Fic: "witb ix: When Happily Ever After Fails," V/Lamb, V/Weevil, R/adult.
This is it, the end of the tale that has held me in its thrall for months. Note, to my amusement, that the beginning of the title designation kind of spells out "Weetabix."
Also...if the end causes anyone major distress, I confess my ominous gloom and doom moaning about The End aren't necessarily true. I'm toying with a tag of the "Five Ways That WITB could have ended but didn't" variety. :-).
And, erhm, in case it doesn't show...I'm TERRIFIED about how this is going to sit with readers.
Title: "witb ix: When Happily Ever After Fails"
Author: monimala
Fandom: VM
Rating/Classification: adult language, nongraphic smut, angst, V/Lamb, V/Weevil.
Disclaimer: I do not own these characters.
Summary: The ninth and final chapter of “washed in the blood.” All they have left is the inevitable.
Notes: If you've missed them, the eight previous chapters are all now archived here. (Yes, that includes "The Ties That Bind," which I just posted yesterday.)
She didn’t have to wait long…but even the minutes beating by felt like hours. Hours spent thinking about a little girl with Lamb’s dark hair and Lamb’s bright eyes. Hours spent wondering what the Hell that meant. And fearing she knew exactly what. Somehow, she didn’t think this was what Eli had intended when he shooed her off to figure out her “thing” with Lamb.
Because this thing was decidedly un-figure-out-able.
Unless Don Lamb was trying to tell her that he’d taken some kind of vow of chastity and eternal assholitude after getting somebody pregnant when he was younger and her nubile wiles had messed with his plan.
And, yet, that didn’t seem quite right.
Probably because she seriously doubted he’d ever been chaste in his life.
And she wasn’t so sure about her ‘wiles.’
After several hours - really only twenty-two and a half minutes - she heard the keycard engage the lock. And he looked altogether unsurprised to see her sitting on his hotel room bed. She watched him shut the door with something that was almost...resigned. His shoulders slumped beneath the black pullover that made him look like a cross between a funeral attendee and a priest. Thanks to the white t-shirt peeking out from the collar. And the prior thoughts about vows of celibacy.
He locked the deadbolt and pulled the chain across the door, meticulous about the details like he was when he drove. “Hello, Veronica.”
Since he wasn't surprised, she dispensed with pleasantries, with greetings, or explanations of how she’d gotten into the room. She cut to the chase, folding her hands in her lap. No, folding was an oversimplification. She was becoming a veritable champion at finger origami. "So who is she? Your daughter?"
He flinched, running a hand through his hair. And she almost thought he wasn’t going to answer. But then he did. "No. She's my niece..." He swallowed hard and she watched his Adam's apple tighten with the action. He paused so long she was sure he wasn't going to say anything else. But then he did. And she wished he'd stayed silent. "And my sister."
Niece. Sister. Which meant...? She knew he was watching her work it out in her head. Something that belonged in a VC Andrews book or a Montel episode. Something that made her stomach lurch.
She knew what he expected from her. Disgust. Horror. Condemnation. Everything she already saw in the subdued blue of his eyes. Everything he'd been carrying around for years.
Years. Months. Days.
Like the morning after Shelly Pomeroy's party.
She clenched fistfuls of the duvet in her hands, so tight the seams imprinted themselves against her palms. And she didn't give him anything he expected...just one loaded question. "Why?" As he looked down at her, the muscle jumping in his cheek, she asked him, "Why? When I came to see you that morning...why did you laugh at me? Why didn't you believe me?"
He leaned against the door, crossing his arms over his chest and affecting the pose of somebody who didn't give a damn. "I'm glad you haven't forgiven me for that. At least you haven't completely lost your mind." But she knew he did give. Well more than a damn.
"That's not what this is about." She rose, leaving the relative safety of the bed -- and wasn't that a laugh? -- behind. "This hasn't been about forgiveness for a *long* time. I'm asking you why you treated me that way. Why, after everything...after that little girl..."
"Zoe," he murmured, cutting her off. "Her name is Zoe. She's 11 years old. The same age Karen was the first time our dad crawled into her bed. The same age you were when I met you." Don didn't flinch this time. If anything, his words were bleached clean of any kind of emotion at all. He might as well have been talking about somebody else. "My sister OD'd on heroin when she was sixteen and the doctors had to cut the baby out of her corpse."
Was he deliberately using the worst possible words? Yes. But Veronica didn't let herself flinch either. She couldn't. "And you gave her up for adoption?" she asked, softly. "To that family in Del Mar?"
"Gave her up? It wasn’t a sacrifice. I did that kid a favor. A few more years and she would've been Dad's new toy." Don stared at her, so still and so pale that it was an imitation of death. "Or mine." She started to protest the horrible claim, but he barreled over her. "Did you look at yourself that day, Veronica? Did you see yourself in a mirror? Like somebody rode you hard and put you away wet. You looked like a victim. The Lamb family specialty. Don’t you know that vulnerability is our biggest turn-on? I got you out of there as fast as possible so I wouldn't do something stupid and lose my job. You're lucky all I did was make you cry and force you to grow the fuck up."
