An Ill Wind

by J0

Ch16 “What happened to you, Daddy? What did he do to you?” He bit his lip, lowered his eyes, tried to think. Maureen had figured it out for herself, but Kathleen was a bit childish for her age, and she wouldn’t be able to cope with the truth.

2. Statement

An Ill Wind

Chapter Two
Statement

OOO

16th Precinct
Special Victims Unit
3:37 A.M., November 19, 2005

Captain Donald Cragen was not a happy man. After a twelve-hour day, he'd just been home long enough to loosen his tie, kick off his shoes, and open a bottled water when he got a call from a downtown detective asking him why Elliot Stabler might have left his badge and ID at a murder scene. Don hadn't had an answer for that, but he'd guaranteed the homicide cop that he would have one by dawn.

As he put on his shoes, he started by calling the numbers he had in his cell phone memory. First, he called Elliot's cell. The computer voice told him it was out of service and then kicked him over to voice mail. Then he dialed the Stabler home, and the answering machine picked up on the second ring. He would have tried Kathy Stabler at her mother's, but he didn't have the number or know Kathy's maiden name. Contacting Olivia Benson had been the logical next step, but he'd had the same results as when he'd called Stabler. On his way out the door, he'd rang the office and ordered the civilian administrative aide who answered to "find Munch and Tutuola and tell them that unless they're in hot pursuit of a suspect I want them to get their asses into the station house, pull Benson and Stabler's personnel files, and try every contact number listed."

Kathy Stabler and her mom hadn't seen Elliot since the last time he came to pick up the kids, and now they were worried sick. Depressingly, but not surprisingly, Munch had discovered that, since her mother had died, the only emergency contacts listed for Olivia were Elliot and Cragen, and Cragen was also listed as her next of kin. In reaching out to other colleagues whom Olivia and Elliot might have recently seen in connection with a case or socially, Fin had succeeded only in rousing a sleepy George Huang, a cranky Casey Novak, and a typically overworked Melinda Warner. Almost as an afterthought, Munch had looked through Olivia's Rolodex and found the number for Rebecca Hendrix.

At first, she claimed that she hadn't seen either detective since she'd lost her job at the hospital over that freaky case with the twins. When Fin informed her that they knew Elliot was seeing her for counseling and that he was missing and presumably in trouble, she confirmed that she had seen him earlier in the week, but not since he'd gotten off work that day.

Now it was the wee hours of the morning. Even if everything worked itself out in the next five minutes, it would be after four by the time Don got home, almost five when he got to bed, after six before he could sleep, and the alarm went off at seven.

"I'm getting too old for this crap," he said, leaning back in his chair and rubbing his tired eyes. He had hoped by this point in his career that he would be through with the twenty-four-hour shifts, but as it was, they happened far too often for his liking.

He closed his eyes and dropped his chin to his chest, breathing deeply to relax for two minutes. He had learned the technique from his AA sponsor when he had first gone off the sauce, and he had found it useful in stressful work situations as well. Originally, the idea was to use each breath to think of something he could do besides having a drink. This morning, in the two minutes it took him to take eight deep controlled breaths, he was able to put his anger, frustration, and fear for the safety of his detectives aside and focus on the one thing he needed to do next.

He had made the decision to start calling hospitals and morgues looking for anyone who met Benson or Stabler's descriptions and was reaching for the phone to begin the task himself when it rang.

"Cragen," he barked into the mouthpiece.

"Captain, it's Olivia. I'm at the hospital with Elliot."

"Is he all right? Are you?"

"I'm fine, Don," she answered, "Elliot's not in any danger, but he's not ok either."

"If he can talk, put him on the phone," Cragen ordered. "His badge was found at a downtown homicide, and I've had the whole squad looking for the two of you for the past six hours."

"I'm sorry, Sir, I'm not going to do that."

At least she was calling him 'Sir'; his detectives usually did that when they knew he was about to hand them their asses.

"Dammit, Olivia!" he roared into the phone, the worry of the past several hours coming out as anger.

"He's been raped, Sir," she said calmly, "I've convinced him to give a statement, but he'll only talk to you."

Stunned, Cragen fell quiet for a full minute.

"Sir?"

"How is he?"

"He's a wreck, but he's hanging in there," she said. She gave him the details on Elliot's injuries and then said, "He came to me because he needed a friend to help him through this. As a friend, I have been able to get him to come to the hospital, have a rape kit done, and now, talk to you. I'm afraid if I start acting like a cop, he'll shut down. Also, because we work so closely together, he has asked me not to work the case or even read his statement."

Don sighed. That meant Munch and Fin would have to do everything on their own, but making sure Stabler was ok had to be his priority. "All right, we'll have plenty of other things for you to do. Unfortunately, we always do. What hospital?"

She gave him the necessary information and hung up. He grabbed his portable tape recorder out of his desk and left.

On his way out, Don stopped by Munch and Fin's desks. "Benson just called. They're safe at St. Vincent's Hospital in Manhattan." He allowed himself a smile as the two detectives sighed with relief to know that their friends and colleagues weren't dead.

"So, what happened?" John asked.

"I dunno," the captain lied, acutely aware of the need to protect Stabler's privacy, at least until he had the whole story, "but I'm on my way over there to find out." He looked from Munch to his partner. "Get some food and then some sleep in the crib, not at home. I expect to have another assignment for the two of you before daylight."

