Okay. First, apologies for the delay, and also for the roughness and probable confusingness of this whole thing. It's case stuff, and while it all makes sense in my head, it also stretches the limits of reality and I never know what to write down and what will make it seem like I'm disrespecting you as readers...anyway, PM me if you want the whole thing explained.
However, this is longer than the average chapter has been, so even if it's really confusing, at least there's more of it!
Special shout out to AliLamba, who I has been my surprise cheerleader for a few chapters now, and also recced me on the vmficrecs tumblr. I'm wearing my Audrey Hepburn sunglasses in her honor because she makes me feel like a movie star.
Anyway, here we go.
"I guess bad guys don't respect the power of a good naming surprise," Veronica says, shaking her head. "This is like Darth Vader all over again."
"Like you knew enough Dutch to figure that out. Still, I like that the nerd grows strong in you." Mac grins, reaching into the sleeve of jelly beans and popping one into her mouth. "But I don't think the Castle was really looking to surprise you, just to find a name for their bribe your local sheriff fund."
The two of them are at the front desk, Mac in the primary position by her computer, Veronica twirling just a little in her chair beside her. "But this is stupid kids giggling because they figured out how to use the thesaurus. It's like they're not even trying anymore."
"If they're not trying anymore, it doesn't do great things for our rep if we can't actually figure out the grand scheme of things." Mac leans back, using fingers to tick off all the questions they still have. "Somewhere along the way, your old friend Grant got onto the Castle membership list. The Castle is bribing the police through a foundation called Fortress. We still don't know why. No idea why it's different than your typical rich people-money-cops scenario, or why Grant is special to the Castle."
"Negativity," Veronica says, rolling the word in her mouth, "Is not the name of the game. Patience is." She reaches over to select her own jelly bean, but gets exasperated with the decision and just slides a handful into her palm. "Capitalize on my willingness to take a break, and satisfy your mom's wish for you to bring home a guy. This is a rare offer of my wingwomanship."
"Can we go back to conversations that pass the Bechdel test?" Veronica raises an eyebrow and Mac raises her palms in response. "What? I just like conversations that don't revolve around guys."
Veronica nods, businesslike. "Okay. Want to take advantage of my wingwomanship to pick up a girl?"
They pause for a minute, listening to a police siren in the distance. Veronica's eyes are a little tighter when they meet Mac's again, and Mac has to resist the urge to turn back to her computer. Instead she holds Veronica's gaze and asks, "Are you okay? Not to be like a seventh grade girl at a slumber party, but I'm getting a weird vibe from you."
"Sure."
"Really? You're fine? Logan and your dad are-" she winces a little, apologizing in advance for a terrible pun, "All shipshape?"
Veronica's response takes just a touch too long, but her voice is still light. "As far as I know."
Veronica knows how to deal with the unknown. You revisit the scene. You badger witnesses, and get information from people in power. You fit things together and puzzle it out until it is known. And then when it's over you sit vigil beside hospital beds and victims. You find closure. You move on with enlightenment in your heart.
She is familiar with crisis. But none of the normal rules apply to this one.
It is the tenth apartment that they are seeing, but Diana is undaunted.
"Sometimes it just takes a little longer to find the right place," she tells Veronica, still cheerful, and Veronica feels guilty for a moment about forcing her through the trouble when she is still uncertain that she'll be able to get her own place at all.
The apartment almost changes her mind, though. It's not particularly large but it feels spacious, all rough wood floors and light walls and gray accents.
"Now, there's only the one bathroom, but it's a nice size," Diana is saying, but Veronica is still looking around.
"And you're sure this is within my price range?" She takes her eye off the big windows to look straight at the real estate agent, gaging.
Diana grins. "Hard to believe, isn't it? It's just gone on the market, but I knew that this was a listing that would appeal." Veronica gets over her shock enough to make sure that it includes enough of the features she wants, but everything still looks too good to be true.
