3 - Copycat Caffrey

"Tell me something I don't know" Eric said, all charm and bravado and yea, Neal would be lying if if he said he didn't see just a little bit of himself in that kid.

"And never, never think you're the smartest guy in the room" He replied, "... Unless you're the smartest guy in the room".

The boy's grin faded slightly.

"Oh, uh, you want to keep your place in that deck? Keep the tip of your little finger in the brief".

"I think I know what I'm doing".

He held up Manny's fifty dollar bill.

"Want to put some money on that?"

"... Sure. Who's the mark?"

Neal glanced around the room, knowing he'd recognise at least one unsavoury character in here. The fact that it was Alex, just made it that much easier. Good job, Moz.

"How about her?"

Eric glanced past him before smirking and jumping up, making his way over with Neal following a few feet behind him.

At the bar, he held out his hand.

"Hi, I'm Eric".

"Alex" She greeted, "Nice to meet you".

"Alex, pick a card".

She smiled, beauty and innocence all wrapped in one.

"This looks like fun".

Pulling out a card, she looked at it, and then briefly glanced over at Neal. He flickered his eyes back to Eric and subtly shook his head.

"So, put it back on top and cut it for me, would you?"

She did as told and Neal was positive that Eric didn't catch her palming the card.

"Okay. Okay, now, the card I stop at is gonna be yours".

Alex looked over at him again and he shook his head more firmly this time.

"He doesn't think it will be".

"He's wrong".

She glanced down at the cards he was flipping over.

"200 bucks says he's right".

"No. I can't take your money".

She smirked, "Why not? You can't make bets with girls?"

Eric gave Neal a look but he merely shrugged, and with a sigh, the kid pulled out two one-hundred bills and tossed them down on the table. A few flips later and-

"And that's your card".

"And, no, it's not".

Oof. Alex could be brutal.

"Well, that was supposed to be your card".

She gathered up the money.

"Now, I guess he was right. Sorry".


Folding the money, she was stopped with an older man grabbed her wrist.

"I believe this is her card, Eric" Professor Oswald said, pulling the Queen of Diamonds from her purse.

"She and Caffrey played you. She's his, uh, 'inside man', if you will".

"Nice catch".

Eric wasn't so appreciative, so Neal quickly tried to calm him.

"Look, we weren't gonna take your money".

He scoffed, eyes furious.

"Yea, right!"

"Check your pocket".

He pulled out two hundred dollars, but his scowl didn't abate.

"I guess the lesson here is never con a con man" Oswald finished, but Neal smirked, "I think we all know what the lesson is for today, don't we, Eric?"

He was still fuming.

Whoops.

He probably shouldn't have said that.

"Yea. Yea, I guess I'm not the smartest guy in the room".

Before Neal could so much as blink, a solid fist struck him across the face, sending him feeling back against the bar stools.

"But I'm still the strongest!"

Eric stormed off as Alex quickly reached out to steady him.

"You okay?"

Neal blinked, slowly, before reaching up and wiping a bead of blood from the corner of his mouth.

"... Yea. I'm good".

"I'll have a talk with him" Oswald said, but his smirk betrayed his amusement with the situation, "But hey, congratulations. You humbled him. That's not easy to do".

Neal pressed gingerly against his jaw and tried not to groan.

"I'm, uh, Professor George Oswald".

He held out a hand.

"Alex Hunter" Neal quickly said, fighting through the pain to stay on track.

She gave him a dirty look but couldn't say anything with Oswald right in front of them.

"Hi".

"What do you do besides card tricks?"

"Oh-"

"She's in the moving business" He interrupted again, the sharp sting slowly reducing itself to a dull ache.

"Ah. Well, nice to meet you" Oswald said, "If you want to join us for a drink, the next round is on Eric. It's the least he could do after a scene like that".

"Nice to meet you" Alex replied, and Neal nodded "Be right there".


The moment he was gone, she glared at him and stormed out.

"Hey, hey, hey!" Neal quickly caught her wrist, "Thank you for backing me up in there".

"Mozzie tells me to come to the bar because you have a plan" She snapped, "and now I'm out 200 bucks and you're dropping my name".

"Do you trust me?"

"No".

Ouch. That hurt more than the punch.

"Okay, I assume we're doing more than baiting frat boys with bar tricks" She finally gave in, "What's with the dead poets society in there?"

"You know it's my current case and the solution to your problem" He said.

