A/N: Just want to address something quickly before we get to the story: I've gotten the question of where this fic is going. Do I plan to wrap it up soon? Will I follow it through until they have a baby? I have an idea as to what I want to do, but I really want to hear from you guys. What do you want to see? I'm about 2 chapters ahead in my writing and I'm figuring a lot out as I go. I will keep working on this fic as long as you all are interested and it still feels right to me.

Now onto the story!

It was freezing cold the night that Elliot and Olivia were called out to the scene of an abandoned restaurant where a Jane Doe had been raped and left bleeding out. They had been curled up on the couch with hot chocolate when they caught the case and had dressed and headed out immediately. Cragen still hadn't given them any word on how he was going to handle their relationship, so for now they were still working together.

After visiting their victim's girlfriend, Sharon Harris, and running into Babs Duffy on the way out, they stopped at a diner for lunch. They sat across from one another in a booth and Olivia picked at her chicken salad while listening to Elliot rant about Babs.

"All I know is we better solve this case as soon as possible. I don't know how much more of that woman I can handle." He looked exasperated and while Olivia thought he was letting her get to him too much, she did understand that the woman seemed to have it out for Elliot.

"Whatever you say, Assy McBigPants," she teased, trying to lighten him up a little bit.

Elliot threw one of his French fries at his partner. "You love my ass."

Olivia smiled devilishly. "I do. That's not all I love. And it's certainly not all that's big." She punctuated her innuendo with a wink.

Elliot almost choked on the food he was eating, coughing and sputtering. Once he had calmed down, he brought the discussion back to the case.

"So what kind of read did you get on the girlfriend?" She had ignored Elliot's presence almost entirely, so he was curious as to what his partner, who she actually paid attention to, thought.

"I don't know. She seemed shaky to me. Could be grief, but I think there's more to it than that."

Elliot nodded his head, "She didn't seem that devastated to me. It seemed like a good approximation of a grieving partner. She said they were getting married, but I don't know. I didn't feel it." They hadn't discussed marriage yet, but if Elliot were being honest, of course that's where he saw his and Olivia's relationship heading. He was already so committed to her that he felt like she was his wife. He couldn't imagine that he would have been as composed as Sharon Harris if Olivia went missing for a day and then he found out she was raped and murdered.

"You think she might have something to do with it?" Olivia sipped her water and Elliot watched the small movements of her neck as she swallowed. Everything about her was perfect and beautiful.

"I don't know. Maybe we should go talk to that Brooklyn Bias Crimes guy Babs mentioned. What was his name? Ellis?"

"Couldn't hurt." They finished their lunch and Elliot left enough money to cover the bill and a generous tip on the table before they headed to Brooklyn.

Most of their leads pointed them to Sharon Harris, despite Babs' insistence that Alisa's death was a lesbian hate crime. When they confronted Sharon, she clocked Elliot in the face and they took her into custody. Olivia stood now between Elliot's legs, cleaning up a cut above his eye from the Big Apple Aggressive woman. Normally when Olivia was between his legs with her hand cradling his neck, he was minutes away from making her come. This was nothing like that. The alcohol wipe she was using stung and he couldn't help but feel a bit emasculated at the fact that Olivia was taking care of him. He should be the one taking care of her. All of the comments from Babs and now this, he had to admit it was getting to him.

He pulled away a bit. "Liv, it's nothing."

Olivia wasn't having it. He had a cut. It needed to be cleaned. It was as simple as that. She knew he wouldn't like it, but he had to understand that nothing would ever make him less of a man in her eyes. "Will you please hold steady," she said, not letting up.

"What happened to him?" Alex asked, walking in with a file in hand.

"Technical term? Punch by a chick," Fin teased from his desk, watching Olivia tend to him.

"Ha ha. You're laughing now. Wait til I get a confession out of her." Since the incident with Dean Porter a few months ago, Elliot's anger issues hadn't been a problem for him. It was a miracle what having Olivia to go home to had done for him. But right now, he had to admit that he wanted to punch something. He was a man, dammit. A strong man. A tough man. The sexiest woman in the world had chosen him to be the one to protect her and fulfill her every desire and he did a damn good job if he did say so himself. He moved his head away from Olivia again and felt her pull her hand back.

"All done," she said, giving him a quick smile to let him know that it was okay to let her take care of him as well. That she wasn't reading anything in to the fact that Harris had got a punch off when he wasn't prepared.

"Hold on. A suspect assaults a police officer and charges get filed," Alex insisted.

"I'm fine," Elliot said, walking away. He didn't want to have this discussion anymore. What he wanted to do was strip Olivia naked in an interrogation room and fuck her until there was absolutely no doubt about his masculinity. But of course, he couldn't do that. So instead he would interrogate Sharon Harris until he got to the bottom of things.