"Now," Diana says as they walk out, losing a bit of her smile. Veronica braces herself for the plot twist. "I know that you were still unsure about your time frame for moving, but this is a listing that is going to go fast. I've already heard that there's some interest from someone out of LA who is willing to pay above asking." Her grin sneaking back on despite herself, she leans over toward Veronica. "Actually, I heard that it was Jeremy Sloane."
A brief image of Lilly flashes across Veronica's mind, and the nostalgia of it makes her relaxed and open. "My best friend and I were obsessed with him. We used to watch his show, that terrible soap opera he was on, and plan our weddings to him like he would have been cool with marrying a couple of fourteen-year-olds." Diana is locking up the apartment, but Veronica catches one last glimpse. It still looks perfect to her. That makes her frown. "But why does he want this place? It's gorgeous, but why does he need a one bedroom in Neptune? Even if he was going to use it for storage or turn it into a Ping-Pong room, it's still a commute from the land of the golden parachutes."
"I think he's actually thinking of moving here. We're going to have to lock up the teens, you know. I think that man must have sold his soul because he doesn't look like he's aged since you were fourteen." Diana goes to leave the key in the building manager's office, keeping up a warm flow of chatter as she does. "He actually went to Hearst, before he got discovered, so he already knows the area. He'll probably buy that apartment, buy out all the other tenants who live here, tear it down and build himself a nice new place. The location is excellent." The evening is warm, so the two of them stand comfortably beside their cars. Veronica leans against hers. It might be Logan's, but she has grown attached to this gorgeous, sleek vehicle in his absence. Her breath catches for a moment, and she anchors herself with the reality of the metal.
"What happened to your architectural integrity?"
"Hey, for what he's paying, he could tear down my house and use it as overflow parking." More than her words, it is Diana's rich laugh that makes Veronica smile. "It's actually a great time to be a real estate agent in Neptune. Sloane is part of a pack of people with big checkbooks making their way here. Tearing down properties and putting up new ones, even paying residents of the…lower rent parts of town for their lots."
"Am I allowed to chain myself to this building so they can't take my sunshine away and replace it with a soulless McMansion that costs more than my college tuition?" Veronica extends a foot. "These are my sticking-it-to-the-man boots, after all."
"I'll tell you what. I'll try to make sure that this place is held for a couple of days. No guarantees after that, though."
"I can work with that," Veronica nods, and they shake on it.
Veronica knows fear. The ignored worry that she would one day to come home to find her mother aspirating on her own vomit. The numbness that comes from being surprised by a psycho with a gun or a spinning tattoo needle. The scream of the world upon seeing her father bruising and burning and broken. The pulse of her heart matching music as she confronts a maniac with only a unicorn or a Taser in her hand. But this is the worst kind of fear, the kind that chokes her every minute, the kind that stays in her chest even as she tries to outrun it, the kind that sits small and clawed in her mind.
Veronica hasn't heard from Logan. It has been six days.
Her dad is out when she gets home. She suspects that he has started seeing someone, but doesn't mind waiting until he confirms it. It is a bit of a relief not to have to talk to anyone.
She gets ready for bed. The quiet just makes the fear in her mind grow. She takes out her computer, checks for new mail. There is nothing. She tries to avoid looking at the display of emails below, but her eyes wander to the last one in her email chain with Logan.
If you keep trying to argue for the Stones over the Beatles reads the line displayed in her inbox. She closes her eyes, remembering the rest: my dad's Fab Four-dar is going to go off, and he'll fly over there to drop kick you into the ocean where they'll never find your body.
Her knuckles are clenched white around a pillow as she manages to fall asleep.
She dreams that she is putting together a puzzle. The pieces are large, obvious, but she can't seem to get them to fit together. One has a large house, one a police car, one a man's face. She twists them together, hoping that they will slide together in a match.
She wakes up with an intake of breath. 'Very literal,' she thinks. 'And I try to be a challenge for the shrinks.' But she understands now how to make her match.
