Law and Order: SVU is the intellectual property of Dick Wolf. The use of the characters, settings, and plotlines is not malicious. This is a work of fiction.
"Well," Elliot sighed, walking over to Olivia and handing her a glass of champagne, "I'm officially divorced. Leave it to Mason to ruin a good party by handing me legal documents."
She took a small sip from her glass, her arms folded, and said, "This isn't a good party. And that's...that's a good thing, right? Everything is...over."
"Not everything," he said with a small grin. "Some things...are just beginning." He winked at her and sipped his own champagne, mentally noting the ways he could get her out of her slinky red dress before dawn.
"Oh, do I need to get a fire extinguisher?" a voice cracked, breaking through their silence.
Olivia turned to see Alex Cabot, a friend and colleague, standing beside her with a martini in her hand. She looked menacing, her gaze flitting from Olivia to Elliot. "What?" Olivia finally replied.
Alex chuckled. "The look you two just gave each other...there were a lot of sparks there." She shrugged and took a sip of her drink. "Just saying."
"Have another martini, Alex," Olivia said, rolling her eyes. "Maybe you'll drink yourself back to sober."
"Oh, please," Alex spat back. "Deny it all you want, but, uh, I know what I'm seeing here. It's New Year's Eve, you two should make a couple resolutions...and you know what they say about that midnight kiss." She leaned into Olivia and lowered her voice. "And if you're trying to keep him at arms length because of his wife, you should know, as of this morning, he's single."
Olivia smirked and suppressed the urge to laugh. "You really don't know anything, do you?" She sipped her champagne and turned away from Alex, shooting Elliot a smoldering glare. "Detective Cabot's onto us. Do we have an escape route planned?"
He laughed and put his left hand on the small of her back, and he walked, guiding her away from Alex and toward a group of people in the corner of the room. "Hey, guys," he said, downing the rest of his champagne.
"Stabler, Happy New Year, man," Fin said, raising his glass in greeting. "And Benson...damn, girl, who knew you were hiding those dangerous curves under your suits?"
"I did," Elliot said with a smirk, dropping his empty glass onto the tray of a passing waiter, exchanging it for a full one.
Fin narrowed his eyes, but let the comment go, returning his attention to Olivia. "You making any resolutions, tonight?"
Olivia sipped and nodded. "Just one, but it's pretty major." She turned her head, hearing someone cough, and said, "Hi, John."
John Munch tilted his head. "Hello, Red Queen." He bowed in jest and added, "And the happiest of New Years to you."
Elliot laughed and looked at Fin. "He's loaded already, isn't he?"
Fin rolled his eyes. "Man, you have no idea. Beyond lit. He spent twenty minutes telling his crazy government conspiracy theories to the lamp, over there."
"Great," Elliot scoffed, and then he looked around. "You see Cragen, anywhere?"
Fin looped an arm around the shoulders of the woman next to him, shaking his head. "No sign of him, yet," he said. "Weird, he's usually the first one of us at these things."
"Yeah," Elliot breathed, taking a long swig of his drink.
"What about you," Fin said, lightly back-handing Elliot in the chest. "What's your resolution?"
"Tonight," Elliot said, his eyes traveling toward Olivia, "I'm promising myself...and someone else...that I'm..."
"All hail the chief!" Munch shouted, cutting into Elliot's words. He slapped Cragen on the back and pulled him into the small circle. "I knew someone was missing!"
Cragen blinked rapidly a few times. "We don't need a breathalyzer to tell this one's three sheets to the wind, huh?" He shook his head and then shook hands with Fin and Elliot, and then gave Olivia a small hug. "Happy New Year, everyone."
"Same to you, Cap," Olivia said with a smile.
Elliot smoothed his hand up and down her back a few times, taking another long drink, and then handed her his glass. "Hold this for me?"
"Sure," she told him, her knitted brow giving away her confusion. She watched him move over to Cragen and whisper something to him, and the two men walked away, fading from view.
"What's up with them?" Fin asked, jutting his chin in their direction.
"I have no idea," Olivia returned, but she immediately but her lip and felt her stomach churn. She did have an idea, after all. She felt someone tap her on the shoulder, and she turned around to greet them.
"A two-fisted-drink kinda night?" the man asked, pointing to the half-empty champagne glass in each of her hands.
"Oh, no," she smiled politely, "This one's Elliot's." She held her right hand a bit higher.
"Oh, right, right, Elliot," the man said with a slight disdain. "Where is that partner of yours? I need to speak to him."
"Talking to Cragen, by the bar," she said. "We couldn't have possibly done anything to piss you off, tonight, Tucker, so why do you..."
Ed Tucker looked honestly offended as he held up his left hand. "Benson, I'm not always out for your asses," he said snidely. "The man called me this morning. Left a voicemail, told me he needed to talk to me. I'm not chasing him down to string him up." He grinned and flattened out his tie. "Not tonight, anyway."
Olivia had gone white, losing track of the conversation somewhere in the middle. She thrust both champagne glasses into Tucker's hands and walked away from him fast, her heels clicking rapidly against the marble floor as she headed for the bar. For Elliot. Reaching him, she grabbed hold of his arm and pulled hard.
