Sixteen.
Olivia felt terrible after telling Kristi they didn't have enough evidence to prosecute her rapists, but she couldn't help but chuckle on her way home when she thought about calling Tucker to see if he wanted to meet for a drink.
"Oh yeah," she said to herself, rolling her eyes, "Tucker's at my apartment."
She assumed Noah would be asleep and entered quietly to the sounds of a Disney movie playing at a low volume and the sight of Ed lying on the sofa with Noah out like a light on his chest. Sensing her presence, Ed woke up as soon as she hung her trench and blazer on the coat rack.
He offered a breathy "hey" and sat up slowly so he didn't wake Noah.
Olivia instinctively held out her arms, but she stopped herself when she saw Ed tenderly cradle the boy's head and stand up.
"You wanna take him?"
The question didn't exactly indicate he was eager to hand over her son.
"Um…let's put him in bed. C'mon."
Ed followed Olivia to Noah's room and laid him gently in the crib he would probably only use for a few more months. He squeezed Olivia's elbow and left her alone to kiss her son goodnight.
"Thanks," she sighed when she returned to the living room. She'd expected to see Ed back on the sofa, but he was leaning against the counter and apparently ready to leave which was exactly the opposite of what she wanted. "Do you want a drink?"
"Sure, but…if you're wantin' to—"
Olivia waved away his objections. "I'm going to change. I'll be right back. I have a couple of beers, bourbon…wine…whatever you want."
"What do you want?"
Olivia tilted her head in the direction of a recorked wine bottle. "Will you pour the rest of that for me?"
"Yep." His breath caught in his throat. She knew he wouldn't want wine.
Back on the couch, inches apart, Ed asked about her day and listened as she immediately launched into a diatribe against Chief Dodds.
"I…I admit, this girl, is not a great witness…but as soon as he heard Bobby D'Amico, it was…case closed. Blinders up. The guy bought him dinners at some fancy restaurants and he's forever innocent of all crimes."
Ed's antipathy for Dodds was no secret. "How'd Mike react?"
"All of us know something's not right," Olivia replied, failing to answer the question. "Dodds, the Chief, wants it swept under the rug. But, then again, he's right. Even Barba agreed. It's beyond murky…it's…"
She flapped her hands around in exasperation and Ed caught them.
"Frustrating?"
"In every possible way," she replied, feeling the familiar butterflies as Ed leaned in for a kiss. It was sweet but brief. Ed never pressured her; he let her lead the way when it came to intimacy. Had she merely given him a peck and retreated to her side of the sofa, he would have done the same thing and been perfectly fine with it. But she parted her lips, released his hands, and held his head to hers.
She kept her eyes closed for a few seconds after the kiss. "That was nice."
"Yeah."
"Ugh," she groaned, "This whole day…was not supposed to end up, well, it wasn't supposed to last the whole day. Fucking Dodds."
Ed had a million derogatory words for Bill Dodds, but he chose to remain silent, gaze at Benson, and run his fingers through her hair.
"I hope you didn't have important plans for today," she said weakly.
"Liv," he half-whispered, "I want you to call me when you need someone for Noah. Or for you. And I want you to know you don't have to think twice about it." He kissed her again, tentatively, leaving space between their bodies. "Right now is my important plan."
She grinned and played with his shirt collar. "Ed Tucker…"
His eyelids hung heavy as he gazed at her. "I'm glad you called me today," he said, "It means a lot."
"I…"
He held up a hand and interrupted her, a rarity. "—I know you trust me. I know this," He held her hands again and ran his thumbs over her knuckles. "Is goin' to take some getting used to."
She inched closer for another kiss. "I don't want you to feel pressure," she hesitated, suddenly anxious and at a loss for words.
"No pressure," he said, reassuring her with a smile. "We're…havin' such a good time together…I care about you, Liv—"
"I care about you, too."
"And I already told ya…I like you…a lot." He added a playful nudge. "And I'm pretty sure you kinda like me…So let's not overthink it, huh?"
"I like that idea." She smiled and settled in under his arm.
"Noah's been talkin' a lot about trains lately," Ed said, "Want to take him to the Transit Museum sometime? Might be fun."
Seconds after they'd agreed to avoid overthinking, Olivia had to stop herself from doing just that. She put her arm across his chest and took a moment to soak up the comfort of being so close to him. "You're full of great ideas tonight," she murmured, flirting a bit. "Got any more?"
