"I want a team looking into the mine," Peter said. "Jones, dig up what we can on Barrett-Dunne. We need an in."
"Anything I can do?" The kid asked.
"Stay close."
They all moved to leave. Peter tapped Diana on the shoulder, a sign to stay. He saw Neal watch as he sat down beside her as he walked out. Did his pet convict suspect something? If he did, what would he suspect unless it had to do with the art?
"What's going on?" Diana asked when they were alone.
"Our patience may have paid off." He glanced in Neal's direction, but he was playing with his phone, and Peter knew he could not hear anything with the door closed. "D.C. Art Crimes uncovered a new Cézanne in a Baltimore storage vault."
"Does it match either of the Cézannes on the u-boat manifest?"
"No word yet. Either way, I want to see it myself. Kramer is sending over photos."
"This is our first potential hit off the list." She was excited. It was the joy of a hunt, and she did not have the same connection with Neal as he.
"Mm." He looked at Neal. "If you wait long enough, your thief will make a mistake." If the kid were involved, he would have no problem cuffing him and taking him back to prison. If Neal had the treasure, the kid would have walked behind his back and fooled him, besides from doing a theft on his very watch. Peter wished his leads to be false.
They rose and left the office.
"Everything okay?" Peter asked Neal, still lingering outside, putting his phone away.
"Yeah. Staying close."
"Good. All right, you need something to do?"
"Sure."
"I've got a mortgage fraud case for you." Peter took the file from his desk. The kid took it with a sigh.
"As I said, you love to poke a stick at me."
"And I agreed." Peter glanced at his pet convict. He did not look amused. Did he really feel that he was being tormented? He was a convict, but… "You know I give you these cases because you're good at them, right? You solve them almost twice as fast as Diana."
"That's the trouble of being a genius. You get to do too much of what you already can."
The kid disappeared down to his desk. Peter watched him. If he had to put him back in prison, there would be one question that would haunt him forever: how much of it was Peter's own fault? What if Neal wanted to create another life somewhere because of how he was treated?
Neal walked out of the conference room with that disturbing feeling he had any time Peter and Diana were alone together. Peter always threw him glances, and Diana did not. And they never said a word until he was out of the room with the door closed. They did not act that way with other cases he was not involved in.
He stopped outside, leaning against the railing to the bullpen, and played with his phone. He made sure not to send a single glance into the room. It was easy to avoid because he started the camera on his phone and filmed.
Though he could not point it deliberately at the two of them, and he had to look busy, so he used his thumbs a lot on the screen, moving the camera and himself a little from time to time.
They moved to leave, and Neal finished filming and keyed just a little bit more for good measure. He smiled at Diana as she left.
"Everything okay?" Peter asked.
"Yeah. Staying close."
"Good. All right, you need something to do?" he asked.
"Sure." Mysterious postcards with microdots were intriguing.
"I've got a mortgage fraud case for you," Peter said, holding out a file. His mood sank.
"As I said, you love to poke a stick at me."
"And I agreed." Peter grinned, and Neal hated this part of their game. He had always seen Peter as an equal. An opponent, yes, but an equal and a friend. Sometimes, though, Peter was a bad winner, mocking. "You know I give you these cases because you're good at them, right?" Peter added, seeming regretful. "You solve them almost twice as fast as Diana."
It felt better, but it did not make it more fun.
"That's the trouble of being a genius," he said. "You get to do too much of what you already can."
Neal walked down to his desk and did his job. Two hours later, he left the file at Peter's desk.
"Solved. Now, you can reward me by letting me go early. Or give me more of the same, and I'll soon be down at the speed of Diana, because I'll gain nothing by being good at my job."
Peter smiled at him.
"Well put. You can go early."
Neal did and met up with Mozzie.
"For what it's worth, I'm really sorry about Sara," his friend said. "She has an infectious joie de vivre. And she looks terrific in pantsuits."
"Promise me you'll never speak at my funeral."
"You were gonna have to cut ties with her eventually," Mozzie said, unaffected. "Our days here are numbered. Providing we find a way to start selling off the art without alerting the feds."
"Yeah, speaking of, Peter and Diana are up to something."
"Feds? Up to something? Quelle surprise."
"Yeah, two closed-door meetings in as many days? I videotaped their conversation." Neal's hand went for his cellphone.
"Ah, gutsy," Moz said.
"Mm, well, desperate times." He keyed on the phone and found the film. "Can you tell what they're saying?"
Mozzie took the phone and pushed his glasses up his forehead.
"Oh, something 'paid off.' Wait. The Suit says, 'new Cézanne.'"
"You sure?"
"Or possibly 'Rue McClanahan,'" Moz said without a smile. "I'd go with 'new Cézanne.'"
"We've got a pair of Cézannes in our stash."
"'Bridge Over a Pond' and 'The Mount of Saint Victoria.'"
"Not good, Moz." Neal took his phone back.
"Peter's still looking into the art from the u-boat?"
"Yeah, he's not one to give up." To be quite honest, he did not know that that was what Peter was doing. Peter himself would say that what Neal said he knew was no proof, only a theory. Neal admitted to himself that it was a theory, but until that theory was proven wrong, he had too much to lose to not take it for fact.
"I thought he handed the investigation over to D.C. Art Crimes," Mozzie said.
"He may have handed over the partial manifest, but he wouldn't let go of the investigation."
"Think you can find out what he's up to?"
"I'll do what I can."