"Bullshit." Her voice shook at the ugly images he was painting. At the ugliness he was attributing to *himself*. "That's not who you are. You are not your father, Donald."
"Then who am I? Huh? If you're so fucking smart, if you're such a great detective, you tell me...who the Hell am I? Some kind of saint? Some kind of misunderstood sad sack who just needs to be loved?" He hit the door with his fists, punctuating each choice with a blow. “A guy who really didn’t mean to hurt you? A guy who really didn’t mean to let his baby sister become a junkie? A guy who really didn’t mean to drown out the sound of her crying with two or three pillows over his head every night for years? Yeah, I’m a great person, Veronica. I'm a real Helluva guy.”
"You are. You're someone who became a cop so you could make a difference. You're someone who found *my* dad and looked up to him and realized *that's* the kind of man you needed to be. You're someone who loved Karen, who loves Zoe." She closed the distance between them, taking his chin in her hands and forcing him to look at her. *Really* look at her. "And you love me, too."
"Since you were 11," he taunted, the self-loathing coating him like thick, black, tar.
"I'm not 11 now. Do you still love me?" she demanded. "Is it different? Is it better? Has it gone *from* helping me with my homework *to* helping me take my clothes off?"
He didn't answer. Maybe he couldn't. But it was there anyway. Deputy Lamb had never looked at her pre-pubescent body with lust. He had never touched her inappropriately -- unless brushing her fingers while passing the gravy boat somehow counted. He had handled her teenybopper crush on him with equal parts amusement and embarrassment. And the first time she could remember him looking at her with any kind of male interest was after she’d turned eighteen, months ago.
"Then you're not a pedophile," she assured, fiercely. "My God, you are so obsessed with pushing away anyone who cares about you because you're afraid they'll see the truth about you...and you're the one who can't see it. You're a bastard, but you're not a monster. You're not destined to hurt little girls."
"Then what do you call what I did to you after you were raped?" he demanded, "If that's your definition of love, then you're more pathetic than you were with those mascara tracks on your face."
"What you did to me...is shove me out of your life." His hands came up to her shoulders as he moved to do it again. But she wouldn't budge, even as the tears slipped down her cheeks. Mascara tracks again. But she was far from pathetic. No, Veronica was finally strong. Stronger than him. Stronger than his hatred. Stronger than his fear.
"Oh, don't get me wrong. You *were* an asshole of epic proportions," she pointed out. "You made sure that I would never come to you for help again... and never ask you to be human, to care, to protect me. To *lose me*." He made a strangled noise and she knew she'd hit the marks. The one he never showed anyone. Finger-shaped. Somewhere in Hell, next to a seat saved for Aaron Echolls, she hoped his father was experiencing the worst kind of torture.
"I don't need you to protect me, I'm not going to kill myself...and I am *definitely* not your little sister. And you know that. You knew that when you kissed me in the bathroom. You're obsessed with me for totally mundane, absolutely normal, healthy, male reasons. Like I'm sexy, I'm way too good for you, and I have a kickin' sense of humor." She poked him in the chest for emphasis. "Why in the world would you think depriving yourself of Mars companionship was a good idea? My family is the best thing that ever happened to you. That's why you can't stay away from us. Why you can't stay away from *me*." She assured, gently, "You totally deserve me. And want me. And need me. And you love me."
"Shut up," he hissed, shaking her. "Shut up, Veronica, for once in your life..." He was pleading with her. Don Lamb. *Pleading*. "Just...stop."
So she did. After she pressed her lips, firmly, to his.
And that was all it took to light the fuse. To make him open up to her and kiss her like he had under those harsh fluorescent lights. He stopped trying to push, yanked her impossibly close with his hands on her ass. He kissed her so hard that she had to hold on for dear life or risk being shot across the room like a bottle rocket.
Good God, but once you got him past all the b.s. and the angst and the "woe is me," Don Lamb was *easy*.
It was probably all the repression...and that was the last coherent thought Veronica had for at least five minutes. Until he moved his mouth. "Don't you *dare* feel sorry for me, Veronica Mars," he growled against her throat, using teeth.
"Have you met me, Don Lamb?" she scoffed, tilting her head back so he could go ahead and bite if he wanted to. In fact, she debated *daring* him to. "Does this look like pity? 'Cause from where I'm standing, I'm just trying to get your pants off."
"Don't expect me to be here in the morning," he warned, the edge in his voice a combination of promise and desperation.
"I don't expect anything at all." Which was a lie, but she knew he wasn't ready for the truth. Hell, *she* wasn't ready for the truth. So, she shrugged and kept things light. "Except for you to pay for your room because, really, who want to be stuck with the bill?"
He jerkily opened up his wallet, but not to front the cash. He pulled two foil-wrapped packages from one of the compartments. Two. Just. Two. That was all he had. The question was in his eyes, in the way he tossed them onto the bedside table. "I'm on the Pill," she said, simply. "So feel free to make every second until sunrise count."
With the technical details out of the way, all they had left was the inevitable.
Getting his pants off proved to be really, really, simple.
