Force of Gravity, Ch. 2
Title: The Force of Gravity
Rating: R (language and sexual content)
Summary: It's a darker Neptune, a darker Eli Navarro, and Veronica's pretty sure that she's gotten darker too.
Spoilers: Up to Not Pictured.
Disclaimer: All characters, plots, etc. belong to Rob Thomas and the lovely people who make Veronica Mars possible.
It doesn’t take long for Logan Echolls to appear. He’s a whirlwind of squealing tires in that bumblebee SUV of his and Eli thinks that if any brakes in the world deserve overtime pay and a long vacation, those do. Barbed curses spew from Echolls’ mouth even before the door opens enough for them to be heard above the music blasting from the portable stereo. He waits, leaning against the table with the tool chest, as Logan storms into the garage bay spoiling for a fight.
“What the fuck is this? You planning on nailing all of my girlfriends? Is that what it takes to get you off?” Logan’s face is flushed and his eyes are a little too puffy to have not been crying. The odor of whiskey hangs off his clothes and on his breath.
“Might help if you tell me which one you’re talking about,” he says without flinching.
“Veronica.” He chokes on her name and the tears almost come back. “Is it true?”
Eli shakes his head slowly and examines the grease under his fingernails. “Should know better than to trust Veronica Mars, man. You tellin’ me she’s been nothing but honest with you? How about that time she thought you killed Lilly?”
“For all of five seconds.” Logan’s voice is hoarse and frayed, like a rope about to snap.
“Long enough for her to whisper it in my ear.” He lets that sink in just long enough. “Why’d you think I was after you, huh? That night on the bridge. Think I just happened to ride by with my boys? There ain’t no coincidences in Neptune, you know that.”
“She wouldn’t...” The protest is feeble.
“Wouldn’t what? Know that she had no evidence on you...know that you were the son of a rich, white movie star? You would’ve walked just like you did for Felix.”
“I didn’t kill Felix.”
“And you didn’t kill Lilly either.” He shrugs and forces himself to stop picking at the grease on his skin. “But she didn’t know that, did she?”
Logan’s floundering for solid ground and it shows on his face. Never did have much skill at poker, with or without the chips. “I don’t believe you.”
“Ask yourself one question, did you really think she could be with you? Knowing what your dad was, knowing you’re just like him.” Even with his voice lowered, the words echo like gunshots in the quiet garage. Picking up a dirty rag, he rubs at some of the stains and looks up at Logan with a bitter smile. “So yeah. It’s true. She came to me, like she always does when she needs it done right, and I fucked her in some filthy alley off Ocean. You must really suck, cause she practically begged for it.”
He’s surprised he got that far before Logan throws the first punch. It stings, cuts his lip on his teeth, and rattles his brains around a fair bit. Wiping the blood away with his thumb, he simply smiles and waits for the next shot.
“Guess prison was good for you. You used to have a glass jaw,” Logan sneers. Always a talker, that one.
The second punch connects just as hard; he savors the shooting pain of what will be a black eye in the morning. He refuses to agree with Logan, refuses to say aloud that prison was good for him. That it stripped away the tattered shreds of any hope, any optimism, any blind faith in the goodness or justice of mankind that he might have had going in. He went into prison as Weevil but he came out as Eli Navarro, and he’s a whole new animal.
“What is this?” Logan asks when he still hasn’t tried to hit back.
“Just lettin’ you warm up. You gonna start putting some weight behind those or do I need to pretend they hurt?”
Logan pulls back for another punch that Eli can see a mile away. He ducks back out of the way easily, grabs the handle of the torque wrench he deliberately left sitting on the edge of the table, and whips the business end of the wrench across Logan’s face. There’s shock and pain staring out at him but he just smiles again, tasting his own blood in his mouth. Logan’s looking around for a weapon of some kind. Eli beats him to it and slams the wrench down onto his forearm. Now he sees what he wants to see. Fear; enough of it that it cuts through the rage and the pain and seeps into his consciousness that this was a profoundly bad idea.
“Maybe you’re right,” he tells Logan casually, enjoying the sight of him cradling the arm that’s probably broken. “See, I learned a few things in prison. Might want to keep that in mind.”
