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elrhiarhodanTitle: Fire Damage
Prompt: White Collar 100 – #010: Home
Author:
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elrhiarhodanRating: R
Characters/Pairing: Peter Burke, Neal Caffrey
Fandom: White Collar
Spoilers: None
Warnings/Enticements/Triggers: None
Word Count: 300 Exactly!
Summary: Second fill for the “Home” prompt in the Danger Series, continues the events in Smoke.
THE DANGER SERIES: TARGET | HUNT | CASE | FILE | BACKGROUND | INTERROGATION | WITNESS | HOME
“Peter, come on. Get out of here.”
Neal’s pulling on his arm, trying to drag him out of the house. He knows he should go, but this is his home. He hears sirens and lets Neal guide him outside. The clean autumn air hits him and he’s coughing from the acrid smoke he inhaled. Three trucks pull up and firemen pour out. He tries to shout, to tell them the fire is in the chimney, but he can’t. Neal presses him back against the car and runs over to the captain. He can’t hear them over the sound of the engines, but he sees Neal urgently gesturing and the man giving instructions over the radio.
Neal comes back and stands by him. Peter tries to talk but starts coughing. Neal waves over the EMTs and they put an oxygen mask on him. He waits for the sound of shattering glass, the destruction of his home, but it doesn’t come. In fact, it’s over in less than a half hour.
The chief comes over to talk to them. “The Arson Squad will need to do a complete investigation, but it looks like it was an incendiary device planted in the flue, set for a slow burn. If you hadn’t been home or if it was in the middle of the night, the fire would have taken the whole house.”
He lets Neal talk; it’s enough that he can hear the answers.
“How bad is the damage?”
“You got lucky. It was contained to the fireplace and the surrounding area. Mostly smoke, not a lot of burn damage.” The chief walks off to talk with the arson crew.
Neal turns to him. “You don’t think that there was only one device planted, do you?”
Peter manages to get one word out, “No.”
Go to Assumptions - WC100 #012 – Family (1st fill)
