For the first annual Caffrey-Burke Day! (Because instead of writing good ol'canon, I give you a 9K mangled mess of an AU.) But that aside, yes, this is a role-reversal!AU featuring Peter as Neal's Kate. :D Also, this is for all those who's been wanting me to write long-fics (this is probably one of the longer pieces I have done!)
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Love Letters from New York
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"I can't do this anymore, Neal."
Five months before his four years sentence is served, Peter tells him, head shaking in firm broad strokes, like a wild fire of black ink spreading on white cartridge paper.
Peter doesn't allow a hint of hesitation to leak into his voice.
He waits, patient, as his words get through the plexi-glass and into the ears of the man on the other side. He doesn't look away from the stinging orange or the flash of panic that fleets through Neal's eyes because he has to be firm and neat, and almost harsh.
There are sirens going off in his head when Neal's hand flies up to the glass, as close to Peter as this all allows him to be.
And that much is clear, he is forcing himself to see pass the vanishing light in Peter's eyes when he asks, fear rising as he pushes forward against a glass wall that refuses to budge.
"Peter? What are you—"
"I'm sorry, Neal."
Peter stands up and he is looking at him, a moment too long for it to be their last goodbye.
(Except it is, Neal's not delusional and Peter is much too kind to do this twice.)
He can hear his heart pounding against his chest because Peter doesn't go without saying he loves him. He doesn't leave without smiling something soft and warm and just for him, Peter doesn't do any of that without telling him that he'll be back next week.
His clockwork lover.
Neal surges up from his seat and he wants to get to him but the glass and the guards on alert keep him from crumbling to the ground, if only to see Peter's back walking further and further away.
If only to shout his name one last time.
"Peter!"
And his heart snags a rip when the man doesn't turn around.
000
Mozzie is waiting when he is out.
And it takes him exactly a month and a half to break out of Supermax. There is still that one hundred dollar bill from the man at the airport, who handed over the keys to his car to the young man with the million dollar smile.
The yellow jacket has been tossed, the car abandoned in a lot almost three miles across town. But his hands are still shaking when Mozzie hands over the bottle with something close to sadness in the way he looks up at him.
"What did you find?"
He asks with no real hope in his eyes.
"Nothing, I'm sorry, Neal."
Still Mozzie doesn't feel any of that, he has no heart, Neal reminds himself. But nothing is comforting, not when the apartment is cleaned out, white walls barren, screaming a reminder back at Neal that he is no longer here.
"Peter's gone." Mozzie tells him, reluctant when Neal sits down in a heap on the floor.
The apartment is bare, almost empty aside from a rag-tag bunch of objects, Neal included now that he's home. There is no sign that Peter, let alone Neal has once lived here during some of the happiest times of their lives.
But they are ghosts, flitting by on borrowed time, on aliases of men who comes and goes. And with the Feds closing in for the kill, they run and they run until they've run out of roads to go by.
"It's not that simple, Peter won't just up and leave like this. There's more."
Except the apartment is still stripped of furniture, the bottle empty of wine, and no one is there to welcome him home with something akin to true love.
"Neal."
"Moz, he loves me."
The insistence is evident, the trust will always be there even when the man himself isn't.
Mozzie doesn't reply, just takes the bottle from his hands and tells him one last time.
"He's a ghost, Neal. Peter doesn't want to be found."
000
He remembers meeting him for the first time.
"Carlton Lead, nice to meet you."
Neal remembers his dark eyes and his large warm hands that envelope his.
"Pleasure's all mine's. I'm Nick, Nick Halden."
They shake and nothing is electric, just an undercurrent that runs slow as they finally pull back. Neal's smirk too all-knowing and obvious, Peter's smile too kind and subtle.
"I'll show you to your desk, Mr. Halden."
"Call me Nick…"
"Carlton then, Nick. I don't think we'll have a problem but we might as well get along, we both work for Mr. Adler now."
He remembers being young, almost boyish, too star-eyed and focused. Mozzie has taught him that a long con takes dedication but this is something else all together, something neither of them has planned on.
Something that almost makes him goes off the rails, something that almost takes his all to see.
He takes a seat at his new desk and looks up from the fine wooden polish to catch Carlton looking back at him.
They exchange a smile, it's the first of many.
000
There are no sirens chasing them out of their hiding place, no red and blue flashing against the curtains, drawing them out and into the glaring light where they'll be cuffed on top of a police car with less than gentle hands.
"We've got to go, Neal."
Mozzie says, hands in his pockets, swaying back and forth on his heels as he watches his friend from the top of his glasses. And it isn't weariness, he has seen enough of Neal's relationships to know better. That Neal can flirt and please but there'll only ever be one.
"What if," Neal's fingers trace the mouth of the bottle, lingering. And Mozzie doesn't want to be the one to break Neal's heart but paranoia pushes him forward and he isn't unkind, he only knows he still sounds less than nice.
"He isn't coming back."
The silence unnerves Mozzie and he is anticipating the snap, the breaking of a good man.
Instead, there is a sigh (a heart beating desperate and fragile even with all the determination in the world.)
"Yeah, you're right, Moz."
But because this is Peter they are talking about, Peter Burke who has had their backs since Vincent Adler. Even Mozzie knows this isn't it. He watches as Neal picks himself up from the ground, brushes the imaginary dust from his clothes before smiling something fit for a conman.
"Peter isn't one for the classics, he's not coming back, not here at the very least."