“You son of a bitch.” Wincing visibly at the pain in his arm, he takes a step back to get out of range of the wrench.
“I’m the son of a bitch? I wasn’t the one who tossed a sick old lady out on the street, was I?”
“What are you...” The question dies as understanding dawns. “That wasn’t--”
Eli doesn’t let him finish. “I’ll fuck your girlfriend if I damn well feel like it. Hell, you’ll bend over and grab your ankles if I tell you to. Do we understand each other?” His grip tightens on the wrench just in case the idiot doesn’t, but he simply glares and limps back to the glaring yellow atrocity. Eli’s sick and tired of 09er bullshit and now he knows it doesn’t end after high school does. It never ends. He’ll always be the dark gunk underneath the shoes of people like Echolls.
Alone again, he runs the wrench under the tap and then pours bleach over it. The shop lights are more than enough to scan the floor and equipment for stray drops of blood. Even if they find blood on the floor or any of the tools, odds are it’ll belong to one of the mechanics rather than Echolls’. They’re welcome to look. He learned a thing or two in prison.
He rolls back under the car and gathers up the tools he used. The whole engine needs to be broken down and built back up; that’s what Angel’s paying him for now that he’s a felon and has no choice but to bite his tongue and join the family business. Everywhere he goes, that criminal record will follow and even though he knows it was worth it, it tastes sour in his mouth.
The timecard he clocks out with isn’t his. But he’d pay that much to see Echolls get beat up any day and Vargas is an asshole who thinks a woman needs to be kept in her place with a fist. There’s no motorcycle waiting for him in the parking lot; he walks the eight blocks to where he left it outside a house still full of lights and voices. He’s up the back stairs, quiet as a shadow, and slips inside. The party’s downstairs but his alibi is asleep in her bed.
Stripping down to skin, he eases into the bed gently enough that she stirs but doesn’t wake immediately. Another few moments, he waits and rolls onto his side, pretending to sleep.
“Did you go somewhere, baby?” Marla asks sleepily.
Making a show of yawning, he rolls over and snakes his arm around her waist. “Why would I leave when everything I want is right here?” That’s all he has to say to make her smile and she’s wide-eyed with trust in him. When the cops come knocking, and he knows they will, she’ll swear on a Bible that he was with her all night.
She snuggles up against him, stroking his arm and making those little sighs that make him want to break things. He doesn’t, of course, because she serves a purpose and he’s not done with her yet. Marla is all coy smiles and flirting; she makes sure he notices her breasts whenever he sees her. He tells her what she wants to hear more often than not, whispering it against her skin without meaning a single word. There are nights that he wants to, but once they’re spent and he’s free to roll away without hurting her feelings, he’s just as empty as he was before.
What she doesn’t do is ask him to press her up against a wall and do whatever he wants to her. She doesn’t say harder because Marla is all about sweet and slow. It’s hard not to be impatient with her constant sweetness and he’s beginning to wonder if he was wrong.
Marla was soft and gentle and he thought that’s what he needed to make him feel human again, but when he closes his eyes, he doesn’t see her. There’s a too skinny blonde whose skin tastes like betrayal stuck in his head. It’s her voice he hears; her flashing, angry eyes that he sees. She’s sharp angles and porcupine quills. Veronica Mars is a lot of things but soft will never be one of them. He’s beginning to crave someone with teeth and claws, someone who’ll cut into him until he feels alive.
He wishes he didn’t want her, wishes that he could bury the memories of her beneath sex or alcohol. Wishes that he’d done the smart thing and left her standing in that alley. Left without knowing the feel of her body against his because now it’s all he can think about. All the soft caresses and sweet Marlas in the world weren’t ever going to get under his skin the way Veronica does.
While he may not always do the smart thing, he’s not stupid either. He knows Veronica isn’t his for the taking. The alley was about leverage, about making sure she had the firepower she needed. Even knowing that it wasn’t him she wanted, just anyone but Echolls, he’d been angry and reckless enough to take the offer. He did it because he wanted to be the one holding the knife in Logan’s back. It was just a bonus that for one brief, desperate moment pressed against her, he felt alive.
