It's funny how things stayed with you. 

Autumn had swung back into the city, faithful companion to crime, as the nights grew longer and the days grew colder.  Elliot liked autumn though: something about the colours, and the joyous delight in his children as Christmas approached.  His kids weren't really all that young any more, but still, they seemed to take great pleasure in the wonder of the up and coming season.  Halloween first though. 

Halloween: trick or treat sometimes took on a whole new meaning around then.  Something about the new moon and those who really didn't understand the morality of the human race as a whole: their sheets were full.  Still though, a flash of red hair and violet contacts always sent Elliot's heart into his mouth.  She'd rattled him.  Matter of fact yet full of compassion, her eyes were like looking though a door into the pits of oblivion.     

"Elliot?  A word??" Cragen said, holding the door to his office open. Elliot glanced at Munch and Olivia, before slamming down his pen and crossing the bull-pen to the glass panelled room.

"A perp seems to think you had him by the throat when you collared him," he began.

"No," Elliot said, flatly, looking at a point on the wall.

"He's screaming police brutality,"

"He tried to run away, I subdued him," Elliot said, still looking straight ahead..

"You've never been the same since that woman told you no, everyone has noticed.  What's gotten into you?"

"Nothing," Elliot said, his voice gaining an edge.  Since they'd found one of the other men implicated in the Jordaine case, Elliot had worried it…like a dog with a piece of flesh, chewing to get to the bone.

"You are out with the jurisdiction of our department pursuing that case detective.  It was ruled a suicide.  Lithium causes you to fit; he had one head injury that they think he sustained hitting the door, why can't you let it go?"

"Juris-MY-Diction!" he said, his voice raising, snarling.

"She's gotten to you, and I don't know why.  What did you see in those eyes that rattled you like this?"  Elliot looked at him, leaning on his knuckles on the desk, then sank into the chair.  There was a tap on the door and Cragen gestured.

"Nothing.  That is exactly the point.  It was like looking into the eyes of someone who had suffered at the hands of her tormentor, and could see her tormentor staring back at her,"

"I think you met one of the silent ones Elliot," Olivia said, throwing a file on the desk.

"The new assistant DA wants to see you," she added to Cragen.  Cragen closed his eyes.

"I was hoping that you could meet when things were slightly less charged," he began, looking up at the woman in the doorway "ADA Harper I'd like you to meet Detective Elliot Stabler…again," Elliot's head snapped up, and he turned around, only to meet the eyes that had been haunting him with a little more sparkle.

"Yes Detective, I'm one of the silent ones," she said, offering a hand. 

Elliot's jaw worked and he shot a look at Cragen.

"She's DA's office, you might have met her in court for all I knew" he shrugged.  Elliot turned to her, and took her hand.  There was no tremble in her handshake, it was firm and to the point.

He shook her hand, looking her up and down slowly, then met her eyes again, letting go of her hand.  .Her hand strayed to her slightly extended stomach and she dropped her eyes from his gaze.. "So you're working for us now?"

"For a little while, just until another post opens up.  I've got other things to do between this post and that though too," he nodded.

"So are you a silent one from childhood or because of the child you're carrying?"  If he'd startled her, she didn't let on.  She smiled softly and handed him a file.

"You wanted these unlocked.  To the other, neither and both.  If you'll excuse me Captain," she nodded her head to him, "Detective, I have other matters to attend to,"

She turned and left, sedately.

"That was uncalled for Detective," Cragen said.  Elliot shrugged.

"She's a lawyer, if they get a hold of that; they can use it against her,"

"She's DA's office, a breed apart," Cragen said, as Elliot opened the file: getting files unlocked for gang members was one thing, finding dirt under an alias and tying it to the same file was unheard of.  She'd done both by the looks of things.  A note in the file said that the information had been cross referenced last year then 'lost'.

"Son of a BITCH!" he exclaimed and handed the file to Cragen.

"She's good, I like her," he said, the smile rising to his eyes.