templemarker

by templemarker

Notes: Wildcard – Rough Sex for kink_bingo. Veronica/Logan, NC17, really it should be self-explanatory. Spoilers through the entire series. I suspect this is actually the story I have always wanted to write post-finale, and if marcolette had her way this would be about five thousand words longer. Perhaps someday she will.

***

The first time Logan had joked that Veronica couldn’t take him down, they were sixteen and a little drunk and in a room full of people who were entirely self-involved unless something really juicy was going down.

When tiny little blonde Veronica Mars had both of Logan Echolls’ hands pinned behind his back, face shoved into the beige Berber carpeting of the Kane front room, eighty perfectly coiffed heads turned to watch. She grinned, triumphant, and climbed off him, pushing up onto her stacked wedge sandals like it was nothing.

“Damn, Mars,” Logan said from the floor, “I didn’t know they taught jujitsu in ballet class.”

She took her Mike’s Hard Lemonade back from her boyfriend, who was helping his sister up from where she had fallen down laughing, and said, “They also teach hand-to-hand and marksmanship, so I’d mind the mouth if you want to keep your family jewels, Logan.”

He never shut up about it anyway, but he didn’t give her quite as much shit about being with Duncan after that.

*

Two years later he’s drunk and sorry and fucking pathetic. Veronica can’t remember the last time she drank anything stronger than a Diet Coke, and when he tries to kiss her she knees him in the balls, flips him so he’s crushed against the wall, and pushes her hand against his neck to mash his face against the pretty blue tile of the doorframe.

“Veronica,” he says, breath catching on her name, and she can’t even enjoy the way he says it anymore, which makes her so fucking mad that she drops her hold and steps back. She tries to control the harsh panting that’s ringing in her ears, and when he slumps down the wall she can see the line of his dick against the zipper of her jeans. That would make her more angry, because that used to be hers goddamnit; but she takes another step back and doesn’t look down when she walks out the door and away from him.

*

Another eight years go by, and Veronica has absolutely no intention of going to her high school reunion. No one would be surprised by the Federal badge clipped to her belt, and Quantico is far enough away from Neptune that she only thinks of home every other day. It’s progress.

But then her dad calls, makes up some story about how he could really use some help around the house, says the dog really misses her, guilts her into booking a flight and RSVP’ing for the stupid event. This is what comes of single parenting, she thinks ruefully, the ability to guilt trip at three thousand miles.

The house is fine, the dog ignores her, and her dad hugs her so tightly she thinks her ribs are going to break. They do silly father-daughter stuff, and she suggests again that he should move to the east coast, and he slips her a hundred bucks to go buy a new dress even though she brought a perfectly fine black one she’s only worn once. Veronica tries to give it back, but her dad is still better at lifts than she is, and she finds the note in her pocket on the way to the mall. She rolls her eyes and buys a dress; it’s too hard to argue with him sometimes.

When she walks in to the gym of the high school, it feels like everyone’s looking. It takes her a second to realize they’re not; she’s just scanning the room like she would if it were a first-response situation, and she laughs herself out of it and goes to the bar. One miserly beer in hand, she picks a spot and leans, not intending to move for the rest of the night.

Of course, ten minutes later her ex-boyfriend and former accused murderer has come to slouch companionably by her side. “Didn’t expect to see you here,” Logan says like they talk every other day about coupons at Albertson’s.

Veronica looks straight ahead, starts reciting uniform codes in her mind. “The power of the parental,” she says succintly.

“So involved, so young. When will they ever learn?” Logan tsks.

Veronica just takes another sip of her Bud Light.

“You know, sometimes I still think about how you felt when we had sex, the way you’d push up against me and dig your fingers in my arm. I loved the noises I could get you to make. When you finally trusted me, for those ten minutes, you let yourself go and it felt like I owned the world. Or I owed the world, whichever one will get you to take me home tonight.” Logan finishes the rest of his sparkling water and puts the cup on the folded-up bleachers. She didn’t miss the sobriety chip dangling from his wrist.

Her beer had been halfway to her mouth when he starting running off his, and she’s staring at members of the football team trying unsuccessfully to breakdance while she’s figuring out what to say. “Cutting right to the chase, huh?” she says finally, setting her half-drunk beer beside his cup.

“It always seemed to work best with you,” Logan shrugs, pushing his hands into trousers that cost more than her last trip to the vet and holding her gaze. He was always able to do that, even when they hated each other, even when they were fighting. He could give it right back and not look away.

“We’re not fucking at my dad’s,” she says, pushing off from the wall and knowing he would follow. “I assume you have a room?”

“And a condom,” he said, dry voice belying the obvious excitement in his body. “I learned to be prepared.”

The room is modest even by Veronica’s standards–just a big, unwrinkled bed and a simple accents. It’s the kind of room that costs significantly more than it looks like it should, and Veronica’s a veteran of enough hotel rooms to know the difference. She toes off her shoes and places her handbag on the side table, and as her fingers touch the glass Logan comes up and wraps his arms around her.

“I remember the way you smell,” he says hungrily into her ear. “You always smelled like spearmint and adrenaline, it made me crazy.” He runs his hands up the length of her body, and for one brief moment she entertains the thought of letting him do this, touch her and remember being teenaged and stupid and way, way too close.

Then her rationality returns and she stills in his arms. “Nope,” she says, because this is not going to be about nostalgia. Their past doesn’t deserve to be remembered. She steps out of his arms, and he’s too surprised to do anything but let her. She turns, watching his eyes widen and then dilate like he knows what’s coming; but she doesn’t give him enough time to recall that even when he could read her he could never figure out what she was going to do next.

It takes two short stabs of her fingers and his six-foot frame is brought to its knees. He’s looking up at her, pain flaring briefly into heat, and she kind of hates that she can still read him, too. She lets her hand rest briefly on his face, thumb brushing against his mouth. He kisses it chastely, and it’s so close to sweet that she presses the seam of his lips until he opens and sucks it, slight bite of teeth on her skin.

“Up,” she says, and he rises shakily to his feet, moving towards the bed. She’s behind him, staring at that square line of shoulder beneath his white shirt pebbled with sweat. Just as he gets near enough, she places her hand in the span between his shoulderblades and her knee behind his and forces him face down into the mattress.

He knows what to expect from her, and she’s always had to use speed and agility to combat people–men–who physically outmatched her. The difference with Logan is that he never seemed inclined to fight back.

Some part of her pulls out, just enough past the lust burning in her veins, the screeching want of more that always happened with Logan, which apparently wasn’t just because they were hormone-stupid teenagers. She threads her fingers through the short hair at the back of his neck, remembering how they felt a decade ago, fascinated by the similarity. “Do you want this?” she asks, surprised at the thready sound of her own voice, and she can barely hear Logan’s “Fuck, yes, Veronica,” from where his mouth is against the comforter.

“I don’t know why you always trust me,” she confesses, because she doesn’t have to see his face; his body goes slack and open beneath her, and she grinds down a little just so he can feel how wet she is.

She stands to unzip her dress, and she watches as he stays exactly where she put him, hands clenched against his sides, ass slightly elevated. She puts a hand there, just to see what he would do; Veronica is certain that Logan’s fucked men before, but she doesn’t think he’d ever tell her about it. His stuttered jerk into her hold says everything and more. Her dress is crumpled on the floor, and Logan is waiting on the bed, and when she gathers his wrists in her hands she tries not to think of what tomorrow might look like.