Author: Regency

Title: The King Con

Pairing: Peter/Neal

Rating: PG for light swearing

Spoilers: None save for 1.02 Threads for mentions of Cruz and her outfit.

Category: AU, drama, some humor, slash, UST

Word count: ~4,424

Summary: Special Agent Neal Caffrey had spent his entire career chasing ace conman Peter Burke. He’d expected to catch the man someday; not to himself be caught.

Author’s Notes: Although I started this beforehand, the completion of this story was inspired by the awesome story, The Badger Game, kel_trina wrote me for the White Collar Valentine’s Day Fic Exchange. The prompt was for Peter to be the con and Neal the fed.  As of her first posting, the two stories were very different and I’ve made every effort to keep them that way.

Disclaimer: I don’t own any characters recognizable as being from White Collar. They are the property of their producers, writers, and studios, not me.  No copyright infringement was intended and no money was made in the writing or distribution of this story. It was good, clean fun.

~!~

For a man sorely lacking in Neal’s old Hollywood allure, Peter Burke was devastating in a tuxedo and tails. His bowtie as level as a straightedge, his black shoes shined to a fresh penny glimmer, the sight of Peter alone convinced Neal that he had stepped into a whole new world.

He didn’t quite feel shabby in his three-button Giorgio Bissoni, but he felt like a man with a bulls-eye on his back. This wasn’t his turf and these weren’t his people.  If they could be called loyal to anyone at all, he’d have to attribute it all to Peter.  And here was Neal, in the thick of things without a stitch of backup to his name.

He barely suppressed a sigh.  This seemed like a good idea when I planned it.

Neal had been ordered off the Burke case for the first time a week ago.  They were sending in someone new to shake things up.  It wasn’t a reflection on his work, they’d comforted. Just an infusion of fresh blood, they’d said. But Neal hadn’t risen through the Bureau’s ranks by being the fool of anyone with a bigger office than him.  He knew he was being put out to pasture.

Five years of his young life and the bulk of Neal’s career had been devoted to putting the conman Burke behind bars. Now, it was all but over and done without him ever having completed his task.  He couldn’t allow that. He needed one more shot at it and this was it.

Having come across a tip placing the New York office’s most wanted man at this very event, Neal had dusted off his finest tux and called in a few nebulously-legal markers to wrangle an invite. So, here he was, steeped in the criminal elite up to his neck.  It was a room full of people he would have been only too glad to arrest.  If only he had a warrant and a bushel of handcuffs.

Nevertheless, Neal acted like he hadn’t a care in the world and picked up a flute of golden champagne.  It tickled his nose fresh from the bottle and its taste leaping on his tongue made him smile.  He’d gone too long without a drink like this.  It had been years since he’d had a night like this.

“It’s comforting to know that the feds are teaching good taste at the Academy for a change,” opined a voice from behind him.  Neal turned slowly, having recognized the unique pall that overtook a crowd when Peter Burke entered the room.

Neal raised an eyebrow in greeting.  “I thought we agreed that taste couldn’t be taught.  Isn’t that what you said, Peter? ‘It’s either something you’re born with or something you learn to do without,’ I think it was.”

The would-be convict tipped his head and gave a nod of concession.  “You’re right, I did say that.  I sometimes forget that you never forget anything.”  Neal filed away the momentary tint of admiration in the other man’s eyes for a later date. One more impression for the profile.

“It’s a pain in the ass for you, isn’t it?”

Peter crooked his mouth in faint amusement.  “Less so than you’d think.  It’s actually pretty entertaining for me.”

Neal gave an exaggerated bow, all too aware that his and Peter’s little vaudeville act had become the center of attention. “Glad to be of service, sir.”

Peter clicked his tongue and took a sip of his own champagne.  “Don’t be a smartass, Caffrey. You’re not that good-looking.”

Neal finished his champagne and handed his empty glass off to a passing steward.  Tucking his hands into his pockets, he smiled winningly.  “Why, Peter, that was almost a compliment. If I didn’t know better, I’d say you liked me.”

“Clearly, you don’t know better,” Peter quipped, giving Neal his back as he went to speak to someone else.  The con was light on his feet and self-assured.  There wasn’t a single person in attendance that wouldn’t nail gun Neal Caffrey to the wall as soon as shoot him.  Giving the fed his back was nothing and Neal was painfully aware of that.

“I’m disappointed. I was expecting the grand tour.”  Neal affected a pout that would have either amused or annoyed. He could never predict which it’d be with this man.

“Yeah, you were also expecting to catch me. That didn’t happen either.”  Amusement it is. Having apparently lost interest in his companion, Neal found he had the criminal’s full attention once again.

