Chapter Six
WARNING! This will be the most triggering chapter of this story. William Lewis has Olivia and in this story she is pregnant so this will involve the mistreatment/abuse/assault of a pregnant person. You have been warned.
For the lines I took from the show - Disclaimer: I own nothing, intellectual property belongs to Dick Wolf and his people.
Also, there are things that may be medically or legally impossible/unrealistic. My medical education is from the University of Meredith Grey. If you're a nurse or a cop, you might roll your eyes but just go along with it for the sake of the story, okay? : )
Also a little supernatural afterlife stuff because it felt right.
TRIGGER WARNINGS: William Lewis and everything awful he says and does more, sexual violence, PTSD, flashbacks, kidnapping, abuse of a pregnant person, mentions of injuries, mentions of blood, rape, murder, torture, medical procedures, mental illness, lots of crying and guilt, abandonment issues, near death experiences.
May 23rd 2013 - abandoned warehouse parking lot, somewhere in Long Island, New York - 7:50pm
"Wake up, sweetheart."
A hard smack to the cheek brought Olivia back to rocky consciousness. She could hardly open her eyes, they were dry and her eyelids were so, so heavy. Her head lolled from side to side as she blinked rapidly, trying to bring the world into focus through bleary eyes. Her arms were tied behind her back, legs taped at the ankles and duct tape stuck over her mouth. The last time she'd been awake, Lewis had thrown her into the trunk of Mayer's car. At some point while she was out, he'd moved her to the backseat.
The thought of him moving her around and touching her while she was unconscious sent a chill of disgust up her spine.
"If I take the tape off, are you gonna be a good girl?" Lewis asked in a mocking, sing-song tone.
She nodded weakly. In her condition, and three days into her captivity, she would do almost anything he asked if it meant he would loosen or remove one of her restraints.
The pregnancy discomfort she'd experienced before was mild compared to what she was feeling after a few days in the company of The Beast. Her lower back blazed with constant pain. Her hips throbbed and ached. Her inability to hold her bladder resulted in 3 fresh cigarette burns added to the extensive collection littering her once-perfect skin. Her head bled on and off from a pistol whip wound which throbbed near constantly, and her blood sugar was dangerously low, keeping her weaker and more docile than his sleeping pills and vodka ever could.
The tiny movements in her belly from her baby girl were the only comfort Olivia had left, and those had stopped around 3pm on May 22nd.
Lewis ripped the tape from her mouth with a quick motion and she sucked in lungfuls of fresh air through the pain. Much of the skin from her lips was ripped off with the tape and it left a sticky bloody residue that coated her face. The lingering aftertaste of vodka on her tongue almost made her gag, but she breathed through her nose and swallowed it back, knowing the punishment for puking would be much worse than the taste of her own sick.
"Picked up a few things, some supplies," he taunted, waggling his brows and pulling out a water bottle from his brown paper bag to dangle in front of her face. She instinctively leaned toward the bottle and whined. She'd never felt such thirst in her life. Lewis laughed and pulled out a bottle of vodka,"drink this and I'll give you some water."
She shook her head in futile protest and closed her mouth tightly, cringing as her damaged lips stung with her refusal. Lewis gripped her jaw hard and shook her face, leaning close enough that she could smell his rancid breath, "You don't get to say no to me!" he roared, his spittle peppering her sweat-coated skin. She was dizzy and felt like she was slipping back into unconsciousness. He smacked her again and her eyes shot back open, "I didn't give you any pills today, stay awake."
Olivia blinked slowly and mumbled, "I can't. I haven't eaten in two days."
Lewis smirked, reached into the bag of supplies and stated, "If you do what I say, we can share this." He pulled out a large candy bar and waved it in front of her face. Her mouth watered at the sight of it and she nodded desperately. He placed the tip of the vodka bottle onto her lips. She hesitated for a moment on instinct. Enraged, he gripped her hair, yanking her head back and forcing the liquid into her mouth. She gagged at the taste but managed to swallow a few gulps, silently apologizing to her daughter and praying to a god she didn't believe in that her baby was still alive and wouldn't suffer for her actions.
"Good girl," Lewis cooed, putting the candy up to her mouth and allowing her several bites in between his own, "You'll get more food if you behave." He slapped the tape back over her mouth and planted a violent, wet kiss over it. Olivia groaned and tried to squirm away, but he squeezed her face in his hands. He chugged a bottle of water while she watched, offering her none, then crushed the empty bottle against one of the burns on her upper chest. The pain had her screaming and she nearly lost consciousness again from the lack of oxygen.
Laughing, he pushed her down to the floor of the backseat and set a tarp over her. In a few minutes, she was dead to the world once again.
May 23, 2013 - Manhattan Special Victims Unit - 7:50pm
Though he hadn't worked at the precinct for almost 6 months, Elliot did not stop at the desk to check in when he arrived. He ran through the front doors and sprinted up the stairs leading to the Special Victims Unit, nearly colliding with 2 unis on this way up.
When he finally reached his destination, he stopped dead in his tracks at the sight before him. The squadroom had been converted into a situation room, desks pushed against the wall and replaced with cork boards of varying sizes.
Pinned to each board were brutal crime scene photos. He scanned them all at lightning speed.
Burnt skin, a woman's taped wrists, a dead man's face.
The smallest board had only 6 photos on it. It was labeled, "Olivia Benson's apartment". Elliot could see that her home was completely ransacked.
His eyes flitted between each photo rapidly until they settled on the one that would haunt him for the rest of his life.
The photo was of a light purple or blue room, he couldn't quite make out the color.
Ripped decals of zoo animals hung from the walls.
A white crib lay cracked and crushed in the middle of the room.
Little baby clothes were scattered about, appearing to have been ripped or cut.
All of the items were covered in paint and what Elliot assumed to be urine.
Horrified, he realized it was a nursery.
The man who had taken Olivia had destroyed the nursery that she'd prepared for her baby.
Their baby.
He walked up to the photo and ripped it from the board, holding it with both hands in front of him. It was one of the worst things he'd ever seen, but he couldn't tear his eyes away. Something about the crib and the baby clothes lying destroyed had him in a trance of his own anguish.
Elliot was no stranger to the work and love that went into preparing a nursery. He could picture Olivia carefully selecting the crib where their baby would sleep, washing and folding and putting away the little clothes, anticipating the day where she'd put them on the little person she'd created. It was a beautiful, sacred right of passage in the journey to motherhood.
Elliot knew how badly Olivia wanted to be a mother, he'd known since the first time he saw her with a child back in 1998. She'd waited 44 long years to finally experience motherhood and the excitement of pregnancy. It should have been the happiest time of her life… yet some vile, scumbag, piece-of-human-shit destroyed the room where their child was meant to sleep and violated the sanctity of Liv's nesting.
Elliot knew he'd kill the man if he ever laid eyes on him, consequences be damned.
"Stabler."
The familiar voice pulled him out of his shocked thoughts. He tore his eyes away from the photo and saw the face of John Munch staring back at him.
"John," he choked out, taking in more of the photos, still white-knuckling the nursery picture and trying to think straight before he spoke, "How the fuck did this happen?"
"We can't give you any information about the case, Elliot. I'm sorry. You shouldn't even be in here." Munch replied, professionally but sympathetically. He gently took the photo from the other man's grasp to place it back on the cork board, "I can let the cap know you're here but you might want to make yourself scarce before-"
"The fuck are you doing here?" an angry voice interrupted from the entryway. Elliot knew immediately that the voice belonged to Nick Amaro, and he felt himself snap into fight-or-flight mode. He didn't have a problem with Nick personally but he was feeling unhinged and knew that he would lay hands on the other man if pushed too hard.
