Within the hour, Logan and Veronica were on his father's boat, his boat now. The car ride had been completely silent.

Veronica emerges from the lower deck as Logan finishes up preparing the boat for departure.

"You do like green," she said again as she emerged wearing her new shorts and an olive green bikini top.

"Only on blondes," he said automatically, admiring her in the outfit. He bought the swimsuit to help break the ice with her after her return. He noted the irony that she was now using it to break the ice with him.

"I promise I'm not trying to distract you," she said sarcastically, "but I do need help tying this." She held up the strings around her neck with her left hand.

"Fine," he said gruffly, but his hands were gentle as he took the strings and fastened it securely. Veronica cinched up her tank top and slipped her right arm through the arm hole and gingerly lifted it over her right shoulder, avoiding unnecessary pain; the rest of the shirt she put on effortlessly.

Logan watched this and his stomach turned, "So this is how it's been all summer?"

"Yeah, it's easier now though," she admitted.

" I suppose you're going to tell me you weren't allowed to talk to anyone about what happened? That it was top secret?"

Veronica looked down at her feet. "No. I was allowed."

He shook his head in disgust. In a flash, Logan had the boat in reverse and then steered toward open water. "Hang on" was all he said as the speed helped him clear his head.

About half an hour later, Logan turned off the boat. They were in the middle of the ocean, completely alone. The sun was shining, but it was a little cloudy so the day was perfect for being outside. The perfect day for windsurfing, Logan thought.

The boat rocked slightly from the waves, but it was calm enough to walk around without holding onto anything. Logan and Veronica made a show of doing everything without talking. Veronica opened the picnic basket and began to set out their lunch as Logan got water bottles out of the cooler. He then found the suntan lotion and asked her permission—with hand gestures—if he could put some on her shoulders.

As he massaged the lotion into her shoulders gently, he traced her surgical scars lightly with his fingers. "You know I would have dropped everything without a thought to be with you, right?" he said, finally breaking the silence.

"I know," she said quietly, "That's one reason I didn't want to tell you. I knew you'd leave your surfing trip."

"You think I care about a surfing trip! Do you even know me at all?"

"I do know you, Logan," she said meeting his eyes. "Can you understand that when I left Neptune I told you we were through—that I wanted you out of my life forever?""

"No, you apologized for that before you left. And even if you hadn't, we were never through."

"What I'm trying to say is that when I left we were undefined, but I was hopeful. Hopeful that we would have time and distance to figure us out. What we wanted from each other. And then this awful thing happened."

"This awful thing you didn't tell me about! What is wrong with you? Don't you know I would have done anything for you—been right there for you while you were in surgery, held you when you were scared, helped you with rehab—anything!"

"Of course I know that! But don't you ever wonder what we would be if you didn't keep saving me all the time?"

Logan was stunned. Nothing, thus far in their oceanic shouting match had thrown him like what she just said. "What are you talking about?"

"How many times have you saved me, Logan? From the ATF agent, from Liam, from Beaver, from the rapist—and each time you do we get together. I can't help but fall for such a big damn hero. Each time there's this heightened sense of a connection between us, but then real life breaks us apart. We fight and hurt each other and break up and it's killing me!"

"The only reason I've come after you all those times is because I love you! Not to show off or be some hero. You of all people know how close some of those calls have been. And you know the only reason I've had to do those things is because of you! You can't keep yourself out of trouble!"

She hung her head, realizing what he was saying was true. Her look of shame broke his heart.

"Are you sure you don't want to make your librarian job your full time gig?" he asked in jest, hoping to see her smile. He knew he would never really ask her to give up what she loved doing.

"No way. Me? A sexy librarian? I wouldn't even know where to buy horn rimmed glasses and pencil skirts. I prefer an occupation with fewer clichés," she was thankful for the break. Thankful she loved someone who could make her smile at a time like this.

Logan sits down beside her again looking serious, "Are you telling me the reason you lied to me all summer was to see how our relationship would be if everything was normal and boring? That you didn't want me to 'save you' or whatever by coming to Virginia?"

