tear out all your tenderness

by nimblewordplay

Summary:

He’s just been trying so hard not to react.

Notes:

About a year ago, I came across a poem that made me think of these two. I've been trying to write something around it ever since. I've had this in the drafts for a few months, sitting on it because I felt like fandom was sort of...not in the mood for something like this? But lately I've been in the mood for the Olivia Benson who sees and knows (and loves) the wolf.

I like them a little toxic sometimes too, what can I say :)

Title is Florence and the Machine's Howl.

(as always, thank you to Daily Meloni for allowing me to deep sigh and say “CAN YOU READ THIS?” when I can’t look at it anymore.)

 

It isn't gentleness 
that you and I are looking for 
in the hills and valleys, 
it is the cliff, the gorge, 
the scraped ocher on the knees 
of the slopes 
and the red crevice in which the land 
shows too, the brilliance of its wound.

(It Isn't Gentleness - Francisco Segovia)

—————————

—————————

The inside of her interrogation room is bathed in white, too harsh fluorescent light. Mid September, and the sinking sun outside the window throws its own orange glow, the battling warm and cool shades casting dueling shadows on Elliot’s face. 

Olivia stays back, out of the light, as she watches. 

“Come on man, you know me.” 

The man across the table from Elliot shakes his head, interrupting his own plea to turn around and peer at her briefly. She could take a seat at the table at any time, but she’s choosing to be back where she is instead. 

It’s her room, but it’s Elliot’s CI.

An informant he’d worked for months, agonizingly careful to build trust both ways. And Elliot did, it seems, build that trust. He believed the guy, and more devastatingly he’d believed in the guy, and now that same guy is sitting across from him in her interrogation room, desperately trying to refute what they’d all seen. 

Right there, on crystal clear video, sent to her just this morning.

He has the audacity to use Elliot’s name like they’re friends, and she watches the first inevitable tell. The stiffening in Elliot’s spine as his gaze darts up to meet her eyes for one, barely there millisecond. 

“You gotta trust me — ”

He says it, but there’s a hint of a sneer. His tongue, pinned between his teeth, like he’s trying to hold back a laugh as he eyes Elliot across the table. She only looks for a moment, her eyes moving right back to Elliot as the other man finishes. 

“Elliot, come on - would I lie?” 

That’s when she sees it. 

He has other tells, of course. If she lets him go on, everyone else will see it, too. Through the two way mirror, in another few seconds, they might notice the tilt of Elliot’s jaw up, angled at the other man across the table. An astute observer might see the white knuckled grip on the edge of her table that she’s sure would come, too. The clench of his jaw, the way the muscles in his neck grow taut, tense. The flare of his nostrils he tries to hide by tugging, pinching his nose between his thumb and his finger. 

They might have seen all that, if she hadn’t stopped it. 

All she’d needed to see was the look in his eyes. 

Olivia steps out of the shadows; the only corner of the room not bathed in light. Two hands on her table, she puts herself in between both men in an instant. She watches Elliot’s eyes go hard, the blue inside of them turning to flint in the white light as he realizes. She knows exactly how this will end later.

It’s been coming, this moment. 

“We’re good here, Detective,” Olivia warns.

He’s already moving, metal chair legs dragging on her interrogation room floor as she finishes. When her eyes meet his, she sees Elliot’s already schooled his face into something neutral, something that doesn’t belie what he’s feeling inside. 

A look that says it’s fine; her intervention. 

She knows it’s a lie. 

 “Why don’t you step out?” 

***

Olivia can feel the change in him the second they board the elevator leading out of her squad room. 

He‘d let the mask start to slip as soon as the doors closed.

Now, Elliot trails behind her all the way to the parking garage of the precinct, the frustration bleeding off of him; as palpable as the thick, humid air. It’s early September and there’s a heat wave that blankets the whole fucking city. The schools dismissed early this afternoon. She’d heard a news flash this afternoon about semi tires exploding on the freeway. 

She can barely breathe in this garage. 

“It happens every year, right after they send them back to school,“ she’d muttered over her mug of coffee this morning, eyes on the alert that came over her phone.“This heat wave, I mean.”

Elliot’s thick fingers had been fiddling with the sash of her robe; both of them toying with the idea of just how far to take it. A little past six and both of them in no real hurry: a Friday, a heat wave, her son fast asleep for another twenty or thirty minutes as she scrolled through new emails, new notifications from Noah’s school. 

Elliot had been weighing his options. 

In the end, he’d slid his hand down the open front of the robe, palming her breast with a languid ease; no intensity or urgency. A promise for later, as he muscled himself in, his chin notching neatly in the curve of her shoulder.

“I don’t know why we act surprised when it happens,” he’d murmured, using his nose to sweep her hair to the side; using his thumb to circle unhurriedly at her nipple. Olivia could feel him, half hard through the pair of sweatpants he keeps at her place, his mouth slow and soft and lazy as he’d mouthed down her neck. She’d let her fingernails trail down his back, grinning at the way he’d growled against her when she rocked her hips gently. 

“There’s always one last heat wave in September.” 

Their kisses after that had been lazy, soft and slow. 

Now, his footsteps are heavy; fast behind her, and she can feel it. His pent up frustration - that flash of silent discontent she’d registered, back in interrogation - finally coming out, right here in the echoing space of the garage. 

Good, she thinks. 

She’s been waiting. 

He’d hid it decently well upstairs in her squad room. His jaw had clenched and his eyes had narrowed as soon as she’d stepped in, but he’d adjusted by the time he stood up. 

She supposes she should feel some tenderness, maybe, at his easy deference back upstairs. 

He hadn’t sulked, hadn’t stood stony faced and annoyed in the corner of her squad room. He hadn’t slumped on her couch, mouth pinched and small. Minus the initial fleeting burst she’d caught, he’d been good. 

He’d waited. 

She hopes he won’t be able to swallow it down completely. 

She knows it’s choking him, now. Lodged in his gullet, that bitter pill with no coating is dissolving and it’s burning his throat the whole time. 

“What time is it?” she asks, voice echoing; carrying inside the garage. 

His voice is gruff, curt as he replies. She can hear it, rough and curling off his tongue, his irritation as tangible as he’s let it be yet today. 

“Ten after seven.” 

Olivia stops, turning on a heel. There is a band of dampness at the waist of her jeans that’s been a constant since eight this morning. The keys to her SUV are clutched in her hand, her palm as damp with sweat as everything else is too. It feels like she can barely breathe in here, her lungs fighting to work in the stifling weight of the air.

She wishes he’d just say it. 

(She wasn’t wrong, is the thing, when she’d made him back off. She doesn’t know if she was altogether right, either. She’d seen the flash in his eyes - his knuckles going white on the table, the tendon in his neck twitching; straining, and — )

“Do you need to say something, Elliot?” she starts, voice low. She tries to stop shy of obviously goading him, of too clearly pushing him into this tangle. She breathes, and adjusts her tone to something less. 

“Because — ”

She flexes her hand, resisting the urge to raise it up, and point right at him. 

“If you have a question about why I did what I did, up there — ”

“I know why you did it,” Elliot says brusquely. It comes out too fast; harshly blurted out before he can stop himself. She feels her own whole body response - the rapid fire in her nerve endings, the buzzing under her skin; the way her chest starts to rise and fall quickly, immediately - and she draws herself up. For a second, Elliot looks truly shocked at his own vehemence, but then he shakes his head, mouth falling open again. 

There it is, she thinks. 

Her body thrums with the welcome electricity. 

She’s been waiting for this moment for months.

“Yeah, I know exactly why you — ” 

He breaks off and stares past her. Behind him, she sees the headlights of someone driving into the garage flash on, illuminating him from behind. It’s dusk outside, the sun starting to set on this day that started out entirely different. 

The heat hasn’t broken, though. 

Olivia stands there. She watches Elliot swallow. She watches him breathe. In, out, slow and easy, trying to calm himself down. She should laud his control; appreciate his growth in learning restraint. 

She doesn’t. 

She mostly feels —

Unsettled, as she watches Elliot fight for control. 

She watches the twitch in the long tendon of his neck; the flare of his nostrils as he exhales. She watches Elliot blink, and try so hard. 

“Let’s just go home,” he tells her quickly, his voice quieter than before, pinched through his restraint. She can hear the faintest bit of a plea in his words. The healthiest thing she could do right now is agree. Elliot wants to anchor this down under the surface. Like he has been, since they started this; taking every disagreement and letting it sink down, down, down.  

Olivia wants to drag it up from the depths. 

“Back to your place,” he tells her. Elliot tries again, when she doesn’t answer. “We can get dinner, get some sleep. Let’s go back to — ”

“No,” she interrupts. 

She watches as he flinches. 

“No,” she repeats. “I told Fin we’d meet them.”

She watches Elliot blink, absorb it and try not to react. She knows he’d heard her make a half-hearted promise to try to show up to both of their teams, but her absence wouldn’t be a shock to a single soul. 

“We should celebrate,” she says carefully, her eyes on him the whole time. 

Elliot doesn’t move. 

“After all, we did close the case,” she adds.

She watches him bite his lip. She watches him curl it back, working it harshly between his teeth. She watches his mouth fall open, then slam shut again. 

She watches Elliot breathe - in, hold, out - again. 

She wonders if he counts to three with each step, or if she’s just projecting. 

“Ok,” Elliot says, finally. “Your call.” 

Olivia turns without answering, and makes her way into the front seat. The stagnant, burning air inside her SUV hits them both like a brick wall. Sweat finds her in all the places it didn’t before, beading on her brow and pooling behind her knees, trickling down between her breasts where her bra gapes when she leans forward. 

