I own nothing.
Olivia sat outside Maureen's hospital room, phone plastered to her ear, talking with Fin on one line and the crime lab on the other. Every few minutes she glanced discreetly in, checking on Elliot more than Maureen.
Maureen would be fine. At least, she would live. She'd just come out of surgery; there would be a small mark under her ribs and a fist-sized patch of scar tissue on her back for the rest of her life. The doctors had also had to remove the bottom half of a lung. She probably wouldn't be able to run for several years, if ever.
While she slept, Elliot gripped her hand, staring straight ahead. Olivia was pained every time they made eye contact; his face had the same expression it had since nine that morning, after Cragen had called him into his office. He had come out white and thin-lipped, jaw cranked shut so hard Olivia thought he would break his teeth. His crystal blue eyes were wide, unblinking, filled with some unnameable emotion – or a thousand. As he grabbed his jacket and rushed past her, she had called out, "What's up, Elliot?"
"Maureen was attacked," he said tightly, and was out the door.
Olivia had rushed into Cragen's office; he held up his hand before she could ask. Pain was written all over his kind face. "At 8:30 this morning NYPD received a call from Columbia University. It was Elliot's daughter. Apparently a man pretending to be delivering a package entered her dorm room this morning and…just shot her. The roommate is missing."
"My God! Shot her where? Is she…all right?"
"In the chest, and we don't know. She is alive, they're taking her to the hospital now.
"Did he…was there any evidence he-"
Cragen knew what she was asking; it had to have been the first place his mind went, too. "We don't know anything yet. Because she's Stabler's daughter, which could mean there's a connection to a sex offender, I've requested permission that you be the lead investigator on this one. Get up there. They've already secured the scene."
"Did you request a rape kit on Maureen?"
"My next call. You're heading to Carman Hall, room 218. And Liv?"
Olivia paused, already halfway out the door.
"Bring all information to me before giving it to Stabler. You understand why."
Olivia stiffened. "I think you can trust me to tell my partner, and the victim's father, what he needs to know without compromising the case."
There was a second of silent tension between them. Olivia knew Cragen understood that she wouldn't hold back from Elliot, not about this. But he couldn't put up with direct insubordination from anyone, especially not now.
"Just bring it to me first, Liv, and I don't want to have to remind you. Get going."
"When Munch and Fin get back, send them to me. I'll need them going door to door. And I'll need to hear the 911 recording as soon as you can get it," she said over her shoulder as she rushed out of the office.
Though unfamiliar with the campus, Olivia was able to immediately find Carman Hall by the six police cars camped in front of it. She rushed towards them, badge out, and one of the standing policemen waved her over.
"Detective Benson? We heard you were coming. We haven't let anyone leave."
"Great. You're taking statements?"
"The whole second floor so far. Nobody knows anything. We've talked to the girl at the front desk, and she says she saw an adult male, white, leave with Janey Christopher."
"The roommate."
"Yeah. Said she didn't see any signs of a struggle."
"I wouldn't expect a struggle if he had her at gunpoint. How did he get in? Don't you need a key?"
"An ID card, but any student could have let him in. They're pretty easygoing about it."
Olivia grimaced. "Guess that's about to change."
College students in their pajamas milled curiously around the second floor, hoping to see part of the drama. Room 218 was taped off, and the crime scene examiner, a young man Olivia didn't recognize, was already at work when she arrived. He met her outside the door. There was blood on his gloves, and Olivia suddenly felt short of breath, thinking of Elliot running stone-faced out of the station. "What can you tell me?"
"We can clearly tell where the shooting occurred. We've got the bullet hole and bullet, and powder on the doorframe. Girl was apparently lying on the bed when it happened. There's a trail of blood leading to the phone, where there's a pile of bloody vomit…" Olivia tried not to react. She had seen Maureen just a few weeks ago, on her eighteenth birthday. "…but as for signs of a fight, I don't think we'll ever know."
"Why?"
"Brace yourself." The examiner led her into the room – or, more correctly, to its threshold, since there was no path in through the ocean of crap on the floor. He gave a tired chuckle at her stunned expression. "Yeah. It's going to take my team about a week to dust for fingerprints. That's if we can get a team in here without causing an avalanche."
In the mess, it took a few seconds before Olivia could even make out the blood puddle. She wouldn't have seen the bullet-hole explosion of fluff on Maureen's mattress if it weren't marked with the crime photographer's number tag.
"Here's what's really important. We didn't want to touch it until you got here." The examiner indicated a shoebox-sized cardboard box, also marked with a photographer's tag, on the pile near the door. Carefully easing into the room, trying to squeeze her feet between clothes and food containers without moving them, Olivia squatted by the box and read its label. It looked like standard mail, with the dorm room as the receiving address. It was to Maureen, from Elliot, with a piece of orange tape labeled URGENT across the front.
"I checked with the front desk. No mail comes to the dorms, it all goes to a separate building."
"Send this to the lab right away," Olivia said. "The perp was supposedly dressed as a delivery man. Tell them not to open it till they're sure it doesn't contain anything dangerous. And if you're dusting for prints, start with this."
"Will do. And you should take this." He took a framed picture off one of the desks and handed it to her. It was of a pretty dark-haired girl with a heart-shaped face.
"Our missing person."