He stands up and they go, it is an easy choice.
And the bottle, it comes along.
(No one looks back, they never do, not unless it is their pasts coming back for blood.)
000
It starts with chatting and it ends up sounding more like tamed flirting.
Neal imagines Carlton have no interest in men, and why would he when there are women with soft curves and rolling hips. They talk baseball instead. Their topics revolve around the game from last night and the files in their trays, all the while Neal builds Adler's trust.
Carlton Lead is Vincent Adler's personal assistant, and in all the months Neal has sat across from him, he can tell, Carlton is a good man through and through.
While he wants to press him up against a wall, hands a frenzy for skin and flesh and shirt and hips, Neal sits still and plays the game by the strict straining rules. Sometimes the frustration gets to him, and while he doesn't go for a cheap fuck in the bathroom of an even cheaper bar, Neal goes home to a cold and empty bed and jerks off beneath the covers, the motion of his hand almost brutal and punishing for such a feeble fantasy.
The tailor steps back, allowing him to look at himself in the mirror. And boy, is he something to behold. The cut is simple, the gesture bold, there is no point in saying no, this has been his since the start (before they talk of fabric, before they measured his shoulders and waist and hip.)
And it's been five months, it is now or never.
Adler hands him a folded slip of paper.
"Burn it when you're done, Nick."
"Of course, Mr. Adler."
He leaves Adler's office with Ancientlyre burning against his heart.
000
Like an addict with no whim to help himself, Neal is self-aware enough to know that he'll always revert to his old ways.
In the midst of a small time heist, he thinks he sees a man that looks too much like Peter.
He isn't wearing the sharp suits Neal loves him in but he can still see the muscle beneath the clothes. He wants to shout his name, he wants him to turn around but he only takes the suitcase, motion fluid and ducks around the corner where Mozzie is waiting.
He slips into the backseat of the car, tinted windows gliding by as their mark picks up the one with the switched out cash.
And the man he's imagined to be Peter is nothing more than a New York banker in another cheap worn suit passing by. But his heart doesn't still in his chest, and he knows it's about time, he isn't going to forget Peter anytime soon.
"I want a bigger job, Moz."
"How big are you thinking?"
"…Raphael big."
"Something that high profile will get Peter's attention for sure."
"That wasn't what I—" He catches Mozzie's glance from the rear view mirror and looks away.
"Neal, you're still a running fugitive."
"Then it'll be a challenge."
"…And you know just how much I love a challenge."
"Damn right I do, Moz." Neal doesn't need to catch Mozzie's eyes to know he will probably look manic and matches his old friend's grin with one of his own. "Now what do you have in mind?"
000
There is panic and his hand doesn't exactly shake but it comes close.
"He knows, Moz. He knows."
"What are you talking about?"
"He knows what I am."
He has his heart beating in his chest and he knows, this is the end, because Neal sees this for what it is: Adler's second chance if only because he has come so far. The anagram unscrambled at the bottom of that slip of paper. (Nice try, Neal.) Mozzie seems to understand, and everything is fitting back into place, like a well-oiled machine that's been out of commission for five months.
"Alright, give me half an hour, I'll get everything ready."
Except there is him with his heart compromised.
"No, I'm not leaving New York."
"What are you talking about, Neal?"
"I—"
"It's the guy, isn't it?"
"Yeah, Moz," he replies, resignation ringing loud even in his own ears, "it is."
"Neal."
"Yes?"
"They won't take it well, they never do."
Mozzie sounds like he is speaking from his own experience, but he's never let on anymore than it is necessary. He's been in the games far longer than Neal can even imagine, it doesn't take trust to believe the man.
"…I know."
000
He isn't moving heaven and hell to get to him (he feels like he ought to though.)
"We're not cat burglars."
And it isn't a claim, Neal is just stating a fact.
He is sitting at Wednesday on a Friday when Mozzie has their heist spread out on a board game. There is no directory explaining the scatter of chess pieces, the worn scraps of Monopoly money, and little trinkets splaying across the foreign board. They don't need one.
He is reaching out for a stray plastic baby figurine when Mozzie slaps his hand away, claiming that as the key in having this all work the way it is supposed to. Neal sits up straighter with furrowed brows, like this all makes sense in the most bizarre way.
"Alex is."
"Your point, Mozzie?"
He gives a nonchalant shrug, directing Neal's eyes to anything but that. "All I'm saying is that we, might, need her help."
But they are friends for a reason, distractions only work for so long.
"No, we are not asking Alex for help."
"Scared?"
"Terrified." Neal replies, as a matter of fact, voice flat on his tongue with memories of the last time Alex has been his partner in crime. It is designed to be a two-men con and it doesn't fall apart, not exactly, but Neal has ended up in the hospital with a fracture in his leg and Alex, she has been flagged by three different countries in Europe.
"The music box does that to people." Mozzie adds, almost forlorn, remembering the clean up job he has had to pull after them all too well. He is still mourning over the alias he has had to burn for the two of them.
"No Alex." Neal repeats, remembering Peter and his refusal to speak to him for nearly three weeks after the heist, even when he has been hopping around the apartment in crutches, half-dazed with painkillers. Peter hasn't taken the bait back then, he isn't about to this time.
"Fine, but—"
"No, we can handle this ourselves."
He doesn't want to give, not when it involves Alex. Not with the amount of history, not when she might the second thing to come between Peter and him.