A week ago they’d fucked in his bedroom on Saturday morning, the air conditioner off and the sunlight and heat filling the room. He’d used his tongue, eager and hot, to lick away the rivulets of sweat in that same spot; his head buried between her tits as she rode him, her fingernails sharp on the back of his neck.

Olivia starts the engine. 

She turns the vents on full blast; the frigid air filling the space as she pulls out of the garage. 

It’s September, and there is a heat wave and it feels like it’s swallowing them whole.

***

Elliot’s own vehicle stays parked, three spaces away from hers as they drive away. 

She wonders if the coffee mug he’d poured in her kitchen this morning is still in there. Hers is back on her desk; barely two sips swallowed before the call had come in. It’ll stay there all weekend, creamer sinking to the bottom and curdling. The coffee was brewed from whole beans he keeps - and grinds, fresh - in the cabinet by her refrigerator. Expensive enough that she rolls her eyes, mouths the word ‘snob’ at him every time he adds a new bag, but it is good. 

The coffee is good. 

Elliot’s phone pings as they exit the garage, the noise barely registering over the roar of her air conditioner at full blast. 

“Fin just sent me the address,” he mutters. “Two lights up, then a left.” 

She leans forward and turns the air conditioner down halfway, suddenly chilly. It works too well, sometimes. The light in front of them turns green, yellow, red as they barely inch forward.

 A full cycle, complete. 

“Place is gonna be — ”

Elliot breaks off as it turns green again, and she taps on the gas. 

“Gonna be what?” Olivia asks. 

“Busy,” he answers. 

He uses a voice that he thinks gives nothing away. He’s been using it since they started this thing, since they jumped all the way in. The same voice every time there’s more than a hint of dissent. She wonders if he thinks she doesn’t notice. The strain in it; the catch in his throat. The way that voice tells her that he’s too afraid to let it out. 

She hates that voice. 

It’s too purposeful; too on fucking purpose. 

It’s not just when he’s angry, either. 

The last time he’d used it on her was last week. He’d found a picture of her and Ed in Paris, stuffed in the back of the drawer where she keeps winter socks and a few too large for her t-shirts he’d been searching for. It wasn’t the first one he’d seen, not the one she’d shown him when they talked about it, when they aired out the pieces of her past. When she’d told him about Ed and her and how happy she’d been for a moment. It wasn’t the picture she kept out for the world to see for so long. 

This one was different.

This one was Ed Tucker and her, blurry in the low light of a Parisian restaurant. The waiter had been kind, had offered to take it and they’d nodded, happy to capture the feeling. Ed’s mouth, soft and warm at her ear, her own smile so effusive and real that it felt too intimate to actually put the photo on display. 

“You, uh - you look really happy, here,” Elliot had murmured when he’d found it. 

He’d been staring down at that moment, and her real, palpable joy frozen in time, held in his hand. She’d seen his quick, tortured glance down, but then he’d tucked it back in her drawer gently, and he’d shaken his head as he turned. 

“I was,” she’d answered. “It was…”

She’d told the truth. 

“We were,” she’d murmured. “We really were.” 

She’d come up behind Elliot, waiting. She’d watched the muscles in his back tense, ripple; the shirt he’d been searching for clutched in his hands. Olivia had watched, from behind, the whole time, the way he’d breathed. 

She’d wanted to talk about; had wanted to really air it out. She’d wanted to find out his true feelings about Ed Tucker and her. She’d wanted to dig deeper than the ‘I’m glad you had someone like that in your life, Liv,’ he’d given her the first time they talked about it, and find out what it did to him, knowing that she’d actually been happy with Ed. 

Her breath had caught when Elliot had turned around, finally. 

She’d been so, so ready for it. 

It hadn’t come. 

It’s been like this since they started. He walks away, instead of fighting. When she says she’s not ready for a weekend at the beach with his family, he hides his hurt; his vexation. He doesn’t press her when she shakes her head and looks away when he comes home after two weeks away with angry red cuts on his chest. 

He uses that voice every time. 

“I’m glad,” Elliot had told her that night about Ed.

She wasn’t sure who he’d thought he’d been placating.

That’s when she’d realized what was happening. 

In the end, that night after he’d stared at that photo of her and Ed, she’d waited five minutes, then trailed him into her shower. She’d kissed him hungry and greedy, forcefully bypassing the tender way he’d tried to hold her close - pushing against him; using her tongue and her teeth and the slick press of her body - until the second she’d felt Elliot stop holding back.

She’d come three times that night. 

Once with Elliot on his knees in the heated spray of her shower, her head against the tile as he’d fucked her with his tongue; with the thick curl of his fingers.

Two more times as he’d filled her over and over and over; her body eagerly welcoming the punishing pace of his hips at the edge of her sink. 

In the morning, she’d seen the red mark on the swell of her breast in the shower; and felt him in the twinge in her hip every time she stood up. 

She’d felt vindicated. 

She’d told herself it was enough. That she could let him bury it - his torn feelings about Ed Tucker, her upset at the danger he keeps dragging himself in; her gentle spurn of his attempt to advance - and that it was enough, using their bodies like that.

It did take the edge off, for a while at least.

“I’m glad,” he’d told her that night 

“Got it. We’re all good,” he’d told her in the squad room today.

“Busy.”

Elliot tells her now in that same voice in the front seat of her car. Forced, like he doesn’t give one single shit that she’d kneecapped him back in her squad room; hadn’t trusted him enough to stay calm.

She hums, and taps on the gas. She can make out where the bottleneck opens up ahead. This light, then another, then another after that. She flips up her sun visor, still down from this morning. 

“That’s all I meant,” Elliot adds in that same voice, still. “Just that it’ll be busy tonight. It’s Friday.” 

She makes it through the first green light, finally. She considers it, as she goes. It really would be easier to turn the other way and go back home. It’s crazy to want to push him this way. 

She feels Elliot’s hand on her knee. 

His thumb smooths down the inside, right at the seam of her jeans. 

His touch is too light; too hesitant. She looks down to see it; his big fingers splayed on the narrowest part of her thigh. Sometimes when he goes down on her he starts there, right behind her knee. Drags his mouth up achingly slowly, the bristle on his chin making her shiver as he mouths his way closer. 

It feels like it takes hours, sometimes, as she tries to hold still and let him make his way there. It’s always worth it, when his tongue makes that first eager pass. When he buries it in her cunt and they both groan in relief. 

Still, sometimes Olivia tries. Sometimes she digs a heel into Elliot’s back, or she squirms down low in the sheets. Sometimes she grinds down when he’s close; when she can feel the nudge of his nose, the nip of his teeth on the inside of a thigh. Sometimes she pleads with him just a little, her fingers curled at the base of his skull as she breathes it out: 

Please. 

Now, she sees him fidget with the end of his tie, his eyes still straight ahead.

She tries one more time: 

“You don’t have to go, you know,” Olivia tells him. 

Elliot’s hand on her thigh goes still. They both look down at it, locked in tandem even now. Before she can stop herself, she looks over and tells him. “I can take you back to your car.” 

Elliot stiffens, and immediately responds. 

“That’s not what I — ” he growls before he can stop himself, now, and then he actually grimaces. 

His whole face, stuck like that, almost like he’s appalled at his own reaction. He bites his lip again. If he keeps doing that, she thinks, he’s going to pierce right through it. As he turns his gaze forward, she wonders if he is right now. If the pink of his lip is giving, finally under his frustration; the sharp dig of his own teeth finally winning the battle. 

She thinks about the heavy taste of copper on her own tongue. 

Elliot’s hand on her knee stays perfectly still. 

“Light’s green,” he mutters.

***

The bar is busy. 

Packed, full of too many people twenty years their junior, sipping drinks she’s never heard of, milling around like cattle in the glow of the underlit bar shelves, all vying for a spot on the pleather bar stools. Their group had snagged a table before Elliot and she got here; jammed back and in the corner like good cops do. 

The air inside moves, but just barely. They’d lifted the big garage style doors in the front instead of turning the air conditioning all the way back on. The heat is supposed to break in the morning.

She peels off her leather blazer, and drapes it over the back of the too heavy barstool she sits at, waiting. She waits, watching everyone else. The rest of the table is empty, everyone scattered. Fin’s voice is loud, almost yelling when he comes back with her drink.

“Bruno picked it,” Fin warns her as he hands her it. It’s brown, in a clear glass, one huge ice cube in the middle. It makes her think about the iceberg that hit the Titanic; floating all alone in the ocean until its horrific destiny found it. 

“Told him red wine but he said everyone was doing whiskey or bourbon, so — ”

“This is fine,” she says as she takes a sip. It’s smooth, rich and a little sweet. The nice thing about having a too rich detective is the top shelf liquor, she supposes. 

Fin would have gotten her a glass of cheap red wine.

Elliot would have gotten her a glass of nicer red wine, the same one she orders at dinners. The same one he keeps on his bar cart, for her. They don’t stay there much, with the baby and Eli and Becky, but last time she’d seen the beige colored label; two expensive bottles stocked on the bottom and waiting. 

“Whiskey or bourbon?” Fin asks now. 

She swears she can taste cinnamon on the back of her tongue, and that heady aftertaste of vanilla that people try to chase. 

It’s too sweet to be whiskey.

She thinks she could drink it all in one, long sip.

“It's definitely bourbon,” she answers. 

She tilts her head at the empty chair across from her. The small group is scattered, little pockets of NYPD all around the bar. She’d expected more of the group to show up, but it’s only six of them. 

Elliot is off to the side, cornered by Velasco on his way back from the bathroom; the other man likely asking rapid fire questions about OCCB while still maintaining that infuriatingly slow pace he does. 

Lately, her detective seems eager to branch out. 

