Now
Olivia had a lot on her plate with the summit- organizing her summit statement, meeting with senators. He knew most of them and was able to weed out who was pro reform and who wasn't but still, it was a lot.
She was struggling to balance everything. And no matter what he tried, he couldn't seem to get her to relax. He just couldn't wait until it was all over so he could get his wife back.
Not that watching her change the world wasn't satisfying, but he was worried. She wasn't herself and he felt so damned useless. Every time he brought up the summit thinking she needed to talk about it, she would open up, and the more and more she did, the more and more he felt like there was something else bothering her. She was nervous he knew, the summit was a big deal. It would be the foundation of their rapekit reform plan. But what she was displaying was chronic, crippling anxiety and she had no intention of bringing him into the middle of it. She pushed him away mostly. Cried over the most ridiculous things. It was scary. And she wouldn't let him help, stressing that it was only work.
By the time the big day rolled around he had chalked her behavior up to her impossible desire to have everything be perfect. These issues and SVU were so important to her, he imagined she was making herself sick trying to spear head the conversation.
Finding her curled next to the toilet a few days ago only confirmed that. If it were over anything else, they would've had a fight over her work, but because it was the summit, he let it go, and just held her and slowly fed her saltine crackers over the course of two days. Silently praying that the big day would come already.
To busy himself, he actually planned a surprise get together at their condo building. He invited everyone. Her people from SVU, his sister and the kids- much to his reluctance, Ed too. It was a hit. Just what she needed. As soon as they walked into the night club together, she lit up seeing everyone and he fell in love with the burning fire wood of her eyes all over again, watching her smile into the night. She radiated peace. Real peace. And joy.
"Being loved by you, is all I could ever ask for," she whispered to him as he held her in his arms, fighting tears. She wasn't wrong. And when he kissed her in front of everyone he knew there wasn't a thing in life that would tear them apart.
"You did all of this?" She asked as they swayed together.
She meant the decorations. The club was strewn up with flowers floor to ceiling and leading into it had been like walking through a forrest. Her favorite chef was making dinner for everyone. They had a cake.
"Of course I did," he said, drawing her near, his hand in the small of her spine pressing her as close as he could. "For you, I'd give you the world."
"Stop, I'm getting too emotional." She warned.
"So get emotional." His lips brushed her cheek bone, and then brushed the softness below. "This is your life baby. I'm here with you. You're here with me. It's been a long time coming for both of us but we're here. That's all that matters."
"Stop talking."
"I'm just so proud of you. You're the strongest person I know, Liv. Everything you've been through, everything you're doing. You're a fighter. And even though I like to pretend that I'm so good at taking care of you, the truth is, you're taking care of me. Loving me, turning me into a better man. I don't want to be anyone but who I am when I'm with you." She laughed, and the sound was rich and warm. Then her smile died. "I know it wasn't wasn't easy. Life has been unkind, but if it brought me to you…" his voice trailed off as he curled her hair around his fingers.
"No, it wasn't. I don't know why the cost is so high, but I do know, it was worth it. And I'd do it all over again." She bit her lip, struggled to find her voice. "You have given my life so much meaning."
"You had a very full life without me."
He hated that. Wish he met Olivia twenty years earlier. Wish he had been there through all of her pain. And knew that because he wasn't, she would forever be unattainable to him. All of her big moments, he had missed out on. All he could do now was pick up the pieces. Light a torch. As she loved to sing top notch while she got dressed, "tell her story." Maybe that was enough for her, but it didn't rest well with him. Loving her sometimes was like picking up a book half finished. The beginning and middle pages lost to him. He only had the end to go off of. He only had the day they met and the days that followed. It wasn't enough. It was never enough.
She had wrapped her arms around him.
"But it wasn't complete," she answered, leaning closer to him, not carrying if they stopped dancing all together. "It was a life, but loving you has made it worth it, and being loved by you has made me complete." She kissed his chin. "Believe it. Believe that I love you, and only you, because it's true."
She highlighted his darkest insecurity with such finesse he felt his heart pinch. Nothing in the world is more beautiful than hearing the woman you love confess her love over you. And when Olivia confessed to him, she possessed him in every which way. She could have any man she wanted, (she may not have known that) but she chose him.
