into hers.
"Hey, Elliot," Cathy said cheerfully. "Where's Olivia?"
He just watched Cathy, memorizing this look on her face. Hopeful. Content. This was the one he had to get
onto Olivia's face somehow.
"I'm gonna go find her," he said quietly, finally feeling some sense of purpose.
Cathy nodded, slipping her arm around Jim's waist. She nodded towards the two s'mores bags on the picnic
table. "She's never had a s'more you know," she said solemnly, meeting Elliot's eyes.
Elliot glanced at the bags and then back at this woman who somehow wasn't as obvious as he had thought
she was. He grabbed the bags off the table.
"Yeah," he said softly. "That's the first thing on my list of things to fix."
It was a few moments later, as he stabbed a single stick with the two marshmallows, that he heard Cathy
talking to Jim off to his left. She had her arms wrapped around him, her face tilted up to his.
"Wanna go back to the room?" she teased her fiancé. "I brought the portable DVD player and some DVD's.
We could um," Elliot heard the obvious flirtation in her voice. "Watch Alias."
Elliot turned the marshmallows carefully, getting them evenly brown while wondering how Olivia would
like them. If she was making her own would she prefer a slow and even burn, one that would liquefy the
insides but keep the shell intact so that when she bit into it, it would explode in her mouth? Or would she be
one that preferred to light it on fire and watch it incinerate in a blaze of glory?
Jim laughed, the sound deep and even. "Let me guess, you brought Season Two?"
Cathy's responding giggle surprisingly didn't grate on Elliot's nerves. "Of course, sweetie. It's when Sydney
and Vaughn finally admit they want each other. Plus," she said coyly, loud enough for everyone at the
campfire to hear. "They worked so much better together after they finally got it on, don't you think?"
The marshmallows went up in flames, and Elliot figured it was only appropriate.
He had let them slow burn for far too long.
+++
Back to index


Chapter 7 by MaddyM
A/N: Thank you so much. I don't know what to say to all the reviews, I'm so grateful. Jess & Brynn for the
betas..you both rock immeasurably. Pooks, Tam, Kuk, Kel, Brynn, Nik and Cat - I owe you either multiple
emails or review responses and they are coming. Longer chap to make up for my delay? Still haven't seen
Fedex bring em to me, DW keeps holding onto them and won't share. Onward...
Olivia heard the slow, even beat of footsteps on the grass behind her and knew it was him long before he
even approached. If there had been any doubt as to whom the rhythm belonged to, it would have evaporated
the moment she heard the steps hesitate, stop, assess and then resume again.
That was them, in a nutshell.
She should have turned; she should have given him something that would have helped alleviate his
apprehension. She should have made amends for her earlier, abrupt departure from their conversation by
offering a smile, or even turning her head to face him. She should have encouraged him to keep moving
towards her.
There were a slew of things she should have done. But she didn't, she hadn't, and so what was done was
done.
She sat on the incline of grass, right before it met the sand. Ahead of her lay the lake, the fresh water
disturbed only by murmurs of movement. If water had emotion, she wondered what it would choose. If it
would choose this gentle, half-asleep rocking or if it would choose the torment of the storms, because the
white-tipped froth of waves in the wind at least expelled some pent-up energy.
"It's so quiet out here," she said softly as an explanation for her choice of location when she heard him
finally come to stand just behind her.
"You mind the company?" Elliot asked, his words stilted, unsure.
Olivia turned, and finally lifted her face to his, the moon casting shadows across the planes of his cheeks.
"Depends. Are we going to end up irritating each other?"
He smiled just a little bit. "Probably." He shrugged, holding out the napkin shrouded contents in his hand as
a peace offering. "I brought s'mores and beer."
Olivia felt her own small smile start. He sounded like a little kid, shoving his Oreos towards her in the
lunchroom and then looking away in embarrassment. "You bribing me?"
He expelled a breath loudly, forcefully. In an instant she decided the water preferred the storms, because
there was a certain relief clearly evident in simply letting things out. "Yeah. Guess I am."
"Well, then sit."
"I'm your partner, not a Labrador," he said, his amusement slightly dissipating his obvious tension.
Olivia lifted her face to his and arched her eyebrows, her lips quirking. "There's so much I could say to that,
Stabler, but I'll let it slide this time."
Stabler, but I'll let it slide this time."
"You're gonna let the opportunity pass you by? You're slipping, Liv." He shook his head, staring out at the
water. "You sure you don't mind the company?"
She shrugged, looking back at the black ripples on the water. "Just don't ruin it, Elliot. It's nice out here and
I just..." Her fingers tangled with the grass, pulling out the blades and letting them fall through. "I just want
it not ruined, okay? Just for tonight."
He stood still for long moments. She could feel his eyes on her profile, even in the dark. Olivia wondered if
she was supposed to look at him, if she was supposed to encourage him to sit again, but she didn't want to
ask him only to have him walk away. If he wanted to stay, he would. If he didn't, he'd leave. He'd make that
decision without any help from her, just as he always did.
She wondered when it had become this hard. If there was a moment, a day, a case that had started this shift
where everything between them had become strained. She wanted to chalk it up to the breakup of his
marriage, to the moment she realized Kathy had left him and he hadn't told her. But that was too easy, and
if that was the answer then the resolution should have come when he decided he was moving home and his
stability had been found again.
But in the last few weeks, everything had only become worse.
Next to her, Elliot made the decision to stay. He sat next to her, drawing his legs up and resting his forearms
on his knees as he set the beers between them and opened the folded napkin. Inside sat two s'mores, stacked
one on top of the other. Silently he held one towards her, the sticky, charred edges of the marshmallow
slipping out from between the graham crackers.
"Can't believe you've never had one," he said quietly, still holding onto the dessert.
Olivia looked at it, finally reaching for it. For the briefest of seconds her fingertips brushed his and she
wanted to drop the s'more between them and figure out what it would feel like to get his fingers in between
hers. To alternate, to have one of his fingers slide between hers until they were stacked, meshed, their
knuckles slipping past each other's until that curve of skin at the base of her fingers was warm, pressed
against by his.
She took the s'more, and examined it, wondering if she should break it in half first to keep it from cracking
in her hands when she took a bite. Olivia finally threw caution to the wind and sank her teeth right into it,
the melted chocolate and oozing marshmallow exploding in her mouth. It was incredible, the still warm
liquid center of the marshmallow incongruous with the texture of the graham cracker. Her fingers were
sticky, messy, and crumbs actually fell into the top of her sweatshirt yet she didn't care. Jesus Christ, it was
good. She could make these at home, she decided. She could spear a marshmallow and hold it over her gas
stove and make these at home because with a glass of wine, it might actually be something to look forward
to at the end of a bad day.
They were quiet as they sat there and ate the peace offering. Elliot was done in two bites, brushing his pants
off quickly and then reaching for a beer. Olivia ate slowly instead, enjoying every bite, until she even darted
her tongue out and quickly captured the crumb that sat on the top of her lip.
It was the first silence between them that she had ever been content to let linger.
There were the intermittent sounds of the frogs, the crickets, and the water that rocked against the dock. It
was odd for them to be sitting under the moonlight, sitting still, the burdens brought by their cases not new
ones. The latest horrors were days old, which meant sleep would come tonight. Olivia wanted to hear her
surroundings tonight because they were new. She wanted to absorb them because they weren't the sounds of
surroundings tonight because they were new. She wanted to absorb them because they weren't the sounds of
traffic, of sirens, of her cell phone ringing in the moments right after another life was destroyed.
But as the minutes dragged on, all she could hear was the silence and it was so loud that it drowned out
everything else.
"You ready for the ropes tomorrow?" Elliot finally asked.
She knew what he was asking. If her fear of the heights was easing at all, if the slow build of trust for her
teammates, for him, was at all alleviating her tension. She shrugged. "I guess."
He nodded, taking a sip of his beer. "Nothing bad is gonna happen, Liv. People do these courses everyday."
She looked at him, meeting his eyes in the dark. "Yeah, I guess," she said again.
"You guess?" Elliot's eyes locked on hers. "You don't sound okay about this."
Olivia looked away, reaching for her as yet unopened bottle. She twisted the cap off, feeling the bite of the
ridged edges on the metal cap poke into her palm. "I'll be fine. I've always managed my pathetic fear of
heights before, haven't I?"
His intent, searching gaze was still hot on her cheek. "It's not pathetic. But I'm gonna be with you. Earlier
you said you trusted me back when Simon contacted you. You still trust me now, right?
Even out here, with nothing but air around her, her chest begged for oxygen. She didn't want the beer she
had just opened; she wanted an explanation for why she couldn't just say yes. Why she immediately thought
of things like his wife, and why for some odd reason the image of Kathy stole Olivia's ability to assure him
that yes, she trusted him.
I trust you, Elliot. I trust you to have my back in the field.
Leave it at that.
"You asked Cragen to split us, didn't you?" Olivia suddenly blurted out instead.
Shit, she thought, as soon as the accusing words had dropped between them. Where the hell had that come
from?
Elliot slowly set his beer into the grass. He picked a weed next to him and started breaking it into small
pieces that he let drop onto the ground, taking long, painful moments before he spoke. "Yeah, just for a case
or two," he finally uttered.
She wondered if it was her pointed question or his blunt response that qualified as the something stupid one
of them would inevitably say when they talked these days. She knew they both qualified as the something
that ruined the peace that she had been seeking. "You could have told me first."
He nodded slowly. "Yeah," he said quietly. "I could have."
Olivia looked at him, at his profile as he glanced at the water. Here, in the dark, she should have been able
to let go, to cry if she needed to. But he was here and so she'd have to wait until he was gone. She'd make
sure he'd leave first so she could be alone.
She was good at doing that.

"Why don't you tell me things anymore, Elliot?" She hadn't meant to sound wistful. Then again, there were
so many things she hadn't meant.
His fingers stilled on the last bits of the weed, but he didn't look at her. Instead his lips started to form
words and then stopped. Twice. His eyebrows furrowed, as if he was picking out a detail on the water but
she knew what the truth of it was.
Elliot was trying to stop his eyes from watering.
Olivia didn't want to hear the words that were coming. She didn't know what they were, but she was
suddenly so deeply sorry that she had asked the question. The silence would have been okay. It wouldn't
have made things better, but at least it wouldn't have made things worse, and whatever he was about to say
was going to hurt. It was going to-
"I slept with Kathy again," he said in a flat monotone.
Olivia let her eyes drift closed. Despite the fact that her breastbone felt like it was being smashed in a vice,
she didn't make a sound. It hurt when it had no right to. It hurt when it should have been assumed from the
moment he had told her he was moving home. It hurt her eardrums because the words themselves were
painful, just as the ones that would fall from her lips would be. "She's your wife. I think that's to be
expected."
"Don't do that," Elliot shook his head, never looking at her. "Just... don't do that."
Olivia found the same tone that he had used when he told her. "Do what?"
"Trivialize what I'm telling you. You asked me to tell you things, and I did and then you do that." The half-
laugh he emitted on a breath held no humor. It was instead tinged with disbelief.
She couldn't cry and she couldn't scream. She was angry that even if she could, neither one was an
appropriate option right now. "I'm sorry Elliot. I didn't know there was something ideally appropriate to say.
I must have missed the memo on that lesson," she said sarcastically, no, bitterly, and despising the sound of
her own voice.
Elliot finally looked at her. She could feel his eyes on her cheeks but she didn't give him the satisfaction of
facing him.
He didn't take the hint. He kept staring at her.
"Jesus, Elliot. Stop looking at me," she hissed, focusing on the buoy that danced in the water twenty yards
out.
"Christ, what happened to us?" he whispered.
That was it. That was all she could take. The combination of reverence and horror in his voice washed over
her skin and she let out a sound she'd never heard before as her head fell to her drawn knees. She closed her
eyes tightly, willing herself to breathe, not to cry, just not to cry. She rarely cried and if she did now, it
would freak him the hell out.
But the image of his words had now crystallized in her head and all she could see was Elliot, moving over
Kathy as his powerful, bare arms held her, as his voice whispered tenderly to her. She was sick to her
stomach, the nausea twisting in her gut as she fought the images her head was conjuring when it had no
right. She had no right. Those were private moments for Elliot and she was fucked up to think about them,
to picture them.
to picture them.
He made love to his wife, Olivia. Get over it. Congratulate him. You've got no emotion over this. No
emotion.
Who the hell do you think you are?
Get over it, Olivia.
She was too hot and her palms were clammy. She wondered if there were fire ants out here and if they had
found her skin. She was going to vomit. Olivia pushed her forehead against her knees, holding down the
bile, trying to calm her protesting stomach.
You're making a fool of yourself. Get a grip.
He's not yours, so what difference does it make?
"Tell me why it hurts you," he bit off, sounding like he was cracking apart. As if he was seconds away from
breaking, from exploding.
From shattering.
But she couldn't do it. She couldn't lift her head. Not yet. She was grateful for her long hair, for the fact that
she had pulled out the rubber band before the campfire. Because it hid her now, it formed a curtain around
her face so he couldn't see her.
He couldn't know if her face was wet or if it wasn't.
She was dying right now, and it was his job to save her. Then again, he couldn't save her from him.
"Liv," he said again, his desperation growing. "Tell me."
Olivia shook her head. "Go away," she finally managed. God, if someone took a razor and scraped away the
layers of her skin it wouldn't hurt this much. Two years of watching him break, of breaking with him, and
he was right back where he started.
So was she.
He was with his wife and Olivia was alone.
God, Olivia. You really think he'd throw away twenty years if he didn't have to? For what? For you? He's
your partner. He'd stop your chest from bleeding, but he's not responsible for the ache.
She felt the panic begin to weave itself around her. "Go away," she said again, because he didn't seem to
listen.
"No. I'm not you," he said softly. "I'm gonna stick around until I figure out why it hurts."
Olivia counted to ten a few times, trying to make sure she took a breath on every other count at least. When
her throat unlocked just a little bit she lifted her head. "I asked you not to ruin it out here," she accused, her
voice barely registering.
"I slept with Kathy the night of the Royce case," Elliot said loudly, harshly, his empty eyes trained on hers
in the dark. He pushed the words at her, saying them as if they were her truth as well. But they weren't, they
weren't. They only involved him; they had nothing to do with her. Nothing.
weren't. They only involved him; they had nothing to do with her. Nothing.
When Elliot had walked right by her that morning after he had broken Royce, he still had Kathy on him.
She'd covered for him with Cragen that night so he could go home and see his kids.
He'd failed to mention he was going home to sleep with his wife.
He'd pushed her too far. Her voice rose dangerously. "I heard you the first time, and I don't know what you
want. A medal? You want a medal, Elliot? You want to know what you've won behind door number two?
You've won your life back; you've won your wife. You've won the house in the suburbs back. You've won-"
"Tell me what I've lost," he interrupted quietly, sadly, as if he was assessing the damage done to a broken
thing.
She sucked in a breath, stopping the words that were still on the verge of slipping out. Words of anger, of
hurt.
Of jealousy.
Everything calmed inside of her again as she found the one thing that she knew how to do. Olivia gave up
even though she didn't know to what she was surrendering. "Nothing. You haven't lost anything." She
tucked her hair behind her ears and looked for the buoy again, thinking it was odd that she needed it to keep
her floating even while she was on dry land. She wondered how strong the buoy was, why it would always
have the instinct to reach for the surface.
She wondered why air could make something float when air was just an intangible.
The minutes stretched between them, and Olivia used the time to regain her tenuous hold on her emotions.
She methodically closed the doors on the reasons for her outburst, tucking herself together again. She tugged
on the walls that had collapsed and did her best to send them up again, surrounding herself with them.
She finally felt calm again, as if her pulse had evaporated. Of course a missing pulse usually meant someone
was dead, but she didn't want to think about that.
"I don't want to sleep with her again," he whispered, his horrified words barely discernable against the soft
whistle of air that started to rustle through the trees above them. "She's...she's legally still my wife and I
don't want to sleep with her again."
Olivia froze, and she thought that everything around them did as well. There were no more sounds, no
crickets, no water. There was just the quiet, the dark and his hushed confession; the one that seemed like it
had been ripped from deep in his gut without his permission.
"You're moving home," she said, because she couldn't give him answers when her questions were so loud.
"You're moving home." Her confusion was overwhelming, it made her head hurt.
It made her lips dry.
"That's just it," he said. He was looking at the buoy, too. "I'm moving home and I don't-"
"She's your wife." Olivia's voice was rising, climbing for reasons she didn't understand.
He glared at her in the dark. "Stop saying that, Olivia," he hissed. "The divorce papers." He stopped, sucking
in all the air around them. "I got the final papers back from the lawyer. He knew we were working on
reconciling, but they had been initially filed with the court so he had to send them to me for the record. Just
reconciling, but they had been initially filed with the court so he had to send them to me for the record. Just
one more signature. One, that's all they would have needed. The last one before I sent them back. And they
sat there on my kitchen table with that fucking line blank."
"Because you're moving home." Olivia knew she sounded stupid, but it didn't matter. She had to say the
words, to just keep saying them so she'd hear them.
She just had to hear them. Really hear them.
"Goddamn you, Olivia. You're not even listening." Elliot cursed quietly and then shoved his beer bottle
towards her on the grass, as if she would need the remnants of his drink after he was gone. He stood up to
leave, brushing his jeans angrily.
She lifted her face to his. "Well then why don't you figure out what you're trying to tell me!"
Elliot ignored her. He turned and started to walk away.
He was going, finally, and she'd get some space. She'd get some space to figure out why the hell it was any
of her business, why she'd ever felt she had some claim to him, why it had felt like a-
"I'm not betraying you by sleeping with her."
His dead, flat words stopped his retreat, stopped her heart.
"I'm not, Olivia," he said emphatically. "I'm not."
She didn't know who he was trying to convince. She didn't say anything. Off in the distance the faint lights
of a boat cut through the water. It was moving slowly, cruising towards wherever home would be found
after the long night.
In moments the residual effects of its waves rocked the buoy.
"Dammit, Olivia." He headed back towards her, her clue being the increasing volume of his words. "You're
the one who asked me why I don't tell you things and-"
She whipped her head up and around to face him. "You told me you had sex with your wife! What exactly
am I supposed to do with that information?"
His anger was building too. Elliot narrowed his eyes as she looked at him towering above her, the blue
seeming nearly black in the shadows. "Ask me why, for God's sake."
Olivia's eyes widened as her adrenaline spiked. "Jesus, since when do we talk about our sex lives, Elliot?
Ask you why you had sex? Are you insane? I know why you had sex. Because you were horny, because you
wanted to get laid, because you love her and you-"
He cut her off with a low, menacing growl. "Shut up, Olivia! This is why we don't do the talking thing
anymore! Because we can't. Because we can't say two damned words to each other without screwing it up
somehow!"
He was right. He had been right when he had asked Cragen for the split and he was right now. "We should
just go back to the city, Elliot. You were right. We should just tell Cragen we need a split," she mumbled as
she stood up, her eyes not meeting his. "It's best for everyone if we split."

"I meant for a case or two, Olivia. I didn't mean for good!" Elliot spat at her angrily.
She was tired. Her bones were tired of fitting together; her skin was tired of holding her in. She didn't have
any more instincts anymore, nothing that warned her of the danger. Olivia was far too numb to care
anymore. So she just said it. She asked the question he wanted her to, the one she didn't really want the
answer to.
"Why Elliot?" she said woodenly, perfunctorily. He was standing in front of her so she focused on the tip of
her flip-flop, kicking the tree root that bulged up from the ground and broke the surface of the grass. Olivia
tried to sound bored and she ended up sounding weary, exhausted, defeated. "Tell me why you went home.
Tell me why you don't want to do it again. Tell me why you haven't thrown those damned papers away."
Elliot stepped closer to her, his voice dropping on her. He answered her so quickly that she knew he had
been waiting for her to ask all along. "She didn't feel like my wife anymore," he said raggedly. "And Liv,
I..." His swallow was audible. "I was supposed to be packing and I...I signed the papers. I signed them just
to know what that would feel like. What does that mean, you know? It means I'm the one that's leaving
them. If I don't go back, it means I've left them."
Olivia didn't know what to say. Her toe trailed over the top of the root. Rubbing it, pressing on it, trying to
get the damned thing to just go back into the ground. But it had been working on bursting out of the ground
for years, and just the pressure of her foot wouldn't make it budge an inch. She was angry with it. Angry
with it for not staying where it belonged. It belonged underneath, in the dark and the dirt where it would
never see the light of day. But it wasn't comfortable with boundaries so it had broken through anyway. It
just did what it pleased.
She hated it. She hated it and so she pushed harder on it, trying to shove it in. It wasn't moving and she was
getting frustrated. Olivia used the full sole of her flip-flop now, nearly stamping on the root. Then she tried
actually putting her weight into the pressure. Again, and then again.
She lost her balance. Just a little bit. It was enough that Elliot reached out to steady her although he didn't
say a word about what she was doing. He didn't say anything about the fact that she was probably crying.
In front of him.
Elliot's hands were on her elbows. "But if I go back to them," he continued softly as if she had never lost
her mind. "If I go back to them, for some reason it feels like I'm leaving you."
Olivia stilled, looking up but not at him. She looked past him, into the wall of trees. Into a place where she
knew the ground would be covered with thousands of roots that wouldn't stay buried. They'd be everywhere,
making her trip and fall if she just kept walking ahead and into the dense forest.
"You can't leave something that's not yours to begin with," she said, lifting her chin. It was stupid to be
defiant when her face was so obviously, pathetically wet. She shrugged. "We're partners, El. Just like I said
to Kathy. I'm just work."
His fingers bit into her elbows as he shook her a little bit. "What do you mean like you said to Kathy?"
Her nose was going to run if he didn't let go of her. She sniffled, then hated the whimpering sound of it and
stopped. So her nose might run. She was a mess anyways. He already knew she couldn't hold it together.
After eight years together, this would be what he remembered of her. Sniveling, pathetic, dramatic Olivia.
"Kathy called me one day. In the middle of the Sennet case. Wanted to know why you weren't signing the
papers."

"You talked to her about my marriage?" Elliot's words were short. Punctuated. His fingers were starting to
hurt.
"She called me, Elliot. She wanted to meet me. It's not like I called her up and said-"
"You met with Kathy?" he prodded, his voice tightening.
Olivia finally looked at him. He was angry and that was just the barrier she needed between them to give her
the ability to look him in the eyes. "Yeah, I met her in the park. She thought I was close enough to you that
I'd know why you hadn't signed the papers. She thought that you preferred to spend time with me instead of
at home. But she doesn't have a clue, does she Elliot?" Olivia wrenched her arms hard, pulling them harshly
out of his grasp and taking a step backwards.
The root tripped her just a little; making her stumble. She cursed it out as she steadied herself.
Olivia wasn't finished. She was finally just splitting out of herself. "Or maybe it's you that doesn't have a
clue, Elliot. Because you didn't sign the papers for two years, and now, in the moment you can go home
you're signing them just to see what it feels like?" She tilted her head, hating the mocking, taunting sound of
her words. "What the hell is that, Elliot?
He didn't fight her. He didn't give her what she wanted. His eyes shuttered, and she could see the change
even in the dark. "I don't know," he said in a rough timbre so deep that she barely heard him.
Another boat passed by them, another group going home for the night. Only this one was louder, filling the
silence for a few moments. This time she didn't check on the buoy. She figured it would float. It would
knock around and bob a little and act like it would sink from the waves, but in the end it would seek the
surface just as it always did.
It was a persistent sonofabitch.
Maybe it was his vulnerability in the moment; maybe it was that he seemed lost. Maybe it was because he
seemed too big, too strong to seem this weak. Maybe she knew they'd eventually figure out the
consequences of her asking in the first place. Whatever it was, she finally stepped closer to him. Too close.
So close she could feel him breathing on her cheeks.
"What did it feel like, El?" she asked, feeling her guard dropping. "When you signed the papers, what did it
feel like?"
His head was hung just a bit, but as he heard her quiet question it lifted. His eyes said that he knew the
answer already; it was one he had been aware of before she had even asked. A conclusion he had just been
waiting to say out loud.
"I felt free of it all," he whispered guiltily, the words mixed with too much wind from his lungs.
His face was inches from hers, and the world around them was quieter than it had ever been. Everything
was slower, everything around them felt like it was watching them, waiting for something.
Elliot must have felt it too, because he moved. But instead of pulling away he got closer. His hands came
up and slid over her hair, bunching up the strands into both his fists. Olivia stood still, terrified to move. He
didn't use his hold on her to pull her any closer, he didn't hurt her. It was just him and his hands and her hair
locked in his grasp. She didn't even know if he saw her, if he knew she was in front of him. His eyes were
glazed with a faraway expression, his lips parted.

And then his hands moved, released her hair. One of them slipped lower, curving beneath the thick length
and around her neck, sliding his rough palm against her skin. The fingers on his other hand brushed her
bangs to the side, softly, gently sending them away and out of her eyes.
Elliot had never touched her like this before. Not reverently, not as if he was learning her. Olivia didn't
move even though something inside of her was screaming to make him stop. She couldn't have pulled away
if her life depended on it, and somehow she thought that maybe it did.
She knew it before it happened, and she wanted to protest. She knew this was up to her, because if she made
even the slightest sound he would have been jerked from wherever he was now and he would have seen
what he was doing. Elliot would have backed off, he'd have pulled back. But he wasn't entirely with her in
these moments, and it was almost like knowing instinctively that a sleepwalker shouldn't be woken.
Elliot's mouth closed in on hers, slipping through the distance until space disintegrated between his lips and
hers. He just pressed them against her for a moment, as if her lips were ice cubes and his were on fire. He
pressed hard and then she felt him breathe for a moment, dragging in air that she thought was hers. Elliot
tilted his head, and fitted his mouth more solidly on her. He closed his lips around hers and drew her in,
pulling her with him.
Olivia didn't know where to put her hands, so she reached for his shirt at his waist, clutching it in her own
fists without touching his body. His tongue thrust into her mouth and she nearly fell, the ground uneven
beneath her feet. He tasted like the marshmallows and the chocolate and the beer. She instinctively wanted
more of it, even if it was just for this moment, this one single second of time. She frantically tried to taste
him again with her own tongue, tried to drink him in, tried to get every millimeter of his lips against hers. It
was just about fitting, about fitting and she was dying because against his mouth hers seemed to find a
place.
Olivia pushed closer to him, unable to stop herself from wanting more. In the same moments that he gave
her knowledge about what it was like to live, he took away everything she had ever known about what it
was like to breathe. The tips of her breasts brushed against the immoveable, solid granite of Elliot's chest,
every breath dragging her sensitive skin against him. She didn't know if she was struggling to inhale simply
to create friction between her chest and his or if it was because his lips had commanded hers, owned hers,
and with him claiming her mouth she simply needed to find another way to get some air. She eventually
found air where she could get it, by fighting for it in gasps, in shudders, and by absorbing it through her
skin. And finally, when there was no way to get air anywhere else, she simply took his.
Elliot's strong fingers pushed on the delicate skin on the back of her neck as he urged her closer, and he
used his other hand to cup her jaw, to tilt her upwards to meet his open, hot, seeking mouth, his demanding
tongue. He rubbed his lower lip along hers, allowing her to breathe briefly and then he was back, his whole
mouth capturing hers, his intake of breath fiery against her skin.
He was fierce, wholly devoted to her mouth, lavishing it with his own lips. Elliot's teeth bit gently on her
lower lip when she made the mistake of closing her mouth just a little bit. It was him chastising her,
teaching her, instructing her. No Olivia, keep your mouth open for me. His body against hers ignited a
brushfire on her skin; wild, untamed, ruthless and without boundaries. He nipped at her, devoured her, and
then gave her back to herself just long enough so she could do the same to him. But he was impatient, and
he never gave her as long to explore his mouth as she gave to him.
Elliot was a possessive, greedy bastard sometimes.
Olivia moaned into his mouth and stepped closer to him, needing all of his heated, scalding desire on her,
against her. She was kissing Elliot, she realized in the haze, but then she knew she was wrong.

He was kissing her.
She'd been wrong about so much. Elliot wasn't rage, or anger, or even the simplicity of justice. Elliot was
goddamned sex, seduction and unchecked passion. He was consumption and explosions and things best left
uncontrolled.
Basic, she thought. Primal. Jesus, he was practically snarling, growling into her mouth as he arrogantly took
things she didn't know she had to give.
Olivia was trembling from it; she had to be because there was a motion in her pulse she couldn't define. She
had to force her body to stay still, not to lock around his, not to drag Elliot onto the grass beneath her feet
and beg him to give her all the hard planes of him. She was pounding, everything about her was throbbing,
screaming, desperate and all she had of Elliot was his glorious mouth.
She didn't want to know more. She couldn't. Not yet, not when she was sure she would shatter from needing
to process just this.
Elliot kissed her. Christ, that was such a simple, mundane word for all of it.
Kissed.
Bullshit.
Her lips were wet, bruised and singed when he finally pulled back. She knew, even without getting her
hands onto his chest, that he was shaking. Or maybe she was.
Elliot pressed his lips on her temple. "I felt free," he said again. "God help me."
And then the air was cold again, colder than it had ever been and it felt like a wind had picked up off the
lake because he abruptly let go of her. Nearly pushed her away. He stepped back, and before she could say
anything, before she could tell him to watch out for the roots, he was gone.
He was gone.
He never tripped. He seemed to know where the roots were, even in the dark.
Olivia stood there stunned, the lake air drying her mouth, drying her face. And as the night sank deeper into
the darkness, the small light on the pier still danced off the bobbing white glare of the buoy.
+++
The campfire had still been burning as he made his way back to the cabin, his footsteps heavy. The
foursome from Kodak and Jim and Cathy had still been laughing, sitting around the dwindling flames. He
knew they saw him stalk by, but he couldn't even acknowledge them.
His body was a fucking mess. Of course, the disaster in his head was far more disturbing.
Elliot was turned on. Desperate. Every damned nerve cell in his body was standing at attention. He was
grateful for the length of the untucked shirt he wore because otherwise he'd be announcing his raging hard-
on to everyone.
The hard-on he was sporting for Olivia.

Fuck.
Elliot slammed the door, standing in the dark of the room he was assigned. He turned, pressing his forehead
into the wood of the door, his palms flat against the rough surface.
He'd kissed her. He'd fucking kissed Olivia. And then like a complete asshole he had just left her standing
there.
He'd kissed Olivia.
He'd had her lips beneath his, he'd heard her make a small sound as he'd done it, he'd thrust his tongue into
her without stopping to think.
He had taken her mouth because he wanted it. Hell, had she said no? Had he even stopped to listen? She
couldn't have said no, she couldn't have. He'd have heard that. Okay, so she hadn't said no.
She hadn't said stop. She hadn't said stay either.
Christ.
Olivia drove him crazy. She was driving him crazy. All the things he wanted with her she would punch him
in the face for. He wanted to own her, to claim things, to just take, take, take. He wanted to be deep inside
of her when he heard her agree that yes, dammit, she was his.
I belong to you, Elliot.
He laughed bitterly and shook his head in disgust. She was going to fucking kill him.
Elliot pushed himself off the door, keeping his palms on it to steady the room as he dropped his head,
staring at the faint light that slipped underneath the door. He could still taste her, could still feel her lips on
his.
He could still hear those blasted, impossible sounds. What the hell were they? Moaning? No, they weren't
that strong. Pleading? No. And they weren't damned whimpering because Olivia didn't whimper. Ever.
Ever.
She didn't.
Goddammit, he wanted her. He wanted her bare skin beneath his hands, wanted to hear her say his name
when it wasn't out of anger or disappointment, wanted to grab that damned hair when he slid himself deep
inside of her.
Inside of Olivia.
Elliot blew out a deep breath. She'd always been attractive, stunning if he was honest. But it wasn't until the
last few years that he had found himself truly considering her this way, noticing her more and more until his
want crept up on him and knocked him flat. Then this, this damned weekend, and suddenly it was right there
in front of him every time he turned around.
Hi Olivia, I'm your partner Elliot and this is my goddamned hard-on. We think it's very nice to meet you.
He couldn't think of her legs, and mull over why the hell they were so long. He couldn't think of them,
wrapped around his waist, the long, smooth column of her thigh flexing beneath his hand as he drove

himself higher into...
No.
No, no, no.
You don't own Olivia, Stabler. She's not yours. She's going to kick your ass.
Lock the door, asshole.
She may be on her way here to kick your ass now.
Yes, she can do it. Just watch her.
Jesus, she'd felt incredible. The skin on the back of her neck, her lush lower lip, her hands fisting in his
shirt. She'd smelled good too. Her hair had trapped the smell of the campfire, and it mixed with the sweet
smell of her apple shampoo.
He squeezed his eyes shut. He'd left her standing there.
He ran out of swear words.
Tell me why you went home.
Olivia's words echoed in his head, and he wanted to come up with answer. Here in the dark, almost two
hundred miles from the front porch he had stood on when he'd asked to be allowed back into his marriage,
he needed to figure out why he'd done that in the first place. He'd been scared. He'd seen it all fall apart. The
night he'd thought he had killed Ryan Bedford, he had seen the last of what he'd had fall away and the days
after had been disastrous.
His job had been done as far as he had known, his freedom potentially lost. Kathy had been so far removed
from him that she hadn't even called him.
Essentially he had lost everything.
Olivia had fought tooth and nail for him, yet all he could process was that when they took his job, they were
taking her, too. There would be no more Benson and Stabler. No more sitting across the desk from her, no
more reasons for him to see her. He'd fucked up so badly that he wouldn't even be allowed to protect her
anymore.
Without the job, he didn't know if she'd even want to see him. She wasn't his.
He poured his scotch that night and tried to assimilate all that had been taken away and he realized that the
only thing he had any semblance of control over was his family. The NYPD had the power to take
everything else, but if he lost his family it was his own damned fault.
Kathy had called him two days after he had made his request. Said she thought about it. Time had passed,
maybe they had learned things. She'd give it one last try, if for no one else but the kids.
He hadn't been able to explain why he had put Kathy off in the days that followed, in the days that he had
been cleared. He had been given back his job; he'd been given back Olivia. He was the Stabler of Benson
and Stabler again. Call after call came in from Kathy and he'd begged off repeatedly that he had a case.
Somewhere deep in his head he wondered if she'd tell him to go to hell because if anything he had become
less available than he had been during their marriage.
less available than he had been during their marriage.
Elliot flipped on the light in the small room, turning to face his duffel that sat open on his bed. He went and
sat on the thin mattress, dragging the bag onto his lap and searching in the small pocket on the side. His
fingers dug into the fabric, closing around the small piece of metal.
His wedding ring.
Elliot rolled his neck again, as he did often these days, trying to alleviate the painful tension. The gold band
caught the light and glared back at him. He took it everywhere with him. Tossed it into his jean pocket,
occasionally just setting it on his dresser at home. He stared at it sometimes, wondering if he'd suddenly feel
like putting it on if he looked at it long enough.
He never did.
Even now he analyzed the simple band, remembering the moment Kathy had slipped it onto his finger all
those years ago, her blonde hair shining and falling straight over her shoulders, her clear blue eyes lit up
with promise.
Elliot wanted to feel something more than this. But it was like a fond memory, a moment in time that was
owned by the past. He had made love to her; he had held her, kissed her, sunk his body into her and tried to
forget the image of a bloody Lindsey Royce and a dead little boy that had lifted his face to Elliot's only
hours before.
But that's what it had been. Having sex with Kathy had been about blocking out images, and somewhere
along the line he had blocked out the ramifications of what he was doing, had blocked out everything,
including her.
He had come, and then he had gone. Yet the damage had been done.
He kissed Olivia.
The damage was now complete all the way around.
Somehow he had to figure out how to say things to a woman that had given up on him after twenty years.
He had to tell Kathy that in the space she had forced upon him he had given up on her too. Somehow he had
to figure out how to do that without feeling like he was abandoning his kids.
Somehow he had to do those things because against Olivia he had seen his truth and he'd been wrong by
trying to fix the past by sacrificing his future.
Somehow he had to figure out how to salvage a partnership he'd just trashed because he'd sought his truth at
Olivia's expense.
He wondered if she was re-packing her bag. If he'd finally sent her away for good.
His cell phone chimed, the distinctive sound indicating a text message had just been received. He reached
into his back pocket and grabbed the thin phone, flipping open the screen.
The ropes make me nervous but I trust you.
His ring fell from his fingers, the small, empty sound of it hitting the wooden planks barely registering. He
dropped his head into his hands, flipping the phone closed.

Olivia wasn't running. She was talking to him instead.
It was far more than a bastard like him deserved.
+++
Olivia propped her small toiletry bag on the worn, dented steel of the vanity top, choosing the sink closest to
the door. She looked up into the hazy mirror, seeing her reflection and wondering if he would text her back.
She didn't think he would.
She had done it without thinking.
She had tossed their beer bottles into the garbage near the campfire and noticed Cathy and Jim curled up
together, talking so intently that they hadn't even acknowledged her. Before Olivia had known any better
she had texted Elliot, only the sound of the sent text finally alerting her to what she had done. She had
shoved her phone back into the pocket of her sweats as she pushed open the door to the sleeping cabin.
His door had been closed and the light had been on.
She had quickly grabbed her small bag and a towel from her room and made her way out of the cabin,
heading across the camp to the small building that contained the bathrooms. She wanted to shower, to rinse
off, to stand under the hot water in the stall and let the heat soak away the memory of his hands on her.
If she licked her lips, she could still taste him. His beer, his mouth, his heat.
In the mirror, she stared at her reflection. She looked like she had been kissed. Hard. The skin around her
lips was slightly red, tinged and scraped from his stubble. Her lips were swollen, her hair mussed. There
was color in her cheeks and her eyes were far too bright, too wide and hollow for her own good.
Everything still ached. She ached for him, in anticipation of him, because of him. Her nipples scraped
against her bra, and her thighs shook with the need to lock around him.
Impossible.
This was impossible.
He had gone home and had sex with his wife.
He didn't want to do it again.
Olivia's hands shook as she fumbled in her small bag for her toothbrush and toothpaste, jumping as she
heard a toilet flush and a bathroom stall open behind her.
Hell, she was losing it. She hadn't checked beneath the stall doors when she had walked in, hadn't even
noticed any noise. She was a detective for God's sake, and she wasn't even paying attention to her
surroundings.
Jessica walked out of the bathroom, glancing up at Olivia and offering a small smile. "Hey," the younger
woman offered easily.
Olivia swallowed, taking in Jessica's appearance. The other woman was flushed, blushing, the lip gloss she
put on every few minutes over the course of the day noticeably gone. She had either been fooling around
with or had sex with Tyler at some point in the very, very recent past and they both knew it was obvious.
with or had sex with Tyler at some point in the very, very recent past and they both knew it was obvious.
"Hey," Olivia responded awkwardly.
She saw Jessica glance up into the mirror as the woman washed her hands. Jessica wasn't examining herself
as Olivia had done moments earlier, instead she simply caught sight of her reflection and blushed again.
"Probably not a good idea to mix business with pleasure huh?" Jessica mused softly, still smiling.
Olivia froze. "Excuse me?"
Jessica shrugged, pumping the soap dispenser for some of the bubblegum pink froth. "Tyler. I mean, I know
it's probably not totally appropriate, but he and I have worked together for a couple of years. Guess this
thing was bound to happen."
Olivia tried to mimic this girl's casual demeanor. While Jessica was somewhat sheepish, she wasn't
apologetic, and she was openly discussing something so intimate with Olivia like it was nothing.
"Just because two people work together doesn't mean that..." Olivia shut up, realizing how defensive she
sounded. "I mean..." She didn't know what she meant. She shut up again.
Jessica looked up, startled. She recovered quickly and grabbed a paper towel. "No, I know. He and I, we
just always had something there I guess. Right from the start. I don't know why I'm telling you this," she
tossed the used towel away. "I mean, I just don't want anyone here to think that we're...that we're like sleazy
or anything. It's not just like we are randomly hooking up or whatever, you know?"
Olivia nodded, feeling starkly out of her element. "Right. Not random. Got it,"
she tried to offer Jessica an encouraging smile. She figured she failed at the attempt and started to put
toothpaste on her toothbrush instead.
Jessica leaned back against the counter, picking at her cuticle. "Can I ask you a question? I mean, you being
a little older and everything, you might know. And I could totally use the advice."
Olivia found herself frozen for the second time in as many minutes. She paused, her toothbrush held in mid-
air. Did all people in public relations talk this much, this openly, this freely? Was it their job to? Was
Jessica just entirely not afraid of talking to anyone and everyone as if they were already her best friend?
Her lack of response must have been a response, because Jessica continued unfazed. "Do you think it's a bad
idea for Tyler and I to like, hook up? I mean, Hannah thinks I should go for it. She says at worst I get a new
job, which I'd probably have to because I've got a year of seniority on Tyler and that could piss the company
off. But she said that meeting Mr. Right is totally more impossible that finding a new job, and I'm stupid if I
don't see what's right in front of me."
Olivia set her hand down, her toothbrush as yet unused. Was there a question in all of that?
Jessica looked up. She scrunched her pert nose and tucked a portion of her long, dark hair behind her ear.
"So do you think it's a bad idea? I can't even ask my older sister because she's all forty and single," she
rolled her eyes as she made air quotes with her fingers. "You know, like all I am woman, hear me roar, I
don't need a man, blah, blah, blah." Jessica straightened. "Which is such bullshit. She's just all defensive
because she's been burned like nine hundred times. So she'd tell me to stick with the job because it's all I've
got. But, you know, Tyler..." Her pretty face softened. "He's incredible and he makes me laugh and he's
totally hot, and I figured this weekend could totally change things for us."
Olivia's fist tightened on her toothbrush. She had to end this because she was pretty sure she was making an
ass out of herself by just staring at the younger woman. She couldn't believe that Jessica was actually
ass out of herself by just staring at the younger woman. She couldn't believe that Jessica was actually
standing in a bathroom lit by fluorescent bulbs and casually discussing whether she wanted her job or a
man. As if it would be decided here, now, in this place?
Did people really make major life decisions in public restrooms?
Jessica smiled brightly, her brown eyes sparkling. "So what do you think? Should I go for it?"
There was something about her that was innocent. It was light and airy and free-spirited. She was a woman
that had been raised on the shows that Olivia let drone on her television in the middle of the night after the
worst cases. Melrose Place, 90210, The O.C. To her, relationships were potential, to be tried, to be
examined and dissected with friends over lattes in coffee bars with overstuffed couches. She was all about
the pursuit of love, her job an accessory to her life and not everything in it.
"I think you should go for it," Olivia found herself saying quietly and actually believing it.
Jessica grinned. "Yeah. I think so too." She cocked her head. "So, your partner, is he available?"
Olivia flinched, accidentally dumping the toothpaste off her brush and into the basin of the sink. "I'm sorry?
"
Jessica came closer, her voice dropping conspiratorially. "Well, my sister is single, you know? She lives in
Manhattan too. And he's so intense that she'd be into it. She likes that brooding type. Plus," Jessica sighed,
"he totally looks like he needs to loosen up and get laid, don't you think?"
"He's not single," Olivia choked, responding far too fast and emphatically for her own liking. Shit. Shit.
Why did that feel possessive?
Why the hell didn't Kathy cross her damned mind when she said he wasn't single?
Shit to infinity.
Jessica shrugged. "Oh well. Too bad. As long as all those muscles aren't going to waste, you know?" She
smiled and touched Olivia's arm as she walked past. "Anyway, thanks for the advice. I might just take you
up on it right now, if you know what I mean." She winked. "See you in the morning. The ropes should be
fun!"
Olivia stood there, unmoving, until long after Jessica's footsteps faded from the tile floors. Her eyes were
trained on the swell of her lower lip where Elliot's teeth had nipped at her.
She was surprised by the one thought that ran through her head as her finger traced the redness left by the
demands of Elliot's mouth.
Maybe some things did get decided in public restrooms after all.
+++
Back to index

Chapter 8 by MaddyM
A/N: The reviews have blown me away. Everyone has always been generous, but this has really astounded
me. Thank you. I'm catching up on responding I think, just daily life has been crazy. responding to emails is
next. I vow to keep up this chapter! This chapter kicked my butt - Jess, Cat...thank you. They'd have given
up on the weekend and driven home by now if it were not for you.
"Liv? Hey, Liv."
Her head was heavy, and vaguely she realized that she wasn't in her bed. The clean, dreamy haze of the
early morning sun filtered into the room from the small, high window. Her back was even aching more than
usual and her feet were left uncovered. She groaned, rolling into the rough pillowcase on her thin pillow.
"Olivia, wake up."
Her eyes flew open at the proximity of the sound. Familiar sound. Familiar voice. Not so familiar place.
Elliot was sitting on her bed.
She practically sat straight up but realized a split second before she knocked her head on the upper bunk that
she wasn't at home. She collapsed awkwardly back onto the pillow.
Elliot was sitting on her bed. In her room. And the door was closed.
Okay. Well, then.
But he wasn't looking at her; he was looking at the door, his head bent awkwardly because there wasn't
room for him to sit up straight either. His fingers steepled and then fell, unable to stay still in his lap.
She cleared her throat awkwardly. "Elliot?"
He looked at her for just a brief second before his gaze fell away. The panic in his tired eyes told her he
hadn't slept much.
She hadn't either. She had lain awake for hours, analyzing the criss-cross pattern of the wooden slats above
her, the ones that held the empty mattress of the bunk. There were twelve slats horizontally and two
vertically. The third one from her feet had a crack in it and the one directly above her eyes had a big, dark
knot in the wood. The angry knot looked like a black hole, and for hours Olivia had contemplated the
possibility of climbing right in.
Of being sucked in by gravity and nature and things undiscovered.
But it was only wood after all, so barely an hour before the birds would start singing for no damned reason,
she had finally fallen asleep. Surprisingly she didn't remember tossing and turning. For the few hours of
sleep that she had stolen, she had slept soundlessly, her head heavy and her limbs unusually relaxed.
Of course now that she was awake again, she was right back where she had left off in this mess.
Crap.

Elliot had kissed her. She had kissed him back. But he was the one that had walked away, while she, on the
other hand, had stood there like an idiot that was waiting for more. If she had wanted to be permitted any
dignity at all today about how eagerly she had responded to him, she should have been the one to walk
away. Or she should have been drunk, because that was always a good old standby excuse when she made
stupid decisions. The blame it on the bourbon trick was one of the only ones taught to her by her mother
that she had held onto, whether she was proud of it or not.
But she hadn't walked away and she hadn't been drunk.
So she was left with the disaster of having not only practically begged him to keep going by grabbing his
shirt, but having moaned or something akin to it. Worse, as she saw the set of his jaw, the way that his t-
shirt molded over his shoulders, and realized he hadn't bothered to shave but that he definitely smelled like
soap, she felt her body immediately tighten in response.
Elliot. Sitting on this narrow bed. Her bed. While she was in it.
Why didn't this feel the same as if they were in the crib right now?
Because you're not in the crib, Olivia. Because the door is closed. Because he looks hard and dangerous
and just somehow bigger in that navy blue t-shirt. Because that t-shirt isn't really big enough to hide what's
underneath.
Because you know what Elliot tastes like.
Because Elliot knows what you taste like.
Olivia shifted uncomfortably and pressed her eyes shut, thinking this was the worst possible way to wake
up. She was wearing a tank top, but it had thin straps and she was feeling a little bit exposed where the sheet
fell away. She could lift the sheet, but that would make her discomfort obvious. Elliot was sitting there
seemingly distraught and wanting to rectify last night, and to top it all off it was a crapshoot as to whether
or not coffee was going to be offered out here in the wilderness.
Plus, her door was closed with Elliot on the inside. This was going to mean a day of endless, prying
questions from Cathy. The woman was so observant she should have been a detective.
Going back to bed seemed like a brilliant idea.
The silence hovered in the room and permeated everything around them. Olivia had never been one to
fidget, but the need to start was overwhelming. Only fidgeting meant moving, and moving potentially meant
that she would touch him again and...
"The door was locked," she finally managed, her voice failing her and cracking miserably.
He shot her another look. One that told her in no uncertain terms how ridiculous that observation was. She'd
seen him pick locks at least a dozen times and he knew it.
"You overslept. We have to be at breakfast in a half hour," he said flatly, as if that explained everything.
Outside a robin began chirping annoyingly close to her window. For some reason, the sound unsettled her,
grated on her nerves. Of course, the last time that she had heard a bird singing this close to her bedroom
window in Manhattan, it had promptly flown directly into her closed apartment window less than three
minutes later. The popping sound as it hit had spurred Olivia into reaching for her gun, convinced it was
someone trying to break in, before she had realized what had actually happened. At the time she hadn't
really considered the bird's fate, but now she wondered if its carelessness, if its inability to gauge depth, had
really considered the bird's fate, but now she wondered if its carelessness, if its inability to gauge depth, had
killed it or merely stunned it.
Then she remembered. Later that afternoon she had mentioned her foolishness in reaching for the gun to
Munch while they grabbed lunch. Ninety million birds die by flying into windows every year, he had rattled
off. They're attracted by something in the reflection and don't realize the danger before it's too late.
Olivia dragged in a breath, hearing the sound reverberate loudly in the room. "The alarm on my cell would
have gone off in five minutes."
He considered that, swallowing and looking away again. His hands finally stilled. "Okay." He stood up, his
eyes darting over the small closet and the floorboards before staring longingly at the door. "Just didn't want
you to miss breakfast."
He had picked her lock to make sure she was in time for bagels? Right. Olivia rolled over, facing the door
that he now stood in front of. "Elliot, wait-"
Elliot's hand froze on the doorknob. He turned to look at her again, and she absently thought people were
wrong when they described eyes as darkening in frustration. His lightened, became muddled with a storming
gray. "Your hair. What happened?" he rasped suddenly, the sound infused with a seductive danger, just like
the soft roll of thunder in the deepest part of a hot, summer storm.
Olivia sat up, dragging the sheet with her. One hand flew to her head before she remembered. She had
showered last night, let the air dry the long strands. It was probably wavy now, the way she had worn it in
Oregon. Her bangs would have a slight wave, the layers by her face would have just enough of a twist that
they wouldn't stay put in the ponytail she would try to shove them into today. "I showered last night," she
said quietly. "It happens when I don't dry it."
His chest seemed to expand and contract with great difficulty. "I didn't know."
Olivia cocked her head. She almost felt like she was dealing with one of the victims again, knowing
instinctively that she couldn't make any sudden movements, couldn't raise her voice. He was thrumming
with tension and unsettled energy.
She dropped her voice, her heartbeat picking up in speed. "What didn't you know?"
"I didn't know that about you," he confessed in a fractured whisper. His hand tightened on the doorknob and
he dropped his head, shaking it bitterly. "I didn't know your hair was naturally...like that."
He seemed so tense, so coiled, that she wondered if he had ever received her text last night. She had
watched the water for endless minutes, and somehow the fact that the buoy kept riding the top of the water
made her want to fix things with him. At least let him know that they could put that kiss behind them. Of
course that had seemed so much easier without the bright light of day upon them. "Did you get my text?"
she asked gently.
Elliot nodded, and looked up at the door as if searching for answers in the grain. He didn't say anything. He
didn't even look at her. She wondered where in the world he had found the courage to come into her room
in the first place if he was this uncomfortable now.
"It's okay, Elliot. We can just pret-"
Elliot shook his head. "I can't pretend," he mumbled, analyzing the knots that even permeated the surface of
the wood door. "I just can't. I'm sorry."

That was all he gave her, because before she could react he was gone, the door slamming shut behind him.
+++
Elliot filled his small Styrofoam cup with ice for the third time before going over to the industrial coffee
dispenser that had been set up. For the third time he pressed the button and watched the hot, black liquid hit
the ice cubes in his glass and lose steam.
He wished it was that simple. He'd take a bath in ice cubes if it would calm his body down.
He downed the bitter, lukewarm liquid again, never giving it time to fully cool down. It was too damned hot
out already for straight coffee, but he hadn't slept last night and this was going to be all that was going to
get him through the day.
They had the goddamned high ropes today and Olivia was going to be a bundle of nerves. It wouldn't do
him any good to be half-asleep when she needed him most.
Of course between last night, this morning and the fourth splash of coffee he was already reaching for, his
nerves were shot to hell too, but it was his own damned fault.
What the fuck had he been thinking?
He wanted to blame it on this campsite. Stupid, weak pin and tumbler locks had been used on the room
doors. Those were the easy ones to open, which left no real barrier between him and Olivia this morning.
No one had even noticed him standing in front of her door; no one had paid attention when he had raked the
lock by inserting the small pick from his Swiss Army knife and quickly shot the lock pins back up into their
housing. The knife had been a gift from Maureen two years ago.
The Swiss Army Voyager.
Of course, as Olivia's door had popped open and he had seen her laying there, her face softened by sleep
and all those blasted curls on her pillow, he had realized he was more of a voyeur than a Voyager.
Elliot had been inordinately quiet; knowing that as a cop, the slightest of sounds would have woken her. His
instinctive stealth scared the shit out of him. Why hadn't he knocked? What the hell did he think he would
figure out by simply seeing her without the pressure of her eyes on him? He wondered if there was
something seriously wrong with him that he was using a present from his daughter to break into the
bedroom of his partner. He wondered if it was worse that he had broken in, or more of a screw-up to have
sat on the edge of her bed, waiting to say her name until he could unclench his fists, until he could make
sure he wasn't going to get that damned sheet off of her body and pick up right where he had left off last
night before he had walked away.
He had broken into Olivia's room.
Jesus Christ.
He had wanted to talk to her, he promised himself. He just needed to see her. He had just wanted to set
things right.
Such a pathetic line of shit he was feeding himself. He hadn't had a clue why he was there, only that he had
needed to be there and there was no logical thinking whatsoever that could have permeated his stupid brain
and stopped him.

And now she was maintaining ten feet of space between them. As if she knew that if she so much as came
close he was going to rupture. She was shooting him curious looks, ones filled with trepidation and curiosity
and goddammit, fear, yet he couldn't even do the decent thing and smile at her.
All he could think was that it had grown, swelled and become unmanageable last night. Of course he didn't
know if he was referring to this thing between them or his dick, but somewhere in his head he knew that
both things were part of the same problem.
He had been awake most of the night. He should have jerked off. A few times. Maybe that would have
calmed him the fuck down today. But he had been riddled with a sense of self-disgust about getting off to
the thought of Olivia, and he had known she deserved far more than a prick like him thinking about her like
that.
He had to go home and talk to Kathy. He had to just say no, dammit. He had to find his balls and tell her
that he had monumentally screwed up once again. He had to tell her something that didn't make him seem
like a jerk that was still finding himself well into his forties.
Hey, Kathy, you remember all those nights you worried about me having the hots for Olivia?
Yeah, well, now I think I've got ‘em. I want to know what its like to belong in her bed, to feel her around
me, to have her smile just for me. She makes these sounds when I kiss her and I can't stop hearing them in
my head.
Still want me to move home? Yeah, didn't think so.
Crap. He had to work on what the hell he was going to say. Maybe one of those Kodak Kid spin doctors
could craft something up for him. Isn't that what they did? Write nice little press releases that spun away
colossal fuck-ups until everything was good again? They'd have a blast coming up with a title for the
release.
NYPD Detective Finally Gets His Head Out of His Ass; Realizes He Wants To Fuck His Partner, For More
Information, Please Contact: Kathy Stabler a.k.a Ex-Wife That Deserved Better.
Shit.
Elliot didn't know how to approach it, but sometime during the long night that seemed to get warmer instead
of cooler as the hours wore on, he realized that whether he moved back home or not he was still an asshole.
But if he didn't move home, at least that's all he was.
If he went back, knowing that who he really wanted was Olivia, he was a liar, too.
"How'd you sleep?" Leo grumbled next to him, stacking his paper plate high with bacon.
Elliot looked up, thinking the only thing he might manage to eat out of this entire spread was a bagel. "Like
shit."
"Yeah, me too." Leo sighed, irritably searching for a plastic fork in the cup filled with silverware. He kept
coming up with spoons and angrily shoving them back into the container. "You ever wonder if togetherness
is such a good thing?"
Elliot looked at the other man, the one that wore the ravaging effects of no sleep on his face in a way that
Elliot figured mirrored his own expression this morning. "All the time." Then because Leo was swearing
under his breath and slamming a bagel onto his plate, he decided to not be a jerk for the first time this
morning. "You okay?" he asked.
morning. "You okay?" he asked.
Leo raised his head as he finally stood still for a minute. He shrugged. "Thought things were getting better
last night with Colin. Campfire went well, it was like it used to be, you know?" He shook his head and
started digging into the ice bucket for a small cardboard container of orange juice. "But then we spent half
the night fighting again. He thinks I'm a dick for still being angry about being booted from the Corps. Says I
should be proud to take a stand. He's pissed I'm angry all the time."
Elliot made the decision to try some of the bacon too, maybe some of the fruit. He couldn't be tired and
hungry all day or he'd really be useless. "You're preaching to the choir," Elliot mumbled.
Leo smiled just a little bit, sadness in his face. "You know what all this relationship bullshit reminds me of?
This damned war in Iraq."
Elliot grabbed a couple of water bottles. "Yeah? How so?"
Leo let out a deep breath, finally turning and watching Colin talk to Cathy while sitting on a picnic table.
"Sometimes you fight for something so long that you lose sight of what you're fighting for. I always had to
fight for my right to be with him, but now I'm not so sure it's him I want to be with in the first place. Isn't
that just a sonofabitch?"
Elliot paused, suddenly, desperately, needing to know. "Do you know what you're gonna do?"
The other man's shoulders fell. "Right now? No. But I'm pretty sure I'm going to figure it out this weekend.
Maybe this is what I needed, to just be forced to finally decide if what's in front of me is what I want."
Elliot saw Olivia sitting on the grass, already done with her breakfast. Her chin was lifted, her eyes partially
closed, and the sun lit the skin on her cheeks. Her hair was blowing, the strands dancing riotously in the
slight morning breeze. Her shirt left her neck and top of her chest bare, the long lines of her arms already
even more golden than usual.
He just stopped, staring at her long after Leo had walked away. She didn't see him watching her because she
was soaking up the heat. She looked relaxed out here, despite everything that had happened last night. She
was a self-proclaimed city girl that somehow seemed more at home out here than she had ever seemed back
in Manhattan.
Elliot stood back, absently picking at his food and watching her. Here there was something even, steady
about her. She looked as at home with her fingers in the grass as she did with a Glock in her hand. There
was a softness here that had calmed the haunt that lived in Olivia's eyes, that made her seem almost
vulnerable.
It only made him feel more protective.
He had never known anyone that could infuriate, agitate and scare the shit out of him in the same moment
that she could take his breath away just by looking at him for a moment too long.
Of course, for all the truths he was facing now - the ones about his family, his life, his job - there was only
one that truly terrified him, that made him wonder if in the end he'd still be able to hold his life together.
There was only one realization that had the power to bring him to his knees.
He'd never been consumed with anyone like this before.
+++

The day was so damned hot. Nearly oppressively humid.
Olivia had used the anti-mosquito lotion she had brought, but the campsite was practically even too hot for
the bugs to come out. Overnight the temperature must have shot up nearly fifteen degrees, but then again
that fluctuation wasn't unusual for New York this time of year.
She was wearing a light yellow fitted t-shirt and yoga pants, but she longed for the single pair of shorts she
had brought. She also longed for an icy lemonade. She settled for taking another sip of her already nearly
empty water bottle.
Of course, what she really longed for was Elliot to actually look at her, but some things were just asking too
much.
She sat on the grass, waiting for the day to start and dreading all of it. The high ropes, the games, the
conversation with people she didn't know. She thought it was insane that strangers would talk to her and he
wouldn't, but that was just the way things were these days between them.
These days.
No, that was wrong too, because after last night, after he had kissed her, these days were going to be
something completely different than they had been before.
I can't pretend. I'm sorry.
She tried to ignore his words. Tried to ignore the regret and the panic on his face, tried to tell herself that
she'd be okay if he walked away from her for good. She almost expected it now, because after what had
happened last night they had no right to be partners anymore. It wouldn't be fair to his marriage.
And in the end, no matter how conflicted he was, he would always end up choosing his marriage.
I can't pretend. I'm sorry.
He couldn't look her in the eyes and then go home and look his wife in hers. Olivia should have never asked
him to pretend that nothing had happened, because that wasn't Elliot. He wouldn't betray Kathy that way.
I'm not betraying you by sleeping with her.
Olivia lifted her face, watching him walk across the field towards the circle of people that was forming
around her. Elliot wasn't looking at her and Olivia stared at him, willing him to just make eye contact for
one moment. His strides were long, powerful. Even in his anger and confusion he was still commanding.
Two water bottles dangled from his fingers.
She wondered how one man could make her hurt so much. How one man could make her want more than
she would ever have.
He finally looked at her when he was twenty steps from the circle in which she sat, and Olivia didn't know
if it was better or worse to feel his eyes on her. She could still feel the scrape of his stubble, the flat surface
of his lips coaxing hers open. She could feel the possessive dig of his fingers on her neck, hear the dead
silence that had descended in the first seconds after he had finally, blissfully covered her mouth with his.
And then she thought of him moving home. Of the moment he had dropped that news on her like it was
nothing, when in truth it was absolutely everything. She remembered how in the moment he told her, she'd
imagined for a brief second that she'd finally known what Valerie Sennet had felt like when doused with
gasoline, when lit up in a living, burning fire.
gasoline, when lit up in a living, burning fire.
She remembered how that tiny part of herself that began opening up to him, that had acknowledged that he
was more than just Stabler, he was Elliot, how that part had slammed shut with resounding force.
Until last night. Until he'd crumbled all the walls again by kissing her.
And as far as she knew, he was still moving home to his family. Which meant there was no time like the
present to start recovering again. Only this time she had the taste of him embedded on her lips.
Olivia dropped her head, shivering despite the heat.
He was moving home; he'd made love to Kathy.
Elliot sat down next to her, silently handing her one of the water bottles. She waited until he set it on the
grass, unwilling to accidentally touch his fingertips by reaching for it while he still held it. She wanted to
run from here. She wanted to get away from the trees and the crickets and his proximity. She maybe wanted
to get away from him altogether, because being near him made breathing impossible.
He'd made love to Kathy.
She thought about the two years he'd been separated. All of the rage, all of the anger. All of the days and
nights when she had panicked, wondering if that would be the moment in which she would lose him because
he was careless with his own life, was careless with their partnership, was careless with his emotions. She
thought of the moment he had chosen her over a victim and the moment when she had made the decision to
do the same. She thought of all the moments she had held her breath, watching a proud man disintegrate and
praying she had enough within her to keep him together.
She thought of the moment she finally realized that what he needed he'd never find in her, and how it had
made her leave.
She thought of the realization that the things she still needed she'd always find in him and how it had made
her come back.
After all of it, he'd gone home.
She had avoided his fingertips on the bottle, but sitting next to him she couldn't avoid his fingertips on the
small of her back. Olivia nearly jumped with the unexpected contact, but she didn't look up at him.
Elliot leaned over towards her ear, his fingers still scraping her back lightly. "I brought my ring with me in
my bag," he whispered out of nowhere, looking ahead and his lips barely moving. "I kept thinking I'd want
to wear it sometime, I just didn't know when. And then it just fell outta my hands last night onto floor of my
room."
Goose bumps broke out on her skin despite the heat. His low, rolling tale spinning its way around her.
"Liv, it's there. It's still on the floor. I couldn't pick it up."
Olivia grabbed the full water bottle he had given her, twisting the top off, staring at the cap in her hand. It
sat in the palm of her hands. The cap wouldn't just fall out of her hands; she'd have to drop it. Her fingers
would actually have to purposefully separate and let the cap roll away from her. It wouldn't just happen
accidentally. She wouldn't be able to drop something like that out of her hands without meaning to.

She finally looked at him.
His eyes were haunted, but they weren't empty. "I can't pretend, Liv."
Her silence was still all she could give him. She was terrified that if she said anything, he'd stop talking. But
just his gaze on her sent the shivers into hiding again. She was warm, so damned warm, and yet she could
have sworn her skin didn't care where the sun was because Elliot was blazing next to her.
"I don't want to pretend," he said softly, his fingers stilling on the small bit of exposed skin on her lower
back.
"Okay folks! Hope you enjoyed breakfast! Nothing like bacon cooked on the open grill, huh? We've got a
long day ahead of us so let's jump right in, shall we?" Grant's voice bounced off the trees around them.
The tips of Elliot's fingers pressed into her back and she leaned into the contact.
"So, today we have a full day planned!" Grant enthused. "First we're gonna start with an exercise to get us
warmed up, then head over the low ropes course we have set up. That should take us a few hours, which
brings us to lunch, another little game and then the best part of the weekend, the high ropes!"
Olivia felt the agitation sift through her nerves at the mention of the height exercises. She didn't want to
fight gravity. She didn't want to play the games.
Elliot discreetly flattened his palm on her lower back. Unless someone was standing behind them, no one
would ever know that his fingers had stretched along her skin, that the tips of them burned into her.
Grant smiled at her, focusing directly on her, pointedly ignoring Elliot's contact. "So, first up is an
icebreaker called the Human Knot. This is a great little exercise that gets everyone working together as a
team. I'm going to have everyone stand up in a circle, and then reach for someone else's hand across from
them. You'll repeat that with your other hand, only you must hold hands with two different people. The
result is what we call the Knot. We'll have Cathy here," he grinned at a beaming Cathy, "squeeze her right
hand for a quick game of pulse. When your hand is squeezed, respond by squeezing your other. That will
send the pulse around the circle and as soon as Cathy receives one back on her other hand, we'll know we
have everyone in the same link and we can begin."
"And then?" Leo couldn't hide his disdain.
Grant turned to him, his smile faltering in the face of Leo's scowl for only a moment. "And then you have to
untangle yourselves without letting go of anyone's hand. It's going to require some twisting, some turning,
some stepping over arms, but in the end you'll be in a circle again, only in different places." Grant smiled
proudly, as if he had invented the game he obviously thought was highly clever.
"Christ," Elliot muttered next to her.
For some reason, his frustrated mutter was so familiar that it soothed her. Olivia found herself smiling
slightly as she shifted just a little, the movement creating the slightest rub of his fingers on her back.
Elliot didn't move them.
"You ready?" Olivia whispered.
Elliot nodded. "As I'll ever be." He stood up as the others did, his hand falling away from her back yet
reaching for her.

She let her hand slip into his, allowing him pull her up. "Me too," she said quietly, feeling the imprint of his
hand on hers long after he let go.
It was then that she knew two things.
The first was that while there might not be any jumping in between them, there wasn't any running away for
the moment either.
The second was that if there was one thing she needed to keep in mind today, it was that gravity had a mind
of its own.
+++
Elliot wanted to think that what he was doing was simply watching her.
But it wasn't. This wasn't as benign as observation. This was tracking her, honing in on her, outright stalking
her. Olivia was trying to hide her skittishness after his ambiguous, self-centered confession less than five
minutes ago in Ludwig's circle of truth, and rightfully so. His last name was a joke because stable was the
last thing he was. He told her not too long ago that he was moving home, then last night that he'd made love
to his wife, yet he still went ahead and slammed his tongue into her mouth.
Not exactly a resume that would win him any stability awards, to say the least.
And just because kissing her last night tore up his world, it didn't mean that it would even register as a
tremor in hers today. Maybe she was pissed; maybe she didn't believe a thing he said; maybe she just plain
didn't feel the same way about him. Of course they way he felt about her in the first place hadn't exactly
been pinpointed yet either.
The only thing he knew for sure was that those low riding sweats of Olivia's were personally hand-sewn for
her body by Lucifer himself. It was like that show Lizzie always watched, Project Runway, only in this
version Satan had a sewing machine in hell, and he was competing with Elliot's control over his hard-on for
the top prize.
"So, who do we have left?" Ludwig smiled, glancing around. "Elliot, you all set?"
"Yeah," he gritted, as he tossed the bottle of water in the trash and came back to stand in the circle that had
formed. Where he ended up put him nearly directly across from Olivia, and sandwiched between Hannah
and Carl.
Olivia met his eyes. She stood between Cathy and Colin, her small smile unable to hide her discomfort.
Only this time her anxiety didn't have to do with him, it was of the same sort that Elliot felt right now.
This game was glorified Twister.
Somewhere in the reaching of hands across the circle, in the midst of the laughing, the rearranging, and the
palms of strangers intermingling and seeking one another in a space that was quickly becoming negligible,
his left hand found Olivia's right one. He didn't truly notice that Cathy had found his right hand, or that
Olivia's left hand was now linked with Jessica's right. All he realized was that this was different. Her fingers
were pressed together, her palm curving, settling into his hand as he wrapped around her.
The smile she had just tried to give Jessica faded as she looked at him across the jostling, across the
amusement of adults playing a children's game. Her hand slipped deeper into his, the lifeline on her palm
embedded against his, the small bones of her hand startling him. This was different, this wasn't just touching
her, this was holding her. This wasn't panic, or desperation or even lust.
her, this was holding her. This wasn't panic, or desperation or even lust.
Her hand was in his, resting there, content.
Elliot found the tension seeping from his body, until the sounds of the joking and teasing around him
became crisper, the oppressive feeling of being underwater lifting. The air was sharper around him; the
breeze hit him differently on his shins than it did on his face. He looked down at where their hands met, at
her flat wrist and the small rubberband that encircled it. She'd use the band later, lifting her hair into a high
ponytail and he already knew that some of the waves wouldn't stay put. No matter how many times she tried
to gather them all, some would rebel.
Some would fall.
His hand tightened around hers and he felt himself actually wanting to smile. It took this, this damned game
and this adult summer camp to finally get this to happen. This simple gesture, this one that he had never
experienced with her, the one he hadn't known he missed until now. It took Cragen sending them away to
try and fix things for him to be allowed to put her hand in his, to just be permitted to hold it, to relax and
know that because he had reached for her across this circle, that when all was said and done and they were
untangled she would end up next to him.
By reaching for her, he would end up with her being closer to him than she had been before.
"You okay?" he mouthed to her.
He watched her drowsy eyelids rise up just a bit, just enough for him to see the lethargic, relaxed look of
satisfaction on her face. Her lips curved, slowly, her chest rising as they did. "I'm good," she mouthed back.
Seconds later he felt it, Cathy's hand squeezing his and beginning the game of pulse. He found himself
smiling as he did it, as he squeezed Olivia's hand and passed along the beat. She must have forgotten about
the instructions laid out by Ludwig only minutes before because she startled when he squeezed her hand, her
eyes widening with such a brilliantly innocent look of surprise that he laughed.
She blushed a little bit, and he could breathe again. Olivia actually blushed. He hadn't known such things
were possible. It took her a moment before she realized she was supposed to pass it along, and as soon as
she did she looked back at him.
This time when she looked away, it wasn't out of avoidance. It was embarrassment, something akin to her
actually being shy.
He laughed out loud in pleasure and disbelief, the sound drowned out by the laughter of eight other people.
"You have to be shitting me," he said, thinking no one would hear him.
But she did. Of course she did. "What?" The game was beginning now, the untangling portion of the
exercise underway.
"You're shy?" he teasingly accused.
That was all it took for her to regain her footing. She narrowed her eyes at him, her annoyance marred by
the slightest tinge of amusement. "Watch it, Stabler."
He had been watching it. All morning as a matter of fact. He'd watched the way she moved, the way she
smiled, the way she tilted her head. Unable to help himself, he finally let go. His eyes dragged hotly up her
body, ignoring the tug on their hands, ignoring the negotiations taking place during the untangle. His gaze
trailed over her narrow hips, the sinful strip of flesh visible along her belly, over the pull of her t-shirt as it
trailed over her narrow hips, the sinful strip of flesh visible along her belly, over the pull of her t-shirt as it
curved over her breasts. He could see the faint outline of her bra beneath and he forced himself to look
higher, at the small freckle on her collarbone.
"I'm watching," he finally murmured, knowing it wasn't the sun that was simmering on his skin. He tilted his
lips upwards, and even though it was wrong he couldn't help where his thoughts drifted. He wondered if she
would blush if he got his mouth on her. He wondered if she would call him Elliot when she was pleading,
and Stabler when he would hold back what she'd want most.
He wondered just where else that particular blush would manifest itself on her skin.
He wanted to know.
Goddammit, it was more than that.
He needed to know.
+++
"Olivia, if you duck under Leo and then turn around, we'll open up our end a bit more," Cathy offered
helpfully.
Olivia jerked her head towards the woman on her left, blinking. What the hell was that? Elliot had
practically just eaten her alive with his eyes. It was raw, dangerous and blatantly erotic out here on the
middle of a converted soccer field. She didn't know he even knew how to do that. Did men actually do that?
Well, obviously they did if he had just...
"Sorry I had to interrupt," Cathy said, grinning conspiratorially as she leaned towards Olivia.
Olivia let her eyes drift shut. Jesus, were they even being obvious about it on top of it all?
I'm Detective Benson and this is my partner, Detective Stabler.
She just had to remember. That was all.
"Olivia," Cathy prompted again. "Shift under Leo's arms."
Olivia bent her head and slipped beneath the link of Cathy and Leo's arms. This put her farther into the
middle of the circle, facing Elliot. Hannah and Jim had stepped over Elliot and Cathy's linked hands,
sending Olivia to the left end of the circle, separated from Elliot only by Cathy.
Elliot actually seemed amused. Of course the bastard wasn't moving. He was just letting everyone around
him negotiate their space and expected that they would work around him as if he were an immoveable
statue. The blasted thing was, people gave into Elliot's presence, so inevitably while he stood still, the rest of
them were forced to pull, tug and twist to get untangled.
Tyler seemed to be having far too much fun with the exercise. His one hand was linked to Colin, his other
to Jim, and Jessica was trying to get beneath his linked arms. Tyler grinned mischievously and then at the
last second, as Jessica was trying to duck under, he jerked his arm lower, sending Colin stumbling forward
and Jessica backwards onto her ass, nearly on top of him.

It sent the whole circle scrambling.
Olivia felt herself suddenly get pulled back, but she realized no one was letting go. Everyone was taking the
challenge of Grant's game seriously, and despite the potential for landing in a heap, no one was releasing
hands. Jessica's tumble sent Olivia backwards as well, her rear end making hard contact with the grass as
Colin's elbow dug into her back.
She saw it a second before it happened. Elliot was going to fall towards her. His eyes darkened with debate
as to whether or not he was going to let go of the hands that held him. She knew he would have if the
alternative would in any way hurt her. Instead, he jerked their linked hands to his left, allowing him to brace
himself on his elbows as he staggered forwards, catching himself so that his weight didn't drop fully onto
her.
But it was enough.
Someone's back was beneath her head, and the laughter had ratcheted up several notches, yet Olivia was
uncomprehending. The people, the grass, the game was lost to her as Elliot's body immediately and
completely trapped her between him and the ground.
Olivia smothered the cry that nearly broke from her lips at the sensation.
Elliot was big, hard, solid. He smelled like pine and coffee and his darkening eyes were inches from hers.
Her breasts were smothered by the rock hard planes of his chest, her right leg bent and practically cradling
him intimately against her. He didn't have any hands free to touch her, and Olivia knew it was a blessing.
Elliot was on top of her. On top of her.
Her tailbone now pressed into the ground beneath her, and she felt the telltale signs of his immediately
growing arousal against the inside of her thigh. Only thin layers of cotton separated them.
Elliot was dark, feral, hungry as he gazed at her.
He should have lifted off of her. They both knew it. But the group was distracted, disengaging themselves
from the crumbled heap without giving up on the game, and Olivia knew that she would have do the same
eventually.
But for now, this was just them.
Elliot shifted a little, his jaw tightening. "Olivia," he drawled seductively, the syllables doubled as he
lingered on each one. As he lingered on her.
She was bad. Bad. Wrong. But she raised her hips, the throbbing tips of her breasts grinding into him as he
nearly imperceptibly ground into her. "Yeah?" she responded. She had intended to sound casual, but it came
out in a rapid breath, her eyes drawn to the swell of his lower lip and the scruff that coated his jaw.
God, they needed to stop. This was Elliot. Her partner. The one that she had left.
Christ, why had she left him again?
They needed to focus.