He knew both men would follow his instructions, so with only a nod goodbye, he turned and left the squad room.

Room 327

St. Vincent's Hospital, Manhattan

4:08 A.M., November 19, 2005

Olivia watched her partner as he studied the wall of his hospital room, and decided there was something more she could do for him. She knew what kind of response she was going to get, but she hoped that with a little coaxing she could get him to relent.

"Elliot, when the captain gets here, I'm going to go to the visitors' lounge and call Kathy, ok?"

"What? Liv, no! You can't."

"Why not?" she asked.

"Why not! Liv, she left me a year ago."

Smiling, she told her friend, "That doesn't mean she's stopped loving you, El."

"Olivia, she packed up and walked out on twenty years of marriage with no warning, nothing. I just came home one day, and she was gone, and the kids, too."

He was angry now, and she took that as a good sign. Both of them were much better at coping with anger than they were at dealing with despair. She also knew that he'd actually had plenty of warning, but if she pointed that out to him, he would get defensive and dig in his heels about not calling his wife.

"Elliot, whatever her reasons for leaving, what you two had, well, that kind of connection doesn't just die. Let me call her, I'm sure she'll come, and you need her support."

"I don't want her coming here just because I need her," he said. "I'm not that pathetic."

"No," Liv agreed, wanting to bolster his shattered self-esteem, "you're not pathetic at all, El, but you have been hurt, badly, and you need the support of all your friends and your family. Besides, I might not know Kathy all that well, but I do know she would never come just because you need her. She'll come because she loves you."

Elliot pressed his lips into a tight line for a moment, the way he always did when making a decision that he knew he couldn't avoid. "How can you be so sure?" he asked.

"Because I would do the same thing."

He was silent, and Olivia knew she had made her point. It would take him a minute, but he would see the sense in what she was saying. Finally, he nodded.

"Ok, call her," he said, "but please, don't tell her . . . what he did to me."

"Elliot, the point of contacting her is so she can help you deal with what happened. She can't support you if she doesn't know the truth."

"I can't have her seeing me that way, Liv," he explained, pleading with his eyes for her to keep his secret. "I can't stand to have her look at me as a victim, to know I let him . . ."

He stopped talking when he couldn't bring himself to name the thing that had been done to him. Olivia waited a minute, literally counting out sixty seconds in her head, but he couldn't go on. Finally, she spoke.

"Are you afraid she will think less of you because of what happened?"

He shrugged.

"Do you believe I think less of you?"

He didn't answer.

"Did you invite him to do this to you?"

He stayed very still.

"Elliot, did you invite or encourage him?"

She saw his lower lip quiver.

"Elliot, did you ask him to do any of the things he did?"

"No, damn it, of course not!" The outburst caused some pain in his ribs and he grimaced slightly.

She placed a hand over his. "Then you did not 'let' it happen. The fact that it happened anyway, against your will, makes you a victim. You are a victim, of a terrible, violent crime, but nobody who matters will think any less of you for that."

His head dipped, and he shut his eyes tight against the threatening tears.

She moved to sit on the edge of the bed beside him. "Elliot, the fact that you were assaulted makes you a victim, but the fact that you are here makes you a survivor. With the help of your friends and family, and with time enough to heal, you will get stronger. In order to help you, the people who love you need to know what happened. Kathy is going to know from your emotional state that this was more than a beating. Not even you can hide this kind of pain. If you don't let me give her some idea of what has happened, she's only going to worry more."

"I don't want to worry her, she's had enough of that already, being married to a cop all this time."

She gently squeezed the hand she was once again holding. "Then let me tell her what you told me, that you were sexually assaulted. She doesn't need to know more than that."

Again, she counted off a minute of silence.

"Elliot?"

He sighed with resignation. "Ok. I trust your judgement, Liv."

"All right, will you give me her mother's number so I can call?"

An Ill Wind

Don Cragen stood outside of room number three twenty-seven at St. Vincent's Hospital, and took a few deep breaths. As a kid growing up in Brooklyn, he had never imagined the kind of violence, savagery, and depraved indifference he saw every day in this job. It had taken him a while to adjust to working with the Special Victims Unit. Eventually he had learned to accept the fact that for some people, life was very sad, and he'd begun seeking his joy in the small things like a full candy jar on the corner of his desk, a drink (even if it was just club soda) with one of his detectives after work, a good baseball game, or a picture of his late wife.

The people he worked with were a pleasure, too. John Munch's paranoid tirades always gave him something to laugh about, and more often than not, something to think about, too. The guy was so intelligent, a genius according to his personnel file, and so well read, that it made his absurd ideas almost believable. They were all lucky to have Odafin Tutuola and his stinging wit in the squad to shut Munch down with a pithy comment when his ramblings got too bizarre.

Fin, more than any of the other detectives, was a mystery to Don. He was as intelligent and capable as his colleagues, but he was often reticent and aloof even after five years in the squad. Strangely, though, he was the only one of the senior detectives whom Don felt he could pair with anybody and get satisfactory results every time. Don thought it had something to do with the many long undercover assignments Fin had worked while in narcotics. His survival had often hinged on doing what was expected of him without drawing undue attention to himself, and he had developed a knack for getting along with people without being sucked into their drama.

