Disclaimers:

None of the songs or musicians I mentioned are mine or in any way related to me

I don't own Alex, Olivia, or any other character from 'Law and Order: SVU'

Author's Notes:

Not much to say actually, for once. Thanks to anyone and everyone who takes the time to review.

There was light-hearted bickering in the car for the first hour and a half. Alex wanted to listen to a CD of Edith Piaf. Liv wanted an ancient tape of 'The Who'. It was a stalemate until Olivia put in 'Beatles One' to get her traveling companion to shut up. It worked like a charm, and all was well for the next fifty miles.

Half way through 'Blackbird,' there was a dull...thumping noise coming from the rear of the vehicle...

'Crap... I think we've got a flat,' the detective mumbled, 'do you keep a spare in here?'

'Hmm... yeah... I think there's one in the trunk... and a jack... I hope...' she said as she pulled over.

Olivia had spent the better part of an hour trying to change the tire (with little success as it were, especially considering that the tire was of the wrong dimensions) while Alex peered over her shoulder, offering essentially useless suggestions, and pestering with questions about how much longer the process would take when a grey Toyota Camry pulled over near them. It was in reasonably good condition, especially for a car that appeared to have been created not long after the bicentennial. Two men stepped out, swarthy in complexion, and dark haired, though one was balding.

"Need any help?" one of the men (the younger of the two, whose faded work jeans were rather tight in the waist) asked through a thick accent after muttering something to his companion in Spanish.

"Uh yeah... our tire seems to have gone flat and the uh spare doesn't fit," having to explain that the tire had been purchased in the wrong size did not make Olivia feel particularly intelligent.

"I can help with that maybe, a little bit of muscle can make a lot of things fit," he seemed to be hinting at something, "So, where are you two lovely ladies headed?" the man rolled up his sleeves and knelt down by the wheel to begin his inspection.

Alexandra Cabot could not, for the life of her, figure out why the man seemed so ill at ease, or why she felt the unbearable urge to lie. Perhaps it was two years of lying, or perhaps it was just... a childish impulse, whichever it was, she somehow resisted. "Auburn, then Niagara Falls."

"Pretty country up that way. Almost as pretty as you." He gestured to his companion with a curt nod of the head, "Eduardo." The bald man came, as he bent, a tin of Altoids fell from his pocket and clattered open, spilling its contents across the pavement.

He mumbled something in Spanish, apparently, from his tone, a curse. The other man spoke to him crossly in the foreign tongue.

The fact that it had fallen was not particularly amazing, the pockets in the bald man's khaki pants were, in fact, quite shallow. Nor was the fact that the tin had come open, for that happed quite frequently, Alex, in fact, recalled a specific incident when the tin had simply come open in her purse. She'd been fishing out mints for a month (though she would never admit that their extended stay in the bottom of her shoulder bag had not dissuaded her from consuming them as they were found. The detail which struck both the detective and the attorney as unusual. Nay, the detail that struck them both as downright bizarre was that he went quickly skittering after them, carefully blowing off each tablet before carefully reinserting them in the tin. The bald man hurried back to the car.

"I apologize for my friend's... unusual behavior. It's not like him. It's just the long drive. Being still for long times... it bothers him." The man was slick, that was for certain, though he sounded slightly fazed. "Let me get your tire fixed and you can be on your way.

The tire was quickly exchanged, though the two women decided they would need, without a doubt, to stay over a day in Auburn to get it replaced with a proper tire. And, as the man had said, they were soon on their way.

A few miles later, when the grey car and its occupants were safely out of sight, and the music was, once again, safely on (this time it was Grace Jones), conversation picked up.

"Liv, you speak a bit of Spanish, right?"

"Yeah... and no, I didn't pick up much of what they said."

"Haven't seen me in two years and you can still read my mind, sad, isn't it. Am I really that predictable?"

"Not at all, I just know you that well."

"Love you."

"I Love you too Hun."

