I own no one but my own people

A/N So hello. Again. Sorry, I know it's been a while and clearly my ideas on what would happen were WAY off but still *shrugs* always good to wrap up a story. Plus I really did have like 2 chapters left so… yeah lol. Anyway, enjoy, review, but mostly enjoy.

Amaro sprinted as hard as he possibly could to Brian's room where several Doctors were working feverishly on his former rival.

"What's wrong with him?" Amaro yelled out as he tried to peer over the heads of the frantic care workers, only able to catch a quick glance of the seizing police officer who was shaking so hard he had ripped out his IV.

"Get him out of here!" One Doctor shouted and immediately a nurse hurried over and began to push Amaro out of the room. "Tell me what's wrong with him! Please!" Amaro pleaded, the sound of a heart monitor beeping franticly echoing in his ears.

"Sir, the Doctors will be out to tell you as soon as-."

He interrupted the nurse with a frantic plea, one they prayed they would listen to. "You can't let him die! He's all she has!"

"They'll do their best, Sir, now please, leave."

The nurse pushed Amaro out of the room but, for one shining moment he heard it. One faintly spoken familiar name traveling above the medical jargon Amaro couldn't hope to understand, spoken almost as if it took all of his strength to speak, the words broken apart in sharp jagged syllables; by the man he had once considered an enemy. "O-liv-i-a...!"

The door slammed in front of Amaro's face, leaving the Detective stranded in the hallway but since this nightmare had begun, he felt a small ray of hope shine down upon him. Brian was alive. And he remembered Olivia.

She wasn't alone. Not yet anyway. Lewis hadn't taken that away from her. He had tried but Brian didn't let him succeed. And for that, Amaro would be forever grateful…

That faint glimmer of happiness stayed with him as he made his way back towards Olivia's room where the Detective had tears running down her nervous face. When Amaro walked through the doorway she immediately turned her attention towards him, her eyes wide with fear. "What's happening?" she demanded. "What's going on?"

Amaro took up his familiar seat by her bedside and took her hand in his, a thin sliver of a smile on his face. "That code they called… it was for Brian's room."

Olivia's eyes went wide with shock and tears instantly flooded her eyes but Amaro quickly continued. "But Liv, he… he woke up. He was seizing but he was awake. He said your name."

Through all the pain and the horrific memories, a smile found its way to her bloody cracked lips. "He… he's awake?"

"I don't know, Liv," he answered truthfully. But he was seizing when I walked in and he said you name…"

Her grin disappeared from her face but at lease she wasn't as hopelessly dismal as before. She had faith now. She had a reason to keep fighting. Brian was alive, for now, and he had called out to her like she had called out for him.

Amaro leaned forward on his chair and gave her a soft smile. "He wants you, Olivia. He still loves you, no matter what you've been through. Because he knows it isn't your fault. None of it."

Olivia shook her head. "It is though. I should have pulled my gun when I first heard someone in my apartment. I thought…" She sighed at her own hindsight. "I mean I thought it was Brian."

"Liv, I would have thought the same thing as well."

"You would have pulled your gun. Okay you wouldn't have let yourself get… get attacked by this monster." Fresh tears shone in her eyes as she rubbed her stomach. "You would have fought for your child."

Amaro's face fell at her admission. He wanted to wrap his arms around her and tell her that it wasn't her fault. To listen to that voice he knew was inside her telling her that she wasn't to blame. But instead all he could do was shake his head. "You're wrong Liv. The only person to blame here is William Lewis and Cragen, Fin, and Elliot are closing in on him as we speak."

Olivia's eyes went wide with shock. "They… they found him?"

"They got a solid lead. He… he killed Vanessa Myers then stole her car and credit cards and headed upstate."

She stared in shock at her partner, looking for any hint of laughter in his brown eyes but found none. "His lawyer's dead?"

"He was hiding out at her place," Amaro explained. "He stole her car, her wallet… He didn't rape her but it's definitely him."

Olivia swallowed hard as the information processed. As much as she hated it, she envied Vanessa. He hadn't raped her. She didn't have to live through the trauma. She died without knowing how it felt to have your body violated, without knowing the shame that surrounded that kind of attack.

Olivia would have given anything to have taken her place… And that scared her more than anything else ever had in her life.

