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Peter gets an anonymous tip on Thursday, two days after the last Caffrey lead dried up somewhere between the Shedd Aquarium and the Art Institute of Chicago. He's staying at a Holiday Inn downtown where the wifi is free and there's breakfast every morning. He's ready to call it quits here and go home to his wife for a few days. The email arrives with a ping in his inbox, his work email, and he automatically opens it and reads. There's no subject line and the sender's address is blocked. There are three lines of text. A date and a time, an IP address and a single name. Neal. It's the sort of thing he would do. The date is today. Nine thirty pm. That's in a little less than half an hour. He packs up his papers and his computer from where they've taken over one of the breakfast tables in the lobby and heads back to his room.
He tries a few tricks to find the location of the IP address, without success, before he just types it into the address bar of Netscape. It's not a puzzle, it's not a cryptogram, none of Neal's usual nose-thumbing gestures. It's a webcam feed, grainy and slightly distorted. Right now pointed obliquely at a blank wall. Blank that is, save for a small Matisse, very fine and very stolen, hanging just off center. He watches for a moment, expecting, well, he's not entirely sure what he's expecting. Nothing happens, the wall is blank, the Matisse is mocking and he's no closer to solving this riddle. He should forward all this to Jones and someone in IT but waits, too curious to share just yet. He's still early for the rendezvous. He considers his next move in this endless cat and mouse that he and Caffrey have been playing for more than two years. He's close, but Neal is too clever by half. Peter knows that this cleverness, Neal's pride in it and refusal to take what he's doing seriously will eventually lead to a mistake that he can leverage into a win. It's that same clever intelligence that keeps Peter fascinated, assuring that he's never going to let Neal go.
A flicker of movement puts his attention back where it's needed and he watches Neal and Kate walk into the camera's range. Neal helps her with her wrap and then he's shrugging out of his jacket. His lips move silently, no sound to the feed, and he disappears out of sight with the clothes, probably to hang them up. Kate turns and for a second, Peters would swear she looks directly at the camera, and smiles.
Neal's returned to the frame and Kate puts her hands on his shoulders and pushes him back, against the wall. She moves her hands down to his biceps and holds him pinned as she kisses him voraciously. Neal's kissing back, following with his lips as best he can while making no move to break from her hold. Interesting. But baffling. Why is Neal showing him this? He never involves Kate. She's his alone of all the things that Neal and Peter share. But it has to be him, it doesn't make sense for someone else to have gotten past both Neal and Peter and set up something like this.
Kate's still kissing him, but she's moved even closer now, pressing herself between his legs and steadily unbuttoning his shirt. She steps away; Neal stays where he is. His lips move and Peter imagines that he's whining at the loss of contact. She puts a finger against his lips and Peter sees a flicker of his tongue before he's turning to face the wall at her direction. As he turns, she takes hold of the collar of his shirt and smoothly pulls it down over his shoulders and away from his back. The cuffs catch on his wrists and Peter can see the muscles in her forearms jump as she tugs harder and frees him from it entirely. She tosses it behind her and runs her fingers lightly down the curve of his spine. Peter can't see either of their faces now, but the intimacy of their bodies is embarrassing enough. She leans in close and kisses all the points she's just touched. Her hands have reached around Neal and are doing things Peter can't see, but can imagine. She steps back again and Neal's pants puddle to the floor, he steps out of them and he's completely nude. No underwear. Of course not. He's Neal, always prepared for the next move.
Kate's talking again, the maddeningly silent feed making him guess at what she might be saying. She touches Neal's arms lightly and steps back. Neal raises them and places his hands carefully against the wall at shoulder height. Kate walks behind him and kicks his feet apart and out. Peter can see the muscles in Neal's back bunch and shift as his arms take the weight of his body. Neal lowers his head and fixes his gaze down. Unconsciously, Peter adjusts himself as he continues to stare at the screen. He doesn't understand what Kate's doing to Neal or why he's going along with it, but the sight of Neal, naked and vulnerable makes him ache. No, that's not exactly right. It's Neal, naked, vulnerable, and willing that is making Peter come undone, just a bit. Kate's walking around him now, pacing; stalking him like a predator. She's smiling though, incongruously sweet and in stark contrast to her body language. Peter can just see the answering smile on Neal's face from this angle. Peter can also see Neal's cock, curving up from its nest of springy curls. Peter's mouth goes dry. He forgets entirely about contacting Jones.
