It had advantages to be rich. An elevator direct to your apartment was really handy. You were let inside on the bottom floor and the one living in the apartment let the elevator take you there. No stops or other people entering on the way.
"We should talk to June about getting an elevator," he said as he stepped out into an apartment which was more like a luxury villa, in a sky scraper.
"Didn't think you're staying that long," the kid replied.
Peter scanned the room as a jolly young man bounced down the stairs from the upper floor.
"Hey, FBI guys. How's it going?"
"I'm Agent Peter Burke," Peter presented himself. "This is Neal Caffrey."
"Not Agent Neal Caffrey?"
"Consultant," Peter said after a glance from the kid.
"What do you consult on?" Mr. Picah asked him curiously.
"Frauds, forgeries, cons," Neal answered and slid away, surveying the room, obviously trying to avoid further conversation.
"Awesome hat trick," the man burst in admiration. "Can you teach me that?"
Peter had to fight a smile. Obviously Neal had put his hat on in his usual manner and got an admirer. He turned to see the kid with a wide, overly polite grin all over his face. Peter saw a gray bust with a fedora hat on that had caught Neal's interest.
"You like that statue?" Mr. Picah asked. "Don't worry. It's real."
The man was intense. Peter was used to dealing with odd people in his work for years and could handle most of them. He smiled politely and looked at the bust.
"He uses a Boaz Vaadia bust as a hat rack," Neal whispered upset. "Do you know how much this bust is worth?"
"I paid four-fifty for that," Dan Picah answered and to Peter's amusement, he saw the man trying Neal's hat trick in front of a mirror. It was not the same when you had to use two hands.
"I can't be here," Neal said and moved to leave. Peter stopped him.
"Mr. Picah."
He put the hat back on the hook beside the mirror.
"Hey, we're friends. Call me Dan."
"Okay, Dan," Peter agreed and hoped that Dan would address him as Agent Burke. "Have you been in contact with any beautiful women recently?"
"Sure. It's New York. I'm dating all the time. Why? What's going on?"
Peter dug in his pocket and produced a photo of the woman called Pierce. He held it out to Dan.
"Well, have you been in touch with her?"
"No, but she's pretty. Should I be in touch with her?"
"We think she might be after something you own," Neal said. "Something... rare."
"I got tons of stuff," Dan said, stating the obvious. The apartment was littered with expensive objects. "What do you think she wants?"
"We were hoping you could tell us," Peter said.
Dan's eyes ran across the room.
"Maybe it's my sword," he suggested, walking past them, pointing at a samurai sword in a stand. "It's a Go Yoshihiro. Japanese, 13th century. Cost me two hundred and twenty thousand dollars, if you can believe that. I love history. Do you like history?"
Peter nodded while Neal left Peter's side and strolled away without replying.
"Silent type. I get it. Do you ever pull your weapon?" he asked Peter. This man was a child in an adult body.
"Yep."
"You shoot anybody?" he whispered like the gun could go off if he talked too loud about it. "Shoot?"
"I've come close a few times," Peter assured him and caught up with the kid. "Hey, we gotta move this along."
"Are you not standing in the same space I am?" he got in return. "Peter, it could be anything. All of this is valuable and completely incoherent." He made a gesture towards his head to show what he thought of the man's taste of valuable items as the only measure.
"Wanna see the rest of the place?" Dan asked, already moving towards the staircase.
"No, I really don't," Neal whispered so barely Peter could hear him and made a gesture with his head towards the exit.
"But we have to," Peter replied in the same way and added in a more normal voice. "Let's go, Moriarty."
He pulled an unwilling Neal along towards the stairs. Peter was totally amused that Neal made more resistance going through a house full of valuables than being cuffed and arrested.
"Yeah, that would be great," he replied to Dan's invite.
"Awesome!" Dan was thrilled and rushed up the stairs ahead of them. "I got four floors. Let's start at the top."
Peter had to give Neal another push to prevent him from returning down the stairs.
That night Neal sat alone in his apartment on the sofa, reading a book where the amber music box was described and complimented with a pen drawing. He heard Peter down the stairs and put the book under the cushion where he sat. He grabbed another book on the table and Peter entered.
"Hey."
"Hey."
