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Stephanie loved being undercover, her inner drama kid basked in the glory of having to act a certain role with the free liberty of what the role would say, Neal Caffrey was a true masterpiece, it was adaptable and it had been used for everything from heists to elaborate schemes.
A downside of being undercover was that it wasn’t allowed to have contact with the manor about more than mission reports and new knowledge about the undercover league agents who had taken on roles as FBI agents.
It also meant that Steph would miss Christmas dinner. Christmas dinner was a stable thing at the Wayne manor, Alfred would make a wide array of food, not necessarily christmas food but more a mix of the kids favourite food, Damian would get some vegan dish and dessert would be waffles with a side of homemade ice cream.
Stephanie refused to miss Christmas dinner no matter the costs, she would show up and get some of Alfred’s homemade treats, how she would get from New York to Gotham while having a 2-mile radius and how she would get away without getting busted by Peter, her all knowing stalker FBI agent.
The plan was simple, the first step was to get the 24th december off from work, Peter didn’t seem to know that Christmas was a thing so he kept working no matter what special date it was, she had once seen the man work on Elizabeth’s birthday, why she still stayed with him was a mystery to Steph.
“Peter, can I have the 24th of December off from work?”
The whole plan relied on him saying yes, if he denied the request, Steph would have to go and beg Hughes for time off from work and Neal Caffrey having to beg for time off from work would look suspicious.
“What exactly do you need to do on the 24th?” Peter asked, one of his eyebrows raised in a taunting manner as if to say ‘I will never let you get off from work’.
“I’m gonna pull a heist the day right before christmas” Steph retorted, with a sour expression on her face, no matter what she would reply would result in further questions from Peter so she might as well start off strong.
“Neal, be serious,” Peter said, his face forever expressionless.
“I have a few errands to run” That was the perfect answer, it was the key phrase to get a yes from her handler.
“I will see what i can do”
Thankfully a miracle happened and Peter let Neal Caffrey the best con woman alive have a day off at work, step one of the plan was already done, the next step aka the second most important step was preparing the apartment for a horde of guests and more importantly she had to hide every Monopoly game known to mankind.
Steph didn’t want a repeat of the monopoly games of 2019, Tim and Damian had finally teamed up which resulted in a catastrophic game, Jason and Dick previously undefeated champions had been beaten to the ground, Alfred had to get involved before his brothers began killing, and if Steph had to be honest her brothers had killed for less. To be even more honest the apartment needed to be baby proofed before her family even stepped foot in the house.
Thirdly Steph needed to find a place to get the food for the Christmas party, that was perhaps the hardest thing to do, the different members needed different foods, there was no thing called a traditional christmas dinner at the Wayne manor.
Damian required spicy vegetarian dish, Dick just needed a sugary substance, Bruce always wanted a traditional feast so Alfred usually made that for him, Tim wasn’t as picky as the others all he wanted was something edible, Steph on the other hand demanded burgers sure it wasn’t christmas food but what defines christmas food anyways?
The apartment also needed to be decorated, Steph hadn’t gotten around to that yet. Thanks to a 3 am burst of energy Neal Caffrey the very sophisticated con woman spent her whole night decorating her apartment and Peter Burke the ever nuisance came and disrupted the very sophisticated Neal Caffrey’s christmas decorating.
“Neal” Peter looked around the apartment very confused “What… are you doing?”
Steph was in the process of decorating the fire mantle when the question was asked, so a bit of sass was needed in the reply.
“Commiting a felony” Steph scoffed “What does it look like?”
Peter's expression reminded Steph of one of those very offended noble women, all that it was missing was the scandalised gasp.
“So, Christmas decorating” Peter said with an amused look in his eye “Who is coming to visit?” he let out a laugh “Is there a mister Caffrey?”
“Bold of you to assume i’m straight”
“Wait, no, sorry, I didn’t mean it like that” Peter tried to save his mistake, but failed. The scandalised Miss Caffrey was going to make his life miserable.
“How DARE you assume my sexuality, what would Diana say?”
Diana would be laughing her ass off, but Peter didn’t need to know that.
“I am sorry, okay?”
Steph tried to keep her face straight, which was basically impossible, after a few seconds her face was scrunched up trying to contain her laughter. “Peter my guy, I’m not mad”
The agent let out a thankful sigh, “Do you need help decorating?”
