A/N: Only a bit more than a week between updates this time! Proud of myself! But the moving process is now in full swing so writing will be on the back burner for a little while. When I have updates ready, I will post.

For now, enjoy this chapter and leave a review!


Olivia wished she could say that her conversation with Elliot had provided the closure she needed to finally put him behind her once and for all, but it seemed to have had the opposite effect on her. She caught herself thinking about him more than ever before. Filling out paperwork, interviewing potential new detectives, grabbing a bite to eat, lying in bed listening to Noah's breathing on the baby monitor. Elliot had taken up permanent residence in her mind.

Sometimes she wondered what he was doing at the moment or what his life looked like now. But mostly she thought about what he had told her at the bar. And what he hadn't told her. "I was in a bad place, Olivia. A really bad, really dark place." She heard his words over and over in her mind and she couldn't help the curiosity that tugged at her. She wanted to know more.

It made her feel just the slightest bit better to know that Elliot's life hadn't been all good times since he left and she hated herself for taking any bit of solace in his pain. She had been in a very dark place herself and she wouldn't wish it on her worst enemy. But somehow, knowing that Elliot had been hurting as well, made her feel less alone.

The sounds of Ed's grunts brought her back to the present. On the other side of the kitchen, he was struggling to open a jar of sauce for the pasta that he had insisted on making her for dinner. Olivia sipped her wine, unsure if she should offer to help. Most men took offers of assistance as a threat to their masculinity, she knew. After a few more tries and running it under warm water, the jar gave way under Ed's grip.

The way he moved around the kitchen was determined, but it didn't strike Olivia as very natural. Ed was always a bit stiff, but he seemed more so tonight. She looked over her shoulder to see Noah building a tower with his Legos on the living room floor and she smiled at her son.

"So how's the search for the new detective coming along?" Ed asked as he stirred the pasta to keep the noodles from sticking.

"It's coming," Olivia answered taking the last sip of her wine. "A few good candidates, but I don't think I've found the right person just yet."

"What do you mean? They have a clean record, good recs, they seem like a decent person who would be able to handle the vics, you hire 'em. Takes one more thing off your plate."

Olivia shook her head but Ed couldn't see it as he tended to the stove. It wasn't just about how the applicants looked on paper. It needed to feel right. To feel like a good fit. Sure, she would love to have one less thing to worry about, but she wasn't going to sacrifice the quality of her unit to make her life any easier. "I don't know," she said, knowing Ed just wouldn't understand.

She reached for the bottle of wine to refill her glass when she heard her phone ringing from across the room. It was a Saturday night and she wasn't expecting any calls. She made her way over to the coffee table to grab it and Noah looked up at her. He asked, "Mommy leaving?"

"No, baby. Mommy's staying here with you," she answered, feeling a pang in her chest at the fact that her son associated her phone ringing with his mother leaving him.

The number wasn't one she recognized, but she picked it up nevertheless. "Benson."

She heard the caller take a deep breath before a shaky voice asked, "Olivia? I'm so sorry to bother you. Is now a bad time? Can you talk?" Lizzie. Olivia turned around to see Ed still working in the kitchen, unconcerned about who was calling her. There was no way she could have this conversation in front of him.

"It's fine. Just hold on one second," she told Lizzie, pressing the phone into her chest to muffle the microphone.

"Ed, it's work. I'm just going to take it in my room. Keep an eye on Noah?" She doubted he would get suspicious. Ed knew that her cases involved confidential information that he could not be privy to and on top of that, she didn't like to discuss her work in front of Noah.

When he nodded in assent, Olivia moved to her bedroom, closing the door behind her. She sat down on the bed and pulled a throw pillow into her lap, working the edges of it with her fingers. The phone back at her ear, she asked, "What is it, sweetie? Are you okay?"

"I… I don't know." Olivia could hear it in Lizzie's voice. The timidness, the insecurity, it reminded her too much of herself.

Lizzie drew in another breath, her sniffle giving away the tears that Olivia could imagine rolling down her pale cheeks. "I'm… I can't sleep, Liv. I try and I try. I've been staying with my mom and I lay in my bed all day with the curtains drawn and I just stare at the ceiling willing myself to fall asleep, but I can't. And at night, I have to keep all the lights on, and I'm too scared to fall asleep. I just… I'm so tired, Liv. I just want to sleep. But when I close my eyes, I see it. I feel… him."

Lizzie's rushed words stimulated Olivia's tear ducts and her vision became cloudy as she gripped the phone tighter. "I know, Lizzie. I know how scary it is and how sick you feel. But you need to know that you are safe now. He can't touch you. He can't hurt you, Lizzie. I promise."

Quiet sobs echoed through the phone. Olivia wished she could hold the young woman, but she knew that if Lizzie was anything like her, she probably wasn't letting anyone touch her yet. Olivia stayed on the line as Lizzie cried, whispering words of assurance every so often. Her heart was in a vice grip. The victims had always affected her deeply, but the pull grew stronger after becoming a victim herself, and this was no normal victim. This was Lizzie, the daughter of the man that had been her everything for over a decade. She loved this girl and wanted to protect her as much as if she were her own child.

After a few minutes, there was a soft knock on the door and Ed called out, "Liv, dinner's ready."

Lizzie must have heard the commotion because all of the sudden, she took a sharp breath, "I'm so sorry, Liv. I shouldn't have called. I'm sorry."

"Lizzie, no-" And the line went dead.

Olivia tried to pull herself together, but before she could wipe her eyes, Ed was peeking his head in the door. "Liv, dinner-." He stopped when he saw her tear-streaked face and her red eyes.