***
"*You* should always be shirtless." She reclined against the headboard, wolf-whistling as he stripped off the sleeveless white t-shirt and left it by the side of the bed. "I swear, you plus clothing equals an absolute tragedy. Why I have I never seen you naked before?"
The frank admiration in her gaze almost made the words lodge in his throat, but he got them out, reminding her, not without irony, "You just did. But barring that...I was always pretty sure Keith would kill me."
"Well, after you got his job the second time, he was pretty tempted." She laughed, but then the amusement slipped away. She got serious again. Beautifully serious. "But Dad would never lay a hand on you, Don. I don't think there's anything you could do...including me...that would make him hate you that much. He doesn’t even hate Mom and she abandoned us and stole our money. That's how family's *supposed* to work." She reached out to him, beckoning him with the curl of her fingers. "That's how caring about someone works and it's about time you figured that out. I mean, hey, I’m a slow learner, too, but it doesn’t always have to hurt."
Yes, it does, he thought, numbly.
She'd seen the worst of him, every part of him...and she was still here. Still looking at him like That. Like she really did intend to make it with him all night. Every minute. Every second until sunrise.
So, he gave her one last out. One last chance. "Does Navarro know how lucky he is?"
She looked as serene as a Madonna. Or maybe just Madonna. Because she was busy sliding out of her corduroys and his mind went blanker and blanker at every inch of skin she bared.
"I'm the lucky one," she said, softly, as she pulled her own shirt over her head and launched it in the direction of his. "And if you really want Eli in bed with us, I can call him. I'm sure he'd prefer to be here in person," she mused. "He might be able to give you a few pointers. Like where to find my..."
"I think I can find it without help," he interrupted, quickly, brain fuzzing over.
"Not from way over there you can't," she countered, snapping her bra at him like a rubber band. It was blue and lacy. It matched her impossibly tiny panties. She actually walked around wearing those on a daily basis? He wanted to hesitate. To rethink this. To put his clothes back on and run like he'd been running all this time. But how was any heterosexual man with a pulse supposed to function knowing that Veronica and Victoria shared these kinds of secrets?
Sick, wrong, healthy, right...he suddenly didn't care anymore.
He didn't care about anything except being inside her as quickly as possible and staying there for as long as he could.
So, he stepped out of his boxers and joined her.
She came to him without reservation, without even a moment's doubt. Warm and naked and, thank the fucking Lord, anything but child-like even though she was so tiny he could barely feel the weight of her against him. She didn't look away. Not even for an instant. She kissed him with her eyes open, with her mouth open, and the sweetest tongue he'd ever tasted. No, not sweet. Bittersweet. She looped her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist, making it impossible for him to escape...not that he was going anywhere. Not right now. Now, there was nowhere to go but straight to Hell...by way of Heaven.
"VeronicaVeronicaVeronica," he chanted into her mouth, bearing her down into the sheets she'd so thoughtfully folded back. "I do want you," he admitted somewhere between her throat and her breasts. "I do need you," he confessed into the inside of her thigh.
She tore open the first condom and he thanked the powers, again, that she was a grown woman and cognizant and on the Pill because once and twice weren't going to be enough. He wanted to do this until it killed him...and the first touch of her fingers on him nearly finished him off. "I do love you," she whispered as she sheathed him in latex and then in herself.
He held himself above her, arms straining from the effort. She was actually here. With him. Wanting him despite everything she knew. Forgiving him. The slick, hot, depth of her was telling him that it was even okay for him to forgive himself. How could this be possible? He was dreaming. Any second now, he was going to wake up in his cruiser with sticky shorts and stale donuts.
"Stop. Thinking. Donald," she murmured, surging upwards, dragging him down.
So he did. After he pressed his lips, firmly, to hers.
There should have been guilt. There should have been shame. Something, anything, signaling that he was damned a million times over. Instead, all there was…was the gorgeous oblivion of driving into her, over and over, grasping her hips hard enough to leave bruises because he was so fucking afraid to let go of her and find out he was in bed alone with his demons. He buried his face in her neck, licking the sweat from her skin as she panted his name. Her hands traveled up and down his back. She clutched his shoulders, nails digging in, and, God, he’d called it all those months ago at Luciano’s because she scratched like a cat and it only made him harder and more determined to make her come until her screams bounced off the walls. Lifting weights was nothing in comparison to this endorphin rush. To the pleasure-pain of waiting till she hit the edge and hurtled over it before letting himself follow.
Don Lamb had been on the planet for thirty years. But he’d never actually lived until he heard Veronica gasp, “Oh my God,” and felt her go limp in his arms from the force of her orgasm.
“See,” he chuckled, feathering kisses across her brow, “I told you I’d find it without help.”
Her palm was cool on his cheek. He kissed it, too. “Mmm…lucky guess,” she assured, looking up, lazy and sated...and still wanting him. “Better do it again just to make sure you know the way.” She helped him get rid of the condom and after he returned from throwing it out, she pushed him onto his back with one hand flat against his chest. “In fact, maybe I should drive,” she teased as she climbed on top of him, trapping him between her thighs.
