Neal strolled around in one odd yard sale. It was an empty office floor with chandeliers hanging in the ceiling, and the items for sale were Mozzie's stuff. He had known the man for more years than he had known Peter and still it felt like rummaging in his sacred private even by looking at the items.

"I think I would like to take the Ushanka hat spy cam," June said behind him, the only customer there, except for himself. "It's good for the New York chill."

"Well, in that case, may I interest you in this nuclear-winter lantern?" Moz said with delight, holding up a lantern of some sort. "It generates vitamin D."

"Always good to be prepared," Neal said, inspecting a megaphone. He wondered what made it a typical Moz-thing. Mozzie was like Bond's Q, finding and hiding the most extraordinary technical gizmos.

"I'll take it," June said. "Thank you so much."

"Please tell all of Byron's old friends," Moz said. "I need as many buyers for my sleight-of-hand-me-downs as I can possibly get."

"You know I will." June paid him, and they hugged. "Thanks, dear. Send them?" Neal smiled at the upper-class attitude of always getting things they bought delivered home by someone else.

"Yes, of course."

"Thank you."

"Bye, June," Neal said as she passed him on the way out.

"Bye, darling. See you at home."

"You know she doesn't actually need a Russian-surplus spy-cam hat," Neal said to Moz when she left.

"She's a wonderful woman."

"Are you sure you want to sell everything, Moz? I mean, I know how much some of this stuff means to you." Neal picked up a plastic banana from a bowl of plastic fruits. A thumb-sized blade emerged from its end. He did not see that coming.

"Well, can we sell our treasure?" his friend asked in return. "We know it's from Russian museums. It's not tainted. It'll sell quick."

"With the sub's manifest locked away at the D.C. bureau? You know we can't risk it."

"Well, then, yes, I'm gonna sell all of my treasures."

"Oh, come on. Is it really that dire, Oliver Twist?" Just like Neal, Mozzie had a good nose for finding easy money when needed. They were both in the game. When ever they needed money they stole it one way or another.

"Oh, it's worse. Remember I told you about Mr. Jeffries?" Mozzie dug in his pocket and brought out a photo that must have been a part of him since he was a kid. Neal had seen it before. It was the single evidence Neal knew of that proved that Mozzie had once been a kid too. Beside the kid-version of Moz was an Afro-American gentleman, both smiling towards the camera.

"Yeah. Your old headmaster from the group home in Detroit."

"Yeah, well, they lost all their funding because of the economy in Detroit."

"I'm sorry, Moz." So that was the reason. Small cons could not cover those amounts needed.

"I sent an anonymous donation last month, but that's not gonna last very long. The orphanage is Mr. Jeffries' entire life. Those kids need him."

"All right, I will spread the word about the sale," Neal said, and dug in his pocket for a ten-dollar-bill. "And I'll buy the banana."

"Excellent choice."


"Guys, quiet down," Peter said, walking into the crowded conference room Monday morning. "Quiet down. Let's get through this. Blake, follow up with Bellevue about those fake insurance cards. Jones, stop texting. Put a smile on your face." Jones put on a huge fake grin. "Another IBF." He handed Jones a file.

"I'm smiling," Jones said.

"Diana, copyright infringement."

"Not another one," she muttered, accepting the file.

"What was that?"

"Yay, another one."

"That's what I thought I heard. Neal?"

"Here," the kid replied at the other end of the table.

"Help Diana if she needs it." Peter reminded himself to find something for the kid during the day. "All right, I saved the best for last. Organized crime is asking us to keep an eye out for any financial movement from the Motor City. Apparently, the Detroit mob's in town." He put a mugshot on the screen. "This guy, Frank de Luca, has been spotted poking around our local criminal hot spots." He switched between a few photos of the man taken on different sites. "Organized crime thinks that he's looking for somebody."

"Do they know who?" Neal asked, and Peter thought he detected a tone of worry.

"No, but last night, this numbers runner met with an unfortunate accident after somebody tried getting information out of him." Peter put a photo of the dead man on the table. "O.C. suspects it was de Luca doing the asking. We got Al Capone on tax evasion. Maybe there's a financial angle that we can play de Luca. That's it. Meeting adjourned."

People filed out, but Neal approached him.

"Sounds like we've got an easy day."

"We do. Please don't complicate it."

