It's always bothered him, how Randy gets everything he wants. How Randy does whatever he wants, and takes whatever he wants, and the world never seems to slap his hand for it. It's never been like that, for Elliot. Never been easy. Every time Elliot wants something he gets punished for it. Randy had plenty of sex in high school and none of those girls ever came up pregnant. Randy got to go to college, got to go to all those parties Elliot used to dream about when he was a kid; Randy got to dick around and have fun while Elliot was trying not to get shot in the desert. Randy got rich, Randy got laid, Randy gets to live on a beach in Florida while Elliot is dodging bullets in the city.

And Randy got to fuck Liv first.

It isn't the only thing on Elliot's mind while he stands, pinning her to the door with his fingers buried inside her and his lips burning a trail across her chest, but it's there. Couple of orgasms, that's what Liv said, and that means Randy made her come more than once, and Elliot hasn't made her come at all, not yet. All the things Elliot wants, all the things he's been thinking about for twenty-five fucking years, Randy got there first, and it burns him up inside.

Randy got there first, but he's damn sure not going to be best.

Liv is clutching at him, rocking her hips in time to the thrusting of his hand, encouraging him, a litany of pants and moans falling from her perfect lips while his fingers curl inside her cunt and his thumb rubs at the nub of her clit. She's shaking all over; he's got one of her long pretty legs hitched up around his hip, his fingers digging into the soft flesh of thigh and anchoring her to him, and he can feel her trembling, can feel her muscles flexing as she chases the promise of her release. The leggings lie discarded in a heap by his feet and he thinks she's going to come like this and he wants it, wants to feel her shatter around him, because of him. It won't be enough just to make her come, though; he wants to make her come harder than anyone else ever has. He wants to be the best.

So he keeps going. Uses the cadence of her moans as a road map to get him where he wants to go, uses his hips to guide the thrust of his hand, fucking her with his fingers while he feels her cunt flutter and clench at him, and she's so wet he can hear it, the thick, slick sound of her sex welcoming him in, and it has him moving faster, harder, making music with her body. More, and more, until her moans reach a fever pitch and her whole body curls around him, her arms wrapped tight around him, her heel digging into his ass, the leg she's standing on beginning to buckle with the force of her release.

It's good, but he wants great, and so he doesn't stop.

"Sh- sh- shit," she stammers, bucking beneath him like a rodeo bull, overstimulated and half delirious with pleasure, and it makes him feel like a king, drawing that desperate little curse from her lips.

With a sharp tug he draws his fingers out of her. Those fingers are slick, dripping with her, and he moves them up to her clit, rubs and rubs, furiously fast, so fast the muscles in his forearm burn, but he won't relent, not until she comes again. The waves of her first orgasm have barely even begun to recede and they are both riding them now, cresting the swell of an even greater release. One of her hands shoots down between them and wraps around his wrist, her grip crushing, but it's not clear to him whether she means to stop him, or if she just needs something to hold on to. She doesn't try to pull him away, and the sting of her nails digging into his wrist makes him growl and sink his teeth into the curve of her pretty tit where the neckline of her sweater dips low, and that does it; she comes, a long, shuddering, high-pitched sort of sound stuttering out of her while the flood of her release soaks his hand, and he raises his chin so he can watch her. He's out of breath, too, and smiling so hard his face aches with it, but alarm fills him when he sees tears sparkling at the corners of her eyes.

"Jesus," she stammers, smoothing one of her hands over the back of his head. Before he can ask are you ok she continues. "You got something to prove, Stabler?"

"Maybe I do," he answers, and then he leans in, and kisses her.

The second his lips touch hers she raises her hands to his face, holds him close against her, her thumbs brushing gently against his beard. She's still breathless and panting and the kiss is messy, all bruising force and wet, searching tongues, and it probably burns, the scrape of his beard against her soft lips, but she presses herself into him like she loves it.

It's a good start, he thinks. Two orgasms while he's still got his shoes on, and her tongue in his mouth, her hands on his face, not pushing him away or asking him to slow down. He reaches once for her, wraps his hands around her bare waist and paints her skin with the slick of her desire, and she arches into him, hungry, eager, and it's beautiful, and he wants her so bad his cock is threatening to burst out of his jeans of its own accord, but something unpleasant twists deep in his belly, has him pulling away from her kiss to catch his breath.