After the examiner left with the package, Olivia poked carefully around the room, examining the blood trail, bullet hole, and the trash near the door, hoping to find any kind of evidence, but the examiner had been right: it was impossible to tell lazy-mess from struggle-mess. At one point, while she was leaning in to look at Maureen's bloody handprints on the phone, her head brushed a plastic filing shelf and the tower of soda cans on top of it collapsed on her head. Frustrated, she turned to leave. She was surprised by a large picture of Jesus hanging over the girls' door. He looked stern, and it unsettled her. Creepy decoration for a dorm room.
Outside the room she yelled at the gathering students to back off so she could call Cragen for an update with some privacy. He sounded understandably stressed, but was, as always, collected. Maureen was in surgery; Munch and Fin were on their way; and the 911 recording was ready. Cragen had the operators feed it to her cell. She listened while her stomach twisted sickeningly.
"911. Where is your emergency?"
"Help please, help me…" crackling, maybe a sob. "I've, I've been shot. This, this guy-"
"Honey, where are you?"
hard coughing, vomiting, more sobs. "Where are you? Darling, can you tell me where you are?"
"At Columbia. University. C-C-Carman Hall…room 218…(sob)…he took Janey and he sh-shot me, but he w-wanted me…"
"An ambulance is on its way. Where are you shot?"
"In…the stomach, the chest. I don't know, God…" vomiting, "but you've gotta find J-J-Janey, he's got her and it was supposed to be me, she said she was m-me."
"I don't…What's your name?" (heavy breathing) "Hello? Honey?"
"Maureen Stabler, my dad's a policeman, please send him, please, please, please hurry…"
"We're on our way, hon, they'll be there in five minutes. Can you tell me who shot you?"
"This guy, he said he was delivering a p-package and it was for me (sob), but my roommate s-said she was m-me, and he took her, her name is Janey Christopher, you've got to find her, it's my fault, please…"
It went on for ten more minutes. Near the end, it was just Maureen's heavy breathing, with the operator agitatedly trying to keep her talking. When Olivia heard the sounds of the EMTs she hung up her phone with relief. Hopefully Elliot would never have to hear the recording, though he would probably insist.
The worst thing about the call was that it confirmed her fear. "It was supposed to be me…" If the guy was connected to Elliot – a perp with a grudge? – they could be dealing with a kidnapping rapist. Who was after Maureen. Who…thought he had Maureen?
"She said she was me."
Why?
Had Janey known this guy was dangerous? Had she lied to protect Maureen? Well, Olivia prayed Janey Christopher knew enough to lead her kidnapper on. If he was out to hurt Elliot and he learned his victim wasn't Elliot's daughter, he would probably kill her.
Olivia examined the picture. Janey actually could be Elliot's daughter; she looked more like him than Maureen. Maureen was blonde and classically beautiful like Kathy. This girl's hair was Elliot's dark reddish-brown, and she had his small mouth and widow's peak. The only real difference was in the eyes; Elliot's were large and ice-blue, while Janey's were brown and slightly slanted. Doe eyes.
"Liv, we got the kid who let him in." Olivia turned to see Fin (who had spoken) and Munch coming down the hall. "Freshman. Looks like the guy just walked in behind him before the door shut, and the kid didn't say anything 'cause that happens all the time."
"We don't think he intentionally aided the guy, but we've got him crying and pissing his pants downstairs if you want some entertainment." Munch: always tactful in serious situations.
The detectives all knew his various inappropriate moods – flippancy, sarcasm, crude humor – were his way of dealing, but this time Fin told him to shut up.
Olivia told them what she knew and suspected. They listened in grim silence.
"We've got guys searching the area, but the perp had a good hour before anybody started looking for him," said Fin.
"Nobody seems to have gotten a good enough look for any description except 'white male in a brown uniform,'" added Munch. "Our guy moves fast. And he's smart - if you're going to attack a dorm, do it Saturday morning when nobody's up. Used a silencer, too. So I'm thinking he also had a getaway plan."
"He's not that smart, if he got the wrong girl," Fin pointed out.
"We need to talk to Maureen. Hopefully she got a good look at him," said Olivia.
"We need to talk to Elliot," said Munch. "Find out who's got a grudge against him."
"I'll try to find out if the girls had any boyfriends, enemies, that kinda thing," volunteered Fin.
Munch gave him one of his patented looks of dry contempt. "You do that."
"What the hell is wrong with you? You've been half-assing it ever since we got here!"
"There are no answers here, Odafin. We're not looking for a boyfriend. We all know what this is about. Fine bunch of detectives you all are if you worked with Elliot for seven years and didn't see this coming!"
"That's enough outta you!" barked Fin.
Olivia's jaw dropped. "You're blaming Elliot?"
Munch hesitated with a sigh, which was quite unconvincing to Olivia. "Not blaming. Deducing," he answered. "And so are you, I'm just the only one saying it. A guy with four kids, when any jerk with the Internet can get on and read all about them, and he's been on SVU for what, ten years? We deal with rapists and he's got a beautiful eighteen-year-old daughter. I can't be the only one who's thought of this."
"Think about shutting your mouth, John!" Olivia snapped.
Her phone rang. Disgusted, she turned from Munch to answer it. Behind her she could hear Fin and Munch arguing harshly in low voices.
She turned back. "Maureen's out of surgery. Let's be there when she wakes up. And Munch, if you say anything about this in front of Elliot, so help me, I'll shoot you."
"Won't have to. He's been saying it to himself all morning." Munch headed for the elevator. Fin put a sympathetic hand on Olivia's shoulder before assuming his normal stoic look and following.