Disclaimer: I don't own anything!
Author's Note: Headed to the beach and thought I'd get this up before I leave. Tit for Tat is currently on writer's block, but it's still getting worked on, I promise.
"You really think I can do this,? Peter, I'm touched."
"Give me a break. You could sell light switches to the Amish."
-Neal and Peter (White Collar)
Five—In Which Southern Charm Isn't What It's Cut Out To Be
He looks like something that stepped out of an old painting with the well-cut suit and his slicked back hair revealing the classically handsome features to their fullest. His cufflinks glint if he turns his wrist at the right angle and his shoes are shined to a military-worthy gleam. A pocket watch hangs on a chain from his left pocket. It looks expensive and Eames' fingers itch with the automatic urge to steal it.
He looks like fun, Eames decides, and moves to join him where he's taken to watching the crowd, a glass of something cold in hand.
"See something interesting?"
The man's eyes flick up to Eames, who is only taller by a few scant inches. Up close, his slicked back hair is fighting a losing battle with the humidity and some loose strands curl around his face. "Not anymore." His warm Southern drawl curls around the consonants and softly stretches the vowels.
"Ouch. So harsh and we've hardly spoken, daring. I just thought you could use some company."
"Don't call me that." Dark brown eyes look Eames up and down and he wonders if imagines the interest sparking in their depths. "And are you often on the lookout for lonely men?"
"They're the best kind, in my opinion." Eames smiles charmingly, raising his own glass of whiskey that he'd been working on for the better part of an hour. It wouldn't do to get drunk when he's trying to make some money off the rich folks.
He eyes the pocket watch for a second before looking back up. By his mental count, he doesn't have long before the races are over and all this money scatters back to its ranches and mansions. "I'm sorry, but do you have the time? I fear I might be late for something."
"That doesn't surprise me." The man finishes the last of his drink—sweet tea, by the smell of it and if that isn't a cliché—and sets it down on a table before fishing out his pocket watch, snapping it open with a precise movement; the man seems very very precise to Eames. Ex-military, perhaps? "Quarter to five."
Eames' mental clock isn't wrong then. He leans closer, falsely fascinated. "That is a lovely timepiece you have, sir."
"A gift from my wife last holiday. She has excellent taste, doesn't she?"
It doesn't take much for Eames to pretend to look disappointed—he'd been hoping on having something with this man, if for nothing more than a night. "A wife, is it?"
The half-smile that uncurls on the man's lips is slow and touched with a vague mischief and triumph as he pockets the watch again. "For seven years now."
"Any children?"
"Two. Anna Marie is six and Evelyn just turned four two weeks back." His accent thickens a bit, reminding Eames of melted chocolate.
"Two girls, how nice." Eames imagines that this man is the kind to dote on those girls, even as his hand slowly inches towards the pocket watch.
"They're a handful. Smart as their mother, they are." It's half a grumble, touched with fondness.
That makes Eames chuckle a little and he doesn't really have to fake it, his fingers now touching the cool silver. He slips it carefully off, not even looking because he needs to keep the man's attention. "They're going to be trouble when they're older, aren't they?"
"I dare not even think of it."
Eames leans back, palming the watch and slipping both hands in his pockets in a casual motion. "They sound wonderful."
"They are." He looks back out at the crowd. "I best be going. I don't wish to be caught in the traffic of them leaving."
"I must be leaving as well. I've got a long ride home." Eames hesitates before saying, "I never got your name."
"…Arthur." He holds out a hand—slim and lightly tanned from the Southern sun. "And you are?"
"…Eames. Pleasure to meet you."
"Likewise." The grip on Eames' hand tightens with a strength that Eames wouldn't have guessed from him and Arthur's left hand slips around to Eames' pocket, drawing out the stolen watch. "You're a good thief; I almost didn't catch you."
"Can't win them all, can you?"
"Of course not." The crowd that had been watching the races disperses, a sudden wall of sound and heat surrounding them. "But a word of advice," Arthur's accent is gone then, dropped like it had never been there. "Don't con a con."
Arthur disappears then, into the mass of people and Eames blinks after him and it takes him a moment before he thinks to check his pockets. He swears when he finds his wallet missing and he runs out to the front of the building to find Arthur in a car already. Arthur catches his eye before he drives away and Eames laughs a little, unable to help it.
He'd been right, he supposed, when he'd thought Arthur looked like fun. And he couldn't very well let the man get away with his wallet, could he?