Fic: All the PI’s Men (Logan/Veronica, Ensemble) NC-17 (1/7)
Title: “All the PI’s Men”
Author: em2mb
Pairing/Character: Logan/Veronica, Mac, Keith, Weevil, Wallace, Piz, Sacks.
Word Count: 9,754
Rating: NC-17, and not always the good kind. This chapter is tamer than what’s to come, but you’ve been warned: it’s dark and twisty.
Summary: Dammit, Veronica, he thought. Are you starting to see what it does to us when you insist on running off on your own like this?
Spoilers: Through 3x20, “The Bitch is Back”
Warnings: Violence, language, sex, character death. Even Cliff McCormick probably wouldn’t defend this one in a court of law. Not that I blame him. Seriously, folks. This one is dark.
Author's Notes: Even Rob Thomas thinks he’s a whore, so I’m borrowing his characters. Special thanks to lazaefair, who was always happy to plot fic with me instead of studying; jayiin, who always makes my writing worth reading; and earth2mars, who gave me the encouragement to keep going. Title very obviously ripped from the Woodward and Bernstein book, which lazaefair was supposed to talk me out of BUT NEVER DID. Written in part for 100_situations. Prompt: traitor.
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
The old station clock he’d always relied on before wasn’t ticking under its thick layer of dust, and he’d lost all concept of time.
Already, he’d tugged holes in his shirt playing with his sleeves, and now he was pacing. In the back of his mind, he knew it hadn’t been that long since he was arrested, but time had never passed so slowly before. He longed for his watch to serve as confirmation, but the sheriff had taken it along with his other effects when he’d been brought in.
He was all nerves as he crossed the floor of his cell in the Balboa County Sheriff’s Department. He hit the bars and doubled back. The old t-shirt he had on beneath his button down was soaked with sweat, and he could feel condensation prickling at his hairline.
Being in jail was bad enough. But being in this jail, accused of this crime?
He wasn’t even sure if his one phone call would show. Hours had passed since he’d made his plea to a tinny answering machine, and Logan Echolls had nearly given up hope.
I guess that’s it, he thought bitterly. If you were wondering if anyone still cared, then the answer is no.
Logan took a seat on the ratty bed just as he heard the squeak of cheap leather on linoleum. Springing to his feet, he smacked his head on the upper bunk, but the stinging pain hardly slowed him.
“Cliff,” he breathed, gripping the bars so tightly his knuckles turned white. “I didn’t think you-”
“I’m not staying.” Cliff McCormick, Neptune’s primary public defender, adjusted his tie as he cut Logan off.
Logan’s heart sank. “You can’t think I-”
“I can,” Cliff corrected. “And maybe I do. At any rate, I’m not here because you called me. I’m here on behalf of Balboa County, but like I said-not staying.”
“But you have to represent me.”
“I have to represent those who cannot afford legal representation of their own,” Cliff corrected. “You can.”
“Maybe I don’t want another lawyer,” Logan challenged. Maybe Cliff was just testing him. They’d played this game before, after all.
But the young man knew instinctively this was different when Cliff shoved his hands in the pockets of his polyester suit, eyes never lifting from his briefcase on the floor. “Maybe, but I’m still not your lawyer. The judge agreed there’s a conflict of interest here. You can call someone, or you can wait until morning when they send in some other schmuck with a mail-order law degree.”
“You’re selling yourself short, Cliffy,” Logan said, desperate. He kept staring at the lawyer, hoping to draw his eyes upwards, but Cliff didn’t budge.
“You’re in no position to get comfortable, kid,” he retorted. “The prosecutor asked you not be granted bail.”
“And?” Logan asked anxiously.
“The judge agreed.”
“What?” Logan was incredulous. “I’m not a flight risk! Dammit, Cliff, I’m not even guilty!” He waited. Nothing. “You can’t think I’m guilty.”
“The sheriff thinks you’re guilty.”
For the first time all afternoon, the white-hot tears that had been boiling in Logan’s throat sprang up. He scuffed the ground in front of him with his toe before rattling the bars he gripped. “No,” Logan pleaded. “Not you too.”
Cliff finally looked up. “Me too.”
He picked up his briefcase and turned.
“No, please, Cliff, wait!”
The lawyer stopped, shaking his head. “Even I can’t defend you on this one, kid.”
Logan watched Cliff walk away, feeling his own legs start to tremble beneath him. He continued to grip the cell door, but this time he held on for balance, not out of anger. He was still confused, still indignant, but if he couldn’t even convinced Neptune’s best lawyer in a hundred-dollar suit of his innocence, there was no chance he’d be walking out of this cell anytime soon.
* * *
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Jerry Sacks continued to grip the wheel of the squad car after putting it into park outside the industrial-looking building. He waited until his knuckles had turned white to look at Keith. He desperately wanted a chance to repay his mentor, the man who had done so much for him, yet somehow Sacks looked to Keith for guidance even today, on what he imagined was fast becoming the worse day of the sheriff’s life.
“I’ll do it,” Keith said wearily, releasing the door handle he’d been clutching the entire way to Los Angeles. “It’s only proper.”
Sacks’ stomach turned as he scrambled out of the car behind Keith. He couldn’t let the sheriff do this, not if the coroner’s suspicions were correct. She’d be so damaged, so broken, and he’d be damned if that’s how Keith came to remember her. So at the door, Sacks pushed his way in front of the sheriff and made an offer that still fell short of the heroic gesture with which he’d always hoped to thank Keith Mars.
“Let me do it, Keith,” Sacks offered. He wrung his hands as they approached the receptionist’s desk. “I can handle it.”
Keith just pushed passed him, flashing his badge at the woman behind the counter. “Keith Mars, Balboa County Sheriff. I’m supposed to discuss some remains with Dr. Magee?”
“Of course, sir,” she replied, rapidly dialing an extension. After a brief exchange with whoever was on the other end of the line, she nodded in the direction of the hallway. “If you’d like to take a seat, the coroner will be right with you.”
“Thank you,” Keith said. He grabbed a chair halfway down the hall, and Sacks shivered as he followed. Even upstairs, two stories above the morgue, cool air blasted from the vents.
Keith had ignored his first request, but Sacks felt obligated to try again. After all, it was the man sitting next to him who had taught him to be steadfast. Determinedly, he insisted, “I’ll do it, Keith. You shouldn’t have to.”
“This is something I have to do myself,” Keith replied automatically. He’d been bald as long as Sacks had known him, but he’d never looked old before. Even at the height of the Lilly Kane debacle, Keith Mars had always been dignified. He might have fallen from everyone else’s grace, but Sacks’ respect had never faltered. It remained now, but Keith looked tired, as if the years on the job had finally succeeded in weathering him.
Sacks wanted to tell him he could handle this routine ID, but there was nothing routine about preparing to enter the cold basement morgue. Nothing had been routine about the last week, nothing at all. “Really, I can handle it.”
Keith gave him a warm smile-in spite of a week of incredible adversity, he remained downright fatherly. “Of course you can, Jerry. And if it were anyone else-”
Anyone else. The words hung between the two of them in the stale refrigerated air as they waited for the coroner. “It still could be.”
“It still will be,” Keith corrected.
“Let me do it, Sheriff,” Sacks pleaded.
Keith didn’t have a chance to refuse his offer again before the coroner stepped out. “Sheriff Mars? This way, please.”
Sacks stood when Keith stood. The older man shook his head. “I’m doing this, Sacks.”
“Not alone, you’re not,” Sacks said stubbornly, and he matched Keith’s folded-arm stance until the other man relented. The coroner spoke as they followed him down a flight of stairs. To Sacks, the walk felt impossibly long. He couldn’t imagine how Keith was holding up.
“The victim is a young woman in her late teens or early twenties,” Dr. Magee said, “approximately five foot one, with blonde hair, blue eyes, and a petite build. Her body was recovered yesterday morning from a park several blocks away. She suffered from a gunshot wound to the left shoulder, multiple stab wounds to the chest and abdomen and laceration of the neck.”
Keith paled as the coroner led them into the morgue. A sheet-covered gurney sat in the center of the room. The coroner continued.
“Multiple fractures and severe bruising suggest she fought with her attacker. She may have been the victim of a sexual assault. Her body was discovered within approximately twelve hours of her death, so there’s little decomposition, but I might warn you, sir-” his eyes flashed with a compassion Sacks hadn’t expected “-the damage is extensive.”
“I received your initial report,” Keith replied. “I’m ready.”
The coroner’s eyes flickered. “You’re sure?”
Sacks said a silent prayer, certain Keith said one too as he nodded. But then Dr. Magee lifted the sheet.
Keith’s face contorted. Sacks’ stomach lurched. He watched his mentor-his friend-grope unsteadily for support that wasn’t there, and Sacks’ reaction was automatic. He elbowed past the sheriff, blocking his line of sight. The coroner looked at him expectantly. Sacks wanted to shout. Had Keith’s reaction not just confirmed it?
“That’s her,” Sacks said quietly, and he gently led the sheriff, still shaking, out of the uncomfortably cool room.
* * *
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Backup bounded at him when he opened the door to the apartment, always underfoot. Any other night, Keith would have welcomed the pit bull warmly, or at least made a half-hearted effort to scratch behind his ears. That night, however, he ignored the canine entirely as he settled in his armchair, not bothering to turn on the lights. Backup continued to whine, first for attention and then at the door to go out, but Keith just stared at the wall clock, watching it tick down the minutes to the ten o’clock news.
Finally, as the second hand slipped past the twelve, he reached for the remote. The call sign for one of the affiliate stations in San Diego came on at once, and for a moment, Keith paused to wonder how long it had been since the Mars family television had seen a DVD or even another channel.
“Tonight’s top story is breaking in Neptune, where an arrest was made today in the ongoing murder investigation of a Hearst College student,” the anchor chirped. “Twenty-year-old Veronica Mars was found stabbed to death nearly two months ago.”
A photo of Veronica, taken on her last birthday, filled the screen. Keith’s eyes flickered from the station’s photo to the original, sitting on a shelf near the television. He swallowed hard.
“Mars, who was abducted from her car while driving on the PCH in December, was the daughter of Balboa County Sheriff Keith Mars. Although her father’s tenure with the force has been shaky at best, his relentless search for his daughter’s killer has gripped the entire Southern California coast. Mars stepped down today after arresting Veronica’s ex-boyfriend, Logan Echolls, the son of the late movie star Aaron Echolls. Charges against Echolls are currently pending. We have Mark in Neptune with the story.”
“Thanks, Elizabeth,” said Mark, a well dressed man who both smiled and blinked too much. Keith’s lips curled upwards in distaste as he remembered the man ambushing him as he’d tried to leave the station that day. “Emotions in Neptune are high today following Echolls’ arrest. The abduction and murder of the sheriff’s daughter would be big news in any small town, but this small seaside community was still reeling from the disappearance of former sheriff Vincent Van Lowe when Mars-”
Keith switched off the television, having heard enough. He sat in his armchair in the dark for a long time, fingers idly stroking the pocket of his shirt his badge typically occupied, Backup whining at the door.
He eventually let the dog out, but he’d surrendered his badge to Inga at the desk and he’d given the heart it symbolically covered to the daughter he sorely missed.
* * *
Friday, December 21, 2007
When Lianne left him, he had removed every drop of alcohol from the house-or, at least, he’d tried. He had emptied every cabinet and torn through the kitchen, dumping entire bottles of rum down the kitchen sink. Just when Keith thought he’d cleared his wife’s stash, he found a bottle of tequila in the nightstand and a flask of whiskey in the living room.
So he tore the house apart-ripped throw pillows from the sofa and yanked every drawer from the dressers. He had tossed the booze and was triumphantly cleaning up the mess he’d made when sixteen-year-old Veronica had come in from school, taken a swig from a water bottle in the fridge, and spewed vodka all over the kitchen.
In a way, it had been a relief when the bank foreclosed on the house. At least when they moved into their tiny two-bedroom apartment, he’d finally felt like he was living in an alcohol-free home. He’d hardly had a drink since, but tonight, Keith Mars was holding a bottle of whiskey.
He was starting to understand why Lianne (who he’d spent six hours trying to reach so maybe, just maybe, she’d make it back to Neptune for their daughter’s funeral) had chosen to drown her sorrows rather than face them.
A drink sounded better than asking Cliff, the closest thing Keith reckoned they had to a family friend, to write the eulogy. A drink sounded better than facing Veronica’s friends, who’d shown up at the station, the office, the apartment, offering sincere condolences. A drink sounded better than launching an investigation into his daughter’s murder, and it certainly sounded better than knowing his little girl wasn’t coming home again, not ever.
Keith grabbed a glass-but before he could pour himself a drink, someone knocked on the door. It’s probably for the best, he thought, padding lightly around the island and stepping over the dog, who had started to growl. “Backup,” he said warningly, glancing through the peephole. Mac. She’d been by before-six times now, seven?-and for a second, he contemplated not answering the door.