"Can we?"
"Yes, Moz. Don't doubt me."
"I wasn't."
He narrows his eyes at him while he does the same but somewhere between this back and forth toss of blame, they have an odd understanding. It takes another moment before Mozzie surrenders, throwing his arms up in the air, almost dramatic and he may be shaking his head at Neal but his brain is already formulating another way into the building where they won't need Alex's specialty.
"Your boy, your way. I can't say I get it but," Mozzie shrugs, "okay."
000
He goes into work the next day and nothing has changed even when Adler has already pulled the world (and all that he has known for the past five months of his life) from beneath his feet.
Nick sits perched up on the corner of Carlton's desk when he makes his offer, fingers still deft and quick as he plays with a chain of silver paperclips. He isn't looking into his eyes, he doesn't even try to read the man like he is an opened book and on display.
"Have lunch with me?"
There is a short silence, something that sounds like misunderstanding or much needed ignorance. Neal is ready to bolt, smile prettily with some half-assed excuse already on his tongue.
But Carlton has always been a predictable and unsuspecting man. Instead of turning down Nick, the man asks, genuine curiosity in his question. "Why?"
Like there is actually a reason aside from the obvious, the I want you that way that has always been sitting out there between them. Instead Nick gives him the smile that he knows Carlton likes best and plucks the time piece from his pocket, dangling the watch in front of Carlton like a prize he has just won even when he is greedy and wants so much more.
"Come and I'll give you back your watch."
There is a jolt of surprise that crosses Carlton's face and a half-formed how that brings a soft laugh to tumble from Neal's lips. And it makes everything hard just a fraction easier when Carlton returns his laugh with a reluctant smile of his own.
"Alright, make it worth my while, Nick."
Nick stands up, drops the link of paperclips back to Carlton's desk and tilts his head to the side, feigning innocence.
"Don't I always?"
He buys him Manhattan's best sandwich and the two of them sit at the park bench, knees knocking as they chew. It isn't awkward, it is just a little hard to get it out of his chest and into the space sitting in wait between the two of them.
They talk baseball, office politics, and dogs. Carlton wondering whether getting a puppy will really be worth all the work and Nick telling him that a Labrador Retriever might be good for him. And it isn't until Neal swallows his last bite just as Carlton crumbles his sandwich paper in his hands that it has finally come to it.
"Carlton," he doesn't dare to look away from the lines of trees in the distance, he thinks he may not be able to do it otherwise, "I think you need to know something about me."
He also imagines Carlton not caring one bit. And really doesn't know what he will rather have at this point. Neal stands up instead, ready to bolt at the first sign of distress, Carlton follows him on to his feet.
The two of them, shoulder to shoulder, until Carlton finally dares to bodily turn Nick to look at him.
"What are you talking about, Nick?"
His eyes are worried and the lines around his mouth serious.
"My name isn't Nick. It's Neal." He doesn't heave, he makes it smooth, like this is a plan going his way and he wouldn't have it any other way. "My name is Neal Caffrey."
He smiles something small and sad. Carlton takes a step back, and Neal nods in understanding. He wishes him his best and turns to go, New York unfamiliar beneath his feet.
Neal remembers figuring it all out, he remembers taking the (actual honest) money and running, not far, just close enough to disappear into the crowds at just the right moment. He remembers trying to forget Carlton, he also remembers failing miserably until three weeks later.
Carlton imagines he isn't allowed to run after Nick, Neal his head supplies two seconds too late. Instead, he heads back to the office and there on his desk is Nick Halden's resignation letter sitting beneath an intricate origami. Something small to remember him by.
One paper crane folded from the waxy wrapping of Manhattan's best sandwich.
000
"If the dark does nothing for us, what'll you have us do?" Neal plays with a forgotten chess piece Mozzie has lying around the board, has the metal edge warming in his palm. And he isn't criticizing as much as he is genuinely curious. "You don't really see people stealing high end collections at noon and get away with it."
"Well, no, there was that time where—"
"Oh yeah, good times, weren't they?" Neal smiles a little, nothing like the usual but it has been a while.
"Almost too good, I am still anticipating the repercussions one of these days." Mozzie looks out at the balcony windows, like he is expecting a sniper over on the roof of the next building, like there is an army of the SWAT team surrounding their temporary home.
"Hiding and still in paranoia." Neal adds, finally releasing the pawn from between his fingers. "So, what do you have in mind?"
Mozzie grins, something that reminds Neal of the sun.
"We'll strike in the daylight then, my friend."
The sun is blazing above their heads, the grass lush and green beneath their feet.
There is champagne being passed around, sparkling in the sunlight and hors d'oeuvres on shiny silver trays circulating around the open courtyard.
Neal is in a white three-piece suit, tailored and perfect against his shoulders and tapered at his waist. The tie is abandoned for something more casual, an opened collar exposing skin.
He wants to tell Mozzie he can do better, probably.
That the two of them together can pull off something on a grander scale. But he also sees the worry, not for Moz himself but for Neal instead. And he may be blind on all sides in his search for Peter but he can still see the extra paranoia that thrums beneath his friend's hands, or rather the tray he is holding up.
Neal thinks he is smiling but he can't be sure, his heart caught in a vice, his eyes lingering over the splendid crowd for dark hair, dark eyes, and those hands that steady when he is ready to fall, those fingers ready to put him together when he has fallen apart.