"One or two," he replied, matching her tone.
"Care to share?"
"Whenever you're ready."
….
As dusk fell over the city early Wednesday evening, Sarah and Noah burst into the Tucker apartment with their hands full of shopping bags and early dinner leftovers. Their afternoon together included stops at the National Museum of Mathematics, two hobby stores specializing in model trains, DaVinci for art supplies, a stroll through Chelsea Market, and a stop at Kidding Around where Noah picked out presents for the twins.
"Here ya go, babies!" Noah triumphantly pulled two boxes from the bags. "Got Monster Pile 'cause it r'minded me of BABY PILE and dis other one, we can build a 'musement park, but I haveta help ya. It say you haveta be three, but you're almost two, and I'm six, so Sare Bear said it's okay."
Maggie and Wyatt crouched and inspected the boxes.
"SIDE!" Wyatt exclaimed, pointing to the slide pictured on the box. "Bi' SIDE!"
The pieces to the amusement park were secured in a plastic tub. Noah easily slid it from the soft cardboard case. "Comes with a book, Wyatt. We gotta read da book and follow the instructions."
Wide-eyed, Maggie jabbed an index finger at the second box and shouted her word for "Monster!" She tried to rip open the packaging, and, finding the lid hopelessly secured with tape, dragged the package to Ed.
"Want me to open it, Maggs?"
"OH! Dada! OH!" She grunted and tried again to get into the new toy.
Ed sliced the tape with a knife and spread the pieces on the floor. "Here ya go. You stack 'em like this." He secured the first few monster pieces and Maggie took over. Perched on her knees, she worked carefully and twisted her lips in concentration.
Sarah had helped herself to a small pour of what looked to be bourbon. Ed raised his eyebrows and questioned her choice. "Long day?"
"No," Sarah replied, "I saw this in your cabinet and it looked interesting."
Ed saw the bottle of the sweet holiday bourbon he thought they'd finished off months ago. "This was in there?"
"Yes. Why?"
Ed shrugged. "Thought we were out of it." Sarah either ignored or didn't notice Ed's flushed cheeks. He poked around in the take out bags and opened one container. "Where'd you eat?"
"Bar Sardine."
Ed bit into the corner of the lukewarm cheeseburger and chewed approvingly.
"Noey and I decided to do the tour of the best burgers in the city," Sarah said, "So we started there. We also brought doughnuts from Chelsea Market. In the other bag."
Ed broke apart one doughnut and gave a piece to each of the kids. He grinned at Maggie and Wyatt as they tasted the semi-unfamiliar food. "Yummy?"
"YUM!
"YUMUMUMUM!"
"They had lotsa doughnuts there," Noah said with his mouth full.
"Did ya try 'em all?" Ed asked.
"Only three."
Ed lovingly rolled his eyes and returned to the island.
"How are we doing with party planning?" Sarah asked. "We haven't talked about it in a couple weeks."
Ed found his phone and pulled up his checklist. Invitations had been mailed. The catering and venue arrangements had been secured. The program had been created and was ready to be printed and duplicated. "We're pretty much ready to go," he reported, "You and Brooke are doing the decorations, right?"
"Yep!"
"Then we're good. Workin' on one last thing, but that's more the Department's thing than mine."
Sarah picked up on the air of secrecy, "What is it?" She leaned forward and stared at her father with wide, inquisitive, Tucker-blue eyes.
"Secret."
Scowling, Sarah snapped, "Oh, come on. You brought it up. You know you want to tell me!"
She was right. Since learning of the plan, he'd been so desperate to let someone in on the surprise that he told Maggie and Wyatt one afternoon before their naps.
"Fine," he said. "But you can't tell anyone. Not Justin. Not Brooke. Nobody."
Sarah exuberantly bounced on the barstool. "Promise, promise, promise."
Ed skeptically eyed Noah. Even when he seemed fully occupied, the kid overheard bits and pieces of conversations. His interest may have already been piqued hearing the word "secret." He thought of a boring excuse to get Sarah out of the room.
"Hey, bud, I'm gonna show Sarah our closet shelves. We'll be right back."
"Kay, Daddy!"
Once they were out of sight, Sarah giggled and said, "Closet shelves?"
"You want to know or not?"
"Yes, yes, yes. Let me see this fantastic closet design."
"I'm sure you've been in here snooping a hundred times before."