But he couldn’t just leave her out there either, shoulders slumped, oversized sweatshirt drawn tightly around her. Running a hand through his nonexistent hair, he pulled open the door.
“Cindy,” he mumbled.
“Mr. Mars,” she said respectfully. “I know you said-”
“It’s not the best time,” Keith said, hand still on the door. “I appreciate your concern, and I know Veronica would be happy you’re checking on her old man, but I’ll see you tomorrow at the memorial.”
“Yeah, tomorrow, at the memorial,” Mac repeated. “Really, Mr. Mars-”
“Cindy,” he cut in, “good night.” Keith shut the door to the chorus of her protests, exhaling slowly as he heard shuffling on the step.
Another knock. Another glance through the peephole-Wallace. He hadn’t realized Mac wasn’t alone. Sighing, he opened the door again. Veronica’s BFF was kicking at nonexistent dirt on the pavement with white basketball sneakers. “Your mother didn’t send you, did you?”
Alicia had called seven times in two days, but Wallace shook his head. “Actually, Sheriff, we were wondering-”
“Logan,” Mac cut in anxiously. “You haven’t seen him, have you?”
Keith shook his head. “I haven’t, not since-” he broke off, remembering how Sacks had to drag him out of the morgue and back to station. When Logan had seen the deputy supporting the sheriff, he’d known instantly the body was Veronica’s. Keith had pulled himself out of his own grief just long enough to watch the fire in the young man’s eyes extinguish. They had remained bright throughout the search, hopeful, but just like that, the spark had gone. “Not for a few days, at least.”
“We can’t find him anywhere, sir,” Wallace explained. “No one’s seen him, no one’s heard from him-”
“Dick’s been staying at his frat, but the TV’s been on in their suite all night,” Mac rushed in. She laughed nervously. “Which we know because we’ve been pounding on the door for the last hour.”
Keith folded his arms across his chest. “I’m not sure what to tell you,” he said, starting to shut the door again, but Wallace kicked his foot in the frame to keep it from closing. The young man’s eyes were pleading.
“Mr. Mars, you know Ver-”
He held his hand up to stop Wallace from continuing. “Of course.” Keith smiled sadly. “You said you were trying to find Logan?”
Mac shot Wallace a sideways glance, biting her lip. “The Grand staff won’t let us in because there someone put a ‘Do Not Disturb’ on the room.” Keith continued to stare at her expectantly. “And he’d given Veronica a key when they were dating.”
“That was months ago.”
Wallace kicked the pavement again. “She still had it in her wallet two weeks ago.”
Two weeks ago, before everything went to hell. “Right,” Keith said. “I’m sorry, kids, but they collected her purse for evidence.”
It had been bloodstained, filled with broken glass and shards of her smashed cell phone, still in her passenger seat when they’d found her car, almost as though her abductor had known the first thing he’d do was activate one of three GPS devices he had secured to her possessions. Somehow, all three-her phone, her car, and her wallet-had failed him.
“Right,” Mac said, bowing her head. “We’ll just-really, Mr. Mars, is there anything we can do?”
Keith shook his head as the teenagers waited expectantly. “I appreciate your concern, but I’d really like to be alone right now.”
Mac’s lower lip quivered ever so slightly, but Wallace grabbed her shoulder. “Come on, Mac, let’s go.”
“Of course. Thanks, Mr. Mars,” she said. “And-I’m so sorry. We both are.” They started down the steps, and Keith realized he was the one who should be offering to help them.
“Kids, wait,” he said. Smiling sadly, he reached into his back pocket for his own wallet. He thumbed past his credit cards and handed Mac a plastic rectangle with the Neptune Grand’s logo. It had become an afterthought when Veronica had broken up with Logan all those months ago, but he was still surprised it had taken him so long to think of it. “I got to be pretty good friends with the security staff when they were dating. See you tomorrow.”
He pulled the door shut behind him to their chorus of goodnights. He waited until he heard Mac’s car rumble to life and roll out of the apartment parking lot before grabbing his own keys. Keith imagined he could be wrong, and sincerely hoped he was, but instinct told him they could burst into Logan’s suite with the copy he’d made of the boys key and still not find him there. After all, if Veronica’s death caused the former sheriff, a non-drinker, to crave cheap Scotch, he imagined Logan had already abandoned the mini-bar.
Keith took side streets through Neptune and got on the PCH several exits past where they’d found Veronica’s car. Soon, he was entering San Diego, and then he exited to cross the Coronado Bridge, praying he wasn’t too late. Pulled off to one side was Logan’s Range Rover, confirming his worst suspicions.
It had never been that he didn’t like Logan, or even that he worried the boy would turn out like his father. He’d gotten over having to replace the living room lamp, but he’d never forgiven the boy for the nightmares he’d given Veronica that first summer they were together. The nights Logan hadn’t sneaked back into the apartment and into Veronica’s bedroom, she’d had had nightmares about him jumping from this very spot.
“Logan!” Keith called, surprised at how black the night looked over the water, panicked when he didn’t immediately spot the young man. He couldn’t have already taken the same swan dive as his mother, could he? “Dammit, Logan!”
“Mr. Mars?”
Logan’s words were slurred, and he drunkenly rose from where he’d been sitting on the concrete. Keith rushed forward, grabbed the boy’s arm, and dragged him back from the edge. For a second, he thought his daughter’s ex-boyfriend was going to take a swing at him, but instead, Logan just seemed to collapse in on himself, breaking down into hiccoughing sobs.
His feelings for Logan had been grudging at best, disdaining at worst. But at the moment, he didn’t know what to do but to embrace the boy and let his own tears fall.
“I loved her,” Logan said, over and over. “Did she ever see that?”
Over the past several days, Keith had wondered the same thing. If no power in the world could bring his little girl back to life, he just wished he could change their last month together to anything but stormy silence. He let go of Logan slowly and clasped the boy’s shoulders. Keith had long grappled with Veronica’s affection for Logan, seeing even when she didn’t that her love for the boy rivaled that for her old man. But as much as he hated to admit it, he felt he owed Logan the truth.
“She loved you, too, Logan.”
The words sobered Logan enough to get him to surrender his keys, and he didn’t complain when Keith made him ride with him to get the Range Rover off the bridge. The long walk back to Keith’s cruiser sobered him even further.
“You can’t go back there anymore,” Keith said somberly. “You can’t take the easy way out just because she’s gone, son.”
Logan stared out the window. Keith wondered how long it had been since anyone called him that. At the Grand, he mumbled his thanks and scrambled out of his car. If Keith hadn’t seen him wipe at his eyes with his sleeve, he probably would have been offended. As it was, he let it go.
Back at the apartment, Keith finally poured himself that glass of whiskey.
* * *
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Sacks tugged nervously at his damp collar, worried that his sweat was outwardly obvious. His ears burned; his moustache itched. The badge he wore on his left shirt pocket seemed so much heavier than the one he’d worn as a deputy.
“Are you sure you don’t want a lawyer present?” he asked, not for the first time.
Echolls pulled at the sleeves of his shirt-again, not for the first time. He stared at Sacks through swollen eyes. The sheriff had to look away, having spent all night at the station, pacing, wondering how the hell he’d been thrust into this situation.
In the back, the kid had cried.
“I told you, I don’t have a lawyer yet, and if I can’t have Cliff, I don’t want a public defender.” Echolls wiped hastily at his face with his sleeve. “Besides,” he mumbled, “isn’t this like a cop’s dream? Interrogate the suspect without an attorney shooting down his every question?”
Sacks swallowed hard. “So you’re waiving your right to legal counsel?” Echolls swept his hand through the air. Sacks waited.
“That was me ‘waving’ my right,” Echolls grumbled. “Man, Lamb would have loved that. So, Deputy, what do you have for me?”
“I need to ask you a few questions about the night of December thirteenth last year,” Sacks said, sliding around the table and trying to lean against the edge as he’d seen Keith and Don do a thousand times over. Instead, he misestimated where the table’s edge was, and almost toppled onto the floor. He brushed imaginary lint from his pants as he waited for Echolls to answer.
“What?” The kid arched an eyebrow. “I’m waiting for a question.”
Sacks could have died of embarrassment right there. “Right, okay.”
“You’re doing fine,” Echolls said encouragingly. His eyes were still red, but a smirk played at the corners of his mouth. Elbows propped up on the table, he pressed his fingertips together. “So?”
“Why don’t you tell me where you were on the night of December thirteenth?”
“Let’s see... December thirteenth? A Thursday, right? Thursdays were so uneventful last semester, I only had one class-” Echolls laughed tersely when Sacks began to stare. “Someone’s been taking lessons from Sheriff Mars.”
Sacks gripped the edge of the table with both his hands. “Echolls, you’re being charged with murder. You need to take this seriously.”
“Sorry. Just taking a moment before I relive the last time I saw the girl I love alive,” Echolls said coolly. “Like I said, I had one class on Thursday. British History from the Glorious Revolution. It was the last review session before the final. I got out at nine, grabbed something to eat, and went to the River Styx.”
“Why?”
“Veronica’s friend Mac had told me-”
“Mac?” Sacks interrupted.
“Cindy Mackenzie,” Echolls said impatiently, then sighed. Shoulders slumping, he pointed to the file on the table. “Seriously, I gave my statement already. Why do we have to go through this again?”
“What did Mackenzie tell you?”
“She had come to me earlier in the week because she was worried about Veronica. Late nights, stakeouts, and Veronica’s grades were suffering, which had never happened before, no matter how many cases she was working. She’d asked for Mac’s help to override some complex security-”
He stopped abruptly.
Sacks tapped his foot impatiently. “Well?”
“I’m not saying anything that will get Mac in trouble.” Echolls glared. “At any rate, she thought Veronica was in danger, so she’d put a bug on Veronica, which let her know Veronica had tapped the River Styx.”
“And?”
“And it’s the fucking Fitzpatricks. I was worried!”
“Of course, Mr. Echolls, but what did you do?”
“I drove to the bar and parked around back. Mac had given me a receiver so I could pick up the tap I had on Veronica, who was also there. I didn’t see her car or anything, but I heard male voices yelling through her wire. I thought she was in trouble, so I stormed into the bar.”
“And was she in trouble?”
“She wasn’t there,” Echolls said flatly. “I came in and swung a few punches before I realized I had gotten a tap of her tap on the Fitzpatricks. Of course, she heard the fight break out on her tap, so she came to my rescue.”
“Interesting.”
“Actually, the word you’re searching for is ironic,” said Echolls. He sighed. “She wouldn’t have been in trouble if not for me.”
“Are you saying you caused trouble for Miss Mars?”
“I’m saying it’s a bad idea to storm into the bar where known members of the Irish mob play pool,” Echolls retorted. “Veronica rushed in, almost got clubbed with a barstool, and I just about lost it. I threw a few more punches and got hit a few times myself before she could get me out of there.”
“How’d she get you out of there?”
“Dragged me,” Echolls said. A sad smile crept onto his face. “And I know what you’re thinking-Veronica Mars, a hundred pounds with her combat boots on, couldn’t drag me out of a bar fight. But she’s bossy, too.”
Sacks had to turn away. He could handle a big murder case, he honestly believed he could. He just didn’t know what to do with the grieving boyfriend of a girl he’d once ferried back and forth from soccer practice when her dad couldn’t slip away from the station. These questions weren’t ones he wanted to be asking.
Fortunately, Echolls continued without prompting. “Anyway, we got outside, and she just started screaming at me. She was pounding on my chest with her tiny ineffectual fists and actually managed to land a pretty good kick to my shin.”
“So you fought?”
“We fought.” Echolls drummed his fingers on the table, holding his chin with his other hand. He finally looked up. “It was a lot like foreplay for us, actually.”
“Fighting was?”
“That’s why I’m here, isn’t it? Everyone knows Veronica and I fought.” He paused. Softly, he said, “I would never hurt her.”
“I have a witness who saw you grab Miss Mars’ arm and wrench her back towards you when she tried to leave.”
“I don’t know who your witness is, but-” Echolls blinked several times. “Look, Veronica always stormed out on me, and I couldn’t watch her walk out of my life again. So yeah, I tried to keep her from leaving. I probably grabbed her arm. But I didn’t do it to hurt her.”
“Yet Miss Mars was found with a badly bruised wrist.”
The young man’s face drained of color. “She told me I didn’t hurt her.” His admission, though laced with regret and guilt, didn’t have quite the tone for which Sacks was hoping. Echolls looked pained for having hurt her, not for having admitted as much.
The sheriff shifted. “Did things get rough with Miss Mars?”
Echolls’ voice shook slightly. “Stop calling her that.”
“Stop calling her what?”
“Veronica. Her name was Veronica. You knew her, too. What? Department barbeques and shuttles to and from soccer practice?” He wiped at his eyes again. “She always liked you, you know. Thought you deserved more credit than you got.”
