As Logan stepped into Veronica's apartment, he tried to mask his surprise. It was small - one cramped room served as a kitchen, dining room, and living room. The woodwork bore faint scuffs from countless tenants, and the air had that unmistakable scent of a slightly neglected building: a blend of dust, old wood, and faint mildew. But Veronica and Keith had tried to make it more than just a temporary stopover. A soft green throw was draped over a worn couch, cushions mismatched but clearly chosen with care. There were small, framed photos on the shelf - scenes of her and her dad, and a picture of Veronica and Lilly that caught the light, as if daring the world to dim that memory. Despite everything, they'd carved out warmth here, a fragile comfort that Logan felt instantly out of place in.
Veronica moved past him, barely glancing back, and motioned for him to sit. He obeyed, sinking into the comfortable green couch, while she slowly perched on the striped armchair next to it, something awkward about her movement. The tension between them was thick, the air charged with things unsaid and things he feared saying.
Finally, Logan broke it, his voice soft. "What... what did they do to you, Veronica?" His voice cracked as he spoke, terrified of her answer but unable to bear his ignorance a moment longer.
She met his gaze, her eyes guarded. "They sexually assaulted me, Logan." She said it plainly, each word like a stone cast into a still pond, rippling through the room until he couldn't breathe. Her words were a punch to the gut. She finally looked away, her fingers fiddling with a loose thread on the throw. "Dick, Tad, and Sean were the main ones. Beaver, Caz, and Enbom were there too."
The words rang in his ears, confirming his worst fears and he clenched his fists. "I'm so sorry, I had no idea they would—"
"Go that far?" Her voice cut through his words, sharp and brittle. "Because you were so busy doing what exactly? Putting glass in my shoe? I was your friend, Logan, and you set them on me like dogs, while you stood by and watched." She swallowed, her voice cracking as she added, "They were your lackeys."
Logan's face paled, and he struggled to look at her. He couldn't bear the look in her eyes, the way they flickered with equal parts pain and fury. "Veronica," he whispered, ashamed, "why didn't you tell the police?"
She laughed, a bitter, mocking sound that sent a chill down his spine. "Are you serious? Go to the police?" Her expression hardened, her jaw tightening as if holding back a torrent of emotions. "With what credibility, Logan? The girl already accused of murder by half the town? I'd be laughed out of there before I even started."
The realisation struck him like a blow. She'd been carrying this all alone, her every avenue of help closed off. Guilt gnawed at him, settling deep and dark in his chest. "Do you have any evidence?"
"Yes," she replied quietly, her voice nearly a whisper, tinged with both strength and vulnerability. "I do. But who's going to believe me, Logan? Who's going to see past all this?" She gestured around the room as if it contained everything the world held against her and Keith.
Logan opened his mouth but found the words caught in his throat. "And you haven't told your dad?" he asked, though he already suspected the answer.
She shook her head, her expression hardening. "I think you know the answer to that. He's all I have left, and if he found out, he'd…" She trailed off, her voice thickening, as her eyes flickered with barely restrained emotion. "This would break him, Logan. And he'd go after them himself."
Logan pressed his palms together, his fingers trembling as he tried to find some way to help. "Please, Veronica," he whispered, his voice almost pleading, "please go to the police. Don't keep this inside. Your dad can handle this. You shouldn't have to go through this alone."
She stared at him, a raw anger flickering to life in her eyes. "And why do I have to go through it alone, Logan?" Her voice wavered, breaking slightly. "You of all people, Logan—you should've known me better. You really thought I'd killed Lilly? How could you even believe that?" She choked back the words, and for a brief moment, he glimpsed the depth of the betrayal she felt, the hurt she'd locked away behind a mask of anger.
Logan's gaze dropped, and he traced the patterns in the old, threadbare carpet with his foot. "I was so angry, I just... I couldn't see past it."
They both sat in silence, a chasm of broken trust and shared history stretching wide between them. Veronica shifted uncomfortably, folding her arms around herself as if warding off the memories that lingered in the room.
After a long pause, she took a deep breath, as if summoning every last reserve of strength. "Maybe…" Her voice was soft, almost a whisper. "Maybe I'll go to the police. Now that the charges against me have been dropped." Her face hardened, as if bracing herself for what would come next. "But I need you to do something for me."
"Anything," Logan said quickly, his desperation thick, his eyes pleading.