He must have known it too, because the next words out of his mouth were intended to draw them both back
into the present. "Detective Benson, am I hurting you?" Elliot murmured.
But he said it with an unintentional smirk, with a latent danger in the midnight of his eyes. It became wild,
hot, possessive, until her name, her title, became part of the seduction. Detective Benson. Hell, in that one
sentence he had changed her identity until her rank was no longer the thing that held him at bay, but the
thing that linked her to him.
The thing that dripped like honey from his throat until it wasn't only hers, but his as well.
The air around them was stifling, and beneath her head the body of someone shifted until her hair rested in
the grass around her. Elliot's head dipped lower, following her descent, the weight of him molding against
her, filling the hollows of her body with the liquid heat of his.
God, he was hard all over. He was rigid, granite lines that were being held in check simply by the force of
his self-control. She knew he was fighting his body's natural reaction just as she was by the way his
breathing had become shallow, by the nearly audible grinding of his teeth as her thigh shifted and he found
space even closer to the core of her heat.
"You're not hurting me," she whispered, knowing that the moments were passing quickly now, and within
seconds he would have no choice but to lift off of her. Elliot was trying to breathe against her, his heat
enveloping her skin and his pulse seeping into her. She wanted to lie there, languidly, and reach between
their molded bodies for the button of his shorts; she wanted to just close her eyes and let him get inside of
her.
She wanted to sleep for some reason, her body suddenly tired. It wasn't the weary exhaustion that she felt
when she slipped into her bed at night in the city, her chest never really joining the rest of her body in
slumber. This was a whole, all-encompassing kind of sleep, the kind that would be dreamless, easy, safe.
She wanted to sleep with her face pressed against the pulse point in his neck, her skin chafed from his
stubble, her legs wrapped around his waist.
Elliot's waist.
"I'd never hurt you, Liv," he said softly, as her eyes drifted open again. She blinked back the infusion of
noise, of sun, of people that came back to her as she looked at him. Her surroundings drew her back, his
heated body already rising off of her.
Seconds later she was standing again, the tangle of people finally gaining some movement as they figured
out how to loosen the binding knot.
"I know," she responded belatedly, her back to him.
Olivia knew that in her position he couldn't hear her, couldn't see her lips move, but she also suddenly knew
that it might be the first time she really saw him.
"Hey, Olivia, take a step back and I'll climb over you," Jim said.
She backed up, but for the first time it wasn't a retreat. Olivia turned, feeling the twisting of her arms give
just a little bit as the circle of people unknotted. She looked up, meeting Elliot's eyes as Cathy maneuvered
and settled to his left.

Finally Olivia had enough room to take a step forward, her arms suddenly more comfortable without the
binding twist putting pressure on her.
She breathed a sigh of relief, because the step she took ended up placing her directly next to Elliot.
+++
Back to index

Chapter 9 by MaddyM
I am so sorry for the delay in this chapter. I was struggling to write it this week. I am planning events for a
family wedding, no - GOD, not mine, but it's been chaos as we have ten events in four days. So I've been
writing this by carving out ten minutes at a time. I'm so completely sorry I haven't gotten through the
amazing reviews. But it was either wait for me to finish that and then post, or post and then I go do that. I
chose the latter and I hope that you all will stick with and forgive me! Thank you so much for continuing to
believe in this story, even though it seems like they have been at camp for 9876554 days.
Thank you Jess, Brynn, Pooks, Kel and Cat. Also a huge, amazing thanks to Jamie, because I love my vid
and especially the amazing cover pic that you so kindly made for this fic. I wish I could make it clearer on
this site! :-)
Olivia had been nine-years-old the spring that her mother had taken her to Niagara Falls. It hadn't been a
vacation, or a mother-daughter trip; it hadn't been an escape, or even an adventure. Her mother had been
forced to attend a conference upstate by the university, and without much of a choice, Serena had dragged
Olivia along.
It had unsettled Olivia, because at nine years old, the only thing she counted on was the routine of school,
and for five days she would no longer have the security of that rigid schedule but would instead be subject
to the erratic mood swings and parenting of her mother.
Her mother had been blissfully sober for the drive up, and for nearly two whole days after that. Olivia had
walked along the Canadian side of the Falls with her, intently watching Serena delicately finger the small
trinkets in the souvenir shops, instead of taking the time to pick out gifts of her own. Her mother had bought
postcards, collecting them from every shop along their walk although there was no one to really send them
to. There were cards that depicted the Falls at night, lit up in a mirage of colors; ones that captured the
rainbows that seemed to hover over the water every day; ones that focused on the idyllic floral tapestry that
lined the roadways along the walk.
And then there were the postcards of the different Falls themselves - the Bridal, the American and Olivia's
favorite because it seemed to be the most vibrant, the Horseshoe Falls.

Her mother had religiously stuffed the postcards into her purse, one after another, and Olivia realized later
that it had been her mother's way of taking pictures. Only they weren't their pictures or their memories.
They were flawless images of a moment in time experienced by someone else. They were like memories
that had been cleaned up and mass produced so that anyone could own that perfect second and pretend that
it had been theirs.
On the third night, her mother had finally grabbed more than one small bottle from the mini bar and started
drinking, heading towards a binge. Her purse lay open on the bed, the cards spilling out, and Serena had
drunkenly grabbed one. It was of a cable car, suspended between two cliffs, high over a gorge. The small
vehicle rode the cable line precariously as it descended slightly to the other side, still hundreds of feet above
the swirling, ominous waters below.
"Let's go," Serena had grinned at Olivia.
Olivia had recoiled, her skin dancing with goose bumps. "No, Mom, I don't want to." Her mother had been
drunk, and Olivia had no desire to have to be responsible for her in public. The hotel room was fine;
eventually her mother would pass out on one of the beds and Olivia could settle in with a book, but to have
her mother inebriated in the crowds of tourists seemed to be asking for trouble.
Her mother's smile had disappeared. "We're going, Olivia. So don't argue."
Olivia had gauged her mother's level of intoxication and realized that she wasn't drunk enough to stay still.
They'd be going, whether Olivia liked it or not. She had fought back tears of frustration as she had laced her
sneakers, taking her time and hoping against hope that if she just took long enough to get ready that Serena
would drink enough in the meantime to want to stay put.
Olivia hadn't been that lucky.
Her mother had walked ahead of her in the crowd by at least two steps, leaving Olivia to continually play
catch up. Serena had hailed a cab, sliding into the back seat before Olivia, and had thrust the picture of the
cable car into the driver's hand.
"We want to go here," Serena had slurred, her eyes oddly calm despite her obvious drunkenness.
"The Great Gorge," the driver had smiled amiably. "Terrific view of the Whirlpool," he offered. The older
man winked at Olivia. "Never seen anything like it. The Niagara River turns counterclockwise and escapes
through the narrowest channel in the Gorge, just wait until you see how fast that water moves beneath you."
When the cab had dropped them off, Olivia had frozen, hearing the rushing, gurgling water below even
from top of the cliffs where the landing site was for the antique cable car. She watched the car head back
towards them on the cable and shivered, terrified that a drunken Serena would want to go on it.
Olivia's fears had been justified.
"Let's go," her mother had said, grabbing Olivia's hand.
There was an urgency in Serena's voice that had scared Olivia. A desperation, a level of intoxication that
wasn't quite enough to make her mother sleepy, but enough to completely skew her sense of judgment.
While Serena bought the tickets for the ride, Olivia briefly wondered if she should tell someone her mother
was drunk. Her eyes had darted over the possible targets for her confession. Should she tell the bored
teenager behind the counter in the small booth or the young father with his son, a little boy who was only a
few years younger than Olivia? There was an older couple towards the front of the line, the man holding up
a camera that hung from his neck, and Olivia debated over telling him quietly that her mother shouldn't be
allowed on.
allowed on.
Please help me, Mister, she imagined she'd say. My mom's not right. I don't think she should be allowed on
that thing from this high up.
But before she could muster up the courage to make a decision, the line had been moving, their feet crossing
the plank and onto the grated floor of the red and yellow car.
Her mother had pushed towards the front of the car, tugging Olivia along with her. It was there, her back to
the rest of the crowd, that Serena had pulled out one of the small bottles from her purse and taken a long sip
of it, closing the cap and nearly missing the open pocket of her bag as she tried to shove it back in. Serena's
gaze had been intent, tracking the swirling waters below her with a reverence and fascination that stole
Olivia's breath.
The car had begun to move, its shuddering start jerking Olivia's small body. The car seemed awfully
dangerous because the gates on the sides only came up as far as her mother's chest, and above that they were
completely open.
Serena had leaned over a little bit, snapping her foot down to keep her balance as the car moved. "So high
up," her mother had whispered. "Come here, Olivia."
But Olivia had stayed put, to the right and one step behind her mother, her hands ready to grasp onto
Serena's blue shirt if need be, her lungs ready to fill with air if she had to scream for help.
Serena leaned over a little bit more, and Olivia watched with her heart slamming. "Mom, step back just a
bit," she said urgently. "Please?"
But her mother hadn't been listening. Even from the side Olivia had seen that her mother's face had relaxed
into a faraway expression, her features filled with longing. "You ever wonder what it would be like to fly,
baby girl?"
Olivia wanted to cry with the fear. Beneath her feet, the metal grate had one-inch holes, and the water
twisted and turned, the white froth of it visible even from this high up. It bubbled and curdled as it rushed,
and Olivia somehow had known that her blood was doing the same thing inside of her.
"No," Olivia had answered. "Mom, step back just a little," she begged again, softly.
Serena's hands had trailed over the edge of the railing, as if she were caressing it. Her mother appeared
mesmerized by the height, by the rustling below them. She was nearly dazed with it, the tip of her flat sandal
perched on the top of the bumper on the floor. "I always wondered," Serena said, her voice sounding like it
was coming from far away.
Olivia's chest had closed with the abject terror. Her mother wasn't really even with her right now, she was
off somewhere, in a place where the height of where they were wasn't dangerous.
Which meant Olivia herself would be responsible for her mother's safety. She was angry at the ride for not
being enclosed; who let people onto something like this and didn't close them in completely? Why didn't
anyone smell the liquor on her mother's breath?
"I wonder if trying to fly is giving up, or if it's finally having hope," her mother mused breathlessly, her
other foot now perched on top of the rubber bumper.
Olivia felt the tears spring to her eyes. Her mother wasn't scared. Not of the height, not of the danger.
Serena looked peaceful instead, like she was finally at rest in a way that made Olivia's small stomach turn in
Serena looked peaceful instead, like she was finally at rest in a way that made Olivia's small stomach turn in
a path that followed the water's current beneath them.
She couldn't throw up. Not up here. She just couldn't throw up. Maybe when they were on land again, maybe
then she could relax and let her stomach do what it wanted.
Olivia tugged frantically at her mother's shirt. "Mom, get down, come on. Just get down." She had visions of
what it would be like to see her mother pitch over the edge. What it would be like to see her mother
plunging through the air, falling into nothingness. The worst of it was the recognition that it wouldn't be an
accident if it happened, it would be Serena, flying.
Leaving Olivia totally and completely alone.
That was always what scared her most. That if her mother died, she'd be that word she never said; an
orphan. She'd probably have to figure out how to run away and survive on her own because she couldn't live
in one of those foster homes. She knew it was a possibility that her mother would die, because Serena wasn't
careful when she was drunk, but Olivia was grateful for every birthday she had because each one meant she
was older and still had her mother. Each one got her closer to sixteen, when she knew she could probably
take care of herself for real.
"Ma'am," came the strong, young male voice behind her. "I need you to step down."
Olivia had looked up at the pimply face of the man who had saved her mother. Who had saved her, too, at
least for a little while longer. He shot Olivia a quick, ironically apologetic grin, oblivious to the grateful
burst of emotion coming from the nine-year-old that stood before him.
Serena's toes had edged off the rubber, bringing her back down six inches and onto the floor of the cable
car. Her eyes had become flat again, lifeless. There was a small bench in the middle of the car, and
mercifully Olivia watched as her mother deposited herself dejectedly on the bench.
"Ridiculous ride," her mother had muttered.
For the rest of the ride, Olivia had stayed on the bench next to her mother, never once venturing to the edge
again to get a better look at the sucking, treacherous, destructive rapids below.
+++
Olivia squinted against the bright, morning sun, blinking back the past and trying to focus on the present.
She knew where the memory had come from, the afternoon high ropes course was weighing heavily on her
mind, and she had never recovered her courage when it came to heights after that sunny afternoon as a
child.
The heat was becoming more and more pronounced as the morning wore on, and Ludwig had given
everyone ten minutes before they left for the low ropes course in case people needed to change into
something cooler, use the bathroom, or simply relax.
She had decided on the latter, and Elliot had gone back into his room to grab his cell phone so that they
could try Munch and see if there had been any progress on the hunt for Parker.
Olivia sat on the Adirondack chair on the patio of the cabin and drew her legs up, closing her eyes for a few
moments. She could still feel Elliot's body pressed against hers; his arousal on her still scalded her body and
left him imprinted on her in a way that was terrifying.

She was scared.
He had said he wouldn't hurt her, and she knew that to be true. Intentionally, Elliot Stabler would never
harm her. But the pain he inflicted on her was always the residual effects of something else, something he
had never planned on affecting her with in the first place. The breakup of his marriage, his rage over their
job, the reconciliation with Kathy.
It was the last one on that list that was now fueling her fear. Elliot had been toying with the idea of going
home for weeks, and when push came to shove, when a case had gotten the best of him, he had proven that
what he had needed most was his wife. No matter what he said, no matter what kind of confusion he still
felt about his marriage, the bottom line was that he had picked Kathy to heal him in his moment of hurt.
She was still his wife after all.
And Olivia was just his partner.
Which meant everything that was happening here, this explosive attraction that was blooming between them,
was going to end up going nowhere. Even if they gave in for one night, even if Olivia finally succumbed to
what she wanted, he'd go home, as he always did, and Olivia would be the one left to pick up the pieces.
Olivia wouldn't even be able to blame him, because truth be told, she knew ahead of time that when it came
to his family, he'd always have one foot in the door of that house in Queens. He hadn't just gone home, he'd
slipped back into Kathy's bed, and for that reason alone Olivia couldn't let him into hers.
"It went to voicemail both at the office and on his cell."
Olivia jumped a little bit, not having heard Elliot come out of the front door. She looked up at him, drinking
in the wide, broad lines of his shoulders. "Did you try Cap?" she asked quietly, dragging her eyes away
from him.
"Okay guys! Let's get started. Everyone all set?" Grant announced loudly from the grass that lay ahead of
her. Everyone else was there, except for the two of them.
Elliot ignored Grant. "There's no one at the office. Which either means they're in interrogation or they're out
looking for the sonofabitch." Elliot squinted his eyes, staring out at the group assembled. "I think you're
right, you know. I think that Parker might get closer to his mother's place. They should canvas west until
Broadway if they don't have him."
Olivia shook her head. "No, he's not stupid Elliot. You were right. He wouldn't be so obvious."
That squint was suddenly directed at her. "What're you doing?"
She had unfolded her legs and stood. "Standing up."
He let out an impatient breath. "That's not what I mean, and you know it."
"Hey, Elliot! Olivia! You both joining us?" Grant smiled widely, shouting across the lawn.
"I'm gonna kill the prick," Elliot muttered, dropping his head.
Olivia covered for him. "We'll join you," she called back. "Just some work stuff came up. Which trail?"
At the mention of work, Cathy's head had shot up, her eyes conveying obvious interest. Shit, she should
have lied and said it was something else because now Cathy would have twice as many questions when she
have lied and said it was something else because now Cathy would have twice as many questions when she
finally interrogated Olivia.
Olivia sighed in defeat and heard Elliot snort in disgust next to her.
"We're taking the north trail. The trail ends at the course, you can't miss it," Grant offered helpfully, before
going back to herding up the rest of the group.
The group was already beginning to walk off when Elliot pressed his question again. "So you want to tell
me?"
Olivia didn't want to look at him. She couldn't. Not when he made her want things. Not when there were
parts of her that now longed to just step forward, to just find her space in his. "Tell you what?"
"Why you're questioning yourself all of a sudden?"
She couldn't help it. Her eyes sought his, her skin aching all over. He was right in front of her, less than two
feet away. She could see the stubble on his jaw, see the thick, corded lines of his neck. Without her heels, he
seemed taller. Bigger. More formidable. He seemed like a place she wanted to be, and yet she couldn't go
there because she knew better. Her natural, physical reaction to him, the one that was quickly becoming
unmanageable, had to be controlled. She couldn't respond to him anymore, and especially not in the way she
had been doing so over the last twenty-four hours.
Because she knew he'd go home eventually and hoping for anything beyond a night or two with him was
indulging in the worst kind of hope.
"I didn't think it through," she said, feeling her frustration rise as she tried to look away and failed.
Elliot shifted in front of her, and there was something indescribable in his eyes. "We're gonna find him close
to Broadway, just like you said. Your first instincts aren't wrong, Olivia. You have to go with your gut."
He had no right to look so sure of himself when she knew it was the last thing that he was. She felt a flash
of anger flare within, resenting him for encouraging any of it when he so obviously was in no position to do
so.
Didn't he get what a mess this would be if they took this any further?
She took a deep breath, trying to calm her shaky nerves. Olivia's jaw clenched, her mother's words repeating
in her ears.
I wonder if trying to fly is giving up, or if it's finally having hope.
She knew what trying to fly was. It was impossible. It was stupid. It resulted in things being smashed,
destroyed, and broken when they finally crashed back to earth.
Olivia knew that fact to be the absolute truth firsthand, because the moment that Cragen had called her into
his office over five years ago and told her that her mother had died, she had known that her mother hadn't
accidentally fallen down those subway stairs.
Serena Benson had finally, drunkenly, tried to fly, and with her death had proven once and for all to her
daughter that it simply couldn't be done.
+++

"Olivia."
Elliot watched her try to shake off the fact that he had quietly called out to her. They were at least twenty-
five yards behind everyone else on the trail, a tribute to the call they had placed to Munch for an update on
the hunt for Parker.
They hadn't gotten through to anyone. And although Olivia and he had started out at the same time, heading
towards the low ropes course at the end of the trail, she had somehow picked up the pace so that she now
purposefully walked two strides ahead of him.
The more they walked, the more something inside of her shifted, changed. Her strides, which had matched
his only moments ago, now outpaced him.
Something was up.
"Olivia," he said again, with a little more force behind it.
She stopped mid-stride, her shoulders dropping just a little bit. Finally, she seemed to consider her options
and spun on her heels.
"Yes?" she cocked her head, her eyes darkening defensively as he watched.
"You've got a grass stain on your ass," he smiled, trying to lighten the mood a little bit.
He knew even before she coiled that he had made a horrible mistake. It had just been a way to ease the
tension, the discomfort that had plagued them over the last half hour since the end of the Knot game. She
hadn't really been able to look at him ever since she'd definitively felt his erection on her, but he could have
sworn she had lifted her hips towards him when it had happened, so was he really the only one to blame for
this shitstorm brewing between them?
And now he'd gone and committed the ultimate fuck-up. He'd cracked a joke. About her ass no less. Which
meant she knew he had been -
"Why the hell are you looking at my ass, Stabler?" she said angrily.
Ah, yeah. This was why he didn't do humor. He always screwed it up. He'd let loose with a sarcastic
comment, only the Chief of Detectives would be standing there, wholly unimpressed. He'd make a wry
observation about the neighbors, and it would turn out the wife was Kathy's new best friend. And now this.
A comment to Olivia, one that should have been helpful, no less, and she was now, shit, stalking back
towards him.
Elliot braced himself, and tried to appear unfazed, as if that would deflate whatever reprimand was taking
shape in her head. Then again, Kathleen had told him under no uncertain terms that when he did this, when
he inhaled and pretended to look bored, that all the kids knew it was when he was most likely to be paying
close attention. So Olivia would know that about him too.
Which meant she knew she had an audience for whatever was about to come next.
Your honor, I move to strike "trying to appear bored" from the record, please.
I'm sorry, Detective Stabler, your motion is denied.
"You know, Elliot," Olivia said, coming so close to him that she had to look over his shoulder, instead of at
him. "It's not funny. This isn't funny. I don't know what the hell is happening here, and I'm guessing you
him. "It's not funny. This isn't funny. I don't know what the hell is happening here, and I'm guessing you
don't either. So maybe while we're trying to figure out how to deal with what the hell is going on, you could
refrain from looking at my ass." She finally leaned back and looked at him. "Do you think we could do that?
"
Okay, well that pissed him off.
She was talking to him like this was his fault entirely, and the more he thought about it, the more her game
of Pin the Blame on Stabler didn't add up. She'd kissed him back last night. Her mouth had been there, open,
willing, hot as hell beneath his. The smooth skin of her lower back had pressed into his hand this morning,
and as time went on, he was even more certain that she had, in fact, writhed beneath him in encouragement
when he had been on her.
She had goddamned reacted to his hard-on and now she was pissed at him?
He understood that this was messed up. He probably understood it more than she did. Because he was the
one who had a wife, God, ex-wife, no, still wife, that needed some sort of explanation from him. He was the
one who had tried to make love to his...to Kathy, and ended up only having sex with her instead. He was
the one who had crept out of his own fucking house as if, as his daughter had so eloquently put it, it had
been a "booty call."
And now Olivia wanted to stand there like she had a patent on the comprehension that this beast of sexual
awareness between them was, as she liked to say, complicated?
Complicated.
Complicated.
Jesus. Christ.
The pain in his head that had somewhat subsided since yesterday was now back, so suddenly and so
viciously that he thought he might lose his balance. Complicated.
Was that what the hell she was trying to tell him last year? Had she known, all this time, that there was this
thing between them? After Gitano, after he had chosen her, had she recognized before he had that his anger,
his possessiveness when it came to her, might be borne of pure, sexual want?
Of course, it wasn't that simple. This thing that was eating at him wasn't just sexual, but at its most basic
level, he wanted her. At least he wasn't too stupid to finally figure out that much.
But this thing wasn't entirely basic. This wasn't something they could simply fuck away into non-existence,
and they both knew it.
Olivia's head tilted to the side, her waves slipping over the tops of her shoulders. Her wide-set eyes were so
dark that he could nearly see himself in them, could see the reflection of the trees in the shine of her irises.
She was upset. Holy shit, she was upset. Her chest was practically heaving with the effort to simply breathe
while her right hand clenched then flexed, and he couldn't help but be glad the woman wasn't sporting her
Glock right now.
Christ, now why the hell did that image turn him on, too? He was fucked up. That had to be it. He was
fucked up because when he had taken Dickie to see Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life in the theater, a few
years ago, he had found himself curiously getting a hard-on despite his loathing of Angelina Jolie. Now,
with Olivia standing in front of him, her stance widened, her blatant, dangerous, don't-fuck-with-me attitude
with Olivia standing in front of him, her stance widened, her blatant, dangerous, don't-fuck-with-me attitude
radiating from her skin and her hand practically begging for her weapon, he knew why he had found
himself uncomfortable in his jeans while at a movie with his son.
Years ago.
Fuck Stabler, it's just your partner standing in front of you in some kind of sweats. She's not a fictional
avenger in leather. Go ahead, dare to call her Lara Croft, you asshole.
Shit, shit. Had Kathy been right all these years? Had there been something in him that wanted Olivia all
along?
He began to count down the minutes to lunch already, knowing that lunch would bring proximity to his
over-the-counter pain relievers.
"Elliot," Olivia bit off. "Do. You. Think. We. Could. Do. That?"
So, he hadn't responded last time she had asked. He needed time to think. And now, with the attitude?
Really, Olivia?
He glared just a little bit at her, his jaw grinding involuntarily and adding to the throbbing in his head. "I
don't know, Olivia. Why don't you tell me? You seemed to be just as respon-"
She cut him off, stepping closer to him. "You think I'm responsible?" Her voice rose.
His dropped. "I was going to say responsive," he snarled back. "But yeah, now that you mention it, I'd say
we're both responsible."
Olivia flinched, but it only took her a moment to recover. "I'm not having this discussion with you right
now. Just don't look at my ass, Stabler," she hissed, before turning in an effort to storm off after the group.
This was such total and complete bullshit.
Elliot's hand snaked out and caught her elbow, his reflexes just a tad faster than hers. "Don't."
Olivia looked disbelievingly at his hand on her, drawing her lower lip into her mouth for one quick second
in anger. She raised her burning eyes to his.
She was furious.
Furious as in Cragen's she's-gonna-kill-Thatcher-get-in-there-now-Elliot furious. He would have dropped

her arm, but he had lost his ability to breathe against the fire she was suddenly emitting. Somewhere, deep
within, he wasn't scared. Her anger made him inexplicably ache instead, because Olivia was normally so
well-controlled.
She was only angry when she was hurt. Fury meant she was in outright agony.
Come on, Olivia. Talk to me.
She stepped even closer to him, her chest practically touching his. Her lips settled near his ear. "Let go of
me. Now."
His hand gripped her elbow tighter, his confusion compounding. Maybe he had been wrong? Was that
possible? Had she not reacted to him at all? Was her responsiveness to his touch entirely in his imagination,
possible? Had she not reacted to him at all? Was her responsiveness to his touch entirely in his imagination,
and did she think he was manhandling her?
His stomach rolled violently with the possibility. "Liv, I swear t'God I thought," his throat locked, trapping
his voice and sending even the few sounds he had made into her hair.
Even now he was a sorry bastard because he wanted her. He wanted to forget the trail and the course and
the people and drag her off into a corner of the woods and get her back against one of these oak trees. He
wanted to get his hand onto that grass stain that had been caused by their tumble earlier, wanted to lift her
slightly so that he could use his hips and one hand to trap her there while his other hand slid up, beneath her
t-shirt and over the flat planes of her stomach. Her skin would be warm, heated both by the sun and the
promise of what was to come. His palm wouldn't know which way to go against her skin, up or down, front
or back. There would be no way to touch her all over at once, but he sure as hell wanted to try.
"Liv, just talk to me. What the hell is going on?"
Olivia's eyes flashed to his. "I don't know! I just know we can't do this, whatever the hell it is. You want to
make me want things, Elliot? Then go ahead," her voice dropped to a rushed, sharp whisper that stabbed at
him. "But you're a bastard if you do, because you can't deliver!"
He gripped her, tugging her towards him. His whole body was suddenly tense, tight with need, with
anticipation, with outright frustration. "You think I can't deliver?" he grinned, baring his teeth. Elliot leaned
in close to her, his lips nearly connecting with the top of her cheek. "I've been accused of a lot of things,
Olivia," he drawled softly. "Not delivering isn't one of them."
He expected her to slap him, to yank her body away from his, to bring her knee up and try and take him
down. What he hadn't expected was for her to suddenly lose steam, to deflate visibly in front of him.
He hadn't expected her to squeeze her eyes shut, or for her arm to go limp in his hand.
Elliot stilled, his anxiety ratcheting up a notch as he waited for something, anything from her.
When Olivia finally opened her eyes again and looked at him, he thought there must be a part of her
missing, because she wasn't as whole as she had been only minutes before. He'd seen this look on her face
before; on a night she had nervously sat on his front porch and rocked her knees back and forth, like a little
kid that had to tell their parents they had just smashed a baseball through a window. Like someone scared
of what the damage done would cost, how the punishment would stack up.
"You said your ring is on the floor," she said, so quietly he almost didn't hear her and he was standing only
inches away. "You said you didn't want to go back. But you will, Elliot. And you should. We're partners,
and whatever it is that's happening here this weekend, can't."
"Olivia, just say it, at least. Just admit there is something happening here between us." He had to know, he
needed to know. Once and for all he wanted to stop dancing around the abyss and just finally just accept
that one existed. But he had to hear her say it.
She shook her head, her lips lifting in a soft, melancholy smile that never touched her eyes. "You're married,
Elliot. Stay married. People don't just take twenty years and gamble it all away on the unknown." Olivia's
face lifted, and he could have sworn she was seeking the warmth of the sun on her suddenly paling skin.
"Be my partner, let's go kick ass on these ropes. Then let's go home tomorrow and just forget about last
night."
He dropped his arm, the weight of it too heavy hold up. Forget about kissing her? Forget about feeling her
up against him, forget about her hands seeming smaller as they clutched at his waist? Forget about the way
up against him, forget about her hands seeming smaller as they clutched at his waist? Forget about the way
she tasted, the impossibly smooth skin at the back of her neck?
Forget about the fact that after eight years, he had finally tipped her mouth up to his and taken it, owned it
for just a few moments and she hadn't protested, she hadn't pulled away?
Forget about Olivia making those sounds, those small ones that were involuntarily emitted from deep within
her throat as he kissed her?
Right.
There wasn't a man alive that would forget Olivia Benson moaning into their mouth, let alone one as
goddamned hard for her as he was.
Even right now.
Goddamn it.
"I can't forget last night," he finally managed.
"You don't have a choice," she said, straightening. "This isn't happening."
Before he could think to even reach out to her again, she had walked away, closing the distance between her
and the mouth of the trail where it would open up onto the course. He stood there and rubbed his hand over
his face, trying to get acquainted with the few pieces of information she had just offered him. She was
trying to quash this attraction that was bubbling between them, basically telling that he should, that he would
go back to his marriage.
Elliot used this thumb and forefinger to pinch the bridge of his nose, and hoped that would ease the pain of
his headache, but he realized that the pain wasn't as centralized as his forehead or his temples. It was all
over, deep within, and the fact that Olivia was walking down the trail without him was as good, as
profoundly effective, as her walking away like she had all the times before.
He couldn't let her walk away. Not again. He hated the confusion, but by God they were going to figure this
shit out. Now, if need be. This pathetic limbo that he had put everyone in, that he had lived in, would end
this weekend.
Once and for all.
Only took you two years, Stabler. Way to be on it. If time really was money, you'd be on public assistance
by now.
She wasn't that far ahead of him, and it only took a light jog to catch up. He settled into a stride next to her,
before finally overtaking her and blocking her path.
Olivia stopped. The look she shot him was wary, tired, resigned. "Elliot, everyone is going to wonder where
we are. It's going to cause a scene. We need to catch up," she said quietly.
"Then talk fast." Without thinking he widened his stance, folding his arms over his chest and effectively
blocking her.
The fight she had offered him only two dozen steps back was gone. Olivia stared off to her right, her
breathing so scarily steady it unnerved him. Whatever she believed, whatever she had told herself, she had
already accepted it as the truth.
already accepted it as the truth.
"You told me you were moving home," she started, examining something in the dense, vibrant foliage that
lined the trail. "You said you were moving back. And then...then..." Her shoulders dropped and he watched
her brace herself. "Then last night happened. If that had happened even six months ago, El, I could have
probably handled it. But right now, knowing," her voice caught, choked as her eyes watered. Something
scampered in the weeds and she dropped her head, following the movement in the leaves. "Knowing you
don't know what you want, I can't, I just can't."
She could have shot him in the chest and the impact wouldn't have hit him as hard as the sound of her
unsteady voice did. "Olivia, I'd never - "
Her head jerked up, accusation flooding her expression. "Don't say it. That you'd never hurt me? That's what
you were going to say, right Elliot?"
Elliot wanted to deny it. God, he wanted to say something that she wasn't expecting, something that would
make a difference.
He had never heard her voice sound so small, so unsteady. He wanted to make Olivia stop looking at him
like he had just stolen her most prized possession. But she had dumped the raw truth between them.
His silence rendered him guilty.
She shook her head disgustedly. "You don't get it, do you Elliot? You can't just keep trying out different
lives until one feels right. People get hurt along the way. Yeah, we kissed. Yeah, God," she blew out a
breath. "Yeah, so I'm attracted to you. But I'm not going to be a one night stand so you can test this thing
out between us, and we both know that if we keep up at the pace we've been going at for the last two days,
that's exactly where this is headed."
His immediate anger suffocated him. "You think that I'd risk my partnership over a one night stand?" Elliot
narrowed his eyes. "Come on, Olivia," he said with just a hint of derision. "Give me a little credit here."
Olivia's eyes widened. She lowered her voice, although everyone else was so far ahead they couldn't even
see them. "Just why in the hell do you think I'd expect you to treat me any better than you treated your wife?
" she said scornfully.
Elliot nearly rocked back on his heels, the blow hitting him hard and fast with its brutality. "Maybe," he
snarled. "Maybe because I've always treated you better than my wife."
"Great," she said sarcastically. "So I'll be a two-nighter. Sign me up." Olivia rolled her eyes and started to
dodge around him to keep walking.
He sidestepped and caught her full on. Both of his hands wrapped around her upper arms. "Saint fucking
Olivia, huh? You've never made a mistake? Because that's what it was. I made a mistake the night I went
home. A mistake. You do know what those are, right?"
Olivia's skin drained of all color. "Stop it," she warned, her voice dropping to a nearly indiscernible level.
But he was on a roll, his fury, his anger so pronounced that he couldn't control it. He was sick and tired of
her running. Of having to pick up the pieces of himself when she did. He was sick of that look she got on
her face when she thought she knew better than everyone else. "No, Olivia. I want to know. Haven't you
ever needed someone, and for that night, that one, single night, it seemed like it would all just be okay if you
could lose yourself?"

She blinked at him, her lips pressing together hard as her eyes welled. "Please, stop," she asked again, her
voice even less commanding than it had been the last time. "Elliot, please."
There was something in her reaction that was wrong. She wasn't yelling at him, she wasn't attacking, and it
scared him. She should have been pushing back, that's what he had expected. That's what he had hoped for.
But she was withdrawing instead and that wasn't making sense.
Her vulnerability drained the fight from him. Immediately.
Elliot lowered his voice, ducking his head close to her. "I needed something that night, Olivia. I wanted to
forget. And if you think that I don't hate myself for involving Kathy, you're wrong. Maybe it seemed like a
safe place to go, because any other place I could turn..." He paused, trying to get air, trying to say the words
that would tell her what he believed his only other option would have been. "Any other place I would have
turned scared the hell out of me."
Olivia closed her eyes, the sun finding a home on her eyelids. The heat swarmed and the thick brush of the
trail somehow seemed even more lush as it narrowed the space around them. She was shaking. Beneath his
hands she was outright trembling.
"I shouldn't have done it, Olivia. But I did. I didn't think about how it was going to feel in the moments
after." His forehead bent to hers. "Liv, I..." he had to say it. He had to. It was all he had to give her. "It felt
wrong. Even when..."
Olivia lifted her face, opening her eyes. He'd never seen them look like this, not even in the nights after she
had discovered her brother might be a rapist. Scarred. Bruised. "Even when you were doing it, you wanted
to stop."
Elliot felt everything disappear. The ground, the sun, and most of all the air. There was only this, only her
words, ones that recognized far too well and far too quickly. He wanted to scream, to yell, to shake her out
of this stillness that she had found.
And because knifing him once wasn't enough, she said it again, her voice empty. "Even when you were
there, lying in that bed, there was some part of you that wished you'd had the strength to push the other
person away."
Hollow words. Ones soaked with regret. Ones that she knew so clearly, so innately, that it made him sick.
He didn't want to know. He just didn't want to know.
But he needed to know, because irrationality had no boundaries.
"Who was he?" Elliot felt rip from his gut, his throat raw and his fingers biting far too hard into her skin.
Olivia just looked at him. Then she looked pointedly at his fingers until he dropped them, the remaining
faint white rim around the red points of contact forming impressions against her skin. "None of your
business," she whispered on an empty breath.
Before he could recover, she was gone, once again headed down the same path she had always been on.
+++
Olivia stared at the obstacles laid out before her, not processing any of it. Elliot had come up behind her as
they reached the group, but he had promptly moved away, positioning himself on the other side of Cathy
and Jim.
and Jim.
Jim's side.
Which left her standing next to Cathy.
She wanted to go home. She wanted to be alone. She wanted to be anywhere but standing in the woods with
the humidity and the low, constant hum of the bugs and birds crawling over her.
Grant was explaining each activity, but Olivia tuned out. These seemed simple enough. The first one was
called Double Trouble and was laid out between two trees. There were two ropes tied between the trees, one
a foot off the ground and another about seven feet off the ground. The point was that each pair of partners
would start at opposite ends, balancing on the lower rope by holding the one above. The trick was that when
they crossed paths on the ropes as they moved, eventually they would have to maneuver around the other
person without falling off.
She didn't want to be that close to Elliot. Not right now. Not when his anger and accusations were wrapped
around him like lights on a burning Christmas tree. Olivia considered asking Cathy to be her partner, but it
would only raise more flags if she did.
Who was he?
Elliot had looked at her with something that resembled disbelief in his eyes, and she didn't know why. She
hadn't owed him anything when she had done it, and she still didn't. She was single. On her own. And her
decisions were no one's business but hers.
Then why did you shower for so long the next morning, as if you could soap away the mistake?
She pressed her eyes shut for a single moment, willing away the recollection of that morning.
Why was it Elliot's name that you cursed out as the water slid over you? Why did you blame the man in
your bed for not being someone he could never be?
"Derek tried with Addison too," Cathy said quietly, as Jessica and Tyler took the first stab at the ropes.
Leo, Jim and Elliot stood off to one side, and of the three, only Elliot reminded her of rolling, pitching, dark
thunder. He tried to appear casual, as if he was merely observing the exercise, but by the way his arms were
folded across his chest, by the way the muscle at the corner of his eye twitched and his jaw flexed, she knew
that he was seething.
He looked the same as he did when she was interrogating a suspect and getting nowhere. As if he was just
waiting for the moment to slam his palms on the table and send the chairs skittering away on their own.
Biding his time until he could pounce, snarl and then tear apart the object of his disgust.
She knew the rumors around the squad. That when Elliot got like this, if she wasn't in the room, that she
was the only one to be sent in. To calm him, soothe him, coax him into breathing again.
She just didn't know how to calm, coax or soothe him when the person he was mentally shredding was her.
"Everyone knew how he felt about Meredith, but after Addison said she wanted to work on it, it took him
forever to sign the papers."
Olivia realized Cathy was talking to her. "What?" she frowned, trying to decipher what the hell Cathy was
talking about now.
talking about now.
"McDreamy and Mer. Everyone knew they were meant to be, and he screwed it all up by trying to work it
out with his wife. If he had only known what he wanted in the first place, then Mer would have never slept
with George or Finn."
Okay, this one Olivia knew. McDreamy, McSteamy. She had heard of those. Grey's Anatomy, if she was
right. Not that she knew what channel the show was on.
She caught Elliot shooting a glare at her, his eyes the bluest part of a flame, and she wanted to escape. The
only way she knew how was to return the smile of the woman who stood next to her, and pretend that she
knew what in God's name she was talking about.
"Grey's Anatomy?" Olivia said, wondering if her knowledge for once would buy her some time until her
next response was needed.
Next to her, Cathy laughed in delight. "Exactly. And hey, if you're the Meredith of your life, you're lucky.
She's had McDreamy and McVet, and McSteamy flirts with her too every now and then. Although..." Cathy
lowered her voice conspiratorially as she nodded towards Elliot. "You've got a McStud of your own over
there."
Olivia couldn't help it. After everything that had happened over the course of the morning, it was the woman
that she had been avoiding that finally managed to make her simply forget and smile. "McStud?" Olivia
whispered back, feeling her chest lighten just a little bit despite the anger brewing in her partner. "Elliot?"
Cathy laughed. "Hey, I'm engaged, I'm not dead. And don't tell Jim, but even if I was," she tilted her head
towards Elliot again. "I think McStud would be enough to raise me out of my grave, if you know what I
mean."
There was a reserve in her she didn't know about. One that this woman seemed to find and tap into at the
most inopportune of moments. Whatever it was, wherever it was, Olivia didn't want to question it.
She glanced at Elliot again, at the way he was now unflinchingly staring at the course and ignoring even Jim
and Leo.
He wasn't you, McStud, she said to him silently. Even when I wished he could be.
+++
Back to index

Chapter 10 by MaddyM
A/N: Thank you Jess for keeping me sane on this. Thank you to my girls for letting me run everything by
them, stopping all conversation. Thank you to everyone who has patience with my slow as hell review
responses (still completely, totally, ecstatically plugging away, I promise) and my gradual build up here. I'm
not a masochist, I swear. Oh, and when I need Hot Elliot inspiration, Kel, I just watch your Hot Elliot
youtube vid. The slow blink gets me every, single time.
Chapter 10
Like hell it was none of his business.
He had goddamned bared his soul to her, told her he regretted sleeping with Kathy, and she'd looked at him
with a mixture of horror and pain last night. As if he had finally screwed up so badly that even she couldn't
believe it.
And the whole time that Olivia had been staring at him with accusation, she had been holding onto the fact
that she had been sleeping with someone too.
Breathe, Stabler.
Elliot dropped his neck backwards, staring up at the sky and exhaling as he widened his stance yet again.
He didn't even miss the pain relievers anymore because he knew they would accomplish precisely jack squat
against the raging fire in his temples.
It shocked him, exactly how out of control he felt right now. Exactly how pissed, how hurt, how angry.
Technically, she was free to do as she pleased. That little tidbit had actually registered with him. But just
barely.
All he could think was that she had known, had known there was something there between them as far back
as Gitano, and she had slept with...slept with...slept with only God knew who it was since then anyway. She
had let someone else touch her, undo those buttons on her shirts, slip her jeans over her hips, get their bare
hands on her skin.
Elliot pressed his eyes shut. He couldn't think about any more of it.
He just wanted to slam his fists against one of these fucking trees until his knuckles bled. Until he could
erase from his memory the look of pain that had merged with the righteous indignation on her face only
minutes ago when she had basically told him what she had done.
That wasn't even the emotion that terrified him right now.
The one that scared him was the one that was gaining steam, the one that was causing his blood to rush
faster through his body, that was making his lungs contract and expand with greater frequency and his face
to pound with the throbbing effects of his restraint. It was the one that wanted to grab her arm, drag her
back to the campsite, lock the fucking the door on that cabin and get her beneath him.
Immediately. There. On the floor. He didn't give a shit where.
He wanted to get inside of her and make sure that she damned well knew that...that...

That what, Stabler?
One word coursed through him. Angrily. Furiously. Possessively. One word that wanted to roll off his
tongue far too easily, and one that staked his claim because by God, he needed to be owed one.
Mine.
He deserved to be shot. She'd do it herself if she knew what the hell he was thinking. And if Kathy knew
how to use a Glock she'd probably stand in line behind Olivia to make sure the job was done.
Not because Kathy'd be pissed that he wanted Olivia. No, she'd probably actually be relieved that her
instincts hadn't been completely out of whack all these years like he'd claimed they were. She'd probably be
relieved that he had finally come to some sort of understanding.
Which was fucked up to begin with. That his...that Kathy wouldn't lose her mind if he wasn't going to move
back should have been all he needed to know about that particular situation.
But she'd want to shoot him anyways, just for taking so much damned time figuring out what she had told
him again and again over the last few years.
You're not in this marriage, Elliot. You've got to let me out of it, too. Let all of us out of the limbo.
Olivia was glancing at him, making small talk with Cathy in the same way he should have tried to do with
Jim and Leo while they waited their turn. Hannah and Carl were laughing and nearly falling off the ropes as
they teetered wildly back and forth and Elliot wanted to tell them to just shut up and get the damned
exercise over with so they could all catch a break.
Elliot ignored the look of wariness Olivia was giving him and instead rolled his neck on his shoulders,
realizing he hadn't exhaled in the last few seconds. He took care of that, blowing his breath out while Jim
and Leo talked about something, the Yankees he thought he heard, but he couldn't focus.
He needed to know who.
She knew he had slept with Kathy; it was only fair that he knew who she had...triple fuck. As much as he
didn't want to think about it, he needed to know.
"Excuse me," he muttered to Jim and Leo, backing away and heading for Olivia.
She looked up as he made his way over to her, her purposefully impassive expression unable to mask the
questions in her eyes.
"I need to talk to you," he bit off, deliberately not looking at Cathy. That one he couldn't deal with right
now.
"Elliot-" Olivia started, his name a warning on her lips.
"No," he interrupted. "Now."
One of Olivia's perfectly groomed eyebrows arched skyward, her lips tightening in disapproval. "This is
hardly a good time, Elliot."
Cathy quickly glanced back and forth at the both of them, her head only coming up to his shoulders as she
stood between them. Not that he really noticed.

His eyes were focused on Olivia's, daring her to say ‘no' one more time. "No time like the present," he
gritted.
"Well, I'm just gonna go over there with my fiancé," Cathy said, a mixture of amusement and
embarrassment in her voice as she pointed. "Right over there if you need me," she said to neither of them in
particular. "Which you won't of course. Need me, that is. Right. So," she ducked between them. "Over
there." She nodded affirmatively to herself, hunching her shoulders inwards, careful not to touch either of
them as she scooted away as fast as she could.
Good. Now he had Olivia alone. He took two steps closer to her, and Olivia, being Olivia, didn't take a step
back. Which meant his body was nearly pressed along the length of her.
"You really want to do this right here?" he whispered into her ear, hearing the danger in his own voice.
"No," she hissed back quietly. "I don't. I just told you that."
Elliot looked down at her. He was so used to practically going toe to toe with her that the couple of inches
he gained when she was in flat shoes actually changed the dynamic with her just a bit. He felt himself use
his size advantage, and he didn't particularly like that he was, but he couldn't help it.
"Then tell me who," he demanded.
Before he knew what he was doing, his hand had found her waist. To anyone watching, it would have been
no big deal. Of course no one was watching except for Cathy anyway, and she obviously thought they were
fucking or should be, so it didn't matter what the hell that woman saw in any case.
Elliot tugged Olivia closer to his body when she didn't say anything, his lips near her ear. "Olivia. Tell me."
She was shaking again. Instantly. Just like that. "It's none of your-"
He jerked her against him, her breasts flattening against his chest. "You really want to prolong this out here,
in front of everyone?" he warned, his breath hitting her temple.
Olivia was far more pliable against him than he expected to her to be. Her hands came up weakly, but
instead of pushing him away, her palms rested against his upper chest in a mock attempt to get some space.
Her shoulders had fallen, her breathing too even to indicate she felt any semblance of a fight within her.
"Sometimes I hate you," she said quietly.
Elliot didn't move. He couldn't. "Yeah, I know. Sometimes I hate you too."
Her breath hitched, hard. "So then what the hell are you doing?"
His mouth fell, his lips finally, thankfully making the slightest contact with the skin right near her hairline.
"Sometimes I don't," Elliot rasped. "Sometimes...I don't... hate you."
Olivia sank just a little bit in his arms.
In his arms. The recognition that she was, in actuality, in his arms in the first place gave him pause. Twenty-
four hours ago, he wouldn't have believed it. Yet, twenty four hours ago he also had been plagued by the
idea that he was required to move home again, simply because he had asked to in a moment of confusion.
He'd been convinced he would be abandoning his family if he chose not to. Yet now he was beginning to
see what he owed himself, what he owed Olivia, and most importantly, the truth he finally owed his family.

"Olivia," he said quietly, easing up his grip on her and finding surprisingly that she wasn't as yet pulling
away from him. "Are you...are you still...?"
She looked up at him, barely moving. "No."
He wanted that to be enough. Elliot wanted to be able to let it go. But he couldn't. "Who was it?" he
demanded.
Olivia stared at him, not giving an inch. But her belligerence didn't have depth; it was all on the surface. A
weak, filmy layer of defiance that was offering her about as much protection as a sheet of saran wrap would
when trying to stop a bullet.
He couldn't push her. For some reason, her vulnerability was blinding, even in the face of her stubbornness.
He changed tactics, despite the desperation he felt just to put a face on the asshole that had taken up
residence in his head. "How long have you known, Olivia?"
A sheen of haze filtered over her eyes. "What do you mean?" she asked softly, caution permeating every
syllable.
He couldn't help where his gaze fell. He couldn't help that her lower lip was so damned full that it made him
want to taste it. He couldn't help that she was tipping her face up to his, and that the curve of her waist
dipped in just a little bit, making a place for his hand. "How long have you known that this thing with us
existed?" he whispered urgently.
Olivia's eyes widened in response to the stark question. Then they filled with just the slightest bit of fear
before he saw her visibly brace herself. She was afraid, he realized, afraid of whatever she was about to tell
him.
Just don't deny it, Olivia. I can't live through lies anymore. Not mine, not yours.
"Since the day I found out you were separated from Kathy," she said tightly, her body stiffening against his.
He hadn't expected her answer to make him fight for air. "What..."
But he never finished his question.
Olivia had found her self-recrimination, and she was now wearing it like a shroud. "As scared as I was for
you, I went home that night Elliot. And you know what I did?" She laughed disgustedly under her breath
and shook her head at the recollection.
Only the breaths she was fighting for, the ones that sent her chest pressing against his, told him just how
little control she had over her body right now.
He was dying in the face of her resignation. Elliot wanted to tell her that there was nothing she could say to
him that would make him need her any less. Even if she was about to tell him that was the very same night
she had gone home and slept with the anonymous asshole. She could tell him she had gone and slept with
half of Manhattan, and it wouldn't be her that he would have the problem with. It would be anyone who
hadn't recognized that no matter what she said, what she did, Jesus, what she allowed, that they should have
known better than to take something from her that she didn't have to spare.
But she didn't tell him she had slept with someone that night. What she hated herself for, what she was
showing him that she couldn't live with, had nothing to do with whoever it was that she had been intimate
with.

"I felt bad for you. My heart broke for you. And in the midst of all of that, there was this feeling that I didn't
honestly want to recognize." Olivia's voice was choked, her erratic inhalation drowning out the sound of
Jessica and Tyler behind him, even when Jessica stumbled off the rope and laughed loudly at Tyler's antics.
He still only heard Olivia. Only processed her anguish. Only watched her observe the scene on the ropes,
over his shoulder. Looking anywhere else so long as it didn't involve looking at him.
The breeze blew a strand of her hair across her face, sending it over the smooth plane of her cheek and
towards her lips. Elliot's hand left her waist, reaching up to trap the strands between his forefinger and
thumb. As he went to move it away, he let the side of his thumb slip over her lips, watched them part
involuntarily as he did it. He tucked the strand behind her ear, wishing like hell he could slip his hand
around the back of her neck and draw her head towards his shoulder.
He just wanted to hold her. Without an audience. Without Cathy with a C watching. Without the noise and
the laughter that echoed off the trees surrounding the enclave in which they stood. He wanted to hold her,
here in the fresh air, beneath the cleansing heat of the sun.
"I found out your marriage was probably over, Elliot," Olivia murmured in a monotone. "And that night, I
felt something I hadn't felt since I was kid."
Elliot knew what she was going to say, so he let her take her time in saying it for herself. For some reason
he relaxed, despite hearing the pain in her voice. Pain would fade, it could fade. He knew that firsthand,
because although his marriage had fallen apart, in the end, after all of the struggles, he hadn't.
And, even though she didn't realize it, what she was going to say gave them someplace to start at least.
"I felt hope," she continued finally, her eyebrows furrowing beneath the guilt as she stared beyond him.
Olivia left him again, pulling away from him and going back towards the group. He stood there for a
moment longer, wondering if it really was as clear as he was beginning to feel that it was.
He didn't even mind this time when she left him, because at least this time she had left him with the one
thing that she was ironically disgusted that she had felt.
Hope.
+++
She didn't have a clue.
That's all she could focus on. She had just admitted that she had been selfish and stupid while he had faced
his worst moments, and still the tension that had filled Elliot only moments before was slowly
disintegrating.
Olivia had woken up only a few hours earlier yet she was exhausted already. She had already spent more
time baking in the sun today than she would on any given day. Her lungs had already been offered more
fresh air; her heart had already been dragged through more ups and downs. Most of all, her skin had already
been offered more of Elliot that she had ever experienced.
In eight years. Combined.
Yet Elliot Stabler was walking around like there was nothing chaotic happening. He was now...grinning at
Jim?
Jim?
Olivia narrowed her eyes, trying to decipher what the heck was happening. Elliot and she were up next,
Cathy and Jim having just completed their turn, of course not falling off once because they wouldn't. But
Jim and Elliot were laughing, discussing something about the ropes, and Olivia was left standing there as if
she had just entered the Twilight Zone.
Shit, she couldn't say that out loud. God only knew that Cathy would have some Twilight Zone analogy to
offer her. Olivia was convinced the woman's DVR needed to be unplugged.
"Liv?" Elliot called out to her from nearly the other end of the ropes.
She looked up, wondering what had shifted, and when it was going to all fall apart. When would he process
what she had just told him? When he realized how self-centered she had been, would he walk away?
Would he look at her with disdain, with hurt? With accusation?
"Yeah?"
Elliot's eyes locked on hers, and they were as clear as the sky. She didn't know if she had ever seen them
like this. It was amazing, really, how many colors he could capture in just the irises of his eyes alone. "You
ready? We're up."
Olivia nodded. "Yeah."
To her right, Jessica stood next to Tyler. "See, Tyler. Guarantee you Elliot's not going to try and purposely
make her fall."
Tyler chuckled as he shrugged. "C'mon, Jess. It was funny. You laughed. And seriously, what's the worst
that was gonna happen? You'd fall on your ass?"
Jessica laughed despite herself. "I'm gonna knock you on your ass, Ty. Just wait. Your ass is mine."
Tyler practically guffawed. "And this is a threat?" He turned to the side and started to bend over. "It's
yours," he sighed in mock defeat. "Do with it what you will."
Jessica giggled, slapping his ass. "Stop it, you moron. Let Olivia concentrate." She shot Olivia an apologetic
look. "Don't mind him. He forgot to put on his I'm-all-grown-up-now pants this morning."
Olivia saw Elliot heading towards her and felt the slightest twinge of envy at the easiness that existed
between Tyler and Jessica. Whatever Jessica had decided last night hadn't made things worse between them.
They seemed even more relaxed today, this weekend just another adventure in a series of them that they
would encounter. Jessica didn't appear to be worried. She wasn't stricken by anxiety and tension; she wasn't
anticipating that the worst was yet to come.
The tiniest of smiles played across Olivia's lips. "Does he even own any?"
Tyler feigned hurt, grabbing his chest and staggering back a step. He pouted dramatically. "You ladies are
not nice," he pretended to whine. "I'm gonna go hang out with the big boys until you two learn how to play
nice."
Jessica grinned brightly at Olivia as Tyler headed towards Carl and Leo, her radiance almost infectious.
"You were right last night, you know. It's gonna be worth it, no matter what it takes."

Elliot came up behind Olivia, standing there for a moment and realizing he was interrupting. He looked
from Jessica to Olivia, his natural curiosity winning. "Right about what?"
Olivia froze, her smile fading as she felt the sun drift behind clouds for just a moment. "Nothing," she said
quickly, hoping that would head Jessica off.
But the girl was already beaming, her sparkling brown eyes full of laughter as she looked at Elliot. "Olivia
gave me some really good advice last night."
Elliot turned his head to face Olivia, his expression a cross between amusement and interest. "Really?" he
said, cocking his head. "Like what?"
Olivia swallowed, wishing the ground would swallow her up. Don't say it, Jessica, she pleaded silently. Just
don't. Someone, somewhere has to cut me a break here. "You ready, Elliot? I think everyone is waiting,"
Olivia said, trying to change the subject.
But Elliot was far too invested in Jessica's revelation now. "Sure, one second. So," he said, smiling
encouragingly at the younger woman. "What sort of advice?"
Jessica was practically bouncing on the balls of her feet. She looked past Elliot to where Tyler was smiling
at her again in some private, shared joke. "I didn't know if I should go for Tyler," she said distractedly,
watching her new boyfriend as he reveled in her attention. "Because we work together and all. But Olivia
said to go for it, which was just what I needed to hear."
Elliot's bemused, surprised gaze shot to Olivia. "You said go for it?" he questioned, his voice dropping.
The other woman hadn't noticed. "If you'll excuse me," she said, giving Olivia one last smile. "Thanks
again," she offered, before pushing her way past them and towards the one man that had all of her attention.
Elliot stepped closer to her, his eyes deepening in color. "You said that to her?"
Olivia's nerves were shot to hell. "Elliot, it has nothing to do with us because there is no us. Now can we do
this stupid exercise or what?"
His jaw flexed as his expression hardened again. "If it's not about us, then why'd you tell her to go for it?
You have some track record with work relationships working out that I don't know about?"
Olivia felt the blood drain from her face. She wondered if this would be the moment that she finally walked
away from this place. If when she headed back down that trail that had brought them here if she would be
walking alone, or if he would follow her. She wondered if he walked away first if she would follow him.
She looked hopefully at Grant, wishing he would choose this moment to hurry them along, but he was too
busy socializing with Hannah to realize that no one was on the ropes.
Elliot had started using all the air around them. She felt herself fight harder for it, the faster that he inhaled.
"Olivia," he said, her name falling perilously from his lips. "Why won't you tell me?"
"You don't need to know, Elliot. Bottom line, it's none of your damned business," she said irritably.
He flinched before his hand shot out, yet again, and settled possessively on her elbow. "We're-"
"Partners?" she interrupted, her voice rising. "Yeah, you've tried to use that excuse before when you wanted
to make my personal life your business."

Back off, Olivia. Back off. You're losing control.
It's Thatcher all over again, only this is your partner you're kicking the shit out of.
She blinked, staring at the ropes and knowing she had to climb onto them now. They were low ropes, no
clear and present danger obvious to the naked eye. But there would be a moment on those ropes, a moment
when she would stand next to him, facing him, hanging onto the upper cord while balancing on the bottom
one and knowing that she had to share space with him. That to get around Elliot, to just keep moving, she'd
have to negotiate the same two feet of rope, and find a way to have that precarious ledge accommodate them
both without impeding their progress.
And here she stood, with Elliot pushing her, determined to know something that had nothing to do with their
partnership. He was breaking down barriers, and making her personal life his to know.
He wanted to inhabit the same space. And somehow, after they did, he wanted to be able to keep moving
forward.
His anger had flared in response to her silence. The brief respite they had found only moments ago after her
confession of selfishness was once again lost. "Fine. Don't tell me." He shook his head in frustration, staring
at the treetops for a moment before he dropped his chin again to look at her.
She could feel his tension prickling in the air, the hum of his body nearly making her take a step backwards.
"Fine. Good. Great."
Elliot leaned in close to her ear. "You can do your damndest to convince yourself that no one needs to give
a shit about you. But you're never going to convince me of that. Because you know what, Olivia? You're
right. We're goddamned partners, and somewhere along the line it stopped meaning one thing and started
meaning everything else."
When her head shot up to look at him, when her eyes connected with the tumultuous tumble in his, she
knew what it was like to truly want something. She wanted him so badly in that exact moment. Maybe
because he cared in spite of her; maybe because he'd somehow placed her first on his list of people to save.
Maybe because, when it ultimately came down to it, Elliot was the only man who didn't back down when
faced with her displaced wrath.
Or maybe because the way he was looking at her left no room for interpretation. It was pure, raw, sexual
hunger from a man that believed he had staked his claim on the woman he was glaring at.
Her awareness of Elliot, of his body, of his proximity, of the risk that permeated this attraction, ratcheted up
a thousand notches. He must have seen her reaction to him, must have read her eyes. Because in the
moment that Grant Ludwig finally got his head out of his ass and called out to them, reminding them it was
their turn to climb onto the ropes, the hard planes of Elliot's face relaxed, offering her the most dangerous
look of all.
His lips curved upwards, gradually, lazily, his innate knowledge of their pending camp activity written all
over his face.
"Be careful when I slide around you, Olivia," he said softly, the warning in his tone unmistakable.
And in the second before he walked away from her, to the other end of the ropes, he gave her one final
glimpse of what she had to look forward to.
The bastard smirked.

+++
Her movements were unsteady. Nearly jerky. She was wiping her cheek and her hand was shaking.
Good.
She deserved it.
He only knew two things in this moment. One, he'd know the idiot's name by the time the day was out. And
two, he was going to fucking kiss her again.
Again, probably by the time the day was out.
Christ, if he kept this up, it was going to happen before lunch. Maybe here. Maybe he'd pull Olivia off the
ropes and against him and get her to open her smart-ass mouth by driving his tongue past her lips.
He added a third thing that he knew in this moment.
She'd make that blasted sound too, because he'd damn well kiss her until she did.
He wondered if there were meetings for this sort of thing. Like Attracted Partners Anonymous. He
wondered if there was a basement room in the bottom of One PP where dickheads like him sat around and
talked about the fact that one day, they had woken up and suddenly realized that their decidedly asshole-ish
behavior towards their partner for the last two years probably had something to do with the fact that
partnerly feelings were no longer partnerly.
Hi. My name is Elliot Stabler and I've got a hard-on for my partner. Yeah, Olivia Benson. You've met her?
You're right, I'm going to need all the luck I can get.
She was nervous as she stood at the other end of the ropes. She was fidgeting, waiting for him to grab hold
of his end. Her bangs fell into her eyes as she looked at him with just a hint of trepidation. "You ready?"
"Yeah," he exhaled.
He grabbed a hold of the top rope, bringing it down an inch or two. Olivia had to stretch for it a little bit
more on her end, but she did it. She stepped onto the bottom rope then, wavering as it buckled slightly
beneath her, facing the group behind him.
It took her a second to regain her equilibrium, but she finally found it by pushing out on the lower rope with
the bottoms of her sneakered feet.
He knew by the look on her face that balancing on the rope was harder than it looked. Her jaw was set into a
stoic line, the muscles in her shoulder flexing beneath the tightly drawn cotton of her t-shirt.
Olivia shot him an exasperated look. "Well? What are you waiting for?" she huffed, her body swaying
before she regained her balance again. This time he saw her smartly lock her knees.
Elliot smiled a little and the dirty look she shot him almost made him laugh. He shrugged. "Just giving you
all the time you need to get your footing," he indulged.
If looks alone could kill, he'd be on the ground by now and there was a slight possibility Olivia wouldn't
even bother calling for a bus. "Get on the rope, Stabler," she grumbled.

If he were Dickie's age, he would have made as much commotion getting onto the rope as possible, just to
watch her try and accommodate the new weight. If he was Tyler, he would have deliberately rocked the low
rope, just to watch her scramble. But he wasn't either of them, and in the end, as much fun as it was to see
her determination battle her inability to ask for some leniency, he didn't ever want her to struggle for
anything.
Elliot got on, facing the opposite direction so that he would eventually come face-to-face with her. He did it
as carefully as he could, rocking the cord he was stepping on as little as possible.
"All set?" he asked.
She lifted her chin, glaring at him mutinously. "Yeah."
For a brief moment, he found that he was enjoying this. As he watched her concentrate, forgetting to move
himself, he realized just how little he had been given of Olivia outside the confines of the job. He knew her
accuracy rate at the range; he knew how to move with her in the interrogation room to get a suspect to
break. He knew if they came across a suspect, guns drawn, that Olivia would aim for his heart while Elliot
always aimed for his head.
He knew she had cried in the crib, four days after she had found Maria, when the little girl had called the
squad because she wanted to talk to "her Olivia" again. He knew that she had thrown up the night that she
hadn't heard Elliot tell her to switch directions in her car in Central Park, resulting in a man being abducted
and raped. He even knew that for one single night, in the midst of the hunt for her brother, she had gone to
sleep a little bit easier because for those few moments she had convinced herself that maybe her father
wasn't the monster she had imagined him to be.
But the rest of her was what was drawing him in now. The dark, early morning that she had texted him
while he lay in bed, and then sat drinking her tea next to him on his front steps, was the first time he had
really begun to understand and comprehend how alone she was, and yet how amazingly well she had
learned to survive. When he had walked into Cragen's office, thinking he had murdered that Bedford kid,
and had told them he was done, he had seen the disbelief and pain on her face that told him with certainty
that her leaving months earlier hadn't been about not needing him.
And now, watching her navigate the ropes, moving towards him despite her insistence that there wasn't
anything between them, he knew that no matter how much Olivia fought him, she was only doing what she
thought she needed to do in order to survive.
Just like he had thought he had to go home, she had thought she needed to run.
He had to believe that they both were wrong.
The rope scratched against the palm of his hand as he gripped it, looking at her again. Olivia was two steps
closer already; it was his turn to catch up. He knew she'd stay still if he made a move, so he did, shifting his
sneakers to the left, towards her.
As soon as the rope steadied again, Olivia slid her feet to her left, starting to eat up the space between them
on the rope. He found if he pushed out with his feet, and she did as well, that the cord would tighten
between them, offering them more resistance on which to slip closer to one another.
Olivia stopped moving, looking at him, realizing that if they moved one at a time, their balance would
remain the steadiest because they wouldn't have to fight the motion of the other. With her stilling, he
progressed, and he watched her arms tighten to hold on as he accidentally rocked the rope on which they
stood.

She didn't fall off.
"You good?" he asked, an apology built into the tone of his voice.
Olivia's confidence had increased. Her eyes were lighter, her face a bit more relaxed. "Yeah, I'm good," she
said quietly.
Without asking him, without needing to, she moved next, knowing he would stay still. When she stopped,
he slid closer to her, less than four feet now separating them.
"I told you, Tyler. See? Instead of knocking me off, we could have worked on having some kind of rhythm
up there," Jessica complained.
But Elliot knew she was wrong. This sort of rhythm wasn't one that anyone could just find on a hot,
sweltering morning with someone they were just beginning to know. Balance was earned over time, over
years, and was built with the understanding that it could be knocked at any moment, with just the slightest
careless movement. But if there was rhythm, it would keep the balance strong. A constant movement whose
beat was familiar, that beckoned even when the ground was unsteady, that called to the next step and coaxed
it forward even when the bottom gave out behind them.
Olivia shifted even closer, knowing what was coming. They'd have to cross each other soon. In seconds she
closed the last two feet and stopped, looking at him expectantly.
As he held on tightly to the top rope, he headed for her, knowing that in a game like this, both ropes were
equally important. The one beneath their feet was the one their weight was on, but it was the one above
them that they held onto when the other one rocked.
His left shoulder was finally almost touching hers.
Elliot's chest was tight as Olivia lifted her face to his. "Where do you want me?" she said softly.
Well, that was a loaded question.
Here? How about around the corner? There's a huge sugar maple over there that would provide some good
cover for us. You in?
Shit, he had to focus.
Elliot spread his hands apart on the rope, giving her a foot-and-a-half of room. With just a look she knew,
and her left hand came off the rope in front of her and slipped onto the space he had left her. He looked up,
saw her fist tightened around the cord, saw her grasped onto the rope he offered her as if not falling off had
suddenly become the most important thing in the world.
He wanted to be the one to move now. He wanted to tell her to stand still, to let him do this, to let him be
the one to get around her. But as much as he wanted that, he knew that would make her uneasy.
Elliot bit down his need to be the one to make the next move, and widened his legs on the rope instead,
leaning backwards. "You do it," he said softly, so low that only she could hear him.
Her face lifted to his in surprise. He knew why. Elliot had practically threatened her a few minutes ago that
he would be the one to do this, that she would be at his mercy.
The plain, stunning gratitude in her eyes nearly knocked him off the rope. She nodded, the movement slight
but discernable. "Okay," she whispered.
but discernable. "Okay," she whispered.
"Wow, you guys are fast," Grant commented, standing behind Elliot, facing Olivia.
But Elliot ignored him, and he found a distinct satisfaction in the fact that Olivia did too. Her gaze was
trained on Elliot, hesitation and trust blending together until one gave way to the other, only he couldn't tell
which was which.
Olivia looked down, getting her shoulder as close to him as she could. She lifted her left foot then, trying to
swing it around his and settle it down between his feet. Her weight tipped backwards, making one of her
hands slip off the rope unexpectedly.
She reached for him suddenly, instinctively, her open palm landing flat and hard on his chest. He held onto
the rope with one hand, grabbing her hard, unwilling to lose this game. Elliot hauled her up against his
chest, strands of her hair tickling his nose as she pressed her whole body against him.
"Elliot," she expelled harshly as she grabbed for the rope again.
His right hand clenched harder on the rope. By fucking God, they weren't going to fall and make asses of
themselves. Not if he could help it. He saw the panic in her eyes too. It was the same for her; pride had
determined that they wouldn't lose this game.
For a moment they just stood there, breathing, her breasts sliding just a little bit against his chest as her
lungs contracted, responding to the surge of adrenaline. Her slim, muscular thighs were wrapped around one
of his, and with his heavier weight he inadvertently dipped backwards, sending her onto his leg a little bit
more.
His t-shirt remained untucked, thank God.
Of course she had to feel it, she had to know. Especially if they stayed like this a few seconds longer. His
response to Olivia would be unmistakable. His dick would be fully hard and pressed against her belly and
she'd let go, because she'd trust him even less.
But she surprised him. Instead of pulling away from him, instead of giving up the game, Olivia stayed still,
her incredible, mind-numbing body molded around his as if she had been made solely for the purpose of
sliding on top of him. Elliot watched her pupils dilate with awareness, her lips part on a rushed breath. She
was liquid fire around him, draped against the contours of his body.
"Olivia..." he groaned quietly.
Elliot wanted to get inside of her. He just wanted to know, dammit. He wanted to know what the bare skin
at the top of her thighs felt like, what it would feel like to have his hands on her ass as it flexed when she
moved above him. He wanted all these fucking clothes off, because it seemed absurd that he didn't know
what she felt like completely naked and rocking to completion in his arms. He knew for certain that she'd be
hot; that the temperature of her skin alone would sear him. Inside of her would be pure velvet heat, so
fucking tight and wet that he'd willingly die just to be allowed to thrust again. He figured she'd come for
him more than once, because her sexual appetite had to be as relentless and voracious as his.
"You okay for me to move?" she whispered.
He winced, knowing what she meant. His dick was far too ecstatic right now, pressed like a steel rod hard
against her. But he was afraid the slightest movement from her and he'd lose it, right in front of everyone.
"Don't move," he gritted, slamming his eyes shut for just a moment. "Just give me a sec."

Olivia nodded, her eyes widening. And then she defied him, nearly rubbing herself along him as she shifted.
"Sorry," she rushed, immediately stilling in apology.
Thank God no one could really tell what the hell was happening here. Thank God no one was really paying
attention, and even if they were, they surely wouldn't be able to actually see the electricity that was sending
shockwaves through him.
He hoped.
"Okay, Olivia. Move now, and fast, because if you don't move..." he said, his lips barely moving and the
sound of his voice so soft that only she could hear.
He didn't need to finish his sentence. Olivia grabbed for the rope on the other side of him, finally slipping
her body past him, although the movement sent her breasts digging and sliding across his chest. Then,
mercifully, she was fully off of him, heading for the far end of the rope.
Movements be damned, he hurt. He physically ached. Elliot shifted, moving fast, thinking that even his t-
shirt wouldn't offer him any discretion with his arms raised like this. She didn't seem to have any problem
now, moving even as he rocked the rope.
She wanted to be down and off this thing as much as he did.
When she finally jumped down on the other end, he did too, keeping his back to the group behind him as he
rubbed his hands over his face in complete and utter agony. This was ridiculous. He'd accidentally found
himself watching her a few times over the years, feeling like a prick when he had noticed her wearing a
shirt that left a little less to the imagination, or seeing her chew on a pencil and finding himself imagining
something he shouldn't. He'd always shut those thoughts down so fast he hadn't given them a second
thought.
But now, this was out of control. Every movement she was making was wreaking havoc on him.
Olivia was heading over to him. Christ, at least she was still speaking to him.
"El?" she said throatily when she was right in front of him, her eyes dark and shimmering.
Goddammit, Olivia, he wanted to say. Don't look at me like that unless you're as ready for this as I am.
Why did he have to be the one to get a partner with the longest legs on the fucking planet?
No, Stabler, don't think about her thigh curving tightly around your shoulder, you asshole. Listen to her;
she's trying to say something.
"Yeah," he said instead, blowing out a breath.
It took him until that moment to figure out which emotion had won with her. Hesitation had lost, and
instead some level of trust now emanated from her. "Do you still want to know?" she asked, her voice
catching.
Did he want to know?
No. He wanted there to be nothing to know. He wanted to pretend it had never happened. He wanted to
think that she had been waiting for two years for him, because in a perfect world she would have.

But if there was one thing he knew, it was that the world wasn't perfect. Because if it were, he wouldn't
have hurt everyone along the way just to get to the realization that he was now, finally, at about the two of
them. If the world was perfect, victims wouldn't exist, regret wouldn't be the consequence of action, and
mistakes would always turn out to be for the best.
The heat in her eyes was fading as she looked at him, replaced by anguish, by the realization of all that was
imperfect. Behind him, the group was assembling to walk back to the campsite, Grant's next activity
apparently lined up for them there.
Elliot shook his head. He didn't want to take something from her, and he was afraid now that if she told
him, she'd be giving him something she wasn't ready to give. "No. I don't need to know," he said.
Olivia stepped a little bit closer to him. "You stayed still on the rope. Why'd you let me be the one to move?
"
The sun was getting ever warmer if that was even possible. The slight breeze of the morning had dissipated,
and they were left with just the humidity and the lulling cacophony of the birds. Even the voices of the
others had faded, even though they stood only a few steps away.
"Because if I did, you'd figure it out," Elliot shrugged. He wanted to say something more, but then he looked
at her and saw the pain in her expression and he couldn't stand there and absorb it. It hurt too damned much
to watch her struggle.
He started to step around her, his head hung, when she reached out and stopped him. "In Oregon," she said,
just above a whisper. "My last night there, we went out for a few drinks after the case with that girl
officially closed. One thing led to another at my hotel. I thought I'd never see him again."
Elliot closed his eyes, her fingers branding his arm. He didn't think it would feel like this. Like she had just
sliced him open at the breastbone and grabbed his lungs out. He didn't think he'd feel this much anger once
he knew who it was. He didn't think it would want to make him tear apart the sonofabitch, if he could just
put a face on the shadow.
He had thought of other names that wouldn't have done this to him. Ones that he knew held little bearing
with her. Names of people that were already gone, that wouldn't know Olivia like he did.
But the name she was now giving him, because for some sudden reason after that ropes game, she trusted
him not to act like a fool, was the one name that he didn't realize he had been holding his breath and praying
it wasn't.
It was the name of the man Olivia had let help her, when she hadn't let Elliot in.
All of the heat was gone. For all he knew, the sun had just fallen out of the sky and the harsh winds of
winter were rolling in. Elliot stilled, and the only movement coming from him was the slow blink of his
eyes.
He couldn't look at her. He wanted to, but he couldn't. He was such a fucking idiot. Somewhere in his head,
Elliot tried to remember what she had said as they had been walking here, to the ropes site. What had she
said about that night?
He couldn't remember. All he knew was that when the asshole had come back, Olivia had taken off with
him, indulging in the search for her family that deep down, Elliot had always assumed he would be a part
of. She'd lied to Elliot by evading him, all the while letting that GQ fucker help her in a way that eight years
of partnership hadn't seemingly earned Elliot the right to.

