Work Text:
Neal: How did they know about Nick Halden?
Mozzie: Let's be honest: Nick was not your best work. He's no Steve Tabernacle.
Neal: Steve was a good man.
Mozzie: Steve is a good man. Besides, you should be more concerned with what the guy with the ring wants.
***
(about 5 years ago)
Neal propped himself on an elbow watched Kate as she dozed. With the shift of the mattress her eyes opened and she blinked languidly at him, still caught up in the pleasant aftermath of their exertions. Her smile nearly blinded him. She stretched and twisted, turning towards him in a boneless roll that stole his breath and seemed determined to halve his recovery time. He bent down and kissed her, chaste and slow. Meaningful. He caught her lip in his and gave it the slightest tug as he pulled away.
It felt like a con. Like there wasn't a chance in hell that the universe would let him have something like this. He wanted her to have everything, and he'd give her anything to convince her to stay, because one day she'd wake up and realize he was nothing but smoke and mirrors.
"What do you want?" The words escaped before he could wrap them in bows and ribbons, and the honest vulnerability they carried made his insides churn.
Puzzlement crept over Kate's face, and Neal wanted decades—centuries, even—to draw that furrowed line in her forehead and get that quirky arch in her brow just right. "What?" she said.
"What," he waved his hand to encompass everything: the apartment, the world. . .life, "do you want? If you could have anything."
The confused look remained, but her eyes softened as she stared at him. She took her time with the question, and Neal knew that she understood, however badly he'd expressed himself.
***
Neal: I don't know. I've stolen a lot of stuff in my lifetime.
Mozzie: Maybe Poe's "Tamerlane" book?
Neal: No. Sold that a while back. The Tamayo painting.
Mozzie: Not worth all this.
Neal: . . . Washington's love letters?
***
"Washington's love letters." Kate had been silent a long time before she spoke.
Neal blinked in surprise and then laughed. "You want Washington's love letters?!"
Kate swatted at him before snuggling in close. "No, not the actual letters," she said. "What they had. George and Martha. Do you know they exchanged letters all their lives, anytime they were apart? Even when they were both really old, he still called her 'my dearest Martha.'"
Neal laughed at Kate's George Washington impression.
"And she always called him 'my love'," Kate continued, and Neal didn't miss the wistful tone. "And when he died, she never even went back into their bedroom. She locked the door and didn't set foot in it again. Just waited to die so she could be with him again."
She looked up at him and the intensity in her stare trapped him. "That's what I want. That passion. Knowing a love that strong. Forever." She turned her face into his shoulder as he tightened his arms around her, and her lips tickled his skin as she whispered, "That's what I want."
He could give her that; in fact, he didn't think he could manage anything less. You have it, Neal had wanted to say. The words had frozen on his tongue but screamed from his eyes, and he knew that Kate couldn't help but see them if she looked up. But the phone chose that instant to ring, and, as they were pulled into Mozzie's paranoid need to change apartments yet again, the moment was lost.
***
Mozzie: Seriously, I don't even know why you stole that in the first place. Martha— Oh, I love this part!
***
"Neal, this is stupid."
"Yeah, Moz, you've made your feelings clear." Neal adjusted the large desk-mounted magnifying glass and leaned in close as he carefully reproduced the uneven ink lines from a dulled fountain pen.
"No, I don't think I have. Because you're still at . . . this." Mozzie waved his hand at the parchment-covered room, evidence of Neal's imperfect attempts at reproducing Washington's letters. "It's been weeks. No one's going to be looking that closely. No. One. Cares. They're not worth the effort of stealing, and they're going to be next to impossible to fence. I can give you twenty better targets at the same museum!"
"Great. They're all yours. Go wild." Neal caught his lip in his teeth as he let the tail end of the "f" blob. He counted to five and then brushed his finger over it in a downward stroke. He'd had to start over four times because of the imperfection in this single character. After this job, Neal was convinced that the proliferation of printing presses, with their regular, predictable idiosyncrasies was the best thing the world had ever given a forger.
"Neal," Mozzie tried again. "I know you're upset that Kate's still avoiding you, but I don't think this is a healthy—"
"Enough! Moz, I . . . just come back a bit later. These need to be perfect."
"Fine." Mozzie walked to the door, opened it, and then spun back to Neal. "'Friendship marks a life even more deeply than love'!" he said in a near-shout, waving his arms for emphasis.
"What?"
"'Love risks degenerating into obsession, friendship is never anything but sharing,'" Mozzie continued. "Elie Wiesel." He stared at Neal for another beat then made an about-face. "I have to pick up the rest of the equipment."
"Moz—" The door banged shut. Neal let his shoulders sag. He'd make it up to Mozzie once this was done.