Is it just that it feels good, he wonders; is it just pleasure that's making her react like this? Does she want him, or will she regret this when the fog of lust clears and she's looking at him with clear eyes? Was she like this with Randy, he wonders; is she like this with everyone, every man who's ever had the chance to touch her? Have they all seen it, the glory of her with her inhibitions down, and does she always put her walls back up after, and will she do the same with him once she's satisfied?

"What's wrong?" she asks him, one of her hands still gently cradling his cheek, her thumb still brushing through his beard like she doesn't even realize she's doing it.

"You gotta know, Liv," he tells her. "I meant what I said. This is it for me. You're it for me."

This, what he's just done, what he means to do, it's not just about fucking. It's not just about pleasure, about having someone to hold. It's the end of everything, and the beginning of something new, and he never wants to touch anyone else for the rest of his life and he doesn't want her to, either. He wants her to be his forever; he wants her to be his goddamn wife. Maybe that's a crazy thought to have when he hasn't even been inside her but he looks at her, and she is everything to him, the only partner he'll ever have, the other half of himself, and now that he's had a taste of what they can be together he knows he'll never be able to put his feelings for her back in the box where he's kept them for all these years. His love for her has broken free of its cage and he'll never be able to contain it again. It's all or nothing now; he wants all of her, and he can't be just her friend anymore, not after this.

There's something like confusion in her eyes, her mouth dropping open the way it does when she can't find the words to speak. Like she's trying to figure out why he sounded so goddamn sad when he said this is it, like she's trying to figure out why it matters.

"What do you think this is, Elliot?" she asks, and her leg slides slowly off his hip, and it looks to him like she's about to run, and he wants to scream. Why does everything always have to be so fucking hard with her?

"I don't know," he grinds out from behind clenched teeth.

"Oh, fuck you," she says. "What do you think? You think I just wanted to fuck? If that's all I wanted I wouldn't be here with you."

"No, you've made it clear you're more than capable of scratching that itch with someone else-"

"Asshole," she snaps. "Yes, I fucked Randy! You wanna crucify me for that, fine, but I only did it because I couldn't have you. You're the one I want, you selfish prick. I'm scared, Elliot. I've been scared. Because I always knew the second you touched me it'd be over. You'd be the only one I want forever."

He likes the sound of that word forever, but she's mad at him, and the whole thing has left him just a little confused.

"Liv-"

"This is it for me, too," she tells him. "You're it. And that scares the shit out of me because you can hurt me. Please…please don't hurt me, Elliot."

"Never," he swears, reaching for her, wrapping his hand around the back of her neck and pulling her forward so he can rest his forehead against hers. "I never want to hurt you, Olivia. Never."

"Then don't," she tells him in a small voice. "Just…just love me."

"I do. I do. I love you, Olivia. I love you."

The breath escapes her on a small, hitching gasp like she's about to cry, and he ducks his head, finds her lips again, kisses her again, but softer this time, sweeter. He winds his arms around her and holds her close and kisses her, and tries to make her feel it, to feel how much he loves her, how badly he wants to hold her, to protect her, for their rest of their lives. Maybe she does; maybe she can feel it, because she kisses him back, fists her hands in the back of his shirt and pulls him closer, and it starts all over again, the passion rising to a fever pitch between them once more.

It's never been like this for him, never. He's never been this hungry for someone else. The way he wants her, wants to pull her into himself, breathe her into his lungs and feel her race like blood through his veins, it drives him mad with need, and he thinks she feels the same way, if the insistent grip of her hands and the trembling of her body in his embrace is anything to go by.

Fuck it, he thinks. He could keep doubting, keep wondering, keep waiting, or he could trust her, when she says forever, could trust the voice in the back of his mind that says the same. Forever, she's his forever, his always, his everything, and he makes up his mind right then not to question it any more. Confidence, that's what she needs, but it's what he needs, too. He needs to be brave enough to love her. She deserves it.

He snaps, then, catches her ass in both hands and lifts her up, helps her wrap her legs around him and then he begins to move. Between the door and her bedroom there are a half a dozen places he could stop and bury himself inside her; the sofa, the chair, that beautiful island in her kitchen, a bare patch of wall, the shelf behind the couch that's covered in knicknacks, the bookshelves lining the wall where he could press her back and watch her hands scrabble for purchase on the shelves above her, but that's not what he wants. What he wants is her, naked, stretched out and soft. What he wants is her bed.