When Elliot had found her that day outside the police station in Jersey, just hours before the standoff, he
had glared at Porter, effectively letting the Fed know to back off when it came to Olivia. Elliot had been
nearly smug, seeing Olivia get into his car as opposed to that uptight prick's shiny, black truck.
But Elliot had been the fool. Because although Olivia had slid into Elliot's car, she had once slid on top of
that bastard.
Thank you, she had said as they stood outside of that house in Florida. For trusting me.
Elliot hadn't responded then, and maybe it was because deep down he knew. Maybe he had known that
Olivia had made him look like a fool in more ways than one. That she had trusted the Fed with her history,
her body and her safety while shutting Elliot out, her flimsy excuse about protecting Elliot notwithstanding
the harsh truth of this newfound information. Maybe his instincts had already told him what had happened
between those two; maybe he had known he was odd man out.
"Porter," Elliot said bitterly.
"El," Olivia began, her voice shaking and her eyes far too bright. "You wanted to know, so I-"
Elliot cut her off by shaking his head, unable to look at her. He finally gave her back exactly what she had
given him. "Thank you for trusting me," he said flatly, the wintery ice finding its way into his throat.
And then he coldly stepped around her and started walking back to the campsite.
Alone.
+++
Back to index

A/N: Okay! I'm doing better with responding and having time, so yeah!! Thank you AGAIN, I'm blown
away constantly by the response to this story. This is doubly long, this chapter, to make up for my incessant
delays in review responding. Thank you SO much to everyone who has helped me so much with this. Have
a great weekend!
"You okay?"
Olivia was startled by the question, and her head jerked up, seeking the source of the invasion before she
could control it. Her feet were heavy on the dirt path, even the pads of her feet aching inside of her shoes.
She tried to focus on the person asking her as she dragged her eyes from the matted leaves and dust that
shifted as they all trekked back to the campsite.
"I'm fine," Olivia said, thinking she must have managed to smile back at Cathy.
Cathy's eyes were still full of concern. "You don't look okay. You want to talk about it?"
Olivia shivered beneath the fiery sun as her anxiety rocketed skyward. Talk about it? No. That was the
dangerous activity that had catapulted her into this mess in the first place. For eight years, she hadn't really
talked about her personal involvements with Elliot. For eight years, they had maintained a careful distance.
A casual mention here or there from her about a date, a dinner, a play. From him she would inevitably get a
little bit more, but because the significant other stayed the same for him, she assumed it was easier for him
to share. Would you help me figure out what to get Kathy for our anniversary? he'd say, his face contorted
in confusion. Or she's mad I've been here so late this week, mind if I make up for leaving now by hitting this
paperwork early tomorrow? he'd ask apologetically.
Boxed and framed tidbits.
Maybe that's all they had ever been able to do. Maybe any more than that and they had known that they'd
screw up what they had.
Maybe they had just been stupid enough to forget Elliot and Olivia's Official Rules of Engagement.
"Olivia?" Cathy said again, as she tilted her head in sympathy.
Olivia folded her arms across her chest as she walked, hugging her body. "I'm fine," she said quietly, hoping
it would head Cathy off.
Thankfully, it did. For a few minutes there was only the sound of their shoes, crunching across the
compacted, dry foliage on the trail. The sun had become merciless, burning her arms while moisture made
her shirt stick to her lower back. Even the birds had quieted, as if it was simply too hot to make a noise.
Ahead of her by forty feet, Elliot walked with Leo, both of them staring straight ahead as they stomped
along. Their demeanor was the same, their backs stiff and their stride relentlessly purposeful. She watched
Elliot, finally able to without fearing that he would catch her looking. His shirt was contoured to his
sculpted, powerful body, his broad shoulders flexing as his hands moved. His waist seemed lonely without
his holster, his gun, his badge.
She wondered if she looked like that too. Empty. Vulnerable. Missing something.
For one, single second she let her eyes drift shut as she walked, allowing the aching, prickling heat have her
skin.
skin.
Thank you for trusting me.
Sarcastic. Biting. Angry.
That had been them in a nutshell for the last year or so. Of course their track record of animosity had been
surprisingly marred by moments when she had felt overwhelmingly connected to Elliot, too. Pathetically,
she wished that the moment in which he had walked away from her with accusation in his eyes had been
one that had left her feeling only animosity for him.
But it wasn't.
She was angry with him for being a hypocritical asshole, for making her feel like she had done something to
betray him, but she also remembered what it had felt like last night when he had told her he had slept with
Kathy.
Logic hadn't dispelled that hurt for her then, so she didn't know why it would for him now. But she hadn't
even been able to explain herself to Dean, so how did she expect to find words to make Elliot understand
her choices?
Of course, she shouldn't have to, Olivia reminded herself. She had been single. She was still single.
Available. Unattached.
Olivia blew out a hard, painful breath.
She was a horrible, horrible liar, especially when it came to lying to herself.
She had been attached to Elliot for far too long. She had been locked in an orbit around him, around his
presence, his emotions, his life, for as long as she could remember. And somewhere along the way Olivia
had made the mistake of becoming overwhelmingly aware of him.
Physically.
Somewhere along the line she had started to pay attention to the sound of his voice, to the sheer lethal size
and shape of him, to every nuance of his body as Elliot moved, stalked, circled.
Somewhere along the line she had found herself unable to tear her gaze away from him before he would
catch her staring.
And now, she realized, somewhere along the line he had become aware that her anger, her frustration with
him, had become infused with a want so strong that it made her skin flush, her chest constrict and her thighs
clench with the need to wrap around him.
The simple, physical idea of Elliot turned her on like nothing, like no one, had ever done before.
Olivia closed her eyes. Elliot had been hard, hot, and insistent against her. Twice today. But on the ropes
she had practically ridden his erection, and in that position, if they hadn't been clothed, he would have been
inside of her.
Elliot. Deep in her body. She wondered what his voice would sound like when he first pushed into her, what
his chest would feel like bare against her breasts. She wondered if he would rumble and purr in
encouragement as he rocked within her, and if he'd give her that smug, satisfied smirk when he did, because
her want would be obvious just by the liquid heat of her as he sank deeper.
her want would be obvious just by the liquid heat of her as he sank deeper.
Olivia rubbed her hands over her face quickly, stifling a painful moan. She wasn't going to throw away eight
years for a one night stand. For a weekend away. For a few minutes, or hours, of pure, carnal bliss.
Not that it was an option anymore, anyways, considering he was royally pissed off at her for not telling him
that she had been intimate with Dean.
And just how exactly was she supposed to tell him in any case? What did he expect? Hey Elliot, while I was
away I had sex with my FBI case agent. Just telling you in case he shows up here in a month or two and you
end up working with him, too. By the way, is that a fresh pot of coffee you're making?
Her anger flared again and she let it, knowing it was far safer to be pissed at him than to indulge her
growing need to catch up to him on the trail and demand that he comprehend that they didn't owe each other
anything. To demand that he understand, acknowledge...forgive.
No. There was nothing to forgive. And she was sick and tired of being made to feel like there was. First by
Dean, and then by Elliot. She wasn't an exhibit in a museum, left on display to be poked at, prodded, and
examined relentlessly. Her motivations and reasons were hers and hers alone, and both Dean, and now
Elliot, could go to hell.
They were in his truck, heading for Sharon Marsden's house, when she knew he had finally reached the
point where couldn't hold back any longer. She had to give him credit. They had been driving for over
twenty minutes already, so she knew he had given her attempt at avoidance a valiant effort.
"Olivia," Dean said, clearing his throat. "I hope you don't regret what happened."
She dropped her forehead into her hand; her elbow propped on the window, and prayed her headache
would go away. From the moment she had seen Dean standing in Cragen's office, she had known he would
want to talk about it. To question why she had crept out of her hotel in Portland as he had slept, why she
had hailed a cab to the airport without saying goodbye.
Dean wasn't one of those men that shied away from the conversation. He wasn't one of those men that
routinely slept with a coworker, either. Both facts had worked against the likelihood that she would be able
to avoid this discussion.
Not now, she thought. Just not now.
"You do regret it," he said, shaking his head, his lips lifting in a self-deprecating smile. "I guess the fact
that you crept out like that should have been my first clue."
"Dean," Olivia mumbled irritably. "We've obviously got enough to deal with. Can we just focus on finding
Simon?"
He shot her a glance across the black interior of the truck. "Can I ask you a question?"
Olivia sighed, staring out the window. "What?"
"Why isn't he here with you right now?"
That got her attention. Her breath quickened, wariness flooding her veins. "Who?" she tried, knowing it
wouldn't buy her more than a few seconds.

Dean laughed. "Come on, Olivia," he said quietly. "He's your best friend, right? Isn't that what you said?"
She didn't like the tone of Dean's voice. A slight twinge of disbelief permeated his words that she herself had
used to describe Elliot months ago in Oregon. "Yeah, so?"
Nearly a full mile was lost beneath the wheels of the Tahoe before Dean responded. "So how come you
haven't called him yet?"
Olivia had never responded well to being pushed. And while she knew every button to shove in a suspect to
get them to talk, she despised those same tactics being used against her. "None of your business."
Dean's head snapped back a little bit in response, his eyes still focused on the road. "You can't blame me for
wondering why he's not here. If I were your partner? I'd hardly let you go off with a fed, chasing down your
past without having your back."
The anger bubbled up without warning, an immediate defense of Elliot bursting from her lips. "He doesn't
know, okay? Because if he goddamned knew, he'd be here. Which is exactly what I don't want, because at
this particular moment he's got more than enough to deal with in his own life. So stop speculating about
things you know absolutely nothing about," she snapped.
Olivia didn't want to know any more about the pain that filled her when she thought about how she missed
Elliot here with her now. How when it came down to it, deep within, she wished to hell she could have
indulged her selfishness in wanting Elliot to help her. To even just stand next to her as she did this, because
in a way even his stoic, silent presence would have been enough to calm her nerves.
But she couldn't. He wasn't hers. He had his own life he was fixing, and he couldn't be there to fix hers.
Especially when what she was doing could cost him his job.
It was only when her pulse began to return to normal that she realized she had fallen for Dean's ploy for
more information. That made twice that she had done that. Once about the cameras in the post office, and
now about this.
Great.
She squeezed her eyes shut in frustration, blowing out a breath.
"I'm sorry," Dean finally said. "Just don't want to see you get hurt."
That had her attention again. Her curiosity blended with the strange sensation of having a man that was still
practical stranger care about her well-being. "What's that supposed to mean?"
Dean's jaw set into a firm line. "He's married, Olivia. No matter how you look at it, it's going to get messy
when someone finds out."
Olivia blinked, her eyes widening in shock. "You have to be kidding me." She opened her mouth to say
something, but no sound came out. She tried again, tilting her head in disbelief. "First of all, how the hell
do you know anything about his personal life? And secondly," her gaze narrowed. "You want to go ahead
and have the guts to say what you're implying?"
Dean's face tightened. "I pulled his jacket when I realized you were helping Marsden. I wanted to see if
there was any reason to suspect Stabler was involved too. His jacket said he was married. And I'm not
implying anything, Olivia. I'm telling you directly. If you think it's gonna be messy when his wife finds out
about you two, you've got no idea what a shitstorm the NYPD is going to whip up for the two of you."

Olivia laughed bitterly. "So just because I didn't stick around for tea and bagels with you in Oregon, I must
be screwing my partner? That's just...perfect." She shook her head in frustration. She wanted to let Dean
think whatever he wanted. She wanted to not care if he thought she was sleeping with Elliot, but for some
reason it was important that she reveal the truth. Maybe it was because while she didn't care about what
Dean thought about her, it was increasingly vital that he know just who Elliot was. "I get that you think I'd
be the type for an affair, but you haven't got a clue if you think for one second that Elliot would ever cheat
on his marriage. With anyone. He was even separated for two years, and he still didn't cross the line."
Dean was quiet, his face impassive as he gripped the steering wheel with his right hand. Olivia had finally
calmed down a little bit, thinking the conversation was over. Thinking she had made her point.
But Dean hadn't been conceding in the silence, he had just been carefully constructing his next words.
"What you mean is that he didn't see what was right in front of him."
Maybe it was because her world was presently in the process of falling apart so quickly that she was being
thrown her off her game. She had come back from Oregon and watched Elliot with Dani, and been given a
painful glimpse of her own past with him. She had endured the possibility of Elliot nearly going down on a
murder charge, and then withstood his casual confession that he was moving home. Then there was Simon,
and finding out about her father. Combined, it now made her want to give up. To just hole up in her
apartment and yell and sleep and ignore her phone. Combined, it made her not have anything to say to
Dean that would be emphatic enough in its denial. "Go to hell," she said softly instead, willing herself to
reveal nothing.
"Olivia," Dean said, his voice far too even to be familiar. "If he doesn't see it, he's an idiot."
"He's married," she had breathed in protest, her voice cracking as she dragged out the last word. Her eyes
blurred as she tried to make a point, and she realized too late that she had just revealed more than she
should have.
There was silence in the truck after that, and absently Olivia realized that was the third time that Dean
Porter had made her confess far more than she wanted to.
Later that same evening, as she had stood outside of a house that had once been her father's and watched
Simon climb into the rented Tahoe, Dean had looked at her and made it clear to her that he would have shot
Simon.
He had been pointing out clearly to her to pay attention to the fact that Elliot hadn't.
Elliot had listened to her, given her the benefit of the doubt when she had pleaded with him not to shoot. He
had gone against every instinct he had as a cop, simply to indulge the stronger instincts he had regarding
her. He hadn't been a cop in those moments; he hadn't been her partner.
He had been hers. Her Elliot hadn't shot Simon, when every, single cop on the planet would have.
Dean, for some reason, wanted her to realize that. To take some solace in that. And she had, for one, brief
moment. Until she had turned to Elliot and thanked him for trusting her and Elliot had stood there blankly,
not saying a word.
She had never wanted to press forward and against him as badly as she had then. She had wanted to feel the
leather of his jacket beneath her fingertips, against her cheek. She had just wanted to rest against him,
dammit. But in that moment she had realized that while he thought she was the one with a penchant for
walking away, he always walked away first. He just did it while standing in place.

"You want me to get you a drink?" Cathy said quietly.
Olivia focused, realizing that they had already arrived back at the campsite. She had been so lost in thought,
she hadn't even realized they had covered the distance. In silence. Cathy hadn't interrupted her thoughts at
all.
She looked at Cathy, once again realizing the woman was far more intuitive than she perpetuated herself to
be. Olivia did that herself sometimes. It made her recognize something in Cathy, that despite her insistence
that she was okay, and in most ways she was, there were still some things that were easier to cover up
behind the guise of indifference.
Olivia smiled at her, at a woman that was trying so hard to be a friend, when she was being given nothing at
all in return. "I'll join you. How long do we have until the next exercise?"
Cathy's face relaxed. "He said he'll give us about half an hour, so we can get rehydrated and change if we
want to, considering the temperature is supposed to keep climbing."
Olivia was quiet, realizing she had been so lost in thought she had missed all of that. "Yeah, I might change
into shorts." She looked around, realizing Elliot was headed over. He wasn't looking at her. Instead he was
staring off to his right as if she didn't exist, while his feet were still carrying him towards her.
Cathy followed the direction of her gaze. "You never said why you were sent here this weekend," she
mused softly.
Olivia shrugged, her eyes fastened on Elliot. "Don't really know. We've been...having some challenges
working together lately."
The other woman smiled. "Not on the ropes, you didn't. You guys got through that in half the time of
everyone else. Guess that's something, right?"
Elliot was almost upon them then, and Cathy gave her a sympathetic look. "I'm gonna throw shorts on, too.
I'll meet you at the picnic tables."
Olivia nodded, and for the first time watched Cathy retreat with regret. Because in her absence, Olivia was
now subjected to Elliot alone.
He looked past her, as if he had left something on the trail behind her that he was looking for. "I'm gonna
call in, see if I can get through to Munch."
Olivia nodded. "Okay, or I can do that instead if you want."
The muscle in his jaw jumped as he finally trained his eyes on her. They were cool glaciers, and despite the
heat suffocating her, she had no desire to crawl into them. "No. It's fine. I want to check up on the kids too.
I'm gonna call from the car, sit in the AC for a bit."
She knew what he wasn't saying. He was going to get some alone time, to try and process all she had just
told him. Olivia nodded. "Fine."
He looked like he was going to say something else, but didn't. "Fine," he repeated.
Her need to explain herself suddenly became overwhelming. "Elliot, just because I was attracted to you
doesn't mean that..."

Elliot laughed, harshly, angrily. "Was?" he cocked his head, biting his lower lip for a moment, as if
deciding whether or not to continue. Then again, he had never been able to curb his anger once it had taken
hold. "You still are. Or is that something you want to pretend isn't happening too?"
She was instantly pissed again. "I never pretended it didn't happen with Porter, Elliot!" Olivia realized how
loud she was and dropped her voice. "Just because I didn't report right back to you doesn't mean I was
deliberately hiding it!"
Elliot almost seemed amused. But it was a chilling sort of amusement. He chuckled, the sound cold as he
shook his head in disgust. "You're good at it, I'll give you that. You justify shutting me out by simply not
telling me things." He cocked his head, squinting at her. "You think because you don't actively create a lie
that it doesn't feel the same as if you had? You ran the DNA, then found Simon. You practically stalked
him. You sent him money when he was a fugitive. And all the while you think you're so damned noble
because you haven't lied to my face?"
Her anger was ballooning. It had a grip on her that threatened everything she had ever known. She was stuck
in a vice, and Elliot was cranking the handle without realizing that when she exploded it would leave him
with nothing but pieces of what once was. "You think," she retorted icily. "You think that you're so much
better than me because you are able to suddenly drop things on me now? Because right in the middle of a
case you tell me you're moving home as if you're telling me what the weather will be like tomorrow?
Because last night you told me you slept with your wife?" her voice rose dangerously. "That makes you a
better person than me?"
Elliot stepped closer to her. "You should have told me about him, about your relationship with him, before I
had to work with him," he snarled. "I have the right to know when my partner is involved with someone
who potentially might need to have your back or mine." He shifted, as if trying to settle himself and finding
no relief. His hand reached out and grabbed her arm. "So next time, if you're going to go sleep with
someone you work with-"
She laughed mirthlessly, interrupting him. "Might as well be you?" Olivia looked pointedly at where his
hand gripped her arm, and shook her head in disbelief. "And just so we're clear, it wasn't a relationship. It
was a one time thing. Now..." she said angrily, pulling out of his grasp. "Get your hands off me, Stabler."
Elliot dipped his head low, his forehead nearly touching hers. "That's not what you want, Olivia," he
growled. "And you know it. If there is one thing that we've discovered in the last twenty-four hours, it's that
you like my hands being on you as much as I like to put them there. So why don't you decide whether or not
you feel like being truthful for once?"
She gaped at him, stunned by the dangerous fury that emanated from him. Or maybe it was coming from
her. She wanted to say something biting, something hurtful, something that cut him to the bone, just so he
would know what it felt like.
But she didn't.
Maybe it was because she'd be a liar.
Or maybe it was because he had already walked away.
+++
Elliot dropped his head back onto the headrest in the sedan and let the air hit his face. He had left messages
on Munch's and Cragen's lines again, wondering what the hell was preventing them from answering. He
wanted to call the house too, see how his kids were, but he wasn't quite ready to dial that number.

The car had been running for a few minutes now, and he had tilted the air vents towards his face in the
hopes that the chilled air would cool the rest of him down.
No luck as of yet.
He rubbed the heel of his hand over his right eye and then around, over his neck. Cracking his neck to the
left wasn't helping either.
Sonofabitch.
He wasn't a stranger to being pissed. He wasn't a stranger to fighting. He wasn't even a stranger to being
pissed and fighting with Olivia. What was new, however, was this burning need to disprove all her
indignation and righteousness with his mouth. Because when she wrapped herself up in all of her anger and
came out hissing and clawing, he wanted nothing more than to haul her sinful damned body up against him
and kiss her hard, until she finally had no choice but to shut the hell up.
He wanted to smother her arguments by shoving his tongue in her mouth, by tasting her, by eating at her
until she'd make no sound other than to moan sexily and beg him for more.
Of course, in reality none of it would likely go over well. At all.
He wondered how that night with Porter had started. Had Olivia initiated it and then questioned herself?
Had that stupid fucker persisted and changed her mind? Worse yet, had she been willing from the get go?
He wanted to pretend she had been drunk, but Olivia didn't really get drunk, not when it was too much of a
reminder of her past. So at some point, Olivia had been kissing that bastard and had made the decision to
keep doing it.
Why?
Why'd you keep kissing Kathy? There wasn't anything there, and you knew it, Stabler. Why'd you kiss Dani?
You were trying to make something out of nothing, right?
Something out of nothing. Okay, fine. But why the hell did Olivia feel the need to make something out of
nothing, too? She hadn't lost anything, like he had. So why the sudden need to conjure up some emotion for
that Fed?
Because she didn't have anything to begin with, asshole. And then when she thought she did, your head
stayed buried up your ass for two years.
Elliot leaned over and opened the glove compartment, grabbing the small bottle of Advil that was always in
there and popped two into his mouth, swallowing harshly. He leaned back into the seat, intending to close
his eyes for a few moments.
The harsh sound of the cell phone ringing cut through his silence, its ring a dichotomy against the natural
sounds of the campground that had filled the last day and a half. He didn't even bother opening his eyes. He
grabbed it off the seat next to him and flipped it open. "Stabler," he muttered.
"Elliot, Munch and I both got the messages. We've been out canvassing all morning," came Cragen's terse
greeting.
Focusing on the case was a welcome relief. "Any luck finding Parker?"

Cragen sighed, his weariness evident. "Not yet. But we got another vic who reported this morning. Olivia
was right. He hit three blocks from his mother's restaurant. Only now that he knows we're onto him, he's
given up using the dry cleaning receipts for addresses. He attacked a girl he had delivered food to four
months ago." His captain was silent for a moment. "She's eighteen, from the Midwest. Moved here late last
year to be an actress."
Elliot felt the dread slither over him. Kathleen had just turned eighteen. She was heading to Philadelphia in
September on a partial academic. "She have any family?" Elliot said quietly.
Cragen sounded exhausted. "Yeah. Her mom and dad are flying in from Indiana later this afternoon. My
guess is they'll take her home for good when she's released in a few days."
"Can't blame ‘em," Elliot said, thinking that four hundred milligrams of pain relief really wasn't
accomplishing much. "Look, this camp is bullshit. Olivia and I can head back-"
His captain laughed sardonically. "Nice try, Elliot. You two stay put. It's over tomorrow right? See if you
can't use the time to resolve some of your issues with her and vice versa. I don't want all that crap brought
back into this squad room."
Elliot was silent. He didn't know if he should tell Cragen that the only thing they had managed was to make
it worse. That the only thing they had accomplished was to make it so bad that there was, in all likelihood,
going to be a need to come back and officially request a partner reassignment. "I don't know how much
good it's doing," he said, absently talking out loud to a man that, despite his authority, had always been a
friend.
Cragen's voice lowered, his rank suddenly evaporating from the tone of it. "Look, Elliot, even if your
partnership ends up falling to shit, make sure your friendship doesn't. You've been partners a long time, and
as much as I would hate to have to split you up, in the end it's still just your job. Olivia and you..." Cragen
let out a deep breath. "Don't confuse your partnership with...however else you care about her."
Elliot froze, wondering if Cragen would dare to say more. He was silent, thinking he had screwed up
already. If his captain thought he was about to get involved with Olivia, they'd be split up no matter what.
"We're just partners," Elliot grumbled in denial.
"Then it should be easy to work out. Stay until it's finished, Elliot. One way or another. You two owe it to
each other to at least do that much." Cragen sounded tired. "We're heading over to talk to the latest vic
again, so we'll catch up with you later."
Before Elliot could even respond, the line had clicked off.
Stay until it's finished, Elliot.
He had.
Only not with Olivia.
With Kathy.
Maybe that was the only way out of this clusterfuck. To start resolving things one by one.
He scrolled through the speed dial and hit the number for the house he had spent twenty years in. Maybe he
should have realized he wouldn't go back when he had changed the name he had programmed in for that
number from Home to Kathy.
number from Home to Kathy.
"Hello?"
And just like that all of the tension began evaporating. "Hey, buddy. What are you up to?"
In the background, Elliot could hear the sounds of a video game being turned down. "Well, I got through the
whole board, and I just unlocked the Diner. So I'm gonna have to use the nunchucks."
Elliot grinned, breathing. Finally. "WarioWare again, huh? I'm surprised you got to use the television.
Doesn't Lizzie normally hijack it Saturday mornings?"
Dickie's voice quieted. "She's still sleeping, Dad. I'm not about to wake her."
"It's ten-thirty, bud. Shouldn't she be awake by now?" Elliot arched his back a little bit, trying to stretch out
the knots that had taken up residence in his shoulders.
"No way," his son responded, seemingly exasperated. "The longer she sleeps, the less I gotta deal with her."
Elliot knew the feeling. Sometimes, a sleeping woman meant a very peaceful man. "So what are your plans
for the day?"
Dickie seemed distracted, and Elliot could hear the muted sounds of his son sorting through his equipment
for his new Wii. "Just gonna play awhile, then I'm gonna go swimming over at Dylan's. Wait," Elliot heard
something slam. "I thought Mom said you went to some camp this weekend?"
Don't remind me, Dickie, Elliot silently pleaded. "Yeah, it's for work. It's a ropes camp."
There was silence. "Really, Dad? I saw something like that online for a Navy SEAL camp for teens. It's in
California though, so Mom said I had to talk to you. I can't go until next summer, ‘cause they're all full for
this year. But you have to apply early and I can already pass all the water requirements. So," he rushed.
"Can I go?"
"Ah, Dickie. Maybe, okay? We'll talk about it next weekend."
Dickie laughed, easily appeased. "Hey Dad, remember when you said no real betting on the Hold ‘Em games
at your place?"
Elliot smiled, the car considerably, mercifully cooler. "Yeah. I don't need four gambling addicts on my
hands."
"Yeah well, Kathleen bet Maur that if she ends up with more chips, Maur has to say Kathleen's spending
July Fourth in the city with her for a couple days, so Kathleen can sneak off to Montauk with Jason. But if
Maur wins, Kathleen has to give up some pair of boots or something. Just so you know."
He closed his eyes, leaning his head back. "I'm not getting you a new game, Dickie. I told you I'm not
bribing you for information, much as I would like to. Although now Kathleen is going to want to kick your-
"
"Come on, Dad!" his son interrupted. "That's valuable info right there! Has to be worth at least one game.
But I'll give you a deal. I'll tell you one more thing and you can have two for the price of one. Okay?"
Elliot grinned. "You're going to make a terrible SEAL, Dickie. You're not supposed to be able to be bought.
It's a little thing they call treason."
It's a little thing they call treason."
Dickie muttered a curse Elliot couldn't really hear, talking to the video game. "Fine, Dad. But I'm telling
you, some of this stuff, you're gonna wanna know. Offer stands."
He wondered if it was wrong that his son had just helped put him into a frame of mind where he might
actually be able to finally say the things to his wife that would end their marriage once and for all. He felt
calmer. More coherent. And the idea that his kid had just made him that way, knowing what was to come,
made him feel guilt for a fleeting moment.
But then he focused on the truth that had become apparent. He was doing this for all of them, himself
included. They all deserved a break.
"Hey, is Mom home?" Elliot asked quietly.
"Yeah, one sec. Mom!" Dickie yelled. When they both heard the phone being picked up, Dickie piped up.
"Talk to you later, Dad. Just remember my offer."
Then the buffer was gone. His son had hung up, leaving him on the phone with Kathy.
"So what was he trying to sell you now?" Kathy asked, hesitation infiltrating her tone, despite her attempt
to be casual.
"You aware that Kathleen-" he started.
"Is sneaking off to Montauk?" Kathy sighed. "Yeah. I know. I'm still giving her the benefit of the doubt that
she'll eventually tell me first. It's a ways off anyhow, who knows if they will even be together then. So," she
paused. "Aren't you supposed to be at that course?"
Now that he had her on the phone, his voice was threatening to fail him. "Yeah, I'm here. Just wanted to
check on the kids."
There was a silence on the other end. "They're fine, Elliot. I'd call you if they weren't."
She was right. She had called him about anything that involved them, right through the separation. Dickie's
fight at school, Maureen's fender bender, Lizzie's first broken heart. Kathy hadn't left him out of any of it,
even when he wouldn't be able to offer any help. "Yeah," he acknowledged, "I know."
"So..." Kathy prodded, her voice soft.
He didn't know what to say. Hey, you're right, let's be done? It's been fucking swell? I'm sure I could dig up
some nice parting gifts for you? Elliot squeezed his eyes shut, and prayed the answers would be written on
the inside of his eyelids.
They weren't. Which left him on the phone with his ex-wife, locked in silence.
"Elliot," she finally said, making the first move because she always had. "Just say it." Her voice was gentle,
filled with compassion.
Shit. That's all he needed. To be enough of a prick that she had to do even this for him. "Kathy, I just...I
don't think...we..."
Thank God she was quiet. He could hear her breathing. Slow, deep, even breaths. But that was it. She had
never been one for hysterics.
never been one for hysterics.
"I can't do this. You and I...I know you've been calling, so that we could...I just..." Dammit all to hell. He
needed to find his balls, for once. "I don't..." Elliot swallowed, hard. "I don't want to move home. I
just...can't."
For the longest time, there was nothing. There was no sound. He had thought that maybe they had been
disconnected, but it was in that moment that he heard Kathy's breathing pick up again.
"Okay," she said, so quietly that he barely heard her.
Shit, shit. Shit. He was an asshole for having done this over the phone. He could have at least taken her out
for a drink and said it. He could have asked her to meet him somewhere. He had slept with her for God's
sake. He had let himself sink into her bed, into her body, and was literally ending it over the phone.
"God, I'm such an asshole," he said aloud, startled by the sound of his words.
Her laughter was delicate. Melancholy. "No, Elliot. It's..." she stopped, tripping over her words just as he
had been. "The night we..." she cleared her throat. "That night, I think I just thought it would maybe change
something, you know? But...not just for you, El. For me, too."
His eyes snapped open. "You didn't want me to move home?" he asked, more surprised than hurt. "Then
why did you call me so many times to meet you out for drinks?"
He could almost picture her expression perfectly as he waited through the silence. Her head would be bent,
her long blonde hair falling forward as her forehead scrunched a little bit. She'd look like she was in pain.
As if she had a headache while she was coming up with the words. But as soon as she found them, as soon
as she said something and heard herself make sense, her face would smooth out. "To talk about what we
wanted to do, Elliot. I said that. You just always assumed I automatically meant it was to start fixing our
marriage. I was more confused about why I had said that we could try again than I had been the night you
dropped the papers off. That fact scared me."
His head banged backwards against the seat. "Why did you, Kathy?" he asked, genuinely curious. "Say yes,
that is. I just showed up out of the blue. Why'd you say yes?"
Out the front window of the car, he could see the edges of the clearing on the other side of the registration
lodge. Ludwig was there, refilling the ice tubs with more water bottles. Most of the site was blocked from
his eyes by the building, but in the areas he could see, he didn't see Olivia.
Now, long minutes after he had traded insults with her, his stomach plummeted. It was only in this moment,
in the cool confines of the car, that he heard himself over again. Accusing her of wanting him the way he
wanted her. Accusing her of lying by omission. Accusing her for knowing how she felt about him, yet
giving herself to someone else anyway.
You're guilty too, Stabler. Somewhere in there, you knew what was happening with Olivia and you kept
trying to force your marriage to work.
Olivia probably hated his guts. There was a possibility she was packing even now. If she didn't want to be
partners, and after all that had happened he wouldn't blame her, there was no reason to stay here any longer.
He had to finish this conversation with Kathy in any case. His need to put his marriage to rest couldn't be
dependent on whether or not there was something flaring between Olivia and him. No matter what, no
matter how he sliced it, there wasn't anything between Kathy and him, and that alone meant he had to
establish some closure.
establish some closure.
He didn't realize how long the silence had extended until Kathy spoke up again. "That night, Elliot, when
you stood on the front porch and said you wanted to come home, you confused the hell out of me. Do you
remember what I said? That I had known you didn't hurt that boy?"
Elliot's gaze retreated inward, no longer staring at the campground, but instead at his bare left ring finger.
The one that no longer bore the faint white line from where his ring used to sit. "Yeah, I remember."
"I wanted to call you, Elliot. And the kids called you in front of me those few days. But I never got on the
phone because I figured that you'd need someplace to turn."
He laughed suddenly in disbelief. "How does that make sense?"
Her voice calmed. Lowered. Became steadier. He knew that her forehead had smoothed now because her
confidence was coming back. "I figured you'd find your new place to turn if I stayed away. That maybe, in
those horrible moments, you'd fully realize I wasn't the one you needed. And I didn't want you to need me,
Elliot. Because...because the half-assed way you always needed me left the both of us miserable in the end."
He was silent. Elliot clenched his fist in his lap, watching his fingers clench and then release. There was no
ring there, nothing there to tighten around his skin if he were to try and grasp onto something. It was a relief
that should have been apparent months and months and months ago.
"You thought I'd turn to Olivia," he said, his chest aching.
He had never understood Kathy's resentment of the things that stayed between Olivia and him. Those things
had been nightmares, horrors, things that no human being should ever hear about, let alone see. He had
never comprehended why Kathy fought so hard to be the one he shared those experiences with.
But now he did. Knowing Olivia had let the Fed in, knowing that she had set out to unravel her past without
Elliot and had instead shared those things with Porter, he finally understood what that felt like. He knew
what it did to a person to watch someone they cared about, someone they needed, someone they - he closed
his eyes, his throat constricting - someone they wanted turn to somebody else through their worst moments.
He had done it to Kathy for years.
"When you didn't go...elsewhere, it confused me, Elliot. It made me doubt myself. It made me think I had
figured something wrong along the way, and that yeah, maybe I owed it to this marriage to try. But then..."
"But then what?" he prodded, his breath held in both dread and anticipation.
"Then I realized it wasn't needing me that brought you home. It was just that you weren't ready to admit you
needed..." She stopped.
"Kathy," he said, trying to coax her into finishing.
She finally did it. He finally heard her voice catch and the slightest sob break from her. "I'm ready for this
to be over too, Elliot. I want to move on. I even signed those papers one night after you didn't call me back,
just to know what it felt like. And God knows, it didn't hurt like it should have. But you were mine for
twenty years, don't expect it to be easy right away for me to watch you be with Olivia, either."
He searched for Olivia then, along the fringe edge of the campsite. Jessica was heading for the bathrooms
and Leo and Carl were casually tossing a Frisbee. But he didn't see Olivia. Elliot wanted to see her then, to
be able to watch her when she wasn't looking. To just be allowed to absorb her without being met with
be able to watch her when she wasn't looking. To just be allowed to absorb her without being met with
accusations and questions.
"I'm not with Olivia, Kathy. Yeah, she's here. But I'm not with her in the way you're thinking," he said, his
chest tight.
Kathy sighed, her breath shaking as she expelled it into the receiver. "Elliot. I'm glad you called. I really am.
I'm relieved I guess, because we just...need to move on, and I guess I didn't really expect us to happen
again. But don't lie to me. And don't lie to yourself. You're not easy to be around when you're living in
denial." As her voice gained strength, she sounded a little bit irritated. "I'm sending the papers in Monday. I
assume you'll do the same. Now I've got to go because I have to get Lizzie up, and drop Dickie at Dylan's
before my class this afternoon."
Somewhere, in all of it, he knew something wasn't adding up. "Class?"
"I told you," she said, agitated. "I'm taking a real estate course to get my license. We talked about this."
Kathy sighed heavily. "You weren't listening that day, were you?"
He wanted to say he had been. He wanted to recall hearing about this class again. But he had probably
tuned her out, like he had hundreds of times before. For the first time, he didn't protest his innocence. She
wasn't really his wife anymore; there was no reason to fake trying to be a good husband. "No, I guess not."
"Do yourself a favor, Elliot. Get your head out of your ass and listen every once in awhile. Might do you
some good."
He found himself smiling, the medication likely kicking in because his headache was subsiding. He liked
hearing Kathy like this. Like she was stronger than he was. Like he hadn't broken her, or broken any of
them by not being able to stay. On the contrary, he knew that the breaking would have come if he had
continued to live the lie.
"Bye Kath," he said quietly.
He sat holding his phone open, staring at the empty space in which Olivia still hadn't appeared, long after
his ex-wife had hung up the phone.
+++
"So we come out of The Whiskey, and Tyler's trying to convince us that it's a good idea for him to get a
tattoo at this place on Sunset at like one in the morning. But we're," Jessica looked at Hannah in shared
amusement. "We're like, seriously Tyler! We're in LA for a product launch that we need to be at in exactly
seven hours. So maybe not such a good idea."
They were sitting around two picnic tables, absorbing the heat and their water bottles for the ten minutes
they had left. Their next activity was apparently in the middle of the soccer field, and Grant was busy
setting up some configuration of ropes, planks and blue tarp.
Olivia had changed into denim shorts, and the sun was beating down furiously on her bare skin. She had
lathered on the sunscreen, but her flesh still tingled from the contact with the sun. She wasn't used to it. She
wasn't the type of woman to lie out all day and sun herself, nor did she have much opportunity to do it. At
least her skin was naturally darker, which helped her not look like a ghost year round.
She dropped her forehead into her hand, staring at the wood grain on the table as Jessica entertained the
group with a story about one of their business trips. Olivia found herself latching onto the light, melodic
tone of the younger girl's voice. Full of energy, of humor, of hope.
tone of the younger girl's voice. Full of energy, of humor, of hope.
"So anyways, Tyler, as you know," Jessica laughed, looking affectionately at the subject of conversation.
"He wasn't going to be swayed. But in the meantime, Hannah realized we had locked the keys in the rental
car. But of course, it's one in the morning, so Enterprise was of no help. Finally, Carl calls the LAPD."
Olivia's lips twitched. She remembered her days as a beat cop, and the outrageous but irritating calls they
would get. She could only imagine what the LAPD officers that had to respond to that call at that time of
night had thought. Not a priority. Not against the robberies, the muggings, the violence that was inevitable
in a big city. As far as LAPD had been concerned, the tourists could call a cab to their hotel and deal with
the rental company in the morning.
"Yeah, but they were like, what the hell ever. I don't think those stupid cops gave a shit about us. I swear, I
think that dispatch operator hung up on Carl before he even fully got our problem explained," Hannah
lamented, obviously still disgusted by the lack of response on the part of the LAPD.
Olivia saw Jessica, who was sitting on one of the picnic tables next to Hannah, nudge the other girl as her
eyes widened. "Hey, Olivia. She didn't mean...um...stupid cops. She just meant..." Jessica stumbled.
She found herself laughing. "No, no. By all means. Locked out of my car at one a.m. I'd probably feel the
same way."
Jessica grinned at her, and the color that had flooded Hannah's pale skin began to fade. "Right. So anyways,
we're sitting on this guardrail of this parking lot on a side street, waiting for the cops, and Tyler comes out
of the tattoo parlor with his calf all bleeding and bandaged. He couldn't even get the whole tattoo done
because he had been drinking, which meant he started bleeding badly during the inking. The tat artist had
gotten pissed and stopped."
"Bastard," Tyler added helpfully. "I had to have it finished the next day."
Olivia scanned the group. Cathy was enthralled with the story, her eyes sparkling. Jim was amused, Colin
was picking bits of leaves off of his shirt from when he had fallen on the ropes earlier, and Leo was sitting
on the grass, slightly away from the group with his eyes closed, letting the sun hit his face.
Elliot wasn't back yet, and the way things had been going, Olivia was grateful for the reprieve.
"So we're sitting there, on this guardrail, and Tyler's got his leg all propped up, and there are these four guys
on the guardrail next to us. Just hanging out. Like, they had been there, then left, then come back. But they
weren't bothering us, so we didn't think anything of it. Like, fifteen minutes later, four LAPD cars come
screeching up from all angles."
Olivia found herself actually listening. She watched Jessica's face light up with the memory, and watched
Hannah, who was considerably more reserved, latch onto Jessica's outgoing personality. "So what had those
guys next to you done when they had disappeared?" Olivia said, without thinking.
Jessica stopped, her head tilting and her eyes radiating admiration. "How'd you know?"
"She's a cop," Hannah smiled, grinning shyly at Olivia.
Jessica laughed. "Right. So yeah, so these cops are all holding their guns on us, as if this was some
television show they were filming. Like, they were leaning over the hoods of their cars, with their...guns on
us," she repeated, her voice dropping for effect. "I was like, holy shit, like, someone is actually holding a
gun and it's pointed at me. I mean, I know they were cops, but still. Scary as shit." She shook her head
dramatically. Then her head lifted. "Wait, Olivia, has that ever happened to you? I mean, have you ever had
dramatically. Then her head lifted. "Wait, Olivia, has that ever happened to you? I mean, have you ever had
a gun..."
Olivia felt the easiness she had just found start to slip away. She didn't want to tell these people anything.
She wouldn't. She suddenly missed Elliot, because the way that everyone was looking at her, except for Leo
whose eyes were still closed, made her feel like she was an outsider. Like she didn't fit in, she didn't belong.
What was she supposed to say? Yeah, I've killed someone. I've shot people. I've had guns pointed at me, but
it doesn't compare to the one I watched remain ruthlessly focused on my partner's head. I didn't give a shit
if I died. Bullets only really scare the hell out of me when they are directed at Elliot. He's been hit before,
and I wasn't there. Do you all know what that's like? To pick up your cell phone and hear that your partner
has been hit?
She didn't know what to say.
"Wait," Cathy said, shooting a glance at Olivia. "So why were the cops there in the first place?" she asked
Jessica, purposefully redirecting the attention back to the story.
Olivia let a breath out. She'd found an ally where she had never expected it. In a woman that had needed
someone in Olivia's position to protect her as a child, but who was determined now to protect Olivia instead.
Jessica was easily swayed back into the story. "Well those guys next to us had robbed the convenience store
on the corner in those few minutes they had left. Then they tried to look all normal, like they were friends of
ours. But when the cops pulled up and saw Tyler's bloody leg, they thought he had been injured trying to
rob the store too, so that's why they were trying to arrest us."
"Hey," Tyler shrugged casually, obviously pleased at having been the center of Jessica's attention for the last
few minutes. "At least those cops unlocked the car door for us before they left, right?" He tried to look
innocent and failed.
Hannah hopped off the table, her water bottle empty. "You're crazy, Tyler," she said, shaking her head as
she walked behind Olivia. She suddenly stopped. "Oh shit," she breathed. "Hey, Olivia, don't move."
Olivia's natural instincts immediately disobeyed Hannah's request, instead reacting to the panic in the girl's
voice. She turned quickly, "Wha-oh God!" Her lower back suddenly exploded into a fiery pain that radiated
across her skin. Her eyes watered from the sensation and her breath caught in her throat. For a second, she
thought she was going to be sick from the ache, but as she tried to catch her breath the pain began to ebb
into a hard, relentless throbbing.
Cathy was out of her seat and behind her before Olivia could even turn around. "What the heck was that?"
Out of the corner of her eyes, Hannah's face flooded with red. "I shouldn't have said anything," she
mumbled guiltily. "It was a bee. I shouldn't have, oh God, Olivia...I'm so sorry."
Olivia shook her head, trying to breathe before she moved. It felt like someone had grabbed a bit of her skin
and cut it off with a razor blade. Logically, she knew it was just a sting, but it hurt like absolute hell. "It's
fine. It'll be fine," she choked, waiting for the sharp tenderness to subside. She dropped her forehead into her
hands, willing herself to just breathe. "It's fine," she said again, finally looking at Hannah and trying to
reassure the girl. "It's not your fault. It probably would have stung me anyways," she said, pushing the
words past her throat.
Before Olivia could even move, Cathy had called Grant over. "She's been stung. Do you have any Benadryl
gel, or some baking soda and water we can put on it for her?" she asked Grant. "She needs some Motrin
too, to ease the swelling," Cathy continued, mothering Olivia without being asked to.

"Yeah," he said, his voice unsure. "Olivia, I've got all that in my cabin. You want me to bring it out here, or
can you come with me? I've got some topical anesthetic and antibacterial ointment too, so we can get it
clean and ease the pain. But we should make sure you don't have the stinger still in there." He calmed,
taking control of the situation. "Are you allergic to bees?"
Olivia shook her head a little bit. "No. I'm not. And I can come with you."
She shifted gingerly, untangling her legs from beneath the picnic table. Olivia gave Hannah a small smile,
trying to reassure the poor girl. "It's just a bee sting, Hannah, honestly. It's not your fault at all."
Hannah nodded, her eyes skittering away as she sucked her lower lip into her mouth. "Okay, yeah. I'm sorry
again. I should have just let it go."
Olivia tried to put her hand on the girl's shoulder as she walked past her, just to soothe the guilt in her eyes.
As soon as she did it though, her skin tightened around the sting and knocked her breath away again.
Damn, that thing hurt. It felt like it had stung her right on her spine.
She followed Grant towards the small cabin to the left of the registration lodge. In the window of the cabin
hummed a loud air conditioning unit. "You live here year round?" Olivia asked, trying desperately to make
conversation despite the throbbing in her back.
Grant stepped up onto the small, crude patio. "Yeah," he responded, giving her an assessing look. "I run
cross-country ski weekends in the winter out here. Plus, I've pretty much got no use for a big city. It's nice
out here. You sure you're okay? I know what that feels like, trust me, and it hurts like a bitch."
Olivia followed him into his small cabin. She was surprised at how nice it was. It was rustic, and mainly
consisted of one big room that boasted a fire place in the middle with a stone chimney that went straight out
the roof. His place was clean, his furniture sturdy, and his small kitchen was obviously outfitted with the
basic amenities. His dining room table was made of dark wood and sat to the right of her, four chairs that
seemed to be made of refined logs tucked into the sides of it.
"I'm fine. It's just a sting, and it's easing already," she lied. The attention was starting to chafe at her. She'd
been hit, she'd been punched, she'd been knocked out cold, and this was just a bite from an insect. The sting
still hurt like a bitch, but the worst part was over. Every moment that passed, it had to get better.
At least that's what she told herself.
Grant went into his small kitchenette and opened a cabinet. He pulled out a First Aid kit, and filled a glass
of water for her. "Why don't you sit up on the table so I can get the stinger out? I've got a magnifying glass
here somewhere." He grabbed a bottle of Motrin from a drawer and gave her what she supposed was
intended to be a reassuring smile.
Olivia nodded. She pulled two of the chairs away from one end of his dining room table and then propped
herself up on the flat surface, her legs dangling off the edge. Grant would be able to go around the back of
the table to get a better look. Shit, she wanted that Motrin, but she didn't know if she wanted it more for the
sting or for the headache Elliot had given to her earlier.
Grant handed her the glass of water and the pain relievers. "So where'd Elliot go?" he asked casually.
Olivia quickly downed the water with the pills. "To make a few phone calls. Thanks for this," she said,
handing him back the glass.

Grant went around behind her. "Just lift your shirt a little so I can see it," he said.
Olivia leaned forward, pulling her top up a few inches. The sting was low on her back, but she was still a
little uncomfortable. While Grant had left her alone today, yesterday the interest in his eyes had been
obvious. Of course, Elliot's glaring looks had probably alleviated any curiosity Grant had about her, but it
still made her uncomfortable a little bit to sit here lifting her shirt up.
"Ouch," he said, unnecessarily. "You're sure you're not allergic? You're swelling a bit." He seemed to
consider it. "Although it's close to the bone so that could be it."
"I'm fine, Grant," she said a little too impatiently. "The faster the stinger is out the better."
He took a deep breath. "Okay, just lean forward a little bit more so I can find this thing."
She felt his fingertips on her skin and tried not to flinch. She'd been like this ever since the morning she had
walked away from Dean. Resistant to being touched by a man, unless he was a doctor she was being forced
to see. Unless, of course, it was Elliot. For him she had been all but pleading in encouragement. Her face
flamed at the recollection. Olivia took a deep breath, squeezing her eyes shut. "Do you see it?"
"I'm looking. Hey," he said, and she knew he was going to unnecessarily try and distract her from the
second of pain when he finally found it. "I want to get in touch with someone officially at the NYPD and set
up a specific ropes program for police personnel. You wouldn't happen to know who I can contact there,
would you?"
Grant's fingers were pulling at her skin a little bit, and Olivia felt all of her muscles tighten in protest.
Maybe it was better to leave the damned stinger in, just to end this. "I don't. But someone at One PP will
know. I can find out for you when I get back." She winced as she felt something pinch her again.
"Great, I think I found it." Grant straightened getting something off the table. "Just give me a second." She
realized that he was being careful not to touch her unless necessary and she had to give him credit.
Although her shirt was halfway up, and his palm was on her back, he was careful not to do anything that
could be misconstrued. "So can I get your number then," he said as he leaned over her back again. "And
call you about it once you get back to the city?"
The front door slammed shut. They hadn't heard it open, but they both heard it close. Olivia twisted her head
around, but she already knew who it was before she saw him.
"Sounds like I'm interrupting," came the chilling monotone.
For anyone else looking at Elliot right now, he would appear to be expressionless. His eyes were flat, his
face impassive. But Olivia saw all of the warnings in his posture. His head was held just a little too straight,
his neck was taut with tension. And the fact that he wasn't making eye contact with her combined with the
slow motion blink of his eyes told her that he was angry.
The more relaxed he appeared, the angrier he was. It was the proverbial calm before the storm.
"I got stung," she said, her voice sounding far smaller than she intended. Olivia cleared her throat and tried
again, putting more authority into it. "Grant was just helping me."
Elliot's jaw tightened, and his eyebrows lifted for just a brief moment before he gave up, allowing his eyes
to narrow instead. He leaned against the doorframe and crossed his arms dangerously over his chest as he
swiped his tongue over his teeth inside of his mouth.

As if he was anticipating eating something alive.
Olivia knew what he was doing. The only way in or out was past the front door that he was now lounging
against, as if he had cornered his prey. She just didn't know if Elliot's prey consisted of her or of Grant.
Neither option seemed to be any better than the other.
"You okay?" Elliot finally asked, his voice so low she could barely hear him.
He was looking at the open First Aid kit, still not looking at either of them.
But there was something in his tone that seeped into her skin. The baritone of it, or maybe the soothing
familiarity of it, made her realize how tired she was. The morning had already worn her down, and fighting
with Elliot, as much as she wanted to pretend it hadn't, had taken a toll.
"Yeah, it's just a bee sting," she said softly, realizing Grant's hand had frozen on her back.
Elliot nodded. Once. He drew his lower lip into his mouth, as if he were considering something. As if
evaluating if he should say something or not. He lazily used one fingertip to rub the edge of his lip and then
blinked slowly.
Olivia inhaled. She knew this look. He used this one right before he snapped. He'd gain the confidence and
trust of a suspect by appearing to be relaxed and then he'd strike. Mentally, she flipped through all the
things she had ever done to calm him, and realized that none of them would work when the one that was
inciting him was her.
"She'll be okay once I get the stinger out," Grant said, breaking the silence because he stupidly didn't know
better than not to.
Elliot finally took a deep breath and made the monumental effort of looking at Grant. Not at her, at Grant.
"We'll be fine from here, thanks for your help," he said snidely, arrogantly dismissing Grant as he pushed
himself off the doorframe and headed towards her.
Despite the fact that Elliot was prowling closer, despite the drone of the air conditioner and the fan whirring
slowly above, everything seemed to stand still. The air was thick, so hot and hazy that Olivia could see
particles floating in the oppressive heat of it.
Grant didn't move. "She asked me to help her," he said, a little too loudly in the room for all of them.
Oh God. Did Grant not have a single defensive instinct in his body?
Olivia wondered if this was what it felt like in the clogging, arid heat of the Midwest during the last days of
summer, when the alarms would go off, warning of a pending tornado. She wondered if this was what it was
like to know that something was violently eating up space, closing the distance and leaving no option to run,
but to just stay still and pray for the best.
She knew that if any of them really stood a chance at saving the rest of the weekend, it was up to her.
"Grant, thanks. I really appreciate it, but..." her voice faltered, betraying her as she was sucked into the
swirling, twisting perimeter of Elliot's proximity.
"But she wants me to take care of it. That okay with you, Grant?" Elliot said, his head tilting to the side as
he stopped in front of where Olivia sat, facing off with Grant across the table. His tone was eerily congenial,
and he offered a quick, full smile that Olivia immediately recognized as cold as hell. Elliot's eyes were dark.
Nearly menacing.

Christ, Grant's hand was still on her. "Elliot..." Olivia breathed in warning. "Grant's been-"
"Oh," Elliot interrupted, baring his teeth as he looked down at her. "I know precisely what Grant's been
doing."
Olivia's lungs burned, her awareness of Elliot's body now making her more cognizant of her own. His gaze
had dropped seconds ago to the bare expanse of her legs as she sat on the table. He had raked his eyes over
her slowly, starting at her knees, which nearly touched him, up to her thighs where they disappeared into her
shorts.
Elliot might as well have taken a blow torch to her skin. The burning ache he left behind nearly made her
reach out for him, despite this territorial bullshit. She almost didn't care that he was being an ass so long as
his hands traced the path his eyes had taken. So long as his mouth smashed onto hers in the next few
seconds.
She had to breathe through it. That's all. Just breathe through it.
God, what the hell was happening to her?
The other man's clammy hand actually pressed into her still throbbing back. Olivia recognized his reaction.
Grant wasn't being possessive, or even stupidly macho. He was seeking reassurance and comfort because he
knew he was under attack.
"Look, Elliot, I don't know what you're implying here, but I was only trying to help," Grant said, irritation
and impatience lacing his voice.
But Elliot had seen enough. "I'd suggest, Ludwig," he said, finally doing away with the pretense of
cordiality and letting his voice plummet into Hades. "That you get your hands off my partner before I
remove them for you."
Elliot smiled again. As if he had just asked if Grant wanted cookies with his milk.
Fuck.
Olivia closed her eyes. "Elliot," she gritted out, carefully reaching up to rub the space between her eyebrows
without touching him. "Grant's been trying to get this bitch of a stinger out. Do you think we could actually
do that?" She finally looked up at Elliot, and hated that she was sitting on this table at such a height
disadvantage.
Grant's hand slipped on her skin a little bit. "Hey, Olivia," he said, in a voice he must of thought was
commanding, despite his precarious position. "Just hold still and I'll..."
Elliot shifted in front of her. "I don't think," he said, his jaw practically locked. "You heard me, Ludwig."
"Elliot," Grant started, too amiably to seem entirely innocent. His fingers flexed on her, and Olivia realized
she was about to take care of removing them herself. At this point, the stinger could stay there forever.
"I'm just trying to-" Grant tried to explain, stupidly challenging Elliot.
Elliot's lips lifted in a cold smile, and Olivia finally knew what mercenary justice looked like. "I know what
you're trying to do. You're trying to play doctor with my partner. And I'd suggest that you rethink your
strategy because I'm about this close," he held his hand up, his thumb and forefinger an inch apart. "To
rethinking it for you."

Olivia forgot all about the pain in her back. Her anger was immediate. Overwhelming. She put her hand flat
on Elliot's chest. If she had been given room between the edge of the table and Elliot's body she would have
jumped down, sting be damned. But she hadn't, so she stayed still. "Elliot, Jesus. Calm the hell down," she
hissed. "You've got no right to come in here and..."
"This is absurd," Grant scoffed openly.
Olivia sank just a little bit in defeat on his behalf.
Elliot's gaze was trained over her head, focused unflinchingly on Grant who hadn't moved except to drop his
hand from her. "You know what your problem is, Ludwig?" Elliot growled. "You think that you're not
goddamned transparent. But I've watched you, watching her, and you don't seem to recognize that she's off
limits to you. And if we're all going to get along, then I suggest you run along now. I can handle this."
Olivia jumped off the table, pushing Elliot back and ignoring the burning sensation that flared up. "Back the
hell off, Elliot. Do you understand me? Stop acting like an ass." Then, because her fury won, she cocked her
head, playing just as irrationally and dangerously as Elliot was. "Besides, I'm not off limits. I can do
whatever the hell I please."
Elliot laughed at her. Boldly. His eyes narrowed as he smirked at her, still far too amused for his own good.
Bastard.
Behind her, Grant shifted unsteadily. And even though it was his house, she knew without looking at him
that he was assessing his options and finally deciding that ruining the weekend wasn't worth it.
Thank God.
"Well, it's obvious why you were sent up here, isn't it?" Grant took his potshot, shaking his head in disgust
at Elliot as he walked to the side of the table. He turned to Olivia. "You okay? Or do you still want me to
get that sucker out?"
Olivia flinched. Because for as furious as she was with Elliot, she suddenly, desperately knew that she
would prefer for Elliot to do it. "I'm fine," she breathed, startled by her reaction.
Then again, she was pretty damned close to asking Cathy to come in and do it for her instead of either of
them.
Grant nodded, his lips pressing together as he looked at Elliot one more time. "I'll be outside if you need
me," he finally said to Olivia, before banging the door open as he walked out of his own house.
Now that she had some privacy, and her furious dissension regarding Elliot's behavior would remain solely
between them, Olivia whirled on Elliot. "Don't you ever, ever do that again!"
Elliot's jaw tightened. "Get back on the table, Olivia."
She stepped closer to him. "You had better apologize, Stabler. I'm not kidding you. That was totally - "
"Get on the table," he said, his voice deceptively calm.
Her chest was rising and falling faster and faster as the adrenaline surged through her. She was gearing for a
fight. She could feel it, feel all of her frustration and anger swell until she knew she was going to lose it.
"Don't tell me what to do, Elliot," she bit off, trying to calm down.

Elliot's face was granite. "Cathy told me what happened and it's gotta hurt. And the longer that thing is
embedded into your skin, the more it's gonna release the venom. So sit down."
Olivia closed her eyes, trying to breathe through her nose. She counted to ten, to twenty. To thirty. Shit. She
was going to need to count to a damned thousand before she was going to unclench the fist that she
desperately felt like using. Instead, she slipped back onto the table, lifting her shirt a little bit and hunching
over. "Fine, then do it," she ordered. "But you still better figure out some way to explain to me just what the
hell you were thinking."
Elliot stepped around her, behind the table, and before she could even brace herself, his big hands were
wrapped around her waist. Her bare waist. His thumb gently traced closer to the sting. "Liv," he started.
Olivia could hear the retreat in his voice. She closed her eyes, not knowing how he did that. How did he go
from infuriating and bullheaded one second to calm and soothing the next?
"Liv, he was enjoying you like this too much. He just...pissed me off," he murmured softly.
Elliot was so close to her bare back that she could feel his hot breath against her. The bee sting was
practically forgotten, as was the argument. His thumb traced down her spine a little bit, just rubbing the area
around the sting a little in a way that somehow stopped the burning.
"I see it," Elliot said quietly. "Just hang on."
This one-hundred and eighty degree spin unnerved her. Combative Elliot she could deal with; this Elliot
was far too disarming.
"Make it fast," she bit off, trying to maintain her anger.
"You sure you want it fast?" he whispered, close to her ear.
Olivia shuddered, unable to diminish the effect his hands were having on her. Elliot's rough, calloused
fingertips were practically on her stomach as he held her in place. If he slid his hands a few inches up, he'd
be at the underside of her breasts. Her skin was burning beneath his touch, the sensation so hot, and so
deliciously sharp, that she had forgotten where the sting was in the first place. "Just do it, Elliot. Now," she
struggled, her throat clogged with need.
And then, before she even knew what was happening, one of his hands had slid up the back of her neck,
into the loose strands of her hair that she hadn't as yet tied up. His fingers tangled in the strands, his wrist
pushing her neck forward. "Bend, Olivia. Just a little bit, so I can see what I'm doing," he coaxed.
She wanted to bend forward. She really did. But she arched backwards against his hand. "You had better
apologize, you sonofabitch," she breathed, closing her eyes, feeling the liquid heat pool low in her belly as
his fingers made contact with her scalp.
Elliot laughed, letting his hand linger in her hair for a moment too long. He leaned forward, until his chest
was practically touching her back.
"Make me," he whispered.
+++

Back to index

A/N: I don't know what to say anymore. I can apologize for years, but I know it gets old. Life has been out
of control busy, what with practically moving 3,000 miles back home in the last week. I read every single
comment, I'm sorry I've been so remiss in responding. I truly am. Some of the things that have been said I
have literally been stunned into humility over. Thank you. Longer chapter again, hopefully will earn me
some forgiveness? Thank you Jess, Brynn and Pooks for the beta's this week. And Pooks, thank you for
being my McSteamy. Timmy - thank you for the bee. ;-)
Chapter 12
Skin.
Hers.
Beneath his hands.
At some point after Elliot had insolently whispered those inciting words, he had expected that she'd return
fire with furious protests. He had expected Olivia to whip around, to challenge him, to Mapquest explicit
directions to Hell and tell him to have a nice trip.
Instead, stunningly, shockingly, amazingly, her head had fallen forward with no response. She'd just
inhaled, her breathing consisting of deliberately long, even-paced drags of air. He'd assumed she was in
pain, and thankfully the stinger had been surprisingly easy to extract with a quick side swipe of the sharp,
plastic edge of the small CPR instruction card from the First Aid Kit. Her exhaling changed as he dipped his
finger into the small tub of antiseptic to clean it, before covering the already calming sting with the
antihistamine lotion.
When he was done, her chest began to rise and fall erratically and he could hear her breathing catch when
his hands finally stilled. It was when he was done with his ministrations that he finally heard what she had
been whispering beneath her breath all along.
"Go to hell, Elliot. Just go to hell," Olivia mumbled, her eyes pressed shut.
That was appropriate, because he was already there. He had woken up this morning, smack dab in the
middle of it, and hadn't been given a reprieve for one, blasted minute as yet.
As a matter of fact, until this very moment, his day had been getting progressively worse.
Then again, that was until this moment. Because right now, his hands were now on the very bare, very
smooth, very fucking tan waist of his very fucking pissed partner.
He wanted to ask God to help him, but this was Hell, so he figured that was his clue that God had resigned
in his case. And Lucifer would definitely approve of his growing appreciation of her body because he was
the omniscient bastard that had created it in the first place.
He needed permission. That very important, very crucial fact had, mercifully, permeated his rapidly failing
brain. He didn't want to take his hands off of her, but she had to give him the go-ahead. Of course, he was
acting like a prick, so the likelihood of him saying Hey, Olivia, mind if I get my mouth on your skin for a
bit? and her reacting positively was pretty much non-existent right now.
Elliot did the only other thing he knew how. He'd get her permission by making sure she didn't want to deny
him.
him.
He leaned forward, his lips near Olivia's neck. She had been shivering all day today when he did that. When
he spoke softly and murmured near her, he had noticed that small goose bumps would appear on her arms
and she would shudder. He'd take what he could get at the moment, no matter how stupid of a choice it
might ultimately be.
"Olivia," he dragged out, her name playing out over his lips. "Tell me to get my hands off of you again."
In response, she sucked in air. And even from where he stood he knew her eyes had shut tightly once again.
With no refusal pending, the flat of his hands slipped over her warm back, sliding upwards and taking the
bottom of her t-shirt with them. Long seconds later, the shirt was all the way up, the back of her white, silky
bra teasing him. Three little metal clasps. Three little loops of fragile wire that kept him away from
everything. If he ripped those, tore them, the material that kept him from her would fall away, allowing him
access to wrap around and finally cup her in his hands.
He couldn't swallow. He wanted to, but something was lodged in his throat. Elliot couldn't even comprehend
getting her in his hands like that. The notion that at some point, he might very well be able to slide his
palms over her bare skin, slip his fingers over her nipples as she pushed herself into his hand...that concept
was too mind-numbing to even fathom.
And some things could wait. Some things had to wait.
Instead, he trailed one rebellious finger down the protruding column of her bare spine. Slowly. As if he was
following the slipping, dripping trail of molasses as it licked its way down her skin. He followed the line, all
the way down, until it dipped into the back of her denim shorts.
"Come on, Olivia. Tell me what an asshole I am. Tell me to go away, to leave you alone," Elliot rumbled,
getting closer to her. His finger played along Olivia's back, dancing upwards, the edge of his fingernail
scratching her lightly, and he was dying to follow its trail with his mouth. He crouched, his eyes now level
with the perfect little concave at the small of her back. His thumb rubbed over that spot, and he realized that
the pad of his finger fit perfectly where it indented. She had the tiniest freckle there, a small little black
circle that taunted him, as if marking the spot his mouth needed to be. "Olivia," he grated, his throat feeling
like it had been roughly dragged over hot coals. "Unless you tell me not to, I'm gonna have to-"
He got that sound from her. The one that last night his mouth had coaxed from her. She now gave it from
simple anticipation alone. "Please-" Olivia whispered quickly, under her breath.
Jesus Christ, she was as desperate for it as he was.
That's all it took before he fell forward, inhaling in the seconds before his mouth landed hotly on the small
of her back. Her skin smelled like coconut and she cried out, arching backwards and almost dislodging him
by the sheer, visceral strength of her reaction. His fingers tightened on her skin, demanding that she stay
huddled forward.
Her skin was soft, smooth, sweet with just the slightest tinge of salt, and he was dying because of it. Elliot
opened his mouth against her, his tongue darting out to get her into his mouth. His lips slid over her skin,
over her spine, his tongue feeling the hard ridge of it before his teeth gently nipped at her. Elliot's hands
widened around her waist, gripping her, careful to avoid the reddened area where she had been stung.
Olivia was shaking, and vaguely he realized that the sounds she was making had changed. Her hips shifted,
as if she was seeking relief on the smooth surface of the table, but getting none. She almost sounded as if
she was in pain, and that kind of sweet agony falling from her was only encouraging him further.
she was in pain, and that kind of sweet agony falling from her was only encouraging him further.
He straightened, his mouth never leaving her skin. It wasn't able to. He kissed her, dragging his wet lips up
her spine, inch by agonizing inch, stopping only to nip at her, to open his fingers against her shoulders as he
reached the back of her bra.
"Elliot-" Olivia cried out.
For one split second, Elliot faltered. His confidence hit the floor, his panic sluicing over him. What if he
really was hurting her?
"Olivia, Christ did I hurt you?" he rasped, muttering softly, nearly imperceptibly under his breath. "Jesus,
baby, I'm sorry..." He managed to drag his mouth off of her skin and straighten. He couldn't breathe; his fear
that he had increased her pain lodging in his throat. He had to see her face; he had to know if, by being the
selfish bastard that he was, he had managed to magnify her hurt in any way.
Elliot soundlessly slipped around the table, standing in front of her, wedging himself between her knees.
"Tell me if I hurt you," he ordered, his fingertips sliding gently over her temple.
Olivia's eyes widened and her cheeks flushed. Her chest was contracting from the short, deep breaths that
required her lips to part simply to accommodate the rapid pace of them. "Don't you dare..." she hissed, and
then sucked in another breath, cutting her accusation off mid-sentence.
God, her lower lip was full. Wet. As if she had been biting on it. He wanted to draw it into his mouth, to be
the one to create that fuller, luscious effect with his teeth. He was a real piece of shit too, because she had
just been stung painfully and he had used her vulnerability to his advantage. "I'm sorry, Liv. I didn't mean to
hurt-"
Her furious eyes shot to his. "If you ever, ever call me that again, Elliot, I swear to God you'll regret it."
Elliot raced through the last few moments in his head, searching for what he had done that was so offensive.
What had he called her? What the fuck had he done? Fuck the proverbial duck. The least she could do was
enlighten him as to what the hell she meant. But no, she was staring at him with all of the contained,
barreling fury of a hurricane and yet he was supposed to just know what the hell he had done?
Olivia's eyes narrowed. "Baby?" She tilted her head, her dark eyes flashing. "What the hell was that,
Stabler?" she hissed. Then she said it again, practically spitting the word at him. "Baby? Are you kidding
me?"
Elliot couldn't help it, the corners of his lips twitched. She was stunning when she was furious. Her hair was
mussed, tangled from the humidity. Her lips were moist, her eyes accusing. Of course, she was staring at
him with all of the unpredictable and lethal venom of a rattlesnake, ready to strike. And he knew that if she
ever hauled off and punched him, it would hurt like a bitch, although God knew he would deserve it.
But out of everyone, only Olivia Benson had ever truly gone toe to toe with him. And sure as shit she was
doing it even now, without even standing up. When it came down to it, she'd never feared him like he feared
her. Size advantage notwithstanding, she could crumble him, and he knew it.
Which brought him to the other half of his ill-advised amusement. She was currently directing all of her
untamed piss and vinegar at him, but was doing it while her bare legs had naturally tightened around the
outside of his thighs as he leaned into her. And some deity needed to save him because her nipples, Jesus he
was looking at her nipples, were tight as hell and stabbing through the thin fabric of both the bra and that t-
shirt she was wearing.

They were taunting him. Begging him. Teasing him to just reach out and flick his thumb over one, hard,
sexy as hell tip. He wondered what it would be like to take her into his mouth. Her shirt be damned, he'd nip
her with his teeth right through the cotton. He'd get that material wet with his mouth so she'd feel him on
her, and he would make sure that she'd be the one trying to get her shirt off for him.
Elliot glanced at her fingernails. Short. Manicured. Natural. She'd use them, he suddenly decided. She'd find
a way to embed them into his skin despite their short length. He wondered what that would be like to
shower in the hours after being in her and feel the hot water sting the brands Olivia would leave. He
wondered what it would be like to earn new ones while in that same shower, her wet body pounding against
his as she tried to hang on.
God, he was thinking about Olivia like that. His partner. The one that, until now, he hadn't realized he'd
been storing fantasies about. The one that he had probably wanted for longer than he cared to admit, even to
himself.
She caught his gaze as it dropped between them. She probably also saw the satisfaction that had registered
on his face at her obvious physical response to him.
"Are you done?" Olivia fired at him wildly, her chin lifting and her volume rising. Her voice was infused
with defiance and irritation, but her skin, God in heaven, her skin was flushed with raw, blatant, sexual
arousal. He knew if she had been able to look in a mirror, she wouldn't bother with the protests because her
body had already betrayed her.
His body hadn't betrayed him. His body was ready. Desperate. His hard-on was wondering why the hell he
was betraying it by letting her get herself worked up because there was always the possibility she'd do some
irreparable harm to their chances here if he allowed her to keep going on and on.
But he knew why he was letting her. It turned him on a little bit. Maybe a lot. Of course, that was if it was
even possible to get any more turned on. If it was actually, physically possible to get one, single additional
drop of blood into his dick at this point without it actually exploding while he simply stood here.
Of course, righteous Olivia should have scared him. If he had even an ounce of self-preservation, he
wouldn't take her on when she was in this state. Somewhere in the last year-and-a-half she had stopped
battening down the hatches of her anger and frustration, and had come out swinging instead. He had seen
just how dangerous she had become in that first interrogation with Thatcher. When Elliot had been sitting
there lounging in his chair, she had fearlessly leaned over that desk and grabbed the prick's wrist, itching for
a fight. She'd been arrogant, full of fire, justice and reckless courage.
Elliot had watched her that day, trying not to be affected by the twist of her lips, the cocky tilt of her head,
the low purr of her voice as she had taunted their suspect. If he was honest with himself, which he was
trying like hell to be for five damned minutes at least, she'd turned Elliot on then.
Of course, it was nothing compared to what she was doing to him now.
Right now, Elliot knew exactly how he wanted to settle her. With his mouth, with his hands, with his body.
She'd threaten to kick his ass, sure. But he'd lay bets Olivia wouldn't actually do it.
Olivia tipped her head, barreling recklessly on. "You're racking up so many mistakes here, Elliot, that you
could spend the next twenty years apologizing for them and you wouldn't even come close to being able to
undo the damage that you seem hell bent on creating. And for what? For sex?" She scoffed openly and
arched an eyebrow.

Shit. She'd done that then too. Later that night in the locker room, when he'd tried to calm her down after
she'd attacked Thatcher, she'd looked at him just like she was now. Sweaty. Hot. Derisively. He'd had
definite ideas about how he had wanted to wipe that look off her face even then.
The poster boy for rage, she'd laughed harshly. He should have been angry when she had said that. He
should have told her to go to hell. But instead, Elliot had wanted to haul her up against the lockers and trap
her between the metal and his body, before simply daring her to say it again.
Say it again, Olivia, he would have said. I dare you.
But he had shown more control then. He'd been suffocating beneath his pending move home, and he'd found
the strength to shove those confusing, dangerous instincts down. Told himself it wasn't anything. Natural
reaction to adrenaline was all.
What's your excuse now, Stabler?
Olivia was apparently missing the five alarm blaze he knew was radiating from his eyes, his skin.
"Just because," she continued angrily. "When you do that...that thing with your mouth it makes me," she
stopped, suddenly licking her lips before expelling a harsh breath.
Ah, fuck, he thought. She had to stop doing that. Now.
"It makes me...react, it doesn't mean that we should just..." Olivia bit her lip quickly, as if searching for the
right word. "That we should..."
Elliot stared. At her lower lip. The moist one that was now guarding the tip of her tongue as it played peek-
a-boo with him. Her tongue darted out again, taunting him as it swiped over her lower lips. Fuck him.
Dammit. It wasn't his fault, he thought at the last second. It wasn't.
"That we should fuck," she finally said, throwing her shoulders backwards and tilting her head up to his, as
if her point was made by her crass word. "There's no reason that just because we both seem to be attracted to
each other that we should..."
She just wouldn't shut up, so he really had no choice.
"Throw away eight years just to get of-"
Elliot groaned in defeat in the second before he slammed his mouth against hers. Hard. His fingers dug into
her hair on either side of her head to hold her in place. "Goddammit, Liv," he muttered against her parting
lips. Against the breath she expelled into his mouth. "Just shut up." Then he tilted her head, fusing himself
against her and shoving his tongue past her lips.
Olivia tasted like lemonade and mint gum and hot, afternoon sex. Crazy sex. The kind of sex that they'd do
once without stopping to breathe. The kind they'd have to just find some control and get the first, mind-
numbing orgasm out of the way so they could do it again slowly. Methodically. He tasted her again and
again, his lips covering hers, her taut body still not buying into the kind of forgiveness her open mouth had
already begun to offer.
Her moan slid like honey into his throat. "Bastard," Olivia mumbled.
He couldn't argue with that, so he deepened the kiss instead. Her mouth was hot, sweet, demanding. She
wasn't pliant this time; this time she dueled with him every step of the way. If he nipped at her, she bit hard
onto him. If he plunged his tongue into her mouth, she followed suit, demanding an immediate, belligerent
onto him. If he plunged his tongue into her mouth, she followed suit, demanding an immediate, belligerent
entrance of her own.
He wanted to get the upper hand, and she wouldn't let him win.
Elliot upped the ante.
He let his right hand drop, seeking the tanned length of thigh that danced in his peripheral vision when he
lifted his head, drinking in air. When his mouth landed on hers again, she moaned, and he didn't know if it
was the sensation of his tongue owning her mouth, grasping at it, or if it was from his hand, sliding slowly
up the inside of her thigh. His fingers pressed into the soft, smooth flesh that beneath hid long, toned
muscles. His thumb slipped higher, teasing at the edge of her shorts, before daringly swiping just under the
hem on the leg of them.
Her thigh was indented there. He was high as hell up on her leg. He wanted to grip it and drag it over his hip
to lock it in place as he thrust forward, but he settled for rubbing. Rubbing her. Rubbing Olivia. Higher and
higher beneath the leg of her shorts as he dragged his mouth hotly over her swollen lips.
And then she did it. She whimpered. Loudly. Maybe because she never whimpered or maybe because she
hated not being in control, Olivia's fingers then slipped over his face and forcefully hauled his mouth onto
hers.
+++
He was going to annihilate her, and he'd use her body against her as his weapon of choice.
But goddamn, she thought, what a way to go.
Somewhere in her hazy, foggy head she knew she was supposed to stop. She knew she was angry, that she
should end this right now. But even the heat had stopped swirling around her, the air stagnant, and the only
thing that was moving was him.
Elliot.
Her partner. Capital P. Partner.
The one who Olivia had always considered to be like her, but who wasn't at all. He wasn't just a cop. He
wasn't just her friend. He was all hard, hot, unforgiving angles. He was demanding, domineering, relentless.
He was kissing her like he owned her, and she wanted to tell him to fuck off. She wanted to bring her hand
up, to push him off of her.
But she couldn't. Nothing worked, her body wasn't listening to her. It was listening to him.
And he knew it because that was the one way in which they were both still similar. Like her, he was an
arrogant sonofabitch.
But Jesus, Elliot was male. All male. All male and devouring her.
Olivia wanted him with a ferocity that terrified her. She didn't want long nights on a rug by a fireplace, she
wanted this. Here. Now. Fast. She wanted Elliot on top of her, inside of her. She wanted him to fuck her, or
maybe she wanted to fuck him. She wanted this burning, fiery pit in her stomach to go away, and she
wanted him to fix it.