For the next two songs ('The Hunter Gets Captured By the Game' and 'Warm Leatherette'), there was a comfortable silence. Then Alex spoke again.

"So what did he say?"

"Huh?"

"You said you didn't pick up much of what he said, which implies you still picked up some of it. What?"

"You haven't been practicing law, or at least not trial law for two years and you still think like a prosecutor."

"It's in my blood, and you're being evasive, please."

"It was nothing important." Olivia did a poor job of masking the concern in her voice.

"Just tell me. I will not beg, but I can and will make you beg if need be. Though on second though, I'll probably make you beg later on, just for kicks, now tell me."

"We're almost in town... I'll tell you once we get stopped for the evening. Hey, there's a motel at the next exit, do you mind staying there for the evening?"

"Uh, sure, whatever, we're not going to be getting out early tomorrow anyhow, what with the tire and all."

"Hun, tomorrow's Saturday, if you think we're going to be able to get a tire replaced in a small town like this on a Saturday, you're nuts, we're probably going to have to stay the weekend," Olivia didn't sound particularly comfortable with the prospect, an uneasiness her soon to be wife failed to overlook.

"It's a nice town... What's bothering you, there's something, just tell me."

Just then, they pulled into the parking lot of the motel, whose neon sign flickered lime green and tangerine, 'Finger Lakes Forest View Resort, TV, Pool, Vacancy'.

"I'll tell you when we get to the room"

They rented a room for the night, as soon as the door was closed and the chain set, the interrogation continued.

"Okay Olivia, we're here. We're in the room. Tell me."

"There's nothing to tell."

"Yes there is. You're never evasive just for the hell of it."

"Fine, call it a cop's intuition, or the cynicism and paranoia of a jaded law enforcement officer, whichever suits you, but there's something I didn't like about you two."

"I trust your judgment, and believe me, I felt it too. And not just the generic sleaze ball type thing. But what did they say?"

"You know mi Español isn't great, and they were speaking quickly, and not at me, I didn't even hear half of it."

"And you wouldn't be bothering with all this pretext if there weren't something you were trying to shelter me from. The more you keep on, the more sure I become that you heard every word. Tell me, now."

Olivia gave in, against her better judgment, to the pleading of her fiancé, "Fine, first the ugly one asked the bald one if he had seen us before, or if we looked familiar, or something to that effect, then, when the bald guy dropped the tin, which I'm pretty sure wasn't filled with mints, he cursed. The other guy said he hoped for everyone's sake the product wasn't ruined and the boss was going to be mad."

"That doesn't sound good"

"Believe me, I know. I just didn't want you to worry or feel-"

"Feel guilty for telling them exactly where we're going when they're probably Velez's hit men or drug runners or henchmen or lackeys or... oh God, they might come after you now, they know about you know… God, I'm so sorry, god oh God! If, if they-"

Olivia placed a finger on her lover's lips, a signal to be quiet, not to fret. The gesture didn't have the desired effect of calming the woman. Instead, Alex collapsed into Olivia's arms, it wasn't so much this one small thing, the two men from the road, it was everything, being in hiding, the separation, the shooting, even the cases she had handled in her old life, it was everything compounded into this one great, horrible thing that was so out of her control. She sat there sobbing in the arms of the one person that had made her isolation so unbearable, in the arms of the one she loved, while Olivia held her, rubbed her back, and tried to keep her voice level and placid as she uttered reassurances...

"It's okay. We'll forget the tire and staying on tomorrow, we'll check out early, It's less than two hundred miles to the border, to Niagara Falls, we'll be fine. We'll be fine." Olivia Benson prayed silently that everything would be fine, she knew in her heart it wouldn't be, but if she repeated it enough, maybe she'd grow to believe it.

Silent tears slid down from big brown eyes, and their source was thankful her tears were at least under control, she could not offer comfort to the one crying into her shoulder if she too was wracked by sobs.

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