Then there was Olivia Benson. A child of rape, she was one of those people who'd had a very sad life. She'd never known her father, and her mother was an alcoholic who got stumbling drunk one day and killed herself falling down outside her favorite bar. Despite her background, or maybe because of it, Olivia herself was a source of joy and beauty in Cragen's life, and not just because of her stunning good looks. Strong and confident, with a seemingly endless supply of compassion for those who were suffering, she was absolutely devoted to her partner. He could easily see why Elliot had gone to her when he needed help, and he would do nothing to interfere with that bond. If Stabler didn't want her working his case, he would find other things for her to do.

Finally, there was Elliot. From the day they had met, Cragen had felt a paternal bond with the younger man. That connection had strengthened over the years they had known each other, and as Don had watched Elliot mature and grow into a damned fine detective, he had come to care for his subordinate as he would for his own son. Just as he had always tried to provide gentle guidance, and sometimes not-so-gentle coercion to help the talented investigator keep his cases and his career moving in the right direction, he knew he would do whatever was necessary to help his friend through this crisis.

Stabler had a temper and didn't always exercise good judgment. More than once, Don had put his neck on the line to save the volatile cop from himself, but deep down, Elliot was probably the single most decent human being Don had ever known, bar none. A good Catholic boy, Elliot had been raised to respect women. As a devoted family man, he adored children.

The things he saw in SVU tore Stabler up inside, Don knew, and sometimes he didn't cope so well. The fact that he hated talking to the department shrinks so much meant he had ended up behind a desk more often than some of his colleagues, but Don wouldn't think of having him transferred because he was too damned good at his job.

It had shocked the squad when Elliot had started seeing Rebecca Hendrix for counseling, but as a recovering alcoholic, Don knew rock bottom when he saw it. When Stabler beat Pete Breslin half to death in the courthouse, even the stubborn detective had realized he had to make a change before he destroyed himself.

Of all the people for this lousy thing to happen to! Don had always realized that one of his people could become a victim of a sex crime, just like any member of the public, but like most guys, he always figured it was something that only happened to women. Oh, by virtue of his job, he knew it happened to men, too, but usually only homosexuals, jailbirds, or other guys who were asking for it.

He shook his head, berating himself. He knew no one, male or female, gay or straight, criminal or law-abiding, ever asked to be raped, it just happened because some sick pervert decided the victim looked like an easy target. Yes, he knew it happened to men, but he had never dreamed that it would happen to one of his men. So, why the hell did it happen to Elliot?

Don closed his eyes and counted to ten, trying to brace himself for the task at hand. When he opened them, he was surprised to see Olivia Benson standing there, framed in the doorway in front of him.

"Hello, Captain. How are you?" she inquired softly, giving no indication that she was surprised to find him lingering outside the door with his eyes closed.

"I'm fine." He peered past her into the dim room at his other detective, looking surprisingly frail in the bed and asked in a hushed voice, "How is he?"

"He wants to pretend it didn't happen, but he can't, he's just hurting too much. I've been trying to nudge him along, step by step: Seek medical attention. Request a rape kit, report the crime. Tell your family. You know the drill."

Cragen raised his eyebrows in surprise, and she nodded. "He just gave me permission to call Kathy and tell her."

"All of it?"

Olivia shrugged. "All that he told me. I think that's enough."

Don nodded and gave her a pat on the shoulder. "You do good work, Liv."

She put her hand over his and said, "Thanks, Cap." Then she looked over her shoulder and said, "Go easy on him. I think he's ready to give you the details, but if you rush him, he might just implode before he can finish. I don't know many of the specifics, but I can tell you that he still thinks he should have done more to stop it."

"Ok, Liv, thanks for the info." As they were about to part ways, he remembered something she ought to know. "Kathy might already be on her way. Munch called her when we first started looking for the two of you. I'm sure he called her back when I told him you were here."

Liv nodded and pointed down the hall. "Well then, I'll be in the visitors' lounge when you're done, with Kathy, I hope."

"I'll come get you."

She took her leave of him, and he took another deep breath. Then he crossed the room to the bedside of his squad's latest special victim.

An Ill Wind

"So what do you think is up with Elliot and Olivia?" John Munch asked as he sat down on one of the squeaky cots in the 'crib,' a sleep room provided for exhausted personnel when they were forced by circumstances to work extended hours.

"I dunno. I figure the captain will fill us in when he has any information we need to know," his partner, Fin Tutuola, said and rolled over, turning his back to Munch and hoping to end the speculative conversation.

"Oh, he has information," Munch said, "I could see it in his eyes."

"Knock it off," Fin said, and he turned the other way to face his partner. "I don't trust many people, but Captain Cragen, Elliot, and Olivia, I do. If and when they need to involve us, someone will tell us something. Until then, ignorance is bliss and I'm gonna get some shuteye."

"Yeah, try telling that to IAB when they question you about your activities tonight," Munch said ominously as he lay down on the bed and snuggled under the covers.

Agitated now, and mad at himself for letting his paranoid partner get to him so easily, Fin sat up and looked at his Munch in disbelief. "Are you saying Benson and Stabler are dirty? That's the only reason the rat squad would be involved."

