A/N: So far the voting is indifference regarding Duncan, so he will be mentioned and not actually return. I got a great PM on why it should be Dick who gets a little sister and while it was amusing, I think I will hold that idea off for another story and stick with Logan. There were two votes as of this minute for a boy and five for girl, so Fiona Echolls aged 8 and six months will be coming into the story about three chapters from now.
Regarding the chapter, Vee is a little angry with her mom but in the end, when it counts she will help her.
Chapter Ten
Logan and Veronica were listening to what Keith was telling them and neither of them knew what to say. Logan because he was torn between what he felt was right and what he knew that Veronica would want. Veronica wasn't sure what to think regarding her mom being back in Neptune.
"So let me get this straight. Mom is coming back to town, to fix her relationship with me. At least that is what she is saying, but oh, there is a bonus to it, in that she is going to be marrying Jake Kane as soon as his divorce is final? Am I missing anything?" Veronica asked coldly curious as to what Jake had offered Celeste to finally get the divorce he had wanted for years and that the other woman had blocked.
"Veronica, I get why you are upset but she IS your mother. She only has a short time left." Keith said as he held his daughter's hand. He wasn't happy with Leanne himself, but he knew that this was his daughter's last chance to make peace with the woman who gave birth to her.
"Dad, she isn't coming back for me. She is coming back for Jake." Veronica said freeing her hand from his and heading towards the door. She couldn't deal with Leanne and her sudden need to mother her after everything she had done. She knew her mom had been living with Jake, so what were Jake and her mom keeping a secret from her dad that required her to be in Neptune.
When Veronica had left heading to the car, Logan looked at her father and said "Sir, let me talk to her. I think I can get her to considering visiting Leanne."
Outside, he found Veronica standing near the pool. Holding her, he pressed a kiss to her head and asked "Do you mind if we go for a drive?"
"I just want to think about something, anything else." She admitted. Arriving at a beach that she didn't recognize, she looked at Logan and asked. "Why are we here?"
Pointing out the bridge in the distance, Logan said "That is why we are here. My mom died here, Veronica. I didn't get a chance to say goodbye. She loved me, I knew that but I also knew that my mother was not a good mother. She loved her pills and vodka more. She let my father use me as an ashtray and a punching bag. But it took her death for me to realize that there were things I never got to say to her."
Wanting to tell him it wasn't the same thing, she didn't, and she just sat there, trying to listen to what he was telling her in spite of her inner fearful Veronica saying to run away and not listen to him.
"At the same time that I wish I could tell her I love her, I also wish I could tell her she was a terrible mother. That she left me behind with HIM. Veronica, you have a chance to tell her what you are feeling. To be honest and say yes I love you mom but to also say that she left you behind, that she wasn't there when you needed her. That she stole from you more than just money that she helped to destroy your trust." Logan had long wished he had had a chance to say those things to Lynn but he hadn't gotten that chance and he didn't want Veronica to live with anymore regrets than she already had.
"She is drying, Logan. How can I tell her that?" She asked wishing she could tell her mother how angry she was with her and yet also that deep down she loved her.
"How can you not tell her that? Tell her how you feel about her choosing Jake Kane over you. That yes you love her but you hate her actions." Logan said as he held her in his arms.
Veronica sat there, thinking hard on what Logan was telling her. She wanted to rail at her mother, wanted to tell her how she felt but earlier that night she had gotten no farther than the nurse's station on her floor at the hospital.
She had seen Jake leaving a room and had known that he was with her mother and had left quickly. Hearing her phone ringing, she didn't recognize the number so she answered cautiously.
"Veronica, its Jake Kane. Can we talk?" His voice alone was enough to make her change her mind about speaking to her mom. Hearing Lilly's dad had Veronica wanting to escape from the entire mess.
"About?" She asked pretending not to know what he wanted.
"Let's not play dumb. Your mother was expecting you to stop in and see her tonight. Do you understand how sick she is?" Jake sounded tense as he spoke to Veronica.
"I will stop in to see her tomorrow morning, but I don't want you there. If you are there, I will leave." She said firmly. "Let's not pretend that either of us wants to see the other one."
"Fine, just don't upset your mother." Jake ordered.
