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Invader
Dick Wolf owns everybody, but Dottie is mine.
Feedback needed.
That's all.
- Chapter 1 –
Trespassing
"Who the hell she thinks she is?"
A quite pissed Alexandra Cabot muttered with irritation when the key in her right hand turned inside the lock. These words and the noise the door made when opened were the only sounds at 9:00 pm, in the dim corridor on the 4th floor of the old building where Olivia Benson lived.
Another fight over a case and, this time the ADA wasn't willing to reconsider the detective's behavior. 'Olivia's intensity' went too far.
And, totally ignoring her after the Press Conference to inform the public about the closure of the case that ended with the arrest of Jason Hill Junior that afternoon as Olivia did, oh, no, as a Cabot, she wasn't used to be treated like that. They hadn't any kind of serious commitment, of course, but she deserved a little more respect.
'And that redhead bitch perched on her desk!' Her blood boiled when the vision came to her mind once more. She hated feeling such indescribable affliction.
They were casual lovers in the essence of the term, and they're motivations were purely hedonistic, or so it seemed but, now. . .
So far, Alex had succeeded into not rationalize what had changed, maybe as a form of self-preservation, she couldn't say. Anyway, whatever it was, it didn't matter anymore. She was through with Olivia Benson and that was all.
Closing the door behind, an absolute silence surrounded her and, once more, thoughts about being doing something wrong assaulted her.
A swift touch on the switch and the whole place exploded in light.
'Nonsense! I'm just picking up my things while she's away. I'm doing nothing wrong.' Alex, eyebrows furrowed in reflection, nodded reassuringly. 'I'm just preventing an embarrassing moment for both of us'.
The thought renewed her drive. The apartment's key then, firmly held in one of her hands, was kept inside of the back pocket of the tight fitting black jeans she was wearing.
However, the blonde didn't move yet, remaining leant against the door, pensive. Embracing herself, she felt in her hands the soft texture of the sweater that nicely completed her dressing.
The delicate red cashmere piece was Olivia's once. The detective borrowed it to her on a cold autumn day, when the temperature dropped more then the usual, abruptly.
It happened a few months after the ADA had started working with the SVU squad, more then two years before. Alex had a clear memory of the occasion. That was the first time she felt something different, exciting really, related to the female detective.
At the 1-6 Precinct, after having a reunion with Cragen, the young and beautiful ADA stopped by the detectives Benson and Stabler's desks on her way out, just to say good bye. Alex was making an extra effort into being polite with them, once their work relation wasn't being as easy as she hoped. They were good people, she knew that already but, well, they were also as strong willed as herself, and that had led to a few unpleasant situations so far.
Olivia noticed that she was shaking, wearing only one of her impeccable tailored suits. The expensive outfit could do a lot for her figure, elegantly outlining her perfect forms, but, having forgotten her coat at the office, she was freezing because the thin fabric couldn't do much to keep her warm.
Out of concern, Olivia took the red sweater from her locker, offering it to the ADA, suggesting that she could put it under the cream silken blouse she was wearing with the stylish charcoal colored suit.
"No one will notice, Cabot" Olivia said with a wide smile.
The ADA didn't answer promptly. She was amazed because that was the first time she saw Olivia smiling. She wouldn't forget a smile like that.
There was something else, though. In a certain way, the smile exposed Olivia's fragility, a deep sadness, something Alex missed so far and once revealed that infinite sorrow would always concern her. She had eyes then to see more then she wanted, her first step into an unknown territory.
Olivia insisted, taking her off from that momentary trance and, still pleasingly surprised by the detective's gentleness, Alex accepted the offer.
At the interrogative expression on her face, Olivia understood and told her to change inside one of the bathrooms. The district was especially loaded with people that day and Alex asked to the detective to go with her and watch the door.
Olivia inexplicably hesitated at first but, at Alex's inquiring eyes, she finally agreed.
Once inside, Olivia stayed at the latch-less door, holding it closed while Alex began to take off her jacket and blouse in front of a mirror.
An observant person by nature, to Alex was evident Olivia's discomfort, her uneasiness into being there and seeing her like that. And, for some reason she didn't identified completely at that moment, it felt good.
'Oh,' She thought, 'The rumors.'