Peter was sweaty from exercising. Considering the basketball he had probably found a place to chase it all by himself.
"You want a beer?" Peter asked.
"Oh, we don't have any beer," Neal said. Last night Peter had even drunk the two he had had of Jones' favorite brand.
"Oh, I got some," Peter said and swung the door to the fridge open. "I got us a whole case."
Neal stared. Was it not expected that you asked before you placed something in someone else's fridge? And Peter had bought a label in a can not a bottle. Neal disapproved of cans. It was something about them that made him associate them with drunkards.
The next shock came when Peter sat down next to him on the sofa.
"You're sweating," he pointed out.
"Yeah," Peter agreed with a tired grin, sipping his beer.
"This is a nice couch," he tried to explain. "I don't want—"
"Yeah, it's comfy," Peter agreed and searched for the remote to the TV. Next, the room was filled with shattered noises from some sport event.
"I'm reading here. I'm doing some research."
"Yeah, so am I. I'm reading and researching and listening. I'm multitasking."
Neal got tired of being subtle. He took the remote and turned the TV off.
"Wait," Peter protested. "What are you doing? I— No, no. When I'm in my home, I listen to the game and I look at my case files."
"Too bad we're not in your home."
"Yeah, the power is still off," he grabbed the remote and turned the TV back on. "So we'll have to hear it."
Obviously, Peter considered his work more important than his.
"All right, I'm going downstairs." Neal took his book and rose.
"Why?"
"I'm going downstairs. I can't think. It's too loud. It's like—" He did not find the word for the insane feeling of having Peter in his home not respecting Neal's needs.
He found June downstairs. She must have seen on his face how he felt because poured him a glass of cognac without saying a word. They needed so little to understand each other.
They sat down on the sofa in the magnificent living room.
"Not what you had expected, was it?"
Neal shook his head with a faint smile. He was not sure what he had expected. He just offered a friend a place to stay, as friends do.
"I have never had a place of my own, really," he told June. "Always shared the space with someone, or lived there under a fake name, on borrowed time, you know. In prison, my cell could be searched at any time. Nothing was private. And here, it's the same, and I accepted it without a problem. Why do I feel as my home has been invaded?"
Mozzie often used his apartment without asking on beforehand and it had not bothered him much. But now with Peter...
"Because he takes charge over my home," he answered the question himself. Have someone searching it, was totally different from having someone living with you, taking command.
"As crazy as it may sound," June said after some thought, "I think you should be honored that Peter dares to be himself. He has struck me as one who loves his home, values his privacy. A man like that doesn't feel at home anywhere but at home."
"You're probably right," Neal agreed. It did not help much though.
Peter sat on the sofa realizing he was alone in Neal's home. Something he had never been before. He was a guest and he had promised himself to try not to be so much fed while he stayed with the kid. But still... It was tempting. Too tempting. He placed his file on the table leaned over and glanced at the thick book on the armrest. Doing so he placed a hand on the cushion where Neal had sat.
It was something hard there that did not match the softness of his own side. He lifted the cushion and found a book. He opened it on the bookmark and discovered an image of a music box. Probably the one Kate wanted, the one in amber. So the kid was looking for it, but felt he needed to hide the book from him. Why?
He was so absorbed in his thoughts that he barely heard Neal calling his name as the kid ran up the stairs. He got the book back where it was in the last second before Neal burst into the room.
"Go back to the house," Neal said firmly, his reading material still in hand.
Alright, the kid was upset because he had done something. They could sort it out.
"I told you the power's out. I can't go back."
"Christopher Gray's house," Neal corrected him. Peter stared. What now? "The FBI interrupted Pierce's search. She wasn't expecting that."
"So whatever she was looking for is still there," Peter realized and got to his feet. "Maybe we can figure out what Gray and Dan have in common if we go back." The thought of Dan's four-floor home stuffed with items... There was not a chance they could find out what they had in common on their own.
"With Dan," Peter said at the same time as Neal, who came to the same conclusion.
They drove there the next morning and Dan met them with great enthusiasm the second the elevator door opened.
"It's the FBI guys! Hey, welcome back."
"Dan, we need your help with something," Peter said. "Mind coming with us?"
"Awesome! Of course. Let me get my hat." He said the last with an appreciating look at Neal.