Sacks swallowed the lump in his throat, forcing his emotions from taking charge. Procedure, dammit. He was following procedure. And trying to show a bit of respect for the girl this young man had very likely stabbed to death. He repeated his question.
“Did things get rough with Miss Mars?”
Echolls clenched his fist. “I told Veronica I wanted to talk. She told me my eye was popping out a little. She insisted on driving me back to the Grand to clean me up.”
“You rode with her, in her car?”
“Yeah, she didn’t want me driving.” Exhaling slowly, Echolls took a shuddering breath. “I knew I was wearing her down. She was pissed as hell with me, but she also wanted to make sure I was all right.”
“And?”
“And she cleaned me up and took me back to my car.”
“What aren’t you telling me?” Sacks asked. “Did things get rough, Mr. Echolls?”
Echolls stared blankly at the wall behind Sacks’ head. He gritted his teeth. “I loved Veronica. We talked about whether or not we could actually make our twisted, fucked up relationship work. I thought we could. She wasn’t sure, like always.”
“Did that frustrate you, Mr. Echolls?”
“Did it frustrate me? Yeah, it frustrated me. Did it make me hurt her? No.”
“You were seen fighting with Miss Mars around ten p.m. You said yourself to Sheriff Mars she didn’t drop you back off at your car until at least two a.m. Did you really spend four hours talking about your relationship?”
Another sad smile. “Four hours would barely have put a dent in our issues.” He sighed. “No, we didn’t just spend four hours talking.”
“Then what did you do?”
“What do you think we did?”
“I think you left something out of the statement you gave Sheriff Mars earlier.”
“I did.” Echolls ran a hand through his hair. “Would you tell a man licensed to carry a gun you’d just had sex with his daughter? When she was missing and he was frantically searching for her?”
Sacks continued to stare at him. “We’re going to need a DNA sample.”
Echolls sat back in the chair and folded his arms across his chest. “I’m going to need a lawyer.”
* * *
Friday, December 14, 2007
The Range Rover hurtled into the parking lot, landing in not one or two but three spots. Logan didn’t lock the SUV as he hurtled into sheriff’s station. He didn’t care if he was written a parking citation. Add it to the half-dozen automated tickets he expected to receive in about two weeks. If his haste meant Veronica was home safe then, he didn’t care how many red lights he had to run. A woman stared at him quizzically as he pushed past her at the doors, taking in his bruised and swollen face and probably assuming he was there to report an assault.
He barely paused at the receptionist’s desk. “I need to speak to the sheriff,” he said, brushing past Inga. She wasn’t fast enough to grab his arm, and one of the deputies, the mustached one, had to jump out of his seat to serve as a blockade.
“Mr. Echolls,” he said, his tone warning. Logan struggled to get past him.
On his other side, Inga shifted her weight from foot to foot. “You cannot go back there, sir, the sheriff is busy,” she said, but all Logan heard was Veronica calling in favors to other law enforcement offices in a ridiculously heavy German accent.
“I know, I know,” Logan pleaded, trying to shake the pleased smile his ex-girlfriend would wear whenever she conned a lawman into providing her vital information. “Veronica-”
The way the deputy’s face fell confirmed Logan’s worst fears. He’d known the instant he stormed into the station something was going on, something big. He paled. Wallace was right, then. It was something with Veronica. He tried to shove past the deputy again, who looked genuinely sorry to be holding him back.
Sacks. His name was Sacks. He’d always been nicer to Logan than the other officers whenever Lamb dragged him in for questioning.
“I assure you, everything is being done,” Sacks promised. “I can-”
But his obvious sympathy had given Logan just enough of an in to edge past him and dart towards the sheriff’s office. He didn’t bother knocking, just threw open the door. Keith was standing up at his desk, poring over a map and scribbling furious notes on a yellow legal pad.
“Is it true?” Logan demanded. He grabbed the doorframe when Sacks appeared behind him, attempting to drag him back into the main station.
Keith looked up from the map. His brown eyes were dull, devoid of their usual smile as he took in Logan’s unseemly appearance. “It’s true,” he said, sighing. “Sacks, it’s fine.”
Sacks let go of Logan’s shoulder, but he continued to hover behind the younger man. Logan pushed further into the office, deciding he preferred even Keith’s cold stare to the current lack of spark. “What-”
“Logan,” Keith said, holding up a hand and walking around the desk. “Stop. We’re going to find her. We think this has something to do with the Cas-”
“No,” Logan shook his head. “It’s the Fitzpatricks.”
Keith narrowed his eyes. “How do you know?”
“Veronica was at the River Styx last night,” Logan blurted. “I was with her.”
“You were where?” Keith demanded, and Logan immediately felt like he was breaking the Mars’ living room lamp all over again.
“She was doing surveillance,” Logan babbled. “Mac, she was worried about her-Veronica. She asked me to keep an eye on her.”
Keith had walked back to his side of the desk and sat down in his chair. “Have a seat, Logan. You’re going to have to slow down if you’ve got information we can use. Sacks?” He glanced up at the deputy still standing in the doorframe. “Can you give us a moment?”
“Of course, sir,” Sacks said respectfully, and the door clicked shut behind him. As soon as the deputy had gone, Keith’s temper flared.
“The River Styx, Logan?” he demanded. “What the hell were you thinking? You let her go near the Fitzpatricks?”
“I didn’t let her go near anyone!” Logan shot back. “Mac called me a couple of days ago. Veronica had asked her enough questions about a high-end security system that she’d gotten suspicious. She did a little checking into it and realized Veronica had been tailing Liam Fitzpatrick.”
“And Mac didn’t come to me?” Keith wanted to know.
Logan averted his eyes. “No offense, sir, but she probably knew things hadn’t been so great between you and Veronica lately.”
Keith’s face twitched slight. “No offense, Logan, but things haven’t been so great between you and Veronica lately, either. Why’d Mac call you?”
“She’d tried Wallace. He didn’t think it was his place to get involved. The last time he’d done Veronica a favor, it ended badly, and you know how well the direct approaches works with her. She would have denied everything. Piz-” Logan hoped he’d managed to veil his disgust at least somewhat when he spat the name “-isn’t exactly what you’d call muscle, so Mac called me.”
“What did Mac want you to do about it?”
“Make sure Veronica wasn’t doing something stupid?” Logan suggested irritably. “She put a wire on Veronica, but when I tuned in, I caught what her tap on the Fitzpatricks was picking up.” He glanced down. “I rushed into the bar. I thought she was in trouble.”
Keith had grabbed the legal pad and flipped to a new page. “Go on.”
“She followed me in,” Logan mumbled. It’s your fault, a voice inside his head screamed. If anything happens to her because of them, it’s on your head. He swallowed hard. “God, Mr. Mars, I’m so sorry.”
“Something happened to her at the River Styx last night, and you’re just now reporting it?” Keith barked.
Logan paled. “No, no,” he said hastily. “It didn’t happen like that. She dragged me out of there after I’d swung a few punches. She insisted on driving me home because, uh, Liam Fitzpatrick had also swung a few punches.”
“She cleaned you up.”
“Yeah, the bruises-” Logan pointed to his face, where his eye was probably still popping out a bit from the night before. Add it to the scratches on his cheek and swollen jaw, and he probably made a pretty picture.
“Got it,” Keith said. “What time was this?”
“Ten. It probably took her an hour to clean me up. Then we-” Logan hesitated ever so slightly “-we, uh, talked. Well, first we yelled. She’d been yelling at me since she dragged me out of the River Styx and all the way to the Grand. But then we talked.”
“About?” Keith’s prompts were growing more and more impatient.
“Us,” Logan said. “Our relationship. Maybe, you know, getting back together.” He watched the sheriff’s face drop and added quickly, “Probably not. But when she took me back to my car, things were more amiable between us than they had been in months.”
“What time? Eleven? Midnight?”
Logan shook his head. “It was closer to two.”
“You spent four hours talking to my daughter?”
“Uh-huh. Talking, sir.” He watched the sheriff’s eyes twitch and realized he’d have to be a bit more convincing if he didn’t want to stare down the barrel of a Balboa County issued gun. “She gave me a chance to explain what I was doing at the bar, and then we spent a few hours catching up.”
“Did she say what she was doing at the River Styx?”
“Wouldn’t say. Just told me about her summer and her classes, things like that.”
“I see.” Keith jotted a few more notes, and Logan breathed an inward sigh of relief when the sheriff didn’t press further. “Did she have anything left to say by the time she dropped you off?”
“Veronica always has something to say,” Logan said, almost forgetting for a second she was missing and now wasn’t the time to banter with her father. Please, please, please, Veronica, he begged, give your dad a chance to like me when all this blows over. “I made her promise she’d go straight home.”
“She was on her way when they-” Keith broke off abruptly. “Can you remember anything else, Logan, that might help us? She really didn’t say why she was trailing Liam Fitzpatrick?”
“Believe me, I asked,” Logan said, exhaling slowly. “She said it was the usual. Maybe drugs? She said she was on the trail of a ring of some sorts, but she wouldn’t talk about it.”
Two more scribbled lines went on the notepad. Keith looked up. “I knew you’d be in at some point today, son,” he said gruffly.
“Wallace called me,” Logan said softly. “He said you’d called to see if he knew anything. He thought I should know.”
“I need you to give your official statement to one of the deputies, Logan,” Keith said. “I’d take it myself, but I have to call Mac.”
“Of course, sir.” Logan wiped hastily at his eyes, trying to will away the worst of the nightmarish thoughts he’d been having in the hour since Wallace had called. “I’ll do anything I can to help.”
He shook Keith Mars’ hand when offered, and saw himself to the door. Mac, eyes red and puffy, nearly ran him over. Logan grabbed her shoulders.
“Is he in there?” she wanted to know.
Logan nodded.
“Is it true?” Mac’s lower lip was trembling.
“It’s true,” said Logan, and his voice shook ever so slightly as tears started to stream down Mac’s face. He propelled her gently towards Keith’s open door.
Dammit, Veronica, he thought. Are you starting to see what it does to us when you insist on running off on your own like this?
* * *
Monday, February 18, 2008
“Ain’t done nothing wrong, Deputy,” Liam Fitzpatrick pronounced immediately, sauntering into the interrogation room. He arched an eyebrow, waiting for a challenge, but Sacks just closed the door, reminding himself he’d taken office temporarily just a week before. It wasn’t a sign of disrespect; people just didn’t have a reason to call him “sheriff” yet.
Keep on telling yourself that. Sacks gestured for Fitzpatrick to take a seat. “Didn’t say you’d done anything wrong. I just need you to answer a few questions.”
Fitzpatrick kicked his legs up on the table and extended his arms behind his head. “Fire away. Anything I can do to help the law enforcement in this fine town.”
Sacks tried to ignore the sarcasm dripping from Fitzpatrick’s words and forced himself not to consider all the crimes he could charge the Irishman with at that very moment. He needed information. “Night of December thirteenth, last year. Where were you?”
“Don’t know, Deputy. What’s so special about the thirteenth?” Fitzpatrick laced his fingers together in front of him, the twinkle in his eyes telling Sacks he knew full well the date’s significance.
“Let me refresh your memory, then,” Sacks said, leaning on the side of the table. It would figure he’d be trying to get the hang of this interrogation thing just when he had to bring in Neptune’s most notorious crime boss. “Veronica Mars went missing that night.”
“Right, the Mars girl,” Fitzpatrick said. “Pretty little thing. Real shame what happened to her. How’s her dad holding up?”
“He’ll be holding up much better when her killer’s behind bars,” Sacks snapped. “Answer the question-where were you the night of December thirteenth?”
“My lawyer and I met with Sheriff Mars back in December, Deputy. I’m sure you know I was bartending that night until four. Your own Deputy D’Amato was checking IDs at my door from midnight on.”
Leave it to Balboa County to provide Liam Fitzpatrick an alibi when he needed it the most. Sacks had triple-checked the reports for Keith on a number of occasions, but it hadn’t stopped him from reviewing them again when he’d taken office. If it had been anyone else vouching for Fitzpatrick, Sacks would have still suspected foul play, but he reckoned D’Amato was the only other deputy who wanted to see justice served as much as he and Keith did.
Echolls’ story had been checked months ago, when security tapes from the Grand confirmed he left his room with Veronica shortly before two. Leo’s story had never changed, either-both Liam Fitzpatrick and Danny Boyd had been at the River Styx from midnight until four, almost an hour after someone disabled Veronica’s car on the PCH. But even if Fitzpatrick wasn’t responsible for Veronica’s disappearance, it didn’t mean he didn’t know more than he’d let on.
“Of course,” he offered tersely. “Look, Logan Echolls said he came through your bar that night. Earlier, before we began to sweep. I need to know if he’s telling the truth.”
Fitzpatrick’s dark eyes burned. “Echolls came through.”
“And?”
“He’s underage. Had to throw him out.” The corners of the Irishman’s mouth turned up in a smirk. “Ain’t that a concern of this administration? Did I not just mention the upstanding young officer who stood at my door for over three hours on the night of the thirteenth?”
