"Hey." Rafe waved from over Merlin's head. Merlin rose and bowed, shaking Des's hand and kissing Melissa's knuckles in a manner far too chaste to be anything but chaste.

"My pleasure. Your daughter is a very courageous, if somewhat impulsive, young woman."

"We did figure that out," Melissa agreed, smiling at him and squeezing said daughter once before shifting her gaze to the woman hovering over the older man's chair. If everyone in Gabe's family looked like that, Melissa was going to have to start getting jealous. "What's 'Donnie' short for?"

"Donna," 'Donnie' said promptly. "S'Italian. It means 'lady'. Think someone was bein' hopeful." She flashed a grin at Erskine.

"You'd better open it," Gabe said. "You'll regret not opening it. I guarantee you'd have preferred opening it yourself to what's going to happen--oops, too late."

With a blaring trumpet and a circus tune the present unwrapped itself on Skulduggery's lap, its top unfolding with a spray of confetti. Out from the box rose a powdered white and curled wig, rotating slowly on a pike until it presented itself at Skulduggery with a flare of tiny firework sparklers.

"Surprise, pardner," Gabe drawled.

Dexter turned his head to look, snorted, and buried his face in Erskine's arm to cackle madly, muffled though it was.