Day Eleven, cont'd

Day Eleven, cont'd

He couldn't have been asleep for more than a few minutes. He was still half-asleep, unsure as to exactly where he was. The scream that had awoken him was still ringing in his ears and his instinct to comfort Olivia in her terror wasn't the slightest bit dulled by his confusion. Although it was a bit of a shock to realize for the first time that the woman lying beside him, the woman sharing his bed, was Olivia. It only took a split second for the surprise to give way to utter happiness.

Unfortunately, it only took another split second for the happiness to dissolve into a flood of sheer panic when a whimper came from the place beside him.

He rolled onto his side, stretching his arm out around her body, trying both to shake her from the memory or the the dream and to communicate his protective presence to her unconscious mind. It wasn't unexpected for her to withdraw, to coil further into herself, to reject his touch in her sleep. But it hurt just the same, more so when he realized that she was not lost in the throws of a nightmare. He told himself that it wasn't personal, that it couldn't be personal when she was no more aware of his identity that she was of the fact that she was lying in her own bed.

He kept his arm out, his hand gripping her shoulder. "Liv, it's ok." He was thankful for the darkness which prevented him from seeing her more clearly. "It's just me, honey. You're safe."

He hadn't necessarily expected his words to fix anything; he didn't think she would sit up and snap out of it. Nor was he adequately prepared for her to shriek at his voice and flail her injured arms to escape the confines of his gently touch. Her actions did, however, comfort him on some level because she wasn't fighting him or afraid that he would hurt her. She was back in Howie's basement, reliving those terrible days she was alone there.

Her pathetic cries faded, giving Elliot false hope that she was through the worst of it. But her voice came again before he was even able to breathe a sigh of relief. Although her words would have been lost between the softness of her voice and the tears, Elliot was all too familiar with them, easily recognizing those words that broke him deep inside.

"Please, god, no, stop!"

He knew she wasn't fighting him, despite the way she twisted and pulled at his hold. He also knew the words weren't aimed at him, that she never would want him to leave her. He was even starting to half believe her promise that he hadn't raped her. Even so, her words, her desperate voice, her obvious fear, crippled him. He supposed it was all the years working as a cop, especially in SVU, or it could have been having had an abused mother and younger sisters and three daughters, or perhaps it was simply an innate instinct in him, but no matter the cause, he could barely stomach witnessing Olivia's attempt to ward off her captor. He hated seeing her cry. He hated hearing her whimper. He hated seeing her injured and broken and helpless.

And as much as he wanted to grab her and shake her free from the hysteria that forced her to stare at him and see Howie, his hands had long since released their hold on her. Because even unconsciously, he'd responded to her request to let her go.

He wasn't physically capable of touching her against her will, he realized.

Finally, the millstone of guilt no longer weighed down on his weary shoulders. He hadn't raped her. He might have been out of control and crossing all sorts of lines that he would have been well-advised to stay far away from, he knew he would never have laid a hand on her that wasn't welcome and he certainly never could have held her down and raped her.

The downside of his mental release and subsequent physical relaxation was that Olivia was awake and unencumbered and terrified out of her wits. Quite literally.

She sprang from the bed and was halfway down the hall before Elliot even realized it. He gave chase, fearing what could happen if she were to get out of her apartment or worse, if she were to get out of his line of sight.

It served to his advantage that her eyes and mind were locked inside Howie's walls because her escape was far less effective than it would have been had she been aware that she was at home. But Elliot could hardly rejoice in the ease of her defeat, not when it came in the form of her collapsing against the back of her arm chair and curling into a ball, sobbing with the excruciating letdown of failure.

As he approached, he moved slowly and spoke softly. He was trying to get in a position where she might see him eventually, hoping his voice would help guide her out of her fear. There was a voice in his head that taunted him, telling him that her pleas for someone to stop doing something certainly meant she'd been raped by Howie. He couldn't listen; he couldn't even think about it. Because he figured it was more important for her to know she was free. Once she knew she was safe, then he could work on getting her to open up about what had happened to her in Howie's prison.

"Hey, Liv, it's ok. It's just me." When he was within an arm's reach of her, he squatted down so he wouldn't appear as imposing if she happened to look up. It killed him to see the way her hands revealed how very aware of his presence she was – her nails dug into the fabric of her sweatpants and likely into her skin as well.

He couldn't fight back the urge anymore. He had to touch her. He had to try to soothe her. His hands moved to cover hers, careful to not threaten her with more confining contact. Instead his fingers worked gently against hers, trying to loosen her grasp on herself. He figured it would be a step in the right direction if he could simply get her to cling to him rather than to continue thinking she was alone.

By the time he'd worked her fingers open enough to slip his palms against hers, she'd stopped whimpering. Not that her silent, racking sobs were much of an improvement. But he decided to count it as a victory that he was maintaining contact with her.

"You're safe, Liv. You're safe now." His voice broke as he said the words, as he realized that his days of desperation and hopelessness had taken a much bigger toll on her. While he'd been slightly deranged and practically suicidal, she'd been fighting to hold onto the life she knew. She'd been waiting for him to help her and he'd been busy feeling sorry for himself. He wanted to apologize, to beg for her forgiveness, to admit that his selfishness might have caused her additional time at Howie's mercy.

But before he could, her hands pulled free of his. Her face remained down, turned away so that he couldn't even tell if her eyes were open. Rather than another escape attempt, Olivia did exactly the last thing Elliot expected, although it was absolutely welcome. She reached for him, stretching her arms around his waist, shifting into his side, pushing him to lay down, pressing her face into his neck.

He wasn't sure what had caused the change, but he wasn't going to knock it. Not when it was so reassuring to him to find out that he was a source of some sort of comfort to her in her hysteria. He pressed a kiss against her hair and promised himself that he wouldn't allow the discomfort of lying on a hard wood floor to bother him under the circumstances.

Her voice was muffled by his skin when she spoke, but he doubted hearing it at full volume would have made the cracked, broken sound resemble his partner's voice any better. "I'm glad you're here, El."

He tightened his arms around her. "So am I." Finally letting out a sigh of relief, he figured he could sleep standing up as long as Olivia continued to be able to fight her way clear of the demons.

When she spoke again, though, her words made his blood run cold.

"We'll never get out of here. No one will ever find us."

Any joy he felt in having reached her disappeared in the cloud of disappointment. He was no closer to getting through to her. She was still locked in that dungeon, scared so far out of her mind that she thought he was there with her. All he could do was hold her and promise her that everything was ok.

Even though he knew he was lying to her.