He finds nothing that even resembles one of the things he has loved for a better part of his adult life. And it isn't with pity, he has gone passed that, that he turns back to the task at hand.
Catching Mozzie's eyes from across the courtyard, everything falls together, or apart depending on where you stand with the crowds.
They work their angle with ease, play up a worthless piece of art to a wealthy mark and while everyone has their eyes on the unveiling of an untitled piece (a post Impressionist painting that took all of 3 hours to slap together), they have already disappeared into the man's home, tools hiding in the blind spot of the security cameras that hasn't existed until only a week ago.
He skips right over the paintings, because it is either cut them out of the frame (and he couldn't do that, not without stabbing the artist lurking behind the forger in the heart) or take them whole while the entire house shuts itself down, alarm blaring loud and clear through the air.
Instead, Moz and him go for the antiques (the real ones of course) they have had their eyes on since their first scouting. Neal is in the process of setting the rare gems into his black duffle bag when he hears Mozzie from somewhere behind him.
"Did you see his wine?"
"And that's exactly why I didn't mention it to you."
"He has a—"
"I know, Moz. Now either take it or leave it, twenty-seven more seconds."
"No names! And don't you ruin this for me."
Neal zips up his bag, three separate coin collections and a stash of rare jewels heavier, and turns around to give his partner in crime a look. Instead, he sees Mozzie gingerly sitting three bottles of wine into the trolley cart he has pushed in from outside.
He raises an eyebrow when Mozzie looks up, "I see you're taking that, along with that and is that…" he squints his eyes to see the label and his voice is breathy when he gets it out, "a 1907 Heidsieck."
"Yeah, the shipwrecked ones." Mozzie answers with glee in his voice before shrugging at the Rodin sculpture behind him, "we didn't really want the head anyway."
"Fine, we'll do it your way this time." Neal laughs as he tucks the bag into a hidden compartment of the trolley. "Next time, we're going for the Matisse."
"Second floor of the MET?"
They are in time to the moving security cameras, dodging one for another. The guards are all directed to the back entrances where the party is being held.
"Where else do you think?"
And then they walk out of the front door with nearly 1.5 million.
The mark asks for a toast to his dear seller, the man in the white three-piece suit with the million dollar smile that has just been standing there by the trimmed bushes. But of course, George Devore is already gone and silence rings back at him in the opened courtyard.
(Panic ensues.)
000
Three weeks later, someone is at his door.
There is no morse code tapped into each knock, no special sequence Moz has been telling him about in the midst of a rant, just a random knuckle-against-wood, an easy tap-tap that he doesn't dare to think more about. So when he opens the door, his heart catches in his throat, his hand freezes on the knob.
"Carl—"
And his eyes probably look too wide and wild in disbelief.
"Hi, Neal." The man looks away a second later, almost bashful. "A shirt?"
And it is only then that Neal comes to his senses, drops his eyes down to the lines of his chest and decides, yeah, it is probably a good idea to slip on a shirt. And for a moment, he is almost shy, blushing red down to the tips of his paint stained fingers.
"Uh, come in first then, I guess." He hastily backs from the door and Neal has never been at a loss of words but there is always a first time, he is welcoming it right now if this is it.
He turns to his bedroom for a shirt but a hand catches at his wrist, almost reeling him back into the man with the door closing behind him. There is a protest that catches in his throat, his heart that is lodged somewhere in between.
And then the door shuts, soft in the silence of the room.
"I think you need to know something about me as well, Neal."
He is trying to think, really, he is. But Carlton is calling him by his actual name (not an alias he stole off of a pamphlet lying by), speaking into his ear with a voice that leaves him warm in his own skin.
"My name isn't really Carlton."
Neal twists in the loose not-quite embrace so they can face each other. He briefly flutters his eyes shut and when he opens them again, he is still here.
"It's Peter, Peter Burke." He says.
There are questions that needs to be asked and answered, like how did you find me I live off the grid or why are you trusting me with this, but that can wait. Neal smiles, heart swelling in the confine of his chest, and he sounds breathy when he finally speaks.
"Nice to meet you, Peter."
They don't shake hands this time but Peter is already dragging him closer for something more intimate, his parted lips meet his eager opened mouth, and Neal doesn't put on a shirt for a while longer when he leaves a streak of red paint along Peter's jaw.
000
He gets a phone call four days later, the number hidden from his cell and there is a fraction of a second when he thinks this is a bad idea but, what-if.
"Who is this?"
He picks up, smooth with confidence.
But you would think it is snowing in the New York summer with the way he is shivering, stunned when the world narrows to just Neal clutching at his phone, Peter's voice speaking in his ears for the first time in months.
"Why'd you run?"
He sounds forlorn like he is the one conflicted with something much more complicated than this.
"Why'd you leave?" Neal doesn't add the me, the how could you leave me behind after everything. "You know exactly what I did, what I do, who I am and still stayed for so long, Peter. Why did you leave then?"
"…I was protecting you, Neal."
"I don't understand." He cuts in, hands clenching into fists, blunt fingernails digging crescent moons into his skin.
"You don't need to, I don't expect you to."
"Don't, Peter." Neal pleads, desperation raw in the way his voice scratches across the line. "Peter, you don't get to—"
"My questions, Neal. You were a felon, now you're a fugitive that escaped from Supermax with three months before your sentence was due."
"You cleared out two days before I made it home."
"I took my time, I thought you would wait for a few months before you did something stupid."