"Would you be saying that if it was a 200-pund man who slugged you?" Alex wasn't letting this go.

"Well, next time one does, I'll let you know," he said, heading for interrogation with Olivia right behind him. Right before they went into the room, Olivia grabbed his hand.

"I love you, El," she winked.

When another member of LesBe Strong was raped and Babs Duffy was threatened, it was clear that these were in fact hate crimes targeted at lesbians. Babs accepted protective custody, though reluctantly, and Olivia took the first shift with her.

It wasn't easy to keep Babs away from blogging and texting and tweeting, but Olivia was doing her best. "Why don't you take this opportunity to have a moment alone? Try to get your head together?" she offered.

"Cause I don't do alone very well," Babs admitted. "I don't like sitting here while that prick is out there attacking my sisters." Olivia could relate. It was difficult for her when Cragen sent her home to the rest in the middle of a long and exhausting case. All she wanted was to be out there, on the front lines, finding the perps and putting them away. It was what she was meant to do.

"Babs, don't worry. Nothing pisses off my partner more than somebody targeting women. He's gonna catch this guy." The only person she trusted to get the job done as well as she would was Elliot. He was an amazing cop and had taught her everything she knew. They were still waiting on word from Cragen and she really hoped she would still get to work with Elliot, in some capacity, even if not as partners.

Babs scoffed at her words and Olivia prepared to defend Elliot to the redhead, but she was surprised by what she had to say, "Well, he has the hots for you, you know."

People had always made comments about their partnership and the attraction between the two of them, but really it wasn't anyone's business. "Excuse me?" She asked, cocking her head to the side.

"Stabler."

Now it was Olivia's turn to scoff. "Uh, no, that's never gonna happen." She felt a small pang at the lie, because she remembered that just a little while ago, it had been the truth. She turned the conversation elsewhere, anything to get off the subject of her and Elliot.

She never would have thought that Babs would misinterpret her kindness as an invitation, but when she felt her go in for the kiss, Olivia pulled back. She let Babs down as gently as she could and luckily an officer came to relieve her a few minutes later.

Back at the station, Olivia tried to find a way to tell Elliot about Babs putting the moves on her. She knew he wouldn't be upset, but she wanted to tell him before Babs let it slip. The woman did not know when to shut up. When she told Elliot, he laughed it off, chuckling, "I get hit, you get hit on." On the way to Babs apartment after news of a shooting, Olivia reached for Elliot's hand that rested on the center console.

"Hey, El."

"Mmm?"

"I know the Babs thing was no big deal, but I just want you to know that I never want anyone else's lips on mine. Only yours, okay?"

"Ditto."

Watching Olivia in interrogation with the real perp, the guy from the copy place, Elliot could feel himself getting hard. He always loved it when Olivia took charge at work, but now that he knew what it looked like when she did it in the bedroom as well, he couldn't help his body's reaction.

She was incredible. She knew exactly how to get under this guy's skin, just like she always did. He hated when she used her sexuality to reel in a perp; he didn't want those sick fucks to even look at Olivia. There was the tiniest part of him that felt bad for her victims because absolutely no man could resist Olivia Benson. She had Ronnie on the hook now and he was about to lose it when she went in for the kill, "Yeah it was a mistake. Just like all us lesbians are a mistake. Except the good news is, you know how to correct us."

She had him back up against the wall and he muttered, "You're wrong."

Olivia didn't waver. She got as close to Ronnie as possible, her voice lowering the closer she moved in. "But you want to make me right, don't you, Ronnie? Correct a bitch like me. Grab me off of my feet, throw me onto that table and bend me all the way over, because you've got everything you need to make me a real woman right between your legs." Her hand hovered over Ronnie's crotch to emphasize her point when Ronnie grabbed her hand and brought it to his junk as he confessed.

Elliot just about lost it. He was this close to exploding in his pants at Olivia's words and when Ronnie brought her hand to his body he wanted to rip the spineless little man limb from limb. No one else would ever put their manhood inside of Olivia ever again. As she strutted out of the box, confident as ever, Elliot followed her out.

"Liv," he said, jogging to catch up to her.

She turned around and cocked her eyebrow at him, "Yes, El."

Fuck. She knew exactly what her performance in there had done to him. "I want to fuck you so bad right now," he growled into her ear.

"Patience, Stabler. We have work to do." With that she sat down at her desk and started in on the mountain of never ending paperwork. Elliot walked uncomfortably to the locker room. He would take care of himself for now so that he could focus on work, but later tonight he would show her exactly what her words had inspired in him.

A/N: Don't forget to leave me a review. Questions, comments, suggestions.

And please check out my new story, "The Return" !