'How would I know?' she wonders on the way to work. Who would they tell? Trina is probably his next of kin, just by default. Would Trina tell her? Would she even care? She imagines going to the drugstore and seeing Trina's face on a magazine cover, twisted in exaggerated grief beneath a false headline about personal tragedy.
Her cell vibrates against her thigh and she tenses, breath tripping into her throat. It's an email.
Hi Veronica! I'm a recruiter at Epic, and I recently reviewed your resume as provided by the Columbia University resume book. I'm excited to learn more about you-
She doesn't know whether the spam makes it better or worse.
Logan is a part of her life, her whole life, in a way he never was in their prior incarnations. She tells him about her cases, about arguments with her father. He is the one who slides her into humor when she is in a snappish mood after a bad day. She finds his stories sneaking into her conversations when she speaks to Wallace or her dad. She has worried about losing him before, but he has never been so dispersed into the parts of her life, so fundamental.
Logan is her friend now in a way he has not been in many years.
She presses the panic down and goes into the office.
Either Mac is aiming for employee of the month, or she really has a thing for the bad instant coffee they have in the office because she is already sitting at her desk. Rewinding the past fifteen hours, Veronica sits in the chair beside her, her grin intense.
"Imagine," she starts, "That you have a ridiculous amount of money and you want to break the law."
Mac doesn't even turn. "Well, you already just described my life, so, done."
"But are you part of a secret society?"
"The Castle?" Mac finishes what she is doing, or is finally interested enough to look up. "Did you have your magic moment?" She wiggles her fingers around slightly, hovering them above the keyboard.
Veronica keeps her voice low. The door to her father's office is closed, but she wants to be careful. He has already been hurt by these people for getting too close. "So you've got money and you want to break the law, but you don't want to have to keep bribing the police."
"Efficiency-conscious criminals?" Mac turns to look at her fully. "This is new."
"More like cops for hire, a personal police force. Making sure that they're always going to look the other way and help you out, no matter what happens." The dream still fresh in her mind, Veronica tries to put the pieces together in a way that will make sense to Mac as well. "I don't know if you've been playing 'I Spy' with the sold signs around town, but Neptune is getting a fresh crowd of 09ers, and they're not staying in the safe zone of city real estate. This is not just a few people. This is a migration, to a place where they can do anything they want, where they will never have to listen to the law."
"Is this a sitcom where the businessman moves to the barrio and everyone bonds and a laugh track plays over hilarious cultural misunderstandings?"
"By the time the businessmen move to the barrio, it will be the 09 South. The cops have been more aggressive. That's already started to convince people to get out, and when these guys come up with their checkbooks, they take it and move to somewhere the grass is greener." There is a shuffling from inside the office. Her dad might be coming out in a minute. Veronica gets up, positions herself in front of the desk. "Can you cross a list of people who have bought real estate in Neptune with the Castle database?"
"Oh, I didn't tell you about my amnesia? I've lost the ability to do simple computer tasks." Mac looks at her almost pityingly before smiling. "I'll email it to you."
Keith is opening the door as Veronica places her hand on the knob. "I thought I heard you out here," he says suspiciously.
"Just catching up with my peeps." Veronica throws finger guns at Mac.
"I'm the peeps," Mac says flatly, and while Keith and Mac raise a dry eyebrow at each other, Veronica shrugs and goes to her desk.
"I'm never going to be beloved by all with the negativity from those nearest and dear to me."
"I would start with being beloved by the occasional passerby," Keith tosses after her, giving a false pursed-lip frown. "Start small." His voice grows muffled as he moves toward the door. "I'm going out, and yes, I feel well enough. And Veronica," he leans his head back into the office, "Don't follow me. I taught you those skills. Don't think the student can use them against the master."
"Like I don't have better things to do than keep an eye on the old man," Veronica snorts. When Keith leaves, she goes to Mac's desk and drops off her keys. "Don't let me have these until I actually have to leave."
