Disclaimer: I do not own Law and Order SVU or any of its characters
A/N: This is a story that has been bobbing around in my head ever since I learned the ages of Olivia and Amanda's actresses. I thought it would be interesting to poke around with the idea of the two having a closer bond. As per usual please forgive any spelling or grammar mistakes, I am dyslexic and spell check can only do so much. I do proof read before I post anything several times, but its funny how much can actually slip by me. Anyways... enjoy :)
"Come on Anita, this is your last chance to do what's right for yourself and your little girl" Olivia said in a stern but calm voice.
The SVU squad had recently caught a disturbing case. A serial rapist had been kidnapping women in their twenties and keeping them in his basement as he assaulted them for three days before releasing them in one park or another. They would be found the next day with no memories of the events which lead them up to that point. There had been DNA present on every victim, but nothing was matched in CODIS, or any of the other DNA data bases at their disposal.
The team had finally caught a break when the latest victim seemed to have had some natural resistance to the drugs used on her, and was able recall some key details of the house she was kept in as well as describe the man who held her. This lead them to Carlos Anastasio, a refrigerated truck driver who held routes that coincided with the areas all of the girls were abducted from. This information allowed for SVU to search Anastasio's house with a warrant and found the basement the girls were held in as well as video evidence of the assaults. All that was left to do was find the bastard and lock him away for life, but here inlaid SVU's current dilemma. Anastasio was nowhere to be found, but he left behind his wife and daughter in his haste for escape.
"You can't honestly think I believe that you had no idea what your husband was doing down in the basement, do you?" Olivia tried again to have the latin woman in front of her come clean. At this Anita shook her head violently as she rocked back and forth in her chair. She was sitting in an interrogation room at the one six, while her daughter was in the common area playing with Carisi, waiting for child services to arrive.
"You have to believe me" Anita cried "My husband is very demanding, and he can become violent if I ask to many questions. Carlos made sure Paula and I spent most of our time upstairs, away from his work place"
"But you did have questions then? Right" Amanda spoke up trying a different angle to have the frightened woman speak. Anita nodded.
"I would hear crying some times at night, and when Carlos would finally crawl into bed he would smell of another woman's fear, it was always a smell that gave me the shivers I would ask him to shower before he came to bed but some times he refused and I would leave to sleep in Paula's room" Anita confessed
"What happened when you confronted him about the crying?" Olivia asked trying to keep the flow going.
"He would tell me it was the neighbors fighting again. But he would give me the look that if I asked anymore I would be the one paying the price so I just looked the other way" the sobbing woman said "I knew something was going on, but I just didn't want to believe it"
The two female detectives knew that this woman suffered from the knowledge of what her husband had done, and how she was practically complicit in the crime. They also realized that she was in fear for her life as well as that of her daughter's, a severe form of domestic abuse had been practiced upon them for years.
'This is your chance, Anita, to get away from your abusive husband for good, just tell us where he would go" Olivia asked gently as she reached out to grab the latin woman's hand.
Anita quickly pulled away and sat back in her chair as she wrapped her arms around herself "But I love him, no matter what he's done. I will not let you put him in prison like some sort of animal"
"He is an animal" Olivia said harshly as her temper began to rise "In fact he is less then an animal, he tortured women, used them as his toys and then discarded them like yesterdays trash. He hurt them in a permanent way, and right now we can charge you as an accomplice to all of it. You will go to jail for a very long time" the brunette detective finished, hoping this could at least scare the woman into cooperating
"I don't care, I will never betray my Carlos" Anita finished firmly, turning her head to indicate she was done talking. Olivia was about to leave, ready to search for other leads to find Anastasio but she was halted when Amanda began to talk.
"I get it, you love your husband" Amanda began "but do you love your daughter too?"
"Of course I love her" Anita answered in anger, not liking the fact that the blonde detective questioned her affection for her little girl.
"Then what about her in all of this? If you go to jail Paula will be left all alone, that's quite a burden to place on a 5 year old" Amanda said in a calm and soothing voice, trying to undo the tension that had built up in the room
"They'll put her in foster care or something, she'll have a better life like that" Anita said with clear sadness displayed on her face. "I'll get to see her again, I know it. I can manage"
"Are you sure she'll be safe? That she'll really be better off living with some strangers" Amanda questioned
"What are you getting at?"