The brunette sniffed and glanced down at her sheets, nodding in understanding. "I can't face him in trial," she admitted after several seconds. "I know I should be able to, and I need to but I know I can't. He… he took too much from me."

Amaro swallowed hard as he gazed at his partner. "Liv, worry about that when the time comes okay? Just rest right now okay?"

"I can't rest. Every time I close my eyes I see him. I'm… I'm afraid to sleep."

Amaro nodded and scooted closer to her bed, praying he didn't frighten her. "Then I'll be here to guard your dreams. I'll stay right by your side and watch over you okay? You never have to be afraid with me around, I promise."

Olivia couldn't help the sliver of a smile as she looked up at him. "Thank you," she told him, her voice nothing above a whisper, the mere suggestion of sleep making her feel as exhausted as if she had just ran a marathon. She leaned back in her pillow, keeping her tired sights locked on Amaro, whose soft warm eyes filled her with the courage she needed to face her nightmares.

After a minute or so her eyes began to close but since her Hell had begun, her thoughts weren't filled of the demon who had put her in the hospital, but of the man sitting next to her who was gently whispering that he would keep her safe, even in her dreams, and of the man across the hall who had cried out her name.

Then, slowly but surely, she fell asleep.

xXxXx

For as long as Captain Cragen had worked in Sex Crimes, he could not remember Elliot Stabler being a particularly verbal man. He never really shared details of his personal life or the issues going on at home. Hell, Cragen could still remember when he and Olivia had been informed that Kathy and him had separated by a defense attorney.

But the silence that encased him in a thick could was a different kind of silence. His eyes brewed with a heavy storm that he was begging to unleash while his hand clenched so tight his knuckles, which still bore the scars from his years at SVU, were stark white. His breathing was thick and heavy, like it was taking everything in him to hold back a scream over what Lewis had done to his partner.

Finally, only when Cragen could take the brooding no longer, did he finally speak to his former Detective. "Elliot, I know this is hard for you but-."

"I wanna be the one to do it," Elliot interrupted with a snarl more fit to come out of an angry dog then a human. "When the time comes, I wanna be the one to shoot him."

Cragen and Fin glanced at one another before the older one spoke. "Elliot, if it's in self-defense-."

"Oh don't give me that horse shit; you're not letting him walk out of wherever the hell he's at!" Elliot barked, turning his attention from the stretch of barren highway. "You plan to shoot him dead!"

"And do so without hopefully landing anyone in jail!" Fin yelled back. "We had a plan, Stabler, and believe it or not, dragging you along so you can go bust in cowboy style isn't part of it!"

"Then let me in on it. Tell me what I can do to help because rather I'm part of your two's 'plan' or not, I'm putting a bullet in that fuckers head."

Elliot let out a shaking breath, his lip trembling from the sheer amount of anger he had raging inside of him for this monster, this beast, who had hurt his partner. "I will break his arms," he growled. "Break his legs, break his back, his face… and then I will put a gun against his forehead and make him beg for his life before I shoot him. I am going to do this with or without you two."

Elliot glanced at both Fin and Cragen ho was doing a horrible job at disguising their slight terror for the man they used to work with. "With you guys I'll get away with it. Without you I won't. It's up to you. But William Lewis will die by the end of tonight by my hand..."

Cragen swallowed his fear. Not at Elliot's words of insanity, but at his own desires of wanting to do the same thing Elliot was so hell bent upon doing. The fact that the almost insane ramblings of a man were making sense to the Officer frightened him more so than anything else he had ever done. And Cragen could tell, with just a single look in Fin's eyes that his detective had the same fear.

The fear of doing what they all truly wanted to do to William Lewis.

He didn't deserve death. Eternal slumber was too good for what he had put Olivia through. He deserved so much more. And they could do it. There was over eighty years of experience between the three of them; they knew how to cover their tracks better than any criminal.

But, as Cragen drove closer and closer to their destination, sanity and clarity seeped through the walls of their insanity. They were going to kill them. Of that, neither of the three had no doubt, but they couldn't torture him. They hated him and wanted him punished but they also knew that the longer they stayed, the more they interacted with Lewis, the more chance they had of leaving behind evidence.