Nick walked closer, eyes full of rage, challenging Elliot to say something. Neither uttered a word until they were standing a few feet from each other, their testosterone choking out everyone unfortunate enough to witness the dramatic display of machismo.
"This is what it takes for you to come back? She had to get kidnapped for you to give a damn about her and your kid?" Nick seethed, barely contained rage in his voice.
The men were inches from one another, eyes locked, unblinking and unmoving. The air between them was charged with Nick's words and the heavy, angry breaths of both men.
Elliot sneered at his former colleague and pointed a finger into the man's chest, "Fuck you, Amaro. You don't know shit about how I feel."
Nick jabbed him in the chest, sneering, "I don't give a fuck about how you feel, Stabler. I care about Liv. You left her without a fucking word after the warehouse, and now you show up here after months of nothing? It's a little late to act like you care."
"I just want to help find her." Elliot replied defeatedly, swallowing down the anger he felt toward Nick, knowing it was just a reflection of the hatred he had for himself and the blame he put on himself for Liv's disappearance.
Fin walked over and pushed the two men apart. He turned to Elliot with a look of disappointment and said,"We tried to call you for months, man. Where the fuck you been?"
Elliot swallowed hard at the question. He wasn't going to give them a recap of the last 5 months of his life, not at a time like this.
"It doesn't matter. I fucked up bad, I know that." Elliot conceded, the confidence in his voice betrayed by a slight wavering break, "I didn't even know she was pregnant until I saw the news tonight."
Cragen, whom Elliot suspected had been silently observing the interaction for a while, finally made himself known and whistled for their attention, "Enough of this. Olivia wouldn't stand around arguing over who is to blame, she'd be working. John and Fin, work the tip line for a few hours. If anybody mentions the beach, you send a uni to check it out. Nick and Amanda, comb through Lewis' MO one more time. If you find clues about where he might have taken Liv after they left the Mayers, you let me know immediately. Elliot, my office."
The detectives dispersed immediately to their respective assignments and Elliot trailed Cragen into his office. The older man perched on the end of his desk and motioned for Elliot to close the door.
"Sit." He instructed.
Elliot opened his mouth to argue, to scream at the man that there was no time to sit, no time to stop, no time to breathe. He thought better of it, shut his mouth and sat down stiffly in the chair across from his former boss. There was no time to argue either.
"If you want to be here, you're here on my terms. You are a civilian, I am the police. You will follow my lead. Understood?"
Elliot nodded tersely. He wanted to interject but he knew better.
"Good. Here's what we know. Our perp William Lewis took Olivia on the 21st. We think he was waiting for her in the apartment when she arrived home that afternoon. He left with her on the 22nd and drove around with his girlfriend Vanessa Mayer while Liv was tied up in the trunk. They went to her parent's home on Long Island for dinner. Lewis then drove her to the train station and returned later that night to her parent's home with Liv." Cragen stopped for a moment, turning away from Elliot and taking a deep breath before continuing in a low, mournful tone, "He murdered the father, then beat and raped the mother while he made Liv watch. She was tied up to a chair."
Elliot recoiled at the words. The thought of Olivia Benson, the most empathetic person he'd ever met, a true champion for sexual assault victims, tied up and forced to watch a woman be raped… It was probably the worst kind of mental torture someone could inflict on her.
He knew Olivia would never be the same after witnessing that.
"Is the mother okay? Did she say anything about Liv?" Elliot asked, dread pooling heavier and heavier in his gut. The more pressing questions he needed to ask were stuck in his throat and he found he couldn't bring himself to say the words aloud.
Cragen paused for a beat, breaking eye contact with the younger man. His silence told Elliot that he was holding back some key information related to Olivia's unknown of it made his skin crawl. Elliot pleaded, "Whatever it is, Don, I need to know. I need to be prepared when we find her."
Cragen sighed, "She said Liv was barely conscious, that she appeared to be drugged. Mrs. Mayer said Lewis would burn her with a lit cigarette if Liv looked away or closed her eyes while he was raping her. The woman has dozens of burns. She said…"
Elliot closed his eyes, bracing himself for the words he knew were coming. The silence in the room was palpable, suffocating.
Cragen said nothing. They were stuck in a horrible silence until Elliot whispered, "He burned Liv too, didn't he?"
"Yes," Cragen choked out, "There was a pan on her stove with a house key and a wire hanger, there were cigarettes everywhere and… we could smell burnt flesh in the apartment."
That was Elliot's limit. He grabbed the trash can from next to Cragen's desk and heaved up everything he'd eaten earlier in the day. Hot tears poured down his face as his stomach tried to bring up more and more. The vivid images of Olivia screaming with a molten hanger on her skin was just too much for his broken heart and mind to process.
"What else?" Elliot asked, face still buried in the can.
"It's okay, Elliot. You don't need to hear the details." Cragen soothed.
Elliot slammed the can down and shook his head furiously, fist clenched at his sides and, in an agitated tone, snarled, "Like Hell I don't. I need to know everything that you know. Everything. Keep going."
He stood and started to pace the office, bracing himself for more devastation.
"Okay, okay." Cragen appeased, "We know that they left the Mayer's house in Mr. Mayer's car last night. We know they're still somewhere on Long Island. Lewis told his girlfriend that he wanted to go to the beach, so we have unis out searching the beaches. There's no way to narrow down a general search area yet because we have no idea where they went after the Mayer's. From Lewis' MO, we know that he's looking for a secluded location to keep Liv, somewhere off grid where they'll stay for a few days," Cragen swallowed deeply before continuing, "Once he believes he's in the clear, he usually starts a spree of rape and torture, one or two full days until he either leaves them tied up somewhere or..."
"...or he kills them." Elliot finished the sentence and plopped back into the chair, feeling weak. His skin was clammy and his heart felt like it was beating in slow motion. He leaned over and put his head in his hands in an attempt to regain composure.
"Elliot, I know this is bad, but this is Olivia we're talking about. She's tougher than most-"
"-she's pregnant and injured, Don." Elliot replied, voice breaking with pain.
Cragen nodded, "Yes, but that doesn't make her weak, it makes her strong. She's fighting for her baby, your baby, she'll do anything to get them both out of this alive."
Elliot knew that was the truth. Liv fought harder for children than any other cop he'd ever known. Her protective instincts would be even stronger for their child.
The thought gave him a bit of fleeting comfort.
"I should have been there, I should have-"
"-Lewis would have shot you dead. Or worse. You don't know him, Elliot. This is the slipperiest bastard I've ever seen. He's a professional," Cragen argued, "And this is not the time to blame yourself. You can hate yourself after we get her back."
The Captain pulled a stack of paperwork out from his file drawer and set it in front of Elliot with a pen, "Since we're all hands on deck with this investigation, I'm reinstating your badge until we find Olivia. It's been less than 6 months since you left the force so we just need you to sign a few papers and you'll be good to go. The brass has agreed to this with only one stipulation: you cannot be armed. If someone has to take Lewis out, it cannot be you. Understood?"
Elliot's left eye twitched. He wanted to kill Lewis, felt as if he had to do it for Olivia, like it was the only way to make everything right.
As that thought popped into his head, he realized it was exactly why he couldn't be the one to take Lewis out. If he killed the man, it would be an act of revenge fueled by bloodlust and hatred, and there would be no arguing against that. He wouldn't be able to control himself if he saw the predator and had a gun at his disposal.
He would execute Lewis, then he would go to prison. It was as simple as that. It would be yet another tragedy that Olivia would have to survive.
An image of Olivia carrying a dark haired infant into the visiting room at Ryker's flashed before his eyes and he shook it away immediately. He wouldn't - couldn't - do that to her.