Sacks clenched his hands in such tight fists he was sure his knuckles were turning white beneath the edge of the table. He pushed away from table and circled Fitzpatrick. “Really? You kicked Echolls out because he was underage?”
Fitzpatrick winked. “Just trying to do my part, Deputy.”
“You kicked him out because he was nineteen, not because he started throwing punches?” Sacks leaned in and reached around Fitzpatrick, grabbing a file off the table. “Your pal Danny Boyd went to the dentist the next day with three cracked molars and a swollen jaw.”
“Thirsty Thursday, Deputy. People get to drinking, fights happen. Danny’s always one of the first to start swinging.”
“Was there or was there not a brawl at the River Styx the night of December thirteenth?”
“There was.”
“And Logan Echolls was or was not involved?”
Fitzpatrick’s eyes darkened. “Was.”
“So why’d you tell me you kicked him out for being underage?”
“We were gonna kick him out for not showing proper ID, but before anyone could do anything, he started cursing and fighting. Real temper on that kid.” Fitzpatrick whistled under his breath. “How many times did he stab the Mars girl before he slit her throat? Seventeen?”
Fifteen. Sacks mentally corrected Fitzpatrick, certain the mob boss could hear his heart pounding beneath his badge. “What about Miss Mars? Did she come into the River Styx that night?”
“Yeeeeah,” Fitzpatrick said, stretching the word’s single syllable. “Echolls burst through the bar demanding to know where ‘she’ was. He threw a punch at Danny, a few at this old drunk, Ethan, one at me, and then there Miss Mars was, yellin’ at him.”
“And Echolls left the bar with Miss Mars?” Sacks asked, wishing Fitzpatrick hadn’t just thrown his attempt to respect the dead right back at him.
“Echolls was struggling and slapping at her even then. Shouldn’t have let them leave.” Fitzpatrick’s eyes taunted Sacks as he kicked his legs down and pushed his chair back from the table. “Eh, well, hindsight’s twenty-twenty. Get what you need, Deputy?”
“Sheriff.”
“Excuse me?”
“I’m sheriff of this county, now, Fitzpatrick. I don’t know how you’re used to having things run, but I’m going to need you to sit back down until I’m finished asking questions.”
Fitzpatrick didn’t return to the chair. Instead, he just folded his arms across his chest, matching Sacks’ stance. “You’ve got your killer in custody, Sheriff.”
“Just trying to flesh out the case as best as possible,” Sacks countered. He was intimidated as fuck, but he’d be damned if he showed it. “Isn’t it strange that we’ve done this twice now? That you were one of the last people to see Sheriff Van Lowe and Miss Mars?”
“Don’t see the we in it, Sheriff. If I remember correctly, Sheriff Mars was asking the questions last time I came through. About his daughter, too,” Fitzpatrick sneered. “Does it bother you that they asked a disgraced PI to fill in for Van Lowe? Did you finally think you were going to get your break?”
Actually, I suggested they hire Keith back. Sacks’ breath came in shallow gasps as Fitzpatrick leaned in. He tried to narrow his eyes, like Keith would, but he feared he would only look like he were squinting. “Are you threaten-”
“I gave my statement to Sheriff Mars already. I’m sure you can find anything you need there,” said Fitzpatrick. “Best of luck, Sheriff.”
As the door to the interrogation room slammed shut, Sacks could have sworn he heard Fitzpatrick mutter that he’d need it.
* * *
Thursday, November 8, 2007
“Dammit, Jerry, the residents of Neptune need you,” Peter Fuller begged, leaning forward at his desk in the executive office of the county supervisor’s office. “You’re the most senior member of the department. If you won’t do it, who will?”
Sacks shrugged hopelessly at Fuller. Sure, this county supervisor didn’t send quite the chills down his spine Woody Goodman once did, but that didn’t mean he knew the first thing about law enforcement.
Not that Sacks felt like he did, either, most days. Which is why he couldn’t accept the offer. He shrugged hopelessly. “I’m sorry, Supervisor, but I can’t take the job in good faith.”
Fuller smacked a stack of papers down on his desk. “Then who am I supposed to appoint? Twenty-two year-old D’Amato? Recently rehired Gills?”
Sacks hesitated. “You could cut your losses and beg Sheriff Mars to come back.”
The supervisor stopped pacing behind his back. “I could cut my what?”
“Rehire Keith Mars. When I walked in here, you asked me who was most qualified to lead the force in light of Van Lowe’s disappearance. His was the first name that came to mind.”
Fuller collapsed in his leather office chair. He gripped the arms, knuckles turning white. “You want me to rehire a disgraced former sheriff whose PI license was revoked?”
Maybe Sacks hadn’t thought this one entirely through. He pushed out of his chair, shaking his head. “He’s more qualified for the job than the man he’d be replacing, and you know it.”
“I expected more from you, Jerry,” Fuller said sharply, stopping Sacks on his way to the door. “First the sheriff of Balboa County disappears. Then a fifteen-year member of the force expects me, County Supervisor, to replace him with the man he ran out of office? A man charged with evidence tampering?”
Sacks turned, meeting Fuller’s stance. “Isn’t your daughter on a full-ride to Yale thanks to Keith Mars’ daughter?”
“Miss Mars is irrelevant to this discussion.”
“Keith was never formally charged with tampering. There was never enough proof.”
“I won’t ask him back to the department, Jerry.”
“And I won’t serve as acting sheriff. You’ll have to find someone else to do the job.” Sacks leaned in, bracing his hands on either side of Fuller’s nameplate on the desk. “Which might be hard, since most of the other deputies have only been with Balboa County for a year or two.”
“Thanks to Keith Mars,” Fuller grumbled. He slammed a fist against the desk. “I’ll only take you, Jerry.”
“Then I guess you’ll be trying to locate Sheriff Van Lowe’s whereabouts yourself,” Sacks said. He stuck out his hand, but the supervisor wouldn’t shake on it.
“If Keith Mars makes a fool of me, I’ll have your job, Deputy,” Fuller said icily.
Sacks looped his fingers through his belt confidently. “Then I’ll be a representative of Balboa County for a long time, sir. Good afternoon.”
He ambled confidentially out of Fuller’s office, but as soon as he shut the door behind him, his knees began to wobble. He wasn’t interested in serving as sheriff.
Not now, not ever.
* * *
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
For a second, Eli Navarro hesitated. He could see Veronica’s mouth set in a firm line, telling him that Logan Echolls wasn’t all bad, and it was enough to make him stop short in front of the sheriff’s station.
He could also see Veronica’s tiny body twisted terribly, her clothes stained with blood, her bright blue eyes listless-a mental imaged he’d been unable to shake in the weeks since her body was found. He’d hoped the media was lying about the extent of her injuries, but then her casket had remained firmly closed at the memorial service.
And Weevil had started having dreams of dead blondes again. Dreams that, starting last week, had involved Logan Echolls standing over his ex-girlfriend’s bleeding body, breathing heavily, eyes wild.
Gang membership ran in his family. He supposed murder ran in Echolls’ blood. Not hesitant any longer, he pushed his way into the station. Waving the papers in his hand through the air and ringing the bell at the receptionist’s desk repeatedly, he hollered, “Can anybody help me? Got a tip on the Echolls’ murder case somebody might wanna hear!”
One of the deputies was out of his chair before the others, scrambling to assume Inga’s usual position. D’Amato, according to his badge. “You have what?”
“Tip,” Weevil said, crossing his arms in front of them, still clutching the papers. “Who do I make my statement to?”
“I can take your statement,” D’Amato offered, glancing at the sheriff’s office, where the lights were clearly dimmed. He pointed in the direction of an interrogation room, but Weevil held up a hand.
“I know the way, Deputy. Name’s Eli Navarro.”
D’Amato stopped. “R-right,” he stammered. “Come on, Mr. Navarro. What do you know?”
Weevil just smirked until he was situated in the room, door closed firmly behind D’Amato. He slid the papers across the table. “I know that my uncle replaced the hood, side fender and front headlight of a Saturn VUE belonging to Veronica Mars two weeks before she disappeared.”
The deputy snatched the papers from Weevil almost greedily, going immediately to the photos Weevil had snapped of the damage. “She told me she’d hit a light pole.”
D’Amato’s brow furrowed as he inspected Veronica’s bashed headlight. “Looks like she could have.”
“No,” Weevil said, shaking his head. “I didn’t buy it for a second. The damage wasn’t deep enough for a collision. Someone bashed in her headlight with a bat.”
“Right,” said D’Amato. “Did she say who?”
“She denied the possibility when I confronted her, but it’s not the first time she’s brought in a car with that kind of damage. Look at the rest of the papers.”
“What are these?” D’Amato squinted as he picked up a work order dated September 2005. “Veronica’s car wasn’t this old.”
“The LeBaron she used to drive was,” Weevil said, through recognition had dawned in the deputy’s eyes before he even started. “Repair for the same kind of damage after one Logan Echolls took a bat to her car at the beach. Witnessed it with my own two eyes. So did a bunch of my old amigos, but if their testimony is no good, one of V’s friends was there, too.”
D’Amato continued to thumb through the photos, paperwork and order forms stacked in front of him. “I dunno, Mr. Navarro, it might just be a coincidence...”
“Or Logan Echolls could have welded a crowbar to her Saturn just like he did her LeBaron and that cop car last year.” Weevil smirked at D’Amato’s dumbfounded look. “Check his file if you don’t believe me.”
“Right,” D’Amato said. He looked a little pale and completely astonished. “I’ll have to talk to the sheriff about this.”
Weevil settled back in his chair. “I can wait.”
D’Amato stopped in the door. “You’re on parole, right?”
Weevil just smiled. “Right.”
After all, if his information helped put her killer behind bars, then it was Veronica who owed him the favor.
* * *
Friday, February 22, 2008
Logan lifted his head as the door to the main station screeched open, darting his eyes as Deputy D’Amato glared disdainfully. “You have a visitor,” he snarled.
Even though the clock across from his cell still wasn’t fixed, Logan glanced at it as he scrambled to his feet. He was meeting with his lawyer (a man so smarmy he made Cliff look like a candidate for priesthood) at four o’clock, but it didn’t feel like late afternoon already.
Perhaps, he realized as Mac appeared behind D’Amato, because it wasn’t. The deputy continued to glare. “Fifteen minutes.” He turned to Mac. “Holler if he gives you any trouble, okay?”
“Okay,” Mac repeated softly, folding her arms across her chest. A single tear slipped down her cheek as D’Amato slipped out. Logan reached over his head and clutched the bars. “Well?” he asked.
Mac took a hesitant step forward. “I just gave my statement,” she said flatly. “Since Weevil came forward, the sheriff has called in all her friends.”
“Funny. You’re the first that’s been by to see me,” Logan replied. He dropped one hand to his hip. “And? What did you tell them?”
Mac’s tongue flicked against her lips, moistening them. “The truth.”
Logan pushed away from the bars entirely, sitting heavily on the bottom bunk. “What’s that these days?” he muttered.
“That you and Veronica fought a lot,” Mac said, her eyes filling with tears, “but I never worried you’d hurt her.”
“Do you worry now?”
“Isn’t it too late to worry when she’s already dead?”
“I didn’t kill her, Mac,” Logan rasped, surprised his voice was so hurt. He could feel the all-too-familiar lump rising in his throat, and his eyes stung. “I loved her.”
“Then why are all the fingers pointed at you?” Mac wanted to know.
“I don’t know,” Logan said desperately. “I never could do what they’re saying I did.”
In his mind, he could hear his lawyer’s low whistle as he opened the case file: assault, abduction, rape, murder. He wasn’t sure which accusation hurt worse. She’d been shot, stabbed, her throat slit-
“What is it that they have on you?” Mac demanded. “Why did you break into Mars Investigations?”
Logan pulled his sleeves over his hands, drawing them to his face. “I was looking for something, anything-I needed an explanation. I needed to know if she was working on something that could have gotten her in trouble.”
“And you didn’t think Mr. Mars would have it covered?”
“I thought he might have missed something.” Mac didn’t look convinced, and he pushed off the bed, returning to the cell door. “I was with her that night, Mac. I just thought I might know to look for something he wouldn’t.”
“Like what?”
Logan shook his head. “I don’t know,” he said hollowly. “I just don’t know.”
Mac’s eyes had brimmed with tears. “Wallace came in yesterday,” she said. “He says the sheriff let slip a witness saw you grab her arm outside the bar that night, hard enough to leave a bruise.”
“Mac, I-”
“Did you, Logan? Did you yank her back to you?”
“Yes, but-”
“I told you to protect her,” Mac said roughly, shaking her head. “I told you to protect her, and somehow she winds up dead.” She turned on her heels.
“Mac, wait!” Logan begged. “She was in too deep. It was something, Mac, something with the Castle or the Fitzpatricks or Vinnie Van Lowe or-”
The door slammed shut behind her, and he sunk bitterly to the lower bunk again.