“Shit,” he groaned, helplessly, “I should’ve done this years ago…” And even as he said it, he felt like he’d stepped into a cold shower. He froze, shaking his head furiously, “I mean…no…no, that’s not…”
“Shush…I know.” And she lowered herself onto him, inch by tortuous inch. No latex this time. Saving it for a later round. So, it was just her and him and flesh and fluid…and forgiveness, again. And again. And again.
He gathered her close and it wasn’t close enough. He buried himself deep inside her and it wasn’t deep enough.
She believed in him…and it was…it was more than enough.
When the first streaks of sun started to come in through the drapes, he made himself get out of bed. Out of her arms. Out of the most amazing place he'd ever been and never would be in again. He dressed with agonizing slowness, so he could memorize the way she looked with her hair sticking up all over the place, with her skin rubbed red from his stubble...how perfect and strong and content.
She didn't look a damn thing like his sister. Or Zoe.
She didn’t look like a victim, like someone he’d hurt or let down or taken advantage of.
She just looked like a beautiful woman who loved him.
Maybe she was right. Maybe he wasn't a monster.
And maybe he could finally be a man.
"Good-bye, Veronica," he whispered. "I do love you, too..."
***
As Veronica drove home toward Neptune at nine the next morning, the police scanner on her dash crackled on and off. Sometimes, the sound of the static and the highway patrol codes was comforting. Like whale songs or bullfrogs.
This was not one of those times.
She was just three miles outside of town when Dispatch reported shots fired in a domestic dispute at the Manning residence.
Then, Officer Down.
No.
Officer KIA.
And just like that, without fanfare, without ash trays at pool side, without warnings or any kind of rhyme or reason, the man she'd brought back to life...*into* her life...was dead. The anti-climax to the multiple ones from the night before.
She didn't get to say good-bye. She didn’t get to see the body. The body. As opposed to 'his' body...the one that had cradled her and left a dozen love bites and sore spots and memories.
Her last memory of him was hazy, watching him walk to the bathroom around 3 in the morning and admiring the firmness of his spectacular ass. She'd fallen asleep by the time he climbed back into bed. She'd awakened again hours later, alone -- as he'd promised -- finding the hotel bill paid in full and slipped under the door and a note trapped beneath the edge of the bedside telephone that said, simply, 'I'm going to see Wizard.'
Meg's father was arrested, of course. Shooting an officer of the law made for an automatic Murder One and a hot seat on Death Row. This was one 09-er who would not be getting off with a slap on the wrist. Lizzie, Grace and the baby were removed to Child Protective Services. Duncan tried to enlist her in his campaign to get custody of his daughter and she could only numbly turn him down...and then stop taking his calls.
Finally, Eli actually went over to the Neptune Grand and explained things - surprisingly, without using his fists.
A coward's way to break up with someone, but at least it was finally done. Better late than never.
The mayor spoke at the funeral and so did Dad. They used words like "service" and "community" and "hero" and she knew that Don would either really love that or really hate it. She cried, unabashedly, not caring what anybody thought. Because, seriously, wasn't that her way? The inscrutable Veronica Mars who did whatever she wanted...and lost people she loved. Besides, it was better than standing up in the middle of the minister's monotone droning about the "way" and the "life" and the "shall never die" and pointing at the county treasurer going, "He sleeps with teenage hookers!" Although, *that*, Lamb definitely would have loved.
Later, when she and Weevil were the only ones left at the freshly-covered grave, he held her close and murmured all the right things and let her lean on him. Pretty much like he had since meeting her near the line of squad cars out by the Mannings' house. But there was no way she could have held on to Lamb, was there? No matter how tight the embrace. There had been no right words. No happily ever afters. Just one night. One night that had taken seven years and two lifetimes to get to.
She quietly told Eli stories as they stood there...
Her father had slapped the new deputy hard on the back,"Don, this is my pride and my joy, the fruit of my looms...Veronica."
"Uh, hi..." he'd stammered. No trace of the arrogance yet to come.
"You're cute!" she'd announced after giving the gangly uniform with the big ears a once-over. He had nice eyes. Hopefully one day the ears would catch up. 'Potential,' her mom called it.
He'd blushed. Actually *blushed*. "Um, so are you..."
And then there was the infamous Fish Taco Incident...
"You hurled on Lamb's shoes? Priceless, V. Seriously."
"I made him swear on his badge that he wouldn't tell anybody. And, well, he did a lot of shitty things to me in the last few years, but he never told a soul."
And now she, too, had a few things that she would never tell a soul. A story that was solely hers. Where she loved Sheriff Don Lamb and he loved her and all the pain they'd caused each other boiled down to nothing more substantial than a kick to the ankle.
*"I've got a secret. And it's a good one."*
It almost felt like something she imagined, a whisper on the breeze, a lyrical laugh. "Take care of him, will you, Lilly?" she asked, softly, sending the words up to the cloudless sky. Over the rainbow. Beyond.
Eli kissed her temple, his lips moving down her cheek and caught the last tears. He reassured her, promised her, "Don't worry, V. I think the man's in good hands now."
She stared down at the finely etched granite for just a few seconds longer and then focused on the warm, brown fingers intertwined with hers. Tightly laced, steady, secure. Safe. VM + EN and a sideways 8.