Still distracted, Mac holds the keys aloft in her fist. "And I thought if I stayed in and hung out with nerds I would never get a designated driver moment like this." She does not pay attention to Veronica's smile, absentmindedly allowing the keys to drop into a drawer as she organizes the Castle information.
Veronica reenters her office. She pulls up a listing of their current cases, tries to prioritize them. But without the drive of the corruption in Neptune to focus on, her undistracted mind wanders back to Logan. It is the seventh day.
She had not thought that she would worry like this. Not when she went nine years without seeing him. Not when there is no sign that anything is wrong. But she is tense with a lack of knowledge.
Logan has known that she would be. The day before he had left, he had given her an email address. "If anything goes wrong, they're not going to tell you. We're not related, and we're not married. It'll be a media blackout until they've told all the families and then they'll release to the press," he had said, folding a piece of paper into her hand. He had read her face and stopped her thoughts as they were forming. "I'm not joking, Veronica. This isn't the kind of thing where you can get information with a head tilt, or fake tears, or a good story and a photoshopped badge. If you don't hear from me for a week, write to this address. I'll tell you what to say."
"A week? Logan, a week without information for me is like-"
"Years, I know." He had left off pressing clothes into his bag and come over to loop arms around her waist. "But promise me. Whoever I ask to do this, they would be breaking operational security. They'd be putting their job on the line for me. I would be asking them to trust that I was making a decision that wouldn't endanger the entire crew."
She had leaned back against his supporting arms to look into his face. "You have people who would do that for you?"
She was glad that she was watching because the smile of shy confidence that filled his face was something worth seeing. "Yeah. I do." He had pulled out his phone and showed her a picture of his uniformed self standing beside a stable looking woman with bright red hair who was grinning toughly at the camera. "This is Annie, my best friend in the service."
Veronica looked at the email address in her hands. CBrendanawicz. "Shouldn't it be A Brendanawicz?" She had gasped with delight as a thought occurred. "Is the C for commander? Tell me she's your superior officer. I'll know I've had a good influence if you're making friends with the people who can get you the good stuff."
"She wishes she was my superior. We were in training together and we've moved up together since then. She'll outpace me eventually, though. Helps when you don't have a regular date with murder charges." But he said it lightly, without the contained bitterness it might have held in his teenage years.
Logan's easy relationship with women had always bothered Veronica. She had never been sure whether he was unconsciously, easily friendly with them, or if it was some misguidedly dysfunctional way of forcing her jealousy to confirm her affection for him. She forced a breath, forced calm. "How did you become friends?"
"I was the famous one, she was one of a handful of women, and the only married one. This one CO wasn't fond of either of us, kept giving us the shit jobs. Eventually she said, 'If we're going to keep getting stuck together, I should probably know more about you than that your dad used to be my Auntie June's favorite actor and that you can curse in seven languages.'"
"Isn't that how all the great friendships start?"
"Controlling girl decides that you're going to be friends? It's worked out for me so far." He had gazed at her, remembering a similar incident on a soccer field almost two decades ago, until she pressed a palm to his cheek, gently pushing him away.
"Keep the sex eyes in your head." She had pulled away a little, adding Annie Brendanawicz's address into her phone. Logan waited patiently and eventually she had met his eyes again, gaze serious. "And she'll tell me what's happening?"
"Yes. But one week, Veronica. One Earth week."
'It's into the seventh day,' Veronica thinks now, and writes out the message that Logan had given.
Hey Annie,
Haven't heard anything in a while, so I'm just checking in to make sure everything's okay. Fill a stateside girl in!
V
She has looked up Annie, knows that she was born Canada Gordon and married Paul Brendanawicz eight years ago. She knows that her call sign is "Nuff Said" because her name was bad enough to be a nickname all on its own. She knows that she has red hair and stands as tall as Logan's shoulder and has joked about making Logan godfather if she ever has a kid in such a way that he doesn't know if she is serious or not.
