Disclaimer: I don't own these characters because if I did, Fault would have looked more like this.

A/N: Who else can I dedicate this chapter to besides Jenna? Persistence truly does pay off. I wrote this for her. Please know that this is my interpretation of what would have happened if the roles were reversed if Olivia would have been held at gunpoint and not Elliot. So everything that happens after that is up to personal opinion. Thank you all for the kind reviews, they kept me going when this fic wanted to pull me under.

0200 HRS

MERCY GENERAL HOSPITAL

365 W 32ND STREET

She's quiet.

It's all Elliot can think of. He's a shell of the sex crimes detective he was just a week ago.

She's quiet.

Something so uncharacteristic of Olivia in this situation. She's always volunteering to take bedside duties, she's always the first to talk to the families. It's engraved in her core. With every victim she helps, every rapist or pedophile or general criminal she puts behind bars, she weakens the hold that her mother's rape had on her soul.

SVU needs people like Olivia. They're extremely rare. Someone so passionate about something because it's close to them but has a level enough head to not let it get to them for the most part. Olivia is all of the things he is not. She's strong even in the face of a pedophile accused of committing some of the most heinous crimes even Elliot had heard of. She goes toe to toe with combative suspects. Yet delicate, she's able to soften every part of her when she talks to children, women or any other victim.

She's quiet.

Elliot peers to his right, he can't help himself. He needs to see her expression and understand why she isn't speaking. Olivia's chin is tucked into her neck as she looks up towards the fluorescent lights. She exhales through her nose – a shaky, ragged breath escaping her as if she had been holding it for far too long.

He knows the look. It's one he's sported far too many times. They teach you in the academy to do this very move.

It cuts off the tear ducts, so you won't cry.

Why would I cry on the job?

If only he knew back then how much he would cry, how gut-wrenching it would feel when he attended the funeral for his fire team partner during the police academy, how hard he had to look up at the sky for weeks after the funeral, knowing that his friend, his colleague had committed suicide after just a few years on the job.

He knew she was fighting the tears to save face.

Perhaps he was to blame for the mess.

"I know you would have taken that shot, Elliot."

He squints at her. Is she joking?

"No, Olivia. I wouldn't have." His voice betrays him and echoes the betrayed feeling in his heart through the hospital hallway. Why couldn't she see what had really happened with Gitano? "I couldn't just end your life like that." In the dim light of the hospital, Olivia's eyes are almost black.

Olivia's bangs flutter with the exhale of her breath. "Why?"

Everything in Elliot's view becomes tighter. His heart pounds hard enough that his temples hurt. He's sure she can hear that his heart rate just took off. How can he answer her? That she's the one who makes him feel the most alive? She would run. His eyes shift back to her. She's taken her bottom lip into her mouth as she bites down on it in concentration. He couldn't blame anyone else – she didn't have anyone else. It was just them.

"Kathy, the kids – they've all left me. At some point, I had to admit to myself that this is more than a partnership. That you were something more than a partner to me. I couldn't lose that. I couldn't lose you too."

Beside him, Olivia huffs. "Well, now you have."

0400HRS

APARTMENT OF DETECTIVE STABLER

4726 44TH STREET

Well, now you have.

Why did she have to say that?

Of course, she had screwed things up. She couldn't go to Cragen just yet. In the morning, she would go back and speak with him, see what her options were. An uneasy feeling washes over her. What if he slammed the door in her face? What if he sent her packing as soon as she stepped in the door? What if he had gone home to Kathy and kids?

The masochistic part of her laughed, knowing that last thought was inevitable.

He'll always go back to her; he'll never choose you.

He chose her today. Elliot had chosen today, the worst day in probably both of their whole lives to finally fess up in a half-assed way. Olivia raises her hand to knock but decides against it, trying the door. It's unlocked. Just like Elliot to give absolutely no fucks about his own safety after a day like today.

Inside his apartment, Elliot sits with his back to the door. The television is quiet – too quiet for him to not have turned at the sound of her entrance. She chews her lip. There have been very seldom times when Elliot has been like this, and none of them have been remotely easy to deal with.

Once, after a particularly difficult case, she had found him slumped at his kitchen counter. At first, she thought he was sick, but when she approached to check his vitals, he let out a quiet, broken sob.

So tonight, Olivia knew it would be no treat. She was at her wit's end with everything this partnership had given her, but she just couldn't quit. More than anything, each case they worked together, the closer she got, the more she finally understood why Elliot was the way he was.

There was a deep, driving need within her to push herself to be there for the victims. A dark past. A darker childhood and conception. Elliot, however, saw his wife, his daughters, in every victim. He wanted the pedophiles, rapists, perverts, no-good-doers off the streets because he needed every woman in his life to be safe. With every perp, he slammed, slapped, punched, kicked – a little bit of control over the things his family would see came back to him.

Olivia sheds her coat and folds it over the first dining room chair she sees. In the darkness, Elliot doesn't stir. His back is broad, the light of the tv spilling over his shoulders and stretched out arms. The only movement he makes is to press the beer bottle to his lips and back down again. With another pass of her tongue over her lips, Olivia swallows her nerves and marches towards him, sitting next to him on the couch.

In one swoop of her nimble fingers, she steals the bottle from his mouth and drains the contents in seconds. "I was drinking that." His voice is gruff, ragged as if he had cried until she stepped in the door.

"Too bad," Olivia smirks. If she's really here, she needs some liquid courage to help her through the conversation.

He adjusts in his seat. His arms are still spread wide across the back of the couch. His large body always intimidated her – not that she would ever let him know, but it did. His left arm is so close to her face, she could lean her face right into his palm if she wanted. "What do you want, Olivia?"

"I don't know." She's a bad liar. Or maybe it's that he's been able to read her so well for their entire partnership. She's never had to put walls up with him. He always knew what she wanted. Except now.

"Yes, you do," Elliot calls her out so quickly. As if the answer was so simple, so easy.

"I want the truth." She's surprised when he laughs. Olivia looks at him now. She knows she looks like shit. Her tear-stained cheeks, bloodshot eyes, dirty clothes. Her hair is probably flat too, she thinks.

The evidence of his smile fades from his cheeks as his brows furrow with thought. "I… I almost lost you today. When Gitano was holding that gun against your head, I kept thinking of all the stupid shit I've wanted to tell you. Little things. Things that made me laugh. Things that made me roll my eyes. I couldn't bear the thought that these I would never get the chance to tell you."

His eyes flicker to the cut on her neck and settle on the crescent-shaped bruise on her temple. Her throat closes while she fights the urge to cry again.

God, she's sick of crying.

Elliot sniffles. "I don't want to talk anymore." Her voice is barely audible. His eyes search hers for answers but all she gives him is a heated, desperate look. Elliot's mouth parts when he begins to realize the meaning behind her words. His blue eyes darken and narrow – he looks to her as if he's never laid eyes on her. As if the permission is finally there and he takes in the woman before him as she is.

"Liv-" Olivia cuts him off, sealing her mouth onto his with a rough, emotional kiss. His right-hand twines into her hair and his left pulls her into his lap. Tears spill from her eyes freely now. His lower half crashes into hers when she rotates her hips, trying to feel all of him. A low rumble erupts from his throat, a groan of need. Relief floods her and she feels him relax beneath her as if he feels it too. "Wanted this for so long," He mumbles against her lips. "I almost lost you…"

"I know."

A/N: Please let me know what you think!