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Disclaimer: Veronica Mars was created by Rob Thomas. While my first name is Rob, my last name, alas, is not Thomas.
X X X X X
I felt a sharp pain in my left shoulder and then I somehow fell to the porch.
I could hear people screaming and panicking.
Dad was yelling, "Get down!" to everyone. Why 'get down?' Just because I had this pain in my shoulder. Logan and Dad picked me up and carried me into the house -- I think I heard somewhere you're not supposed to move someone who's been hurt so why were they moving me?
Lynn was already there and they put me down on her couch. I tried to get up and Dad said, "No, sweetie. Get down."
"I've already called 911," Lynn said.
"Did anyone see anything?" Dad said.
Everyone said no.
"What happened?" I asked.
"Somebody shot you, sweetie."
Somebody shot me?
Trina, out of breath, came rushing up from somewhere in the depths of the house. "Anything I can do?"
"Stay out of the way," Logan said.
"Go outside and see if you can find a doctor," Dad said. Trina did.
He then came over and ripped open my blouse, and started pressing on my shoulder. "Ow!" I said.
"Sorry, sweetie. I'm trying to keep the wound from bleeding."
"Did it go through?" Logan asked.
"No."
"No doctors," Trina said. "But --"
"Mr. Mars," a voice came, "I have paramedic training."
"Take over, then," Dad said.
Then I saw Clarence Weidman leaning over me. "You're in good hands, Miss Mars."
That's the last thing I remember for a while.
X X X X X
When I woke up, my left shoulder felt sore and I had no idea where I was.
Then I remembered. Someone had shot me!
"Daddy?"
"I'm here, sweetheart."
I turned to my left and saw Dad sitting in a chair. "Who did this?"
He closed his eyes and chuckled. "Leave it to you. Almost everyone else would be asking what happened, how am I, things like that. Not you. You jump right to the big question."
"And the answer is?"
"They don't know."
"What do they know?"
"You were shot with a .22 caliber rifle. It hit you in the left shoulder and the bullet stayed there. No serious bone damage. You lost some blood and you'll have some muscle weakness in that area for a while."
"So no heavy lifting?"
"And also no driving."
"What else?"
"They found the rifle -- it was back towards the far edge of the Echolls estate. From where we were standing, the left edge. A couple of hundred feet away." He laughed again, but this time the laugh was bitter. "You know who found the rifle? Eli Navarro. He heard the shot and guessed where it was from, but by the time he forced his way through the crowd the shooter was long gone."
"He didn't touch it, did he?"
"He says not."
"Tell me that wasn't Clarence Weidman I saw standing over me right before I passed out."
"Okay, that wasn't Clarence Weidman you saw standing over you right before you passed out."
"You're a lousy liar."
"I know."
He stood up. "How are you feeling?"
"Not as bad as I would have thought."
"That's the pain medication talking."
"Gee, give me something to look forward to when it wears off." I yawned. "What time is it?"
"It's about 2 in the morning. Same night. I'm going to go tell the doctor and everyone else you're awake."
"Everyone?"
"Logan, Lynn, Mac, Wallace, Duncan. Eli and Meg were both here but they had to leave. I think Eli has some idea he's going to find who shot you. And Meg's parents made her leave at 10."
"If it's a choice between Weevil and Lamb," I said, yawning again, "I'll bet on Weevil."
He came over and very gently hugged me, then kissed my cheek. "I'm so glad you're okay, sweetie. Now try to get some sleep."
"I can do that," I said, and promptly did.
X X X X X
The next time I woke up, my shoulder hurt like hell, it was the next morning and Dad wasn't there.
A nurse was leaning over me – pretty, Hispanic, maybe 35. "How are you feeling?" she asked. Her name badge read, "Cora."
"Like I was in a bar fight with an angry pro wrestler," I said.
"The pain medicine must be wearing off," Cora said, looking at my chart. "It's not too long before you get another dose."
"That's good. I think I could use it."
"The doctor wants to talk to you and there's someone out in the waiting area who's been waiting for you to wake up," she said.
"Do you have any idea when I'm going to get out of here?"
She laughed. "They always ask that, and I always have to give the same answer."
"'As soon as you give me enough bribe money?'"
This time Cora's laugh was even longer. "No. 'It's up to the doctor.'"
"Could I bribe her?"
She shrugged. "Probably not. She's pretty dedicated."
"Damn. Just my luck to run into an honest doctor."
Another laugh. "I'll go get your friend and Dr. London."
Dad had left the book I'd been reading on the table to my right. I picked it up and had gotten through maybe a page when I heard a knock on the door.
I looked up and smiled. "Logan."
He nodded, "Veronica." Then he walked swiftly across the room and kissed me. "Thank God you're okay."
Then he kissed me again. The second kiss was substantially deeper. When he pulled away I murmured, "I guess this means I'm forgiven?"
He chuckled in that way that only he could, amused and sexy at the same time. "You could say that."
"Is anybody else here?"
"Everyone else is at school," he said. "Except for my Mom. She's down at the Sheriff's. Somehow she's gotten herself dragged into two cases now."
"I assume she turned over the tapes?"
"Sometime during the night," he said.
"Did you or she see anything?"
He frowned. "You're not going after this person. Much as I hate to say this, leave this to Lamb." He laughed. "That way if someone else gets shot, it's going to be him."
"Not disliking that aspect," I said. "I have no plans to go chasing after an armed lunatic," I lied. "I'd just like to know for my own curiosity."
"All I did was hear the shot, pick you up and run. My dear mother didn't see anything either."
