Author's Notes: This is my first shot at NealxPeter, my first shot at White Collar, actually. This is on the 2x11 episode, after Neal tell all there is to tell about Adler. I hope you like it, please R&R!

Disclaimer: I do not own White Collar or any of its characters, unfortunately.

All that talk of the past had left Neal feeling sadly nostalgic. There were so many questions in is head, so many 'what if's, but there was really no point in wondering. What happened, happened, and the only thing he could do about it was to catch Adler…with Peter. Just how did that happen?

They were sitting on the couch now, both staring at the ceiling, trying to figure out how life had brought them together in such a weird way. Neal was never supposed to form any kind of bond with the agent who caught him. Yet, he did. He formed an attachment to Peter since the first moment he saw him. He liked the space he occupied in Peter's life.

Bond. Bonds. James Bonds.

He liked the nickname Peter gave him. It suited him. And who was he kidding anyway? He loved the chase. The cat and mouse game he had played was exciting, and Peter wasn't a menace to him, he was more like a puppy. Neal left some treats for him here and there, and waited for him to take the bait. He wouldn't have gotten caught, had it not been his love for Kate.

However, she was also the reason everything happened. One different decision, and there would be no Peter, El, Satchmo, no June with her tiny little Bugsy in his life. So much in his life led him back to her, it hurt to think that she would be forever the missing link. No more Kate.

"Neal? What is it?"

Watery blue eyes avoided dark brown ones. Peter didn't know what to feel when he saw Neal like this. Unguarded, vulnerable, lost. He always knew what made him get that way though.

"Kate." He stated, completely sure that his guess was correct. Neal sighed, his gaze moved rapidly from one corner of the room to the other, but the changing gaze couldn't hide the sheen of the tears he was trying so hard to keep at bay.

He turned his face towards Burke, not really looking at him, more like staring at his shoes, and said in a choked voice, "I just can't believe she's really gone."

"I'm sorry, Neal. We'll catch Adler, we'll make this right."

"It won't bring her back."

"You're right, it won't. But maybe it'll give you what you need to move on."

Peter must have said the right thing then, because Neal looked at him, no, Neal stared right into his soul. Peter Burke wasn't used to being stared at so intensely by Caffrey's –wow, his eyes are so…so…- blue eyes. He gulped nervously, but stared back, not wanting to be the one to give in.

Neal's gaze softened, the tears vanished, and he smiled broadly in his way. Peter had noticed - or maybe imagined, he wasn't quite sure - that Caffrey had a sort of intimate, just-for-Burke sort of smile. As if they were accomplices on some new con, but not quite that as well. Peter didn't like the way that smile made him feel, and denied feeling anything at all other than camaraderie.

"Well, well, look at you turning oh-so wise after a pack of beers. Maybe you should start drinking on the job."

"And who would have thought that cheap wine makes Neal Caffrey honestly tell me what's on his head when I ask him. I should start lacing your coffee with it."

"This thing you called wine mixed with what the Bureau calls coffee, hm, I'll probably never notice the difference."

Neal laughed and looked at Burke again, and for some reason Peter felt the need to turn away this time. Maybe it was because they were too close, or slightly too drunk to be in each other's presence. He should have gone home then, but he didn't, instead, he stayed and said something he most certainly should not have said. Ever.

"You know…I've always been a little jealous of Kate." What in the Heavens possessed him when he confessed that? He didn't know. And although he couldn't see the way Neal was looking at him, he could picture it. Half intrigued, half amused, a brow slightly arched and the hint of a smile on his perfectly shaped lips.

"No! The amazing Peter Burke is too good for something petty like jealousy! Is it because I gave her a kiss before disappearing while you only got a lousy lollipop?"

"Mock all you want, Caffrey, but…" Why didn't he just laugh and shut up was a mystery to Peter. OK, he laughed, but he didn't shut up, so Neal was more than intrigued, and the conversation had suddenly taken a serious turn.

"But?"

"But she always had you wrapped around her finger." And Neal's smile was suddenly gone. "Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to offend her, or you for that matter. It's just…even when I was convinced you were doing better, letting go of your past, you weren't. No matter what I told you, or how I advised you, you ran after her every single time, consequences be dammed. She had, has, this power over you. She could get you to do anything. You barely even listen to me, even though I just want what's best for you."

Peter pretended to study the label of his beer for the minutes of painfully awkward silence. He could feel Neal's stare as if it were a knife entering his skull. He wished he were lying or exaggerating, but he wasn't. Neal was so intelligent, he was brilliant. He could have such a different future, but Kate was this force pulling him backwards. Suddenly, Neal laughed. The sound surprised Peter, and he looked at Neal's amused expression.

"You're selling yourself short, Agent Burke."

"Ha, I wish I were."

"I listen to you…sometimes."

"Sure you do. And I know you would listen to me much more if I looked half as good as Kate did in a dress." He tried to make a joke, turn the focus of the conversation back to Neal, back to Kate, back to anyone but him.

"Well, you do need a change in your wardrobe, but I think a dress would be too radical. But who knows what Agent Peter Burke hides under such hideous non-tailored suits."

They both laughed, but things had just gotten ten thousand times more awkward. Peter went for a joke, it backfired and all of a sudden it was like they were actually flirting. No, no, no, that was wrong in so many different ways and for so many different reasons.

"I should go. El's probably worried."

"I texted her a while back. She sent her love and told me to take care of you for the night."

"You, take care of me? Shouldn't it be the other way around?"

"Surely even you need to be taken care of every once in a while, Peter."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"Don't you ever get tired of wondering when I'll do something stupid? Wondering where I am, whether I'll run or not. Tonight you won't have to worry, so, technically, I'm taking care of you. Making sure you rest one night, just for a change."

Peter chuckled, shook his head, and wished deep inside his heart that what Neal said was a lie. Of course it wasn't. El was probably exhausted of hearing him talking about Neal Caffrey every day for so many years. He had the loveliest of wives, yet, here he was, avoiding the ex-con man's eyes, admiring how his blue shirt stood out against his pale complexion and made his figure much more appealing than usual. He would never drink that much beer near Caffrey again.

Lost in his musings, he didn't even realize that Neal had gotten closer. Only when their arms and legs brushed did Peter notice how absurdly closer they had gotten, so near, in fact, that he could feel Neal's breath on his cheek whenever the other man turned to face him.

"You believe I rarely listen to you, and that you have no power over me. You're wrong. Do you really think we would be here if I didn't care about you at all?" The question caught him off guard, and Peter panicked.

"It's hard to tell things with you, Caffrey." Neal had turned his whole body towards the older man, his head was on the couch, angled in all the wrong and right ways towards Peter's, his breath smelled of cheap wine, and Peter could count the man's eyelashes if he wanted to.

"OK. Even though you sent me to prison twice, put a GPS on my ankle and made me drink the worst wine I have ever tasted, I'm really glad to have you in my life, Peter."

And then something happened. Something that most definitely should not have happened. He saw Neal's eyes slowly close, his long and dark eyelashes touching his pale skin, his mouth partially open coming closer and closer to his - soft, pink lips barely touched his chapped ones, and that was enough. It was enough for his denial to go out the window, enough for his eyes to close, and for his mouth to work on its own accord, and suddenly they were kissing.

It was short and chaste, but it didn't matter. He pressed his lips against Neal's and it was Heaven, it was Hell. It ignited a fire inside him he had never felt, and he wished he could feel it forever, he wished he had never felt it in the first place, and his mind was so full of confusing thoughts, he didn't know what to think, he opened his eyes scared of what he might find, scared of Neal's reaction only to see—

Neal was asleep.