She wanted to know what he sounded like when he came. She wanted him to groan, to mutter curses, to use
the low, reverberating thrum of his voice to say her name.
Because he'd say her name. She'd make damned sure he said her name.
The sensation of his mouth on hers wasn't all pleasure. Even as she sank her tongue into his mouth, she felt
the stubble of his rough skin scrape roughly over hers. But the pain didn't matter either. Not even if he
pushed her backwards, not even if the table pushed against her sore back, not even if her tailbone smashed
against the wood. She didn't care if he was too big, and from what she could tell, he was larger all over than
she had expected. Even if he couldn't wait, and he pushed into her ruthlessly, nothing would matter but this.
She was careening through a tunnel full of fire, and nothing mattered other than making sure that he burned
all of her.
His hand was on her leg, circling higher and higher. And as he shifted, as Elliot took back control of the
kiss, his thumb dipped up underneath her shorts again, following the curve of her skin. She couldn't help it.
She arched towards his touch, her thighs widening in response.
Elliot, being Elliot, chuckled softly and took her invitation. His thumb slipped higher, trailing along the line
of where her thigh ended and the satiny edge where her underwear began.
Olivia heard that horrible, pathetic cry and knew it was her again. She could have sworn she did it again
when he started to dip just beneath the edge of the satin, and she knew that any chance she had of
controlling herself would be lost for good. If he went any farther he'd know. He'd know she was wet, hot,
ready for him. His thumb teased her, rubbing maddeningly on the edge of the satiny, clinging material.
"Elliot," she said softly. "El-"
He must have heard the questioning in her voice because before she could even ask him if he was sure, his
hand was gone, sliding up her rib cage instead. Olivia pulled back, and his forehead dipped, resting on hers.
"Sorry, Liv. I can't help..." Elliot ground out. "I'm sorry," he cleared his throat, rocking just a little bit. "I,
God, I don't want you to think...that I...Jesus," he breathed, shutting his eyes.
His face was practically against hers. And even though his hand had slid upwards, his thumb now absently
stroking the side of her breast, she knew he wasn't as sure as he seemed to be. For some reason, that fact
alone had her tipping her mouth back up to his.
He took what she offered, groaning into her as he tasted her again, slowly. This kiss was lazy, the sweltering
air around them suffocating as she let the hard, flat planes of his lips coax hers. Elliot's thumb finally took a
pass over her aching nipple, and she arched into his touch until he did it again, flicking over her before he
cupped her breast soothingly in his big hand.
Olivia shifted uncomfortably, the ache between her legs nearly unbearable. God, he could get inside of her
so easily right now. He'd slide in, all the way, setting her back against this table and he'd take her. She
wasn't confused about how the first time would play out either. Elliot would take, demand, drive her to a
place where she'd relent to his alpha male tendencies. She'd let him too, because he was the only man she
had known that could dominate her space and still make her feel safe while he did it.
She tugged on his hips, pulling him intimately against her and she felt his granite erection grind against her,
between her legs. Christ, he did it again, rolling his hips just a little bit while her heart slammed furiously in
her chest, her fingers barely able to hold onto him as his mouth captured hers again. This wasn't just about
sex, it was a mindfuck because the reality that it was Elliot's hard-on that was now driving against her,
separated from her heat by only cotton, was enough to send her over the edge. His left hand latched around
her waist, and the other was on her breast. It amazed her that his mouth could be so forceful, yet at the same
her waist, and the other was on her breast. It amazed her that his mouth could be so forceful, yet at the same
time, in direct counterpoint, his fingers could be so gentle.
Of course, he was nothing if not unpredictable. So the moment that his mouth slowed, his lips rubbing lazily
over hers, his thumb and forefinger tightened suddenly on her nipple making her cry out with the sensation
of it. He apparently got the reaction he wanted because he pulled her closer to him, grinding harder into her
while he smiled in satisfaction against her mouth.
She could come, just from this, just from the rhythm of Elliot's big, hard, erection rubbing against her again,
and again and -
"Hey guys, we're all ready for the next event so if you're rea-whoops!"
The wind knocked out of her at the sound of Cathy's voice. Elliot stilled immediately, his mouth on hers for
one second longer. Then he pulled away, slowly.
Olivia's back was to Cathy, and Elliot wasn't looking at the other woman. His eyes were closed in pain, his
head was bent, his lips parted. And his erection, God, his magnificent erection was still nestled perfectly
against her.
"We'll be," Elliot started, still not opening his eyes. "We'll be right..." his voice was strangled.
She had to find air. Olivia had to recover, but had no idea how to breathe through the desperate, liquid want
that filled her. "Right there," she breathed, trying to finish Elliot's sentence.
"Um, well you know," Cathy said, her voice obnoxiously loud in the quiet, hovering air. "I mean, Olivia,
your um, sting, seems really bad, don't you think? I mean, I could always tell them that you need to...uh...
rest. Because you do, you know. That sting...needs to be taken care of. So Elliot," Cathy said brightly from
behind Olivia, her voice cracking. "Elliot, you'll um, stay with Olivia, right? Take care of her?"
He'd been taking care of her all right.
Elliot hadn't responded. He hadn't even opened his eyes. And Olivia knew that he'd let the other woman tell
the group that they were both going to wear tutus and practice The Nutcracker as an excuse for not joining
in the next activity, so long as they could stay right where they were and were given some privacy.
Olivia couldn't turn around to look at Cathy, not when her gaze was captured by the agony on Elliot's face.
Agony she had caused. "No," Olivia managed. "We're fine, we'll be right there," she said, her voice finally
finding some flat plane to exist on.
"Are you sure?' Cathy asked worriedly. "I mean, it's no problem for me to say..." Her voice died as she
realized where her sentence was headed.
Say what, Cathy? Olivia thought. Say that we can't join the group because I'm currently five seconds away
from seducing, or being seduced by my partner? On Grant's table no less? How would you word that
exactly, Cathy? Hey guys, they can't join us because after eight years, Elliot and Olivia have decided to fuck
it out?
"You know," Cathy tried again. "At least this time the bee got it right. On The X-Files, when the bee stung
Scully it actually stopped them from kissing, it didn't start them kissing, like it obviously did here." Her too-
cheery voice picked up speed. "Not that you wouldn't have anyway, I mean, without the sting, because you
would have. Kissed, that is. Because you know, that much was obvious, even to Jim. Because I asked him
what he thought last night and he agreed you two had a thing for each other. Although he was tired too, so
maybe he didn't really hear me because he started snoring right after that. But, anyway, it's nice to see that
maybe he didn't really hear me because he started snoring right after that. But, anyway, it's nice to see that
the bee finally-"
"Cathy," Elliot interrupted gutturally, his eyes still shut. "Go."
Olivia closed her eyes at the calm, decisive tone in Elliot's voice. He hadn't been rude; he'd just thankfully
made a decision for all of them. She smiled as she heard footsteps practically stumble their way out the door
and the screen door bang shut behind them.
"She means well," Olivia said quietly, wondering how to extract herself from the position she was in with as
little awkwardness as possible.
Elliot opened his eyes, staring out the door and still regaining control of his breathing. "She's Cupid on
crack."
The comment should have made her laugh. It should have lightened the mood, allowing Olivia to become
his partner once again. But it triggered other memories. Of Elliot, being thrown through a window, of his
arm and shirt covered in blood. For one moment, her chest tightened, her heart slamming painfully against
her ribcage.
It figured that the only Cupid she had ever really known had been a drug-addicted giant of a man that had
hurt Elliot and forced Olivia into working alone. She'd put that Cupid out of commission, and she'd set
Cathy straight pretty soon too.
"Elliot," Olivia started, when he made no motion of moving. "We need to talk about this."
He stepped back, rubbing a hand over his face. "Don't, Olivia. Don't dissect this. Just let it be for once."
"How can I?" She didn't know how he did it. How even though everything around them was falling apart he
kept going. "You're married, Elliot," she said, the words ripping from her before she could stop them. "This
isn't you, either. You don't want this. You want your wife. Even though you think you don't, you do. I know
you do." Olivia knew she sounded desperate, she knew her throat was thick with tears, and she hated herself
for it.
Elliot finally looked at her, his eyebrows furrowed together. "Olivia, don't tell me what I want, when you
can't even admit to yourself what you want, okay? And don't presume to know anything about my marriage,
because you don't."
He had stepped back just a little bit, and Olivia slid down from the table. He wasn't looking at her again, so
she took the moment to look at him. "I know you want your kids," she said, no question in the sound of it.
That was her trump card.
Elliot's eyes flickered back to hers warily. "My kids have nothing to do with this." He looked her over once,
his irises tumbling back into cobalt. "The one thing I'm realizing is that some things are mine no matter
what."
Olivia drew in air. "Go home, Elliot. And this stays here. Whatever just happened here, it stays here."
He smiled sardonically, his lips curling without mirth. "So you think this is Vegas?" His face darkened. "Or
is that what you said to Porter in Oregon?"
Olivia wanted to be angry. She wanted to yell at him, to curse him out, to accuse him of being a confused
piece of shit. But none of it would have been honest, or truthful, or even fair. Then there was the small
biting fact that she had said some version of it to Dean.
biting fact that she had said some version of it to Dean.
Besides, it was more important that he understood he could still go home. "El, what I mean is, you have a
chance to move home. And just because of this, whatever this was, I don't want you to think that when we
get back I'll run if you take that chance. You can still move home, and we can...forget this."
Elliot shook his head in disbelief. "Liv, don't you get-"
"No. Listen to me, Elliot," Olivia interrupted. "My mom...my mom looked at me and every single day there
would be one moment, just one, where I'd catch her looking at me with regret. And I - I can't take that if...I
can't see that on your face. I can't. And if a fling with me costs you your family, I will."
He jerked backwards as if he had been slapped. "Jesus, Olivia, don't you get it? You think I'd use you like
that? You think I'd risk our partnership for a weekend fling?" Elliot suddenly looked exhausted. "Look, you
can protest all you want. But there's been something there between us for awhile, or it wouldn't just explode
the way it is now. And we've both learned at work that no matter what people try to cover up, eventually the
truth is gonna come out. So I say we deal with it. Figure this shit out."
"There's nothing between us, Elliot! Not like that, there's not. Take the out I'm giving you, for chrissakes. Go
home, and we'll pretend this didn't happen." An errant thought slammed into her, the potential effects of it
nearly knocking her back and onto the table. "Unless," she said, feeling the fight drain out of her. "Unless
when you move home you want to tell Kathy. I mean, you know, I know you don't lie to her, and I
understand if you...Oh God." Olivia turned to face the table and bent over, her stomach rolling. Her palms
hit the wood, and she was grateful for the solid surface. She just had to stay on her feet. "You're gonna have
to tell her and she won't want you to work with me and she'll be right. Jesus, Jesus. What have we done?"
"Olivia. Would you-" Elliot said, trying to stop her.
"No, Elliot. I know. I mean after this we can't work together because...because this will be there and its not
platon..."
"Seriously? Do you think for two damned seconds you might shut the hell up?" he roared angrily, spinning
her around to face him.
She stared at him. At the man she knew she had lost before she had even found him.
"I'm not moving home, Olivia," he said, his voice suddenly low, controlled, calm. "Not because of this
weekend, or because of whatever these feelings I have for you are about. I'm not moving home because
regardless of everything else, I'm not in love with Kathy anymore. I signed those papers because...because
she felt like my ex-wife. And I called her less than half an hour ago and told her that. We both agreed it was
for the best."
Technically, there were still papers to sign. Technically, a court had to proclaim it. But Olivia knew the
most terrifying thing of all had just been dropped in her lap.
Because, as of now, technically Elliot Stabler was the one thing she never let herself imagine he'd be, and
he had initiated it of his own accord. His wife hadn't left him; he hadn't been kicked out of his own house.
He wasn't sitting in limbo, wondering what could have been, or what still could be when it came to a
woman he had been married to for over twenty years.
Instead, he was looking at her. At Olivia. Telling her that he had decided to put the past behind him. He was
looking at her free of everything that haunted him in Manhattan. Free of guilt, of horror, of anger. He was
free of the things within him that she knew how to handle, and was instead showing her a new thing inside
of him that was far more dangerous that anything else.
of him that was far more dangerous that anything else.
Expectation.
It scared the shit out of her. He scared the shit out of her. Because as Olivia looked at him, she saw that
Elliot's eyes had cleared, that they were steadier than they had been in years. There was no barreling, dark
storm. There were no churning depths of a deadly sea. There was no wind, no rain, no howling of branches
that were snapping off in pain.
It was just him, facing off with her, daring her to deny something her body had already told him.
She was in trouble, was all she could think. She was in trouble because while raging Elliot was a beast of
burden, calm Elliot was a soothing, coaxing anesthetic that would dull her defenses.
And then there was the most dangerous Elliot of all. The one he had just told her, in no uncertain terms, that
he finally was. The one that tossed out the whole top half of her list of excuses.
Because the man standing in front of her now, the one she could still taste on her swollen lips and feel
imprinted against her skin, was far less off limits than he had been only an hour ago.
She was now looking at a totally single Elliot Stabler.
+++
There were times in his life he had believed that he had been well and truly fucked.
Even off the top of his head, he could think of at least half a dozen times when he had thought his life was
over. Some of those times he had literally thought he was dead; other times he just felt that way.
The first time he really remembered thinking that was as he stood at a party at Tommy Jacobson's house
over twenty some odd years ago and watched his then girlfriend refuse the wine cooler being handed to her.
Her pretty face had declared her uncertainty, her lower lip had been sucked into her mouth, and she had
shook her blonde hair, finally deciding not to take it. When all of that had been followed by a furtive glance
at Elliot, wondering if he understood her hesitation, he had known innately that the ‘thing' she had told him
they needed to talk about the following night at dinner would mean that all of his plans for the next few
years had just been crushed into dust. There would be no cramped apartment, rooming with three of his
buddies in the city, going to school during the day and working at night. There would be no police academy
at twenty-two, no trip to Florida to celebrate senior year finally being over. Kathy had been pregnant, and
while his life hadn't ended, for a few short moments standing in the wet grass of Tommy's backyard, it had
felt like it had.
There were other moments of fatalism too. When Lizzie had been three and Kathy had noticed she was
bruising far too easily, they had taken her to see her pediatrician. When the doctor had suggested a
comprehensive round of blood tests, Elliot had stopped breathing. For forty-eight hours they had been left
with possible causes for her illness, and until leukemia was ruled out, Elliot had wondered if he'd survive
the chance he'd lose his little girl. It had been a simple bacterial infection that had been cleared up in a week
with antibiotics, but he'd stared dying in the face until they had known.
He'd been held at gunpoint a few times too; standing outside of a bank with an automatic to his head, he'd
been sure the drugged teen would pull the trigger. Lying on the floor of a courthouse, shot in the arm and
staring down the barrel of another gun held by a teenager that had already shot him once, he'd assumed he
was looking at the end of the line. Holding explosives in his hand for a second too long in a mobile home
with Special Agent Dana Lewis, only two words had crossed his mind.

Royally. Fucked.
But what was so startling to him right now, watching Olivia listen to Grant's instructions for the next hurdle,
was that this combustible need he was allowing himself to feel for her didn't scare him as much as it should.
She was looking at him with a mixture of horror, anger and fear yet he wasn't panicking the way that he
expected he would have.
He didn't feel like they were totally fucked.
Because he knew explicitly what the common denominator had been in the moments when he felt far more
courage than he should have. In a moment when Gitano held a gun to his head, in a moment when he was
cuffed to a van inside of a warehouse with a trapped Shenkel, he'd been sure of Olivia. He'd known she was
there, and even if she couldn't save him, he'd had been okay with the outcome because she'd be there for it
and that was enough.
He was sure then, just like he was now. Whatever this thing was, it was with her. The person he trusted
most. And somehow that made it okay.
Watching the tiniest hint of a breeze lift a few strands of the ponytail Olivia had just thrown her hair up
into, he felt his shoulders relax. In the last few years, home hadn't been his comfort, she had been. When
Kathy had left him, he hadn't found it within himself to grow up, to calm the hell down, to get his shit
together. And maybe that was because he knew deep down that he didn't want that part of his life back, so
there hadn't been anything worth changing for.
But when Olivia had left, he'd done a one-eighty. He'd been fucking terrified and angry and hurt as hell.
He'd known, deep down, that if she came back, she'd only stay if he earned her back again.
Whatever they had found, whatever he had done, she had stayed. And he needed to get it through his thick,
stupid skull that if she wanted Special Fuckup Dean Porter, she would be with him. Hell, if she wanted that
life so badly, she'd have taken the FBI up on the offers they probably gave her to stick around with them in
the first place.
Olivia listened to Grant explain this next event, one that involved two eight-foot platforms, and
miscellaneous objects they would need to use to cross the chasm one-by-one, and Elliot took a deep breath.
For a moment in this crazy morning, everything slowed down. This moment wasn't about kissing her, about
touching her, about breaking down her arguments and secrets. This one was just about her, out here, away
from the city.
Grant, the prick, must have cracked a joke, because Olivia smiled just a little bit as laughter sprinkled
through the group. Elliot realized he was a moron because for as beautiful as he'd always known she was, he
hadn't really known.
She wasn't like any other woman he had ever come across.
There were things about Olivia Benson he knew. He knew she could kick ass in a hand-to-hand
confrontation. He knew she was a better shot than ninety-eight percent of the NYPD. He knew she hated
romantic comedies, and that as a kid she'd watched James Bond movies late into the night. He knew she
preferred beer or a neat scotch over anything fruity, and he knew that she still used the tiniest bit of makeup
to cover up the scar Gitano had left on her neck.
But he was quickly developing a list of things he didn't know that were becoming vitally important for him
to find out. What side of the bed did she sleep on? Did she talk in her sleep? In the morning, did she wake
up fully coherent and ready to go, or did she lie there for a few minutes and think about things before she let
up fully coherent and ready to go, or did she lie there for a few minutes and think about things before she let
the world intrude?
Olivia looked up at him, her smile fading. There were people in between them, because no matter what had
happened in Grant's cabin, she'd keep up the pretense that they were just partners. He wanted to say
something to her, to smile at her and see if she'd smile back, but they didn't do that sort of thing, so he let
the moment pass.
"You know what's funny?" Jim asked, breaking the haze that Elliot had found himself in.
"What?"
"Grant's got all these rules for this game, like we can't use an object twice to get someone across, and we
can't step on the grass to get between the platforms. But in the end, what's he really gonna do about it if we
do?"
Elliot found himself smiling. "Oh, he's not gonna say a word. Trust me."
Jim laughed. "Did you set him straight on Olivia?"
Elliot turned to face the man on his right. The one he was beginning to actually think of as a friend. "So it's
not just me, right? Liv seemed to think I was being a little overzealous."
Jim shrugged. "Yeah, well. Women don't like it if you do stake your claim, and they don't like it if you don't.
So I say you keep an eye on what's yours."
Five feet away, Olivia swiped her bangs out of her eyes and looked up again. The rare, unguarded look in
her soft, brown suede eyes knocked his breath away. She was checking on him, just as he had been checking
on her.
Maybe this desire that was growing between them was just the final piece of the puzzle, because they'd been
looking at each other like this for years. Small looks, out of the blue, that would settle him and apparently
settle her, too.
And just like that, he knew that what Jim said was true. People did keep watch over the things that were
theirs.
Because the two of them had been keeping an eye on each other for years.
+++
She was hot, sticky, sweaty.
Not to mention, these games Grant had them playing were getting old. She didn't care anymore about
building trust or resolving control issues before the high ropes, especially not in a game called Shark Attack.
As far as Olivia was concerned, at this point she'd try and do whatever high ropes course was laid out in
front of her right now in exchange for a cold shower, air conditioning, and some more lemonade.
Olivia cracked her neck, feeling the hot, clammy moisture on her skin. The sun was relentless, attacking her
skin with its rays. Of course, Elliot was no less merciless with his gaze either, and she was pretty sure the
sun had decided it was jealous of the heat Elliot Stabler was able to cause with his eyes alone.
Olivia blew out a long breath. Elliot was single. He'd told Kathy he wasn't moving home. He was done once
and for all. Just a few of the things she now had to process and deal with and file away.
and for all. Just a few of the things she now had to process and deal with and file away.
Elliot kissed as if he had learned how to in a best-selling romance novel. He teased, bit, smirked and
plunged his fingers into her hair when he slid into her mouth. He drove her to the brink only to bring her
back and then push her there again.
Things she couldn't file away.
It was bad enough that he knew all of her. It was bad enough that he was the person she trusted most. Those
things alone would have been difficult enough to overcome and try to maintain a professional relationship.
But it was just her damned luck that Elliot had to be sexy, too. That he had to wear sex in his expression, in
his eyes, in the way his muscles rearranged themselves as he prowled around her.
Sonofabitch.
The whole alpha thing really wasn't her thing. She hadn't dated any brooders in the past. Even the few cops
she had dated had been more the outgoing, personable type. The ones that actually considered going to the
theater on the weekends. The ones that liked nice restaurants and early evenings that ended at the door half
the time.
Olivia used her fingertips to rub her eyes. She was under the impression that her very dark, very moody
partner would have no use for the theater, reservations at DaSilvano's, and a simple kiss at the door. He'd be
sex that started on Friday night, weekends that meant having to change the sheets on Saturday morning only
to climb back in, order take out and do it all over again. He'd want to be in the shower with her, and if she
locked the door, he'd bang until she opened it, demanding...demanding...demanding.
"Olivia, you should go next," Elliot said loudly.
She jerked her head upwards, hating the wet heat that pressed down on them. In front of her was an eight-
foot platform on wheels that Grant had brought out from the storage shed and locked in place. There was a
small staircase on the side that led to the top, to a flat surface that would accommodate no more than two
people. Across from her, where Elliot stood, was another such contraption.
She had listened. She knew the game. Next to her on the grass was an array of objects. Tarp. Boards. Two-
by-four planks and flat stones. There were ropes of varying lengths and two white buckets. The goal was to
choose a few objects, climb to the top of the platform and find a way to get across to the top of the other
one without ever touching the grass, also known as the imaginary shark infested water.
Of course Elliot had gone first, taking the most difficult portion of the task. Without asking anyone, without
waiting for anyone else to volunteer, he had simply gone ahead and chosen two heavy flat stones. As she
had watched him take them up the stairs one at a time, she had realized that this was who he was. He didn’t
wait, he didn’t linger when it came to making decisions if they were his to make. The only time he had
waited on anything had been when it came to his divorce, and that was only because he hadn’t been the one
to initiate it in the first place.
But when it came to everything else, Elliot dealt in reality. He would take a situation, assess it, and conquer
it immediately. He wasn’t one for debate, for the what if’s. Maybe that was another way that they were
different. Olivia stepped back, waiting, watching what other people were going to do first, assessing her
options.
Elliot always jumped right in, come hell or high water.
When he had reached the top of the platform, he had thrown the flat rocks from the top of the platform to
the ground. In the moment before he had lowered himself down onto the stones, he had turned, looking back
the ground. In the moment before he had lowered himself down onto the stones, he had turned, looking back
at her. For some reason she had felt like that had been the moment of truth.
The question in his eyes had been about far more than the game. Look, I’ll show you, he seemed to say. Just
follow me.
Olivia had watched him, silently, removing herself from the chatter of the group as she did. Elliot tossed the
rocks one by one, using each one as a stepping stone before turning around, retrieving the one left behind
and repeating the process. It didn’t seem easy, on the contrary he was sweaty and breathing heavily by the
time he had crossed.
But maybe that was the point. He was across.
And she wasn’t.
On other side, Elliot had jumped to grab the edge of the platform ledge and hoisted himself up, grunting
during the course of it. Olivia had watched, dry-mouthed, as his fitted t-shirt had clung to every movement
of the muscles in his back as he pulled himself up. His arms had flexed, his shoulders bulged, and his thighs
had tightened as he found traction against the side of the platform. She’d seen Jessica watching despite
herself, and even shy Hannah had shot Elliot a glance. He moved gracefully, powerfully, in the way she
imagined big cats would in the wild. Olivia realized that was just innately Elliot. He’d appear to be lazy in
his movements only to be able to coil and strike in the next.
Realizing Cathy was watching her, Olivia had called him an unflattering name beneath her breath and
chalked him up to being a show-off.
Then again, the fact that he had gone over first, using the most difficult of the tools, had helped everyone
else that followed. When Hannah had jumped down and sat on a tarp, tossing Elliot one end of a rope, he
had simply slid her across the grass and helped to pull her up onto the platform. When Cathy had laid down
a plank and easily walked across it, Elliot had grabbed her and hauled her up too. Even Leo had needed help
when he had stuck his feet into two buckets and walked across, dragging the clunky plastic with him.
One-by-one, everyone went over to Elliot's side. And each time, Olivia took a step back, watching them go
and then avoiding Elliot's questioning eyes. It was just her and Jessica left on this side now, and almost
every piece of equipment that Grant had laid out had been used once, which meant it couldn't be used again.
Olivia knew that when she ended up alone on her side, it would be no one's fault but her own. She had
backed away from every opportunity given to her, as if even out here, playing a game in the wilderness, it
was her job to serve, protect and sacrifice.
Or maybe that was too noble a reason for why she stayed on her side. Maybe she was just scared to go over
to Elliot. It made sense though, that he would go first and she would go last. They would always split up for
the greater good. Even if it meant one of them would one day be asked to sacrifice their life in exchange for
another.
"You want to go, Olivia?" Jessica asked, her voice slightly unsteady.
Olivia knew why the girl was hesitating. The last one to go would have to operate mainly on their own,
unlike everyone who had gone before and had help on both sides.
"No," Olivia said. "You go. We'll get you across and then I'll figure it out," she said, her voice low. She
didn't look at Elliot. How could he expect she'd go and leave Jessica here to fend for herself? She knew,
deep down, that he didn't truly expect her to. At her feet were two ropes, both long enough to reach to the
other side. "We could tie these tightly on this end and on that end, and you could sit on them only a few feet
other side. "We could tie these tightly on this end and on that end, and you could sit on them only a few feet
off the ground and shimmy across. What do you think? It would be pretty safe."
Jessica bit her lip. "How could I stay on them?"
Olivia shrugged casually and infused some measure of confidence into her voice. "If we keep them tight and
taut and put about a foot in between them, you could lock your knees over them and lean forward. Would be
like a slightly more flexible jungle gym."
Jessica nodded. "Okay, but what about you?"
Olivia looked down at the only thing left. A plank. About a foot wide and six feet longer than the space on
the ground would allow between the platforms if she tried to set it down and walk across. Short of having a
saw, there was no way to make it fit. She'd have to get the plank up, set it on top of the platforms and sit on
it, going across at a height of eight feet.
No one else had been forced to maintain that level of height. She'd waited so long she was left with the
worst of it.
"I'll be fine, don't worry about me." Olivia looked at Elliot, her chest no longer expanding as she breathed.
"El," she said, as evenly as she could. "I'm sending Jessica across and we're using the ropes. I'll help lower
her down here, but you guys secure the ropes on your end too."
"Olivia-" he warned. "Why don't you go now on the plank and let Jessica hold it. The ropes will still be easy
for her."
She knew though, that asking Jessica to lower herself wouldn't be easy. Olivia shook her head. "We're fine.
I'm sending her across." She looked behind her, at where the staircase reached the top of the platform. There
was a small gap between two of the metal bars of the staircase that would let her lock the plank in place
when she used it. Technically, this would work.
Thankfully, Elliot let her send Jessica over. As the younger girl giggled, making her way slowly across the
ropes, inch by inch, Olivia began to feel the isolation kick in. She was all alone on her side, watching the
group commend each other across from her.
She'd be responsible for herself here. If she screwed up, if she moved wrong, she was going to fall eight
feet. As Elliot lifted Jessica beneath her arms on the other side and brought her up, Olivia pulled one end of
the plank onto the platform. The other end rose towards Elliot.
He grabbed his end, his blue eyes locking on hers. "This is bullshit," he mumbled. "I'm coming back over
there, Liv. Or just forget it. You don't have to do this."
Olivia shot him a dirty look. "Save it, Elliot."
Grant stood there, on the ground, between the two platforms. He gave Elliot a look of disdain. "She can do
this, Elliot. I've seen it work. Plus, I'm here beneath her if anything goes wrong. It's only eight feet. "
Elliot's tightening jaw was visible even from where she stood. He glared at Ludwig. "This isn't boot camp,
Ludwig. This is a game. And I'm telling you that I don't want her doing this. You got that? And if you're so
sure that eight feet isn't that much, why don't you let me drop you from that height and we can see if-"
"Elliot," Olivia cut him off, impatiently. "Can we do this? Please?"

On her end, the board was secure, locked between the stairway bars. On his end, he sat on it. Everyone else
was on the ground, already distracted by their own conversations now that their part was over.
Olivia climbed onto the board, feeling it rattle a bit beneath her weight as it settled more firmly into place.
She straddled it, her legs dangling off both sides. The rough sides of the board cut into the bare skin of her
legs. There was nothing but air beneath her feet.
"Liv, you good?" Elliot asked, his voice a deep, thrumming monotone.
The sun was making her dizzy, the intense heat of it slipping over her until she was light-headed. She had
felt like this not too long ago, in the seconds before she had passed out in an apartment building full of
toxins. It was the sort of vertigo that made her hands slippery and her temples throb. She gripped the edges
of the board tighter and leaned forward.
"Yeah," she said quietly, pulling herself forward by nearly six inches, careful not to let her skin scrape the
board. Her eyes were on the plank still in front of her, on the uneven, raw grain of it. It wasn't substantial,
or particularly reassuring.
"Hey, Liv. Don't look down. Look at me. It'll keep your equilibrium."
She lifted her face, inching forward, fighting the nausea and stifling air. Elliot was straight ahead, the cool,
oceanic blue of his eyes soothing in the midst of the sweltering heat. She knew then, that while she had
passed out when left to fend for herself in that building a few months ago, here he wouldn't let it happen.
This time, Cupid hadn't knocked him out and left her alone.
Elliot held the other end of the board and maybe that was enough.
He smiled a little bit as she got closer, the distance between them closing faster than she expected. She
knew in her head she was the only one moving, but the space was shrinking rapidly as she scooted towards
him.
"Careful," he teased, when she was less than two feet away. "You move too fast and you'll end up with
splinters on your ass."
He grinned at her then, and she stopped, frozen on the board. She had forgotten that smile, the one that filled
every line and plane of his face. "You've been awfully concerned with the state of my ass today, Stabler.
First the grass stains, now the splinters?" She tried to return his banter simply to lighten the mood.
He shrugged innocently as she started moving again and reached the end. "Gotta look out for my partner,"
he smirked.
Olivia shook her head as Elliot reached for her, helping her off the board and onto the ledge with him. "I
think you're looking out for yourself," she retorted.
He stopped, his hands on her arms as he settled her onto the platform. "You really think that, Liv?" he
asked quietly, suddenly serious as he watched Grant walk back to the group. "You think I'm not looking out
for you too?"
Olivia turned her face to his, drinking in features that were sometimes so familiar she ached from just
looking at him. "No, El. I don't think that," she said quietly.
Elliot nodded once, looking like he was going to say more but then didn't. In seconds, he turned and headed
down the stairs. At the bottom he waited for her, and she realized why.

He was simply making sure that they were both finally back on solid ground again.
+++
There were a few benefits he had discovered about being stuck at this damned camp.
First, he was finally in a place with Olivia where she couldn't walk away from him. Here, when she was
pissed at him, which was several dozen times in an average day, there was no slamming of her desk drawer,
no rattling of her keys and a terse "see you tomorrow."
Second, it was hot as hell out. This meant that his partner was now spending their lunch break roaming
around with her long legs left bare below the leg of her shorts as she sauntered around the campsite, taking
her turn to call Cragen. It meant she had pulled her hair up, leaving the column of her neck exposed to him
in this heat. It meant that she was wearing a very small, very fitted t-shirt.
Third, in the moment when watching her saunter around had become too much of a distraction, when his
dick had hardened for the nine hundredth time this morning, he had been able to grab a towel, throw on his
navy swim trunks and head for the cool, gently rippling waters of the lake without being too damned
obvious.
The only downfall he could see at the moment was that it wasn't exactly private around here. While the trees
by the lake provided some cover from the campsite, if he took a cold shower to jerk off and get some relief,
his activities would be far too public.
At the present moment, the comfortable waters lapped around his waist, his body somewhat cooler as a
result. Beneath his bare feet, the small rocks had given way to coarse sand and he planted his legs,
maintaining his position despite the now rocking waves making their way to him from the Donzi that had
passed by moments earlier.
Elliot brought up one wet hand and swiped his hand over his face, relishing the refreshing feel of the chilled
water. He could smell the grill being fired up across the field and knew he didn't have time to linger if he
was going to make lunch as well. He dove beneath the water one last time, letting the wet relief wash his
body for a moment before he surfaced again.
He rubbed his face one more time with the heels of his hands as he started to walk out of the water and
back up onto the short beach. The water only made it up to his shins when he finally removed his hands
from his face, his body stilling as he stared at her.
Olivia stood in front of him on the sand, her cell phone clutched in her hand. Her fingertips were white
from the effort and she was frozen in place less than six feet away from him.
"Liv?" he asked, cocking his head. He knew he was dripping everywhere as he got closer to her, but the
look on her face scared him. Getting his towel from the dock wasn't a priority.
Her skin was pale, and on her that was no small feat, especially after all of the hours in the sun. Olivia's eyes
darted past him nervously, searching for something on the dock. "Your towel," she said finally. "You want
me to get it? I can get it for you."
Elliot's head felt heavy, his confusion building. Her voice was small. Uneven. "Hey, you okay? What did
Cragen say?" He reached out to touch her bare arm but she jumped back, away from him.
Olivia licked her lips and looked up at him, her movements skittish. "They've got a lead on him. They think
they'll get Parker before the end of the day." Her words were rushed. Stilted.

Elliot nodded. "Okay, that's good. What's wrong, Liv? Did Grant say something to you after what happened
earlier? Cause if he did, I can have a talk with him."
Her eyes shot up to his. "No. I mean no, he didn't say anything. I'm fine, really."
But he knew she was lying, because she was jumpy. Her breath was coming out in small bursts. He looked
her over, wondering if the sting was still bothering her, or if she was dreading the ropes later that afternoon.
His gaze raked up her body out of habit, searching for whatever it was that she wouldn't tell him.
"Stop it," she hissed. "Just stop it."
He flinched, rocking backwards on his heels and squinting as he tried to assess the cause of her accusing
look. He was all ready to press the issue in the moment before he saw it.
Before he knew.
Without meaning to, her eyes dropped to his chest. Olivia blinked then, before looking back up at him.
He blinked too, grabbing air with his lungs, stunned by the look of open hunger on her face. He felt a drop
that lingered on his lashes hit his cheek and slip down over his skin. The water droplets ran down the middle
of his back, down his arms, off the legs of his swim trunks and onto the sand. He was soaking wet, and as
he watched her lips part and her eyes roam recklessly over his bare skin, he suddenly, desperately wanted to
drag her back into the lake with him.
God, he was slow sometimes. How could he have not known in those first moments after he had seen her?
Maybe he just never expected to have this effect on her. It seemed impossible that he could do for her what
she did for him.
She stood, paralyzed, less than a foot away from him. She was trying so hard not to look him in the eyes
that she was now staring at the Christ tattoo on his arm. Fixated.
"Olivia," he murmured, dragging her name out because it felt good on his tongue.
"I should get you your towel," she repeated, not looking him in the eyes. Her efforts at being aloof failed
because she was now looking at the wet, bare space between his pecs.
Elliot smiled a little bit. He'd never really considered all his time in the gym as anything more than part of
his job. He'd never considered the way he was built beyond how it would help him when up against the
pricks they nabbed.
But Olivia, Jesus, Olivia was staring at something she liked. Or hated. Because she was probably cursing
herself out for reacting towards him and simultaneously blaming him for existing in the first place.
Because he was an asshole, he couldn't help himself. "Why are you so determined to get me my towel?"
She swallowed thickly. "Because you're...you're..."
He arched an eyebrow, letting his lips lift. Letting her suffer through her self-created silence. When she
tried to look away, he scratched at his chest for a second, achieving his goal.
Her gaze was back again, following his movement. And this time, her tongue darted out and dragged her
lower lip back into her mouth.
lower lip back into her mouth.
Hell yes.
"You're wet," Olivia breathed.
There was far too little fun in his life. That had to be why he did it. He leaned forward, dripping a little bit
onto her and pulling her fingers up to his chest, settling her hand on his skin. "Well will you look at that?
You're right. No one can accuse you of not being a brilliant detective," he said, leaning over and dropping
the words softly into her ear.
He thanked God for the huge maple tree that gave him just the tiniest bit of privacy from the campsite.
Olivia's fingers splayed out his wet skin. Her palm opened, flexed, slid. "You need to dry off," Olivia
murmured, her lips near his. Her voice was even, full of air, hypnotizing.
"Depends on how you look at it," Elliot mused quietly, his words pushed into her hair. "Either I could get
dry, or you..." he paused. "Could get wet."
She exhaled, long and slow, her breath fanning against his damp chest. "Maybe once. Maybe once we could
do this and just get it out of our systems. Maybe that's the best thing to do. Just get it over with. Then we
could go back to being partners and just forget it, you know? Maybe it's just this place." It was rushed,
desperate, nearly indecipherable.
Elliot laughed, feeling the effects of it seep into his lungs. "You think we could do this just once and stop?"
He shrugged. "Sure," he grinned, slipping his wet palms up beneath the sides of her t-shirt, feeling her hot
skin beneath his hands. "Let's go ahead and give that a try."
Olivia lifted her sleepy eyes to his, her lips parted in a drowsy, sensual offering. "You're a bastard, Stabler,"
she whispered.
He brushed his lips against hers. Testing. Teasing. The barest hint of a touch. "Pretty much," he agreed, and
then slid his other hand over her jaw and dragged her mouth up to meet his.
+++
Back to index

A/N: I'm so sorry this is taking forever. I'm trying - but cross-country travel, work and a huge family
wedding next weekend are just kicking my ass. I'm aiming for longer chapters to make up for my obvious
slacker tendencies. (Hey! 12,000 words a chap, please forgive me?) J Jess, Pooks, Brynn - you rule my
world for all the help. No Pooks, the lake will not dry up before they do the nasty, so you can stop checking
the water levels. Haha. Jess, the marshmallows was genius, and yes, CM's InStyle article was pics for me,
grilling for you. Brynn, because you asked, my writing song was "I Look After You" by The Fray for this.
Lastly, Foo - you made my whole world brighter with this gorgeous sig. I don't know what to tell you,
except for that you inspire me. I'm so shocked how many people are reading this - thank you.
Elliot's mouth was on her.
That was the bare minimum of Olivia's current reality, and that was the maximum that she could process.
When she had watched him slowly emerge from the water, his hands on his face wiping the water away
from his eyes, she had been paralyzed. His narrow, muscular hips had shifted with each deliberate step, and
his chest had glimmered from the sunlight trapped in the wetness that dripped from him. His swim trunks
rested low on his waist and the weight of the water made them cling to every, single detail about him. She'd
watched, no longer breathing, as the muscles in his chest had moved, shifted, flexed, and she had been
stunned into silence.
She'd seen his chest before. She'd seen Elliot without a shirt on before. But this time was different. This
wasn't just simple admiration for his physique.
This was pure, raw, physical need.
Olivia had watched him come closer, unable to say anything that would stop him. Her skin was hot, her eyes
burning, and his wet body beckoned as if it would cool her down.
Of course, that had been a deceptive mirage. Because the longer he had stood in front of her, the higher her
internal temperature had soared.

Ultimately, she'd given up fighting it.
Elliot's thumb now tugged her lower lip down, opening her mouth to him again. He kissed her slowly,
deeply, possessively, and Olivia had no choice but to step closer to him. Her hands were moving of their
own volition, sliding up over his wet chest and around, along his shoulders, down his arms and then back up
again until they curved around his neck.
Olivia moaned from the searing pleasure of it, dropping her head to the side. Elliot took advantage right
away, his mouth settling on her jaw line.
She tried to reconcile this Elliot with the one that she had known for eight years. She tried to fit all of the
moments, all of the cases, all of the days that she had been given with him in the same reality in which she
currently stood. Olivia knew that denying she had wanted him was a lie. But for all the ways in which she
had speculated he would be when it came down to it, she could have never imagined this side of him.
She could never have imagined that he'd be playful, sexy, demanding in his seduction. That Elliot would
innately command a response, that he'd use her bullshit excuses against her. That he wouldn't hesitate to
make her open her mouth for him, that he wouldn't be reluctant to pull her hard and fast up against his
arousal. He made no apologies for the force of his want, and he didn't temper his roaming hands.
There was hot, relentless sex in every movement he instinctively made.
His hot, open mouth slid along her neck, his fingers sliding up into her ponytail. "Olivia," he groaned. "Of
course you have to agree to this now, right? You couldn't have known you wanted this an hour ago when
privacy meant more than just a few trees?"
Did she truly know she wanted it? Or did she know that she didn't want it? Wasn't that what she had
meant? That she wanted to get it over with, get this reckless attraction dealt with once and for all?
"This is dangerous, Elliot," she said, her protest coming out as a half-hearted excuse. His big hand was now
sliding down her neck, playing along the neckline of her t-shirt.
His lips lifted in a sensual, teasing smile. "Danger never deterred you before." His finger trailed down the
side of her neck. "Don't tell me you're gonna chicken out now?"
Elliot was treating her as if her excuses weren't valid. For a moment her anger flared again. "Am I the only
one trying to save our partnership here, El? Don't do that. Don't make me out to be the bad guy. That's not
fair and you know it." Olivia pulled back, feeling her frustration build. She was relieved in a way. Her
frustration, her anger, her fear, those were the reliable standbys. Those were the ones that dulled the stark
image of a wet, glistening, half-naked Elliot Stabler from her eyes and gave her some solid footing. "I'm
trying to hold on to what I have. And you're just racing forward without thinking!"
Elliot stepped closer to her, his eyes darkening. He tilted his head. "You think I haven't thought about this?
I've spent the last two years trying to figure out what in the hell was going to make me feel some semblance
of being alive again. And I tried everything. Jesus, I even tried going home again. But that didn't do it,
Olivia." He pressed his lips together for one moment, squinting as he looked over her shoulder. When he
finally looked back at her, she knew he was tempering down the extent of his true frustration. "But when I
touch you, when I get my hands on you and you're against me, I'm fucking alive again. God help me, you
and the entire NYPD, because that's the only damned truth I know right now!"
Olivia didn't want to understand. She didn't want to listen to what he was saying. It couldn't be about more
than one time and somewhere deep inside of her, she knew she was deliberately provoking him just to get
some space to process the true ramifications of what he was saying. "So sex with me would make you feel
better?" she said sarcastically. "Well, in that case, why the hell not? Anything to make Elliot Stabler feel
better?" she said sarcastically. "Well, in that case, why the hell not? Anything to make Elliot Stabler feel
better, right?"
He flinched, his jaw setting tightly. She saw him take a deep, even breath as if trying to calm himself. This
was something he had learned while she had been away. He'd always just let himself explode before, and
then, while she had been in Oregon, he'd learned to do the opposite. To suppress, to compact all of it within
him. Both approaches had to be combustible as hell.
Danger never deterred you before.
He was wrong. Danger terrified her. She always just chose the path of least destruction. And for now, that
meant pushing him away.
He watched her face intently. "Watch it, Olivia. Don't say anything else you're gonna regret," he murmured
before she could say anything. Tension swarmed around him.
Around them.
Maybe it was the implied threat in his voice that made her snap. She stepped closer to him, lifting her chin.
"You think I'm an idiot, Elliot? Ten minutes after you give your marriage the boot you're in Grant's cabin
shoving your tongue down my throat." Olivia cocked her head, fear, anger and frustration melding into one,
hot, gurgling pool of quicksand. "At what point did you see the word ‘rebound' tattooed on my forehead?"
"Olivia-" he warned.
But she cut him off, air pushing out of her nose, her throat, her chest. "No, Elliot. I'm sick of this. I'm sick
of ending up hurt because of you. You don't know what the hell makes you happy, and in the process of
trying to figure it out over the last few years, it's me that's had to bear the brunt of your bullshit. Kathy left
you and you shut down. Then, when that didn't make you feel better, you started blowing up. Then I leave,
and all of a sudden you try calming the hell down. I come back and you try moving home. So what the hell
is it that you need, Elliot? Because from where I'm standing, you don't have a damned clue, and yet you
think I should trust you to know that you want me?"
Elliot stepped back, his feet planted shoulder-width apart in the sand. He folded his arms across his bare
chest as he tilted his head and pressed his lips tightly together. "Keep going," he said quietly. Dangerously.
"Because there's more right, Olivia? So do it," he challenged, a sneer forming on his face. "Keep going.
Why stop now?"
Her chest was pounding, the adrenaline pulsing through her. Somewhere, deep inside of her, it was all
coming out. All of it. All of the years. His image blurred in front of her. "You just do whatever you want,
Elliot! You just go for it. And sometimes, I admire that you do. But other times..." Olivia shook her head. "I
hate you for it. I hate you for not thinking things through, for not realizing that people get hurt along the
way." The pitch of Olivia's voice rose, and she couldn't control it. Not this time. Not when unraveling
seemed unstoppable. "You think that just because Kathy said she was fine with moving forward with the
divorce that she didn't get hurt by your last minute Hail Mary there? Because if that's what you think, let me
just clear this up for you. She got hurt, Elliot! She got fucking hurt!"
Elliot's eyes were frost blue as he laughed mirthlessly. "One talk with her and all of a sudden you know
how she feels?" His lips curled in a snarl as he leaned in closer to her. "She'd already signed the papers too,
Olivia. So at least let's be honest here and for God's sake say what you mean. You mean you got hurt when I
asked to move home!"
Olivia flinched. She wanted to tell him he was wrong, but there was a fine line between denial and lying and
she wasn't willing to cross it. His blue eyes were on fire right now, full of accusation and disbelief. She
she wasn't willing to cross it. His blue eyes were on fire right now, full of accusation and disbelief. She
found herself trapped in them, unable to look away from the dark centers of his pupils that were framed by
the mutable, fickle blue.
The longer they stared at each other in silence, the closer Olivia came to stepping forward, to just wanting
the ache on her skin to stop. She wanted to say she was sorry and she wanted to hear him say it, too. She
wanted to feel the thick cords of his arms slip around her waist, and she wanted to find some relief pressed
flat up against him.
She wanted to be fearless. But she wasn't, so she simply stood still and waited.
Elliot looked past her for a moment, out onto the lake. When he looked at her again, the frost had become a
solid, dark layer of ice and his voice had submerged somewhere beneath it. "You want to tell me how the
hell I was supposed to know I was hurting you, when you did your damned best to act like you didn't give a
shit?"
That brought her head up a little bit. "What do you mean?"
He leaned closer to her, shifting on his feet and tightening the fold of his arms. "I mean," he gritted his jaw.
"I mean that you knew, Olivia. You recognized it before I did. You figured out that being partners meant
something like what Munch and Fin have. It wasn't this. It wasn't this inability to let anyone else in.
Because that's the damning truth, isn't it? You and me, we can't let anyone else in. And after Gitano held
that fucking gun to my head, you figured it all out." He scowled. "That's why you left. It wasn't because I
was such a pain in the ass like you wanted everyone to believe. It was because you had figured out why we
were both so miserable." Elliot laughed, the sound rueful and harsh at the same time. "So instead of being
honest with me, instead of trusting me and maybe, just maybe, helping me out of my own confusion, you
ran." He bent over, leaning towards her. "That high horse doesn't feel so high anymore, does it Olivia?" he
whispered.
There was too much truth in his words. Olivia had run from him. She had run from herself. And she hated
that there was a little part of her, deep inside, that was tired as hell of running, because it would get her into
trouble if she indulged it. "Why didn't you just know?" she asked quietly before realizing the words had
slipped from her mouth. "You should have just known."
Elliot lifted his face, surprised too that she had responded without ammunition. "What?" he breathed.
She had already asked once, so dying twice couldn't hurt any more than it already had. Olivia looked at him,
at the face that the sun had settled upon, at the lashes still clinging to the last drops of moisture from the
lake, at the dark stubble that shadowed his skin. She met the familiar eyes that had softened with
compassion, but that still held the residual wariness left behind in the months after war.
"Why didn't you just know that we were... different?" she said, struggling to keep the full extent of her hurt
that he hadn't discovered this about them out of her voice.
You didn't feel it, Elliot? How could you not see it? Sometimes I think you see too much, and other times
you see nothing at all.
Elliot stilled. He closed his eyes, as if the sun could warm his eyelids enough to melt the coldness that had
lived beneath them only moments before.
But he didn't give her an answer.
Olivia stepped closer to him, feeling like there wasn't anything left to protect. She prayed her voice would
hold out. "You're right, Elliot. I left because I felt too much for you. Outside of that hospital room, you
hold out. "You're right, Elliot. I left because I felt too much for you. Outside of that hospital room, you
essentially told me that those feelings had no place between us because they would cost us our partnership,
and you were right. Even when I came back, I tried to maintain some level of distance. But then, when I
found Simon, you..." Her throat caught, choking on her own words. "You were there, Elliot. Every step of
the way, even when I didn't want you to be. Even when I didn't know how to let you be. You created this
safe space for me to figure things out. You stood between me and everyone - Cragen, the squad, Millfield,
even Simon - and you protected me. Physically, professionally, emotionally. And everything I thought I had
managed to make go away in Oregon came back." Olivia rubbed her fingers over her face, knowing they
would come away wet. It didn't matter. Not when he knew the rest of her already anyways. Not when she
was more concerned about the things falling apart on the inside of her. "You know, even earlier, when I
thought you needed me, when that Bedford kid died and you thought you did it, I thought I could somehow
show you that I was sorry I had taken the Oregon assignment by clearing you. I thought I could show you
what you meant to me, no matter what it took."
Elliot dragged his eyes to hers. "And I went back to Kathy afterwards," he said, his words guttural.
Punctuated. Hollow with recognition.
Olivia shook her head, using her palms on her face this time. "I didn't know that until later. Until after I
found Simon. Until after I had already let myself rely on you more than I should again."
His lips had parted to accommodate the heavy rise and fall of his chest. He was staring at her, his face a
blank, granite mask. "You relied on me, and then you found out I had already gone back to Kathy," he said
dully. Elliot looked empty of anything more than basic comprehension.
"I knew your family always came first." Olivia shrugged, as if the simple movement would throw off the
ache from where it clutched her shoulders. "Besides, I hadn't proven anything to you. I wasn't the one that
cleared you." She tried to look at him and failed. "Anyways, the part that hurt the most in that whole disaster
was when you stood in Cragen's office and told us you were done. I..." She couldn't breathe, she couldn't
even stand. She dug her bare toes into the hot sand, looking for some semblance of balance. "I just
remember how you weren't gonna fight. You were just gonna let them lock you up, or at the very least take
your badge. You were gonna walk away from being a cop, from being my partner, from..."Olivia dug her
short fingernails into her palms just to keep breathing. "You never called me. You never talked to me about
it. Instead, you just decided all by yourself to...give up on everything. On me."
Stop whining, Olivia. Just stop whining. You're the one that walked away from him first without talking to
him about it. When it came down to it, why did he owe you anything different?
He didn't know you always knew you would come back. He didn't know you could never walk away from
him for good.
He didn't know he was the only one you had.
He seemed startled. "Olivia, that wasn't about giving up on you."
Her head jerked up. "See? That's what I mean. You thought you were just giving up on yourself. But you
weren't, Elliot. You didn't think about what your choice meant for anyone else. For me. And that's what
scares me. That's why I know what this is."
"What this is?"
"This attraction. You're thinking about you, Elliot. You're not thinking about how when you're done, when
sex isn't the thing that makes you feel better anymore, how it'll hurt me!"

"You still think this is some random thing," he shook his head, twisting his lips. "You still think I'd risk
our...friendship, to use the term loosely these days, over sex? You honestly think I would use you?"
Her pain, her frustration, won. "Not intentionally, Elliot, but in the end - you don't know how not to."
His face cleared, his expression smoothing out. "Good to know." The bitterness was apparent in the flat,
reverberating cadence of his voice. "Eight years together and all you can come up with is that I'm a selfish
bastard that's so hot for you that I'd fuck up everything we've got for a good lay." His eyes dragged down
her body and then back up again. He smirked angrily. "A great lay." Elliot rubbed his hand over his head,
his skin nearly dry. "I'll leave you alone, Olivia. You want to switch partners when we get back, then do
what you need to do. There's no way that in a few days here I'm going to be able to undo the fact that you
think I've got shit for brains and a hard-on without a conscience. But when you run, and I'm sure you will,
think about the fact that if you had just opened your goddamned mouth, if you had just asked for what you
needed, you might have actually gotten it a long time ago."
Her anger, her pain, her inability to hear the harsh truth all melded together into a defense whose only
strategy was a good offense. Her hands practically balled into fists. "Don't flatter yourself, Elliot. I don't
need you. Not anymore. I made that mistake once, and I won't make it again."
Elliot didn't even flinch this time, and somewhere in her empty chest, she knew that was the worst sign of
all. That they had hurt each other so many times that they either expected it, or were so numb to it that they
didn't react at all. His hand lifted, his finger reaching out to swipe across her bangs, shifting them out of her
eyes. The tender gesture had no place in the midst of the viciousness, or maybe it did. Maybe it was them in
a nutshell. "You need me, Olivia. Just like I need you," he said roughly.
For all of her accusations, for all of her fears when it came to him, he had just offered her more of himself
in one sentence than she had offered him in eight years. For the first time in the last ten minutes she heard
the sounds of the other campers across the field behind her, heard the sound of the water as it lapped against
the metal side of the canoe tied to the dock. She heard him breathing, and heard herself unable to do so. "El,
I don't want a new partner. I just want to keep what we have," she explained softly.
"You're so afraid of ending up with less, that you forget to try for more," he said, his head bent and his lips
near her forehead. "I can't make promises, Liv. I'd be lying if I said I could. And I know better than anyone
that I've fucked up more times than I can count. But I'm trying to listen to my gut here, and my gut is saying
that we need to keep-"
He was trying to convince her again. To explain to her why they should let this attraction run its course,
consequences be damned.
He hadn't heard a word she had said.
Olivia pulled back. Her eyes narrowed in anger. "That's not your gut talking, Stabler. That's your dick."
As soon as the words were out of her mouth, she felt the air rush out of her in shock. Even she couldn't
believe what she had just said. For all of the times they had baited one another, this time may have been the
final straw. She watched him retreat, withdraw, close up again. He blinked, startled at the crass, callous way
she had rebutted his confession and then stepped back from her. His expression changed, his eyes shuttered.
Elliot just stared at her, as if the last person on earth had finally proven they were a disappointment too.
He didn't say anything, and Olivia suddenly knew the true powerlessness of regret. "El-" she started,
realizing she had gone much too far.

God, she had gone too far. Jesus.
But he shook his head, a sad smile playing over his lips. He looked down at the sand, as if the words he
needed were somewhere in the grains that still stuck ruthlessly to his wet feet, but that would easily fall
away from her dry ones. He had been willing to jump into the water to get some relief from the heat, yet the
thought hadn't even occurred to her. Maybe that was fitting.
She tried again. "El..."
"Don't, Olivia," he said quietly. When he finally dragged his eyes back up to hers, she felt as if someone
had punched her squarely in the gut. He was out of the water, but he was still drowning nonetheless, and his
resignation to his fate was written all over his face. "You're right and I'm sorry," he said evenly, his voice a
low, death march drumbeat that pounded onto her skin. His jaw clenched. "I thought..." he stopped. "I
thought I could make you feel the same way. Like we both finally had something." He shook his head again
as if clearing his misperception. "I shouldn't have assumed you'd need me too."
Elliot stepped around her then, walking away to get his towel so he could fully dry off.
She was suddenly alone on the sand.
Olivia stood there, frozen, her hands hanging empty at her sides. Out of her peripheral vision she could see
him swipe his towel and shirt, heading back to the campsite without looking at her. She faced the water
fully, her mouth still bearing the effects of his. It figured that now would be when the breeze would pick up
off the lake, ruffling her bangs and cooling her down far too quickly. The wind dried the few remaining
spots of moisture from where he had dripped onto her arm.
And when the wind settled down a moment later, her skin was dry. The effects of him on her gone but not
forgotten. Her blurry eyes focused on the end of the dock, searching for a buoy that only last night had been
a lifeline for her.
She saw the white rope of it, but the buoy itself was tangled around the leg of the dock, keeping it just out
of sight. Olivia closed her eyes tightly.
He had finally talked to her. He had finally opened up, and she had used his confessions against him. Elliot
had given her far more importance than she deserved, far more power over his well-being than she should
have been entrusted with and she'd shown him immediately and effectively how little she could be relied on
with any of it.
I shouldn't have assumed you'd need me too.
It was her own damned fault, just like every other mess she lived with. She should have told him. She should
have stopped him, grabbed his arm, told him the truth about things like her wants, her needs, the terrifying
things that were taking shape in the recesses of her heart.
"I need you too," she said quietly, rubbing the heel of her hands against her face. She wouldn't cry anymore.
Not out here. Not just because the first time she had ever said those words, there wasn't anyone there to hear
them.
She had been scared, as she had always been.
Scared that the need he had for her would be finite, when hers for him knew no bounds.
+++

Elliot wanted to ignore her. He wanted to be done with her. He wanted to be able to look at her and not
feel his gut twist and sway in the wind as if it had been tied precariously to a laundry line in the middle of a
tornado.
Wanting things was a bitch. And wanting Olivia Benson was the worst kind of bitch of all.
She sat at the picnic table twenty feet away from him, her head bent to the task of peeling an orange. The
skin didn't fall away in big chunks; instead it was one of those oranges whose skin was just a little too dry
so the peel came off in tiny, frustrating pieces.
Or maybe Olivia was peeling it that way deliberately so that it would take her longer, so that she would have
no reason to look up at him.
He noticed that the rubber band was once again out of her hair, and she had done it despite the heat. Which
meant she was trying to hide behind that curtain of hair, shielding herself from exposure at every turn.
She wasn't eating either. And of all the stupid things he'd let her do, between this heat and the upcoming
high ropes exercise, not eating wasn't something he was going to let her get away with. He turned to the
table behind him, the one he had been leaning against while watching her and the one that was still full of
food, and grabbed a plate. He dumped salad and a piece of chicken on the plate and pulled an icy bottle of
water out of the bucket. He snagged a plastic fork, knife and napkin and made his way over to her.
Jess sat to Olivia's left, and Cathy diagonally across from her. But while the two other women were engaged
in conversation, Olivia sat peeling her orange as if she were a dedicated factory worker in some third world
country. Her head was low, her attention focused. She was working so slowly on the piece of fruit that he
figured she'd finally be able to eat it sometime around dinner.
He dropped the full plate directly in front of her, letting it hit the table with a smack so hard that the lettuce
and chicken bounced a little bit. He slammed the water down next to it.
She didn't look up. Her hands simply stilled on the orange while the table fell into silence for a moment.
Elliot gave Cathy an irritated look at the sudden stop of conversation and the woman started up again, her
voice cracking as she awkwardly tried to tear her gaze off of him and direct it back to an equally startled
Jessica.
"Eat it," he said to Olivia. "I won't have you passing out in the middle of nowhere."
Olivia tried to look up at him, then decided better of it when her eyes reached the faded USMC logo on his
khaki green t-shirt. She dropped her eyes and started up again on the orange. "Not hungry."
"I didn't ask if you were."
That brought her eyes up to his as he took a seat next to Cathy, directly across from Olivia. He knew he had
the advantage here, because she wouldn't want to make a scene in public, yet she knew he would if he had
to. She'd eat. He didn't care how stupid they both looked arguing about it.
She leaned over the table. "This macho bullshit is about as attractive as- "
Elliot laughed. "I don't give a shit what's attractive. Or did you forget that's no longer an issue for us?
You're my partner, and I'm looking out for your safety. And I don't want you on the high ropes on the verge
of passing out. So," he reached across the table and lifted her fork, stabbing it into the still-warm chicken
and letting it rest there. "Eat."

Olivia shot a startled glance towards Cathy. To his right, conversation had stopped, Cathy no longer able to
keep up the pretense of not being interested. His eyes were on Olivia, but he could tell by the way her face
had paled that Cathy had caught her eyes out of blatant curiosity.
Olivia hated having an audience.
He, on the other hand, didn't really give a shit anymore.
Of course Olivia wasn't one to back down, to take orders, to give in. She stared at him, glaring angrily while
the muscle in her jaw jumped again and again.
He remained impassive, waiting for her to take a bite of the food.
It was a good, old-fashioned picnic table stand-off. He could almost hear the ominous musical whistling of
an old Western playing in the background.
"So!" Cathy said brightly, startling all of them. "The chicken was amazing, Olivia! You'll really enjoy it. I
think they had marinated in some lemon and garlic concoction. But whatever it was, it was delicious.
Although," she leaned over the table towards a startled Olivia and lowered her voice. "Jim's grandma Bette
makes the same sort of chicken and she adds just a hint of thyme to hers and it's unbelievable. Plus, that
dressing they put out for the salad didn't really go with the chicken, so it's a good thing Elliot here," she
nudged Elliot's elbow with her own, "didn't put too much on your salad because that would have been a
huge mistake."
A laugh coughed up and out of him. Elliot couldn't help it. The woman was a veritable talking head. For that
one moment, he found himself liking her. A lot.
Even Olivia blinked. Once. Twice. "I'm not hungry," she started.
Cathy reached across the table, ignoring every rule about touching Olivia had probably ever dreamt up when
she grabbed her forearm. "Are you feeling okay? Because people react differently to stings. Maybe you're
not hungry because you have a fever?" She pulled her hand off of Olivia and gave Elliot a wide-eyed look,
meant to seem innocent and concerned all at the same time. "Maybe she should go lie down for awhile, don't
you think, Elliot? Maybe you could take her back to the cabin and make sure she doesn't burn up," she said
dramatically, looking at Olivia.
Olivia meaningfully, purposefully and emphatically dug into her salad, the orange long forgotten.
"Oh! Well," Cathy continued, extracting herself from the table as she grinned widely. "Glad you're feeling
better. You just never know with those stings." She patted Elliot on the arm as she turned, winking at him.
He was sorry he had ever been rude to her before. There was something about her that was magnetic. An
understanding masked by her light, airy personality. A sense of hope that he instinctively knew she
consciously worked at maintaining.
In a way, he wished that some of her smiles, some of her faith would rub off on his partner.
The one who didn't want anything more because she didn't trust him to know what he wanted in the first
place.
In seconds, Jessica excused herself from the table too and he was left sitting across from Olivia, silence
lying like a wall of bricks between them. Olivia cut into her chicken, never lifting her gaze from her plate.

He watched her because he knew she wouldn't find her voice simply to tell him to stop. It wouldn't be worth
it to her to speak out loud. Her bangs moved as she blinked, hitting her lashes, and her shoulders were now
bare because she had changed into a light blue ribbed tank top to accommodate the heat. The top dipped
farther down than the t-shirt had, and as she huddled over her plate he found his gaze wandering over the
smooth column of her neck, down, across the top swell of her full breasts. Elliot found himself noticing
details about her that for some reason he hadn't analyzed fully before. The wide-set, almond shape of her
eyes, the arch of her eyebrows, the curve of her bottom lip.
Olivia took a few more bites without really looking at him and he wondered what would have happened if
she had told him months ago that she had some level of emotion for him that had nothing to do with being
partners. He wondered if he would have been ready to hear it, or if he would have been scared by the
prospect of disappointing her in the same way he had let down his family.
You walked away from her after Gitano. Out of everyone, you were most scared of leaving her alone if you
died. You knew that everyone else would survive without you, but she wouldn't. And you knew that because
you figured you wouldn't survive without her in the reverse, Stabler. You knew that and you didn't tell her.
So who's the liar now?
His chest began to pound, hammering beneath his ribcage. He had just accused her of running from him by
not telling him how she felt. He had told her that her life being a mess was her fault, because she didn't ask
for the things she needed.
When she came over after the Sennet case, you wanted her to come upstairs with you. You didn't want to go
out for breakfast. You wanted to make it for her while she sat at your table, her tired head cradled in her
hands and her sleepy voice filling your apartment.
He watched her eat now, her right arm propped on the table and her forehead resting in the palm of her hand
as she meticulously, silently chewed the food he had put in front of her.
She told you she had been alone her whole life, and you barely said anything. You were scared shitless to
tell her that she hadn't been alone since you had met her. That she had you. That you'd never, ever walk
away from her.
Her hand finally stilled, her fork full of lettuce as it hovered mid-air. Olivia let it drop from her hands,
giving up and setting her head into both her palms.
Elliot drank in the long lines of her forearms, and the smooth, shapely fingers that had never been graced by
a ring of commitment or left empty when it had come time to remove the same band. She'd never had
anyone, and he'd been angry she didn't know how to ask for more.
When you went home to Kathy, you were going back to what was familiar. When you were the most
terrified, you picked what you knew even if it wasn't what you wanted.
Olivia had always known running, protecting herself, waiting for the other shoe to drop. She relied on
escape because that was familiar to her.
She looked at you, Stabler. Outside of that house in Florida she looked at you and thanked you for trusting
her. Her eyes had been full of pain, her shoulders beaten down beneath all that she had learned, all that she
had endured. Yet she found it within herself to thank you and you didn't stand still. You were so damned
jealous of that Fed's involvement that you ignored her, and you ended up letting her mistakenly think that if
she took of you, needed you, that you'd resent her. You'd be angry. You'd walk away.

"Olivia," he finally said, his voice a low thrum that vibrated in his throat.
She didn't look up, her eyes remained focused on the slats of the table and her bangs were pushed up by the
heels of her hands.
"You were right," he murmured. "I didn't take my own advice. I didn't tell you what I needed either. And I
did know, Olivia. I knew for longer than I wanted to admit that there was something more between us."
Olivia didn't say anything; she didn't even lift her head. But he saw her fingers tighten in her hair, saw her
head drop just a little bit more.
He saw her shoulders shudder, just once.
Behind her, he saw the group head out to the center of the field for the next activity. He could have spoken
louder now, if he had been at all confident of his ability to speak.
"You asked me why I didn't know," he said softly, his voice cracking beneath the effort. "But I did. I knew
that together we were...different. That as partners, as friends, as more, we weren't like everyone else. But it
wasn't because of me, Olivia. I'm just an ordinary asshole when it comes down to it. But you're not. You're
the thing that makes us different, Liv. You make me different."
Her head finally went down, cradled in her elbows as she slid her fingers along her scalp, grabbing fistfuls
of her own hair.
And as he looked at her for just a moment longer, he finally realized that of all the times he had watched
her and felt he had the right to, in this moment, he wasn't owed a thing.
Elliot slid his legs out from beneath the table, and dragged his eyes away from her as he stood. "I don't
always like who I am to you." Elliot blew out a strangled breath. "But I like who I am with you, Olivia. And
whether or not you want more with me, you should know at least that much."
He stood there for a second longer, squinting out at the field where the group was forming a circle. Olivia
didn't move from where she sat, her face buried in the hollow of her arms.
But in the second before he finally left her alone, he looked down and could have sworn he saw the
slightest tremble shake her normally stalwart shoulders.
+++
Sitting out in the middle of a field in Upstate New York in the early part of the afternoon, the air oppressive,
the blades of grass against the back of her legs the only relief from the heat, Olivia had never felt more
vulnerable.
The sound that gunfire made had long since stopped making her flinch, the adrenaline rush of executing a
search had years ago dimmed. She had discovered that she had a brother, uncovered the truth about her
father, and she'd felt the sharp, biting slice of a knife slipping across her skin. She had even found a space
within her that gave safe harbor to the horror they saw far too often.
Yet none of those experiences compared to this. Not one of them could scare her, terrify her, strip her bare
in the same way that just a few rushed words from Elliot had.
She had wanted to look at him when he said them. Olivia had heard the nearly violent ripping of his voice
as he had laid himself out for her, and she had wanted to simply look up, to meet his eyes, to feel her own
burn against the image of Elliot standing there and daringly offering himself up for scrutiny.
burn against the image of Elliot standing there and daringly offering himself up for scrutiny.
But she had limits to what she could take. What she could withstand. And watching her partner, watching
Elliot, say things she never imagined he would was more than she could handle.
You make me different.
Her legs were stretched out in front of her, and one thigh began bouncing just a little bit, her anxiety levels
escalating. She folded her legs Indian style hoping that would stop the motion and looked up at Grant, trying
to focus on what he was saying.
But Elliot was there, across the circle from her. He wasn't even pretending to listen. She knew, even without
looking at him, that he was staring at the grass, searching for something. Just the haze of his presence in her
peripheral vision was enough to make her forearms ache again. She hadn't known for the first few minutes
why her skin had tingled uncomfortably there, but then she knew.
She knew.
Her arms had been on him less than an hour ago. Sliding along his skin when he had stood in front of her,
his body still wet from the lake. His mouth had been on her, opening her to him, crossing lines and
boundaries with lightening speed.
She was scared to death of never being able to go back to just being his partner. Olivia knew what he tasted
like now. She knew the groan that would tear from Elliot's throat as he kissed her; she knew what it felt like
to feel the heat of his bare skin against her body.
The way Elliot felt against her terrified her, but the way she felt against him petrified her even more. It was
more than physical. The ache he created went far beyond something that he could assuage with his mouth,
his hands, his rock-hard body buried high inside of her and pushing her over the brink.
Despite her fear, a simple glance at him, at the way his muscles flexed in his arms as he grabbed and pulled
at fistfuls of grass, and she felt her body flame. For just a brief moment she let herself imagine it. She let
herself think about lying beneath him, her legs wrapped around his waist as he teased her, as he talked to
her in the deep rumble and pitch of his voice, as he locked his arm beneath her thigh and opened her to him
as he moved deeper into her. He'd be big, hard, and she wondered if she'd stop aching once Elliot was
inside of her.
"Olivia?"
She blinked, trying to focus on the voice. Jessica. That meant to her left. She turned to face the younger girl.
"Yeah?"
Jessica smiled patiently, handing her the box of pens and the stack of index cards that had been making its
way around the circle. "Take a few cards so it's easier to write on."
Olivia tried to smile in appreciation, but by the time she figured her expression reflected her gratitude,
Jessica was already talking to Hannah on the other side of her.
Cards. Pens.
Shit, she hadn't listened at all to this activity. She took a few cards and slipped a blue pen out of the box,
then handed them to Cathy on her right.

Cathy smiled at her. "Two truths and a lie."
Olivia jerked. "What?"
Cathy laughed. "It's supposed to build our knowledge of each other as a team before the high ropes. Teach
us to trust each other with our emotional safety before we trust each other with our physical safety."
Olivia felt herself deflate, knowing Cathy was simply repeating the spiel that Grant must have just given all
of them. No wonder Elliot had torn bare patches in the grass next to him. He had been listening to the
instructions of the activity when she hadn't been.
Trust each other with our emotional safety before we trust each other with our physical safety.
Elliot knew this was as much bullshit as she did. That wasn't how it worked. It was the opposite.
Olivia stared at the blank card in her hand. "What the hell do we write? How does this work?"
Jessica leaned over, interjecting. "Just write down two things about you that are true, and one that's a lie.
Then you fold your card and put it into the box in the center." She smiled, obviously enjoying the prospect
of the game. "We go around, pick a card, read it and try to guess whose it is based upon what we've learned
about each other and then you have to guess the lie."
Olivia rubbed the back of her hand against her forehead. "Thanks," she muttered, as Cathy and Jessica went
back to writing theirs down.
Long, frustrating moments later she finally thought of something to write on the blank card.
I'm a detective with the NYPD.
One down, two to go. She was feeling better about this game when she heard Grant's laughter coming from
the center of the circle, where he sat with the box. He was holding open a card he was reading, and as she
caught Elliot's eyes she realized he was already done, his card already deposited in the box.
Or maybe not. Grant was reading the card in his hand. "Elliot. We all know you're a detective with the
NYPD. You can't use things that are so obvious, or that you've already stated. It defeats the purpose of the
game." He was relishing the fact that he had something to hold over Elliot.
Elliot narrowed his eyes at Grant, his lips thinning into a straight line. He was silent, daring Grant to say
something more.
But Grant had already proven that self-preservation rarely occurred to him. "Try it again, Elliot. Just be a
little less obvious." He chuckled again at Elliot's supposed display of inaptitude.
For one second as she watched him, she wondered if he would take Grant apart. If this was the moment he
would rush across the circle and haul Grant up by his shirt. Olivia kept her eye on him, watching him eye
Grant dangerously.
Then Elliot looked at her. For some reason the fact that they were both caught at this camp, doing this
ridiculous exercise, made her smile. It sucked, but it sucked for the both of them, and that made it a little bit
better.
He smiled too, just a little bit, most of the gesture caught in his eyes.