"Peter, where are you?" He asks, voice pulled taut and quiet, Peter almost strains to hear the pleading in his voice.
"Don't look for me anymore, Neal. Trust me, this has to be goodbye."
Maybe on a good day, Neal would've let him go without a fight. Maybe on a bad day, Neal wouldn't have gone after him, blind and desperate like Peter is the only one that matters (and at this point Peter is his only worth.)
"You know I won't do that, not until you tell me the real reason."
"Just trust me, Neal."
Peter ends the call.
000
He crushes his lips to him and it doesn't seem to matter that he's been keeping his real name from him. He drags him down by the neck with one hand and pins his hip back against the wall with the other.
There is a stuttering second where Peter pulls back to ask whether they should talk about this. And for a second Neal wants to blurt out that he is insane but settles for a terse no instead.
Neal drinks him in with an agonized sort of want, tongue slick and wet as Peter surges forward with bruising force, pausing just a breath away like he is waiting for something.
A rejection perhaps.
Neal glances up, a slow flickering light in his eyes, before he is dragging Peter's hand down his chest, pass the exposed skin and streaks of drying paint, pausing only at the waistband of his sweatpants, riding lower and lower at the rate he is pushing himself up at Peter's hard press body.
And then all doubt falls away.
Peter retaliates by nudging a thigh between Neal's legs, pushing pressure as he mouths kisses along the side of his jaw. He sucks low appreciative noises from his throat and manhandles him until they find the bed.
There is a breathy exhale when Neal is lying splayed out against the sheets.
"One of the better shirts I've seen you in but let's lose it already."
"But I thought you love my shirts."
"Just that blue one with the cufflinks."
Neal shakes his head with a hidden smile and he tugs on the end of Peter's shirt once more just for emphasis, as if Peter can't see the bare naked need in the way his dark eyes are looking up at him. It is in the way he holds back, bites his bottom lip with a slow smile like he still can't believe Peter is willing to give him the one thing he has always wanted.
Like Peter is a gift.
Like Peter doesn't feel the same.
(When all he feels is this and so much more.)
He fits a hand against his hips and steps strategically on the cuff of Neal's loose sweatpants, there is a grin like he's read his mind before Neal slides back against the sheets, slipping free of his pants to pool at the side of the bed.
He motions for him to come closer, beckoning him with his arched spine and a taut tilt of his hips up at him. Peter obliges, following Neal down to the bed with warmth in the palms of his hands and heat against his smiling lips, pressing something fit to bruise over his beating heart.
And it is something that resembles love with the way his mouth curves over his skin.
Peter wants to tell him a lot of things, secrets and well hidden truths beside the immediate I love you that wants to leap off of the tip of his tongue. But he has him tongue-tied the same way he has him stumbling for purchase.
Talking can wait.
He wakes up with a pleasant buzz in his head and an arm draping easily over his stomach, like it belongs, like the man lying in bed with him has always been there to start with. He feels sated and warm when he grabs the vibrating cell from the bedside table before it can start ringing.
Neal takes the call, the screen of his phone blinking a capital M.
"Mornin' to you too, Moz."
Peter stirs a little next to him.
"…hmm? This morning? …no, not yet. Oh. No, no… I had no idea. Sorry, Moz. Let me get back to you… yeah. No, I've got him."
Neal turns his head to the man in his bed, feels the heat against his body and the comfort even when he should be devastated. He nudges Peter softly until he is almost a wreck himself.
"Carl—Peter."
"…Hm?" He cracks open an eye and even half asleep, Peter manages to piece Neal's bleeding anxiety into something more coherent. "You know."
"You lost everything, Peter."
"Yeah, there's that. But," and there is worry in the set of his jaw, unease in the way he looks down for a brief second before coming back up to catch Neal's eyes, like he isn't sure whether now is a good time, "I gained one thing that outweigh them all, Neal."
Neal decides vulnerable is a good look for Peter, but only with him.
000
"I considered keeping this from you."
Neal glances up from the blueprints, pencil still distracted enough to tap a tune against the table top. But then he sees Mozzie and the look in his eyes, and everything seems to fit into place. The pencil drops from his hands as he places both palms flat against the surface, willing the trembling to calm to a stop.
"You found Peter."
Neal tells him, and it isn't a guess, they have been friends for too many years to get this far and not give the truth a painful name.
"I found him."
Mozzie repeats, looking everywhere but Neal.
"And?"
There is impatience in the breath that he lets out.
"He is Judas."
"What?"
"He betrayed us, Neal."
The short man tosses a folder on the table and if he has any hair left, he would be pulling at them right this moment. But because Neal is a five years old child with no impulse control on his good days, the man doesn't understand fear like he does.
"We should've known, but you were too blind to see it and I can't believe I'm saying this, but I trusted him. Neal, Peter, he's…"
Mozzie sucks in a breath and he might as well be screaming Haversham at the top of his lungs because the distress signal is blaring loud and red and blue, like police sirens in the room.
And there, in Neal's painfully blue eyes, true fear finally shines through the cracks. Mozzie can tell, Neal doesn't want to know. Still it comes, as true as the lies they have been believing all their lives.
"Peter's a Suit."
000
He thinks of Alex.
He remembers her in his bed, sharp cutting hips and long brown hair. He can clearly remember their first time together, Alex not minding that he has someone else on his mind, Neal trying to be fair to someone else for a while. She is naked beneath his sheets and he finally rolls over to look at her, lips still tasting of her dominating kisses.
