Sometimes You Can't Make It on Your Own, Chapter Five
Righto, sorry it took so long for this chapter to be posted, but I had to rewrite it three times because I kept making massive continuity errors. That's what I get for not setting up the case properly… hopefully I've managed to work around it all so that Alex and Liv can hook up without falling into any gaping plot holes!
Oh, and I was a bad writer and made this uber huge blunder in the last chapter (that can't be ignored), and so I went back and sneakily fixed it. Heh. I was telling my mate about all the errors I've made with this story… she went to bed to get away XD
"He lawyered up quickly," Alex remarked, watching the interrogation room with Cragen. "Are you sure he's your guy?"
Cragen was still, his expression stern. "Kelly gave us a positive ID. I suppose we'll find out soon enough." The captain depressed the button to allow the interrogation to be heard in his office.
"I've got nothing to say," Taylor was sneering, smirking at Olivia.
His lawyer, a defense attorney Alex didn't recognize, leaned forward and put his arm on the table, waving a hand at his client's criminal record. "This is irrelevant. And there's no evidence of my client being on those tapes, and you have no proof that he's involved in the filming of them, either."
"What tapes?" Alex asked Don. She hadn't been briefed before she had been pulled from her office by the captain. She had been pleased to hear the stakeout had been successful and they had Howard Taylor in custody, but she'd also been looking forward to getting out of the office relatively early for once. Seeing her best friend, however, was a nice bonus to round off the day.
"Taylor was carrying a package with him, a brown manila envelope," Cragen explained. "Inside were three DVDs. Munch and Fin checked them out once they got back - they all contained underage girls in various acts of pornography."
Alex sucked in a breath. She knew Olivia hated the child pornography cases the most. She turned her eyes to the detective, watching her carefully through the two-way glass.
"That's all right," Elliot was saying, grinning eerily like a shark as he did so, "We're not bothered about that… yet."
"Kelly Johnson," Olivia took over, in a clear voice that didn't give any hint of the animosity she felt. To emphasize her point, she slapped in front of Taylor a picture of the girl, and followed it up with a picture of Michelle Lee lying on Warner's morgue table. "And Michelle Lee. You raped them, you brutally assaulted Kelly, and then you killed Michelle."
Taylor scrutinized the photographs carefully, then leaned back in his chair with a cocky smirk. "You got nothing on me. Where's your evidence?"
Alex watched as Elliot's and Olivia's features grew stony and expressionless. Finally, they glanced at the mirror and Alex felt a slight tug at her heart as she saw Olivia draw in a deep breath, but let it out silently and imperceptibly. One of their techniques - if they exhaled with the same force that they'd inhaled, it would've been interpreted as a sigh, and that Taylor had won.
"Oh, we'll get you, you son of a bitch," Elliot growled, getting in Taylor's face. "But we can put you away for a long time for possession of child porn while we build up the case that's going to bury you."
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"I feel it in my gut, Cap, this guy's dirtier than the dirt."
Elliot, Olivia and Alex were in Cragen's office, mulling over their options while Howard Taylor sat in the squad room's holding cell far too close for their comfort. Fin and Munch leaned against the closed door, distastefully eyeing the envelope that held Taylor's DVDs.
"We have absolutely no evidence linking him to Michelle or Kelly," Olivia sighed, collapsing into the chair opposite Cragen's desk. Alex saw her pick up a pen and fiddle with it, something she noted the detective did quite often when she was pensive or otherwise contemplative.
"What about the hair from the rape kit?" she asked.
Elliot shook his head. "No follicle attached. The lab ran it through the database but didn't get anything."
"How the hell does that work?" Alex wondered out loud.
"It's our luck," Olivia sighed, dropping the pen onto a loose stack of papers. "Alex, we've got to put him somewhere. Get him on the child porn."
"Well," Alex nodded agreeably, "He has a record, right?"
Elliot nodded and picked up the file, handing it to Alex. "One assault charge, two B-and-Es, one child pornography."
"I'll be able to get at least ten years for the DVDs, with his priors. What exactly is on them?"
"Exactly?"
Alex conceded. "Enough to help me get him into Rikers."
"Three discs, kids - all girls - in front of a camera on a stand, in various states of undress. These bastards are sneaky," Elliot groused. "No faces of the people behind it."