"Mr. Kane, frankly you don't get to give me orders. You aren't my father and I have the DNA tests to prove it." Veronica said as she hung up her phone. Sitting there as Logan held her, she drew strength from his warmth.
"Do you want me to go with you?" Logan offered knowing that Veronica shouldn't go alone but pretty sure she would want to.
"No, I need to do this by myself." She said as she felt her own emotions changing. "Instead, how about we go someplace when I am done?"
Standing, Logan drove Veronica back to her dad's place and when Keith followed him outside, Logan said "Jake is going to be trouble for Veronica."
Grimacing, Keith said "He called me, furious that Veronica demanded that he not be there."
Early the next morning, Veronica hesitated as the elevator doors opened but before they could close again, she had hit the door open button. Exiting, she looked around and saw Clarence Weidman talking to another man who moved down the hallway towards what she knew was her mother's room.
When she saw Jake exiting, she ducked into a small alcove and waited until she was sure he had left. Heading down the hallway towards her mother's room, she stood there at the doorway watching as her mother and the man talked.
Realizing that he was a doctor, she eavesdropped and got what they were talking about. Spinning on her heel, she was about to leave when she looked back inside and found that Leanne had seen her.
"Veronica!" Seeing the tears in her mother's eyes, Veronica was cynical enough to wonder if she was crying about the news she had just heard or for the idea that she wouldn't get the spare time to marry Jake if things didn't work out.
Veronica moved forward and when the doctor began to speak, Leanne started to hush the man, but Veronica coldly interrupted. "Don't bother, mother. I heard everything. You know, I thought you came home to make peace after your theft of my college money, instead I find out that the only reason you are here, you need a kidney after all of the drinking destroyed yours."
"Veronica, I swear, sweetie that isn't true." Leanne said with a stutter to her voice. "Please, believe me, that isn't the only reason."
"It won't be happening." Veronica said and turning she saw Jake Kane standing in the doorway glaring at her as he moved towards Leanne to comfort her. "Take her back to whatever back alley bar you found her in. I am not giving her any part of me."
"Veronica, do you understand your mother might die if she doesn't get this transplant." The doctor asked wanting this young girl to understand the severity of the situation. He hated dealing with these family dramas but he had a patient to save.
"Does my mother understand why maybe telling me that the boy I was dating might be my half brother might be a good idea? Does my mother understand that taking a check for tens of thousands of dollars from her child might be wrong? Does my mother understand that leaving her young daughter and husband to run off to drink herself to death then only to show up because she needs her daughter to save her life might make me a bit resentful."
With that, Veronica looked at Jake Kane and said "I am surprised with all of your money; you just didn't try to buy her a kidney on the black market."
"Veronica, honey, please, let me talk." Leanne said as she tried to sit up in her hospital bed.
"Mother, there are no words that will make me change my mind." She said her eyes now on Leanne who she could see looked on death's door but Veronica found it hard to feel guilty especially when Jake began to speak again.
"Veronica, if it is a matter of cost…"
"Let me guess, you will write me a check?" She asked Jake mocking his words. "Will you be sure to make sure that my mother doesn't steal this one like she did the last one? OR will this check be a reimbursement for what she stole from before, or maybe of my wasted college fund that I used to attempt to send her to rehab. See at the time I had no idea she drank because she was stuck with us and wasn't with the great love of her life, you. If I had known, I would have had them send you the bill."
Walking to the door, passing Clarence Weidman who was now standing there, she looked at her mother then Jake and said "I would have preferred a telegram telling me she was dead when she died."
With that, Veronica left the room and went to the elevator and held her emotions tightly under wraps until she got to her car and began to bawl. She had listened to Logan and had come her to make peace with her mother, instead she had found out that the only reason her mother came home was because she needed a kidney from her.
Logan wiped out again and found himself at the shoreline as Dick surfed in to join him.
"Dude, where is your mind today?" Dick asked disgusted with his best friend after he had wiped out yet again on an easy wave. "I thought you fixed things with Ronnie?"
