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“You were shot?” Peter yelps, a distinct, gutwrenching look of surprise on his face, and Neal makes a last-minute decision.
Peter can’t know about Collins.
He has far too much faith in criminal justice. The knowledge that an agent of the FBI—or any federal officer—would shoot an incapacitated, non-violent suspect would send Peter into a spiral. Peter Burke believes in the system, has been lucky or ignorant enough to avoid being disillusioned with it so far, and Neal refuses to be the one to show him its flaws.
“Yeah,” he replies quickly, ducking beside Peter and behind the car, weight off his bad leg, pretending he isn’t itching with unease at having Collins out of his field of view. “Got a plan?”
“Well, this certainly throws a wrench in it,” Peter mutters, but like the brilliant team they are, they make it work anyway.
“So,” Peter begins around a glass of wine, wincing in uncharacteristically mild disgust at the taste, “how did you get shot?”
Neal, like the fantastic conman he is, comes up with a lie on the spot. “Dobbs realized I was a runner. Decided I was better slow and whiny as hell than a flight risk. Collins”—he expertly disguises his half-flinch at the name—“got me some medical attention before we left.”
“Not nearly enough, it seems,” Peter muses quietly, peering doubtfully at Neal’s leg. He puts the wine down and hides his relief by looking out the plane window, drowsily watching the ocean below them. Neal refuses to twitch or fiddle. His leg is a dull ache below him. Peter turns back to him, meeting his eyes squarely, and Neal tenses at the strange expression on his face. “Somehow,” he says, “I don’t believe you.”
Neal eases back into his chair. Why do you insist on making my life so difficult? he thinks, somewhat admiringly. “Do you ever?” he deflects, amused.
For some reason, it makes Peter frown and look out at the ocean again.
Neal feels some fondness in his chest, deep down. This agent cares about him, would do almost anything to help him. What a novelty. But, he knows, there’s nothing either of them could do about Collins. It would only haunt them both. Better Neal than Peter. “Listen—” he starts, planning to redirect Peter’s focus elsewhere.
“Dobbs didn’t seem like the violent type,” Peter interrupts. He’s sitting stiffly, that working-the-case look in his eyes.
“Yeah, well, he was,” Neal lies with ease. “He’s good at deceiving—even fooled me, early on. I thought he was just cautious, like any self-respecting conman, but he was on the Most Wanted list the whole time.” He laughs with minimal humor.
“I could get him in trouble for that,” Peter thinks aloud. Neal’s mind races—shit. He should’ve tracked that angle. He can’t let Dobbs take the fall for Collins—that, at least, Neal revolts at the thought of. Dobbs was the one who saved Neal from having to travel to New York with a bullet still in his leg.
“Wait, wait, Peter,” Neal hurries to say, tone slightly too rushed—Peter looks at him perceptively, and Neal swallows around a lump in his throat. “I don’t want him in any more trouble,” he whispers hesitantly.
Peter eyes him, following hypotheses and evidence as if it’s all presented to him in a clean, clear-cut file. “He wasn’t really the one who shot you, was he?”
Neal’s backed into a corner. He shifts in the jet seat, eyes flickering to the window, the sea, and then back to Peter. He can’t let Dobbs get more years for this, and he can’t let Peter know it was Collins. Or—he can’t let Peter know Collins did it for fun. “Yeah,” he agrees, relieved at the way out. “It was Collins. I tried to run early on, ’n he clipped me in the leg.”
“Clipped you?” Peter mutters skeptically. “Neal, the way you’re limping, the trajectory must’ve been—”
Jesus. Peter Burke and his everlasting, immortal skepticism.
“I rushed him,” Neal lies. As he does, he hides his wince. This has to be one of the most poorly thought-out lies of his life. This could get him in deep shit. “I tried to take his gun, knock him out. He retaliated.”
Peter’s quiet. The plane rocks. Mild turbulence stirs Neal’s leg; he grits his teeth. The crystal blue out the window mocks him like a diamond he can’t swipe.
“Why are you lying?” Peter asks, at last.
Neal sighs, fabricates fake reluctance from very real shame. “I didn’t want it to go on my record.”
“What? The violence? ‘Rushing him’?” Peter snorts. “We both know you didn’t do any of that, Neal.”
Neal freezes, panicking quietly. He clutches the armrests and pretends it’s because of the shaking of the plane. “What do you mean?” he prompts with narrowed eyes.
“You would never,” Peter replies simply, certainly. “So—who really shot you, Neal? And why are you lying?”