Infinity. Eternity. Forever.
"So am I."
--end--
January 3, 2005.
Also...if the end causes anyone major distress, I confess my ominous gloom and doom moaning about The End aren't necessarily true. I'm toying with a tag of the "Five Ways That WITB could have ended but didn't" variety. :-).
And, erhm, in case it doesn't show...I'm TERRIFIED about how this is going to sit with readers.
Title: "witb ix: When Happily Ever After Fails"
Author: monimala
Fandom: VM
Rating/Classification: adult language, nongraphic smut, angst, V/Lamb, V/Weevil.
Disclaimer: I do not own these characters.
Summary: The ninth and final chapter of “washed in the blood.” All they have left is the inevitable.
Notes: If you've missed them, the eight previous chapters are all now archived here. (Yes, that includes "The Ties That Bind," which I just posted yesterday.)
She didn’t have to wait long…but even the minutes beating by felt like hours. Hours spent thinking about a little girl with Lamb’s dark hair and Lamb’s bright eyes. Hours spent wondering what the Hell that meant. And fearing she knew exactly what. Somehow, she didn’t think this was what Eli had intended when he shooed her off to figure out her “thing” with Lamb.
Because this thing was decidedly un-figure-out-able.
Unless Don Lamb was trying to tell her that he’d taken some kind of vow of chastity and eternal assholitude after getting somebody pregnant when he was younger and her nubile wiles had messed with his plan.
And, yet, that didn’t seem quite right.
Probably because she seriously doubted he’d ever been chaste in his life.
And she wasn’t so sure about her ‘wiles.’
After several hours - really only twenty-two and a half minutes - she heard the keycard engage the lock. And he looked altogether unsurprised to see her sitting on his hotel room bed. She watched him shut the door with something that was almost...resigned. His shoulders slumped beneath the black pullover that made him look like a cross between a funeral attendee and a priest. Thanks to the white t-shirt peeking out from the collar. And the prior thoughts about vows of celibacy.
He locked the deadbolt and pulled the chain across the door, meticulous about the details like he was when he drove. “Hello, Veronica.”
Since he wasn't surprised, she dispensed with pleasantries, with greetings, or explanations of how she’d gotten into the room. She cut to the chase, folding her hands in her lap. No, folding was an oversimplification. She was becoming a veritable champion at finger origami. "So who is she? Your daughter?"
He flinched, running a hand through his hair. And she almost thought he wasn’t going to answer. But then he did. "No. She's my niece..." He swallowed hard and she watched his Adam's apple tighten with the action. He paused so long she was sure he wasn't going to say anything else. But then he did. And she wished he'd stayed silent. "And my sister."
Niece. Sister. Which meant...? She knew he was watching her work it out in her head. Something that belonged in a VC Andrews book or a Montel episode. Something that made her stomach lurch.
She knew what he expected from her. Disgust. Horror. Condemnation. Everything she already saw in the subdued blue of his eyes. Everything he'd been carrying around for years.
Years. Months. Days.
Like the morning after Shelly Pomeroy's party.
She clenched fistfuls of the duvet in her hands, so tight the seams imprinted themselves against her palms. And she didn't give him anything he expected...just one loaded question. "Why?" As he looked down at her, the muscle jumping in his cheek, she asked him, "Why? When I came to see you that morning...why did you laugh at me? Why didn't you believe me?"
He leaned against the door, crossing his arms over his chest and affecting the pose of somebody who didn't give a damn. "I'm glad you haven't forgiven me for that. At least you haven't completely lost your mind." But she knew he did give. Well more than a damn.
"That's not what this is about." She rose, leaving the relative safety of the bed -- and wasn't that a laugh? -- behind. "This hasn't been about forgiveness for a *long* time. I'm asking you why you treated me that way. Why, after everything...after that little girl..."
"Zoe," he murmured, cutting her off. "Her name is Zoe. She's 11 years old. The same age Karen was the first time our dad crawled into her bed. The same age you were when I met you." Don didn't flinch this time. If anything, his words were bleached clean of any kind of emotion at all. He might as well have been talking about somebody else. "My sister OD'd on heroin when she was sixteen and the doctors had to cut the baby out of her corpse."
Was he deliberately using the worst possible words? Yes. But Veronica didn't let herself flinch either. She couldn't. "And you gave her up for adoption?" she asked, softly. "To that family in Del Mar?"
"Gave her up? It wasn’t a sacrifice. I did that kid a favor. A few more years and she would've been Dad's new toy." Don stared at her, so still and so pale that it was an imitation of death. "Or mine." She started to protest the horrible claim, but he barreled over her. "Did you look at yourself that day, Veronica? Did you see yourself in a mirror? Like somebody rode you hard and put you away wet. You looked like a victim. The Lamb family specialty. Don’t you know that vulnerability is our biggest turn-on? I got you out of there as fast as possible so I wouldn't do something stupid and lose my job. You're lucky all I did was make you cry and force you to grow the fuck up."
"Bullshit." Her voice shook at the ugly images he was painting. At the ugliness he was attributing to *himself*. "That's not who you are. You are not your father, Donald."