A little smile crept up on her lips at the vision of Olivia looking to the bathroom ceiling.
As a memory inside another, Alex recalled one of Jack McCoy's outrageous indiscretions one night, and her smile grew wider at the same time the cold air hit her exposed skin in the middle of the bathroom.
All the significant members of the DA's office were invited to have dinner at Arthur Branch's house for his birthday. They were already at the table, and McCoy was sat at her left side.
Despite noticing that Jack McCoy had drunk a little more than what could be considered convenient, when he asked her if it was true that she had accepted the task of prosecuting only sexual crimes and she said yes, she couldn't guess what was to come next.
"And you'll work, according with what I've heard, with the 16th Precinct SVU team…"
"Yes, Jack. I had my first meeting with Captain Cragen this morning and…"
"Be careful, okay?" He interrupted her words. Eyebrows arched, and that expression of being the exclusive owner of the truth in the whole world innerved her as always.
"Why?" She asked cautiously.
"There's this… Female detective, you know? Olivia Benson, a beautiful piece of ass, by the way…" He seemed confused, digressing about the woman, "Excuse me, please, don't take me wrong, Alex, she's very competent too. The best I should say, and she'll work with you but… Take care, Alexandra."
"Why?" Alex asked again. McCoy could be drunk but, now, Alex was irremediably curious.
"She's a lesbian." He blurted.
She looked at his face and said nothing for a few seconds. The ice in her eyes could have frozen him right were he was. Then, looking away, she finally reacted verbally to his 'information'.
"And so?"
That was all Alex said, concealing her shock, but not because of what she just had heard, but at the improper behavior she was having the distaste to witness.
Sighing and trying only to concentrate in the salad on her plate, she deliberately ignored him. He insisted though, into making other comments on 'the competent, and very attractive, Olivia Benson'. And, oh, on 'the beautiful, stunning Abbie Carmichael'. According with the words coming from him, which she was trying not to hear, they were lovers.
However, at the mention of the other ADA, her colleague, for Christ's sake, Alex snapped and was about to reply when the lady at her right began to laugh enjoyably.
"Jack, Jack…" She said merrily, "Stop it, please!"
Dottie Frommer was one of Branch's assistants, an agreeable middle aged woman, and her words had the power of making him shut up immediately. Alex looked to one and then to the other.
By the expression in McCoy's eyes, Alex could see that he feared that more would come. And, the constant grinning on Dottie's lips confirmed it.
"Oh, Jack, don't be mean," After a brief moment of awkward silence, Dottie continued in a slightly mocking tone of voice, "Just because a woman let you down, avoiding your advances, it doesn't make her a dyke."
More then amused by the stunned expression on McCoy's face, now Alex was also embarrassed. Noticing it, Dottie hurried into soothing her.
"Come on, Miss Cabot!" She whispered and only the blonde could hear her then. "It's all about Jack's wounded pride. You see, he hit on them both. And was rejected. Apparently he can't deal with being discarded by beautiful women, so…"
"They are having an affair!" He said a little stridently, because the two women seemed to be ignoring him. Some other faces around the table turned in his direction.
"I'm sure about it!" He completed in low voice, still trying to call Alex's attention. He was also upset, reacting to whatever Dottie could be revealing to Alex so furtively.
"Those two beautiful, beautiful women, they… God! What a waste!" He completed disdainfully.
At McCoy's insistence on the matter, Dottie almost lost her temper. But, she didn't.
"And, if this is the case, Jack, if they're really having an affair," The elderly woman began, defiantly, "First, this is nobody's business. And, second, my friend, how do you explain that a guy named Cassidy, Brian, was transferred from the SVU squad because of the torrid affair he had with Benson, Olivia. Between them, Cragen chose the skilled, proficient Olivia after having seriously warned her, and got rid of Cassidy in the blink of an eye, deceiving everybody in the department, the IAB, to be precise, evaporating whatever suspicions they might have then. As well as at the Department of Justice, at the NYPD only professional relations are encouraged, and anything else, isn't it Jack?"
A completely dazed and google-eyed McCoy became motionless, speechless and, as magic, after a second he seemed to have recovered his common sense. Next, there he was entangled in a conversation about basketball with someone else across the table.