"Her mom is in town and in the hospital because she is dying." Logan said as they began to peel off their wet suits. "Leanne isn't-"
"I remember when we were in school. So all of that was true? Way harsh man; to use that against her, Logan." Dick said feeling a bit sick as he recalled what they had done.
"It's even worse. Leanne had an affair with Jake Kane. It's where he was when Lilly died. Then Ronnie paid for her mom to go to rehab with her college money and her mom left after a week, costing Ronnie all the money she had saved. Mr. Mars found Duncan when he ran; her mom stole the check while Mr. Mars was in the hospital recovering from what Aaron did to him."
"Man and I thought my mom was bad." Dick said with a shake of his head. "So she is going to see her today?"
"Yes, but since it was Mr. Kane who brought her back..." Logan didn't need to say anymore, Dick of all people would understand how screwed up parents were.
Dick didn't say anything; he did get the mess that family made of your life better than anyone and that just because they fucked you over didn't mean you didn't still love them. Changing, he said "Mac is meeting me at my place to help me, but maybe we should send her to Ronnie."
"No, Wallace knows the history better because his mom once dated Mr. Mars. He is going to wait for her at the hospital." Logan replied. "I called him this morning."
Logan was still worried but knew that if he wanted to help Veronica, the best way to do so was to go and see Mr. Mars. Watching as Dick headed towards their old zip code, he looked at his phone, hoping to see that Veronica had called.
Arriving at Mars Investigations, he went into see the former sheriff who was with a man in a suit. Seated behind Veronica's desk, he saw Weevil entering and asked. "What is it 'take-a-former-gang-member-to-work' day? I wonder why I didn't get an invitation."
"Rich boy, there is a difference between a gang member and a juvenile delinquent." Weevil replied then said "Mr. Mars asked me to stop in."
Logan stayed silent not wanting to upset Veronica by picking on her pet criminal so he just replied. "He is in a meeting. Have a seat."
"Lost all that money you inherited so you are working for your girlfriend's dad, huh?" Weevil asked with a broad smirk as he looked at Logan acting all professional.
The door to the inner office opened and Keith Mars walked out and assured his client he would take care of the situation. Seeing both Logan and Eli waiting, he saw his client out and returned. "Logan, was there something you needed?"
"I can wait. It's about Veronica." He replied then sat down while Keith asked Eli to join him in the office.
When the Mexican said that he hadn't done anything, Keith chuckled and said "You aren't being accused of anything. I was looking to hire you."
"For what?" Eli asked suspiciously.
"I am working on a bail jumping case and need some muscle. With Veronica in school, things are changing." Keith said and when he saw that Eli was confused.
"Why me?" Eli asked again.
"Veronica suggested you might want to work for me." Keith then explained his future duties and shook hands with Eli. "Meet me here on Monday morning."
When Eli had left, Logan entered the office and said "I am worried about Veronica."
"Me too." Keith said as Logan sat down across from his desk and seemed to want to ask him something. "What is it, Logan?"
"I talked her into going to see her mother. I reminded her about my mom and how she died." Logan said.
"I found out this morning that Leanne lied to me about why she came home. I called Jake to let him know that I won't encourage Veronica to help her mother. Leanne needs a kidney transplant; it's why she came to see Veronica."
"Holy shit." Logan said beyond stunned as everything began to sink in. "She wants Veronica to…"
"Yes." Keith said bleakly. "Either way, Veronica is going to end up feeling guilty. If I had known, I would have at least warned her or tried to prevent Leanne from returning."
"I was wondering if you knew." The teary eyed blond in the doorway looked at her father then at Logan and finally at the boy who came in with her. "I had Wallace drive me over. Logan, I need to speak to my dad, alone."
Standing, Logan walked over and hugged her expecting for her to be numb instead she returned the hug and whispered for him to wait.
Outside in the outer office, Wallace said "Man, Logan it was bad. I got there just in time. Jake Kane was approaching Veronica with that henchman of his. I got Vee out of there, but the look on his face. I wouldn't trust him; he wants Veronica to help her mother. He won't stop, if he has to he will use whatever he can, including causing damage that harmed Veronica but that would make her kidney still viable."
Logan wanted to say that Jake Kane wouldn't do that, but he had come to realize when Jake had had his father killed that he didn't really know the man, so he asked. "Did you tell Veronica?"