"I have no idea what you're talking about."
…
Justin was very athletic and nimble in the sand and Olivia proved herself to be an excellent receiver, so the two of them on a touch football team were difficult to contain. After the first half hour of play, they combined for three touchdowns, Wyatt and Noah ran in two more sores, and, on defense, Justin sailed across the sand, stopping the opposition from gaining large chunks of yardage.
Sarah summed it up best as she took a breather while the two sides set up for kickoff. "I have burned every single calorie I've consumed on this vacation," she panted, hunched over with her hands on her knees.
On the next possession, Justin set up as quarterback and Olivia split out at wide receiver. Brooke jogged over to cover her, but Ed got there first. "I got this one," he said with a wink.
Justin barked meaningless signals and Noah hiked the ball.
Olivia sprinted past Ed, sidestepping his attempt at holding, and cut across the center of their white sand field. Justin lofted a pass and Olivia caught it in stride. She made a break for the goal—a set of sand pails—but Ed caught up and wrapped her in a bear hug. He lifted Olivia off her feet and swung her around. Dizzy, his knees buckled and she collapsed on top of him.
"HEY!" Noah shouted, "NO TACKLING!"
Maggie and Wyatt, who had not quite grown out of their proclivity for piling on others, heaved themselves on top of their parents. They both tried to wrestle the ball from Olivia's grip. She managed a handoff to her teammate.
"Go, Wyatt, go," she said.
He sprinted for the goal and kept running to the shore. Sarah and Brooke gave chase and ended up taking him down in the waves.
"Well," Sonny said, "Guess that's the end of the game."
"Sorry," Ed mumbled as he helped Olivia to her feet.
"Daddy! You were not s'posed to tackle," Maggie said, her hands on her hips and her sweet little face contorted into a frown.
"Hey, I'm on your team, Maggie May," Ed said. He now had his arm around Olivia's waist.
"It's alright, Captain," Sonny continued, "I'm beat anyway." He rocked back and forth from heel to toe, "Gonna feel this in the morning."
Justin chuckled at Sonny. They got along well, but Sonny's tendency to be a bit finicky always amused Sarah's husband.
Everyone but Ed and Olivia headed to the shoreline, and Ed kissed a few times at Olivia's neck. "Whaddya say we head in and get dinner ready?"
She didn't have to look at him to know what he was thinking.
"Sure, Captain."
Ed shouted their plans to the rest of the group. He knew their kids would not want to go inside. Sure enough, they begged to stay.
"We got 'em," Sarah said, "C'mon, kiddos. Get the buckets. Let's go find some shells."
Ed and Olivia watched their brood plus the Carisis, Sarah, and Justin meander down the beach. All three Tucker kids employed the same type of gait—a half-skip, really—and it warmed Olivia's heart. They were all so happy.
Impatient to get inside, Ed tugged on her fingers. "Liv?"
"Oh, yeah, sorry…dinner."
He grinned devilishly, "Yeah…dinner."
…..
Seeing another inquiry from the brass at One PP made Olivia audibly groan. It had been two weeks since the first body surfaced in the reservoir, and she and the squad were miles away from closing the case. They had no promising leads and only two of the four bodies identified. Matching names to the corpses hadn't gotten them any closer to finding the perp, and the pressure was weighing down everyone, Olivia most of all.
She summoned Rollins into her office.
"Yeah, Liv?"
"Hey," Olivia said in her most solicitous voice, "Will you do me a favor?"
"Sure."
"That FBI profiler will be here soon along with the water expert and the ME with the final autopsy reports. I really need to be here. Can you go down to One PP and brief them? They're," Olivia scowled at her laptop screen, "Not taking give me a couple hours for an answer."
"No problem," Rollins said, "Whaddya want me to say?"
Olivia raised her hands in frustration. "Give them what we have…which isn't much…and stress that we've called in the feds."
"Sure thing."
Rollins grabbed her jacket and went directly to the headquarters. She was glad the Lieutenant gave her something official to do. Olivia's retirement was still three months away, but, unbeknownst to anyone, Rollins was preparing for the Lieutenants' exam and hoped to be selected to succeed her boss. She rehearsed a few lines on the way, and gave, what she thought to be an intelligent, informative report. She easily fielded questions and assured the panel of men in their dress blues that SVU would eventually bring the killer or killers to justice.