So as fast as those thoughts crept into his mind, Cragen had shaken them lose. He cleared his throat and glanced in the rear view mirror that still held the look of madness in his eyes. "We can't torture him," Cragen informed the car, swearing that he saw Fin breath a slight sigh of relief. "Kill him, yes, but not torture."

"Maybe you can't but I can," Elliot answered.

"No you won't," Cragen shot back. "You know as well as anyone how easy it is to get DNA from the smallest minute source. The longer we're there and the more we do to him, the more chance we have of leaving something behind. Okay, you know this, Elliot. I want him to suffer as much as you do. I wanna make him feel as much pain, as much agony, as much hopelessness…" Cragen shook his head for a moment before he forced himself to continue. "As he made her feel… but we can't go that far."

Elliot glared at the man in the driver's seat. "So you just wanna kill him and be done with it? One shot to the head? No pain after what he did to her?"

Cragen nodded and Elliot scoffed at the answer. "That's bullshit. He deserves to feel pain!"

"I know that! But we can't without getting caught and I don't wanna go to jail for him unless I have to! Now if you don't agree with that then you can get the hell out of my car now, Stabler!"

Elliot glared at his old boss for a moment before he shook his head and leaned back in his seat, fuming mad but nevertheless silent about the affair. Cragen and Fin glanced at one another for a brief moment before they turned back towards the road, both thinking they had made a monumental mistake in deciding to bring Elliot along.

A tense silence settled over the three Detectives that lasted over a half hour until they reached their destination; a local diner called 'Capital Burgers'. Their palms began sweating as they exited the car and made their way into the nearly abandoned diner apart from an older couple sitting at a booth and an exceptionally large man sitting at the booth who was stuffing his face with what looked like a five pound burger.

The three detectives approached the counter where a middle aged waitress was wiping down the table top. She glanced up at the three men and nodded towards the seats in front of her. "Take a seat, I'll be right with ya," she announced as she reached for a stack of menus.

"Actually, we're not here to order food," Cragen informed her as they all held up their shields. "I'm Captain Cragen, Manhattan Special Victims; this is Detective Tutuola and Elliot Stabler. We need your help with something."

The waitress's eyes went wide and she dropped her rag on the counter and walked over to them, "of course, what can I do ya for?"

Cragen got out his phone and flipped to the most current mug shot of Lewis and showed it to the woman. "This man came in here recently?"

The waitress took one look at the phone and her nervous demeanor evaporated into a smile. "Him? Oh yeah, he was in here maybe two hours ago. Nicest guy you could ever meet. He gave me a twenty dollar tip for a four dollar burger that was half burnt. He was a veteran too; his hands got burned in an explosion, the poor guy. I gave him a slice of pie for free as a thank you."

The three officers glanced at each other before turning back to the Waitress who was examining the picture more closely. "Wait… Is that… is that a mug shot?"

"Yes. Now this man, despite what you believe, is very dangerous and he has hurt a lot of people. I need you to tell me everything about this man that you can remember. Where was he going, what was he driving, did he mention seeing an old friend or anything?"

The waitress' look of slight fear had returned. "He just said he was looking for a place to stay, somewhere cheap…"

"Okay did you give him any recommendations?"

The Waitress shook her head but the large man sitting down cleared his throat and turned towards the small group. "You looking for the guy that was in here earlier? Willard?"

Elliot narrowed his eyes in confusion. "Willard?"

"Yeah, Willard Loomis. Hell of a good guy."

"He changes his name whenever he moves," Cragen explained to Elliot before showing the mug shot to the man just to be safe. The man nodded before he spoke again. "My brother owns the Albany Motel about ten miles from here. Anytime I hear about some tourist needing a room to stay in I point them there. May not be the Hilton but it's cheap, it's got a shower, low rent-."

"Did he take your recommendation?" Cragen interrupted, caring less what the Albany Motel had to offer.

"Said he would," the man told them. "And he looks like he's a man of his word so if you're looking for him, I'd check there first."

Cragen could have kissed the man but instead he just gave him as much of a smile as he could manage and a hurried "thank you!" before all three rushed out back into their car.

"Hang on, would he really stop to rest if he's on the run from the cops?" asked Elliot as he shut his door behind him.

