CHAPTER TWENTY

Olivia stared at Huang with intense contempt. He stared back, his face unreadable. In the corner of the room was a video camera, a silent witness to the proceedings. They had been sitting there like that for more than 30 minutes, Olivia refusing to talk to him. She had gone into defiant mode. Who cares about her defense? Her life was a ruined mess, there was no way of getting it back now.

"Olivia," Huang said patiently. He expected this from her. He had his notes from his interview with Elliot and he knew what direction he needed to go in to get Olivia to open up. "It won't help your defense if you won't talk to me. Now, I'm prepared to sit here all day if you'd like."

Olivia sighed. "I am on trial for my life. You all say I've done things…horrible, despicable, inhumane things. You say you have all this evidence…you say I tried to hurt Elliott…" The mere mention of his name filled Olivia with infinite sadness. "What's there to talk about? I can't tell you about the…killings, because I don't know what to tell you. I can only tell you what I learned from my involvement in the investigation."

"Olivia, how do you feel about your mother's death?" he decided to take another route, they were stalling on the murders themselves.

Olivia blinked and bit her lip. With everything that had been going on in her life, she had been successfully able to block out her mother. Her poor mother, lying dead at the bottom of those subway steps while she made love to Elliot.

"I feel guilty," she said in a small voice. "I…I was involved in something and I should have noticed she hadn't come home."

"How did you feel about your mom being your roommate? Was it like when you were a child?"

"Of course not," she snapped. She didn't really want to talk about this. "I'm a little too big for her to beat up on now."

Huang picked up speed. Persons who suffered from MPD normally suffered emotional, physical or sexual abuse in their childhood. "Your mother hit you Olivia?"

"When she was drunk enough…but I could handle it," Olivia said quickly. She felt like a traitor, speaking ill of the dead. But she was tired, tired of it all. Maybe if she just answered his questions quickly, he would go away and leave her alone.

"What would bring on the attacks…besides the alcohol?"

"I don't know…just stuff," Olivia mumbled. "I mean, it wasn't just me. She would unload on her various boyfriends too."

"Did you ever have any boyfriends Olivia?"

She swallowed. She could feel the tears coming. "I had an older boyfriend once…see my mother was a professor at the University…she was fired not too long ago…but anyway, he was one of her students…"

Huang smiled. "Go on. Tell me about him."

Olivia shifted in her seat. "He wanted to marry me and I said yes. I thought it was my ticket to finally get away from her. But when she found out…"

"What did she do Olivia?"

"She threatened to get him kicked out of school…you see I was only sixteen at the time. But we argued and she started hitting me. And I lost it, I just lost it. I started fighting back, which I had never done before…but…"

Huang didn't want her to stop now. "But what, Olivia?"

Her face crumpled. "She said I could hit her all I want, but she would never let anyone have me, anyone love me." Olivia covered her face with her hands and cried softly. Her head was killing her, but she was a pro at this by now. "…I have to go lie down now."

Huang sat up, alarmed. "What's wrong? Is it your head? Do you have a headache?"

"Yes," she said weakly. "I need to go…"

Huang glanced at the video camera. This was better than he could have ever hoped. Olivia's alter, Sasha, was about to make an appearance. "No," he said loudly, firmly. "You need to stay put. We aren't finished."

Olivia threw him a bizarre look, through painfully narrowed eyes. "No, I'm done with this, I'm finished…" Olivia closed her eyes and slumped in her seat. Huang quickly signaled to the camera, alerting the officials watching not to enter the room. He waited in anticipation.

Her head popped up so quickly it nearly startled him. "Hello, Doctor," she said irritably.

"Hello…I don't believe we've met."