He takes her there.

Takes her to the bed and lays her down gently and kneels between her thighs while he reaches for the hem of her sweater, his eyes on her face, searching for reassurance he wishes he didn't need. He finds it, though, because her eyes are wide open, watching him, and when he touches her she nods, just a little. With her help he gets the sweater up and off her, and then she reaches behind herself to unfasten her bra, and she is suddenly, gloriously bare, wearing nothing but his compass sparkling around her neck, and a lump forms in the back of his throat because he's never seen anything as beautiful, as precious as her in his entire goddamn life.

"I love you," he tells her. "I love you."

"I know," she says. "Come here."

She pulls him down on top of her, kisses him long and deep with her thighs bracketing his hips, her hands smoothing over his back.

She likes it when a man pulls her hair, that's what Randy said, and the words have been burning through Elliot's brain from the moment he first heard them. The images they bring to mind, of Olivia, wanton and needful, body arched and taut, the idea that Olivia might like it when a man is a little rough with her, has set him on fire, and as he drove over here tonight he'd resolved to give that to her. To be powerful, forceful, to show her that he can be what she needs, can be everything she wants, but now the moment has come and he doesn't want rough. He doesn't want bruises and bite marks and his hand tangled in her hair; he wants to hold her. Beneath him she is so fucking soft and he has promised not to hurt her, and he doesn't want to, not now. Maybe later, maybe if they survive the conflagration of their coming together and she lets him have her again he can be that man for her, but for now, for this very first time…he just wants to hold her. He just wants to look into her eyes, just wants to memorize every line of her pretty face. He doesn't just want to fuck her; he wants to love her.

So he does.

He kisses her, and while he kisses her his hands begin to move, roving gently over her body. Cradling the weight of her breasts in his palms, testing her reaction when he strums her nipples with his thumbs. His hands ghost over her belly, her hips, and she laughs into his kiss when those hands return to her tits. The touch of her hand running soothingly over his head feels like a benediction, and she lets him take his time.

He wants to taste her skin, wants to taste her everywhere. Runs his mouth along the slope of her neck, down to the warm soft valley of her cleavage, lips trailing over her skin and leaving goosebumps in their wake. She reaches behind him, pulls his shirt up enough to get her hands on the skin of his back, and she's got the right idea, he thinks. There's too many clothes between him and her; he needs to feel her, warm and alive and pressed against him, skin-to-skin, heart-to-heart.

Slowly he raises himself up, looks into her eyes as he begins to unbutton his shirt, and she smiles at him, and helps him. They peel his clothes off together, and then he is bare, and sinking back down into the cradle of her hips, and there is something intimate in the way their bellies touch, something more personal, more fragile, than anything else they've done tonight.

"You're so beautiful," he tells her, smoothing his hand over her hair.

"I love you," she answers shyly, and he grins down at her; Christ, he's been waiting so long to hear her say those words and he knows how hard it is for her, knows love doesn't come easy to her, that it never has, and he knows what it means, that she's telling him now. It means she meant it, when she said forever. It means no matter how scared she is she's opening her arms to him, trusting him, and that trust is a precious gift, one he means to treasure.

The way his laying, the aching length of his cock is nestled against the agonizing softness of her still-dripping cunt, and as he leans over her, nuzzles his face into the crook of her neck and breathes in deep of the smell of her, tickling her with his beard and making her laugh, she rocks against him experimentally, and they both shudder, overwhelmed by their sudden closeness. It's delicious, this moment of almost, nearly; part of him thinks he could stay right here forever, poised on the brink, feeling her feeling him. She's just there, beneath him, all around him, wet for him, open for him, and the way they grind together lights him on fire for her. They rub together like teenagers grinding on a sofa, trading breathless kisses, hands gliding over one another, exploring, learning.

Maybe it was just a quick fuck, with Randy. Maybe it was just hard and fast and done, but that's not what this is. This is slow, and easy, and comforting, and right.