"Russell wants to meet on Sunday to fence the rest of the Krugerrands, but it's a setup. He's gonna sell me out to whoever put the price on my head, and your plan is to bring the feds into it?!"

"I tell the FBI that Oswald and his kids are gonna steal the Krugerrands" Neal explained, feeling his split lip reopen with the movement, "They'll pull Russell in and talk to him. It will kill his reputation. No one will be buying information off him if they think he's in bed with the bureau".

She glanced back through the bar window, "You're crazy".

"It'll work".

"You're crazy" Alex repeated.

"Are you in or are you out?"

"... I'm in".

Neal grinned, and his jaw ached from it.

"Get Mozzie to text me the plan" She finished, eyes flickering down to the blossoming bruise on his face, "And then go put some ice on that".


"The kids do the legwork" Neal said the next morning, "Oswald fences the good and kicks them back a share of the profit. If the kids get caught…"

"Oswald can sell them out" Peter finished.

"Yea, he'll say he was... teaching a class, and they took it too far".

"He's more slippery than you are" Diana said.

He grinned and his jaw throbbed.

"Thank you".

Peter shook his head at him.

"Do you think you can get him to reveal the painting?"

He shrugged, "I don't know. They spent the night talking about the next best heist".

"Which way are they leaning?"

"Everything from diamond heists to stealing boats" He explained, "... But I think we can choose for them".

"How so?"

Neal slid into a chair and cautiously glanced at the door.

"I happen to know a petty crook who's moving Krugerrands on Sunday".

"Gold Krugerrands?" Peter asked, "Of course you do".

"His name is Russell Smith".

Jones started typing, before hitting enter and turning the laptop around.

"Bingo. Racketeering, extortion, robbery".

"And I don't like him" Neal finished, "We intercept Russell with the Krugerrands, send Jones down the street with the coins, and I get the kids to steal them from him instead".

"We can watch them, follow the case back to Oswald" Diana realised, and he nodded.

"Tell me more about this guy. How do you know him?"

"He's... a friend of a friend".

"Mozzie?" Peter guessed, and Neal looked away, annoyed.

He had more friends than Mozzie.

Not… many, exactly, but Peter didn't have to keep pointing that out to him.

Didn't he at least deserve some privacy in his new not-so-clean life?

"You can convince Oswald and the kids to go after him?" Diana asked.

"I can still be slippery" Neal said, leaning back in his seat, "I'll get them to convince me".

She scoffed in disbelief, and Jones shook his head, amused.

"Alright, I'm in" Peter decided, "So is now a good time to address that bruise on your face?"

His grin fell as he winced.

"We just had a little… disagreement, last night, at the bar. Uh, don't worry about it".

"Kinda feel like I should" He countered, "Especially since these guys need to trust you".

He raised a solitary eyebrow and Peter sighed.

"Okay, fine, they need to trust you insomuch as criminals can trust each other. But they can't suspect what side you're on, Neal".

Yea, he thought sardonically, my own.

"They don't" He said instead, "The ringleader, Eric, he just got knocked down a few pegs. Didn't take it too well".

"A baby Caffrey on the loose? Now I don't feel so bad about arresting them" Diana teased, standing up with a handful of files, "I'll brief Hughes on what we're doing".

"And I need to get into character" Jones said dryly, following her, "I've never stolen Krugerrands before".


Neal watched them go with a smirk before spinning his chair around and jumping up.

"I'll go convince the kids".

A quick hand on his wrist stopped him, and he turned back around with a frown.

Peter was staring at him with a calculating look in his eyes and he immediately felt guilty about something he hadn't even done yet.

"... You sure you're okay?" He finally asked.

"Of course" Neal forced his signature grin, "Like I said, they think I'm on their side".

"That's not what I asked".

His smile slowly fell.

He was surprised to find that he actually wanted to tell Peter about the real plan, about Alex being in trouble and Smith being a no-good snitch and, no, the irony of that wasn't lost on him, but at the same time he knew that Peter would immediately call off the operation if he did find out the truth.

And besides, he wasn't… lying to him, per say. He was just… you know… not telling the full truth. As usual.

Either way, it meant killing two birds with one stone and if everything went according to plan, then Peter would never even know about it.

"I'm good" Neal finally said, his jaw pulsing with every movement, "Let's just get this over with, yea?"

Maybe then, he'd come clean...