[open]

[notgoingtorun]

If Neal was being truly honest with himself, he knew full well that this moment was inevitable. He knew he was going to be exposed one way or another. At least this way, Peter had let him keep at least some of his dignity by allowing him to tell the truth on his own, rather than have the message delivered for him as though he were completely incapable of telling the truth. Oh, it would still be humiliating to round up so many people and tell them the truth, reliving a difficult conversation over and over again, but perhaps that was the message that Peter was trying to get through Neal's head: taking the easy way out was never the best solution. Neal had taken the easy way out, and he was paying the price for it now.

Neal had put this off for as long as he could, but he knew it had to be done. Aside from facing Peter's wrath, the guilt would gnaw at him until he did. Guilt was a new feeling, one that had never touched him when he was stealing priceless artifacts or defrauding billionaires, but now that he'd made friends and started a life that was built on lies, he was starting to know what regret really felt like.

This wasn't the first time that he'd had to do this dance -- once, not so long ago, he'd had to sit down with Kate and tell her that Nick Halden was a fabrication, and that hurt -- but that didn't mean he wasn't nervous about it. He'd dressed in his best clothes today -- suit, waistcoat, tie, hat -- because if he was going to go back to being Neal Caffrey, then he was going to own it.

As Neal began to track down his friends, people he cared about, people who trusted him, he realized that this was going to be a very long day.

"Hey there," he said, plastering on a cheerful smile as he approached, "do you have a couple of minutes? There's something I need to talk to you about."

Comments

[notgoingtorun]

That got an arched eyebrow from Neal -- either she was much older than she looked, or there was something special about her.

Whatever. Not his business.

"Friend of mine from back home showed up the other day, he was less than pleased to find out I've been living under an alias. He just likes to make sure I'm staying on the right side of the tracks, I guess."

[tricksthetreat]

"Your own personal Jiminy Cricket. How lovely." She took another sip of her drink, considering those implications. He had a baby-sitter on the island. Or at least someone who could exert some pressure on her newly-chastened employee. "What's his name?"

[notgoingtorun]

"Peter Burke," Neal said. "Special Agent Peter Burke. FBI, white collar crimes division. He... might not necessarily appreciate the Jiminy Cricket reference, but it's certainly apt. On the up side, if someone tries to rip off your casino and you want to get the law involved, he's the smartest agent I've ever met." Not that Trixa needed the help, but Neal knew Peter would be overjoyed to investigate anything.

[tricksthetreat]

"Special Agent, huh? Busted your ass?" Sounded plausible to her, especially since Neal was all contrite now. Busted once meant the possibility of getting busted again and no one likes having the person who knows all your tricks around.

Unless they're on your side.

"And I appreciate the offer, but someone starts something in my house, they answer to me."

[notgoingtorun]

"Hey, that's the way it should be. You built the place, you're more than capable of taking anyone down."

Neal nodded, a smile on his face. Not many people could look back with fondness on the time they were arrested, but in a way, Neal did. It had changed his life.

"And, yeah, he busted me. Took him three years, and one stupid mistake on my part, but he got me. Got me out of lockup, too, though, so, like I said. One of the good guys." Not too many agents would have been willing to give Neal as many chances as Peter had.

[tricksthetreat]

"What was the mistake, if you don't mind my asking?" Trixa was the kind to happily learn from others' mistakes whenever she could. Figuring out what brought the competition down was always a good plan anyways.

Not that he was competition, but the same general rule applied.

[notgoingtorun]

"A girl," Neal said, sounding almost a bit wistful. For people like Neal, there was always a girl. There was a time when he wouldn't have wanted to tell this story -- wounded pride that he'd gotten caught, for a while, and then, later, he was just too raw from Kate's death to want to think much about all the time together that they'd lost. Now, though, was different.

"My girlfriend went to ground and I was having a hell of a time tracking her back down. Feds found out where she was, leaked her location, and I ... I knew on some level probably that I was walking into a trap, but I couldn't help myself." He shrugged, like it was no big deal. "I don't regret it -- going after her, I mean."

[tricksthetreat]

"Always with the sweetheart, huh?" Trixa smirked. Who said romance was dead? It was the one human element that hadn't changed from the beginning of time. There was something reassuring in that, it was the one piece of leverage she could always use.

"What's she like?"

[notgoingtorun]

Dead, he wanted to say, but didn't, because not even he could be that flippant about Kate and what had happened to her.

He went for the other side of the truth, instead, the less harsh things, the things he wanted to remember.

"I was an easy mark to take down, it just took them years to realize it." If Peter would have been able to play Kate against Neal from the very beginning, it certainly wouldn't have taken the feds so many years to bring Neal in. "Kate was... she was beautiful and sophisticated and funny and a very quick learner. I had to give her this speech once, too, the whole I'm not who I said I am thing. She was pissed, but she went with it, and by the end, she was running some pretty brilliant cons of her own." Including the fact that she very well may have been conning Neal at the end, that maybe they never loved each other, just the idea of each other.

Just more answers that Neal knew he would never get.

[tricksthetreat]

Not answering her question. That was almost all she needed to know. That and the past tense. Everyone here used the past tense, but there was something in the way he used it that was a bit more final than 'Oh, my girlfriend is back home, I miss her so much'.

That was the price you paid in the game sometimes.

"Those fast learners, gotta keep an eye on them sometimes. For what it's worth, I'm sorry she's not here with you."

[notgoingtorun]

"Thanks," Neal said. Thinking about Kate and what they'd shared... it was hard now, still, always, but he had perspective that he hadn't had during those tense months when he searched for her killer, when he was ready to put a bullet between Fowler's eyes for his role in it all.

"I think... I think it's probably better that she's not here. She's probably better off, wherever she is." Or maybe Neal was better off, without Kate, without needing to sort through what was real about their love and what was just a con. In the blank nothingness of death that he was certain she rested in, at least there would be no more trouble, no more games, no more lies. "But we had some good times, that's for sure."