"Then who am I? Huh? If you're so fucking smart, if you're such a great detective, you tell me...who the Hell am I? Some kind of saint? Some kind of misunderstood sad sack who just needs to be loved?" He hit the door with his fists, punctuating each choice with a blow. “A guy who really didn’t mean to hurt you? A guy who really didn’t mean to let his baby sister become a junkie? A guy who really didn’t mean to drown out the sound of her crying with two or three pillows over his head every night for years? Yeah, I’m a great person, Veronica. I'm a real Helluva guy.”
"You are. You're someone who became a cop so you could make a difference. You're someone who found *my* dad and looked up to him and realized *that's* the kind of man you needed to be. You're someone who loved Karen, who loves Zoe." She closed the distance between them, taking his chin in her hands and forcing him to look at her. *Really* look at her. "And you love me, too."
"Since you were 11," he taunted, the self-loathing coating him like thick, black, tar.
"I'm not 11 now. Do you still love me?" she demanded. "Is it different? Is it better? Has it gone *from* helping me with my homework *to* helping me take my clothes off?"
He didn't answer. Maybe he couldn't. But it was there anyway. Deputy Lamb had never looked at her pre-pubescent body with lust. He had never touched her inappropriately -- unless brushing her fingers while passing the gravy boat somehow counted. He had handled her teenybopper crush on him with equal parts amusement and embarrassment. And the first time she could remember him looking at her with any kind of male interest was after she’d turned eighteen, months ago.
"Then you're not a pedophile," she assured, fiercely. "My God, you are so obsessed with pushing away anyone who cares about you because you're afraid they'll see the truth about you...and you're the one who can't see it. You're a bastard, but you're not a monster. You're not destined to hurt little girls."
"Then what do you call what I did to you after you were raped?" he demanded, "If that's your definition of love, then you're more pathetic than you were with those mascara tracks on your face."
"What you did to me...is shove me out of your life." His hands came up to her shoulders as he moved to do it again. But she wouldn't budge, even as the tears slipped down her cheeks. Mascara tracks again. But she was far from pathetic. No, Veronica was finally strong. Stronger than him. Stronger than his hatred. Stronger than his fear.
"Oh, don't get me wrong. You *were* an asshole of epic proportions," she pointed out. "You made sure that I would never come to you for help again... and never ask you to be human, to care, to protect me. To *lose me*." He made a strangled noise and she knew she'd hit the marks. The one he never showed anyone. Finger-shaped. Somewhere in Hell, next to a seat saved for Aaron Echolls, she hoped his father was experiencing the worst kind of torture.
"I don't need you to protect me, I'm not going to kill myself...and I am *definitely* not your little sister. And you know that. You knew that when you kissed me in the bathroom. You're obsessed with me for totally mundane, absolutely normal, healthy, male reasons. Like I'm sexy, I'm way too good for you, and I have a kickin' sense of humor." She poked him in the chest for emphasis. "Why in the world would you think depriving yourself of Mars companionship was a good idea? My family is the best thing that ever happened to you. That's why you can't stay away from us. Why you can't stay away from *me*." She assured, gently, "You totally deserve me. And want me. And need me. And you love me."
"Shut up," he hissed, shaking her. "Shut up, Veronica, for once in your life..." He was pleading with her. Don Lamb. *Pleading*. "Just...stop."
So she did. After she pressed her lips, firmly, to his.
And that was all it took to light the fuse. To make him open up to her and kiss her like he had under those harsh fluorescent lights. He stopped trying to push, yanked her impossibly close with his hands on her ass. He kissed her so hard that she had to hold on for dear life or risk being shot across the room like a bottle rocket.
Good God, but once you got him past all the b.s. and the angst and the "woe is me," Don Lamb was *easy*.
It was probably all the repression...and that was the last coherent thought Veronica had for at least five minutes. Until he moved his mouth. "Don't you *dare* feel sorry for me, Veronica Mars," he growled against her throat, using teeth.
"Have you met me, Don Lamb?" she scoffed, tilting her head back so he could go ahead and bite if he wanted to. In fact, she debated *daring* him to. "Does this look like pity? 'Cause from where I'm standing, I'm just trying to get your pants off."
"Don't expect me to be here in the morning," he warned, the edge in his voice a combination of promise and desperation.
"I don't expect anything at all." Which was a lie, but she knew he wasn't ready for the truth. Hell, *she* wasn't ready for the truth. So, she shrugged and kept things light. "Except for you to pay for your room because, really, who want to be stuck with the bill?"
He jerkily opened up his wallet, but not to front the cash. He pulled two foil-wrapped packages from one of the compartments. Two. Just. Two. That was all he had. The question was in his eyes, in the way he tossed them onto the bedside table. "I'm on the Pill," she said, simply. "So feel free to make every second until sunrise count."
With the technical details out of the way, all they had left was the inevitable.
Getting his pants off proved to be really, really, simple.
***
"*You* should always be shirtless." She reclined against the headboard, wolf-whistling as he stripped off the sleeveless white t-shirt and left it by the side of the bed. "I swear, you plus clothing equals an absolute tragedy. Why I have I never seen you naked before?"