"Ow! Hey!" He spun around and stared at her, slightly pissed. "Rude!"
"Oh, I'm rude? You're the one using tonight as an opportunity to quit on me!" She ran both hands through her hair as he chest heaved. "Christ, Elliot, you can't do this to..."
"Quit?" he hissed, grabbing both of her hands and pulling them down, holding them tight. "Baby, I'm not quitting."
"Tucker told me you called him," Olivia said, shaking. "First, you pull Cragen over here for a man-to-man chat, then Tucker tells me you...what the hell, Elliot?"
"I'm not quitting," he repeated, the grimace on his face now replaced by a warm smile. "That's why I needed to talk to Cragen, and I have to talk to Tucker...because of us. You said..." He pulled her closer. "Last night, you said you had every intention of kissing me, right here, and you didn't care who saw it happen." He dropped one of her hands, slid his fingers up her arm, around her neck, and into her hair. "I owed it to you...to us...to make sure that kiss wouldn't cost either of us our jobs."
"Oh, my God," she gasped, her eyes widening slightly. "You told Cragen?"
He nodded, licking his lips. "It didn't really surprise him." He shrugged and said, "We're the only ones this came as a shock to, I guess."
She tried to take a deep breath and moved further into him. "What did he say?"
"He said..." he began, tugging her hair lightly, "...that as long as it didn't affect how we work, which...let's be honest here, we've been waiting for this for years, and these feelings...they've always been there, so...nothing's going to change. Except, you know, now when we piss each other off, we can actually fuck it out."
Laughing, she dropped her head into his chest. She felt his hand massaging her scalp and playing with her hair. "Cragen isn't the problem, then. Tucker has been waiting for something like this to..."
"Baby," he said, stopping her, "He can't bog me down for this." He slid his hand around to the front of her face and cupped her chin, tugging it upward. He looked into her eyes. "What's your resolution?"
"I'm..." She froze, then, realizing he knew what it was. "I'm not going to be afraid of this. Of us."
"So start not being afraid," he whispered to her, before gently kissing her lips. "Go back over there by Fin, keep Munch from spilling any government secrets, and I will be by your side as soon as I can."
She nodded and then, spurred by a new-found assurance, she kissed him sweetly. "Don't make me wait too long. It's almost midnight, and, uh, you have a resolution to stick to, too, you know."
He smiled. "Oh, I intend to," he told her, and with one more short kiss, he left her by the bar to find Tucker.
Alex walked up next to Olivia, grinning, and said, "Taking my advice, are we?"
Olivia shook her head and sighed. "No, Alex...El and I...we...it's been a while, now." She shrugged and looked at her friend, waiting.
Alex's face fell from grin to gape. "What?" She squinted slightly. "What...how long? He just got divorced! Oh, my...you were having an..."
"No!" Olivia stopped her firmly. "No, no...I was there...the night Kathy left, he called me. It didn't happen that night, don't look at me like that!"
"Sorry," Alex offered. "Go on."
Taking a deep breath, Olivia continued. "It was...hard for him, the first week." She toyed with the small, square pendent on her necklace. "He needed me. I knew I had to be there, for him, the kids...I helped them make it through the first few weeks, and Thanksgiving." She smiled, remembering how incredible Thanksgiving was, despite the underlying drama. "I stayed with them, with...with him, and by Christmas it was...we realized what we had, what we always had. We both wanted more, we knew it...and we just..."
"Didn't want to wait anymore," Elliot finished, stepping up behind her and wrapping his arms around her waist.
Fin walked over to them with his date, then, followed by Munch and Cragen, who was smiling almost proudly. "Guys, you're gonna miss the ball drop...uh, what am I looking at, here?"
Elliot chuckled, then bent his head and kissed Olivia's neck before spinning them around to face their friends. "You're looking at the hottest couple the NYPD has ever seen!" He gratefully took two full champagne glasses from a tray on the bar. He handed one to Olivia.
Fin looked at them, confused. "What...when...how..."
"It happened...as the bests things in life usually do," Cragen said, his arms at his sides and his hands in his pockets. "When you weren't looking." He jerked his head back toward the window, and then led his team over to it.
The room filled with loud, echoing voices, counting backward from ten.
Elliot wrapped himself around Olivia, so tightly he could feel her heart beat in time with his, and he nuzzled her nose for a moment.
They shared a laugh, shared a breath, and as the widely sung chorus of "one" filled the room, they shared a kiss. A kiss that could've shattered the enormous glass window they were standing before. A kiss that would make angels weep and Shakespeare write a brand new sonnet.
"Happy New Year," he panted, pulling away from her lips but keeping his head pressed to hers.
She let the fingers of her free hand rest against his cheek as she kissed him again, a long, lingering, kiss. Against his lips, on the breathiest whisper, she spoke, "Happy New Year, El." She pecked his lips again. "Now, tell, me...what was your resolution?"
He grinned. "I have everything I have ever dreamed of, right here in my arms, wrapped in red," he breathed out, and after kissing her once more, he looked into her eyes. "I am never letting go."
Happy New Year! Peace and Love
Jo
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