A/N I can't thank you enough for the follows and favourites. They mean so much. As for the reviews, there are no words to express the depth of my gratitude. I know not many people are reading so any extra effort you take to let me know my efforts have found any audience are appreciated. I would love to hear what you think?

It feels like I can never get out from under this. It's like five years later I am still lying under his body, trapped. How can I feel compassion for the idiot that put herself there?

Hell, even the court didn't validate me. I know I left it late, but I wasn't even worth the jury's time to listen to, not even to evaluate how my experience corroborates Reese's assault.

How did I get to this point again? Why did I let it all come out? If I had been stronger, I wouldn't have reacted. I wouldn't have invited all of these questions and I wouldn't ever have sat on the stand prepping with Barba. I would never have said those words...

He. Raped. Me.

Barba. I can barely even look at him now. He has been so amazingly, undeservedly good to me. I can't help wondering if his gentle questions pushed me to admit what really happened? I will never be able to thank him enough for how he treated me, when it all slipped out. How he behaved towards me the whole way through the trial and plea deal was so much more than I deserved or could ever hope for.

I had never really appreciated why Liv has become such good friends with him. I never thought I'd ever tell anyone. But of everyone, I would never have thought he would be the one to whom I would choose to disclose my deepest shame. I thought he was cold, aloof, arrogant, full of himself and a little obnoxious at first. Then as we got to know him a little more, I was always impressed at his passion for our victims. How he really cared. I guess I had to experience that care first hand to understand him properly.

He knew I was uncomfortable on the stand even for prep. I thought he would snap at me when I asked did we really need to prep at all, but he didn't, he could see the difference between testifying as I usually do and what happened with Patten. He listened, letting me tell my story, only prompting me gently to continue when it started to get too difficult. I expected to be peppered by tetchy questions, to be interrupted every few words with "only the facts, Detective" or "not relevant", but he was so gentle. I could see his face tense and see his upset as my story started to stumble out of my lips but I could feel he was upset for me. He reacted exactly how I would want when the words finally slipped out, he kept eye contact, he wasn't disgusted, he didn't look away. He showed his distress but didn't try to placate me, or handle me, or comfort me. He allowed me my dignity. He didn't make a scene. He trusted me.

The next day he didn't treat me any different. He didn't make me feel incompetent or stupid. He treated me professionally but still found a way to whisper "I will fight to let you be heard". I don't think it is even remotely possible to explain what this meant to me. Those words all at once communicated, support, belief, understanding and caring. And a couple of times he said things such as "My door is always open, Detective. Anything I can do..." and "You know where I am...". Always quietly, unobtrusively, not pushing, just making his support known. I was surprised at his grace and unbelievably grateful.

I am so lucky. I don't know why or how, but Liv, Nick , Fin and Barba have just been much more than I deserved. They have all offered their help. Their support. I find myself wishing sometimes that I could take even one of them up on their offer even once but I need them to believe I can do my job. To not know how truly damaged and broken I really am.

My sorry truth is that I have nothing other than this job.

At some point in my life I switched off completely.

And now I find myself here in a hotel on vacation simultaneously wanting to be back at work and dreading having to go back. When I am at work I can delude myself that I am making a difference, or at least, that I am trying to help people. Even when just doing my job hurts me. I can somehow distance my past from their suffering. The people we try to get justice for are real victims. They are un-deserving of what happened to them. I can sometimes feel the sensations they describe as they relive the assault for us to take their statement but I am not like them.

I am also dreading going back. Knowing the looks Olivia endured after her kidnapping, I don't think I can face everyone knowing. Knowing how stupid and naive I was. Knowing how I betrayed all the victims we have encouraged, convinced and cajoled to testify by doing the exact opposite thing that I should have. Knowing my shame.

I feel so stupid for not even properly realizing what had happened. I mean, I knew immediately that he had forced me, I had said no, I had fought him, he hadn't listened….I know that is a pretty text book description of rape, how did I not manage to acknowledge it? Somehow it felt better to be able to cling to saying that "he just took advantage of a bad situation I put myself in". It had a more palatable sound. It sounded like a more honest assessment of the situation. It acknowledged my collusion in what had happened. Somehow this minimization made me feel better. Now all I feel is guilt, guilt at how I allowed him to do this again, and emptiness.

There is a huge part of me missing. I don't know how long it has been gone. Did I lose it when those words tumbled out to Barba or was it gone years before then? It feels like a part of who I am has just been scooped out. Maybe in an attempt to be able to work, to take the opportunities I was presented with, I had to switch off some of the feelings that would have prevented me from doing the job I needed to do. The only way to take the risks necessary to do the job meant I didn't allow myself to feel. How could I have played bait for a couple of rapists in uniform when Cassidy was undercover if I could feel the paralyzing fear? How do you trust your life to men you barely know if you are worrying whether one of them is watching your ass instead of your back, and won't take 'no' for an answer? How can you work on a one-on-one basis with men when you worry that given the chance they will hurt you? How do you trust the chain of command when you have been betrayed by it? Feeling it just wasn't an option.

