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This was the first Christmas in five years that Neal was a free man. Well, relatively free in that he could wander within a 2-mile radius in Manhattan with his whereabouts just a fingertip away on Peter’s phone. But it was better than last year when Peter had found him in an empty apartment and then slapped him right back in his old cell in Sing Sing right before the holiday. The cautious G-man took his time pondering a proposed deal option, so it was well into the next year before Neal’s favorite agent decided to fetch his new lap dog. Now, here they were, twelve long months into their partnership, perhaps a little more trusting, but perhaps not. Maybe neither man felt entirely comfortable making assumptions about a colleague, even if one of them had a lot of potential to be an asset.
It seemed that not everyone considered Neal to be valuable, or even an essential part of the unit, for that matter. And that became quite evident when a new decree came from the mount on high. SAC Reese Hughes had decided that all agents with a family would have December 25th off to enjoy the presence of their loved ones. The bullpen would be manned by volunteer agents, first year probies with no tenure, and one extraneous confidential informant who didn’t get a say in the matter.
So, okay, maybe Neal didn’t have family to break bread with or exchange presents with, but this seemed kind of harsh. He had been hoping that a handler would extend an invitation, but now that became a moot point. Peter had given his CI a “what can you do?” shrug and piled a stack of cold case files at the corner of his desk when he left at the stroke of 6 pm on December 24th.
On Christmas morning, Neal came into the office sporting a bright red tie. It was his only concession to the holiday he wasn’t going to be celebrating as he trudged into a quiet room filled with young wannabe agents and old timers nearing retirement age. Surprisingly, Hughes was already in place ensconced on his throne overseeing his minions, and he glared at Neal when the con man gave him a little wave and sent a dazzling smile in his direction. After Neal got comfortable at his desk, out of a sense of tradition, he riffled through the stack of cold cases until he located the old tried and true bugaboo, the Mortensen Loan Scandal. That just seemed appropriate for a day when absolutely nothing was going to get done.
That annoying cold case was an enigma that would probably never be solved, so Neal decided to reduce it to something that could be unraveled in a unique sort of way. He wrote out the file name on a blank piece of paper and entertained himself by seeing how many words he could make using the letters. There were some helpful vowels, even though an “i” and a “u” were missing, but he made do until his list was nearing the end of the paper. It was at that point when Neal sensed a presence beside him.
“Maybe you can be more productive in the field, Caffrey,” Hughes growled as he stood glowering with his trench coat over his arm. “We have a case that needs our attention, and it’s more challenging than just silly inappropriate word play.”
“You want me to go with you, Sir?” Neal asked in an astounded voice.
“Better to have you where I can see you,” Hughes said with an edge. “If I left you here with these probies, there’s no telling what I’d find when I came back.”
Neal trailed after the big boss down to the garage. “So, what’s the case?” he dared ask meekly.
“The local PD called us about a robbery downtown. Since it was a federal credit union that was the target of the heist, the precinct cops eagerly bowed out and passed it on to us.”
Neal tried to maintain an upbeat demeanor, but a bank robbery was just so mundane it was beyond his ability to feign enthusiasm. And when they got to the scene of the crime, it proved to be a rather inelegant state of affairs. The thieves had breached a secluded outside wall in the rear of the building, probably using a diamond carbide reciprocating saw to cut through cinder block. That gave them access to a room where the safe deposit boxes were kept. Every metal box had been pulled out and forced open, leaving debris littering the floor. Neal gazed down at birth certificates, passports, house deeds, and such, but no jewelry that he could see.
“This had to take a lot of time for our intruders. Was there an alarm sensor in this room?” Neal asked the bank manager who had been summoned to the scene.
“Not in here. The alarm was tripped when they moved on to where our vault is located,” the man answered in a disgruntled tone. “The police said they found some kind of explosive material, so I would have to assume they intended to blow the safe open but got cold feet when they realized the alarm had been triggered.”
Hughes spoke up, making it clear that he was the senior partner. “I’ve put in a call to our forensics people. They’ll photograph everything in situ, then dust every surface for prints. That means we’ll need a list of all your employees whom I’m sure have been vetted and fingerprinted. I’ll also need a list of every customer whose security box has been rifled. We’ll have to interview them, one by one, to get an inventory of what they had in those containers.”
After the bank manager shuffled off looking disgusted, Hughes turned to Neal. “Got any brilliant ideas about this clusterfuck, Caffrey?”
“I’m thinking amateurs, Sir,” Neal said slowly. “If they had done their homework, they would have known where they were tunneling into. Unless they had inside information about something worth their trouble in one of these boxes, I think they just took advantage of where they wound up, and after that they decided to go after the real target. That would explain them bringing explosives, which seems kind of over the top for a successful bank heist.”
“So, you could have done it a lot better?” Hughes mocked.
“Most definitely, Sir, if that had ever been my intention,” Neal grinned.
“If memory serves me, it was your intention in Europe on more than one occasion,” the old man harumphed.
Neal smiled. “I wouldn’t put much stock in rumors, Agent Hughes. I’m alleged to have done a lot of things, but I’m afraid it would be quite difficult to establish fact from fiction at this late date.”
“So, I guess that means your past crimes are beyond the statute of limitations,” Hughes said with a raised eyebrow.
“Perhaps you could look at it that way,” Neal answered slowly, never admitting to anything.
“So, do you really think we’re ever going to get these perps?” Hughes asked Peter’s CI with a cynical look.