Her breath hitches when he thrusts shallowly against her, his cock dragging through her folds. When he does it again her back arches, just a little, and his mouth sinks over her nipple and she hums softly, sweetly. The sounds of her keep catching him off guard; everything he does, every move of his body, draws another little noise up out of her. She's so response, so open with her pleasure, and knowing he's the cause of all those little sounds makes him flush with pride. He wonders what other sounds he can tease out of her. How she'll sound when he buries his cock inside her. He's about to find out.

As he rocks above her she reaches between them, wraps her hand around his cock and fists him lazily, and it's his turn to groan, his head dropping to rest on the swell of her breath while his mind goes suddenly, mercifully blank. All he knows is sensation, the warmth of her, the electric shock of her touch, and when she grips the base of him and drags the head of his cock through her dripping folds his whole body shudders.

"Want you," he chokes.

"Yeah," she answers breathlessly. "Yeah."

And then she shifts her grip, positions him right at her entrance, and whispers, "please."

When she does his body reacts, overcome with the need to give her anything, everything she wants. His hips rush forward, and his cock slides down, and in, and they cry out together as he finds his home nestled deep inside her. It steals the breath from his lungs, the molten clutch of her sex enveloping him, and she's not breathing either, he thinks. For a moment they remain frozen, locked together, overwhelmed by the reality of their connection, but then she whimpers and rocks her hips up towards him, and instinct takes over.

Slow, he moves so slow, lets her feel every inch of him as he drags his cock back, as he slides forward again, deeper this time. She gasps once, softly, so he does it again, and again, finds a slow and steady rhythm that is less about pounding his way to release and more about just feeling her. He's got one hand on the mattress by her head and the other drifts down, over her hip, hitches her thigh once more up around his waist so on the next pass he can press even deeper within her, and she cries out, throws her head back on the pillow and arches her back, her tits tantalizing close to his face. He'd duck his head to kiss her there but he wants to watch, doesn't want to miss a second of this.

Wants to watch, and does, watches the way her cunt grips his cock as he withdraws, his body slick with her, watches the way she takes him in when he returns, the way he disappears inside her, mesmerized by it. Again, and again, and he can't look away from the sight of it, of him fucking her, of Olivia, holding him. Her nails drag down his back and he thrusts a little bit harder and sees, feels every muscle in her body clench in response.

Again, he thinks. Again, he plunges into her, again he withdraws, and her hips meet him, match the rhythm he's set, and on the next pass he grinds into her a little bit and that makes her moan, makes her buck up towards him like she's trying to speed him up, and he gives in, just a little. Fucks her a little faster, a little harder, until he can watch her heavy tits bounce, until she flings her hands back against the headboard and holds herself steady for him. She stops moving but he knows it's not because she wants him to stop; she's anchoring herself in place so he can take the lead, and he does.

Pleasure races like lightning up his spine as he moves faster, faster, hard enough to knock the headboard against the wall, and he likes the sound of it, and likes the way she cries out for him, so he keeps going. The thump thump thump of the bed against the wall and the wet slick smack of their joining and the chorus of her delirious panting moans rises up around him like a goddamn concerto and need pools low in his belly and he keeps watching, memorizing the way she looks as he takes her. The faster he goes the louder she gets, and she starts to swear fuck shit fuck and it's the sweetest sound he's ever heard in his life.

He's gonna come. It's racing towards him, his inevitable release; he can't resist the siren song of her body. The way she feels, cradling him, the way she looks, taking him, the warmth and the wet and the softness of her; she will be the end of him. But it's not enough; his orgasm alone won't sate him. He wants her to come again; he needs her to come again. He needs to know how it feels when she comes with his cock buried to the hilt inside her.

He surges forward, winds his arms between her back and the mattress, and hauls her up until he's sitting on the bed with her in his lap, his cock as deep inside her as it's possible for him to go. She shivers and throws her head back on her shoulders, and he can see the red burn of his beard all over her neck, her breasts, and feels a wild, primal surge of pride. Mine, he thinks. Mine. His hands trail from her ass up the slope of her back and she rocks forward until her knees hit the mattress and squeezes his cock inside her, and when he groans a grin tears across her face, wild, feral.