He’s strangely patient with this. And—Neal squints—he might have overestimated Peter’s distrust in him. In any other situation, the faith might’ve felt nice. “It really was Collins,” Neal says truthfully, knowing Peter will see through a lie, hoping he will misinterpret the truth.
He doesn’t. Peter looks at him, and Neal can track the angles he’s calculating, even though he doesn’t want to. He turns away, watches the mild waves of the sea roll by.
“Yes. Collins,” Peter agrees. “But—but you weren’t resisting, were you?”
Neal’s jaw tenses. He remains silent and still, looking out the jet window, hoping to God Peter leaves this alone.
“Neal,” Peter prods. When Neal doesn’t answer, he reaches out from the corner of Neal’s eye and prods his leg, right below the injury. Neal startles, rears forward, looks at him with mild betrayal. Peter huffs. “Tell me. How did you get shot?”
He’s firm, but not impatient. Neal assesses him as he gathers his thoughts.
He’ll tell the truth this time, he decides. Even though—he tracks the tenseness of Peter’s shoulders, the dread in his eyes—it will hurt the both of them.
“I—um. We had to wait, to get me out of Cape Verde. Collins, he tied me up in the basement of the building. There were four cell walls, screwed in, and a drain.” He leaves out the part about the gag. “After that, Collins and Dobbs went upstairs and discussed something. They left me alone.”
Peter snorts a little, and Neal halts, smiles with him. “Rookie mistake,” Peter says, almost gently.
“Yeah. Well, I got outta the cuffs pretty fast. Was halfway done unscrewing the walls when—when Collins came down.” Neal gulps. “He discovered my plan and realized, I think, how close I was to getting out. Right under his nose. It upset him.”
“Were you out of your cuffs?” Peter asks, his eyes thoughtful and clinical as he the scene unfolds in his head.
“I was pretending they were still on,” Neal says. “But Collins—he knew.” He winces all over again at the clang of the wall falling down, the adrenaline of being caught, the immediate fear at the look in Collins’s eyes. “He drew his gun. He said I wasn’t worth the risk, bein’ able to run. And he pulled the trigger.”
Neal watches as the story settles in, watches as Peter reorganizes the world as he knew it. Years ago, long before their partnership, Neal might’ve felt vindictive, felt proud. Now it sickens him, the betrayed look in Peter’s eyes. The wine he was trying for Neal’s sake nearly topples as the plane hits rough air.
“You—you weren’t resisting. You weren’t running. You—”
“Technically, I was running,” Neal says. “I mean, I was halfway there—”
“Neal,” Peter snaps, and Neal shuts up quickly. “I wouldn’t have given him the victory, the promotion. He’s—he’s a mockery of an agent. He’s a mockery of a person.”
“There was nothing you could’ve done.”
“I could report him. I could—”
“Peter, stop,” Neal interrupts, leaning forward across the gap between them, their eyes firmly fixed on each other despite the plane’s rattling and the sea going by. “Leave it alone. I’m asking you: leave him alone. Please. Let it go.”
“How—? Why didn’t you tell me—”
“I knew it would upset you,” Neal replies honestly.
Peter gestures with his hands, caught up in his own outrage. “I could’ve done something—do you understand what I just gave him? The payday of a lifetime, Neal, I put his name in the fucking history books—how could you have stood to be near him, to let him win?”
Neal sighs. “I’m a conman, Peter. Faking is what I do.”
“You—” Peter looks at him, eyes flickering around, to the walls of the plane and the seats and Neal’s leg, seeking something and not finding it. “I—”
Neal leans forward, touches Peter’s leg like Peter had done for him only minutes ago. He smiles weakly, truthfully. “It’s fine, Peter. Calm down. I’m fine. It was just one agent, one incident.”
Peter quiets a little and considers him. He eases back into his chair like his strings have been cut. “Okay,” he says with confidence, like he’s gathering his thoughts, although there’s still a wild look on his face and an unusual rapidity to his breathing. “But—but I’m telling Hughes. He’ll help.”
Neal gives him a comforting but disbelieving smile. “Okay.” He pulls his hand back, curls his fist, tries to hold onto the feel of another human being in his hand. Chances a glance up. “Want to see if there’s any beer in the back?”
“Oh, yes,” Peter agrees in real relief and gratitude, though the look in his eyes is still vaguely disturbed. He pushes the wine over to Neal’s chair and hurries to the back of the plane, stumbling through the turbulence, and Neal laughs as he gets to his feet also. Peter holds out an arm like it’s nothing, helping Neal up, letting him lean on him—and Neal smiles up at him gratefully as they move to sift through the cabinets at the tail-end of the jet, both of them relieved at the change of topic.