Chapter 5

It was 10:30 am. Diana was impatiently waiting for her mentor whose plane landed a couple of minutes earlier at Charles de Gaule airport. She was nervous. Neal was still in custody. He had no idea what she was up to. She chose not to tell either man what she plotted. She wanted to see Neal's face when he would see Peter. She was certain that she would know at that moment whether the con man told the truth. At least, that was her hope.

As for Peter, she did not have the courage to tell him the truth over the phone. Of course, she could still tell him everything on the drive to the precinct, but deep inside her, she knew she wouldn't do it.

Finally, she saw Agent Burke, who was looking for her in the crowd. She waved at him and they hugged for a long time, without uttering a word. Peter was the one to break the spell.

"Diana, you look amazing! It's a pleasure to see you."

"The pleasure is all mine, Peter. Thanks a lot for coming. I suggest we go directly to the precinct so I can keep you up to date with the case."

"Well, it's just that I'm a bit tired after such a long journey. Can't we stop by my hotel?"

"We have a suspect in custody and we won't be able to keep him there for long. Each minute counts."

"If you have a suspect, why do you need me?"

"He is… tough."

They walked to the parking lot. Diana settled behind the wheel and they drove in silence to the precinct. Both of them were deep in the memory of so many car rides, in another country, on another continent, in another life. Way too fast, according to Diana, they made it to their destination.

"Just a second, I'm going to make sure that we can see the suspect."

With these words, Diana left Peter to wait in the hall. She walked to the officer in charge and ask that Neal would be reinstalled in an interrogation room with no chance of seeing them. Then, she went back near Peter. They did not wait long. A couple of minutes later, they were led to their suspect.

Diana chose to open the door and enter first. She wanted to see Neal's reaction when he would realize she was not alone. The young man was looking down at his cuffed hands when the door opened. He raised his head slowly. Diana stepped aside, letting him see Peter.

The silence that fell on the interrogation room was deafening. Both men were staring at each other. After what seemed like hours, Peter crossed the room in long strides, caught his best friend by the shoulders, lifted him and hugged him.

"I knew it," he murmured. "Deep inside, I knew it. I've known ever since I opened the container. Thank you for helping me figure it out. I was turning crazy. I had the feeling I had killed you."

Neal did not stay petrified very long. In the blink of an eye, his hands were free from the cuffs and he was hugging the other man back, the man who taught him that another life was possible, in spite of his past and in spite of the lies.

On the other side of the room, Diana watched silently as the two friends celebrated their reunion. Neal's face had given her the answer she expected: he was innocent. Peter's words, on the other hand, rang strangely in her hears. The two men finally split up and the three of them sat down around the table.

"I'm sorry for not warning you, Peter," Diana started.

Peter cut her off.

"I think I understand why you did not. You wanted to know whether Neal was telling the truth. And you wondered whether I helped him disappear. Am I right?"

"Yes. I had my doubts. I thought that Neal could never leave and let you believe he was dead."

"Yet I did, for several months. Until Elisabeth and I got a bottle of 82 Bordeaux. She did not make the connection. I did. I took out the personal effects I received at the hospital. There was that key. I did some digging and I found the container Neal had left behind. Then, I understood. I wanted to have faith, even if I saw Neal's body at the morgue."

"I'm right here if you need me," Neal sighed. "I guess you'd like an explanation."

"I already had one," Diana answered.

"You thought that if you stayed, we would all be in danger. So you chose to leave, never wondering whether we could survive without you. You broke El's heart. And I won't even talk about Mozzie. He stayed in New York for some time, until we decided to move to Washington. Since that day, he's gone off the radar. I used every FBI resources I could to find him, but I didn't."

Neal was thunderstruck. He had hoped that his friend would find comfort with Elisabeth, and even Peter, because despite his loathing of G-men, Mozzie truly liked the Burkes. He gazed at Diana. Since Theo's birth, she and Mozzie had built up a strange but intense relationship. She gently shook her head. She had not heard of the little man in months either.