A/N: I know I should be finishing up Betrayal's Sting, but I'm not feeling good about that story anymore. So, I decided I needed a break from it for a little bit to stretch my imagination and thus this story was born :) It will consist of only a few short chapters, so don't expect it to be a long one.
Amanda's mouth was dry, her head was pounding and her whole body felt sore as she laid on her back with her eyes closed. She could feel the early morning sunlight streaming onto her face, the sudden brightness painful in her hungover state. She slowly turned onto her side with a small moan of annoyance. It was in that moment, however, that her eyes shot open with surprise. Laying right next to her was the still sleeping form of Carisi.
She suddenly sat up, a move she instantly regretted as she felt a wave of nausea pass over her. She slightly swayed in her upright position as she clung tightly to the sheets. Slowly she looked down and her heart dropped as she realized that she was in nothing but her birthday suit. Tentatively she risked a glance at her partner and realized he was in the same state. Most of the sheets were crumpled up on her side of the bed not leaving much to the imagination for the Italian detective's well-toned physique.
Clutching her chest in embarrassment, Amanda finally took the time to analyze the contents of the room around her. It was not her own and not one that she recognized, but considering the person laying next to her, she reasoned that she must be in his room, in his bed, naked. Her cheeks quickly turned a dark shade of red as she began to get flashes of the previous night.
The SVU had just closed one of their hardest hitting cases. A teenager was habitually being abused by his mother's boyfriend, both physically and emotionally. Carisi was the lead detective on the case and had instantly formed a bond with the kid, seeing much of his younger self in the boy. Carisi had confided in Amanda that it hurt him that the boy's own mother was complicit in the abuse, doing nothing to protect her son from the hands of her boyfriend. "That's not how a family should be" Amanda remembered Carisi saying dejectedly with a sad shake of his head.
The case struck close to home for Carisi, but it wasn't terrible, until the trial began, that is. The young teenager suffered from many problems due to his prolonged abuse. One day toward the end of the ordeal the boy finally snapped, lashing out at the man who had hurt him so much. He attacked the older man with a long knife on the court house stairs. It had all happened so fast right in front of Carrisi's eyes. The boy was able to kill the man he hated most but was instantly shot dead by an officer of the court.
"Come on, I'll buy you a drink" Amanda remembered offering him the night before, it was Friday and her babysitter was going to spend the night anyway. Amanda had anticipated it becoming an all nighter after the incident, she didn't need to rush home to Jesse. Amanda was actually surprised when he had taken her up on her offer. Unfortunately, the one drink became many more as they both lost their inhibitions with the potent liquid they consumed. Amanda didn't remember how they made it to Carisi's apartment, but just looking at her exposed state sent chilling visions of the passion they had shared afterward.
"Hmm" Carisi moaned as he shifted in bed, still very much asleep. Amanda's heartbeat increased rapidly as she was pulled from her recollection. She couldn't bear to see her partner's reaction to her being in his bed. She didn't want to see the regret that would be in his eyes after he would realize the situation they had placed themselves in. Silently she rose from the bed and collected her clothes that laid across her partner's floor, praying that Carisi would not wake up and hoping that he would have no recollection of their actions.
By the time Monday morning came around, the late-night romp was still at the forefront of her mind. She had been too nervous and embarrassed to call or even text Carisi but it seemed so was he because she did not hear from him the entire weekend. She was afraid. She was afraid of destroying her partnership with Carisi over one drunken mistake. Amanda had never been good in relationships, most of them ended in disaster with one, or both, of them leaving with emotional scars. She didn't want to ruin the comfortable friendship she now had with Carisi.
Somehow, Amanda had arrived at the precinct before her partner. She instantly dove straight into her work, hoping that if she was busy Carisi would not come up to her and talk about their one-night stand. She dreaded the impending awkward conversation. She knew he would tell her it was all a mistake, she didn't know why but she knew if he said those words it would hurt her. She also feared that he would say that he was sorry and that he took things too far in his drunken state. That was the last thing she wanted. She didn't want him to apologize like it was all his fault, she knew him well enough to know he could think that way.
Her eyes wandered to the squad room entranceway every once and a while to see if he had arrived. When he finally did, she couldn't help but notice how her nerve ends seemed to light on fire, her mind pulling her back to that night and replaying all that they did. She quickly put her head down and resumed her work as she tried her best to hide the way her face had become so flushed.
Carisi seemed to have been doing better than he had been the last time he was at work. Amanda kept observing him from the corner of her eye as he worked on the plethora of paperwork that came with their job. The Italian detective didn't seem the least bit off to Amanda, which was off putting for her. She kept anticipating him to pull her into the bunks so they could talk, but he never made such a move. He treated her like it was any other day at the office. This lack of development left Amanda feeling on edge the whole day.
"Hey, Boo" Fin said quickly as he leaned over his desk "you feeling okay? You've been kind of quiet and non-combative" the elder detective observed with a small smirk, but concern still shown in his eyes. If there was any person who could read Amanda when she didn't want them too, it was Fin. The elder man had been with her through all of her trials and tribulations since the moment she moved to the Big Apple. He had gained the respect of Amanda almost immediately, something that she almost never gave out so quickly.
"Yeah, yeah," Amanda said with a slight eye roll as she waved him off "I'm fine, just tired you know. Jesse is in the midst of her terrible twos. I would never have expected after all my time on the force, my biggest opponent would be my own daughter" she lied easily. It was true that Jesse was getting to her rambunctious stage, but Amanda's current state wasn't the result of her little girl's mishaps.
"Well she is your daughter so I can expect her to be extra stubborn, and from what I've seen of her, the apple doesn't fall from the tree" he responded with a slight chuckle. He quickly had to dodge a pen that was thrown at him, not moving fast enough and the instrument hitting him square in the chest. "I just hope you put her in martial arts, with your temper and physical abilities she would make a fearsome opponent" he added which caused him to be hit with a wadded-up sticky note this time as Amanda playfully chuckled along with him, she couldn't help but to agree.
The day carried on much like any other Monday. It wasn't until after she had left for home for the night that Amanda began to wonder if Carisi even remembered anything. He had drunk more than she had that Friday. If he did have any imagines in his head, he may have simply chalked those up to a drunken dream or fantasy. In one regard, Amanda let out a large sigh of relief, but a different side of her was surprisingly disappointed, and that part terrified her.