She doesn't know when she will write back. She doesn't know if she is any condition to.
It's like an ache that this is all she can do. She bends her head to her hands, just for a moment, then takes in a sharp breath and opens a case file at random. She has started making notes about the direction that she should take when her email chimes.
"Thanks, Mac," she calls, shoving the folder to the side and opening Mac's list. Grant Winters's name is at the top, just because Mac is thorough. Jeremy Sloane's name is there. Veronica can't believe that she never noticed it in the list when they took Jake Kane's hard drive in the first time, but it was a frantic few hours between cracking it and deciding she no longer wanted to have anything to do with it at all. Overall, the list is a little longer than she expected, but not by much. Just enough people to start an elite little kingdom by the ocean.
The problem now is not lack of information. It is confusion about what to do next. She leans back, swivels a little in her chair before standing abruptly.
"I need my keys." She takes her bag and strides toward the door. "Mac, I need my keys, and cancel all my appointments."
"There were days," Mac remarks, glancing at her, "When I renowned and respected for my expertise. Once I was the sidekick in this whole operation, not the secretary."
"I'm having a cape made up, just for you." Veronica gives what she hopes is a convincingly winning grin. Mac allows a matching one to creep onto her face. She digs in the drawer for her keys.
"You didn't have any appointments anyway."
Veronica is already in the doorway, but she turns and proposes, "Tomorrow I'm going to take you to the movies. I'm going to buy you popcorn."
"It's a lady-date." Mac makes a face at the expression as Veronica closes the door. Through the wood, she can hear her call, "But why am I suddenly afraid that we might not live to see tomorrow?"
Veronica jubilantly starts the car. She knows where she needs to go. But she thinks of Logan, of panic and the possibility of him alone somewhere, and the smile slips from her face. She'll make a stop first.
On the drive, Veronica imagines funerals. She thinks of uniforms filled with people who belong to a different part of Logan's life than she does, visualizes gun salutes drowning out for a moment the clicking of paparazzi cameras. She pictures herself giving eulogies, saying things rote ("Logan Echolls died serving his country") or dramatic ("Logan Echolls was the love of my life") or true ("Logan was my oldest remaining friend, and the last promise he made to my face was a lie").
She presses her foot to the gas even though Logan's car doesn't need it. She has to keep focused. She has to try to outrun the fear.
Weevil's house is bracketed by For Sale signs. As she comes down the street, Veronica sees a cleared plot of land, once big enough for several homes, now with the barest beginning shadow of a larger one.
Jade answers the door when Veronica knocks. They have had few conversations, just one really, when Veronica had seen her at the grocery store a few days after Weevil was arrested for disorderly conduct two months ago. "Why are you letting him fall back into this?" she had asked. "He has you and Valentina now, and he seemed happy."
Jade had placed a box of cereal in her cart. "People come after you because you pester them. If you stopped, they would stop too. It's different for me and Eli. People are always going to come after us for looking the way we look and living where we live. He's trying to protect us the best way he knows how."
Jade's face is a little tenser than Veronica remembers, but maybe that's just the natural reaction people have when she turns up. "Eli," Jade calls over her shoulder, "Someone wants to know if you can come out to play."
Weevil comes down the hall, his daughter balanced on his hip. He hands the little girl to his wife as soon as he sees Veronica. There's something distressing about that. He steps out onto his porch with her.
They stand for a moment without speaking. "People are running scared, V," Weevil says finally, tilting his head toward one of his neighbors' homes.
"You want to do something about that?"
"No." Weevil doesn't even hesitate. "If it's going to risk me not getting home to my wife and my baby girl, not even for you."
"And running up against the cops who have it in for you isn't a risk?" They are beyond the cutesy head tilt. Veronica looks at him straight on. "Weevil, if you help me with this, you won't have to worry about getting home to your family anymore."
