A/N : Yeah, this took kind of a more dramatic turn than I originally planned. Hopefully just because the plan has changed won't lead to this story sucking at all. I guess we'll find out...
(For disclaimer, etc. - see chapter 1)
Chapter 11 - A Hole In The Heart
"Veronica, sweetheart" Keith ran to his daughter and grabbed her in a tight hug.
He was the first person she'd called from the payphone when she'd arrived at the hospital, having driven Logan in her car behind the ambulance that carried his own father who was bleeding from a deep gunshot wound to the chest.
"Dad, I'm so glad you're here" she said, her face buried in his shoulder.
This whole ordeal had taken it's toll on her emotions, first finding out what the tapes she had found in Lilly's room really contained, and what that might mean, then chasing an angry Logan back to his house, and discovering Aaron bleeding to death.
"What exactly happened, do we know yet?" Keith asked his daughter, who forced back a few tears and nodded.
"I heard most of what Mrs Navarro told Sheriff Lamb" she admitted, "It was another crazy fan-turned-lover, like the one last Christmas" she explained, "It seems like Aaron had slept with her too, then dropped her. She couldn't handle the rejection, and I guess she knew from before that stabbing wasn't always enough to get someone's attention"
"So she shot him?" Keith asked, not feeling as shocked as perhaps one ought to have been on hearing a crazed fan shot their favourite actor who had used them for sex and consequently dropped them like a hot potato.
"Right through the heart" Veronica nodded, "At least, that's what they think she was aiming for. She was yelling a lot about him not using it anyway so she might as well stop it beating altogether" she explained, "By the time Logan and I got there, she was long gone. The staff said when she realised what she'd really done, she screamed and just ran. They were more concerned with saving Aaron's life than chasing her down"
"My God" Keith sighed, looking heavenward, wondering at the world as he often did, sometimes for good and sometimes for bad.
How people could be so unfeeling, he had no idea. Aaron Echolls seemed to think he could use people as he saw fit and never face consequences. It would seem some had severe punishments in mind for such treatment, punishments that no sane person could ever condone.
"I guess we were lucky we didn't arrive sooner" Veronica said shakily, "The way Logan was driving we're lucky we got there at all..."
"What do you mean?" her father checked, "Had Logan been drinking, because..."
"No, Dad" she explained quickly, before his anger levels hit overload, "He was just angry..." she started to explain, stopping when a nurse walked past and smiled at them. Veronica smiled back briefly as she pulled her father to one side of the hallway and checked no-one was around.
"What's going on, sweetheart?" Keith checked, knowing by now that this whole situation wasn't half as simple as it seemed, it couldn't be from the way his daughter was behaving.
"We found something out, Logan and me" she explained, "I found some video camera tapes in the air-vent in Lilly's room, when I found the ring that got Weevil out of jail"
"You said those were just film of you kids from before" he recalled and Veronica nodded her head.
"I thought that's all they were, but one had October 3rd written on the box, the day Lilly died" she told him, "We played it, and then we played another. Dad, Lilly was having an affair... with Aaron" she explained to her father who looked suitably stunned, "Those tapes were from the pool house at the Echolls' place. I'm pretty sure Lilly took them and ran, probably just managed to get them into the air-vent before Aaron caught up with her and..." she couldn't say the rest, as her eyes filled with tears and emotion took her voice.
Tonight had been a little too much for her, between realising it was likely her boyfriends father killed her best friend, and then finding that very man bleeding to death in his front hall, Veronica was emotionally exhausted and so torn about what she was feeling.
"Where are the tapes now?" Keith was eager to know, as he checked his watch and looked around the hall, glad to see there was nobody around.
"Still at home" his daughter said quietly, on the off chance anyone could hear, after all it wasn't the first time she'd been followed or bugged, Clarence Wiedman had seen to that, "Logan was so mad at Aaron, he left fast and I had to go after him. I didn't want him to do anything stupid"
"Seems he didn't get the chance anyway" Keith sighed, sparing a moment to feel sympathy for the boy who had now lost his old girlfriend, his mother, and most likely his father too. In moments, his mind was back on the job at hand, the Lilly Kane murder case which it seemed was about to be solved once and for all.