Fin eyes the spot to her left, and she nods. She’s at the head of the table, her back half to the wall, half not. The spot to her right has Elliot’s water glass; two-thirds gulped down as soon as he’d brought them over. His reading glasses - unused today, tucked into his collar for the most part - sit folded next to it. He used to do this exact same move, a million years ago. Leave his keys, his winter hat in the spot closest to her. A pair of thick leather gloves, for a few seasons, before they started to peel. 

He doesn’t have to do that anymore.

No one’s going to make the mistake of taking his spot. 

“Elliot getting his own drink, or — ”

Fin leans all the way in to ask. 

“I thought so,” she answers. “I think so, yeah.” 

She glances over to where Elliot still stands, his head tilted close as he strains to hear her detective’s questions over the drone of the bar. It’s loud enough that she can’t even hear the actual music, just the beat in the refrain of the songs every now and then. 

She takes another sip of the bourbon. 

The ice is already starting to melt rapidly; the top of it a little mountain peak in the sea of amber. It’s so clear, too, like the ice itself is as expensive as the drink. She pokes at it, fragile and thin at the top, watching to see if it breaks. 

A trickle of sweat sneaks down her back. 

“Looks like he got pinned down by Velasco before he could make it back,” Fin says loudly. He takes a sip of his own drink, grinning around the rim of it as he eyes the duo. “Good fucking luck to Stabler.” 

She laughs into her glass. Dry, a little mirthless, her voice muffled as she answers. 

“Well — ”

Fin cuts her off, leaning even closer, his eyebrows high. 

“You plan it that way? He seemed pretty calm about the whole thing back there but I know he can still be…Stabler,” Fin keeps digging; pushing and she wonders how much he had to drink before they got here, if this is his first or his second.

It doesn’t really matter, she knows. 

He’d still probably ask. 

“Or has that changed since you guys finally — ” 

Fin stops when she titles her head quickly, arching one eyebrow up. He raises one palm coming up for a moment, a small backing down; an easy surrender. A deference from him, too.

Olivia sets her glass down before answering, fingertip running the rim slowly. She looks down at it. It has changed, would be her answer, if she was inclined to give him one. 

Not for the better. 

“He is pretty calm,” she says instead carefully, slowly. 

She doesn’t add the unspoken part; the ‘unfortunately’ that’s right there on the tip of her tongue; stuck behind her teeth like those shitty tootsie rolls Noah used to leave at the bottom of the Halloween candy bowl. 

“Very calm, actually,” she adds. 

“He avoiding you to keep it that way?” Fin asks, and she can just see it, that smirk at the edge of his smile. 

She shakes her head and takes another sip. She toys with the napkin under her drink. It’s gummy, already soaked with condensation; too soggy to shred.

She gives up.

“I think he’s…”

She blinks up, looking past Fin. Elliot’s eyes catch hers for a moment. She holds them as he tilts back a beer she hadn’t seen before. In the dim light of the bar with his chin tilted up, the lines around his eyes look deeper, harsher, but when he lowers his head and looks back at her, they soften again. 

Olivia looks away first.

Fin sits, quietly waiting. 

“I think Elliot’s avoiding himself,” she says softly.

She casts her eyes down as she lifts her glass again. She’s said it so quietly that she’s not sure that Fin heard, but when she takes another slow sip and sets it back down, he asks: 

“That pissing you off?” he asks and this time her laugh is loud, genuine as she tries to swallow her bourbon without choking. She nods in response and Fin - her friend, Fin, right now - settles back in his bar stool. 

He eyes Elliot, still cornered by Velasco. 

“Yeah,” she admits. “Little bit, yeah. Yes, it is.” 

Out of the corner of her eye, she can see Bruno and her new detective approaching; Reyes close behind. Time to move on, for now. 

When she looks back over, Elliot’s eyes are on her. 

“Want me to knock him around a little?” Fin asks quickly, quietly.

Olivia arches an eyebrow. 

“If I said go for it?” she asks, another low snicker escaping as she does. She feels looser, all of the sudden, the first moments of unspooling somehow sneaking up on her, and when she looks down at her drink, she sees half of it gone.

The ice is almost melted already. 

Fin’s grin is huge, a flash of teeth as he shakes his head back and forth. The music dies down for a minute, a small lull in the buzz, and she doesn’t have to shout or lean close as he responds. 

“You’re right,” Fin admits. “He has had it coming for about twenty five years, but uh — ”

He glances over at Elliot - who is eyeing both of them, his eyebrows furrowed just slightly as he pretends to give a fuck about what Velasco is asking at all - then back at Olivia. 

“I think I’ll let you handle that.” 

***

It’s easy to fall into it. 

Olivia finishes the first glass, and nods yes when Bruno asks about refills. She usually stops after one, when she’s out like this. She’s not sure entirely what she wants. It’s a toss up, what she’ll get; the outcome of an ode to her complicated genetic code. It could dull the feeling inside of her as it dulls her senses; her reactions. Maybe the bourbon will start to turn the heat all the way down; set the flame back to simmer until it can cool. 

Or - maybe the lowering of inhibitions will allow it to catch. 

She’s so careful, usually. 

Elliot stays where he is, one shoulder against the brick wall. 

Every time she lifts her gaze away from her drink or from some idle conversation (Bobby Reyes and cost of daycare in the city; his three kids in three different age groups with three different needs) she catches Elliot’s eyes, staring back at her. 

She doesn’t really like how easy it is to drink this bourbon, if she’s being honest, even if she does like the drink itself. The hint of lingering sweetness; the too smooth way it slides down her throat - it bothers her how easy it is to drink more and more. Cheaper liquor would burn, making itself known as it took its effect. As it dilated her blood vessels and flushed her cheeks even more, a less expensive, less passive drink would have reminded her with every single sip. 

“Good stuff, isn’t it?” 

Bruno asks as he hands her another short glass tumbler. The ice cube in this one is square; as clear as the last. The air around her is still so heavy, still so warm. The glass in her hand is cold; wet with condensation, and when she lifts it to her lips, the bourbon is perfectly chilled. 

She looks straight ahead as she drinks, right where she has all night. 

Elliot’s eyes burn into hers as she lowers it. For someone who had bit his tongue so carefully today; who has measured and gauged every single reaction he’s had since this afternoon, he isn’t so careful with his gaze. 

For someone so deliberate in his restraint — 

He always did give away a lot, when he looked at her. 

“It is,” she answers. “It really is.” 

Olivia watches him take a long pull from his beer. It’s not a sip this time; not small and short. The muscles of his throat work as he swallows and swallows again and she wonders if he’s as warm as she is here. Maybe there’s more of a breeze where he is, halfway up the bar. Tepid and coming in from the street, blowing up from the pavement when the buses drive past. 

When Elliot lowers the bottle, he’s still looking at her with that same scorching gaze. 

She takes another drink from the bourbon, letting it linger for a moment; heavy and cool on her tongue. 

Olivia blinks away and reminds herself to slow down. It’d be so easy to down it all quickly, just like she did with the first. 

It’s too mellow. 

There’s not enough bite to this drink at all. 

***

Elliot keeps the distance between them for as long as he can. 

Eventually, Velasco grows bored - or distracted, or intrigued, or likely both, when her newest detective slips off her blazer at the table revealing a sleeveless tank - and they both come back. Elliot sits in the chair he’d laid claim to; half across and half beside her at the head of the table. She feels his knee knock hers once, and she waits for him to reach under, and rest his hand on her thigh.

When he doesn’t, she tilts her drink back and takes a long, slow swallow.

She reminds herself that’s what she wants. 

His second beer is almost all gone, and her second glass of bourbon is halfway there; but everyone else is already done with their second, well on to their third. Lips grow looser than they would and it’s not long before the conversation drifts to where she knew it inevitably would when she’d insisted on coming here. 

“Man, your guy –”

Bruno’s head shakes as he swings his body around in the barstool to face Elliot. From here, she can see every single reaction that Elliot has, and she catches it immediately. His face grows still, and he corrects her detective immediately. He rubs at his nose, and looks down at the scratched up table. 

She’s sure they came pre-scratched from the warehouse. 

“Not my guy,” Elliot shakes his head. “My CI, but not my fucking guy.” 

She remembers the call that came in this morning, then. Elliot’s boss, calling to give her a heads up. They’d had video monitoring on a CI who was supposed to be leading them to a break in their case, but it had caught something else. Something horrible, something that made every single one of them sick - the thing that made them call her, her SVU team - but he’d disappeared into the wind. 

It had taken hours for both teams to track him down, but they did, and then Olivia had given Elliot the courtesy of first interview. 

He was his CI, after all. 

“Still,” Bruno shakes his head. 

There’s a slur to his words, and she knows he’s as drunk as he’ll probably let himself be. She’s not sure if Bruno likes Elliot or hates him, or still just hasn’t figured him out. It’s a familiar pattern in the NYPD when it comes to Elliot Stabler. “I thought you were going to jump over that fucking table.” 

“I wasn’t,” Elliot snaps. She sees his jaw clench, sees the breath he holds in. He doesn’t look up from his drink. “I wasn’t going to –”

His gaze lifts to find hers. She watches him exhale; pushing out that breath and then he shakes his head once, curt and short. He shoves himself up from the table, and he keeps his eyes on hers as he pushes the barstool back in. Olivia can feel the way everyone looks up from their drinks; from their mostly demolished pesto covered flatbread and the mini goddamn charcuterie board that’s been picked clean, but she doesn’t break her gaze away from his. 

“I gotta take a piss,” Elliot mutters. 

He stalks off, heading to the last of the single stalls and it’s quiet for a moment. Not quiet, quiet, but their table goes silent for one beat too long and she thinks she should really, really give a shit. He’s being an ass, stomping off sullen faced two drinks in; in front of both of their teams but — 

Fuck, if she doesn’t want this. 

