Chapter Text
Olivia stifled a long yawn with the back of her hand as she tried to shove her remaining foot into her boot without bothering to move it away from its resting place against the hallway wall. It was early – too early – on a Saturday morning, which she had hoped to spend recuperating from a long and stressful week. Instead, she was struggling to wake up enough to put herself together and get out the door to the emergency meeting the Chief of D’s called. She cursed the uniforms who’d had the bright idea to arrest someone last night during an on-air interview, bungling both the arrest and the NYPD response to the peaceful protesters.
Now she had to spend her Saturday morning hauling her ass to 1PP along with the rest of the command officers to be lectured on controlling their people. Two undertrained, overzealous, and spiteful officers were ruining the Saturday of all the captains, who’d in turn ruin the Monday of all their sergeants and detectives and officers.
Liv resigned herself and bent down to pick up her stray boot when the knock on her door finally arrived. Standing with one hand full and without moving from her half-shoed spot, she reached over to the chain on the door, removed it, then flipped the locks and twisted the door handle.
“Hey, El,” she said through another yawn. “Thanks for coming.” Liv flung the door open and let her hand fall back to her boot, presuming that Elliot would take the hint and come in. She guided her toes into the boot as she surreptitiously watched him yank off his own boots from the corner of her eye. Tension in her chest stifled her inhale when his muscles flexed, the ridge of his trapezius sharpening, his deltoid firming, the smooth skin of his exposed bicep rising over the stiffening muscle beneath. Her heartbeat picked up speed when he spoke in his deep, gravely voice.
“I told you, Liv. Anytime you need something, I’m there.”
She didn’t expect to see him so soon after last night, and she didn’t expect her body to remember so viscerally, react so immediately. Liv’s mind had been sidetracked, and it took her too long to notice he was rising and turning to face her, catching her mouth agape and her gaze focused inches below his eyes.
“I was already up,” he continued without pause, “and at this hour, there wasn’t any traffic. It took 20 minutes to get here.”
Liv darted her eyes up to meet his, and she saw him scan her tired face, question in his soft eyes. Hopefully she remembered to wipe the sleep crust from her eyes at some point in the 25 minutes she’d been awake.
“Well,” Liv cleared her throat, desperately trying to calm her racing heart. “Noah should sleep for at least a couple more hours. The admin who called this morning said to expect this to take all morning.”
“That’s okay, Liv.” Her eyes floated down to his lips as he spoke. “I’ve got nothing going on today. You can even run some errands if you need to. Noah and I’ll be fine.”
She watched as the ends of his lips curled upwards, and she realized he knew she was staring at him, ogling his brawn, following his mouth as he spoke. Blushing furiously and rolling her eyes to reset her face, she ignored his blatant amusement.
“Thanks, El. I’ll text you when I’m headed home.” And Liv grabbed her spring jacket off its hook, rushed past him, and pulled her door shut behind her. She’d put it on in the elevator; she needed to flee before she combusted from being in the same room as him.
Elliot straightened the living room and cleaned the kitchen while he waited for Noah to awake, even scrubbing the inside of the microwave and refrigerator. By 8:00, he was getting impatient and switched to organizing the kitchen cabinets and drawers. By 9:00, he was sitting on the couch and channel surfing as he sipped his cup of Olivia’s substandard coffee. He heard Noah’s bedroom door click open as the Good Morning America weekend edition hosts were coming on air. Muting it so he wouldn’t be subjected to their blathering, Elliot watched the hallway, waiting for Noah to notice him.
But Noah didn’t even falter at Elliot lounging on the couch. In fact, Noah plopped down sideways at the other end facing him.
“Hey, kid,” Elliot said neutrally, a little unnerved that Noah didn’t seem surprised he was there.
“Where’s Mom?”
“She got called into a meeting with the head honchos. She asked me to come over to stay with you.”
Noah hit him with raised brows and a flat line of lips. “I know you’ve been here since last night. I heard you and Mom.”
“What? You heard us this morning?” Elliot didn’t think they’d spoken that loud while they were removing and putting on their shoes, and they were by the front door, half an apartment away from Noah’s bedroom.
“No,” he said with tweenage cheek. “I heard you last night when I woke up to use the bathroom. I’m not a little kid. I know what sex sounds like.”
“Noah – I – ,” Elliot sputtered and coughed as he swallowed hard. Exhaling sharply, Elliot shook his head and met Noah’s skeptical gaze. “I wasn’t here last night.”
“You don’t have to lie. I heard Mom say your name. The last time it was really loud, so I ran back to my room so I didn’t have to listen anymore.”
Elliot scrubbed his hand over his mouth, at first to buy him time to respond, but then he kept it there to hide his grin. Noah seemed so confident that Liv had had sex last night, and if Olivia had said his name multiple times in the throes of passion, and at what was likely her moment of orgasm, then she had to have been alone and thinking about him. It’d explain her preoccupation with his arm and lips this morning and her twitchiness when she fled after he caught her staring. He wondered if she’d used her hand picturing his hand in its place or if she used battery-powered help. Noah didn’t mention hearing the dull thrumming of a vibrator.