“Not yet.” He found he sort of liked it.

Peter repeated his signature wry head-tilt.  “Not likely.” He swirled his refreshed champagne distractedly.  “Sometimes, I think I know more about what goes on in that Bureau of yours than you do.”

Neal didn’t blanch. He didn’t gulp. He didn’t even lower his eyes. But he did worry. “You know?”

With a twist of the lips that was neither victorious nor comforting, Peter confirmed, “I know.”

It wasn’t his tone, but all that went unsaid that sent a current of fear along Neal’s spine.  The shake-up was supposed to be internal memo only; strictly up and down the chain of command. No one aside from Neal’s immediate superiors and his colleagues on the Burke case were to have been apprised of the change.  They hadn’t wanted to tip the fugitive off in case he decided to rewrite his playbook in the interim.  We have a leak.

“You have a problem,” Peter concluded on his behalf.

Firmly shoving his reservations into the mental equivalent of a titanium steel, tri-locked vault, Neal nodded, but showed no concern.  “We take care of our problems in-house.”

“And I have a great deal of respect for that,” Peter assured. “I do.”  He gestured toward one of the many essentially faceless hangers-on in the den. Tall, nearly handsome, and built like a one man armored tank division, the man stepped up to Peter’s, and coincidentally Neal’s, side.  “Unfortunately, I’ve found that a problem for the Bureau nearly always constitutes a problem for me—and who wants that?  I’ve been enjoying this cat-and-mouse game we’ve got going.”

“And why fix what already works,” asked Neal, rhetorically, and not without a little suspicion.

“See, we’re having fun again already.” This time, Peter gave a grin. It wasn’t charm personified, but it would have gotten a smile out of any other man—or even Caffrey if he was off his guard. The right woman would have been hopeless, had been hopeless before.

“I forgot to tell you, Elizabeth West sends her regards.” While it was little, it was enough, and the smile was gone, replaced by the telling slash of teeth gritting across a square face. A grimace, Neal surmised with narrowly concealed disbelief.  Peter Burke didn’t do guilt. He didn’t do violence either, but he did do harm and he’d never seemed even slightly apologetic about it. But for Elizabeth, for Elizabeth he winced.

I guess he wasn’t lying when he told her he loved her.  Neal made it his business neither to scoff nor to choke.  That bitter taste at the back of his throat must have been the champagne. Maybe it wasn’t as good as he’d previously thought.  That was all. Really.

“I’ll have to send her a nice flower arrangement,” Peter finally replied.  “I’ll have Kilo get right on that. But first, my friend here,” he gestured to the human sycamore tree fittingly known as Kilo, “is going to debug your very nice hat and show your lovely comrade the door.”

Neal raised an eyebrow and snagged said hat from his head before large, beefy hands could come within a foot of it.  To say it was his favorite, though little-worn, accessory was an understatement.  From the moment he’d found it sitting on his doorstep five years ago, he’d known he was in for the adventure of a lifetime.  The adventure hadn’t disappointed, even if the climax had left something to be desired.

“Don’t worry, Agent Caffrey, he’ll give it back to you in one piece. And, if he can’t, I have a couple of others that I think might suit you.”  The con laid his fingers on Neal’s wrist and Neal didn’t have the sense to move, so he let them stay.  He didn’t have the sense to hold on tighter either, so he let the fedora go and a new drink replace it.  At that moment, he felt something shift.

While he was standing here, something had ended.

Your career, his conscience opined.

Your life as a law-abiding citizen, contributed his better angels, though it was getting harder to tell his better ones from his worse.

Nothing worth saving, said the rest of him and he felt a slightly sick at that.  He was letting something go and it wasn’t only his hat.

“Kilo, please escort the beautiful young woman in the foyer wearing the red and black dress to the valet. I think she’s been with us long enough, don’t you?”

“Yes, sir,” his hulking but merry henchman answered.  He marched away on legs like logs toward the reception area near the entrance hall.  Neal knew exactly who he was going for, even if he still hoped he was wrong.

So much for hope, he thought as he heard the very familiar protestations of the very green Special Agent Lauren Cruz as she was being firmly but politely ejected from the building.  He stifled the urge to sigh. When he’d said he had no backup, he meant no competent backup.  His judgment of the situation had been disappointingly accurate.

“Now, that that’s taken care of, why don’t you join me for dinner?”

Neal raised his eyebrows theatrically. Might as well make the best of it. “There’s food?”

Peter scoffed. “Of course, there’s food. What kind of host do you take me for?”

Neal raised his hands disarmingly. “I didn’t mean anything by it. You’ve just never seemed like the type to sit at the grand table and give grand toasts.”