"Look, honey" Dottie confided to Alex in an assuaging manner. "I don't know if Benson is a lesbian, or if she's bisexual, there are rumors, sure, but it really doesn't matter. Jack's warnings are improper and completely unnecessary; she's a fine person, you'll see that."
Those scenes came in flashes to Alex's mind, and then, shivering, she finally put on the sweater. All the time, her eyes were on Olivia's image, reflected in front of her. Rejoicing into extending a little more the detective's torture, she remained in front of the mirror for more time than necessary, adjusting the piece that seemed simply perfect on her body.
At last, savoring the awkward expression on Olivia's face, Alex said that she had loved the cloth and asked for her opinion.
"It's… It's fine, Cabot," Olivia sighed, glancing at her and then looking to the floor. "And, you know what, counselor?" Olivia raised her eyes and said with a nod, "Keep it!"
"Oh, no, I can't accept it…I'll give it back to you…"
"Yes, you can, Alex, don't be silly. And, anyway, it fits better in you than in me!"
"I seriously doubt it, Olivia, and I really can't …"
Someone knocked on the bathroom door interrupting their conversation. Alex hastily dressed the rest of her clothes and they leaved the place.
The rumors she heard about Detective Benson were true, after all.
When Alex was leaving the squad room that cold afternoon, something else was warming her than only Olivia's sweater. She could smell the faint scent through her clothes. That was Olivia's perfume.
Since the beginning she didn't whish to decipher the reason why what she had experienced in the 1-6 made her feel so elated; and that day her mind was occupied into intentionally leave that issue aside, focusing only into find a way to return the detective's unexpected gift.
A week after that day, and that was another vivid recall, Olivia was at her office revising files about some of the cases they were working on. Elliot Stabler, Olivia's partner, hadn't come with her so, unusually, they were alone.
She was apprehensive, stealthily glancing at the detective from time to time. Concentrated on files, reports, and other documents related to the case, Olivia hadn't noticed her tension or her furtive behavior.
At the end of the day, having accomplished their task, Alex stood up and walked towards the cabinets by the window. Preparing to leave the place, Olivia had already gathered her things when, on the ADA's desk in front of her, a box elegantly wrapped appeared.
Taken by surprise, the detective looked up to Alex, over her right shoulder.
"What…?"
Alex moved away, rapidly returning to her seat, feeling her cheeks becoming slightly warm. 'Jesus, am I blushing in front of her?' She was worried about that, however, still resisting against completely make obvious her nervousness.
"It's nothing, detective," She struggled to say it as collectedly as possible, almost recovered from that flitting moment of weakness, "It's just… How could I say? It's just a little reciprocation for your kindness a couple of weeks ago. And, by the way," She smiled, "I love my new sweater."
"This wasn't necessary, Alex. I…"
"I know, but I insist. Please, take it." Alex said standing up and walking casually around her desk, removing her glasses. "Anyway, detective," She reasoned, "I think it might be useful on some long cold night of work. Don't you agree?
"You bet, counselor" Olivia said sighing deeply while admiring the nice handmade crochet dark blue scarf inside the box. "Thank you!" she said sincerely and, looking straight into Alex's face, she did that again. She smiled.
'Oh, God!' Alex sighed.
The ADA closed the door when Olivia finally left that day. The expressions on the detective's face, when she saw the box, and after that, when she wrapped the scarf around her neck, were the sweetest things she had seen lately and wherever she was, they kept coming to her mind for days.
Still leaned on Olivia's apartment door and, as warm tears had welled in her eyes, blurring her vision, Alex wiped them with trembling hands, knowing full well that many others would roll down her face that night.
The anger and the resentment she had felt since the fight with Olivia three days before, which was still intense especially after the rather indifferent treatment received from the detective that afternoon, all this seemed to disappear, giving place to that sudden and immense sadness.
It was more like a sense of loss of something important, whose significance had been neglected all the time. Something left aside, somehow denied, and that now was reclaiming attention.
She was also feeling powerless to fight against those remembrances. And, as strange as it could seem now, they were welcomed. Pieces of their past together, at work or at that place, those few stolen hours when their agendas allowed.
Glancing around Olivia's small but singularly inviting apartment she could feel her nerves slowly relaxing. All clean and tidy, that place always had that effect on her. She had always felt good there.
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