"No, but if the rats get involved, that's what they'll try to make it sound like. I'm just saying something is up, Cragen knows what it is, and we are being left out of the loop," John complained. "If knowledge is power, we have been rendered impotent."

"Yeah, well, they got pills for that now, so make an appointment with your doctor and let me get some sleep." Fin lay down and rolled over again as if he really did believe the discussion was over.

"You said you trusted the captain, Benson, and Stabler," Munch rambled on.

"Yeah, so?"

"You didn't say you trust me."

Fin sat up again and looked at his partner with a mixture of amusement, frustration, and disbelief on his face. "You've been my partner since I joined this squad and I haven't asked for a new one. That should be all you need to know."

Munch looked at him thoughtfully for a moment, then smiled slightly and nodded. He lay back and closed his eyes. "Sleep well, Fin," he said.

Fin lay down for a third time, turned on his side, and closed his eyes. "You, too."

He was just dozing off when a voice came out of the darkness. "Fin?"

A deep sigh. "What?" He was not at all eager to hear what was coming, but sometimes talking with Munch could be like watching a train wreck. You really didn't want to do it, but you just couldn't stop yourself.

"I trust you, too."

"Thanks," Fin snapped. "I can't tell you how happy I am to hear that." He was careful not to sound at all happy when he said it, because that would only encourage the man. "Now shut up and go to sleep before I bust a cap your bony ass."

An Ill Wind

Captain Cragen took a moment to study his top detective's face as Elliot dozed quietly. He had two black eyes, a fat lip, and a swollen nose, but Olivia had assured him that they were all just ugly-looking minor injuries. The damaged hand, stabilized by an inflatable splint, was more serious and would require some surgery, but it was nothing that would threaten Stabler's life or livelihood. He knew that under the covers Elliot's broken ankle was also splinted to keep it still. He supposed the IV in his arm carried fluids, electrolytes, antibiotics, and a mild sedative, not enough to knock Elliot out against his will, but enough to help him fall asleep when he was ready to quit fighting it and rest. It seemed the only serious lasting damage had been psychological, assuming he didn't contract HIV from his attacker.

"Hey, Cap." Elliot pressed the button that raised the bed to a sitting position and Don startled slightly because he hadn't realized Elliot had known he was there. The dry, weak voice was nothing like the one Don had come to associate with his friend and colleague. He also noticed right away that the detective sounded a little stuffy.

"Elliot." He poured a glass of water from the convenient plastic pitcher that was available in every hospital room and handed it to his injured officer.

"Thanks." Elliot took a swallow of the water. "Have a seat." He indicated the chair near his bed. Don sat, and there was a long silence neither of them could fill until Elliot spoke. "Sorry for dragging you out at this time of night."

"Don't be." Don said as he sat down. He was at a loss for words. Finally, he decided to admit it. "I'm sorry, Elliot, I don't know what to say."

Elliot shrugged. "Nothing you can say. It won't make it any better. Just do the job."

He needs me to take charge, Don realized and took out the portable tape recorder he had stashed in his pocket before leaving the office. Pressing the record button, he spoke into the machine supplying the date and location, his name and Elliot's. Then he rewound the tape and played it back to make sure it was working properly. When it had reached the end of his speech, he pressed record again.

"Elliot, do you have any objection to this interview being recorded?"

Elliot took another swallow of his water and said, "No, Sir."

"Do you know who did this to you?"

"Roger DeVane," Elliot answered in a soft monotone, his words slightly muddied by his swollen lip. "You saw the letter, remember? He was let out on parole, compassionate release because he is sick. He . . . he raped me." His voice quavered, revealing fear and torment, and for a moment he had to pause and fight for control of his emotions.

He took another sip of his water, holding the cup carefully so he didn't reopen the cut on his lip before continuing. "Then he killed Muriel Faringo. Olivia lives only ten blocks away, so I went to her place and had her call it in. She asked for a bus, too, and rode here with me."

"Ok, Elliot, I'm going to pause right here and make a call."

Elliot nodded as his captain picked up the bedside phone. He felt relieved to have finally said the words, but he also dreaded what was to come next.

"This is Cragen," Don said into the phone. "Wake Munch and Fin and tell them to pick up a Roger DeVane. He's in the system, just out on parole. His P.O. should know where to find him . . . For questioning in connection with . . . " he looked at Elliot. Even with his eyes closed, the younger man couldn't hide the pain he was feeling. If he told Munch and Tutuola to bring DeVane in on suspicion of rape, they would probably guess who the victim was from the fact that Olivia had been the one to call and say Stabler was safe.

"I don't care what they say," he said angrily. "Munch has a good vocabulary. Tell him to make something up. When they're done with that, tell them to get on to dispatch and find out why in the hell, when one of my detectives called in a homicide at one address and asked for an ambulance at her own home, they failed to notify me."

Without so much as a goodbye, he hung up the phone and turned on the cassette recorder again. "Are you ready to continue?" he asked. When Elliot nodded, Don took out his tablet to make notes of things he wanted to come back to later.

"Ok, Elliot, I want you to start from the point at which you learned that DeVane was out on parole," Don said as gently as he could. "Unless I get confused about something that I don't think can wait until you are finished, I won't interrupt. Can you do that for me?"