The conman nodded his understanding, settling a single, nimble hand in one of his pants pockets.  “Probably because I’m not that type. Agent Caffrey, I eat, sleep, and operate in private. Surely, you must know that by now.  Aren’t you, after all, the expert on me?” he asked, donning the very baiting expression that he wore in every frame of security footage and every snapshot of him that had ever existed. It’s not nearly as irritating in person.

“That, I am,” Neal confirmed, with not a little pride.  Peter Burke was not an easy man to research, much less to arrest and convict.  He slipped in and out of people’s lives and left almost no impression, save for a brief, shamed flush and the sense that they’d underestimated the wrong man to their detriment.  They never make that mistake twice, Neal thought somewhat smugly on Peter’s behalf.  The man might have been a crook, but he was a brilliant one.

Sometimes, Neal liked to imagine how well they might have worked together if Peter had chosen a different purpose for his brilliance.

Long nights bent, shoulder to shoulder, over case files. Stale coffee and staler donuts.  Working off frustrations in the Bureau gym.

He always stopped his thoughts there, because that wasn’t simply imagining anymore and fantasies were strictly prohibited. So, he stopped fantasizing.  That was always easier than he expected it to be.

Peter was standing before him with that damnable smirk and that damnable head tilt.  His otherwise unexceptional eyes had caught the light of the chandelier over their heads and seemed to dance in time to his suppressed laughter.

Neal frowned and lifted his chin in an attempt to regain a modicum of composure when Peter shook his head and turned away.

“If you’re done giving me cow eyes, I’ve got a mushroom risotto to die for waiting for us upstairs.”

Neal absolutely didn’t blush. It doesn’t count if there are no witnesses.

And Peter absolutely didn’t mind—or didn’t seem to. The agent could never tell.  His conman was as inscrutable as he was clever, always had been. How else would he have stayed out of prison for so long?  The man had been at the criminal trade for nearly twenty years. It was a career now and it had made him rich. Neal’s work would never make him rich, but so far it had made him happy.  He wondered if Peter could say the same.

Trailing Peter as he passed through the who’s who of international robbers and thieves, Neal was pretty sure he had his answer.  These people revered Peter, for what he could do in grifting from right beneath the noses of the authorities, for what he refused to do in eschewing force and violence completely. If there was a generous, venerable uncle in this fairy tale, it was Peter Burke and they adored him for it.  If nothing else, this should have made the man happy.

                He just…doesn’t seem like a guy who has everything he ever wanted.  If I was this kind of guy and this was my life, I don’t think I’d ever stop smiling.

                But Peter, for the most part, wasn’t a smiler.  He occasionally smirked and he’d certainly grinned when he got one over on the team on his tail, but he’d never done much in the way of a casual smile.  To Neal, he seemed to spend his life hoarding his happiness, stowing it away for a time when he was desperate to feel it. 

Although Neal liked to think he knew Peter’s story start to present, there were blank spaces in the man’s history that kept him up nights. He imagined they kept the con up, too.  Whatever they held, whatever they hid, it wasn’t equal to the Vermeer on the parlor wall or the Kandinsky that had recently disappeared from the Met. It wasn’t as beautiful as those by far, but they had put that haunting darkness into Peter Burke and it was the one aspect of his past that he’d never managed to shake. That and the accent, Neal mused, even if he had developed a certain fondness for his drawl.

You can’t forget where you come from, Peter. It’ll always follow you to where you’re going.

Neal heard Peter sigh and just managed to suppress a startled flinch when the other man suddenly glared back at him. “What?”

“Psychoanalyze me any louder, you’ll be doing it over a megaphone. Turn down your brain, Caffrey. We’re here to have a party.”

Neal yanked his lapels straight to conceal his nerves. Not so bad at the psychoanalysis yourself there, Peter. “Nice. What’re we celebrating?”

“You should know, shouldn’t you? You got yourself invited.”

Neal shrugged off the veiled sarcasm with feigned modesty.  “You know, it pays to have friends in…places.”

“That’s what I always say,” Peter commiserated with a disconcerting twinkle in his eye.  “If it was any other agent, I’d be worried. But not with you.”

“Why not?”

“Because if you came any cleaner, you’d be hermetically-sealed.”

Another way of saying, You won’t get me shot in the head, Neal imagined, and it was true.  He’d always played the Burke case close to the vest.  He hadn’t been about to watch some angry mark end his quarry before he could land him.  That had gone double for other ambitious agents in White Collar Crimes.  Peter was his get and, frankly, his adversary. No one else was going to get the pleasure of taking him down but Neal.