His mood change accomplishes the wrapping up of the night - for Fin and Reyes at least, she is one hundred percent sure that the three members of her team will let their night drag on somewhere else - and while cash is being left on the table, Olivia slides off of her barstool, her blazer and bag clutched in her hands as she eyes her destination. 

The world doesn’t spin, but she feels the unsteadiness in the wobble of her boot heel on the floor, and she knows that the two glasses of bourbon have done their job. Her heartbeat starts to race as she elbows her way closer; as she cuts off a man waiting for one of the three doors to open.

She raps hard on the wooden door. 

It flies open quickly - like he’d known, like Elliot had been standing there on the other side of it; like he could feel it, in the pattern of her knuckles on the wood - and she crowds him as she pushes her way in through the threshold, and slams the door shut behind her. 

Her shoulder rocks into his chest, hard. 

He doesn’t move at all.

She turns to face him. 

“Olivia,” he warns her. 

He exhales, harsh through his nose. She can hear it over the fan in the bathroom; over the muted sounds outside. He turns, and braces his hands on the sink. With his dress shirt sleeves rolled up, she can see the bulging veins in his arms; the grayish-black ink of his tattoo. She can see how tense he is, how hard he is holding on. 

“I just need to cool down,” he mutters, eyes on himself in the mirror. 

The stall is tiny, an ugly black and white tiled floor, a copper sink that doesn’t match at all and looks, she thinks, perpetually dirty. That’s the problem with copper, she’s heard. If you don’t clean it exactly right every time, it always looks like this. Streaky, unclean; until you strip it all the way back down to start over. 

“I just- I need a minute,” he says. 

She fixes her gaze on him. The light is shitty, but she can see him this close. His lower lip is chapped, angrily torn apart, and there is a storm still lingering in his eyes.

She wants to yell, so, so badly. She wants him to yell, too. Elliot doesn’t need a minute. 

He needs to let go. 

“Everyone left,” she tells him, instead. Indirectly giving him some sort of tacit permission. He doesn’t need to worry about her status, how this will look. He doesn’t need to worry about her being the Captain right now. 

She pushes, tries the easiest button. If he can’t tell he’s angry, that he’s mad at her, maybe she can get him over that bridge like this: 

“If you think I was wrong to pull you out today, now’s the time to say it,” she demands.

Elliot blinks back at her. He has one hand balled into a fist; the other flat on the vanity of the ugly copper sink. She feels a frisson of something churning in her gut, and her heart beat keeps up its hurried staccato. 

“Everyone’s leaving,” she says again. “We can talk about — ”

“I don’t want to talk about this,” Elliot interrupts. “I don’t want to. Olivia — ” 

She hears the warning tone again, and she keeps watching him, waiting, and she still thinks it’s going to happen. If she pushes a little bit more, if she shoves a little bit harder, it’s going to happen. Here in this bathroom; the fan above them pulling out the air; masking any other noise but their breathing. Here in this bathroom, she thinks, where the air is frozen, where all the air conditioning must be funneled right in. 

Go on, she thinks. 

“Elliot,” she says, drawing out that middle syllable; tongue pushed to the roof of her mouth. She knows they both hear the provocation in the way she says his name, but she doesn’t care anymore. “Tell me.”

Elliot’s eyes stay fixed on hers, warily. She feels like they’re stuck in a boxing ring, right before the bell dings, right before they both lurch forward. 

She needs him to say it. She needs him to tell her he was angry; to say it out loud. To be mad, and not to be afraid of that anger because she can take it. She can take the version of him that no one else could stomach. 

She always could. 

Say it. 

She opens her mouth to tell him exactly that, but he’s too quick. 

“Liv — ”

Her name is a growl, as one hand finds her waist, the other at the nape of her neck as he pulls her close. Elliot’s mouth is crushed against hers, teeth and tongue and hurried lips and all of the unsaid words there, and because she loves him - and because she has done the same; buried feelings inside of the physical, and because she has had two glasses of bourbon and it feels so, so good to at least have something - she gives it right back. 

His mouth tastes like beer and pesto and it is so shockingly cold; tongue ice against hers like he’d just drained the last of his drink. She moans, and he surges forward; her ass against the sink, the frigid drag of his lips against her neck as he starts to move. 

It is quick, Elliot‘s hands sliding down her body, yanking her shirt loose; pulling at her belt and the buttons of her fly. They both tug them down together, denim catching at mid thigh as she huffs, frustrated, and they both give up. 

It doesn’t slow him down. 

Elliot finds her again. His mouth on her neck makes her shiver, the heavy drag of his fingertips on the outside of her just as cold. On her shoulder, on the cotton of her shirt and the swell of her breast. On the skin he tugs out of the cup, rough and needy; cold lips around a nipple as his hand moves between them. The lap of his tongue is warmer, but only slightly, and the chill on the pad of his thumb makes her jump. 

She is aching and it’s not right but it’s not wrong, either.

It’s never wrong, this part. 

And she loves him, even when it’s not quite right. 

“Please,” she pleads as his fingertip teases at her entrance. She pants, open mouthed and needy into the air; her arm around his neck so tight. “Please, Elliot just fucking do — ”

She’s cut off by her own guttural moan when his finger slides in. One, then another, sinking into where she is warm; where she’s all wet heat and burning ache and this is quick too. Olivia is already right on the edge, so keyed up and so needy for something that it barely takes anything at all. His thumb, warming steadily against her clit, his teeth grazing her nipple; his fingers plunging in and out of her again and again. 

She steadies herself on the sink with one hand, and holds on. 

“Fuck, Olivia, fuck, fuck — ”

She can just hear it, too. He’s turned on, she knows, but there’s something else in there too and when she reaches down between them with her free hand, and curls it around his wrist, she feels it. With her eyes closed, and her head tilted back, she feels it in the tension of his wrist, the rumble of his voice as he says her name in his chest, and she is so, so close, already. 

“Need you to — Elliot,” she gasps. “Harder.” 

His other hand grips her waist to steady at her; rough at first and then immediately easing up, his thumb brushing and smoothing softly against silvery skin pulled tight, even as he sinks the fingers of his other hand deeper, harder. His ragged breathing fills her ear; her own sounds of pleasure caught in her own throat. 

“What to you need, Liv?” he grunts. “You need more?” 

She tries to tell him, but it’s just a soft cry and a whine; keening and loud when he crooks his two fingers deep. 

She doesn’t know what she needs. 

She needs him to say it, she knows. 

She needs him to show her, but she needs him to say it, too, and she needs him to know he can do both those things but fuck.

Fuck.

Right now she needs him to finish this, at least. She needs him to finish fucking her with his fingers; needs him to drag her over that edge and when she opens her eyes, she gasps. Loud, and filling the room, because Elliot is dropping to his knees; his fingers buried to the knuckle inside her still, his eyes directed straight up at her and his other hand splaying huge on her ass and holding her there. Before she can utter another gasp of surprise, before she can say another fucking word his mouth is on her.

She jumps, jolts at how cold his mouth still feels but he holds her there tightly, bicep straining as he mouths at her. Each pass of his tongue is hard, harsh, and his mouth still feels too cold by far but she’s too far gone now. He devours her, sucking her clit; big nose smashed to her pubic bone and his fingers thick and curling inside of her as she whimpers. 

And that, at least, brings the heat. 

White and sharp and blindingly hot, it radiates out as her knees shake, as she holds on so tight. 

“Fuck - oh - oh — ”

Her cry is too loud, too sharp; the copper edge of the sink biting into her ass. Her cunt clenches, contracts, and she hinges forward against him. The waistband of her jeans digs into her thigh, and Elliot’s tongue and fingers keep working slower and slower. She lets her eyes flutter open, chin tilted down to see him, and through the haze of it, she realizes.

It didn’t change a thing.

She still feels on edge, still feels everything she felt before and she tugs at Elliot roughly. He stands, and his fingers slide out of her; still sticky and tacky with her as they wrap at her waist. 

He is breathing so hard against her. 

His head dips low, close to her ear. She feels them brush against her ear. His body still feels so tense against hers, and then she feels his breath, ragged and curling and hot against her ear. The only warm thing in the room. 

She could fuck him right here, and she knows it wouldn’t do the trick. 

It’s not enough this time. 

She pushes him away from her gently. She uses her hands to pull at her jeans, shaking her head as she looks at him, the blue in his eyes so achingly sharp. It’s there, at least - the truth - when he stares back at her. 

Even if he won’t admit it. 

The haze of the alcohol is gone, and she can see clearly now. She starts to fix the rest of her clothes in a rush, shaking her head. 

“You’re never going to let go, are you?” Olivia asks. 

***

Elliot starts as soon as they tumble out of the front door. He stops on the curb, like they’re going to stand here and finish this while they wait for Mikael to get here with their Lyft. 

His eyes search hers, confusion in the depths of them as he tries to suss out what the fuck is going on.

“What the fuck are you talking about, Oliv— ”

She grabs his arm roughly, and pulls him around the corner. She’s already crossed about ten fucking lines in front of their teams. They’re not going to do this in front of the goddamn bar. He goes, lets her move him. She stops, halfway down the narrow alley, and he pulls his arm away. 

Olivia stares at him. Open-mouthed and breathing hard, he glares back at her. His back is to the street; hers to the wall at the end of the alley. In the dark like this, she shouldn’t be able to see the way the anger lingers in his eyes, but she supposes she’s had more practice than most. 

“Was I wrong?” she asks. “Tell me I was wrong.” 

Her heart is racing. She can feel it in her chest; in her throat, in her ears; pounding in her lips. He has tried avoiding this, and they have both tried burying it the way they know works, and it’s still not enough. 

