"Working hard?" Logan's voice, out of the shadows.
Weevil heaved the trash bag over the edge of the dumpster and turned around to see Logan, sitting on the low wall at the edge of the parking lot. "Unfamiliar concept to you?"
Logan smirked. "You guessed it."
"Why are you still here, anyway? It's Christmas Eve. Go home." He didn't feel like trading insults with Logan; he wanted to go home himself.
"Yeah, I'm really looking forward to spending the holiday alone in my hotel suite."
"Cry me a fucking river."
Logan shrugged.
"No, seriously." Weevil folded his arms. "What are you doing here?"
Logan sighed and lowered his voice. "I heard Jenkins throws exams away after the last day of school. Figured I could score a few."
Now it was Weevil's turn to grin. "You heard right...kind of. They're shredded already."
"Son of a bitch." Logan's shoulders slumped. "So much for that idea."
They stood there uncomfortably for a few seconds. "So...don't you have holiday plans? Black-tie parties to go to, some shit like that?"
Logan's laugh this time was strained. "Let's see. My best friend here turns out to be a rapist. My only remaining friend from high school is in Beaver Creek. My father—coincidentally a murderer who slept with my girlfriend—is dead. My mother offed herself. My sister's shooting a commercial on location in the fucking Bahamas. And I don't have a girlfriend. Yeah...it's going to be one holly jolly holiday in the Echolls household."
"Sucks," Weevil said. The thing of it was, he actually did feel bad for the guy.
"How 'bout you? All the familia coming over to make tamales and listen to Feliz Navidad, or whatever the hell you people do?"
The bitchiness didn't have any bite behind it, so Weevil ignored it. Somehow hearing Logan describe his crappy holiday matter-of-factly made Weevil inclined to do the same. "Not exactly. This is the first Christmas since my grandma died, and I don't figure we'll be getting together anywhere this year. And I'm not exactly the type for Midnight Mass."
Logan looked up at the sky, then back at Weevil. "You wanna... play some cards and drink some tequila or something?"
Despite himself, Weevil smiled. "You inviting me over for Christmas, rich boy?"
"It's not like either one of us has anything better to do."
"So getting drunk with me beats watching holiday specials on cable and getting hammered by yourself, huh? You're a real prince, Echolls."
"Cable! There's satellite tv at the Neptune Grand. I wouldn't watch cable if you paid me."
Weevil shrugged. "Satellite tv, now, that changes things. What the fuck. Sure. Lemme go home and change."
"Into something a little more comfortable?" Logan raised an eyebrow.
"Into something that's not this uniform, asshole." Weevil scowled. "You plan on making innuendo like that, you better have some good liquor up there."
Logan bowed a little, as if tipping an imaginary hat, and hopped off the ledge to head for his car.
Weevil smelled smoke from halfway down the hall. He rapped on the door and Logan opened it with a cigar between his teeth.
"You really do like having things in your mouth, don't you?"
Logan didn't answer, just walked across the room, opened his humidor, and threw a cigar to Weevil. Smelled nice, unlit: this was some good tobacco. Handrolled. Probably Cuban and cost fifty bucks—exactly the kind of bullshit Logan would spend his money on.
"They let you smoke these things in here?"
Logan twirled his lighter in his hand, pausing to flick it on: like a little butane torch. "When you're paying for the penthouse, they let you do whatever the hell you want."
"I'll bear that in mind," Weevil said, and walked over to Logan to get a light.
Logan lit his cigar, standing just a little too close. Weevil blew smoke in his face.
"I ordered pizza," Logan said, jerking his head toward the coffee table where the box was waiting.
"Classy."
"Look, if I wanted foie gras and caviar, I wouldn't have invited you over in the first place."
Weevil grinned and withdrew the bottle of Herradura silver from his bag. "Maybe this'll help."
"My night's looking up already," Logan said, and grinned.
Weevil just smiled back, a little bit dangerously, showing teeth.
They'd played a few hands of gin rummy, and polished off a few shots of tequila apiece, when Logan made his move.
"Play your cards right, there might be a holiday blowjob in your future."
Weevil grinned. They hadn't fucked around in—shit, it had to be two years, but he hadn't forgotten Logan's...enthusiasm. "That so? And all I gotta do is draw better cards than you?"
Logan tipped his shotglass back. "Truth of the matter is," he said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, "you don't even have to do that."
Weevil wouldn't have admitted it aloud, but he'd been hoping this was how the evening might go. He'd been half-hard since he got here, a pressure that was rapidly increasing. "You want it that bad?" He studied his cards, trying not to show how desperately he suddenly craved what Logan was offering.
Logan waited until Weevil was looking him right in the eye. "Fuck, yeah."
Somehow the strength of Logan's desire turned the tables, took away Weevil's control. He leaned back on the couch and dropped his cards. As Logan's hands scrabbled at the thick leather of his belt and unzipped his jeans, Weevil bit back a groan.
The gleam in Logan's eye made his heart catch in his throat. And then Logan bent and slid his mouth all the way down.
