Of the three of them, Backup was the first to detect something out there in the murk. He leapt up and, his snout extended out into the darkness, began barking.

"Do you think he smells something?" Duncan asked.

"The breeze is blowing toward us from out on the ocean, so it's certainly possible." Bending down to rub behind Backup's ears, Veronica asked him "what is it boy? Do you smell Logan?"

The dog's only answer was to keep barking out into the night, until, out of the blackness, a white silhouette in the shape of a Sundancer 410 took form.

"I think that's him," Duncan proclaimed.

"Why doesn't he have any lights on?" asked his sister, gazing out at the darkened vessel.

"We'll know soon enough."

As they approached, the lights of the Vulpecula illuminated Logan's smaller craft. Logan was standing at the prow of the yacht, balanced precariously over the water. His face, along with the front of his shirt, was covered in blood that still flowed from his nose and mouth. Bruises were purpling around his eyes and all along his cheeks. In his arms, he held a large picnic cooler, which, by the looks of how he strained to lift it, was filled with something heavy, something that would sink quickly beneath the waves. He had tied himself to the handle of the cooler with a length of rope.

"Logan!" Veronica cried.

"Don't do it!" Duncan yelled as he pulled alongside Logan's boat, albeit about twenty feet off his starboard.

"Duncan, Veronica, fancy meeting you two out on the water this time of night," Logan shouted back with a smile.

"Please put the cooler down," Veronica cried.

"I will in a minute, don't worry," he answered good-naturedly.

"You know what she meant, man."

"Duncan, Veronica, seriously, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to do it."

"What are you talking about?" Veronica asked.

"What can I say? She just made me so jealous, and then when I came back to Neptune that day, and I went to confront her, she just laughed at me."

"Logan, stop it!" Veronica cried.

"I didn't even mean to do it, I just wanted her to love me. But when I saw what I did, I got Dick and Beaver to lie and say I was in TJ with them all day."

"Logan, why are you doing this?" Duncan yelled.

"I just want to come clean after all this time. Look, I'm glad the two of you are back together. That's the way it's supposed to be, right?"

"Logan, Duncan and I are not back together! We'll never get back together!"

"That's too bad. Nothing's been like the way it's supposed to be for a long time. She was supposed to love me, you know."

"Logan, stop it! We know you didn't do it!" Veronica replied.

"You're just saying that so I won't do this," he answered, hefting the cooler in his arms.

"Logan, we caught the real killer."

"Yeah, who?"

"We'll tell you, but first, step away from the edge and put the cooler down."

"That's what I thought."

"Logan, I went looking for your letter!" Veronica cried.

He turned to face her then, his mouth curling open in a look of wonder. He saw her face for the first time. "What happened to you?"

"I told you, we found the real killer."

"Did he do that to you?"

"Yes, but—Logan, please don't do it."

He laid the cooler down, well away from the edge, but did not untie himself from it. "Why did you go looking for it? The letter, I mean."

"I, I had to know if, if—if I could have been so wrong."

"Wrong about what?"

"About you, about us!"

"Veronica, I'm sorry!" he was frantically untying himself from the cooler now, practically tripping over the rope as he rushed over to the edge, as if he could jump across the twenty feet of open ocean into her arms. "I'm sorry I lied, I'm sorry for, well, for just about everything up until now, but I love you!"

"Logan!" she was blubbering openly now. "I love you too. Please, just come back to the marina with us, it's going to be okay."

The three of them sat at the edge of one of the docks at the Albacore Club. They had taken their shoes and socks off and rolled their pant-legs up, and were now dangling their feet into the water. Veronica sat between Logan and her brother. Backup was stretched out across their laps, a contented rumbling sounding from somewhere in his chest as the three of them absentmindedly petted him.

"So, do you want to tell me what happened?"

"Sure. Uh, Veronica, why don't you start?"

"Okay," she began quietly. "After you left me on the beach, I was trying to think of where Lilly might have put the letter you left her, and it occurred to me she might have put it in the air-conditioning vent in her room."

"Of course, that's where she would have hidden it. I can't believe I didn't think of it."