Not unless she asked him to kill the man for her. Then, he would find a way.
In the meantime, he would agree to the stipulation and be grateful for the opportunity to assist in the search. He wasn't sure what Cragen had to do to get his badge back for this, but he wasn't going to question it.
"I understand." He told the older man.
Whatever he needed to do to be there for Olivia, he would. He'd wasted enough time.
Cragen slid a badge across the desk to him and solemnly met Elliot's eyes, "Good. You'll go where I go. Once we get the call that they've been found, don't lose your head. We do everything by the book. Lewis has escaped justice more times than anyone I've seen. If he comes out of this alive, we'll need a squeaky clean investigation. He cannot walk away again or Olivia will never be safe."
Elliot nodded, "Understood."
"Alright, then let's get to work, detective. It's going to be a long night."
May 23rd, 2013 - the stolen vehicle of Mr. and Mrs. Mayer, somewhere in Long Island, New York - 11:53pm
"Every morning, every evening, ain't we got fun? Not much money, oh but honey, ain't we got fun?" Lewis sang tauntingly from the driver's seat of the Mayer's SUV.
He was driving them around in search of a final destination to carry out the worst of his plans for Olivia. She lay on the floor of the backseat covered with a tarp, trying to block out his voice and instead focus her energy on the middle of her body.
Come on, baby girl. Move for me. Move just a little for mama. Please, sweet girl. Show me that you're okay. Give me a reason to fight.
Nothing.
The burns Lewis had left all over her torso hurt constantly. Her likely concussion coupled with the effects of mystery pills, alcohol, starvation, dehydration and her pregnancy left her with the most extreme headache she'd had in her life, and she'd been battling flashbacks from the warehouse since the second Lewis appeared in her home.
None of those things hurt Olivia as much as the fact that there was no movement in her belly anymore.
She tried not to panic about it, tried to keep herself calm and alert as much as possible.
She was barely conscious as it was, she couldn't afford to lose more time or oxygen.
The end was near.
Suddenly, red and blue lights flashed in her vision and the sound of a single police siren filled her ears. The fact that it was only one siren did not bode well for her odds of rescue and a sob stuck in her throat at the realization. She knew Lewis would sweet talk his way out of a ticket or kill the cop. There was no imminent miracle for Olivia.
"He's young… One move, he's dead." Lewis threatened.
Olivia listened with an ever-growing sense of dread as Lewis attempted to charm the young officer and failed miserably. When the officer escalated his questioning of Lewis, pointing out the alcohol in the passenger's seat and asking him what was in the backseat, she wasn't surprised to hear the gunshot.
She took a moment to grieve the stranger, the young officer who just happened to pull over the wrong car, just another piece of collateral damage in Lewis' game against her.
The door near her head opened and Lewis covered her face with the tarp before lifting her out of the car and tossing her into another trunk. She landed hard on her back.
Her muffled cries went unheard by kind ears.
He slammed the trunk shut and she was wrapped in total darkness once again.
She hated the trunk more than anything else. A panic attack crept ever closer but she fought against it, closing her eyes and picturing a baby girl with dark hair and a gummy smile and her daddy's blue eyes. She held onto that image until her heart and breathing slowed. It wasn't long before she was dead to the world once again.
May 24th, 2013 - on the road, somewhere in Long Island, New York - 5:59am
Elliot's fitful night of sleep in the cribs was too reminiscent of his previous life to be comfortable in any way. The familiar feeling of the lumpy mattress, the distinctive musty smell of the sheets, the flicking light underneath the doorway, all of it left him achy with nostalgia, and a bone deep longing for Olivia.
The overflow of emotion he was feeling for her was all-encompassing after 5 months of pushing her out of his mind. He loved her, he always had and always would, but the shift in the way that love presented in him was transformative. It was heavy and tragic and laced with a primal, ferocious instinct to keep her safe that he could feel in every inch of his body. It was driving him, pushing him through hunger and exhaustion.
Knowing that she was vulnerable, growing his child, injured, drugged, that he'd left her alone to face a monster… it made me crazy. He believed if he saw William Lewis alive, he wouldn't need a gun to rid the earth of the putrid creature. He was certain he could rip the man's heart out of his chest with nothing but his bare hands and the power of his love for Olivia Benson.
If she asked him to kill Lewis, he would do it without hesitation.
If she was alive to ask.
Elliot told himself she would be, she had to be, it was the only reality he could stand to live in.
If she didn't make it out, neither would he.
There was no world in which he could live with himself if he lost Liv like this.
And their baby…
How could he walk the earth another 40 years knowing there was a sixth child he was meant to have, one that he never got to meet because he'd abandoned Olivia and didn't protect her from harm?
It was too much suffering for one man to survive, he was sure of that.
He sat in the passenger's seat of Cragen's car as they raced to Long Island, lights on and sirens blazing. He was trying not to assume the worst but he and Cragen had been called to meet Nick and Fin over 3 hours before their scheduled swap.
The other two detectives had covered the overnight shift on Long Island, working with unis to search beaches and follow-up on tips from the 24/7 tipline. Elliot had wanted to go with them but Cragen made him stay back at the precinct, promising they would swap out at 8am on the 24th.
They'd stayed busy at the precinct until the early hours of the morning, scouring over maps for potential search locations to add to the growing list. Cragen finally convinced him to lay down for a few hours of sleep around 3am, but sleep did not find Elliot until 4am. A call came in at 4:43am that they were needed on Long Island.
Munch handed them each a cup of disgusting black coffee as they hurried out the door. The energy boost it provided was diminutive.
Elliot was impatient. Their drive to Long Island from Manhattan was long and the sirens only helped so much during rush hour. He resisted the urge to ask Cragen to let him drive so he could shave a few minutes off of the journey, already knowing the captain would refuse and tell him to relax.
Every second they didn't have Olivia was another second closer to Elliot's inevitable insanity.
He breathed a sigh of relief when they finally approached the scene, the red and blue lights in the distance illuminating the orange morning sky. Dozens of units came into view as the lights flashed ever brighter.
Elliot braced himself.
A passage from Psalm 34 looped in his head, " The righteous cry out, and the LORD hears them; he delivers them from all their troubles. The LORD is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit. The righteous person may have many troubles, but the LORD delivers him from them all; he protects all his bones, not one of them will be broken."
Please God, deliver them from this, he prayed, deliver them. Save Olivia. Save our child. Please God, I will do anything.
As soon as Cragen put the car in park, Elliot jumped out and sprinted to the crime scene, flashing his newly reacquired badge at anyone who offered resistance. As he approached, he saw a uniformed officer lying lifelessly on the ground in a puddle of dark blood, surrounded by his brothers in blue, with a single gunshot wound to the head.
They were informed that the man's name was Jimmy Hamilton and he'd only been on the job for 3 months. Lewis had murdered him and taken his gun, badge and squad car.
"Anything in the car?" Cragen asked Nick, a look of dread lining his features.
The detective winced, replying, "traces of blood and hair. Looks like he had Liv on the floor of the backseat."
"And that's Hamilton's squad car?" Cragen asked, gesturing at the empty squad car that was also surrounded by unis and a crime scene investigator.
"Lewis used it to pull over another driver, pistol-whipped her, locked her and her baby in the squad car trunk, drove off in her minivan. We got a BOLO out on a white minivan with Connecticut plates." Fin advised.
"He'll ditch that as soon as he can, go to ground." Elliot suggested, hating the way his voice sounded small.
Time was running out, he could feel it, feel the walls closing in.
"We've moved the grid search east and south, checking every home, foreclosed home, second home, even boats, from here to the water's edge." Nick said, with a bit more confidence than Elliot believed was warranted. There was a lot of ground to cover. Anything could happen to Olivia in the meantime.
