Episode 14: Mars, Bars
Last episode, Veronica was arrested for helping Josh Barry escape from jail, where he was being held for supposedly killing his father, Coach Tom Barry. Apparently, Josh was allergic to the peanut butter cookies Veronica brought him and when an EMT gave him an Epi shot, Josh overpowered him and jumped out of the ambulance. Of course, Veronica didn’t know Josh was allergic to peanuts (although Josh specifically asked for peanut butter cookies, so this must’ve been his plan all along), but Sheriff Lamb doesn’t believe her. She calls her father, who’s
with Josh’s mother; she wants Keith to find Josh before the cops do in case he gets hurt. While Keith is in the Barry house, he notices an envelope from slimy private detective Vinnie Van Lowe on the table. At the jail, Veronica tells Keith what happened and they wonder if Josh really did kill his father, since he’s acting pretty guilty. Cliff (Josh’s lawyer—and now Veronica’s too) says he believes Josh is innocent. He also says Veronica should be in the clear since Josh’s drunken cellmate ate all the remaining cookies, but Lamb’s going to hold her as long as he can just to be a dick.
On the way out, Keith runs into Vinnie and asks about the envelope he saw at the Barry’s house. Turns out Mrs. Barry thought her husband might be 
screwing around a while back and hired Vinnie to tail him. Vinnie got photos of Coach Barry with a good-looking woman … who’s also married. At Hearst, Keith talks to Dean O’Dell’s assistant, who mentions the visit from Mel Stoltz the day the Dean died, which left the Dean kinda shook up. She also mentions a Xanax prescription that the Dean needed refilled. She called it in, but it was so busy that day neither she nor the Dean had time to go out and pick it up. When Keith checks with the pharmacy, he finds out someone did pick up the Xanax … Mindy, the Dean’s wife (who was cheating on him).
Speaking of which, the guy she was cheating with (Professor Landry) shows up at Keith’s office to ask him about a bug he found in his cell phone. Keith
denies planting and says he doesn’t think Veronica did either. Landry reiterates his alibi for the night of the Dean’s death—watched a basketball game, banged Mindy, watched a movie—then tells Keith Veronica would be better off going into real criminology instead of slumming it in Keith’s office. Keith tells Lamb about Mindy picking up the Xanax and since the Dean had Xanax in his system when he died, Lamb decides to do some actual police work for once. He sends Sacks to get all the Dean’s stuff from his office and tells him to bring in Mindy O’Dell.
Keith goes to the jail to ask Veronica if she bugged Landry’s phone and she 
denies it. Keith mentions Landry knows she suspects him and she realizes Landry saw through her casual query about the movie he supposedly watched the night of O’Dell’s death. Keith said she should’ve quizzed him about the Clippers game, since men always assume women know nothing about sports. As Keith leaves, Logan arrives to visit Veronica (get a photo of her behind bars). She asks him to get the wireless card she had when she was arrested and take it to Mac, since she needs it for something tonight.
Lamb grills Mindy about all her inconsistencies, but she keeps coming up with (somewhat) plausible answers. She did pick up the prescription but didn’t see her husband that night … but she did take a few of the Xanax after
he died, so if Lamb finds the pills and some are missing, that’s why. At Hearst, Weevil gives Sacks O’Dell’s computer and stuff from his office. Logan drops by the dorm to give Mac the wireless card and Parker asks him to do her a favour. Wallace stops by the jail to tell Veronica that Mason has gone missing after telling the Sheriff he saw Josh arguing with his father. Cliff springs Veronica and after he drops her off, Josh grabs her and takes her to his car … where he has Mason tied up in the trunk.
Josh shows Veronica Mason’s gun, which turns out to be a .22 (Coach Barry 
was shot with a .45). Veronica convinces Josh Mason didn’t shoot his father and urges Josh to turn himself in. But Josh says he wants to get out of the country, using some rare coins in a safety-deposit box to finance the trip. Veronica says she’ll get him a fake ID and tells him to buy a burner phone. She let’s Mason loose after Josh leaves and Mason still swears he saw Josh arguing with his dad that day.
At Hearst, Parker, Mac, and Bronson have talked Logan into accompanying them on a Valentine’s Day scavenger hunt. He’s reluctant, but they need a fourth person, so he agrees to be the driver and leave the clue-solving to them. At home, Veronica tells her dad about running into Josh and how she
promised to help him … but just as a way to set him up so he can be taken in peacefully. Keith shows her the photos Vinnie took of Coach Barry and the mystery woman … whose husband is a U.S. Navy Captain, meaning he owns a .45 pistol. Logan and the others track their first scavenger hunt clue, which involves sending a photo of them recreating a Kama Sutra pose (with their clothes on). Logan and Parker do the pose, which looks rather uncomfortable. The second stage has them buying Super Titan condoms, which embarrasses the hell out of mac, but doesn’t faze Logan at all.
