She lets go of Peter's hand when they exit her office. Her squad is becoming more informed with organized crime and their progress with drug investigations into the mafia. She's impressed when they finally seem to be connecting dots between her stalker and drug laundering.
She introduces Peter to the squad, telling them that if they wish for court transcripts of Lewis's trial, and any legal advice, that he'll be working with Carisi. Her eyes land on Elliot mid conversation, and he looks at her unimpressed. She ignores him.
Peter is distracted as he moves over to the white board, arms folded, his eyes scan the photos taken from the stalker's apartment, picks up one of her and Noah, and then one with himself and Olivia in the park and he looks at her in disbelief.
Shit, she thinks. She forgot to tell him about the photos.
Rollins begins to explain, "The photos we found trace back three weeks. We don't think you're in any danger. We've been tracing his online activity and haven't come across your name, yet."
"Yet?" he asks before adding to everyone's surprise. "My apartment was broken into this morning. Does that have anything to do with this?"
"What?" this is new to Olivia, and she perks up, shocked.
"Yea, but I didn't know that it might have anything to do with this."
"Why didn't you say anything?"
"I haven't even reported it yet, Liv. After the airport, I dropped my luggage off and came straight here."
Olivia rubs her forehead in desperation, before beginning to create a plan in her head. "Okay. I want a few unis to go to Stone's apartment. Look for anything unusual and pull out the security hardware in the wall next to the stairs. You should get access to the security footage."
Elliot shifts uncomfortably in his seat, rubs his forehead in frustration. He doesn't want to think about how it is that she knows the layout of his apartment so well, he doesn't want to imagine how many nights she might have spent in his bed, he doesn't want to imagine anything concerning her and this hotshot, redheaded looking lawyer with a power over Elliot that not even he expected to envy.
As the officers' scatter to investigate, the squad detectives remain the room.
Its seconds later that she sees Garland entering the precinct and with a wave of his hand, he requests her toward her office. She excuses herself, leaving Peter alone with the squad.
Almost on instinct, Peter recognizes who Elliot is as he reads his demeanor, and Elliot's response to him being here is just as inaudibly volatile, but neither man make it verbal, despite the tension that grows.
"Did you notice anything strange Mr Stone? Any footprints? Did you go upstairs, did you search?" asked sergeant Bell.
"No, no, nothing. I wasn't really thinking... I thought maybe it was just a robbery. Nothing much was damaged; it was just the padlock that was broken. A few papers thrown on the floor, draws left opened. I had cash in my office desk, but it wasn't taken. I don't know what they could have been looking for."
"So, it's likely that he was looking for the target – captain Benson."
"Did you notice anything taken?" Elliot spoke for the first time, his voice low.
Peter eyed him carefully, unintimidated by the clear and obvious contempt exposed in Elliot Stabler's eyes. Peter carefully contemplated his next words and felt a smug feeling tug at his chest as he said them.
"Yes actually. An engagement ring was taken from the draw in my bedside table."
Peter's gaze refused to unlock with Elliot's, even when silence penetrated the room and all eyes looked up at him, expectantly.
Elliot felt his jaw lock and his fingernails dig sharply into the palms of his hands.
Engagement ring.
Not under my fucking watch, thought Elliot, with his outward demeanor expressing patience while his eyes told another story.
The tension in the room was broken when Kat, ever so oblivious, fist pumped in the air. "No way! Sorry bout the ring, but way to go dude!"
She high fived him and he chuckled. Amanda just looked at the both of them, unimpressed and decidedly over whatever it was that was going on here.
"Good luck. Liv's never really been the marrying type." Elliot announced, a self-satisfied grin taking to his lips as he sat back in his chair.
"Will see about that."
Elliot's eyes clouded and Peter smiled, more than pleased with himself.
Just then, Olivia came barreling out of her office, phone next to her ear with Garland in toe.
"We have him! We have him!" she reveals. Speaking on the phone, she says, "Yes, keep him locked up. Thanks officer, we're on our way."
She hangs up the phone, begins to explain... "Intel got an alert at J.F.K. He was trying to flee the country. They have him arrested in an interrogation room."
The detectives in the room were just as shocked as she was at her report. They all stood up, grabbing their vests and weapons as they quickly began to detail a plan for his pending and official arrest.
Olivia's gaze travelled to Elliot almost as soon as she announced the good news, and he met hers with equal relief in his features.
"Whose idea was it to send out an alert to the boarders?" Garland asks, surprised.
Olivia scratches her brow, suddenly uncomfortable. "I uh... mine. Last night, after talking on the phone to Barba, I remembered that Lewis had a knack for travelling and taking his victims with him." She swallows, blinks back the image of her locked in a trunk and continues. "I can only guess that if this perp was trying to imitate him, he might do the same thing. It was just a hunch."
"It was a good one, captain. Good job."