"All right, check hardware stores, gas stations, anywhere they could've stopped between here and Montauk." Cragen instructed.
Nick and Fin left immediately and Elliot took a moment to survey the area. He saw a woman sitting in the back of an ambulance, clutching a baby in her arms and sobbing. The sight stole his breath away. It reminded him too much of what was at stake.
Cragen called Munch and Amanda and instructed them to contact gas stations in the area to gather their surveillance videos from the night before. He and Elliot stayed on scene, going over the evidence that had been collected by ESU and setting up a mobile workstation in the back of Cragen's squadcar.
At 8am, Cragen received a call from Fin that had the blood draining from his face as he listened. Elliot wasn't able to hear the other end of the conversation, but based on the look his former Captain was giving him, he dreaded the news.
After a few minutes of tense listening, Cragen thanked Fin numbly and advised him and Amaro to head back to the cribs for some rest. It was clear from Cragen's reaction that both detectives refused to leave Long Island.
Elliot understood why. How could anyone truly rest knowing Liv was being tortured?
They could catch up on rest once she was safe.
When Cragen hung up the call, he quietly advised Elliot that the owner of a hardware store in Yaphank had sold Lewis a tarp, a rope, some wire and a handheld blow torch at 7:45pm the night prior.
The news hit Elliot square in the chest. He wondered sincerely if he could be having a heart attack as a bolt of pain passed through his arm and into his chest.
If she dies, I die. If she dies, I die. If she dies, I die. If she dies, I-
"Breathe, son. You can't lose it now, we don't have her yet." Cragen soothed, not sounding completely calm himself but trying to put on a brave face for the other man.
It didn't help.
May 24th, 2013 - a beach house somewhere on Long Island, New York - 1:15pm
Time was running out, Olivia knew that.
Lewis had found his perfect torture spot, the one he'd been waxing poetic about for 4 long days. It was an empty beach house with no nearby neighbors to hear her tortured screams. He'd even ditched the car and covered their tracks to ensure there would be no interruptions.
Any hope she'd had of someone saving her was gone. She would have to save herself.
Or die trying.
She was cuffed to a metal bedpost, the skin of her wrists raw and weeping from her attempts to escape while Lewis was out dumping the car. She'd saved every bit of energy for that opportunity and tried like Hell to make it count for something.
She'd been able to move the bed a few feet when he'd caught her and thrown her fully back onto the mattress. She'd narrowly avoided landing directly on her stomach, but had instead managed to land on her elbow which dug into the long, wire-shaped burn on her left hip.
Olivia screamed from the pain and Lewis gave her a look of fake sympathy, "You sad? Thinking about someone you'll never get to see again?" He ran a finger up and down her belly and she thrashed to get away from the touch, "Baby daddy, maybe? Bet you'd give anything to see him just one more time. You're gonna cry out his name at some point, they always do." Lewis grinned as he inched closer to her face, his putrid breath making her gag through the tape, "Put him out of your mind, you don't make it out of here alive."
Olivia didn't give up then, though. She couldn't. She was tired and dizzy and angry and afraid and in pain, but she was a mother, she had to fight until the end.
She tried every tactic she could think of: baiting him, placating him, taunting him, bargaining, begging, acquiescing. The two of them went back and forth, verbally jabbing at one another. Nothing worked in her favor and she was fading out fast. Her mind said fight but her body wouldn't let her.
Lewis finally had enough of the buildup. Olivia didn't have any more fight to give.
He climbed on top of her; her eyes wouldn't stay open.
He smacked her in the face; she could hardly feel the pain.
His hands were on her breasts; she was almost back into blissful unconsciousness.
Too much trauma, too many substances, no food and the pregnancy her body was trying desperately to keep had used up all of her reserves.
She was done.
Then, there was a knock at the door which stopped the predator in his tracks. Divine intervention, perhaps, but Olivia was too far gone to appreciate the timing. Her breaths were slow and deep, her eyes closed, her heart slowing for the first time in days. It was almost over.
Lewis told her to shut up and left the room, but she didn't hear him.
A wave of peace washed over her. Her eyes were still closed, but she could see a warm light filling the space all around her. She was in a dream, or a vision, or a hallucination.
She didn't care what it was, really, she was so close to freedom.
It was a safe place, the safest place she'd ever been. The warm light grew larger and brighter around her, kissing her skin softly. She sighed at the feeling, her soul filling with contentment for the first time in many years.
Olivia knew that she was exactly where she belonged.
Her burns were healed, her back no longer ached, her head no longer throbbed with pain.
Her arms were no longer restrained. Instead, they cradled a perfect, swaddled baby with a crown of dark hair and the chubbiest little cheeks she'd ever seen.
She knew in her heart that the baby was her daughter. The joy she felt at the sight of her beloved child was all-consuming.
She laughed a bubbly, carefree laugh that she'd never heard from herself before. It was an unburdened laugh. It was the laugh of the Olivia Benson she could have been if life had been just a little less cruel to her. It was the light, airy laugh of a woman who loves and is loved and is never alone and is never lonely.
In the warm place with the bright light, she could be that Olivia. She could thrive with her little baby and feel none of the pain Lewis brought to her, none of the damage her mother had caused her, none of the lifelong inferiority that Joseph Hollister had instilled in her when he'd raped her mother and violently brought about her existence.
The agony of losing Elliot did not exist in the warm light.
Nothing bad lived there, only all of the good things that she deserved to have.
For once, Olivia decided to choose the painless path. She started to walk slowly forward, eager to feel more of the warmth. Walking had never felt so easy as she cradled her cooing baby girl and led them both into safety, into a place where no one could ever hurt them again.
She knew if she just kept walking into the warmth that she could stay there forever with all of the good things she'd spent her lifetime craving and none of the bad things she'd spent her lifetime receiving.
It didn't matter to her anymore if it was all a hallucination, or a vision, or a vivid dream borne of a dying mother's desperate wish to spend eternity with her baby. She'd already chosen the light and she would accept whatever came next.
Until his voice stopped her in her tracks.
Not even the promises of that bright eternal light could make her turn away from Elliot's voice.
You have to fight, Liv. Don't give up now, this is your last chance. Turn around, come back to me.
She shook her head weakly a few times, replying, "No, it's better here. We're safe here."
The light will wait forever for you, Liv. But you aren't done on this earth yet. You deserve to watch her grow. If you stay there, she'll be a baby forever. She'll never know her daddy or her siblings. She has a family here… you both do. Please come back.
His voice was crystal clear and she could almost feel the warmth of his breath on her ear as he begged. The light was still calling to her, but the allure was fading with the desperation in Elliot's voice.
"I'm too weak, El. You don't know what he did to me." She replied mournfully.
You have one more fight in you. I know it's hard to see it, but it's deep down inside of you - in the part of you that wants to live, in the part of you that wants to see me again, in the part of you that's never stopped fighting a day in your life - there is strength left. You have to pull it from the angriest, most stubborn part of yourself and fight back.
"What if I can't?" she whispered.
You can. You can fight and you can win. And when you do… you kill him, Olivia. Don't hesitate. Do not let him leave that beach house. You and the baby will only be safe if he's dead.
She stood frozen, her soul being tugged in two opposite directions.
Go, Liv! Now! You're running out of time.
She looked down at the bundle in her arms and knew that she had to try one more time.
"Your daddy is right. Trust mama. We'll be together again soon," She sighed and kissed the baby's soft cheek, whispering, "Goodbye for now, my love."
She turned away from the light and ran. Instantly, the warmth faded from her skin, the pain returned to her body, her baby returned to her womb.
