Truth And Deception

(Chapter Fourteen: One Little Mistake)

Olivia sat at her desk watching as Elliot typed up his report. She couldn't see to focus all afternoon, too much was on her mind. Fifteen minutes until quitting time and she couldn't wait to get their evening started.

Her husband was taking her out for a romantic dinner at her favorite restaurant and then it was back home for a little alone time. It had been nearly six months since they had decided to try to conceive a baby and so far all of their attempts had failed.

For the last two weeks they had been so tied up in a case at work that they had been working many late nights and hadn't been able to spend much time alone together. Tonight they planned a romantic evening to try and make up for that.

Elliot looked up across his desk to catch her watching him. He smiled and reached for her hand.

"You finished?"

Olivia nodded with a smile.

"I'll just be a few more minutes. I am almost done here. It will be nice to finally have some time alone with my wife."

"Yes, it will."

"I do kind of wish you hadn't told Cragen we were trying to get pregnant though."

"Why?"

"Because now every time we are alone together he is probably assuming we are having sex."

"Elliot, we still have not come out of our newlywed stage. And pretty much every time we are alone together we are having sex."

"Right, but I would rather our boss not know it."

Olivia smiled. "We could stop having sex for a while. That would really throw him off."

"Smart ass."

"Just finish your paperwork, Stabler so you can take me home."

Just then Elliot's cell phone rang. He looked up at Olivia as she shook her head. Neither of them were on call tonight and there was actually no reason he couldn't just let it go to voice mail.

Elliot pulled the phone from the clip on his belt and looked at it. "It's about the case," he said looking over at his annoyed wife. He opened the phone and placed it to his ear. "Stabler," he said as he grabbed a pen and paper. "Yeah, yes, okay. Umm…twenty minutes…"

Olivia felt her heart drop in her chest.

"Well I kind of had… No, no. I will be there." He hung up the phone and took a deep breath exhaling loudly.

He shifted his stare up at the look of disappointment in Olivia's eyes.

"I'm sorry."

"I had a feeling something like this would happen."

"Okay so on to plan B…"

"There's a plan B?"

"No time better than now to make one." Elliot pulled his car keys from his pocket and tossed them to her. "You take the car and head home. Cragen wants me to run across town and talk to this guy. I'll be home after that. I thinking maybe an hour and a half, tops. Then we are right back on schedule. The rest of the weekend is ours, I am turning off my phone for a little alone time with my wife."

"Okay."

"Liv, honey. I am sorry."

"It isn't your fault. I know that. It is just that lately, it is kind of our luck."

"I'll be a little late tonight, but we are still on. The entire weekend. Just ma and my wife. No work, no cell phones, no interruptions. Just you and me babe. And if we are lucky, this could be the weekend we make our baby."

Olivia smiled. "Okay. I will see you when you get home."

"I'll walk you out," Elliot said as he followed her toward the elevator. He kissed her goodbye and waved as she drove away, then headed for the squad car.

Olivia decided to run a few errands since it would be a while before he got home anyway. An hour later she headed back to their apartment. She took a quick shower and got dressed for their evening out together. She poured a glass of wine and sat down on the couch with the remote control to wait for Elliot.

An hour later Olivia opened her eyes and realized she had fallen asleep. She looked up at the clock, it had been over three hours since she had gotten off work and still no sign of Elliot. On the coffee table in front of her sat the wine glass still full with only a few sips missing from it.

She stood up and walked into the kitchen picking her cell phone up off the counter. It had been on vibrate and she had missed two calls from Elliot. She opened it to call him as she heard his key turn in the door.

"Hey you. I'm sorry I was later than I planned."

"I was starting to wonder about you."

"I tried to call."

"I must have fallen asleep on the couch waiting for you to get home."

"Well, it is after eight now and we missed our reservation. I was thinking maybe I could cook for you tonight and I'll call and make the reservation for tomorrow night. What do you think?"

Olivia wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him. "You're home. That is all that matters to me."

"So, what are you hungry for?"

"I don't know. I was just thinking maybe we could order in and skip straight to desert." She smiled and winked at him.

Elliot laughed. "I'll call our for Chinese."

"You read my mind."

"And you know, by the days you marked off on the calendar, we're in the green."

She smiled again and laughed. Green meaning go, as in good to go. As in she was ovulating and stood a higher chance of getting pregnant if they made love.

When all of this baby stuff had first began several months ago, they had been using all of the methods they had found on the internet. Ovulation prediction kits, unique and tricky sexual positions, even eating certain foods that were rumored to boost fertility.

Getting a little over excited, Olivia had even marked the calendar for the entire year on the days she was due to ovulate. Getting as busy as they did it was usually hard for them to track her ovulation and remember what days she was most fertile. So she had taken a green highlighter and marked each of the days for the entire year. So far, nothing had worked for them. They had pretty much given up on the calendar stuff.

Elliot called in the order for their diner then sat beside her on the couch. He picked up the book she had been reading from the end table beside the couch. "You're still reading this? Find anything useful in here?"

The book was one she had purchased months earlier that suggested different methods for getting pregnant. "Actually this man has some interesting theories on how to determine the sex of your baby from conception."

"He does, huh? Sounds like a load of…"

Olivia took her book from his hand and opened it to the page where her book mark laid. "He says that the position of sex during conception plays a big part in determining the sex of the fetus. Missionary, due to a shallower penetration, favors a girl. And deeper penetration methods, usually result in a boy."

"Let me see that," he said taking the book from her hand and flipping through the pages.