Elliot nodded, and then, as if he realized the tape recorder wouldn't recognize it, he said in the same flat monotone he had used when he first named his attacker, "Yeah, ok. It was . . . yesterday, I guess, since it's after midnight now, and the letter was actually addressed to you as my CO. I had a copy, too, but I hadn't opened my mail yet. You wanted to make sure I didn't miss it."

As Elliot told his story, the hospital room faded away and he found himself reliving the hours leading up to the attack. Most of it had been routine, so at first he was perfectly calm, but soon, Don knew, he would have to discuss the assault in detail, and that could get hairy.

"It was like any other day, just normal stuff. Munch had a 9:00 court appearance, so he didn't come in until later, and Fin was writing the report on a case he'd been the primary on."

Elliot sniffed a couple of times, and then grabbed for a tissue. First, he wiped his nose, and then he blew it softly. "Sorry," he said with a sheepish look on his face. "The doc says it's busted, but not too bad. It should heal all right on its own, but he didn't say how I am supposed to keep breathing when it won't stop running."

Don smiled slightly and said, "The swelling will go down in a few days, I'm sure, then it will be easier."

"Yeah, right," Elliot nodded, but didn't sound convinced. "And until then, I have to breathe through my mouth. I hate that, I always sound like an obscene phone call."

Seeming to feel he had said enough about his condition for the time being, Elliot went back to his story. "Ok, so, Fin was writing a report, and Olivia and I had our own cases to deal with. After we made a few phone calls and bounced some ideas around with Fin on another case we had all been working together, Liv and I headed out to interview an alibi witness."

Don noticed that he was calling his colleagues by name instead of by their professional titles. He was talking like a victim telling his story, not a cop giving a statement. Just the thought of it tore at his heart.

"When the alibi fell through, we went to our suspect's job, a plumbing and electrical supply store, to talk to him again and place him under arrest, but big surprise, the little perv had called in sick that day."

Elliot's frustration and disgust with the suspect was beginning to show in his words and his tone, and as he was talking, he became slightly more animated. He shifted in bed, and grimaced as his abused ribs protested. It took him a minute to catch his breath, but then he continued his story. "We checked his home and his mother's house, and then visited some of his known haunts and hangouts, but by noon we'd had no joy, so we stopped at a Chinese buffet in the area for lunch while we decided what to do next on the case.

"At lunch, I got a call on my cell that our suspect had called his boss and asked for his paycheck, so we had our food boxed and went back to the store to wait for the little creep. We collared him there, and of course he had a perfectly plausible reason why he was trying to get his paycheck and skip town, and naturally, it had nothing at all to do with the fact that he had raped a woman in the alley behind her apartment when she was taking her trash out to the Dumpster."

Elliot grabbed another tissue to wipe his nose, and when he opened his mouth for another breath something rattled in his throat and he started to cough. For the next couple of minutes, Don watched, wincing in sympathy, as his friend struggled through the coughing spasm and the agony it caused his cracked ribs. He considered calling the nurse, but knew Elliot could have been coughing up blood and would have insisted he was fine.

Finally, the spasm passed, and Elliot gently blew his nose and settled back against the pillows with a long, low moan. He was pale and perspiring, and Don wondered if he should come back later to finish the interview, but he knew Elliot was the only one who could tell him that.

"Are you all right?"

"No," the answer was still nasally, "but I can go on."

Don nodded. "Ok, just take your time, and if you decide you need to stop, just say so."

Elliot nodded. "Where was I?"

"You had Chinese food for lunch and then busted a suspect."

Don doubted that any of the information he had received so far was relevant to the crime, but he figured that Elliot had been trying to work himself up to discussing the details of what had happened. Knowing that it was best to let victims proceed at their own pace, he just kept quiet and listened as his detective rambled on about a routine day in the SVU.

"Ok, right. We took our suspect back to the station and booked him, completed our paperwork, and contacted Novak about taking the case to the grand jury for an indictment. I checked my messages and found out there had been twelve hysterical calls from Muriel Faringo. She had received the notice that Roger DeVane was out and she was certain he was calling her house."

The closer he got to his nightmare encounter with DeVane, the more restless Elliot got, and every time he shifted position, he would wince in pain. Don supposed it was the flight part of his flight or fight instinct that was making him squirm around despite the pain it caused, and he resisted the temptation to tell the other man to just be still.

"I called her back and it turned out she was receiving hang-up calls where the phone would ring, and when she answered it, there would be no one there. I figured it could be DeVane, but we'd have to prove it before we could do anything to stop it. I gave her my word I'd have the phone company look into it, to make sure it wasn't any problem with the phone lines, and I told her I would stop by that evening to check on her. Liv and I made some more phone calls, completed a couple more reports, and reviewed one of our stalled open cases hoping we could come up with some new ideas on what to do next."

Elliot tried to sit straighter in the bed, and he used his hands to push himself up. The pain that shot through his injured left hand and arm caused it to give out, and when he suddenly slumped to that side his ribs screamed at him in protest. He bit his tongue against the stream of expletives that wanted to come out and tried to catch his breath instead; but it hurt too much to take a full breath, and soon, he was seeing stars. Then there was a strong, comforting hand on his forearm, and his captain's voice said, "You can curse about it if you want, I won't be offended."

"Ohhhh, damn," he moaned.

"Slow, shallow breaths, Elliot," Don suggested. "Take all the time you need."