In the elevator, glad to be alone, she took deep breaths. She hadn't realized how nervous she'd been. Usually, if she spoke to the press or to their superiors, Olivia was right there and certainly willing to step in if Rollins went off script. This time she'd not only been on her own, but she was confident she'd made no errors.
When the car stopped, Rollins moved to exit, thinking it was the lobby. Instead, she nearly ran smack into Ed Tucker.
"Oh, uh, um," she stammered, "Sorry, uh, Tucker. Wrong floor."
Tucker appeared stunned, not unhappy to see her or irritated, only completely blindsided he'd (almost literally) run into her.
"Rollins," he managed to sound friendly and forced a smile, "How are things?"
"Good, good…just…here to brief 'em on the case, you know, the girls in the reservoir."
"I may have heard somethin' about it."
She smiled, getting the joke and stalling. Small talk with Tucker would always be a challenging endeavor. Luckily, the rest of the elevator ride lasted less than a minute and the two of them hurriedly parted on the street.
…
For the first time in at least a year, maybe more, Ed awoke to the sound of Olivia's body thrashing around under the covers. From her mouth came soft, unintelligible, distressed whimpers and moans. In the moonlight he saw her clenched jaw and eyes squeezed into an impossibly tight squint.
He grabbed for her hands first.
"Liv. Liv, baby, wake up."
As if controlled by a remote operator, her entire body froze and her eyes popped open. Seconds later, she realized where she was and who she was with.
"Ed."
"C'mere," he propped himself against the headboard and lifted her into his arms. "What was it?"
It could have been a hundred things, but he assumed the stress of the reservoir case was finally taking its toll.
"You couldn't get to me," she whispered in an almost disembodied voice.
He kissed her head and held her as tightly as he could without being overly aggressive, "I'll always get to you, Liv. Always. No matter what."
Olivia didn't immediately respond. She spent the next several minutes concentrating on her breathing and on the feel of her body against Ed's. The details of the nightmare remained fuzzy, but she had no doubt about its origins. Earlier that afternoon when Rollins mentioned seeing Ed, alarm bells went off in Olivia's head. Yet another piece of evidence pointing to her husband's deception. But why? And for what? The calls were one thing, but visiting One PP? Was he thinking about rejoining the force? Would they even let him do that? Never once, in any of their conversations, had he regretted retirement. Could the dedication to their family, a commitment he displayed on a minute-by-minute basis, be waning?
She shivered.
"Liv?"
"Sorry," she replied a bit too quickly, "I'm fine…I…every once in a while…"
He reached over and turned on the lamp.
The expression on his face caused her to immediately feel guilty about doubting him. There was nothing but love, adoration, and, now, concern in his eyes. He smoothed her hair and examined every millimeter of her features.
There was no fooling him.
"Actually, Ed," she sighed, "I'm not fine." Then, in the ensuing minutes, it all came pouring out. The declined calls at lunch. The conversation he ended abruptly when she came home. And finally, the encounter at One PP. She waved her hands around as she ticked off her observations. She struggled to make eye contact. When she finished, to her utter shock, the classic Tucker smirk was plastered on his face.
"Busted," he said, holding up his hands in surrender. "I should've known better."
"What is going on?"
"I can't tell you. But," he planted a soft kiss on her lips, "I can't let you live in suspicion any longer, so I'm partially coming clean. I have been consulted…about a project related to your impending retirement. And that is absolutely all I am saying."
An intrigued smile crossed her face. "Seriously?"
"Seriously." He kissed her again. "I'm sorry…you, uh, you can see now why I rarely went undercover."
At this, Olivia laughed and laid back down, resting her head against his chest. "I won't ask questions. But…this is a relief."
"You didn't think I was havin' an affair did you?" He was obviously joking and made himself chuckle.
"No...but…there were so few other explanations…and…to be honest, I kind of forget I'm retiring soon, so something related to that didn't immediately cross my mind, but, today…I didn't know if you were going back to work and nervous about telling me, or—"
"—I promise you, that will never be the case."
"So," Olivia lightly scratched his stomach, "Whenever you're a little cagey, I can assume you have some surprise up your sleeve…birthday, anniversary…"
Her hand drifted lower, guaranteeing they weren't going back to sleep anytime soon.
"Yep," he replied with a gasp, "all kinds of occasions for surprises…Mother's Day, Valentine's Day, or—" he gasped again, this time more sharply, "—just because I love you."
…..
#Tuckson