"Even your well-meaning stuff, it's threatening. You practice that?" He looks out at his neighborhood, at the quiet. "Let me talk to Jade," he says.
"How's Echolls?" Weevil asks as they drive, not quite making it to casual.
Veronica stares dead ahead. "I haven't heard from him in a week." It's the first time she has said it out loud. She keeps her voice flat so it won't break.
Weevil is shaking his head beside her. "He's a stubborn cabrón. Whenever you think you've got rid of him, it just means that he's mutating into something harder to kill."
The corners of Veronica's mouth spread upward a little. "And they say your bromance is dead."
If there is a vampire in Neptune, it is Clarence Wiedman. He never seems to age, and irritatingly, never seems surprised to see her there.
"Ms. Mars," he says as he answers the door, not even having the courtesy to throw a little 'I've been expecting you' in for ambiance.
Veronica rests a hand on his shoulder. "Clarence, if he's still not treating you right after all these years, you should leave him. By this point, you should at least have a snazzy uniform."
"I'll inform Mr. Kane that you're here," Wiedman says dryly. He hasn't invited her, but she steps inside anyway, Weevil naturally managing threatening beside her shoulder.
"Lilly's dad have a hermit thing going?" he mutters. He isn't wrong. Jake doesn't technically live in Neptune anymore. Mac had given her what she knew about the newest Kane residence, best described as a cabin, near one of the park areas outside of the city.
"It's still probably wired better than your place or mine. Maybe if everything goes well, he'll let us stick around and see what's on his super cable." She does a little headlining arc with her hands to highlight the last words. But her jazzy voice and wide eyes fade as Wiedman and Jake Kane come into the room.
"Hello, Veronica," Jake says. She thinks he has said those words to her more than any others, but they seem wearier than ever. She had been in the background at his fortieth birthday party when a friend had boisterously declared that Jake Kane was growing older with more dignity than the rest of his generation put together. It is no longer true. He is just past fifty and looks aged and shuffling.
"They kicked you out of the Castle, didn't they?" The words blurt out, but gently, muffled. She does not know why she thought she would need Weevil. Jake Kane is no longer the man who helped the sheriff position escape her father twice, not the man who lied and concealed and ignored justice, not the grieving terror of a man who threw himself howling at Aaron Echolls. He is a man in two dimensions, as if life has finally given up on him, and even Wiedman can't make up the difference.
Jake makes his slow way to the couch and rests heavily upon it. "There is no real leaving the Castle, but yes, I lost my position. I made a mistake when I publicized the theft of my hard drive. The members were not pleased to hear that I had not protected our most potentially damaging material and it had…escaped into the wild."
"Who did they get to replace you?"
"A computer specialist named Grant Winters," Jake says, and a hoarse kind of smile comes into his voice. "But I suspect you knew that. It was my understanding from some of his confessions that it was your influence which brought him to our attention in the first place."
And the pieces just keep clicking together. "And it was your influence that got him out of the FBI scam charges."
Jake sees the disgust in her eyes. "The Castle wasn't always like this. There was a time when it was about something other than power."
"I don't think even you believe that," Veronica says, arms crossed. "And I definitely know better."
Jake sighs, a little plea for understanding in his tone. "He was a promising talent who was being expelled from his university due to the investigation. There were those among us who thought that he was someone useful to have with us, so Hearst was convinced to offer him a place, and Clarence had some of his connections in federal law enforcement clear up the legal trouble."
"You played that one wrong, didn't you?" Weevil says, voice low. "Give a guy like that some love, he's going to think he deserves to keep taking forever. So now he's taking my city."
"Actually." Veronica does not think she has ever felt so triumphant as when she sees Wiedman raise an eyebrow as she pronounces the word. She doesn't want to work with these men, but she definitely believes that it is better the devil you know. "I didn't just come here so we could have fill in the blank time. I think it's time for Grant to get taken instead."
