He listened to her rant, mentally ready to tell her off again, and reiterate his point. How could she believe that being prepared, or informed made you 'ready' to be raped? Because that's what she essentially meant no matter how much she emphasized that wasn't "what I'm trying to get at." She said so emphatically she wasn't blaming the victim. He couldn't think of a more appropriate thing to call her blaming their lack of observational skills as a cause of their rape. To Dani, that was the victim's fault on some level, whether it was unconscious or not.
He understood why she felt that way. She spent so much time being a cop, she didn't know how to be vulnerable. She didn't know how to be a normal woman, who maybe had a boyfriend, or was single, or was just a wife or mother with her family. Her training meant she "looked at the approach of every strange man with caution" automatically. Maybe most women liked to be optimistic, and hope that a man offering to help with groceries meant well. Didn't she get that?
She did. She understood so much more than this replacement; she had all the touches, all the nuances, she had that special relationship with a victim in a second. She always was the one to tell the woman it wasn't her fault, that no one was prepared, that no one deserved this. But would Dani get that? It didn't seem like she wanted to. She was too busy being angry at whatever.
All he wanted right now was a tall, cold beer, an aspirin and his lonely house. And to wake up knowing that she'd be sitting across from him when he got to work.
She seemed to be winding down with her tirade about how women should be better prepared and more informed, and he sighed, knowing from years of experience and years of 'promoting awareness' that there were still going to be the good guys and the bad guys, and he still had a job to do. This was neither the time nor the place to get into it with her about the morals of this unit, and the relationships with victims that she'd either learn to form or learn to avoid.
He knew he could go on for too long about how you could never be ready. How no woman deserved this degradation. And he knew it would end up with him diverting the argument into a spiel about the children. How could innocence deserve this? And then her circular logic would wheel back around to blaming the parents (especially the mother, he was sure), because they were supposed to be aware, they were supposed to do everything right and take better care of his--their kids. This was not about him. Nor was it about his assumptions of her, and his opinion of her opinions.
So he bit his lip and sighed. Took a step back and shook his head, then gave her one more intense glance.
Those blue eyes reflected just for an instant his true emotions, his true wishes.
That one, brief, single look said it all.
"I want Olivia back."