"It was the squad. Everyone here did a fantastic job, but we aren't finished yet. We should go." She motions for movement, grateful that they're on it.
Her gaze instinctively traverses back to Elliot and finds that he's looking at her hesitantly. "Are you sure it's a good idea you leave too?" he asks her.
Garland, still behind her, agrees with Elliot. "I strongly advise you stay where security can keep an eye out. We're still not certain whether you're safe or not." Her boss tells her.
She feels the gaze of both men rest on her determinedly and she closes her eyes. She was a reasonable woman, always open to negotiation, but she increasingly felt like she was losing control. On cue, she heard Noah's voice in the background. He was talking to Peter in the next room, and her heart stammered as she remembered her responsibility as a parent.
"Fine."
Garland leaves, and she and Elliot are alone. She watches him as he slips on arm protection over his shoulders with ease, as if its lighter than a shirt.
"El..."
"I'll have someone call you after making the arrest. Will bring the son of a bitch straight here for interrogation." Elliot announces, determined. He refuses to look her in the eyes.
"Don't do anything stupid." She begs him, imagines his sturdy arms pinning the perpetrator against a wall while Bell and others try and pry him away.
He nods in her direction, and then his gaze aimlessly wanders over to Peter and Noah in the next room, and she follows it. Her son is enraptured in a conversation with her boyfriend and its less adorable, more painful as she realizes what the sight must do to Elliot, who less than a few hours ago, had been sitting at the kitchen table nibbling at Noah's toast.
"El.."
"Don't, Olivia."
His face is less furious than she expected, and she isn't sure why she expected volatility to be his response, but it surprises her to find that he looks pained, hurt, even. Elliot Stabler doesn't wear his heart on his sleeve, not out in the open and certainly never in a squad room, but his emotions are so clear in this moment.
Before she can say anything further, his back is already striding ahead, and his quick exit of the building leaves her little room to stop him.
------
She's forced to eat something when she realizes that Noah hasn't had lunch yet. She and Peter sit with Noah in the room next to her office, she picks at her salad, her eye trained on the door waiting for her squad to return.
"Mom?" Noah asks for the second time.
"Sorry honey, what was that?"
"Can we stay at uncle Elliot's again tonight?"
Peter flinches lightly, and she tries her best to answer safely. "Why is that baby?"
"I like it there. I don't have to worry about the bad man coming for you."
Olivia closes her eyes, feels an ache well in her stomach. She opens her eyes to find Peter staring at her, uncomfortably. She reads his eyes well, knows that he can't protest because its Noah and it's her safety and there's not a lot he can do to convince her that she would be safe anywhere else.
Elliot's innate need to protect her at all costs can often come across as possessive to the outsider. It's part of the reason why she slept so soundly last night. She never had to worry about her safety when in his presence, her heart however, told a different story.
"I'll talk to Uncle Elliot, okay sweets?" she replies, unsure of whether Elliot will accept the invitation after the tornado of emotions that they'd both experienced this morning.
Peter asks Noah a question about school, and she spots Amanda and Fin enter the building with several squad members behind them. "Mommy has to get back to work now, okay Noah? Stay in here and don't come out until absolutely necessary."
"I'll stay with him." Peter tells her, she rubs his shoulder, thankful before she darts out of the room.
Just then, the man that they had been trying to track down for the last 48 hours is brought into the building in handcuffs, Bell and Freddie behind him. Olivia stands beside Fin, her gaze cold as the perpetrator nears. His face, unharmed, is overwhelmed at the sight of her.
"Olivia..." he breathes, his eyes transfixed on her face until he scans her from head to toe.
"You're here." The stranger says, surprised.
She ignores him. "Put him in cell 2. Will deal with him later."
As he is escorted down the hallway, his gaze is still hypnotized to her face until he's no longer able to see. She looks over at Ayanna Bell, "Did he put up a fight?"
"He demanded for his lawyer. Other than that, no, he didn't."
"This is your house, captain. I get that, but the sooner we can get him to open up about his connections to the mafia, the sooner..."
"I understand that you have a separate investigation, Ayanna, I do. But just trust me on this one, okay? If we can pin him down first for the assault charges first, he won't have a chance of getting out of prison."
She's reluctant, but she nods anyway. Olivia tells her, "We'll help you with your case Sergeant, I promise."
She felt the back of her skin warm again and only just realized that she'd felt anxiety ever since they had all left. As she turned around, she found Elliot standing behind her, as always. She breathed a relaxed sigh, he was safe, unharmed, and more importantly, he came back.
Olivia catches his pensive silence, "What?" she asks.
His eyes crossed towards the cell that the perpetrator had just been put into, and she exhaled. "Absolutely not." She replied.
"Just five minutes."
She tilted her head, her face absolute, wordlessly reminding him of the last time she allowed him to enter one of her interrogation rooms. He shook his head, "That was different. A different time."
She was well aware of the time period, she thought. Never would she forget that first night he re-entered her life, causing a string of consequences that neither of them were willing to face.