"He doesn't know Olivia and Brian have been found," Fin told him as he entered in the destination on their GPS as Cragen began to drive. "He's cocky. He's gonna think that he's scot free until we show up at his door."

Elliot nodded as Cragen began flooring the car towards their destination. It took less than ten minutes to get to the shabby motel and once there they sprinted inside. "This man, have you seen him?" Fin demanded as they ran up to the front desk, his phone already out with Lewis's face front and center. "No bull shit, tell me now!"

The desk manager seemed slightly taken aback for a moment before he nodded. "Ye- yeah, room 211, second floor."

Without a single word of thanks, the three men raced up the stairs. This was it. The chase was nearly at an end. They were so close to finding the man who had hurt Olivia they could feel it. Their hands gripped their weapons so tight their knuckles were bright white. But their breaths were steady. Their hearts pounded slow. They weren't nervous because they knew what had to be done.

As they came to a stop in front of the door where they could hear the muffled sounds of the TV, they all knew there was no turning back. They were breaking the law but they knew that the criminal justice system, the system Olivia had worked tirelessly to upkeep, had failed her once. They would make sure she was never failed again, no matter the cost. Olivia was someone all three of these men would risk their life for, risk imprisonment for the rest of their lives for.

Cragen swallowed hard as he turned to his two men who had the same steely look of determination. In their eyes as he had in his. He nodded to Fin before he turned to Elliot and clapped his shoulder, giving him a soft smile, letting him know that no matter what lay in the past he wouldn't let him down in the future.

Elliot silently nodded and returned a knowing grin before all three turned their attention back towards the door. Cragen took a final deep breath and held up his hand.

He raised the first finger.

No turning back.

The second.

Olivia deserved Justice.

The third.

God help them.

They broke down the door and ran in…

Four Days Earlier

A cry caught in Olivia's throat as she quickly moved her finger and pressed down on the answer button.

"Brian?" she cried out as she put the phone to her ear, praying with every ounce of her willpower she had caught him in time.

There was a breath of relief and then a voice flooded with happiness answered. "Hey, Liv. I thought… I thought I missed you."

Olivia shook her head, trying her hardest to hold back her tears. "You didn't. I'm right here."

She could practically hear the smile on his face as he spoke. "Good. I'm… I'm actually really glad you picked up, Baby. I was scared you wouldn't."

"For a moment you almost did," she admitted.

There was a short pause before he spoke again. "Well I'm glad you changed your mind. Do you wanna maybe get dinner tonight and just talk, hang out? I'll call in and we can have a night just for us."

Olivia struggled to take the deep breath she needed in order to accomplish what she had set out to do when she forced herself to answer the phone. She wouldn't take the coward's way out with him. He deserved so much more than that. He deserved so much more than her…

So instead she merely willed herself to say the words she so desperately wanted to hide. "Brian, I… I don't…. I can't go out with you tonight."

"That's fine," he said without hesitation. "We'll just go out tomorrow then."

"No, Brian, you don't get it. I can't go out with you tonight or any other night. I didn't… I didn't pick up the phone to say I wanted to be with you. I… I picked it up because I need to break up with you."

A stone cold silence filled the air. She could hear Brian's breathing on the other line while she waited for him to say something to her. To yell or scream or beg her to take him back. But instead all she got was a trembling "why?"

"Because you were right," she told him as she wiped the promises of a teary face from her eyes. "You don't deserve me. You are… SO perfect, Brian. Any woman would be happy to have you. But I'm too screwed up for you or anyone. I can't trust people, even when they earned it."

"So that's it?" he asked, the anger rising in his voice. "Because you can't handle your own crap, you expect me to just give up on you?"

"You deserve a woman who'll trust you. Who CAN trust you and who… who can say 'I love you' without freaking out…"

"I don't deserve another woman, and I don't want someone else!" he shouted. "I want you, Olivia."

Olivia wiped more fresh tears from her eyes and cleared her throat. "Well I'm sorry. This is my choice."

"I love you," he told her with fierceness in his voice. "I don't care if it freaks you out, I do. Okay I have been in love with you for a very long time and I will take the bad with the good when it comes to you because that's what couples who love one another do."