It turns out that revenge is still bittersweet.
Rating: R (language and sexual content)
Summary: It's a darker Neptune, a darker Eli Navarro, and Veronica's pretty sure that she's gotten darker too.
Spoilers: Up to Not Pictured.
Disclaimer: All characters, plots, etc. belong to Rob Thomas and the lovely people who make Veronica Mars possible.
It doesn’t take long for Logan Echolls to appear. He’s a whirlwind of squealing tires in that bumblebee SUV of his and Eli thinks that if any brakes in the world deserve overtime pay and a long vacation, those do. Barbed curses spew from Echolls’ mouth even before the door opens enough for them to be heard above the music blasting from the portable stereo. He waits, leaning against the table with the tool chest, as Logan storms into the garage bay spoiling for a fight.
“What the fuck is this? You planning on nailing all of my girlfriends? Is that what it takes to get you off?” Logan’s face is flushed and his eyes are a little too puffy to have not been crying. The odor of whiskey hangs off his clothes and on his breath.
“Might help if you tell me which one you’re talking about,” he says without flinching.
“Veronica.” He chokes on her name and the tears almost come back. “Is it true?”
Eli shakes his head slowly and examines the grease under his fingernails. “Should know better than to trust Veronica Mars, man. You tellin’ me she’s been nothing but honest with you? How about that time she thought you killed Lilly?”
“For all of five seconds.” Logan’s voice is hoarse and frayed, like a rope about to snap.
“Long enough for her to whisper it in my ear.” He lets that sink in just long enough. “Why’d you think I was after you, huh? That night on the bridge. Think I just happened to ride by with my boys? There ain’t no coincidences in Neptune, you know that.”
“She wouldn’t...” The protest is feeble.
“Wouldn’t what? Know that she had no evidence on you...know that you were the son of a rich, white movie star? You would’ve walked just like you did for Felix.”
“I didn’t kill Felix.”
“And you didn’t kill Lilly either.” He shrugs and forces himself to stop picking at the grease on his skin. “But she didn’t know that, did she?”
Logan’s floundering for solid ground and it shows on his face. Never did have much skill at poker, with or without the chips. “I don’t believe you.”
“Ask yourself one question, did you really think she could be with you? Knowing what your dad was, knowing you’re just like him.” Even with his voice lowered, the words echo like gunshots in the quiet garage. Picking up a dirty rag, he rubs at some of the stains and looks up at Logan with a bitter smile. “So yeah. It’s true. She came to me, like she always does when she needs it done right, and I fucked her in some filthy alley off Ocean. You must really suck, cause she practically begged for it.”
He’s surprised he got that far before Logan throws the first punch. It stings, cuts his lip on his teeth, and rattles his brains around a fair bit. Wiping the blood away with his thumb, he simply smiles and waits for the next shot.
“Guess prison was good for you. You used to have a glass jaw,” Logan sneers. Always a talker, that one.
The second punch connects just as hard; he savors the shooting pain of what will be a black eye in the morning. He refuses to agree with Logan, refuses to say aloud that prison was good for him. That it stripped away the tattered shreds of any hope, any optimism, any blind faith in the goodness or justice of mankind that he might have had going in. He went into prison as Weevil but he came out as Eli Navarro, and he’s a whole new animal.
“What is this?” Logan asks when he still hasn’t tried to hit back.
“Just lettin’ you warm up. You gonna start putting some weight behind those or do I need to pretend they hurt?”
Logan pulls back for another punch that Eli can see a mile away. He ducks back out of the way easily, grabs the handle of the torque wrench he deliberately left sitting on the edge of the table, and whips the business end of the wrench across Logan’s face. There’s shock and pain staring out at him but he just smiles again, tasting his own blood in his mouth. Logan’s looking around for a weapon of some kind. Eli beats him to it and slams the wrench down onto his forearm. Now he sees what he wants to see. Fear; enough of it that it cuts through the rage and the pain and seeps into his consciousness that this was a profoundly bad idea.
“Maybe you’re right,” he tells Logan casually, enjoying the sight of him cradling the arm that’s probably broken. “See, I learned a few things in prison. Might want to keep that in mind.”