"Take it from someone whose been though the system, its not a great place to be" the blonde detective said as she leaned back in her chair folding her hands in front of herself "You move from one house to another, never feeling like you're wanted. You also have to be careful if you land in a house with a foster dad or brother who is a little bit too affectionate" she paused before continuing, allowing the implications to sink in "You resent your parents for allowing you to live in such conditions, its not the kind of place that you want to grow up in. It will simply destroy her" Amanda paused again looking straight into Anita's eyes " Or..." Amanda began again, her voice raising an octave "or she could get lucky, find a family that really does love her, shows her the affection she's always deserved. They may adopt her and she would want nothing to do with you ever again... Either way you'll lose your daughter forever"
"No. I can't lose her too" Anita whispered. She paused for almost a minute contemplating her options "alright I'll tell you where to find him" she breathed out "but please let me keep my daughter, and don't let Carlos know I gave him up" she said as tears pored freely down her cheeks. It did not take long for Anita to finish recounting the details necessary to find her husband. Fin, Carisi, and Dodds left soon after with a strike team to apprehend him.
Olivia sat in her office filling out all the necessary paper work to be done for the case, ensuring that Barba could not complain to her again about her squad's inability to fill them out on time. The Lieutenant sat back in her chair for a moment to rest her back, she could not help but notice Amanda's desk empty. Her thoughts immediately traveled to what the blonde had said in the interrogation room. She then decided to get up and stretch as an excuse to find her youngest detective.
Just as Olivia had suspected, Amanda had been in the break room fixing herself a strong cup of coffee. "Good work today, getting Anita to open up by appealing to her sense of motherhood" the elder woman offered as she stood next to the blonde to prepare her own cup of the caffeinated liquid.
"Thanks" Amanda said shyly, not used to Olivia praising her work. Rollins was well aware of her screw ups in past years and Benson was never hesitant to call her out on them. It just felt, to the young detective, that nothing but admonishment ever left her superior's mouth towards her "Ever since I've had Jesse, I've come to realize that nothing is stronger than a mother's desire to protect her child" she turned her head and mumbled "unless you're my mom" that last part did not go unnoticed by Olivia
"Was it true" the elder woman asked suddenly "what you told her, how you've been through foster care?" Benson wanted to know, but feared she would be over stepping on Amanda's desire to keep her past mostly a secret.
Silence hung in the air for several long moments, and Olivia was worried her young detective would not answer. Until... "Ya, it's true" she said quietly. Olivia just nodded, not wanting to press the woman before her too hard "I'm sorry" was all she said.
The mood became somber and the lieutenant was about to walk away when Amanda began to chuckle to herself "you know the funny part? It happened before I even met my now messed up family"
Benson was confused at this statement "what do you mean?"
Rollins took a deep breath and shrugged her shoulders "I was adopted. Not once but twice, in fact I was actually born in New York"
"Adopted? New York?" Olivia questioned. She was thoroughly confused now.
"Ya, I was born on April 13th 1980 at Mercy Hospital" Olivia's heart skipped a beat for a moment unbeknownst to her young blonde companion. "Apparently my mom gave birth at 16 and gave me up for adoption" Benson's heart was racing now "I was adopted by a nice family apparently and they moved to Georgia, but were killed when I was almost two by a drunk driver. I guess I was a difficult child because I bounced around in the system for years until I was almost 10. That's when the Rollins family took me in"
Olivia simply nodded her head "seems like you went through a lot, Amanda". Olivia was surprised at this revelation, but it made sense. She had always wondered how Beth Rollins could abandon her pregnant daughter right before she would give birth because of the mistakes her other daughter had made. Olivia guessed that Beth would always see Kim as her favorite since Amanda wasn't even her real daughter, at least not by blood.
The blonde detective shrugged her shoulders and slightly shook her head "not really, it wasn't that bad" Amanda didn't really understand why she was suddenly being so open, it was not like her. She chalked it up to finally being able let her past go. Being a mother to Jesse was truly helping her come to terms with many of her past demons. The love for her daughter was a therapeutic miracle.
Rollins sipped her coffee and sighed "lets not talk about such depressing things anymore" she said as she felt the need to get back to work
"Okay Rollins, but if you ever want to talk..." Benson left her statement open. Amanda nodded and left to her desk, regretting opening her mouth to Olivia, a woman who loved to talk about feelings and the past. She silently made a note to herself to be careful about how her new found happiest made her want to open up more.
As Olivia watched the younger woman's back retreat to her desk, her head was racing a mile a minute. Too many of the details of Rollins' past were similar to her own situation. 'It couldn't be' Benson thought to herself silently, chuckling as she momentarily thought of her own child she had given up for adoption, the same day and hospital in which her youngest detective was born.