Just like that, they both relaxed.
He bent his head first, writing something down immediately. It gave her courage to stare at the new card she
had shuffled to the top of her pile. Thoughts raced through her head.
I've abandoned my partner before. My mother was an alcoholic. My father raped my mother. I've killed
someone.
Olivia squeezed her eyes shut against the first self-truths that sprung to mind. She hated that those were the
first things that she thought of. There had to be more. Parts of her that existed outside the realm of secrets.
Misunderstandings. Hurt.
My favorite show as a kid was Eight is Enough.
She almost laughed out loud as she realized she was already writing it down on her card. She had been nine
or ten when the show had started, and for the next few years she had escaped into a world of television. Into
a show in which a house was barely big enough to hold all of the siblings and a woman who wasn't even
their mother was willing to step in and love them all. It was a world that made her believe that somewhere,
kids just like her worried about breaking windows with baseballs and about hiding fender benders from their
parents.
If I could go anywhere in the world, I'd go to Greece.
She had been seventeen years old and studying Greek mythology when she had come across pictures of the
white-tipped froth of the sea that surrounded Santorini. For nearly a year afterwards, she had bought feta-
sprinkled gyros and souvlaki sandwiches from the street vendor on the corner. His name had been Mikos,
and his weathered face had been lined with a lifetime of travel, of dreams, of laughter. He had spent years
on the streets of New York, selling simple salads, breads, and tzatziki sauce, and as she had stood there and
told him of her dream about one day going to Santorini, he had filled her head with stories of his childhood
in the village of Krinides, just north of Kavala. She had looked for him one day, just after she had
graduated from college, and the handsome face of the dark-skinned man that had manned the same cart told
her Mikos had passed away only a few weeks earlier. But the younger man had smiled at her, introduced
himself as Nikolas and said that his uncle had mentioned she might stop by again one day.
She needed a lie.
One sprang to mind, quickly, emphatically. But she quelled it, knowing it wasn't one she could give voice
to. Not yet. She had to think of something else.
I think Brad Pitt is sexy.
She smiled. She had never been into pretty boys. And the fact that she firmly believed he had cheated on his
wife made him lose major points. She respected people that worked on their marriages, that tried even when
it became difficult.
Olivia folded her card and got up to drop it in the box.
As much as it had hurt when Elliot went home, she had to admit that despite his confusion, she had
respected the hell out of him for even thinking about trying. For thinking he might have owed it to his
family, for not being able to let go of his commitment just because it wasn't perfect.
He won't let go of you because you aren't perfect either, Olivia. Kathy left him first, not the other way
around. He doesn't run. He doesn't always get it right, but he doesn't just walk away either.

Elliot had sat down only moments before her, his card completed too. And as she looked at him, as she took
in his weary eyes and the face that had seen too much, she suddenly wanted to give him something more
than what he had. The last year for her had been hell, but it had been for him too. His marriage had ended,
he'd been accused of murder, two partners had walked away. Maybe those were the big things for him. But
she knew there was more. He'd been physically hurt twice, he'd pulled a young mother's body out of a noose
in her living room, he'd been there with Olivia when they had been forced to face a family, much like his
own, that had been slaughtered where they slept.
There had to be some relief somewhere. And maybe he was right. Maybe it was with each other.
"Okay! Are we ready?" Grant enthused, jumping up and grabbing the small, cardboard box. He walked over
to Hannah and handed it to her. "Let's start here. Go ahead, take one."
Hannah laughed, taking the box and reaching in. She pulled out a card and set the box on the grass in front
of her before reading it out loud. "If I could be anyone famous, I'd be Rachael Ray. I love football. I was in
the audience at Oprah Winfrey's show once." Her face scrunched up as she scanned the group. Olivia saw
her linger on Colin as a potential correct guess, but then she moved on. When her eyes landed on Cathy, she
lit up. "Cathy!" Hannah laughed.
Cathy grinned. "I was easy, huh?"
Hannah nodded. "And I'm gonna say your lie is that you love football."
Cathy shook her head, her blonde hair hitting her chin. "No way. I love football. I'm a huge Bills fan, ever
since they made that four-time run at the SuperBowl. I mean, I know they didn't deserve the games against
the Redskins or the Cowboys, but they should have beaten the asses off the Giants."
Olivia heard Elliot make a sound of protest, and she almost laughed, but Cathy interrupted all of them with
a dramatic sigh.
"When Scott Norwood kicked that ball wide right at the end, I swear I hyperventilated," Cathy continued,
obviously on a roll. "I mean, the man regularly puts them through the uprights at forty-seven yards, so you
know it was either the hold or nerves that made him send it wide. Which I can understand because-"
"Honey," Jim started laughing. "Why don't you let Hannah guess your lie?"
Cathy's eyes widened. "Oh. Yeah. Okay. Sorry. Just it makes me so mad, because Superbowl twenty-five
was ours. Everything was perfect. Even Whitney wasn't drugged-out back then, and when she sang the
anthem, it was amazing. Of course, Thurman couldn't find his helmet for the first drive, but still..." she
huffed, her shoulders falling. Then she remembered about the exercise again and looked up at Hannah.
"Okay," she smiled. "What's my lie?"
Hannah's face had turned red from the attention being focused on her again. "Um. That you've been to see
Oprah?"
Cathy shook her head again, smiling proudly. "Nope! I did that too. I tried to go around the time I thought
they would do Oprah's Favorite Things, but no such luck. Although I did get to see Faith Hill and Tim
McGraw be her guests, so that was kinda cool." She shrugged, scowling. "But Rachael Ray drives me nuts.
She's like, Suzie Homemaker on steroids. I mean, really, does she ever shut up?"
Olivia couldn't help it. The indignation on Cathy's face, and her inability to see the parallel between her and
the talk show host had her bursting into laughter. She wasn't alone. Most of the group had started laughing,
including the normally quiet Leo and Elliot.
including the normally quiet Leo and Elliot.
It felt good. Goddammit, laughing felt good. Her chest felt lighter and she wondered if maybe it wasn't just
the humor that was making her relax, but the fact that despite all the pain, at least she had talked to Elliot.
At least he had talked to her.
"My turn!" Jessica giggled, grabbing the box from Hannah. She opened a card, keeping the box on her lap.
"Let's see. I once stuck twelve marshmallows up my nose and had to go to the hospital, because only eleven
came out." She snorted, laughing. "I'm a Republican. I'm afraid of spiders." Her pretty features contorted as
she concentrated, also scanning the group. She stopped on Carl, then skipped over Tyler. She skipped over
Elliot and Jim and then stopped on Leo and Colin. "Colin?" she asked, her voice hesitating.
He nodded. "That's me," he affirmed. "Now, can you guess my lie?" he asked, folding his hands in his lap.
Jessica sucked her lower lip into her mouth. "You're a Republican?"
Colin shook his head. "No. Wait, I mean, I should have amended that. I'm a left-wing Republican. See,
morally and economically I'm a libertarian, and I wholly believe in green politics. But when it comes down
to it, I vote Republican because we all know that even the Liberals can't agree on gay marriage or how to
effectively feed the homeless, so might as well keep as much of my paycheck intact as possible while we're
all miserable, right? So, no, that's not my lie." He smiled patiently.
The look on Jessica's face was pained. "Okay. So the marshmallow thing?" she squeaked in the face of
Colin's self-serving speech.
He rolled his eyes. "Yes. Absolutely. Who would be dumb enough to shove marshmallows up their nose?"
he scoffed.
Next to him, Leo shifted uncomfortably, clearing his throat.
Olivia caught Elliot's eyes and grinned.
You wondering how many Leo once shoved up his nose too, El?
Six, she mouthed.
Eight, he countered, mimicking her gesture.
Elliot smothered his smile by looking back at the grass.
"He's so annoying," Jessica muttered under her breath before handing Olivia the box.
Olivia fought the urge to agree, reaching in for a card. She pulled one out, recognizing the handwriting right
away. Her gaze flew to Elliot's, realizing that he had already discerned from her body language that she had
his card.
Olivia scanned the card. "I watch American Idol," she said quietly, her lips lifting. She knew that one had to
be because of the kids. Elliot was watching her, his expression softer all of a sudden. "I don't like hockey."
That was his lie, because he was a huge Rangers fan. He took Dickie to a game whenever possible, which
seemed to have become less and less frequently over the years. Then she read the last one. The one that she
knew had to be a truth. "I hate Oregon."

She stared at the card. At the faded blue lines on it, at the blocky scrawl that she had read hundreds of times
on hundreds of reports. His writing. Elliot's. Telling her in concrete terms something that she wouldn't hear
from him when he said it verbally to her using different words.
I hate Oregon.
It wasn't angry, it wasn't full of blame. It wasn't even specifically directed at her choices. It was despising
the overall circumstances that had led them to that fateful moment. The one that had created a deeper chasm
between them.
It was hating the bigger picture, but not the details in it.
She clutched the card in her hands so tightly that her fingertips turned white. "It's Elliot's," she said, trying
to say the words loud enough for everyone to hear, but still unable to stop staring at the words. "And he
loves the Rangers, so that's his lie. The hockey part." She swallowed, her throat locked. Olivia lifted her
face, seeing Elliot watching her intently. His eyes skittered away when she met them.
"Hey man," Tyler piped up. "My old man used to take me camping in Oregon when we lived in California.
Whatcha got against it?"
Elliot's head swiveled, startled. He looked like a deer caught in headlights just from Tyler's simple question.
He opened his mouth to say something, then closed it, instead visibly grinding his jaw.
"It's complicated," Olivia said, smiling just a little bit and answering for him, saving him from explanations.
A small, surprised laugh broke from Elliot. He shook his head, dropping his chin, his genuine smile
unmistakable.
It was funny how the word didn't seem to divide them this time. Instead it was a shared understanding, one
word that could describe the indefinable situation that hovered around them. Olivia passed the box to Cathy.
The other woman picked out a card, setting the box to her right. "I own all of the Melrose Place DVD's. I
hate turkey on Thanksgiving. My father is Deputy Director of the FBI."
Olivia and Elliot's heads shot up at the same time. She questioned him in the same way he was now
questioning her. Someone's father was Deputy Director of the FBI? They hadn't really shared last names out
here, so it was possible. Deputy Director Charles Rutledge. Rutledge.
Olivia scanned the group, thankful that they hadn't made any overt cracks about the FBI. Elliot had raised
one eyebrow, as curious as she was if that was anyone's truth.
Technically, someone's father here had been Olivia's superior for two months this year. He still would be if
they were on duty.
Cathy was looking around the group. "Melrose Place, huh? So I'm assuming that rules out the guys. Olivia,
you don't seem like the type. So...Hannah or Jess." Cathy scrunched her nose. "Jess."
Jessica laughed. "Yup. I was obsessed with Kyle McBride. And I'm glad that Peter and Amanda ended up
together, but for Kyle to end up Jane?" She shook her head in disgust.
Cathy squealed. "Did you know that Chris on Silk Stalkings and Kyle were the same actor? He's so hot."
Jim coughed, laughing.

His fiancée shot him a sympathetic look. "Sorry, honey. I mean, he's not as hot as you. Never." Cathy shook
her head emphatically. "So, let's see," she said, quickly changing the subject and turning to Jessica. "Your
lie is that you don't like turkey."
"I eat so much of it I always fall asleep by three," Jessica moaned. "But you got it right. I think I eat so
much of it so fast because my brothers will hog it all if I don't. My mom ordered a thirty-pounder this past
Thanksgiving, and I swear by six p.m. it was down to its bones."
Olivia's eyes widened. Jessica Rutledge. Her father had been appointed before the World Trade Center
attacks, and he had publicly borne the burden of responsibility far beyond the call of duty. He'd seen more
horror than most men, assumed the task of veritably answering to an entire nation for its safety. He'd been
privy to death, to destruction, to the futility of politics. A man in his position had made the choice between
life or death countless times, and was nearly at the very top of a chain of command that accepted casualties
as a part of their daily life. He would have been forced to sacrifice his ability to nurture his family in an
effort to keep people alive, safe, protected.
And yet his beautiful, promise-filled daughter sat next to Olivia, her laughter echoing and her eyes bright
with new love. She wasn't weighted by her father's secrets; she didn't carry the same haunted look Olivia had
seen in Deputy Director Rutledge's eyes. Instead she seemed to approach her father's choices with
acceptance, without taking on responsibility for them. She had simply offered up her father's role along with
other basic facts about her own life.
Jessica had delineated her life from her parents; her mistakes, her accomplishments, her tragedies would be
her own. Her identity wasn't based upon who her father was.
It was a concept neither Elliot nor Olivia had ever really before seen evidence of. She had always worn her
parents' mistakes as her own, and he had assumed his would be passed along to his kids.
Olivia glanced at Jessica, before realizing Elliot was doing the same thing. The game continued on around
them, but they had both taken more away from it than Grant had ever intended.
They had always believed that anguish and pain were hereditary.
It shook her to think how many choices they had both made upon that very concept.
It scared her how wrong they both might have been.
+++
Elliot threw his cell phone back onto his bunk bed, frustrated as all hell. They had expected to have Parker
by now, but the slippery bastard seemed to be one step ahead of them. Elliot was angry, irritated, his
adrenaline spiking just from Munch relaying the most recent known or unknown whereabouts of the little
prick.
But for the first time, Elliot hadn't suggested that he and Olivia could turn right around and head home to
help.
This place pissed him off sometimes, mostly when Ludwig was around. But there were surprises out here
too.
Jessica Rutledge.

That one had thrown him for a loop. He had racked his brain, trying to recall if he had made any
disparaging remarks about the FBI around her, but he hadn't. Not that it would have mattered anyway. The
girl didn't seem to be impacted by her father's prominent position at all. Jessica had been worried about
things like her press launches, her romance with Tyler, how many calories were in the dressing. Of course,
at the very same moment her father was likely worried about domestic terrorism, counterintelligence and the
proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. But she wasn't her father.
She wasn't her father.
He vaguely wondered if his own kids referred to his career choice as casually as Jessica had. If, in the end,
all of the damage he thought he was bringing home to them on a daily basis hadn't really reached them after
all. He wondered if Olivia had been just as affected as he had been about Jessica's ability to extricate herself
from her family history.
Elliot's head hurt as he grabbed his water bottle, knowing the group was getting ready to leave for the high
ropes. He picked up the cell phone and shoved it into the pocket of his duffel, placing it next to the ring he
had finally picked up off the floor. He wasn't going back to his marriage, but he also knew that ring
represented a hell of a lot of history, of lessons learned that he hoped to God he'd remember.
He was zipping the bag shut, getting ready to join the group when he heard the footsteps behind him. Elliot
straightened, knowing it was Olivia.
For a moment, he wanted to protest. To not let her speak. Every time he thought they were getting
somewhere, they backtracked. And right now, he didn't want to backtrack. He had the image of her laughter
locked in his head and he didn't want to give it up.
He turned to face her, swallowing hard, his hands unclenching at his sides. He didn't say anything, and he
hoped she wouldn't either. Olivia was leaning against the doorframe, and he could have sworn to God he
had never seen anything as fucking beautiful in his life. Her hair was loose, left to brush her shoulders in
long, natural waves. The light blue tank top hugged her body, her denim shorts curving over her hips and
giving way to her long, tanned legs and sneakers. He wondered what it would be like to feel that denim
beneath his hands, to hear the echoing snap of the button as he undid it, to feel it slide over her skin as he
pushed the shorts down.
But out of any of it, it was her skin that taunted him the most. The hours in the sun had burnished it with a
light, coppery hue, the bridge of her nose turned just the slightest shade of pink.
Olivia looked healthy. Whole. Warmed by the sun. It was completely different than the last time she had
ever walked in and leaned against a doorframe to wait for him. Back then he had been fresh from a fight
with Blaine, and while he had been seconds removed from implanting his fist in the other man's face, she
had been the one standing there looking pale and nervous.
"Hey," she smiled tentatively.
Elliot had to admit it. As much as he wanted to grab her, to get closer to her and slip his fingers into her
hair and just listen to her fucking breathe, he was scared as shit of her. Of what she could say, what she
could throw at him. Of how much of him she could destroy with just a sentence if she wanted to.
"Hey," he said, his apprehension growing. She was looking at him, her face unreadable. She bit her lower lip
and he followed the motion with his eyes. He had done that earlier. When she had started to pull away, he
had tugged on her lower lip with his teeth.
Christ. He was fucked if all he could think about when he was this close to her was kissing her.

He forced himself to stand in place. Don't reach for her, Stabler. Don't. You had fun playing that damned
game outside, but it doesn't mean she didn't just decimate you an hour ago. She doesn't need you.
Remember that, Sherlock?
He swallowed, dragging his eyes from her mouth. "Eight is Enough?" he finally managed. Tyler had picked
Olivia's card and had guessed correctly, when even Elliot wondered if he would have. Every person in the
group had guessed the right person, they just hadn't always picked the lie accurately. Elliot figured that was
appropriate. As well as people thought they knew each other, there was always more to know.
She let out a breath, her smile growing fractionally as she shifted, lifting one of her feet and digging the toe
of it into the floorboard. "I liked Abby."
"She was the mom?"
Olivia nodded. "Stepmom."
He glanced at her warily, silence descending again. "Liv, about earlier. I shouldn't have pushed so hard. You
have every right not to trust me after all the-"
"El?" she interrupted.
He stopped speaking immediately, his arm reaching for the top bunk to lean against. "Yeah?" He needed
something to occupy his hands or he would end up touching her. She infuriated him, frustrated him, scared
the living shit out of him. But she also tempted him, fascinated him, made him want to pound the hell out of
anything that gave her even so much as a moment's trouble.
Elliot breathed out, into her silence, wondering what she would do if he kissed her now. If she'd yell, hit
him, curse him out. Or if she'd melt for him, like she had the last two times he had managed to get her lips
beneath his. He hated the stupid twin bed in this room, when what he really wanted was his bed at the
apartment. The king size one. The one he could lay her in the middle of and spend hours learning all the
ways Olivia Benson could lose control.
God. Olivia. Out of control. He'd make it his personal mission to make it happen again and again. He'd use
his hands on her first, so he could pay attention, so he could watch her face when she shattered.
She laughed softly and with just that he knew she was aware of what he had been thinking about. "You're
impossible."
Her words alone would have had his guard up, but the soft, amused look on her face calmed him. "So I've
been told."
Olivia unfolded herself from the doorframe, taking a step towards him. She looked hesitant, tentative. When
she was directly in front of him, he couldn't help it. Her damned bangs fell into her eyes and he moved them
again, wondering if they bothered her. They bothered him because they blocked her eyes from his.
"I have something for you," she said, her apprehension rising. Her eyes were darting between his, the
floorboards and the wall behind him. She didn't look at him as she reached into the pocket of her shorts and
pulled out a folded index card.
She licked her lips as he took it from her, her head bowed so that she couldn't see his face. He wanted to
remedy that situation, but the card in his hands seemed to be more important.

He opened it, his hands practically shaking. He recognized her writing, blinking as he read the words.
My name is Olivia Benson. I'm an NYPD Detective.
Two obvious, easily recognizable truths.
I don't need you.
Something broke inside of him. He didn't know if it was walls that crumbled or his chest that imploded, but
something shook him. He wanted to reach for her, to get her against him, to haul her up and finally take
what he was beginning to think he had wanted all along.
But he was paralyzed, nothing moving as he held the card. The one that held the only truth he had ever
needed in the four words of the game's lie.
I don't need you.
Her lie.
In front of him, she lifted her face, her luminous eyes glassy. She smiled, almost as if she was embarrassed.
"You ready?" she whispered.
He didn't know if she meant for the high ropes, or for whatever else seemed to be within reach, but it didn't
matter.
"Yeah," he said.
And because she was Olivia, he assumed she'd know what he meant.
+++
Back to index

A/N: So...I'm crawling out of the Cave of No Updates, where they so kindly built me my own wing in the
last few weeks. Family obligations now aside, I'm trying to get this story back on track and finished as
planned but I'm convinced a root canal with no anesthesia would be less painful for me and all those
involved. This was rewritten half a dozen times, and I swear I birthed it. Brynn, thank you for not killing me
over the last two weeks. If I were you, I'd be dead. Roz - for all the ideas, for showing me the error of my
ways, for making Elliot hot again...thank you! (Shit, I should have brought Murph to camp! Mmmm..) Jess,
for the eleventh hour fixes thank you. And to Pooks, let's get them to pump some water into the lake and get
it ready, shall we? Okay, so here we go if anyone can even remember this story anymore...lol.
"You want to play Truth?" she asked.
Olivia shot a tentative glance at Elliot as they walked along the path, once again bringing up the rear behind
the group. It was ironic that for all the times they had let their competitive nature get the best of them, out
here they were content to let other people lead the way.
"I didn't know you knew how to play Truth." Elliot was looking straight ahead, but his lips quirked.
If it hadn't been for the quirk, she would have been pissed. He didn't mean it like it sounded, she reminded
herself. That's not what he meant. Olivia rolled her head from side to side, hoping to alleviate some tension.
If they were going to get their partnership back, she had to stop assuming that everything he said was an
insult. And she wanted to talk to him. She wanted all of it, every last misunderstanding, every hurt, every
thing left unspoken to finally be laid out on the table.
He's just teasing you, Olivia. Don't ruin it. You swore to yourself you were going to try and repair this
thing, whatever it is.
"Yeah. Truth." She looked at the matted path beneath her sneakered feet. "You know how to play?"
Elliot grinned. "I used to play it with Maureen and Kathleen after their dates. They had to answer a question
of mine truthfully, and in exchange I would answer one of theirs. No holds barred."
The weight on her chest lifted slightly and she laughed. "Controlling bastard. They'd have been too
embarrassed to ask you anything good. Either that or they wouldn't want to know."
Elliot raised one eyebrow. "You'd be surprised. Two teenaged girls who realized their parents' marriage was
falling apart?" He shook his head ruefully. "They could have probably cracked a few suspects for us with
falling apart?" He shook his head ruefully. "They could have probably cracked a few suspects for us with
their ruthless interrogations. But at least I found out enough about their stupid dates to get some sleep."
Olivia stopped fighting the heat of the day for a moment, and found pleasure in the way the sun beat into
the skin on the tops of her shoulders. A few steps later, she took a deep breath, letting her chest warm with
the influx of humid air. "So, you want to play?" she asked quietly. For some reason, after their last game in
the circle, it suddenly seemed like it might be easier to talk to him. She found herself wanting to talk to him,
instead of doing everything in her power to avoid it as she had been for months.
He didn't look at her, but he didn't pull any punches either. "You think we need a game so we can finally be
honest?"
The smile dropped off her face. They were half a dozen steps farther down the path before she answered.
"We're not all that good with the truth, El. So yeah," her shoulders fell. "Maybe."
He nodded. "If that's what you want, we can play. I'm just..." He squinted against the sun. "Tired of the
games I guess."
"I'm not," she said, and then realizing how small her voice sounded, she cleared her throat as if trying to
explain. "I mean, you told me about Oregon in the last one, and that made me..." Olivia stopped, unable to
say the words yet. Shit. How was she going to get him to play a game of Truth when she still couldn't say
out loud what she had already admitted in writing on that card?
He looked at her, almost daring her to deny him. "And that made you admit you needed me."
Olivia swallowed, feeling like shattered shards of brick had just been shoved down her throat. She looked
away from him, pretending to search for something in the woods to her right.
"Jesus, Olivia. Say it, for God's sake. You won't disintegrate if you say out loud that you need someone."
She felt the fear slip over her skin again as his voice dropped immediately into frustration. This was who
they were, who they had become. The anger permeated every reaction, every word, every step. This was
precisely why she had teased him into a game that she hoped might clear the air. And if she wanted to hear
his truths, she had to be willing to admit hers. "Fine. I need you," she mumbled quickly.
Next to her, he did something she hadn't expected.
He laughed softly.
Her eyes were immediately drawn to the pleasure in the sound of it. "That's funny to you?"
The side of Elliot's mouth lifted. "Ah, yup."
She rolled her eyes, trying to ignore the way his suddenly lighter mood was making her stomach unknot.
"Glad someone is amused."
Elliot lifted one of his arms, swiping his short sleeve over his face. "You don't always amuse me, Benson.
You should take what you can get." He leaned closer to her as they walked. "Plus, the pout?" His arrogant
smile bordered outright smirking. "It has a certain appeal. Especially knowing that you need me." He
dragged the word out, lingering on it and raising the volume of his voice like a little kid who was taunting
her.
She choked back a laugh, wondering how he made the most terrifying word of her life become okay,
acceptable, even casual. "Think we'd get booted out of camp if I kicked your ass?" she mused.
acceptable, even casual. "Think we'd get booted out of camp if I kicked your ass?" she mused.
Elliot turned his face towards hers, and before she knew it, his eyes had deepened into a dark, hot, hazy
mist. "I don't know, but I'm willing to let you try," he practically purred in challenge.
And just like that, want exploded deep in her belly. Air seemed to become trapped in her lungs at the
instant, hungry desire on his face. She jerked her face away from his, blinking back the arousal that began
pounding through her.
Christ. Images assaulted her, ones that had no business being in her head. Ones that had her writhing
beneath his body, her arms over her head and her wrists trapped in his big hands as Elliot's mouth slid over
her neck, her chest, her stomach.
Olivia blew out a deep breath, trying to focus on the trail. It was wholly unfair, she decided, that she had
been partnered with a man that only got bigger, harder and sexier as time went on.
She wouldn't have these thoughts if she had been partnered with someone like Munch. Or Fin. She'd slept
with Cassidy years ago, yet she hadn't even spent two minutes before they had fallen into bed imagining
what it would be like. Elliot, on the other hand, could probably earn his union card after the number of full-
length explicit features she'd had him star in.
It wouldn't be good, she told herself. Elliot, in bed, couldn't be that good. There was a chance that Kathy
was the only woman he had ever been with, so how good could he be really? Of course, he'd kissed Olivia,
and his mouth alone knew things that no man should be allowed to know. Just the mere brush of his hard-on
against her had nearly sent her spiraling, shaking, needing to slip her fingers over the muscles of his ass and
draw him into her.
Beginner's luck? she wondered. Maybe just because they'd never done that before he had managed to make
her react like that? Couldn't happen again. It wouldn't.
"So what are you thinking about?" Elliot prodded, a little too cockily.
Fuck.
"Nothing," she lied.
Hot, knowing eyes met hers. "Liar. I thought we were playing Truth?"
Olivia was desperate for water, but the bottles were in the cooler backpack Grant had slung over his
shoulder. And the group was too far ahead on the trail for her to even call out for some. "I get the first
question then, since I'm the one that wanted to play." Olivia lifted her chin, daring him to contradict her.
Elliot just kept walking, grinning. "Then shoot."
Long moments of heat clawed at her, prickling over her skin. "What happened between you and Dani?" The
question came out of nowhere, and it surprised the hell out of her that she had asked it. She'd wanted to
know; she'd been scared to know. But she had never really believed she would ever utter the words. Less
than two steps later, she realized he had stopped mid-stride.
She stopped too, wondering if someone could suffocate on humidity alone. Behind her, there was no
movement. Olivia finally turned, apprehension sending crackles of fear over her skin.
Bad idea, Olivia. Games like this only cause trouble. What is it that they say? The road to hell is paved with
good intentions?
good intentions?
He was glaring at her, his eyes slit so narrowly that his eyelashes seemed to get tangled. "I'm not answering
that," he finally said, his jaw grinding so hard she wondered if his teeth could withstand the pressure.
Olivia felt her eyes widen and her breath become shallow. "You have to," she breathed. "It's the rules of the
game."
Elliot took a few steps towards her, closing the distance until he was practically looking down at her. "Yeah,
well I seem to recall that if I refuse to answer I have to take a dare," he growled, his eyes glittering. "So
dare me to do something instead, Olivia."
"No," she said immediately, searching for an ounce of sanity.
"No?" he tilted his head. "Why not? Scared?" He inched closer to her, crowding her even out here in the
great outdoors.
She was suddenly furious. She'd posed a legitimate question, one that she seemed to have a right to ask after
how much they had delved into her personal life all day, yet he was clamming up. Did he really think that
he could use this blasted sexual heat between them to get out of answering?
"Fine. Don't answer. I don't give a shit anyway." Olivia spun on her heel intending to quicken her pace on
the pathway.
He grabbed her arm, twisting her back around to face him. "I'm doing you a favor. You can't go asking
questions you're not ready to hear the answers to."
Olivia felt all of her control slip away, as easily as if she had shed a coat. It was gone, whatever protection,
whatever veneer of apathy she had mustered over the last few months was eliminated by the look on his
face, by the vehemence of his words. She stepped closer to him, getting directly in his face and searching his
eyes. "Don't think I give a rat's ass if you slept with her. Because I don't."
A muscle jumped in his cheek. "Obviously," he said quietly. "No one ever taught you how to play this game
because the object of it is to be honest." His hand gripped her elbow and his mouth came closer, poised just
over her ear. "And for the record? I didn't sleep with her." Elliot let go of her then, so abruptly that Olivia
took a step back just to steady herself.
Fire flashed through her. "I told you, I don't care if you did. I was just curious, that's all."
Elliot's lips lifted, but the genuine smile of a few moments ago was gone. "Is that why you came by the
squad when you got back but didn't tell me?"
Olivia's head snapped back with the force of her shock. He had known about that? All this time, he had
known? Denial came swiftly, too quickly to even stop it. "I don't-"
Elliot bent, his mouth inches from hers. His sneer silenced her. "Careful, Olivia. You want to out and out lie
to me, go ahead. But let's just be clear that once you do, whatever trust we've got left will be gone." He
licked his lips, stepping back and crossing his arms in front of his chest. "So let's try this again. Why the
hell did you come by and then make sure Cap didn't tell me you were back?"
Cragen had betrayed her?
Elliot laughed derisively. "No, he didn't tell me that. But the look on your face just did."

Olivia suddenly ached from the pain the blossomed on her skin. She remembered walking into the squad
room that day, feeling like she might have a handle on things again. She had looked different; she had felt
different. She'd missed him, and she had known that she'd need to apologize for the way she had left. The
time away had clarified a lot for her, made her realize that she had relied on him too much, to an extent
where it hadn't been fair to him. She'd been prepared to smile at him that day, to maybe even take him out to
dinner and hear about everything that had happened while she had been gone. Olivia had been ready to start
again.
What she hadn't been prepared for was to find someone else sitting at her desk. A beautiful blonde that
looked like she could have fit into a trendy catalog. One that immediately and easily identified Elliot in his
new role, as her partner. Olivia had known in that single moment that starting again wasn't an option,
because she was already right back where she had been.
On the outside, looking in on Elliot's life with someone else.
Only then it was even worse, because from the window of Cragen's office she had watched Elliot casually
lean over and lay his hand on the woman who had introduced herself as Dani Beck. That moment had told
her everything. Elliot, a man who had practiced boundaries until he defined them, didn't have any when it
came to his new partner.
Olivia had been shaking as she walked out of Cragen's office that day. Her voice, her hands, her stomach.
All of it had become a trembling, rocking, shiver of disbelief and loss that had taken days to subside.
And now Elliot stood before her, wanting to know why she had walked away. As if it were simple enough
to define in a few quick, stolen minutes here on the trail. She shrugged. "I came to say hi. You were busy.
Figured we'd catch up later," she said, unable to meet his eyes.
When she finally caught his gaze for a moment, she could see the hurt in them. She had lied, and he knew
it. "Liv, try again," he said, his voice surprisingly gentle, nearly pleading with her to revise her answer. "Just
play the game. Give me the truth."
But Olivia couldn't tell him anything, not when it seemed like she would be giving him everything. She just
blinked, wondering why she had the urge to beat him with her fists in the same moment that she wanted to
launch her body at him and tell him she was sorry, that sometimes she was nothing more than a pathetic
coward.
Elliot smiled ruefully, his expression filled with regret. "Dani told me someone had come looking for me.
That this person also asked for Cap. She described you, but she also said my visitor had a ponytail." Elliot
laughed sadly. "That threw me off. I didn't put two and two together until later, when you walked into that
room during the Masoner case and said you were assigned to be my handler." Elliot's lips tightened. "You
know, you said you were assigned to me. You didn't say you had wanted to come back or that you wanted
to be my partner." He lifted his head, focused on something behind her. "Cragen knew before I did that you
were back, and then when I saw you, the way you said it..." He blew out a painful breath. "After asking
Dani if I was in, something changed your mind." He looked at her as they walked. "So how come you left?
What changed your mind?"
Olivia closed her eyes, wondering if that would block out the sunlight that was suddenly too bright. There
was a glare on everything - the leaves, the path, his darkened skin. She wanted to have a better answer than
the one that was begging her to be said. The answer that bore the arrogant, unforgiving seal of the truth, the
one that gave her no leeway to bend and shape to her will. "She did," Olivia said quietly, hating the pettiness
that was only now evident as she said the words aloud.

Anger flared in his eyes, but surprisingly it wasn't directed at Olivia. "Dani did? What did she say to you? If
she said something to you, something to make you leave ... Jesus Christ Olivia, I had no idea that-" He
stopped talking then, his eyes squinting in fury against the sun and his lips turning white from the force he
had placed upon them as he pressed them together.
His immediate reaction had been to assume Dani had committed the transgression, not to assume that Olivia
was just a chicken shit? Sometimes he gave her far more faith than she deserved. "She said she was your
partner."
One breath punched out of his chest, hanging there between them. "That made you leave?"
"I'm your partner!" Olivia thrust at him before she could stop herself. Her accusing eyes darted to his,
wondering if he would call her on petulance. If he'd tell her to grow up, get a life, act like an adult.
Instead his shoulders dropped, tension seeping out of them while she watched. "Yeah, Liv. And I'm yours,"
he gritted softly.
Olivia shook her head, ignoring his words because they didn't fit with the cozy image of him and Dani that
was burned into her brain. "You were fine with her. I saw it, and I knew. You were fine, Elliot!"
Recognition dawned on Elliot's face. "And that wasn't okay, was it?" He blinked, stunned as the magnitude
of the realization sank in. "What did you want, Olivia?" He seemed dazed, unable to process what her
stupid, childish words really meant. "You wanted me to fall apart when you left? Is that it? You wanted me
to implode?" He exhaled, his nostrils flaring with anger as he stepped back from her. "Sonofa..." He shook
his head rapidly, as if trying to clear her asinine assumptions. "You wanted me to...you..." Elliot's head shot
up, his face pale. "You left to see if I'd self-destruct without you? Why the hell would you do that, Olivia?
Why would you..." but his words were left unsaid because he had given up, instead furiously walking ahead
and leaving her behind while still shaking his head in obvious disbelief.
Olivia stood there, watching him go and knowing she was unable to defend herself. That wasn't why she
left. He was wrong about that. But she'd be a liar if she tried to deny that when she came back and saw him,
doing better than he had been before she had gone, that it hadn't hurt like a motherfucker. It had hurt her; it
had scared the hell out of her. It had made her feel insignificant, invisible and worst of all...disposable.
Truth, she told herself. This moronic game she had started had been about Truth.
"When I left, I did it so I wouldn't fall apart!" she said, knowing she had managed to say it loud enough that
he could hear her. "When the feds asked me to go, when they said they wanted me, I went because at least
they could admit they needed me!"
He just kept walking. He thought he had his answers.
Asshole. Asshole! She had given him the brutal, revealing truth and he just kept walking. Stalking away
from her with his head all screwed up about them again. She had watched him like this once before, in the
hallway of the squad during the Gitano case. He had turned his back on her and walked away, only to turn
around and accuse her of more shit.
This time, he wasn't even bothering to turn around.
She was pissed. So pissed that her ears were filling with a dull roar. He couldn't do this to her again. He
couldn't walk away thinking he knew better because he didn't know a damned thing! Olivia found herself
breaking into a jog, closing the distance between them. Two feet behind him, she couldn't keep her mouth
shut anymore. "How hard did you try, Elliot? To get her to stay? Did you ask her? Did you beg her? Did
you tell her that you couldn't take one more person leaving you?"
you tell her that you couldn't take one more person leaving you?"
He stopped. His back rose and fell with the force of his breathing.
"Come on, Elliot," Olivia stabbed recklessly, her voice rising and plunging without any sort of pattern. "Tell
me. You tried to get her to stay, didn't you? So how come you didn't sleep with her? She turn you down? "
The idea that he had tried, that he had picked someone, chosen someone and put forth effort to seduce them
made her sick. "Did she see the tan lines left by your fucking ring and know that your life was a mess she
didn't want to be a part of?"
His hands balled into fists, but he still didn't turn around.
Olivia was out of control. She knew it, and she was helpless to stop it. It was the same blinding rage that had
filled her in the moments before she had attacked Thatcher. She didn't care about her job, this camp, the
people who were probably wondering where she and Elliot were. She cared about hurting him. Olivia
wanted to hurt him. She wanted to make him see her, get her, understand one damned minute of the hell that
had permeated her head. She didn't want to smother her anger, her helplessness, or her resentment anymore.
She couldn't. Control had expired at the thirty-nine year mark of her life, unwilling to turn forty. "I know
you, Elliot," Olivia finally said, her voice shaking. "And when I saw you with her, I knew it was easier for
you to be with her than it was to be with me and fuck you...fuck you for that!"
He was silent. Silent. Silent.
She should have taken lessons, but self-destruction by nature didn't heed warnings.
"All of this shit you've been spewing about there being something between us, it's just that, isn't it? It's shit.
You'll take anyone that will believe you, right? But no one's buying into it, are they Elliot? Kathy wasn't.
Dani didn't. But me?" Olivia choked back the sound threatening to break from her throat. "Me, I was
starting to buy into your crap. And you knew I would, didn't you? So what? Was I just an easy mark
because I don't have anything else? Because that's true, isn't it, Elliot? I've pretty much got nothing. Not
really." Hard, unforgiving gasps punctured her lungs. "You knew you were all I had and...because of that
you think I'd fall for it when you said you feel something for me?" Olivia swiped the back of her hand under
her nose angrily, knowing she was crying and blaming him for that shameful lapse of self-control as well.
"You and...Dani, you kept saying her name after she left. Jesus. I'm saying your name and you're saying
hers," Her words cracked and splintered around her. "I fucking hate you, Elliot. You think it's so damned
important that I need you, but you know what? I hate you even more because of that!"
He didn't move, and Olivia didn't care anymore. She simply wanted to leave. This camp, this humidity, this
job, him. She wanted to leave so damned badly. Just go somewhere and never come back to this mess. She'd
start with getting out of this stupid forest. She'd read about enchanted forests as a kid, but they weren't.
They were places where things would fall and die and no one would hear the sound.
Elliot wouldn't even turn around, so he probably wouldn't even know that she was walking away.
Which was fine. Some things never changed, anyway.
"I hate you," Olivia said again, and he didn't even flinch. For some reason, his indifference made her fall
apart. For one moment she watched him. She absorbed the completely still silhouette of Elliot's back,
comprehended that his posture had been wholly unaffected by every way that she had tried to hurt him.
Her breath hitched hard in her chest. Once. Then again. She couldn't breathe.
Move, Olivia. Fast. If you're gonna walk away, don't linger. Just go. It's like ripping off a band aid. The
faster, the better. It will hurt less.
faster, the better. It will hurt less.
She wanted to walk away from him, but instead she stood there frozen, aching, staring. She knew every
plane of his back, saw the familiar bulge of muscle in his shoulders, raked her blurry eyes over the way his
hips narrowed. On the back of his neck, the ends of his hair formed a perfect line straight across, where it
had been buzz cut against his skin and she envied the cut. Simple. Clean. Razor sharp in its precision.
Olivia needed that sort of separation.
She turned, walking away from him towards the campsite and breathing, feeling dizzy. One of her feet must
have crunched on the trail, and then the other. The sounds of the dirt and leaves shifting beneath her
sneakers came slowly, evenly for a few steps. But then it began to sound erratic, picking up speed, and she
felt the hot air press against her cheeks making her realize she was nearly stumbling, moving, doing
anything she could to get away from him, from here, from this.
"Olivia!" Elliot's voice came from far behind her, sharp, commanding, authoritative.
Screw him. Screw him, she wasn't stopping.
"Goddammit, Olivia!"
Behind her, his footsteps picked up and she tried to speed up in response but she was far too nauseous. Her
equilibrium was off and she was staggering more than running. Desperation propelled her forward. Across
the dried, dead leaves, through the merciless heat, back towards a campsite that held her things, the keys, a
method of escape. Of quitting.
Stop crying. You can't see the trail. You'll get dehydrated. Just stop crying! It's pathetic, and he'll see you!
"Liv, Christ, stop! Just..."
Olivia threw her hand up as she kept moving. "Leave me alone!"
Hurry up, Olivia. You feel too much for him, you stupid girl, and you've got no right. He's your partner. He
was your partner. But he'll find someone else when you leave. Just like last time. No one is irreplaceable.
She ignored the other voice in her head. The one that rarely spoke up. The one that was pleading for her to
listen as she kept walking away.
He's irreplaceable, Olivia.
"No, you're not walking away. Not this time." Elliot's determined voice was closer. Too close. Too sure of
himself.
He's right, you can't walk. You have to run. Pick up your damned feet and run!
Olivia felt her chest cracking as he came up behind her. At the last second she tried to make a break for it,
suddenly unable to control the urge to get as far away from him as possible. She was moving as fast as she
could without actually running. "I swear to God, don't touch me! If you touch me, Elliot, I swear I'll-"
His hand landed hard on her shoulder, trying to turn her around. "You'll what? You'll-"
Olivia spun, shoving him hard in the chest until he stumbled backwards. "Get your hands off of me!"
But Elliot was too fast. His blue eyes narrowed, anger and determination building a fire in them as he

recovered, stepping forward and reaching for her again. "I will! If you promise to stop running!"
She shoved again, harder this time, her lips curling with the force. Her breath was ragged, her damp hair
sticking to her neck. "You are such a piece of shit. What? Does it feel good to make people need you,
Elliot? Is that some sort of trophy for you?" He was coming at her again, his hands held out to brace himself
against her clenched fists. She pushed anyway, higher this time, her palms connecting quickly with his
shoulders as she threw her weight behind the gesture. He didn't budge at all and it pissed her off. She
sneered at him. "So why didn't you sleep with her, Elliot? Because something happened? I know it did."
Inside of her head, a buzzing sound started. She thought maybe it was the sound of disintegration. Of
vultures and insects swirling around on the dead thing below, picking at it until there was nothing left. She
almost looked up, thinking she would see the angry black birds over her head.
Elliot made a mistake. He came even closer, his face impassive. "I kissed her," he said flatly.
It was one thing to think something, another to know. With any other man, the admission would have meant
nothing. Coming from Elliot, it meant everything. Sleeping with his ex-wife seemed like acceptable loss.
But he'd gone farther, challenged his ever-present commitment to his marriage. Only not for her. For Dani.
She had been wrong when she told Dean that Elliot would never test his boundaries. He had. Only she
hadn't been the one worth doing it for.
Olivia physically felt the blood drain from her face in the moment her heart stopped. "Good for you," she
whispered.
This time she didn't want to run away. She wanted to walk away. Slowly. Methodically. Rhythmically. He
wasn't moving, not even an inch. Which meant she had to. She'd have to turn around. Find the ground.
Make her heels and toes connect with it hard enough that she would feel something. Somehow, she realized
she had managed to twist around, back towards where they had come from. Elliot wasn't in her line of sight
anymore, and vaguely she knew that meant he was now behind her.
Olivia was drowsy from the heat and the pounding in her head, and she didn't feel entirely steady.
Somewhere, in the deepest part of her, she recognized this feeling. She'd felt it once before. As a kid.
Watching her mother teeter on the edge of the cable car over the gorge, she had been forced to let go of
something she loved because she had no control over it. Her mother couldn't be trusted, so that day Olivia
had intentionally let her heart break because at least then it was on her terms. Years later, her mother finally
taking the fall Olivia had known was coming, her heart hadn't been surprised.
No one could break what was already broken.
Her eyelids pounded with the restraint of all they held back. Of course, that analogy wasn't entirely right.
She didn't love Elliot. She never had and she never would.
Call Dana. She said they'd be glad to have you. Anytime. They'd move you around a lot. No roots
necessary.
She practically tripped then on the snaking, coiling, tricky roots of a maple tree that had woven its way onto
the path over time. Olivia cursed it, swore at it, nearly kicked at it but then just stepped over, unwilling to
give it any importance.
She was so distracted that she didn't even feel him coming at her.
His arm slithered around her waist, hard, angrily, nearly tripping her for a second time. He hauled her
backwards, the vice around her stomach cutting off her air, not due to force but due to the element of
backwards, the vice around her stomach cutting off her air, not due to force but due to the element of
surprise. "You're gonna hear me out," he said angrily. "I'm done tiptoeing. You got that?"
Olivia struck out instinctively, her arms shooting around to push him off of her. But Elliot just tightened his
hold, his other arm capturing and wrapping around both of hers, effectively cutting off her movement
without so much as even digging into her skin. Anyone else, she could have taken them. But he knew every
move in the book that she did, and with him, he had the added benefit of sixty pounds of muscle. Plus, he
wasn't going to hurt her. Even now, even in his unrelenting hold he had been careful. She could reason with
him.
"Elliot-" she protested desperately as he shifted, pulling her back harder against his chest.
"I don't want Kathy. I don't want Dani. That's about as fucking clear as I can get." His voice was low,
grating, originating deep in his throat. "Yeah, I kissed her. And I'm sorry about that. But that's all it was. It
wasn't like you and me. That's the problem. Nothing is like you and me. Which is a bitch, because you're
the most damned difficult woman I know."
"You should have just been patient, Elliot," Olivia managed to bite off, staying perfectly still. The solid,
reassuring wall of his chest was behind her, and she despised her instincts, the ones that were failing her
right now. She couldn't lean back into him. She was walking away, dammit. Not succumbing to his will like
some romance novel heroine! "I'm sure the NYPD would have set you up with another female partner.
Musical partners," she laughed derisively. "Elliot Stabler's version of Match.com."
Elliot's heavy hand spread wide open on her stomach, against the thin cotton of her tank top. He tugged her
back using his palm for leverage and his lips were practically nipping at her ear. "It used to hurt, you know.
Watching you so damned determined to be independent. But then you left and I thought, fuck her. So yeah,
I felt something for Dani. Not much, but something. She reminded me of you the first year. Only you were
just my partner that first year, Olivia. That was all. And that's all she was. It's every damned moment after
that that led me into this inability to want anything but you."
Olivia closed her eyes, her skin hot, damp, sticky. Moments ago she could smell the pine, the wildflowers,
the pungent aroma of the baking soil. Now, she could only smell him. Soap, lemon, deodorant. All
masculine. All around her. His arms were thick, muscled, and unforgiving around her torso, and she knew
that no matter what she did, he wasn't going to loosen his hold. She asked anyway. "Let go of me."
His hand slipped lower, down over her belly. "No." His fingers moved then, sliding up absently or
deliberately, beneath her tank top and over the bare skin of her stomach.
She shivered with pleasure at his touch despite herself. "You can't force me to -"
Elliot's mouth fell to the back of her head, his lips on her hair. "You think-" his words disappeared, falling
into a strangled sound of disbelief.
Oh God. No. That's not what she had meant. Not if his life depended upon it. He'd eagerly toss his life on
the line, and had, to save anyone from that. She'd meant he couldn't force her to stay. But his grip on her
had loosened and she turned around quickly, realizing the most important thing in the world was to make
him realize where he had misunderstood.
Elliot's eyes were unfocused, staring beyond her, his hands still loosely draped on her hips. "Liv..."
He was intoxicating. His full lower lip, the hard slash of his eyebrows, his hard, strong cheekbones and chin.
His neck was thick, resilient, and the muscles of his upper chest pushed against his t-shirt. The small voice
was getting louder the longer she looked at him. The longer she saw a good man, one who had chosen to
defend anyone less able than him, live in the self-doubt she was responsible for.
defend anyone less able than him, live in the self-doubt she was responsible for.
Nothing is like you and me.
"I'm not going to let you..." she started, trying to quiet that small voice. "I don't want you to..."
"I wouldn't force you," he mumbled, his head bowed between them.
She couldn't help it. Her head lost the battle with her body and she reached for him. Olivia slid her hands
out from between them, reaching for his temples, settling the tips of her fingers on his skin and dragging
them down, softly, reverently. Her fingernails lightly dusted over his cheeks, down, along the firm set of his
jaw, towards his chin. And then all of her was focused on his mouth. The pads of her fingers felt the smooth
lushness of his lower lip and she could feel his hot breath on her knuckles.
"Tell me you know that," he said gutturally.
"I know that," she said, leaning forward, her head touching his forehead. "Of course I know that. Jesus, El,
that you could even think for one second that I'd ever, ever think that of you..."
"I don't know what you think of me."
Olivia lifted his face to meet hers, every, single slam of her heart echoing in the space between her chest
and his. When she looked at him, when the endless, aching blue of his irises met hers, she knew she had
never felt more protective of anything, of anyone in her entire life. She had to reconcile that with the fact
that it was her own shit that was causing him hurt in the first place. Her words. Her accusations. She
somehow had to explain to him that it wasn't him as a person that she was running from; it was what he
could do to her if he ever ran first.
Words formed, but didn't fall from her lips. Endless seconds passed.
"How could you know me at all and not get what it does to me when you walk away?" He pressed his face
into her hands. "You want to know if I fell apart when you left? I didn't want anyone else, Olivia. I told
Cragen I'd work alone until you came back. And he said no. So I said I'd take a temporary partner, and he
shrugged it off. As if I could believe what I wanted to. So I made the best of it. Yeah, I kissed her, but
Jesus, I just wanted to feel something. Anything. And before she left, she asked me....to ask her to stay.
Because she would have," Elliot shook his head slightly. "But I couldn't, Liv. Because if she stayed, it
meant I was giving up on you coming home."
Olivia stilled. "You let her go without knowing if I was coming back?"
His lips lifted sadly. "I let my wife go without knowing if you were coming back, too." He lifted then
dropped his shoulders. "Maybe I didn't understand it then, Olivia. But I do now. You've gotta trust me on
this." His eyes clouded for a second. "You know what's ironic? You think I'm using you as a substitute for
someone else, but for years Kathy used to tell me I didn't think anyone compared to you. Then Dani started
in on the same thing." He smiled, and this time there was almost light in his eyes again. "You know, Dani
even called you my precious Olivia." Elliot's amusement was evident by the way he had relaxed against her.
Laughter burst out of her, unexpectedly and awkwardly. "I sound like a gnome when you say that."
Sometimes, one single moment of lightness was enough to illuminate all of the dark. "When you were
saying....all of that a few minutes ago, you said something about saying my name," Elliot teased quietly.
"Do I get to know what that was about?"

Olivia shook her head. "No."
His eyebrows lifted in curiosity. "You know, denying me only makes my imagination run wild."
She had hurled so much crap at him and he was still there, standing in front of her. She owed him
something, even if it was at her own expense. Especially if it was at her own expense. "In Oregon, at one of
our protests, I was accidentally knocked out."
That brought his head up fast. "What the hell-"
Olivia silenced him by laying her fingers over his lips. "It was pretty much an accident. But they sent all of
the injured protesters to the hospital." She bit her lip, ducking her head at the memory. "When I woke up,
one of the other female EDG members was in the bed next to me."
"In your bed?" Elliot grinned lewdly.
Olivia, only a few minutes before in the throes of a meltdown, miraculously found herself rolling her eyes.
She batted the side of his head as his fingers tightened on his waist. "You've been watching too much late
night Skinamax, Stabler."
He shook his head, then brought one finger up to tap the side of his head. "Nope. All the good stuff is up
here."
She narrowed her eyes. "Sometimes I wonder if anything is up there."
He pretended to look wounded, and for a moment she felt nearly giddy with relief. They had never been
good at talking things through, but for some reason, unleashing the worst of what had been inside of them
was serving as some sort of catharsis. And in the wake of the storm, it left them as they used to be. Or
maybe even better than before, because he wasn't scaring her the way he had for the last two years. He
didn't seem as unpredictable. Just confused, the way she had been.
"Fine," he grumbled. "So she was in a bed next to you. Go on. Get to the part about saying my name in
ecstasy."
Her eyes widened. "How do you know I wasn't saying it while cursing you to hell?"
Elliot's hands were roaming now, sliding up the sides of her hips, over her bare arms and then resting, his
hands cupping her jaw as his thumb trailed lazily over her lips. "Because when you were gone, I was
already there."
Olivia smiled gently, heat reaching places inside of her that the sun couldn't. She knew there were things she
needed to process, things that he had said that she needed to understand, but she wasn't as skittish as she
had been ten minutes ago. Maybe because he hadn't let her walk away, or maybe because, when push came
to shove, he had found his voice even if the only words he could offer were the bluntest of truths.
The truth was enough. No matter how harsh, it was enough.
"So tell me the rest," he said, his lips getting dangerously closer to hers while his eyes fell to her mouth.
"When I came to, she wanted to know who Elliot was," Olivia offered, her breathing becoming shallow.
"Did you tell her how wonderful I am?" he asked, his lips finally descending and making contact with her
jaw.

Olivia moaned, unable to stop herself. In the ultimate game of Truth, his mouth on her skin was able to coax
the only answer that seemed to matter. "Hardly. I told her you were just some guy. She didn't believe me."
She drove her fingers into the short hair that lay cut so perfectly against his neck, trapping it between her
fingers.
Elliot's hot, rough, seeking mouth slid lower, opening, falling to her neck as her head tilted to the side. "As
well she shouldn't," he said, his tongue darting out and moistening the place she knew she had a small scar.
"So how come she didn't believe you?"
Olivia's body pressed against his t-shirt, her hips seeking his but knowing, innately, that she had to stay
away as yet. "Because later she caught me on the phone and I had to hang up quickly. I was talking to Fin,
but I hung up so abruptly she thought it had to have been you."
His head lifted slowly. His eyelids were heavy, his smug look of satisfaction not something she even cared
to fight him on. "I thought you hung up on me because you didn't want to talk to me."
Another mistake. Another miscommunication. She was exhausted. Worn out. And nothing meant anything to
her in this moment other than this, him. Not her job, not the ropes course they were noticeably late for, not
even every single thing about him that had caused her heartache.
Being with him mattered. Trusting him mattered. Trying for him mattered.
She didn't know what they had, or if in the end it would hurt like hell. But the fighting had to end. "Elliot,"
she finally said, pushing herself up on her tiptoes to get even with his mouth.
"Yeah?" he murmured.
"Do something for me." Olivia brushed her lips over his, thrusting her chest into his. God, why had she
never, truly realized how devastating his body was? She teased him again, her mouth dusting across his, her
hand reaching to her hip for his. She brought his big, possessive hand up, sliding it over her torso and then
higher, until it cupped her breast.
Elliot groaned, his hand instinctively tightening on her, his fingers splaying over her cotton-covered skin
until his thumb found her pebbled nipple. "You want me to do that? You should have asked sooner."
"No, Elliot. What I want," she said, as his fingers flicked over her. "Is for you to stop talking," Olivia
ordered, and then covered his lips with hers before sliding her tongue deep into his mouth and crushing his
hand between them.
+++
"Do you honestly think that the Rangers have a shot at the Cup next year?" Olivia asked, her face
scrunching into an appropriate scowl.
"No," he shook his head, grimacing. "And that didn't work. Try again, Benson."
Light danced in her dark eyes as she walked next to him. "Do you think that China will ever free Tibet?"
He took a few steps, the sun beating so hard on his skin he could have sworn it was playing percussion.
"Possibly. And that didn't work either."
"Do you think Clinton had sex with that woman?" She attempted to look innocent and failed. Miserably.

Elliot glared at her. "Sexual subjects are not helpful. So unless you're okay with me telling Ludwig to fuck
off about this course, and you're willing to endure the speculation of the whole group when I drag you back
to camp and lock that damned door on my room, I'd suggest you try harder to distract me with something."
The corner of Olivia's mouth lifted, far too satisfied for her own good. She raised her eyebrows. "Do you
think California will ever fall off into the ocean?"
"Fuck." Elliot stopped, standing still. "Seriously, Olivia. I'm over this ropes shit. And after that....stunt you
pulled back there," he shook his head in misery, his eyes darting to her tank top. "I don't know at what point
you decided it was a good idea to put my hand on your..." he stopped, unable to say it. "Your..."
"Breast," she supplied helpfully, widening her eyes.
He cursed her out under his breath and started walking.
Olivia shook her head. "No, I don't think it's physically possible for me to do what you're suggesting," she
said loudly, catching up.
He wasn't sure what he liked better. The Olivia that wouldn't let him near her with a ten-foot pole, or the
Olivia that he knew, at some point, was going to let him have her. All of her. Beneath him. The sound of the
damned dirt crunching beneath his feet was enough to taunt him.
Flat surface, it seemed to call. Lay her down right here. Everyone else is long gone.
Shit. Shit. The worst part was, she wasn't hiding it. Not anymore. Not after she had grabbed his hand,
slipped it between them and placed his palm right on the hard-as-hell tip of her breast. She had plastered her
hot, little mouth to his and moaned, and then reached down, trying to slip his hand beneath her tank top.
He'd protested. Not because he wanted to. Hell no. He'd been reluctant because he was positive that he was
going to rip the hell out of her shorts and take her for the very first time against the sticky bark of a maple
tree if he even so much as cupped her bare skin.
The problem was that she had seemingly made some sort of empirical decision about them. Apparently he
was going to be allowed to touch her. Everywhere. And because he was far luckier than he deserved to be,
she was actually, shockingly going to encourage him.
Which meant her notorious impatience now reigned supreme. Which meant Benson was now far more
dangerous than she had ever been.
Which also meant that from now until the moment he had her, which wasn't looking like it could feasibly be
on this trip with the lack of privacy, she was going to torment the shit out of him. While looking at him like
she was. Right now.
She hadn't picked up a thing from every suspect that had ever tried to look innocent. She looked guilty as
hell.
"So," she licked her lips. "From what Grant explained, the course should be just up around that corner.
Which mean's we've got like five minutes before we reach the end of the trail. We could play I Spy?"
The look he shot her should have been intimidating.
Olivia Benson simply looked sweetly back at him, one eyebrow raised. "What? It's a good game, Elliot. See,
I can start. I spy, something with my little eye that's..." her eyes darted to the front of his shorts. "Okay,
never mind. Not a good game."
never mind. Not a good game."
He groaned, rubbing his hand over his face. Maybe quiet, sullen, confused Olivia was a godsend, and this
one was the devil herself.
"So," she said brightly, lifting her chin. "You know when we get to the end, everyone is going to think we're
this late because we had sex."
Agony.
Welcome to hell, Detective Stabler. And this is your partner; she'll be your tour guide.
He wondered if he gave her the silent treatment if she'd shut up.
"Which we didn't. Of course. Have sex that is. But we're late nonetheless and I'm thinking that we should
have some sort of story. Like a cover." Luminous brown eyes turned to his. "What do you think?"
Elliot looked at her in disbelief. "I'm thinking that you chatting away merrily like you've been taking lessons
from Cathy should have been enough to rid me of any attraction to you."
Her eyebrows dropped as her lips lifted in a seductive smirk. Molasses, syrup, things that dripped and oozed
and stuck sweetly to his lips had nothing on her. He knew, before she even came closer, that whatever she
had up her sleeve wouldn't bode well for him.
Of course, she wasn't even wearing sleeves. No. That would be too much of a favor to him. Instead he had
to stare at the toned, long, elegant shape of her golden, bare arms right now as she lifted them, her fingers
reaching to her ponytail to tighten it.
Deliberately.
Tightening his damned shorts again as her flimsy shirt pulled over her chest.
Cragen wasn't going to have to split them up. Elliot was going to take care of that himself when he
requested a transfer to Siberia just to get away from her taunting, teasing, seductive little...fuck.
Elliot stopped. "Alright. Let's get a few things straight."
Humor danced over her features when she stopped next to him, her inability to fully stifle her smile amusing
her. The more she tried to stop her smirk, the worse it got. "Seems you already did."
That cracked her up.
He figured he needed to make a phone call to hell.
Hey, Lucifer? I have your minion here. Want her back?
"Listen to me, Benson. Unless you want Ludwig letting Cragen know that you and I missed the last part of
the course because I was so damned hard for you that I couldn't-" Elliot stopped, his mouth going
completely dry.
He blinked, his throat closing as he watched her. Olivia had lifted the bottom of her tank top all the way up
to wipe it over her face, baring her stomach until right beneath the bottom of her breasts.
Logically, he'd see more on the beach. Logically.

But logic had just taken a flying fuck off the high dive because all he could see was inches and inches of
toned, shapely, bronzed skin. It was the most beautiful color when the sun hit it - like a mixture of
butterscotch and caramel. He had white sheets at home, and the only thing he could imagine was what her
skin, her body, would look like when laid out, waiting for him, on his bed.
Elliot, she'd say, arching her back and letting her knees fall apart in invitation. Hurry.
"Elliot," Olivia prodded. "Are you done with the lecture because we have to hurry."
Eight years, he'd known her. For more than half of that he'd forced himself to never, ever spend time
contemplating her as more than his friend, his partner. But now all he saw was Olivia. All of her. How in
the hell no one else had stolen her from him in all that time, he had no idea because she was the most exotic
thing he'd ever seen. She was beautiful. Sexy.
His.
Off in the distance, a bird started calling loudly. The hot, smothering air clung to him and crickets hummed
deep in the underbrush. But it was all just background against the image of her, standing there, tilting her
head and parting her lips.
"El?" she questioned, when he didn't respond.
"What's going on, Liv?" he finally asked quietly, searching for any sign of retreat in her eyes.
She blinked, and he saw her consciously push her apprehension away. "What do you mean?"
"This. You're suddenly okay with this? With us?" God, please don't let him be pushing his luck. He just
wanted her to be sure, because her withdrawal again would likely kill him.
She sucked her lower lip into her mouth, her eyes falling to the ground between them. "Don't, El. Just let it
be, okay? I'm okay right now and," Olivia lifted her eyes and met his stare head-on. "And..." she suddenly
looked nervous, as if she was failing something because she didn't have the right words.
He nodded. "Okay."
Olivia seemed relieved. "Yeah?"
Elliot smiled at her. "Yeah."
The games, the jokes, the teasing. It was all a cover and he knew it. As he looked at her he knew that
whatever humor she was employing wasn't without fear. But mixed with her fear was courage, overpowering
it, stifling it. Yet what she wasn't able to suppress was the desire on her face. It had manifested itself as a
flush on her skin, as a bright, brittle, needy thing in her eyes.
Elliot took a step towards her, one hand snaking around and fisting her ponytail and hauling her up against
him. He closed his mouth over hers once, hard, taking ownership of the right to kiss her from now on. Olivia
didn't shy away this time. Instead she was there, fierce, demanding, equal. Her hips slammed up against his
and he fought every instinct known to man by refraining from taking her right there.
Her bare, naked, silken thighs would be around his. The promise of it was there. Soon. She'd ride him, he
figured. She'd want to be on top, too. She wasn't one of those women that had spent a lifetime taming their
basic instincts. Instead, she had relied on every, single primal urge to keep her alive.

She'd make love like that too, he decided. Wild. Ruthless. Unstoppable. He'd wear her on his skin by the
time they were done.
She'd wear him.
Elliot tore his mouth off of hers. "Get used to the idea. Because it's gonna happen," he said, the sound a low,
pulsating reverberation of a promise. "You. And me. Until neither of us can crawl out of bed."
Olivia ran her hand shakily over her swollen lips, raw desire on her startled face.
Elliot figured she might, finally have nothing to say.
He was wrong.
He heard it as he took a few steps forward , rounding the bend until the expansive, impressive high ropes
course was laid out in front of him.
It came from behind him. So close to him that she practically mewed it into his ear. Her lips brushed against
his skin, her fingers trailed over his arm.
She laughed, the pitch low, rolling, seductive.
"Promises, promises," Olivia whispered throatily.
He looked at her and she arched one perfect eyebrow towards the course without taking her alluring eyes off
of him.
"So now the only question I've got left," Olivia practically drawled, her lips sliding hotly across his jaw and
coming to rest at the edge of his mouth. "Is whether or not Detective Stabler is gonna be able to keep up?"
She winked at him and she was sex. And then she blinked and she was Olivia. She could play at the
seduction all she wanted, and she could bring him to his knees while she was at it. But in the end, as he
watched her turn around and assess the course, the determined lift of her chin all Benson, he knew she'd
face this thing between them just like she was about to face the course in front of her.
She'd handle it the way his partner would.
Despite her overwhelming fear that she would free-fall straight into nothing.
+++
Back to index

A/N: So in the time its taken me to update, many of you may have delivered babies, gotten married,
graduated, flown to the moon, who knows. I can't say anything that justifies my inability to write this
chapter. I've written much of what comes after, but it was this chapter that stymied me relentlessly. So here
it is. Finally. Thank you for sticking with me, for not throwing things or mailing me unfriendly pizza boxes.
Brynn, thank you for sitting with me all day while I wrote this, practically dabbing my head as if I had a
fever. I shall stop using you as the fodder when people ask me where the chapter is. It's not your fault. It's
Jake's. Pooks, for all the endless notes of encouragement, you win at life. And Jess, seriously, you SO took
one for the team. Who else would take a story sent to them at nearly midnight and beta that very second?
GAH. So here it is.
"You're late."
Olivia's head snapped upwards as she immediately twisted towards the unfamiliar, disgusted tone. Grant
was glaring at Elliot, his face a thundercloud.
Elliot's eyes widened fractionally and then immediately narrowed, his breathing slowing audibly.
Ah, hell. Elliot, just calm down.
Compounding the issue was the fact that there was no one around. By the looks of it, the group had already
begun the course.
"Would you look at that, Liv?" Elliot said, never taking his focused eyes off of Grant. "The NYPD seems to
be missing out by not hiring Grant. ‘Cause he's a damned fine detective, too. He's so smart that he figured
out all by himself that we were late."
Double hell.
Grant smiled arrogantly, all earlier pretenses of civility gone now that the three of them were alone again.
"From what I was told, you and Olivia were ordered to finish the course. But you missed all the instruction
on this exercise so I'm afraid that completing it won't be possible." His hand waved up to the two hundred
foot course behind him that spanned a small bay on this side of the lake. "The rest of the group already
started. Unfortunately, you missed it. But you're welcome to head back to the camp if you'd like and rejoin
us for another weekend in the future."
Elliot shifted, and Olivia knew she was seconds away from witnessing irreparable damage being inflicted
upon Grant's face. She still wasn't exactly clear on why Grant thought that he had even a fighting chance
against Elliot. Sure, Grant had a rugged physique, one built on his time in the outdoors, but there wasn't a
shot in hell that he'd come out on top when it meant going up against Elliot.
Elliot fought to kill. He had always just stopped himself from winning before his opponent stopped
breathing.
Of course, that was in the past.
She didn't think he'd stop if he went up against Grant.
Which meant she had to run interference. Now.

Olivia stepped in between the men, her back to Elliot. "We can probably catch up to them if you could take
the time to just go through the activities with us. Could you do that for us, Grant?" Olivia smiled, tilting her
head and praying Grant would take the out she was offering.
Behind her, Elliot bumped into her just a little bit. He was nudging her as if he were a bull itching to be let
out of the gate. His breath was hot at her ear, and she could practically feel the coiled energy emanating off
of him.
Grant had mere seconds to acquiesce.
But the look Grant was giving the both of them was akin to starting a pissing contest, and for all intents and
purposes he already had his pants unzipped, ready to go. Of course, Olivia mused, there probably wouldn't
be much in there for him to pull out.
So what would be the worst that would happen if she let Elliot have him? They'd get kicked out of camp?
Sent home?
Split up?
Shit.
She had to stop this. Not because she had any specific inclination towards saving Grant, but because she
didn't want this to be another mark against her and Elliot. She didn't want to see Cragen's face as he was
told, yet again, that they had screwed up.
She didn't want to know what Cragen would finally do if his back was shoved up against the wall. If yet
again he was told that Elliot and she hadn't been able to stay focused. Clear as to their purpose in any given
situation.
She didn't want to fuck up. Again.
Grant ignored her, cocking his head stupidly at Elliot. "Well why don't you tell me why you were late so I
can decide if I should bother repeating myself?"
The chuckle that came from behind her was low, dangerous, promising menace. It sent shivers dancing
across her skin, and she mentally chalked up the feeling that pooled in her belly to simple adrenaline.
Alpha-Elliot didn't turn her on. He didn't. She appreciated rationalization, negotiation and compromise. She
wasn't at all affected by Elliot's masculine posturing or the deliberate flex of his muscles as he crossed his
arms over his chest. He stepped up and to the right of her.
Heat slid from her belly to her thighs and back up again. The very recent memory of Elliot's big frame
against her sent fire into her cheeks, her palms, her toes. He was formidable. Beyond formidable.
Intimidating. Of course, she'd never backed down from Elliot, but maybe that was part of the draw. Because
she had never backed down, he continually looked at her now as if she was a puzzle. One he was going to
take apart and shatter using nothing more than the simple, blatant burn that she now recognized in his hot
eyes.
Christ. She had to get a grip on something that didn't involve his body.
Olivia steadied her voice, channeling all the patience for Grant that she could muster. She had to make
peace or concede this round to Elliot's version of handling it. "We had something come up and we
apologize. We know it's extra work for you but if you could just run through the course for us quickly-"
apologize. We know it's extra work for you but if you could just run through the course for us quickly-"
Grant stepped closer to her. "I didn't expect this of you, Olivia. Him, maybe. But not you. You think my
course is some sort of a joke? That this whole weekend is a joke? Because the two of you have done pretty
much whatever you wanted all weekend and expected the rest of the group to tolerate it. You both are
always ten minutes behind, or offering half-assed participation. This course I've developed actually means
something to some people. Everyone has personal reasons for being here. But you both are disruptive. You
think everyone didn't know what you two were up to back there?"
Olivia stilled.
"Just give me the go ahead," Elliot mumbled in her ear, shifting to ease his apparent need to bash the hell
out of Ludwig's skull. "No one will miss him."
But hell if she'd let Elliot have all the fun. Grant Ludwig had just pissed her off.
She'd given Grant the benefit of the doubt for days. She had ignored his lingering glances, his sly smiles,
and even pretended that his help with her sting earlier was strictly friendly, instructor-like assistance.
But the accusation that hovered in the words that he hadn't as yet said infuriated her. The bastard had no
right to cheapen or ridicule anything that had or had not happened between her and Elliot. They had enough
to deal with without needing this asshole's judgment.
The kid gloves came off. Now.
Olivia widened her eyes. "So," she said casually, stepping closer to Grant. "What were we up to back there?
" She smiled as pleasantly as possible. "Why don't you clarify it for me?"
Grant, never one for sensing his own vulnerability, narrowed his eyes. "When I created this course, it was to
enhance interpersonal relationships. What it wasn't," he said snidely. "Was a romantic rendezvous for two
people whom I'm pretty sure, according to your department regulations, shouldn't be doing what they're
doing."
Elliot practically growled behind her. "Prick."
His breathing had picked up, and as Olivia turned slightly to look at her partner, she realized his eyes had
frosted over with hatred. "El-"
He didn't take his predatory gaze off of Grant. "No more ‘El', I'm sick and tired of-"
Olivia silenced him while arching one eyebrow. "I was just gonna say, let me."
Elliot flinched with surprise as he suddenly looked at her. The ice in his eyes melted, replaced with a glint
of amusement she hadn't seen in years. "Yeah?"
She found herself nearly smiling. "Yeah."
Fun could be found in all sorts of unexpected places.
Grant was standing in front of her, clearly waiting for a response, and becoming agitated by the interplay
between by the two of them. "I'm right. I know I am. And I'm pretty sure that partners are not supposed to
be-"

Olivia stepped towards him, leaving less than an inch of space between her and Ludwig. "Fooling around?"
she whispered in his ear. "Screwing?" she said a little louder, stepping back. Olivia cocked her head. "Doing
the horizontal mambo? What is it exactly that you're so sure we're doing, Ludwig?" She arched one
eyebrow, daring him to respond.
He gaped at her.
Elliot widened his stance, sighing as if he was bored. "You pissed her off," he shrugged as he shook his
head. "Not good, buddy. Not good at all."
Warmth spread through her, a familiar, secure rhythm finding its beat between them. Good cop, bad cop. It
was the feeling of being unequivocally backed up. "C'mon, Grant," she said, sugar dripping from her voice.
"What was it that Elliot and I were doing? Surely," she purred, "A big, bad, tough outdoorsman like you
isn't afraid to say the word?"
Ludwig blinked stupidly.
Olivia leaned in close to him. "Sex," she said seductively. "You think we had sex don't you?"
Elliot laughed behind her. Loudly. "You're making me feel sorry for him, Liv," he said, as if Ludwig weren't
right in front of him. He stepped up next to her, squaring off against the other man. "I shoulda warned you.
She's a real ball buster, Ludwig."
"She's got you by the balls," Ludwig finally snapped desperately, shooting his gaze towards Elliot.
"Yup." Elliot's head dropped back on his shoulders as he crossed his arms over his chest once again. He
winked at Ludwig, his grin cold. "Jealous?"
Ludwig scoffed. "Hardly."
"You'd be more believable if you stopped pitching a tent in your pants, Ludwig," Olivia said dryly as she
stepped back from him and turned around, facing Elliot as her eyes scanned the clearing for some
equipment. "Besides, your help isn't essential. We can complete this course without you."
Elliot's eyebrows rose fractionally at her declaration.
Olivia put her hands on her hips as she glared at Elliot. "You were a Marine, right? And we're both cops. If
we had a vic at the end of this course that needed us, you think we'd stand around waiting for directions?"
The look on Elliot's face was one that clearly meant he wasn't interested in dissenting with her on anything
at this point.
Mentally, she gave him a point. Good call, Stabler. Now isn't the time to disagree.
"You can't just-" Ludwig started behind her.
Olivia sighed, looking pointedly at Elliot. "I give up," she said, shaking her head at Ludwig's stupidity. "He's
all yours. I'm going to go figure this equipment out."
Ludwig laughed arrogantly. "You know what? Try and figure the course out. Have at it and good luck. Just
know it's against advice. So you fall and break your neck? It's on you. This camp isn't responsible for your
safety any longer."

With that, Grant Ludwig stalked off, leaving them with a pile of equipment and two hundred feet of course
to navigate all on their own.
+++
Pitching a tent in his pants?
Had she really said that?
Well.
He shot a glance at Olivia as she purposefully slipped her legs into the harness and clipped the belt together.
This part she knew. She used to rock climb at the gym, so this wasn't entirely unfamiliar to her. Her bangs
brushed her eyelashes and she bit on her lower lip as she bent her head to fasten the belt.
She was approaching it all so earnestly and intently that he'd almost be willing to believe that she was
simply focused on the task at hand. But he knew her better than that. All her motion, bravado and sarcastic
quips were hiding the fact that this thing that was exploding between them was freaking her the hell out.
She was a piece of work, this one. She always had been, only he was just now beginning to truly
comprehend the extent to which she could consistently knock him back on his ass.
Olivia's eyes lifted to his, the sun glinting off the dark strands of her hair. "What are you looking at?" she
accused, her chin tilting upwards.
Shit. She was looking at him the same way she had just looked at tent-in-his-pants Grant. That couldn't be
good.
Think landmines in the desert, Stabler. Best way to avoid ‘em? Don't venture into the sand in the first place.
He gave her the clearest expression he could muster. "Nothing," he shrugged.
Olivia rolled her eyes as she snapped the light vest on. "Stop looking at me, Elliot. It's not normal."
Elliot grabbed his own vest out of the pile of equipment. "Right. And so much of this is normal."
This must be what they call verbal diarrhea. Sick shit. Uncontrollable. Things just came out.
Olivia froze, her fingers stilling immediately on the small snaps. "Elliot, if you're changing your mind, then
just-"
Oh. Hell. No.
"Changing my mind?" he growled, interrupting her. Elliot stepped closer to her, his hand reaching out to
cup her upper arm so he was sure he had her attention. "You think I'd change my mind about what
happened back there between us?"
Olivia didn't look at him. Instead she lifted her chin in the opposite direction, surveying the course that at its
highest point rose almost forty feet off the ground.
He tightened his hold. "Olivia, look at me."
She turned back to him, giving him a casual look that didn't quite reach the depths of her eyes. "What?"