She checks her email one last time before she goes in. And maybe it's a sign that she's doing the right thing, because a stranger has sent her just what she needs to hear from across the sea.
Hey V,
It's great to hear from you! Everything here is fine, boring even, except that Lola is grounded for a couple of weeks. I'll have someone tell you the story later, or maybe the two of us could get together sometime.
Love,
Annie
Her shoulders relax as she reads the word 'grounded.' It stands for something that Logan had told her could happen. "Engine malfunctions, or a bird hits you wrong so you land on a base at the ends of the earth, but then you have to wait two weeks with sporadic radio contact for some old guy to come up with replacement parts strapped to the back of his camel."
She won't hear from him for another little while, but he is boringly safe. She goes into WinTech Solutions smiling.
Grant Winters is cocky. The building he has listed as his business is little more than an empty warehouse without even cubicles to give the illusion of office space. He has no employees and no security. Veronica walks in, hands in her pockets, and says, "I've been thinking about opening lines- you know, the classics- and this is probably a 'there ain't room enough in this town for the two of us' situation."
Grant Winters looks older. He has lost the imbalance of spreading ears and nose attached to a round face, but there's still something shifty and ghostlike about him. He wears a polo shirt and khakis and an unpleasant smile as he approaches from the desk in the back. "I figured you would get here eventually, but I didn't think it would take this long. It's been months since you got back to town."
"Well, you weren't the only one who wanted to throw me a welcome home party. Also, my dad had a little accident, so you were kind of just down there," she gestures toward the floor, "On my priority list."
"Oh, yeah, I had heard about your father." His voice has a run of satisfaction in it, so while Veronica keeps her smile, it turns concrete and feral. "That was a real shame."
Veronica waves a hand in the air between them and squints up her face. "Yeah, see my bullshit detector is telling me that you don't really think it's a shame, and my common sense tells me it's because you probably knew about it before anyone else. You probably weren't driving, though. You guys in the Castle have people to run over the good guys for you."
If Grant is surprised that she knows about the Castle, knows about his connection to it, he shows nothing. "It really is good to be king."
In a detached way, Veronica wonders what Logan would do now. Would this be the point where he would tackle Grant with a curving 'you really shouldn't have said that' grin, or would he hold out, let logic rule? She will have to ask him.
"Yeah, I figured that it must be for you to have decided to be the ringleader for the merry band of billionaires."
Grant moves a hand as if to brush back his hair. He smirks, trying to seem relaxed rather than embarrassed when he realizes that it is now too short. "When the Castle came to me and asked if I would do a better job with their information than Jake Kane had, I had a bigger idea. What running into you taught me back then was that you need to have the authorities working for you. You have that, you can do anything you want. So we set up a little fund. Everyone contributes to the pot, and the police look the other way or come down hard on whoever we want them to and get to go home to their new big screens." He looks at her with pride not that does not ask to impress. It is the decided pride of a creator discussing an undoubted accomplishment.
"Funny, the lesson I learned was not to be an entitled sociopath who steals from people, but I guess it stuck for me because I already knew that one."
"This isn't stealing." Grant opens his palms, amused rather than affronted. "This is just making sure that there is a place for all my brothers to come and live the lives they deserve. After all, they picked me up after you almost ruined me. It's time I gave a little back." He cocks his head to the side, watches Veronica nod and smile understandingly. "Oh, did you think that you just got the confession you needed? That you transmitted all the damning evidence through one of your clever bugs?" His smile grows. "I've been waiting for you, Veronica Mars. I knew it was only so long before you showed up with your sneaking and your wires. This place has the most advanced anti-surveillance systems available. The CIA could be trying to get a glimpse inside and would come up blank. I just wanted to see the look on your face when you realized that I beat you this time."