Veronica paused for a moment before continuing. "So I disguised myself as a catering waitress," she said, gesturing at her outfit, "and snuck into the party the Kanes were throwing for the governor. Duncan caught me in Lilly's room, unscrewing the vent panel."

"She had this wig on, I didn't even recognize her."

"So the two of you found the letter in the vent, go on."

"No, we di—"

"What? But you said—"

"Let me finish. We didn't find the letter, but we found something else."

"What?"

"Tapes. Video tapes."

"Tapes of what?"

"Logan, the night I ran out on you after the surprise party, it wasn't because I needed to go do whatever."

"What was it? What's that got to do with—"

"I left because I found hidden cameras in the bedroom."

"What? Hidden cameras? Veronica, they weren't mine, I swear."

"I know that now. At the time, I don't know, I guess I just freaked out. I thought maybe you were just setting me up for a big joke all along."

"No, I, I wasn't, I swear."

"I know. The tapes we found, well, the first tape we looked at, it was from October 3rd, the day Lilly died. Lilly was in your poolhouse, and she found the cameras, almost the same way I did."

"I don't understand though. Why was she over at my house that day?"

"Logan…."

"What was she doing in my poolhouse, you know, without me?"

"It's just—are you sure you want to know?"

"What? What's so horrible?"

"She was meeting your father there."

"My father? Oh my God."

"They were having an affair. That was what was on the earlier two tapes, but Lilly found the cameras, and she took the tapes and hid them in her vent, but your father went after her. When she wouldn't tell him where the tapes were hidden, he killed her."

Logan was silent for several long moments before he spoke. "How could she? How could she have hated me that much? I mean, I knew she didn't love me, not the same way I loved her, but, but, I thought she at least liked me, or, or cared about me at least a little."

"Logan, we were both shocked too," Duncan said. "I, I mean, I was in the womb with her, so I thought I knew her as well as anyone could, but I can't, I don't know why she'd do a thing like that, I really don't."

"Wait, what happened next? Veronica, did my father do this to you?" he asked, gesturing at her injuries.

"Yes. I left the Kanes' to take the tapes to my father. Duncan was going to watch to make sure your dad didn't leave the party, but, well, I guess he had figured out about the vent too, and he must have overheard us, and he beat me to my car, and hid in the backseat. After I had been driving for a few minutes, Duncan called me to tell me he couldn't find him anywhere at the party. As soon as I hung up, he sprung up behind me. I crashed my car to get away from him."

"You crashed your car?"

"I rammed it into a telephone pole. We were both knocked out, but I had my seatbelt on, so I woke up first. I grabbed the tapes and ran to a nearby house. I hid the tapes and tried to get the guy who lived there to let me in, but your father woke up and got to him first, and knocked him out. Then he knocked me out again," at this, she pointed to the bruise forming below her eye, "and locked me in this old fridge the guy had out on his porch. When I woke up, he tried to get me to tell him where I'd hidden the tapes, and he started pouring gasoline on the fridge."

"I can't believe this. I knew he was a bastard, but—"

Veronica winced at that. "Please just let me finish."

"Of course, I didn't mean to—I'm sorry."

"Anyway, I guess Duncan must have left the party to come after me right after we hung up, so maybe he should tell the rest."

"There's not much to tell. I drove after her and when I found her car wrecked, I grabbed her stun-gun from where it had fallen below the dash, and I ran up to the house. I snuck up behind your dad and hit him with the stun-gun a couple of times and then tied him up. Then I got Veronica out of the fridge and we called the cops. Then we went looking for you."

"Thank God. I feel so useless. I should have been there with you, instead of…."

"It's not your fault," Veronica answered. "You couldn't have known."

"I'm just glad you're alright. Wait, but, are the two of you back together? I mean, he saved you and everything. I mean, maybe the two of you really do belong together, you know?"

"Trust me," Duncan answered, "we don't."

"But, why not? I know you still love her Duncan."

"It's—"

"Complicated," finished Duncan.

"I can handle it. I want to understand."

"I don't know, it's just—"

"What? What could possibly be more horrible than what you've already told me?"

To be continued….