She chose him.
He drove his hand through the back of her neck and pulled gently on a fist full of hair. "I'm so fucking in love with you woman." He felt her laugh in his arms. "I love you so much it hurts, you know that?"
She was smiling the most beautiful radiant smile up at him. Her cheeks golden and rosy. Her eyes all lit up. "I do, because I can feel it. Every moment, of every day, and it makes me believe all things are possible."
He wiped her eyes with his big thumb. Seeing her up there in front of the commissioners and the generals, and the captains, it was surreal really. And the fact that it was his wife standing in front of all those people…The fact that it was his Olivia….he was overwhelmed with the best kind of joy. The kind you get from loving someone to the fullest extent of admiration. If it had been anyone else in that room, or at the helm of this movement they were starting together, he wouldn't have the faith in the vision that he had now. All of this, every inch of their work to help survivors had been conceived entirely out of Olivia's own imagination. This was her dream. Her territory. Her mark in history, and getting to see her bring it to life, getting to see her transform society was spellbinding. Her work, dark as it was, made her shine. All of her strengths. All of her confidence. The woman beneath all of the hurt really came through while she fought for survivor rights.
And he just fell in love with her all over again.
"All things are possible," he repeated. "You sound so sure."
"I am." Her voice went way up. High pitched. The way it did when she was so upset about something. Or excited. She took his hand and pressed it against her torso.
He hadn't even registered at first. He had still been so tied up in being in love with her that he didn't catch on. But the smile he loved so much softened to a deep, quiet expression. She took on a stillness that whispered too closely to the sea at night under an open, starlit sky. And that's when he knew. When they stopped swaying. When her eyes, normally a warm hazel brown turned into deep, black beads of moon light.
The rush of blood that went to his head swelled in his skull, and his face went numb, forcing his eyebrows to crease. He grabbed her hair tighter with his free hand, his gaze searching hers.
No. "A baby?" He choked.
"Our baby," she agreed.
"You're pregnant?"
She nodded, smiling from ear to ear, as she wept.
Before that moment he thought 'my heart crumbled' was just an expression, but he had felt it. On God he felt it. It was like something was chipping away underneath his ribs and falling into his stomach. And every time a piece fell, his chest would swell with a warmth that traveled all through out his body. He felt that warmth every moment he took a breath. And for a moment everything became palpable. Love. Happiness. Joy. Gratitude. And something else. Something much deeper that he couldn't describe. A word evident but in some language only his soul knew. He couldn't put his finger on it, he just knew that whatever it was made him feel alive, made him feel so blissfully happy that he felt strong enough to carry the entire weight of the world on his shoulders.
And suddenly all of her tantrums started to make sense. The crying, the anxiety, the sickness. She had been carrying their child the whole time.
So when he started to cry under his laughter he didn't care or try to stop it. He'd never felt more whole or complete in his life.
"A baby? Really?" He cried.
Olivia was none the different, which crumbled his heart even more. Locking her in his arms, he pressed them together forehead to forehead.
He kissed her all over. Everywhere. Her cheeks. Her nose. Her forehead. Her jaw. Even the sensual place under neath her ear. Begging her over and over to say it again.
It was so good, he had to hear it three times.
"I'm a daddy," he wept. Holding her still flat stomach in his hands. He kissed her eyes again. He remembered looking at the baby and feeling so happy he could faint. He couldn't stop kissing her, or crying. Neither could she. Honestly it was stupid, he knew that once they started to try it wouldn't be long. He expected she'd come to him with news soon, but the shock of it.
He was a father.
His heart swelled so tight that he could hardly breathe. Hardly think. Aside from making Olivia his wife, this was by far the greatest joy of his life. They kissed each other so deeply that they stole the air from each other's lungs, so good that she started to cry harder.
That was their kiss.
The kiss of their relationship.
The one it stood on.
It was the definitive one.
There hadn't been one like it, and it wouldn't come again. No matter how hard they tried to recreate it.
They pulled apart breathless. He tried to bend on his knees but she stopped him. "Not here," she pleaded. "I don't want anyone to know."