"Yes, it's why she wanted to talk to her dad. She is worried. I think she would have helped if Leanne had been honest." Wallace replied.
"It's my fault she even went to see Leanne." Logan said feeling guilty as he looked at the closed door. When it opened fifteen minutes later, Veronica exited and looking back in at her dad said "I won't give her a kidney, dad. I can't."
Wallace was not surprised when Logan and Veronica left together. Looking at Mr. Mars, he said "Is there anything I can do?"
"I think that Jake and I need to have a talk. Wallace thank you for going to help Veronica deal with this." Keith said wishing that there was more he could do for his daughter, but this was a decision only she could make.
"Thank Logan, he called me." Wallace said as he left the office knowing that between Logan and Mr. Mars things would be okay.
Mac pulled into the driveway not all surprised to see how large the house was. Getting out of her Beetle and moving towards Dick's SUV. Seeing no one was around, she moved towards the front doorway.
Letting herself in, she heard the sound of a beeping in the distance and figured out that Dick was inside. Moving towards the staircase in front of her, she followed the sound of the beeping down to the bottom floor.
Hearing the beeping going away, she called out "Dick?"
"In here. I will be right out." Dick came out a few minutes later, his hair sticking straight up but wearing jeans and a green t-shirt as he held some sort of electronic devise. "So what do you think of the house?"
"I only came down the stairs." Mac said as she sat her messenger bag down on the bar in front of her. "So, I did some looking around, found a list of suggested items. You don't want to know where the main list came from, though."
"Why not?" Dick asked as he put the electronic measuring tape away as he looked at Mac who seemed amused about something. "Where did it come from?"
With a wicked smirk she said "It was part of a suggested bridal registry."
"Okay, maybe its better I don't know." Dick said with a shudder then when Mac handed him a four page list, looking through it, he said "Damn, this is thorough, dude."
"Let's get started. Now with the furniture it might be better to actually make sure that they are sturdy so that means we should go to the furniture store."
With that, Mac used her camera phone to map out the rooms and what Dick wanted in each one as they moved through the floors. Arriving on the second floor, she was surprised when he didn't want to use the master bedroom.
"The sun will rise first on that side of the house. I want that bedroom." Dick replied when asked why he wanted the smaller bedroom. "Besides, it's not that much smaller. According to the plan it's only a foot smaller on the length."
Getting finished with their measuring and mapping, Dick and Mac locked the house up and were arguing as they got into his Lexus. "Which store?"
"It's your house, you decide." Mac said as she looked over the papers they had written on. "Do you have any idea what kind of style you want or colors or anything?"
Dick was quiet as he thought about it then said "Let's bring the water, the sand and the sky inside. The grass too."
"Sort of a natural palate then?" She asked as Dick pulled onto the Interstate. "Uh, Dick where are we going?"
"I was thinking that we might have better luck finding what we need in San Diego." He said his eyes coming off the road long enough to look at her. "I mean, you said that we could spend the day getting my place ready. I am assuming that means you don't have anything to do."
Jake looked at Clarence and said "Do what you have to do; I want Veronica to help her mother."
"The only bargaining point we have is Duncan, Jake. If you want a future with Leanne we can't harm Veronica." Clarence warned him. "Do you want to risk your own son?"
"We already have people working on fixing things to allow Duncan to return to the states. Veronica doesn't know that and frankly I don't think it would matter. She loves him and we can use that to get her to help." Jake replied as he stared out the window at the large expanse of lawn.
"What about Celeste?" Clarence asked.
"Celeste signed off on getting the divorce, she won't be a problem." Jake replied.
"If she thinks you are involving Duncan she might become one." The head of security warned. When Jake seemed to not hear a word he said, he added "You might want to wait a week while your divorce becomes final, let me see if Veronica is a match. Get a hold of her medical records and find out if she has any issues that might interfere in the transplant."
"Go ahead and do that, but start to put the pressure on her. I want her on the edge when the results show she will match her mother. I won't lose Leanne, not when I am this close to having everything I have ever wanted."