She turned to him, her expression unwavering, her voice low and steady. "Keep them away from me. I have to see them every day, Logan, knowing what they did to me. That they hated me enough to do that." Her voice cracked, and her hand tightened on the edge of the couch. "Can you imagine that? Walking past them in the halls, seeing them laugh, as if none of this happened?"
He couldn't imagine it, couldn't fathom the strength it took for her to walk into school each day. "I'll make sure they stay away from you," he said firmly, his voice resolute. This was the least he could do, and he knew it.
Veronica gave a small nod, her lips pressed into a tight line. Her gaze drifted towards the window, the light casting shadows over her face, making her look distant, unreachable. "And tell me what they say. If they say anything helpful, anything I can use."
"I will, I promise."
They sat together in silence, but it was different now, tinged with a fragile understanding. She had let him in, just barely, and Logan knew he'd have to fight to earn whatever trust she had left.
A chill clawed its way up Veronica's spine as she approached the Neptune Sheriff's Department, each step up the worn stone steps feeling heavier than the last. The building loomed, casting long shadows that swallowed her resolve. She walked through the entrance as the unforgiving lights buzzing above illuminated the gritty, peeling paint and stale walls. It was as if the place itself had absorbed years of secrets and lies, waiting to judge her like everyone else had.
At long last, her ankle was free of the monitor, the weight of it gone but the itch of its memory still there. All charges had been dropped. But even in this moment of supposed justice, Sheriff Lamb hadn't bothered to face her himself. Instead, he'd sent Deputy Sacks to break the news to her and Cliff at the station, who looked as though he were grateful to be the bearer of good news for once. Sacks had delivered the news with a quiet relief that seemed to say he'd never believed she should've worn that monitor at all, a silent apology she almost wished he'd spoken out loud. The dismissal felt empty, just another reminder of how easily they'd pinned her for murder in the first place.
Inside, she caught sight of Inga at her desk, sorting through paperwork. Inga looked up, her face softening into a welcoming smile, but Veronica's own expression remained stiff, unable to return it. "Is Lamb around?" she asked, her voice clipped, betraying none of the nervousness clawing at her insides.
Inga nodded, disappearing to check, and when she returned, she motioned for Veronica to go through. Veronica felt her pulse quicken as she crossed the threshold into Lamb's office. From behind his cluttered desk, he looked up, his expression shifting from casual indifference to a flicker of mocking surprise.
"Well, well, Veronica Mars," he drawled, crossing his arms. "Like a bad penny, always turning up. What's the occasion this time?"
Veronica swallowed, fingers clenched tightly around the strap of her bag to keep her hands from shaking. "I need to report a crime." She kept her chin up, forcing herself to hold his gaze, though every part of her wanted to shrink back, to run away before he could twist the knife deeper.
Lamb scoffed, a lazy smirk tugging at his lips. "You just can't stay out of trouble, can you?" He didn't invite her to sit, but she perched on the edge of the padded chair opposite him, bracing herself.
She took a deep breath. "On the 28th of November… I was attacked. And raped."
Lamb blinked, his smirk flickering, but it didn't fully disappear. He tilted his head, the look on his face a mix of scepticism and boredom. "By who?"
Her voice caught in her throat, but she pushed forward. "A group of boys I go to school with. Dick Casablancas, John Enbom…"
"Oh, I see," he interrupted, a derisive laugh escaping his lips. "This your little revenge fantasy? Trying to drag the sons of Neptune's finest through the mud?" He leaned in, his tone dropping to a sneer. "Why didn't you report it right away, Veronica? Too busy avoiding murder charges?"
Veronica's throat tightened, but she reached into her bag, her hands cold, her fingers stiff as she pulled out the papers from the hospital. She laid them on his desk, the silence between them thick and suffocating, filled with her fear, her shame, her hope that maybe, just maybe, someone would listen. "There's a rape kit at the hospital," she said, her voice a mere whisper. She lifted her sleeve, exposing the faint, sickly yellow bruises that lingered on her arm. She hated this, hated showing him what they'd done to her, but it was her last card. "They hurt me. It's all documented."
Lamb stared at the bruises, his expression impassive. When he met her eyes, there was no sympathy, only a cold, calculating stare. "How am I supposed to know you didn't just have… you know, a little rough sex that you regretted the next day?" He shrugged as if this were nothing, something trivial. "A girl like you, Veronica, you're used to getting what you want. Maybe it didn't go your way this time."