"It has something to do with the pH levels. More acidic conditions favor girls and more alkaline favor boys. That is because the X sperm or female sperm tend to live longer than the Y sperm or male sperm. So deeper penetration where there are less acidic conditions are better for boys because they don't have as far to travel before they reach their destination."

"I am not so sure this guy knows what he is talking about. I have five kids, all conceived in the missionary position. And two of those are boys."

"Well, it doesn't mean that you cant conceive a boy in the missionary position. Just that you are more likely to conceive a girl."

"And you really believe this quack?"

"It is just interesting reading."

"I just wonder how many children he has. And how many he has accurately predicted the sex of using this method."

"Maybe it isn't accurate. But what have we got to lose? At this point I would gladly take a boy or a girl, I just want a baby."

The door bell rang and Elliot wend to get their food. That night after dinner they retired to the bedroom early to make up for lost time.

Around eight o'clock the next morning the home phone rang. It was Cragen who wanted to speak to Elliot. Olivia rolled over in the bed holding the blankets against her. She exhaled and blew a strand of hair from her eyes as she eavesdropped on Elliot's conversation. How was she supposed to get pregnant if she never had time to have sex with her husband?

She rolled over and stared up at the ceiling in frustration as she heard Elliot hang up the phone. "So?" She asked looking up at him as she propped her chin against her palm. "How long will you be gone?"

"Just a few hours. Hopefully. A woman called the station and has information that could help close this case."

She nodded.

"Olivia, I have to go."

"Elliot, it's okay. I understand. I work this job, too. It is just going to be a little difficult to get pregnant when I am stuck here all alone."

"You sleep in. Relax," he said kissing her softly. "I will be home as soon as I can. And we are still going to dinner tonight, I promise."

"Okay. I love you."

"I love you too baby."

Elliot headed off to work and Olivia went back to sleep for a few hours.

Around ten thirty she finally climbed from the bed. This was the latest she had slept in months and she must have needed it, because she felt incredible. She stretched and headed for the bathroom. She stood in front of the mirror and stared at her reflection in the mirror. She groaned and reached start the shower to adjust the water temperature.

"Elliot Stabler," she groaned looking down to realize that once again her husband had failed to replace the empty toilet paper roll with a new one. She reached under the sink pulling out a new roll of paper and found an ovulation test. "What the Hell?" She said softly as she opened the wrapper from the test and held it in her urine stream. Maybe she had disfigured or something. She replaced the toilet paper roll and sat the test stick on the counter. It took about ten minutes for accurate results, so she took her gown off and climbed into the shower while she waited.

That evening Elliot returned home with flowers and a box of chocolates. He felt horrible that his wife had spent yet another day at home alone and work had managed to postpone their baby making plans, yet again.

Olivia kissed him and handed him a glass of wine. "I'll be ready in a minute. Why don't you sit down and relax while you wait."

Elliot took a seat on the couch and sipped his wine as she inquired about his advance in the case. Elliot told her about the information he had gotten from their new witness.

"So, what did you do today?"

"Well," she said with a devilish grin, "as I was replacing the empty toilet paper roll, I found an ovulation test strip under the sink."

"Oh."

Olivia walked across the room and straddled herself over his lap placing one knee on each side of him. She smiled and held up the strip clearly displaying two blue lines. She smiled again and leaned in to kiss her husband tenderly.

"We already knew you were ovulating," he mumbled between kisses.

"But I'm not," she said staring into his eyes. "You see, I took the wrong test by mistake."

"You mean?" Elliot took the test strip from her hand to look at it again.

Olivia leaned in and kissed him again. She placed a trail of small kisses around to his ear. "Congratulations daddy," she whispered softly.

"You're pregnant?"

He watched as a smile spread slowly across her face. Olivia pressed her lips together and nodded her head. "Kind of funny, huh? I mean I was taking the test to see if I was ovulating so we could try to get pregnant. But I mistakenly took one of the pregnancy tests from the last time I was late and hoped I was pregnant. I didn't realize I even had the wrong one until I climbed out of the shower and picked it up to look at the results. The ovulation tests have pink lines, not blue. I realized what I had done and was a little nervous and afraid I was wrong, so I took another one. They were both positive. We are having a baby."

Elliot laughed. "That is the best news! We are finally pregnant."

"Yes, we are!"

"God," Elliot exhaled wrapping his arms tight around her. "Can you imagine how great this kid is going to be? The best of me and the best of you."

"I have been so excited since I found out this morning. It took everything I had in me not to call you. But I didn't want to tell you over the phone. I wanted to see the look on your face when you found out that we were finally going to have a baby."

Elliot tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and traced his fingers over her jaw line. "You are so beautiful. I hope this kid looks just like you."

"Or has your blue eyes." She smiled. "I could live with that."

"I want to give you everything, Olivia. I love you more than anything and I want to make all of your dreams come true." He brushed his thumb over her full lips and kissed her passionately.

Olivia smiled as she placed her hands over her abdomen and looked into his eyes. "You already have."

Elliot pulled her mouth to his.

"What time is our reservation?" She mumbled through kisses.

"Seven thirty," he replied kissing her neck.

"What time is it now?"

Elliot shifted her a bit to look at his watch. "Five forty five."

Olivia smiled as she gazed seductively into his eyes and raised an eyebrow. "What do you say we celebrate a little before dinner?"

"Yes, ma'am."

Olivia laughed as Elliot laid her back against the couch and proceeded to make love to her.