Then, why aren’t you doing it, his conscience poked.  As he’d done often lately, he ignored it.  He also gave the lesser angel holding up Peter’s profile in the Dior number as explanation the proverbial finger.  Doesn’t matter how good he lucks in a tux, I’m nailing his ass.

He tried in earnest not to think any harder about that statement than was absolutely necessary.

“Keep giving me that look, Agent, and the walls will begin to talk.”

Peter’s back might have been to him as he flushed, but Neal was certain the con knew all about it. So much for no witnesses.  “But the question is do they tape?”

“We can make a tape of our own, Caffrey,” he responded with a teasing lilt.  “No need to make the walls do all the work.”

Neal halted in his progress down the corridor of the exurban mansion. The runner under his feet was a work of art and he felt guilty for even standing on it.  The walls of were cherry wood paneled and decked with glorious reproductions—he hoped.  The statuettes and vases galore should have taken his breath away, would have on any other evening with any other man as company.  But tonight? Tonight, Neal Caffrey only had eyes for the con he’d come to catch.  If only he could be so sure what he’d do once he’d caught him.

“Are you flirting with me, Peter?”  He’d always been Peter and never Burke or Mr. Burke.  That would have been too strange and drawn too starkly the lines between them.  Neal had always found he worked best when he made the perp feel like the chase was a game and the pursuer was a friend. People slipped up more easily, then.  But not Peter, never Peter.  He was too clever, too quick, and he was far more than a friend.

Perhaps he always had been.

Peter had stopped a dozen feet ahead and was looking back at an angle.  He hasn’t turned his back on me, but he isn’t facing me square-on.  Gives him an easy out and keeps me from having all of the power in this confrontation. Neal lived in the profile.

“Call it flirtation or invitation. That’s entirely up to you.” The esteemed conman shrugged with a look that might have been carelessness on another man, but was shrewd on this one.  “The Bureau cut you loose. I’m giving you options.”

“And those options are?”  I’m not actually entertaining this. This is purely for profiling purposes. He summarily ignored that fact that the profile would be moot once Peter was behind bars, if Peter was behind bars.  Why am I not putting Peter behind bars?

“Stay and have dinner—maybe more—with me, or go and find some perp that’s half the challenge.”

“You think a lot of your skill,” he deflected.  He’d already gone on record saying that he thought a lot of it himself. He really hoped that Peter had never seen any of that.  The raised eyebrow was not encouraging.

“I think a lot of your judgment. Never thought much of myself until I’d stumped the FBI’s finest.”  Hands in pockets, eyes set on Neal like a heat-seeking missiles.  Neal wasn’t fidgeting, he was dancing.  Never mind, think that’s my pulse.

“Who said I was the FBI’s finest?” His voice didn’t squeak and he only mimicked Peter’s posture because it looked like a particularly comfortable way to stand.  Even his better angels thought that was bullshit. He just wished they’d have had the decency to stop him while he was ahead. Or behind. Whatever.

Peter narrowed his eyes knowingly and his mouth crooked just so.  “The FBI, Neal.”

Stomach not in knots. Check.  For some reason, his mental sharpie was all dried out. The metaphorical item on his metaphorical To-Do List went unchecked.

“Right.”  Additionally, Neal had decided that now as a bad time to acknowledge that he was officially on a first-name basis with a world-class art confidence artist.  That just seemed like a bridge too far in the scheme of things.  I’m a federal agent and I’m fraternizing with the criminal element. Yeah, this has promotion written all over it. He knew he’d failed with that attempt to rouse his LEO loyalty when Peter took a few steps closer and Neal took exactly no steps away.

“I can still hear you thinking.” Although there wasn’t much of a difference in height between them, Peter still cast a shadow over him.  He shivered at the sudden presence of extraneous body heat and the unadulterated scent of Peter Burke draping itself around him.  He was dangerous because he inspired feelings like this.  Can’t catch a man even the petty thieves love.

“I’m always thinking. It’s sort of a part of my charm.”

The career criminal gave a nod Neal could only describe as fond.  “It is.”

“You find me charming,” he provoked in an ambivalent attempt to both close the distance and multiply it. “You should have said something.”

“I am.”  It didn’t need to be mentioned that Peter had substantially decreased the space between them until they were about as close as two bars on a cell door. Probably can’t fit a deep breath between us, he thought, but he tried.

He ended up closer than he’d imagined, or even fantasized.