"Fuck," Weevil said, unsteadily, thrusting up. Logan's outflung arm held him down, and Logan's mouth forced a slow rhythm, pulling back and sometimes grazing him lightly with teeth.
Weevil promised himself fervently that when their positions were reversed he would make Logan pay for every excruciating moment. "Come on," he bit out, barely resisting the urge to beg. "Don't fuck with me."
Logan pulled back and laughed, low and dirty, sending a stream of air across the sensitive head of Weevil's dick. Weevil clenched every muscle in his body to keep from coming. "Why not? You're enjoying it."
"Cabrn," Weevil muttered, and Logan bent to take him in again. He was on the edge of orgasm when, to his horror, the door of the suite opened.
"Oh my God," Veronica said.
Weevil could only gasp, staring right at her, as he came down Logan's throat.
"Oh my God." Veronica looked shellshocked.
"You said that already." Logan sat up and leaned back, defiant, as if daring Veronica to make a move. "Close the door, will you? You're letting in a draft."
Weevil yanked on his shirttail to cover himself.
Veronica closed the door and turned back to them, standing with her back against the door. "I don't know what I... I mean, I—didn't expect this," she said, finally.
At least she didn't look like she was going to kill him with her bare hands. Weevil relaxed a tiny bit.
Logan gestured toward the box on the table, which still had a few slices in it. "Pizza?"
"Not on your life."
Okay, maybe she was still pissed. Weevil reached for the bottle and Logan handed it to him without looking, eyes still locked on Veronica.
"I don't know what I thought I was doing, coming over here. I guess you aren't missing me much." Her voice was too bright, as though she were fighting tears.
"Like hell I'm not."
"You look...plenty occupied."
"What do you want me to say, Veronica?" Logan sounded miserable.
Veronica let her head thunk backwards into the plane of the door. "Ow," she said, to no one in particular.
Weevil was starting to get annoyed, being talked around like he wasn't even there. And he wasn't sure who he felt sorrier for, and that was a painful position he'd never meant to get himself into. "Won't you two excuse me," he said, biting the words off clean, and left them alone.
The bathroom was ridiculous: marble everywhere, and everything that wasn't marble was gold. Through the door Weevil could hear snatches of conversation: Logan saying, "it's not..." and "you don't..." Veronica saying "I just missed you" and "I shouldn't have..."
Kind of a shame; all night he'd been looking forward to making Echolls beg, but now that didn't seem to be in the cards. He felt a little guilty for even wanting it, now.
He flushed the toilet, hoping they would hear it and stop fighting or whatever they were doing out there, and headed back into the living room. There were three neat shots of tequila lined up on the coffee table, and Veronica's eyes were wet but she didn't seem to be crying.
"Time for a toast," Logan said, expansively, gesturing at the trio of shotglasses.
Weevil took one, a little warily, and sat on the edge of the other chair.
"Here's to..." Logan stopped.
"A better new year?" Weevil suggested.
"It's not New Year's yet."
"Fine, a Merry Christmas." Jeez.
"A Merry Christmas," Veronica echoed. All three of them downed their shots, and Logan refilled them with a flourish.
Veronica raised an eyebrow. "Trying to get me drunk? Are you sure that's a good idea?"
Logan just grinned, and Weevil felt the pit of his stomach curl. Sonofabitch wasn't crazy enough to hit on both of them at the same time, was he?
"Cards?" Logan suggested.
"My deal," Veronica said, firmly, and took the pack from his hands.
They switched to beer after a while. Weevil groused, but he was secretly glad of it. They'd been putting back the tequila at a fairly alarming rate, and he doubted Veronica could hold as much liquor as either he or Logan.
When Logan got up to take a piss, Weevil tapped Veronica on the arm. "You okay?"
Veronica tucked her hair behind her ears, which made her look younger somehow. He had a flash of memory of her showing up at school with her hair chopped off after Lilly died. "Yeah," she said, after a while. "I'm okay."
"I mean, with —" Weevil gestured at the room, meaning to suggest what she'd walked in on. She raised an eyebrow and he felt himself blush.
"Really. I'm okay. It's not like I have any claim on what he does, you know?"
She wasn't looking at him. Weevil's heart clenched. "V, I didn't mean for this to hurt you. We were just blowing off steam, you know?"
"Men," she said, lightly, rolling her eyes.
"Yeah," Weevil said, swigging the end of his beer. "You wanna make something of it?"
She didn't get the chance to answer before Logan rejoined them. "Another cold one, anyone?"
"Count me in," Veronica said, and gave Weevil a smile that made him blush again.
If it had been anyone else, he would have figured she was flirting with him. With them. But this was Veronica Mars; he had to be seeing things. It was the tequila and the beer and the weird turn the evening had taken. It was some kind of Christmas wishful thinking. It didn't mean anything.
"Get me one too," Weevil told Logan, and reached for the cards. "My turn to deal."
The next time Weevil came out of the bathroom, Logan and Veronica were tangled on the couch, kissing like they'd been jonesing for each other for weeks.