"Are you changing your mind about seeing where it goes?"
Her eyes shuttered just a little as if she were bracing herself. All of the playfulness of a few minutes ago
was gone. He expected it would be like this. There would be moments when she was alright with this
explosive attraction, and moments when the reality would hit and it would send her reeling.
"No," she said, aiming for nonchalance. "I'm not. Can we do this course now and get it over with?"
Impatience filtered into the waver of her voice.
But he knew her better than to think she'd simply accept that he had feelings for her. She'd analyze the
newfound information, inspect it, assess a value to the potential damage it could cause. He could only
assume that she'd already calculated the risk, and realized it could hurt like hell if it all went wrong. Then
she had decided to do it anyway.
He wondered why she was allowing him to push forward. Because of her own feelings, or because she
didn't want to disappoint him?
He wanted her. By God, he wanted her. But he wouldn't push Olivia at her expense. When he finally had
her, and he knew he eventually would, he wanted her to be right there with him, giving as good as she got
because she wanted to. He wanted Olivia to be blazing in the same unstoppable fire that he was. For every
curse word he'd let slip from his lips when he was in her, he wanted her voice to utter two.
He wouldn't take her until her moments of doubt faded. Even if she said she was ready, he'd have to believe
she was, too. He wasn't going to lose her for good over immediate sex, no matter how much his dick
protested.
"There's no hurry Liv," he said quietly, dropping his hand. "Whenever you're ready, okay?"
Her body relaxed and her eyes filled with relief, but she didn't immediately acknowledge the leeway he was
giving her. "Let's do this now, Elliot. The sooner we do it, the sooner it's done."
He knew she meant the course, but the tone of her voice scared the shit out of him. He didn't want her
saying that to herself about him. About them. About the fact that they both were crystal clear on the fact that
sex was going to happen.
He didn't want to be someone that she just wanted to get it over with.
"Liv..." he started, her name locking in his throat. Being careful had never been so important. He'd never
paid attention to consequences before, but she made him realize just how much he couldn't make a mistake
this time around. He'd raised a family through trial and error, but they'd been resilient because they'd always
had each other. Even when they didn't have him, Kathy had been able to turn to the kids and they had been
able to rely on her. Damage had always been buffered.
But not for Olivia.
Olivia hadn't had anyone.
All of the mistakes she'd seen in this lifetime, she had absorbed, withstood, grown to expect.
No more mistakes. Not for him. Not for her. They'd lived through enough of them.
She deserved for him to do something right. If that meant taking it slow and telling his body to calm the
fuck down, then so be it. The suffering would be worth it.

Olivia continued to look at him. Her eyes were wide, tinged with fear. But the depths still held trust. "Don't
try to figure me out, Elliot. Let me do that," Olivia finally said softly, the faintest of breezes sifting up from
the lake and sending her bangs across her forehead. "Do this course with me."
He got it then. She didn't want Grant's help. She didn't want the rest of the group with her. All of the trust
exercises and emotional footholds that had been building over the last two days led to this. To something
she wanted to do with him. She was scared of heights but was a master at rock climbing. He couldn't climb
those tiny ledges for shit, but thirty feet up wouldn't faze him. Where one of them would falter, the other
would thrive. Maybe that was what it always was.
Elliot blew out a breath. Behind her, the lake glimmered, the tiny ripples of the water shaking the sunlight
and sending it scattering. Olivia was staring at him, asking him something that went far beyond a course, or
a camp, or even their partnership.
Do this with me.
Don't go ahead of her, where he could pave the way. Don't trail behind her, where he could make sure she
didn't fall. Go with her. Next to her. Christ, he hadn't really been there in years.
"You got a deal, Benson," he said quietly.
He could have sworn he saw the faintest hint of a smile tilt the edges of her lips up as she ducked her head
and handed him a harness.
+++
"How the fuck are you holding onto that?" came his irritated grunt from three feet below her and to the left.
Olivia looked upwards. She was only ten feet off the ground as yet, and the first ledge was twenty feet up.
Halfway there. Of course, Elliot was still precariously clutching the small nodules that protruded out from
the bark of the huge trees a few feet down, sounding entirely frustrated.
This activity she knew. She'd been able to hook the lines, send the lock upwards, and get them harnessed
properly so that if they fell backwards off the tree the tension line would slow their descent. It would be
enough resistance that they could keep their feet beneath them before they made brutal contact with the
ground.
She also knew the key to this activity was to keep looking upwards and to never, ever, look down.
Which would be fine except for the fact that Elliot was now what would technically be known as "down"
from her. Which meant she had to look at him, check his position, advise him as to the location of the next
foothold because he obviously wasn't intuitively and correctly discerning what his next move should be.
Olivia dug her gloved fingers deeper into the tiny grooves at the top of the man-made nodules and shut her
eyes. She ignored the voice in her head, the one that had belonged to her instructor years ago when she used
to indoor rock climb. Don't look down, Olivia. It causes vertigo. You'll freeze up and lose your sense of
balance.
She blew out a breath and stared at the bark in front of her. The worst that would happen if she lost her
balance would be that her line would send her downward, and she'd have to control the drop until she hit the
forest floor again. She wasn't going to die, or break a bone, or probably even twist an ankle. But she'd have
to endure that agonizing plummet in her stomach. The one that told her body that she was falling, gliding,
heading south because humans didn't know how to fly.

You ever wonder what it would be like to fly, baby girl?
Her stomach twisted, flipping over deep in her belly.
"This activity blows," Elliot muttered. "These damned things are made for kids to hang onto, not two
hundred pound adults."
"Two twenty," she mumbled.
There was silence beneath her for a long moment. "How the hell do you know what I weigh?"
Her fingers cramped on the small hold and she loosened them marginally. Her bare knees were pressed
against the rough surface of the tree and her shoulders ached from the position she was in, her arms
reaching above her as she got ready to pull herself up and place her sneakered toes on the next notch for
leverage. "At the gym. Saw you weigh yourself," she said, her chest tight from the exertion.
"You watching me work out, Benson?" he leered.
Sonofabitch. How did he manage to do that? She was plastered to a tree like a koala and he still managed to
send heat into the very tips of her toes. Great. She was a horny koala. "Kinda like you're watching me right
now?" she countered.
Laughter broke from his chest beneath her. "Can't say I'm not enjoying my vantage point, that's for sure," he
drawled.
That had her head whipping down and to her left, her eyes narrowing as her fingers clutched tighter to the
holds. She saw him grasping onto his tree, which was only two feet away from hers, and felt her adrenaline
spike. From where he was, he was probably staring straight up the leg of her shorts. He wasn't even making
a move to advance upwards. Instead, his lips were flattened into a smirk and the glinting muscles of his
forearms taunted her as they too were extended upwards.
Jesus Christ in Heaven, every single inch of him was sculpted. Even without having an aptitude for this part
of the course, he looked fluid, lazy, at home perched against the side of a damned tree.
She, on the other hand, was probably a sweaty, awkward mess.
Figures.
"Stabler, just pull on the hold to the right, not the left. If you use the left you won't have anywhere to put
your foot," she fired off. Olivia ignored the ground as it came into focus in her peripheral vision. She looked
back upwards, to the ledge. "And keep your eyes to yourself."
"Only my eyes?" he teased. "Does that mean my hands can-"
She pulled herself up until she could get her toes onto the next foothold, and then used the leverage to push
herself upwards. Olivia rested her forehead against the rough, peeling bark. "Only if you can catch me,
Elliot," she half-whispered, half-lamented.
Elliot laughed. Low. Amused. Deep in his throat.
Not for the first time, it made her wonder what he would sound like in bed. Would he be guttural groans and
hard, catching breaths or would bed be where he'd talk to her? Would he say things to her as he moved in
her? Would it be that rumbling c'mon Liv or a commanding, Olivia, look at me?

Christ.
Even precariously wrapped around a tree, her body still stung with the need to wrap itself tightly around
him. The magnitude of her need was astounding in and of itself, let alone the fact that it was overwhelming
her right smack dab in the middle of a height exercise.
She had to focus.
Her fingers were sweating in the climbing gloves and a single drop of perspiration slid down her spine. She
lifted her forehead off the tree and inhaled. "You coming?" she asked, deliberately infusing impatience into
her voice.
There was complete silence from beneath her.
Hell. Hell. Hell. The bloody damnation trifecta.
The least he could have done was laugh off the innuendo. Smirk, or even crack a joke. But no, this had to
be where he was dead, fricking silent. He was letting her flail around in the implication of what she had
unwittingly said.
When she had apparently suffered enough for his liking, he finally piped up. "Not in this position, no," he
offered helpfully.
"Don't make it to the top, Elliot," Olivia warned. "Because I'm going to send you straight back down the fast
way." She pulled herself up to the next handhold and found a spot for her left foot, creating even more
distance between them. She was less than five feet from the top now, and he was still less than halfway from
the bottom.
The sun was scalding her bare skin and the air seemed to get thicker the higher she rose. A few hours from
now, she'd be done with this. She'd have an icy water bottle in her hand and some fresh clothes. She'd have
some space to adjust to this kind of banter, this sort of acquiescence to the inevitable that she had seemingly
agreed to back on the trail. It had been too much information today and not enough time alone. She was still
reeling from the fact that he wasn't going back to his wife, yet she was already flirting back.
After nine years of nothing happening, it was all rushing forward around her at the speed of light.
Her head was hurting just as much as her body was aching for him. And her heart, the pulsing cavity in her
chest - she didn't even want to begin to delve into what was happening in there.
"You leaving me down here?" Elliot asked.
The playfulness was gone, just like that. He was serious, his voice dipping into a clipped tone she heard only
when they were working. Even that surprised her. After all the years in which she didn't think he had a clue
about what was happening in her head, he now knew her almost to the point where it was unsettling. Just as
she was reaching her comfort limit with the innuendo, he was there, pulling them both back into a safe zone.
Of course, what he was asking meant she had to look down again. From even higher up than she had been
before.
"I swear to God I'm gonna fall off this fucking tree," he complained. "I'm too big for this sh-"
"Big cats do it, Elliot," she interrupted as she stopped again. "And bears. They're both bigger than you are.
Gorillas do too, and some of them are five or six hundred pounds. So stop making excuses."
Gorillas do too, and some of them are five or six hundred pounds. So stop making excuses."
"Great," he muttered. "I've got the Discovery Channel for a partner."
"Yeah, well you're being so dramatic about this, it's like I've got the Lifetime Channel for one." Somewhere
near her head, an insect buzzed. Her body froze until she realized the buzzing sound wasn't that of another
bee. Olivia sighed. "You need help?"
There was silence in response again, and it drained away all of the wit and sarcasm they had been hiding
behind. The words echoed in her head, and they seemed to take over the air around her. A thousand
moments suddenly played in her head. A thousand times when they had both refused each other's support.
His marriage dissolving, her search for her father. His stumble back home and her determination to help
Simon. Those were the big ones. But there was a pathway they had been on that was littered with the small
ways they had locked the other out, too.
You need help?
She wondered what he was going to say. Would this be like yesterday when he had purposefully crossed the
balance beam blindfolded without her, or would this be today, when they were trying something new?
Everything inside of her started to lock up, as if she was battening down the hatches of an underground
hideout in the midst of a Kansas thunderstorm, waiting for the tornado to crackle through and destroy
everything they had been building.
He was going to refuse her.
She could hear him now. No. I can do this, he'd say. And she'd pretend the words didn't leave her feeling
useless. Floating. She'd hold onto the edges of the nodules and climb upwards, the height that she was
perched on suddenly making the bare skin of her legs tingle with apprehension.
She'd cut him off first, so she didn't hear the words that dismissed whatever she had to offer.
"Never mind, I know you can do it," Olivia finally said, her lips pressing tightly together as she glanced
upwards, the sun filtering between the leaves of the crocheted treetops. She was dizzy with it, with the idea
that belief and disappointment could so easily be interchanged, that hope could so quickly and summarily be
dismissed. She'd get to the top, and she'd start figuring out the next part of this course. She'd tell herself that
whether or not he needed her didn't matter. She needed him, and that would have to be enough.
People don't fly, she had whispered in her mother's hotel room over thirty years ago. The night of the cable
car ride, her mother slept off the rum and bourbon while the colorful evening lights that shone on Niagara
Falls played outside their window. They don't fly, mama, and don't you try. You'll get hurt, mama, she had
choked, holding in her stomach tightly so she wouldn't cry. Olivia had fallen asleep that night just like that.
Her stomach tucked in and her knees pulled securely to her chest, her long dark hair dusting over the pillow
as she stared at the outline of her sleeping mother and the stunning beauty of the natural wonder that lay
just beyond the open curtains of the window.
She didn't know why the memory haunted her now.
"Did you hear me?" The low, insistent question came from her lower left.
Olivia shook off the fog, and paid attention to her perch. She was almost there, almost to the top. She
wouldn't let his simple refusal of her help mean more than it was. It didn't hurt. "Yeah, I heard you. You're
fine. You can do it. I got it." Her words were short. Punctuated. Abrupt.

Assuming.
She didn't look down at him.
"That's not what I said," he said gruffly. "Liv, look at me."
Don't look down. It causes vertigo.
Olivia gripped the handholds until her fingertips were probably white.
But because it was him, she slowly looked downwards, and the bright, lucid blue of his eyes caught her gaze
immediately. He was looking up at her, concern marring his features and his body frozen in place against the
tree trunk.
Elliot shook his head just a little bit as his eyes softened. "I'm getting in the way of myself down here. Can't
get a good idea of the height of the different holds. Think you could guide me?"
It wasn't the height that was causing her vertigo, it was his words.
"I need help, Liv." Quiet. Murmuring. His lips lifted just a little at the edges and it transformed his whole
face into something safe, welcoming, easy. The heat, the anger, the righteousness and quest for vindication
all melted away. It was just Elliot and that gravelly voice. Asking her. Needing her.
"Okay?" he prodded.
She saw the ground beneath them this time and she turned her eyes towards it, absorbing the details. The
matting of last year's dead leaves, the disturbed earth that in some places revealed moist, rich soil. There
were the fallen branches and the spurts of weeds and ferns. The intermittent smattering of flowers. It was
just the ground. It wasn't dangerous or dark. It was just some place she had been a few minutes ago and it
wouldn't swallow her whole.
Olivia lifted her gaze from it and met Elliot's curious stare once again. "Okay," she agreed, sucking in her
lower lip nervously.
"Okay," he smiled.
Her stomach unclenched and she let out an exhaling breath. "You want the hold to the right, and use the
right foothold at the same time, so you'll have enough leverage," she supplied.
And just like that, Elliot moved towards her.
+++
"Liv! Did you know Scully and Mulder were sent to a ropes course?"
Olivia jumped from the unexpected sound of yelling. Elliot and she had made it to the top of the ledge, and
were now untangling their lines and hooking them to their vests for the next portion of the course when the
words drifted over the breeze. She looked around, seeking the direction of Cathy's voice, and finally realized
that it came from across the small bay and ten feet lower, where the woman stood on another wide platform
built between two trees.
Cathy and Jim waited there, getting ready for their turn to go across the third segment, having just
completed the portion Elliot and she were about to undertake.

Olivia wondered if she could pretend she didn't hear Cathy from this far away.
"Did you hear me?" yelled Cathy, waving her arms over her head. "Yoohoo, Olivia!"
Elliot grunted, his head bent in front of her as he focused on the task of securing the hooks to the metal
loops on the front of the vest she wore. "Aren't you going to answer her, Liv?" he said under his breath,
attempting innocence.
Olivia stared at the top of his head, wondering if she could hit him. Not hard. Just enough so that she'd
rearrange his brain matter, giving him a sense of humor that might finally seem remotely funny to her. "Why
don't you answer her, Mulder?" Olivia said dryly.
The hook clicked, and Elliot tugged on it slightly, testing its mettle and offering her a sexy grin as the
movement jerked her possessively towards him. He didn't drop the grasp he had on the hook.
"Olivia!" came the sound from behind Elliot again. "Isn't that funny? Jim just reminded me! I didn't
remember that they..." Cathy stopped, tipping her head towards Jim's as he said something meant for her
ears only.
Olivia was planning on responding to Cathy, but Elliot's eyes had just deepened so that they now matched
the lake. Not the blue of the shallow bay beneath them, but the dark indigo that rustled out in the middle of
the lake. He was holding the hook linked to her vest and she was nearly up against him. Despite the stifling
air, she could feel the hot whisper of his breath on her cheek.
"Maybe I should tell her," Elliot rumbled, his lips near hers and his eyelids dropping seductively. "That we
can't be Mulder and Scully because I'm not partial to redheads. I think I'm definitely a brunette man."
Olivia's throat closed up. God, she was desperate for him. Even up here, the water laid out in front of them,
and the zip line they'd have to cross dangling ominously as it led towards Cathy and Jim's plank, she was
unable to breathe in anything more than shallow gasps.
"Elliot," she tried to warn, putting her palms flat on his vest without really pushing him away. "They can see
us."
He shrugged arrogantly, his lips coming closer to hers. "I'm not gonna undress you up here, so let ‘em look."
She wanted to chalk up her scalding need to Elliot simply being attractive. That was explainable. Even
normal. She had heard the chatter about him by some of the females around One PP. Olivia had seen the
lingering glances directed towards Elliot by the desk clerk, or a rookie cop. Elliot had a reputation. Not for
sleeping around, or dating, or even flirting. His was all about his intensity, his reckless justice, his hero
complex. I'd like to be interrogated by Detective Stabler, one of the rookie uniform cops had once laughed
as she walked down the hallway with a friend, entirely unaware that Olivia was directly behind her. I
wonder if he'd be that intense in bed, the other had speculated openly.
Olivia had cleared her throat, and when the two young women had turned around, she had just glared at
them.
But she couldn't reduce this thing between them to simple chemistry or his overt sexuality. This was rooted
far deeper, and that was starting to scare her even more. "Elliot," she protested half-heartedly as his thumb
traced lazily along her hairline. "We're in the middle of the course, on a platform that might as well be a
stage, this is hardly the time or the-"
Without warning, his mouth descended on hers. Hard, fast. His lips grabbed at hers and his tongue pushed
right into her mouth. Elliot pulled on the hook in the center of her vest with one hand, using that as his only
right into her mouth. Elliot pulled on the hook in the center of her vest with one hand, using that as his only
hold on her as he growled into her throat. His stubble grated along her skin as he deepened the kiss, going
in for more.
Olivia moaned, her head falling back as he drove his tongue into her mouth. Her thighs became taut and her
breasts ached, bound tightly within the vest. Her face flamed as he kissed her, taking possession of her
mouth, of her, with just the demanding pressure of his lips. Her hips instinctively rolled towards his,
needing. Needing.
She couldn't get used to this. Elliot. Her partner. Kissing her. Christ.
Elliot pulled back, his lips moist and swollen and his dark lashes framing the blatant, heated arousal in his
eyes. "So tell me," he murmured.
Olivia blinked in the sunlight, seeing nothing in the glare but those blue depths. "What?" she said quietly,
feeling dizzy on the platform. She licked her lips and she could taste him on them, feel the smooth, swelled
texture of them. To her right, the water rocked and shifted over twenty feet below.
"Tell me why you're afraid of heights."
Olivia swayed just a little bit, and he tightened his hold on the hook, keeping her against him. "Elliot-" she
started.
He dropped his forehead to hers, his hand trapped between them, unwilling to let go. "Tell me."
The lake beneath her suddenly seemed loud, and the rush of it was only increasing in volume. It had been a
day like this one when she had held her mother back on a cable car, the sun luminous in the afternoon sky,
the breeze enjoying its journey over the white frothy ripples of the water. It would sound stupid if she told
him. I thought my mother was going to fall into the Niagara Gorge.
Of course, that would be a lie if she said it out loud. But the truth was far too hideous.
I thought my mother was going to throw herself into the gorge. She was going to leave me there. She was
going to leave me because of who I am. I wasn't someone worth staying for. Not even for her. Not even for
my mother.
Olivia pulled back, her chest so constricted that her gasp for air was audible, even against the seemingly
roaring sound of the water below. "Let it go, Elliot," she whispered, desperately seeking out the horizon.
She'd heard that once, that if on or over water and dizzy, look for the horizon. It was supposed to steady her,
return her to center.
It didn't.
But Elliot did. His hands reached out and held her by her elbows, the heat of his palms seeping into her bare
skin. "Can't."
"Can't or won't?" Olivia fired back. She shot an angry, furious gaze towards him. She was starting to realize
just what being on this platform really meant. The platform with no railings, no safeguards, no barriers.
His eyes narrowed, his jaw setting stubbornly. "Both."
She wanted to tell him to leave her alone, but another thought was growing within her. If she went over the
edge then she'd tumble into the shallow lake. If she lost her balance, if she...if he...Oh God. If the zip line
they were supposed to fasten themselves to broke with Elliot dangling from it, what then? What if he went
they were supposed to fasten themselves to broke with Elliot dangling from it, what then? What if he went
over? If he fell?
You ever wonder what it would be like to fly, baby girl?
She'd see him, Elliot, falling through the air. It would be that horrible day with her mother all over again.
She'd have to watch him go, but this time she wouldn't need to wonder who would take care of her, be there
for her, be who she had left.
She didn't need to wonder, because she already knew.
Without him, there wouldn't be anyone at all.
+++
Olivia was pale as hell.
Being up on this fucking ledge wasn't helping either. It was barely six feet by eight feet at most, and with the
way she was wobbling, it might as well have been a goddamned tightrope for all the safety it offered.
He grabbed onto the hook on her vest again and glanced around for the pulley on the zip line. The heavy line
was tethered between this platform and the one that Cathy and Jim had been standing on only moments
before, and if he hooked her vest to the line and gave her the handles and feet hooks that also slid along it,
she could ride it safely to the lower platform.
Of course getting the handles and hooks set up for her meant he'd have to let go of her, and that wasn't
happening.
Olivia was staring off at the distance, teetering despite her best efforts to steady herself. "I can do it," she
mumbled. "I got it, El. I can do this," she said, trying to pull her vest out of his grasp. Her voice sounded
like it was coming from far away.
"Hang on," he ordered, reaching for the pulley and trying to manage drawing that over while still hanging
onto her.
"No," she shook her head. "I can do it, I can. You don't have to-" Olivia yanked herself backwards so
suddenly that the hook on her vest slipped out of his sweaty grasp, and she stumbled backwards.
Elliot lunged for her, grabbing her arm and hauling her up against him. "Christ! Olivia, what the hell is the
matter with you?" he hissed into her hair. She was shaking against him. He thrust one hand against her
scalp, letting her hair tangle in his fingers and using his hold on her ponytail to gently tilt her head
backwards so he could get a better look at her.
The look on her face silenced him.
The pain in her eyes was visceral. He'd seen her hurt before. He'd seen her ache, cry, even bleed. But where
this agony was coming from was a new place. A place from which nothing else had ever surfaced before.
She'd cried over her brother. She'd spun in circles over her father. She'd even lamented bitterly over her
mother's drinking.
But this was different.
She looked like a little kid. The wide, hollow expression on her face was one that a child would wear when
completely clueless as to how to heal themselves.
completely clueless as to how to heal themselves.
"What's going on?" he asked softly.
"If the line breaks," she began. But her voice collapsed, disappeared. She swayed yet again. "Can we just
get down, El?"
Her words were small. Weak in volume. Elliot pulled her up against him and thanked fucking God she let
him. The light wind lifted the sweet scent of her hair and it filled his lungs. He wished there was an easier
way to get her down than moving forward, but climbing back down the notches on the tree would be far
more dangerous than just completing the course as it was intended.
Elliot shifted, desperate to get closer to her, but the vests were in the way. "I'm gonna hook you to the line,
okay? You just have to hang on to the handles and put your feet in the straps. It'll stop itself at the other end
and you can put your feet down and unhook yourself. Even if you let go, Liv, your vest will be strapped to
the line. You won't fall, no matter what."
Her hands were fisted onto the back strap of his vest. "How will you get down?" she asked quietly.
God, she wasn't really with him. Whatever it was that was messing with her head was taking over. He gave
her credit though. She was trying. Olivia was fighting it, trying to stay in the game.
"When you're done, and you unlatch yourself, I'll be able to pull the hooking mechanism back from here. I'll
meet you over there if you just wait for me." Elliot kept his voice calm, mechanical, matter-of-fact. But
inside he was rebelling against all of it. Maybe they should have just said fuck it, and gone back to camp
when they had been given a chance. He didn't know what the hell they were trying to prove.
Olivia shuddered, staying pressed against him for one moment longer before pushing herself back from him.
"Okay."
Okay.
Not okay.
She wasn't looking at him. Olivia ducked her head and moved towards the pulley. "Can you latch me?"
Something was incredibly wrong. Her voice had dulled, become perfunctory. Yet through it all she was
functioning, trudging forward despite whatever it was that was haunting her.
He shot a glance to the empty platform at the other end of the line. He desperately wished Cathy and Jim
were still standing there. That they'd be there when she came across. But they had completed that phase, and
he could hear the faintest echoes of voices coming from the trees nestled at that end of the bay.
The two of them were alone on this one.
Elliot's instincts were ricocheting around inside of him. He knew that sending Olivia across was safer than
most of the things they did, but with her shaky grasp and punctuated breathing, he wasn't entirely convinced
he should let her do this.
Let her? She'll kick your ass if you think you have control over her, Stabler. Do you see her? Trembling like
a leaf in a hurricane and she's still fiddling with the pulley.
He came around the back of her, reaching his arms around either side of Olivia as he reached for the metal
hook, carefully extricating it from her fingers. His lips fell to the top of her head as she leaned back towards
hook, carefully extricating it from her fingers. His lips fell to the top of her head as she leaned back towards
him. The way she was pushed back against his body, he figured she was probably pressing her eyes shut
too, thinking she'd find her equilibrium that way.
"What did she do?" Elliot said softly, the words fading against her hair.
"Who?" Olivia responded immediately. Defensively.
"Your mother. She did this, whatever it is, didn't she?"
Elliot was met with silence. He dragged the hook downwards off the line and fastened it to her vest by
looking down and over her shoulder. Stray strands of Olivia's hair brushed his cheek and his whole body
tensed, frustrated as hell that she had to do something that was obviously wreaking havoc upon her.
"We were in Niagara Falls when I was a kid. She almost fell off a cable car ride that went over the gorge."
Olivia's voice was far too even for his liking.
Her hook snapped into place, linking her to the zip line. It was the only sound he heard.
"Heights have messed with me ever since then," Olivia shrugged, as if dismissing it.
Something inside of him snapped. There was an awareness, a recognition within him that said he had missed
absolutely fucking everything when it came to Olivia Benson. She was with him all the time. Day in and day
out. But he still didn't know things like this. He had garnered all he knew about the effects of her mother's
drinking on her by watching Olivia sort through the hidden liquor bottles at a vic's house. He had realized
the depth of her frustration with her brother and the questions left unresolved about her father when he
watched her beat the hell out of Thatcher. But Elliot didn't know the details. He'd always thought he was
doing what was best for her by giving her some space, but in the end, that might have been the one thing of
which she'd always had too much.
Elliot came around the front of her, crowding her, ignoring her usual circumference of personal space. Her
personal space could take a flying fucking leap for good as far as he was concerned.
She wouldn't look at him. "I'm ready." Olivia's stoic gaze was focused on the water she was about to cross.
"Yeah? Well, I'm not," Elliot countered.
Olivia lifted her chin and then squinted at him. Christ, she was itching for a fight. He understood the
instinct. When pressed to talk, he had always come out swinging, too.
"Fine," she bit off. "Then I'll go myself."
Elliot barricaded himself between her and where she'd need to step in order to start the glide. His back was
to the edge of the platform. "Fine. Go around me."
Olivia must have realized immediately that would be impossible without knocking him into the water.
"Sonofabitch," she cursed. "Elliot, just get out of my way."
Elliot folded his arms across his chest and tilted his head, squinting his eyes right back at her. "She was
drunk."
Olivia rolled her eyes, but she did it while looking away from him. "You're so smart."

"Did she almost fall, or did she try and jump?" He was purposely succinct with the questions. He didn't
think she was going to have a coming to Jesus about opening up to him on a platform twenty feet above the
water. So he'd interrogate her if need be. She'd tell him, come hell or high water.
The anger darkened her eyes into a stormy midnight. "She was going to jump."
His chest caved in. He didn't want to know the answer to the next question. "How old were you?"
"You done, Elliot?" Olivia finally spat, her voice rising. "Jesus! I'm not a suspect. This isn't any of your
business. Now get the hell out of my way so we can get this stupid-"
Elliot grabbed her arm, hard, pulling her against him. His voice was low, nearly threatening and he delivered
his words directly into her ear. "When I was eleven, I caught my father in the garage with a gun in his
mouth, Olivia. I didn't stop him. I didn't even trust him by then. He was so fucked up about being stripped of
his badge, that he was unreliable. I didn't know if he'd only end up shooting himself if I confronted him. So I
walked away. And I sat on the front steps of the house for an hour, waiting to hear the blast." Elliot licked
his lower lip, his heart pounding in his chest. "The blast never came, Olivia. It never came. Instead, that
night we all had dinner, and my father sat there shoving his mashed potatoes around, just like he did every
other night. Which made me wonder how many other afternoons he had spent in the garage, sucking on the
barrel until something finally made him come inside."
Olivia's eyes welled and she shook in his grasp, her focus directed on the edge of the plank. "You never said
anything," she breathed quietly.
"Yeah?" he said angrily. "Well neither did you. That might be the fucking problem with us, don't you think?
Because you want to know, don't you Olivia? When I tell you shit like that, you want to know."
Her face lifted to his, and all of the haze that had lived in her eyes only minutes before was gone. Olivia
scrunched her forehead to try and stop herself from crying. "Yeah, I want to know," she whispered.
Elliot expelled a breath and he did the only thing he knew. He brushed his lips along her temple, his mouth
pressed hard against her skin. "Well, I want to know, too."
Olivia nodded slightly and pressed her skin back against him.
"No one is falling off this thing, Olivia. Not you and not me. It doesn't matter if we're five feet up or a
hundred feet up, we're getting across and nothing is going to happen."
"Roger that," she said softly, her lips rising just slightly in the hint of a forced smile.
Elliot's mouth slid to hers. He couldn't help it. He wished every argument they'd had over the last two years
had ended this way. His lips across hers. Her breathing directly into his chest as if she was saving a life. He
wondered if he was kissing her this much because he couldn't get enough of tasting her, or if it was because
he was trying to prove to her that she was his. Probably both. Her lips were full, pliant, willing. Her soft
moan sifted over his skin in the second he pulled away.
When she looked at him this time she was calmer. Less shaky. The panic in her expression had dissipated
and she was holding his gaze steadily. He couldn't put his finger on the change, but it was there, giving her
an almost serene quality.
"I'm ready, El."
He absorbed what she was saying and how she was looking at him. In their entire history, it may have been
the most rational, synchronized moment they had ever been given. Standing twenty feet off the ground, left
the most rational, synchronized moment they had ever been given. Standing twenty feet off the ground, left
entirely alone with nothing but their fucked up pasts and their uncertain futures, she seemed to find him.
He stepped out of her way, trusting her to handle this.
Olivia lifted one foot and hauled herself up, locking her ankle through the rung before doing the same with
her other foot, hanging onto the handrails. He nearly laughed, watching her strung up in the contraption.
Elliot waited, watching her hanging there. Long moments passed.
Olivia shot a look of disgust at him. "Christ, Elliot. Release the lever or I will."
He smirked. "Well, say something when you go across. Something just for me. Whaddya say?"
"I say hell no. Now release the lever."
"C'mon, Liv." He grinned at her and stepped towards the lever. The one she could have pushed with her
foot, if only he wasn't now covering it with his hand. "Yell cowabunga or something."
Olivia's eyes narrowed so much that her lashes banged together. "Cowabunga? What am I, twelve? Not
happening, Elliot. Now get your hand off the lever."
"How about yippee-kai-eh motherfucker?"
She glared at him. "I'm not Bruce Willis. I have girl parts. And this isn't Die Hard. Release the goddamned
lever."
"I'm the king of the world?" Elliot tried hopefully. He drew his eyes together, raking his eyes over her body
slowly. "Girl parts. Right. I'm the queen of the world?"
"Fuck you, Elliot!" Olivia seethed loudly, nearly yelling.
"That'll do," he grinned, and promptly released the lever, sending her flying across the lake.
+++
Back to index

A/N: Okay, so it's practically a double chapter. Twice as long as usual. I figured if I stopped any sooner
than I did, a few of you (you know who you are! Pooks*cough*Pooks) might contract out for my head on a
platter. You're all wonderfully nuts for still sticking with me on what I now refer to as "The Beast". (Okay,
fine, I refer to Elliot as such as well, but that's my own little personal time, mmmkay?) Thank you Jess and
Brynn for reading 40 pages at a moments notice. Everyone should be nice to you, all moronic delays this
time are expressly my own.
Olivia stared in the mirror, watching the water droplets fall off the tip of her nose and eyelashes and back
into the sink. She'd been desperate for the chance to cool down all day, and as soon as the course had been
completed, she had immediately headed for the cabin, snagging a gauzy, short-sleeved crème peasant
blouse, clean khaki shorts, flip-flops and a washcloth from her bag before heading for the bathrooms.
She'd been merciless with the water, turning the knobs until it gushed out icy cold and then splashing it on
her face and neck. She had undone her ponytail and dragged her wet fingers through her hair, despite
knowing it would only make her hair curlier and less manageable.
Nothing mattered except for cooling down.
Now, the camp activities and courses complete, she stared at herself in the mirror, barely recognizing her
reflection. Of course, the basics were the same. The dark arch of her eyebrows, the rise of her cheekbones,
the point of her chin. But there were noticeable differences, too. Her skin was bronzed, as if light was
reflecting off of her, and the bridge of her nose was slightly deeper in color. Her lips were devoid of
Chapstick, but they were a deep pink, slightly swollen from where Elliot had nipped at her.
And her eyes were different. Her normally deep brown irises glittered, as if in anticipation.
Shit.
Olivia filled her cupped palms with more of the frigid water and splashed it over her face again, as if that
could make the obvious glow disappear. She wasn't a damned schoolgirl basking beneath the attention of her
crush. She'd agreed to let this flirtation play out and see where it went, but that didn't mean she had to lose
her head over it.
She'd dated before. A long time ago. And she had never, ever invested early on. There hadn't ever been any
butterflies in her stomach, or last minute dashes to the nail salon. She had never wasted hours digging
through the racks at Bloomingdale's for a suitable dress or mulling over conversations she'd had with her
date over breakfast with friends. So as far as she was concerned, this ill-timed flush that had manifested
itself on her skin could just take a long walk off a short pier.
Olivia hung her head over the sink, trying to clear her memory of the way Elliot tasted. Shit. She should
have brought her toothbrush with her to the bathroom. That would have helped.
"So I was right."
Olivia whipped her head up, blinking back the water droplets that clung to her eyelashes. In the mirror, she
could see Cathy standing behind her, her arms crossed over her chest in satisfaction as she leaned against
the frame of the bathroom doors.
the frame of the bathroom doors.
Christ, where had she come from?
"About what?" Olivia deliberately tried to be vague.
Unfortunately, by the incredulous look Cathy was giving her, she had come off as horribly obtuse instead.
"You. And Elliot." Cathy grinned, her eyes sparkling with mischief. "I saw." She dragged out the last word
in a singsong that had Olivia reaching desperately for her washcloth.
Olivia dragged the material over her face, trying to buy a few seconds. Of course, that only gave Cathy time
to continue.
"I saw you when you were on the ledge, before you caught up to us. I mean, Jim told me to leave the two of
you alone, but who can help from peeking over and making sure you two were making out," she cleared her
throat, grinning sheepishly. "I mean, making it across okay?"
Olivia expelled a breath and squeezed her eyes tightly shut for just a second behind the cloth, then finally
clutched it in her fist and opened her eyes, still unable to turn around. "Look, Cathy, about what you saw
this morning, and then on the course-"
"You two kissing?"
Olivia jerked at the new voice that had just joined them, turning her head to her right and seeing Jessica
walk in.
She cringed, thinking oddly enough that who she needed to get her out of this mess was Elliot. Of course, he
was half the problem in the first place.
"They make it look good, don't they?" Cathy egged Jessica on, her lips widening into a teasing grin.
Jessica nodded, her dark hair spilling forward over her shoulder. "You two do look really good together,"
she added helpfully, leaning her left hip against the counter as she crossed her arms over her chest. "So
that's why you said to go for it with Ty, right? Because it's working for you?"
Olivia sucked in a breath, feeling her face flame and her skin prickle with unease. Mentally, she apologized
to every innocent person that Elliot and she had ever boxed in and interrogated.
There were two routes to go here. One, deny, which meant being an obvious liar. Two, play it off like it
didn't mean anything. Which once again meant she was a liar.
Shit. She was screwed.
"It's..." Olivia started, turning around and facing her interrogators while leaning back against the sink. She
stared at her fresh change of clothes which she had slung over one of the bathroom doors and wished
desperately she was behind that door, slipping into clean clothes. She licked her lips, trying to think of
something to say.
"How long have you two been partners again?" Jessica piped up, her voice echoing in the bathroom.
Olivia's gaze darted towards the younger girl. Okay, this she knew how to handle. She'd heard defense
attorney's advising their clients for years. Just answer the questions. Don't offer more than you need to.
Simple, short responses. "Nine years."
Simple, short responses. "Nine years."
Jessica's eyes widened as her eyebrows drew together. She shot a shocked look at Cathy before returning
her focus to Olivia. "And how long have you guys been together?"
Olivia stilled, again searching for an answer. Damn, so this was why people asked to have a lawyer present.
Didn't she have the right to not self-incriminate?
Of course she didn't even need to respond when Cathy was around.
Cathy laughed in delight. "Officially? Just a few hours, I think. Which explains why she still looks shell-
shocked."
"I don't look shell-shocked," Olivia managed, her lips dry and her voice cracking as she protested.
Jessica smiled conspiratorially. "Well, you sound shell-shocked. So does that mean you didn't expect this to
ever happen with him? ‘Cause I gotta tell you, he's hot. I mean in an older guy kind of way. And if he were
my partner-"
"Right?" Cathy piped up, affirming Jessica's unspoken insinuation.
Olivia's fingers gripped the edge of the sink behind her. "Look, I-"
"Don't worry about it, Olivia," Cathy assured her, stepping forward and resting her hand on Olivia's arm.
"They do know what they want, even if we don't believe they possibly could. Trust me. I once saw a picture
of Jim's ex and was just devastated. I mean, she was gorgeous and I thought, now why in the world would
he want me? Not that you have that problem. I mean, look at you!" She smiled patiently, cocking her head
without letting up on the barrage of words. "But you know, when they say they want you, you just gotta trust
that they're big boys. I mean, Elliot's a big boy. And he can look out for himself. So if he says he's done
with his ex-"
"His ex?" Jessica interrupted.
Cathy nodded, ignoring the squeak that Olivia was sure she had made. "He has an ex-wife. Or a soon to be
ex, or something like that. Olivia said he was trying to work things out with her, but Jim said Elliot was
already referring to her as his ex, capital E, and that was before I caught these two kissing, so I'm-"
"Wait, what?" Olivia finally broke in. Somewhere in the jumble of words, she thought she had heard
something important.
Cathy broke into laughter. "You didn't know?"
Okay, so this was the benefit of talking things over. Information. Insight. Right. "Elliot said what?"
Okay, so maybe it wasn't right to ask about him, or talk about him with a third party. But surely, if Cathy
had information that could help, it had to be okay to engage in the conversation? Had to be. This wasn't
gossiping. Couldn't be. It was merely gathering evidence from eyewitnesses. Research, really. Because she
didn't gossip. Especially about Elliot. Ever.
Olivia felt the faint beginnings of a headache as she swayed a little on her feet. "What did Elliot say?" she
tried again.
"He said she was his ex. Jim said Elliot was referring to that woman in the general context of sayonara long
before I walked over to Grant's cabin and caught Elliot trying to get the bee stinger out by sticking his-"
before I walked over to Grant's cabin and caught Elliot trying to get the bee stinger out by sticking his-"
Olivia put up her hand, effectively halting Cathy's description. "I got it, thanks."
Elliot wasn't kidding when he said he didn't want to move home. It wasn't a spur of the moment decision. He
was ready. He had been ready. It had taken two years, but maybe it was true, better late than never...
Jessica seemed suddenly very interested. She shifted against the sink, refolding her arms even more tightly
across her chest and leaning forward. "Wait, when you got stung, Elliot and you went and had sex?"
"What?" Olivia croaked. "No, we didn't-"
"They didn't," Cathy affirmed quickly.
"You didn't?" Jessica's eyes darted skeptically between the two of them, trying to determine if she was being
left out of the loop.
Cathy shook her head emphatically. "Swear. They didn't."
Jessica seemed to be deducing a multitude of things in her head. "But when you both were late to the
course..."
Cathy's eyes widened in appreciation of Jessica's brilliance. Then they flew to meet Olivia's. "Did you?"
This was precisely why she didn't have friends. She didn't know what to do with them. Olivia let out a long,
exasperated breath. "We didn't."
Oh God, had she really just revealed the details of her non-existent sex life to strangers in a bathroom?
Well, that answered her question from last night. People really did reveal personal things while in
immediate proximity to toilets.
Shit. Shit.
Olivia sucked her bottom lip into her mouth, trying to figure out what the hell she was doing upstate, in a
bathroom, with two relative strangers, discussing whether or not she had slept with her partner. She half-
expected the music from the Twilight Zone to start reverberating in the stifling confines of the light blue
walls, because at least then the spinning in her head would make sense.
"But you will." Cathy surmised. "Right?"
Olivia closed her eyes and slumped back against the sink, using one hand to pinch the bridge of her nose.
Of course the woman would ask the one question that had been pounding inside of Olivia's head for the last
two hours. Across the tightrope walk, her rope tethered to Elliot, she'd caught his eyes drinking her in when
he should have been focused on the course. His gaze had been hot, possessive and had nearly seared her
skin, but she hadn't shrunk from it. She'd welcomed it, nearly reveled in it, so much so that she had barely
registered the precarious height. Then, as they had descended the ten-foot-wide rope ladder, he'd practically
been on top of her - his arm brushing her thigh or his breath hot on the side of her calf - even with four feet
of space available on either side of her.
No matter how much he bumped into her, nudged her, breathed on her, it wasn't enough. The ache pounding
inside of her wasn't going to be alleviated by the skim of his fingers or the tumble of his voice. By the end
of the course, she couldn't even look at Elliot without feeling her fingertips throb with the need to dig into
his skin or to tug at him, while simultaneously praying to God that Elliot wouldn't temper himself or hold
back when they finally had sex.
back when they finally had sex.
When they finally had sex.
It was always there that her brain ceased to function, while the rest of her body traitorously leaped to
attention. The entire concept took a hell of a lot of getting used to, and she wasn't even close to processing it
just yet.
"They will," Jessica answered for her, as if Olivia wasn't even in the bathroom. She eyed the clothes draped
over the stall door. "Is that what you're gonna wear?"
Olivia blinked at the sudden change in conversation. "My clothes?" she fumbled, confused by the question.
Cathy pushed herself off the doors and turned to her left, assessing the clothing. She reached for it before
Olivia could protest. "Let's see," she separated the pieces, holding them up for Jessica to take a look. "With
your legs, can't go wrong in shorts. Smart woman," she laughed, grinning at Olivia.
"They're just khaki's, from the Gap-" Olivia defended, not liking where this was headed.
Jessica rolled her eyes. "Right. But seeing as you're blessed with a hell of a lot more leg than the rest of us -
on you shorts are not just shorts anymore. Trust me. Those are a very, very good choice." She looked
pointedly at Olivia's tank top. "But we're done with the activities, and its just dinner and the campfire, so
you can up the ante now." One of Jessica's eyebrows arched skyward as she pointedly nodded towards
Olivia's shirt.
She couldn't possibly be comprehending this properly. Were they actually suggesting that she dress to
encourage Elliot? Were they kidding? The entire idea of wearing something with the specific intention that
Elliot would appreciate it was completely absurd. He was her partner for god's sake. He'd seen her after
forty-eight hours of hunting down a suspect. He'd seen her just waking up in the crib. He'd seen her with
her hair shoved into a ponytail and wearing a three-day old sweatshirt, mumbling incoherently over shitty
coffee while glaring at him and muttering that he was a bastard.
And now she was supposed to forget all that and try to sex it up?
For Elliot?
Right.
She had to head this off. Especially in light of the fact that Jessica's father was the Deputy Director of the
FBI. Not that she believed she and Elliot would be Jessica's topic of conversation at the Rutledge
Thanksgiving dinner this year, but still.
Olivia shook her head, pressing her lips together. "I think you both have this all wrong. Elliot and I aren't
like that. What I wear doesn't-"
"Oh! I like this!" Cathy interrupted, holding up Olivia's peasant top for inspection. "It's sexy in a flirty,
bohemian sort of way. Not bad, Olivia," she praised.
Jessica tilted her head, reaching for the shirt. "Yeah, I gotta admit that's pretty cute. Undo a couple of
buttons at the neckline and he'll be all over her."
"Like he isn't already," Cathy snorted. "Poor guy looks ready to either punch Grant's lights out or
permanently submerge himself in the lake. Physically, all that repression can't be good for him." She
groaned. "Of course, when she gets that on, next to her I'm gonna look like Carol Brady."
groaned. "Of course, when she gets that on, next to her I'm gonna look like Carol Brady."
Jessica shook her head, still avidly inspecting the blouse as she held it up. "Nah, you look great. Besides,
you've got Jim whipped."
Cathy burst into sudden, easy laughter. Again.
Olivia cleared her throat, trying to best determine how to get her shorts back from Cathy and her blouse
from Jessica while remaining invisible. She tried snaking her hand out to gently tug the soft, beige fabric
from Cathy's hand without creating too much movement.
But the woman stopped laughing abruptly, frowning immediately as she looked at Olivia. "Do you have
lipstick somewhere in your bag, Olivia?"
Olivia gave up on stealth and yanked her shorts out of Cathy's hands, turning to make quick work of
extricating her blouse from Jessica's. "Don't think so."
Cathy tilted her head at Jessica. "You've got some for her, right?"
Jessica nodded, immediately fishing through her hip pack. "Like an iridescent pink. It's really pretty. Super
light. MAC makes it. It's more of a gloss, really," she muttered absently as she looked. "It'll look great with
that shirt."
"Perfect!" Cathy beamed.
Olivia froze. Okay, take control of the situation. Survey the scene, devise a plan of escape. You can either go
hand-to-hand or talk them down, but either way, you have to make a move.
"Actually, I don't feel well guys, so I think I'm just gonna go lie down for awhile and-"
Cathy scoffed at her, stepping in front of Olivia's path. "Not happening. You really think that as your
friends we're just going to let you throw away this opportunity?"
Her friends?
Olivia's head started pounding. "Opportunity?" she croaked, her skin suddenly feeling like it was breaking
out in goose bumps.
"Oh God," Jessica let out a dramatic sigh as if she was running out of patience. "Yes. Opportunity. You
want the guy? You want him to see you as something more than his kick-ass partner? Then you have to
show him that you're okay with being more than that." She leaned back against the sink and crossed her
ankles. Cathy meanwhile turned around to smooth out Olivia's clothes while re-hanging them on the edge of
the door. "So I'm thinking some lip gloss, that sexy little shirt and throw away the rubber band that you've
been using to hold all that hair back. Let the man see what he's getting for all his effort."
"Get laid for God's sake," came the murmur.
Both Jessica's and Olivia's eyes flew to Cathy's back.
Cathy smiled a little too sweetly over her shoulder, her fingers freezing as she purposely unbuttoned some
of the clasps at the neck of the shirt Olivia would soon wear.
"Whoops!" she feigned apology and attempted innocence to no avail. "Did I say that?"

+++
He was a dead man.
Elliot clutched his beer in his fist and let out all of the air in his lungs, because surely, that was the first step
in making sure he didn't combust.
When all of the air was out of his chest, he realized that he was no better off than he had been only thirty
seconds ago, so he promptly inhaled, this time dragging in as much air as possible.
No, that didn't help either.
Sonofabitch.
This was it. He was going to do it. Right here, right now.
He was going to have sex in public.
He didn't have a choice. Watching his partner walk across, no, stalk across, the field towards him, he knew
he'd never been as completely at her mercy as he was now.
What the hell was she wearing?
Elliot lifted his beer bottle to his mouth, subsequently praying he wouldn't a) drop his bottle, b) forget to
swallow the liquid or c) do something monumentally stupid like think he could handle touching her once
she got close enough.
She was agitated, that much he could tell from her expression even at fifty paces, but he couldn't deal with
that just yet. What he was focused on was that sometime in the last forty-five minutes, since they had
returned from the last of the courses, she had changed into some soft, flowy shirt thing and was now
wearing shorts that fit a little too perfectly over her hips. And probably her ass too, although he hadn't been
afforded that view.
Yet.
Her hair was left loose, in suddenly silky waves, and it skimmed across the tops of her shoulders where her
blouse slid open, helped by the fact that she had left the top two buttons undone.
To anyone else, she would have simply looked cooler, more comfortable.
To him, it was maddening glimpses of flesh. Tantalizing. Taunting. Inviting.
Goddamn, he could see the smooth concave in the top of her shoulder, and he wanted to get his mouth on
her there, see if she tasted like -
"Do you have a napkin?" Olivia demanded, coming to a stop in front of him.
Her skin was flushed. Her eyes were a little too bright, and her hands were clenched into fists that
intermittently opened and closed.
God, that shirt had a little row of white buttons that lined up just between her breasts. Of course the first few
weren't done, which only gave him ideas as to what he needed to do to the rest of them. The shirt was a
dare, really, and the more he thought about it the more he thought he really enjoyed risks. A lot.

"Elliot," she said again. "A napkin? Handkerchief? The registration forms for this weekend? Do you have
anything at all I could use to wipe this crap off?"
Elliot shifted, letting the beer bottle dangle from his fingertips at his side. "What crap?"
Olivia looked at him like he was a moron. Her eyes narrowed with indignation. "I have three shades of lip
gloss on. And there is some sort of apple gloss in my hair. In case you haven't noticed, I've been accosted in
the bathroom and the cabin, and I'm seriously considering telling Cragen that I'm putting in for hazard pay
because he's left me out here in the wilderness with those two."
He was beginning to get a vague idea of where this was headed, but he didn't want to head her off just yet.
The more irate she was becoming, the more he realized just how much he was going to enjoy settling her
down. He mentally noted that the side of the mess hall was less than five yards to his left, and they'd have a
hell of a lot of privacy there. Everyone was just relaxing before dinner, no one would miss them.
"Are you listening?" she ground out.
Elliot blinked, refocusing on the flash of horror in her eyes. "Which two?"
Her hands shot to her hips. "Cathy," she bit off. "And Jessica."
He'd never seen her like this, and he had to admit he was going to milk the hell out of it. Her agitation had
nothing to do with a case, with the sick work of a pervert or with her frustration over the system's inability
to work all of the time. Best of all, it didn't have to do with him. This was familiar in a way. She was being
irrational, but it wasn't the kind borne of a psyche too often damaged. This was just Olivia being...female.
Which was, he admitted to himself, highly amusing. Refreshing, actually.
"What did they do?" he encouraged, trying to keep his voice neutral and his obvious enjoyment out of his
expression.
He took a sip of his beer. A long sip.
Smile and she'll beat the hell out of you, Stabler.
Elliot swallowed and then cleared his throat, aiming for concerned.
She blinked once or twice, trying to calm herself. "They think there is something going on with us."
He smirked. He couldn't help it. "There is."
Another sip of his beer. This one longer than the first. At this rate, he was going to need another one really
damned soon.
"Elliot," Olivia hissed in exasperation. "You might think this is funny, but they were prying into my
personal life in there. I swear to God, they were trying to dress me up to seduce you. Five more minutes in
there, and I wouldn't be surprised if Cathy asked what sort of underwear I was wearing. The woman has no-
"
He knew before he interrupted her that he was going to hell for it. But it seemed like a small price to pay.
Elliot stepped forward, directly into her space. He lowered his voice and dropped his lips near hers. "What
kind are you wearing?"

Everything froze around them. This was it, he thought. This is the moment that you'll know everything.
Either she'll truly be okay with the teasing, or she's going to snap back into partner mode. Make or break,
right here, right now.
Olivia sucked in air, leaving him nothing around them to fill his own lungs with. Her startled eyes locked on
his and those now glossy lips parted slightly. He watched it happen. Her skin flushed and each breath that
followed was shorter than the last. But she wasn't backing away. Instead her pupils widened and her chin
tipped up towards his. Determination flooded her expression, despite the obvious racing her of her pulse.
Come on, Liv. No guts, no glory.
"Wouldn't you like to know," she murmured huskily, her breath small puffs that landed on his lips.
Control evaporated in the moment that she laid down her version of checkmate. He used his free hand to
wrap his fingers around her arm and tug her towards him. "Goddamn it," he cursed, inhaling the faint scent
of apples and letting his eyes drop to that shimmer of gloss. Her lips looked wet, impossibly fuller, and he
suddenly knew exactly how he was going to help her out.
He gripped her fingers and pulled her towards the side of the mess hall. Christ, this was like summer camp
all over again, only he was going to get his hands all over his partner this time.
"Where are we going?" she asked, sounding wholly unconcerned.
"You wanted that lip gloss off," he growled. "I'm gonna get it off."
Behind him, he heard a slight rumble of laughter from her. By the time he had effectively dropped his beer
bottle into the grass and a little too roughly pushed her back up against the side of the building, he was
wondering what the hell was so funny.
She smiled at him, her features softening into drowsy pleasure as he used both of his hands to tangle his
fingers possessively in her hair. He was aggressive, using his body to trap hers against the siding, every
nerve ending in his body throbbing in anticipation.
"Olivia," he groaned, his lips practically against hers. "What's so damned funny?"
She shifted against him, and he used the movement to immediately shove one of his thighs between hers.
Olivia made a small sound that hovered between pleasure and pain. She tilted her head, angling for his lips.
"Nothing," she whispered.
She kept writhing against him, so he reluctantly let one of his hands drop to her hip to still her and was
immediately rewarded. This shirt she'd put on was a godsend, because it didn't cling to her waist at all. He
slid his hand upwards and met with the hot, smooth skin of her torso.
"Christ," he grimaced, dropping his forehead against hers. His fingers pushed into her waist, noting the
curve of her hips and the silky, taut skin of her belly. His hand skimmed upwards, feeling the press of her
ribcage against his palm, and then hell...hell, his thumb brushed against satin.
Elliot stopped, shifting as he tried to lift her a little with his thigh, aiming to get her settled more intimately
against him. Maybe that would help. Maybe that would alleviate some of the frustration that had his dick
turning into concrete too damned fast every time she was within five feet of him. He thrust against her in the
same moment that he dropped his mouth, immediately capturing her shiny lips in between his.
Mother of God. That stuff tasted like berries or some other suitably enticing shit.

He lost his damned head in that moment, sweeping his tongue deep into her mouth without even giving her
a moment to accommodate him. Olivia recovered from his intrusion quickly, opening her mouth and
moaning into it as she hiked herself up farther against his thigh until his hard-on was pushing at her, kept
out of her only by the cotton of their shorts.
Elliot refused to even consider where they were or what was happening. At some point he would stop. He
would. He didn't want the first time he was inside of her to be against the side of a building just before
dusk. But right now he needed more. So much damned more.
He brushed his thumb against the underside of her breast again, deepening the kiss until it wasn't kissing
anymore. It was making love to her mouth, and he realized that this was just foreplay of what it would be
like to be inside of her, everywhere. All at once. The second that she lifted her hands to slide around his
shoulders he moved his hand upwards, letting the full weight of her breast fit snugly into his palm.
She made some sound deep in her throat as his hips crashed forward.
He tore his lips off of hers and squeezed his eyes tightly shut. Curses slipped out of him. One after another.
But his hand never moved from where it now rested, fully cupping her breast as his thumb traced endless
circles around her satin-covered hardened nipple.
One of her hands moved too, wrapping around his waist as she arched towards him, pressing her back into
the siding and riding impossibly higher on his thigh. "Elliot." His name ripped from her throat, pleading
with him. Her hand slipped lower, over his ass, pulling him into her until he was grinding against her.
"God," she choked. "Don't stop."
Elliot debated his options, their surroundings a blur. He could make her come for him just by this rocking
motion, but he was scared of doing it. He didn't have a handle on how the minutes after would play out just
yet. He wasn't sure she wouldn't run, or hide, or avoid him out of sheer embarrassment.
He wanted to be there with her when she came for him the first time. In her. Watching her face and
knowing she was beneath him and not going anywhere in the moments after, because she was too damned
spent to move.
Christ, he was literally dry humping Olivia in broad daylight. She deserved so much fucking better than he
was delivering.
"Liv," he tried, doing his best to slowly pull away. He was convinced that this moment alone was God's
punishment for all of his sins thus far. Surely, if he survived this, having to pull away, he'd be absolved of
everything he had ever screwed up.
Olivia's feet rested on the ground again, but her eyes remained shut. She slammed her head back against the
wall behind her.
His hand was still in her shirt. Shit. He'd have to move it and it that seemed to require far more discipline
than any one man should ever be required to have. The grinding of his jaw was audible as he reluctantly
peeled his fingers off of her breast and slid out of her shirt, the backs of his fingers skimming her stomach
as he let her go.
"Not like this," he said quietly, brushing her bangs with his fingers. "Can't do it like this, Liv." He couldn't
really get the words out of his throat with any sort of diction. His stomach, his chest, his throat - it was all
locked up, knotted painfully by the sheer strength of his need for her.

Need that went far beyond the physical. This sort of brutal, driving need to protect her, to make things right
for her, went beyond anything he had ever expected. He'd felt protective of his kids, sure, but he had come
to the painful realization that they would need to have their own lives at some point. This was different. He
wanted to reshape every experience Olivia would have from now on.
He watched her face as she slowly opened her eyes, trying to focus on him. Her head rolled against the wall
as she expelled a harsh breath. Without warning she started laughing. It started softly, as a wry, amused
thing, and then built until it was a full sound, emanating from deep within her chest.
"Seriously Benson, you never laugh, yet you pick now to start?" he groaned. "You trying to give me a
complex?"
Olivia shook her head, and finally looked at him. Her eyes were bright, dancing in a way that humbled the
hell out of him. "No. It's not you. I swear."
But her lips were permanently curved upwards, trying to hold back her laughter.
He scowled at her. "Well, that's reassuring."
She burst into laughter again, and he literally felt the sound of it crawl up his back and loosen the coils in
his shoulders. "No, I was just thinking that those two knew what they were doing." Olivia arched one
eyebrow in amusement. "I didn't realize that the point of the lip gloss was just that."
Elliot glared at her. "That?"
Olivia stood up then, leaning close to his ear as she straightened her shirt and shrugged nonchalantly. "For it
to come off."
The look of pure, smug satisfaction on her face haunted him, even long after she had left him standing there,
waiting for it to be physically decent for him to head over for dinner.
+++
He had always been hyperaware of where she was at all times.
Elliot remembered the first time that he had realized that his physical intuition was reliable when it came to
her position, her proximity, her movements. They had been partners for two years when they had been
staked out at a warehouse by the East Side docks, hoping for their suspect's brother to show up. Instead,
they had been surprised when the suspect himself had exited the dark blue Honda, and rushed around to the
side of the warehouse before disappearing inside.
They'd called for backup - procedure dictated that they did. But in that moment they realized that they were
likely only a hundred feet away from where the two little boys they were looking for were likely being kept,
and waiting for the uni's seemed like endless minutes they didn't have.
They'd gone in. Two different doors. No floor plans imprinted into their heads.
Olivia had always had the same flash of reckless as he did.
But that day, Elliot hadn't frozen, hadn't worried that he would lose her in the snaking hallways and crates.
The awareness on his skin had given him an inclination as to where Olivia was at all times. And when he
had finally come face to face with their suspect, and had his Glock trained on the bastard's head, Elliot had
felt the faint stirrings of a grin as he watched Olivia's gun come into focus from the opposite side, her Sig
pointed confidently at the back of the fucker's skull.
pointed confidently at the back of the fucker's skull.
There had been a glint in her dark eyes as she looked at him across the barrels of their guns that November
afternoon.
Hear the boys whimpering? They're alive, Elliot. We got the sonofabitch.
God, the sirens still sound miles away. Good thing we didn't wait. Didn't need them, did we?
Those days, they'd both been a little bit invincible. They had lived beneath such an umbrella of confidence
in the other that for awhile they both sensed that justice righteously owned the upper hand.
Maybe it was inevitable it would come to this. Him needing her, wanting her, nearly driven to his knees by
the force of his arousal for her. Maybe having that much admiration and wonder when it came to another
person automatically meant that boundaries would crumble.
Elliot took another long sip of his beer and watched her. Olivia was on the other side of the fire pit, close to
the picnic tables that had just recently been cleared, and her head was tipped towards Jessica. The younger
girl was animatedly relaying yet another tale, and Olivia actually seemed engrossed by it.
Kind of.
She must have sensed him too, because as Jessica laughed with Hannah and Cathy, Olivia's head lifted, her
eyes seeking out his across the faintly illuminated grass. She barely smiled, but she didn't need to. He didn't
need her smiles or her tears to figure her out. Not really. Everything she said she had always offered simply
by the look in her eyes.
He'd just stopped looking for the last few years.
+++
"It was a good color on him."
Olivia leaned back on her hands, with her feet outstretched in front of her. The grass tickled the back of her
thighs while the heat from the fire warmed her already cozy toes. The night air was thick with the humidity,
but Leo and Elliot had started a campfire after sundown in any case, if for nothing more than ambience.
"What color?" Olivia asked absently, letting her head fall back on her shoulders as she closed her eyes,
tipping her chin up towards the dark sky.
"I think Jessica said the gloss was Love-In, right?" Cathy paused. "Looked better on you, but Elliot pulled it
off well too, I'd say."
Olivia grinned, opening her eyes and lifting her head to meet Cathy's impish smile. She shrugged, realizing
Cathy had noticed it on Elliot's lips after their indiscretion earlier. "I'd say Elliot's more of a dark red,"
Olivia decided, playing along.
There was something in Cathy's expression that made the surface smile fade from Olivia's face. It was more
than the kindness that Cathy wore openly. It was probably the fact that Cathy was now looking at her with
more understanding and compassion than anyone ever had, outside of Elliot. Cathy seemed to get it - that
talking about Elliot this casually was progress, that it wasn't coming easy, that in the end, Olivia had needed
the bullying because given the option, she would instinctively run.

The moment passed and Olivia sighed, watching Elliot settle in next to Jim and Leo across the campfire.
From what she could tell in the few bits of conversation that drifted over, they were discussing the merits of
the Patriots quarterback versus Indy's quarterback, with Jim siding vehemently on the side of the Bills'
passer. Which was making Elliot and Leo unite to taunt him mercilessly.
In the last two hours, somewhere over grilled chicken and baked potatoes, Leo and Jim had also bought into
Elliot's opinion of Grant as well, and about a half hour ago their fearless leader had decided his best option
was to retreat to his cabin.
"It's good you know, Olivia," Cathy said quietly, watching her fiancé. Despite her boisterous personality,
she had moments of depth that resonated with Olivia. This was one of them. "To have someone. To let
someone in. It's not easy, but in the end it's got to be harder to end up alone."
Olivia stared at the stars that she could make out. She had never, ever been able to piece together the shapes
of the constellations. She couldn't say anything. Everything was too fresh, too precarious for her to be able
to even open her mouth right now. She could flirt with Elliot, sure. That was getting easier as the hours
passed. But it was the rest that she still held at bay. It was as if there was a widening sink hole, and she was
on the edge, and as soon as she fell in there would be no turning back.
He had the power to change everything if she let him. He'd have the power to destroy it all, too. And that
was the part that still adhered to caution. She didn't think he'd ever hurt her purposely, but even the best of
intentions still went askew.
"How come you went into Special Victims?" Cathy murmured, her eyes still focused on Jim, but her lips
lifting in a melancholy smile.
The barriers were there, stifling her. Her throat became tight, just like it always did when she was asked. She
knew if Elliot were here, he'd deflect the question or change the subject, sparing her the scrutiny.
He'd have protected her.
Maybe it was the knowledge that he would, if need be, that made her finally admit it without the bite of
anger that usually accompanied it. "My mother was a victim."
Cathy didn't flinch, or stare at her in horror. She didn't freeze up or clear her throat uncomfortably. Of
course, she wasn't at odds with her own past, so she had no reason to be shocked about anyone else's either.
"As a kid?"
Olivia shook her head. "In grad school. Had me as a result." She was shaking, just a little. Her words were
far braver than the battle playing out in her head.
Cathy finally turned to look at her. Her eyes softened. "Special Victims, huh? Interesting word to use.
Special."
Olivia sat up, staring at Cathy. She'd never thought about the word except to mean that the vics she dealt
with would be kids, or the elderly, or people who had been singled out for a special kind of horror.
But looking at Cathy's open expression, the quiet peace in her eyes, Olivia started to see the word
differently. Over the years in the job, she'd met remarkable people - victims that became counselors, parents
of children lost that went on to have other children, kids that braved their fears and came forward, sharing a
history that should have brought them to their knees. They weren't all stories that ended with the abuse - so
many of them only started there.

Olivia's breath hitched. She'd judged all of the horror by the way her mother had chosen to deal with it.
She'd attributed sexual assault to utter destruction and hadn't truly looked past, to the ones that had chosen
to fight.
"Does your mother approve of what you do?" Cathy asked, turning back to look at the fire. Her words were
low, physically directed away from Olivia.
Maybe that's what allowed her to answer. That Cathy gave her room to breathe when she most needed it.
"She died six years ago. But no, she didn't approve."
Cathy took a sip of the beer next to her. "She didn't want you fighting her battles, huh?"
Olivia's chest locked, and she fought down the immediate need to get angry, to get defensive, to find
anywhere to be but here. "She didn't want me to find her rapist," Olivia whispered.
Next to her, Cathy shook her head. "Maybe not, Olivia. Or maybe she just didn't want to pass the fight
along."
Olivia blinked, feeling the effects of Cathy's gentle words tumble around inside of her gut. She would have
said something, but across the campfire, Jessica laughed loudly as Tyler tugged at her, trying to send her
sprawling back into the grass.
"Seriously?" Jessica protested, trying to keep herself upright. "You're such an ass!" She batted at Tyler,
shooting a pleading look at Olivia and Cathy. "Can we distract him, please? You guys want to play truth or
dare?"
Jessica's voice had carried, drawing Elliot's attention. His dark eyes reflected the fire, his gaze suddenly
intently focused on Olivia. She got the impression that this wasn't the first time he had looked at her in the
last few minutes, because when she caught his gaze, he almost looked guilty, as if he had been caught.
Olivia couldn't say anything. Truth or dare with a bunch of strangers seemed to be a ridiculous option. She
didn't want to share anything, and dares seemed childish, but when she returned Elliot's gaze, she saw his
lips lift in amusement.
He was going to play along. They were leaving in the morning, but for tonight, he was going to escape into
this world they'd found themselves in. There were no victims, no all-night cases, no rationalizing away the
ways in which justice would too-often fail.
His voice rumbled across the space like an earthquake slowly trembling towards her. "I'm in," he said.
She was mesmerized by the force of his intent. It was nearly hypnotic, the way he was drawing her in with
his brand of permission and encouragement.
"I'm in, too," she said quietly, just for him.
She never heard anyone else's response.
+++
"I was not!" Hannah's eyes widened, her mouth opening in blushing indignation at Jessica's amendment of
the truth Hannah had just offered. Hannah had revealed, in response to Colin's question about the wildest
thing she'd ever done, that she had once danced on the bar Coyote Ugly style to the song "Save a Horse,
Ride a Cowboy."

Jessica, of course, had added to the story.
"Well, if you didn't hike your skirt up, then how would I know you were wearing pink undies with Hello
Kitty polka dots?" Jessica shot back, smiling in satisfaction.
Hannah's mouth opened and closed a few times, before her shoulders slumped in protest. "I was wearing a
skirt. And I was on a bar. But I did not deliberately hike it up!"
Jessica grinned. "I have two words for you, Hann. Hitch. Hiker."
Hannah glared at her for a long moment before giving up and bursting into laughter.
Elliot, on the other hand, felt his jaw immediately snap together and begin to grind. "My daughters are never
again allowed to go out," he muttered under his breath.
Next to him, Olivia smiled. "They already go out, El. It's a little late to ground them."
He looked at her, pained by the thought. "Well, they might go out. But they are certainly never going to
dance on a bar."
Olivia's eyebrows rose, as if she clearly didn't believe him. Or worse, she was goddamned humoring him.
Which meant she thought that one of the girls would do that. Or had. Or might be doing it at this very
fucking moment.
Shit.
He really shouldn't have stopped drinking after two beers.
"What?" he questioned, narrowing his eyes. "You think my daughters-"
Olivia quickly backed off, letting the grass she'd been picking fall out of her hands as she raised them in
protest. "No, no. Of course not," she teased. "The Stabler girls would never-"
"Hey, Elliot! Truth or dare?" Hannah called out.
Next to him, Olivia snorted in amusement. "Yeah El," she taunted quietly, while smiling in encouragement
and approval at Hannah. "Truth or dare?"
Fuck.
"Truth," he ground out, wishing for a beer and still contemplating calling Kathy to find out where the hell
Maureen and Kathleen were tonight. Hell, he'd check on Lizzie's whereabouts just for good measure.
Crap, maybe he should have taken a dare, just so something would take his mind off the idea. Thank God he
had a son. One less worry. Of course the kid had a hero complex, and that was going to raise the hell out of
Elliot's blood pressure in the near future too.
But no, no dares. The last one Jessica had issued had required Tyler to kiss Colin and Christ, although Tyler
had horsed around enough that it never happened, there was no reason to tempt fate twice.
Hannah paused to consider her question. "Okay, worst date you've ever been on?"
God, he didn't remember. There had been be a dozen or so as a kid. "My first," he offered finally, feeling
like an ass for agreeing to this game. "I was thirteen. My girlfriend's father decided he didn't trust me, so he
like an ass for agreeing to this game. "I was thirteen. My girlfriend's father decided he didn't trust me, so he
sat behind us in the movie theater. I reached down for my popcorn and he nearly took my head off. Theater
security had to get him to let go of my arm."
Next to him, Olivia made a sound of disbelief. "You had a girlfriend at thirteen, Elliot?"
"Nice work, man," Tyler grinned. "I like how you're still sticking to the story that you were reaching for the
popcorn."
Elliot narrowed his eyes. "I was."
Tyler smiled even wider. "Yeah, right. I used to play Drop the Skittles myself, dude."
He was about to challenge Tyler when Olivia stopped him. "Don't worry, he's not dating your daughters,"
she murmured soothingly, humor filtering into her voice.
"Wait until Rutledge gets a hold of him," Elliot muttered back. "Patriot Act means Rutledge could easily
make sure Tyler never again sees the light of day."
"Your turn, Elliot!" Jessica offered, as Leo walked around behind him, tapping him on the shoulder to hand
him a cold bottle of beer.
He thanked Leo, and as he popped open the beer, his lips lifted. This was the reason he had agreed to play.
With Olivia in the game, he won either way. Truth or dare.
"So, Liv," he grinned finally. "Truth or Dare?"
"Bastard," she hissed under her breath, giving him a look for choosing her. Of course the amused light in her
eyes belied the accusation in her words. "Fine. Truth."
He rolled his eyes. "Fine. Your worst date?"
She tilted her head, staring at the fire in the middle of the group. "When I dated the honeydew."
He was sorry he had just tipped his beer to his lips. He nearly spit it out, choking instead. He couldn't have
heard her right. "The what?"
Cathy started laughing. "Oh my God, Olivia. How'd that happen?"
Elliot turned to Olivia in confusion. "You dated a fruit?"
On the other side of the circle, Colin cleared his throat loudly.
Elliot shot him an irritated look. "Not a dig. Christ."
Olivia started laughing, and the sound wasn't yet familiar enough to go unnoticed. He watched her as she
laughed, her head falling back just slightly. She was putting all of herself into it, and he could have sworn
he'd never seen her like this.
Not even in the beginning.
She tilted her head as she looked at him, and her hair spilled across her shoulder, illuminated by the
firelight. "A Honey-Do. You know, like honey do this. Honey do that. They're basically handymen for
people who need help. I had called for one, and the guy who showed up asked me out to dinner before he
left."
left."
Tyler snorted. "I bet they're handy alright."
Elliot felt the tension seep back into his legs, his wrists, his upper back. "Why'd you need a handyman?" he
questioned under his breath, determined not to let Tyler know he was on his way to losing his cool.
Jessica laughed. "And why was he the worst date?"
Olivia shrugged, smiling at Jessica. "He fell asleep. I worked late that night, so he couldn't pick me up until
ten. We were just going to go out for a late bite, but he came over for a beer first and fell asleep. I felt bad
waking the guy." Olivia ducked her head, obviously realizing the spotlight was still on her. "Okay. Jim.
Truth or dare."
Jim straightened, unwrapping his arm from around Cathy's waist. "Dare."
Elliot tuned out the dare, something to do with Jim showing everyone a dance move Olivia was obviously
oddly aware that he knew how to do. Elliot watched her instead, the way she was unraveling, loosening, or
more truthfully, escaping. She'd lost the haunted look she'd worn for too many years, and it was almost as if
she'd been given back some of the time that had been stolen from her as a child. Her skin seemed warm, her
guard let down. She didn't even look at him with the same stifling, oppressive wariness anymore.
The idea that tomorrow he would have to drive her back into the city made him ache.
"Liv," he said softly, as everyone laughed at Jim's display. "Why'd you need a handyman?"
She stilled, her eyes snagging on the fire before she finally looked at him. There was no hint of emotion in
her expression. "Hot water heater broke. Would have taken management three days to fix."
He knew in just that moment what she was, and where she had been. He understood the sheer magnitude
and absolute of her brand of alone. He realized that for all the things he had demanded she rely on him for,
she'd kept twice as much to herself. Even for the little things, she'd always had to fend for herself.
She'd maintained her independence, because until now, his presence hadn't been assured. And every time
she ran, she was merely proving to herself that she still could do it on her own.
He'd blamed her for leaving him, yet it had never been about him at all.
Apparently his selfishness knew no bounds.
"You could have called me when it broke," he said, his voice rougher than he had intended. "I would have
fixed it."
I would have been there.
He gripped his beer tightly, thinking he was wrong. He might not have been there. He'd been too wrapped
up in his own life to even consider hers. She'd never been sure of his answers, so she had just stopped
asking.
Her fingers slipped across the grass, her thumb sliding over the back of his hand just once. "You can't fix
everything," she said softly, because she'd always given him far too much forgiveness. "There are things I
need to do for myself."

