Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Carl finished dinner, sitting down to read Frank’s case file for the hundredth time. He sighed, wondering where the kid with seven last names and too much brain for his own good could possibly be, when there was a knock on the door.

He sighed again, annoyed. If this was Mr. Pepeman from down the hall who lost his cat again....

He pulled himself off the couch and made his way to the door, in no particular hurry to explain to the man that his runaway cat had not in fact snuck into Carl’s apartment, but yes, he would return the cat if he found it.

He took a moment in front of the door to try his best to wipe his annoyance off his features.

He swung the door open, his greeting dying before Pepeman’s name could cross his lips.

“Mr.... Frank?” he asked in concern, registering that his late night visitor was not his elderly, well-meaning neighbor, but instead the kid he had been trying to catch for over a year.

Carl barely had time to take in the fact that Frank was sobbing before the kid surged forward and burrowed himself into Carl’s chest, his arms clutching at the FBI agent’s back.

Once a father always a father, his instincts took over as his arms came up to hug the sobbing kid back.

Without releasing the hug, he pulled the boy into the apartment and shut the door, barely remembering to lock it back before the hand he’d used to swing it shut returned to running soothingly down Frank’s back.

“Frank, are you hurt?” Carl asked, firm, but gentle.

Frank shook his head but couldn’t stop sobbing long enough to answer.

“Is anyone coming after you? Is anyone trying to hurt you?”

Frank shook his head again, burying his face even further into Carl’s shoulder.

“Ok,” Carl said gently, running a hand through Frank’s hair. “Ok, Frank. Let’s go to the couch and figure this out.”

He gently tried to disconnect long enough to lead him to the couch, but Frank clung on tighter, refusing to be separated.

Carl huffed a fond laugh and led him to the couch in an awkward shuffle.

Carl sat on the end, situating Frank on the middle section. He watched in concern and slight amusement as Frank immediately shed his shoes and pulled his feet up onto the couch, curling into a tight ball that almost completely fit under Carl's arm.

At a loss for something constructive to do, Carl looked around, surveying his living room for anything that could help the distraught boy sobbing on him.

He released the hug with one arm, much to Frank's displeasure, and reached across the end table to snag a blanket off the nearby chair, spreading it across Frank's shoulders before he returned the hand to Frank's hair.

Frank sobbed for several long minutes before his cries began to slow down.

"Frank, what's wrong?" Carl asked softly, rubbing his back in slow, even circles.

"He's gone," Frank choked out. "Dad's dead."

Frank sobbed harder again, but that was enough of an explanation.

“Oh, Frank,” Carl whispered, squeezing him tighter and resting his head on Frank’s hair. “I’m so sorry, Frank.”

Frank sobbed, heartbroken, for what seemed like hours, but he eventually cried himself out.

“It’s going to be ok, Frank,” Carl promised. “It doesn’t seem like it now, but it won’t hurt like this forever.”

Frank sniffled, pushing himself impossibly closer to Carl, and Carl pulled the blanket up that had started to slip off, tucking it tighter around the boy’s shoulders.

“Is there any family I can take you to, Frank?” Carl asked, quiet and concerned. “I can drive you there, let you spend the night with them before we think about the next steps.”

Frank shook his head and a few more tears fell.

“There isn’t anybody else, Carl,” he whispered, heartbroken.

“What about your mother?” Carl asked, rubbing his back. “She’s in New York. She was worried about you when we interviewed her.”

Frank shook his head and his eyes clenched shut.

“She.... she has a new family,” he admitted in a devastated tone. “She moved on. She even has a new kid. A cute little girl. Mom’s always wanted a girl.”

Carl shook his head, his hand migrating up to Frank’s hair for a moment before it returned to his back.

“Frank, wanting a daughter doesn’t mean she loves her son any less.”

“It does with my mom,” Frank said, utterly convinced. “She told me -, she told me right before they got divorced that .... -, she was having an affair. I asked her why, I said I thought she was in love with dad. 

She said she had been. She said when she had been younger she wanted to get out of France, she wanted to marry dad, she wanted to have a baby with him. She said that people change and she didn’t want that anymore.”

