Title: Body Heat

Rating: Gen

Genre/Relationship: General Friendship

Spoilers: None

Word Count: 718

Story Summary: The White Collar team has always been close, but a blizzard brings them even closer.

Body Heat

They say heat escapes through your head, Neal thought dimly, looking with longing at Diana's glossy dark locks. He shoved his hands under his armpits and tried to stop his teeth from chattering. He had considered asking her, but he was more afraid of bleeding than he was of freezing to death, but the balance was shifting every moment.

"They'll find us,"" Diana said. "Your anklet still working, right?"

Neal glanced at it, not-quite-alarmed that he could still move his foot, but he couldn't feel it. He started to speak, then stopped.

"Spill it, Caffrey," she snapped, her voice muffled inside the collar of her coat.

"I don't think it's finding us that's the problem. I think it's going to be—"

"Yeah. Getting to us. I know, Caffrey. I know." She turned around and looked at him in the backseat, noticed the faint bluing of his lips. "Caffrey—don't you dare freeze to death on me."

"Wouldn't think of it," he chattered.

"Caff—Neal, do you think Jones is okay? He left a while ago."

Neal looked out the car window into the blizzard, into the sheet of blowing snow. He did what he did when he did not want to lie—he deflected.

"Jones is big, and he's tough. It would take a lot to put him out of commission."

"Come up here, won't you?" Diana said. Her voice sounded calm. Nobody else would have noticed the tremor in her voice. He made his own voice gentle in response.

"It would be better if you came back here," he said. "Bench seats instead of bucket seats..."

Diana nodded, clambering over the seat with difficulty. Neal noticed her shoes. Beautiful, but not offering any real coverage. If his feet were frozen... She practically fell into his arms, but their laughter was mostly defensive, almost hysterical. Neal did his best to tuck her in beside him, placed her feet underneath his thigh.

"They're so cold, Caffrey," she muttered. "Are you sure you want to—"

"Are you kidding? Pass up a chance to play footsie with you?" She looked at him, annoyed, or trying to be. "My legs are frozen anyway," Neal joked. It was not quite true, but not quite funny, either. The looked at each other, then Diana tucked her head against his, put her arms around his awkwardly and tried not to shake.

It was better. It wasn't good, but it was better. Better was freezing to death in the arms of someone who knew you, who cared about you. Better was sharing your hope, and the slow dwindling of it as the blizzard encased the city. Time slowed to the slow rise and fall of their chests, the pulse of their blood through their veins.

It had not been long when something hit the car—hard, but not hard enough to be another car, or a snowplow. Neal had not shared his fear that they might be bisected by a city snowplow that was hunting for them. They startled, shaken with surprise, then heard pounding on the roof, the door. Someone was scraping at the car window—

"Jones!"

"Oh my god, Clinton—get in here!" Awkwardly, they pushed the car door open—the back one—and the big agent fell in, fell across them. They hauled him in and pulled the door shut.

Within minutes, the had Clinton in the center of the back seat and had draped themselves across him, across each other.

"If either of you talks about this," he managed, teeth chattering.

"You should be so lucky," Diana said, and smacked him on the back of his swathed head. His hat had been soaked through, so she had taken her scarf off and wrapped it around Clinton close-cropped head.

Remembering his envy of Diana's tresses, Neal slipped his arm around Clinton's neck and tried to cover his head. This necessitated sitting on Clinton's lap, but since Diana was already sitting on his lap...

"Hey, watch it," Clinton said, looking up at Neal.

"Watch yourself, big guy," Neal teased. "Not all of me is numb." Later, Diana would swear that Clinton's blush raised the temperature in the car 5 degrees. There was no denying that the three of them were doing better staying warm together than the two of them alone.

"If we get out of here, Caffrey," Clinton growled. Diana smacked him on the back of the head again, but lightly.

"When, Clinton. I think the word you're looking for is when."

"Right," said Clinton. "Right." He looked up a Neal, no teasing on his face. "You're anklet still working?"

Neal nodded. "Peter will find us," he said. "He'll find us."

They all knew that. The question wasn't if, but when.

And the second question was,would it be in time?