"Trina?"
"Trina was sulking in the house, by her own admission. She heard the shot but didn't see anything."
"400 people in your front yard and not a single one notices the guy with the rifle."
"At the time everyone was watching my mother," he said. "Quite a compelling speaker when she wants to be, that one. I'm sure she had everyone convinced that my father had killed Lilly."
"Did that even make the papers?"
"Oh yes. Sidebar story, but yes. This is national news. 'Girl Shot at Echolls Press Conference.' 'Widow Accuses Aaron Echolls of Murder.' There are reporters camped outside the hospital, the estate, and the sheriff's office. And I'm talking people you've heard of. Trina's been downplaying everything like only Trina can do, but so far no one else except your doctor and Don Lamb have been talking." He grimaced. "That's probably what's taking the bitch so long – she's out there sucking up to Robin Roberts, or something."
Oh, great. Just what I needed. More harassment from the press.
"Actually, the bitch is right behind you." I looked around Logan and saw a tall gray-haired woman who looked to be somewhere in her 50s.
"Dr. London, right?" I asked.
"Right," she said, not smiling. "The bitch was actually answering as many questions as she could to stop people from trying to sneak in here, which would have both disturbed Miss Mars and the operations of my hospital. But the bitch is selfish like that."
I liked this woman.
"Um –"
"Logan, remove the foot from your mouth, apologize to the lady, and let her do her job."
He muttered, "Sorry." Then he gave me another quick kiss. "I'll be right outside."
Dr. London came over to my bedside. "He was just sticking up for me, you know."
Now she smiled. "I know. It's good to have people like that around after an incident like this. But he still needed to be told he was wrong about me." Then her voice turned clinical. "And how's your shoulder feeling?"
"Like an elephant stepped on it," I said.
"That's about par for the course, I'm afraid," Dr. London said. "All things considered you were extremely lucky that the bullet hit you where it did."
"Oh yes," I said. "I feel tremendously lucky that somebody tried to kill me."
"They failed," Dr. London said. "Not only that, if you had to pick a spot for a bullet to hit you you couldn't have picked a much better one. It missed your vital organs – an inch down and to the right and it would have gone through your esophagus. It nicked your collarbone and one of your ribs, but that should heal up fairly quickly. The only real damage it did was to your skin and muscle tissue." She looked at me. "Try raising your left arm. Stop when the pain becomes intolerable."
I did so and stopped when it was only a few inches off the bed. I just couldn't lift it any further.
"Hold on a second." She left the room and came back with Cora. "We're going to get you in a sitting position now. If you do this yourself, you have to remember not to lean on your left arm. Also, what side do you normally sleep on?"
"My left."
"You're going to have to train yourself to sleep on your right, your back, or your stomach for a while. Now, come on, let's sit you up."
I didn't really need the help, but I let them move me to where I was sitting on the edge of the bed.
"Now, extend your left arm and try raising it again," Dr. London said.
I couldn't get it to the level of my shoulder. Even moving it at all was excruciating,
"Can I have some of that pain medication again?" I said.
"As soon as we're done," she said. "I want you to understand the extent of your injury. When you're on the pain medication things might feel better and I don't want you pressing the arm to do too much before you're ready."
"I understand," I said. "Really. I do." After a second, "So how long will it before I get out of here?"
"A couple of more days," she said. "After we make sure there's no lingering damage."
A couple of days?
X X X X X
Dr. London hadn't been lying. It was Friday morning before they were ready to release me.
Everyone had come by in the interim. Of Logan and Dad, one of the two was always there. Then Lynn, Mac, Wallace, Weevil, Meg, Duncan, and even Cliff, Clemons, Ms. Stafford, and to my astonishment, Clarence Weidman.
The words practically stuck in my throat as I said them, but I managed to thank him for what he'd done.
He nodded and said, "You're welcome, Miss Mars. I wish I would have seen who did it."
"How do I know it wasn't you?" I asked half-seriously.
"Two reasons," he said. "Because I have no reason to harm you – and because, if I had, I wouldn't have missed."
Which was very likely true, unless he wanted to teach me a lesson somehow.
But what lesson? "Keep faith with me and I'll shoot you in the shoulder?"
No. Not saying it couldn't have been him, but he was on my back burner list of suspects.
Dad also told me that the rifle they'd found had been wiped clean of fingerprints. Not that I was expecting anything else.
On that Friday morning, I asked Logan about the press. Dad was getting last-minute instructions from Dr. London on the care and feeding of wounded Veronicas.
"Still out there," he said. "Mother's been continuing her assault against Daddy Dearest to anyone who'll listen – and a lot of people are listening. She's been on Larry King, Fox News, and the Today Show. She's also promised a $50,000 reward to anyone who helps the police find out who shot you. So far our beloved Sheriff's Department hasn't come up with a viable suspect."
"See, that's where you're wrong," a voice came from being him.
Logan whirled and confronted Don Lamb. "Am I going to have to get eyes installed in the back of my head?"
"What do you mean, he's wrong?" I asked.
"We just arrested someone this morning and I thought you'd want to know," he said. "And I don't think this time your Dad'll have someone calling press conferences to show us what fools we are."
"Who did you arrest?" Logan asked tightly.
"Dick Casablancas," Lamb said. "The younger one."
That couldn't have been right. I'm not saying Dick didn't want to do me harm –
But right when I'd leaned over to whisper to Logan, I'd been looking directly at Dick Casablancas.
He'd shot me a look of pure hatred.
He had not been carrying a gun.