He displayed real confliction, before dragging her off the dance floor and somewhere more private. He kissed her again only that time it was all lust. He needed to be inside her. He needed to show her how absolutely more in love with her he was. Shamelessly he moved his hand lower, undoing her suit pants before slipping his hand inside.
He heard her gasp.
"I have to get you home," he croaked. "I need to be inside-
She pressed her thumb against his lips. "Take me upstairs."
Back to their old condo. As soon as she suggested it he drove her out of the party like a mad man. They had barely gotten through the door, before he was inside her.
The sex was out of control.
He still had bits and pieces of it. He remembered bending her over the couch, pummeling into with reckless abandon, until their was a straight assault on her cervix. The moon light cascading her skin. The feel of her hair against his face when she moaned.
He had fucked her hard. Urgently. Claimed every inch of her body as his without doubt or reservations, until she was cumming all over him. By the time they finished they had exhausted themselves. Their heartbeats irregular. Their skin sticky and sweaty, clinging to each other.
He loved her to sleep.
And while she rested he drew patterns all along her stomach. Kissing, whispering sweet nothings in Italian.
"You're happy?" She croaked after resting for an hour.
He looked up at her. "What?"
"You're happy I'm pregnant?"
"Of course I am."
She smiled behind her closed, sleep heavy eyes. "I was so nervous that you weren't going to be." Her voice came out deep. Coarse.
"Che dici? What are you saying? We've been trying. This is what you wanted. It's what I wanted. This is a good thing." He trailed off and hung his head low and nuzzled their noses together until she opened her eyes. "Haven't I supported you with this? I thought I was being clear with you...I want my child inside you, cara. It's all I want."
Her heart was pounding hard. So hard he could see her pulse jumping from her throat. He kissed her instinctively. A renewed and reinforced hunger for her rolling off his tongue.
"You should've told me as soon as you suspected anything. Do you have any idea how long I've waited to hear you say this?" He whispered softly. With their arms wrapped tightly around each other, she started to emerge. The color started to return to her cheeks.
She arched her brow. "Humor me."
It was a rhetorical request, but David didn't fault her for it. Olivia needed constant reassurance. "Meeting you was the best thing that ever happened to me. Marrying you gave me a purpose. But this child, our child," he leaned into her. "This completes me the way it completes you. When we started dating all I could think about was you coming to see me at the office one day, carrying our children inside you and in your arms."
Olivia rolled her eyes. "Liar."
She thought he was just kissing her ass now.
"It's true. Why do you think I kept calling you that first week. I had to move fast. Get you to go out with me so I could knock you up." She smirked nonchalantly. "There's nothing in the world that I want more than this." He kissed, palming her soon to be curve. "I can't wait to hold you both like this in a room full of people. Can't wait to tell everyone my wife is pregnant. How far along are you?" He rasped.
He felt her exhale deeply. "Eight weeks."
"How long have you known?" He pushed her hair behind her ear.
"Almost a month."
His heart broke and he held her tighter. "A month?" Madre de dio. He was unhappy that she hadn't told him but he had to be understanding. She needed to work up a lot of trust and confidence before telling him this sort of thing. And it was his fault that she hadn't had any. His brows furrowed. "I will do better." he kissed her.
Before him, Olivia had been with someone else. Gotten pregnant. Had an abortion. So all of this was bittersweet. Despite her wanting to have a baby, he had worried initially that she might get cold feet. That she was biting off more than she could chew. She hadn't really allowed herself to have anytime to think about what getting pregnant again would mean. He was terrified she was going to wake up one morning with a whole in her heart for all the things that could've been. They hadn't even really talked about getting pregnant except for the night that she asked him and the small things they said to each other out of mutual anticipation. He never had the chance to reaffirm himself with her, or let her know that if it did happen, things were going to be different.
"It what I needed." She shrugged in his arms. "I wasn't ready to tell you. I just wanted to be pregnant for a while in case you wanted differently."
"Wanted differently?" He didn't follow. "I don't want different, I want you. I want you both. It hurts me knowing that you didn't feel like you could tell me sooner, but I understand. And I'm not going to stop until it's clear to you how important this is to me. If you knew how much I love you, you'd know that I've never wanted anything more in my life than this child. I love our baby so much, Olivia. Even more because they're apart of you. I want this. And I'm going to be here every step of the way. You're not alone. You're never alone. Promise me, you'll let me take care of you, ok? Don't push me away. Please. I can't stand it."