Peter exchanged a look with him as the man hurried towards his collection of hats. To Peter's great amusement, Neal took his hat off and turned toward the elevator. He did obviously not enjoy to be a style guru for this guy.
"Let's go," Dan said, with a hat similar to Neal's but did not quite seem to fit on his head.
"Yeah, looks good," Peter said and pattered him on the shoulder.
"Thank you."
In the car, Dan was a fountain of questions mixed with one or two interjections about expensive things he had bought.
"No music boxes?" the kid asked.
"Are there any exclusive music boxes? I thought they were kids' stuff. But I am tone deaf so I would not have much use of a music box even if I found one I liked."
"I hope you don't make much use of that samurai sword of yours," Peter mused.
"Oh, I see what you mean. I buy a samurai sword but not a music box. I can understand that my collection seems just random to you. It's okay. It is, I suppose. But even if I don't use my sword, I know I could, at least in my dreams. But I have never listened to any music that I liked so... Have you never bought anything just to have, to nest your dreams around?"
"No I don't think I have," Peter replied. That was not true. He had. But he had no intention to become familiar with this guy.
"How about you, Neal?" Dan asked.
"What?"
"Have you bought anything to just have to nurture a dream you have, like a samurai sword because you always dreamed to become a samurai?"
"No."
"Com' on guys! Don't you have dreams? Com'on we're friends! Haven't you even bought paint and brushes and a canvas because you dream you would become an artist someday?"
"Neal is an artist," Peter told him.
Dan's eyes become as big as plates.
"Wow! You live your dream! That's awesome! I knew you-"
"I'm a con artist," Neal blurted, angry. "I can paint you a perfect copy of Mona Lisa. I forged some bonds that I cashed in for real money and went to a very real prison! How's that for a dream?"
Dan went silent for once and stared.
"Oh, wow..." he said at last. "Does... does he know?" He pointed at him, Peter could see in the back mirror. He had to keep from laughing.
"Peter arrested me," Neal muttered.
"Twice," Peter added.
For once Dan's admiration swayed.
"You can't be that good if you get arrested, can you?"
"He wouldn't be working for the FBI if he wasn't," Peter assured Dan. To Neal's obvious annoyance the man's admiration returned.
Peter stopped outside Gray's house and Lauren met up inside, handing them all latex gloves. Dan pulled them on as if he was about to do surgery.
"Now, listen to me Dan," Peter began and got the man's full attention at once. "A man got killed in this home for an item. We don't know what it is, but it's likely you have the same thing, or something similar. We think the item is still here, so we want you to walk around and see if you can find what it is."
"Okay."
They walked upstairs.
"So this is a crime scene?"
"Yeah."
"That was where the body was," he said noting the white lines on the floor. "Don't touch anything, right? I won't. Just survey the scene."
"Dan, look in every room. It could be anything you have."
"I'll let you know. Hey, Neal, maybe you could teach me that hat trick sometime."
"Yeah, yeah, maybe," the kid answered without much enthusiasm.
"He wants to learn your trick," Peter mumbled to him. "Adorable."
"Don't, Peter."
"No, it's adorable. It's adorable." It really was. "Go keep an eye on him," he told Lauren.
"So, what happens if I don't find it?" Dan asked. "Where are we going next?"
"He's stalling," Neal whispered. "He wants to hang out with you."
"No," Peter objected, also whispering. "He wants to hang out with you."
"No, he saw—"
"Is that fingerprint dust?" Dan asked. "Neal, did you see this?"
"Yeah," the kid answered, probably realizing that Peter was right.
"Okay," Lauren interrupted. "Yeah, let's go check another room."
She led him away, passed them and to the other side of the stairs.
"Okay. You're hanging out with him," Neal told him the second he was out of sight.
"No," Peter said at once. "You're hanging out with him."
"This is your job."
Peter felt a rising panic and fumbled for any argument about that logic.
"Rock, Paper, Scissors?" Neal suggested.
"I'm not gonna play."
"Rock, Paper, Scissors."
Peter sighed.
"This is it," Lauren's voice broke their disagreement. She held a green jade elephant.
"Did I do good?" Dan asked.
"You did great," Neal answered without blinking and took the elephant from Lauren.
He gazed at it and then at Peter.
"Do you know what this is?"