Her eyes opened and she was back on the bed - filthy, bloody, bruised and wide awake. Buzzing.
Elliot's words repeated over and over in her head. You have to fight, Liv. He'd begged her to try, so she would try.
She would go one last round with the Beast for him.
The door opened.
Olivia steeled herself for the final showdown.
Lewis entered her space with a sickening grin on his sweat-coated face. The tension in the room was palpable. They both knew it was time.
He gleefully informed her that a maid and her 5 year old daughter were tied up in the other room. He was enchanted by the little girl, Luisa.
The mention of the girl enraged Olivia.
The burning ember of the fight inside of her was growing fast.
She started to taunt him about how he only went after vulnerable people - little girls, old ladies, pregnant women - how he couldn't handle a real fight, how he was scared to rape her because he was afraid she could kick his ass, even while pregnant. He was afraid she would see how weak he really was.
"I think you're afraid of me." She breathed out, all fear and baseless confidence and rage.
Elliot's words replayed on a loop and the ember of fight was suddenly a flame licking at her muscles. The strength was filling her, her body was finding it for her despite everything she'd endured.
"I'm not the one who's afraid, Olivia. You forget, you have more to lose than I do," he sneered. He climbed on top of her, straddling her legs and pulling a knife out of his pocket. Olivia pulled harder against the bar she was cuffed to with steady, sustained force as Lewis pulled her shirt up over her belly and placed the blade on the bottom of her baby bump, grinning, "let's see how tough you are after a c-section, hm?"
She focused every bit of energy and power and rage that lived in her onto that bar.
One slice to her abdomen, about 3 inches long and a half centimeter deep, was all it took. The most primal scream she'd ever heard burst forth from her own mouth and she lurched forward in response to the pain, the bar finally coming free with the sheer force of her body.
She gripped it like a bat and, in one fluid motion, swung for Lewis' left hand.
It landed on his fingers with a loud crack and he shrieked in pain. The force of the blow knocked him back and he dropped the gun onto the mattress. Olivia kicked it onto the floor out of his reach, then kicked Lewis off of the bed using both of her legs. He fell to the floor with a thud and a groan, knife still gripped in his right hand.
Blood seeped from her abdomen, but she didn't falter, not for a second. She knew there were more guns in the room somewhere and she wasn't about to give him another chance to find one of them.
She swiftly bent to pick up the firearm with her cuffed hands and limped over to him, bringing the butt of the gun down on his face as hard as she could. She watched his teeth burst from his mouth and scatter on the wood floor. The animalistic scream he let out gave her very little satisfaction.
The Beast was not dead yet. He still had the knife and he was trying to stand up. He was swinging it in her direction.
She needed to end it.
Elliot's voice screamed back at her, guiding her next movements.
Olivia, don't hesitate.
She didn't.
She aimed the gun and fired.
Time seemed to slow down as she watched the bullet enter Lewis' face square in the middle of his forehead.
She watched him fall back, eyes open and instantly lifeless.
The gun fell from her hands and clanged to the floor, startling her back to reality.
It's over. It's finally fucking over.
She turned away from Lewis and stumbled toward the door. There was a full length mirror in the room and she caught a glimpse of herself in it.
She was unrecognizable. Her hair was ratted and oily, skin slicked with grease and sweat and blood. Her eyes were dull and her skin pale, ghostly.
The yellow baby doll maternity shirt that Lewis had dressed her in was rapidly turning red in color, reminding her that she wasn't quite out of the woods yet.
She limped back over to Lewis' body and rummaged through his pockets to find the handcuff key and the phone he'd taken from the maid. As she tried to use her left hand to look through his pockets, pain shot through her arm and she realized her left wrist was broken.
Through the pain, she persisted. Time was running out.
She would not let Lewis steal her victory.
She found the handcuff key first and was able to twist her unbroken wrist enough to unlock the restraints. She threw them across the room and started to dig in his other pockets.
Adrenaline and determination were all that she had left.
When she finally wrapped her fingers around the phone and pulled it from his pocket, Olivia felt a moment of triumph and the unbelievable realization that she might actually survive.
If she didn't bleed out, there was a chance she'd get to meet her baby, to see Elliot again, to live a new life.
She'd fought and she'd won and the rest of her life was the prize.
She dialed 911.
May 24th, 2013 - on a road somewhere, Long Island, New York - 1:50pm
Elliot and Cragen stood on the beach supervising the dozens of unis that were searching the area. Several officers were going door to door, passing out flyers with Olivia and Lewis' faces, and cautioning the residents not to answer the door for anyone but police until Lewis was captured. Other unis were searching the sand and the water for-
-Elliot didn't want to think about what they were searching for.
The trail was cold for now. All they could do was keep looking and keep hoping.
As they walked down the beach, finding absolutely nothing for the umpteenth time, he let out a growl of frustration. Cragen grabbed his arm and turned Elliot to face him.
There was a look in his eyes that Elliot did not like. He tried to shake off the other man's grip but Cragen tightened his fingers.
"Don't." Elliot warned in a low growl, "Don't say it."
"Elliot, you need to prepare yourself. If she's alive-"
"-she's alive, Don," He pulled his arm out from Cragen's hold and put some space between them, "you can't give up on her."
"I'm not giving up. I'm trying to tell you that you need to prepare yourself. If Olivia is alive, she's going to be in rough shape. You saw the crime scene photos from Lewis' other sprees." Cragen advised with a gentle, sympathetic voice that made Elliot want to scream.
He nodded stiffly, "Whatever he did, we'll get her through it."
Cragen took a moment to contemplate his answer before asking, "Are you planning to stick around?"
Elliot snapped, "We're having a baby. You think I'm going to abandon Liv and my kid?"
Of course they think that, you already did, a small voice in his head taunted. He shook it away.
"Olivia wouldn't hold it against you, Elliot." Cragen assured him, "Neither of you chose what happened in the warehouse, but she made a choice to keep the baby. She doesn't hold you to her choices, she's made that very clear."
Elliot thought that was the dumbest thing he'd ever heard. There was no world in which he would walk away from Olivia and their kid just because of the way the child was conceived.
The warehouse was a hideous nightmare that he'd never forget, but their child was separate from that, a flower blooming up through the cracks of newly-laid asphalt. It was a miracle.
He hated that Olivia had resigned herself to being a single mother, and hated even more that their baby's conception made her question if he would want them.
He wanted them - both of them - way too much.
"I've made a choice too. I'm choosing my family, my whole family. That includes Liv and our baby now. I'll take care of them, no matter what."
Cragen nodded, a small smile gracing his worry-worn face, "I'm glad to hear that. Olivia deserves a family."
He felt a lump in his throat as he agreed, "She does."
Elliot thought she deserved the entire world.
He would give her as much as he could, just as soon as she was safe.
Cragen patted him on the back and gestured toward the car, "Let's head to the next location. It's about 15 minutes away, we can stop at the Shell for gas and coffee on the way."
Elliot agreed without much gusto and they headed back to the vehicle. It felt like someone was tightening a rope around his neck just a little tighter every time they left a search location without Olivia.
There were too many spots and not enough time. Every second they didn't have her was another second Lewis could be raping, torturing, killing her. The thought would surely drive him to madness.
Oh Lord, please hear my prayer. Please help us find Liv, keep her safe until-
Cragen's radio squawked to life, "Dispatching units to 98 Spring Way. Caller claiming to be Detective Olivia Benson, requesting emergency response and SVU, ambulance en route. Captain Cragen, do you copy?"
Elliot started sprinting toward the car, though he couldn't feel his legs anymore.
Cragen snatched the radio from his waist and responded, "10-4, on our way. "
As soon as they were in the car, Elliot punched the address into the GPS.