She had stared at him at a loss for words, before nodding and letting him run his fingers through her sex wild hair.
"I had a plan to surprise you," she said after a while.
"Hm."
"This could be our only pregnancy. I wanted to do all the things that other mothers do."
"You will. We're going to have a house full of babies when I'm through with you."
He kissed her hard so she fell onto her back again. And when she instinctively spread her legs for him. He made love to her slowly, sinking home in one heavy thrust. Holding her thigh over his waist, he rocked into her hard, making the bed move each time.
She was exquisite.
The way her eyes would open and close. The way her mouth and eyebrows would contort into deep satisfaction.
She clawed at his back begging him not to stop. Her perfect lips pressed against his neck until he finally felt the head of his cock thrust up against her cervix at the same instant his torso touched hers. They were made for each other and fit together perfectly. Holding himself deep inside of her, he bent down and kissed her again. She returned it opening her mouth in his and snaking her tongue into his mouth. They embraced tightly, and kissed deeply with their hips flattened against each other. The passion that poured out through their bodies brought on white fever, until at last there was no more, and they collapsed in each other's arms, consumed by their love, immediately falling asleep.
The next morning she woke him with her mouth, before riding him in the way only she could. Her body looking so beautiful as she brought herself to orgasm again and again, until she couldn't take it anymore.
By the time they'd stopped, the sunlight had peaked into the morning. He wrapped her up in blankets and let her straddle his chest so he could kiss their baby. She held his head against her, running her fingers through his hair as he warmly kissed and kissed her skin. There was so much love in that moment, he thought. Holding Olivia that morning, his forehead pressed against their baby his soul had found home.
"I love you so much," she'd whispered before sitting on his cock again. "Only you…only you."
And while her whispers turned into soft, desperate cries for more he left marks all over her. Thighs. Neck. Breasts. Ribs. Ass. Everywhere. And then sent her off to work just so she could come home and they could do it all over again.
The weeks that followed were the best moments of his life. She became completely different with him. She was so honest and open about everything. They talked a lot which was sacred to him. Nothing was off limits. She told him everything. Everything she was feeling, talked more about her past, and work, and her concerns. Which was new and big for her. They had a close relationship before, but it was so flirtatious. You know. Sprinkled with the newlywed bliss. She had moments with him in the past where she shared, but they were almost always fleeting and short-lived. Now though, everything was different. She trusted him. Really trusted him. She even flaunted her keen sense of humor. All through her morning sickness they would laugh together. Every chance she got she would wrap herself in his arms, and each day she grew more and more confident about the pregnancy.
She was in her prime.
Her honesty. Her vulnerability. Made it that much easier to hurt her in the end.
Alex shifted uncomfortably in front of him. Her straight pointed nose staring at him under her glasses. She had bookworm glasses. The hot teacher type which always made him laugh because she was a total prude. Self made, but born and raised in Connecticut to a wealthy family. Frat and plaid Republicans Fed Exed from South Carolina and Texas respectively. She had a questionable brother in the sense that he'd never leave a woman he loved alone with him, and apparently other fathers and husbands and brothers felt the same. The guy was a 40 year old, unmarried, doesn't matter, I'll just pay someone to have sex with me kind of guy. No kids, miraculously, so carrying on the good Cabot name was Alex's responsibility.
Queue another laugh track.
She was the bane of her parent's existence. A truly smart, and educated woman. A Pro choice, democratic, vegan. Sexuality TBD. Too Bad Dad, I'm gay.
I think.
She was in denial honestly. Never went out unless it was with Olivia or Casey, or some drunk idiot in a red sweater. He pointed out red sweater because no straight man working as a lawyer would get caught dead wearing a red sweater in the office. Even if it was cashmere and made in Northern Ireland. Needless to say she had a very small group of friends, and considered working out to be a hobby. And if that truly wasn't big strap, top energy, then he wasn't sure what was.
She leaned forward agitated and clumsy.
"What the hell aren't you telling me?"
She said it frustratingly but he could hear the worry in her voice underneath his 3am buzz. Miraculously.