The frank admiration in her gaze almost made the words lodge in his throat, but he got them out, reminding her, not without irony, "You just did. But barring that...I was always pretty sure Keith would kill me."
"Well, after you got his job the second time, he was pretty tempted." She laughed, but then the amusement slipped away. She got serious again. Beautifully serious. "But Dad would never lay a hand on you, Don. I don't think there's anything you could do...including me...that would make him hate you that much. He doesn’t even hate Mom and she abandoned us and stole our money. That's how family's *supposed* to work." She reached out to him, beckoning him with the curl of her fingers. "That's how caring about someone works and it's about time you figured that out. I mean, hey, I’m a slow learner, too, but it doesn’t always have to hurt."
Yes, it does, he thought, numbly.
She'd seen the worst of him, every part of him...and she was still here. Still looking at him like That. Like she really did intend to make it with him all night. Every minute. Every second until sunrise.
So, he gave her one last out. One last chance. "Does Navarro know how lucky he is?"
She looked as serene as a Madonna. Or maybe just Madonna. Because she was busy sliding out of her corduroys and his mind went blanker and blanker at every inch of skin she bared.
"I'm the lucky one," she said, softly, as she pulled her own shirt over her head and launched it in the direction of his. "And if you really want Eli in bed with us, I can call him. I'm sure he'd prefer to be here in person," she mused. "He might be able to give you a few pointers. Like where to find my..."
"I think I can find it without help," he interrupted, quickly, brain fuzzing over.
"Not from way over there you can't," she countered, snapping her bra at him like a rubber band. It was blue and lacy. It matched her impossibly tiny panties. She actually walked around wearing those on a daily basis? He wanted to hesitate. To rethink this. To put his clothes back on and run like he'd been running all this time. But how was any heterosexual man with a pulse supposed to function knowing that Veronica and Victoria shared these kinds of secrets?
Sick, wrong, healthy, right...he suddenly didn't care anymore.
He didn't care about anything except being inside her as quickly as possible and staying there for as long as he could.
So, he stepped out of his boxers and joined her.
She came to him without reservation, without even a moment's doubt. Warm and naked and, thank the fucking Lord, anything but child-like even though she was so tiny he could barely feel the weight of her against him. She didn't look away. Not even for an instant. She kissed him with her eyes open, with her mouth open, and the sweetest tongue he'd ever tasted. No, not sweet. Bittersweet. She looped her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist, making it impossible for him to escape...not that he was going anywhere. Not right now. Now, there was nowhere to go but straight to Hell...by way of Heaven.
"VeronicaVeronicaVeronica," he chanted into her mouth, bearing her down into the sheets she'd so thoughtfully folded back. "I do want you," he admitted somewhere between her throat and her breasts. "I do need you," he confessed into the inside of her thigh.
She tore open the first condom and he thanked the powers, again, that she was a grown woman and cognizant and on the Pill because once and twice weren't going to be enough. He wanted to do this until it killed him...and the first touch of her fingers on him nearly finished him off. "I do love you," she whispered as she sheathed him in latex and then in herself.
He held himself above her, arms straining from the effort. She was actually here. With him. Wanting him despite everything she knew. Forgiving him. The slick, hot, depth of her was telling him that it was even okay for him to forgive himself. How could this be possible? He was dreaming. Any second now, he was going to wake up in his cruiser with sticky shorts and stale donuts.
"Stop. Thinking. Donald," she murmured, surging upwards, dragging him down.
So he did. After he pressed his lips, firmly, to hers.
There should have been guilt. There should have been shame. Something, anything, signaling that he was damned a million times over. Instead, all there was…was the gorgeous oblivion of driving into her, over and over, grasping her hips hard enough to leave bruises because he was so fucking afraid to let go of her and find out he was in bed alone with his demons. He buried his face in her neck, licking the sweat from her skin as she panted his name. Her hands traveled up and down his back. She clutched his shoulders, nails digging in, and, God, he’d called it all those months ago at Luciano’s because she scratched like a cat and it only made him harder and more determined to make her come until her screams bounced off the walls. Lifting weights was nothing in comparison to this endorphin rush. To the pleasure-pain of waiting till she hit the edge and hurtled over it before letting himself follow.
Don Lamb had been on the planet for thirty years. But he’d never actually lived until he heard Veronica gasp, “Oh my God,” and felt her go limp in his arms from the force of her orgasm.
“See,” he chuckled, feathering kisses across her brow, “I told you I’d find it without help.”
Her palm was cool on his cheek. He kissed it, too. “Mmm…lucky guess,” she assured, looking up, lazy and sated...and still wanting him. “Better do it again just to make sure you know the way.” She helped him get rid of the condom and after he returned from throwing it out, she pushed him onto his back with one hand flat against his chest. “In fact, maybe I should drive,” she teased as she climbed on top of him, trapping him between her thighs.
“Shit,” he groaned, helplessly, “I should’ve done this years ago…” And even as he said it, he felt like he’d stepped into a cold shower. He froze, shaking his head furiously, “I mean…no…no, that’s not…”
“Shush…I know.” And she lowered herself onto him, inch by tortuous inch. No latex this time. Saving it for a later round. So, it was just her and him and flesh and fluid…and forgiveness, again. And again. And again.