As if he read her mind, he pressed again. "So, what's the plan then?"
She rolled her eyes, shaking her head, she began to move to her office, motioning for them to follow her. Bell entered, followed by Rollins, Fin and Elliot.
Fin interrupted first by saying. "Apologies cap, but neither of us speak telepathy. What is going on?"
"Yes, sorry. I'd like it if myself and sergeant Bell took over interrogations, for now."
Elliot rubbed his forehead in frustration, "Is that really a good idea? The man is obsessed with you. It's not safe for you to be in there."
"Oh, and you beating the living daylights out of him is?"
"That won't be happening." Bell told him, firmly.
"Liv.." Fin intervened, his face serious. "Maybe Rollins should take your place instead. Elliot is right. Its unchartered territory."
Not really, she wants to say. But Fin is Fin, and he will always have her best interests at heart. At the end of the day, she's all for democracy, so she nods over at Amanda. The blonde has been diving into a rabbit hole with this case and knows all the ins and outs of Elliot and Bell's investigation into the mafia, and so Olivia watches with faith as the two women enter the interrogation room.
Elliot is the first to approach the window, turning the microphone on, she hears Bell speak first.
"Sorry to disappoint. I'm not the woman you were after, am I?"
------
The perpetrator is detailing all that he had learned of what Lewis had done to her. And for many reasons, Elliot is not yet aware of the specifics until he speaks to them out loud. The sick thing is, and it's surprising to everybody but Olivia, but he speaks in first person. As if he is William Lewis himself.
Olivia simply sits at her desk, her palm pressed against her forehead as she realizes that this sicko might get away with a room in a mental facility, rather than a prison cell.
"I put my weapon in her mouth, made her beg for her life. She liked it though, I know she did. She loved playing hard to get. I then put her in the trunk of a stolen car, took her to my lawyer's house. I made her watch as I raped the lawyer's mother. Each time she looked away; I burned her skin. I can still smell the whiskey and vodka I poured down her throat. It makes my throat dry. May I have some water?"
Olivia's breath is hitched as she's forced to relive her kidnapping through the voice of a complete psychopath. Elliot is standing at the interrogation window, his fist pushed against the frame as his eyes pierce through the glass. Olivia sat still at her desk, twisting a pen in her hand as she memorized all the different coping strategies that she and Dr Lindstrom had practiced over the years. Count to ten. Recount your five senses. Think of Noah. Breathe.
The perp continues talking, even when Amanda recurrently reminds him that he's not William Lewis.
Elliot pushes himself away from the window, swings past Fin and pulls the door open as he barrels into the interrogation room.
It all happens too fast, Olivia knows this, and she half expected it but when it actually occurs, she's overwhelmed with shock, running after him in an attempt to stop it.
His entrance startles Bell and Rollins, especially when he dashes in the direction of the perpetrator, wraps a hand around his throat and proceeds to bash him with his fist.
"DETECTIVE STABLER!" multiple voices call his name, but he's dead to the world. Elliot punches him multiple times, picks him out from the throat and then spits in his face before he's yanked away by Fin.
Suddenly Olivia is in the room and the offender is alert again as Rollins pushes him onto a chair.
"Olivia," he grumbles through bloody lips. "I was never going to hurt you. You have to believe me. Please."
"Shut your mouth," Elliot interjects.
"We're meant to be together. You and I..."
This stops everyone in their tracks, and Olivia stares over at him in disbelief.
The perpetrator's mouth is bleeding, he has a bloody eye, and both his cheeks are bruised. Elliot could have done worse, had already imagined all the different ways in his head of how he might break this man's bones, but he still wanted to leave him some room to deliver the rest of his speech. For the sake of the investigation.
When Fin pressures Elliot out of the room, Olivia follows them, slamming the door behind her, they enter her office, and she raises her voice.
"What on earth were you thinking!"
His breathing is heavy, it hasn't felt this way in months, and he feels rushes of his ptsd come back to him. Suddenly everything the therapist has taught him this year is forgotten and he can't think of anything except her voice. He looks up from where she stands at the door, breathes in and out.
She's here.
She's alive.
She's safe.
He's dead. William Lewis is dead
Elliot stands there and takes it. His right fist is bleeding, unless it isn't actually his blood. He stares at her from the long distance they share, he traces every outline of her perfect face, the sharp shape of her jaw, the gentle bronze color of her hair, the way it rests so peacefully against her face as she screams at him. The beautiful outline of her body as it stands, upset and hating him. Her hands fly everywhere, and it's when she turns her back to him that he realizes he hasn't heard a single word of what she's just said.
"Get him out of here." He hears her say, and his gaze travels to Fin standing with the door open, perhaps less disappointed in Elliot than Liv was, but disappointed, nonetheless.
"Come on man." Fin tells him, and without another thought, Elliot strides out of her office.