For the next several minutes, the detective just sat with his eyes closed, breathing through his mouth, and sniffling periodically as he collected himself. Finally, he sighed, blinked a few times, and began to speak again.

"Ok, the day ended without anything important happening, and I decided to drop by Muriel's house on my way home. Um . . . I was officially off the clock, but I figured . . . she just needed some reassurance, you know?"

Don nodded. "I know what you mean. We've all done it from time to time."

As he got closer to the worst part of his story, Elliot began to alternately pause and rush his words as if thinking of what he could bear to say next and then blurting it out before he had a chance to change his mind. He had also started balling the fitted bed sheet up in his good hand until he had gathered up so much of the fabric that was about to pop off one of the corners of the mattress. His voice became shakier and more uncertain as spoke, but as long as he was willing to continue talking, Don was content to let him go on a little longer.

"I intended to . . . um, check her locks, let her know if I saw any shrubbery that needed to be cut back to keep it from giving an intruder cover to break in at the windows . . . and I was going to do that for her if I could and she didn't have anyone else. It wasn't a big deal, you know? And, since my wife has moved out and taken the kids with her, it wasn't like I had anything better to do. So, I sent my partner home and then signed out myself."

It was the catch in Elliot's voice when he mentioned his wife leaving that made Don decide to intervene. The attack was enough to deal with, he didn't want his detective to start dwelling on all the things that had gone wrong in his marriage while he was at it. He needed to stop and redirect his friend's attention somehow.

"Elliot, I'm going to stop you for a moment," Don said, though he didn't turn the recorder off. So far, he had only about thirty minutes on the first side of a ninety-minute tape, and he didn't think he'd need to worry about running out because Elliot wouldn't want to dwell on the rest of his painful story. Mostly he just wanted to break in and pull his friend back to the present. "I have a few questions."

He poured the younger man another glass of water, and since Elliot had only one good hand right now, he had to let go of the balled up sheet to accept it.

"First of all, did you ever hear back from the telephone company?"

"No, but you know how they can be, Cap. It would have taken a couple of days for them to get back to me, and I didn't want to leave Muriel hanging that long."

Elliot sipped a little of his water but didn't seem to want it. He set the cup on the table that extended over the bed in front of him, and this time, he rested his hand in his lap.

"Yeah, I know they have no idea what the word 'now' means. Why didn't you take Benson with you?"

Elliot shrugged. "If I had asked her, I'm sure she'd have come, but like I said, we were off the clock. I was stopping then because it was on my way home. I thought it was going to be more of the usual hand-holding, you know the kinds of things we do to reassure victims when we can't really protect them. If I had known . . ."

Don waited and watched his friend clench and unclench his fist, watched the muscle in his jaw twitch. After several seconds, Elliot lowered his head and, in a tightly controlled voice, said, "If I had known what would happen, if I had known I would need backup, I would have asked her to come."

Looking up, Elliot continued. "Muriel had never met Olivia. I felt that, considering everything she had been through, bringing a stranger into her home would be an unnecessary intrusion, even if she was a cop."

"Ok." Don made a few notes, and seeing that he was now close to the forty-minute mark on his tape, he pressed fast forward. Once he had flipped the cassette and started again, giving the date, location, his name and Elliot's, and stated that it was side two, he asked, "Do you feel like you can go on?"

Nodding, Elliot took a slow breath and said, "Yeah, Cap, now that I have started this, I need to finish it."

His voice became a flat monotone as he began to speak about what had to be the worst night of his life. "When I got to Muriel's house, the door was ajar. That seemed a little odd to me, but it wouldn't have been the first time a scared victim had freaked before I could get there and just run off to a friend's house leaving the door open and all the lights on. I figured I'd just in, call her name, see if she was there before I did anything else.

"I pushed the door all the way open, and there she was, in the middle of the front room, naked and tied to a chair. She . . . she was gagged, and her legs were tied open. I swept the room, and didn't see anybody else."

Here Elliot looked at his CO, his eyes begging to be believed. "Cap, I swear to God, I looked! I swear I did, but I didn't see anyone! He must have been around the corner or something!" The shouting must have caused him pain, but this time, his need for reassurance was so much greater that he seemed not to notice the discomfort.

"I know, Elliot," Don assured him gently. "I know you looked, but why didn't you call for backup?"

"I had my phone in one hand and my gun in the other as I crossed the room," he said, the words pouring from him now as if it would hurt less if he told the story faster. "I was about to dial, but I wanted to get her untied and out of there. She tried to warn me, Cap. She was screaming into the gag, but I was doing too much at once, and I didn't realize what she was trying to tell me until I heard something moving behind me, sort of a whoosh, I turned just as he swung, and he only landed a glancing blow. It was enough to knock me down, disorient me. I think if I hadn't turned, if he'd hit me square on, he'd have split my skull. He was using a bat, I think, something heavy like that, too heavy to be a broomstick."

Elliot paused for a moment, took a sip of his water. He was trembling slightly and had a lost, confused look in his eyes that a man with the experience of Don Cragen recognized as abject terror. He hated to press, but Elliot had been right earlier when he'd said now that he had started the story, he needed to finish it. If Don let him stop now, just as he was getting to the hardest part, he might never find the courage go on.