Completing the forgery of George and Martha's letters took another week, and by that time Neal had every stroke, every accidental ink smudge, and every crinkle of the page memorized. When Neal slumped back to stare at the stack of letters on the table, Mozzie stepped forward. He traced the edge of a sheaf of parchment, sniffed at it and then scrutinized the writing, tilting the page from side to side. He replaced it with the others in the stack, and sighed.
"This is your best work."
Neal smiled tiredly. "Thanks."
"No. I mean it. These are impeccable. Perfect." He shook his head sadly. "No one will ever know. It's tragic, really."
Neal shrugged. "We can do the job tomorrow."
"What's the hurry?" Mozzie asked. "It's not like we have a buyer lined up."
"I'm not selling them," Neal said.
Mozzie's mouth dropped. He raised his eyebrows and waited for an explanation.
"They're for Kate," Neal added. Mozzie waited for something more, but Neal just closed his eyes and fell into an exhausted sleep.
***
TV: Too rich for your blood, Li Kang?
The film was patently ridiculous, and given how vital Pai Gow was to tomorrow's mission, Neal really wasn't in the mood. A cult classic, Mozzie had called it.
Mozzie had been right, years ago, about the Washington letters. No one, not curators or visiting scholars, ever noticed that the prominently displayed correspondence of George and Martha was forged. Only Kate and Mozzie knew.
TV: I believe it is your blood that will make me rich, farmer boy!
And Kate was a fan of the classics, too.
***
"I got your letters," Kate said into the phone, as soon as she sat down.
Neal stared at her from behind the prison safety glass, and he wondered if, despite his best efforts, he looked as desperate as he felt. She hadn't come to the hearing. He hadn't heard a word from her since Agent Burke had cuffed him. After months of separation, culminating with his arrest, he'd thought she might be gone for good. He'd gotten word out to Mozzie through his lawyer, and asked him to ensure that the Washington letters made their way to Kate, but he'd heard nothing back until now. With Kate sitting across from him. She looked well, and it killed him to not be able to touch her.
It would be a long four years.
"Good," he said, with a glance at the nearby guard detail and Kate followed his gaze. "I. . . wrote them for you."
"I wrote you a letter too. They wouldn't let me bring it in though," she twisted in her seat to look back at the closed steel door behind her. "I don't know what they—"
"It's okay," he said. "They have to approve all correspondence." He blinked and looked at her more critically. Mozzie must have gone on endlessly about Neal's criminal loss of freedom at the hand of America's hidden neo-fascist regime. There was no way he wouldn't have talked to Kate about prison censorship.
"Mmm," Kate said, and the smallest of smiles tugged at the corner of her mouth. "I read each letter. Every sentence. I can probably recite them word for word."
Neal narrowed his eyes. This was not a Kate-like conversation, and while any reunion in the visitation room was bound to be awkward, this seemed more deliberate.
"I meant what they said," he said, after a moment, and Kate's smile widened.
"I can't stay long," Kate said, and Neal's heart caught in his throat as she pushed her chair back.
"You just got here. You don't have to—"
"I'll be back. Next week. I needed to see you but M— my friend gave me a ride and I don't think leaving him alone outside too long is a good thing. He was looking a bit jumpy . . ."
Neal's eyes widened and he nodded quickly. The trouble a jittery Mozzie could get into outside a federal prison was best not to dwell on. He was touched that Mozzie had even attempted to get so close. He swallowed as his eyes watered, but he maintained his game face.
"Write me back," Kate said. Her smile slipped as she put down the phone.
Kate's letter took three days to pass security screening.
"Caffrey," a bored correctional officer called, and Neal took single stride to the bars of his cell to take the opened envelope that was handed to him. A large green stamp proclaimed it to be acceptable by the screeners. Neal wondered if they had made a copy. Neal slouched back on his cot to read, but sat up at the first words.
My love, it began. Miss you and I am counting the days. I don't want letters, I want more. A quick scan proved the rest to be equally banal. But Kate's reference to the letters, and Martha's opening 'my love'. . . He grinned.
Kate had coded it.
The message was short, meant more as a test than to pass along anything of substance, and it didn't take him long to puzzle out. Book ciphers were simple if you had the key, and notoriously uncrackable if you didn't. Only Mozzie and Kate knew about Neal's connection to the Washington letters.
George had always started his letters to his wife in the same way. My: two letters—second word. Darling: seven letters—seventh word. Martha: six letters—sixth word. And so on, starting with the earliest dated correspondence, and looping back if it was ever needed.
Love the letters. Bald one says hi.
That night, after Neal added another lonely notch to his wall tally, he slept with the letter under his pillow and clutched in his hand. Kate had given him a lifeline.
***
Neal: Okay, what are they doing right now?
The television conveyed the noises of tiles being stacked and moved around. Neal needed to find Kate, and to do that he had to make the FBI happy and find their missing agent.
Mozzie: Oh, they're drawing from the wood pile. . .