“Elliot — ”

Elliot rubs at his nose, tugs at the end and shakes his head. He still won’t answer, though, and she digs; two heels into the fucking quicksand as she eyes him. 

“You’re mad at me and you’ve been holding it in all fucking night, Elliot but you won’t tell me. Just - tell me I was wrong,” she shouts. She is goading him now; is trying so hard to get him to where she knows he’s fighting so hard not to be. 

“You think I was wrong, and you won’t say it - but was I wrong?” 

He laughs, loud and angry and harsh. 

“You kneecapped me today, Olivia,” Elliot says, finally. It’s still not an answer, but she doesn’t stop him. He’s so close to breaking. “You stopped me right when I had him in my fucking sights because you thought I couldn’t handle myself.” 

He goes on, momentum building; words coming out frenetic and fast. 

“You were wrong, and — ”

Elliot stops himself again. She watches, transfixed.

He bites down on his lip, rough. The muscles in his neck are taut, tense. His shoulders almost shake with it; that deep restraint he’s still trying so hard to have. She sees his fingers flex, watches him dig them into his palms. 

He is still trying so, so hard. 

He has gotten entirely too practiced at this in all these years away. She thought if she could get him to say she was wrong, that he disagreed, it would be enough. Enough for him to break, and let go. Still, she sees it. In his eyes, like this, she can see it - that flicker that refuses to be extinguished. 

“You’re right,” she says. 

Olivia takes one step in, her eyes on his in the dark. Her phone vibrates in her pocket, their warning that their driver is close. She should stop him, tell him to pause this until they walk through her door, but he’s going and she doesn’t want this to stop. 

“I did,” she admits. “I did kneecap you. I thought you were about to go past the point of no return so - I stopped it.” 

Elliot blinks, confused at her words; her easy admission. 

She draws even closer, eyes narrowing as she tells him: 

“I stopped you.” 

He is so close she can hear every breath that he takes. Slow, measured, his mouth gaping slightly open as he tries to catch his breath in the fetid, humid thick air in this alley. The sweat on the small of her back is pooling, gathering under her arms and behind her knees. She can see it on his brow, under the arms of his dress shirt, too. She’s noticed now that when Elliot sweats, it beads on top of his head. Sometimes when she’s on top of him - when she’s driving it, when she’s taking what she needs - she feels it under her chin, pressed against her sternum. His limbs tremble with the restraint as he holds her and tries not to move, but she can always feel it. 

After she comes, she likes to roll them both so she’s underneath. She likes to watch how Elliot’s face goes slack and his eyes go soft and she likes to urge him on, her voice low and raspy; her fingers digging into the meat of his ass. 

She likes how raw it is, the sound of skin slapping and his cock driving into her; her sheets damp underneath them both. 

“Show me,” she’ll pant, close to his ear. “Let me see it.” 

She likes to watch Elliot in those last moments when he finally lets go.

She likes how he can’t hold back then. How his groans become grunts become something else entirely; rumbling utterances of her name. She likes how he - how they - gets messy; the sweat dripping down the side of his face, pooling hot between them as she holds on tight. The slick between her thighs, the sweat on her sheets; the smell of sex hanging heavy in the air. When it’s over she shivers, the feel of it all so blissfully overwhelming. His weight above her; everything they’ve shared leaking between them. His heated damp cheek; head, body pressed against hers as they breathe. 

They don’t hold any of it back for propriety’s sake.

She likes the mess.

She eyes Elliot now, holding so still. Holding in the mess that is him. 

“I was fine. You were wrong,” he says hoarsely. 

His breath is harsh, slow and unsteady. She can see it in his gaze. Intense and focused on her; the flicker finally starting to spread. 

“I would have been fine,” he tells her. “You didn’t need to stop me.” 

It’s still not enough. 

Olivia shrugs. 

“Maybe,” she tells him. She can see him starting to bend, starting to break. Starting to finally let go of the fight to hold back. “Maybe not. But I did stop you today, Elliot. I don’t know if I was right, but I’d do it again because I saw something. Are you — ”

Her phone buzzes again. 

She ignores it. 

She keeps her eyes trained on his. 

“Are you mad about that?” she demands. “Are you mad at me, Elliot?” 

She sees it then, finally. The second before it happens, she sees it and it is so, so twisted that the first thing she feels is the rush of relief. When his eyes go angry; when the flash so dark, she feels relief. 

“Yes I’m fucking mad!” he explodes. 

He moves close and she can feel him; feel the burning heat he throws off of him. She can feel it between them. She wants to throw her phone on the ground, and wrap her whole fucking body around him right here in the alley. She wants scrapes from the bricks on her back; she wants his knees red from the pavement. She wants to revel in this feeling, his blood finally set to the same boiling heat as her own. 

“Of course I’m mad, Olivia,” he says, voice cracking in the middle of her name; glowering and close and burning alive. “I’ve been mad at you all fucking night.” 

He glares at her, narrowed eyes so close and it is so, so horribly twisted how much she wanted this. How much she craved it, this raw and real reaction. They are never going to be good at communicating; never going to be the two who sit down and calmly and rationally parse every piece of this out, but she needs him to know he can do this. 

She needs him to know how much she needs this part of him, too. 

“I’ve been mad at you since you pulled me from the fucking room, Olivia.”

She stares back. Elliot’s eyes are wild, angry; every part of him tense with it. The air feels electric with it, palpable and heated and god. 

God. 

She feels so fucking relieved. 

Olivia reaches for him and he comes, immediately. Like instinct; all that dormant muscle memory as her hand curves around his face; and his fingers find the jut of her hip. For a moment she thinks about kissing him, here, taking his lips rough and harsh again with her own this time, but she doesn’t. 

They’re not done yet. 

She lets her forehead rest against his, though. Her other hand finds his arm; the width of his bicep and she holds him there. They stay right there - his hand slowly drifting to rest on the small of her back - until both their breathing has evened, slowed.

“Are you still mad?” she asks. 

Elliot’s answer comes in the smallest of nods; his forehead still pressed against hers. A small half grunt; half grumble that sounds like yes as his fingertips slide under the hem of her shirt.

He is so, so warm against her.

“Ok,” she breaks away eventually. She repeats it, nodding her own head now. 

“Ok, ok — ”

She looks at him. It was a battle to get here and this is hardly resolved at all, but it’s out there, now. They need to finish this. 

Quickly, before either one of them registers what’s happening at all, she finds his lips with hers. Fast, and just the press of her lips as she digs her fingers into his arm. Her thumbnail digs into the ditch of his elbow and she doesn’t ease up. 

Pleasure tied right to that little bit of pain. 

Against his open mouth, she whispers. 

“Let’s go home, Elliot.” 

***

This time, Elliot orders the ride share. 

Michael with Uber is there in under a minute; a tan Hyundai Santa Fe waiting at the curb as they emerge out of the alley. Elliot holds the door open for her, waiting for her to slide in. Michael has every air conditioning vent open; the interior an ice box as the door shuts behind them. 

They sit close, thigh to thigh; heat still bleeding through his shirt onto her bare arms. Elliot’s hand finds her thigh eventually. 

They both look straight ahead for a long, long time. 

She’s not sure what will happen if either turns. 

Michael’s music is low, an XM pop station playing the same ten songs all night. She recognizes this one from her living room; the refrain played on every other Tik Tok that her son scrolls through. 

Elliot breaks the silence in the backseat, first. 

“It wasn’t about - it wasn’t about taking an order from you,” he mutters. His thumb presses against the outside of her knee. His voice is low, not sullen but not contrite. 

It’s definitely not apologetic.

“It wasn’t a captain thing,” Elliot says. His fingers splay the whole width of her thigh like this. The sweat on both of them is drying, making her shiver; but his palm is still a source of almost unbelievable heat. “It was - maybe it was about my partner not trusting me, but I wasn’t - I wasn’t second guessing you as the boss, Olivia.“ 

“I know,” she says softly. 

She did know - from the beginning, she knew - but she lets him say it anyway. Olivia slides her hand over his. She remembers a half dozen fights they had over the years in front of all of their squad mates, and adds, quietly.

“And I’m glad you didn’t explode in the squad room.” 

Elliot does turn in then, his brow knitted; puzzlement written all over his face. It is confusing - how she’d goaded him into this outburst, then thanked him for not doing it before. 

She’d assumed he’d figure it out by now. 

“So wait what was - what was that about? Were you going to — ”

She squeezes her fingers over his, knowing it’s coming. His voice gets louder, and she catches Michael's eyes flicking up to the rearview mirror, checking in. She shakes her head, small and almost imperceptible, appreciating the concern of her Uber driver; knowing how it looks. 

I’ve got this. 

She knows both men see it. 

“You needed to hear me say you were wrong?” Elliot asks, voice lower this time. 

There’s still heat in his voice, but it’s softer; closer. She leans up, and adjusts the vent that’s blowing cold air down on her, sliding it halfway shut. 

“No,” she says firmly when she’s done. “It wasn’t about who was right.” 

She looks over at Elliot, then. She’s not quite sure how to say it: I am so sick of you trying to water yourself down for me and for this. I need you to be you. 

Elliot stares back at her. 

“You keep tiptoeing around your reactions with me,” she says softly. 

He blinks and his eyes stay shut and for a moment she’s not sure they’ll open back up again. When they do, she steels herself for what she’ll see there as she finishes.

“You can’t even admit when you’re mad, Elliot.” 

She sees it, again then, in the same exact place. This time it’s entirely different. There is no visible recoil, no flinch, no movement at all. 

It’s the way his eyes change, as he stares back at her. 

Elliot was angry before - and he probably still is, somewhere deep inside there - but she sees it now. In the depths of them, staring back at her in the back of a Santa Fe; goosebumps on her arms as she shivers in the recycled, cold air. 

