It's the kind of biting New York winter that sinks into his bones at the beginning of the season and doesn't let up, even when he's drowning his sorrows in a warm sticky bar with his coat still draped around his shoulders.
But when she shivers on the stool next to him, Elliot thinks that maybe just today it has nothing to do with the time of year and everything to do with the absolute pile of shit they've somehow stepped in at work.
"What the hell do we do now?" The pain in her voice cuts him like glass, leaving a scar against his skin, and he steels himself against it, pouring the last of the cheap whiskey down his throat so he can feel the burn of the alcohol instead.
A pain he knows, is equipped to deal with — not whatever this bullshit is.
"I don't know," he admits miserably, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand before he signals the bartender for another round. They've already had two and he's setting himself up for a long walk home, but he can't bring himself to give a fuck right now. That's a problem for future Elliot.
God, he wishes he could rewind to this morning, tell himself to call in sick, step into traffic so he could get hit by a fucking truck, anything but this.
It'd only be delaying the inevitable, but god, maybe it would've fucking prepared him for the bombshell Cragen dropped on them before Elliot had even swallowed down his first cup of coffee.
"I suppose it could be worse," he says, grabbing a handful of peanuts from the bowl in front of them. He clocks her face reflexively, looking for the twitch of disdain at his lack of care for germs, and she doesn't disappoint. He doesn't tell her that he procured a clean bowl when she hit the head shortly after they got there and poured the bowl himself.
He's not proud of it, but sometimes her squirming amuses him.
Olivia winces at that before she slams back the rest of her drink, too. "I don't want to do - " but she cuts herself off, pressing her lips together. A light flush has worked its way up her cheeks and he doesn't know if it's from the alcohol or…something else.
Or both.
"What did you say to her?" he asks. "Hendricks?"
She turns to look him in the eye, a challenge in her gaze. "What did you say to her?"
Yeah, he should've seen that one coming.
"Come on, Liv," he says with a casual little shrug, even though they both know what he's asking is anything but casual.
"She asked me what I would do if I had to choose between saving you and a member of the public," she replies softly.
Elliot sighs. "Yeah, she asked me that, too."
She lifts an eyebrow in question. "And?"
"And what? I told her it already happened."
Olivia nods slowly, biting her lip in thought as her gaze slides away from his, back to the fresh drink the bartender has just placed in front of her.
Hmm. There's something she's not telling him.
"What else?" Elliot pushes.
Her eyes slam shut. "Nothing," she whispers, but her fingers are curling against the bartop and he thinks maybe she stopped breathing and shit, she's never lied to him quite like this before.
It scares the fuck out of him and makes him angry and Jesus Christ, how the hell did they get here?
"Son of a bitch, Olivia, what did you do?" he hisses.
Her eyes jerk back at him. "Fuck you, Elliot," she spits. "You can't put all this shit on me." Furious, she clambers off her seat and shoves her hand into her pocket for some cash before she tosses it onto the bar.
God, he didn't mean —
"Hey, hey." He grabs her arm as she starts to reach for her coat, tugging her gently back to him. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean - " He sighs in frustration, scrubbing a hand down his face. "We were both in that room with Hendricks, not just you."
Her shoulders drop as she settles back down onto the barstool. "What else did you say?" Her anger is gone now, but the fight in her lingers — she knows he's not spilling the whole story, either.
In lieu of an answer, he takes a long sip of his drink before his heavy gaze settles on her, and she looks so fucking haunted at what she sees that he knows he doesn't even need to bother answering that question.
She knows. They both know.
They're royally fucked.
12 hours earlier
"Benson. Stabler. My office. Now." Cragen's voice is sharp and hollow as it echoes off the walls of the bullpen at 8 a.m. on the dot.
As dread fills the pit of Elliot's stomach, he shares a startled look with Olivia, who hasn't even had time to take her coat off yet, for Chrissake.
It's been days since they'd gotten their ass chewed out by their Captain and ordered to get their head shrunk, but Cragen has remained so frosty with the two of them that Elliot's starting to worry that the statute of limitations on his anger will never run out.
Elliot sets his pen down and pushes back from his desk, lead filling up his shoes and his lungs as he trails after his partner, ignoring the commiserative stares from Munch and Fin.
"Close the door and sit down," Cragen barks out as Elliot steps over the threshold into his office.
He closes the door, desperately tries to ignore the ripples of tension radiating off Olivia right now in the clench of her jaw, the stiff set of her shoulders, and the way her fingers are wrapped tightly around the arms of her chair.
He curls his fingers into his palm to fight the impulse to touch her — not something they ever do really, not so much that it should be an impulse but ever since that night in the car outside Simon's house, it's become his instinctual response whenever he feels the need to reassure or comfort her.
Which has gotten so fucking dangerous and almost makes him regret lifting his hand to the back of her neck that night in the first place. He wishes he'd known that with one singular touch all of the floodgates would come roaring open and he'd be left drowning as he tried to figure out how to lock it all back inside.
"I've already ripped your asses for how you handled the Marsden case and botched our rape investigation, so I'll just cut to the chase," Cragen says grimly. "I've spoken to Rebecca Hendricks about your psych evals."
Cragen's eyes flit between the two of them and it's so quiet Elliot can hear his heart thudding in his chest. "She's determined that you're too close."
Oh, fuck.
Olivia sucks in a sharp breath beside him as his vision starts to grow hazy and his stomach roils with nausea.
"She believes that if I were to split the two of you up, I'd lose you both." Cragen pauses. "However, at this point, that's a risk I'm willing to take."
Elliot leans forward, swallowing down the bile that rises in his throat. "Captain - "
"No," Cragen interjects tersely. "I've put up with a lot of crap from the two of you, especially over this last year. Musical partners, unauthorized undercover operations, screaming matches in the hallway, lying to cover each other's asses. I've had it."
Olivia's voice is the smallest he's ever heard it when she opens her mouth. "Are you transferring one of us out?"
"Not yet. Olivia, I'm partnering you with Fin. Elliot, you're with Munch. We'll do a trial run for a few months, but listen to me carefully because I'm only going to say this once: if your sorry asses continue to wreak havoc on my precinct, I will not hesitate to bust your asses down to traffic. Do I make myself clear?"
"Yes, sir," Elliot mutters.
"No field work together or joint interrogations without my clearance first. Is that understood?"
"Yes, Captain," Olivia replies.
"Good. Olivia, I expect you and Munch to have switched desks by the end of the day." He nods toward the door. "You're both dismissed."
He opens his mouth as they step back into the bullpen, but Olivia doesn't pause or stop before she heads in the direction of the bathroom, cutting him off before he can tell her it's going to be all right.
Which is probably for the best because —
Well, he really fucking hates to lie.
More to come! Would love to hear from you.
x,
Liv