"You're pining."
She almost looks pleased.
"I'm perfectly happy with what I've got."
"And what do you have?" She tilts her head at him with eyes that is trying for sincerity, but looks more like mockery, reminding him of his roots. "A job, stable income, a boss who is somewhat decent to you? We're the same people, Nick. Nothing is ever enough."
Neal doesn't add his two cents, just settles back with a smile and allows Alex to take it for what it is and isn't all the same. He knows where she is coming from, he comes from the same place.
"… And we both know, we're never really happy, not when we know what we can have is right there if only we can just reach a little further." She raises a brow in the dark, cheekbones high and prominent, smile stretching out too thin. "Am I right?"
He thinks what it means and what it can mean. And it might just be a conmen consensus. As he stretches against the bed, Alex leans in and he bats his lashes up at her like a cat.
"You aren't all wrong."
He doesn't give it to her, not entirely, but that is only the start of their tangle for years to come. Only he doesn't know it yet, he doesn't know a lot of things back then.
000
He hands him a time and a place, and asks with a deep-set frown.
"You realize what this means, right?"
Like Neal has no idea what he can lose with this confrontation, like he is blind enough to chase after a man who no longer loves him. Neal knows every risk and it is with conviction that he will bet all that he has on Peter, even if it means giving up what is left of his heart for the truth.
"Yes, Mozzie, I've got half a brain."
"This is a trap."
And for Mozzie, this is as close to pleading as he can ever get. He is reluctant to let go as Neal takes the slip of paper from his hands. It feels like demise, and for someone who has been playing damage control for Neal for so long, this is all rather new to him. He is used to covering his tracks, not pushing the other into the fire to burn.
"I've got to see Peter." He tells him, urgency burning bright like a spiking fever. And Mozzie knows he sounds resigned, he also knows he can't change Neal's mind. "I know that too."
"Then you know not to stop me."
"Just." Mozzie nods with something like understanding but that is an understatement all on its own. And there is finality to the way they prepare each other. "Just be careful, Neal."
He gives his best friend a smile, and he doesn't need to tell him outright, this won't be their end.
"I will."
000
Mozzie is a friend's friend.
(An exception has been made for two men, and only two.)
He has his own agenda and won't ever succumb to big brother. He is a living conspiracy theory, the Dentist in the flesh. He is both an old hand at games like this and the man behind the curtains, sort of. But every lock always makes that final click, that moment when he slides the inner latch up and away.
The hotel door opens, silent and near ominous.
"It's been a while, Mozzie."
And really, he doesn't know what he should have been expecting. The address for the warehouse has been obvious, too out there for it not to be for Neal to run straight into. Mozzie doesn't intend to keep it from Neal but the hotel room seemed to be tucked, almost conspicuously, right where he would be the one to find.
It almost seems too easy, at this point where everything is falling into their place, fitting together like perfect puzzle pieces.
Mozzie glares at him from behind his thick frames.
"This trick may work on Neal but don't you even try that with me, Pe—Suit!"
Peter Burke doesn't look much different, not since his days in his and Neal's shared apartment. And Mozzie doesn't understand, how one man can do all this for another. (It may have something to do with his lack of a heart.)
"…I know that you're upset."
"Understatement of the—"
"Just listen to me, Moz." Peter runs a hand down his face, like he has been trying for too long. He paces a little as Mozzie walks into the hotel room, allows the door to close behind him and his glare hardens, his heart weary of an old friend turned traitor through and through.
(And he is almost tempted to put a bounty for Peter with the Father, if it isn't only for the fact that his front man is in love with this Suit.)
"I was undercover with Adler's case."
It sounds like an awful lie to pull off but Peter has never been a liar, nothing compared to the chronic liars Neal and him are. So Mozzie knows this can only be the truth.
"And when he bolted before the FBI had enough on him, Neal became my best chance to find him again. I wanted to use Neal as a mean to take down Adler at first. But, you trusted me when I had my own agenda. And I'm not asking you to trust me now, you don't even have to believe me. But you have to let me see this through."
"See you and your Suit friends throw Neal back in jail again?"
"We both know that I have enough dirt on you and Neal to put the two of you away for twice this lifetime. Why do you think the two of you aren't behind bars?" Peter gives an exasperated sigh like Mozzie really can't see that it has always been more than their lucky streak at work.
"How do you think Neal managed to get four years on just bond forgery when he is suspected in a dozen more? Moz, the FBI isn't stupid, there is only so much you can get away with. I can only pull so many strings and clean up jobs before it gets exposed."
"So you want Neal and I to thank you instead?"
"No, I don't expect that. Hell, I don't want that. I did all that because I was selfish, I was compromised." Peter says it like it is the one thing keeping his world together. He smiles a little, only it resembles a grimace more. "I liked you two."
"You should tell that to Neal." And he really does want to ruin Peter's life, for both the betrayal and allowing it to get this far. Neal hasn't been the only one who lost someone important, Mozzie considered Peter Burke as a friend too, once.
Not that he'll ever admit that.
"Neal is a romantic, you're the realist. There's only so many ways I can go about this without hurting him again."
"I think you are forgetting how Neal really is. But," he narrows his eyes, and it isn't anger, it's resignation and disapproval all tangled in a way his missing heart shouldn't be feeling. "Why did you leave when you did? He had five months left."