Chapter Two
Author: em2mb
Pairing/Character: Logan/Veronica, Mac, Keith, Weevil, Wallace, Piz, Sacks.
Word Count: 9,754
Rating: NC-17, and not always the good kind. This chapter is tamer than what’s to come, but you’ve been warned: it’s dark and twisty.
Summary: Dammit, Veronica, he thought. Are you starting to see what it does to us when you insist on running off on your own like this?
Spoilers: Through 3x20, “The Bitch is Back”
Warnings: Violence, language, sex, character death. Even Cliff McCormick probably wouldn’t defend this one in a court of law. Not that I blame him. Seriously, folks. This one is dark.
Author's Notes: Even Rob Thomas thinks he’s a whore, so I’m borrowing his characters. Special thanks to lazaefair, who was always happy to plot fic with me instead of studying; jayiin, who always makes my writing worth reading; and earth2mars, who gave me the encouragement to keep going. Title very obviously ripped from the Woodward and Bernstein book, which lazaefair was supposed to talk me out of BUT NEVER DID. Written in part for 100_situations. Prompt: traitor.
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
The old station clock he’d always relied on before wasn’t ticking under its thick layer of dust, and he’d lost all concept of time.
Already, he’d tugged holes in his shirt playing with his sleeves, and now he was pacing. In the back of his mind, he knew it hadn’t been that long since he was arrested, but time had never passed so slowly before. He longed for his watch to serve as confirmation, but the sheriff had taken it along with his other effects when he’d been brought in.
He was all nerves as he crossed the floor of his cell in the Balboa County Sheriff’s Department. He hit the bars and doubled back. The old t-shirt he had on beneath his button down was soaked with sweat, and he could feel condensation prickling at his hairline.
Being in jail was bad enough. But being in this jail, accused of this crime?
He wasn’t even sure if his one phone call would show. Hours had passed since he’d made his plea to a tinny answering machine, and Logan Echolls had nearly given up hope.
I guess that’s it, he thought bitterly. If you were wondering if anyone still cared, then the answer is no.
Logan took a seat on the ratty bed just as he heard the squeak of cheap leather on linoleum. Springing to his feet, he smacked his head on the upper bunk, but the stinging pain hardly slowed him.
“Cliff,” he breathed, gripping the bars so tightly his knuckles turned white. “I didn’t think you-”
“I’m not staying.” Cliff McCormick, Neptune’s primary public defender, adjusted his tie as he cut Logan off.
Logan’s heart sank. “You can’t think I-”
“I can,” Cliff corrected. “And maybe I do. At any rate, I’m not here because you called me. I’m here on behalf of Balboa County, but like I said-not staying.”
“But you have to represent me.”
“I have to represent those who cannot afford legal representation of their own,” Cliff corrected. “You can.”
“Maybe I don’t want another lawyer,” Logan challenged. Maybe Cliff was just testing him. They’d played this game before, after all.
But the young man knew instinctively this was different when Cliff shoved his hands in the pockets of his polyester suit, eyes never lifting from his briefcase on the floor. “Maybe, but I’m still not your lawyer. The judge agreed there’s a conflict of interest here. You can call someone, or you can wait until morning when they send in some other schmuck with a mail-order law degree.”
“You’re selling yourself short, Cliffy,” Logan said, desperate. He kept staring at the lawyer, hoping to draw his eyes upwards, but Cliff didn’t budge.
“You’re in no position to get comfortable, kid,” he retorted. “The prosecutor asked you not be granted bail.”
“And?” Logan asked anxiously.
“The judge agreed.”
“What?” Logan was incredulous. “I’m not a flight risk! Dammit, Cliff, I’m not even guilty!” He waited. Nothing. “You can’t think I’m guilty.”
“The sheriff thinks you’re guilty.”
For the first time all afternoon, the white-hot tears that had been boiling in Logan’s throat sprang up. He scuffed the ground in front of him with his toe before rattling the bars he gripped. “No,” Logan pleaded. “Not you too.”
Cliff finally looked up. “Me too.”
He picked up his briefcase and turned.
“No, please, Cliff, wait!”
The lawyer stopped, shaking his head. “Even I can’t defend you on this one, kid.”
Logan watched Cliff walk away, feeling his own legs start to tremble beneath him. He continued to grip the cell door, but this time he held on for balance, not out of anger. He was still confused, still indignant, but if he couldn’t even convinced Neptune’s best lawyer in a hundred-dollar suit of his innocence, there was no chance he’d be walking out of this cell anytime soon.
* * *
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Jerry Sacks continued to grip the wheel of the squad car after putting it into park outside the industrial-looking building. He waited until his knuckles had turned white to look at Keith. He desperately wanted a chance to repay his mentor, the man who had done so much for him, yet somehow Sacks looked to Keith for guidance even today, on what he imagined was fast becoming the worse day of the sheriff’s life.
“I’ll do it,” Keith said wearily, releasing the door handle he’d been clutching the entire way to Los Angeles. “It’s only proper.”
Sacks’ stomach turned as he scrambled out of the car behind Keith. He couldn’t let the sheriff do this, not if the coroner’s suspicions were correct. She’d be so damaged, so broken, and he’d be damned if that’s how Keith came to remember her. So at the door, Sacks pushed his way in front of the sheriff and made an offer that still fell short of the heroic gesture with which he’d always hoped to thank Keith Mars.
“Let me do it, Keith,” Sacks offered. He wrung his hands as they approached the receptionist’s desk. “I can handle it.”
Keith just pushed passed him, flashing his badge at the woman behind the counter. “Keith Mars, Balboa County Sheriff. I’m supposed to discuss some remains with Dr. Magee?”
“Of course, sir,” she replied, rapidly dialing an extension. After a brief exchange with whoever was on the other end of the line, she nodded in the direction of the hallway. “If you’d like to take a seat, the coroner will be right with you.”
“Thank you,” Keith said. He grabbed a chair halfway down the hall, and Sacks shivered as he followed. Even upstairs, two stories above the morgue, cool air blasted from the vents.
Keith had ignored his first request, but Sacks felt obligated to try again. After all, it was the man sitting next to him who had taught him to be steadfast. Determinedly, he insisted, “I’ll do it, Keith. You shouldn’t have to.”
“This is something I have to do myself,” Keith replied automatically. He’d been bald as long as Sacks had known him, but he’d never looked old before. Even at the height of the Lilly Kane debacle, Keith Mars had always been dignified. He might have fallen from everyone else’s grace, but Sacks’ respect had never faltered. It remained now, but Keith looked tired, as if the years on the job had finally succeeded in weathering him.
Sacks wanted to tell him he could handle this routine ID, but there was nothing routine about preparing to enter the cold basement morgue. Nothing had been routine about the last week, nothing at all. “Really, I can handle it.”
Keith gave him a warm smile-in spite of a week of incredible adversity, he remained downright fatherly. “Of course you can, Jerry. And if it were anyone else-”
Anyone else. The words hung between the two of them in the stale refrigerated air as they waited for the coroner. “It still could be.”
“It still will be,” Keith corrected.
“Let me do it, Sheriff,” Sacks pleaded.
Keith didn’t have a chance to refuse his offer again before the coroner stepped out. “Sheriff Mars? This way, please.”
Sacks stood when Keith stood. The older man shook his head. “I’m doing this, Sacks.”
“Not alone, you’re not,” Sacks said stubbornly, and he matched Keith’s folded-arm stance until the other man relented. The coroner spoke as they followed him down a flight of stairs. To Sacks, the walk felt impossibly long. He couldn’t imagine how Keith was holding up.
“The victim is a young woman in her late teens or early twenties,” Dr. Magee said, “approximately five foot one, with blonde hair, blue eyes, and a petite build. Her body was recovered yesterday morning from a park several blocks away. She suffered from a gunshot wound to the left shoulder, multiple stab wounds to the chest and abdomen and laceration of the neck.”
Keith paled as the coroner led them into the morgue. A sheet-covered gurney sat in the center of the room. The coroner continued.
“Multiple fractures and severe bruising suggest she fought with her attacker. She may have been the victim of a sexual assault. Her body was discovered within approximately twelve hours of her death, so there’s little decomposition, but I might warn you, sir-” his eyes flashed with a compassion Sacks hadn’t expected “-the damage is extensive.”
“I received your initial report,” Keith replied. “I’m ready.”
The coroner’s eyes flickered. “You’re sure?”
Sacks said a silent prayer, certain Keith said one too as he nodded. But then Dr. Magee lifted the sheet.
Keith’s face contorted. Sacks’ stomach lurched. He watched his mentor-his friend-grope unsteadily for support that wasn’t there, and Sacks’ reaction was automatic. He elbowed past the sheriff, blocking his line of sight. The coroner looked at him expectantly. Sacks wanted to shout. Had Keith’s reaction not just confirmed it?
“That’s her,” Sacks said quietly, and he gently led the sheriff, still shaking, out of the uncomfortably cool room.
* * *
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Backup bounded at him when he opened the door to the apartment, always underfoot. Any other night, Keith would have welcomed the pit bull warmly, or at least made a half-hearted effort to scratch behind his ears. That night, however, he ignored the canine entirely as he settled in his armchair, not bothering to turn on the lights. Backup continued to whine, first for attention and then at the door to go out, but Keith just stared at the wall clock, watching it tick down the minutes to the ten o’clock news.
Finally, as the second hand slipped past the twelve, he reached for the remote. The call sign for one of the affiliate stations in San Diego came on at once, and for a moment, Keith paused to wonder how long it had been since the Mars family television had seen a DVD or even another channel.
“Tonight’s top story is breaking in Neptune, where an arrest was made today in the ongoing murder investigation of a Hearst College student,” the anchor chirped. “Twenty-year-old Veronica Mars was found stabbed to death nearly two months ago.”
A photo of Veronica, taken on her last birthday, filled the screen. Keith’s eyes flickered from the station’s photo to the original, sitting on a shelf near the television. He swallowed hard.
“Mars, who was abducted from her car while driving on the PCH in December, was the daughter of Balboa County Sheriff Keith Mars. Although her father’s tenure with the force has been shaky at best, his relentless search for his daughter’s killer has gripped the entire Southern California coast. Mars stepped down today after arresting Veronica’s ex-boyfriend, Logan Echolls, the son of the late movie star Aaron Echolls. Charges against Echolls are currently pending. We have Mark in Neptune with the story.”
“Thanks, Elizabeth,” said Mark, a well dressed man who both smiled and blinked too much. Keith’s lips curled upwards in distaste as he remembered the man ambushing him as he’d tried to leave the station that day. “Emotions in Neptune are high today following Echolls’ arrest. The abduction and murder of the sheriff’s daughter would be big news in any small town, but this small seaside community was still reeling from the disappearance of former sheriff Vincent Van Lowe when Mars-”
Keith switched off the television, having heard enough. He sat in his armchair in the dark for a long time, fingers idly stroking the pocket of his shirt his badge typically occupied, Backup whining at the door.
He eventually let the dog out, but he’d surrendered his badge to Inga at the desk and he’d given the heart it symbolically covered to the daughter he sorely missed.
* * *
Friday, December 21, 2007
When Lianne left him, he had removed every drop of alcohol from the house-or, at least, he’d tried. He had emptied every cabinet and torn through the kitchen, dumping entire bottles of rum down the kitchen sink. Just when Keith thought he’d cleared his wife’s stash, he found a bottle of tequila in the nightstand and a flask of whiskey in the living room.
So he tore the house apart-ripped throw pillows from the sofa and yanked every drawer from the dressers. He had tossed the booze and was triumphantly cleaning up the mess he’d made when sixteen-year-old Veronica had come in from school, taken a swig from a water bottle in the fridge, and spewed vodka all over the kitchen.
In a way, it had been a relief when the bank foreclosed on the house. At least when they moved into their tiny two-bedroom apartment, he’d finally felt like he was living in an alcohol-free home. He’d hardly had a drink since, but tonight, Keith Mars was holding a bottle of whiskey.
He was starting to understand why Lianne (who he’d spent six hours trying to reach so maybe, just maybe, she’d make it back to Neptune for their daughter’s funeral) had chosen to drown her sorrows rather than face them.
A drink sounded better than asking Cliff, the closest thing Keith reckoned they had to a family friend, to write the eulogy. A drink sounded better than facing Veronica’s friends, who’d shown up at the station, the office, the apartment, offering sincere condolences. A drink sounded better than launching an investigation into his daughter’s murder, and it certainly sounded better than knowing his little girl wasn’t coming home again, not ever.
Keith grabbed a glass-but before he could pour himself a drink, someone knocked on the door. It’s probably for the best, he thought, padding lightly around the island and stepping over the dog, who had started to growl. “Backup,” he said warningly, glancing through the peephole. Mac. She’d been by before-six times now, seven?-and for a second, he contemplated not answering the door.