He’s hurt, she realizes. 

He was trying so hard. 

*** 

The rest of the ride is silent, and she sits with it. 

They both sit with it. 

Olivia second guesses herself - of course, she does, because she loves him and that is her burden to bear and her saving grace both at once, but she does - when she sees the hurt. 

She tries to remember why she did what she did. 

It’s because she loves all of him. 

Elliot stands with his back to the wall next to her door as she opens it. He looks straight ahead, all the way down the hall past her. When the keys turn and the door slides open and Olivia walks all the way through, he stands back, waiting out in the dimly lit hallway. The air in her apartment is heavy, still, warmer than it should be. 

She wonders if she forgot to adjust the temperature before she left; forgot to flip it back down to make way for the heat wave. 

She turns to face him. 

His eyes finally meet hers again. 

She studies him for a moment. He is so big sometimes; this Elliot Stabler. Broad everywhere - chest, stomach, thighs, even the almost over built muscles of his neck. His huge hands engulf pieces of her when he touches her; cover her stomach, her ass, her breast, with the splay of a hand. 

It seems fitting, somehow, that his frame looms as large as he did in her mind for so long. 

“Are you coming in?” she asks softly.

He takes a step forward, stopping short of entering. One hand reaches out, his big palm flat on the door frame. 

“Do you really want this, Olivia? Me, like — ”

For a moment, her eyes go big, her mouth falling open, a touch of heartbreak clutching at her, making her chest ache that he would question it. That Elliot would think that she didn’t - want him, him like this - and that he would be so unsure that he would feel like he needed to question her. 

She feels bad, for a moment. 

But then she keeps looking at him, and she keeps watching him, and she sees Elliot - Elliot who knows, knows exactly how hard she fought herself to get here, exactly how deep this love she holds is - and any pity leaves her abruptly.

“Are you kidding me?” she snaps. 

She steps aside as she says it, granting him access. Elliot lets go of the door frame and walks in, not gentle or light on his feet at all. 

“I mean,” she starts, her voice blistering as she slams her keys down on her foyer table. They miss, fall on the floor, and she ignores them; her eyes still on Elliot. 

He shuts the door behind himself, and reaches down, grabbing the keyring on the ground. He turns to put them down gently; to place them softly in the glass bowl she keeps on the edge of the foyer table just for this. There’s a spare key to his mother’s place in there, too; an old key fob to a car he’d never once seen her drive that she keeps moving from place to place. 

“I mean - come the fuck on, Elliot,” she grits out. 

Olivia keeps going, deeper into her living room; deeper into this at the same time. 

“Do I really want you?” she scoffs. “After all this fucking time, do I really want you? ”

His head swivels quickly. 

“Exactly, that’s exactly - yeah.”

He stops, and she shakes her head. They aren’t going to hit pause on this, not this time. She turns all the way around in the middle of her living room, facing him. 

She approaches him with zero tentativeness. 

“Don’t stop, Elliot. Tell me, that’s exactly what?” 

“After all this time - that’s exactly why I keep stopping,” he grinds out. His eyes blaze into hers. He comes closer to her, this time, drawing up so he is literally toe to toe with her. “It took you - it took us years to fucking get here, Olivia. If I have been trying to tiptoe — ”

He throws her own word at her, sarcastic and biting as he glowers back at her. 

“— around it, it’s because I don’t want to piss you off and set us back.” 

“You were grieving your wife, Elliot,” she reminds him. It’s a little unfair to throw it back in his face, she’s well aware, but there’s no way that he gets to shove all the blame back on her. Yes, she hesitated on this, yes she fucking deflected and delayed, but it wasn’t just on her.

“You can blame me all you want for waiting, but you weren’t always ready, either,” she says and when she looks down at his hands, flexed and huge. She knows she doesn’t have to say it: a ghost, a ring, an unending cycle of grief that was stained with his guilt. 

“Maybe,” Elliot shrugs. “Maybe that was part of it.”

She can feel the anger; flushing her skin, burning inside of her. She didn’t think they’d end up here, dragging all of this up to the surface, but she doesn’t hate it all. Her heart thumps wildly, and her chest is rising and falling and it feels so, so good. 

“Or - ”

He eyes her as he says it. His necktie askew, top button unbuttoned; his own cheeks and neck red as she reels. The stubble on his face has only darkened since this afternoon. He has the gaul to look smug, even through his anger as he goes on. 

“Maybe you were just afraid, Olivia and I was trying not to spook you this whole time, because - fuck.” 

She scoffs, but he shakes his head and doesn’t give her a second to answer. 

“Because - I am terrified, Olivia, about you pulling back because of me,” he finishes. 

It’s a good barb. It makes fucking sense, and it stings her, sharp and biting, even if she hates that it does. Elliot knows it, and that smug look returns to his face. He thinks he won, she realizes.

She scoffs, and shakes her head. 

“Spook me, Elliot? That’s not why we waited — ”

He cuts her off, infuriating and rude and exactly the man he was twenty years ago. 

“It’s part of it, and you know it. Maybe you’d have come to the fucking beach for a weekend in August if I had pushed but I was afraid to push. I am afraid to push. ”

Olivia laughs, loud and harsh and filling her living room. She knew it, knew it that day in her kitchen over dinner when he’d asked and she’d deflected; shoved it gently away and waited for him to push it right back. He never had, but she knew it. 

“You were mad about that,” she fires back. 

“Of course I was fucking mad about that,” he shouts. “You’ve known my kids since they were in diapers, Olivia.”

He stares at her then, looks at her so deeply that she’s sure with anyone else she’d have to blink and look away. 

“They wanted you and Noah there.” 

Well.

Well he should have fucking said that, maybe. 

He should have fucking said that, because now it’s almost two months later and they are on roughly their third real fight of the night, and god. God, they could have done this months ago; started these back and forths and these fights because it feels like they’ve finally found themselves. The sex is amazing and the relationship is good, a bright point she was always afraid it might not be, but this. 

This is them. 

Buried at their core, molten and swirling - a flaw, maybe; but an antagonistic attribution they both share - and she wants this part of him as much as every other one. 

Olivia arches an eyebrow. 

He gnaws on that fucking lip, and thumbs at his nose. 

“What else are you tiptoeing around?” she asks, finally. “Holding back on? I’m not going anywhere, Elliot, so tell me.” 

He stares back at her, brows furrowed. 

“What else?” she demands. “Are you not glad about?”

Elliot blinks back at her. She sees the second it dawns on him; the second he remembers it, that picture, in a drawer. 

“I wasn’t mad about that,” he tells her. 

Voice gravelly, and so low that she’d have to strain if she wasn’t standing right here, close enough to hear the slow, long way he exhales, too. 

”You weren’t glad about it though,” she says softly. 

For the first time since they’ve started this, Elliot looks away. He blinks, and casts his eyes down before he answers. When he finally does, she can hear him measure each word.

“I am happy that you had him,” he starts slowly. “I am happy that you were happy. I am happy, Olivia that you were loved like you should have been but if you’re asking me - fuck.” 

“I wasn’t mad,” he repeats.

He reaches for her, fingers finding the loose, heavy strand of hair that’s curled in the heat. He pushes it back, and his fingertips ghost against her cheekbone and he is so, so gentle; even as he says his next words with such a vehemence that her whole body aches for more. 

“If you’re asking me if it doesn’t eat me up inside a little - and if you’re asking me if I wanted to act like a jealous asshole that night and stand there and I don’t know — ”

Elliot is staring at her, eyes narrowed and full of heat and she thinks maybe he gets it now. From the way he’s looking at her and the way he’s holding her; from the way he’s finally being so brutally fucking honest with his words and his actions both. 

This is all she wanted, this whole time. 

“React,” he murmurs. 

She thinks this may be the most they’ve talked since they started this; the most honest they’ve actually been since she told him she wanted to do this. It’s so, so twisted to feel vindicated that he’d felt jealous of a dead man - to feel vindicated that she’d been right about it, too - but she was right about this, and she was right about him holding back other things too, and they’re saying it finally. 

Elliot’s hand slides down; his thumb trailing slowly. It brushes down the line of her jaw; down the pulse that’s pounding on the side of her neck. Down to where it settles finally; at the hollow of her throat. She is perfectly still underneath his touch, minus the rapid flutter of her pulse; the increased tempo of her breathing. 

“I wanted to react, Olivia,” he growls. 

Her whole body goes hot. 

Everywhere, like she is burning up from the inside out. Her breath catches and her stomach swirls and her cunt aches with it, the heavy need and desire pooling and threatening to burst. 

This is decidedly not where she’d thought they’d end up when that hurt flashed in his eyes - another argument behind them, and whatever this is building right now - but she thinks it’s probably the most right they’ve been yet. 

The most real, at least. 

And he understands, finally. 

She reaches up, her hand grasping his wrist. Her fingers grip tight enough that she knows she might bruise him; like she’s clinging to that lifeline as he drags her home. 

“I want you to know that you can, Elliot,” she murmurs. 

She drags him as close as she can then, uses her grip on his wrist to pull him in close. Right before she crushes her lips against his, she reminds him: 

“I can handle it.” 

***

He is warm everywhere. 

His whole body, pressed against hers here in the living room - even through the wrinkled remnants of a suit shirt that will need to be dry cleaned after the day it’s seen - is burning. 

Elliot’s mouth is open, his tongue sliding eagerly against hers, wet and warm and demanding; his hands on her hips backing her into the television cabinet blindly. She hits it with a jolt; with a gasp, and he freezes for a second, his mouth still pressed to hers. 

