Title:Mutual
Author: Brendan/brencon
Pairings/Characters:Logan/Veronica, ensemble
Word Count: 2,171
Rating:PG-13, so far.
Summary:What if Logan and Veronica got together before everything went to hell?
Spoilers: Set pre-series, but will include some season one stuff later.
Warnings: Swearing.
Disclaimer: Veronica Mars belongs to Rob Thomas and the nice people at the CW
Author's Note: Thanks to Nikita for the beta. Italics represent Veronica's thoughts and/or voiceovers. Obviously, I've fudged up the timeline, but not by much.
Author's Note #2: So, I know, I haven't updated this story in forever, and I'm sorry, but RL has really been kicking my ass these few months and I've really gotten into a ship from a soap over here in the UK. So here's chapter 14. Thanks to all who reviewed the last chapter.

Lilly Kane, heiress to the Kane family fortune, was having an affair with Aaron Echolls, star of such films as 'The Long Haul' and 'Breaking Point', father of her former boyfriend and brother's ex-best friend.

And, to add insult to injury, Aaron had been recording their little trysts. In this very room. In that very bed.

How many other girls has he brought back to his den of iniquity?

Ugh, I feel sick.

"Veronica!" Logan whispered, trying his best to stop the tape and place it back where he found. He slid the fake book shelf back in place and took his girlfriend's hand in his. Quickly dragging her into the bathroom of the small shack, Logan clamped his hand over her mouth to stop her from making a sound as the patio doors slid open again.

"Aaron? Where are you?" Lilly called out. She flopped onto the bed, looking at her reflection in the bed-side mirror for a few minutes before, giggling like a naughty school girl, landing on her back, arms and legs spread out wide.

Peeking out through the tiniest of gaps from the door, Veronica watched as Lilly too noticed the oddness of the fan in the ceiling.

She must've been busy the other times to not notice.

Veronica shuddered as Lilly opened the faux-bookcase and found the tapes. Lilly played one of the tapes for a few seconds, muttering "Oh, you dirty dog," before stopping it and grabbing the two of them.

And that's when the trio in the pool house heard the deep voice sing-song "Lilly," as it exited the main house.

Acting quickly, Lilly ran from the pool house using the maid's entrance to move through the house and back to her SUV. Tossing the tapes on the dashboard, she pushed down hard on the gas and raced out of the Echolls home.

Aaron, calling out Lilly's name again, appeared through the shimmering curtains.

"Lil-ly?" He sang out. It took him a moment to realise his secret had been discovered. He raced to the video recorder and frantically searched for the tapes. Finding nothing but dust, Aaron roared to the quiet room and pulled out the video recorder and the TV, smashing them on the ground.

His face was fierce as he raged in the pool house. Eyes wide open, he had a murderous look that would scare even the toughest of law enforcers.

As he thought out his strategy, he realised his only option was to stop the girl from ruining his life, one that he'd worked tryingly to make, to make himself different from his old man, the drunken lay about.

And now it would be brought crashing down from stupid, little, high school princess? Not if there was still air in his lungs, and strength in his limbs.

He closed the sliding door so hard that the glass shattered into pieces in his wake.

Inside the small bathroom, Logan was attempting to calm one pissed off girl.

"Veronica, calm down!" Logan asked, taking her in his arms, trying to still her movements.

"That attention-seeking hussy! To call me a slut when she was having an affair with your father? A man older even than her own dad? I don't understand how she can live with herself! I don't know whether to be sick or set Back-Up after the two of them!"

"Veronica, how do you think I feel? She was my girlfriend, he IS my father! You don't understand? I'm lost! But first, I think we need to follow Lilly home… My fa- Aaron is a psycho… we need to protect her."

"I can't believe I'm going to say this, but you're right… we need to help."

And so the two ran from the pool house, dodging the shatter electronics and smashed glass, towards the Le Baron.

I couldn't deny Logan's wishes. For all his bad boy tendencies, he really cared for those he loved… even if the ones he loved were bitches from hell… present company excluded. I may be no angel, but I ain't a devil either.

He called his dad a psycho… has the time come? Is Logan finally going to remove some of that weight from his shoulders?

The duo jumped into their mode of transport (Logan in the driving seat) and began their journey to the Kane home.

Is it just me or does this car ride seem like the voyage of the damned? Moving towards their doom for all of eternity, not knowing if they'll make it through to the other side, making it back home, once the battle has commenced.

That's how it feel's to me in this exact moment. It wasn't as if the Echoll's and the Kane's lived far apart, or that the Le Baron was breaking down again, but that time seemed to slow to a snails pace, and the harder I wished to get there, the longer it seemed for us to move an inch.

And that was when Logan spoke.

"Aaron beats me," He whispered, his eyes unmoving from that road before him.

Veronica swallowed hard as she looked towards her boyfriend, eyes glistening with unshed tears as she reached out to touch his cheek.

"Logan, I-"

"You don't need to say anything, Ronnie. I just put out there. It's just… it's just, if he can beat his own son for accidentally spilling soda on the leather in the Rolls, what can he do to a teenaged girl with the power to destroy his career with the click of her fingers?"

Veronica pulled out her cell phone and started dialling.

"Who you gonna call?" Logan asked. Veronica threw him an incredulous look and he shook his head.

"My dad. We need to stop Aaron before he can do anything. And we need to do it now. If we don't…."

"It may be too late," Logan finished, before speeding just that little bit faster towards their destination.