But he couldn’t just leave her out there either, shoulders slumped, oversized sweatshirt drawn tightly around her. Running a hand through his nonexistent hair, he pulled open the door.
“Cindy,” he mumbled.
“Mr. Mars,” she said respectfully. “I know you said-”
“It’s not the best time,” Keith said, hand still on the door. “I appreciate your concern, and I know Veronica would be happy you’re checking on her old man, but I’ll see you tomorrow at the memorial.”
“Yeah, tomorrow, at the memorial,” Mac repeated. “Really, Mr. Mars-”
“Cindy,” he cut in, “good night.” Keith shut the door to the chorus of her protests, exhaling slowly as he heard shuffling on the step.
Another knock. Another glance through the peephole-Wallace. He hadn’t realized Mac wasn’t alone. Sighing, he opened the door again. Veronica’s BFF was kicking at nonexistent dirt on the pavement with white basketball sneakers. “Your mother didn’t send you, did you?”
Alicia had called seven times in two days, but Wallace shook his head. “Actually, Sheriff, we were wondering-”
“Logan,” Mac cut in anxiously. “You haven’t seen him, have you?”
Keith shook his head. “I haven’t, not since-” he broke off, remembering how Sacks had to drag him out of the morgue and back to station. When Logan had seen the deputy supporting the sheriff, he’d known instantly the body was Veronica’s. Keith had pulled himself out of his own grief just long enough to watch the fire in the young man’s eyes extinguish. They had remained bright throughout the search, hopeful, but just like that, the spark had gone. “Not for a few days, at least.”
“We can’t find him anywhere, sir,” Wallace explained. “No one’s seen him, no one’s heard from him-”
“Dick’s been staying at his frat, but the TV’s been on in their suite all night,” Mac rushed in. She laughed nervously. “Which we know because we’ve been pounding on the door for the last hour.”
Keith folded his arms across his chest. “I’m not sure what to tell you,” he said, starting to shut the door again, but Wallace kicked his foot in the frame to keep it from closing. The young man’s eyes were pleading.
“Mr. Mars, you know Ver-”
He held his hand up to stop Wallace from continuing. “Of course.” Keith smiled sadly. “You said you were trying to find Logan?”
Mac shot Wallace a sideways glance, biting her lip. “The Grand staff won’t let us in because there someone put a ‘Do Not Disturb’ on the room.” Keith continued to stare at her expectantly. “And he’d given Veronica a key when they were dating.”
“That was months ago.”
Wallace kicked the pavement again. “She still had it in her wallet two weeks ago.”
Two weeks ago, before everything went to hell. “Right,” Keith said. “I’m sorry, kids, but they collected her purse for evidence.”
It had been bloodstained, filled with broken glass and shards of her smashed cell phone, still in her passenger seat when they’d found her car, almost as though her abductor had known the first thing he’d do was activate one of three GPS devices he had secured to her possessions. Somehow, all three-her phone, her car, and her wallet-had failed him.
“Right,” Mac said, bowing her head. “We’ll just-really, Mr. Mars, is there anything we can do?”
Keith shook his head as the teenagers waited expectantly. “I appreciate your concern, but I’d really like to be alone right now.”
Mac’s lower lip quivered ever so slightly, but Wallace grabbed her shoulder. “Come on, Mac, let’s go.”
“Of course. Thanks, Mr. Mars,” she said. “And-I’m so sorry. We both are.” They started down the steps, and Keith realized he was the one who should be offering to help them.
“Kids, wait,” he said. Smiling sadly, he reached into his back pocket for his own wallet. He thumbed past his credit cards and handed Mac a plastic rectangle with the Neptune Grand’s logo. It had become an afterthought when Veronica had broken up with Logan all those months ago, but he was still surprised it had taken him so long to think of it. “I got to be pretty good friends with the security staff when they were dating. See you tomorrow.”
He pulled the door shut behind him to their chorus of goodnights. He waited until he heard Mac’s car rumble to life and roll out of the apartment parking lot before grabbing his own keys. Keith imagined he could be wrong, and sincerely hoped he was, but instinct told him they could burst into Logan’s suite with the copy he’d made of the boys key and still not find him there. After all, if Veronica’s death caused the former sheriff, a non-drinker, to crave cheap Scotch, he imagined Logan had already abandoned the mini-bar.
Keith took side streets through Neptune and got on the PCH several exits past where they’d found Veronica’s car. Soon, he was entering San Diego, and then he exited to cross the Coronado Bridge, praying he wasn’t too late. Pulled off to one side was Logan’s Range Rover, confirming his worst suspicions.
It had never been that he didn’t like Logan, or even that he worried the boy would turn out like his father. He’d gotten over having to replace the living room lamp, but he’d never forgiven the boy for the nightmares he’d given Veronica that first summer they were together. The nights Logan hadn’t sneaked back into the apartment and into Veronica’s bedroom, she’d had had nightmares about him jumping from this very spot.
“Logan!” Keith called, surprised at how black the night looked over the water, panicked when he didn’t immediately spot the young man. He couldn’t have already taken the same swan dive as his mother, could he? “Dammit, Logan!”
“Mr. Mars?”
Logan’s words were slurred, and he drunkenly rose from where he’d been sitting on the concrete. Keith rushed forward, grabbed the boy’s arm, and dragged him back from the edge. For a second, he thought his daughter’s ex-boyfriend was going to take a swing at him, but instead, Logan just seemed to collapse in on himself, breaking down into hiccoughing sobs.
His feelings for Logan had been grudging at best, disdaining at worst. But at the moment, he didn’t know what to do but to embrace the boy and let his own tears fall.
“I loved her,” Logan said, over and over. “Did she ever see that?”
Over the past several days, Keith had wondered the same thing. If no power in the world could bring his little girl back to life, he just wished he could change their last month together to anything but stormy silence. He let go of Logan slowly and clasped the boy’s shoulders. Keith had long grappled with Veronica’s affection for Logan, seeing even when she didn’t that her love for the boy rivaled that for her old man. But as much as he hated to admit it, he felt he owed Logan the truth.
“She loved you, too, Logan.”
The words sobered Logan enough to get him to surrender his keys, and he didn’t complain when Keith made him ride with him to get the Range Rover off the bridge. The long walk back to Keith’s cruiser sobered him even further.
“You can’t go back there anymore,” Keith said somberly. “You can’t take the easy way out just because she’s gone, son.”
Logan stared out the window. Keith wondered how long it had been since anyone called him that. At the Grand, he mumbled his thanks and scrambled out of his car. If Keith hadn’t seen him wipe at his eyes with his sleeve, he probably would have been offended. As it was, he let it go.
Back at the apartment, Keith finally poured himself that glass of whiskey.
* * *
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Sacks tugged nervously at his damp collar, worried that his sweat was outwardly obvious. His ears burned; his moustache itched. The badge he wore on his left shirt pocket seemed so much heavier than the one he’d worn as a deputy.
“Are you sure you don’t want a lawyer present?” he asked, not for the first time.
Echolls pulled at the sleeves of his shirt-again, not for the first time. He stared at Sacks through swollen eyes. The sheriff had to look away, having spent all night at the station, pacing, wondering how the hell he’d been thrust into this situation.
In the back, the kid had cried.
“I told you, I don’t have a lawyer yet, and if I can’t have Cliff, I don’t want a public defender.” Echolls wiped hastily at his face with his sleeve. “Besides,” he mumbled, “isn’t this like a cop’s dream? Interrogate the suspect without an attorney shooting down his every question?”
Sacks swallowed hard. “So you’re waiving your right to legal counsel?” Echolls swept his hand through the air. Sacks waited.
“That was me ‘waving’ my right,” Echolls grumbled. “Man, Lamb would have loved that. So, Deputy, what do you have for me?”
“I need to ask you a few questions about the night of December thirteenth last year,” Sacks said, sliding around the table and trying to lean against the edge as he’d seen Keith and Don do a thousand times over. Instead, he misestimated where the table’s edge was, and almost toppled onto the floor. He brushed imaginary lint from his pants as he waited for Echolls to answer.
“What?” The kid arched an eyebrow. “I’m waiting for a question.”
Sacks could have died of embarrassment right there. “Right, okay.”
“You’re doing fine,” Echolls said encouragingly. His eyes were still red, but a smirk played at the corners of his mouth. Elbows propped up on the table, he pressed his fingertips together. “So?”
“Why don’t you tell me where you were on the night of December thirteenth?”
“Let’s see... December thirteenth? A Thursday, right? Thursdays were so uneventful last semester, I only had one class-” Echolls laughed tersely when Sacks began to stare. “Someone’s been taking lessons from Sheriff Mars.”
Sacks gripped the edge of the table with both his hands. “Echolls, you’re being charged with murder. You need to take this seriously.”
“Sorry. Just taking a moment before I relive the last time I saw the girl I love alive,” Echolls said coolly. “Like I said, I had one class on Thursday. British History from the Glorious Revolution. It was the last review session before the final. I got out at nine, grabbed something to eat, and went to the River Styx.”
“Why?”
“Veronica’s friend Mac had told me-”
“Mac?” Sacks interrupted.
“Cindy Mackenzie,” Echolls said impatiently, then sighed. Shoulders slumping, he pointed to the file on the table. “Seriously, I gave my statement already. Why do we have to go through this again?”
“What did Mackenzie tell you?”
“She had come to me earlier in the week because she was worried about Veronica. Late nights, stakeouts, and Veronica’s grades were suffering, which had never happened before, no matter how many cases she was working. She’d asked for Mac’s help to override some complex security-”
He stopped abruptly.
Sacks tapped his foot impatiently. “Well?”
“I’m not saying anything that will get Mac in trouble.” Echolls glared. “At any rate, she thought Veronica was in danger, so she’d put a bug on Veronica, which let her know Veronica had tapped the River Styx.”
“And?”
“And it’s the fucking Fitzpatricks. I was worried!”
“Of course, Mr. Echolls, but what did you do?”
“I drove to the bar and parked around back. Mac had given me a receiver so I could pick up the tap I had on Veronica, who was also there. I didn’t see her car or anything, but I heard male voices yelling through her wire. I thought she was in trouble, so I stormed into the bar.”
“And was she in trouble?”
“She wasn’t there,” Echolls said flatly. “I came in and swung a few punches before I realized I had gotten a tap of her tap on the Fitzpatricks. Of course, she heard the fight break out on her tap, so she came to my rescue.”
“Interesting.”
“Actually, the word you’re searching for is ironic,” said Echolls. He sighed. “She wouldn’t have been in trouble if not for me.”
“Are you saying you caused trouble for Miss Mars?”
“I’m saying it’s a bad idea to storm into the bar where known members of the Irish mob play pool,” Echolls retorted. “Veronica rushed in, almost got clubbed with a barstool, and I just about lost it. I threw a few more punches and got hit a few times myself before she could get me out of there.”
“How’d she get you out of there?”
“Dragged me,” Echolls said. A sad smile crept onto his face. “And I know what you’re thinking-Veronica Mars, a hundred pounds with her combat boots on, couldn’t drag me out of a bar fight. But she’s bossy, too.”
Sacks had to turn away. He could handle a big murder case, he honestly believed he could. He just didn’t know what to do with the grieving boyfriend of a girl he’d once ferried back and forth from soccer practice when her dad couldn’t slip away from the station. These questions weren’t ones he wanted to be asking.
Fortunately, Echolls continued without prompting. “Anyway, we got outside, and she just started screaming at me. She was pounding on my chest with her tiny ineffectual fists and actually managed to land a pretty good kick to my shin.”
“So you fought?”
“We fought.” Echolls drummed his fingers on the table, holding his chin with his other hand. He finally looked up. “It was a lot like foreplay for us, actually.”
“Fighting was?”
“That’s why I’m here, isn’t it? Everyone knows Veronica and I fought.” He paused. Softly, he said, “I would never hurt her.”
“I have a witness who saw you grab Miss Mars’ arm and wrench her back towards you when she tried to leave.”
“I don’t know who your witness is, but-” Echolls blinked several times. “Look, Veronica always stormed out on me, and I couldn’t watch her walk out of my life again. So yeah, I tried to keep her from leaving. I probably grabbed her arm. But I didn’t do it to hurt her.”
“Yet Miss Mars was found with a badly bruised wrist.”
The young man’s face drained of color. “She told me I didn’t hurt her.” His admission, though laced with regret and guilt, didn’t have quite the tone for which Sacks was hoping. Echolls looked pained for having hurt her, not for having admitted as much.
The sheriff shifted. “Did things get rough with Miss Mars?”
Echolls’ voice shook slightly. “Stop calling her that.”
“Stop calling her what?”
“Veronica. Her name was Veronica. You knew her, too. What? Department barbeques and shuttles to and from soccer practice?” He wiped at his eyes again. “She always liked you, you know. Thought you deserved more credit than you got.”
Sacks swallowed the lump in his throat, forcing his emotions from taking charge. Procedure, dammit. He was following procedure. And trying to show a bit of respect for the girl this young man had very likely stabbed to death. He repeated his question.