At home, Veronica realizes the Clipper game would’ve pushed all the programming back an hour the night the Dean was killed, which means the 
witness heard the gunshot around 3:20, not 2:20. So Mindy’s car was already back at the hotel, meaning she and Landry might not be suspects anymore. Logan and the others go after the final scavenger hunt clue, which entails them swimming out to a buoy offshore to get a balloon. Logan and Parker strip down and swim out to get it. Keith and Veronica let Lamb know about the revised time of death on O’Dell. Sacks tells Lamb they found fingerprints on O’Dell’s keyboard belonging to Steve Botando, Mindy’s meth-head ex.
At Hearst, Logan and the others find out they came in third in the scavenger hunt. Logan and Parker seem to have a bit of a vibe. Speaking of which, Mac
and Bronson end up banging, so I guess she’s getting past her fear of getting physical after whatever Beaver did to her. At the police station, Steve says his wife is setting him up, then asks for a lawyer. He ends up with Cliff, who points out that Steve was picked up outside county limits, so anything Lamb gets from him will be inadmissible. Keith talks to the mystery woman, who turns out to be a neurologist. She says Coach Barry had Creuzfeldt-Jakob disease (which is related to Mad Cow disease) and whoever killed him saved him a hell of a lot of pain.
Keith finds out Mrs. Barry took out a new insurance policy on her husband 
not long before he was killed and it had a double indemnity clause … if Barry died from an accident (which includes being shot during a carjacking), the policy pays double. But Keith also points out that Mrs. Barry has an alibi and they had no extra money to hire a hit man, which makes Veronica think of the rare coin collection in the bank. That could’ve financed the hit, if Mrs. Barry took the coins out without telling anyone. When she hears about Coach Barry’s illness, Veronica really starts to wonder.
The next day, Keith goes to see Mrs. Barry to lay everything out for her about what he suspects. She goes into the kitchen and gets a gun from a hiding place under the sink, but Keith anticipates her and hides, disarming
her as she walks by. Meanwhile, Veronica gets a call from Josh and takes him to the bank to get the coins. Veronica knows if the coins are gone, that probably means Josh’s mom hired someone to kill his dad. There’s some cutting back and forth between scenes to ramp up the tension, making us wonder if the coins are still there and if Mrs. Barry is going to waste Keith.
Turns out the coins are still there and Mrs. Barry says she hid the gun from the cops, but now wants Keith to have it to prove Josh’s innocence. She says 
it was her husband’s old gun from when he was in the Army. Josh shows Veronica the coins fro the bank, plus a DVD that his dad left for him in the safety-deposit box. Keith takes the gun to the cops and overhears a call about Steve Botando breaking into the O’Dell house again. He warns Lamb to be careful, but Lamb is his usual cocky self, so Keith follows him. Lamb gets jumped by Botando, who pounds him with a baseball bat. Sacks shoots Botando and Keith finds a freaked-out Sacks a few minutes later and tells him to go call it in.
Veronica and Josh watch the DVD (which Josh wasn’t supposed to see until he was 21, when the statute of limitations has run out on the life insurance policy). Coach Barry admits he had someone shoot him and fake the carjacking so he didn’t have to linger with his disease, and so his family
would be provided for. Veronica notices somebody else in the video, who looks a lot like Josh. Josh recognizes him as his dad’s assistant coach and old Army buddy, who looks a lot like Josh. Veronica figures that’s who Mason saw with the Coach that day. Later, Keith tells Veronica Josh was spotted crossing the Mexican border with a fake ID and gives her shit for helping him. She shows Keith the DVD and points out that Josh has to keep the murder theory alive for his mom and brother to collect the insurance (since a suicide—assisted or otherwise—would pay nothing).
At Hearst, Weevil and the head janitor are servicing the furnace when Weevil finds some bloody clothing stuffed in a flue. At the office, Keith 
agrees with Veronica’s decision and then gets a call saying Sheriff Lamb has died. The next day, Veronica sees Logan and Parker being really friendly in the cafeteria and gets a bit jealous, even though she’s repeatedly made it clear she doesn’t want Logan back. At the police station, Keith (who now has his old job as Sheriff back) shows Mindy O’Dell photos of the bloody clothes Weevil found: some gloves and a shirt with Hank Landry’s monogram on it. Keith says either Landry’s covering for Mindy or she’s covering for him, but she’d better start talking either way.