He cleared the lump in his throat, then started to speak, hoping a suitable explanation or a strong enough diversion would come to him. “Noah – ,” he stopped, having no idea how to continue.
“How come Mom and you didn’t tell me you were dating?”
Jesus, this kid, he thought wryly. He was exactly like his mother. “Uh, we’re not.”
“I’m fine with you guys being, like, together. You’re cool, for an adult or whatever.” Noah ducked his head to mask his admission.
“Well, uh,” Elliot ran his hand over the sparse day-old scruff on the top of his head. “I think you’re pretty cool too.”
Noah rolled his eyes. “You’re just as cringey as Mom. Can we go get pancakes and bacon?”
Chuckling, Elliot nodded. “Sure, buddy. I cleaned the fridge this morning. I know there’s no bacon in there.”
“Can I order a strawberry milkshake?”
“Only if you don’t tell your mom. Now let’s go. She’ll be back in a couple hours.”
Liv felt oddly invigorated as she walked into her building, greeting the doorman with an easy smile and upbeat “afternoon”. The meeting had been long, but time flew by once the coffee filled her veins, her butt numbed, and her mind wandered off to the man likely making himself at home in her apartment.
Silently opening her door, she heard the narration of a documentary on Bernie Madoff, and she removed her boots and padded into the living room.
“Noah in his room?” she asked Elliot, who was sitting at the far end of the couch and watching her as she made her way through the room.
“Playing his Switch.”
“Have you guys had lunch yet?”
“Nope. You wanna shower?” He assumed she hadn’t had time in the early hours of the morning. He was within inches of her, and he didn’t smell her floral body wash; he smelled only her. Her raw, unperfumed natural aroma.
She plopped onto the couch as Noah had done hours before, except she didn’t leave an empty cushion between them. Instead, she settled a foot away from him with her head coming to rest against the back and her eyes shut, fully relaxed now that she was at home and the scent of a lemon cleaner Elliot must have used permeated the air.
“Tired?” he asked as he turned down the volume.
“No, actually,” she replied, turning her head slightly to meet his blue eyes gazing down at her. “I had a crappy week and wasn’t sleeping, but last night I fell asleep almost immediately. I probably could have slept until at least 8:00 if my phone hadn’t gone off. And I don’t feel like showering. I’ll do it tonight.”
Elliot’s eyes crinkled his smile widened so much.
“What?” she questioned. At the shake of his head, she sat upright and turned towards him, her knee connecting with the outside of his thigh. “Oh come on. What is it, El? Tell me.”
He paused, inhaling slowly, his discerning eyes never leaving hers. “I took Noah to get some breakfast. I brought you back an omelet,” he said eventually.
Liv scrunched her face. “That is not what you were going to say.” She rolled her eyes. “Did Noah give you a hard time?”
He let out a quick breath between his pursed lips.
“Well, now you have to tell me. What did Noah do?”
“We…had a chat,” he said haltingly.
“You ‘had a chat’. About what?” When he didn’t continue, she implored, “Elliot.”
“It seems Noah thinks we’re dating.”
“He – .” She stopped as her breath hitched.
“Noah gave us his approval.”
“Approval,” Liv parroted as she turned her head towards the television and away from him. The flutter in her stomach confused her; her anxiety usually manifested itself in shaky hands and crashing thoughts.
Elliot gulped. “Yeah, uh, there’s more.” Her head snapped back to his, tamping out the gentle quivering that had been coursing through her. “He, uh. He thinks I was here last night.”
Liv remained silent, her mouth falling open, unsure how to respond. She hadn’t even thought about what impression Noah would get finding Elliot there upon waking.
He continued, “I don’t really want to tell you why, but he might say something, and I don’t want you to be caught off-guard. Uh,” he cleared his throat and wrung his hands, which made her more nervous than the time she met the vice president. “He said he heard you last night. Us. According to him, he heard you say my name and to quote him, he ‘knows what sex sounds like.’”
It took a few slow seconds for her to understand what Elliot was telling her. When it hit her what Noah had overheard, her chest seized as all the air in her body left her and she muttered “oh my god” into her hands, raised and cupped over her mouth. Then it hit her that Elliot knew too. That he knew what she’d been doing last night to cause her restful sleep and who she was thinking of when she was coaxing herself to orgasm. She slammed her eyelids shut and buried her entire face in her hands, muffling her “oh my god” chant.
“Liv,” he whispered. “Liv, it’s okay.”
Ignoring him, she repeated her admonition once more – to herself, to his god – then abruptly stood and, for the second time that day, fled away from Elliot. This time to the safety of her bedroom, the scene of the crime.
Elliot counted to 60 before he got up to follow Liv. Knocking on her closed door, he waited to hear her grant him entry or tell him to fuck off. When neither came, he opened the door with as much noise as he could make, giving her a warning that he was ignoring her wishes.