He used his fingers to trap hers beneath his hand, the grass flattening between their stacked palms. "I'm
sorry," he said quietly, his other hand circling around his beer as they both looked back towards the fire. He
watched Jim's shadow as it danced across the ground. Laughter filtered in beneath his skin. "I should have
been there," he whispered.
When her palm turned upwards to intertwine with his, he took a sip of his beer and finally inhaled.
For one night, he was out of the city too.
+++
The fire was only being encouraged to the point where it crackled in a low light, emitting as little heat as
possible while still offering an orange illumination to everything that lay within its range of radiance. In the
smoke and haze, Olivia could see the faint shadows of mosquitoes, fireflies and the faces of those campers
that still sat around the burning logs. The humid air left a sheen on her skin.
Olivia leaned her head against the wooden beam that extended from the deck beneath her feet to the
rudimentary canopy above them on the patio of the cabin. Her fingers curled around the horizontal railing
that her hips leaned forward against, careful not to grip too hard lest she take home souvenir splinters
tomorrow.
She watched all of them - the ones that remained around the fire even now, hours after they had eaten dinner
- Jessica and Tyler, Cathy and Jim and Hannah, striking up a conversation with Leo. Their faces were a
study in contrasts.
Jessica's face was luminous, her cheeks barely able to contain her smile and her laugh piercing the thick air
in a way that drew Olivia in. Jessica's eyes were noticeably bright, even from where Olivia stood, twenty
feet away. She teased Tyler, who was intermittently strumming on his guitar, hamming up the lyrics of one
song or another. He'd sing at the top of his lungs, throwing his head back and belting out a few lines until
Jessica would slap his arm before doubling over in laughter, her legs stretched out and her toes on her right
sneaker purposely bumping into his. Every now and then, Tyler would put in a little too much of himself
into the lyrics, and Jessica's face would become serious, eager, and when he was done her huge brown eyes
would soften as her head tilted in admiration. He was currently belting out "When the Stars Go Blue" and
Olivia smiled into the darkness as Tyler hit a particularly high note, howling it upwards until Jessica used
the back of her hand to slap him in the stomach, shaking her head and rolling her eyes.
Olivia watched them the most. It was like watching something clean, easy, magnetic. Maybe love was
supposed to be like that. Maybe if one just fell in love early enough, life wouldn't get in the way.
Her gaze landed on Cathy and Jim and Olivia's lips lifted just a little bit. They were different. There wasn't
the overt innocence of Jessica and Tyler, but there was a hope that was evident in the gentle looks that Jim
would shoot his fiancé, in the way that Cathy's eyes weren't darkened by her past. She'd let her history go,
gambling on something better, and she'd come out with some semblance of a future because she had made a
conscious choice not to be who circumstance had dictated she should become.
Then there was Hannah and Leo. Olivia had watched Hannah a lot over the last few hours, observing her
tendency to stay on the sidelines. But Hannah absorbed everything, and when she chose a moment to join in,
she did so with abandon, throwing caution to the wind. She'd retreat again, moments later, but the effects of
her momentary courage would live in the shine in her irises, the proud flush of her skin. Then there was Leo,
someone who was looking at an ending instead of a beginning, because from what it looked like, he and
Colin were likely headed for a split. But he wasn't broken, he wasn't running back to the cabin looking for a
last ditch reconciliation. He wasn't clinging to his past, believing that what he knew was the only thing that
would keep him safe. Instead he was grinning, giving his entire attention to Hannah's story, his eyes never

wavering from hers. Encouraging the shy girl to keep going, just keep talking.
Just keep trying, until whatever it was that held her back dissipated. Until the caution let go of her. Until it
let her be and speak and flourish.
Olivia let her cheek rest against the beam and released a breath. Her heartbeat had slowed out here, the
reassuring, organic smell of the burning wood seeping into the cotton of her tank, the curls of her hair. There
was a part of her that never wanted to leave. The world seemed different here. Sane, maybe. Full of
possibility. Connected. It was slower, easy, safe.
She heard Elliot inside the cabin, his footsteps moving towards the front door that led to the deck. Tyler was
strumming another ballad, and Olivia made no move to shift or look up as Elliot came outside, quietly
taking up the space on the railing just to her left.
Elliot was watching, too.
Long moments passed, Tyler's voice the only thing cutting across the space. Olivia's lips lifted again as Jess
joined in the singing, tossing her head back and drowning out Tyler until he laughed and shut up, content to
watch her sing a throaty stanza.
"You weren't honest back there," Elliot finally said, his voice a low, even murmur.
There was no accusation in his tone. Nothing jarring about it. There was no anger in the words. It was just
an observation, left dangling between them in case she decided to offer him anything more.
Maybe it was the music. Maybe it was that possibility was playing out in front of her. Whatever it was, it
made her want to give him what he was looking for. "About what?"
Her eyes never left the scene at the campfire, and neither did his. There was a worn, wooden beam between
them, and maybe it made it easier to talk without having to look at the other.
"That last truth. When Jessica asked you what your one wish would be. That wasn't what you were going to
say."
The rough wood was harsh against her cheek. Olivia lifted her head, settling differently against the beam, so
that only her temple rested against it. Her arms ached, her chest burned. The one thing she now knew was
that she didn't want Elliot to walk away. She was still terrified of that. Of him looking at her one day and
realizing she wasn't enough, or that she was too much.
And the truthful answer to Jessica's innocent question would make him leave. The truth would scare him. It
would stop this thing with them before it ever started. He wouldn't allow her to give up the things she was
willing to let go of if he'd simply stay with her.
"No, it wasn't," Olivia admitted quietly.
Then again, if he was going to make the choice to stay, it had to be because he was okay with the truth.
He didn't rush her. The night was too calm, too soothing to push anything faster than it was going to go.
When he finally spoke, his voice dropped into a range of tones that she figured could coax things from her
at will.
"You feel like telling me what the truth was?" It was gentle. Willing to accept her silence if need be.

Olivia's eyes drifted shut. She wondered if this was where he'd walk away. Tell her that the last few days
had been a mistake. If this was where he'd look at her in surprise and shock, and a little bit of regret. If this
was where his face would soften as he told her he never meant to hurt her, but that they probably shouldn't
pursue this thing between them. She wondered what she would have to say to make him believe that she
didn't need the things she once thought she did. That he was enough. More than enough.
More than she had expected.
She wondered if Elliot would let her make those decisions for herself, or if he'd decide what he thought was
best for her.
She wanted to tell him the truth. But more than that, she wanted him to stay even in spite of it.
The debate locked in her throat, until the fire began to blur.
"You always thought you'd be a mother," he observed.
Against the beam that now held her up, Olivia blinked, determined to stay still. Maybe if she stayed still,
he'd forget she was there. He'd forget he needed a response. She'd forget the way his voice didn't waver or
accuse, or saturate with pity and regret.
Her fingers gripped the wood and she waited for the splinters to pierce her skin. None slid into her. None
broke her skin.
"That's what the truth was. Right, Liv?"
She was walking one of those high ropes, only this time there was no net, no cable, nothing to catch her if
she fell. There was only him, and the response he could give her. Olivia didn't know what answer to give
him. If she said yes, he'd probably end this thing between them before it started, because she knew with
absolute certainty that he'd want her to be with someone who could give her that wish. If she said no, she
was a liar, and she was withholding, and he could very well walk away over her inability to be honest, too.
"Used to be," she finally said quietly, shrugging once. "I don't need that anymore."
He shifted suddenly, and she knew he was watching her, his hip against the railing as he faced her. She
didn't unhook herself from her position, needing the beam that hid her face even more right now.
"How come?"
Her heart slammed in her chest, realizing he wasn't presuming to make decisions that he thought were best
for both of them. Elliot was hearing her out, instead of walking away.
Olivia shrugged. "It's not meant to be and I'm good with that."
God, had that just crossed the line from truth to lie?
"Liv, both you and I know what's meant to be doesn't always just happen. You have to go out and make
those things happen."
She laughed softly, wistfully. "I'm well aware that immaculate conception isn't possible, Elliot."
He blew out a heavy breath, turning again so that he was once again facing the fire. "You know that's not
what I meant. I meant that..." his voice faded into the silence. "I meant that you could have done it anyway.
Even if you didn't find the right person, you could have-"
Even if you didn't find the right person, you could have-"
"No, I couldn't have," Olivia cut him off, her voice finally gaining some semblance of volume. Or maybe it
was conviction that put force behind her words. "I'm a cop. A single cop with no family, no regular hours,
nothing to offer a kid, Elliot. I don't have the right to do that to a child."
"Says who?" Elliot ground out, anger creeping into his words.
Olivia pressed her eyes shut, willing herself to breathe. This wasn't a conversation she had ever wanted to
have with him. Not ever. This wasn't a conversation she wanted to have with anyone, period.
"Says the State of New York."
He moved quickly, pushing himself off the railing and coming closer to her. When she didn't turn around, he
nudged her shoulder back, insinuating himself between her and the beam that had been holding her up.
Olivia didn't look at him, instead she just moved farther down the railing so she wouldn't have to touch him.
Her eyes stayed ruthlessly focused on Tyler, who was now showing Jessica how to strum on the guitar,
drawing the amused attention of Jim and Cathy.
"Jesus Christ, Olivia," he hissed. "Care to tell me just what the fuck you're talking about?"
She figured this was it. She'd tell Elliot and he'd think she was crazy. He'd think she was pathetic. He'd feel
sorry for her and she'd want to vomit all over the deck because she could take a lot of things, but his pity
wasn't one of them.
Tell him, Liv. Tell him, and face it head on. If you're going to be humiliated, at least look him in the eye and
pretend your dignity is intact.
Pretend it was so long ago that you don't really remember the details.
Olivia turned to him, lifting her chin and willing her blood to stop moving inside of her. Just for a moment.
If she could just stop breathing, stop feeling, she'd get this out without letting her voice waver at all. "The
reason I joined SVU. It wasn't just about my father."
Elliot flinched, but that was his only response. His gaze didn't falter.
"I mean, I joined the NYPD intending to join SVU, but my mother hated the idea. She tried to talk me out
of it for years. And for awhile, I respected her wishes. I thought maybe I was making it worse for her if I
spent all day around rapists, so I stayed away from the unit in the beginning."
His eyes stayed on hers, so much so that she had to look away. Olivia found a point beyond him, just over
his shoulder to focus on. The other end of the deck held a rocker with a throw blanket on it and Olivia
pretended she was sitting there, rocking, and no one could see her.
"But then we got a call about a homicide on the west side, and our car was the first to respond. My partner
was an older guy, few months shy of retirement, and when we walked in, there was blood everywhere.
Didn't faze him. I thought I was going to be sick when I saw the body. The victim had been my age at the
time, maybe four years out of college. She'd been cut up. Bad."
Elliot was silent, just watching her. There was no revulsion, no confusion, nothing. He was simply listening
to her and it only encouraged Olivia to keep going. To get it all out of her. She tried to lock eyes with him,
but couldn't withstand the open, unhindered blue of his irises, even out here in the shadows.

Olivia bit her lower lip, her forehead furrowing as if that could ward off the rest of the story. But nothing
could. It was her history and he was asking for it, even when no one else ever had. "There was crying
coming from the bathroom. The tub. When we got in there, there was a little girl huddled behind the curtain.
She was a little over four years old. Her name was Kayla and she had these huge green eyes and these thick,
side swept bangs." Olivia shook her head, trying to rid herself of the image, even now, fifteen years later.
But some things never went away. She ducked her head, her throat scratchy. "Kayla had seen it all, Elliot.
Her father had come after her mother. Raped her and cut her up in front of Kayla. And she wouldn't talk.
She wouldn't say a word. She barely even blinked or acknowledged anyone was around. For days and days.
She had no one to go home to, so they kept her under observation at the hospital. I'd sit with her, and she'd
curve her fingers around mine and just stare at the wall without sleeping. And then, one day almost a week
later, when I was leaving, she said my name. As if she was trying to get me to stay."
Elliot was nearly frozen, except for the way his eyelids narrowed.
For one moment, there was such recognition in his expression that she almost forgot that he hadn't been her
partner that day. That he hadn't been there with her, trying to soothe a little girl who could only keen in her
pain, but couldn't find her voice for anything else.
"You tried to take her in," Elliot finally murmured. "You tried, didn't you? And they told you no."
Olivia finally looked at him. It was the ugly, hideous truth laid out for him to inspect. "I needed her, Elliot. I
needed to be there for her as much as she needed me. She was the only one," her throat tightened. "She said
my name, El. And she asked me to stay. But they told me I wasn't fit to care for her." Olivia blinked, trying
to lose herself in the dancing flames of the fire. "My life wasn't conducive to being a parent. And that was
the end of that. They sent her into foster care and her name changed and I didn't see her again." She pressed
her lips together as if that could keep her inside of herself. "But they were right, Elliot. It's not right for me.
It's not."
"Bullshit," he gritted. "That's bullshit Olivia, and you know it." Elliot shook his head, narrowing his eyes as
he stared back towards the fire. "You don't listen to ACS about anything else, yet you let them decide the
course of your life?" He couldn't reconcile the statement, so he looked back at her, heat burning in his gaze.
"Are you fucking kidding me?"
Elliot didn't get it. That was all she could process. He wasn't hearing her. He thought she was a coward that
had just let them walk all over her, instead of listening to what she was saying. She had fully understood the
decision. She had realized the truth in it. You're not a suitable candidate, Officer Benson. We appreciate
your concern, but we need to place Kayla with someone who is better able to care for her. Who can provide
the stable and secure environment that she needs.
"Whatever, Elliot," Olivia mumbled, trying to move past him and into the cabin.
His arm snaked out and grabbed hers, effectively stopping her by pulling her against him. "All those years I
told you that you didn't understand because you weren't a parent..." Elliot laughed harshly, bitterly. "Christ,
I'm such a sonofabitch, Liv. I thought that was just your choice. I had no idea you wanted-"
Here it comes, she thought. Here it comes. He's going to say he'd step aside so she'd have a shot at it. He's
going to walk away because even if this thing between them went somewhere, it would never go there.
"I don't." Olivia met his gaze, praying she could hold it. She had to end this crap. This pathetic line of
drivel. It had no place between them. And she hated the goddamned compassion that was growing in his
eyes, because it had to mean he was going to let go. "That's just it. I don't, Elliot. I don't want it. Just
because you did, just because you had the American Dream, doesn't mean that's right for everyone. You'd
have to kill me to get me to stay still in the suburbs. I don't want any of that. At all." The words came out in
have to kill me to get me to stay still in the suburbs. I don't want any of that. At all." The words came out in
a rush, spilling from her so fast that she couldn't even hear them.
He must not have heard them either, because instead of running from her, realizing she was such a fucking
liar, Elliot pulled her up against him, his fingers threading through her hair. "Liv, they're wrong. Whatever
they said to you, they were wrong."
Olivia didn't want to inhale. She didn't want to breathe in the smell of him, feel the pulse of his heart
beneath his t-shirt. She didn't want to slip her hands up his chest and turn her face into his neck. She didn't
want to believe that utter and complete security existed. She didn't want think about Cathy, about a woman
who had been set on one course in life and who had pushed back, determined to find another. She didn't
want to think about Jessica, whose free spirit should have been squashed a long time ago by the fear that
lived in her father.
If she thought about any of that, it meant that she might have been wrong about too many things for far too
long.
Olivia froze, standing as still as she could.
"Do something for me, okay?" he asked softly, his breath pushing against her scalp.
She didn't move.
"Try to remember your whole life isn't already decided. Who you are and what it's going to be hasn't fully
played out yet."
She was dizzy with the heat, the sounds of the guitar, the silence that rumbled thickly between them.
Don't walk away, Elliot. You made me believe in you this weekend. Just don't walk away because you're
scared I'll want more than you can give.
I won't, Elliot. I promise that I won't.
"You know what I've been thinking about all day?" Elliot asked, his voice growing in strength.
"No," Olivia whispered, feeling his arms slide effortlessly around her waist.
God, Elliot. I don't think I've ever done this. I can't decide if I'm going to crawl out of my skin because it
hurts so badly, or if I'm going to sink into you. You're just holding me? Seems like such a simple explanation
for so much more.
I can't believe you're holding me.
"I've been thinking about why people get divorced."
Olivia stiffened in his arms, bracing for the unknown.
Elliot laughed, his lips dusting across her hair. "Shit, that sounded bad. What I mean is that I've been trying
to figure out motivation. Because it's ending something and endings usually hurt like hell. But what I'm
realizing is that people don't get divorced to stay miserable. They do it because they believe there is
something better waiting for them. Kathy, she had to believe there was happiness somewhere else to ask me
for a divorce, right? We were making each other miserable, and she realized that we both had a chance at
something else."

Olivia pressed her face against his neck. "If you're stealing from evidence in Narcotics, Elliot, I'll probably
have to turn you in."
She pulled back, and watched his expression rearrange itself into something resembling a soft, sexy grin.
"What I'm saying is, don't write your life off so soon. You just never know what's still in store."Elliot
looked smug. Proud of himself for his imparted wisdom.
Olivia couldn't tell him that for some reason, he managed to undo the knots in her stomach. That his little-
boy grin was infectious, and that years ago, when she had walked beside him, she'd felt invincible.
She couldn't tell him that she could feel a little bit of that assurance creeping back into her soul right now.
"No more Chinese, Elliot. When we get back, we're not ordering Chinese anymore. You're developing life
theories from all the fortune cookies," she muttered instead, shaking her head and pulling out of his grasp.
His smile was gentle. Indulging her need to get the hell out of this conversation.
It wasn't until she started to move past him, heading for the stairs that would lead back to the grass and the
fire beyond that he caught her from behind, slipping one thick forearm around her waist and drawing her
back towards him. "They were so damned wrong, Olivia," he whispered roughly into her ear. "Just
remember that. Those ignorant fucks didn't know a thing about you. Because if they knew you like I do, they
would have given that little girl everything just by letting her be with you. Trust me. I know."
He let her go then, and Olivia stumbled down the steps, trying to make out the direction of the fire through
the blur in her eyes and the reassuring weight of her heart, finally intact and nestled deep within her chest.
+++
Olivia rolled over in her bed, kicking off the sheet and feeling the hot, muggy night air sticking to her skin.
She had slipped on her cotton shorts instead of her pajama pants, but even that wasn't helping.
The air was far too still, no wind moving through the open screen that filled the high window.
Her face was flushed, her skin clammy. The humidity was nearly oppressive, which made her hair feel
heavy, the locks of it sticking to her. She slid her leg along the rough sheet, trying to find a cool spot and
realizing she had used all of them up already.
She wondered what Elliot was doing. If he was sleeping. She squeezed her eyes shut as she found herself
debating whether he slept on his stomach or his back. She imagined that his shirt would be off, his boxers
slid low on his hips, and the sheets were probably kicked away, in deference to the heat.
That was, of course, if he slept in anything at all.
Olivia sighed and rubbed a hand over her face, letting her fingers slide into her bangs before falling back on
the pillow above her head. She kicked off her own comforter belligerently, her stomach clenched. Jesus, she
was less than twelve hours from going back to the city, and she didn't have a handle on her body at all. Her
brain wasn't helping either. Her stupid head couldn't get past the fact that Elliot was less than a hundred feet
away and half-naked. Maybe all naked. And he was alone, sprawled across a bed in the thick, heated dark.
She'd agreed to see where things went with them, and she had expected to take it slow. But her skin had
other ideas. Ones that involved him moving all over her. Now. His hands, his mouth, his...

The man had far too many ridges and hard surfaces and goddamned muscles. Someone forgot to give the
jerk the memo that he was a suburban father of four.
She drew her knees up until the sheet only wrapped around her toes. She closed her eyes before she realized
the danger in that. Behind the dark screen of her eyelids, she could see him. The sexy, arrogant twist of his
lips, the flat, rough surface of his fingertips, the way his back was cut and shaped by all of the planes that
intersected across his body.
She wondered if she'd ever heard the deepest tones of his voice.
Her thighs clenched involuntarily. Outside, the incessant chirping of crickets and the occasional frog calling
across the lake interrupted the silence. Olivia sighed, thinking of the expanse of water, of the crystal blue
that had taunted her all day. The lake, his eyes. She needed to lose herself in one of them.
She couldn't breathe in the steam of her room. Even the water in her bottle had warmed to room
temperature. The glare of the blue screen on her phone that sat by her bed on the floor told her it was nearly
three in the morning, but she was wide awake, starting to suffocate. Olivia knew it wasn't the brightest idea
to go roaming at this time of the night, but she was a cop after all. She could at least head to the lake for a
bit, maybe sit on the dock and soak up a stray breeze. It was just across the open field from the small inset
where their cabin sat.
It would take her under five minutes to be on the dock, her feet swirling in the cool freshwater. Maybe her
body would calm the hell down.
Once the idea had formed there was no turning back. In seconds she was out of her bed, throwing on a bra
under her tank and shoving her feet into her flip-flops, a t-shirt and towel firmly clutched in her hands. She
opened her room door as quietly as possible and saw no other lights on. Closing her room door behind her,
she tiptoed across the floor and out the main door of the cabin, the air outside immediately feeling a few
degrees cooler.
The longer blades of grass tickled the edges of her feet as she made her way across the field. The tiny faint
light on the dock of the house across the lake beckoned her, and Olivia smiled to herself. She'd never done
this as a kid. There had been no summers at camp, she had never slipped her toes into the cool waters of a
lake or sat around a bonfire before. There had been no late night sneaking around a campground, no
s'mores, no eight-week romance nestled into the deepest part of the summer.
Yet she had been given so much of it in the last two days.
The biggest part was Elliot of course, and with him in her life she was beginning to recognize that there
wouldn't be anyone else. There couldn't be. It wasn't even as simple as letting him go back to Kathy if that's
what he ever chose, because whether or not he was with her physically, he was already in her head and
against the specter of him, no one else would truly stand a chance.
They couldn't. He was her history, and the only part of her past that she wanted in her future.
She wanted him. She wanted to sleep against him, his body slick with sweat and his heart still slamming in
his chest. She wanted to hear him groan when he was inside of her, she wanted his skin, and his smell on
her. She wanted to slide her nails along his back and lock her thighs around his hips and just hang on.
Olivia fought her imagination's trajectory and walked past the two trees that remained at the edge of the
clearing. They were guards between the grass and the sand, belligerent because one of them had borne the
stubborn roots that had frustrated her so badly the night before. Her flip flops sank into the unsteady sand
and she reached down to pull them off, sinking her toes into the still warm, rough grains.

The water was rhythmic in front of her, slapping ever so gently at the edge of the wet sand, ripples pressing
into the surface of the lake as if someone was playing the piano on the once smooth sheet of glass. It was
perfect, clear, untouched. There was an innocence to the lake; no salt, no crashing waves, and this late at
night, not even any boats.
Olivia let everything drop from her hands, and went to stand at the edge of the water. The wetness hit her
toes, slipping over the top of her foot and then swirling around her ankles. It wasn't cold, but the water
didn't as yet hold the warmth that it would in the middle of summer.
She needed the relief. She needed to be startled out of this desperate, throbbing want.
Her skin was cooling on her legs just a little bit, the reprieve a welcome one. But the skin of her neck, her
chest, the place where her bare arms met the cotton that covered her torso; all of that was still sticky,
begging for relief.
Olivia looked back at the cabin, barely visible despite the few small lights that shone across the field, from
the mess hall, the main office. Everyone was asleep, and she told herself that even if someone was looking,
they'd have to strain to see her.
If she was truthful, the only one who would ever look for her was Elliot. She amended her thought.
If Elliot looked for her, he'd have to strain to see her.
But he wouldn't. He wouldn't wake up and open her room door. He wouldn't be standing there with his
aching eyes and she wouldn't want him, need him, crave the ability to slip her hands under his shirt and up
over the rigid muscles of his abdomen, his chest, his shoulders.
There was something wrong with her, because her head was joining her body in forgetting to take it slow.
There was a rebellious, reckless part of her that wanted to head back to the cabin and wake him up. For all
the nights she had slept across the country from him, for all the days she had stupidly worked a few floors
above, she hadn't gone to him. But now the need was becoming overwhelming.
But she couldn't go there. Take it slow.
Olivia moved farther into the water, letting it slip up her shins and twirl around her aching legs. She closed
her eyes, wondering what it would feel like to be the one to tug Elliot's shirt off, to be able to slip her
fingers into every crevice that lay between the hard lines of his chest. She wondered if he'd suck in air as
she did it, if he'd stand still and let her feel his hot, damp skin under her palms or if he'd need to be the one
who touched first.
She wondered what the buttons on the waistband of his shorts would feel like on her fingertips, if her thumb
would rub the smooth metal surface as he waited, as she waited, as everything just waited for the scratching
sound of his zipper to compete with the crickets as she tugged it down and -
Olivia whipped off her tank top and slipped each leg out of her cotton shorts, holding onto them as she did
so in an effort to keep them from getting wet. She balled them both up and tossed them onto the sand past
the edge of the water, until she was standing there in her white satin bra and the matching white satin bikini
briefs. Her heart picked up speed at the freedom she had out here to simply slip into the comfort of the lake.
She needed the water, the relief, the gentle lulling current caressing her skin. She walked farther in, feeling
the mix of sand and rock give way beneath her feet into pure, smooth sand. The water slid between her
thighs, pushing between them, the movement of the slight ripples she was causing sloshing up and hitting
her between her legs, wetting her underwear. Olivia stood still for just a moment, letting the water repeat the
her between her legs, wetting her underwear. Olivia stood still for just a moment, letting the water repeat the
action, the relief of the pressure hitting her where she was now most sensitive nearly overbearing in both the
pain and the pleasure.
It hit her again and she spread her legs a little bit, allowing the small crests of water more access. Elliot was
in her head now, and what she knew of his body teased her, what she knew of his heart taunted her. Her
nipples pushed through her bra until they seemed brittle, and the water mercilessly licked up the inside of
her thighs. She gave in to her imagination and to the scenery around her and for just a few moments, she
thought about summers, and campgrounds and magic.
Olivia's hand slipped across the water, sliding along the surface and feeling it shift in response to her
movement. Her fingers glided along the wetness, sifting through it, and she wondered what the short strands
of Elliot's hair would feel like on her palm. She relived the moments his mouth had descended on hers,
wholly possessive, demanding, desperate. When he groaned against her there was a pain in its depth, as if
he was settling within, and she thought it sounded like what it would be to hear the tectonic plates shift
beneath the earth's surface in the moments before an earthquake.
Her whole body slowed down, because her physical need for him was far too intense to be frantic. Maybe
she had always required him, maybe every moment of his proximity had simply been foreplay. Maybe the
comfort she had been finding at his simple touches wasn't really comfort at all, but relief.
The water drank from her, sucking at her body where she ached and yet it wasn't enough. It was teasing her,
swirling into her intimately and Olivia felt the smallest sound of pleasure escape her lips. Her hips rolled
against the sensation of the water's surface playing between her legs and she moaned, her eyes slamming
shut. She imagined his fingers trailing over her wet stomach, teasing at the edge of the wet fabric of her
underwear. The burning need to have him inside of her made her dizzy, the need for release nearly making
her cry out loud.
Olivia opened her eyes and moved deeper into the water, drawn by the incongruity of its dark depths against
its cleansing, intoxicating effect on her. Even in its blackness the water wasn't murky. It was sharp, bright,
eagerly trapping the faint light of a nearly full moon that reflected on the tips of the small rising ripples.
Her head fell forward as she recalled seeing him moving towards her today, across the sand, his bare chest
slick with the water, his tattoos unable to make his skin seem harder than his eyes were. Elliot had looked at
her, and she had known he had seen everything. Her lips had ached to press against his body, to slide down
the hollow between his pectorals and then open against his stomach. She had wanted his big hands in her
hair, holding her in place as her mouth dipped lower, tasting the salt of his skin as her hands learned the
powerful mass of his thighs.
God, she wanted to slide her mouth fully around him and hear him groan.
Olivia had always been a swimmer, grabbing hours in the pool at the gym since she had been a teenager.
But tonight, as she arched her body and dove into the water in front of her, she knew she had never truly
been swimming at all. This was different, natural, as basic and unoriginal as time. The water cut over her,
and she kept her eyes closed, feeling the current slip over her shoulders and her back as her skin still
burned. It gathered around her as she plunged deeper, the airless, weightless washing of her skin innately
satisfying. She cut through the water, coming up only for air before sliding down into the relief from the
heat, from the sweat, from heavy, gasping humidity.
There was no relief from the phantom sensations of his big body repeatedly penetrating hers.
Even submerged, her thrumming body was still on fire for his, the intense ache of her nipples, of her
clitoris, of her skin in general not so easily appeased as to be assuaged by simply the cool water. She tried

for endless minutes to swim fast enough, even finding enough room to tumble beneath the water just to see
if she still could, anything that would serve as a distraction from the way she imagined he would feel on her,
over her.
Rocking deep, deep inside of her.
Elliot.
Fucking her.
Olivia burst through the surface again, finding the sand beneath her toes as she stood shakily, the water
hitting her waist. The beach was to her right, the buoy to her left and a thick of trees far in front of her. She
knew that behind her was the abandoned dock with its rickety white metal ladder, but she wasn't ready to
get out of the water just yet. She dipped her head backwards into the water, closing her eyes before
straightening, sluicing the excess water from her hair as she smoothed it down her back.
The hot air immediately began to attack her skin, instantaneously warming her. She couldn't stop thinking
about Elliot. About his fingers on her skin, about the intent in his eyes. This terrified her, this absolutely
unwavering erotic awareness of him that had burst out of its casing over the last few days. She wanted him,
simply put, she wanted him. She wanted to know what it would be like to have Elliot between her legs, his
thighs separating hers as his erection nudged at her, teased her, filled her.
She wanted to come around him.
Olivia moaned out loud into the night air. She slid her hand over the goose bumps on her belly and her
fingers teased at the edges of her underwear beneath the surface. One finger slipped under the band, rubbing
on the sensitive skin. She couldn't help it, she needed relief that the lake wouldn't provide. Her fingers
slipped lower, into her folds that were slick in a way the water alone wouldn't cause. Her head fell forward
as she bit hard onto her lower lip, sliding deeper into her body. She teased at her own entrance with one
single finger, enduring all she could before finally pushing into herself, thrusting her penetration as deep as
she could go.
Her thighs contracted in the moment her inner muscles did, grateful for the impaling. She worked into her
body deeper, once, again, and then again. Her wet underwear was a second skin against the back of her
hand, the water moving around her in a flirtatious dance.
Elliot. She closed her eyes, need overwhelming her. She wanted him, wanted his mouth on her, his hands
roaming her skin, his hard body pushing at her to open for him. She wanted to lie beneath him and know
what it was like to have Elliot Stabler make love to her. To give him the rest of her, the only part he didn't
already have. To feel the bare skin of his stomach against hers, his chest rough against her nipples, his
mouth open, seeking deeper entrance into her body.
She wanted to ache for hours afterwards because he had been all over her, inside of her. She wanted him to
push her to the edge, where she didn't think she would survive, and then she wanted to close her eyes and
let him keep her alive.
She slid her left hand up her stomach, over her ribcage and cupped her breast, needing relief from the sharp,
stabbing ache. She was about to slip her fingers beneath the wet satin when she froze, hearing the slightest,
muffled movement behind her on the dock. She stilled, knowing what it was, who it was, before she even
could remove her fingers from within herself.
"Olivia," he rumbled, the sound deceptively lazy in its command.

Her heart stopped. Then started again, roaring in her ears. She had to move, to do something, to fix the
nightmare of having Elliot watch her like this.
It's not a nightmare though, is it Olivia? a small voice inside of her challenged. You want him. You want to
know what it's like to be fucked by Elliot. You want to know what it feels like when he slides inside of you,
when he says your name, when he hooks your thighs over his forearms and pushes deeper and deeper.
Slowly Olivia slipped her hand out of her underwear, knowing he hadn't seen the details from where he
stood at the end of the dock but he would have known what she had been doing. She let her hand fall back
into the lake, terror and anticipation permeating everything around her.
Olivia wanted to be embarrassed. She should have been embarrassed.
Instead she felt like she'd just reached the end of inevitability. There was an odd sense of surrender, of
succumbing to something far bigger than she would ever be able to control. There was a relief in losing the
battle.
"Turn around," he urged, his voice thick with desire and the vibrations of it skimming across the water.
Olivia let out a deep breath and turned, finally, after all the years, allowing Elliot to see all of her.
+++
Back to index

Chapter 17: Ropes
It was the best sex she'd ever had.
Hours later, lying in bed and fully sated, Olivia wondered why she hadn't jumped her partner sooner. Of
course, he was snoring right now, and the sheets were still damp from their bodies, but all in all, the sex had
been great, even if the lake had provided some challenges to positioning. He was hot, she thought, she
should have jumped him sooner.
Hahahaha....psyche. (God, I need to grow up. C'mon, admit it was funny.)
Okay, fine. Details. You people want the details. I get it...trust me. There is a little perv in all of us, and in
some more than others. Your reviews are phenomenal - like, humbling so much because I can't believe y'all
are still reading.
To three of my favorite pervs - Brynn, Jess and Pooks - I appreciate you sticking by me and helping me
determine line by line what is hot and what is not. You three were like the Idol judges of e/o sex, and for
that I am immensely grateful.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
Olivia took a deep breath, knowing there was nowhere to go, and there was no time left to panic.
Panicking would have been a lie in any case.
Out here, in a place they didn't belong and yet in which they seemed to have always been, she finally
understood what it was like to stand still. Elliot's eyes were on her back and even the lake paused, waiting
for him, waiting for them.
She wanted Elliot. Even if it was for a single night. Even if tomorrow was complicated. For tonight, she
wanted to own him and she wanted to be owned in return by the only man that she would ever let have her.
She slowly turned around in the water, the dock fifteen feet behind her. She lifted her heavy eyes to his,
drinking him in. He stood there, his white t-shirt stretched tight across his chest, his shorts hugging his
narrow waist. His shoes dangled from his fingers, his feet left bare against the worn wooden planks.
Elliot was staring at her, his chest moving evenly with his breaths and the rest of his body unnaturally still.
The moonlight lit up the muscles on his forearms, his tattoo the only dark spot visible on him except for the
ones now evident in depths of his eyes.
She stood up fully, disallowing even her toes to burrow in the sand. There would be no further movement
from her, nothing that would distract his gaze. The water hit her waist, and she was bare above the surface
from her, nothing that would distract his gaze. The water hit her waist, and she was bare above the surface
except for the wet translucence of her bra. He didn't move for so long that she started to wonder, to worry
that she was wrong, that he wasn't going to take what she was plainly offering to him simply by standing
there and waiting for him to come and take it. Take her.
He just stood there, unmoving. His eyelids lowered marginally, as if heavy, weighted.
Olivia cocked her head, silently asking the questions she couldn't say.
He flinched as if she had hit him, but he didn't move. He didn't break the silence.
And he didn't walk away.
+++
Elliot had never seen anything like it in his life.
He was ashamed to admit it, to admit that he had been through humbling, life changing events with a wife
that would soon no longer be his, and with children that would always be, yet nothing had prepared him for
this.
He had watched her gliding through the water twenty feet before he'd hit the water's edge, but he had known
she would be out here long before he had gotten that close. From the moment he had heard the floorboards
creak in the cabin, he had known that of all the participants, it would be Olivia that wouldn't be able to
suffer through the heat without seeking some air.
He'd waited. Tried to talk himself out of following her. He'd wanted to give her some space. And when he
lost his battle, he had expected her to be on the dock, but he hadn't expected to see the crumple of her towel
and clothes on the sand, hadn't expected to see the movement in the water.
She had gone under for long seconds as he walked out onto the dock, and he hadn't known what he was
going to say to her when she surfaced. He wondered if she'd be naked, if he'd see more than she wanted him
to see. He didn't want to embarrass her, yet she was under the water then and he had no way to warn her of
his presence.
Then, like a bastard, he hadn't wanted to.
Olivia had surfaced, the glimmering golden skin of her back only interrupted by the band of now see-
through white satin. She had bent backwards, allowing the water to smooth out her hair, making it seem
even inches longer as it caressed her neck and stuck to her shoulders. Her hands had followed its path,
slicking it to her head and her skin while he struggled to breathe.
He had almost said something then. He had almost used that moment to find his voice.
And then she had moaned, moved, shifted. The muscles in her upper back had contracted, flexed, rearranged
themselves in the moonlight and he had frozen, every inch of his skin pounding beneath the force of his
pulse. He had been transfixed by the sight of her, glorious, wet, nearly naked and crying out softly into the
night air as she touched herself beneath the surface of the water.
God didn't hate him after all.
He had wanted to see it happen. More than he needed air, he had needed to see her as she pleasured herself.
To be allowed to watch her. But he hadn't been able to stand still because his dick had turned to granite in
his shorts and he had been forced to shift to accommodate the hard-on that he had been fighting by
his shorts and he had been forced to shift to accommodate the hard-on that he had been fighting by
widening his stance.
Olivia had heard him move. Elliot had known by the way her golden shoulders had stiffened; by the way the
long, elegant column of her back had straightened. He'd stopped breathing for a moment, terrified she'd be
angry, but she had simply stopped her movements.
And listened to the sound of his voice.
Goddamnit, he wanted to cut through the bullshit, the coaxing, the treading lightly. He wanted to get in that
fucking water and rip the hell out of that wet tease of a bra so he could get his mouth on her. He wanted to
haul every lush damn curve of her body on top of his and get so deep into her the very first time that she'd
scream, plead, brand small crescents in his shoulders with her nails.
But this was Olivia, and he knew with the only certainty he'd ever been afforded that she would run if he
made one, stupid sudden move.
Turn around, he'd asked, or ordered, or pleaded.
Then he had stood there and held his breath. Waiting. Wondering. Praying. He'd vaguely had a sense that if
she turned around, if she let him see her like that, her breasts pushing through the transparent satin, her skin
wet and her eyes reflecting the moonlight, that he wouldn't get himself back. That even if she said no, he
couldn't have her, he'd have nothing left of himself for anyone else ever again.
Once she was in his head like that, there wouldn't be enough time left in infinity to erase the effects she
would have on his body. His chest. His heart.
Then again, he didn't give a fuck. He was shit without her anyway. He didn't deserve her, but for some
reason she needed him too, and he wasn't going to throw away any of the small miracles he'd ever been
granted.
Before he could process it, the ramifications of what was about to happen, she had turned slowly in the
water. He didn't know where to look, so he searched for her eyes. Anything more than that and he would
fall apart with need. His mouth was dry, his cock arrogantly demanding something he didn't know if he had
the right to take yet. He drank in the dark, slick fall of her hair against her skin, the dip at the top of her
shoulders, the long, graceful lines of her arms. And then because he couldn't help it, was far too weak to
attempt anything else, he let his eyes fall to her breasts.
Air was overrated.
Jesus, he'd touched her today. He'd felt the weight of her breasts in his hands, even felt her nipple pebble
beneath his palm, but this was different. The dark tips pushed through the thin, wet material, and his lips
pressed together involuntarily, wanting. Wanting. Wanting.
"Don't leave," he finally managed to get out of his constricted throat. "Just...don't leave."
Olivia didn't say anything. She simply stood still, as if frozen. As if she was a mirage commanded by his
voice, his will.
He wanted her. Now. He wanted to be allowed into the water with her. But he was afraid to ask her; afraid
that if reminded there was a choice that she would remember to refuse him.
Elliot grabbed the edges of his t-shirt in his hands and pulled upwards, swiping the material off his body as
quickly as he could. The dry cotton balled in his fists and he dropped it to the side, wondering if she would
quickly as he could. The dry cotton balled in his fists and he dropped it to the side, wondering if she would
stay still like that, just stay put, if he reached for the button on his shorts.
He was standing there, watching her as her chest rose sharply with each breath, teasing him, tantalizing him
with her damp skin. God, he couldn't scare the shit out of her. One wrong move and he was damn well
positive she'd head for shore and tell him to go to hell.
Jesus, he wanted to say. Please, Olivia. Just please don't fucking move.
He reached for the button on his shorts with one hand, determined not to move the other because the least
amount of movement he could generate the better. His fingers stopped there, poised on the metal disc.
"Olivia," he said, and then realized his voice was so low it was nearly indiscernible. He cleared his throat,
trying to raise it just a single octave so she would hear him. "Olivia, I'm gonna-" his words faded. Because
the truth of it was, he didn't know what in the hell he was gonna do.
She cocked her head, staring at him, unblinking. "Elliot?" she said quietly.
His button was burning against his fingertips. Christ, he needed to get his shorts off, he needed the water,
her skin, her mouth biting against his before falling to his shoulder and sucking his skin into her mouth.
"Yeah?" he said, feeling nearly dizzy in the humidity.
"Hurry," she murmured drowsily.
God, let me live through this. Give me just this and don't let her hate me tomorrow.
His finger popped the button through the loop and he slid the zipper down his shorts. With both hands he
shoved them down and then reached for them, sending them to land on top of his shirt. Goddammit, he was
so hard it was painful. His arousal was more than evident against his dark boxers, but she wasn't looking
away.
He felt like an asshole, standing there wondering if he should take his boxers off, too. He'd always enjoyed
sex; he'd always been comfortable with his body, with initiating, with knowing that he could coax pleasure.
But this was different. He knew, inexorably, that with Olivia he wasn't in control. That after the first
moment when she touched him, there would be no more discipline, holding back, rational thought.
He'd touch her and he'd want to bury himself in her. There wasn't going to be any in between.
Elliot was about to lower himself to edge of the dock to slip into the water when Olivia smiled. Her full lips
lifted, her heavy eyes raised to his again. "Take em off, Elliot," she whispered. And then, in a moment of
sexy-as-hell flirtatiousness she bit her lip, slightly embarrassed by the request she had just uttered.
"Christ," he swore under his breath. Holy Mother of God.
Elliot felt the rough edges of the wooden planks under his toes and realized he was as close as he could get
to the water without jumping in. He sat then, sliding his legs in, feeling the cool water mercifully lap at his
ankles, his shins, his calves. Carefully he lifted his ass off the dock and pulled his boxers off, dragging each
leg out of the water as he tugged them off his legs.
He heard her moving, but until he was completely naked he didn't realize just how silent she had been in
her forward progress. Elliot lifted his face and realized she was less than two feet away from him now.
There were details that were now a gift of her proximity. The small, defined circular tips of her nipples
against the wet fabric, the freckle on her upper arm. The way her hip curved slightly before it disappeared
into the water and the way two small beads of moisture slid down between her breasts.
into the water and the way two small beads of moisture slid down between her breasts.
"I want you so fucking much, Liv. If we can't...if we aren't..." He stopped, searching for words so he
wouldn't sound like a complete asshole. "You gotta tell me now because I can't..." Elliot rubbed his hand
over his face, trying to find control. One last minute of logic. The heel of his hand dug into his eyes and he
swore that he could turn around. He could walk away if she said to. He had to be able to do what she asked.
But she stole control from him in one, shattering moment. Her fingers landed dangerously on his thigh
before her hands slid upwards. Her fingers dug into his skin as they moved, spread out, molding the muscles
of his thighs as they slid upwards, higher...Jesus Christ, higher.
He looked down, knowing he had made that primal sound that had just ripped from his gut. His fingers
tangled in her hair, pulling her head up so he could breathe, think, just be able to goddamned look at her
without howling in need.
But words wouldn't form. The imprint of her hot hands on his thigh was seared into his brain. He was afraid
that one more move from her like that and he'd come before he even touched her. Keep it together, Stabler.
For fuck's sake, don't embarrass the hell out of yourself in front of your partner. In front of Olivia.
"Liv, I gotta get in you," he rasped, because finesse could take a flying fuck.
And then Olivia turned his whole world upside down. She smiled, shoving the dark, sticking strands of her
hair out of her face. "You gotta get in the water first, Stabler," she said throatily.
The last thing he could process was that even with the cool water slipping around his waist, his hard-on was
raging, ready, unwilling to acquiesce to anything but the hot, tight, wet depths of Olivia's body.
+++
You're past the point of no return. You have been since you got back from Oregon. Since you left. You're
already Elliot's.
Olivia stepped backwards in the water as Elliot slid in, shaking and wondering if he could tell. She
wondered if all the bravado in the world could hide her desperation, her apprehension, her simple need for
him. He cupped water in his hands and then splashed it over his face, his neck, his hair, and she used the
moment to close her eyes and regroup.
He was stunning.
That was all she had been able to register in the moment that he had sat before her, completely naked. Her
throat had locked and her belly had burned with the heat that had flooded deep inside of her. She'd always
known that his body was powerful, dangerous, lethal if need be, and being able to touch him in the last two
days had only intensified her awareness.
But this was different. With his skin bare, his muscles shifting and coiled with tension, the lighter skin of
his upper thighs and ass contrasting with the deeper tones of his chest, she had been propelled by something
far stronger than her willpower, her dignity or her fear.
She'd been propelled by desire. Sheer, raw, incinerating need. She had seen the strength, the force of Elliot's
erection and she'd nearly rocked forward, needing to touch him, taste him, feel his skin against her tongue.
And that had been nothing compared to her emotional reaction to him. That had been nearly blinding,
visceral. He was hers. She'd protected him. She'd nursed his wounds. She would literally fight to death for
him.
him.
He was hers.
"Shit," he cursed, his midnight blue eyes the only splash of color she could process. He was staring at her
while his hands skimmed the water roughly. "You're trying to damn well kill me, right?" Elliot's gaze
dropped between them, to her breasts, which were mere inches from his chest. His fingers trailed lightly
over her breastbone, her shoulders, the column of her neck. His head was bent, his eyes following the path
of his fingers. "You're so damned beautiful it drives me insane," he groaned.
The words, coming from his mouth, from Elliot, rattled her. She'd never considered herself beautiful. Men
had said things to that effect, but she'd ignored them. Maybe she hadn't cared. But now, standing here
against Elliot, it suddenly mattered. She wanted desperately to memorize this look on his face, this feeling
inside of her when she knew he wasn't just looking at his partner.
"You know that, right Liv?" he murmured as his hand cupped her jaw, his thumb tracing her lips. "I always
thought you were, I just...Not having you for myself was making me outta my damned mind." His accent
thickened, his voice reverberating in the space between them.
Olivia couldn't take her eyes off of him. Water slid over his face, over his ears, his cheeks, his neck. Her
skin was scalding, his fingers sketching fire wherever they skimmed over her body. She stepped closer to
him in the water, closing the distance between them as she pressed her nipples against the unyielding, wet,
naked planes of his chest.
Olivia cried out from the intensity of the sensation, trying to stifle the sound as she pushed herself against
him. His cock was thick and hard against her belly and Elliot grunted his approval, his hands slipping up the
sides of her neck and into her hair. He tugged gently, drawing her back to look at him.
"Sexy as hell," Elliot said hoarsely, his eyes infused with hunger.
Olivia barely had time to take a breath before his possessive mouth crashed down onto hers.
It was heat, desperation, domination and retreat. His lips moved quickly, relentlessly, his tongue driving into
her mouth and demanding entrance. Elliot's big hands fisted in her hair and he drew her hard up against
him, until she practically stumbled onto him, trying to gain some semblance of balance in the water as she
opened her mouth, tasting him, drinking him into her.
"Mine," he claimed, without thinking. He shifted, spearing one hand farther into her hair and tangling the
wet strands in between his fingers as his other hand skimmed down over her waist and hauled her up higher
on his body, until she was practically wrapped around him, on top of him.
The way he commanded her body to move around his was nothing short of arrogant.
She wanted him like this. She wanted him to feel like she did. The sheer strength of her need for him had
left her unhinged.
His lips were now beneath hers yet she was still at his mercy, the intensity of his arousal evident in the
litany of raw curses that tore from his throat.
Olivia shuddered, her arms curving around his neck as his tongue delved further into her mouth. Elliot
nipped at her, his hand pressing against the back of her neck and forcing her to find some space against the
rock-solid muscles of his big, slick, heated body.

The wetness was everywhere. It slipped between them, over them, and swirled around them. The lake was
cool but the air was thick with heat, the temperature of their bodies seemingly warming the water that
encircled them. Elliot ruthlessly forced her to slide down against him, her body painting every inch of his,
and she protested her displeasure before he quieted her again by melding his mouth to hers. She wanted to
stay where she was, so she finally wrapped her legs around his waist as she found the short, damp wisps of
his hair and slid her fingers into it.
"Elliot -" she hissed, as his hand slipped possessively between them to cup her breast. He wasn't gentle, and
she didn't want him to be. His hand molded her forcefully, shaping her breast to fit his palm as if she was
his to take.
She was.
Her pelvis rocked against his hard-on beneath the surface and she cried out, her head falling back as she
fought the water's rhythm to indulge her own.
Nothing compared to this. Nothing could and nothing ever would. There was something about the night, and
magic, and being lost and found out here in the woods. She didn't want to temper her cries when she came,
she wanted him to hear them, to hear her. Soon.
"God, Olivia," Elliot's fingers desperately clawed at her wet, clinging bra, trying to pull it out of the way.
But the material was too damp, too tight to be removed easily. "Jesus, I need...this thing off you."
Olivia struggled for air, the humidity slipping into her lungs. His fingers tugged at the sticky satin and the
rasp of his nails directly against her nipple sent her arching towards him in shock and desperation. "In the
back," she instructed as loud as she could manage. "Clasp. In back."
But Elliot had given up, and instead he slid his big hand up her back and pulled her down towards him, his
mouth, his teeth on her breast, ignoring the layer of soaking, clinging satin that lay between his hot tongue
and her skin.
A wave of pleasure smashed over her, drawing a moan from deep in her throat as he fastened his mouth on
her nipple, biting, retreating, drawing more of her into him until he was sucking her into his mouth. Her
fingers pressed against his head, the water tossing around them as she struggled to keep her legs locked
around his torso without coming.
Inside of her, her body contracted wildly, matching the pace of his sucking. She was going to fall apart from
just this. She needed his fingers, the thickness of his erection, his tongue.
She was desperate. And if he did that thing with his teeth and his tongue one more time she was going to
come, bucking against him before he was even inside of her.
"Elliot," she protested. "Elliot, God, we have to stop. Please, just...I can't..." Her body was perilously out of
control, and she slipped, sliding down his waist until the merciless, rock-hard length of his naked cock
dragged against her, between her legs, stabbing into the wet satin that kept her from him.
White hot lights flashed behind her eyelids at the sharp sensation, giving her the first clue that she had
closed her eyes. Between her thighs a fire had ignited, so intense and consuming that she didn't even realize
for a moment that she was alone, that he was no longer touching her, that she was now struggling to gain a
foothold in the sand.
Her eyes flew open, her skin suddenly freezing without his against it. She must have stood there for long
moments, because when she regained enough of her sanity to focus on him, she realized he was already all
the way back against the dock, several feet away from her, his hands braced against either side of the white
the way back against the dock, several feet away from her, his hands braced against either side of the white
metal railing of the ladder and his powerful, wet, muscular back facing her.
"El?" she tested, licking her lips. Jesus, what the hell had happened?
Olivia was shaking with need, yet he had practically tossed her off of him in his retreat. She started to walk
towards him slowly, feeling the resistance of the water against her. Only now it didn't soothe her, it didn't
lap at her like it had earlier. Now it only reminded her of how nothing could compare to the promise of
having Elliot deep inside of her.
His head remained bent, and all she had of him was his back, the water lapping at his narrow hips.
"Goddamn you," he bit off. His hiss held the low, ominous tones of thunder. "Don't come closer. Just. Stay.
There."
Panic twisted in her gut. He didn't want her now? Oh God, she knew this was going to happen. She knew
he'd regret it. That he'd change his mind. She just hadn't expected that it would hurt like this. She hadn't
expected to feel nauseous, to feel close to begging, to understand what it was like to want to completely
disregard pride. Her body was trembling, her need to climax hard around him blurring out any sort of
rational thought. "I'm sorry," she finally managed, hoping those words would cover whatever it was that she
had done wrong. She couldn't think, she just couldn't think.
God, she'd take him anywhere. Even if he laid her out right there on the dock.
He didn't turn around. She blinked against the image of water droplets, lazily skittering down his skin. Her
lips parted as she tried to breathe.
Everything was still on fire, despite the goose bumps that now coated her skin. He was still naked, and
although she couldn't see all of him, the fact that she knew him to be was mind-numbing in and of itself.
The feel of his big, bare body was branded into her head and the feeling of his powerful cock pushing
against her flimsy underwear had practically sent her into the throes of a full-fledged orgasm.
She could see the white tips of his knuckles as he gripped the sides of the railing. He lifted his head. "I'm
done, Liv. I can't do this anymore."
She wanted to cry. To panic. But who she was wouldn't let her fall apart until she was alone.
"Okay," Olivia said too quickly, nodding even though he couldn't see her. "You don't want this. I figured
that. I did." Her voice was tight and his fingertips were branded into her skin everywhere. The throbbing, the
aching, was making her light-headed. The full brutality of being rejected lay in wait, just outside her
immediate realm of comprehension, and she used the precious seconds she had been afforded to slip into
survival mode.
Escape. Escape. Escape.
Don't let him see you cry. You're the one that tried to seduce him. Head for the showers, maybe hours of hot
water slamming into you will make you forget the heat of his skin.
She had to get out of the water and her only two choices were walking the twenty feet to shore or going past
him on the ladder. She had to get away from him before she lost her composure, before all dignity had been
stripped from her.
She needed to get away.

Only nothing was moving. Her body wasn't listening to her need to flee.
Elliot finally whirled on her in the water, sending up a spray of it with his hand. "Are you fucking kidding
me?" he growled. His expression was dark, brooding, angry. "I don't want this? You're the one who doesn't
know what the hell she wants! Why the hell would you encourage it only to tell me to stop?"
Olivia's eyes widened. "Stop?" Her skin flushed beneath his intent gaze. "I never said..." she stopped,
realizing what had happened. She'd been close to coming and she'd said...shit.
Nine years later, the man chose now to listen to every word she said?
Just her luck.
The slightest of smiles played over her lips before she could stop it. "Oh God. Elliot. I didn't want you to
stop. Your mouth was, I just...I was going to...no, Elliot. I didn't...want you to stop." A wave of vertigo hit
her, and she braced herself in the slight current around her. "I didn't mean for you to stop. I..." she
swallowed thickly, trying to meet his gaze. "Don't want you...to stop."
She was babbling. Fuck.
Elliot's eyes narrowed in disbelief, his chest still heaving with controlled anger. "Then prove it." He
arrogantly swept her body with a single look. "If this is what you want, then come here."
Olivia shivered at the blatant, driven sexuality on his face. She frantically fought to gain some leverage.
Yeah, she wanted him, but she'd be damned if he ordered her around. "Don't tell me what to do," she
responded, wishing like hell that her voice had sounded stronger.
That amused him. His eyes darkened with something wickedly sensual. "Benson. You just said you wanted
it, so get your ass over here," Elliot smirked.
Olivia glared at him, realizing that with a see-through bra, she wasn't looking half as intimidating as she
wished she did. "Fuck you, Elliot."
That drew a low, sexy chuckle. "No, Olivia," he rumbled, as he pushed himself off the ladder, acquiescing
by moving towards her, cutting through the water. He smiled then, his grin wildly sexual and full of
promise. "Fuck you."
+++
He hovered precariously on the edge of control and civility.
He saw her, Olivia, his. He saw the wet locks of her hair, the glimmering moonlight sheen that played over
her body, the way the sun had warmed her skin to the deepest tones of honey. The tops of her breasts were a
maddening golden color too, glistening as they spilled out from the wet confines of her bra. Her abdomen
was taut, shadows cutting into the shapely flat of her stomach and her eyes, Christ, they were focused on
him, daring him, taunting him. Promising him.
He wanted to fuck her until she begged him to stop, to let her breathe, to let her take a break from the
number of times he was planning on making her come beneath him.
This was the edge of it. Sanity.
Or maybe it was the raw core of him.

Taking her. In the most basic sense, he knew what it was. It was marking his territory and he didn't give a
fuck if she clawed him to hell in the process.
Elliot hauled her up against him, sending the water scurrying around his hips as he plunged all of his fingers
into her hair, tilting her head and claiming Olivia's mouth. He was hard, brutal, unyielding. Fuck stopping,
or listening, or anything else that was going to slow this thing down. She said she wanted it and that's all he
needed to know.
He could feel her lips swell against his own, reacting to the force his mouth was inflicting upon her. She
moaned into his mouth and dipped her head towards him for more, and somewhere in his clouded head he
realized he had known this. She wouldn't be gentle either. She'd give as good as she got.
He let one of his hands fall to her hip, thrusting his fingers downwards along her skin, beneath the soaking,
belligerent satin scrap of bullshit that still clung to her.
Fuck that.
He grabbed a fistful of the satin and yanked, sending the right side of her underwear down a few inches. His
palm slid around in the water and cupped her bare, perfect ass.
Olivia ripped her mouth off of his, her eyes wide and her skin flushed in the pale light. "I want everything
off," she rasped. "Take it all off, El."
He pressed his eyes closed for one second. She was the only one in clothing at all. And he could do it, he
could. He could hold himself together long enough to get her completely naked and in his hands.
As long as she stopped touching him, too.
There was only one way to do this.
He pulled her off her feet in the water and twisted her around, until she was facing the ladder. Her back was
to him. He stepped closer to her, until his hard-on was pressed into the soft, wet rise of her ass beneath the
surface. "Hold on to the railings," he whispered into her ear. "And whatever you do, don't let go."
Her head fell forward and a soft sound escaped her. But she did it. Seconds later her fingertips lifted out of
the water and her palms desperately gripped the ladder railings on either side of her.
He laughed softly. "So you're on board now with letting me tell you what to do?"
Her head whipped up and her back straightened, but she didn't let go of the railings or turn around to look at
him. "Only because," she said quietly, threats and promises infiltrating her voice. "Turnabout is fair play."
Sonofa-
His palms landed on her hips, slipping around and up her back. Her skin was warm and he slid his hands up
her spine until his fingers hit the clasp of her bra. His thumbs snapped the small piece open.
Her fingertips turned white against the railing. "El-" she expelled.
He ignored her, wholly focused on sliding the straps of the wet satin off one by one. She unhooked her
fingertips only briefly from each railing, until the heavy, soaking material fell away and he tossed it onto the
dock.

The only thing he heard was the shifting of the water. When his palms made contact with Olivia's ribcage,
he also then heard the absolute ramming of his heart in his chest. Elliot's mouth fell to the back of her
shoulder, and her skin held the faint taste of freshwater.
Elliot's hand rose higher, until his thumb brushed along the underside of her bare breast.
She shivered, her skin breaking out in small, chilled goose bumps.
Instinctively, he stepped closer to her, as if he could warm her with the heat of his own naked body. When
her back pressed flush against his chest, he finally allowed himself to cup her breast completely in his right
hand, careful not to let his erection touch her skin just yet.
"Jesus," he muttered, as she filled his palm. His lips fell to the top of her shoulder and his fingertip circled
Olivia's nipple. She was shaking in his hands, and he stilled. "Liv," he said, pushing his mouth against her
hair. "Just relax."
In front of him, she simply nodded in silence. Seconds later, her head fell forward. "I-" she stopped, her
words breaking off. "I'm-"
The anguish in her voice was the only thing that penetrated the haze of where he was, and what he was
doing. He knew what she wanted to say, but couldn't. It was about things like stunned disbelief, and fear,
and complications and want. He used his left hand to press her scalp more firmly against his lips. "Me too,"
he said roughly, rubbing her pebbled nipple with the rough pad of his thumb.
She shuddered in his arms as he wrapped his left arm around her waist and held her in place. When he
believed he had a good grip on her body he let his right hand slide lower. Past her stomach.
All the way down.
+++
Olivia slammed her eyes shut as Elliot's fingers slipped over the curve of her ass and caught in the edges of
her underwear.
With one hand, he pulled them down on both sides, and when they were around her thighs beneath the
water's surface, he used his foot to send them all the way down. They were lost to the lake then.
All of them. Everything. Lost.
Elliot's hand landed on her lower belly and his fingers teased downwards.
Found.
The second the tips of his fingers teased against her, she cried out in the night and arched back against him.
She was afraid that she would cry, that the desperation and the sheer, delicious pain of him touching her
would send her into a hysterical mess. His fingernails scraped against her where her body would open for
him and she immediately let go of the railings, unable to hold on.
"No," he ordered, whispering into her ear, hanging onto her even tighter with his left hand. "Hold onto
them, Liv."
Olivia slammed her eyes shut and reached for the railings again, rocking her hips back against his cock. As
his lips slid over her shoulder, she fought her mind's trajectory. She could handle her body's reaction to him,
she could handle the knowledge that this was Elliot, but she couldn't do both at the same time. She couldn't
she could handle the knowledge that this was Elliot, but she couldn't do both at the same time. She couldn't
reconcile that the same Elliot who had been her partner, who had walked side-by-side with her for eight
years, who had been off-limits for far too long - that he was the one now solely responsible for coaxing
every shaking, breathless contraction of her body.
His fingers teased lower, never entering her, but slipping along the outer edges of her slit. "You want this?"
he demanded.
She used her hold on the railing to push her whole body back, feeling the tip of his erection slide along her
ass. "Now, Elliot," she tried to command.
He laughed.
Sonofabitch.
"Elliot, you bastard. I swear to God," she hissed.
He pressed the rough pads of his fingers slightly into her sex. His granulated voice was suddenly next to her
right ear. "Don't piss off God, Olivia. You're gonna need him soon," he promised, just before his hot, open
mouth slid along her shoulder.
She wanted to fight him. She did. But he was so close to commanding a violent orgasm from her that she
was afraid if she opened her mouth again, all of her protests would come out as begging.
His finger slid intimately through her and she jerked against him, crying out softly into the night air.
"So wet," he murmured appreciatively, his voice hard with desire as he teased at her entrance. "So wet and
slick for me."
Olivia held her breath, knowing that he was teasing the hell out of her. She didn't know why she had
expected anything less than this. Elliot was never unsure of himself physically - not in the field, not in
interrogation and certainly not when it came to hand-to-hand confrontations.
So of course he'd use his body, his fingers, his voice with the same arrogance and confidence when it came
to sex. To fucking.
She wanted him to fuck her. Screw anything less, screw anything gentle.
"Elliot." His name tore from her as his finger began to push inside of her, the sharp bite of his teeth nipping
at the back of her neck.
"Yeah?" he responded casually, as if he had all the time in the world. He sank himself a little deeper.
"Fuck me."
His laughter was obnoxious, really. It occurred to her, in the brief second before he brutally plunged his
finger deep into her, that he was an over-confident prick sometimes. But before she could duly inform him
of such, his thick, long finger stabbed into her body, and she gasped. He was a ruthless, sneaky bastard, and
he didn't give her any time to recover before he immediately sent another finger rocketing deep into her.
She couldn't hold herself up in the water, and she began to crumble, until his vice-like arm tightened around
her waist and held her against him. "You're not going anywhere," he groaned. His other hand remained
between her legs as he worked his fingers into her, penetrating her fully.

Olivia bucked against him, her soft cries drowning out the sound of the crickets and the splashing of the
water. Her body was stretched around him and her control was eroded by the slow, methodical way that he
pistoned his fingers in her. She tried to arch backwards, to get his cock between her legs, but he pulled his
hips far enough away from her that she had no leverage whatsoever.
Her pelvis jerked in response to the punishing thrust he gave her. "Not yet," he commanded. "You're going
to come for me first, Olivia. I want to feel you come around my fingers."
She couldn't get air. Her breathing was erratic, and her lungs burned.
"Breathe," he whispered into her ear, withdrawing his fingers until they barely remained inside of her. "Liv,
breathe."
She blinked, not really seeing anything as she tried to open her eyes, to force air into her chest.
Elliot. Please.
Release hovered, blurring her vision with its pending force. She'd never known what it was like, this utter
relinquishing of control.
He was merciless, sucking her earlobe into his mouth. "Liv, get some air. Now."
She tried to pay attention to what he was saying. She knew why he was ordering her to get air, to inhale. He
was about to send her hurtling over the edge and there was a very real threat that she would pass out. But
she couldn't obey. Her whole body was taut, her depths still clenching from his penetration, still throbbing
in anticipation of his big fingers pushing all the way into her once again.
"Come on," he rumbled, dragging the edge of his teeth along the outside of her ear and the edge of his
fingernail along the top of her mound. "Breathe, baby."
"I told you not to call me that," she gritted, trying to convey her frustration. Her lips parted as her eyes
squeezed shut, and before she could prepare herself she realized she had taken a deep, shuddering breath.
Without warning, his thumb immediately brushed over her clitoris, just once. As if by his will alone her
orgasm slammed into her, the brutal spasms of it robbing her of thought. She convulsed as his fingers
moved inside of her, stretching her, filling her, branding the depths of her body with the mind-numbing feel
of him embedded within her.
Elliot.
She came hard, fast, endlessly. He played her body, demanded of it, worked her perfectly and ferociously
through the first crest and then gently through the second. She didn't know her own body, had no idea of
this, of what it was that left her unable to help herself. She could only be helped by him, by his fingers, his
body, his rasping, carnal words of appreciation for the way her slippery body tightened around him again
and again and again, grasping at him all the way inside of her.
And when it was over, she sank backwards, his hard, wet chest scraping along her back. She stilled for just
a moment, shaking, realizing almost immediately that she was desperately hungry for more. She was afraid
her body would never come down from needing his, that everything from this moment forward would
always be just the peripheral to the moments when he was blessedly inside of her.
Propelled by the promise of more, and the once again ache building between her legs, Olivia found a lone
burst of energy. His fingers slid out of her after one last brush across her over-sensitive clit and she spun in
the water, determination and revenge bubbling inside of her.
the water, determination and revenge bubbling inside of her.
She launched at him, gripping the sides of his head with her hands and fastening her mouth on his. She
kissed him hard, tasting him on her lower lip as she pulled her face away from his. "You're gonna pay for
that, Stabler," she growled menacingly.
The lazy, satisfied lift of his lips told her everything she needed to know.
"Can't wait to see what it'll cost me," he said thickly, drawing her back towards him.
+++
He was a stupid, stupid man.
He knew this, of course. He knew that he wasn't all that clear on the fact that every moronic, impulsive
move he had ever made had been wrought with consequences. And at the time, smirking at her and daring
her to pay him back had seemed like a good idea. He'd challenge her, and she'd forget that they had just
crossed every line in the book. Faced with a challenge, she wouldn't run, she wouldn't leave him hard as a
rock and stuck in the lake while she hightailed it to Juneau, or East Pawtucket, or some other ridiculous
place. She was Olivia, and God knew that Olivia Benson didn't back down when the gauntlet was thrown.
In theory, it seemed simple enough.
Stupid.
Stupid, stupid, stupid.
Not only did she not back down, but she was now entirely focused on making him suffer. He'd started to
think of her as Olivia, woman and not Olivia, partner-who-will-kick-his-ass and therein lay his first
mistake. The two people were one and the same, and he'd do well to remember that very crucial fact. She
could redefine his entire sexual future with just a twist of her lips, but she could also drop a man twice her
weight.
Great.
Her mouth was now purposefully, teasingly sliding down his neck, over his throat and onto his chest.
"Olivia," he said gruffly.
Olivia, being Olivia, ignored him.
Instead, her fingers followed the trail her mouth was making, her lips parting and her tongue licking at his
wet skin as she moved. Naked Olivia. Moving against him. Shit. Every wet dream he'd ever had in his
whole, miserable life would be jealous of the vivid, unbelievable reality.
"Olivia," he tried again, clearing his throat and closing his eyes. His hands fisted tightly at his sides as he
tried to recall what she had just said to him.
Touch me and you're gonna spend a long night alone in the cabin, Stabler.
Right. Don't. Touch. Her. She said that like she thought for one, goddamned second that he could control it.
Her palms flattened against his pectoral muscles and then began an ominous slide southward.
Seemed so damned unfair.

He cracked his neck and exhaled, as her fingers teased over his stomach, her lips now descending onto his
rigid jawline. "This isn't funny, Benson," he ground out dangerously. "Whatever happened to compromise?
To working together? This doesn't seem like working together to me."
She finally straightened, her fingers pausing on his stomach. She lifted her head and he watched a single
drop of water slip down her eyebrow, over her cheek and onto her chest. God, the woman was golden
everywhere. Her hair was shiny, slicked against her skin and her eyes were luminous, glittering from the
reflection of the lake around them. Her neck was tanned, dipping into the slight concave at the top of her
chest. And her breasts. Christ. They had filled his hands, spilling over just slightly when he had touched.
When he had been allowed to touch her.
Olivia's breasts. In his hands.
Right.
Focus, Stabler. You're acting like you've never touched a woman before. Calm down or the second her hand
wraps around your dick you're going to do a nice impression of Mount-goddamned-Vesuvius.
It's going to be bad, Stabler. If you come too soon in her hands, just think of all the days you'll have to
spend sitting across from her, enduring the endless amusement on her face? Think of all the paperwork she
will be able to get you to do in exchange for keeping her mouth shut? She's gonna leave pamphlets on drugs
that cure premature ejaculation on your desk, in plain sight.
He exhaled.
She's fucking terrified, despite this brazenness. Hold it together because her guts here deserve some glory.
"Let me get this straight," she said, licking her lips and arching her eyebrow. "You are lecturing me about
working together?"
Crap. So that had been the wrong tactic, too. Silence here would probably help. He kept his mouth shut and
tried valiantly not to groan as she trailed her fingers lower, over the ridge of muscle that cut into his hip. His
dick jumped in miserable protest at being ignored.
She looked flushed. As if she was too warm, too hot. He now knew that she would be hot inside, so damned
hot and tight when he slid into her. He'd have to work himself into her, work her onto his cock just to get
her to take all of him. Yeah, he'd always been proud of his size, he was a guy after all. But for the first time,
he wondered if it would be a problem. She was tight, lithe, narrow-hipped and...
Jesus, Stabler. Nice thought process. Are you on the short bus of restraint? Try and help yourself out here,
okay buddy? Try and pretend it's only her mind that turns you on, alright?
Her teasing mouth moved closer to his, her breath fanning his face. "Do you remember when you put a fed
detail on me without telling me?"
If he had been in a nuclear power plant, this would have been where the alarms went off. Red lights would
flash and a horn would blare and every-single-fucking-thing would illuminate in warning.
No, you moron. Don't look at her breasts. That won't help your predicament. Pretend she is wearing clown
pants beneath the water. Try and forget that she is naked, everywhere. Try and forget that beneath the
surface her hips are bare, and you've long ago sent her underwear somewhere into the depths of the lake.

Try and forget that she is already slick for you, that when she came the clenching of her body around your
fingers felt like a ruthless, relentless vise, that...
He swore under his breath.
Even his brain hated him because it was now conspiring with his dick.
"Yeah, I remember," he finally said, his voice uncooperative and guttural. He was as still as he could
possibly be, well aware that even the slightest movement from him and she would up the ante. The crickets
were so damned loud that he wanted to tell them to shut the hell up, because he was trying to pay attention
to every nuance of her voice, every single word that she said so he didn't screw anything up.
Her fingers slipped lower, stopping inches from his hard-on beneath the water. She stepped closer to him,
until her breasts pushed against his damp chest.
The fed detail was a good idea. Don't let her make you regret it. You did what you had to do, just remember
that. It was a good idea. A good idea.
"Yeah," she whispered against his cheek, admonishing him. "That wasn't such a good display of working
together, now was it?" Her hand brushed lightly across the steel of his dick and he nearly gave in, nearly
hauled her up against him.
"I was..." he lost his voice as she pushed her hips against his, his desperate erection trapped between their
bodies. "I was worried about your safety," he protested.
Her eyes were molten, her lids heavy as she gave him a devastating half-smile. Olivia shifted, sending her
nipples across his skin as she used the back of her hand to rub up against his hard-on gently. "Do you
remember when," she paused, letting her lips hover millimeters from his. "You yelled at me after Gitano
and told me you couldn't look out for me anymore?"
His eyes widened and he felt his chest constrict. All of this be damned, she couldn't believe he had meant
that. He'd go to bed with a hard-on every night of his life if it meant he could explain himself. "Liv, I never
meant-"
Two of her fingers landed on his lips, silencing him. In seconds, her fingers were replaced with her mouth
as she tilted her head and fitted her wet, lush lips onto him. Between them, her fingers danced over the ridge
of his cock without touching him. If she so much as closed her grasp, she'd be encircling him.
He'd be in her hand. And she'd move her palm and...
"I know you didn't mean it, but really Elliot?" She shook her head as if he had been bad. "Just another
display of your inability to grasp the concept of working together," Olivia chided softly, before sliding her
tongue deep into his mouth.
He grimaced in pain before meeting her kiss, desperate for the taste of her.
It was short-lived. Her left arm lifted, sliding around his neck while her right hand stayed in place, hovering
over him.
"Olivia," he said, sheer, blind lust causing her name to come out as a low, grated warning. "You've got
about five seconds before I-"
"And then," she continued uninterrupted, her expression nearly sleepy. "There was that time you said, and I
quote, ‘screw you'." She lifted her head, widening her eyes for one, brief, devilish moment before she
quote, ‘screw you'." She lifted her head, widening her eyes for one, brief, devilish moment before she
smiled in satisfaction. "Now that wasn't very nice, was it Stabler?" she whispered breathlessly.
Because she'd been personally trained by Satan, her palm came down then and wrapped tightly around his
dick. He jerked violently in response, hurling all promises straight into hell. He ground into her hand beneath
the water, and she didn't falter. He knew she wouldn't. She gripped her gun without hesitation, and her hold
on him was just as sure.
"Not very nice at all," he snarled and then hauled her up against him, sliding his hands beneath her thighs
and forcing her to wrap her long legs tightly around his hips. He was done with the goddamned foreplay.
He had to get inside of her, once and for all.
+++
He didn't give her warning.
One second she was standing in the water in front of Elliot, her toes curling into the sand as she tried to
pretend she wasn't terrified of the force of her need, and the next she was on him, literally, wrapped around
his naked, wet, rock solid body with his erection pushing its way between her legs and almost into her.
Her head fell forward, all the pretense of the games over. The bravado was gone, instead replaced by the
realization that she wanted this man, her partner, Elliot, more than she wanted air.
"You ready?" Elliot grated darkly.
She could do no more than manage to nod, holding herself on him by curling her arms tightly around his
neck and dropping her face onto his slick shoulder.
She bucked against him as he thrust up into her at the same moment that he brought her hips downward, the
water splashing around them beneath the brute force of his movement. She cried out, unable to stop the
sound from breaking within her throat.
"Am I hurting you?" he mumbled, nearly incoherent, even as he held them both in the water.
"No," she choked out, waiting for her body to accommodate him. He hadn't waited, hadn't gone slow and
despite the shock of the way he filled her, the way he stretched her as he impaled her on his body, she
wasn't hurting the way he meant. "No."
"God," he groaned, one of his hands landing on her ass beneath the water and the other wrapping around her
bare back.
She ached. She could do nothing more than let her head lie limply on his shoulder and stay perfectly still,
because the first movement from either one of them and she was going to come. If she so much as arched
her hips she was going to shatter.
"El-" she said weakly, looking for something, for some sort of reassurance that his loss of control was the
same.
"I know," ripped from his throat. "Can't move. Not yet. Stay still or this is gonna be over before it begins."
She slammed her eyes shut and opened her mouth on his shoulder, desperate to sink her teeth into
something. Just as vehemently as she had wanted to stay still only seconds before, she now knew it was
absolutely, positively imperative that she move. Her body tightened involuntarily around him and sensation
absolutely, positively imperative that she move. Her body tightened involuntarily around him and sensation
tore through her.
She rocked her hips and he swore, grabbing her waist tightly to hold her in place. "You got a death wish,
woman?" he rasped. "Stay goddamned still."
"This isn't a marathon, Elliot," she retorted, her voice breaking under the last vestiges of her control. "Make
me come."
Oh God, that had sounded like pleading. Close to whimpering and she didn't whimper. Ever. Ever.
Get it together, Olivia.
But sex with Elliot wasn't about keeping it together, or control, or even breathing. It was about him shifting
a little in the water and sending his erection deeper into her, the wildfire of pleasure he coaxed blazing
across her skin.
"So damned demanding," he muttered, and then finally, blessedly moved.
With one deep, searing stroke he pushed impossibly deeper and she screamed, her head falling back as he
held onto her. He didn't stop, finding a rhythm within her. He pushed again and again, using his hold on her
hips to draw her downward every time he invaded her body with the thick length of his cock.
She collapsed around him, riding his body, feeling the stone planes of his chest scraping against her, feeling
the stubble on his cheeks and chin brush against her neck and her jaw. He tormented her with every thrust
and she writhed against him, the pleasure he was wreaking inside of her nearly destructive in its intensity.
Her hand tried to grasp onto something. The back of his neck, the short length of his hair, his shoulders. But
she couldn't focus so she was forced to let him control her movements, able to do nothing except for hang on
as he pounded deep inside of her.
Olivia contracted hard around him clinging to the edges of sanity. "El, I need-" but no other words would
form. She gave up, letting her small cry of pleasure speak for itself.
He refused to ease up, refused to listen to her pleas. Around them, the water thrashed and she felt it splash
up between their bodies. He repeatedly thrust himself into her despite the resistance of the water around
them.
The ache blossomed inside of her, growing in its rippling, electric current. Elliot felt huge inside of her and
he stretched her, even as she struggled to accommodate him every time he moved. Her fingers clawed into
his back as she rode the beginning of the crest, and he pulled her up higher so that she would sink farther,
harder, onto him.
"Look at me," Elliot commanded.
His eyes were harsh, wild, desperate.
And even though she had presumed to know everything about him, she now knew she was wrong. Because
not knowing this about him, not knowing him wholly unleashed - it was not knowing him at all.
The pleasure was biting, and Elliot captured her mouth once. Hard. And then he kept her on him with one
hand and tangled his fingers into her damp, curling hair. His expression was dark, as if the demons were at
the surface, finally being exorcised away.