"Is Kelly Johnson on them?"
Fin shook his head. "Just the dead girl. Michelle Lee."
"That's a solid connection. Maybe she wanted out." Alex bit her lip in thought and leaned against the arm of the chair that Olivia was sitting on. "What about Doug Preston?"
"He didn't have any contact with Michelle. He's… easily impressionable, though," Elliot said.
"All right," the captain nodded. "Go question him tomorrow and see if you can get anything else." Cragen sighed and looked at his tired detectives. "Go home and get some rest. We're not going to get anything new tonight."
The four of them trooped wearily out of the office, Alex following just behind. "Hey, Liv," she said softly, touching the detective's arm lightly as they neared her desk. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Elliot surreptitiously move away to talk to Munch and Fin. "Have you had dinner yet?"
Olivia looked surprised. "No. We didn't know what time Taylor was going to be at the rec centre, so we just went," she replied quietly, shooting a glance at the man lying on the bench in the cell.
"Well, I haven't eaten, either, so do you want to make up for that lunch date now?"
As the detective regarded her with a small grin tugging at the corner of her mouth, Alex felt a smile spread across her face, and she knew she looked braver than she felt. Why it felt so different, she had a bit of an idea about, and if she was honest with herself, it didn't really bother her that much now. But it was waiting for Olivia's reply, Olivia's acceptance, that made her feel nervous, like she was on her first date.
"That sounds good," Olivia replied finally. She retrieved her jacket - the leather one that Alex liked so much - from the back of her chair and shrugged it on, and for some reason placed her hand on the small of Alex's back as they walked out of the squad room together.
Telling herself that she was doing it to protect the slim ADA from Taylor, Olivia almost believed herself.
------
They ate at a small Italian restaurant not far from Alex's apartment block, where most of the dinner patrons had already left since it was pushing close to ten o' clock. The small booth near the end of the restaurant provided privacy and a quiet atmosphere, and the staff had retired to the back - presumably to start closing once their last two customers left.
Alex watched Olivia help herself to another slice of pizza, while she sipped on her red wine. "Are you all right?" she asked, meaning the case.
Olivia grinned at her between bites of pepperoni. "I'm having my favourite food with my favourite person. I'm great."
The smile melted all thoughts of work from her mind. "I thought your favourite food was donuts," Alex jibed, which earned her an even bigger, adorable grin from her best friend.
"Well, it depends on the company. I'm flexible."
Immediately, Alex found images of Olivia in strange and wonderful positions on her bed, her tanned limbs tangled up with Alex's own. Shaking her head, she hoped that Olivia would mistake the flush of arousal for the effects of the wine they had been drinking.
"I'll keep that in my back pocket."
"Ooh, the back pocket. A bit more adventure involved in retrieving it then, huh, counselor?"
"Front's too easy access," she heard herself say before she could register the thought. Shit! What are you doing?!
Olivia saw the horrified micro expression surface on Alex's already flushed features, before they gave way to the look Alex always wore when she was calculating how to tear someone apart on the stand. The stern, determined look that, when seen outside the courtroom, meant 'back away from the counselor slowly, keep your hands where she can see them, keep your mouth shut and then run like fuck!'
It was either the wine or the fact that she was getting a massive headache from the case, but Olivia didn't want to run like fuck. Acutely aware of how her feelings for her best friend were progressing into something more platonic - however much she'd wanted to deny it to Elliot - Olivia decided that this was a good time to see how far she could push things verbally before the walls came slamming down.
"I'm glad you don't just put out for anybody, then," she said gently, putting out a whole lot more of herself than she had intended on doing. She took a long sip from her wine glass so she could watch Alex's reaction openly without making her companion feel self-conscious.
They must have sat in silence for a good three or so minutes. Olivia munched on the last slice of pizza, waiting. She had to give Alex the next move - that was how the rules worked. Well, when it came to Alex, anyway. She knew that if she wanted the walls to stay up, and not crush her, she had to give Alex control. And right now, control was dictating when the silence ended.
After all, Olivia thought, it's rude for me to talk with my mouth full.
Alex spoke only after Olivia had finished eating.
"There's only one person I'd put out for."
