His initial appraisal of Peter Burke, Special Agent for the FBI, didn't turn up much. He looked fairly nondescript. His suit was abysmally lacking in anything resembling style. He was polite but not charming. Neal was almost disappointed.
But only almost.
"You do know," Mozzie said, "That we're supposed to stay unnoticed by the Feds? It's not a mark of doing something right."
"Moz," Neal said, grinning over his shoulder absently, like he could still see Special Agent Peter Burke. "Would I take a foolish risk just to yank the chain of my unsuspecting stalker?"
"Yes."
"It's like you know me." Neal grinned at Moz, who just looked until Neal relented and added, "He didn't have a clue who I was. No risk, and now I know what he looks like. So?"
"If he works it out, your picture could be all over every paper in the United States by tomorrow!" Mozzie hissed, glancing over his shoulder like Burke would appear any moment, possibly cackling with sinister governmental glee. Neal just laughed.
"Don't worry, Moz," he said, "I'm not going down that easy."
"Caution is your friend, Neal," Mozzie said sagely, and Neal's grin broadened again.
"Of course it is," he said. "Of course it is." He lengthened his stride, humming Frank Sinatra, forcing his shorter friend to scurry to keep up. He felt a curious sort of thrill, like having someone on his track made everything more real. Heightened the risk. Created a new level to the game.
He kept those thoughts to himself, suspecting that Mozzie wouldn't approve.
~.~
"You're following your own case?"
Neal set down the scissors and glanced up at Mozzie with his best innocent eyes. "Of course. I want to know how close they are to me, don't I? –not at all, if you were wondering. The sketch isn't even right." He held it up for Mozzie's appraisal, who looked indignant and not at all appreciative.
"You're vain," Mozzie accused.
"Aren't we all," Neal said philosophically, and went back to cutting out the article.
"I'm not." Neal glanced up, and grinned.
"Well, Moz. We can't all be perfect. This Burke guy is supposed to be good."
"And you're stalking your stalker."
"Why wouldn't I? Know thine enemy." Neal snipped the last bit of newspaper and laid it out neatly on the table. "I'm thinking I could make a scrapbook."
"You're asking to get caught."
"Mozzie, ye of little faith." Neal leaned back. "Things with Adler are moving along well, and once that's taken care of we can go anywhere we want, as far away from any and all Feds as you like. It shan't be long."
"I never should have taken up with you," Mozzie lamented, and Neal grinned.
"And yet what would you do without me?" Neal held up his glass of red wine (cheaper than he would like) and wondered if Special Agent Peter Burke was working late.
~.~
Kate curled up with him on the couch and peered at the papers in his hands. "Planning something, Neal?"
"Nope," he said, turning his nose slightly to breathe in the scent of her shampoo. "Light reading." He flashed it at her, and she squinted slightly to read it. And then sighed.
"Again?"
"Know thine enemy," Neal said, and Kate bumped his shoulder.
"There is such a thing as going too far. Getting obsessed." She nodded at the paper. "Where did you get all this, anyway?"
"I have my sources," Neal said smugly. "I've got everything on him he has on me. Or, well. More or less. Might have more, actually. Anyway, you're starting to sound like Mozzie. Getting paranoid?" He grinned cheekily at her, sidelong. "I sent him a birthday card last week. I hope you don't mind that I included your well wishes?"
Kate laughed helplessly, and turned her face up to kiss the corner of his mouth. "Neal…"
"What?"
"I swear it's like you're flirting with him sometimes. Sending dinner and champagne to the surveillance van?"
"They were going to be there all night for no good reason. I didn't see why they should go hungry."
"Are you sure I shouldn't be jealous?"
"You? Of him?" Neal shook his head emphatically. "Never. There's no one else like you, Kate. Not even Peter." He feigned a thoughtful expression. "Although…"
She shoved his head sideways and he won a kiss, long and drawn out. "Just don't get too close. I don't think you'd like him nearly so much when he was putting you in handcuffs."
"I'd like you if you were putting me in handcuffs," Neal said solemnly, and she nipped lightly at his lower lip.
"You'd like me no matter what I was doing."
"Yeah," Neal allowed after a moment. "Point."
"Is Moz coming back soon?" she asked, hands sliding down to start working his shirt out of the waistband, and Neal let his head drop back with a slow, sly smile.
"Don't think so."
"You'd better hope not," she purred, and Neal felt his skin tighten and shiver at once, and tossed the papers aside to tug his girlfriend onto his lap.
~.~
Kate was gone.
Neal was beginning to regret teaching her how to disappear. If he'd known she'd use it like this, he thought, he never would have. It was funny, he thought, how Kate was gone, Mozzie was sometimes, and Peter (he could hear Kate's voice, oh, on a first name basis now?) was constant.
He could have stopped. There was enough money stashed away to keep him going for a good long while, if not longer. But he didn't have Kate.
It was almost disheartening when the most constant aspect of your life was the FBI agent hunting you down. Neal almost found it charming. The man was dogged, you could give him that. And determined, and smart.
When he left origami flowers in the empty frame of a Manet in a personal collection (alarmed, guarded, with a window of twenty minutes to get in and out) Neal wasn't sure if it was dedicated to his pursuer or his pursued.
Kate would have thought he was an idiot. Mozzie would (did) think worse. They didn't quite understand.
Or maybe something in Neal just wanted to be noticed, no matter who by.
Or maybe it was almost flattering.
Sitting in an empty apartment that didn't belong to anyone (yet) and sipping a glass of wine, he looked out at the skyline and wondered who would get there first.
Maybe he was flirting. When someone followed you around that long, Neal couldn't help but think it was a bit warranted. No matter their intentions. Lowering his eyes to the Hallmark card he was toying with, Neal lifted the pen and signed it; best wishes on your anniversary. Take a day off for me, NC.
He couldn't help but smile.