DISCLAIMER: Most characters are not mine, but I'm using them for entertainment and not for profit. The story is my own.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: The “Drinks” series of short pieces: limited to fewer than three full pages, written primarily as fragments of conversations, each featuring at least one drink. The stories are completely unrelated, unless otherwise stated and don’t fit in any particular timeline. They also may be unrelated to canon. I just try to keep the characterization true. I hope I’ve succeeded in that.
SERIES: Third part of the 'Tea' trilogy following Tea – Earl Grey and Tea – Green.
ARCHIVING: Only with the permission of the author.
Drinks Series:
Tea – English Breakfast
By Allie
Slender fingers lifted the hem of Olivia's t-shirt and stroked her stomach. Small muscles trembled and Olivia stopped what she was doing and leaned back into the warm body of her lover, tipping her head forward in surrender and exposing the nape of her neck.
Alex inhaled and placed a soft kiss on the vulnerable, exposed skin. She loved the smell of Olivia. Her breath displaced silky hair as she observed, "You're making tea." When Olivia only shivered in response, Alex asked, "Are you sure it can't wait?"
"It can wait," Olivia confirmed. She turned in Alex's arms. Alex was wearing a tank top and cotton pajama bottoms; Olivia reveled in the supple strength of her lover's body as they held each other. "I thought you were asleep." Her fingertips trailed over Alex's shoulders to her neck and over her throat to her collarbones.
"I felt you leave and it woke me. I was trying to leave you alone… give you some time to yourself… I even went as far as starting a fire in the fireplace, just to distract myself."
"I had years of being in love with you and having time to myself. It got old." She gently, reverently, kissed Alex. "You're so beautiful."
"I'm so lucky," Alex replied, kissing Olivia's lips, then her cheek, then, as she closed her eyes, her eyelids. There was a delicacy to her movements, so that they barely seemed to disturb the stillness of the room. The pale light of the winter morning streamed through the kitchen window, trapping itself in Alex's tousled hair and picking up auburn highlights in Olivia's.
"Want to go back to bed?" Olivia whispered against Alex's ear, biting the soft lobe and watching goosebumps appear on one pale shoulder. She chuckled as Alex shivered against her.
"Yes, but you wanted tea."
"I can have tea later."
"We keep doing this, we'll die of hunger and thirst," Alex warned, but her hands cupped Olivia's hips and pulled the brunette's pelvis against her own.
"But what a way to go." Her hands flattened against the warm skin of Alex's back, pressing their bodies together. "Anyway, we had dinner last night."
"Mmm," Alex agreed dreamily. "We inhaled lasagna right out of the casserole dish and then went straight back to bed where I ate ice cream off your belly."
"And it was even better when it melted and I ate it off your…"
Both women started as a phone began to ring. It sounded alien in the silence of the cottage that had been broken only by their murmurs, their breathing and the faint thunder of the surf in the distance. "I think it's yours," Alex said with a smile. "I don't get calls on Sunday mornings since I started working with the ACLU."
Olivia scowled. "That ring means it's Elliot, Casey or the Captain. They know where I am, so I can't see the point of calling me when it will take me four hours to get back to Manhattan. And I'm on vacation, for fucks sake."
"Must be urgent, then. You'd better take it."
The phone was on the kitchen counter and Olivia reluctantly moved away from Alex to pick it up. "Benson."
She frowned. "That's none of your…. How did you…?"
There was a look of resignation on her face as she said, "Yes."
She blushed. "That's sick."
A reluctant smile spread across her face. "Yes."
She looked at Alex and shook her head wryly. "Thank you."
"I'll tell her," she said after listening for a while.
"Bye, Elliot."
As she flipped the phone shut, Alex asked anxiously. "Do you have to go in?"
"No."
"So what did Elliot want?"
"Let's see…. He wanted to know if I'd spent the night with you after the party, then he said he knew that I had. He wanted to know if you were with me now, then he informed me that he'd won the pool since Fin thought I'd hold out until Christmas and Munch thought it would take you until New Year's Eve to seduce me. He asked if I was happy, congratulated me and asked to tell you that I'm a pain in the ass, but I'm worth it. There, I think that's it." She grinned.
"They had a pool on how long it would take me to get you into bed?"
"Apparently it started on the day you resigned from the DA's office."
"They knew…?"
"Knew…?" Then Olivia realized what everyone around her had known from the start. "You resigned because of me?"
Alex looked uncomfortable. "Yes and no. My politics were increasingly at odds with what Arthur wanted to do with his office. When I was approached about the ACLU job, it just felt right. It's also a career path that will give me a chance at a career-long goal of arguing a case before the US Supreme Court." Her eyes met Olivia's. "But I can't say that knowing that an open relationship between us would always be complicated while you were a cop and I was an ADA wasn't a factor." They'd worked together to convict a lot of sex offenders and each knew that even a hint of impropriety might be used by defense attorneys as grounds for appeal.
Olivia smiled at her. "So, even though you thought I was in a relationship with David, you knew that I'd fall for you in a major, public way at some point in the future."
"It wasn't like that! Ok, I hoped you'd look at me as more than a friend at some point, because I was so much in love with you, but I've never been confident about that. Confident that you care about me, yes. Confident that I can rely on you, yes. But I could barely even bring myself to hope that you'd be attracted to me, let alone fall in love with me."
"Well I am and I have. So I guess I'll just have to devote myself to building up your confidence."
"What confidence-building ideas did you have in mind, Detective?"
"Hmm, well you have the immediate choice between a cup of tea and quiet adoration as we snuggle up together in front of the fireplace and listen to the sound of the surf, or…"
"Sold."
"You haven't heard my other offer, yet!"
"I know, but if it makes you feel any better, I promise to accept that one, too – when you get around to making it."
The End