She could hear the tears in his usually unwavering strong voice and it broke her down more than she ever thought was possible when it came to a relationship. "I know you've been hurt but I need you," he continued, his declaration of love scarred over with tears that would only fall for her. "I can't imagine my life without you, Olivia."

No longer able to hide the pain she felt for doing this or her tears from falling, she shook her head, determined to believe this was the best for him. Knowing that as hurt as he was feeling right now, her pain was ten times greater her heart was smashed into a thousand more pieces. This was for him. She cared about him too much to continue to treat him like the other men in her life who had just walked away from her. "You're… you're gonna have to try because I'm done with you, Brian."

"No..."

"I gotta go. I'm sorry."

"Olivia, please!"

Unable to take another moment of his pleading she hung up the phone and quickly turned it off before he had the chance to call her back. She grabbed a tissue usually reserved for victims and quickly wiped her eyes, just in time for Rollins to burst open the door and almost run back in. "Warner's got something," the younger blonde announced. "Barba's gonna meet us at the morgue."

When Rollins approached the desk of her mentor she stopped as suddenly as if she had hit a brick wall. Olivia cleared her throat and nodded, trying her best to hide the fact she had been crying. "What's wrong?" asked Rollins as she looked over Olivia's tear stained face. "What happened?"

"Nothing." Olivia shook her head and sniffed away more tears. "I'm fine."

"No you're not. Talk to me, tell me what happened…"

Olivia opened her mouth to protest, to tell her to just leave but instead another cry ripped past her throat. Rollins took her by the shoulders and quickly led her into the privacy of the file room and shut the door behind her. "What happened, and don't tell me you're okay because I hate liars."

"It's nothing," the brunette protested, her voice giving away the already clear lie. "I told you I'm-."

"If you're fine why are ya crying?" Rollins interrupted, crossing her arms in front of her chest.

She sighed, shrugging as she did so. "I… I broke up with Brian."

"What?" Rollins gasped softly. "Are you… are you serious? What happened?"

"He didn't deserve me." Saying the words a second time was no easier than the first. "I couldn't trust him. It was nothing he did; it's my own screwed up history."

"… Do you realize how selfish that is?"

Olivia snapped her head up at the blonde and raised her brow. She wasn't expecting Rollins to tell her she was completely in the right for what she had done but that was a little harsh. "Excuse me?"

"You're being selfish. Just because two men hurt you-."

"Whoa whoa whoa… Two men?"

"Yeah. Your old partner and David Haden."

Olivia scoffed as she stood up from the ground and stood in front of the blonde, almost glaring down at her with her arms crossed in front of her chest. "I would trade my soul to only have the memory of two men hurting me. Let's see, my first serious boyfriend who decided I was getting 'too old' for him when I turned sixteen, my fiancé who rather than deal with my mother dumped me, the reporter who got mad after I turned down acting out a rape fantasy stole a case file and nearly got me suspended.

My brother who shows up for what seems to be the sole purpose of ruining my life, another guy who I thought for sure I could fall in love with helped a woman get away with murder right before he told me that 'our feelings don't matter', I'm not even going to mention my father who kept track of me for god knows how many years and never decided to contact me, Elliot and David so yeah, a little bit more than two…"

Rollin's face fell as she looked over the older woman's stern features, swallowing her anger in one quick gulp. "I'm… I'm sorry, I didn't know."

"Yeah well now you do."

Rollins took a step back from Olivia and sighed. "I shouldn't have called you selfish. It was wrong but, Liv… you're hurting a man who loves you and cares about you. What has he done in the past year that would make you think that he can't be trusted or that he would hurt you?"

"Nothing, that's the problem,. It's my issues I need to deal with he shouldn't have to suffer with me."

"That's what a relationship is though. You suffer through all the crap together. Honestly, the whole reason why you think you need to leave him is the whole reason you have to stay. You love him too much to hurt him which is why you're gonna go back with him."

"No I'm not."

"Yes you are. Because if you walk away now, you're gonna lose the best thing that ever happened to you."

Olivia stayed silent as Rollins walked back out towards the door and opened it, nodding towards the main bull room. "Come on. Warner's waiting for us."

Without another look back Rollins strode out of the tiny room leaving Olivia staring after her and after a long moment, she finally followed her out and shut the door behind her.

Two more Chapters. Please Review