She was hungry for him too. She probably always had been. And just as easily as he had taken control, she
now took it back. "Come," she ordered breathlessly, feeling the first, wicked spasm constrict around him.
His face contorted, his eyes narrowing, his possession complete. He forged into her all the way in one,
savage thrust and exploded inside of her. The last thing she saw before she closed her eyes and let the fiery
sensations have her was the thick cords of his neck pulsing and throbbing, just the same way his body was
shattering inside of her.
+++
"You're staying with me," he whispered, as if the decision was final.
Behind him, her hair still wet and her clothes now sticking to her damp body, Olivia shot him a look of
irritation. Although how she could be irritated with him after the last hour, he had no idea.
God, the memory of her scream and the burning imprint of her nails in his back was all it took for him to
want her again. He faced forward again, praying that if he didn't look at her, he wouldn't grab her for
another go-round right here on the shadowed porch. The porch would be a bad idea, because from what he
recalled, most of the floorboards were not only covered in potential splinters but they also creaked.
The porch was out.
"Elliot, in the morning everyone will know that..." her voice faded as he stepped up the stairs to the cabin as
quietly as possible. "They'll know that-"
He stopped and turned to face her. He wondered if she would look this sated even beneath the bright glare
of the sun, or if it was just the moon that managed to make her look this way. Olivia's hair was drying into
soft, tumbling waves and he was breathing through the growing need to grasp those strands once again.
God, if he smiled right now in satisfaction - if he smiled because he was standing here considering the fact
that he had just made her his - she would go get her gun and shoot him where he stood.
Best not to smile either.
"They'll know what?" he challenged quietly and easily, determined not to wake anyone sleeping in the
cabin.
"That-" she started. But then she stopped, her eyes pleading with him to understand whatever it was that she
couldn't say. Olivia looked away, focusing on the mess hall to her right.
He came back down the step he had just climbed and stood in front of her on the grass. He swiped her
bangs out of her eyes because he was allowed to, because of all the things she would protest, she wouldn't
protest that. Her lips were swollen from his kisses and the sight of that alone nearly made him groan. "That
what? That we had sex? That we're not just partners? That you drive me completely insane and I can't keep
my hands off of you? What exactly is it that you are afraid they will know? Because I'm guessing that none
of that will come as a surprise to anyone here." His lips lifted in a smile. "Now if Cragen were in that cabin,
I'd see your point. If Munch were here? I'd sleep in the car because if we so much as went to the bathroom
at the same time, he'd get ideas. But with this bunch?" Elliot shrugged. "What difference does it make? Let
‘em wonder."
Instead of getting angry at his dismissal of her concern, Olivia surprisingly smiled, turning her face back
towards him. "We can't have sex in the cabin," she declared, lifting her chin.

The hell they couldn't.
Christ Stabler, control your dick. It's acting like a five star general and commanding the rest of you around.
He squinted at her in disbelief. "Why the hell not?"
Her eyes widened. "Elliot!"
He shrugged, grabbing the wet, now useless towel they had shared out of her hand and dropping it on the
grass before tugging on her hand to pull her in the direction of the water. "Fine, then we'll go back to the
lake."
She stayed still, unmoving as he tried to get her to move. "You're an ass," she grinned wryly. "Get in the
cabin."
He stood where he was, folding his arms belligerently over his damp white t-shirt. He figured some of his
muscles in his arms would pop when he stood like this, and from what he saw back in the water, Olivia
Benson wasn't immune to muscles. "You staying with me?" he said, cocking his head.
She tried to contain her smile. "It's a twin bed, Elliot."
"No shit, Sherlock," he replied. "You can sleep on top of me."
Her laughter rippled over him, soft and content. "Great. It'll be like sleeping on top of a bed of rocks."
That sounded like acquiescence to him. He finally moved past her, pausing only long enough to whisper a
few words into her ear. "You didn't mind me being hard before," he murmured, dropping his voice into an
embarassing stage whisper.
He could have sworn that the squeak he heard as he finally climbed the steps to the cabin had nothing to do
with any of the nine thousand animals that could be in the woods nearby, nor with the wooden floorboards
beneath his feet - but rather with one woman who was finally, mercifully speechless about something.
Of course there was another woman who couldn't be speechless about anything, and before either of them
realized she had been curled up in one of the padded rockers on the patio, probably to escape the stifling
heat inside, her now too-familiar voice cut through the night.
"'Bout damned time you two hooked up," Cathy mumbled sleepily, pulling the thin blanket that covered her
a little bit higher. She sighed dramatically, and before either Elliot or Olivia could move, she was fast asleep
once again.
+++
tbc
Back to index

A/N:
Okay. So this author's note is weirding me out. This is it. Last chapter. There is a very, very slight
possibility I may post an epilogue one day, because I have an idea, but I can't promise. So for all intents and
purposes, this is it. This story totally was my baby, because you all made it that way. You all were so eager
and wonderful and positive for each chapter, that it really built my confidence as a writer. I can't tell you
how much I've been totally overwhelmed with the response. Even when I didn't respond to every review (I
swear, any time I had I was spending writing, because so many weeks it was one or the other) I was so, so
grateful. I feel like we've all been on this journey...and I can't tell you what it has meant to me. Jesus, I'm
like going off and this is fanfic, but anyway, it's taught me a lot about writing and characters and story arcs
and THANK YOU for reading this and doing this with me and loving the side characters that I will miss
writing.
Forever, "When the stars go blue" will remind me of this story. And as I am writing this, out of 400 songs
on my iPod, that is the song that just randomly came on. Lovely, perfectness.
Jess, Brynn, Pooks - for all the hours spent coaxing me through. You are all goddesses. Thank you. To Cat
and the GG, I met y'all through this story...love ya to pieces.
I don't own them. Didn't at the beginning. Don't now. Wish I could have them.
Chapter 18
Before her eyes had even opened, she gasped, the panic immediate and without focus.
Her chest contracted and she dragged at the heavy, humid air as her body jerked upwards, pushing at the
mattress beneath her. The source of her terror had been ambiguous for the first second after she had been
yanked from her sleep, but as her palm tried to connect with a mattress or pillow and was instead met with
hard, unyielding male chest, her anxiety honed in on its cause.
Her bare, naked leg was draped over a solid, muscular thigh and her cheek was damp from having been
pressed against a ridiculously comfortable, outrageously defined pectoral muscle. She was wearing a t-shirt
that smelled like a delicious combination of man and fabric softener, but it was wrinkled up to her waist and
she...
Oh crap.
Oh hell.
Oh sonofa-sonofabitch! She wasn't wearing any underwear. No bra.
And the naked body that she was seemingly happily draped upon - locked between it and a wall on an
absurdly small bed - belonged to Elliot.
Elliot Stabler.
Her partner.

She was in bed with Elliot. She'd had sex with him. Sex. With Elliot. A lot of mind-blowing sex.
With Detective First Grade Elliot Stabler, NYPD.
Her partner. The one who was now arrogantly sprawled in sleep across the bed, fitting her against him
instead of giving her space. His tanned muscles, tattoos and stubble-darkened skin provided stark,
breathtaking contrast against the white sheets.
He'd brought her to orgasm more times in the last few hours alone than any man had in years. He seemingly
did it with ease, holding her back when it happened too easily. He did it as if he had been working her body
for years, as if every inch of her skin would bow in deference to his will.
Oh God, what had she done?
Three days in the woods and she'd lost her mind. They'd lost their collective minds. She'd also lost her
shorts, but that problem didn't seem to be as pressing as the one now insistently digging into her hip. The
problem bruising her hip was bona-fide proof that Elliot's Glock wasn't the only heat he knew how to pack.
Fuck.
Olivia pressed her eyes closed for one, brief second, a headache forming between her temples. She tried to
slow her racing heart down, because the sound of it would surely wake him, and she just needed time to
think.
They'd just given credence to every rumor ever uttered about them. They'd just combusted and ignited and
incinerated against each other. Elliot had touched her and she'd gone up like kindle in a firestorm. She
remembered begging him, pleading with him to touch her, to make her come. She remembered his name
catching in her throat. She remembered.....fuck. She remembered whimpering.
She had the distinct urge to grab her weapon and immediately set up target practice with tin cans in the
woods. She just wanted to fire at the cans, knock them off one-by-one and remind him that Jesus, she was
still his partner. She didn't whimper. She could shoot. She was decent at hand-to-hand. She could kick ass
and back him up, and Christ, she wasn't prone to whimpering.
But she had. She'd cried out for him. One weekend out here and she had thrown caution to the wind with
the only two things she really had - her career and Elliot.
You can have both, Olivia.
The air out here was filled with too much oxygen, and it was burning her skin.
Stay still for God's sake. He's had enough of the running bullshit, don't you think? He needs proof that not
everyone will leave him.
Her palm pushed at his chest as she tried to lift herself up, determined not to panic. She had to find some
semblance of rationality. She hadn't thrown her career away because really, no one knew. Yet. And Elliot
was still here, too. He hadn't left.
Yet.
Images assaulted her as every muscle in her body protested her movement. She recalled his mouth on her
skin, the warm water swirling around her waist as his fingers slipped inside of her body, as he held her,
pulling her down until she sheathed his far too impressive erection deep in her belly and rode him, digging
her fingernails into his slippery back as she almost blacked out from the excruciating pleasure of it all.
her fingernails into his slippery back as she almost blacked out from the excruciating pleasure of it all.
God. Dressed, the man was a liability. His clothes were always fitted as if he'd chosen them so that they
would move with him, like a second skin. Dressed, he was dangerous enough to the psyche of most females
in a twenty-mile radius. But naked? Completely naked? The man was...
The man was completely naked beneath her.
And as her chest now fought her in her bid to bring air into her bloodstream, she recalled him silencing her
last protests in front of the cabin with his mouth. She remembered him comically tiptoeing past Cathy, and
the way that he had spun her as soon as his room door had closed, pressing her back against the door and
eating at her mouth while his hands roamed her again. Possessively. As if they had a right to.
She'd given him that right.
Again and again and again.
It was barely dawn and that meant it had been less than a few hours since she had let him sit her down on
this small mattress. Since she had let him crouch down and pull off her shorts, had let his lips and teeth drag
up her thighs until they nipped at the inside of her legs. Olivia had relaxed, intoxicated by his low,
incoherent mumbling against her skin, the sound of which soothed her, drugged her. She had let him open
her intimately to his mouth. Her fingers had curved involuntarily against Elliot's head as he kissed her there,
licking against her gently, coaxing her, lulling her with the tender, slow way he did it until his tongue
flicked against her clit and she cried out, ending that endeavor because they both knew that anymore and she
wouldn't be able to keep quiet.
Instead he had rearranged them, laid her out beneath him on the lower bunk before slipping out of his
clothes and trailing his mouth up her body. Elliot had effectively kept her quiet by keeping his mouth firmly
on top of hers as he thrust his way back into her, adjusting her pliable hips with his big, rough hand until
they eagerly tipped up to meet him. He had reached down, curved one of his hands around her thigh and
drawn it up to his waist, holding her there as he drove impossibly deeper into her body. Elliot had ground
against her, groaning in pleasure.
His voice, gravely and thrumming because of her, had nearly sent her into immediate reckless,
uncontrollable, white-hot spasms around him.
Not yet, baby, Elliot had laughed softly. His commands were almost arrogant, murmured against her neck as
his open, actively seeking mouth slid languidly down her jaw and the stubble on his cheek rasped and
burned against her skin.
Don't call me baby, Olivia had said again, as if on autopilot, because she couldn't think straight. His smooth,
thick erection pushed into her repeatedly, and he had rolled his hips in lazy, grinding circles before he
pulled out again, slower on his withdrawal every, single blasted time so that she had time to rebel against
the loss of every blissful inch of him.
She'd been so wet for him that she remembered being embarrassed. She remembered writhing against him
and the way that made him slow down. Don't tease me, Elliot, she'd pleaded, her voice catching. Slow, baby,
he'd gritted. Slow and easy. Just like that.
She remembered the heavy push of his ragged breath on her skin, the taste of his shoulders, the rock-hard,
shifting planes of his ass beneath her palms as she had drawn her knees up and pulled him into her. He'd
found ever deeper millimeters that knocked her breath away as he sank past them and farther into her, riding
her in a rocking rhythm so ruthlessly controlled that it had left his arms trembling with the restraint.

The air had been thick, heavy. Saturated with sex and the erotic sound of him thrusting into her. He'd
coaxed her, had used explicit, soft, sensual words to describe how she felt to him. Jesus, you taste so
damned sweet. All of you, Liv. So damned sweet.
You make me crazy. Liv, say my name when you come. I want to hear you say it.
You're so tight I'm gonna die inside of you.
Olivia had come for him. She had arched, her body going rigid as Elliot grasped her and slid his hand
beneath her hips, tilting her pelvis into him as he slammed into her. When the startling contractions began,
wild and fiery, he slowed down, driving into her with punctuated thrusts that made her wrench her face
away from him so she could bury her cheek into the pillow at her side, determined not to cry from the way
her release had left her shattered and weak with relief.
She'd said his name and her heart had come apart, just as surely as her body had.
He had come seconds after her, his hand cupping her jaw and bringing her mouth back to his as he made
love to her slowly, his tongue tracing her lower lip and drawing it into his mouth until he lost control, biting
her accidentally as his body tightened, the muscles on his back jerking violently as he emptied himself
inside of her again.
And now the reality of him beneath her, his eyes closed, nearly had her choking with fear that she had just
gambled more than she had to give.
Olivia drew upwards, hovering above his sensual, granite-ridden body, staring at him slumbering peacefully
beneath her. Beneath her palm, her elbow locked straight, his heart beat evenly and undisturbed. Elliot's
lashes lay thickly on his cheeks, his face bearing another day's worth of stubble, a reminder that the sun
would soon be up on their last morning here.
She had sex with him last night. Early this morning. More than once. After eight years, after hundreds of
cases, and arguments and moments where he was the only one who understood, she had finally done it.
Done this.
You've never woken up with a man and been terrified to lose him. You've always been ready for them to go;
you've always been ready to run. But you want to stay this time, don't you? It's never been like this, right
Olivia? You want him to stay. You want to hear him tell you again that this...this is okay.
And it is okay, Olivia. Because it's him. It's Elliot.
She nearly wheezed with her need to breathe.
"Lie down, Olivia," Elliot rumbled, his eyes remaining closed. "It's too early." His hand slipped up her bare
back and settled on the base of her spine, trying to urge her down onto him again.
"Elliot," she breathed. "This...this..."
"If you wake me up, I'm gonna be all the way up everywhere, if you get my drift. And you said you were too
sore for more yet," he warned tiredly, rolling his head towards her on his pillow, his eyes never fluttering
open.
"Wake up," she hissed, curving her nails painfully into his chest.

He didn't even flinch.
One of his eyes lifted open, as if testing the morning light, his face contorting into a displeased grimace at
the expression on her face. "Are you always this pleasant in the morning? If so, we're gonna have to have a
talk."
And then the bastard closed his eyes again.
He was acting as if this happened every morning. As if every morning she had awakened to his body
beneath hers, his hands still imprinted on her everywhere and an ache throbbing between her legs from
where he had staked his claim.
God, she was lethargic. She didn't want to fight him. Olivia raked her eyes over Elliot's body, half-covered
by the thin sheet tangled at his narrow waist. She caught the sound that threatened to erupt from her throat
just before it cut into the early morning silence around them.
"Elliot-" Olivia started again, trying to clear her voice. "We do have to talk."
He groaned without giving her the satisfaction of opening his eyes. If anything, he burrowed his cheek
farther into the pillow. "I was kidding about the immediate need for conversation, Liv."
Her lack of response filled the room.
"You don't want to talk to me for eight years, and now you suddenly want to start?" he finally grumbled.
Olivia blinked, pain blossoming in her chest. That's what he thought? That she hadn't wanted to talk to him?
How could he not know that she was terrified to talk to him? Terrified that if she had ever unleashed how
desperately she needed him, needed more, that he would look at her like he had never known her at all?
The morning air was heavy with the moisture, the heat, and the silence.
It might have been her continued silence, or the hitching of her breath as she tried to fully sit up without
keeping her hand on him, but he opened his eyes as he lay on the pillow, focusing his gaze on her. "I know,
I know. We do have to talk," he said quietly, the drowsy effects sleep slipping from his face.
Elliot's expression was so serious, so intently focused on her that she froze, fear sliding through her veins.
Olivia had wanted to talk, but at the same time she wasn't ready for this, for him to agree that they were out
of their minds. It was one thing for her to think it, another thing for him to agree so easily.
Please tell me this is okay, Elliot. Please don't tell me you were wrong, that this is a mistake. Don't tell me
that even after eight years, this is too soon. God, looking at you like this...looking at you like this makes me
want to tell you things, to say words to you I haven't said to anyone since I was a little kid that still
believed.
I think they're in me, Elliot.
Those three words are in me.
Olivia swallowed, her throat locking. "Yeah, we do," she agreed, her eyes dropping away from his and onto
the edge of the sheet. She curved her fingers into it and listened for anything to break the quiet - the birds
outside, the hum of insects, the sound of his leg sliding against the sheet.
"I was awake after you fell asleep, and that's when it hit me Liv. I don't know why it didn't occur to me
sooner. Well, no. I do know." Elliot sighed heavily, rubbing one hand over his face and then over the top of
sooner. Well, no. I do know." Elliot sighed heavily, rubbing one hand over his face and then over the top of
his head. Elliot shifted, finally reaching for her fingers which were twisting in the sheet. She watched his
efforts as he gently tried to pry apart her grip on the fabric. "I got so caught up that I didn't think straight.
You'd think I'd know better, but-"
She couldn't do this. She couldn't sit here and have him tell her he was sorry. That the last few days were a
mistake. That he regretted it; that it was a one-time thing. Olivia had woken up terrified, but somewhere
deep down, in a place she could scarcely admit existed, she held out the stupid, pathetic hope that he would
be able to alleviate all of the accumulating fear.
That at the very least, he would try.
But he wasn't going to. Elliot was lying beneath her, looking at her with concern and empathy and
apologies.
He was sorry.
He was sorry this had happened, he was sorry he had made her believe in more.
Olivia's heart cracked and she let out a hard, shuddering breath. "Go to hell," she bit off, yanking her hand
out of his. She threw back the sheet on his goddamned naked body and tried to scramble over him and off
the bed. "Just go to-"
But Elliot grabbed her wrist, the one that had planted on the other side of his head, and he yanked her down,
until Olivia fell flat on top of him. Her chin landed hard on his chest. "I said I was sorry," he hissed into her
hair. "But you were right there with me, Olivia. Every single moment. And you were as caught up as I was!"
On his chest, Olivia felt all the worlds she had ever kept apart collide. She had believed his edicts about
seeing where things went between them; she had let herself believe he was right. She had bought into his
theory when he said she'd been so intent on not being hurt that she was missing out on everything.
One night with her, and he had changed his mind on all of it. And now it was too much to have to go back
to the city, to have to figure out just where everything would fit into their partnership, their jobs, his family.
Their partnership.
She'd rolled the dice and come up empty.
Against his naked chest, his body shaking with controlled anger, Olivia knew that it was over. Once and for
all, they had killed it. She couldn't put this weekend behind them, she couldn't pretend it had never happened
and neither could he. The sum total of their partnership would amount to the few years of glory working
with him, the two of them feeling invincible, and that would be it. But those days were in the past and she
wouldn't ever get them back, get him back, because of one weekend of weakness. One weekend of falling
into him.
Years of slowly, inevitably falling for him.
Olivia lifted her head off of his chest and he let her. Maybe he was gentle again because she was shaking.
Maybe it was because she could feel the pathetic, stupid, useless blur pushing at her eyes.
"It's fine, Elliot. Really it is." Olivia's voice was hollow, empty, not strong the way she wished it would be.
She kept her eyes on the door that she would walk out in the next few minutes, so that she didn't have to
look into the rocky seas of his irises.

Instead of letting her go, Elliot's heavy arm fell over her body, his other hand coming up to fist in her hair.
He pulled her back down to him, his lips pressing into the top of her head. "I know it's fine. Because trust
me, the possibility scares me a hell of a lot less now than it did twenty-five years ago," he murmured into
her hair. Then he let his lips fall to her temple.
Elliot was holding her. Against him. His mouth was on her again and their bare legs were tangling at the
other end of the bed. For a man who had realized their mistake, his actions and words made no sense at all.
Her muddled head couldn't decipher what the hell was going on. "What?" Olivia croaked, her voice cracking
as his left hand started to gather up her t-shirt and slide it up her back. She moaned involuntarily as his hand
slid over her ass, cupping her as he adjusted himself beneath her, his growing erection pushing against her
stomach as his t-shirt, the one she was wearing, gathered at her waist.
"Liv, if you are, we'll be fine," Elliot continued, his voice deep and rough. "So don't completely freak out
and worry yourself to death, okay? Because-" he lifted her face, sliding his fingers along her cheek and into
her hair, pulling her lips down to his mouth but never letting them touch. Instead, he looked at her from
beneath heavy, lowered lids. "Because you have to admit, as crazy as it is, the idea of it is kind of..." Elliot's
lips lifted into a seductive, sleepy grin. "It's kind of sexy."
The sun finally crested high enough that it streamed into their window, sending streaks of hazy orange
across the floor and their bed.
But she didn't see any of it. Not really. Her eyes widened before she could help herself and her heart began
to race, the implications of his words starting to arrange themselves into something that made sense.
Although she couldn't quite grasp everything he was saying in a way that fit with that she thought he was
probably talking about.
Best to just ask.
"El?" she croaked out. "Just what in hell are you talking about?"
Elliot shifted against the sheets, trying to reach up and capture her lips. He looked impossibly dark,
ridiculously wicked. His pulsing hard-on was pushing into her stomach and Olivia was aching already,
desperate to push her knees down on either side of his hips and get him inside of her, to be filled and
stretched by Elliot's need again. But she couldn't do this, they couldn't do this. That's what they had been
talking about.
How this wouldn't work.
That had to be what he was talking about. He couldn't be implying...he couldn't think -
"If you are pregnant though, Cragen's gonna have my head on a platter," Elliot grumbled, displeased that
she was yanking her lips away every time he lifted his neck to get them against his. "He doesn't come off as
traditional as hell, but I get the feeling he's just looking for a reason to kick my sorry ass in particular. And I
get the feeling he could still get a few good punches in." Elliot finally dropped his head back onto his
pillow, his eyes squinting as if in thought. He licked his lower lip, his irises deepening in color as his
expression softened. He tilted his head on the pillow, encouraged by her silence. One of his fingers came up
and swiped at her bangs, the movement shockingly, brilliantly tender. His half-smile was roguish, full of
mischief, but his voice was easy and soothing. "How do you think he'd explain to the brass that he had to
suspend me for knocking you up?"
Olivia just blinked at him, her breath coming in short, hollow bursts. She parted her lips to get more air, but
it didn't help. The gasping was coming from deep within her, from a place where forty years of disbelief and
it didn't help. The gasping was coming from deep within her, from a place where forty years of disbelief and
distrust was being eradicated by every moment with him.
Elliot stole every protest, every fear, every last excuse from her chest as he regarded her, his expression
open, curious and a little too self-satisfied. For all of his rage, his anger, his brooding, when it came to
something monumental, like Elliot's very real belief that he could have gotten her pregnant, he wasn't at all
flustered.
He wasn't running.
He wasn't even moving, except to get himself situated back between her legs again. He was all calm,
contented confidence while Olivia was shaking with the mind-numbing significance of his assumption.
For one, single moment Olivia wondered if this was how he had been over two decades ago, as Kathy had
told him she was pregnant. Had he just been solid like this? Had he accepted it, dealt with it, easily assumed
the responsibility and never looked back?
His immediate willingness to accept that same life-altering responsibility with her rendered her voice
useless. Olivia tried to open her mouth once, to say something, but nothing came out of her larynx. She was
gaping at him.
He wasn't panicking. He wasn't kicking her out of bed and running while cursing her stupidity. He wasn't
horrified of being irrevocably bound to her.
He was actually trailing his fingers down her neck, shifting to get his erection notched against her wetness.
"Liv," Elliot said again, pulling her head back down so that his lips could slide hotly over her cheek. "Don't
worry. I promise you, it will be okay. You gotta trust me."
The way Olivia was shuddering now was unlike anything she had ever experienced before. Elliot was all
reassuring words and gentle gestures, anchoring her when her mind was tumbling and reeling.
But it made perfect, shocking sense.
Of course he wouldn't go anywhere if she had gotten pregnant. He wasn't the one who always ran. He had
never run. He'd always left the fleeing to her. He'd always regarded commitment as sacred, and his
unyielding devotion had never been limited to his marriage.
Elliot had always been the one to stay still, to wait for her to return. Even when she had hurt him, told him
she'd only come back because of the job, because of being assigned to him, because of the vics. She'd lied to
him about Simon and she had lied to him about giving her brother money. And he hadn't walked away. He
had never made that walk into Cragen's office and said he wanted a new partner. Not like she had.
She'd been so worried that any sort of relationship with him would eventually end, that one day he'd walk
away when he realized who she was, what she could offer. She'd be worried that in the end, she'd be left
without him across the board. No partner, no friend, no nothing.
She'd always assumed he would be the one to walk away.
But the running had always been left up to her.
"Liv?" Elliot tried again, concern permeating his tone. His sleepy eyes were now fully awake and intently
focused on her. His insistent hips had stopped nudging against her, and beneath her body he was all dark
stubble and solid chest.
stubble and solid chest.
"Liv, Jesus, say something. I know it's not perfect, but if it happened, we'd be fine. We'd work it out. I
swear to God, you were sleeping and I was watching you and thinking, shit, it would actually work. It didn't
scare me. You have to-"
Olivia didn't want to know why it hurt to say it. She didn't want to know why the words made her want to
cry, why the irrational edges of disappointment pricked against her skin. Olivia shivered despite the growing
heat in the room. "I'm on the pill, Elliot. I would have said something if, if..." She cleared her throat, tried to
find a place to look that didn't allow her to see his eyes. "I would have said something."
Of course she would have stopped them if she hadn't been protected. She'd always been the one who wore
her caution like armor, who carefully gauged every decision she'd ever made to make sure she wouldn't
cause herself any more hurt or repercussions than necessary.
She'd always been the one run, to shield herself when she was scared.
Beneath her, he nodded, his eyes hooded. "Okay," he acknowledged quietly.
And when her chest constricted so tightly that she couldn't breathe, when she had to close her eyes to hold
back the waves of need that washed over her as she looked at him, Elliot's mouth finally took hers.
This was it, she thought. This was it and this was right. It had to be right.
It had to be right because it would be completely wrong with anyone else.
Olivia pushed her lips onto him, her fingers curving over Elliot's jaw and her hips rising so she could part
her thighs. She shifted, a cry ripping from her throat as he thrust the tip of his erection into the slickness of
her body and drove upwards. She was sore as hell from last night, yet the delicious, stretching ache was
proof that his body had been in her, was in her again.
He trusts you not to run when you've given him no reason to believe you'll ever stay still. Teach him he was
right to trust you, Olivia.
He's not going anywhere.
"You okay?" Elliot whispered, his lips barely moving and his eyes slipping shut. His fingers bit into her ass,
lifting her and drawing her back down onto him as he started a devastating rhythm. "Tell me if I hurt you,"
Elliot rasped as his thrusts became deeper, pounding thickly into her body.
Olivia pushed herself up so that her arms were taut on either side of Elliot's head, her palms pressed into the
mattress. She took the control away from him, rolling her hips and dragging her slickness up and nearly off
of him before tortuously descending again. The ends of her hair brushed his cheeks and he groaned.
Elliot grimaced, his lips parting on a harsh breath. "Christ."
She watched his face as she rode him, the thick muscles of his neck tightening he came up off the bed to get
her beaded nipple into his mouth.
He's not going anywhere.
"I don't want to hurt you," she said softly. And as she reached the edge without warning, she let herself fall
onto him, letting him drive hard into her, taking her as she came.

It was only after she could breathe again that she knew, unequivocally, that the only way to spare either of
them any more pain was to finally, permanently stay still.
+++
"You know, Jim and I don't believe in long engagements."
Elliot's head jerked upwards, searching for the source of the comment just dropped into his ear. The bagel
he had just put on his paper plate nearly slid off, and he quickly caught it, straightening his plate once again.
The sound had come from his right. He half turned, squinting against the sunlight that blared over the edge
of the mess hall. "Morning, Cathy," he said. His voice wasn't welcoming, because the last thing he needed
was for her to announce to everyone in line that she had caught them last night.
Of course, he'd walked out of the cabin this morning surprised that she hadn't stretched a banner across the
soccer field that said Congratulations on Finally Doing It! Then again, the woman hadn't been close to a
party supply store, so he didn't give her restraint too much credit.
"So? You thinking about it?" Cathy prodded, her eyes sparkling so relentlessly that Elliot figured they
resembled something akin to flashing Christmas lights.
"Thinking about your engagement?" he deliberately misinterpreted.
Her face fell dramatically. Shit. Now that was the look of a kid who had just been told Santa didn't exist.
Fuck. Elliot blew out a breath and prayed for divine intervention. They were all leaving within the hour. He
could have patience. He could. He could be pleasant and smile at her and he could do well to remember that
the woman seemed to have a good effect on Olivia.
"Cathy," he finally said, trying a new approach. "Olivia and I aren't supposed to have anything between us,
you know what I mean? So we have to be discreet. It's gonna take some time, some figuring out." Not to
mention that he still needed to finalize his divorce. Of course there was no need to bring that up. No need to
delve into the guilt that existed because he had inexplicably been given a chance with Olivia, while Kathy
would just be beginning the long, difficult road to finding someone again.
God, there was a whole host of explanations and conversations that would still be needed back at home with
the kids, with Kathy. Eventually, hopefully, with Cragen. He wasn't stupid enough to believe that just
because he'd finally extracted his head from his ass where Olivia was concerned, that the rest of the world
was going to give him a free pass on his moronic behavior of late. Christ, even his own kid had called him
out on it when she'd likened his free throw at going home to a booty call.
Elliot was going to have to talk and explain and share and all that crap just to get everyone to understand
that he was finally figuring things out. No, he didn't want to move home. Yes, the divorce was the best thing
for everyone. No, he didn't blame Olivia for leaving him when she had, but yes, thank God yes, they were
too damned close.
Had it really only been three days since he'd been throwing insults at Olivia across the squad room on the
Parker case? He'd like to go back in time and kick the shit out of himself.
Elliot rolled his neck on his shoulders, determined to take care of one thing at a time.
Cathy peered at him intently. One of her arms was folded across her waist while the other hand held a half-
eaten apple that was now suspended precariously from her fingertips. "Love isn't easy," she said
emphatically, narrowing her moss-green eyes. "It takes work and compromise and patience, probably even
more so with Olivia. I'll expect you to remember that."
more so with Olivia. I'll expect you to remember that."
Elliot didn't know whether to be startled at Cathy's mention of love or to laugh at the way this little woman
was essentially trying to threaten him. In the end, he figured that Cathy would only accept one response. "I'll
take good care of her," he promised, leaning towards her conspiratorially and smiling.
Cathy beamed, her back straightening as she took a solid, loud bite out of the apple. "Good. Because despite
that misguided brooding thing you do," she waved the apple around dismissively with her mouth full.
"You've kind of grown on me. And if you're good to her, then I won't have to hunt you down and hurt you."
Her chin lifted as she grinned even wider.
He laughed. He couldn't help it. The fact that this pint-sized female had just declared herself protector and
defender of the very fierce, very capable, and usually heavily armed Olivia Benson was something that
endeared her to him once and for all. "Wouldn't want that," he winked, just as he noticed Olivia making her
way towards them, cell phone in hand.
God, he'd never get tired of watching Olivia like this. Sun-soaked and with her hair left down, her long, bare
legs eating up the space between them, he couldn't remember ever not knowing the taste of her. He couldn't
remember this time yesterday, when he didn't know the small, possessive growls Olivia would make in his
ear as she came, he couldn't remember not being able to haul her up against him just so he could touch her.
He'd have to remember, and damned quick, or Cragen would know exactly what the hell had happened this
weekend and they'd be split up far sooner than they were ready for.
"Morning, Cathy," Olivia smiled. The result wasn't a completely open grin, it wasn't the kind of smile borne
of accepted familiarity, but it was one that came far easier than it had yesterday. She didn't wait for Cathy to
begin in on her about last night. Instead, she lifted her phone in her hand and immediately shifted her
attention to him. "Just got off the phone with Cap. They still haven't nailed Parker. Munch is convinced the
mother is aiding and abetting and Fin's sure that laying on her hard is a waste of time."
Elliot's shoulders immediately tensed. "He's gonna hit again. We're giving him too much time."
Olivia arched one eyebrow, her lips pressing together. "Parker doesn't have access to the addresses from the
cleaners anymore. My guess is he's jonesing for a target and he's going to go after someone familiar. He
likes spaces and faces that he knows."
"Ex-girlfriend?" he mused.
Olivia nodded. "That's what I was thinking. She said she hasn't heard from him. But he might have it in for
her. She was the one that initiated the breakup when he caught her cheating on him." She shook her head
once. "Putting a detail on her place seems to be as good a start as any."
"But he already knows her," Cathy piped up, taking another loud bite of her apple. "If she cheated she
probably isn't worthy of his attention anymore. Who does he have a crush on? I mean, don't sexual predators
often escalate crushes into unhealthy fixations?"
Elliot and Olivia both stared at her.
Cathy smiled and shrugged sheepishly. "I watch too much Law and Order. So sue me." She turned to head
back to where Jim was sitting, but then seemed to consider something. "But don't watch that show," she
advised somberly. "Those characters never hook up."
Not for the last time, she had left them standing there with absolutely, positively nothing articulate to say.

+++
"Hey Liv!"
Olivia shoved the last of her shorts into her duffel bag, and grabbed her finally dry towel off the edge of the
bed in her room, looking back over her shoulder at the sound of her name being called.
Olivia straightened, swiping her bangs to the side again. "Hey Jess."
The younger girl was leaning in the doorway to the small room, her sunglasses perched on top of her head.
"You need help?"
These were the things that made her not want to leave. She'd been accumulating the list of things she didn't
want to forget about this weekend in her head over the last hour. The sound of small airplanes buzzing over
the picturesque lake, the way the breeze was gentle enough to cause the trees to just barely rustle, the hot,
dry air and the cold strands of grass on her feet.
It was so bright here. The sun was always glittering off the water, the buoys were rocking steadily thirty feet
out and time had slowed down. There was no racing against the clock, there was no defeat, there was
nothing left broken in the wake of another day.
And there were people around her capable of offering help. She had become so used to being the defender,
the protector, that it was startling when help wasn't needed, but was instead the thing being offered.
"I'm good," Olivia said, glancing around the packed up room. She didn't want to know why she suddenly
loathed to leave a place she'd hated upon sight only a few days before. But the irrational urge to stay the rest
of the day was growing.
"Only one bag, huh? Don't let Tyler see that, okay? He just gave me so much shit about the weight of my
bags. Plural." Jess laughed, shifting against the doorway. "Anyway, I just wanted to give you my email
address in case you, um..."
This was where Olivia usually fucked up. This was where her back usually stiffened and her face became
expressionless. This was where she usually made people who were trying to get close to her so
uncomfortable that they gave up on the idea.
Olivia smiled, despite her faint discomfort. "I'd like that."
See? And the earth didn't open up and swallow you whole, Benson. You get a gold star for effort.
Jess stepped forward and thrust out a small piece of paper with her cell and email address scrawled across it.
"I'm in the city sometimes for work, so maybe we could grab lunch, you know? Hannah is usually with me,
so we could do a girls lunch or get pedicures and go shopping or something."
Hey Cap, I'm stepping out for a girls lunch and to get my toenails painted bright pink, see you in an hour or
two.
Olivia's smile grew. She'd have to schedule the lunch just to watch the look on everyone's faces. Better yet,
if she could finagle some of those paper slippers the salon would give her afterwards, she could walk back
in balancing her boots in one hand and wiggling her newly sparkling toes at Munch.
Then again, the old man's heart probably couldn't take the shock of it. He'd go off grumbling about the ways
women's magazines were collectively brainwashing females everywhere.

"Count me in," Olivia said decidedly.
It doesn't have to end here. You don't have to leave this place and go back to the way it was.
It can't be the way it was. You're sleeping with Elliot now.
Olivia felt the absurdity of it all bubble up inside of her. One weekend. Barely more than forty-eight hours.
And she was now booking pedicures and figuring out ways to ignore Elliot's possessive-yet-infuriatingly-
sexy grunts every time she was within three feet of him.
Less than four days ago she'd been crying in the crib after he'd told her to at least finish up her files if she
was going to leave him again. Less than four days ago she had been sitting on the cold tiles after Elliot had
left the room, and had wondered if being a sister to Simon would ever, ever come close to closing the
devastating hole that would be left when she was no longer a partner to Elliot.
Jess was looking at her curiously, an amused smile playing over her shiny lips. She pulled something out of
the small purse slung across her torso and held it out towards Olivia. "You should probably take this," Jess
advised, her delicate eyebrows lifting.
Olivia laughed when she saw the offering, and met Jessica's mockingly serious expression. "Love-In lip
gloss, huh? The miracle gloss itself." She reached for it, holding the slim container in her hand and twisting
it. She'd put this on yesterday and Elliot had kissed it off, licking at her and drawing her lower lip into his
mouth. "I might need to invest in this stuff."
Jessica's eyes sparkled, and Olivia watched her face light up as Tyler came up behind her, sliding his hand
around her waist as he peeked into the room. "Nah," she shook her head emphatically. "I think you might
need something like a Taser to occasionally ward Elliot off instead."
Olivia lifted her chin, grinning. "I'm damned good with a Taser, you have no idea. Dropped a three-hundred
and fifty pound beast on crack once with one of those things."
Tyler suddenly conveyed interest. "Yeah? I'm surprised you got close enough to use it."
Elliot was suddenly in the doorway, and Tyler and Jessica shifted a little to let him into the room. "She
didn't. She used a sticky taser. It beams out like a laser." He grunted in disgust as he shoved Olivia's towel
into her bag and zipped it up. "I, on the other hand, was the moron that thought I could tackle the prick."
Olivia remembered that moment, the moment of hearing the glass shatter, of thinking she'd lose him as the
guy threw Elliot into the window. She remembered seeing the blood all over Elliot's arm, and sitting in his
hospital room with him in the hours after as Elliot was stitched up, yet again. He had sat in front of her,
bruised, bandaged and fighting the doctor, and she'd been relentless about making sure her eyes never
settled on Elliot's chest. Not because she was afraid of what Elliot would think if he caught her looking at
him - because back then he wouldn't have recognized her attraction anyway. But she kept her eyes averted
more so because her Captain was in the room and she'd been afraid he'd see something in her face that he
shouldn't.
There were so many moments, so many clues and signs she should have read that told her Elliot was more
than her partner. Moments that made it clear that she wanted more, that she needed more. She'd been hiding
so many reactions to him over the last few months that she had essentially found it easier to hide from Elliot
altogether.
"So what happened?" Tyler prodded, one of his arms casually slung around Jessica's waist against the door.

Elliot grinned. "Sonofabitch threw my ass through a window."
Tyler and Elliot started laughing, some odd male understanding passing between them that seemed to
indicate it was okay, or even worse - amusing - to have been violently tossed like that.
Olivia on the other hand, scowled at Elliot while Jessica just rolled her eyes at them. "You're a moron, Ty,"
Jess sighed dramatically, shaking her head.
Tyler, being Tyler, unexpectedly and animatedly scooped her up and half-tossed her over his shoulder. "But
I'm your moron," he proclaimed loudly, over Jessica's laughter. "Sayonara, guys," he smiled, winking at
Olivia.
When the room was clear, Elliot met her gaze. He looked tanned and rested, despite the lack of sleep. His
lips quirked and one of his eyebrows arched. "I could carry you out of here like that, too, if you want."
Olivia narrowed her eyes at him. "My gun still in the car?" she asked sweetly.
Elliot's grin was infectious. "Yup." He leaned in close to her ear, his dangerously low voice making her
shiver. "Why do you think I had the balls to ask in the first place?"
++++
The miles seemed to fly by, the roads open on the return because it was still somewhat early on Sunday.
They'd tried to leave the windows open and get some air, but then had given up due to the humidity,
blasting the AC because they had been without it all weekend.
In a way, Olivia missed the blazing heat on her skin. In the car, she now bordered on shivering beneath the
onslaught of air, and her skin was awash in tiny, little bumps. She rubbed her hands over her arms and
leaned her forehead against her window, watching the wheels of the semi-truck next to them endlessly turn.
"You ok?" Elliot finally asked, his right wrist draped over the wheel as he drove. They'd been silent for so
long he cleared his throat.
She nodded, determined not delve too much into the melancholy that was creeping up on her. She didn't
want to examine it.
He let the silence win for a few seconds longer than he normally would. "You sure?"
Olivia lifted her head off the window and sighed, keeping her eyes focused on the world outside of their car.
"Yeah."
The small sound Elliot made didn't sound like he was accepting her answer. Instead it sounded like he didn't
believe her.
She turned her head to face him, feeling unnervingly out of sorts. "What's that supposed to mean?"
He shrugged, never taking his eyes off the road. "Just that you don't seem okay."
She slammed her head back against the seat. "You're not Huang. Don't delve, Elliot."
Jesus, she was being a bitch. She couldn't help it. Olivia bit her lip, refusing to let the pressure that was
building on her chest with each passing mile grow. She squeezed her eyes shut for a moment and realized
that the faster the car moved, the more anxiety-stricken she became.

"Can you slow down, Elliot? We're not in pursuit," she muttered.
Elliot's looked questioningly at her for a quick second before turning his attention back to the road. "You
want to drive?" he asked, raising his eyebrows in challenge.
A thousand retorts bubbled on the edge of her tongue. "Just drive," she bit off instead, hating that her voice
shook as she said it.
Get it together, Benson. You're losing your damned mind. If you hadn't just had sex with him a few hours
ago, he'd assume it was your time of the month.
She'd had sex with him last night. More than once. And this morning. More than once. And they were no
longer at the camp; they were no longer locked in the idyllic little world they had been ensconced in when it
had happened. Reality was hitting her, hard, and the irrational part of her wanted to turn around and go back
to the camp until the complications awaiting them didn't seem so monumental.
Olivia blinked furiously and stared out the window, turning her face away from him.
"Seemed easier there," Elliot said quietly.
She closed her eyes, refusing to open them. Figures that the belligerent, caustic man she'd been battling the
day before they were sent to camp would choose now to disappear. The deep baritone of Elliot's voice, the
concern in it, would unravel her if he kept it up.
It was already unraveling her, because she involuntarily opened her mouth. "I liked it there."
Next to her, he laughed softly. "Yeah, me too."
Her thighs started to shake with the force of restraint she was putting on her body just to stay quiet, just to
keep her eyes from welling up or her chest from audibly seeking oxygen. "I thought I would hate it."
"Me too," he agreed easily.
"You gonna keep in touch with anyone?" she asked quietly.
Olivia watched his profile, noticed the way it relaxed just a little as she made conversation. She prayed he
would give her something more than a simple yes or no. She needed something more, something that would
open up the silence. They'd been so used to the silence over the last few months that talking didn't come
easily. They'd have to consciously try to open up again.
"Leo's looking to move into the city, I think. Seemed like he and Colin were done, and he started talking
about the Academy. Maybe becoming a cop. So he gave me his email address. And," Elliot glanced
sideways at her. "Jim mentioned something about Kathy inviting us to their wedding in a few months."
Olivia caught the quick, assessing look Elliot had given her. She didn't know if it was the mention of them
being invited somewhere together or the fact that he had used the word "us" for the first time in a way that
didn't refer to them strictly as partners.
She blew out a breath and fought the goose bumps. "Yeah. She asked me, too. Wanted our, the um, address.
For her to send a card to...us."
Her struggle to get used to the idea sat heavily between them in the silence of the car. A shiver ran through
her and he looked at her, furrowing his eyebrows. "Liv, there's a sweatshirt on the back seat. Or I can turn
off the AC."
off the AC."
She shook her head, never looking at him. Next to them, the semi-truck fell behind and she had a clear view
of the rolling green lawns of a farm. "I'm fine."
He chuckled ruefully. "No. Clearly you're not fine."
Olivia whipped her head around to face him. "Thanks for the diagnosis, George."
Elliot was silent. He readjusted his hand on the wheel, gripping it tighter, and ground his jaw so hard she
saw the muscle in his cheek jump.
Great, just what he needs, Olivia. Three hours of psychotic behavior. Of course he is trying to shrink you -
you've completely lost your mind.
Olivia couldn't take her eyes off of his profile. All of it was rigid, as if his body had been carved of stone.
The muscles in Elliot's forearm flexed as he gripped the wheel tighter and tighter and his breathing became
shallower as the moments went on.
She wanted to crawl across the seat and get wrapped up by Elliot again and that scared the bloody hell out
of her. It seemed logical, rational even, to press up against him in a place where nobody knew their history.
This morning, as she lay half on him, their skin damp with release, she had been lulled into another hour of
sleep simply by the feel of him, the sound of him, the way Elliot had been the most familiar, safe thing of
all.
But they were leaving behind all of the people that accepted them together, and were headed back towards
all of the complications and the history that had kept them apart.
"There's a part of me that doesn't want to go back to the city," she whispered, drawing her lower lip into her
mouth as she looked back out her window. Already she missed the grass, the lemonade, the incessant chatter
of people she oddly enough believed qualified as friends. "The scumbags, the cases, the victims," she
faltered, trying to put more effort behind finding the right words. "Sometimes it just seems so damned dark.
Like nothing is right about anyone."
He reached across the seat without looking at her. His fingers tangled in her hand, pulling her arm towards
the center of the seat so he could hold on. "We're right."
Olivia let out a disbelieving, harsh breath, but didn't extricate her hand from the heat of his rough palm.
"Besides you and I, no one else is going to think so Elliot. Cragen sent us up there so we could stop
fighting, and we come back to break more rules than ever. And your family..." She shook her head. "Your
kids are going to hate my guts. Not to mention Kathy-" her throat clogged as soon as his wife's name
crossed her lips. She wanted to say something but couldn't, instead finding herself pressing her lips together
so tightly that she couldn't breathe. She reached up and swiped away the unstoppable moisture slipping onto
her cheeks. "If you ever want to go back, Elliot, if you are talking to her and you want to try again, you
have to just tell me because-" she couldn't stop rambling, her fears escalating the closer to home they got.
"Listen to me, Olivia- " Elliot tried.
"No, Elliot, Jesus. How's that gonna look to your kids? That you were all set to try again with their mother
and you go away for the weekend with me - on a work trip no less - and all of a sudden you decide not to
move home?" Olivia knew she was careening out of control, the thoughts tumbling through her head faster
than she could even give voice to them. She heaved once, ducking her chin and trying to get her hand out of
Elliot's so she could cover her face.

He tightened his grip on her hand so fiercely that she jumped. "Olivia, listen to me, because I'm only going
to say this once. You got that?" Elliot's voice was fierce, nearly snarling as he glanced at her, maintain his
grip on the wheel. "My marriage was, and is, done. Not because of you. Because of me, and because of
Kathy. I hated that it was over for a long time. I thought I failed it, and in a lot of ways, I did. But the only
thing that I can do to hurt any of them any more is to go back to a life that isn't working for anyone."
She was breathing through her nose, staring straight ahead.
"I think I'm a shithead for making the decision Kathy's probably been expecting me to make while I was
away and then telling her over the phone. So I need to fix that. I do. I need to go talk to them, to explain
things, to make sure they understand. But I promise you that in no way, shape or form is your name in any
way associated with all of the hundreds of ways I helped to kill my marriage."
She wished she had reached for his sweatshirt because she was shaking so badly she could have sworn her
teeth were chattering.
"Do you understand that, Olivia?" Elliot's voice was hard, unrelenting.
"Yeah," she said quietly.
When he looked at her again, his eyes had softened. "And I think we can hold off on telling Cragen.
Agreed?"
She nodded, locking her gaze onto his, even after he turned back to watch the road. "Yeah, we need
to....figure things out."
Elliot's grip on her hand loosened until it was more comfortable. "Agreed."
Olivia let out a deep breath, reaching to turn the air ducts away from her slightly sunburned chest and
towards her legs. "And no sex when we get back to the city. Not until the divorce is final."
He let go of her hand, locking the wheel in a death grip as she heard him draw in air. "You can't be serious."
He looked so horrified, so shocked, that her lips couldn't help but lift just slightly in amusement at his
decidedly affronted response. "Deadly," she said succinctly.
His nostrils flared and his lips parted as he glared out the front windshield. "You're not kidding," he
muttered, shaking his head until he seemed to realize something. "Define sex."
Her laughter was unexpected, making her swipe her eyes to dry the remnants of the tears on her face. Her
nose was going to run if she didn't get a tissue soon. She looked through the pocket on the door and found a
few clean napkins. "Define sex, Elliot? Really? You work in sex crimes, this should be a no-brainer for
you."
"Oral?" he asked, tilting his head in thought.
"Is sex," she responded.
Elliot's jaw locked and she saw the muscles in his neck tighten. "Can I touch you?"
She couldn't let him know that the mere words suggesting it had set her body ablaze. Her thighs immediately
clenched and she dragged her eyes away from him, knowing that staring at the way his gray t-shirt hugged
his sculpted body wasn't going to help her maintain her convictions. "Elliot-" she protested far too weakly
than she would have liked.
than she would have liked.
"What?" he looked at her, raising his eyebrows, feigning innocence.
Olivia sighed. "See? Just for that? No touching. There is nothing about that look on your face that screams
‘I'll be good', Stabler."
His grin finally slid across his face far too easily. "So after we get back to the city, no more sex until my
divorce papers go through?"
Olivia nodded, trying to gauge the source of his newfound acceptance of her edict. "That's what I said."
He was all macho, domineering and self-satisfied arrogance as he suddenly and dangerously cleared two
lanes to the right and took the exit, his eyes solely focused on the two-story sign that indicated that the Red
Roof Inn was less than one mile off the exit.
"Fine. I'll behave," he grunted. "After we get back to the city."
+++
Elliot was making a very concerted effort to find other things to look at.
Yup, the coffee machine was half full and the inside of the carafe was dripping with condensation. It looked
hot, wet, and veritably steamy inside of the glass. Sweltering really.
Shit. Coffee machine was off limits.
He glanced at their desks. They were covered in papers. Files and photos and old coffee cups. Computers
that were five years too old. Nothing that couldn't be fixed or easily replaced if he were to swipe his arm
across the flat surface, clear everything off and deposit her flat on her back beneath him.
Crap. Desks were off limits, too.
The staircase. That had to be a safe focal point for the next three point four seconds at least. There was
nothing erotic about a staircase. Except for the fact that it led to the crib. And beds. Many, many of them.
The crib also had a door that locked. And showers.
Goddamned stairs weren't helpful either.
Elliot sighed and rubbed his hand over his face. It didn't help that he still smelled like her. His clothes, his
skin, everything. They had showered after he had taken her up against the door in the motel. They had
showered. Together. His hands had slid all over her wet, perfect, golden skin. It had been agony every time
he had jerked into her because all he could think was that it would be weeks and weeks before she'd let him
do this again. He understood her point, of course. He understood Olivia's reason for wanting to wait and
admired the hell out of her for having enough willpower for both of them. It was better this way, to wait. It
was. He'd feel better about this in the long run.
But every single thrust of his cock into her body had been sheer torture, because he knew it was coming to
an end for awhile.
Coming.
Christ. Even now, his damned dick was stirring in his jeans. It shouldn't be physically possible to want
someone this much. It couldn't be normal to throb this much, to still be able to taste her on his lips even
someone this much. It couldn't be normal to throb this much, to still be able to taste her on his lips even
after showering, to crave the slick fit of her body as she rode him, hard.
As her hair tickled his cheeks as she leaned over him, her endless eyes wide open and staring at him.
Oh hell. He was so screwed.
He couldn't look up and look at her. She was sitting across from him, and he'd heard her cry out in heated
hunger only three hours earlier. Of course, that was three hours ago. And two hours ago, Olivia sleeping
peacefully against him in between the tangled sheets, his cell phone had beeped. Loudly and horribly it had
abruptly ended the most fucking fantastic weekend he could remember.
Cragen had called him. Demanded to know where the hell Olivia and he were, considering the camp had
ended hours and hours ago and they were needed back at the squad. Elliot had been quiet on the phone,
trying not to wake her for precious few minutes, but his hushed tone had irked Cragen.
Just where in hell are you, Detective?
Elliot's palm passed over his face again. He'd lied. Car overheated, Cap. We'll be there soon.
Well, something had overheated - it just hadn't been the car. It was the first of many lies and omissions
Elliot expected he would have to make if they were going to keep this up until he told his family and Olivia
was comfortable with their relationship being public knowledge. He didn't even want to as yet consider the
inevitability of being split up, or worse yet, of being sent to different squads.
So he had woken Olivia. She had stirred, stretched, lifted her mussed head from the crook of his shoulder
and made a small sound, and he had been lost. Again. Her surprise at where she was hadn't been as
pronounced as it had been earlier that morning. And for the first time in years he hadn't been agitated or
irritated with her. He hadn't felt his palms itch with the need to shake her or grasp her. The anger, the
frustration, it was all slipping out of him now that he could admit that he wanted her. He had forgotten what
it was like to hold someone and just know that it was right. He had forgotten what it was like to hold
someone and just by that, feel a little bit invincible.
He knew the feeling that was growing minute by minute within him. He knew what it was, and if he told
her, she'd either shoot him in the gut or kick his ass. Either way, he figured he was better off if he held off a
little while longer before he started dropping those words in between them.
He could read the tension on her face as it was. When he had woken her, he had mentioned that Cragen had
called and that they were needed. Parker was still out there and Munch and Fin were at odds on how to
track him, rendering them less effective.
Olivia's face had immediately drained of all color. He knew the moment that it hit her. They had been
making love in a motel while work needed them and the realization had caused Olivia to look sick to her
stomach. The whole way back into Manhattan, she'd been nearly silent save for the theories she would
randomly throw out. She'd lose herself in thought, staring out the window as she silently sorted out Parker's
motivations, and then all of a sudden her head would lift and she would look at Elliot, eyes alight as she
tested another possibility out loud.
About fifteen minutes outside of the city, she had unlocked the glove compartment, extracted both of their
guns and badges and set his on the seat next to her. She had rubbed her badge under her thumb for long
moments before finally clipping it to the waistband of the jeans she had slipped on back in the motel. She
had unsnapped her gun from its holster, unclipped, checked and then replaced the magazine and finally
attached it to her belt.

He didn't want to acknowledge the small feeling of discomfort that came with the sound of the holster
clipping to her belt. He didn't want to watch sun-kissed Olivia fade away beneath the horrific shit of their
job. He didn't want to watch the Olivia that had sat in the grass next to him these last few days disappear.
He figured that was his job now. To make sure that Olivia didn't disappear. To make sure she got enough
sun, to make damned sure - when the cases went on for too long - that she didn't give away too much of
herself. The Olivia that laughed, that played games, that ate smores - she was within the seasoned cop that
sat across from him day after day. And as her partner, he'd protect her safety. But as the man that fucking
loved her, he'd protect the rest of her, too.
Whether she liked it or not.
"El? Did you hear me?"
He blew out a deep breath and pulled his gaze off the vinyl flooring near Munch's empty desk. That was
good. The floor was a good distraction. He wouldn't think of her wrapped around him if he stared at the
floor. Unless he considered that the floor was a wide open, horizontal space. He could lie on his back and
let her ride him, and that way she wouldn't be pressed up against the cold, hard surface of it.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. The floor was now off-limits on the distraction scale too.
Where the hell was Munch when he was needed? Looking at Munch would be a good distraction. Nothing -
positively nothing - about Munch would be considered a connotation for sex. Better yet, where was the new
guy, Lake? Lake was enough of a tool that his simple presence was a good way to maintain a healthy high-
level dose of irritation.
"El?"
He met Olivia's gaze, and nearly immediately growled in some mix of possession and lust. Damn that, too.
He'd have to control that impulse. It was mind-blowing to think that the fucking stunning woman sitting
across from him was not only the best damned cop he had ever known, but was also the one that amazingly
called out his name when she came.
When he made her come.
"Yeah?" Elliot grimaced, not liking the look of distress on her face.
Olivia's eyes darted behind him for a moment and then rested back on his face. She leaned forward for one
second, and then sat back, busying herself as she mumbled under her breath. "Cragen's coming."
Great. They had slipped in, sliding into their chairs and busying themselves, hoping for a minimum of
questions if they just seemed immediately busy. But from the look of warning on Olivia's face, they hadn't
escaped Cragen's wrath. "Can't wait," Elliot muttered back, shifting his files around until he could find the
ones he had begun compiling on Parker.
"Are you two ready to be part of this squad now, or do we need to play trust exercises on the front lawn of
One PP?" Cragen said as he came to stand by their desks, his face impassive but his voice conveying his
agitation.
Olivia looked up at him first, gracing all of them with the slightest of smiles. "We're good, Cap," she said,
sitting up straighter in her chair.

Elliot almost laughed. How she did it, he'd never know. She sat there as if she was in a grade school
classroom, innocently placating an ornery teacher with all of the right answers and her homework already
done. Jesus, she had even managed to clean off her desk and get her computer on while he'd been distracted
by the fucking coffee pot. Teacher's pet.
Right. No. The only one permitted to pet her was him.
Christ. She was so going to kick his ass.
Cragen was now disbelievingly looking at him, waiting for some sort of answer. "Elliot? I trust you're
feeling all warm and fuzzy again, too? You're not going to be crawling into my office asking for a new
partner again?"
Elliot flinched, all of the haze in his head immediately gone. God. Damn. It. Granted, his Captain didn't
know the extent of the progress they had made in the last few days, but the blatant reference to his self-
centered actions of less than a week ago seemed unnervingly harsh. Elliot supposed he deserved it - he had,
after all, made the monumentally stupid request - but Olivia didn't deserve to be reminded of it yet again.
He glanced at her, his stomach revolting. Olivia's eyes had widened, betraying a flash of pain.
Elliot didn't break her gaze. "No sir. If we ever request new partners, it'll be a joint decision."
He saw the way her chin trembled slightly. But her eyes were clearing again and he knew she understood
what he had meant. If they requested new partners, it would only be because they wanted more from each
other and had made the choice not to hide their relationship.
Cragen's gaze darted back and forth between them. "So you both are good and we can get back to catching
this bastard?"
"We're good, Cap. Great. Ready to go." Olivia placated him as she stood up, as if her height would help her
to appear more reassuring.
It didn't matter because another distraction came barreling at them. Behind her, Fin stormed into the squad,
yanking his chair out from his desk and angrily depositing himself into it. The metal chair creaked and the
sound was drowned out only by the echo of the files in his hands hitting the desk.
When Fin realized that the three of them were watching him, he cocked his head, his eyes narrowing.
"Whatcha all looking at?"
Cragen ignored him. "Where's your partner?" he bit back.
"Probably asking Parker's mother's out on a damned date. He's focused on her. He's so convinced she knows
where that slimeball is that he ain't willin' to check anything else out."
Cragen's stress levels seemed to rise even more. "Then brief Elliot and Olivia. They're on tonight and you
can split up your leads. Let Munch at Parker's mother. Doesn't hurt."
With that, Cragen dismissively headed back for his office.
Fin tipped his chin towards them as Olivia sat back down. "What, you two now the Barbie and Ken of
SVU? What's with the spray tans?"
Elliot stood. Shit, they'd all been pissed at one time or another. About their personal lives, about the justice
system, and God only knew they'd been angry about the cases. But he'd be damned if he let Fin insult Olivia
system, and God only knew they'd been angry about the cases. But he'd be damned if he let Fin insult Olivia
for no good reason. "You got a problem, Fin?"
Fin shook his head, looking exhausted and contrite all at once as he slumped in his chair. "Nah, man. Just
my partner is a stubborn, old man and it's pissin' me off that even after years of workin' together, he ain't
gonna listen to me at all." He scanned his desk, splitting up the pile in front of him into three stacks. He got
up, handing one to Elliot and one to Olivia. "At least you two survived kumbaya camp."
Elliot took the stack Fin was offering him and glanced at Olivia as he handed her another pile. "You could
say that," he grinned at her.
Olivia's cheeks flushed as she looked at him. Her lips tipped up in the slightest of smiles. Her gaze was
unwavering, locked on his. Her hair was still loose and wavy, and even though she had slipped back into her
jeans, the short-sleeved white button down she now wore accentuated the sun-warmed skin on her arms and
upper chest. Her hair seemed to have been highlighted by the sun, and the only makeup she was wearing
was lip gloss.
God have some amount of mercy. That lip gloss would be the death of him.
Behind him, Fin cleared his throat. "Stabler. Man, you gonna stand there, or are you gonna hand her the
files so we can get goin'?"
Elliot dropped the files on her desk as she jerked out of whatever had just happened there. He couldn't take
his eyes off of her just yet. "Why don't you catch us up and then I know Liv's got some ideas..."
Olivia seemingly couldn't help it. She laughed at the very, very private implication of ideas and then tried to
hide it, ducking her head and opening a file as fast as she could.
Elliot was absolutely, positively fascinated by this side of her. She was actually blushing. Olivia Benson did
not blush. In the past, she'd called him a prick. An asshole. An idiot. She'd done that with a disconcerting
regularity. She was known to have rolled her eyes at him, to have narrowed them, to have lifted her chin in
defiance.
But this whole blushing situation, right here in the squad room, it changed him irrevocably in that single
instant. As much as he didn't want to admit it, some ill-advised combination of male pride and testosterone
shot through his veins.
He'd done this. He was at the very least partially responsible for the very noticeable flush on her cheeks and
light of amusement in her eyes.
Unfortunately, at the very moment that he noticed the very intoxicating, very female response Olivia had
just given him, Munch walked in.
Munch stopped where he stood, a foot from her desk, and immediately, perceptively honed in on Olivia.
"Are you laughing?" he asked, his voice lowering as his eyebrows drew together in irritated disbelief
beneath his glasses.
"Leave her alone," Elliot said, dropping his voice in warning and stepping closer to the edge of her desk.
Olivia's eyes shot up at both of them. "Yeah. I'm laughing. Jesus, John, what's your problem now?"
"My problem is," Munch said, taking off his black sport coat and setting it on the back of his chair. "Is that
we've got a rapist out there, and you two are off playing Robinson Crusoe while my partner here couldn't get
a clear sense of Parker's MO if it fell on him and wiggled." He leaned back against his desk, crossing his
a clear sense of Parker's MO if it fell on him and wiggled." He leaned back against his desk, crossing his
arms over his chest. "So I spend the last three hours with the little shit's mother, only to walk in and see the
two of you making eyes at each other."
Elliot crossed his arms over his chest and positioned himself directly between Olivia, who had just stood up
behind him, and Munch, who was now glaring at him. He licked his lower lip and felt his jaw winding up
tight again. "Mind your own business, Munch."
But Munch was nothing if not observant. "Great. So the Benson and Stabler see-saw has now swung back to
Elliot is defender of Olivia's universe. Tell me, m'friend, have you ever asked her if she likes this macho
routine you pull whenever you feel like it? Last I checked she was a very capable cop who could defend
herself."
Olivia stepped out from behind him before he could stop her. "What the hell is going on here?" she asked
incredulously. "I get that you and Fin are currently disagreeing, Munch. But Jesus, Elliot and I have been
away, so how come we're the ones being-"
Elliot touched her arm, trying to calm her rising voice. "Liv, it's not wor-"
Munch's eyes landed on where Elliot was touching her. His eyes widened as he finally took the both of them
in and interrupted. "So now we're all touchy feely too? Just what kind of camp was this?"
Fin slammed his desk drawer shut. "See what I mean? He's goddamned impossible. This is why old people
retire, Munch."
Munch swung around. "Of course you can't see it. Wouldn't pretend you were a detective or anything!"
Elliot felt his tension levels skyrocket. Olivia was standing just slightly behind him, and he could feel the
heat of her body near him. She didn't need this shit. She was probably out of sorts enough after the weekend
that she didn't need this kind of crap - not from a perp, not from their Captain and definitely not from
Munch and Fin.
"See what, Munch?" Elliot gritted. "Say what the hell you want to say, instead of this conspiratorial bullshit
you feel like spewing."
Olivia's hand must have unconsciously come up to graze along his back, because he felt the slight brush of
her palm on his lower back.
Shit, shit.
Her hand fell away quickly, likely as soon as she realized what she had done. The touch had meant to be
reassuring, and in light of everything else she'd touched in the last twenty-four hours, it was nothing. But in
this squadroom, it was far more than anyone was used to.
Olivia's breath came hot and fast behind him. He could have sworn he heard her curse her gesture under her
breath.
Munch just smirked as his assumptions were given fuel. "So did you play Tarzan and Jane, too?" he teased.
God, the man honestly thought he was being funny. That was the only thing that saved him from having his
scrawny ass sent flying across the room.
"Munch, I swear to God-" Elliot started, hoping the danger in his voice would be enough to curb the older
man. His fists closed.
man. His fists closed.
"John, drop it," Olivia commanded.
But that had brought Fin around strictly out of curiosity. "Drop what? What the hell is going on?"
Munch just grinned happily. "Looks like camp isn't just for partners anymore. Something happened, right?
I'm right about this. I know I am."
Fin scowled. "Jesus, Munch. Leave ‘em alone."
Christ. This was only escalating. The last thing any of them needed was Cragen coming out of his office. If
he hadn't been so damned determined not to involve their Captain, Elliot would have threatened Munch,
glared at Fin and Jesus, did Olivia just step closer to him instead of farther away? "Fin's got the right idea,
John," Elliot growled in warning.
"I'll leave ‘em alone when they admit it. They're a little too cozy now, and three days ago they were going
at each other's throats. So I want to know just what kind of camp this is, that's all," Munch shrugged,
peering over his glasses and refolding his arms across his chest for emphasis.
"You want Elliot for a partner, Munch?" Olivia finally said, stepping forward. "'Cause that's where this is
headed if you keep testing out these theories you've got. And let me tell you, he's hardheaded, impossible,
and he eats more grease for breakfast than the rest of us do all year. Can't get the smell of fries out of your
clothes after a stakeout."
What the hell? Elliot turned to look at her. He liked fries just fine, but was she really complaining about the
smell?
Olivia just shrugged, giving him a look that told him not to argue.
Fine. He'd shut up, because if she didn't fix this, he was about to incur Cragen's wrath yet again.
Fin stepped forward, lowering his voice as he frowned. "Wait, something did happen? You two, you
like...together? Seriously, what kind of camp was this?"
Munch rolled his eyes. "Like they weren't heading there even without Camp Love. If you'd get your head
out of your ass-"
"If you'd get yours out of Parker's old lady's-" Fin countered, his voice rising.
Munch spun around. "Parker called her, Tutuola! " Munch interjected, sounding out every syllable of his
partner's name. "He's gonna pick up money from her in three hours and we're gonna be there to pick him up.
So why don't you just sit down and let the real detectives do some work?"
Elliot was about to interject on Fin's behalf, but Olivia shoved him slightly. "Sit down," she warned.
Despite his growing headache, he turned to follow her gaze. Cragen was, at this very moment, storming
steadily towards all of them, a look of fury growing on his face. There wasn't even time to sit down.
"Do you all care to explain to me why I'm a nursery school teacher instead of a police Captain?" Cragen
hissed at all of them, his face contorting in anger as he took in all of them one by one.
"Man, can't see you teaching preschool," laughed Lake as he walked in, oblivious to the thunder currently
rumbling through the squad. "All those kids spitting up all day."
rumbling through the squad. "All those kids spitting up all day."
Elliot raised his eyebrows, leaning back onto his desk. Really, was anyone that oblivious? It was a wonder
the guy had made it this far.
At least the jovial smile fell off Lake's face immediately when he noticed everyone staring at him. He
slipped into his seat. "Ah, never mind me. I'll just be over here," he said, busying himself and clearing his
throat.
Cragen ignored him. "Munch. Fin," he said, turning to the two of them. "Where are we with the Parker
case?"
Behind him, Olivia took an imperceptible step away from him and he understood it. With Cragen this close
and the rest of the squad seemingly already clued in, space would be their friend.
Not that Elliot liked it.
"We're picking him up in three hours when he is expected to show to collect some money from his familial
money tree, also known as his mother's apartment," Munch said, a little too much self-satisfaction in his
voice.
All Elliot heard was that they could go home after that. They could pick up Parker and process the asshole.
He'd get a damned confession out of the little prick faster than he ever had before, and then he was getting
Olivia out of here. She'd said no touching, but that didn't mean he couldn't damn well take her out for a bite
to eat and then take her home. Maybe sleep on her couch.
Or in her bed, just so long as he didn't touch her.
Fine, so he'd have to work up to that one.
"Here we go with the I told you so's," Fin said bitterly.
Cragen eyed the two of them before turning to Olivia. "You're good with Elliot, right?"
Munch snorted. "Yeah, I'd say-"
Cragen shut up him with just a look.
"Yes, sir, Elliot and I-" Olivia began, clearing her throat. Her voice was raspy, and god, if Elliot didn't know
other ways to make her sound that way.
Cragen cut her off with another question. "This camp thing, it worked? Helped you work out...whatever it
was?"
Olivia hesitated, and Elliot could hear her apprehension. With the way Munch and Fin were worked up after
this past weekend, they couldn't be trusted not to let fly with more information than was necessary about
what might have happened at camp. "Yeah," she said a little too softly. "It was...highly effective."
"You think it could do the same thing for these two?" Cragen asked, tilting his head to indicate Munch and
Fin behind him.
Elliot couldn't help it. Laughter burst out of him at Munch's reddening face and Fin's increasing look of
horror.

Olivia's laughter was muffled beneath her all too serious response. "Definitely," she said emphatically. "I
think it could do for them exactly what it did for Elliot and I."
Munch's mouth opened and then closed, finally silent.
"You'd be surprised what all this..." Elliot waved his hand around. "Tension here is really caused by."
Fin nearly choked.
Cragen let out a deep breath and gave them one short nod. "Good. Then it's settled." He turned to Munch
and Fin. "Pack your bags. There is another ropes session that starts Tuesday. And I fully expect you both to
figure this out just like Benson and Stabler did. Do you both understand me?"
Before anyone could respond, Cragen was gone.
Elliot couldn't contain it and from the look on Olivia's face as she slid back into her seat, neither could she.
Her bangs fell onto her forehead as she reached for a pen, giving Elliot a conspiratorial look.
God, she was beautiful. The color in her cheeks, the way she was looking at him, he'd never imagined a
bastard like him could get so lucky. She wasn't running. She wasn't shutting down. She was sexy, confident,
fearless. His.
Of course, she was also dangerous.
Really, really dangerous.
Because whatever she was about to say was going to be so wrong on so many levels.
"You know, you guys," Olivia said sweetly. Loudly. Solely for Munch and Fin's benefit. "You both should
take bathing suits." She lifted her head and winked at Elliot before widening her eyes and looking
innocently at the pair still grumbling to her left. "Because the lake was a real tension-reliever. You both
should try it. I highly recommend it."
Somehow, she kept a straight face.
Elliot leaned back in his chair, folded his hands across his stomach and just laughed.
+++
finis
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Ropes by MaddyM

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Ropes by MaddyM

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Ropes by MaddyM 3/22/09 10:16 AM

Summary: Cragen finally smiled. “Ropes course, up at a camp in Oneonta.

10. Chapter 10 by MaddyM

11. Chapter 11 by MaddyM

12. Chapter 12 by MaddyM

13. Chapter 13 by MaddyM

14. Chapter 14 by MaddyM

15. Chapter 15 by MaddyM

16. Chapter 16 by MaddyM

17. Chapter 17 by MaddyM

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18. Chapter 18 by MaddyM

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That there would be nothing physically wrong with her.

She didn’t think so.

Pack up his apartment because he was moving back to Queens.

“We’re gonna go grab a beer. You want to join us?”

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“Elliot’s joining us,” Munch said quietly.

“You okay, Liv?” Munch asked.

He was back to the not looking at her thing.

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“Elliot, he's my-”she started.

He looked up at her, his eyebrows drawing together in obvious disbelief. “No?”

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Finally, two weeks later, she found her cry.

About what happened when lies caused people to die.

Olivia had lied. She had lied. She had lied.

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She had trusted Porter with the truth.

She hadn’t asked for his help.

She could have gotten herself killed.

The poster boy for rage.

Well, at least Olivia was right about that.

“Based on what?” Elliot shot back in challenge.

“That’s enough,” Cragen gritted.

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“My office,” Cragen hissed. “Both of you. Now.”

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Neither he nor Olivia had spoken at all.

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Everything was just out of control.

It was a mix of both silence and loss.

“Captain-” Olivia started.

ordering the switch, making it seem like his own mandate.

A few weeks apart at best. At most.

Cragen leveled a glance back at him. “It’ll be handled.”

Olivia’s curiosity won out first. “What is this?”

He looked up at his Captain, waiting for the verdict.

“Cap-” Elliot started.

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“That makes two of us,” Elliot said, breaking the silence.

“I know,” he said, staring straight ahead.

She turned to face him in surprise. “How’d you know that?”

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She sat there, immobilized.

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He reached for her bag too. “I got it.”

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Out here. In the wilderness.

She’d forever be Detective Benson if she could help it.

“You have to be kidding me.” She turned around, looking at Elliot.

She’d give him one.

“So’s this apparently.”