“Liv.”
He studied her as she failed to respond to him at all. She was lying face down on her bed, hiding her embarrassment in her silk pillowcase and cupped hands. He propped himself against her doorframe, straddling the line between the hallway and her private space.
“Liv,” he tried again. Sighing, he decided to put himself out there, and maybe it’d backfire, but he was getting tired of her not understanding where he was coming from when he invited her to family events or asked her to lunch or declared he loved her. He needed her to know his feelings weren’t new or only because his wife had died. “We’d only been partners for three weeks the first time I jerked off to you.”
His straightforward and bold declaration shocked her into raising up onto her elbows to stare at him, completely astonished and aghast at his overshare. Which didn’t stop him from carrying on.
“I had a dream you climbed into my lap while we were in our sedan. I woke up saying your name. Finished myself off in the shower. Couldn’t look you in the eyes the next day.”
“What the hell, Elliot,” she said deeply and slowly, each word punctuated with dismay to hide the fact that she was now picturing both scenarios he’d shared – a flash of them in the front seat of their old car and then she saw him clearly, alone in his shower with water sluicing down the hard planes of his back, slightly less pronounced than the muscles she studied that morning, as he gripped himself firmly with his strong fingers and his body coiled tightly until he snapped with a powerful groan and he spilled himself on the wall of the shower.
Her face burned from her mortification and her rampant imagination.
He shrugged, a smug grin on his face, like he knew where her mind had been and was unbothered by her fantasies. “Now we’re even.”
Liv exhaled heavily a few times and started to form a word that hadn’t come to her yet, then stopped when she had nothing to say, probably looking as ridiculous as a gaping fish. She closed her mouth when Elliot tensed, his eyes widening, and he minutely jerked his head side-to-side, silently telling her they were about to have an audience.
“What’s up, bud?” he said down the hallway towards the quickly approaching Noah.
Noah came to a stop in her doorway directly next to Elliot.
“Mom,” Noah started shyly. “Do you want to watch the new Minions movie with me?”
Warmth flooded Liv at his request; her baby was still somewhere inside the rapidly maturing boy who’d recently begun shunning public displays of affection. “Of course,” she said quickly, sitting upright and forgetting her embarrassment.
Noah looked up at Elliot and asked, “Have you seen any of the Minions movies, El?”
Liv’s heart skipped a beat when she heard her son use her nickname for Elliot.
Elliot nodded. “I’ve seen all of them except the last one.”
“Then let’s go, El!” And Noah disappeared.
Elliot met her gaze and cocked his head towards the living room. At least his lecherous smirk was gone, replaced by a tender smile and a smooth voice. “Come on, Liv. I’ll order burgers and fries from 7th Street Burger for lunch.”
“Shake Shack!” they heard faintly from the living room.
“But the fries are better at 7th Street,” he called down the hallway as he pushed off Olivia’s doorframe and made his way back to the couch, sitting down in the middle, intent on drawing out his invitation to spend time with the Bensons for as long as possible.
“How about we get burgers and fries from both and compare?” Noah wheedled.
“How about we order from 7th Street, and if you don’t like them, I’ll place an order at Shake Shack?” Elliot opened the Seamless app on his phone, pulled up the restaurant page, and handed his phone over to Noah. “Look at these pictures and tell me you don’t want these fries.”
“But Shake Shack also has milkshakes,” Noah said as he scrolled on Elliot’s phone.
“You had a milkshake with breakfast. You don’t get one with lunch too,” Elliot pushed back.
Liv emerged from her room with an arched brow, unimpressed that he had let Noah have a milkshake with breakfast but not objecting to him parenting Noah. She settled onto the couch to his left, now wearing black leggings and a very familiar zipped-up gray hoodie, and slid down the back, resting her head, mimicking her pose from just a few minutes ago.
Still avoiding his eyes, she said, “Noah, if Elliot’s paying, then he gets to pick where we order,” and she reached for the remote that had been on the corner of the coffee table.
Elliot snorted at her saddling him with the bill, like usual, as he reached for her right hand and splayed it out, his own fingers playing with hers, running up and down the soft undersides of long fingers he hoped she had used twelve hours ago to stroke herself as she fantasized about his fingers. Her fingers he hoped had slipped through her wet silken folds, circled her bundle of nerves, pumped in and out of her. He desperately wanted to bring her fingers to his mouth and see if her taste lingered. He knew she hadn’t showered since she’d come; she still carried traces from last night on her skin. But he knew she wasn’t ready for that. And a distant voice in his head reminded him that Noah was in the room.
At last, her big brown eyes looked up at him, confused at his capricious interest in her hand, then outraged as it dawned on her that he’d been imagining where her fingers had been and what they’d been doing.
“Oh my god, Elliot,” and she snatched her hand back. But her indignation didn’t quite match the way she bit her lip or the growing smile or the gleam in her eyes.