Walking into the bedroom and closing the door behind him, he came to sit next to her on the bed. "What's going on?" He didn't sound too concerned. It seemed to Olivia like he was just asking because he thought he should. And now Lizzie was gone. Olivia felt her chest starting tighten. She threw the pillow that have been resting in her lap down onto the bed and stood up.

"I don't really want to talk about it, Ed."

"Olivia, you're clearly upset," he said, standing up with her. "Who was that?"

Without thinking about it, she answered, "That's none of your business. It's personal."

Ed took a step back. "I'm sorry. I was under the impression that we were personal." He turned around and walked out of the bedroom, being careful not to slam the door and upset Noah.

Olivia ran her hands through her hair. She could chase after Ed and apologize, but her phone sat staring at her from its place on her bed. It was an easy decision. She picked it up and called Lizzie back. It rang twice before going to voicemail. She called back once more but she knew Lizzie wouldn't answer.

After her own traumas, Olivia hadn't wanted to feel like she was bothering anyone by unburdening herself on them. "Lizzie. Please call me. You aren't bothering me. Please." But she knew Lizzie wouldn't call.

After washing herself and cleaning herself up, Olivia made her way out into the kitchen. Ed was plating the pasta, but he didn't look too happy about it. "Dinner," he mumbled. Olivia scooped up Noah and placed him in his high chair.

Other than Noah's gibberish, they ate mostly in silence. Olivia cut up Noah's pasta and tended to her son throughout dinner, but Ed barely looked up from his plate. She wondered if she should tell him about Lizzie, but that would inevitably lead to a discussion about Elliot and she wanted to avoid that conversation with Ed for as long as possible.

It was not like Elliot was back in her life. They had had one conversation. Ed was her boyfriend, but that didn't give him the right to know every person she spoke to. He definitely didn't need to know that she had been thinking about Elliot's stormy blue eyes all week.

She was just wiping off Noah's sauce-stained face with a wet paper towel when Ed finally looked up at her. "I think we need to talk, Olivia."

Before she could answer, Noah interrupted, "I'm sleepy, Mommy." His eyes were red from his little fists rubbing them frantically.

"Let me just bathe him and put him down, okay?" Ed nodded and Olivia left him to clean up while she went through Noah's bedtime routine.

As she splashed along with her son and washed his soft skin, she thought about Ed. Even on the nights he slept over, he was never a part of Noah's bedtime routine. She always bathed Noah, rubbed baby lotion over his constantly moving limbs, read him a story in the rocking chair, and kissed him goodnight alone.

Their mother-son time meant everything to her, but there was still a part of her that ached for a family of three. A father for her son who would splash along with them, chase Noah down when he tried to escape her slippery, lotion-covered hands, read him books in a deep, but soothing voice. But when she tried to picture Ed in the role, it didn't feel right. She tried to replace the dark shadow casted over the man's face with Ed's, but it was like forcing together two puzzle pieces that were clearly not meant to interlock.

Then again, that man might never come along and Olivia didn't know how much longer she should hold out hope until it just became embarrassing. She was pushing 50 and she did enjoy the time she spent with Ed. Maybe that was enough.

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Once she was sure that Noah was fast asleep, Olivia kissed his forehead once again and closed the door quietly behind her. Ed was sitting on the couch with a beer in one hand and the remote in the other. The television was muted on a highlight reel from some football game. When he saw Olivia approaching, he switched it off. "So?" He asked as Olivia took a seat next to him.

"So what, Ed?" She turned to face him, bringing her right leg up on the couch and tucking it underneath herself.

"So are you going to talk to me about what is going on with you?" He was upset, that much was clear, but he was trying to keep it together.

"We caught a case recently that was very personal to me," she said, hoping to dance around the specifics. "It's been hard for me to deal with."

"Are you talking to Lindstrom about it?"

Olivia knew she should be glad that he wasn't prying, but it upset her that he didn't even seem to care enough to press for more information. If something was bothering her, shouldn't he want to try to talk it through with her as well? To support her and be there for her? She didn't want his support with this one, but she wanted him to want to support her. Olivia rubbed her temples as she felt a migraine coming on.

"I have an appointment with him this week." The morning after seeing Elliot, she had called Lindstrom on her way to the precinct and set up a session with him for Wednesday. In just 24 hours she had accumulated sessions worth of material. Tonight was just the icing on the cake.

"That's good," Ed said, cracking his knuckles. "Maybe I'm making this up but I feel like things have been different between us the last few months. Maybe we should try to take that trip to Paris. Just the two of us. A little romance to recharge us." He was looking at the black television screen as he spoke.

At the beginning of the summer, when he told her he was leaving IAB, he had also proposed a trip to Paris. Olivia, Noah, and himself for three weeks. They talked about it for weeks but then Ed decided to stay at IAB and work got busier and life got more hectic and the conversation came up less and less often until it was just assumed that they wouldn't be going anytime soon. Now he was bringing it up again, but this time he didn't want to bring Noah with them, evidently.

Olivia's frustration levels were rising and a splitting headache overwhelmed her. Paris was her dream. Dream trips were not meant to be taken when relationships were on rocky ground. The faceless man of her fantasies, the one who treated Noah like his own, who knew and loved every part of Olivia, that was who she wanted to go to Paris with.

She went with an understated rejection, "I don't think that Paris is the answer to our problems. After my appointment this week, let's do dinner and talk about things. About us. Okay? Maybe once we've worked through this rough patch, we can reconsider Paris."

Ed reached for her hand and brought it to his lips, giving it a quick peck. "I just want us to be good, Olivia."

She looked down at their joined hands and back up into Ed's eyes. The first thought she had was that they were much lighter than Elliot's. "I know," Olivia said.


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