At last! The conversation!

Disclaimer: Nope, still 'tain't mine. Unfortunately.

X X X X X

"Before we actually try to settle our issues," I said. "I have an odd favor to ask you may not like."

"Sounds promising," Logan said.

"Have you actually burned the poolhouse or the tapes?" He said no. "Don't. Not until I get a chance to look through them again."

"Why?"

"When I went through the drawers, I noticed that a couple of them were missing. Something about that bothered me."

Logan said, "Someone else probably had Vanessa's brilliant idea: Take them and sell them."

I shook my head no. "Then why haven't we seen them already? Just don't burn them. Please."

"What the hell," Logan said. "They'll make as pretty a bonfire in a week as they will tonight."

"Thanks." Then a silence fell over the Mars Investigations lobby then. "So," I said, "This isn't awkward . . ."

"This may have been a dumb idea," Logan said. "Who says we need to explore everything, anyway? Let's just let things stay how they are."

"How are they?"

"Get this, Veronica," Logan said. "I'm not a 'heart-to-heart' guy. Daddy Dearest only ever wanted to know what I was feeling when it agreed with what he thought I should be feeling. And Mom – well, she tried."

And failed, were the obvious next words, but Logan didn't say them. I said, "Me neither, really. Except with my Dad." The last good guy on the planet. "So, how are they?" I repeated. Logan wasn't getting out of this unless he bolted.

Of course, knowing Logan . .

But wait. That was the point. I didn't know Logan. Not anymore.

"Complicated." Well, duh.

"Do you think you're getting away with that one-word answer, Echolls?"

"If I said yes, would you let me?" I just glared. "Didn't think so. Look. There's an elephant in the room. Whatever we might say, it all comes back to that."

"Lilly."

"Lilly."

I knew the answer, but I had to ask the question. "So why did you start hating me after that? It can't have been just because my Dad was going after the Kanes."

"Didn't help. And remember, I never hated you."

"Then you're a better actor than your father ever was, because you? Pretty good with the insults and nasty shots. Now, why?"

"Because I blamed you for Lilly being dead."

I knew this, but I played along. "Huh?"

"Here's the scenario, Mars. I didn't bring my slide projector so just try to follow along." I nodded. "You saw me kissing Yolanda Hamilton at that party. You told Lilly. Lilly dumped me. So I wasn't around when the bastard killed her. If I'd been there –"

"If you'd been there, maybe you would be dead too," I said.

"Good to see you're up on the list of SVU clichés. Nice touch." He took a breath. "I know that. There have been times over the last year and a half that I would have preferred it that way."

"So you blame me for Lilly being dead."

"Not just you. I blame myself for having been weak, and Lilly for being such a bitch about it. But that's the way it was with Lilly Kane. She could go out, sleep around, wink at me and then expect everything to be forgiven."

I said, "And you forgave her."

"We all did. It was part of the Lilly Kane magic."

"So," I said after another short period of silence, "What do you want from me? Because I don't think I owe you an apology."

"You don't. You owe Lilly the apology."

That was a low blow. "Which is why I'm trying to find out who killed her!" I said a bit angrily

Logan said, "Calm down, Veronica. You asked." I took a deep breath. He was right. And he wasn't, by and large, being that snarky Logan we all know and loathe. "What I'd like from you," he said, "Is an acknowledgement."

"You want me," I began, "to acknowledge that me telling Lilly about your makeout session with Yolanda is what led to her being dead." I shook my head." I can't do that, Logan. Not if you get up and walk out. Not if we go back to being Benson and Kraus. Not even if you threaten to leap off the Coronado Bridge if I don't. Because I'm not responsible." I stood up and leaned forward, "And you're not, either. And neither is Lilly."

"If you hadn't told Lilly –"

"Maybe she would have broken up with you because she didn't like the cologne you were wearing. Or because you forgot to buy her white gold jewelry instead of the regular stuff. Or maybe you wouldn't have broken up at all. I love Lilly, Logan. She was my best friend. But capricious? The girl's middle name. What led to her being dead is whoever smashed her skull in. I didn't do it. You didn't do it. And as suicides go, it's one of the more impossible ones, right up there with strangling yourself. "

"You're an easier target."