“Don’t stop — ” 

It comes out strangled, raspy with her need and half stuck in her throat. She shakes her head, and she grabs him; two palms on his face, and keeps kissing him. She’s fine, she’s good; the split second it stung is over now and she needs to keep going. 

Don't stop, don’t stop, don’t stop. 

She needs him to keep going. 

He does.

Elliot surges forward again, his head still cradled roughly in her hands; his mouth claiming hers again. She thanks god for the doors that shut; for the fact that she’d bothered to close them this morning. If not for that, her television would be teetering back, driven by the way he rocks against her. Moved by the way she welcomes it; urges him on with the needy cry she lets out when his thigh slides between hers. 

It’s so good. 

It’s good, and it’s overwhelming and he’s not holding back at all, not anymore. Elliot is reacting - to today, to tonight, to her words and his own feelings, finally - and she is reacting right back; needy and hungry and starved for this Elliot. 

It is them. 

It’s their two burning hot bodies rocking together; their two mouths chasing and their two tongues demanding, chasing; tangling. Elliot rocks his knee against her cunt, and she grinds herself down with a half groaned plea - pleasepleaseplease - and he has the gaul to smirk, mouth open against hers. 

He halts her, holds her there with his strong hands on her hips. He doesn’t pin her. She can squirm, rock down, drag herself against the meat of his thigh, but there’s no friction and she huffs, annoyed. 

“Easy, baby,” he warns, lips close, but not touching hers; his crooked smile pressed to her. “Don’t just — ”

He catches the corner of her lips quickly, and laughs into the kiss. She tries to chase it, tries to lean into it and reclaim his mouth, but he hovers just that far away. She feels the laugh in the rumble of his chest as he pulls back to tell her. 

“Don’t just react.” 

The fucking nerve, she thinks, but then Elliot’s loosening his grip on her waist, and his thigh is sliding away as his hands move to her waistband. She thinks he’s heading down - ready to fumble with the button fly again, ready to help her pull the tight denim down - but instead he finds the hem of her shirt, and his hand slides underneath and she gasps, loud and open mouthed into his at how hot his palm feels as it slides against the soft skin of her belly. 

They ruck it up together, and she pulls it off ungracefully and then his hand is right back where it was, drifting slowly up her body. 

She lets him for a moment. It feels like hours, achingly slow; the rough, calloused skin of his palm gliding up, caressing, but it’s probably not even a minute before she pushes into it, his hand flat against the slope of her stomach, thumb running along the underside of her bra. It’s too light, not enough. They’d run headfirst into this minutes ago and now he’s slowing it down, drawing it out, and it’s making her crazy. 

She needs him. 

She needs Elliot - the bulk of him, the press of him; that crazy heat of him, steel burning against her - and she keeps pushing; keeps trying to arch her back and her hips so his hand moves higher; so that there’s some sort of contact between them. She wants to feel how hard he is for her; wants his cock pressed into the soft slopes of her belly, the jut of her hip. She wants his mouth on her anywhere; hungry and messy and moving. 

Not this drifting, slow pace of his palm; the ghost of a touch from his thumb. 

“C’mon,” she urges him. 

Olivia tilts her head back so she can see him; catch his eyes with her own. He’s staring - smiling, something knowing and well aware - and his gaze makes her want to fucking beg. 

Instead she angles her chin, and grabs his tie in between them. She doesn’t yank, but she isn’t gentle either. She feels the resistance, the obstinate way he gives her almost nothing. She is well aware he’s strong enough; that the thick muscles of his neck could withstand her pull, but he grants her just enough give so his mouth is close again. 

“Come on,” she hisses. “Do something.” 

He stays there, his smile slowly fading. Not faltering, not falling away, but fading. Her breath hot on his lips, the strain of the back of his neck working against her. It fades, replaced by the smolder in his eyes; his tongue darting out as he slides his hand up, between them.

Still. So. Slowly. 

She manages to land her own lips on him; on the stubbled, hard line of his jaw and she sucks, nips and bites as he works a thumb in; dipping the cup of her bra. She drops her grip on his tie when she sinks her teeth in - right at the corner of his jaw; right where the skin is tender and soft. Elliot lets out a low, ragged growl and she’s rewarded almost instantly with the yank of her bra cup down; the splay of his hand on the flesh as he grasps her. 

She keeps going, mouthing at that spot, licking and breathing in the sharp smell and taste of his sweat; his need.

Elliot keeps going too. 

“This?” he asks. “Is this it?” 

He kneads at her, squeezes, tugs the other side loose and thumbs roughly at her nipple. No nimble fingers, no delicate touch. 

“Tell me,” he urges, her own words from earlier in a bar bathroom. “Like this?” 

Elliot grunts, self satisfied and loud, when she whines, high pitched and needy at the way he pinches so lightly; at the way he uses the rough pads of his fingertips, the exact amount of sting. The light smart of pain is just fucking right. 

“Yeah, yes, Elliot,” she groans out his name, ragged and loud, lips and chin catching on the bristle on his face. She pleads, and tries to rock herself against him. When she still can’t quite get there; still can’t make contact, she huffs inpatient and annoyed; and tries to command him. 

“Like this, please.” 

“Settle down,” he reminds her. “Let me — ”

He settled between her; cock hard through his dress pants, digging into her belly underneath his buckle. They both groan then, neither trying to stifle the relief of that contact, and she can hear the breath hitch in his chest as Elliot ruts himself, seeking out the soft give of her belly. 

She pushes back against him, needy, eager. 

“You trust me?” he asks. His voice is so, so low and thick. “Right?” 

Olivia nods. The whole point of this - all of this - was reminding him that she did. She does. She trusts all of him. 

“Yeah,” she pants. His fingers don’t stop moving, plucking, rolling, working her nipple. It makes her head spin; makes her dizzy with want. Her breath is coming so fast. 

“I just need — ”

Before she can finish, she breaks off because Elliot is ducking his head down low; settling his lips around a nipple and tonguing it rough and slow and wet all at once and fuck. 

It has been physical before, they aren’t strangers to this, but it feels different tonight. Freeing themselves even more on the other end of this; another branch on the path they’d blocked off in their journey pulled off to the side. 

She arches too far back to keep mouthing at him, the back of her head hitting the cabinet. She reaches for him to steady herself, arm looping around his neck. Damp with sweat ringing on his shirt collar, and as hot there as he is everywhere else. Her own stomach feels warm, slick and damp and between her legs she knows she’s already wet again; can feel it in the damp cling of cotton against her cunt. 

He keeps going, moving back and forth between them; lapping, sucking, grazing his teeth on the sensitive peaks. Wet and sloppy, her skin slick and glistening with his split. In the morning, the swells of her breasts will be red, raw from the scratch of his stubble. Right now he is full force ahead, mouth and one hand on her tits; the other snaking between them to try to work her fly free. 

Still, he moves, so, so slow.  

“Elliot,” she gasps when he works his hand down her pants, when he cups her through sticky, damp cotton. She feels hot everywhere; centered right in her core and spreading. His finger crooks just slightly, barely pushing against the fabric, and she tries not to grind down; tries not to seek. He drags it back and forth, barely any contact at all, a low, deep sound from the barrel of his chest uttered against her as he feels how soaked she is. 

And she whimpers. 

Loudly; high and desperate, no shame at all in how much she needs him.

Elliot’s mouth falls away from her breast; cool air hitting the damp skin. 

“You feel — god, baby,” he says, and she feels a little fucking smug at how breathless he sounds. How in awe he sounds as he goes on, using one finger to pull her underwear to the side; sliding another through her instead of fabric. 

“You feel so perfect, Olivia.” 

He runs it slowly there, slicking his finger, coating it and if she’s being honest, she’s in awe too. She’d already come once - quick, and almost brutally, back in the single stall bathroom in the bar - and it hasn’t been that long. It should be harder for him to get her this wet; at her age, through the lingering traces of bourbon slowly driving themselves away. 

It - she - shouldn’t be this — 

“Oh fuck, Elliot,” she groans when he dips a finger in, down to the knuckle in a single stroke. 

He doesn’t stay; slicks it back out and waits. Just for a moment, just for a split second, but long enough that she chases it, rocks her hips forward and tries, and then his finger is back in, and his mouth is hot and close to her ear and she can barely breathe. Elliot’s whole body is burning through his shirt and pants, pressed against hers and it’s good - it’s so, so good; his fingers inside of her, working her - the heat and heft of him against her but it’s not enough. She gasps it out, pleads for more, fuck more but he doesn’t give in. 

He’s still moving just on the edge of too slow. 

He’s doing it on purpose, she knows now. Goading her body like she did his mind, today. Reading her, teasing her; playing her until she fucking reacts and she does, finally; her own fingers curling around his forearm to stop him. 

He chuckles, low and husky. 

“Not enough? You need more — ”

He doesn’t finish before she’s reaching for him. She cups him through tailored pants she still can’t believe he owns; through pants that he would have rolled his eyes at twenty years ago. Pants that barely contain him as is, and pants that strain now; his cock hard and jutting and burning right through them. 

“Yes,” she grinds out. 

“Jesus Christ,” he gasps. 

His hips jerk once, wild and eager before he regains himself. His hand leaves her body to brace himself on the doors of her cabinet. Olivia palms him, rough, and she fixes her gaze on his. His eyes are dark, smoldering as she curls her hand around him. She watches Elliot swallow, the muscles of his throat still tense.

“Yes, I need more,” she grits out. 

He drops his head down, eyes squeezed shut, messily seeking her mouth; but this time she ducks, dips away. She reaches for him with two hands; tugging at his belt, hurriedly yanking as his head lands on her shoulder. As he gives, finally; gives in a little to her once again. His breathing gets harsh and ragged every time her knuckles graze his cock in the scramble and all she can think is she really does just love him so fucking much. 

She needs him so fucking much.

