AN: Here I go again, not finishing another three shot and instead posting the next one and confusing the masses with my order, I apologise, hopefully you can follow.
I'm posting this tonight in honour of the incredible news we all received about Stabler's return (in amongst so much sad) - this is truly the light and distraction we all need right now.
For this story I'm revisiting Wildlife (again..) because it's the greatest fic inspo to exist - lets be real. This time it's a look at what would have happened if footage from that night was recovered and resurfaced weeks later for everyone at the precinct to see. Don't ask me what plausible reason there is for it being filmed and discovered, I haven't thought that far ahead lol but I'm sure someone can fill in that blank for me. This idea came from a picture I found on google (that turned out to be firetipmyballs FF avi) and spawned into yet another thing I have been forced to write lol.
Enjoy.
Let me know what you think. X
SEX, LIES, AND VIDEOTAPE - PART 1
Elliot twists the lid off his coffee cup and takes a sip, a tension permeating through the sedan that started well before their stakeout had begun.
"You okay?"
It's the first words he has said to her in the forty or so minutes they'd been idle and she knows he's trying to start a dialogue with her in an effort to quench the unsavoury tension between them.
"This about what Munch said?"
She stares down the uncharacteristically quiet street of Manhattan, chewing on the inside of her cheek, trying to figure out how best to dodge his question and this conversation.
"Don't humour him Liv," Elliot continues, absently swilling his coffee around in his cup, "you know he's only stirring the pot."
Are you ready for me Daddy?
She presses her eyes closed and she turns to look out the window.
It had been weeks since their undercover stint with Bushido and the last thing she was expecting was footage to turn up after they'd swept the shell of Elliot's staged apartment.
"Wow Liv," Munch looked over at her in shock. "You didn't hold back."
"Turn it off," she had rasped defensively, trying to grasp at the remote.
"Damn Elliot," Fin chuckles. "How'd you sleep that night?'
She can feel Elliot waiting for her to respond and after a few agonising beats she finally gives in.
"I know what it looked like." Her fingertips tap on the open window, her mind still unable to comprehend how forward she had been when she had watched it. "But it had to look convincing." She looks over at him at that point because she needs him to know she is serious.
"Right," he meets her stare, agreeing in a tone that matches hers, a few beats passing before he says it. "And it was."
Her fingers still against the open window, her stomach dropping somewhere in the vicinity of the street below. She blinks against the harsh sunlight pouring through the windshield before she looks uncomfortably away.
She tries to gauge what he'd meant by that, the comment was innocent enough but the tone had felt like a fist to the gut. He had been looking at her neutrally but that was a dig, loud a clear. It was convincing, too convincing.
She doesn't react - just in case she has this wrong, she doesn't want to make the same mistake she did in the bullpen and act on impulse so she instead focuses on the street ahead, concentrating on a young couple engaging in a conversation a few paces up.
She twists the lid of her own cup of coffee that's long since cooled and takes a bitter sip. She tries to let the tension dispel but his words continue to pound through her temples on a loop, his voice quiet, low, like an electrical hum.
'And it was.'
She can't stop picturing the footage, her hand possessively dragging down his chest, her arms wrapping around his neck as she pressed her lace covered breasts firmly against the wall of his chest.
Damn Liv, you didn't hold back.
"I had seconds Elliot," she says through a strained breath, and it comes out jagged and left field, like she'd just had an entire conversation with him in her head that he hadn't been privy too. "What else was I supposed to do?" she mutters out the window.
She knows she should just stop there, because the more she tries to defend her actions the worse she is going to look but her ego is inflamed at that point and she refuses to let anyone think she had ulterior motivations, least of all him.
She is only met with silence in return and when she finally chances a glance at him, the way he's looking at her rattles her far more than his previous jab. She realises then that she might as well be back in the bullpen sparking off Munch and Fin.
"I don't need to explain myself."
"No one is asking you to." He doesn't miss a beat.
His expression is a mixture equal defence and confusion, like he's not quite understanding where this hostility has come from but at the same time he could just as easily be goading her as his irritation unravels in equal union with hers.
"I don't know why I'm suddenly copping it," he whispers. "I didn't say a word back there."
She drags her lower lip between her teeth to stop from scoffing at that, because that was the other thing - he didn't back her up in there, he didn't try to diffuse the situation or explain the way it actually went down, he just blinked back at the footage in bewildered silence while Munch and Fin went to town on her.
"You know what," she lifts a hand up and gives him the indication she is done with this conversation. "It's just.. fine - forget it."
"Olivia I didn't have a problem with it."
Didn't.
Past tense.
Her chest flames at that because it's bullshit anyway, he could barely look her in the eyes that night and when she watched the tape back she could clearly see why.
She doesn't know what to do with his throwaway statement, all she knows is she needs this conversation to end, and now.
"But clearly you do."
That last part was muttered under his breath and the blatant accusation churns in her gut, a tapestry of disbelief swarming in her chest.
She is furious beneath her cool exterior, but she's simultaneously holding herself back because she can already feel the foundations of their partnership cracking around them. She knows one wrong move right now could see this whole thing come crashing down so she stays painfully, silently still.
It's not worth it just to save face.
"Am I wrong?" He tries to push her, seemingly not so ready to drop this himself.
His eyes are back on hers and she is moments from telling him to drop this once and for all when his phone rattles through the console, saving her the hassle.
His eyes flit down to the noisy distraction and after a few beats he is scooping it up in his palm with a sigh.
"Stabler," Elliot answers gruffly, her eye line remaining on his side profile as he takes in the details of the phone call. "Uh huh."
She can almost feel her fingertips trembling against the paper coffee cup as he carries on the conversation. She drags her teeth across her lower lip in worry, they had come so close to it all falling apart and she was beyond thankful that somehow it didn't.
"There's been another attack," he whispers quietly and the tension between them is still heightened, but slowly on it's way to dispelling. "Cragen's called us back in."
And just like that, they drive away.
TBC
AN: Will Elliot let this go? Will they never speak of it again? Is this the end of the story? Will I ever finish this? All good questions.