Frank’s voice cracked on the last word, and he found a few more tears to cry, burying his face back into Carl’s shoulder, hiding from the concerned look the agent was sending him.

“Oh, Frank,” Carl’s heart clenched as his hand buried itself in Frank’s hair and pulled him closer. “I don’t think that’s what she meant, buddy. Your mom loves you. She tried to pay your balance, but she just didn’t have the money.”

“You don’t know her like I do,” Frank whispered into Carl’s chest. “She moved on. She doesn’t want me anymore.”

“Do you have any aunts or uncles?” Carl tried, recognizing he wouldn’t be able to convince Frank his mother still cared.

Frank shook his head.

“I don’t have anyone but you,” he whispered.

Carl swallowed hard.

“I’m glad you came,” he whispered back. “You needed somewhere to go, and I’m glad you came.”

“Me, too,” Frank whispered, almost too quiet to hear.

Carl let the silence settle around them, and a few minutes later, Frank was asleep on his chest.

In sleep Frank relaxed, no longer melded to Carl’s front, and Carl took a moment to really look at the felon he’d been chasing for so long.

He had a light tan, he had been somewhere far sunnier than New York lately. Carl had tried to tell his superiors the kid was in Italy, but did they listen?

He rolled his eyes, thinking of the Italian checks that would be shipped to his office in a few weeks to be added to the file.

Frank was wearing his hair slightly longer than the last time Carl had seen him, and he’d done well with his style choice. The opposite side part with most of his hair swooped across forehead and combed into a slight wave was enough to make him look like a different person to the casual eye that hadn’t lived and breathed his case file for the past two years.

His clothing had changed subtly, too. Gone was the pilot uniform, replaced with something more akin to the slacks and dress shirt of an expensive business suit. Carl leaned forward to glance at the shoes Frank had toed off, and shook his head fondly when he saw the designer Italian business shoes. 

He sat back, unable to stop a wave of smugness from flowing through him. He had told them the kid was in Italy....

Whatever the profession of the week had been, Carl had no doubt that Frank would shed it and move on to the next white collar job now that Carl had gotten a good look at him.

He noticed the rectangular outline of a wallet in his pocket, but as he looked at Frank's tear-stained face, he couldn't bring himself to pull it out and scour it for clues.

The kid was ok, and that was enough for the moment.

Carl transferred his attention to the rest of his apartment, looking for something to do now that his evening plans had been so successfully derailed. 

He glanced at the small table next to the couch arm. Reading Frank’s case file seemed a little redundant when the teen himself was asleep on his chest. 

The other five case files he was working on were across the room on the kitchen table, and try as he might, Carl couldn’t make himself move from his position and risk waking Frank up.

Looking around, he chuckled softly when he saw the bottom shelf of his end table. Months ago, he had set the new book he had bought there, telling himself that he’d get to read it when he caught Frank.

Carl looked down at the boy sleeping on him, and decided he was pretty well caught for the moment, so he reached down to pull the book out and started reading.

Chapter Text

Carl blinked awake, wondering for a long moment why he was on his couch and why he felt like there should be someone else there as well before the memories of the night before trickled in.

He looked around the small apartment with bleary eyes, unsurprised to find it empty.

He had expected Frank to give him the slip at some point in the morning, and to be honest, he was glad the con had made his move before Carl got up because he wasn't sure he'd have the heart to even make a half-hearted attempt to arrest him, and the kid really didn't need that kind of ammunition.

Carl would catch him later, when it didn't feel as much like kicking a puppy.

He yawned and sat up straighter, finally registering that sometime between falling asleep and waking up, his shoes had disappeared.

He glanced down and spied them sitting neatly at the end of the couch. Looking down he also realized he was covered with not only the blanket Frank had been sleeping under, but also the blanket that had been on his bed before Frank relocated it.

Carl huffed a laugh as he wrapped the bigger blanket around his shoulders like a cloak and stood up, glancing at the bedroom door that had definitely been closed before he fell asleep the night before.

