Allegiance
Chapter Ten: Recalling A Love Lost
Olivia stood in the empty interrogation room staring out the window. Outside, the buildings had merged into one large gray outline beneath the sunny skies above. Olivia wondered if it was sunny right now wherever Alex was. Were those same rays shining down on her golden hair, illuminating her gorgeous face and sparkling smile? Or was she even a blond now? Did she receive a new hair color to match her new identity? But it didn't really matter to Olivia what the color of her hair was, or what new name people called her now, for she would always be Alex.
Her Alex.
Despite her valiant efforts, the tears welled up in Olivia's eyes. She glanced down hatefully at her cell phone, at Eric's number on the screen, and she switched it off.
'Who am I kidding?' she thought. 'It would be the same song and dance, anyway. I'd tell him I can't make it, and he'd say he'd understand, and we'd make another date, which I will have to break, and the time will soon come when he'll be too busy to see me. And then he'll be too busy to return my calls, and then…he'll be gone, just like the others.'
Alex understood. Alex was always truly there for her, day and night. Sometimes, because of their busy schedules, they wouldn't see each other privately for days, and when they did, it would be like a stolen moment. Because of that, because their time together was so precious, there was never any explanations or how or why they were so busy, for they each perfectly understood the situation, and simply lived in—and cherished—those stolen moments they had together.
'God, how I wish I could be with you again, Alex!' Olivia dismally thought.
"Olivia?" a man's voice said softly from behind her.
She took a deep breath and wiped the tears from her eyes. "Hello, George."
George Huang took a tentative step towards her. "Would you prefer to be alone?"
'That's just the problem,' she thought sadly. 'No matter how hard I try, I always seem to wind up being alone anyway.'
"It's fine, George. How've you been?"
"Good," he replied, coming up alongside of her. "If I'm being too intrusive, just say so. But judging from your reaction to Cragen changing the protection duty schedule, I take it you've been forced to cancel another date."
Olivia nodded regretfully.
"What did he say?"
"Who, Eric?" She shook her head. "I haven't called him yet."
George frowned in puzzlement. "Why not?"
"What's the point?" Olivia bluntly asked. "If there's one constant in my personal life George, it's that everybody leaves. Even Alex…she certainly didn't mean to, but she still left me anyway."
"You and Alex were very close," George said. It was more of a statement than a question.
"We were lovers," she said. 'This seems to be my week for making earth-shattering confessions,' she wryly thought. When she noticed that George didn't appear fazed, she added, "But I guess you already knew that."
"I suspected," he admitted.
"And you never said anything."
"It wasn't my place to. Your private life is your own business."
"Thanks," Olivia said with a nod. She gazed out the window once more. "I really miss her. Not a day goes by when I don't think about Alex. Today, most of all, thanks to the Alex convention we've suddenly got going in the squad room."
"Yeah, I know," said George, shaking his head. "Munch even mentioned it after you left, and Detective Eames made a joke about it." He took a deep breath. "Listen, Liv…"
"I know what you're going to say," she said. "You're gonna tell me to not give up on Eric, right?"
A slight smile crept across his face. "Actually, I was going to tell you to try not to read too much into the fact that we've got three women named Alex in the squad room. But, yeah, I heartily agree with your point as well."
"It just that everything with Alex was so easy," Olivia said softly. "And now that she's gone, it's so frigging hard. Everything is just a struggle for me."
"That's understandable. When Alex left, you've had to rebuild your life from scratch, and that's not easy. How did you meet Eric?"
She told him about the first time she met Eric in the computer store. Olivia hated computers, and only used them because of work. Yet when the laptop that Alex had given her as a birthday present broke down, she went to get it fixed, since it was one of the few precious things that remained from their relationship, plus it had all of the e-mail she had exchanged with Alex still stored on it. Sometimes rereading those old emails from Alex was the only thing that had kept Olivia going on lonely nights. The computer store was packed, all of the salesmen were busy, and Olivia was at a loss until Eric showed up. At first she thought he was a salesman, until she realized that he was just another customer who had come to her aid, because, as he put it: "You look a little lost."
This goofy guy, who was very handsome in a bookish kind of way, with these narrow black glasses that matched the color of his hair, had won her over with his witty, laconic humor—as well as the fact that he saved her the trouble and the expense of getting the laptop fixed by offering to fix it for free. He took her to a corner café, where he straightened the computer out by giving it a reboot…or something; Olivia wasn't really sure what he did. But he did fix the computer and even helped her to back up all of the old email from Alex.
When she offered to pay him for his good deed, Eric simply sat back in his chair and said, "A smile from you would be payment enough for me."