Well, that was that. And Logan was on top of his leather jacket, damn it. He tugged at it, maybe a little harder than he needed to, and yanked it free.
Logan looked up. "Where you going?"
"Try 'someplace where the two of you aren't going at it.'" He tried not to sound pathetic. He couldn't blame either one of them, which somehow just made him angrier.
"That's a shame," Logan said. "I was looking forward to getting fucked."
Weevil's imagination supplied him with a detailed mental image, and despite himself his cock stirred. "Don't start with me," he said, tightly, and pulled his jacket on. "I'm not in the mood."
Veronica laughed a little, low and flirty. "I am," she said.
Weevil swallowed hard. "Okay, just how drunk are you, because—"
Veronica turned the full power of her smile on him. "It's Christmas."
"This is going to look like a really bad idea tomorrow," Weevil warned.
"It's not tomorrow yet." Seeing something in his face, maybe anger or fear, Veronica dropped the act. "Not especially drunk, actually. Could we just pretend this isn't complicated for one night?" Quietly.
"That isn't—" Weevil began.
"And I think sleeping between the two of you would make me feel safe, for once." That stopped him short. "You don't have to stay, but I wish you would."
His resistance melted away. What was he, crazy, to turn this down? Weevil shrugged back out of his jacket; the smiles on Veronica and Logan's faces were incandescent, like a pair of suns.
Feeling Logan yield under his hands, under his sheathed cock, was hotter than it had any right to be. Logan groaned and Weevil watched his arms and shoulders tense, holding both of them up.
Of course, Veronica couldn't watch for long without telling them what to do. Typical. Though he'd never heard her give instructions quite like these before. "Can you kneel up?" she asked. "Back, like this," demonstrating, her knees slipping apart in a way that made him wish he could reach her.
Weevil wrapped an arm around Logan's chest and pulled Logan back with him. Not easy to sustain, but the angle was obviously good—Logan whimpered, working himself on Weevil's cock, and Weevil had to admire Veronica's ingenuity.
Even more so when she bent to take Logan's cock in her mouth. Logan swore, obviously struggling to hold it together, which made it even more delicious. Payback was a bitch, Weevil thought smugly, and bit the place where Logan's neck met his shoulder.
Veronica did something, or Weevil did—he wasn't sure, even trying to reconstruct it later in his mind—and Logan lost it, convulsing around him and almost crying. They gentled him through.
When they collapsed on the bed it made sense for Veronica to settle in Logan's arms, for Weevil to slide down her body and bring her off with his mouth as slowly as he could manage. Her hoarse cries sounded desperate, vulnerable, unlike any sound he'd ever imagined she might make.
Weevil was the first one to wake. His head throbbed a little, and his skin felt too tight. He slipped out of bed, drank a quart of water, and took the hottest shower he could stand. It wasn't a perfect hangover cure, but it usually helped.
There was no movement in the bedroom when he walked back through. He picked up his clothes from the random places they'd gotten scattered, and went out to the living room to dress.
The empty bottles and pizza box stared at him. So did Veronica's jacket, draped across a chair. Weevil shook his head, as if to clear it, and sat down to lace up his boots.
He was about to walk out when Veronica tiptoed out of the bedroom, wearing Logan's discarded shirt. Weevil could see red marks peeking out of the neckline. "Hey," she said, quietly.
Weevil nodded in greeting.
"You heading out?"
"Figured I wouldn't push my luck."
She just looked at him, not saying anything.
"Isn't your dad going to go ballistic?"
Veronica winced a little. "I told him I probably wouldn't be home until morning. Which I guess means I should start packing up."
Weevil looked at his watch. "It's barely seven."
"Yeah, but if I know my dad, he's already making sausages and pancake batter." She looked thoughtful for a moment. "Want to come over for breakfast?"
"You gonna bring both of us home? That'll go over well."
She rolled her eyes. "I'm not going to tell him anything. Are you crazy?"
Weevil considered it. Going home to an empty house wasn't that appealing, honestly. "I ought to change clothes," he said.
"Yeah, I'm not sure even Drakar can disguise cigar smoke."
"What is it with you and my cologne?"
The door to the bedroom opened and Logan came out, hair even more rumpled than Veronica's. "What the fuck are the two of you going on about?"
"Breakfast at my place," Veronica said, sweetly.
Logan scrubbed a hand over his face. "Veronica, I'm not sure I—"
"There'll be coffee," she said. "And biscuits."
"And hangover remedies?"
"Trust me, my father's idea of a hangover remedy —" she shuddered. "You don't want to know."
Logan walked over to Veronica, putting his arms around her and leaning on her like he wanted to fall back asleep again.
"Look, I'm heading out," Weevil said, antsy. "You serious about the breakfast thing?"
"Yeah. We'll be there within the hour," Veronica promised. "If you get there first, don't tell my dad where I was all night."
"Much less where you were all night," Logan added, wickedly.
Weevil shook his head, looking down so they wouldn't see him laughing, and headed for the door.
The End