Her stomach churned, bile rising in her throat. The helplessness, the raw, guttural fear of that night came flooding back, suffocating her, but she forced herself to stay still, her fists clenched in her lap. "I didn't come forward sooner," she managed, her voice trembling, "because you were so quick to believe the worst of me when Lilly was killed." Her composure cracked, a tear slipping down her cheek despite her desperate attempt to hold it back. "But this happened. They raped me." Her voice broke, the rawness of the admission echoing between them.
Lamb let out a long, exaggerated sigh, leaning back in his chair as if she were wasting his precious time. He looked her over with that same mocking indifference. "Then maybe you should take a page out of Oz," he sneered, waving his hand dismissively. "Go see the wizard, Mars, and get yourself a backbone."
With that, he turned away, dismissing her, as if everything she'd said meant nothing.
Veronica felt her control finally slip, the tears spilling over, hot and stinging as they traced down her cheeks. She stumbled back, barely aware of her own feet carrying her out of his office, through the sterile, cold halls. Each step felt bleak, the realisation settling over her, heavy as stone: if she wanted justice, she'd have to find it on her own.
Leaving the quiet of her apartment behind was almost a relief as Veronica parked in the crowded lot of Neptune High. Out here, under the open sky, she could finally breathe. Away from her father's ever-watchful gaze, she could loosen the tight grip on the truth she was keeping locked inside. Each glance from Keith held an unspoken question, a silent plea to know what weighed on her; he didn't realise the answer would break them both.
The lie between them was suffocating, stretching wide like a shadow over everything. She'd clung to a sliver of hope that Lamb might take her seriously, that perhaps her father wouldn't have to hear the truth from her lips - but that last shred of belief in justice had just shattered into bitter shards.
Keith Mars had always been her rock, her safe haven in every storm. His belief in fair play, his faith in the law—traits that had once made him sheriff, had guided him through the hardest days. But Veronica knew her father's greatest vulnerability.
Her.
If she told him the truth of what happened on the beach, the full truth, she knew the consequences wouldn't be worth surviving. Keith would come for them, and in his wake, there would be wreckage, ruin, and probably bodies. For her sake, he'd cross lines he couldn't come back from, and she'd lose the only person in the world who truly loved her. She couldn't let that happen.
Veronica glanced at herself in the rearview mirror, checking the foundation she'd carefully applied that morning. The bruises had faded to a sickly blend of green and purple, like some grim watercolour staining her skin. She straightened her spine, inhaling deeply.
Take no shit from anyone, she reminded herself.
As she stepped out of the car, Neptune High buzzed around her: the chatter of voices, lockers slamming shut, the familiar clash of cheap perfume and stale disinfectant. This world she once thrived in now felt foreign, like walking through a movie set of her life, with a veil between her and everyone else. She moved quickly to her locker, shuffling books to avoid the eyes she knew were watching her. As she grabbed her books for the day, she froze, her heart lurching into her throat.
At the end of the corridor stood Sean Friedrich.
Ice prickled down her spine. Logan had promised, but she'd known even then that he couldn't be everywhere at once, couldn't divide himself into six pieces to keep them all away. The sight of Sean's face brought a fresh wave of nausea; her body moved before her mind could catch up, spinning around and ducking into the girls' bathroom. She leaned against the sink, her chest heaving with shallow breaths.
The mirror was cracked, streaked with condensation from the sinks, but Veronica barely noticed as she scrubbed her hands in the sink. Over and over, rubbing until her skin was raw. Get it off. Get it all off.
The quiet voice startled her, slicing through her frantic thoughts.
"I think they're clean."
Veronica turned sharply, finding herself face to face with Mac - the girl with green streaks in her hair who had a knack for blending into the background. But now, Mac was watching her with a curious expression, leaning casually against the bathroom stall.
Veronica swallowed, embarrassed to have been caught. She hadn't even heard Mac come in.
"I hear all the charges have been dropped," Mac continued, her voice light, offering a small smile that was somewhere between friendly and conspiratorial. "After that traffic ticket got leaked to the media. Weird, huh?"
Veronica gazed at her, her brain struggling to keep up. "How do you know it was leaked?"
Mac's smile widened, just a fraction. "So, let's say someone - hypothetically - was skilled with computers, and maybe one night they got bored. Just for fun, they might've poked around the sheriff's files for a challenge. Then, purely by accident, stumbled on something… something that could've helped you but wasn't getting any attention." She shrugged, as if it were the most casual thing in the world. "And maybe that same evidence found its way to multiple news desks in Neptune."