Peter looks caught out in a lie, tongue almost as well trained as Neal's is. And when he finally replies, it is a soft admittance, like he is just short of being ashamed of himself.
"…Because I knew he would run."
Mozzie snaps his gaze at him, asks even when he can clearly see the whole picture these puzzles pieces have been creating all along if only to hear it from Peter's lips. And for once in his life, he doesn't know how to look the truth in the eyes.
"What're you trying to say?"
"I head up the FBI White Collar division now, Moz."
000
He remembers waking up next to him.
With the sun filtering through the shades and their bodies warm with the press of skin to skin. Neal has walked into his life as something unattainable, and it isn't like he sparkles or anything (but it does come close when he smiles at him like he is the only one that matters.)
Peter believes this world has order, and someone like him is not supposed to be with someone like Neal. (Not that he regrets any of this, not that he isn't in love with him.) But if Peter doesn't know Neal as Nick before, he doesn't believe he would take a chance, not with a criminal at least.
But he has fallen so far from where he once thought he would be. With the FBI placing him on desk duty in the Siberia of all departments until further notice, Neal is the only thing keeping him from going after Adler with a burning rage he never knew he had in him.
Peter stretches out against the sheets, feels Neal's side of the bed cold before sitting up to smell bacon. And he can't help it, for a conman, Neal is painfully honest with him, like he has slipped up too many times before and Peter is the one good thing he doesn't want to wreck.
And Peter wants to tell him the truth too, tell him that he is in love but fears his betrayal may be too much. He doesn't want to be the one to ruin this perfect thing they have.
"Breakfast too, Neal?" He walks into the kitchen with a soft smile at the sight of Neal cooking and he is sliding bright yellow scrambled eggs on to a plate when he replies, distracted. "Hm?"
And there is something perfect, and genuine and wholeheartedly honest with the way his eyes light up at the sight of him. Peter huffs a short laugh beneath his breath and asks out loud.
"Are you for real?"
"You and Mozzie," he forks some eggs into his mouth, "how long have the two of you… worked together?"
"Lots of history there." Neal smiles in perfect harmony, like a life of crime is all that he has always wanted. "I was eighteen, Mozzie had a goatee. We met in Central Park."
Peter doesn't ask for details, Neal openly offers, sharing his past, glossing over the bad and highlighting all the crazy stunts Mozzie and him has pulled before Adler, and then subsequently Peter, came onto their radar.
He tells him about Europe, and almost Burma of rare gems and lost art. Neal lets Peter ask one question at the end.
"Are you looking for something?"
"A music box."
"And after that?" And there is no doubt to Peter that Neal will have it, one day if not today. It isn't faith or misplaced trust, it is knowledge that Neal has the skills to pull it off.
"There's always something else. This job is a rush, it's an addiction you don't get over."
"Drug addicts hit rock bottom."
Peter doesn't want to admit fear but he's always been afraid for Neal.
"There is no rehabilitation for people like us."
"Jail time?"
Neal shakes his head, like he wish he could be a better man than this.
"Just a warning to be a little more careful next time."
000
Peter takes his place in the Municipal van, and it suddenly feels suffocating. Like he doesn't really belong, like he is living someone else's lie, and he wonders whether this is how Neal feels when he is pulling a con.
"Fugitive, forger, pointman, artist, conman." Diana leans back into her chair, amused at her boss' late entrance, and even more impressed by Neal's rap sheet. "What can't this Neal Caffrey do?"
Peter shakes his head, gruff annoyance mangled with unexplainable fondness. Diana tries not to read the man but it is hard, her boss has never displayed this level of emotional attachment before, and for a running fugitive nonetheless. Still, she isn't one to dig.
"I'm sure there are some things he can't do."
"He broke out of Supermax in a month and a half, three months before his sentence was done, boss." Diana looks up from Caffrey's suspected list of crimes and his convicted list and turns to her supervisor, curious. "What made him run? Do you suppose there was something more important than risking four more years in the big house when he gets caught?"
"I certainly hoped he did," Peter replies, unable to look away from the monitors and Neal's shadow. And he doesn't know whether he can go through with this, not when Neal is the wild card in the deck. The ground team checks in, announcing the warehouse to be secured, all exits covered.
Peter breaths out something heavy before standing up.
"Alright, let's go."
He doesn't check his gun or let anyone get a glimpse of the honest fear in his eyes.
And it is easy.
There are no mistakes made when the teams barge in through the side door, Neal visibly stunned when he sees Peter entering among the masses. He makes everyone lower their weapon, unwilling to see Neal with a dozen guns pointed at his chest.
No one makes a move, Neal stares at him almost as though he is the only one in the room.
"Peter Burke, FBI. White Collar division."
He stares at him in the eyes, unease shining through as he approaches him.
"Neal Caffrey, you're under arrest," and he is just as scared if not so much more, "turn around and put your hands behind your head."
He watches as Neal slowly raises his arms to tuck his hands behind his head, he remembers the arch of Neal's spine beneath his fingertips, the lines of his muscles flexing when he moves. But these are intimate things that a federal agent living off the government's payroll has no right knowing.
Peter has his arms bent behind his back when he leans forward, voice soft and pleading beneath his breath.
"Please don't do anything stupid, Neal."
And then he is cuffing his wrists together, hot fingers branding when he finally lets go. Neal's heart is thumping within the confines of his chest and his ribs ache with the betrayal that is only beginning to settle in after the shock.