Keith entered the hospital room and looked at Leanne who simply said. "I knew if I told you, you would stop me. I can't die, Keith. I won't, I have a chance to fix my life, Veronica's life."
"How do you think you will do that?" He asked idly as if he didn't have a care in the world when all he wanted to do was ask her how much more she was going to try and take from their daughter.
"I can give her back what she should have had all this time. A loving family is what she needs, a mother who is there for her. Her true love, Jake is going to arrange it so that Duncan can come home to Veronica, things will be the way they were meant to be."
Shaking his head, he didn't bother telling her that Duncan could come home, that it wouldn't matter to his daughter.
"Don't look at me that way." Leanne cried out when she saw the pity in Keith's eyes.
"You are living in a dream world, Leanne. You always have. I am out of here; you should consider that by not telling Veronica you lost any chance of her helping you. You used to know your daughter, now you don't have a clue."
Walking out, Keith saw one of the Kane security staff on the phone and just walked on past, knowing that he was telling someone that he had been visiting Leanne.
Veronica and Logan were seated at the beach again as the sun set in the west, watching as Backup chased a stick. "What do you need me to do?"
"Just tell me I was right, please?" She begged as she stared at the waves. "It's my mother. I should want to save her, some part of me still does, but Logan, I am so angry, so sick at the idea that she came home only because she needed a part of me."
Pressing his lips to the side of her head, Logan said "Only you know what is right for you. If it was my dad, I wouldn't even think twice about not doing it. My mom, I would do the transplant but only because I want to believe she would be different afterwards."
"I don't know, I just don't know." She said wiping away the tears, her anger a living thing yet at the same time the guilt at telling her mom she wished she would die eating away at her.
"Veronica, lets find out how long before you have to make a decision, then you decide." Logan suggested.
Heading back to the campus, Veronica said "I have a shift at the library tonight. It's my final one since that project starts on Monday. Care to make out in the stacks."
She saw Logan's expression and reached out to hold his arm. "I need to deal with this in my own way but I am listening, Logan. I need to think on this but before I do that, I need to distance myself from it."
Logan dropped Veronica off and went to park. Seeing Dick's sports car in the parking lot, he rejoined Veronica and said "What are the odds that Dick is in the library?"
Veronica stopped her forward movement turned to look at Logan and asked. "Why would you think he is at the library?"
"His car is in the parking lot." Logan replied. "He was planning on working with Mac today; maybe she dragged him to the library."
Taking out her phone, Veronica called and asked "Mac, where are Dick and yourself?"
"You don't want to know but we are close to the border." Mac said as she watched Dick arguing with the man working the desk. "Listen, can I call you back later?"
Veronica agreed then hanging up, told Logan that Mac was going to call her back as they started towards the library. She looked as they crossed the lawn and saw that there was a car that looked like Dick's Audi R8 in the parking lot. Hearing the sound of someone calling out for help, the twosome stopped and went towards the voice.
Rushing around the corner, Veronica stopped at the sight in front of her. Gasping out loud, she knelt down next to the bleeding man and told Logan to call for an ambulance. "Who did this to you?"
"I didn't see his face." The man said as he held his arm close to his chest and grimaced at the blood flowing from his arm. "I was meeting my girlfriend when I saw a man coming out of her dorm room. He was carrying her laptop."
"You tried to stop him?" Veronica asked and was surprised at how quickly a police officer showed up soon followed by an ambulance. Looking at Lamb, she said "He saw a guy stealing his girlfriend's computer and tried to stop him and was shot for the effort."
Mac fell asleep in the hotel bed, too tired to even brush her teeth. Dick and she had spent the day arguing and buying furniture; in one store, she had been shocked to realize that the sales girl thought that Dick and she were a couple.
So far they had gotten the furniture for everything but the master bedroom and the secondary bedroom. Tomorrow they were going to spend their afternoon picking out colors for curtains and towels.
"Mac, are you awake?" Lifting her head, looking at the other bed, she nodded sleepily. Dick looked at her then said "I was thinking about what we heard about Veronica's Mom."
"What about her?" Mac asked curious as to what was going on in Dick's mind. Today had been a revelation, except the part where Dick had explained why he hadn't wanted the pillow top mattress that had been rather embarrassing as he had offered to demonstrate what he meant to her dismay.