This was taking far longer than I expected, so I cut it off about 300 words ago. I'll turn that into another chapter which I'll hopefully have up by tomorrow night. It isn't really going the way I was intending it to… Oh well. It seems to be going well enough for the moment :D
Oh, and I was a bad writer and made this uber huge blunder in the last chapter (that can't be ignored), and so I went back and sneakily fixed it. Heh. I was telling my mate about all the errors I've made with this story… she went to bed to get away XD
"He lawyered up quickly," Alex remarked, watching the interrogation room with Cragen. "Are you sure he's your guy?"
Cragen was still, his expression stern. "Kelly gave us a positive ID. I suppose we'll find out soon enough." The captain depressed the button to allow the interrogation to be heard in his office.
"I've got nothing to say," Taylor was sneering, smirking at Olivia.
His lawyer, a defense attorney Alex didn't recognize, leaned forward and put his arm on the table, waving a hand at his client's criminal record. "This is irrelevant. And there's no evidence of my client being on those tapes, and you have no proof that he's involved in the filming of them, either."
"What tapes?" Alex asked Don. She hadn't been briefed before she had been pulled from her office by the captain. She had been pleased to hear the stakeout had been successful and they had Howard Taylor in custody, but she'd also been looking forward to getting out of the office relatively early for once. Seeing her best friend, however, was a nice bonus to round off the day.
"Taylor was carrying a package with him, a brown manila envelope," Cragen explained. "Inside were three DVDs. Munch and Fin checked them out once they got back - they all contained underage girls in various acts of pornography."
Alex sucked in a breath. She knew Olivia hated the child pornography cases the most. She turned her eyes to the detective, watching her carefully through the two-way glass.
"That's all right," Elliot was saying, grinning eerily like a shark as he did so, "We're not bothered about that… yet."
"Kelly Johnson," Olivia took over, in a clear voice that didn't give any hint of the animosity she felt. To emphasize her point, she slapped in front of Taylor a picture of the girl, and followed it up with a picture of Michelle Lee lying on Warner's morgue table. "And Michelle Lee. You raped them, you brutally assaulted Kelly, and then you killed Michelle."
Taylor scrutinized the photographs carefully, then leaned back in his chair with a cocky smirk. "You got nothing on me. Where's your evidence?"
Alex watched as Elliot's and Olivia's features grew stony and expressionless. Finally, they glanced at the mirror and Alex felt a slight tug at her heart as she saw Olivia draw in a deep breath, but let it out silently and imperceptibly. One of their techniques - if they exhaled with the same force that they'd inhaled, it would've been interpreted as a sigh, and that Taylor had won.
"Oh, we'll get you, you son of a bitch," Elliot growled, getting in Taylor's face. "But we can put you away for a long time for possession of child porn while we build up the case that's going to bury you."
---------
"I feel it in my gut, Cap, this guy's dirtier than the dirt."
Elliot, Olivia and Alex were in Cragen's office, mulling over their options while Howard Taylor sat in the squad room's holding cell far too close for their comfort. Fin and Munch leaned against the closed door, distastefully eyeing the envelope that held Taylor's DVDs.
"We have absolutely no evidence linking him to Michelle or Kelly," Olivia sighed, collapsing into the chair opposite Cragen's desk. Alex saw her pick up a pen and fiddle with it, something she noted the detective did quite often when she was pensive or otherwise contemplative.
"What about the hair from the rape kit?" she asked.
Elliot shook his head. "No follicle attached. The lab ran it through the database but didn't get anything."
"How the hell does that work?" Alex wondered out loud.
"It's our luck," Olivia sighed, dropping the pen onto a loose stack of papers. "Alex, we've got to put him somewhere. Get him on the child porn."
"Well," Alex nodded agreeably, "He has a record, right?"
Elliot nodded and picked up the file, handing it to Alex. "One assault charge, two B-and-Es, one child pornography."
"I'll be able to get at least ten years for the DVDs, with his priors. What exactly is on them?"
"Exactly?"
Alex conceded. "Enough to help me get him into Rikers."
"Three discs, kids - all girls - in front of a camera on a stand, in various states of undress. These bastards are sneaky," Elliot groused. "No faces of the people behind it."
"Is Kelly Johnson on them?"
Fin shook his head. "Just the dead girl. Michelle Lee."