Frank had probably explored everything in the apartment, a combination of the teen's undying curiosity and the overwhelming need for a distraction in light of last night's tragedy.

Glancing at the kitchen, Carl noticed something else. In his sleepy haze, he hadn't registered that there were pans on his stove.

He meandered over, chuckling as he saw a full breakfast cooked for him, the stove was off, but the pans were still hot and sizzling. Little brat must have left less than ten minutes ago.

A pan of scrambled eggs and a skillet full of crispy bacon sat on the stovetop, and when he surveyed the rest of the kitchen, he noticed two slices of toast standing in his toaster. His table had been set, jelly laid out, and the carton of orange juice was sitting next to an empty glass.

With a bemused smile, Carl glanced at his sink, noting another set of dishes that appeared to have been attempted to be washed, but evidently Frank was a much better cook than dishwasher.

Well, at least the kid ate something.

With a sigh and a chuckle, Carl retrieved his plate from the table and filled it with food, wondering how this had become his life.

Frank had added his own file to the pile and set the case files strewn across the table in a neat stack on the corner. Carl sat at the place laid out for him and pulled them closer as he started to eat.

He glanced down appreciatively as he registered his first fork-full of food, the kid could cook.

He savored his next bite, setting Frank's case file aside for the moment. Carl found that his motivation to find the kid and bring him to justice had mysteriously disappeared in the morning light. Besides that, he really did need to devote more time to his other cases.

None of them had struck home quite as much as a brilliant, well-meaning kid ruining his own life, and they had therefore not been getting the time and attention they deserved. His superiors would start to get on his case about his lack of progress any day now, so it really made more sense to devote his Saturday morning to them instead.

With his excuse cemented, he flipped open the top folder and poured a glass of juice as he read the file number off the top of the page. Five-four-eight. Right, the check used in Pennsylvania from a New York bank.

Carl blinked down at the file as he tried to scan the rest of the page. Three pale blue post-it notes had been stuck to the paper, each filled with small, cramped writing.

'New Heights Community is a local bank that caters to the especially wealthy,' Frank had written. 'There are only three in New York City and no branch offices in other states or cities, so the forger must be a local or at least have been here long enough to learn about it. Called the -' the writing ran into the edge of the paper and Carl transferred his gaze to the post-it note below it.

'bank this morning, this guy was far from their wealthiest client, so the forger didn't research the bank to go after the elite. It is a real check though, the only thing forged is the signature and dollar amount, so he either paid them with it and they washed it and rewrote, or they stole it out of his checkbook. I'd look into household staff or -'

Carl's eyebrows raised as his eyes moved to the third post-it. 'a maintenance worker who would have been inside his house or been paid with a check, particularly someone who feels like they've been ripped off for some reason or a worker that suddenly took sick time or vacation time.'

Carl stared at the notes in shock. That was... incredibly helpful.

Wow. In one breakfast, he'd made it further in the case than he had the entire week before, and they weren't even his realizations.

Huh. If this was how Frank said thank you, Carl should be nice to him more often.

He made a note to follow up on the tips and schedule an interview with the man whose name was forged on the check. Maybe he could get to that after breakfast.... he'd probably have a better chance of catching him at home on the weekend considering he was a business executive.

Carl added the task to his to-do list and slid the file down the table to make room for the next folder he pulled off the stack. He opened it and gaped, amazed to see this one covered in post-its as well.

'You'd have to run tests, but it smells like Werchner Ink, which is a stationary ink only sold in really high end stationary stores. Coastline Community Bank checks use a patent protected and very distinctive blue ink, Werchner 'Starry Night' is the closest off the shelf ink to -'

'the shade. Check the places Werchner is sold to see if anyone bought more than two inkwells at a time. Assuming they're working off a standard issue printer, it takes two and a half inkwells to fill a cartridge. -'

'The person probably paid in cash. If they were stupid enough to pay with a real credit card, they deserve to get caught.'

Carl re-read the notes, a little in awe of just how smart Frank was. If only Carl could get the boy to apply it to something good...

