Chapter Sixteen – Shadows of the Past

"You're really quiet tonight," Olivia told Ben.

They'd finished dinner a short time ago but hadn't wanted to end the evening, so they'd simply been walking down the street. At one point his fingers had briefly touched hers. Olivia had hesitated for a second before cautiously taking his hand. It was soon after that that Ben had gone quiet. In the entire time she'd known him she'd never really seen him quiet. It was really strange. While he wasn't smiling, she wouldn't describe him as upset right then. Thoughtful, maybe concerned, but not truly upset. Still, it didn't feel right. A dark feeling was boiling in her stomach. Was this it? Had he realized that being with her was really not a good idea? Was the silence because he was trying to figure out how to tell her that?

His eyes flickered over to her, and he smiled gently. It didn't make Olivia feel any better. That wasn't his usual vibrant, impish smile. Instead it looked like a sad "I'm sorry" type of smile. She stopped walking and braced herself. At the same time her fingers shifted from his hand into Suvi's fur for support.

"Ben?"

"Can I talk to you about something? You probably won't like it, but I promise if you tell me to stop I'll stop."

Nervousness shot through Olivia again, but she kept it well restrained. When she answered him very little of her true feelings came through.

"Go ahead."

"My brothers and I got together two days ago. Cole, being the slightly overprotective little brother that he is, looked you up."

"Ah, so stalking me runs in the family?" she teased.

That at least got a bigger smile from him.

"Not stalking."

"Right. Reconnaissance."

"Reconnaissance discovered you were a cop. Is that how you got hurt?"

"Figured that one out pretty fast."

"Olivia…"

Before he could tell her that she didn't need to explain, she did.

"I was interrogating a suspect like I had hundreds of times in the past. The difference was this guy apparently had nothing to lose."

"And he attacked you?"

"Slammed my head into the wall enough to knock me out and send me into a coma."

"And you had to quit."

"Retire technically, but yes, essentially I had to quit."

"That couldn't have been easy."

Olivia looked down and trailed her fingers over Suvi's head again. While she was okay with telling him how she'd been hurt she didn't feel remotely ready to discuss what she'd gone through after. She hadn't shared those details with anyone other than her therapist, Christine.

"It wasn't, and I really don't want to talk about it, Ben."

"Then we don't talk about it."

His hand reached out and found hers again. Hand in hand for the second time that evening, they started back down the street. Once more the silence crept in. Olivia didn't want to let it get too far.

"Does Cole usually look into your friends?"

"Friends? Not usually."

She hesitated but eventually glanced at him sidelong.

"Girlfriends?" she asked softly.

Ben returned the sidelong look with a raised eyebrow. This was the first time she'd ever referred to herself as his girlfriend. In fact, he hadn't even officially referred to them that way for fear of upsetting her.

"Girlfriend, huh?"

Olivia blushed slightly. Instead of answering she looked down. Ben took that as a confirmation of the label she'd placed upon herself.

"I haven't had a girlfriend long enough for him to consider looking her up in a long time."

"A guy like you? I don't see why not."

This time it was Ben's turn to look uneasy. She'd shared with him so it was only right that he do the same. Even though he'd recovered from that wound, he wasn't looking forward to ripping the scab open. There would always be pain associated with it.

"The last steady relationship I had didn't end well. We'd been dating for a few years…" he trailed off.

"You loved her."

"I was going to ask her to marry me. Had the ring and everything. That was when I found out she was just out to have fun, and I wasn't the only one she was "having fun" with." His face twisted in pain for a moment but then smoothed over. When he looked over at her there was a small smile on his face. "It took a long time to get over."

And it had shattered his entire view of true love for even longer than that.

"And your brother doesn't want to see you get hurt again."

"So he lovingly monitors any relationship that he thinks I might become serious about. Not that there have been many."

"I can't decide if that's overbearing or sweet."

"Both," Ben laughed. "I'll take Cole's reaction to Ryan's though."

"Oh?"

"Trust me, you don't want to know. Ryan and I are on pretty opposite ends of the spectrum on relationships. He got married once and then divorced pretty soon after. I don't see why."

Olivia eyed him in confusion. She didn't understand how a marriage and divorce was all that unusual. In fact, lasting marriages seemed to be more uncommon than divorces lately. It definitely wasn't enough to be on opposite ends of any spectrum.

"A lot of people get divorced."

Ben laughed. He understood why Olivia was so confused. If someone else had been surprised over why a person would divorce Ben would have been confused as well. It wasn't Ryan's divorce that he didn't understand though.

"I don't mean the divorce. I don't know why he got married in the first place. Ryan's a player. He doesn't do commitment."

"How much of a player are we talking?"

"Probably not at the level you're used to with your job, but he's at a pretty high level. Let's just say that his first question when he saw your picture was how I'd gotten a woman like you."

"And his second was why you hadn't gotten me into bed yet?"

Ben's jaw nearly dropped which made Olivia grin. He might not have been willing to say it, but it didn't bother her. She'd heard a heck of a lot worse.

"Did you forget what I did for a living?" she teased.

"I guess I figured you dealt with men that were a little more perverted."

"Mm. I did, but sometimes the line between the two isn't that thick. I've handled my fair share on the job."

She'd probably dated a fair share too, but she wasn't going to admit that to Ben. It wasn't like she always admitted it to herself even though she knew her judgment of men outside of the job was pretty weak.

"Just don't think Ryan has crossed that line. He's not that bad. Honest."

"Ben, it's fine."

"At least Cole and Ris are normal," Ben said in an attempt to change the topic. It was making him uneasy, and it couldn't be much better for Olivia.

Her eyes flickered up at him in question.

"Relatively normal at least," he corrected.

Olivia laughed softly.

"Ris is?"

"My sister, Clarissa."

"Hard to think that anyone related to you could be considered normal," she teased.

"Not everything is biological, Olivia."

She immediately froze, her hand slipping from his in surprise. He couldn't have possibly known how much that one sentence would affect her. Suvi picked up on her uneasiness first and paused to look up at her. He bumped his nose gently against her hand when he realized her breathing wasn't as steady as it usually was.

"I should go, Ben. I'm sorry. Come on, Suvi."

Suvi whined softly but followed after her, leaving Ben standing in stunned shock. She was already a few steps away from him when the stalled gears in his brain started moving again. He darted after her and caught her arm.

"Olivia, wait! What did I do?"

"This isn't a good idea, Ben."

It wasn't any kind of an explanation, but Ben wasn't sure he needed one. He already had a pretty good idea of what might be holding her back.

"Why not? Because you think you're broken?"

"Am I broken? Definitely, but my injuries aren't the only reason. I have a lot of baggage beyond that and beyond my old job."

She knew full well that she was broken. The problem was those breaks didn't simply come from her head injuries and the experiences she had from working SVU. Her biology was broken, which was a break at the deepest level. Ben didn't deserve to be faced with all of that.

"I don't think that's true, but I'm not going to argue with you about that right now. I think you should let me decide whether or not you're worth it, Olivia."

Ben gave her arm a solid squeeze before turning away from her. As much as he didn't want to leave her, staying would only make her pull away harder. That didn't mean he was giving up though. He was simply taking a small hiatus. Or he was giving her one while he regrouped and tried to figure out what his next move should be. There had to be some way to prove to her that he could face down her darkest demons.