------

In his office at the Balboa county Sheriffs office, Keith Mars was finishing up the paperwork on a set of burglaries that had been committed by the Fighting Fitzpatrick's. The end result was that the youngest of the brother's, one Eoin Fitzpatrick, was sent to prison for 3 years maximum. He had just finished filing away the case file when his cell phone rang. Checking the caller ID, he noticed it was his daughter calling.

"Hiya honey how was the pep rally?" He asked.

When Veronica informed him of everything that had occurred that afternoon at the Echoll's home, he was shocked to say the least. Shocked and disgusted. And as Veronica said they had just arrived at the Kane mansion, Keith started to worry.

He instructed his daughter to stay back, to not enter the house, in case Aaron was still there, he told her to wait until he and a number of his deputies arrived on site to investigate. But when he heard the scream that echoed down the phone line, he knew he wouldn't and couldn't stop his daughter from stopping her former best friend.

"Please be careful. I'll be there as soon as I can."

Father and daughter hung up simultaneously. Keith, grabbing his gun and jacket, raced out to the main office and pointed towards Sacks, Lamb and Everett.

"You three, come with me."

"Where are we going boss?" Lamb asked, grabbing the keys for his cruiser.

"The Kane's."

------

" – tapes, you stupid little bitch!" Aaron yelled, grabbing at Lilly's arm.

Veronica and Logan quietly opened the door that led out to the backyard, and the pool. Before them, was Aaron and Lilly, in the middle of billowing argument. It seemed that Lilly had hidden the tapes once she had returned home and had enough time to grab a magazine and some sun lotion before Aaron had arrived, demanding them back.

Lilly broke free and smirked at him.

"Oh, I'm the stupid one? Well, now you can just watch the tapes on 'Access Hollywood' along with the rest of America," She replied, before dismissing him and returning her attention to readying herself for sunbathing.

The look on Aaron's face is cross between terror, anguish and blinding rage. He scanned the space around him and spotted an overly large and heavy-looking ashtray on one the tables, which he gripped firmly in his hand..

Jumping at the bit, Logan ran towards the scene before him.

"Lilly, watch out!" He shouted, all be it too late, as his father swung the ashtray in his rage just as Lilly looked up at him. His aim is true and he connects with her skull.

"LILLY!" Veronica cried, running towards the limp form of her ex-best friend. Her hair was matted with blood, which was running fast down the patio.

Logan was struggling to take his father down. For years, this man… this thinghad been beating in to Logan's head just how worthless and pathetic he was, and how he would never amount to anything.

The same man who had been involved with a seventeen year old girl, his friends' daughter, his sons girlfriend.

Once the blow and been dealt, Aaron had tossed away the ashtray into the pool, but not before wiping his handprints off. He had only just thrown the ashtray aside when Logan had collided with him, knocking the air from his lungs and sending him flailing backwards to the ground.

Veronica was holding a cushion she had retrieved from one of the lounges to the wound in Lilly's head, keeping the older girls body elevated, trying to involve her in conversation, as the fight between the Echoll's took place just feet away. She was scared of the same thing happening to Logan as what happened to Lilly, but when the warmth of Lilly's body started to ebb, and the scratchy breathing slow to nothing, her fear increased tenfold.

Logan was attempting to keep his father pinned to ground, but he was failing in every sense of the word. Every time he thought he had him in his grasp, his father nudged him or shoved him aside as if he was nothing but air.

His breathing heavy, blood pumping through his ears, he heard the song of the sirens and the screech of tires.

His limbs tired and soar, gave in, and he let Aaron loose in an attempt to escape.

Aaron, thankful that his son was weak and slow, jumped to his feet and ran for the door. But as it was pushed open, and Keith Mars exited, gun drawn, Aaron choose a different route.

But that too was blocked, by a gun totting Deputy.

So he chose the path of the idiot.

He eyed the height of the wall, and the foliage that surrounded it and figured that he could make that climb, and survive the jump to the other side without major injury.

"Aaron, stop!" The sheriff shouted, passing by his daughter and her boyfriend and the dying Kane girl. He had only one option to stop Aaron.

He aimed his weapon at an angle towards the sky and fired a warning shot. Aaron fell from his objective of scaling the wall and held his hands skyward.

"End of the line, Aaron."

Keith called over Lamb and Sacks and had Lamb hold Aaron as Sacks put the villain's hands in cuffs. Keith then told Everett to inform the medical team that they were clear to come through and assist with the victim.

"Take him to my car, Don. And keep watch of him."

Keith and Logan watched as Lamb escorted the criminal away from the scene as Veronica refused to leave Lilly's side whilst the EMT's tried to assess the situation.

"No, I won't go!" Veronica cried, pushing the man's hands away as she reached for Lilly's once again.

"Veronica, move if you want them to save her life," Her father requested.

It took a moment for her father's words to take full effect on her but once they did she got out of the way. Logan encased her in his arms as she cried her tired heart out.

Everett called Keith away to the side.

"What is it?" He asked, watching as the medic's placed Lilly's body onto a stretcher.

"It's her parents. They're out front."

"Oh Lord… I'll go speak to them. Could you please take my daughter and her boyfriend down to the station and take their statements. I want this to get sorted before the vultures swoop in."

Everetts confused look made Keith elaborate.

"The media. This case is going to be watched by the whole world."

Keith moved to the front of the house as Everett instructed the young couple to follow him to his vehicle.

"She's going to be okay," Logan said, his voice filled with unshed tears, "She's going to be fine. We got here in time, and the doctor's are going to save her, and then we'll be all alright."

Logan kissed the top of Veronica's head as they walked behind the deputy.

"All will be fine."