"Don't I know it."

After another brief silence, "I'm glad you believe I didn't do it."

"One, I know you. Attacking someone going after your mom or someone else you care about? Your thing. Attacking a woman, even one who treated you like Lilly? Not so much. That crowbar you had on the beach in September was used on my car, not my skull. And two, my alibi's not as good as yours, and I was with the Sheriff of Neptune. You? Kind of hard to make it back from Mexico that fast unless you're a member of Starfleet or your real name's Clark Kent."

"Since this is designated air-clearing time," Logan said, "There's something else I need to say."

Suspiciously, I asked, "What?"

"I don't have an alibi."

"Sure you do. Dick and Beaver said you were in Mexico until that afternoon –" Logan was shaking his head.

"I asked them to. I came back because I knew Lilly was seeing someone and it was driving me crazy. I didn't know if I was going to scream at her for being such a bitch or beg her to take me back. And then I saw you guys at the pep squad car wash. I know you didn't see me. I was being all stealthy."

The last time I saw Lilly alive. "And then?" I demanded.

"And this feeling came over me. I don't know how to describe it; I just knew it was over. So I wrote her a note and left her a shot glass I bought for her in Ensenada, and then I got out of there."

"So you don't have an alibi."

"I don't. But I swear to God, Veronica, I would never have touched her –"

"I believe you." I had no idea why, but I was sure he hadn't killed Lilly. He had motive, he had opportunity, the means were easily available, but I didn't think he had. It wasn't in his character. And given that Logan Echolls had set up homeless men to attack each other, trashed my car and my reputation, that was going against my reason. Instinct, again. It didn't fail me with Mr. Rooks. There was just something about Logan's protectiveness that aroused the same instinct.

That stuff about the shot glass and the note I'd have to check without getting Dad suspicious. Which was going to be hard to do, seeing as how he'd booby-trapped his safe the last time I tried to go through it. But I'd hash that out later.

A look of relief washed across Logan's face. "I don't know why. I'd suspect me."

"Which is why I'm not going to tell anyone else about this," I said. "It makes you so obvious a suspect even Lamb couldn't help notice. Thank god, Abel Koontz is still in jail so the only ones looking are my dad and me." And usually only me.

"You're sure he didn't do it."

"Yes." I explained why, up to and including the fact that he was dying that I'd snaked out of his medical records. Why I told Logan, I have no idea. I hadn't even told Dad. But really, what was I going to say? "Hi dad. I found out Abel Koontz is dying by reading his sealed medical records. Can we have lasagna tonight?"

"Good work, Machiavelli," Logan said, clearly believing me.

"You know, as cutesy nicknames go? That one's not so hot."

"Sorry, Mars. You're stuck with it." We'd moved back away from the serious stuff into the realm of banter. "So, have we redefined our relationship?"

"You said we'd never be what we once were, Logan."

"We won't. But maybe we can be something different. You're hardly the Veronica Mars you used to be." He half-grinned. "And the change was long overdue."

Okay, there was one more question I had to ask. "Back in your house the other day, when you were escorting me through the house, I said "Take me, take me," and you said, 'Don't tempt me.' What did you mean by that?"

"I did not say that," he said, flushing slightly. Flushing? Logan Echolls wouldn't blush if he were caught naked in the girl's locker room. What would make him –

Oh my God.

"You meant it," I said. "You meant 'don't tempt me because you were actually tempted."

"Okay!" he shouted. "I'm attracted, okay? Does that make you happy?"

"Ecstatic." Logan was interested in me. "I can now torture you until the end of time." I grinned evilly.

"Or," he said, "I could get you attracted to me as well."

"Yeah, right."

He smirked. "Don't challenge me, Mars."

I smiled and said in my best flirtatious voice, "But you like it when I challenge you."

"Game on, then." He said, being deliberately overdramatic, "I will have you, Veronica Mars!"

I laughed. "But until then, friends?"

"What the hell." We shook hands and he left.

Well, there were worse ways the evening could have ended. Logan Echolls had a crush on me.

There was no way in hell he was going to succeed, but it was going to be fun watching him try.

In the meantime, I needed to find out about the note and shot glass . . .