And in spite of how corny the whole thing seemed to her, Olivia had burst into a shy smile right at that moment.
"That's more like it," Eric said with an approving grin. "I knew you had one of them hidden away somewhere."
Olivia realized that she was smiling broadly even now, as she recalled that day for George.
"You really like him, don't you?' George asked.
"Yeah," she replied. "I like Eric. I like him a lot. For one thing, he's not involved in law enforcement, y'know? He designs websites. And he's sweet, nice…and so damn understanding!"
"Then give him a call," George told her. "Follow your own advice and don't give up on him."
"I will," Olivia said, as she brought out her cell phone. "But I'm still not going back into the squad room until that army of Alex broads has cleared out. Dealing with my fears is one thing, but that scene out there is just too freaking bizarre for me to handle."
"I don't blame you!" George said, smiling, as he left the room. "I'm gonna head home, now. See you tomorrow."
"Take care, George." Olivia stared warily at her cell phone. "Ok, Eric," she whispered, "let's see just how understanding you really are."
SVU Squad Room. Five Minutes Later.
'He's a frigging saint,' Olivia thought, as she wandered back into the squad room in a daze. 'The man is truly a frigging saint, no question! When I finally do get together with him, I'd better check him for wings and a halo!'
Munch stood speaking quietly with Eames by the door, while Elliot sat chatting with Fin at his desk. Elliot glanced up at her and asked, "How did it go?"
Olivia simply stared at him and said, "He told me he understood perfectly."
He scowled at her. "You make that sound like a bad thing."
"No, it's not, but—" Still amazed, Olivia simply shrugged, at a loss for words.
Fin burst into laughter. "She finally meets Mr. Right, and she doesn't know what to do with him! That's rich!"
"Fin?" Olivia said sweetly. "Shut the hell up, ok?"
"What did he say, exactly?" Elliot asked.
Olivia recalled Eric's exact words over the phone: "I really like you, Liv. I understand that you've got a very demanding job. And I mean it: I understand, perfectly. You seem like a very interesting person, and I want to get to know you better. And if I have to wait a while to get together with you, then I will. Because anytime spent with you will be well worth it."
Olivia relayed what Eric told her, word for word, and added, "Plus he still has this mysterious 'something' that he wants to show me."
"What is it?" Fin asked.
"I don't know!" Olivia replied, frustrated. "He still won't tell me! It's driving me crazy! He keeps saying he'll only show me what it is once I'm at his place."
"Aw, he's giving you an incentive to come over," Fin said with a smile. "That's pretty sweet!"
But Elliot wasn't smiling. "That tactic has also been used by a lot of the skells that we deal with here on a daily basis." He glanced sharply at Olivia and asked, "What's his full name?"
"Eric Anders," Olivia replied. "And there's no need for you to run a check on him, because I already have, back when I first met him."
"Any priors?"
Olivia let out a heavy sigh. "You think I'd be seeing him if he had any? C'mon, El, give me some credit here. Yes, he's clean."
"The problem with you, Elliot, is that you're not very romantic," Fin chided him.
"I'm being stalked by a psycho-sexual sniper," Elliot replied, jokingly referring to Huang's profile of their perp, "I really don't feel very romantic right now."
"Maybe if you called him for a date? You know, break the ice?" Olivia suggested in jest. When the glare from Elliot told her that her attempt at humor went over like a lead balloon, she gave him a timid smile and said, "Ok, uh, I gotta go move Casey, now. Excuse me."
As she quickly walked over to Cragen's office, Olivia stifled a laugh when she overheard Fin tell Elliot: "You should really think about switching to decaf, man."
Olivia knocked on Cragen's door, and heard him say "Come in!" over a continuous stream of conversation between the two women lawyers. As Olivia entered the office, Borgia told Norton: "And if that's the case you're seriously going to present in court, then you're the one who's certifiable, not your client!"
Olivia glanced at Cragen and mouthed the words "Moving Casey."
Cragen nodded at her as he quickly wrote something down on a sheet of paper then he folded it up and handed it to her. "Take the scenic route."
"Will do," she replied as she took the folded up sheet of paper—which contained the location of the new safe house—and left the office. What Cragen meant by "take the scenic route" was not to go directly to the new safe house, but rather take a roundabout way, as a means of shaking off anybody who might be following or watching them.
When she returned to the squad room, Olivia got her jacket from her desk and announced, "I'm off."
"Oh, we've known that you've been off for quite some time, Olivia," Munch said with a sly smile. "But we still like you anyway."
"Ha…ha…ha," Olivia sarcastically said. "Hey, are you my relief tonight?"