Veronica stared, speechless. Mac's words hung in the air, her quiet, almost reluctant act of rebellion against the injustice that had been suffocating Veronica since the accusations first started. She couldn't believe what she was hearing.
Finally, she found her voice, though it came out barely above a whisper. "Why would that person do that? Help me?"
Mac straightened from the stall, her gaze steady and calm, a flicker of something unreadable in her eyes. "Why not? I wouldn't say I'm exactly an avenging angel, but watching that ticket sit there, gathering dust… it just didn't seem fair."
Veronica swallowed, her mind reeling. She had spent the past few weeks navigating a minefield of whispers, accusations, and violence - trust had become a luxury she couldn't afford. But Mac... Mac had done something no one else had bothered to do.
She had helped her.
Mac's casual demeanour belied the power of her actions. She wasn't just some girl hiding behind her computer screen.
For the first time in a long time, Veronica felt a flicker of possibility - small and fragile, but real.
Veronica nodded slowly, her gaze softening for the first time. "Thank you."
Mac gave a half-smile, pushing her hands into her pockets. "You'd do the same. You've got that whole 'screw the system' vibe going on too."
Veronica allowed herself a tiny smile in return. Maybe she did. Maybe she was more like Mac than she realised. And maybe, just maybe, that wasn't such a bad thing.
As Mac turned to leave, her voice echoed softly in the small, tiled bathroom.
"If you ever need anything... you know where to find me."
Veronica watched her go, the weight on her chest lifting ever so slightly.
"Well, what do you think?" Keith asked, his arm slung casually around Veronica's shoulders, pride swelling in his voice. Veronica's eyes roamed over the newly finished office of the family business, where they had spent the morning rearranging furniture and giving the place some life.
The etched glass panel on the door read Mars Investigations in bold, clear letters. Inside, a second-hand brown sofa from a yard sale sat against the wall, giving the room a comfortable, lived-in feel. The potted plants Veronica had picked out added a touch of green to the space, softening the edges of the room. Red and yellow lighting filtered in from the stained-glass window cast a warm glow, giving the office almost an old-fashioned detective vibe. It felt like home in a way she hadn't expected.
"Looking pretty good," Veronica said, a small smile tugging at the corner of her lips. "Phone lines are hooked up, leaflets are handed out. Now all we need is customers."
Keith chuckled softly, his brow furrowing slightly as he glanced at her. "We?"
"Yeah,we," Veronica replied, meeting his gaze with a firm nod. "I'm your assistant—answering phones, filing, keeping everything organised. You're going to need me."
Keith raised an eyebrow, his smile slipping into something more serious. "As long as that's all it is."
Veronica gave a noncommittal shrug. "We'll see."
Before Keith could respond, the phone on her desk rang, cutting through the moment. Veronica's face lit up with excitement as she darted to grab the receiver with her good hand. "I'll get it!"
"Mars Investigations, how can I help?" she said brightly, cradling the phone with her shoulder, and pulled a sticky note toward her, poised to jot down the details. Her eyes flicked up to Keith as she spoke. "That definitely sounds like something we can help with. Mr. Mars has an opening tomorrow at eleven."
Hanging up the phone with a satisfied click, she turned back to Keith, her eyes gleaming. "First client. Easy."
Keith's face broke into a wide grin. "Nice work." He ruffled her hair affectionately, and Veronica barely managed to contain her flinch at his unexpected touch. "Looks like you were born to be my assistant."
Instead she rolled her eyes, swatting his hand away with a playful grumble. "Yeah, yeah."
Keith laughed, stepping toward the door. "Think it's time for a lunch break. I'll grab us some burgers."
"Ah, yes. Nothing like a healthy, nutritious burger," Veronica said with mock enthusiasm, crossing her arms. "My favourite."
Keith shot her a wink as he pulled the door shut behind him. The click of the lock left the office in silence, save for the faint hum of the fan whirring. Veronica stood still for a moment, waiting, her mind already working. When she was sure he was gone, she moved swiftly across the room to the metal cabinet where Keith stored his new gear.
Sliding open the door, she peered down at the contents, her fingers grazing over the small, neatly organised devices. Tiny cameras, perfect for hiding in unsuspecting places. Tracking devices. Miniature microphones. The tools of her dad's trade, now in her hands.
Her fingers lingered on the equipment as her mind spun through possibilities. She could feel the thrill of it building inside her, the quiet hum of plans forming, ticking away like a clock.
All of this was going to come in handy. Very handy. Over the next few weeks, she'd need every trick in the book.