He went to the kitchen, fluttering his hands at the ends of his wrists, rotating his shoulders, trying to shake off the tension. He poured a cup of black espresso for Oberon—he didn’t really like coffee, but he liked it better without milk and sugar—and brought it along with his own cup back into the dining room. He dropped into a chair, and after a moment, Oberon sat across the ivory-and-gilt table from him, touching his cup but not drinking.

“Scary?” said Oberon, in an absolutely neutral tone. “I am unarmed. She has no need to actually fear me.”

“If you talked to me like that I’d piss my pants.”

“Is that a metaphor?”

“No. Literally. That thing you did with your voice was . . . You were blazing at her like the sun; I could see scorch marks on her forehead.” Oberon stared at him, and Ángel added, “That was a metaphor. Not really. But I don’t think you understand how you affect people, Oberon. Couldn’t you . . . couldn’t you smell it? How you were frightening her? Or feel it, or whatever you do?”

Oberon lifted the espresso cup to his nose, inhaling the aroma. “I could, actually, but . . . I was annoyed.”

“Yeah, that came across,” said Ángel. “I was about to start singing ‘Let It Go’ to distract you.”

Oberon took a deliberate sip of his coffee. “I hardly think that would have made me less annoyed.”

Ángel laughed, some of the tension in his chest loosening. “I used to like that song, but then I played a Frozen-themed birthday party and we sang it over and over again. Imagine three dozen six-year-olds all singing along, all missing that high e-flat at the same time.”

“Why did you do that to yourself?”

“A favor for a friend.”

They sat companionably for a few minutes, drinking coffee. Ángel’s fingertips still tingled slightly from where he had—voluntarily, of his own free will—touched Oberon’s skin. Oberon seemed relaxed, willing to sit companionably with Ángel. Above them, the mirrored chandelier cast motes of light around the room.

They were almost finished with their coffee when the front door opened and John appeared with a USPS priority mail box in his hand. “Good morning, sir,” he said pleasantly to Oberon, coming into the dining room and handing the box to Ángel. “Here we go.”

“Thanks.”

“Is Lily in the kitchen?”

“I think she’s upstairs cleaning the bedrooms.”

“All right if I run up to see her before I head back?”

“Of course, John,” said Oberon.

John disappeared up the stairs. Ángel glanced nervously at Oberon, then applied his attention to his present. The tape holding the box closed had, naturally, already been slit, the contents searched by Chandler and her goons. Good thing Marissa hadn’t bothered with pretty wrapping paper.