"Yeah," she says, and then she leans in, kisses him sloppily, messily while she begins to work herself against him, bouncing on his cock, and he lets her take the lead for a moment because all he wants right now is to touch her. Thighs ass tits, he touches her everywhere, and kisses her, and revels in the feeling of it, of Olivia, chasing her own pleasure along the length of his cock.

It's good like this. Better than good, because he can see her, can feel her, is surrounded by her. She's getting close, he thinks, if the tightening grip of her velvet walls around him is any indication, and he decides to help her. Slides his hand between their bodies, spreads his fingers and just feels, for a moment, feels her cunt and his cock and the wet and the heat of them and the perfect way they come together, and then he finds her clit with his thumb, and she cries out louder than he's heard her so far tonight.

"Just like that," he tells her. "Wanna feel you come just like that." He wants her to come undone like this, on his lap, belly-to-belly, her arms cradling him close. She pulls him in tight and there's nowhere else for his face to go but between her tits, so he gives in, and opens his mouth and sucks a mark into her skin while the chain of the compass digs into his cheek and his cock and his fingers tear a third orgasm out of her. She's loud when she comes and it snaps something deep inside him; he leverages himself up with his arms full of her and drives her back into the mattress, and while she shakes and moans and claws at him he spills himself inside her, comes so hard that for a second he's certain he must have blacked out.

He comes back to himself slowly, her fingers drawing nonsense patterns across his sweat-slicked back, soft, contented little sounds humming out of her as each breath he takes shifts his cock inside her and he wants to just lay here forever, but there's something he wants to see. He has to see it.

He shifts onto his hands, and ducks his head, and watches as his cock pulls slowly out of her, watches as his come follows, drips slowly out of her in time to the contractions still rippling through her sex, and his cock isn't fully soft, not yet, so he pushes back in, fucks his come back into her and listens to the way she whimpers when he does. A few shallow thrusts and he's done for; he'd collapse on top of her, make a pillow of her tits and sleep right there if he could, but he doesn't want to crush her and so he rolls to the side, and drags her over him. She sprawls across his chest, her legs spread and straddling one of his thighs, and she rocks lazily against him, making a mess of them both. They'll need a shower after this, he thinks, and maybe some clean sheets, but the eroticism of the moment is worth the work of cleaning up later.

"That was more than a couple," he tells her. Couple of orgasms, that's what she said, and Liv is the kind of person who always says exactly what she means, so he figures that means Randy made her come twice, and he did it three times, and that means he wins.

Olivia laughs throatily and presses a kiss against his chest.

"You wanna know if you did better than he did?"

"Yeah, I do." He really, really does.

"Next you're gonna ask me who has the bigger dick."

"It's me, right?"

"Asshole," she says, and swats playfully at his side before lowering her head to his chest, her ear right over his heart like she likes the sound of it.

"You didn't answer my question."

"It's better with you," she confesses. "It's better because it's you."

It's better for him, too. This, tonight, with her, is better than anything he's ever known. It's better because it's her.

"I meant what I said," he tells her. "You should be my wife."

"Is this your idea of a proposal?"

"Maybe. You gonna say yes?"

It's probably stupid, to ask her this now. It's probably insane, to go from nothing to marriage, but it's not like it's new for him, being in love with Liv. He's been in love with her for so long he's forgotten how it felt not to love her, and he knows what he wants, and he's tired of waiting. He's not biding his time, anymore. It's not the way he should do it; he doesn't have a ring for her and they've just fucked for the very first time and it's not very romantic, the night of his mother's wake after an explosive fight, but it feels right to him, still. It feels like them. They've always been reckless, and they've always been good together, and maybe all that other shit, the flowers and the dates and the careful wooing, maybe that works for other people, but maybe it's not what they need. Maybe they just need to be honest. Maybe they just need to jump off the cliff before they have a chance to think it through. Maybe the compass she's still wearing around her neck is better than a diamond.

Olivia lifts her head, rests her chin on his chest and looks up into his eyes. He can see the fear in her, but that's not all he sees.

"Yeah," she says. "Yeah, I think I am."

He grins, and tangles his hand in her hair, pulls her towards him and kisses her.

And he'll never, ever say so, but in that moment he's grateful for his brother. Randy's a prick, but he's the reason Elliot is holding Olivia now, and six months later when he's standing at the altar watching Liv walking down the aisle, it's Randy who's standing next to him, grinning. The bastard.