"What the hell were you two doing in there?" Grace snapped.
I opened my mouth, but Gabriel beat me to it.
"You changed the lock on Olivia's apartment," he said.
"So you randomly started opening doors?"
"No," I said. "When the lock on mine didn't work, I was checking whether the one next door looked new, if maybe you'd changed all the locks. When Gabriel turned the knob, it opened."
Her gaze met mine. "Just like that. It popped open."
"Yes," Gabriel said.
"As if you left it open," I said. "Left it for us to find."
"I would never--" She cut herself short. "If that door opened for Gabriel..."
She trailed off, as if realizing that his fae blood must have undone whatever magic she'd placed on it.
"What did you see in there?" she said.
"A crappy apartment," I said. "Just like mine."
"Don't you bullshit me, girl. You--"
"Give Olivia the new key for her door," Gabriel said. "Now. We will return to clear the last of her things, and you will refund all her unused rent money. If you do not, I will sue you for unlawful eviction."
"I didn't change her locks."
"Then undo whatever magic you put on my door to keep me out," I said.
"It's not to keep--" Again, she broke off. Then she said, "I want to know what you saw in there. Exactly what you saw."
"You tell us," Gabriel said, his voice deceptively soft. "It's your building."
Her glamour rippled, her true form shimmering through. "Don't play games, Gabriel Walsh. Not with me."
"Nor you with me." He moved closer, towering above her. "Tell me what we saw in there."
"Do you honestly think you can intimidate me, Gwynn?"
"Don't--"
"Oh, yes, don't call you that. You hate to be called that. You flee from the reminder. Squeeze your eyes shut and pray it all goes away."
That note of contempt--of outright mockery--had me bristling and moving forward, Lloergan growling at my side.
Gabriel only turned cool eyes on Grace and said, "If you'd let me finish, I was merely going to tell you not to play that game."
"What game?"
"The one where you try to distract me by calling me Gwynn. I was going to warn that it won't work. I am learning to accept what I am. It's hardly productive to deny that part of me is indeed Gwynn ap Nudd. Just don't use that name in hopes of distracting me. And perhaps, if you do use it, you'd do well to remember what it means. What Gwynn was. What I am."
"And what do you think you are, Gabriel Walsh? King of the Tylwyth Teg?" she snorted. "You're a boy. A child. I remember the true Gwynn and--"
"And I remember you." Gabriel's voice held a note of Gwynn's, stopping Grace short. "Is that not what I have of him? His memories? One could argue that is the essence of a person. Not DNA, but memories. I have his, and it only takes a trigger--such as seeing your true form--to bring them back. To remind me of who you are." He looked her in the eye. "And what you did, bogart."
She flinched at that, and then recovered and said, "I've done many things, Gabriel. You'll have to be more specific."