“You son of a bitch.” Wincing visibly at the pain in his arm, he takes a step back to get out of range of the wrench.
“I’m the son of a bitch? I wasn’t the one who tossed a sick old lady out on the street, was I?”
“What are you...” The question dies as understanding dawns. “That wasn’t--”
Eli doesn’t let him finish. “I’ll fuck your girlfriend if I damn well feel like it. Hell, you’ll bend over and grab your ankles if I tell you to. Do we understand each other?” His grip tightens on the wrench just in case the idiot doesn’t, but he simply glares and limps back to the glaring yellow atrocity. Eli’s sick and tired of 09er bullshit and now he knows it doesn’t end after high school does. It never ends. He’ll always be the dark gunk underneath the shoes of people like Echolls.
Alone again, he runs the wrench under the tap and then pours bleach over it. The shop lights are more than enough to scan the floor and equipment for stray drops of blood. Even if they find blood on the floor or any of the tools, odds are it’ll belong to one of the mechanics rather than Echolls’. They’re welcome to look. He learned a thing or two in prison.
He rolls back under the car and gathers up the tools he used. The whole engine needs to be broken down and built back up; that’s what Angel’s paying him for now that he’s a felon and has no choice but to bite his tongue and join the family business. Everywhere he goes, that criminal record will follow and even though he knows it was worth it, it tastes sour in his mouth.
The timecard he clocks out with isn’t his. But he’d pay that much to see Echolls get beat up any day and Vargas is an asshole who thinks a woman needs to be kept in her place with a fist. There’s no motorcycle waiting for him in the parking lot; he walks the eight blocks to where he left it outside a house still full of lights and voices. He’s up the back stairs, quiet as a shadow, and slips inside. The party’s downstairs but his alibi is asleep in her bed.
Stripping down to skin, he eases into the bed gently enough that she stirs but doesn’t wake immediately. Another few moments, he waits and rolls onto his side, pretending to sleep.
“Did you go somewhere, baby?” Marla asks sleepily.
Making a show of yawning, he rolls over and snakes his arm around her waist. “Why would I leave when everything I want is right here?” That’s all he has to say to make her smile and she’s wide-eyed with trust in him. When the cops come knocking, and he knows they will, she’ll swear on a Bible that he was with her all night.
She snuggles up against him, stroking his arm and making those little sighs that make him want to break things. He doesn’t, of course, because she serves a purpose and he’s not done with her yet. Marla is all coy smiles and flirting; she makes sure he notices her breasts whenever he sees her. He tells her what she wants to hear more often than not, whispering it against her skin without meaning a single word. There are nights that he wants to, but once they’re spent and he’s free to roll away without hurting her feelings, he’s just as empty as he was before.
What she doesn’t do is ask him to press her up against a wall and do whatever he wants to her. She doesn’t say harder because Marla is all about sweet and slow. It’s hard not to be impatient with her constant sweetness and he’s beginning to wonder if he was wrong.
Marla was soft and gentle and he thought that’s what he needed to make him feel human again, but when he closes his eyes, he doesn’t see her. There’s a too skinny blonde whose skin tastes like betrayal stuck in his head. It’s her voice he hears; her flashing, angry eyes that he sees. She’s sharp angles and porcupine quills. Veronica Mars is a lot of things but soft will never be one of them. He’s beginning to crave someone with teeth and claws, someone who’ll cut into him until he feels alive.
He wishes he didn’t want her, wishes that he could bury the memories of her beneath sex or alcohol. Wishes that he’d done the smart thing and left her standing in that alley. Left without knowing the feel of her body against his because now it’s all he can think about. All the soft caresses and sweet Marlas in the world weren’t ever going to get under his skin the way Veronica does.
While he may not always do the smart thing, he’s not stupid either. He knows Veronica isn’t his for the taking. The alley was about leverage, about making sure she had the firepower she needed. Even knowing that it wasn’t him she wanted, just anyone but Echolls, he’d been angry and reckless enough to take the offer. He did it because he wanted to be the one holding the knife in Logan’s back. It was just a bonus that for one brief, desperate moment pressed against her, he felt alive.
It turns out that revenge is still bittersweet.