"No, that would be Fin," Munch corrected. He still stood with Eames by the doorway. He turned to her and said, "I can't believe you know about the Lone Gunmen. Not many people have heard of them."
"I know them through Goren," Eames said with a smile. "He used to subscribe to their newsletter. I really enjoyed the copies that he lent me. Some of their theories were really way out there. Whatever happened to them? They just stopped publishing."
"Ah, the rumors abound," Munch replied. "My favorite—the one that I believe—is that they've been killed."
"By the very same nefarious forces whom they dared to expose to the light of truth, no doubt," Eames said in an overly melodramatic manner.
"Oh man," Fin said with mock horror, "not another one like Munch!"
After the scattered laughter finally died down in the squad room, Eames said, "You're serious? They're really dead?"
"Well, that's just one of the rumors," Munch told her. "Another was they were abducted by aliens."
"All right," Olivia said wearily, "now that Munch's ranting again, I'm really getting out of here!"
"Wait," Eames told her. "I've gotta go, too. We'll share the elevator." She glanced at Munch and added, "I'd be interested in hearing more about the Lone Gunmen some other time."
"You know where to find me," Munch replied. "I still have to tell you about the time I actually met those guys."
Eames was just about to walk out the door with Olivia when she stopped dead in her tracks. "You met them? Really? Where?"
"In Baltimore, back when I worked down there as a cop," Munch said.
'I'm never gonna leave this place,' Olivia fumed, as she watched Eames and Munch resume their conversation as she weren't even there.
Elliot came over to her and whispered, "Have a good night, tonight. Be safe, and take care of my baby, huh?"
"Will do," she said. "That is, if I can ever—"
"Benson, I'm sorry!" Eames said sheepishly, as she hurried over.
"No problem," Olivia said, as they both walked out through the doorway. She and Elliot exchanged one final nod of farewell before she left the squad room. They went down the hallway and Eames hit the button for the elevator.
"It must be fascinating working with John all day," Eames said, "listening to his stories and interesting theories."
Olivia stared at her, dumbfounded, for a spilt second. It was the concept of applying the word 'fascinating' to Munch that threw her. While John Munch was a truly decent person at heart and a great cop to work with, listening to his conspiracy theories all day often drove Olivia past the point of sanity.
"Yeah, it is," Olivia replied, in an effort to be polite. As they both stepped into the elevator, something abruptly occurred to her in that moment: Eames was sweet on Munch. If nothing else, she was certainly interested in him.
Olivia wondered if he picked up the signs from her. She hoped so. 'Munch could do a lot worse than Eames,' Olivia thought. She recalled the argument she had with Eames and Goren yesterday and inwardly cringed. "Hey, listen, I've been meaning to apologize. You know, about acting like a complete shit with you and Goren in the squad room yesterday?"
Eames shook her head. "Oh, no. Look, this case has put a lot of pressure on all of us, but for you guys in the SVU, it must be a real meat grinder. Don't worry about it, Benson, really."
Olivia nodded. "Call me Olivia."
"Only if you call me Alex," she replied.
'Another Alex,' Olivia thought ruefully. 'But not my Alex….'
The elevator doors opened and they walked out in the main lobby of the precinct. "I gotta head over to the main desk," Olivia told her. "I guess I'll see you tomorrow?"
"See you then," Eames said. "Take care."
"You too."
Olivia went over and consulted with the sergeant at the main desk. She needed him to rustle up some uniforms to help her with moving Casey to the new safe house later. After making some phone calls, the sergeant said, "They'll be down in a sec."
"I'll meet them outside," Olivia told him.
She went out to the front of the One-Six to wait for her uniformed escorts. It wasn't long before Officer Ronald "Ronnie" Dolan exited the building with two of his uniformed comrades in tow. "Hey, Benson! We heard you were looking for some manly studs to escort you, tonight."
"Yeah," Olivia casually replied. "Did you find them, yet?"
Ronnie dramatically struck his chest with his hand, as if he had been hit, while his fellow officers laughed at her wisecrack.
As Olivia turned around to walk to the car, she glanced up at the building—the same one she had been coming to work to for the past six years, now—and was abruptly stricken with an overwhelming sense of dread. It was the strangest thing, but Olivia had the odd feeling that this might be the last time she would ever lay eyes on the One-Six.
'Knock it off,' she told herself. "You've got a job to do. Keep your shit together and get it done.'
Yet even as Olivia remained cool and calm outwardly as she drove off in the squad car with Ronnie, she still could not shake the feeling of dread that had overwhelmed her. It was an ominous feeling that told Olivia that danger was close by. And the danger got ever closer to her the further she rode away from the One-Six.
To Be Continued...