All of him. 

“Liv,” he groans when she finds him; when her hand is full of him. “Liv, Liv — ”

She pumps his cock - not hard enough, she knows, because he thrusts into her touch, the movement of his hips clumsy and erratic - and it’s the first time she’s touched him like this all day. She intends to keep going; keep teasing him and keep up the same game that he’d played, but his breathing is jagged and he’s already moving against her. When she swipes at the head of his cock with her thumb, smearing where he leaks she knows she can’t. 

“You can’t - Olivia,” he warns. 

She can’t, and she doesn’t want to. She just wants him, and it’s clear he’s right there too. His eyes meet hers, gaze focused as he tries to urge her. 

“Liv,” he rasps. “Don’t tiptoe - fuck — ”

She twists her wrist, and he cuts himself off with a groan; and she swears she feels his whole body tremble. 

She strokes him one more time, and she watches him swallow, and try not to move. She watches him try not to buck into her hand; try not to jerk his hips into her touch this time. Against her forearm, the muscles in his stomach twitch. 

“Don’t tiptoe around it,” he manages. 

There it is. 

“I’m not,” she murmurs. 

She catches his chin with her free hand, and drags it up from her shoulder. She kisses him long and slow and needy; a break from the frenetic pace but not a break from the heat at all. 

“I’m not,” she repeats, lips brushing his when they break apart.

His mouth is so hot this close to hers; every breath they take shared between them. She keeps her eyes open, and waits until his open, too. Elliot’s gaze fixes her, eyes hooded and blue and intense as she tells him exactly what she wants, what she needs. She utters her next words against him; open mouthed on an exhale. 

“Need you to fuck me, Elliot.” 

His only answer is a deep, guttural groan, and then it’s a flash after that. Hands scramble to undress themselves, each other. Olivia leaves the remnants of her bra on, tits spilling out, but everything else is off. Elliot’s pants are yanked down by them both, her huff of irritation at how fucking tight, Jesus Christ they are making them give up before he can shed them completely. They land and they stay, pooled at his ankles as he moves back again, catching her and pinning her against her cabinet once again. 

Now it’s speed, speed, speed; both of them aching and craving. 

They move in a tandem, a duo; her reaching for his cock and dragging him close as Elliot catches her thigh, and hitches right at his hip. He’s burning hot in her hands, his cock heavy and thick as she lets go and he presses in. He sinks right into her; her body so slick and ready. It’s one swift stroke; both of them groaning, gasping, her hand on his arm digging and holding. 

It is something, how it feels to be filled by him. By Elliot, by her Elliot, by the man who has promised in this that he won’t hold back anymore. It’s all encompassing; all everything. Her calf burns and her shoulder is going to be bruised from the knob on this cabinet but she doesn’t care. 

This is how she wants him. 

“Jesus, Olivia,” he groans as he starts to move. 

She expects him to move fast, expects him to start doing what she’d begged him to do, but he’s kissing her one more time as he thrusts shallowly, wet and a little messy as she clenches around him, already so close. 

“Just - fuck, I love you,” he says when he breaks away, and she hears the crack in it. She hears the gentle waver, and sees the way his face goes soft when she nods and it’s this Elliot, too. 

This Elliot, the one who’d been so worried about losing her that he’d tried to bury a piece of himself permanently. 

“I love you too,” she reminds him. She is burning up with it - this feeling; this fire - her whole body aflame. She repeats it, lower, huskier; closer. 

“I love you.” 

Then she pitches her hips just slightly, as much as she can like this; urging him on as she watches his eyes change. The heat inside of them stays, but there’s a peacefulness, a relief; and he surges forward then with an eager growl of her name. 

“Yes,” she moans, fingertips digging into his arm; the back of his neck. He’s going to take them both over the edge like this; wild and not holding back. 

Let go.

Elliot starts to piston his hips, starts to hammer them with the urgency they both feel and she grips him tighter. 

I’ll hang on. I’ll stay here. 

He can’t slide in deep - not at this angle, not with their height and bad knees and bad hips - but it’s enough. This, them; his thick cock moving inside of her, filling her, completing her with every stroke in; it’s enough. She’ll feel this, feel him, all day tomorrow; in the hitch in her hip when she stands up, in the stubble burn on her breasts when she dresses, and she’ll be reminded. 

“Perfect,” he pants against her. “You - fuck, Olivia, you’re so — ”

The wood cabinet behind her rattles; shakes, and somewhere in the back of her mind she registers the crash behind the doors. Her television, most likely teetering over, falling and crashing against the back. Elliot doesn’t miss a beat, just keeps pounding into her; his fingers on her thigh holding her up, close. 

The back of his neck beads with sweat, and between them, she can feel his shirt stick to him; to her. It is messy, wild; broken goddamn appliances and a cabinet that may never recover but every time he thrusts back into her, she flies higher and higher and higher. 

She loves this Elliot, this wild Elliot who doesn’t - who was never afraid - to treat her like delicate glass. Since they started, physically at least, they’ve been able to do this, but now he knows that what they have doesn't have to be treated that way, either. 

This Elliot doesn’t hold back, isn’t afraid, not anymore. He is completely hers; to love and to handle with zero delicacy. 

Her back and her ass are hitting the cabinet with every single thrust and she is so, so close, but she need him to know this too. She needs him to know that who he is — 

Is hers. 

“Mine,” she rasps out. “Not going anywhere.” 

“Yours,” he grunts out. 

No hesitation, no break in the unrelenting rhythm. His eyes, fiery and burning for her as he slams into her again and again, echoing it. She is clawing at the back of his neck; at the space between his shoulder blades and the rigid muscle of his arm, but she is holding on.

“Yours, Olivia.” 

She is right there; can feel the pleasure starting to bloom, ready to erupt. Olivia snakes one hand between them - she barely needs it; his cock and the low ridge of his abs are giving her some degree of friction - and he groans; big and shuddery as he feels it. Her two fingers swiping at her clit, slicking through the wetness, the deep pressure and messy circles - it always does something for him, when it’s the two of them working at this together. 

“That’s it, baby,” he pants.

She bursts. Just like that, with Elliot still pounding into her, with her bare ass against a three thousand dollar cabinet. It’s an eruption, a solar flare; a fire that spreads through her like a lightning strike, her whole body shuddering as she mouths his name into his neck. 

Elliot is right there, his cock driving deep and holding in the clutch of her cunt; his own voice still there as he roars out her name. He fills her, pulsing and spilling himself white hot and deep, his head dropping to her shoulder as she holds tight. 

They stay, locked in that embrace - breathing, touching; holding - until her hip aches too much to not move. Elliot slides out of her with a groan, and then it is a wet, messy rush of fluids between them. 

He doesn’t move away. 

He stays close, drawing her in; holding her to his chest. She wraps her own arms around his midsection; around the damp cling of his shirt. His hand smooths down her spine, easy; light. 

When he finally breaks the silence, it is a soft, low laugh. She tilts her up, chin to his chest; one eyebrow arched, and he waits. 

His lips find her temple, and the sweat soaked strands of hair sticking to it. He presses a ghost of a kiss as he murmurs. 

“I think I owe you a new TV set.” 

***

In the shower, later, they are softer; more tender with their touches. 

They wash away the day together. 

It has never been a favorite for her; letting the person she’s with be in here with her the whole time. She’s tolerated it before - let a lover pin her up against the tiled walls; let them sink to their knees on a wet floor - but normally, in the aftermath she stays. She kicks them out with a wry grin, a roll of her eyes about a long hair care routine, and they’ve always gone. 

Just like everything else, it’s different with Elliot. 

“You were probably right,” he mouths against her damp skin. He adds, like she doesn’t already know. “About me in the room.” 

Olivia shrugs against him. 

His arms are loose at her waist, the spray at her back. It’s warm now, not too hot. When she’d started it, it had steamed up the bathroom, the crank on the shower turned all the way over, but she’d adjusted it when they’d stepped in. They won’t stay like this for long, but she likes it more than she’d ever thought she would. Their bodies together for no reason other than this. 

“Maybe,” she murmurs. 

They’re silent for a little bit longer, and she pulls back slowly when she finally moves. The hair on his chest brushes against hers; his belly hard where hers is more soft. His hands stay at her hips, fingers splayed gently behind her as she tilts back, catching her hair under the spray. 

She closes her eyes.

When she opens them, her hair heavy behind her; her mascara undoubtedly running, Elliot is watching her. Their eyes meet, and she waits for it.

She knows there’s something. 

“I, uh — ”

He breathes, and shuts his eyes. She reaches up; hand curving against his cheek. He tilts his chin down, in, so his lips brush her palm. 

“When I first got back, I kept breaking shit,” he tells her. His eyes open up. “Walls, mirrors — ”

She nods. 

“I remember,” she murmurs. 

She’d heard about it from other people back then. His kids, his boss. She’d kept him at arm’s length back then; afraid to step too close to the fray. She was afraid of so many things back then. 

Mainly, admitting the permanence of them was inevitable. 

They’d tried to break it so many times, and it never actually takes. 

Olivia doesn’t let go as she reaches up on her tiptoes, tilting her chin so her lips slant over his. She kisses him with as much fierceness as she can muster in this hazy, sated state as she tries to show him. 

She could say it, she knows; could look in his eyes and ask him to remember all the times they’d tried to shatter this thing, cleave it right in two.

It almost took, the last time, and they’ll both carry the scars from that fracture. 

Still, though. 

Olivia keeps her hand there, forehead tilted against his as she breaks the kiss. Her voice is firm; gentle but as unyielding as she has been all day as she reminds him. 

“Some things you can’t actually break, Elliot.” 

Notes:

I’m earlsofrisk on twitter and bsky and tumblr.