“Fine, you’re right.  I felt badly that I hadn’t called you, or Stabler.  I’ve been getting things straight…,” Olivia started to laugh, and Alex closed her eyes, laughing also.  “At work.”

            “Work, work, work.  You live and breath work, when was the last time you went out on a date?” asked Olivia, giving her order to the attractive waitress who appeared at her elbow.  Then Alex ordered, waiting for the woman to be out of earshot.

            “When I was in Witness Protection, I was a married woman,” announced Alex with some humor in her voice.  Olivia was hiding her giggling behind a cupped hand.  Benson waved her hand, finally getting some composure.  Alex sat patiently and shook her head.

            “Married?  You?  You must have been miserable.” 

            “I wasn’t,” assured Alex.  In reality, if she hadn’t been forced to stay at home, things would have been close to wonderful.

            “Where were you set up?” asked Olivia, taking some bread from the basket on the table.  Alex realized how stunning she looked, her dark eyes were still alluring.

            “Massachusetts.  Small town, I was the typical housewife…” 

            “Stop…,” Olivia laughed again, Alex rolled her eyes, thinking that Olivia was getting too much of a kick out of this.  “Do you have pictures?  Of you, doing laundry?  Vacuuming?” 

            Alex rested her elbows on the table, waiting for the laughter to fade, when it finally did, “We were in Mass, I was ‘married’ to a cop, a woman.”  Olivia didn’t move, a stunned look on her face.

            “Oh.”

            “That quieted you, didn’t it?”

            “Wow.  How did you get out, of WP that is?”  Olivia managed to asked, Alex looked down at the table, reaching for a piece of bread also.  This had been one of the reason she hadn’t contacted Olivia before today.

            “I…  I leaked my location on the internet… they came after me.”

            “You did what?” asked Olivia, stunned at the admission.

            “I know, it was stupid.  I couldn’t handle being there anymore, stuck inside, away from my law books, my job, my life.”  Alex cleared her throat, fighting back the tears.  Olivia reached over, touching her hand.  Alex forced a smile, “I was sure that they’d hit the apartment first, bomb or gunman.  Instead, they went after the woman who was assigned to watch over me.”