"I just can't wrap my mind around the idea of Veronica's mom only returning home because she needs a kidney. I mean I thought that unlike our parents, Veronica and your parents loved their kids. I just don't get wanting to have Ronnie cut up and a part of her taken out. It just doesn't fit with what I always thought."
"Dick, wealthy parents don't have a monopoly on being bad parents. I mean, events can make even loving parents turn into selfish adults."
"Hell mine were never loving. They married to have kids to access my dad's trust fund, when they had us, they dumped us on nannies and then summer camps. When my mother left after getting sick of my dad cheating, she just left us behind and took her jewelry and fought for the art work."
Mac sat up looking over at Dick who was wearing his sweats and a t-shirt and lying on top of the bedspread. Dick didn't seem full of self pity; it was more like he was stating facts as he recited his past.
"Dick, your mom must love you, I mean she took you back to wherever when you needed her and she helped get you into school."
"She took me with her alright, but made it very clear that I was to stay out of the way and out of trouble. She also waited until her husband's children had left for Europe before bringing me there. Her first comment to me after blaming my father for what Beaver did was to ask where he had hidden her art work. My dad and she had a huge legal battle regarding some art work they had bought while married. As for school, she made it very clear that this was her last favor."
Mac went silent then as she realized that Beaver had never talked about his mother and apparently that was for a good reason. Sliding out from under the blankets, she sat down on the other bed and said bluntly. "My parents aren't my parents and my dad took money that they got in a lawsuit regarding my birth and spent it on a business that he had no knowledge of how to run just because he wanted to run his own company."
Dick's eyes went to Mac and saw she wasn't kidding as he reached out and pulled her up so that she was sitting next to him. "Do you hate him for it?"
"No." She said quietly then added "I know that he has huge regrets for what happened. When I told my parents I wasn't applying to MIT like I used to talk about, my dad was so quiet for days. I just didn't know how to fix it for him. He got a job offer recently that would take them to just outside of the capital, I hope he goes, I don't want him and my mom living their life regretting their mistakes."
Sunday passed with Veronica torn between helping her mother and with being so angry with her that she could barely breathe. She had spent the day at her dad's office, getting things in order and showing Weevil the ropes when he had shown up.
"Want to talk?" Weevil asked Veronica as she stormed between her dad's office and the front office. "Cause if rich boy has you this upset…"
"No, it's just my mother." She said with a heavy sigh. "Logan is being very supportive in spite of not agreeing with my decision not to have the surgery to remove part of my kidney."
"What?"
Weevil got the whole story then said "Man, I can't believe I am agreeing with the rich boy, but he is right, chica. You would regret it if something happened to your Momma."
Veronica sat down on the desk and said "I don't want to hate her."
"Sorry Vee, but I don't think you do. I think she hurt yeah, but you still love your Momma. It's what we do, yah know. I mean Thumper caused a lot of trouble but he is still family. If he needed me, I would still rescue him. Its how we roll, man." Weevil said with a slight shove to Veronica's shoulder. "Stop tormenting yourself, cause being angry about money, all it does is make you like them."
"It's not just that." Veronica had never told Weevil the rest of the story and she didn't want him going after Logan for his part in the mess but she needed an unbiased opinion.
Telling him the story of Jake and her mother, how they hadn't told Duncan or her about their possibly being half siblings, she then told him what happened at the party.
When Weevil was ready to go after Logan and Dick, she stopped him and reminded him that he himself had made mistakes that had also lead to terrible things happening. "Anyhow, Duncan knew that I was possibly his sister and he still…"
"Fuck that; that is one twisted white boy." Weevil replied. "Did Echolls know?"
"What Duncan believed?" No." Weevil walked over and decked Logan who had answered his question. When Logan stayed on the floor and stopped Veronica from attacking her friend, Weevil looked at him and said "You deserved that but she is too in love with you to see that."
"I know." Logan replied with a sigh as his hand covered Veronica's where she was checking him over for damage. "I will be fine. He is right, you know that."
Weevil shook his head and rolled his eyes as Veronica helped Logan up and then when he was seated on the sofa, turned to glare at the bald former gang member before going to the small fridge and getting Logan some ice for his bruise.