"Yes," she admitted.

"We talked all summer, Veronica. I'd ask how your day was and you'd say 'awful.' You said all you did was make coffee and sit in meetings. You thought the FBI was going to help your copying and collating skills, but you did more ass-kicking and name-taking in Neptune. Was it all a lie?"

"No!" she said, still forlorn, "No, Logan. All of that was true. All of it, except the one big lie," Veronica amended. "After the incident, that's all they let me do. And what's worse, everyone treated me like a child. Treated me like I was some helpless little girl. Like I was going to sue them or write some tell-all. Or worse, like I couldn't hack it. It was miserable. The only good thing about this whole summer was you and me—how much I looked forward to talking to you, how much I knew you were thinking about me, how much I missed you."

"All you had to do was say the word and you could have come home."

"But that's not the point of an internship. You're supposed to learn how to deal with the real world on your own. And I'm not a quitter, Logan."

"Fine. You're not a quitter, but when are you going to realize you're not alone? Sure, we're not together, I get that, but you still could have told me. I would have found a way to help you without being some ridiculous white knight. Or you could have told your Dad, or Wallace, or Mac—they love you too, you know." After pausing for a moment, he asked sincerely, "Why didn't you tell your dad, Veronica?"

"He finally got elected! I knew he was seeing Alicia. If he was worried about me the whole summer I was away it would have ruined his first few months of joy in a long time." She said this with conviction, but Logan saw that his words were getting to her. He knew it was time to back off.

"It was the outdoorsman training weekend, wasn't it?," he asked with a smirk. "I hadn't talked to you in a few days early in your trip. When you finally called, you said they had kidnapped you and made you survive in the woods on your own."

"Yeah, that never happened. Don't depend on me to scavenge or start a fire from scratch."

"Never would have. I live in a hotel, remember? I scavenge for nothing. The only fires I start come with a remote control." She nodded, conceding.

After a few moments passed, Logan said, "Veronica, I'm so mad at you I cannot see straight. But your idiotic logic makes me love you even more. I'm glad you wanted to see how we'd do drama free and you're sweet to let your Dad finally be happy for a little while."

She looked up at him hopefully. He ignored this.

"But, what if," he started, "I told you right now, soon after you left Sorokin had some goons beat me up and leave me for dead. That my forearm was broken and had to be repaired. That I've got two metal plates in my arm now keeping it in place. But I don't really remember it because I was unconscious for two days in the hospital."

"Logan—did that happen?" she asked aghast. Veronica knew Gory and the Sorokin family was out of the picture, the FBI had seen to that, but that didn't mean some of his henchmen couldn't have beaten up Logan.

"I don't know," he said getting close enough to whisper, "If it did happen, I probably wouldn't have even told you. I wouldn't have wanted you to feel obligated and rush home from your internship. I wouldn't want you to have some 'heightened sense of connection' to me that was just going to fade. "

"Logan, if they hurt you—"

"They didn't," he said abruptly. "But that nauseating minute of worry, helplessness, and dread you just felt—that's how I've felt since the minute you told me. That's how your Dad has felt since you told him."

"Don't you see, Logan?" she asked, "That's another reason I waited to tell you. If you were going to worry from the minute you heard, why not postpone it? Why not be blissfully ignorant for a little while longer?"

"If you don't understand why I wouldn't want you to suffer alone, I'm afraid you don't know me at all Veronica."

The silence that followed his words didn't last long. They ate lunch and swam around the boat for an hour or so. Veronica and Logan were adept at compartmentalizing. Logan tried to impress her with his dives off the boat. Veronica was happy he was laughing again and she was enjoying being active without having her shoulder hurt. Their playful swim was cut short when they noticed clouds rolling in.

He climbed up the ladder in the back of the boat first and fretted as he watched her climb up with her left arm. Logan handed her a towel.

"Usually," Logan said, "I would have lifted you up out of the water with both your hands, but I'm hesitant now. I don't want to break you. How fragile are you, Lefty?"

