Fic: Plausible Excuses
A new unlocked home for this fic......
Title: Plausible Excuses
Summary: Neal lies awake in the Burkes' spare room, trying to work out how to get what he can't have.
Rating: PG-13/R?
Characters/Pairing: Neal/Peter, Elizabeth
Author's Note: for toestastegood (prompt: White Collar, El/Neal/Peter, bed-sharing). Sorry, didn't manage the threesome!
Neal lies, exhausted yet still awake in the half-light of the unfamiliar guest room, as the digital clock on the side table measures out the minutes and hours of his failure to find sleep. Running through problems and plans with Peter all evening relating to their latest case has left him wired, adrenalin rushing around his veins willing him to take action, take flight, even as he tries unsuccessfully to will his body into calm silence. Much to his chagrin, Neal’s own body is one of the only entities that can be immune to the charm, the cajoling, of Neal’s mind. This has compromised him more than once.
Sighing, he looks around, brain weighing up possible solutions to the current problem of sleeplessness, not for the first time wondering why he was so quick to accept the offer to stay over at the Burkes’, rather than call for a cab home to his place on Riverside Drive . The curtains in the Burkes’ clean, unassuming spare room are letting in too much light, the air is a little too warm, the queen-sized bed just a little too narrow to be able to fully accommodate the stretch of his long limbs. He considers getting up to open the window, wondering if he’ll then be thwarted from sleep by the quiet drones of traffic, but instead slowly turns himself on his side to face the far wall. As so often in his life, he’s aware that what he really wants lies on the other side.
He’s reminded of when he was a child (Neal doesn’t like to be reminded too often). When he was home from boarding school for the summer he would sometimes find himself lying awake at night, imagining being able to softly creep downstairs to his parents’ room. However, for his own good, Neal’s parents' didn’t allow Neal to be ‘coddled’, and he knew he would never be allowed to climb in beside them. Therefore he never even bothered with his usual plan of attack with his parents, which was to cajole, flatter or trick his way to what he wanted. No point going to the trouble of a finely organized break-in if the safe holding the prize is ultimately uncrackable. Neal knows that if Peter and El have a child (do they want a child? His heart unaccountably twists a little at the thought) they wouldn’t be those sort of parents. Just as he knows that if he can just find a plausible excuse for being there in the first place, they will not be unobtainable, they will (of course) let Neal in to lie beside them. The guest room ceiling is leaking? Too easily disproved (unless Neal goes to the trouble of sabotage, and the consequences might get a little out of hand). Neal’s having nightmares? Too lacking in dignity for an adult. His mind continues to ponder.
If he can just work out this final piece of the puzzle, then in this case thankfully, getting there is the easy part. All he needs to do is open his door, tread along the soft carpet of the Burkes’ hallway, and press the doorhandle to the Burkes’ own (unlocked, un-alarmed) room, and he will be there (no forgeries or con tricks necessary). He imagines what he would see, the two of them lying immobile under the covers, slightly entwined (but, he thinks dimly, with room for manoeuvre), softly breathing.
He’s been in this room (or at least an imagined one like it) many times before. In his prison cell Neal would spend many daylight hours thinking about Kate, running over the words exchanged at their last visit, placing a weight of importance to each sentence spoken, each sentence not spoken, with an almost paranoiac intensity that he would never have bothered to do in the outside world. But when it came to the night, Neal found that fantasizing about Kate actually provided no comfort , no release beyond the purely physical. He felt too guilty, too responsible, for her imagined presence to be able to soothe him and draw him down into sleep. Strangely, ridiculously (and Neal appreciated the irony), his primary comfort lay in imagining his captor, Peter, lying in bed across the city from him, warm and safe in the bed he shared with his wife. Neal of course knows all about El, he knows everything about Peter (or thinks he knows everything), and the easy warmth of their home life makes him giddy, like a child on a sugar rush from too much ice cream. The comfort, then as now, lies in imagining himself lying there safe with them, the sheer domesticity soothing him. He knows, of course, in the back of his mind, that he wants something else too, but he doesn’t allow himself to think too much about that.
Tonight, he’s drifting off again. In his mind he sees them. Peter and El are both soundly asleep, lying on their fronts with their heads to the side, their bodies not touching. Even in the darkness Neal can see the planes and slopes of Peter’s back, his solid, defined muscles. He doesn’t allow himself to think too much about why he always, in these dreams, chooses to climb into the bed on Peter’s side. He just thinks about pressing close. He won’t even ask for - for anything more. Just a hand on his shoulder? Just a slight press against him, enough to feel the edge of Peter’s warmth down one side of his body? Peter’s warned him about getting too greedy ( ‘This is where it starts…..’) But the thing is, he wants so much.
His imagination has complete hold of him now, and he’s moving a little beyond the borders of what he’s let himself dream about so far. He’s beside Peter now under the covers, parallel to the whole length of him, sensing the warmth radiating from his body. Peter is waking up, rolling over, looking at Neal with a wry, tired, half-smile. For the first time in his dreams, Peter speaks to him.
“Are you after my wife? “ Neal thinks he says. “If so, you’re on the wrong side…” He hears a soft chuckle.
Peter’s proximity, the intimacy of it, is taking his breath away. He feels a hum along his skin, a throb of static electricity. He can’t help himself; he reaches down, firstly cupping Peter’s heavy balls and then moving to a cock that responds immediately to his hand. A slight pull on Peter’s neck finds their tongues meeting, and it’s exquisite. He’s floating, almost growling with pleasure, and he’s never going to stop…
Shocked, Neal blinks, shivers, and he’s awake again. This damn room, too light, too warm, too quiet. He’s aching now with frustration, his body undisciplined and uncontrollable yet again. He puts his imaginings down to the heat, to the stuffiness of the room. He won’t think about it. He tries to drift off. At the same time, whilst the clock counts on and on, a part of his mind is still moving, weighing up, searching for plausible excuses.....