"Elliot, I know this is hard, but you are safe now. You can do this. Tell me, what happened next?"

Elliot nodded, swallowed hard, and closed his eyes. "He, um . . . he took my phone and my gun, and clubbed me a few more times on my back and ribs, mostly. I kicked at him once and he caught my ankle." As Elliot spoke, he reenacted the struggle with small gestures. When he mentioned being hit in the ribs, he wrapped his good arm protectively around them, and when he said he kicked, his right leg twitched.

"Then he caught me in the gut and I couldn't breathe, and he whacked me in the head again." His hand went up to the knot on his head. "I don't think he knocked me out, but he stunned me. All I could do . . . was lie there. I couldn't think . . . couldn't move . . . couldn't fight back. I was so helpless. I couldn't stop him . . . from doing anything he wanted."

Elliot's features crumpled into an expression of despair and tears threatened as he relived the horror of the previous evening. Cautiously, Don moved his chair closer to the bed and placed a hand on his friend's arm once again.

"Elliot?" he said. "Elliot, I know you have heard this before, said it to victims, but it's the truth. You did the only thing you are supposed to do in a situation like that. You survived. You survived, Elliot, and you have people who care about you to help you deal with the rest. You know that, right?"

Elliot nodded again, sniffled and gulped, took a sip of his water, and continued without prompting, rambling through the story, trying to race to the end.

"He took my coat off me and draped me over the back of a chair so my head was down toward the seat and my feet were off the floor. I couldn't resist. It was all I could do to stay conscious. The chair was near the bottom of the stairs, so he pushed it over to the banister. He took my cuffs and chained me to the big post at the bottom. There was a bottom rail where the balustrades were attached, and the cuffs passed under it, so I couldn't stand up.

"Then he taunted me, asked me if I felt like such a tough cop now, and he . . . he started taking my clothes off."

Elliot choked and gasped for air. While he'd been talking, his eyes had closed again and he'd become lost in the fear and shame once more. As he sat there, breathing hard and fighting his tears, Don shifted position to be right in his line of sight when he opened his eyes.

"Elliot, look at me," Don prompted. It took a moment, but the detective obeyed, and when he did, Don said, "You are safe now. No one can hurt you, and no one will judge you. You stayed alive, and that is the most important thing. You survived, and you are safe now, right?"

Elliot nodded.

"Say it, Elliot."

Elliot looked into his captain's eyes and saw the depths of sincerity there. This man and his other friends and colleagues would not think less of him for what had happened. The most important thing to them was that he had survived so they could be there to help him get better and get justice. They would protect him while he needed their protection, and they would support him when he was back on his feet again.

"Elliot?"

Smiling slightly, the detective nodded and replied, "I'm safe now."

Don smiled back. "Ok, take a minute to collect yourself, and whenever you're ready, just continue."

It took considerably more than a minute, and every so often he or his captain would comment on some little, irrelevant thing like the weather just to break up the silence, but eventually, Elliot cleared his throat, and went on quietly.

"He . . . he stripped me from the waist down . . . left my shorts around my ankles . . . to humiliate me, I guess. Said something about being caught with my pants down, and he laughed at me like it was a big joke. He was proud of himself for sneaking up on me like he did . . . Then he, um . . . he asked me if I remembered threatening to put the word out at Riker's that he was a child molester. I did . . . remember, I mean . . . during the interview when we busted him, I thought it might scare him into cooperating. It's not an uncommon tactic, you know."

Don nodded when Elliot looked to him for confirmation. "I know, we make that threat from time to time, it's ok, Elliot. Then what happened?"

"He told me this was payback, and he . . . raped me. He penetrated me from behind, I don't know how many times. He used something . . . hard and cold, and he had my gun and he put it to my head and made me take him . . . his penis into my mouth. He touched me . . . everywhere . . . fondled me . . . like he was flaunting his power over me and the whole time, he kept telling me about guys in prison and what they had done to him, what he planned to do to me."

Elliot visibly relaxed after that, and Don figured that, since he had survived the hardest part, describing the act itself, he would be able to finish his story without too much more trauma.

"At first, I tried to resist, but that only made it hurt worse, and it made him more violent, so I just tried to sort of zone out, like I did when I was in basic training in the Marines and they would give the whole platoon punishment. You go to this place in your head where nothing can touch you and you feel like you can just go on forever, running or doing sit-ups or whatever they tell you to do, but I couldn't quite get there."

Suddenly the detective was tense again. Don couldn't imagine what could be worse than what he had already described, but apparently, to his grave disappointment, he was about to find out. He wished there was something he could do to make this easier for his friend, but he knew, all he could do was hear what he had to say and use it to put DeVane back in jail forever.

"I don't know how long . . . the assault went on, but eventually . . . he stopped. Then he went back to Muriel. He whipped his victims twelve years ago, and told them, 'Careless little girls must be punished.' I heard him . . . I heard him tell her she was a little too old for his tastes now, but he had to finish what he started, and he beat her and said that to her over and over."

Looking up at his captain, he said with cold fury in his voice, "She was twelve years old when he snatched her, Cap, and he held a grudge against her all that time. How the hell can someone hate a little girl for that long?"

Don just shook his head. "I don't know, Elliot, and I'm glad for that. I really don't think any of us needs to get that deep inside the heads of the freaks we deal with."