"…Peter?"
He wants to scream. (He can't go back.)
000
Like an old love letter from the past, it's not hard to see the truth now that everything has come and gone. Neal has always known that Peter has never been the kind of person to live this life.
The door opens and the top of Peter's head can be seen pass the grocery bags he has balanced in his arms. Neal gets up from the table to help but settles for closing the door when Peter grunts his way pass him to dump the contents over the counter.
He catches sight of the mess spread out, strategically, at the kitchen table and asks, "Monopoly night?"
"Friday is chess night." Mozzie corrects, standing up in response. (While it is only Wednesday night, no one wonders what the man is trying to say.) Peter rolls his eyes, pulling a few items from the bags before asking. "Are you staying for dinner?"
"Mozzie already has a dinner date." Neal grins with one hip leaning up against the counter. And it makes Peter dizzy to see him in loose slacks and a plain white tank that clings just right. "With a seven feet tall Russian."
And that has Peter snapping his eyes from Neal's chest to his face in alarm, like he is daring him to be joking. Except he sees the seriousness in the feral grin and shakes his head with a soft smile, like he really shouldn't have expected any less.
"Have fun then…?"
Mozzie waves off the concern and downs the last sip of his wine before he makes for the door with a backwards wave.
He doesn't collect the blueprints, or the blatant display of intricate drawings and references pinned across an easel. Neither does Neal make an attempt to clean things up, he only watches as Peter picks up every little detail as he continues to pull out the groceries from the bags.
And because they are both smart men, Neal doesn't try to hide a thing.
"You aren't the kind, I know that, Peter." Neal smiles, leaning forward to fold the bags into a pile to put away, "I won't ever ask you for something you aren't willing to give. So don't worry about me."
"…I just don't want you to get hurt."
"I'll be fine, Peter."
Neal doesn't stop planning heists and Peter never acknowledges it again.
"So, how's your boring nine to five today?"
"Same old, same old like always, Neal."
He gives him both his trust and faith, and for a long time, it really is enough for the two of them. So when the world attempts to ruin the one good thing he's got going for him, he promises he will move heaven and hell to get to him.
000
The first time Peter breaks his heart, he has been Carlton Lead except neither knows it's a game of deception and so forgiveness comes easy.
The second time Peter breaks his heart, Neal has been behind a wall of plexi-glass shouting his name.
The third time Peter breaks his heart, he has his hands behind his back, his wrists locked into police-issued cuffs. And it isn't so much the fear of going back into Supermax as it is the fact that Peter has been the one to put him there.
He is surprised, he knows he shouldn't be, but he still is nonetheless. If only because he can still remember all that, and so much more that can come in retaliation for all the wrong he has done before.
And for a good long second, Neal almost doesn't allow himself to believe again. Because three broken hearts from the same man should be enough indication that he can't be the one.
Except he is.
There has never been anyone else.
"Is this a proposal, Peter?" Neal's eyes are gleaming like he wants to cry, blue widening just so to convey a wiry amusement to hide the startled disbelief just beneath the surface. His heart is pounding and it hurts still but it is all healing in time to Peter's final offer of a promise.
"It's a tracking anklet, Neal."
"I'll be honoured." He smiles, not even trying to play down the loud I do, now let's get this on me he seems to be screaming in his head.
Peter doesn't pull him across the table for a kiss but oh, does he want to.
"So, what's my radius?"
He is sitting in his car and he has their fingers laced together in a vice grip as he drives. The long roads going straight ahead for miles to come. There is the wind blowing through the opened windows, sunshine hitting his skin and it feels good. It feels like coming home.
"2 miles."
"2 miles?" He tilts his head with a smile he can't wipe away. "I can work with that."
"You can work with 2 feet."
Neal turns his grin to him and nods. "Only if that 2 feet is around you… Do you think I can convince the Marshals that?"
Peter ignores his teasing and grips Neal's hand just a little harder, voice tight as he asks, like he is finally allowing the uneasy fear to show and it is Neal's favourite vulnerability on display.
"It's going to be for four years, Neal. Are you really okay with that?"
And just like before, Peter wants to come clean, wants to admit how selfish he has always been, that this is the only way he knows how to keep Neal close.
But Neal is smart, he has always been capable of knowing exactly what Peter is after. And it pleases him to know that Neal will always be the one he wants. This is Peter's offer at a second chance, another try for Neal to become a better man he knows he wants to be.
He understands the risk, that an agent and a conman seen together will burn both their worlds as one. That a CI and his handler seen together can be another shared hand they play, an angle for the world as their mark.
"…Would you believe me if I want to make this for life?"
Peter almost doesn't hear him over the wind rushing through the interior of the car but he does and it reminds him of who Neal really is, who he has always been, who he will always be.
"…You would have to be convicted for some pretty serious crimes."
"I'm sure I can think of something." He tilts his head against the sunshine. "Do you think a Matisse would do it?"
"Don't you even think about hitting the MET." He lets Neal's hand go for a second before a file lands in the ex-con's lap. "Our first case, a scam at a downtown gallery, the assistant manager called it in."
And then he finds the heat of his palm again, like always, and their fingers fit together, perfect in its own right.
XXX Kuro
And then they proceed to get a dog named Satchmo and because Peter is his handler, moving Neal in with him makes perfect sense. (Feel free to msg me for plot bugs and anything else that gave you an immediate case of what-the-heck, I'm all ears!) :)