Hands that had reproduced artistic wonders of the world had him by the shoulders.  Lips that had sweethearted more fragile hearts to pieces than heart attacks had him by the tongue.  The body that had carried Rodin’s Kiss out of Tate Britain seemed determined to recreate the masterpiece with his own.  And Neal could see nothing wrong with that. He knew his part, knew his role, and thought that a moment so drenched in incredulity and seduction ought to be immortalized just that way.

“Stay,” Peter murmured and it wasn’t a request, though neither was it a command.  It was something else entirely.

“Okay.”  The answering flicker in Peter’s eyes changed whatever might have once passed for hunger into a different sort of need.  “I’m thinking the risotto is out.”  He really wanted to try tasting the champagne on Peter’s tongue again.  Number -3 on the list of things I never expected to have in mind.

“Pity. I figured you’d enjoy the Barbaresco I picked to go with it.”  His fingers lingered at the curve of Neal’s lips.

Neal just shook his head and smiled. “Pity.”

Peter loosely meshed their fingers together.  “If we’re skipping dinner, I think some fresh air might be in order.” Neal could not resist, couldn’t imagine even trying. The question of whether was gone and where to had supplanted it.  “I know just the place.”

Soon, Neal found himself being led up a circling staircase through the residence. He passed nosing guests and loitering wait staff, a number of whom he was sure he had arrested once or twice, before Peter led him out of the house’s innermost finery to the unfettered ferocity of nature it hosted on its roof.  The wind whipped at him, them, and made a mess of all their fashionable handiwork.  What a kiss could not dishevel, let only nature rumple asunder.

Peter wore the ordinariness of dishevelment like a uniform.  Face turned up to welcome the wind and embrace what the night had to give in potential, Neal got it. He got why he kept chasing this one. He got why he didn’t want anyone else to try. It was because they’d see this picture and they’d never give up either.  Guess I didn’t want the competition. He just didn’t know what it said about him that this con, this mastermind of epic proportions was the one who made his blood sing.

He was almost afraid to know.

He turned his back on the sight of his former perp so carefree.  The kiss burned on his mouth, the awkwardly romantic clutch of callused fingers was too tight.  Even though he wanted this to be right, it wasn’t.

So, like all things wrong, it went to hell.

“Shit,” Neal hissed as he spied the tell-tale silhouettes of NYPD SWAT crossing the grounds below.  Peter leaned over the edge of the building at his side and didn’t seem slightly surprised.

“Well, look at that. We’ve got company.”  He raised a sardonic eyebrow and Neal found himself swallowing uneasily.  It wasn’t that he was physically afraid of Peter, it was that, in spite of his reputation for being purely hands-off, Peter generally carried around an aura of potential menace that was pretty off-putting.

“Looks like it.”  It went without saying, but Neal was thinking it loudly.  Other than Lauren, I swear I didn’t know anyone was here, that this was a serious operation. He’d known the probie had taken to scoping him out on his off-hours, but she hadn’t gotten far enough to actually lay eyes on Peter, so he’d assumed they were in the clear.

“‘Assuming’ makes an ass out of you,” Peter said with that damned self-satisfied smirk that made Neal burn. Nothing to fear, gotta remember that. Gotta remember not to spontaneously kiss him either. Something about regulations; might mean prison time. Not interested.

“Please, take a vacation from my head, thanks. And I thought it was ‘me and you.’”

“Mmm, nope.  Sorry, just you.”  Peter made a quick hand gesture to the doorway that Neal couldn’t discern and he was suddenly very aware of the fact that this house was particularly popular with the criminal jet set due to its being equipped with a helipad on this very roof.

He thought, Shit, and he sighed.  Rubbing his face wasn’t nearly enough to wipe away the redness showering his skin. Jilted or outsmarted, take your pick.

“So, this is the part where you exit stage left, right?”  Neal didn’t like how this felt. He didn’t like how it had taken little more than a look and a kiss to turn his head and burn his badge.  He wasn’t even sure he liked the man he was right now. He just…really liked the man he was seeing right now. And he didn’t think that could be good for him.

Peter tipped his head contemplatively for a moment and Neal both wanted to squirm, and be still and never move.  His con reached out a wide square hand to touch his face.  It was warmer than the night air had to offer and it was offering him even more.

He didn’t know what this was or what he was doing.  He could feel the expectancy twanging just above their heads with all that was about to go down.  He could have some part in this, he could make this happen.  I could secure the rest of my career tonight.

But Peter Burke kissed him first—and again.

And, in the end, he didn’t move and no one ever found him.

                Yet, the chase went on and on, and Neal simply watched.

 

General Disclaimer: Every character, with the exception of those specified, belongs to their respective writers, producers, studios, and production companies.  NO money was made during the conception of these stories or their distribution.  No copyright infringement is intended.