He gathered her close and it wasn’t close enough. He buried himself deep inside her and it wasn’t deep enough.
She believed in him…and it was…it was more than enough.
When the first streaks of sun started to come in through the drapes, he made himself get out of bed. Out of her arms. Out of the most amazing place he'd ever been and never would be in again. He dressed with agonizing slowness, so he could memorize the way she looked with her hair sticking up all over the place, with her skin rubbed red from his stubble...how perfect and strong and content.
She didn't look a damn thing like his sister. Or Zoe.
She didn’t look like a victim, like someone he’d hurt or let down or taken advantage of.
She just looked like a beautiful woman who loved him.
Maybe she was right. Maybe he wasn't a monster.
And maybe he could finally be a man.
"Good-bye, Veronica," he whispered. "I do love you, too..."
***
As Veronica drove home toward Neptune at nine the next morning, the police scanner on her dash crackled on and off. Sometimes, the sound of the static and the highway patrol codes was comforting. Like whale songs or bullfrogs.
This was not one of those times.
She was just three miles outside of town when Dispatch reported shots fired in a domestic dispute at the Manning residence.
Then, Officer Down.
No.
Officer KIA.
And just like that, without fanfare, without ash trays at pool side, without warnings or any kind of rhyme or reason, the man she'd brought back to life...*into* her life...was dead. The anti-climax to the multiple ones from the night before.
She didn't get to say good-bye. She didn’t get to see the body. The body. As opposed to 'his' body...the one that had cradled her and left a dozen love bites and sore spots and memories.
Her last memory of him was hazy, watching him walk to the bathroom around 3 in the morning and admiring the firmness of his spectacular ass. She'd fallen asleep by the time he climbed back into bed. She'd awakened again hours later, alone -- as he'd promised -- finding the hotel bill paid in full and slipped under the door and a note trapped beneath the edge of the bedside telephone that said, simply, 'I'm going to see Wizard.'
Meg's father was arrested, of course. Shooting an officer of the law made for an automatic Murder One and a hot seat on Death Row. This was one 09-er who would not be getting off with a slap on the wrist. Lizzie, Grace and the baby were removed to Child Protective Services. Duncan tried to enlist her in his campaign to get custody of his daughter and she could only numbly turn him down...and then stop taking his calls.
Finally, Eli actually went over to the Neptune Grand and explained things - surprisingly, without using his fists.
A coward's way to break up with someone, but at least it was finally done. Better late than never.
The mayor spoke at the funeral and so did Dad. They used words like "service" and "community" and "hero" and she knew that Don would either really love that or really hate it. She cried, unabashedly, not caring what anybody thought. Because, seriously, wasn't that her way? The inscrutable Veronica Mars who did whatever she wanted...and lost people she loved. Besides, it was better than standing up in the middle of the minister's monotone droning about the "way" and the "life" and the "shall never die" and pointing at the county treasurer going, "He sleeps with teenage hookers!" Although, *that*, Lamb definitely would have loved.
Later, when she and Weevil were the only ones left at the freshly-covered grave, he held her close and murmured all the right things and let her lean on him. Pretty much like he had since meeting her near the line of squad cars out by the Mannings' house. But there was no way she could have held on to Lamb, was there? No matter how tight the embrace. There had been no right words. No happily ever afters. Just one night. One night that had taken seven years and two lifetimes to get to.
She quietly told Eli stories as they stood there...
Her father had slapped the new deputy hard on the back,"Don, this is my pride and my joy, the fruit of my looms...Veronica."
"Uh, hi..." he'd stammered. No trace of the arrogance yet to come.
"You're cute!" she'd announced after giving the gangly uniform with the big ears a once-over. He had nice eyes. Hopefully one day the ears would catch up. 'Potential,' her mom called it.
He'd blushed. Actually *blushed*. "Um, so are you..."
And then there was the infamous Fish Taco Incident...
"You hurled on Lamb's shoes? Priceless, V. Seriously."
"I made him swear on his badge that he wouldn't tell anybody. And, well, he did a lot of shitty things to me in the last few years, but he never told a soul."
And now she, too, had a few things that she would never tell a soul. A story that was solely hers. Where she loved Sheriff Don Lamb and he loved her and all the pain they'd caused each other boiled down to nothing more substantial than a kick to the ankle.
*"I've got a secret. And it's a good one."*
It almost felt like something she imagined, a whisper on the breeze, a lyrical laugh. "Take care of him, will you, Lilly?" she asked, softly, sending the words up to the cloudless sky. Over the rainbow. Beyond.
Eli kissed her temple, his lips moving down her cheek and caught the last tears. He reassured her, promised her, "Don't worry, V. I think the man's in good hands now."
She stared down at the finely etched granite for just a few seconds longer and then focused on the warm, brown fingers intertwined with hers. Tightly laced, steady, secure. Safe. VM + EN and a sideways 8.
Infinity. Eternity. Forever.
"So am I."
--end--
January 3, 2005.