(Lucky Penny - JD McPherson)
The last person Veronica Mars expected to see amongst the hundreds of officers n ceremonial uniforms was Madison Sinclair, seated next to friends and family members of Sheriff Donald Lamb. From the presence of Neptune's upper echelon's and California Halls of Justice Commissioners, you could be fooled into thinking they were mourning at this public spectacle, that's how it looked in the pictures and to the untrained eye.
They weren't the largest police force, but the untimely death of one of their own, made most of his fellow officers pause. Madison threw her a dirty look towards her and pulled on a pair of large glasses.
"Badge bunny," Veronica grumbled under her breath.
She wasn't fooled by the sombre suits, they had everything but fluffy angels dressed up for political gain. Most of these people weren't here to pay their respects. Very few wore their genuine grief like actual fabric.
Those like Judge Bianchin?
They just wanted to say good riddance to sleazy small town scourge that demanded portion of their wealth and or he would expose their misdeeds lies, and nasty secrets. It might have been amusing if it hadn't interfered with the murder investigation of her best friend.
This wasn't Police Academy it was a failure of some of the most vulnerable people in their town.
Neptune was riddled with corruption. The ugliness was always there, bumps in the road like this, just brought it all to the forefront.
The four separate break-ins of Sheriff Lambs residence were proof enough of that. If it wasn't journalists snooping around for a juicy story, it was probably spearheaded by someone like Clarence Weidman for some big business the deceased Sheriff had been shaking down.
Sometimes evidence was more profitable than charging someone. Crime rates in Neptune were low because arrest reports rarely got filed, and if a suspect was more useful as leverage… then someone else took the fall.
More than a half of these people had an axe to grind. The criminal element didn't even bother keeping a low profile.
Liam Fitzpatrick, his brothers and a group of unfamiliar Hispanic men in opposite corners of the graveyard flaunted their presence as a show of strength, thumbing their nose to the new Sheriff in town.
A new cartel? No pressure…
Donald Lamb had been a disgrace to the badge, yet he was a lawman all the same.
A dead one.
The mood among the deputies was similar to the one felt by each law professional there. They'd had a complicated relationship, he'd let her down when she was alone and vulnerable but there were times when she saw glimmers of the reasons he had chosen to serve.
Being killed on the job was a choice blue lives made every time they put on the uniform. Getting up for work every day, kissing their loved ones, knowing that there was a risk they might not be coming home.
Snooping around could be a rush, but even doing the job right, with your head on straight didn't always guarantee a successful outcome.
More than a half of all marriages didn't survive.
Veronica had seen her parents argue about it often, perhaps the constant cops wife stress and long hours her dad spent on cases were why her mother had started drinking. She wasn't charitable enough to admit that perhaps there had been more to her mother's decision to disappear into a bottle, and then altogether with fifty grand than that.
"This won't be the only body to drop," Malachi Fitzpatrick snorted, he was the black sheep of the brothers, as big as he talked. Veronica knew he was the most book smart of the family, as long as the family continued to profit, she knew he had a side hustle dealing on campus.
She just hadn't proven it yet.
Looking at the pearl covered coffin, she made a silent promise to make it a priority, as she stood beside her dad in the stoic silence.
Tim Foyle was being handed off to County, and already another body had been found in a dumpster, no doubt courtesy of their new tattooed friends, but there was battle cry to muster the troops.
The townsfolk weren't shaking in terror unless it was in an affluent neighbourhood.
She had questioned her father's motivation for attending the funeral of a man who'd leaked evidence and ruined his career, but right now. It didn't matter. Veronica could feel the power vacuum, and Neptune itself felt as if it were being circled by starving sharks.
She wished Logan was here, watching her father navigate the red tape after his dismissing several deputies with the new Union chief and Mayor was nauseating, in her experience, all that politics and posturing, got in the way of solving cases.
"I've done this too many times," Keith said quietly, looking along the grim ranks.
Steve Botando had struck Donald Lamb several times in the head, and he'd died before arriving at the hospital. It was hard not to grieve the passing of a man, when you felt his life slipping out under your hands when you tried your best to hold him onto life with nothing but your will and your voice.
He issued orders to hit the streets and gather information while he looked up information on a car reported at the scene.
The departments motto 'Fidelius Ad Mortem' hung low as he returned to his office.
Veronica watched her dad settle back into his chair.
Faithful until death.
And only the dead got to rest.
Logan replied to her text when she returned from walking Backup. Dick was awake and Mac was no longer at the hospital. She had been through too much, and Veronica felt sick pondering the alternate outcomes.
She'd screwed up. She had seen her dad carry weight like this.
The guilt.
Tim had been right under her nose, and it was only chance that he wasn't in the wind.
Chance, and Dick Casablancas.
The guy might make every day of her life feel like a musical interlude of Brooklyn Nine Nine but he'd been there when she wasn't. If not for him, Weevil wouldn't have been the only friend she buried this week, and if Tim hadn't been such a crappy shot, Logan would have.
A hard lump formed in her throat as she took the elevator to Logan's floor.
This town? This job? Even losing someone as detestable as Sheriff Lamb?
It wrecked her.
Now Veronica was home, curling into Logan's waiting arms, she finally let the tears out.
Some may think there is a play on the thin line between love and hate.. but there was no grey between life and death.