Neal shrugged. “Um, maybe not, but taking a look at street cam footage right after the alarm went off might be helpful. Those guys had to have a truck or a van to lug in that saw. Not that I would know firsthand, but I’ve been told that it’s rather bulky and heavy. So, maybe if we see someone making a fast getaway from the scene in that type of vehicle, it may pan out.”
“Yeah, yeah—we’ll cover all the bases,” Hughes grumbled, “but in the long run we’re going to be spitting in the wind.”
And Hughes was right. He and Neal spent the next couple of hours doing their due diligence and coming up with bupkis. They wrote up lackluster reports and were ready to call it a day as the second shift of agents sauntered into the bullpen. Neal was surprised when Hughes was once more standing by his desk.
“Look, Caffrey, I know we got caught up in this thing and missed lunch. I guess I owe you a dinner if there was anyplace open on Christmas Day, but I’m sure the chances of that are pretty slim.”
“I may know a place,” Neal heard himself saying. “Do you like Chinese, Agent Hughes?”
~~~~~~~~~~
Neal wasn’t quite sure why he had been foolhardy enough to extend an invitation to someone who made it clear that he only tolerated a parolee rather than liking him. But maybe this was a chance to see Hughes in a different setting. Didn’t Sun Tzu advocate the caveat of, “Know your enemy,” in his book, The Art of War? So that was how two men wound up eating sumptuous Chinese dumplings in a restaurant down on Mott Street, courtesy of an old friend, Mr. Twan, and his young daughter, Bai.
“I’m impressed, Sir, that you sacrificed your holiday to work on Christmas Day,” Neal said as they sipped tea and demolished the Chinese delicacy set before them.
Hughes eyed Caffrey carefully before answering. “I would have been spending the day alone, so I thought it was more productive to cover the unit so others could enjoy time with their families.”
“I didn’t realize that you had no family,” Neal answered softly.
“I do have a family, Caffrey, just not here in New York,” the old man answered with an antagonistic attitude.
“Oh, sorry to be presumptuous,” Neal quickly apologized.
Hughes eyed the young person sitting across from him and decided to cut him a break. “I was once married to a wonderful woman, but she was in Tower #2 when the planes hit on 9/11. I was just starting to climb my way up the ladder in the FBI and we were anticipating a good life while raising a son and a daughter together. Instead, I wound up raising them alone. My daughter is now married to a Canadian and makes her home in Toronto, and my son has an IT job out West in Silicon Valley. We keep in touch, of course, but getting everyone together at the same time is almost impossible.”
“I’m sorry about your wife, Sir,” Neal said softly.
Hughes was quiet for a long minute before he turned to Neal. “And I heard that you recently lost someone special to you, so I’m going to say you have my condolences as well.”
“I appreciate that,” Neal replied, actually meaning it.
“But we go on, don’t we, Neal? We man up, straighten our spine and we do what needs to be done. What other choice is there?” Hughes suddenly had steel in his voice.
Neal began to wonder if Hughes somehow knew that Neal was surreptitiously searching for Kate’s killer. But he was saved from worrying when a text buzzed into his phone. He took a quick glance and realized it was from Peter asking how the day went under Hughes’ supervision without a handler as a buffer.
Hughes had his eyebrows raised in a question. “It’s just Peter worrying, as usual,” Neal hastily explained.
Hughes continued to stare as he pinned Neal with his eyes. “And that makes me worried that Agent Burke may be too invested in you. I hope you realize that you could either make or break your handler’s career.”
“I’d never do anything to jeopardize Peter’s future,” Neal protested.
“Maybe, but it could happen, even if it was unintentional,” the old man said wisely. “I like Peter Burke and have plans for him down the road, so you definitely don’t want me for an enemy, Neal. Do I make myself clear?”
“Crystal, Agent Hughes.”
“Good! Then we understand each other!”
~~~~~~~~~~
The next Christmas, Neal wasn’t marooned at his desk in the White Collar office. However, even though he had been granted the day off, he wasn’t celebrating the holiday with either June Ellington and her family or the Burkes. Instead, late afternoon found him making his way to a condominium apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. It was out of his radius, but Peter had called the Marshals to get it cleared with his watchdogs.
A bottle of top shelf single malt Scotch got him past the doorman and onto an elevator that took him to an upper floor. Stepping off his ride, he strolled down a quiet corridor, past doors festooned with tasteful holiday wreaths, to one that was bare and sterile. He took a deep breath and pushed the buzzer.
Neal tried not to let the shock show on his face when Reese Hughes opened the door. He knew the White Collar Special Agent-in-Charge had been recently diagnosed with lymphoma and was on medical leave to undergo treatment for the malicious type of cancer. But actually, seeing him today made him look more like a fragile old man rather than a formidable tyrant who ruled his minions with an iron hand and a sharp tongue. And it made Neal begin to speculate if the powers that were high up the food chain might use this illness as an excuse to phase the old war horse out of a career that was all he had left.
“Caffrey! What are you doing here?” Hughes growled with a frown, managing to pull off a pretty good imitation of Ebenezer Scrooge in “A Christmas Carol.”
Neal was undaunted by the less than pleasant welcome and soldiered on. He produced a hopeful smile as he held up a bag that was emanating an enticing aroma. “I’m starting a tradition, Sir. What would Christmas be without Chinese dumplings and someone to share them with.”
Hughes tried hard to mask his emotions, and he thought he was doing a commendable job as he opened the door wider and allowed a con man to enter his home.
“Well, at least you didn’t bring fruitcake,” he grumbled. “I hate fruitcake.”
“Agent Hughes, you are gracious to a fault,” Neal grinned. “Merry Christmas and God bless us everyone!”