“Nope” Steph popped the ‘p’ “It’s peachy”
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The 24th December was a great day, Steph slept longer than usual, she didn’t have work so what was the point of waking up early?
Now on the actual day came the tricky part; getting the food. Steph had to go out and get the food ready for the christmas dinner, first stop was the local burger shop they made some of the best burgers ever, they didn’t quite beat batburgers but nothing would ever come close to that.
The next stop was the Indian place, where the food for the little demon could be bought and they also made a disgustingly sweet desert, something a particular Dick would like.
It was possible to get a normal christmas dinner and it wasn’t that Steph hated Bruce, it was more like a traditional christmas dinner was so boring that she refused to even think about getting it.
*****************
The first guest to arrive was none other than Dick himself, he arrived around 1.5 hours too early, which resulted in a bit of a weird encounter. Peter had been there to check up on Neal, because apparently it was weird to want a day off.
Peter and Steph were in the middle of a heated discussion over christmas food when the door was basically kicked down and a singing Dick appeared.
“All i want for christmas” Dick sang along to that god awful christmas song, as he sung the last part he went down in the splits “Is youuu!!!”
Peter looked from Neal to Dick and then forth and back one more time.
“Hi mister…?” Peter said very confused.
Dick looked up at Peter, he was still in the splits “Hi Peter!”
“Who are you?” Peter asked, trying once again to learn the identity of this mysterious man.
“Me?” Dick said, wayyy too excited “I am no other than Mister Caffrey”
Peter’s eyes widened “You have a boyfriend?”
Steph yelled out in disgust “I would never touch Dick. Ew…”
Burke seemed a bit flustered after that “I… I didn’t need to know about your sex life”
“Fuck me” Steph said “His name is Dick”
She whispered in a lower tone to Dick “I understand why Jason refused to come tonight”
Dick led his newest victim Peter into a conversation about the weather, there was no problem with that, but when Dick had a conversation with someone it would quickly take unexpected turns.
The next encounter that happened was when the prickly hedgehog aka Damian the demon brat showed up, in tow was Tim, now you might think that Tim and Damian had a rocky relationship, which was true but somewhere along the line they figured out that they could tolerate one another.
“Caffrey, what is Burke doing here?” Those were the first words that left the demon's mouth.
“Yes, exactly” was Stephanie’s answer.
“Did he catch you committing tax fraud?” Tim questioned. That had happened one time and Tim kept on bringing it up, she hadn’t even noticed that it had happened.
Peter approached them, Dick followed closely, maybe a bit too close but not many could resist the Grayson charm “Tax fraud?”
“Oh, hi Agent Burke” Tim said with a sly smile “Ste- Neal would never commit tax fraud”
“I will be adding that to the list of all Neal’s alleged crimes” Peter let out yet another sigh “Who are you two?”
Dick perked up and looked Peter straight in the face when he answered, simultaneously cutting Tim off from saying anything “They are also Mister Caffrey”
An awkward silence fell over the room as Peter tried to piece together what had just happened. Three people who looked nothing alike were saying that they were related to Neal Caffrey who also looked nothing like them. What would come next? Mozzie would show up and announce that he was marrying Neal’s brothers?
None of that happened, instead he just asked a simple harmless question.
“Are any of them dating Neal?”
Dick had a sly smile on his face “Well there was this one time-”
He was stopped by Tim who jumped at him, kicking him firmly in the stomach, Damian then went to go avenge Dick, so it turned into a brawl. Peter stood on the sidelines quietly praying to god that someone would stop them before he witnessed a murder, Neal wasn’t doing anything she was just cheering them on.
One last person arrived, he was dressed in a suit which reminded Peter of Neal’s just that it wasn’t an obnoxious purple, looking at his face something struck him as familiar.
“Bruce Wayne?”
“Hi?” Bruce said awkwardly “Neal is he dining with us?”
Peter looked seconds from having a mental breakdown “You know Bruce Wayne…”
“Uh, Peter” Steph smiled innocently “Do you and El want to celebrate with us?”
The agent nodded still shell shocked.
**********
The Christmas dinner was great, Peter enjoyed it after he came over the shock of Bruce Wayne. Elizabeth definitely knew who the rest of the guests were but she didn’t say a word about it to her husband, despite being an FBI agent. Sometimes Peter was slow.