It was only 7 minutes.
They were so close.
Oh Lord, please hear my prayer, keep her safe until we arrive-
"We're 7 minutes out," Cragen spoke into the radio and spun out of the driveway, flipping on the lights and sirens and accelerating to 80 mph within seconds, "We'll be there in less than 5. Any status on Detective Benson?"
"Dispatcher said she sounded weak, he couldn't get much out of her. She provided her name, the address, stated that the perp is deceased, that there are two hostages tied up in the home that she was unable to free. She also reported that she is bleeding and needs EMS. He tried to ask where she was bleeding from but the call disconnected."
Elliot gripped the dashboard and tried to breathe.
Oh Lord, please hear-
"Is anyone on location yet?" Cragen asked, making a sharp left and almost sending them careening into a ditch. He corrected immediately and picked up speed.
They were so close.
"No, you're the closest. Long Island PD have been advised that you're taking command of the scene, they'll arrive in 6 minutes, EMS is 13 minutes out."
"10-4." Cragen responded.
They were 2 minutes away, which was actually 60 seconds with the way Cragen was driving. He reached into the center console and pulled out a department-issued pistol. He handed the gun to Elliot who accepted it without question. Lewis was dead, it's not like he could kill the man again.
Cragen instructed, "You get Liv, stay away from Lewis' body, don't touch a thing. Just find her and assess her injuries until EMS arrives. We'll figure out the rest later. I'll secure the house."
Elliot didn't need to be told twice. He was out of the car before the wheels stopped, sprinting to the door and yanking on the knob with almost enough force to take it off its hinges. He gripped the gun with his right hand.
"Liv!" He called out.
She wasn't in the living room. He ran over to another door and threw it open, gun ready on instinct. The smell of blood filled his nostrils and he only took a moment to assess Lewis' corpse on the floor.
"Olivia!" He called out. She wasn't in there either.
He ran to the next door, throwing it open, praying again and again that Liv would be there.
Oh Lord, pl-
The strong smell of vodka and cigarettes hit him like a brick wall.
And there she was.
She was laying in a bathtub, pale but alive, holding a bloody shirt to her stomach and breathing in short, labored pants. Her eyes were closed but tears streamed down her dirty cheeks. Her expression was too calm and it made him nervous.
She was the most beautiful and terrifying thing he'd ever seen.
"Liv," he breathed out, dropping down to his knees next to her. He immediately put his hands on hers, applying pressure to her wound and yelling their location to Cragen, "stay awake, ambulance is on the way, stay with me."
"El," she wheezed, the ghost of a smile on her lips, "I-I-I did what you said. I didn't hesitate."
Her teeth chattered as she spoke. He resisted the urge to pull her into his warmth.
"You did good, Liv. You did so good. Now you have to stay awake for me just a little longer." Her head lolled to the side and Elliot shook her with a now bloody hand, "Please, stay awake."
"I wish you were here, El," she whispered, "I wish you would come save me."
"I'm here, I'm right here. I'm with you. I'm not leaving you again." Elliot promised, tears blurring his vision. He swiped his face on his shoulder to wipe them away, keeping his hands firmly on her stomach.
She didn't seem to hear him but she kept breathing and that's all that mattered.
Cragen called out that EMTs were entering. Elliot moved slightly to give them more space to kneel beside Liv, but his shaky red-stained hands did not leave her for even a second.
"She's 25 weeks pregnant." Elliot heard Cragen inform the EMTs.
The male EMT hung back in the doorway as the female EMT knelt down beside Olivia and placed a gentle hand on her arm. She spoke softly, "Detective Benson, my name is Bethany. I'm going to help you." Bethany put her hands on Elliot's, asking him without words to remove his hands from the wound so she could take over. He did so without argument. She continued speaking directly to Olivia, "I'm going to take a look at your stomach now, Olivia, I just need to see if the bleeding has stopped."
Liv's eyes were still closed but she nodded slightly. Bethany carefully pulled the formerly yellow shirt from Olivia's stomach to reveal a cut which Elliot estimated to be 3 or 4 inches long. He knew the pain must be unbearable.
The placement of the cut made him very uneasy, he'd seen Kathy cut in the same spot during the twin's birth.
He told himself it must have been a coincidence.
He noted with slight relief that the bleeding had slowed, but he wasn't sure if that was a good or bad sign anymore. Olivia was pale and listless and the shirt was absolutely soaked.
"Good news, the bleeding is under control. We'll clean the cut real quick and then get you to the hospital." Bethany assured.
Olivia nodded slightly in understanding. She opened her eyes tiredly and her gaze settled on Elliot. He tried to smile at her through his tears, but she looked away from him. There was something akin to a heart break in her expression.
He ached to reach out to her, but knew he should stay out of Bethany's way so the woman could get Liv ready to transport.
The sooner they got her out of the tub and into the ambulance, the better.
As Bethany poured saline solution over Olivia's abdominal wound, Elliot took time to finally assess her many injuries.
Since she was only wearing a very stained beige maternity bra and a pair of black leggings, he was able to see a great deal of her skin. To his horror, there was hardly a 2-inch patch that wasn't marked with a burn or wound of some kind. He counted at least 9 cigarette burns, a long thin burn that he believed was from a wire hanger, and a burn in the shape of a key on her chest. Her belly had at least 3 angry looking burns that he knew would itch like crazy as their baby grew, and the thought brought him great sorrow.
Her arm sat at an unnatural angle, he guessed that it was probably broken. Her wrists were raw and bloody and resembled hamburger meat. She had several cuts on her forehead that were crusted in dried blood and surrounded by black bruising, and innumerable cuts on the rest of her visible skin.
All of those injuries were just on her front torso. There was no knowing what he'd done to her lower body or back, or what horrors she'd faced beyond the physical.
Olivia moaned in pain as Bethany applied a sterile dressing over the wound. When it was secured, Bethany soothed, "You did great, Olivia. We're ready to move you now. This is my partner, Jeremy. He's going to help me lift you onto the stretcher. Is that okay?"
Liv nodded weakly and scooched forward, closing her eyes as Jeremy grabbed her from under her armpits, Bethany lifted her feet and they eased her flat onto the stretcher next to the tub.
Elliot noticed Don watching from the entryway with a look of anguish.
The EMTs draped a blanket over Liv, covering all but her head, before wheeling her through the house toward the front door. Elliot followed close behind.
When they entered the living room, he was only mildly startled to see dozens of unis scattered throughout the home. He noticed a Hispanic woman and child sitting on the couch talking to Fin. The child was nearly hysterical and the woman wasn't fairing much better. Elliot guessed they were Lewis' hostages, the ones that Liv told 911 she couldn't untie.
Nick stood in the entryway, holding the door open for them. He looked at Liv with an expression of relief and heavy grief. As the stretcher passed by him, Liv reached out and gave his hand a small squeeze. Elliot stopped for only a second, placing a hand on the other man's shoulder in a gesture of respect and comfort. Amaro nodded tersely and did the same back to him.
Olivia was quickly loaded into the ambulance and Bethany waved Elliot over to join them. He appreciated that Cragen must have made that happen for him, that the Captain knew he should stay with Liv.
He settled into a seat next to her stretcher. She wouldn't look at him. It made him ache, but he told himself that it was okay if she was mad at him because he was mad at himself. If she never forgave him, he wouldn't hold it against her because he knew he didn't deserve it.
He watched as Bethany hooked her up to several monitors and put an oxygen mask over her face. Elliot could see the blood pressure monitor and was alarmed at the low numbers flashing brightly on the screen.
The male EMT stood next to Bethany, handing her supplies and quietly speaking instructions to her that Elliot could barely make out. Then, he climbed into the front seat and they were off, lights and sirens blazing.