Keith told Veronica to stay with Logan as long as he needed her, and to call his cell should she need him at all. She promised she would, asking what would happen next. In all honesty, her father had to tell her he wasn't sure. He'd need to see the tapes, look at the other evidence, and then probably go and talk to Sheriff Lamb, however unappealing that idea was.
Kissing his daughter on the forehead, he finally left, and Veronica took a deep breath as she headed back down the hall to the room where Aaron lay, plugged into machines with wires and tubes coming out of him from every angle.
The bullet had missed his heart, so the doctors said, but just barely. They'd stemmed the bleeding somewhat and cleaned him up, immediately beginning a transfusion, and a bunch of other stuff that neither Veronica or Logan had followed too well. Honestly, the blonde couldn't care much whether this man lived or died right now. It was likely he was the murderer of her best friend, and she knew he regularly beat on his own son. He was what drove Lynn to suicide, and alienated his daughter just recently after a violent attack on her boyfriend. The world would mourn a great actor, one of Hollywood's finest, but those who knew him best, would they really be sad to see him shuffle off this mortal coil? Veronica couldn't think of a single person, not even the man's own son, who stood outside the room, peering through the glass at his father.
"Hey" she said quietly as she approached him.
He didn't acknowledge she was there, but she knew he must have heard her as she came to stand next to him, also looking through the glass. Without a word, Logan's hand moved across the wooden ledge and covered hers, gripping on tight to her fingers.
"It's one thing to be thankful for I guess" he said flatly, eyes still staring, voice without emotion, "She didn't have this"
"She?" Veronica echoed, unsure right now as to who he was speaking of, or what exactly he was saying at all.
"There wouldn't have been pain, right?" he said, still not looking at her even though he was clearly speaking to her, asking her questions too, "It would've been fast, like lightening. One second here, one second gone. No pain, no suffering, nothing" he said, voice cracking with emotion that Veronica was almost glad to hear. Though she didn't particularly want Logan to be in floods of tears, it scared her when he showed no feeling at all. She was so desperate not to lose him.
"She wouldn't have felt any pain" Veronica assured him, though honestly she still wasn't sure if he meant Lilly or his mother. Still, her words were good for both. It was unlikely either suffered in their passing, it would all have happened too fast.
"I wanted this" he said, his tone flat one again, "The rich boy always gets what he wants" he laughed suddenly, almost maniacally, and Veronica shuddered involuntarily, "I want it, it happens, and I wanted him to..." he couldn't say the word, he hated himself for ever thinking it, and his girlfriend knew it as he turned and practically fell into her arms, sobbing like a child.
"You didn't do this, Logan, you didn't" she assured him, "No matter what you thought or felt, I know you couldn't've done this, even if you'd had the chance" she told him firmly as she hugged him tight, and rubbed his back, trying to calm him down.
Veronica felt awful for her boyfriend as they stood their in the hall, clinging on to each other. He'd lost so much, as much as her and more in a different way. Though her mother was gone and unlikely to return any time soon if at all, Logan had the pain of knowing he really could never track down Lynn, she was gone to a place it was impossible to return from. Now it seemed likely Aaron would soon be lost too, and as much as Veronica could hate him for what he'd done to Logan and to Lilly, she couldn't quite find it in her to want him dead, to suffer certainly, but his death was not her decision to make, it shouldn't be any ordinary person's choice.
"Mr Echolls?" a small voice said to the side of them, and Logan shifted out of Veronica's arms, sniffing and wiping his face dry with the back of his hand, "You can go in and talk to your father, if you want to" she smiled kindly.
Obviously she was unaware of the situation which had led to Logan finding Aaron as he had, and of the uneasy relationship they'd shared before.
