The Black Market Baby Scandal
(Chapter Five: Without Limits)
The uniformed officers were still standing around outside the warehouse when Elliot and Olivia arrived.
"What the hell is going on here?" Elliot barked at them as he climbed out of the car and approached the building.
"Sergeant, says we don't go in without a warrant," the man replied kicking some rocks across the parking lot. "You got a warrant?"
Elliot looked back at Olivia. "Get out of my way," he said storming past the uniformed officers toward the door of the building.
"Elliot," Olivia called to him as she ran to keep up with him. "He's right. We can't go in there. Not without the warrant."
Elliot said nothing but walked around to the back of the building to climb up on some old oil drums and peer through some windows.
"What do you see?"
"File cabinets. Rows and rows of file cabinets." He jumped down and stacked a few old milk crates on the barrel then climbed back up again.
"Elliot?"
"I think I can get in through this window. The latch is broken and it looks like someone has been climbing in this way to get out of the cold." he tossed his phone to Olivia and took off his jacket so that he could fit through the small opening.
"What are you doing?"
"You call Alex and get her on that warrant. I'm gonna take a look."
"Elliot, anything you find wont be submissible in court. We have to wait."
"I think I can squeeze through, but it's going to be kind of tight."
Olivia took a deep breath and exhaled. "Elliot, wait. I'll go."
"What?"
"Let's get Alex on the phone and make sure she has secured a warrant." She looked up at the small window. "I can fit." Olivia climbed on to the barrel to look inside the dark ware house. All of the other windows were boarded up.
Elliot looked at her, then back at the window. She was right, she had a much smaller build than he did and should fit through the window without any trouble. But he wasn't sure exactly how comfortable he was sending her in there alone.
"I don't know, Liv."
"You don't think I'll fit?"
"I know you'll fit. I don't know if I want you going in there alone."
"I can take care of myself, Elliot. I don't need a babysitter."
"Shit Olivia, if you get in there and get into trouble I am stuck out here until someone arrives with that warrant. Not to mention, both our asses would be in a sling."
Olivia looked down at him from the barrel and smiled.
"What?" He asked.
"That has never stopped you before. Are you losing your edge, Detective Stabler?" Olivia smiled a mischievous smile as Elliot pulled his phone from the pocket of his jacket that had been laid across one of the barrels.
"Alex, that warrant I called you about earlier, where exactly are we on that? We do? Okay, great."
Elliot closed his phone and climbed onto the barrel beside Olivia. He inspected the window once more, pulling at one of the old boards until it busted in half widening the space a little.
"If I give you a boost, do you think you can reach that latch and open the other window?"
Olivia stared in and looked over at the latch for the next window down. It appeared to be a little wider than the one she was about to enter. Wide enough for Elliot to enter.
"I can get it. If I go in here and crawl across the ledge, I can open that window from the inside."
The floor of the warehouse was under ground level. So where they stood ten feet from the ground on the outside of the building was closer to thirty feet to the concrete floor on the inside.
"God be careful, Olivia."
"I can do this," she said confidently. "Just give me a boost."
Elliot lifted her until she was able to reach the opening. She maneuvered her small waist enough to slide through the window.
"I'm in," she said as Elliot stood to look in at her through the window.
"Here," he said handing her a small flashlight. "Carefully, move down and open the latch. We can use that beam to climb down."
Olivia nodded and moved toward the window a few feet away. Elliot moved down on the outside of the building and pulled on the boards over the window until they practically crumbled, falling apart in his hands. Olivia opened the latch and helped Elliot inside.
"If we can get across this beam and into that office over there we can take the stairs to the floor," he suggested.
Olivia placed the small flashlight between her thumb and pointer finger to hold it as she began her journey across the beam. The makeshift office was composed of four walls, but had no ceiling. Once across the twelve foot of beam that would put them over the office, they could jump down safely. Getting that far however, was proving to be a much tougher task than either of them had estimated.
Olivia went first. Once she was a few feet out, Elliot moved in behind her. He stayed close enough he could reach her if she needed help, but far enough back that they didn't put their weight too close together on the beam.
Half way to their destination, Olivia's pant leg snagged on a splinter of wood causing her to lose her balance and fall over the edge. Just as she had started to slip Elliot reached for her grabbing her forearm as she looked below her and watched the flashlight fall, crashing to the floor.
Olivia gasped as she slipped a little more and stared up at Elliot above her.
"I've got you," Elliot tried to assure her. Though his heart was pounding feeling her slipping in his fingers and was also trying to assure himself.
Elliot could only hold her with one arm, his other wrapped tightly around the beam and held them both to it. She slipped again sliding a few more centimeters as he gripped his fingers tighter around her wrist.
"El," she gasped looking down as her feet dangled below her, "I'm slipping."
"Olivia, look at me. I won't let you go. You fall, I fall."