"I would never," Neal assured him. "Can I take an early lunch?"

Peter glanced at him. They had just started working for the day.

"Sure."

Peter watched him leave.

"Something wrong, boss?" Diana asked.

"Neal just complicated my day," Peter sighed. "Have organized crime get those files on the Detroit mob."

"You got it."


When Neal got back to Mozzie's 'yard sale' there were a lot more people there. Moz was a character many of New York's criminals knew of, and he was liked as well as admired. No one else Neal knew of had successfully lived most of his life under the radar, unknown by any authority.

"Okay, you degenerates, listen up," Moz said, walking between the tables. "There are great opportunities here. We've got ultrasonic stun-g*n binoculars, cane swords, cattle prods, morning-star maces."

"This iron do anything?" a guy asked, holding what looked like an ordinary iron.

"Oh, you ever need a multi-directional mike with optional tear-gas dispenser valve?"

"No." He put the iron back and saw a teddy bear in a box. "Who's this little guy?"

"Oh, no, no, no. No, it's not for sale. Can't have that. Here, try this." Mozzie picked up an apple from the same bowl as the banana came from.

"No, don't eat this," Neal dived in. "Trust me. Moz, I need to talk to you."

"Not now, Neal."

"This is important." He pulled his friend aside. "Did you talk to a numbers runner recently?"

"Uh, yeah, Eddie Nine-Ball. Why?"

"He's dead, Moz." His friend made big eyes. But before anything further could be said a new voice entered the arena.

"Hey, listen up, New York underworld." Neal turned to where the voice came from and saw a man in an expensive suit and a thug enter the room. "I'm Frank de Luca Junior from Detroit, and I'm here looking for a man who's known as 'the Dentist of Detroit.'" There were giggles in the room. "So you think the Dentist is a myth, huh? No one man could do everything he's done. Well, I'm here to tell you, the Dentist is real. And I have good reason to believe he's right here in New York City. And so, surely, one of you knows who the Dentist is."

Everyone in the room was silent. Mozzie did not even look at the man. He made sure not to be noted, as he usually did, when not among friends.

Frank de Luca Junior glanced around the room. Neal met his eyes, but he had nothing to say. And even if he had, he would not tell. 'The Dentist of Detroit' and he had never crossed paths what he knew of, and the rumor he had heard had not interested him in searching him out. Too much pain and violence.

"Okay. Please..." He made an ironic bow. "Tell the Dentist that I'm making an appointment," he said pulling a note from his pocket. "And if he doesn't keep it…" He jammed the note to a concrete pillar with a switchblade. "…He can say goodbye to his friend."

He sent a glare around the room and left with his thug.

Once they left, Neal pulled the note down. A place and a time. He turned it over.

"That's Mr. Jeffries!" Mozzie cried, pulling the note from his hands.

Neal looked at his friend. Harmless, clever, friend with most people. How did he get involved with the Detroit mob?

"What's going on, Moz?"

"Neal..." he said, pale. "I'm the Dentist of Detroit."


Peter was not that surprised when Neal did not turn up after lunch, either. He gathered the team in the conference room.

"This everything from organized crime?" he asked Diana.

"Including a map of de Luca's suspected movements around the city," she said, pulling up a map with red lines and dots with dates and times.

"What do you know about him?"

"De Luca Sr. was gunned down five months ago, leaving his son Frank to take over the family business," she said. She handed him a photo. "Leo Mazzera, drives the car, scares the people."

"We got Caffrey's tracking data cued up," Jones came in. "What did he do now?"

"Took an early lunch," Peter said.

"Yeah?" Jones sat down. "Remind me to stay on your good side."

"You notice him perk up when Peter mentioned the Detroit mob?" Diana asked.

"Yeah, but we've been tracking Caffrey for seven years. He has no Detroit ties."

"But Mozzie does," Peter said. He got that piece of info from El. "Jones, overlay Neal's tracking data with de Luca's."

Peter rose to get a closer look at the screen.

"De Luca's in red," Jones said as he merged the two on the screen.

"Look at that," he said, grinning. "Neal's movements, de Luca's movements. Looks like de Luca found who he was looking for." At the same point at the same time, Neal and a representative of the Detroit mob were on the same spot.

While de Luca seemed to have left the building, Neal appeared to be still there. He checked the app on his phone. Yeah, Neal was still there.