AN: Thank you all so much for the wonderful reviews and adds! I love to know that you're out there reading! :) This chapter contains spoilers for Users, Turmoil, and Perverted. In fact a whole scene is word for word from Perverted, but I extended it to add my own storyline into it. I own nothing! Season 11 is just really inspiring to me… haha But I will be taking Perverted down a very different route, fair warning… Enjoy!
Dumbfounded. She was absolutely dumfounded. He had kissed her. She had kissed him. They'd kissed. He was still married, something he had the need to keep pointing out to her.
She sighed and stared into her reflection in her bathroom mirror. She didn't even look like herself, at least not to her. It'd been so long since she'd been intimate with anyone; unless she counted that brief encounter with Porter…
She had wanted to do more than kiss her partner and it was obvious that he had too. Things were gong to be awkward this week…
EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEOOOOOOOOOOO
And awkward it was. Throughout their next case, they both acted like nothing had happened. The crime scene photo of their victim had been leaked onto the internet. Each suspect led them to a new one. It ended up being her twisted psychiatrist that was behind the whole thing.
Their next case started out like any other: a high school girl claiming she was raped by a football player. At trial, the defense claimed they had a witness who said the girl had recanted her statement and Alex was withholding evidence. So then she was put under watch by the bar, which in turn put SVU under a watchful eye. Things got even worse when Dickie went missing.
Kathy was suddenly showing up a lot more, and her presence made Olivia uncomfortable. She'd kissed her husband. She'd dreamed of going further with her husband. She wanted her husband.
A description of a body matching Dickie's description came in. Olivia joined her partner at the crime scene. Elliot had been fearing the worst, but it turned out to be Dickie's friend instead. They found themselves working both cases. Things were still tense between them.
EEEEEEEEEEOOOOOOOOOOOO
Olivia was almost thankful when she woke up with a fever. A couple more days she could spend avoiding Elliot…and their issues…and that kiss… But of course, Elliot couldn't just leave well enough alone and showed up at her apartment.
"Have you seen a doctor?" he asked, walking in.
"No, it's just a bug."
"The Swine Flu is just a bug. Recognize him?"
Olivia looked at the jacket on Clyde, Elliot had handed her.
"No. Maybe he found the card on one of our victims and assumed that she'd talk, so he messed her up even worse and instead of coming to see us, she got revenge."
Olivia settled back down on the couch. She felt exhausted and the last thing she needed was Elliot throwing a case at her.
"Well I'll tell you what," Elliot started, picking up her blanket, "I'll figure it out, you rest. Got anyone taking care of you?"
He laid the blanket over her, tucking her in. She wasn't sure how she felt about this situation…
"No. I'm fine."
"Yeah, sure you are." Elliot placed a hand on her forehead. "You're burning up."
"101. Down from 102 last night. I'm on the mend!"
Elliot walked into her kitchen. "I'm gonna make you some tea."
"This happened outside St. John's?" Olivia asked, looking at the file again.
"Yeah and we checked, to nobody's great surprise, Clyde did not worship there." He opened her fridge. "You have absolutely no food in this house."
"They invented this great thing: it's called delivery."
Olivia got off of the couch taking the file and blanket with her. Elliot noticed some travel brochures on her counter and picked them up.
"Planning your tropical getaway?"
"A girl can dream can't she?" Olivia asked, snatching them out of his hands. "Stop snooping. I see Clyde was recently a guest at a stay he did a nickel at Attica for assault with a deadly weapon. Any chance it was over a woman?"
"It was a brawl at a bike expo. Let's get you into bed. Come on."
Olivia sighed at the remark. Oh the connotations that brought to her mind.
"You know these bike kings don't play nice," Olivia told him, as he dragged her away from the kitchen.
"I'm getting my hazard pay coming to see you. Fin's at the clubhouse."
He led her back to the couch.
"This isn't my bedroom."
Yeah if I take you in there, I may never come out. He thought to himself.
She caught him smirking.
"Are we ever going to talk about what happened a couple of weeks ago?" she finally asked.
"With Porter? I thought we already talked about that…"
"Not about Porter…"
"I should go see of Fin found anything."
"Seriously? Elliot…"
"I'm getting a divorce."
"What? It's not because of…?"
"The thing with Dickie proved to be too much for us. Look Liv, I really have to go. Feel better, okay?"
"Yeah. Yeah, I'll try."
He left. She was stunned. Divorced? Was it because of her? Or was it because of something else? Elliot Stabler was single. She couldn't let herself go there, not again. She'd been in this place before; the place where she actually found hope in having a relationship with her partner.
Olivia knew it was false hope, but this time he'd kissed her. This time, he'd admitted that there were feelings there. This time…would be different.
EEEEEEEEEEEEEOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
He couldn't believe what he was hearing. Olivia was the prime suspect in this murder? Olivia Benson? His Olivia Benson? She'd only killed twice in her entire life and they had been armed suspects who were about to commit murder. This…this wasn't her.
Elliot stared at her empty desk in front of him. She had absolutely no motive for this crime. If by some off chance she had killed the guy, she would have had a reason to do so. And from what he could see, she had none.
She'd come in to work today to clear her name. No one on the squad actually believed she was the perp, but there was so much evidence connecting her to the crime. Someone was framing his partner, he was sure of it. And then IAB came to arrest her. Elliot made it his personal mission then to do whatever it took to clear her name.
EEEEEEEEEEEEEOOOOOOOOOOOOO
"So you're getting divorced and yet you're putting your wife's house up on bail for your partner?"
"Looks that way."
He started to walk away from her.
"Elliot –."
"I know you're innocent, Liv and I wasn't about to let you sit in jail all night."
They stepped out into the night air together.
"Do you know who's trying to frame me?"
"I have a hunch. I'm checking on it tomorrow."
"I'm coming with you."
"Olivia –."
"No. I want to know who's trying to ruin my life. I'm coming."
They walked to his car in silence. They were both on edge.
"How does IAB know about Sealview?" Olivia asked as Elliot started his car.
"What are you talking about?"
"He told me that I killed Clyde because he was trying to rape me and I had a flashback to my 'experience.' He said it happened to people in my…condition."
"What condition?"
"PTSD."
He looked over at her. She was staring out the window, fidgeting nervously with her "fearlessness" necklace.
"Do you think I told someone?" he asked her.
"I don't know what to think."
"Liv, I haven't…"
"He had no right to bring that up in a line of questioning."
"Wouldn't you have?"
"What?"
"We both do it, Liv. We bring up all sorts of personal crap to get a confession. It may be a dirty trick, but there's no law against it."
Olivia sighed.
"How close did he get?" Elliot asked softly.
"Harris?"
She looked over at him as he pulled up to her apartment.
"Yeah. You've never really talked about it."
"Maybe because I didn't want to talk about it."
"What about now?"
"What are you doing, Elliot? You've barely talked to me in over a month and now you want me to talk to you about a very personal, traumatic event?"
"I'm sorry. I've just had a lot on my mind lately."
Olivia got out of the car.
"See you at eight?" she asked.
"You're the one who brought it up," Elliot pointed out.
"I just wanted to know how he knew. I didn't want to talk about it."
"See you at eight."
AN: The story will be completely original from here on out, I promise. I just had some fillery nonsense to get out of the way first. Make my day? (*cough* review *cough*) ;)