“Did things get rough with Miss Mars?”
Echolls clenched his fist. “I told Veronica I wanted to talk. She told me my eye was popping out a little. She insisted on driving me back to the Grand to clean me up.”
“You rode with her, in her car?”
“Yeah, she didn’t want me driving.” Exhaling slowly, Echolls took a shuddering breath. “I knew I was wearing her down. She was pissed as hell with me, but she also wanted to make sure I was all right.”
“And?”
“And she cleaned me up and took me back to my car.”
“What aren’t you telling me?” Sacks asked. “Did things get rough, Mr. Echolls?”
Echolls stared blankly at the wall behind Sacks’ head. He gritted his teeth. “I loved Veronica. We talked about whether or not we could actually make our twisted, fucked up relationship work. I thought we could. She wasn’t sure, like always.”
“Did that frustrate you, Mr. Echolls?”
“Did it frustrate me? Yeah, it frustrated me. Did it make me hurt her? No.”
“You were seen fighting with Miss Mars around ten p.m. You said yourself to Sheriff Mars she didn’t drop you back off at your car until at least two a.m. Did you really spend four hours talking about your relationship?”
Another sad smile. “Four hours would barely have put a dent in our issues.” He sighed. “No, we didn’t just spend four hours talking.”
“Then what did you do?”
“What do you think we did?”
“I think you left something out of the statement you gave Sheriff Mars earlier.”
“I did.” Echolls ran a hand through his hair. “Would you tell a man licensed to carry a gun you’d just had sex with his daughter? When she was missing and he was frantically searching for her?”
Sacks continued to stare at him. “We’re going to need a DNA sample.”
Echolls sat back in the chair and folded his arms across his chest. “I’m going to need a lawyer.”
* * *
Friday, December 14, 2007
The Range Rover hurtled into the parking lot, landing in not one or two but three spots. Logan didn’t lock the SUV as he hurtled into sheriff’s station. He didn’t care if he was written a parking citation. Add it to the half-dozen automated tickets he expected to receive in about two weeks. If his haste meant Veronica was home safe then, he didn’t care how many red lights he had to run. A woman stared at him quizzically as he pushed past her at the doors, taking in his bruised and swollen face and probably assuming he was there to report an assault.
He barely paused at the receptionist’s desk. “I need to speak to the sheriff,” he said, brushing past Inga. She wasn’t fast enough to grab his arm, and one of the deputies, the mustached one, had to jump out of his seat to serve as a blockade.
“Mr. Echolls,” he said, his tone warning. Logan struggled to get past him.
On his other side, Inga shifted her weight from foot to foot. “You cannot go back there, sir, the sheriff is busy,” she said, but all Logan heard was Veronica calling in favors to other law enforcement offices in a ridiculously heavy German accent.
“I know, I know,” Logan pleaded, trying to shake the pleased smile his ex-girlfriend would wear whenever she conned a lawman into providing her vital information. “Veronica-”
The way the deputy’s face fell confirmed Logan’s worst fears. He’d known the instant he stormed into the station something was going on, something big. He paled. Wallace was right, then. It was something with Veronica. He tried to shove past the deputy again, who looked genuinely sorry to be holding him back.
Sacks. His name was Sacks. He’d always been nicer to Logan than the other officers whenever Lamb dragged him in for questioning.
“I assure you, everything is being done,” Sacks promised. “I can-”
But his obvious sympathy had given Logan just enough of an in to edge past him and dart towards the sheriff’s office. He didn’t bother knocking, just threw open the door. Keith was standing up at his desk, poring over a map and scribbling furious notes on a yellow legal pad.
“Is it true?” Logan demanded. He grabbed the doorframe when Sacks appeared behind him, attempting to drag him back into the main station.
Keith looked up from the map. His brown eyes were dull, devoid of their usual smile as he took in Logan’s unseemly appearance. “It’s true,” he said, sighing. “Sacks, it’s fine.”
Sacks let go of Logan’s shoulder, but he continued to hover behind the younger man. Logan pushed further into the office, deciding he preferred even Keith’s cold stare to the current lack of spark. “What-”
“Logan,” Keith said, holding up a hand and walking around the desk. “Stop. We’re going to find her. We think this has something to do with the Cas-”
“No,” Logan shook his head. “It’s the Fitzpatricks.”
Keith narrowed his eyes. “How do you know?”
“Veronica was at the River Styx last night,” Logan blurted. “I was with her.”
“You were where?” Keith demanded, and Logan immediately felt like he was breaking the Mars’ living room lamp all over again.
“She was doing surveillance,” Logan babbled. “Mac, she was worried about her-Veronica. She asked me to keep an eye on her.”
Keith had walked back to his side of the desk and sat down in his chair. “Have a seat, Logan. You’re going to have to slow down if you’ve got information we can use. Sacks?” He glanced up at the deputy still standing in the doorframe. “Can you give us a moment?”
“Of course, sir,” Sacks said respectfully, and the door clicked shut behind him. As soon as the deputy had gone, Keith’s temper flared.
“The River Styx, Logan?” he demanded. “What the hell were you thinking? You let her go near the Fitzpatricks?”
“I didn’t let her go near anyone!” Logan shot back. “Mac called me a couple of days ago. Veronica had asked her enough questions about a high-end security system that she’d gotten suspicious. She did a little checking into it and realized Veronica had been tailing Liam Fitzpatrick.”
“And Mac didn’t come to me?” Keith wanted to know.
Logan averted his eyes. “No offense, sir, but she probably knew things hadn’t been so great between you and Veronica lately.”
Keith’s face twitched slight. “No offense, Logan, but things haven’t been so great between you and Veronica lately, either. Why’d Mac call you?”
“She’d tried Wallace. He didn’t think it was his place to get involved. The last time he’d done Veronica a favor, it ended badly, and you know how well the direct approaches works with her. She would have denied everything. Piz-” Logan hoped he’d managed to veil his disgust at least somewhat when he spat the name “-isn’t exactly what you’d call muscle, so Mac called me.”
“What did Mac want you to do about it?”
“Make sure Veronica wasn’t doing something stupid?” Logan suggested irritably. “She put a wire on Veronica, but when I tuned in, I caught what her tap on the Fitzpatricks was picking up.” He glanced down. “I rushed into the bar. I thought she was in trouble.”
Keith had grabbed the legal pad and flipped to a new page. “Go on.”
“She followed me in,” Logan mumbled. It’s your fault, a voice inside his head screamed. If anything happens to her because of them, it’s on your head. He swallowed hard. “God, Mr. Mars, I’m so sorry.”
“Something happened to her at the River Styx last night, and you’re just now reporting it?” Keith barked.
Logan paled. “No, no,” he said hastily. “It didn’t happen like that. She dragged me out of there after I’d swung a few punches. She insisted on driving me home because, uh, Liam Fitzpatrick had also swung a few punches.”
“She cleaned you up.”
“Yeah, the bruises-” Logan pointed to his face, where his eye was probably still popping out a bit from the night before. Add it to the scratches on his cheek and swollen jaw, and he probably made a pretty picture.
“Got it,” Keith said. “What time was this?”
“Ten. It probably took her an hour to clean me up. Then we-” Logan hesitated ever so slightly “-we, uh, talked. Well, first we yelled. She’d been yelling at me since she dragged me out of the River Styx and all the way to the Grand. But then we talked.”
“About?” Keith’s prompts were growing more and more impatient.
“Us,” Logan said. “Our relationship. Maybe, you know, getting back together.” He watched the sheriff’s face drop and added quickly, “Probably not. But when she took me back to my car, things were more amiable between us than they had been in months.”
“What time? Eleven? Midnight?”
Logan shook his head. “It was closer to two.”
“You spent four hours talking to my daughter?”
“Uh-huh. Talking, sir.” He watched the sheriff’s eyes twitch and realized he’d have to be a bit more convincing if he didn’t want to stare down the barrel of a Balboa County issued gun. “She gave me a chance to explain what I was doing at the bar, and then we spent a few hours catching up.”
“Did she say what she was doing at the River Styx?”
“Wouldn’t say. Just told me about her summer and her classes, things like that.”
“I see.” Keith jotted a few more notes, and Logan breathed an inward sigh of relief when the sheriff didn’t press further. “Did she have anything left to say by the time she dropped you off?”
“Veronica always has something to say,” Logan said, almost forgetting for a second she was missing and now wasn’t the time to banter with her father. Please, please, please, Veronica, he begged, give your dad a chance to like me when all this blows over. “I made her promise she’d go straight home.”
“She was on her way when they-” Keith broke off abruptly. “Can you remember anything else, Logan, that might help us? She really didn’t say why she was trailing Liam Fitzpatrick?”
“Believe me, I asked,” Logan said, exhaling slowly. “She said it was the usual. Maybe drugs? She said she was on the trail of a ring of some sorts, but she wouldn’t talk about it.”
Two more scribbled lines went on the notepad. Keith looked up. “I knew you’d be in at some point today, son,” he said gruffly.
“Wallace called me,” Logan said softly. “He said you’d called to see if he knew anything. He thought I should know.”
“I need you to give your official statement to one of the deputies, Logan,” Keith said. “I’d take it myself, but I have to call Mac.”
“Of course, sir.” Logan wiped hastily at his eyes, trying to will away the worst of the nightmarish thoughts he’d been having in the hour since Wallace had called. “I’ll do anything I can to help.”
He shook Keith Mars’ hand when offered, and saw himself to the door. Mac, eyes red and puffy, nearly ran him over. Logan grabbed her shoulders.
“Is he in there?” she wanted to know.
Logan nodded.
“Is it true?” Mac’s lower lip was trembling.
“It’s true,” said Logan, and his voice shook ever so slightly as tears started to stream down Mac’s face. He propelled her gently towards Keith’s open door.
Dammit, Veronica, he thought. Are you starting to see what it does to us when you insist on running off on your own like this?
* * *
Monday, February 18, 2008
“Ain’t done nothing wrong, Deputy,” Liam Fitzpatrick pronounced immediately, sauntering into the interrogation room. He arched an eyebrow, waiting for a challenge, but Sacks just closed the door, reminding himself he’d taken office temporarily just a week before. It wasn’t a sign of disrespect; people just didn’t have a reason to call him “sheriff” yet.
Keep on telling yourself that. Sacks gestured for Fitzpatrick to take a seat. “Didn’t say you’d done anything wrong. I just need you to answer a few questions.”
Fitzpatrick kicked his legs up on the table and extended his arms behind his head. “Fire away. Anything I can do to help the law enforcement in this fine town.”
Sacks tried to ignore the sarcasm dripping from Fitzpatrick’s words and forced himself not to consider all the crimes he could charge the Irishman with at that very moment. He needed information. “Night of December thirteenth, last year. Where were you?”
“Don’t know, Deputy. What’s so special about the thirteenth?” Fitzpatrick laced his fingers together in front of him, the twinkle in his eyes telling Sacks he knew full well the date’s significance.
“Let me refresh your memory, then,” Sacks said, leaning on the side of the table. It would figure he’d be trying to get the hang of this interrogation thing just when he had to bring in Neptune’s most notorious crime boss. “Veronica Mars went missing that night.”
“Right, the Mars girl,” Fitzpatrick said. “Pretty little thing. Real shame what happened to her. How’s her dad holding up?”
“He’ll be holding up much better when her killer’s behind bars,” Sacks snapped. “Answer the question-where were you the night of December thirteenth?”
“My lawyer and I met with Sheriff Mars back in December, Deputy. I’m sure you know I was bartending that night until four. Your own Deputy D’Amato was checking IDs at my door from midnight on.”
Leave it to Balboa County to provide Liam Fitzpatrick an alibi when he needed it the most. Sacks had triple-checked the reports for Keith on a number of occasions, but it hadn’t stopped him from reviewing them again when he’d taken office. If it had been anyone else vouching for Fitzpatrick, Sacks would have still suspected foul play, but he reckoned D’Amato was the only other deputy who wanted to see justice served as much as he and Keith did.
Echolls’ story had been checked months ago, when security tapes from the Grand confirmed he left his room with Veronica shortly before two. Leo’s story had never changed, either-both Liam Fitzpatrick and Danny Boyd had been at the River Styx from midnight until four, almost an hour after someone disabled Veronica’s car on the PCH. But even if Fitzpatrick wasn’t responsible for Veronica’s disappearance, it didn’t mean he didn’t know more than he’d let on.
“Of course,” he offered tersely. “Look, Logan Echolls said he came through your bar that night. Earlier, before we began to sweep. I need to know if he’s telling the truth.”
Fitzpatrick’s dark eyes burned. “Echolls came through.”
“And?”
“He’s underage. Had to throw him out.” The corners of the Irishman’s mouth turned up in a smirk. “Ain’t that a concern of this administration? Did I not just mention the upstanding young officer who stood at my door for over three hours on the night of the thirteenth?”