"Anyhow, its part of the reason I believed that Veronica had done something terrible that ended things between Duncan and her and why I reacted the way I did back then." Logan said shamefaced as he recalled their past. "Duncan the coward never told me, it was Mac who finally filled me in."
Weevil began cursing in Mexican slang and Logan who thanks to his time surfing in Mexico under stood most of it but stopped the other man "Wait, what did you just say?"
"You really want to know?" Weevil asked doubtfully. Lilly was an ugly subject between the two of them.
"I think we need to talk because Lilly lied to you about things. Yeah I had feelings for Veronica, but they go way back to when Lilly and I started dating. She knew that I stayed away from Veronica because how fucked up my life was. I never did anything to interfere back them between Duncan and Veronica. Back then, I thought that she deserved the best and that that was Duncan, not me."
Veronica looked between the two of them and asked them what they were talking about.
"I uh, used to slip into the Kanes to spend time with Lilly." Weevil said using more polite words for what had gone on between Lilly and him. "Anyhow, I was almost caught by Jake Kane one night and ended up in Duncan's closet and heard Lilly telling Duncan that Logan was trying to break up the two of you."
"Again, you have to tell me what you are talking about because to me that makes no sense. Lilly..." Veronica replied.
"Veronica, I know that you still see Lilly with rose colored glasses, but Lilly wasn't above manipulating things. She would have bruises sometimes and let me believe that Logan gave them to her." Weevil said.
Seeing Veronica look between Logan and himself, Weevil continued, "To be honest, I considered you nothing more than a Lilly clone. It always struck me as odd that she wanted you dating her dull as dirt brother when she would make comments about how she was turning you into another her. She talked about this dress just before she died, how you weren't buttercup yellow but crimson red or some shit."
Veronica blanched, Weevil nodded at Logan and departed, worried that he should have kept his mouth shut. Logan looked at his girlfriend and said "What is it?"
"He was telling the truth, the dress I wore to Homecoming our junior year, Lilly bought it for me, said that it was the real me. There was even this strange comment about you when she tried talked me into getting it. I think Lilly was about to tell the truth to me when she died. I think she was going to admit the truth about manipulating me."
"The thing is, I liked the old version of Veronica. I just wanted to protect you from darkness. I think Lilly did too." Logan admitted.
Seeing she didn't get it, he said "Veronica, we have talked about this before, but I wasn't kidding when I said that to me, you were this innocent angel in our group. Duncan wasn't innocent, he was just… obvious and idealistic. To me, when you two broke up and he stayed silent on the cause, I truly believed he was being a gentleman. That you did something terrible mainly because I think I wanted to believe it that would mean you were more like the rest of us, tainted."
Looking at her boyfriend, she said "Then why did you turn on me?"
With a wry smile, he reached out for her hand, then said "In the end, you weren't tainted, you still stuck with your dad, which in my mind meant you turned your back on us, which we both know was only in my head. I have spent a lot of time talking to Doc about this, mainly because I want to find the answers to this and the only thing that has been worked out to this point was that I was still feeling guilty about loving you and yet at the same time, I had turned Lilly into the angel as a result of my own guilt in how fucked up our relationship was. I mean, look at it, I was sleeping with her because I knew I shouldn't even be looking at you let alone wanting to date you. It wasn't until after the bong incident that I finally started to see you, the real Veronica Mars. The girl I had wanted for years was a human being."
Veronica and Logan had had several talks about this, but she was finding that this time, she was starting to face that while Lilly had manipulated her, she herself had become twisted as a pretzel back then in her need to stay close to her friends. "You know, I was turning into a stepford wife the first time I was dating Duncan and Lilly saw that. The second time we didn't work out, not because of Meg but because I wasn't the girl that Duncan thought I should be. He wanted a combination of Meg and the first Veronica."
