Title: Better No Faith
Fandom: White Collar
Challenge: 145 - Metal
Rating: PG
Length: 407 words
Content notes: N/A
Author notes: Ambiguous canon point. No spoilers.
Summary: There was too much metal anymore, in this gentleman's game; Neal reflects on how things have changed.

There was, Neal Caffrey thought, rolling a Morgan silver dollar between his fingers as he waited for the chemical test strip to change, entirely too much metal in the game anymore. The metal in question was a semi-automatic taking up an entirely inelegant portion of the desk, its matte black edges and cavernous-from-this-angle barrel pointed at him ruining the view of a two-hundred year old polished cherrywood.

The test strip's colour changed from white to green; the tension in the room abated a little, and Neal flashed his trademark smile. It had taken Mozzie four nights and 11 bottles of his Cros Parantoux to perfect the exact combination of sulfates needed to mimic the original. "So everybody gets to go home happy, right?" he said.

"Not so fast," the stern blonde seated across from him said, his clipped accent turning the words into an almost-lure. Neal tilted his head, as if whatever was about to come up wasn't a surprise, and wasn't probably setting Peter outside in the van with out hand on his headset and the other hand on the door latch, ready to run in. "There is one more thing we would like in payment, from you."

Metal in the guns on every belt anymore, at every deal. This used to be a game of softer things, he thought. Champagne at the Hotel Le Chabichou in Courchevel. A touch of fingers against the inside skin of a beautiful, perfumed wrist. A $30,000 Guanashina suit, supple as butter, with hand-stitched silk threads.

"We want you to deliver a message to her former owner. A personal message."

"The deal was the Santa Catalina for the money," Neal reminded them, keeping his tone light and wondering how he was going to work the code phrase -- Aunt Maria -- into this conversation if things went sideways.

Metal in handcuffs, and jail cell bars, and in the GPS chip that was waiting to grab onto his ankle as soon as this case was finished, transmitting its ones and zeroes in a constant stream to the FBI, an invisible digital leash.

"For your cooperation in delivering this message, we will consider this business transaction completed in good faith. If not... then not so good faith."

When did this life become all about the unyielding things?

Neal laced his fingers together, the picture of relaxation, and smiled serenely. "Better no faith than bad faith, as my Aunt Maria used to say."