Elliot nodded and continued, "I guess not. Well, the way I was cuffed to the stairs, I couldn't turn to see what he was doing, but he took Muriel's gag off and I heard her talking. First, she told me she was sorry . . . like it was her fault for calling me, then she begged him for my life, Cap. She pleaded with him not to kill me, and he promised her he wouldn't. And she thanked him."

Elliot paused for a long time, and Don let the silence grow. He didn't need any kind of reassurance at the moment, he just needed time to gather his thoughts. "She thanked him for sparing me and never said a thing to try to save herself. After all the messages she had left, and I thought she was just flaking out. I couldn't have blamed her for that, but then, when it came right down to it, she was really brave. I mean, she was scared, I could hear it in her voice, but she was brave at the same time, like she was accepting it because she knew she couldn't stop it from happening."

Don sense that Elliot was rambling now because he didn't want to say whatever was coming next. He hated to do it, but he gently pushed his friend to continue. "What happened then, Elliot?" he asked gently.

Elliot looked at him with sad eyes. His expression said he knew he'd been babbling, and more than that, he knew that his captain understood why. Taking a deep breath and wincing at the pain it caused him, he pressed on, determined to finish his story.

"He said he was going to leave me to live with the knowledge that I couldn't save her, but he still needed his revenge. I heard the whip crack and she screamed, over and over and over, and I heard his grunting and her crying when he raped her, and then I heard her praying. I couldn't quite make out the words, I . . . I don't remember what she said, but I know . . . I know she was praying for me."

Elliot paused and looked at his captain as if seeking an explanation for the woman's selfless behavior, but all Cragen could do was shrug. He didn't understand it either.

Elliot shrugged back slightly, and continued talking. "I wanted to help her, Cap, God knows I did, but all I could do was yell and curse DeVane and try to get his attention back on me, but nothing worked. Eventually, he just got pissed off and clubbed me in the head again, and that time, I passed out."

There was a quiet moment, and then Elliot added, "Oh, and sometime before he knocked me out, he told me that he had learned one lesson while he was in jail."

Sensing that it was important, at least in Elliot's mind, Don asked, "What was that?"

"He said, 'Dead bitches can't pick you out of a line up.'"

Elliot fell silent for a few minutes after that, and Don used the time to start a new tape. He really hadn't expected this to take as long as it had, but fortunately, there were two cassettes in the package, so he would have plenty of time for the questions he needed to ask when the story was done. When Elliot still hadn't begun talking after a silent hundred count, he asked, "What do you remember when you came to?"

"I smelled blood," Elliot replied, "and I knew I was in some pretty serious trouble."

From there, Elliot went on to describe how he freed himself from the handcuffs and made his way to Olivia's place.

"Why go all that way? Why didn't you just ask a neighbor to call 911?"

Elliot looked at his captain blankly and blinked a few times. "I . . . don't . . . really know," he said. "Maybe I was in shock, all I knew was Olivia was a friend and she would take care of me. I knew at the time that I shouldn't leave the scene unsecured, but I couldn't for the life of me think of any other way. I knew, if I could get to Olivia's apartment, I would be safe. Even if she wasn't home, I have a key and I could let myself in and wait for her."

Suddenly, his eyes grew wide. "My keys, Cap! DeVane took my keys. He has a key to Liv's place now! Cap, we have to warn her!"

"It's ok, Elliot," Don reassured him. "She's waiting in the visitors' lounge right now. I'll let her know."

"She has to get her locks changed," Elliot insisted. "If he followed me, he knows where she lives."

"I'll let her know that," Don said. "Don't worry, we'll keep her safe for you."

It took a couple more minutes, but finally Elliot calmed down.

"Now, I just have a few more questions, Elliot," the captain said gently, "and they're pretty awkward, but I need you to answer them so we can bring as many specific charges as possible against this creep."

Elliot nodded. "I know the drill."

For the next ten minutes, he answered his captain's questions about which particular sexual acts had been performed on him, which ones he had been forced to perform, how many times it had happened, and anything else he could recall about the assault.

Finally, it was over. Don shut off the tape recorder and said, "I'll type up your statement and bring it to you to review and sign later."

"Thanks, Cap." The two men sat in silence for a little while, and then Elliot said, "I let her down, Cap."

"What do you mean?"

"It was my job to protect her, to keep her safe, and I couldn't do it. She apologized to me for what DeVane did. She begged for my life, and he killed her before I could even tell her it wasn't her fault."

"Listen to me, Son," Don said, adopting a paternal, supportive role with his younger, dejected detective. "Hard as it is to swallow, it isn't really your job to keep good people safe. You are a detective. Your job is to put the bad people who hurt them in jail. You did that for Muriel Faringo, and with the squad's help, you will do it again. You can't change what happened to her, but with your testimony, you can make sure DeVane is punished. As for her apologizing to you, well, she's in a place now where she understands that none of this was her fault, or yours either. I really believe that, and you should, too.

"You did your job, Elliot," Don assured him, "your job, and then some. Don't ever think you have failed anyone on that count."

The only reaction he got was that Elliot looked away from him. Since he wasn't sure what else he might say, or what he wanted his detective to say, he just patted the other man on the shoulder, got out of his seat and left the room, saying, "I'll send Liv and Kathy in on my way out."