Carl shook off the thought, refocusing on the file and adding another task to his list to find what stores sold Werchner Ink. His Saturday was filling up.

He rolled his eyes at himself as he shut the case file and stacked it on top of the previous, pulling the next off the stack and adding yet another mental note to his list to get hobbies that weren't working or obsessing about Frank Abagnale Jr., the reason becoming more apparent every second of his Saturday morning that ticked by.

The next file had more post-it notes than either of the previous, and Carl's smile grew as he finished his plate, getting up to refill it before he settled at the table again to read.

'It's the left handed check printer,' Frank wrote on one post-it with an arrow to the seven checks that were paper-clipped to the side of the page, another four post-it notes on top of the checks.

'Look at the way the burred edge has taller burs on one side than the other and compare it to other checks from the same print house. The burs look different if you tear them off with -'

'your left hand or your right hand. He's taking checks randomly out of the printing sets he does for the new customer sample packs, the ones they give you before you spend the money on a checkbook. There's a button on the machine to do an additional print in case the printer runs out of ink mid print or something. -'

'Check the print house for left handed printers or add a number to the check sequence number and subtract a number from the sequence number and find those two checks, one of them would have been printed on the same -'

'day, depending on if he prints the extra at the beginning or at the end of a print run.'

Huh. Carl studied the burred edge and realized that once he was looking for it, he could see the difference Frank was talking about.

If the kid had gone to Quantico instead of the airport, he would have been Carl's boss by now, nineteen years old or not.

Carl stared at the edges of the seven checks for a long minute before closing the file and making another addition to his to-do list.

He pulled the next file open, grateful but unsurprised to see it had its fair share of little blue post-its dotting the page.

'It's someone at a utilities company. If you flip the check over and shifted it around you can see the indentation of what was originally written. The -'

'word 'Utilities' is written on the reason line for all of them, so check what utilities company these people pay to. One of the accountants is washing checks and -'

'using them. May or may not be marking the customer as paid in the system, my bet is on marking paid so it doesn't raise flags when the customer calls angry because they sent in a check. The idiot is also stupid enough to use them -'

'all in the same outlet mall, so you might save time by checking security cameras.'

Carl flipped the checks over one by one and sure enough, faint indentations read 'utilities' on each of them. That was the key he had been missing.

He'd already noticed the outlet mall, that's why he'd grouped so many checks from different banks together, but the stores didn't have security cameras, or if they did they weren't very good.

The staff turnover at most of the stores in question was so high that most of the clerks that would have been working were long gone before Carl even received the check to add to his file. The utilities company, though, that was something he could work with.

Carl cocked an eyebrow as he opened the next file to find a loose sheet of paper sitting on top. Evidently Frank had more to say than would fit on the little squares of post-it notes.

'All nineteen checks have a faint whiff of Chanel No. Five perfume, and they all have the same slight upward tick at the end of each name where the pen was lifted from the page. Called the bank of the first four checks in the pile, I suspect it's a woman going on a first date with the men.

Side note, you really should have a talk with the banks about the amount of information they give out over the phone without any real proof of identity.

Calling in and asking about the account of each of the men, the banks informed me that each of them had also made a large charge on their credit cards to an upscale restaurant in town a few days before the date listed in the file the check was cashed. I bet she takes the check from their book either at the restaurant or after she goes home with them and stashes it in her purse.

She probably spilled a bottle of perfume in it once, or her bottle leaks, hence the scent of perfume that's strong enough it still lingers after it's been passed around the banks and the FBI office.

Given the sequence of dates the checks were used, I'd bet she only gives them one date, but I'd imagine it would be memorable enough the man would have a name or description to give you.'

Carl flipped the file closed and sat back in wonder. Frank had solved all of them in one morning?

With a grin, he looked at the only file he hadn't opened yet and flipped Frank's own file open.

His file was by far the thickest, but it only had one post-it note sitting in the middle of the page.

'Thanks for letting me in, Carl.'

Carl smiled fondly, shaking his head in amusement.

‘Well,’ he thought, shutting the case file without looking further, ‘for a Saturday morning, five out of six ain’t bad.’