Kate stops briefly and again looks straight at the camera. She's still smiling, but her eyes go hard before she looks back at Neal and she's smiling with her whole face again. All her attention goes back to Neal and this game they're playing goes on, Peter realizes with a start that she's got Neal in a classic perp stance, off balance and waiting to be patted down and cuffed. She doesn't disappoint, stepping in close and using her hands to map out his body from neck to toes. Peter can see her touch go from soft and teasing to sharp and insistent and there are marks starting to bloom across Neal's pale skin from her nails. Peter jumps when she slaps his ass hard. Neal jumps, too, and his cock bobs up even more. Peter can't take his eyes away from the perfect handprint that she's left there. She does it again and Neal's hands are scrabbling against the wall, fingers curling against it. She leans close to him, says something in his ear and kisses his neck as she gently rubs the red prints she's left on his skin. Neal's head comes up and he's saying something to her; Peter imagines that he's pleading with her to do it again, or maybe to touch his leaking cock. Peter can’t take his eyes from the screen as he reaches down and gives himself two firm strokes and stops. If Neal has to wait then he will, too. Kate rewards them with another handprint, and another, and another. Neal's head drops again and he's panting, Peter can see his chest move and can almost feel the breath huffing out from his parted lips. She moves in close again and rests her head against Neal's back. Peter can almost, not quite, but almost imagine what the whispery silk of her dress must feel like against Neal's hot, abused skin. He shivers.
Kate snaps a handcuff around Neal's right wrist. Peter's brain immediately supplies the staccato click that accompanies the movement. Her other arm snakes around his chest in a bear hold. She pulls him back against her, twisting his arm up behind him as she smoothly transfers his weight to where she wants it. His trust is still evident in the utter lack of tension in his body. She's already got his other hand back and Peter hears the second snap as if he were in the room with them. She pulls a small key from her pocket and fiddles with the cuffs, double locking them, and Peter's sure they're Smith and Wesson M100's, exactly the same as he carries to deal with felons and he's never going to look at them the same way again. She fingers his wrists and asks him a question. He wiggles his fingers and nods and smiles.
They both watch Neal sway just a bit before dropping to his knees and he's graceful, Christ, how can anyone be so perfectly serene, kneeling there, naked and bound and vulnerable? Peter's hand is on his cock again and he waits, not calm, not patient, almost angry in the way he wraps his fingers around himself and pulls. No one's ever given him anything like this thing that Neal's giving Kate. He's never asked, would never ask, it's too much, too much for someone like him and someone like El. They have honesty and love and pleasure and desire and it's enough, it's always been enough. It has to be. They don't live in this crazy world where the diamonds are real except when they're not and a Matisse hangs on the wall of a one bedroom apartment, but here he is anyway, a voyeur to the lives that criminals lead. The danger and destruction and deviancy have never called to him. Never until now and when Kate comes back into view, this time with an impressively large, silicone dildo strapped neatly between her delicate thighs, he groans in time with the silent moan that Neal's mouth makes as he drops down, cheek against the carpet, and spreads his knees for her.
She's good. She's brilliant, almost and Peter sees the way Neal responds to her, to her clever, clever fingers and then to the fake cock. She holds his hips and pushes into him, steady and perfectly balanced, exactly as hard as Neal needs her to be, Peter imagines. Peter's not even under the pretense anymore that he's the impartial observer and when her right hand snakes around to Neal's cock, he jerks along with Neal until they're both coming and shouting their release on opposite sides of this triangle and when Kate pulls out and Neal gently falls to his side, cradled by her arms as she strokes his back and his face, Peter laughs, a breathless giggle that he does not recognize as his own. She takes the key and releases Neal's left wrist and curls herself around him, whispering maddeningly unknowable words to him for a few minutes before she disappears out of view again and returns with a blanket.
The feed lets him stare at Neal, cuff still dangling from one wrist, stretched out on the floor, still naked under the blanket that Kate's wrapped around him. His eyes are open and for once, completely honest. The camera lingers on him for perhaps thirty seconds before it abruptly blinks off, leaving him alone in a darkened hotel room.
He realizes only seconds after. Neal didn't set this up. Kate did. She's playing a dangerous game here with both of them. Kate's smart but she's not in the same league as Peter and Neal, she's not even in the same sport. This is check; there are still a lot of moves until mate, even with the queen in play. Peter has no idea how he's ever going to manage to arrest Neal after seeing this. But this is Peter and this is Neal and it's inevitable. He will.