He felt his knuckles burn again. They were bruised and cut to hell. He had dried blood stained on the palms of his hand. Truly a fucking nightmare to look at he imagined. But as scary as he was, and as desperate as she needed to know, he wasn't going to spill.
They had made a pact not to tell anyone until she was certain there were no risks. And despite him promising over and over and over again, that he wasn't going to say anything he had sent over a hundred white peonies and roses to her office within less than three days of her telling him.
Not to mention, as soon as he'd gone into the firm Abbie had known by the color in his cheeks.
"Congratulations, brother." She'd smiled hugging him tightly that morning. "How does it feel?"
"Honestly? I didn't think it was possible to love her more than I already do- and the baby? I just can't wait meet him or her. They're going to be everything she is."
"Girl or boy?"
"She's too early for us to know, but I'm happy either way. If she gives me a son, I will teach him to love her the way I do. If she gives me a daughter, I hope she has her eyes, and her smile."
"And her nose. Yours looks like Marlon Brando's voice in The Godfather."
He did have a thick, strong nose on account of one too many fist fights when he was a child, defending his mother's honor. A baby girl with his nose would've been a curse.
A stark 180 from the blessing they were sharing together.
Olivia being pregnant was the best thing in the world. Best thing in his world. Their world. Not anyone else's.
"Can I get you anything else?" The bartender asked him as he set a ginger ale in between them.
"No thank you, that'll be all," Alex answered for him.
They'd gone back inside and gone to the bar to try and sober him up. He'd laugh at the irony if his wife wasn't gone.
"Eat this."
She shoved the burger and fries she ordered in front of him. He didn't want it.
"Eat it," she said again. "You're going to need your strength."
He couldn't.
"You're not talking. You're not eating. Your drinking yourself to a pulp. Please fucking explain to me how that's going to help bring Liv back."
Alex. Always the lawyer.
"David." Alex she pressed again. He looked at her but all he saw was Olivia. Her dark chestnut eyes glistening at him. The honey brown of her hair curled around her face.
He felt his face prickle.
"I'm not hungry."
"Have you called your sister and spoken to the kids?" She tried.
He shook his head no. He couldn't face them yet. "I think you should be with them until this blows over."
"No." He said firmly.
"David, they're you're-
He kicked the table over. The food. The glass. The wine and soda splashing all over the place. The noise had sent him back into the kitchen, and he saw flickering images of Olivia and her blood, and their faces as they silently shouted at one another. Frenzied as the images were, they rocked him into stillness and calm. "I said no," he said quietly, standing up to shake off the wine and fries all over his shirt.
He smiled. God damn him he smiled as he wiped the food off him.
More wine, Liv? That's the second time this week.
The waiters, his staff, came over and cleaned everything up. Jack his manager came over immediately.
"Mr. Haden, is everything alright?"
"I'll take care of it in the morning Jack, just…" He threw the towel on the ground with the rest of mess on the floor.
"David." Alex tried again.
He looked at her again and he knew that he'd just scared the shit out of her. Her thin bony body was stapled to the chair as she stared up at him. A rosy winter blush in her cheeks brought on by a chill in the skin.
Oh, she was terrified. In a, I don't know who you are, what did you do to my best friend kind of way. But as far as he was concerned, she honestly didn't fucking need to know. It was better if she knew nothing at all. He would be doing her a favor by keeping his mouth shut.
He turned around and left her there.
He walked outside into the cold air and Olivia was standing there waiting for him at the foot of the sidewalk, in the middle of oncoming traffic. She looked at him, smiling in her way, before ducking down into the black town car that waited open for him.
He followed her closing the door shut behind him before Alex could follow.
The car pulled off, and in the darkness, he felt her arm snake under his and her head rest against his shoulder. And every now and then she would strum his arm with his thumb. Silently. Methodically. While he watched the lights flash by. Time seemingly bending to a halt, just so they could be together.
Orchids.
Fire.
Skin.
"I'm sorry," he blurt out.
He meant every syllable too. In a few hours when they discovered the body he buried it would become abundantly clear just how much he meant that. How truly, truly sorry he'd been. And then everyone would know how desperately he loved his wife.
To death.
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