Chapter Text
He’d barely been back from undercover for a day before he knew he had to see her, had to drag his sorry ass to 1PP and grovel away his absence with tender smiles and quiet teasing, and the gentle brush of his hand against her elbow as he held the door open for her to settle in her desk chair first before he slid in across from her.
He knew they were loud, but until a rap at the door pulled his eyes from hers, he wasn’t so sure they’d been being so loud.
“You two need to hit a motel or something! My god!” Fin’s voice floated through the open door of her office, interrupting the work that both her and Elliot were not doing. In truth, they’d spent the hour that he’d been back in her space for doing what the kids (his kids) would aptly label as “eye fucking”, Liv drinking in his weathered features and greying facial hair like a woman parched; El’s gaze almost glued to the compass that swung heavy around her neck, gold pendant nestled in the open top of her blouse.
He made excuses that his sudden presence was for a case, sure— but deep down they both knew he’d missed her almost as direly as she had missed him for ten years, just felt that pain measured in months instead.
“We what?!” A light blush coloured the tip of her nose as she looked up from the Chinese takeout containers cluttering her desk (lo mein, he’d picked it up on his way over, no questions asked even six months since he saw her last), chopsticks dangling from her fingers as she locked eyes with Fin and the mischievous grin that was painted on his features.
“Should get a motel or something, I think it would help.” He rolled his eyes and shot Liv a half smile, bating her, daring her to say a word against it, supporting it, anything about it on the matter. She’d told Carisi’s cousin only last month that she wasn’t.. available , per se, and the whole force knew why, her whole team knew the answer and was just waiting for him to turn up on the precinct doorstep.
And he’d turned up, alright. Of course he had.
“Would be good for you two to spend some aloooone time together, Captain.” Fin winked, reaching a hand in to grab a spare manila folder off the bookshelf to the left of her doorway before pushing off and throwing her a mock salute.
“Really think it would be beneficial for the whole taskforce.”
She felt her face burning bright pink as Elliot locked eyes with her, hands coming up to cover her face as she tried to tear her eyes away from his baby blues, stabbing a water chestnut with her chopstick as the words fell from his mouth in a tone just this side of teasing.
“And what on earth could he mean by that?” He ripped open a fortune cookie and raised an eyebrow, snapping the cookie in half before offering one segment her way, shrugging as she declined.
“Would you believe me if I said I had no idea?”
“Sure you don’t.”
“I don’t!” Olivia ran a hand through her honeyed hair, letting out a sigh,
“Rollins has said something similar too, before— in Woodstock. Way back when.” she paused for a second, collecting her thoughts, knowing exactly what Fin meant. Exactly what Amanda had meant, even half drunk out of her mind on boxed wine and good company. She knew exact what they meant because she felt it, had felt it for a damn near quarter of a century, didn’t have the space or the restraint to feel anything else anymore.
“Did she now?” Elliot popped the second half of the cookie in his mouth and chewed thoughtfully, “You wanna tell me what she said?”
Liv bit her lip, stomach doing a flip at his tone, the rise and fall of his voice, the way he was looking at her from across her desk. They’d shared moments like this before, sure, strayed close to the truth of what could’ve been between them, should’ve been— would’ve been if it wasn’t for his wife, and then for his lack of wife, but now? The way he had turned up, god . Would it be so wrong of her to think that all bets were off?
“Amanda um—” She paused for a second, hand reaching up to clasp her necklace between her thumb and forefinger, to rub the pendant with careful fingers like the good luck charm she knew it was. “She made a comment, a while ago. Something else about hotels, about you and I— about.” She avoided saying us like the plague, because oh, what a dangerously hopeful two letters those were.
Why don’t you two just.. go get a hotel room.. and get it out of your system.
She sighed again.
“I know what she said.” A lazy smile played on his lips, balling up the fortune cookie wrapper and tossing it into the trash can by his feet.
Liv blinked at him. Once. Twice. A soft fluttering of her lashes in quick succession as her cheeks flushed pink once more. He couldn’t possibly know what Amanda had said.
(He of course had no idea what Amanda had said— but pushing her buttons was something he could enjoy now just as much as he did when they’d first become partners, way back.)
“How do you—“
“Oh I just know.” He reached for the glass of water she had poured him, taking a sip and smiling around the rim of the glass, his fingers fluttering around it as he shrugged once more, “Though if you don’t believe me.. I wouldn’t lie to you.”
“Elliot Stabler, yes you would !” A laugh escaped her lips, a small smile tugging at the corners of her mouth as she surveyed him. Sure, he wouldn’t lie to her, their partnership, their friendship didn’t leave space for lies, but something about this rang false; in an oddly sweet way. “If you’re so sure, what did she say?”
He pulled a face. “I’ll be damned if I know, Liv.”
Liv. His voice caressed her name, and she felt a warmth spread from her toes up through her torso as she blushed once more, pretty as a picture, the words tumbling from her mouth as she forgot herself, just for a moment.
“Told me we should’ve just… got a hotel room. Back then. Got whatever this is— was— out of our systems.”
“Yeah?” His eyes sparkled a little, the small smirk playing on his mouth making her forget this was Elliot Stabler the gentleman , and putting him in the category of El he was in her dreams, in the breathy moans coaxed out of her by her own hand in the six long months he had been gone, to the man she would never have had said no to if he had never left. “Would that be so bad?”
She looked up at him then, hand back at her throat, at her compass, his compass, taking a shuddering breath as she looked him in the eye and did the unthinkable.
She shook her head.