Peter normally takes notes on cases as he goes, he was always very studious and patient with this kind of work. On occasion if he didn't have the space or time to, he'd ignore his usual mode of operandi and take sparse notes but on the even rarer occasion, he would forgo notes entirely because he was too eager to pause even for a second. This was one such case which is why he was able to skim the file all the way to the end and start on a more thorough, notated read through before he realized that it had been a while since Neal and the two Marshalls stalked off towards the more secluded area of the office. A quick text to Diana confirmed that the Marshalls had already left the building over ten minutes ago.

Peter was on his feet before even registering the words fully and had to remind himself not to run in front of the bullpen, but he did walk rather briskly.

When Peter reached the temporary conference room, he let go of the breath he was holding. Neal sat slumped in his chair head in hand with fingers carding through his hair, other hand holding his phone and he was just staring at it not moving.

Peter watched him for another moment before casually saying, "Thinking about calling someone?"

Without startling Neal put his phone back in his pocket and removed his now messy hair from his hands, "I was thinking about it"

Peter pushed off the door frame he had taken to leaning on to step further in the room and close the door, "So I take it the marshals talked to you about the...the ya know, the-"

"-yup"

"good"

"very good"

Peter cringed at how he started the conversation but tried his best to truck on by pulling up his own chair and sitting down, "Why didn't you tell me?"

"It was classified" Neal said with a wink

Peter recognized this attempt to get them on more familiar, less vulnerable conversation territory, but ignored it, "You never were a rule follower"

"Well, it wasn't about me. I didn't want to get anybody hurt because I decided to leave and I was no longer that person, legally too. There was never a reason to bring it up."

"I understand" Peter said and he did, he was perhaps the only person in the world to understand Neal Caffery this well besides himself. "So, are you going to talk to your family?"

Neal smiled at the question, "I'm gonna call my aunt Ellen. I haven't talked to her in 20 years. I always wondered if she knew what I got up to. I never thought I'd see her again. I was always afraid that if she ever found me that she'd be disappointed but she moved to New York to be near me so that has to mean something good, doesn't it?"

"Yeah," Peter agreed, "It does."

"Are you going to call your mother?" Peter scolded himself for asking. He really wanted an answer, to understand why. Although he was pretty sure he knew the answer, which was also why it was probably not the right thing to ask.

"Probably not" Neal responded immediately.

Peter backpedaled hard, "Sorry that was insensitive of me"

"No, it wasn't insensitive, you don't know- you read my file already?!"

"No! I mean yes but it was just an overview of your time in WITSEC. No real details about your life, just name, location, stuff like that. Ross brought the file with him. I am sorry if it was an intrusion, but I really didn't know what was going to be in it until I read it."

Neal deflated at that, "It's fine. I figured you'd read my file eventually but I didn't realize that it would be so soon... What was in it?"

"It referenced previous arrests as a minor but didn't include them in the report. Anything I need to worry about there?"

Neal glared, which his handler took as an attempt to think his way out of answering, then sighed and relaxed his gaze, "After it came out that my, uh my dad was a murderer, my mom, she kinda fell apart. She just stopped functioning. She could barely take care of herself, couldn't hold a job, clean or cook she just laid in bed all day. Ellen took care of me. Then the marshals thought it was safer that we were kept separate but..." Neal just shrugged, "we got a stipend, compensation because our new identities had no job history or qualifications, not that it mattered, but it wasn't enough. I stole clothes, food, money, anything we needed. I only got caught twice." The last bit was said with pride.

"That's why you ran away?" Peter asked but there was no need.

"Yeah"

"It's still inconclusive in your file if you ran away or were taken, although they're pretty sure you ran."

"When the marshals came to visit me in prison to confirm my identity, they questioned me about what happened, as well as the usual speech of 'don't tell anyone' and all that but I couldn't bring myself to admit that I ran away. I felt bad for abandoning my mom when she couldn't take care of herself."

"You still care about her?"

"Of course, she's my mom, I'll always care about her"

"But you won't call her"

"I won't call her. She was sick and I know that is not her fault, but I can't help but blame her. She might still be my mom but she's not my mom anymore."

After a beat of silence Peter stood up, "come on. It's a nice day and it's lunchtime. What say you, we take a stroll through central park to that hotdog stand you like?"

Neal leveled a stare at Peter, "It is 9:30 am and that is the hotdog stand that you like."

Peter rolled his eyes, "okay fine it's the hotdog stand I like, but you wanted to walk in the park and it is a nice day. We can stay here if you want, work cold cas-"

"-Let me grab my jacket" Neal stood abruptly and powered past a smirking Peter.

Agent Burke also had to grab his jacket from his office. He felt Diana's stare from the bullpen, but he ignored it. It would do no good for Neal to know that Jones and Diana knew about his past too with how much he did not want Peter to know about it. Although to be fair to Neal's intelligence, there was a slim chance he thought that Diana and jones were not involved.

Immediately after leaving his office and giving Diana a frantic "not now" hand signal and walking past a much more discrete, Jones side-eye he could see that Neal had already put into place the Caffrey charm he wore like amor into undercover ops. It was obvious in the way that the consultant made small talk with several agents he passed on his way to the elevators from his desk. Peter wasn't sure how this was even possible given that his desk was the closest to the exit in the entire office. Neal even meandered over to the newest clerk's desk who just so happened to be a stunning young brunette. Peter was stuck standing behind Neal huffing and tapping his shoulder as he flirted. The pair finally made it to the elevator, but Neal kept his beaming smile in place even after the doors slid in place, just leaving the two of them. Had Peter not been the world's leading Caffrey expert (unfortunately it was an officially recognized title in the bureau) Peter would have been upset that Neal felt the need to hide how he felt from Peter. But Peter knew that the whole Caffrey act was also a way to prevent himself from dealing with his own emotions. He also knew not to take it personally that Neal had hidden something from him. Neal never voluntarily gave up personal information and he was starting to understand that this was a habit drilled into him from a young age.