Olivia's eyes closed again and her breaths slowed. They were slower than they should have been, he knew that much.
"I'm going to check on your abdominal wound again, Olivia. We're less than 10 minutes from the hospital. Just try to stay awake for me." Bethany asked calmly and peeled back the blanket and sterile dressing.
Elliot could see a bit of blood on the dressing but was relieved it wasn't gushing.
Bethany turned to Elliot, whispering, "We need her to stay awake. Talk to her. Try to keep her eyes open."
Elliot didn't know where to start. He wanted to comfort her, but he didn't know how. He wanted to throw himself at her feet and beg her for forgiveness and pledge every second of the rest of his life to her to make up for his colossal failure, but he knew it was selfish to put that on her in the back of an ambulance when she's barely hanging on to consciousness.
Liv didn't need his self-pity or apologies, she needed him to be the strong one.
"You're gonna be okay, Liv. Open your eyes, you've gotta stay awake," he said tenderly. Her eyes flitted to his for only a second before she fixed her stare on the ceiling. He continued, "It's okay if you're mad at me, I deserve it. Just know that I'm not going anywhere. Not ever again." he whispered, reaching over to move a piece of greasy, snarled hair out of her eye.
She flinched at the touch and closed her eyes again. He pulled his hand away like it burned and vowed to himself that he would not touch her again until she was ready. He couldn't bear the thought that he might trigger her.
"2 minutes out, Detective Benson. Keep those eyes open for me, I know you're tired, but it's important." Bethany urged.
When she opened her tired brown eyes again, Elliot saw a flood of tears gathering in the corners. He knew she would refuse them passage until she was ready to let them fall.
That was Liv's way.
They pulled up to the ambulance bay and he moved out of the way to give them room to work. Bethany and Jeremy quickly wheeled Olivia out of the ambulance. There were 20 to 30 unis lined up at the bay forming a barricade, and Elliot realized it was because there were dozens of reporters outside of the hospital trying to get photos of Liv.
The feelings of rage and disbelief that bubbled up in his chest were swallowed down for a later date when he was alone with a punching bag.
They wheeled Olivia into the hospital quickly where there was a team of medical staff waiting. The sheer volume of them made Elliot incredibly uneasy. He couldn't decide if they were rolling out the red carpet for the injured cop, or if her condition was a lot worse than he'd let himself believe.
The handoff from EMS to hospital staff was a blur with Bethany rattling off numbers to one of the nurses and another nurse speaking quietly to Olivia while another one took her vitals and then started wheeling her away.
Elliot followed closely behind, flashing his badge at anyone who looked at him sideways.
When she was wheeled into a triage room with a 7-man trauma team, one of the male staff put a firm hand on his chest to stop him from following while another person shut the door.
Elliot snarled at the man and was about to break his fingers when he felt Cragen's gentle hand on his shoulder. The other man's presence reminded Elliot that he needed to keep his cool so he didn't get himself kicked out of the hospital.
"I'm sorry, sir, they need space to triage her, her condition is critical. I understand that the police have a vested interest, but please allow us to do our jobs so we can get Detective Benson the care she needs." The male nurse stated firmly.
Cragen nodded, but Elliot was not appeased. He wanted to scream at the man that he wasn't police, he was family. He wanted to tear the door off of its hinges and refuse to leave Olivia's side for the next 30 years.
He paced outside of the room, glowering at anyone who went in or came out. At one point, several bags of blood were brought in, followed by two more within minutes. It made him sick with worry.
Then, the screaming started.
Her screams were tortured, blood-curdling. Cragen had to physically restrain him from entering her room when he heard those screams. They penetrated his being. He could feel her pain inside of him and it was akin to torture.
All he could do was stand in the hallway while she endured more suffering.
After almost an hour, they finally opened the door and allowed him and Cragen to enter.
The sight of her took Elliot's breath away.
She was laying in the bed, half covered with a blanket, dressed in a light blue hospital gown. She looked impossibly pale and small and heartbreakingly maternal with her hand resting on her belly. There was an oxygen cannula in her nose, several bags of fluids and a bag of blood hung on an IV pole. The IV line was in Liv's right hand, the bloodline was in a vein near her elbow between two dressed burns. One wrist was wrapped in gauze, the other was in a sling. Her forehead was cleaned and stitched and her hair had been brushed and pulled back into a ponytail.
Her face was empty of emotion.
Elliot's heart could not possibly survive much more, he was certain he would break soon.
He entered the room first and cautiously walked to the chair on Olivia's right side, sitting down gently so as not to startle her. Cragen entered behind him and took the seat to her left.
The older man reached out a hand and Liv grasped it with her unbroken one. A silent tear trailed down her cheek and she whispered, with trembling uncertainty, "They're waiting for someone from OB to come do an ultrasound. I haven't felt anything in two days."
A sob caught in Elliot's throat, and the instinct to grab her and pull her to his chest and hold her was so powerful that he had to grip the arms of his chair to control himself.
He'd promised himself that he would not touch her again until she was ready and he intended to keep that promise.
"Oh, Olivia. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," Cragen cried out, his voice cracking and breaking apart under the weight of his guilt, "I shouldn't have sent you home."
Olivia shook her head and squeezed his hand, soothing him with her quiet words, "You were looking out for me. None of us could have known that… that-" she shivered and looked away from her Captain, "Nobody is responsible but him." She closed her eyes for a few moments and it almost seemed like she was asleep until she quietly added. "It doesn't matter right now. I actually need a favor."
Cragen leaned closer and replied, "anything."
Her lip trembled and she whispered, "I need you to find Elliot. If the baby is gone, I need to tell him."
Elliot's spine stiffened and his breath caught in his throat. He looked at Cragen in disbelief and the other man's expression was equally as shocked. For a moment, the room was utterly silent as the men realized what was happening.
"Liv," Elliot breathed out, "I'm here. I'm right here with you."
She didn't look at him or react to his words, just continued to look at her Captain, tears swimming down her cheeks.
"Olivia," Elliot urged, a little bit louder, a little bit desperately, "Look at me. Please."
She closed her eyes and her tears picked up speed. Her body shook as she breathed out, "I think I'm going crazy."
Cragen smiled sadly and shook his head, speaking gently, "You aren't crazy, Olivia. Elliot is right next to you. He's real. I promise."
May 24th 2013 - Long Island Community Hospital, Long Island, New York - 3:51pm
For a moment, Olivia was as still as a statue. Cragen's words sent a shock so monumental through her body that she couldn't remember how to speak or breathe. She stared at her mentor and searched his face, scanning for microexpressions which might imply he was lying to her.
She saw nothing but raw honesty in his gaze.
Her mind raced. She couldn't bring herself to look over her shoulder to where the Phantom Elliot Stabler was posted up next to her bed. The stakes were too high.
If she looked over and the chair was empty and he wasn't real, it would confirm that she was, in fact, crazy. Or worse, hallucinating.
And if she was hallucinating, then maybe none of it was real. Maybe her rescue wasn't real.
Maybe she was still tied up in the beach house being raped or beaten or having her baby cut from her womb with a kitchen knife or bleeding to death in the bathtub.
Maybe she was already dead.
She'd heard Elliot's voice in her head, telling her to fight, telling her to kill Lewis. It brought her back from the brink of death.
Then, he'd appeared when she was laying in the bathtub waiting for the EMTs and the apparition of Elliot Stabler sat in the bathroom as they tended to her.
He sat next to her in the ambulance and tried to speak to her, and she could almost feel his fingertips as he brushed the hair from her face.
The phantom had walked near the gurney as they wheeled her past a few dozen of her brothers in blue into the hospital.