Holding tight to Veronica's hand, Logan allowed himself to be led into the room where his father lay, still unconscious as yet, looking deathly pale. The blonde had to force back the tears in her eyes and the bile that rose in her throat. This was the man that hurt two of her friends, and probably even murdered one of them. He was some kind of animal, a monster maybe, and though she could not hope for his end, she certainly wished pain upon him, no matter how bad a person that made her.
"He looks smaller" Logan said softly.
Veronica didn't answer him, in all honesty she didn't know what to say for the best.
"Do you want to stay or...?" she said at length when he neither sat down or offered to leave the room, just stood their staring at the father he wasn't sure how to care about anymore.
Her half-asked question was left unanswered as the beeping of the machines all around fluttered strangely and Aaron's eyes flickered open. Veronica swallowed hard, not knowing how to really deal with this. Her grip on Logan's hand tightened and she was sure one or the other of them would have no blood supply left in their fingers soon, but they would barely notice she was sure.
"Hey, look, it's Daddy!" Logan said with fake joy and a whole barrel load of sarcasm.
Aaron didn't answer, Veronica doubted he was able, between the blood-loss and the drugs, it was probably a miracle he was awake in any sense at all.
"So, another crazy fan, huh?" Logan said conversationally, scaring his girlfriend just a little bit, since she knew these faked overly pleasant moments were often followed by violence. She still recalled all too clearly their happy little conversation as he smashed up her car several months ago now.
"Y'know Dad you really have to stop sleeping with these random women and then dumping them, it's becoming dangerous" he told his father who looked up at him without a sound, "Hey, I have an idea" Logan snapped his fingers, the painted smile crumbling at last as he got to the point of what he was saying, "Why don't we just kill them, like you killed Lilly?" he asked, the pain he felt evident on his face and in his voice as he asked the question he'd been holding in for hours.
Something passed across Aaron's face, a glimpse of an expression, more than one perhaps. Veronica was sure she saw shock, maybe even guilt, but he was unable to speak, deny the crime, or defend his actions.
"We know what you did" Logan was telling him, getting a little too much in his face considering the circumstances, "You killed her! My girlfriend! You violated her, and then you killed her!" he raged, and Veronica knew this wasn't doing anybody any good.
Aaron looked genuinely scared, for maybe the first time in his life, and it frightened Veronica to see her boyfriend lose it like this.
"Logan, no, please" she pulled him away, and thankfully he let himself be removed from the room, just as an alarm went crazy and the machine that monitored Aaron's heart rate went into a flatline, the long droning beep almost deafening as Veronica dragged Logan away, and several medical staff rushed into the room in their place.
They waited down the hall, they didn't speak, they barely moved, just held each other as they had before, both in tears. She'd agreed with his yelling at Aaron, she'd have liked a turn herself, but she'd rather him not have been in this state. It gave her the weirdest mixture of feelings. A strange sort of pity, as well as the obvious anger, and pain. She wanted justice, but she didn't want this.
"Mr Echolls..." a doctor approached them, looking solemn, and the young people already knew what he'd come to say before he ever uttered the words, "I'm afraid we lost your father a moment ago..." he said as Logan collapsed into tears, both sad and angry. Veronica held him, feeling so awful for him. He'd already been through so much, this was a leap too far.
"I'm here, Logan, I'm here for you" she promised him, wanting desperately for him to know he wasn't completely alone. She knew he must feel that way right now, but he had to understand how she felt, "I'm here" she repeated, "And I love you" she assured him, the words taking the both of them somewhat by surprise. He pulled out of her arms to look at her properly, shock evident in his red-rimmed, watering eyes.
Logan was about to speak when he realised Veronica's eyes had left his own and were staring past him somewhere. He was frowning as he turned around and got the shock of his life when he saw who was there.
"Logan..." she said softly as she opened her arms to him.
"Mom?" he replied, hardly able to believe his eyes, and Veronica couldn't take it in either.
Lynn Echolls, it seemed, was alive.
To Be Continued...