He could tell she was terrified. The truth was he had never been more scared of anything in his life. He had to pull her up. He could never live with himself if he let her fall. It was his fault she was even in here. If hadn't been for him, she would have been perfectly content waiting outside for the uniformed officer to return to the courthouse and bring back the warrant from Alex. He had to make this right.
"Liv, look at me."
She shifted her eyes to look into his and he could see her fear.
"I'm going to try to pull you up. But I can only use one arm. If I let go with the other, we'll both go down. When I pull you up grab my wrist with your other hand."
"I can't reach."
"Yes, you can."
Olivia turned to look below her.
"Don't look down. Look at me."
She looked back up at Elliot's eyes.
"One, two, three." Elliot pulled his arm upward and she was able to get a better grip on his hand. "Good girl. Now we're gonna do it again. This time I am going to try and swing you up more and see if you can grab the beam."
"Okay."
"One, two, three." Elliot swung her body weight as he raised her until she could reach the beam.
Olivia held tight to the beam as Elliot reached to grab her leg and pull it over the beam. She wrapped her arms around it tight and closed her eyes and just breathed. Elliot moved in beside her and put his arm around her as he gently kissed the back of her head.
"Are you okay?"
"I'll be alright," she said softly. She raised her head to look ahead of them. "Just a few more feet," she said as if she were trying to convince her body to move again.
"We're almost there."
Olivia took a deep breath and the crawled slowly the rest of the way. Once they were over the office they dropped down to a desk below them. She climbed down and moved toward the door.
"Olivia, wait." She turned and looked back at him. "Just sit for a minute and relax." Elliot guided her to sit in the chair beside the desk. "Are you sure you're okay?"
"Elliot I'm okay. These pants are ruined and I dropped the flashlight."
"I swear I just felt your shoulder pop out of socket."
"I'm sure I'll be a little sore later, but I'm okay."
Elliot stared into her eyes and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.
"That was close," he said and she could see the tears welling up behind his eyes.
Olivia smiled and placed her palm against his chest as she looked into his worried eyes.
"We'd better get going before they get in here."
"Yeah," Elliot answered opening the door for her.
They followed the stairs down to the floor, feeling their way in the dark until they reached the file cabinets.
"Here," Olivia said as she picked up the flashlight from the floor and tapping it against her palm until it began to glow again. "Still works."
She shined it up above her head looking at the distance between the beam above her and the place where it had landed on the concrete floor. She gulped as she realized how close she had been to falling herself.
"Liv, shine the light over here."
She pointed the light at the drawers of the cabinets as they tried to figure out where to begin looking for Emily's file.
"They are not by letter. Just these numbers."
"Birthdates. The day first, then the month and the year. Three months in each drawer. And some of them have the same codes but the letters at the end are different."
"The hospital where the babies were born. The son of a bitch catalogued them."
"She has to be here, Elliot."
"Olivia, there are two dozen file cabinets in here. We don't have time to look through them all."
"She was born January 23, 1997. You take that side and I'll take this side. We have come too far to give up now."
"You're right."
They skimmed down the rows of cabinets trying to find the one that would contain Emily's file.
"Olivia. This is it, but it's locked."
"Let me see that." She pulled one of the bobby pins that was securing her bangs in place and placed the end of it in her mouth. "Hold the light," she said as she bit the plastic coated tips off the pin and bent it to fit into the lock.
"You know this is illegal?"
Olivia just stared at him. "And breaking and entering isn't?"
"Good point."
"Got it," she said slipping the pin into her pocket.
They flipped through the numbered files. Each case marked only by a number and not a name. Anything in this cabinet that could possibly help them would have to be carefully decoded first.
"This guy sure knew how to cover his tracks."
"What is that?" Olivia asked picking up a folder in the front that held information on the hospital and the parents the babies were sold to. "He made a small fortune selling these babies."
"That woman said that he got half a million dollars for Emily."
"If I had half a million dollars I would buy her back."
"I know. We're gonna get her back, Liv."
Just then they heard the banging against the front door as the men outside tried to get in.
"They must be here with the warrant."
"And how are we going to explain our already being inside?"
"I didn't think that far ahead in my little plan. I guess I somehow thought once we got inside and found the evidence the breaking in part wouldn't matter anymore."
They turned to look toward the door as they heard the banging again.
"We have to hide, Liv."
Olivia tucked the file back into the cabinet and slammed it shut as Elliot pulled her by the hand into a dark corner of the room, under the stair case.
They remained hidden quietly as the men busted into the warehouse and moved to check out the cabinets. While the officers were busy trying to open the cabinets Elliot guided Olivia by the hand back toward the door. Just as they were about to pull it off, Cragen stepped into the warehouse in front of them.
"Where the Hell have you two been?"
"What? We were just…." Olivia pointed behind her as she stuttered.