"Well, you have to tell me when that happens. I want to know when to smile for the picture," Veronica says. She shifts her weight and looks at him. "I had these best friends growing up. Rich kids, who could have had safes installed in their rooms to hide the things they didn't want their parents to see. But they went simple. Air vents and screwdrivers." Veronica takes a digital tape recorder out of her pocket. "Simple." She extends it toward him a bit. "Want to say hello to the man behind the curtain?"
Grant freezes. He reminds Veronica in that moment of an ancient building, firm on the outside but crumbled and empty within. "What are you going to do with that?" he tries. "There isn't anyone around here I don't own. If you wanted me to make you and your father into laughingstocks again, all you had to do was ask."
"Right, Balboa County judges William Schall and Ronald Lewis. Hearst classes of '68 and '76." Veronica looks disinterested. "You know, Grant, I've been away for a while. And in that time, the sheriff's department gained a new responsibility. They're actually in charge of collecting Neptune's taxes now. And you know what that makes them? Part of our country's greatest system: the IRS." Grant is across the space, shadowed, but Veronica can see his jaw clench. She can't resist going further. "That's right. You went federal and you didn't even know it." She clicks off the recorder and tucks it away. "I went to law school since we last saw each other. Figured I should get a return for my investment."
Junior year of high school was eleven years ago. Veronica can see every one of those years shattering in Grant's eyes. "We have people in the federal judiciary, too," he says, shakily.
"No. You don't. And the guy you usually relied on to smooth things over with the Feds, Clarence Wiedman? He has a bizarre loyalty to Jake Kane, and Jake Kane no longer seems to have any loyalty to you." She starts toward the door. Grant begins to move toward her, but his desire for dramatics, a standoff with proper ambiance and gravity after all this time means that he has too much space to cover. "I've heard that at this point you should just gracefully admit defeat," she advises before striding out of the building and handing the tape recorder to a gaping Special Agent in Charge Deborah Fielding.
"That should have enough for bribery, and if you have a good prosecutor and a lenient judge, intimidation and harassment." Agent Fielding peers at her from out of the FBI van. Behind them, Grant Winters is being handcuffed. He looks dazed, Veronica notes with satisfaction before turning back to Agent Fielding. "Why do I always get the disbelieving stares instead of the gold star for ingenuity?"
"Maybe," Keith says as he clambers out from behind Agent Fielding, "Your ingenuity would get more recognition if you had let someone know ahead of time that you thought there might be a reason that the wire wouldn't work."
Veronica fakes a gasp. "But the last minute twist stroke of brilliance is my specialty. We can't go changing the bag of tricks now!"
Keith puts an arm around her, tucking her firmly against his side. "I just want to add in a trick where you actually tell me how your case is going before I get a text that says In the car with Jake Kane. Going to meet with the FBI."
Veronica angles her head to look up at him. "You already took one for the team. It was my turn to get dirty. And there's still going to be the next few months of trials. You can be my number one man for that."
"You know they aren't going to be easy," Keith warns. They begin to walk away toward their own cars. Veronica needs to go back with the agents, but she is not going in the van. "There are a lot of powerful men wrapped up in this. You and Mac have the list of names, the bank transfers to the police department, the Winters confession, and it still might not be enough."
"Hey." Veronica leans against her car and throws a fake punch. "What ever happened to the Mars fighting spirit?"
"What ever happened to my jaded daughter?" Keith doesn't sound too sad not to see her.
Veronica thinks of a base at the end of the earth and a wounded plane named Lola. She feels like her lungs are truly taking in air for the first time in a while. "It's just been an optimistic kind of day," she says.
She wakes up four days later to an email.
I figured I would have the story to tell this time, but I got back to 'don't worry' messages from Mac and Wallace and your dad, and a 'chill out, it's just Veronica' one from Dick, so I'm going to guess that I've been upstaged again. Want to tell me what I missed?
She looks at the time. She is going to be late for work. She sits up and begins to fill him in.
Oh, and Canada Gordon is a real person, the art director for the Veronica Mars movie whose name I noticed in the credits and decided to include.