Just when you thought it was all over.


They stay like that. Staring, unblinking, unable to move from the place that they're in. His large hands are still coating her cheeks as tears stream quietly down her face. The chill of the night begins to chafe her throat with each inhale and after a few stern moments between them she feels something start to culminate in the depths of her chest.

Something is off.

"I need you to listen to me carefully," Elliot begins and it's immediate, her heart begins to pang with imminent concern. She knows this tone. She's heard it countless times in victim interviews, hostage negotiations and life threatening situations.

"Tony is dead," he states and she takes a couple of breaths before her eyebrows furrow in response. She doesn't understand why he is giving her information she already knows, that she had already processed. Tony's limp neck and sagged head lodged between a car seat and her wrists was confirmation enough for her.

"Okay-" she begins confused.

"The other car," he tells her slowly, cutting her off.

That's when it hits her like a wall. There had been another car. This whole time. Another vehicle. Another driver. Sandwiched against theirs. Another persons life, or worse - multiple lives. But all she had been focused on was his.

She starts to move then, as if in autopilot. She can help it, there is still time but as she begins to round the car he stops her in her tracks, grasping her good arm gently and pulling her back around to face him.

"Don't," he whispers, and it's in that one word, that one look he is giving her that she falls forward, doubling over, a howl emanating down the cold dark street. She chokes on her breath and he bends down with her, doing his best to keep her upright, off the shards of glass and bitchumen that she seems intent on wedging into her hands, knees and feet.

But she wants to look. She needs to assess the damage. She needs to know if there is something she can do. She tries to scramble to her feet, but he's blocking her, shielding her, holding her, keeping her confined from the carnage. She starts to breathe rapidly and it's bordering on hyperventilation, her fingers are digging into his forearm as he holds her, tears bucketing down as she struggles to hold herself up.

"How m-many?" she stammers, and her throat is catching because if it's anymore than one she is going to break right here and now. But she doesn't actually want a number. One is too many. She doesn't want any part of this to be real. There's still a panging ache in her shoulder as he holds her this way but it doesn't even begin to match the ache in her heart. From this – all of it.

She has killed. People have died tonight because of her.

He gently cups her shoulder, bringing her back against the car, trying to hold her steady while he says it.

"Listen to me," he repeats as he lines up their faces once more. "I doesn't matter how many okay - look at me," he shakes her gently until he obtains her full eye contact then he waits a few beats before he says it. "There is nothing we can do."

Nothing we can do..

'We' as if it were a mutual decision they made to collect an innocent Sedan on this frozen Saturday morning.

She isn't looking at him anymore, she won't allow herself to watch the judgment unfold in his eyes because it will only mirror her own.

"Right now," he whispers. "You gotta pull it together, because this isn't over."

She can't help it then, her damp eyes move back to his. What the hell does he mean by that? This isn't over. Her mouth parts, she's about to question him when streaks of headlights round the bend they've been standing on and she sees a car approaching the scene.

Then she feels it, another shift in Elliot's demeanor.

"Whatever happens," he rasps hurriedly, as if they're running out of time. "Tell me that you trust.. that I'll protect you." Her eyes are trained on the vehicle approaching and they don't move back to his until he shakes her again.

"Say it," he whispers.

She has no way of knowing who is in the car that's just pulled up or what exactly is to come but the words fall hesitantly and achingly out of her mouth.

"I trust you," she whispers.

And with that he lets go of his grip and moves quickly towards the trunk of their car.

TBC