Sacks clenched his hands in such tight fists he was sure his knuckles were turning white beneath the edge of the table. He pushed away from table and circled Fitzpatrick. “Really? You kicked Echolls out because he was underage?”
Fitzpatrick winked. “Just trying to do my part, Deputy.”
“You kicked him out because he was nineteen, not because he started throwing punches?” Sacks leaned in and reached around Fitzpatrick, grabbing a file off the table. “Your pal Danny Boyd went to the dentist the next day with three cracked molars and a swollen jaw.”
“Thirsty Thursday, Deputy. People get to drinking, fights happen. Danny’s always one of the first to start swinging.”
“Was there or was there not a brawl at the River Styx the night of December thirteenth?”
“There was.”
“And Logan Echolls was or was not involved?”
Fitzpatrick’s eyes darkened. “Was.”
“So why’d you tell me you kicked him out for being underage?”
“We were gonna kick him out for not showing proper ID, but before anyone could do anything, he started cursing and fighting. Real temper on that kid.” Fitzpatrick whistled under his breath. “How many times did he stab the Mars girl before he slit her throat? Seventeen?”
Fifteen. Sacks mentally corrected Fitzpatrick, certain the mob boss could hear his heart pounding beneath his badge. “What about Miss Mars? Did she come into the River Styx that night?”
“Yeeeeah,” Fitzpatrick said, stretching the word’s single syllable. “Echolls burst through the bar demanding to know where ‘she’ was. He threw a punch at Danny, a few at this old drunk, Ethan, one at me, and then there Miss Mars was, yellin’ at him.”
“And Echolls left the bar with Miss Mars?” Sacks asked, wishing Fitzpatrick hadn’t just thrown his attempt to respect the dead right back at him.
“Echolls was struggling and slapping at her even then. Shouldn’t have let them leave.” Fitzpatrick’s eyes taunted Sacks as he kicked his legs down and pushed his chair back from the table. “Eh, well, hindsight’s twenty-twenty. Get what you need, Deputy?”
“Sheriff.”
“Excuse me?”
“I’m sheriff of this county, now, Fitzpatrick. I don’t know how you’re used to having things run, but I’m going to need you to sit back down until I’m finished asking questions.”
Fitzpatrick didn’t return to the chair. Instead, he just folded his arms across his chest, matching Sacks’ stance. “You’ve got your killer in custody, Sheriff.”
“Just trying to flesh out the case as best as possible,” Sacks countered. He was intimidated as fuck, but he’d be damned if he showed it. “Isn’t it strange that we’ve done this twice now? That you were one of the last people to see Sheriff Van Lowe and Miss Mars?”
“Don’t see the we in it, Sheriff. If I remember correctly, Sheriff Mars was asking the questions last time I came through. About his daughter, too,” Fitzpatrick sneered. “Does it bother you that they asked a disgraced PI to fill in for Van Lowe? Did you finally think you were going to get your break?”
Actually, I suggested they hire Keith back. Sacks’ breath came in shallow gasps as Fitzpatrick leaned in. He tried to narrow his eyes, like Keith would, but he feared he would only look like he were squinting. “Are you threaten-”
“I gave my statement to Sheriff Mars already. I’m sure you can find anything you need there,” said Fitzpatrick. “Best of luck, Sheriff.”
As the door to the interrogation room slammed shut, Sacks could have sworn he heard Fitzpatrick mutter that he’d need it.
* * *
Thursday, November 8, 2007
“Dammit, Jerry, the residents of Neptune need you,” Peter Fuller begged, leaning forward at his desk in the executive office of the county supervisor’s office. “You’re the most senior member of the department. If you won’t do it, who will?”
Sacks shrugged hopelessly at Fuller. Sure, this county supervisor didn’t send quite the chills down his spine Woody Goodman once did, but that didn’t mean he knew the first thing about law enforcement.
Not that Sacks felt like he did, either, most days. Which is why he couldn’t accept the offer. He shrugged hopelessly. “I’m sorry, Supervisor, but I can’t take the job in good faith.”
Fuller smacked a stack of papers down on his desk. “Then who am I supposed to appoint? Twenty-two year-old D’Amato? Recently rehired Gills?”
Sacks hesitated. “You could cut your losses and beg Sheriff Mars to come back.”
The supervisor stopped pacing behind his back. “I could cut my what?”
“Rehire Keith Mars. When I walked in here, you asked me who was most qualified to lead the force in light of Van Lowe’s disappearance. His was the first name that came to mind.”
Fuller collapsed in his leather office chair. He gripped the arms, knuckles turning white. “You want me to rehire a disgraced former sheriff whose PI license was revoked?”
Maybe Sacks hadn’t thought this one entirely through. He pushed out of his chair, shaking his head. “He’s more qualified for the job than the man he’d be replacing, and you know it.”
“I expected more from you, Jerry,” Fuller said sharply, stopping Sacks on his way to the door. “First the sheriff of Balboa County disappears. Then a fifteen-year member of the force expects me, County Supervisor, to replace him with the man he ran out of office? A man charged with evidence tampering?”
Sacks turned, meeting Fuller’s stance. “Isn’t your daughter on a full-ride to Yale thanks to Keith Mars’ daughter?”
“Miss Mars is irrelevant to this discussion.”
“Keith was never formally charged with tampering. There was never enough proof.”
“I won’t ask him back to the department, Jerry.”
“And I won’t serve as acting sheriff. You’ll have to find someone else to do the job.” Sacks leaned in, bracing his hands on either side of Fuller’s nameplate on the desk. “Which might be hard, since most of the other deputies have only been with Balboa County for a year or two.”
“Thanks to Keith Mars,” Fuller grumbled. He slammed a fist against the desk. “I’ll only take you, Jerry.”
“Then I guess you’ll be trying to locate Sheriff Van Lowe’s whereabouts yourself,” Sacks said. He stuck out his hand, but the supervisor wouldn’t shake on it.
“If Keith Mars makes a fool of me, I’ll have your job, Deputy,” Fuller said icily.
Sacks looped his fingers through his belt confidently. “Then I’ll be a representative of Balboa County for a long time, sir. Good afternoon.”
He ambled confidentially out of Fuller’s office, but as soon as he shut the door behind him, his knees began to wobble. He wasn’t interested in serving as sheriff.
Not now, not ever.
* * *
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
For a second, Eli Navarro hesitated. He could see Veronica’s mouth set in a firm line, telling him that Logan Echolls wasn’t all bad, and it was enough to make him stop short in front of the sheriff’s station.
He could also see Veronica’s tiny body twisted terribly, her clothes stained with blood, her bright blue eyes listless-a mental imaged he’d been unable to shake in the weeks since her body was found. He’d hoped the media was lying about the extent of her injuries, but then her casket had remained firmly closed at the memorial service.
And Weevil had started having dreams of dead blondes again. Dreams that, starting last week, had involved Logan Echolls standing over his ex-girlfriend’s bleeding body, breathing heavily, eyes wild.
Gang membership ran in his family. He supposed murder ran in Echolls’ blood. Not hesitant any longer, he pushed his way into the station. Waving the papers in his hand through the air and ringing the bell at the receptionist’s desk repeatedly, he hollered, “Can anybody help me? Got a tip on the Echolls’ murder case somebody might wanna hear!”
One of the deputies was out of his chair before the others, scrambling to assume Inga’s usual position. D’Amato, according to his badge. “You have what?”
“Tip,” Weevil said, crossing his arms in front of them, still clutching the papers. “Who do I make my statement to?”
“I can take your statement,” D’Amato offered, glancing at the sheriff’s office, where the lights were clearly dimmed. He pointed in the direction of an interrogation room, but Weevil held up a hand.
“I know the way, Deputy. Name’s Eli Navarro.”
D’Amato stopped. “R-right,” he stammered. “Come on, Mr. Navarro. What do you know?”
Weevil just smirked until he was situated in the room, door closed firmly behind D’Amato. He slid the papers across the table. “I know that my uncle replaced the hood, side fender and front headlight of a Saturn VUE belonging to Veronica Mars two weeks before she disappeared.”
The deputy snatched the papers from Weevil almost greedily, going immediately to the photos Weevil had snapped of the damage. “She told me she’d hit a light pole.”
D’Amato’s brow furrowed as he inspected Veronica’s bashed headlight. “Looks like she could have.”
“No,” Weevil said, shaking his head. “I didn’t buy it for a second. The damage wasn’t deep enough for a collision. Someone bashed in her headlight with a bat.”
“Right,” said D’Amato. “Did she say who?”
“She denied the possibility when I confronted her, but it’s not the first time she’s brought in a car with that kind of damage. Look at the rest of the papers.”
“What are these?” D’Amato squinted as he picked up a work order dated September 2005. “Veronica’s car wasn’t this old.”
“The LeBaron she used to drive was,” Weevil said, through recognition had dawned in the deputy’s eyes before he even started. “Repair for the same kind of damage after one Logan Echolls took a bat to her car at the beach. Witnessed it with my own two eyes. So did a bunch of my old amigos, but if their testimony is no good, one of V’s friends was there, too.”
D’Amato continued to thumb through the photos, paperwork and order forms stacked in front of him. “I dunno, Mr. Navarro, it might just be a coincidence...”
“Or Logan Echolls could have welded a crowbar to her Saturn just like he did her LeBaron and that cop car last year.” Weevil smirked at D’Amato’s dumbfounded look. “Check his file if you don’t believe me.”
“Right,” D’Amato said. He looked a little pale and completely astonished. “I’ll have to talk to the sheriff about this.”
Weevil settled back in his chair. “I can wait.”
D’Amato stopped in the door. “You’re on parole, right?”
Weevil just smiled. “Right.”
After all, if his information helped put her killer behind bars, then it was Veronica who owed him the favor.
* * *
Friday, February 22, 2008
Logan lifted his head as the door to the main station screeched open, darting his eyes as Deputy D’Amato glared disdainfully. “You have a visitor,” he snarled.
Even though the clock across from his cell still wasn’t fixed, Logan glanced at it as he scrambled to his feet. He was meeting with his lawyer (a man so smarmy he made Cliff look like a candidate for priesthood) at four o’clock, but it didn’t feel like late afternoon already.
Perhaps, he realized as Mac appeared behind D’Amato, because it wasn’t. The deputy continued to glare. “Fifteen minutes.” He turned to Mac. “Holler if he gives you any trouble, okay?”
“Okay,” Mac repeated softly, folding her arms across her chest. A single tear slipped down her cheek as D’Amato slipped out. Logan reached over his head and clutched the bars. “Well?” he asked.
Mac took a hesitant step forward. “I just gave my statement,” she said flatly. “Since Weevil came forward, the sheriff has called in all her friends.”
“Funny. You’re the first that’s been by to see me,” Logan replied. He dropped one hand to his hip. “And? What did you tell them?”
Mac’s tongue flicked against her lips, moistening them. “The truth.”
Logan pushed away from the bars entirely, sitting heavily on the bottom bunk. “What’s that these days?” he muttered.
“That you and Veronica fought a lot,” Mac said, her eyes filling with tears, “but I never worried you’d hurt her.”
“Do you worry now?”
“Isn’t it too late to worry when she’s already dead?”
“I didn’t kill her, Mac,” Logan rasped, surprised his voice was so hurt. He could feel the all-too-familiar lump rising in his throat, and his eyes stung. “I loved her.”
“Then why are all the fingers pointed at you?” Mac wanted to know.
“I don’t know,” Logan said desperately. “I never could do what they’re saying I did.”
In his mind, he could hear his lawyer’s low whistle as he opened the case file: assault, abduction, rape, murder. He wasn’t sure which accusation hurt worse. She’d been shot, stabbed, her throat slit-
“What is it that they have on you?” Mac demanded. “Why did you break into Mars Investigations?”
Logan pulled his sleeves over his hands, drawing them to his face. “I was looking for something, anything-I needed an explanation. I needed to know if she was working on something that could have gotten her in trouble.”
“And you didn’t think Mr. Mars would have it covered?”
“I thought he might have missed something.” Mac didn’t look convinced, and he pushed off the bed, returning to the cell door. “I was with her that night, Mac. I just thought I might know to look for something he wouldn’t.”
“Like what?”
Logan shook his head. “I don’t know,” he said hollowly. “I just don’t know.”
Mac’s eyes had brimmed with tears. “Wallace came in yesterday,” she said. “He says the sheriff let slip a witness saw you grab her arm outside the bar that night, hard enough to leave a bruise.”
“Mac, I-”
“Did you, Logan? Did you yank her back to you?”
“Yes, but-”
“I told you to protect her,” Mac said roughly, shaking her head. “I told you to protect her, and somehow she winds up dead.” She turned on her heels.
“Mac, wait!” Logan begged. “She was in too deep. It was something, Mac, something with the Castle or the Fitzpatricks or Vinnie Van Lowe or-”
The door slammed shut behind her, and he sunk bitterly to the lower bunk again.
Chapter Two