"Veronica, when he was dating Meg, she was as close to the original you as he could find. I never told you but he destroyed his car after that horrible farce of a party my father threw for me where I told them that they either accepted us or they were out of my life. When Meg and Duncan ended, it was as if he never even knew her, but when she was in a coma…"
"He went to visit her all the time; I thought it was the guilt, but what if it wasn't. What if with Meg in the coma he had the perfect girlfriend." Veronica asked feeling sick to her stomach. "You know, after I saw you that night at the Grand, I told him what you said. He blew it off and said our love life was perfect, that it was more than perfect because it wasn't about lust. I was still dealing with my idea of normal so I just accepted that there was something wrong with me, that maybe I really was wrong for the way I felt that something was missing in bed."
Both were quiet as they sat there, dealing with this latest explosive news. Veronica suddenly looked at him and asked "Logan, do I want sex too much?"
"Define too much because I think we are perfectly matched." He said trying to lighten the mood, trying not to think about what a twisted bastard Duncan was. He had put Veronica through the emotional wringer because he was a coward; he had put her through hell with their physical relationship because he had made her feel inadequate in some way.
"You know, Lilly was right about one thing. I was so determined to have what I believed normal should be that I never noticed how abnormal things were." Veronica said as she sat there, her past flickering in front of her mind in vivid color. "I am going to talk to my mom's doctor. Get her well then tell her to leave town."
"Why would you want her to leave?" Logan asked knowing that part of Veronica wanted to make peace with her mom.
"My mom and Jake have this huge plan where they get her well, they get married and then they find a way to bring Duncan back. They seem to think that I want him, that what we had was some perfect relationship. Dad was telling me last night what she told him."
"They sound like they are trying to fix the things that went wrong in their past by using Duncan and yourself as chess pieces that they can maneuver around wherever they want them." Logan said.
"Before we spoke to each other, with complete honesty, it might have worked." Veronica admitted. "I was so screwed up and so convinced I was a replacement for Lilly in your life…"
"When in truth, Lilly was a replacement for you." Logan completed. "I can't help wondering if Duncan knew about how I felt for you, what Lilly did. I don't want to believe it is true, but the more I think on things, I can't help wondering."
Madison slammed her way into the Sinclair home and up to her bedroom. She had had a bad day and it was going to be an even worse week. School was boring and the only guy whose attention she had achieved was the son of a coked up washed up pop musician from the seventies.
In her room, she threw herself down on her bed, dropped her purse next to her and pulled out her cell phone. Calling Shelley's house, she asked to speak to her friend only to be told that Shelley was with her boyfriend and that she could leave a message.
Madison hung up before calling the Enblom house. "May I speak to Shelley Pomeroy?"
"Ms. Pomeroy and John aren't here. Might I suggest calling her house?" Madison called around and finally found out that there was a party at Cassie's place.
Dressing in something more appropriate for a party, she went downstairs and was on her way out the door when she saw her father coming out of his office. "Madison, do you have a moment?"
"I am on my way out." She said ducking out the front door and around to the garage. She had been shocked to find out from Don Lamb that her father had confronted the man about their past relationship and she didn't want to listen to him pontificate on her lack of morals.
Inside the house, Mark went back to where his wife was seated and said "She is gone. I am not waiting; she can learn the truth when she deigns to show up needing money or a new credit card since hers expire in February."
Moira agreed they had spent the last few days preparing Lauren for Mac not wanting to met her; the Mackenzies had spoken to their son about the new job and the truth about his sister. They were planning on telling Cindy tonight when she returned from her trip to San Diego.
Everything was arranged except for Madison who clearly was too busy to be bothered to spend time talking to her parents. Moira had had to remind both her husband and herself that Mac knew the truth and hadn't approached them.
"I think it is the guilt of her knowing. She clearly loves her adopted parents." Mark said his hands going to the file he had gotten from his private investigator when he had called him off trailing Mac.
Lifting the picture of his daughter playing a carnival game with Dick Casablancas, he chuckled as the photographer had caught the entire sequence that had ended with them carrying away a sock monkey. "I just want five minutes, Moira. To ask her if she is happy, if she is in love with this boy, if she…"
Hugging her husband, Moira said "You want a lot more than five minutes, Mark. We both do, but we need to face that Mac seems happy with the family she has."
"I just want to hug my daughter." He said his voice trailing off as he watched the tall blond in the picture his arms around Mac as he triumphantly held the prize in the air.
TBC