"That's a solid connection. Maybe she wanted out." Alex bit her lip in thought and leaned against the arm of the chair that Olivia was sitting on. "What about Doug Preston?"
"He didn't have any contact with Michelle. He's… easily impressionable, though," Elliot said.
"All right," the captain nodded. "Go question him tomorrow and see if you can get anything else." Cragen sighed and looked at his tired detectives. "Go home and get some rest. We're not going to get anything new tonight."
The four of them trooped wearily out of the office, Alex following just behind. "Hey, Liv," she said softly, touching the detective's arm lightly as they neared her desk. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Elliot surreptitiously move away to talk to Munch and Fin. "Have you had dinner yet?"
Olivia looked surprised. "No. We didn't know what time Taylor was going to be at the rec centre, so we just went," she replied quietly, shooting a glance at the man lying on the bench in the cell.
"Well, I haven't eaten, either, so do you want to make up for that lunch date now?"
As the detective regarded her with a small grin tugging at the corner of her mouth, Alex felt a smile spread across her face, and she knew she looked braver than she felt. Why it felt so different, she had a bit of an idea about, and if she was honest with herself, it didn't really bother her that much now. But it was waiting for Olivia's reply, Olivia's acceptance, that made her feel nervous, like she was on her first date.
"That sounds good," Olivia replied finally. She retrieved her jacket - the leather one that Alex liked so much - from the back of her chair and shrugged it on, and for some reason placed her hand on the small of Alex's back as they walked out of the squad room together.
Telling herself that she was doing it to protect the slim ADA from Taylor, Olivia almost believed herself.
------
They ate at a small Italian restaurant not far from Alex's apartment block, where most of the dinner patrons had already left since it was pushing close to ten o' clock. The small booth near the end of the restaurant provided privacy and a quiet atmosphere, and the staff had retired to the back - presumably to start closing once their last two customers left.
Alex watched Olivia help herself to another slice of pizza, while she sipped on her red wine. "Are you all right?" she asked, meaning the case.
Olivia grinned at her between bites of pepperoni. "I'm having my favourite food with my favourite person. I'm great."
The smile melted all thoughts of work from her mind. "I thought your favourite food was donuts," Alex jibed, which earned her an even bigger, adorable grin from her best friend.
"Well, it depends on the company. I'm flexible."
Immediately, Alex found images of Olivia in strange and wonderful positions on her bed, her tanned limbs tangled up with Alex's own. Shaking her head, she hoped that Olivia would mistake the flush of arousal for the effects of the wine they had been drinking.
"I'll keep that in my back pocket."
"Ooh, the back pocket. A bit more adventure involved in retrieving it then, huh, counselor?"
"Front's too easy access," she heard herself say before she could register the thought. Shit! What are you doing?!
Olivia saw the horrified micro expression surface on Alex's already flushed features, before they gave way to the look Alex always wore when she was calculating how to tear someone apart on the stand. The stern, determined look that, when seen outside the courtroom, meant 'back away from the counselor slowly, keep your hands where she can see them, keep your mouth shut and then run like fuck!'
It was either the wine or the fact that she was getting a massive headache from the case, but Olivia didn't want to run like fuck. Acutely aware of how her feelings for her best friend were progressing into something more platonic - however much she'd wanted to deny it to Elliot - Olivia decided that this was a good time to see how far she could push things verbally before the walls came slamming down.
"I'm glad you don't just put out for anybody, then," she said gently, putting out a whole lot more of herself than she had intended on doing. She took a long sip from her wine glass so she could watch Alex's reaction openly without making her companion feel self-conscious.
They must have sat in silence for a good three or so minutes. Olivia munched on the last slice of pizza, waiting. She had to give Alex the next move - that was how the rules worked. Well, when it came to Alex, anyway. She knew that if she wanted the walls to stay up, and not crush her, she had to give Alex control. And right now, control was dictating when the silence ended.
After all, Olivia thought, it's rude for me to talk with my mouth full.
Alex spoke only after Olivia had finished eating.
"There's only one person I'd put out for."
This was taking far longer than I expected, so I cut it off about 300 words ago. I'll turn that into another chapter which I'll hopefully have up by tomorrow night. It isn't really going the way I was intending it to… Oh well. It seems to be going well enough for the moment :D