Even now, everyone knows and I somehow can't allow myself to feel it, because if I start to feel it I don't know if I can stop it again. I don't know if I can feel all of this and work, and if I can't work, I can't get through this. I have nothing else. Maybe I have lost the ability to feel it anymore.

I don't trust my own judgment.

I know Fin would never hurt me, he came looking for me and pushed to know what had happened between me and Patten when he thought I had been hurt. I know that even when I pushed Nick beyond his limits, he chose to walk away rather than even speak to me the wrong way. He would never hurt me. I saw Barba's anguish as I told him what had happened, I know he wouldn't hurt me. But somehow behind all that knowledge there still exists a fear. An unnecessary, unfounded, unjustified, unfair fear. A fear I can't really control. I can't open myself up just in case I am somehow wrong. Somehow trusting them to stop me from getting shot or stabbed is easier then trusting them not to really hurt me.

It feels like this all happened so long ago I don't have any right to be too upset it. But then it also feels like it all happened yesterday. Seeing Patten back in Atlanta when we went to get the rape kits for the Pattern Seventeen case brought it all flooding back. In the moment I first saw him it felt like the intervening years hadn't happened. My stomach simultaneously dropped through my feet and leapt into my throat. I was sweating and somehow cold. The dizziness and confusion muddling my mind as I tried not to react visibly to his presence but being completely unable to stop the visceral reactions my body was having. The fact that he did nothing particularly threatening or inappropriate did nothing to change the fact that his mere presence had completely undone me. Even after all this time. Fear overtook my rational mind, despite the safe proximity of my partner.

I can't even begin to explain my reaction when I heard what had happened to Reese. I was nearly jealous of her at the conference. She was what I had been. She was in control and nowhere near as stupid as I had been. And then….I knew as soon as I heard Fin say she had been attacked in her hotel. The creeping sickness started to crawl through me. Its spread unstoppable until I couldn't stay in her hospital room and hear her say the words I knew would be coming. The fear overwhelming me completely, I ran out struggling to hold back the incapacitating rage and guilt. Failing miserably, I just dissolved into a puddle of tears and anguish in the corridor. Even during the investigation, when asked about Patten numerous times, I didn't speak up. I didn't help her. I hid my shame, only considering my own selfish skin.

To my eternal shame I even told Fin she'd go home and get over it. As if it wasn't important. I was too wrapped up in myself to even consider how disgraceful this comment was, especially when you consider it was coming from a special victims detective. I'm glad now I didn't see Fin's face when I said that. I can only imagine the disgust and hate he must have felt. I don't know how he controlled his anger, all he said was "like you did". I avoided his eye as I drunkenly admitted " if you pretend long enough, it's like nothing did happen." As I realized what had slipped out of my mouth I stole a quick glance at him, his brow was furrowed and his face tensed. He persuaded me to at least tell Barba that "Patten was capable" but will he ever really be able to forgive me?

I keep thinking about what Olivia said, that this is an opportunity to get out from under what happened. That I can move past it. I don't think I can. I think that she doesn't understand that I did this to myself. I don't have her strength.

He is no longer really a threat to anyone. His mask has been torn off and his real face shown to all. He admitted to assaulting, if not raping, Reese. He no longer holds a position of authority in the police force. This is all more than I initially hoped for. Reese was incredible. She would not allow him to continue on his merry way to his next victim as I had done. She was right when she said that. She risked everything for not just her own good but for the safety of those that come after her.

My testimony was not allowed.

I don't really know yet how I feel about that. I know Barba fought for me as much as he could. I think he understood that I needed to help, even if it was too late. I think I'm relieved that I didn't have to tell my colleagues the details of my experience from the stand. It feels like even though they know, I still have the control of how much detail they have. I don't want them to know that I was already partly naked when he stopped listening to my wishes. They don't need to know that I hardly had any injuries to show for my fight or that when I should have started fighting with everything I had that, my body refused to respond to my brain and that I lay there unmoving while he pushed into me. They don't need to know how I showered immediately with no regard for the evidence I was destroying; too intent on cleansing myself of the filth he left on my body, to even care. How I then trashed my tainted clothing, removing the last traces of evidence carelessly.

I don't ever want any of them to know how I put on my work face in the same way I clip on my badge and gun. It's a front that looks put together, a 2D movie set that looks completely real from the front but has absolutely nothing behind the façade, an air of confidence that doesn't extend beyond the skin. They don't need to know how his words echo through my head making me feel useless at the worst possible moments. They need to trust me.

It was only sex. I was no blushing virgin. I had agreed to it. I was using my body, what difference did he make that he used it too? He didn't hurt me too badly, the bruises faded in no time and the cuts weren't even bad enough to need stitches. When I compare it to what Olivia went through it puts itself properly into context. She was starved, drugged, tortured, beaten, burned, forced to watch a man killed, his wife raped and god only knows what else. That is a horrible experience. I have no right to complain. I lay down in a bed with a man to have sex, changed my mind and he just pushed it into me anyway. It wasn't my first time. It wasn't my last time. There was no serious damage done.

I had pretty much put it all behind me before this. I can put it behind me again. This time for good because he can't hurt anyone again. My job awaits me.