"We noticed some boards broken from the windows outside. It looks like we might have squatters. We were looking for evidence."
Cragen looked them over then stared down at the torn cuff on Olivia's pant leg. "I want to talk to both of you, now!" He walked toward the back of the building. "You wait here," he said pointing at Elliot as he escorted Olivia by the shoulder.
Olivia followed Cragen a few feet behind the building next to where she and Elliot had climbed inside.
"Are you insane? Do you want to blow this entire investigation?"
"I don't know what you are talking about," she replied.
"Don't be coy with me! You and I both know that you and Elliot were already inside this building, before that warrant arrived! Do you realize that anything we may find now could be useless? That all of this work may have been for nothing? All because you and your partner took it upon yourselves to go against protocol and enter the building before the warrant was in hand!"
"We didn't…"
"I would think long and hard about your next few words before you say them Detective Benson. I found Elliot's jacket right there on those barrels that the two of you used to climb in through that window. And I'm betting that if I were to dust, I would find your finger prints all over the glass panes on the inside and outside of the window and the locks as well. Now do you really want to stand here and tell me that you were not inside this building before we opened the front door?"
Olivia stared at him for a moment.
"It was my fault. I went in. Elliot only came in after me. He did it because of me."
"Detective Stabler is a grown man and he knew the consequences before he chose to enter the premises."
"Please don't do this to him. Do whatever you want to me. But you know as well as I do that he never would have gone in, if I wasn't already inside. I didn't move until we had conformation from Alex that the warrant was in her hand and on its way here. You told him to stay with me. He was just trying to do his job. It was my fault. Don't punish him for my mistake."
"Olivia, I understand that you have a personal interest in this case. And I understand why you did what you did. But you very well could have blown this entire case. This is about dozens of children. One of which happens to be yours. I can't just let this go. I'm going to have to take you off the case. And you're suspended, with pay until this investigation is complete. I never should have let you in on this case in the first place. I should have pulled you the moment I found out you had personal involvement. I need you to turn in your badge and weapon."
Olivia took a deep breath as she felt the tears welling up in her eyes.
"And Elliot?"
"Detective Stabler, is going to be placed on probation until our investigation into this case is finished. He messes up again and I will have to suspend him as well."
She pulled her gun from the holster and her badge from her belt and handed them to him, then turned to walk away.
"Olivia, I am letting you both off easy. What you did could have ruined this case in court. That man could have walked because of your actions here today."
She walked past Elliot and toward the car.
"Liv? What's going on?"
"He knows," she said as she kept walking past him.
Elliot walked back to take his turn with Cragen.
That night Olivia stood looking out from her roof top.
"Hey," she heard from behind her.
"Hey," she said softly with a smile as she turned to face Elliot.
"I brought beer," he said handing her a bottle.
"Thanks."
"How bad is it?"
"I'm suspended, with pay until the investigation is over or the case is closed. You?"
"I've been warned."
Olivia laughed.
"Olivia, I'm sorry."
"Don't be. Suspended with pay. It's kind of like paid vacation. Stay up late and drink beer, sleep late the next morning. Elliot, I knew it was wrong when I did it. I just didn't care."
"This is my fault. All of this. It was my stupid idea to go in. I got you in trouble and I almost got you killed."
"I'm still here," she said with a sly smile.
"Yes, but you almost weren't. How's your shoulder? I still swear I felt it as it popped out of place."
"It's a little bruised. I'm sure I'm gonna feel like shit in the morning. But the good news is that I can rest up and I will be fine."
"I'm sorry we weren't able to get what we needed from that file. If we had just been able to locate a list…"
Olivia took a drink from her beer and reached into the pocket of her jacket and handed him a slip of paper.
"What is this?"
"I must have forgotten to put it back into that file. I found it in my bra when I got home."
"You found it in your bra, huh?"
"We had gone too far to turn back. Risked too much to walk away with nothing."
Elliot opened up the paper. It was the list they had been looking for. A list of the babies that were sold around the time that Emily would have been sold and the names and addresses of the people who bought them.
Somewhere on this list was the family who bought Olivia's daughter.
"So now that I am suspended and you have been warned…."
"Get some rest. We'll start at the top of the list in the morning."
Olivia smiled at him.
"You are still going to help me?"
"Of course."
"Why? You are risking so much. If you get caught, Elliot, Cragen will have your job."
"Because," he said scooting in next to her to look into her eyes, "I have your back. And I know with out a doubt that if she were one of my children you would be right there beside me, fighting to find her and bring her home. You are my partner and best friend and I love you. There is no limit to the things I would do for you."
Olivia smiled.
"So, I'm starving. We have beer, we should order a pizza."
"Yeah. Who's paying?"
"I'm pretty sure it's your turn."
"Somehow it always ends up being my turn," Elliot said as she smiled at him and they headed back inside the apartment.