Veronica carefully swung her right shoulder all the way around. "Almost as good as new," she said. "But I will put my sling on. I'm supposed to rest it some each day. Still, I could handle it if you wanted to get rough," she smiled at him suggestively.

"You're hard to stay mad at for long, Veronica Mars, " he smiled at her as he shook his head. "Okay, I think I'm ready now. Tell me what happened."

Veronica sat opposite him, feeling strange dripping wet on such a nicely upholstered boat.

"Okay. First of all, I promise I didn't volunteer for anything special and I didn't ask to do anything dangerous. Do you believe me?"

"For the purpose of moving this story along, sure. I believe you."

She glared at him for this, but proceeded. "On my first week at the FBI I was on a research team learning about the Mexican drug cartels and how drugs are brought and distributed here and how the DEA tries to infiltrate and stop them.

"Yeah? How did you get mixed up with the DEA?"

"I told you, it was just research. I didn't know the Drug Enforcement Agency also trained at Quantico. I didn't know I was going to be asked to go with real FBI agents later that week as they did surveillance on some guys in DC for them. Even when I did know, I was told it was completely routine and there was nothing to worry about.

"I rode shotgun with an experienced FBI agent as we made a delivery in a truck to this warehouse. Other FBI people were watching us and wanted to see how many operatives this particular cartel had on site, in broad daylight. I was supposed to feel excited they asked me to go on this ride-along, but actually I remember thinking it was pretty dull. It was supposed to be a 5 minute ordeal. Instead, they asked the driver to stay in the car and asked me to get out. He protested of course, but not that hard.

"Honestly, that's when I first I thought it might be an elaborate training exercise. These three guys started asking me questions about who I was working for, how long I had been there, that kind of thing. I didn't have a gun, didn't have a vest, but conveniently was wired—so I started thinking maybe the FBI was training us to resist interrogation. You know me, I love to tell a good story, so I answered all their questions pretty easily with a well concocted pseudonym and back story. I thought I was giving the guys at Quantico a good laugh.

"It all changed when the guys started ripping off my clothes and saw that I was wired." Logan stood up, desperate to move, and listened to her rush through the rest of the story as he gripped the metal boat railing and looked out at the ocean. "What I didn't know at the time was that some other warehouse guys had done the same thing to the FBI agent, except they were pretty rough with him and found his wire. They yelled I was wired to the guys cornering me. By the time they found my wire, the rest of the FBI team was rushing to the warehouse, but one of the men put a gun to my head." She rubbed her left temple, remembering.

"I was panicking. Everyone was scattering. I tried to get away but the guy was holding me around my neck with his right arm and as I turned, he grabbed my upper arm and didn't let go. I heard my shoulder rip and felt it pop out of place. The pain surprised me so much, I fell forward, and as I did someone shot the guy holding me."

Logan's knuckles were white. "Are you telling me that someone was holding you at gunpoint and you thought it was a good idea to try to wiggle away from him?"

"No, I didn't think it was a good idea! I wasn't thinking! But it's lucky I did—would you rather I stood still and let him blow my brains out?"

"Of course not. You know I'm not mad about that. I'm mad you didn't call me the second they got you to the hospital!"

The wind was picking up and the waves were growing larger. The boat had begun to rock as Veronica was telling her story and now the boat was undulating severely. With each rise and fall, she felt pain in her shoulder as it jarred. She didn't know if it was this pain or the pain she saw in Logan that finally caused her tears to break free.

He knew he made her cry too much. He knew he was a jerk for dragging her out into the middle of the ocean just to yell at her and not let her run away. He couldn't stop himself from being a monster. He also couldn't stop himself from picking her up and putting her in his lap when he saw her like this. He braced her shoulder by aligning his right arm with hers and holding his left arm across her collar bones, making his hands meet where she was most vulnerable. He wanted to absorb all of her pain.

"It's okay, Baby," he whispered to her, soft and lovingly now. "We've just gotta' wait out this storm. Driving through it will be harder on you. I'm sorry I yelled. Just relax and we'll get through it."

She cried even harder, knowing she didn't deserve him.