And now, he sat next to her like a sentry in her hospital room.
But she knew he wasn't real.
He wasn't real, because how was he wearing a badge when he'd quit the force months ago? How was he in the beach house? How was he in the ambulance? How could he be in those places and be wearing his badge when he'd disappeared?
She'd fully believed that her mind had created him to comfort her, or to keep her conscious, or maybe to torment her.
She'd tried not to look at him in the bathroom or the ambulance because looking at the specter of the man she loved while she was dying was just too tragic.
She didn't want to die full of deep longing for a man who'd left her behind.
If she died, she wanted to die thinking of her baby…
…but she didn't die.
And she didn't think she was hallucinating anymore.
And Cragen said Elliot was real. Cragen was like a father to her, he would never dangle Elliot in her face like that.
So she was either dead, or Elliot was real.
She had to know which.
She turned her head to the side slowly, her entire body stiff, bracing or an empty chair and the realization that her life was over.
Instead, brown eyes locked on blue.
Her heart monitor beeped noticeably faster, but she felt like the muscle had stopped entirely.
"You're real?" she choked out, hope and disbelief and months of pain echoing through her words, "Are you real?"
Tears were pouring down his cheeks as he reached over to put his hand on her arm and sobbed, "I'm right here, Liv. I'm real."
She grasped his arm and squeezed it as hard as she could. With rasping, desperate breaths, she pulled him closer, clinging to him, needing to feel him so she could believe that he was real, so her heart and her mind could accept that he was real, because there was still something in her that told her she was hallucinating him and maybe Cragen too and maybe she really was dead.
He fell from his chair as she pulled him in, landing on his knees next to her bed. Sobs wracked his body, the powerful unrelenting bonedeep sobs of a man who almost lost more than he could survive losing.
Olivia grabbed his face with her working hand and pulled his chin up. She felt the scruff of his unkempt beard and his warm skin beneath. Her fingers danced along his jaw and landed on the pulse point under his chin where she found what she was looking for.
The steady throbbing under her fingers told her he was real and alive and she was finally safe because Elliot was with her and he would never let someone hurt her like that again.
It was over and she could finally believe it in her soul.
Tears flowed freely from her eyes and she let his presence bring her the feeling of safety that it always had.
Elliot clasped her hand in his own and brought her palm to his lips, kissing her flesh for the first time and weeping, "I'm so fucking sorry, Liv, I'm sorry."
She shook her head vigorously, "No, no, don't be sorry right now, just be here. You can be sorry later." She thumbed a tear from his cheek and leaned closer.
She didn't need apologies or explanations or excuses from him yet. She didn't need the inevitable fighting, the hurt feelings, the discussions about the warehouse, Lewis… all of it could wait for another day when she wasn't weak and broken and bleeding.
All she wanted was him to exist with her and remind her that she was safe, if only for a few days.
"I'm not going anywhere," he vowed, reaching over and placing his hand so, so gently on her bump, "no matter what, I'm here."
She placed hers on top of his and he interlocked their fingers together.
She gripped him tightly, just like she had that night in the warehouse as they laid on that filthy floor, under the bed where they'd unknowingly made a baby, hands clasped together like two pieces of a puzzle made to fit.
There was a quiet knock on the door. A pretty blonde 30-something with a terrible poker face opened the door with a nervous smile and wheeled the ultrasound machine into the room.
Olivia's grip on Elliot's hand went from strong to crushing. He rubbed his thumb comfortingly on her hand but he knew she was too tense to notice.
"Hi Detective Benson, I'm Emily, I'm here to do your scan. Go ahead and pull your gown up and we'll take a look at your little one," she instructed with fake confidence that the three experienced detectives could see right through.
The woman was terrified and Olivia didn't blame her. She didn't want to be the one to discover that the baby was dead, that the baby had been killed in the womb by a sadistic rapist murderer.
Who would want that responsibility?
Olivia pulled the gown up to reveal her stomach which was now a patchwork of bandages. She watched Elliot as he assessed her body with a tense expression.
Particularly horrific was her abdominal wound which - thanks to the unknown cocktail of drugs and alcohol that Lewis had kept her on for 4 days - had been stitched without anesthesia in the triage room.
Several nurses held her still while a surgeon closed the wound. The pain and feeling of being restrained had her stuck in a violent loop of flashbacks that nearly made her pass out from screaming. Everyone was traumatized by that experience, not the least of all was Olivia herself.
At least the rest were able to walk away without a Frankenstein scar on their abdomens.
She hadn't been so lucky.
The tech squirted cold gel on a small, undamaged part of her stomach and carefully put the wand against her skin. Olivia drew in a deep breath, readying herself for the blow.
She had prepared for this moment for days, prepared herself for the possibility that she would escape Lewis and be safe in a room just like this one, and the ultrasound tech would search and search and then give her a small fake smile and say, "let me get the doctor," instead of just letting her hear the heartbeat.
Olivia would know what that meant without being told and she was prepared for it, prepared for anything. It had been two long days since the tiny kicks and flutters had ceased, and what little baby could survive the starvation and dehydration and the drugs and alcohol and the burns and the terror? It just wasn't possible.
She thought, for just a moment, that she should have walked to the warm light after all.
Her daughter had.
But then, a whooshing sound filled the room, and Olivia gasped in astonishment and relief.
"Oh my god. She's alive?"
May 24th 2013 - Long Island Community Hospital, Long Island, New York - 4:19pm
She's alive.
Elliot clutched onto Olivia's hand with both of his and covered his eyes with their arms as another sob escaped him. He battled against his own emotions for what felt like the hundredth time since he'd seen the news of Olivia's abduction, but even floodgates could only hold so long before some water broke through. He was merely human and his tears of relief and gratefulness poured out of him.
Olivia, though traumatized, was still alive and still pregnant with a child - their daughter - that he would love for the rest of his life.
The ultrasound technician excused herself with the promise of another scan before Liv was discharged, leaving the parents and Olivia's captain alone again.
"I was sure she'd died," Olivia choked out in a small voice, "the vodka and pills, and my blood sugar was so low I kept passing out. Lew-" She grimaced and cleared her throat, "No water for days, and a few bites of a candy bar. And he… I was so sure she was gone." She moved her and Elliot's clasped hands to her belly, rubbing between bandages, completely awed.
"She's a fighter, like her mom," he declared reverently. Though his soul was heavy with guilt and regret and grief over everything she'd endured, he couldn't help the small laugh that burst out of him when he said, "We're having a baby, Liv. Together. Can you believe that?"
She smiled sadly and looked away as she said, "I tried to call you. I wanted you to know about her before this."
He cringed as he thought of the voicemails he'd deleted so foolishly all of those months before. "I should have answered your calls or listened to your messages. I should have been here." He lowered his voice, the guilt eating him alive as he listed just a few of the many ways in which he had failed her, "I should have been there, I should have killed Lewis for you."
She shook her head and begged softly, "Don't do that, please. I don't want to go back there right now."
He brought her hand back up to his mouth and pressed his lips to the bandages on one of her wrists, "Okay Liv, whatever you need."
Almost 13000 words haha I told myself this would be a medium sized chapter, but I couldn't leave you on a cliffhanger for the third chapter in a row so this is what you get.
I also know everyone is going through a lot right now (in the States and globally) so I thought we could all use a distraction.
I only beg for reviews when it's a super long chapter so please leave a comment if you don't mind. 3 You all left me some amazing feedback in the last chapter which had me writing this one like a fiend. Thank you all! I appreciate the time it takes to leave a long comment and I promise the dopamine hit I get from reading them is my favorite thing ever. I have the best readers. Thank you, thank you.