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retracted. “What else would they be?”
    “I don’t know.” She glared at him. “Who’s to say only the heavenly host can have wings? Daemons fly, too.”
    “You continue to doubt me, mortal? After seeing me on your television?” He spread his wings halfway and glared back. This was easier when his force field—his glow—and his headpiece were functional. Dammit.
    “Obviously you haven’t seen any 3-D movies.” She marched behind him and inspected his shoulders. He allowed it, even as her gaze made him self-conscious. As though he should flex his muscles and stand straighter.
    She brushed past him. “I can’t see through your armor.”
    If she could, she’d see the wings piercing his skin. They were endo-organic like his headpiece. He tucked the broken array into a storage compartment on his breastplate and eyed her shapely legs. She was finely formed, this Terran woman. As she picked up her hat and gun, he appreciated her rounded buttocks.
    She stuck her hat on her head, her gun in her waistband, snapped her knife holster, and gave him a long, assessing stare. “You see something you like, angeli?”
    He lifted one shoulder. “All mortals look the same to me.”
    She crossed her arms. “Well, you look taller on television.”
    “I’m tall enough.” On Ship he was ninetieth percentile for height. “Taller than you.”
    She blew her bangs out of her eyes. “Ay, who’s not taller than me?”
    He thought about the Terrans he’d met. This woman was petite, though she’d be average on Ship. “Children?”
    She gestured in a way he recognized as rude. “You act more and more like a regular man the longer I talk to you. Not to mention the other thing.” She tugged her hat farther down on her head. “My Jeep is on the road. Or are you going to fly off now?”
    “I can’t leave you here alone.” He didn’t want to frighten her, but the horde was closer than she seemed to realize. With his array out of commission, his surveillance abilities were limited. It was time to relocate.
    “Then come.” She strode off without looking back, so he folded his wings and followed her, several paces behind.
    The view was exceptional. Her thighs and calves working, her buttocks clenching, her hair bouncing on her back. They left the trees and entered a wide meadow.
    “What do I call you, woman?” He could fly her to the East Coast or Australia if his wings were still working. Shades traversed oceans slower than land. The sentient life there avoided them, so they had minimal fuel.
    She cast a glance over her shoulder. “You don’t know my name?”
    “I don’t know every mortal,” he said gruffly. The headpiece had helped him seem omniscient, identifying DNA and cross-referencing with Terran databases. He’d suspected his blaster was done for, but losing the rest of his tech, shoddy as it was, sucked harder than a black hole. If the damage wasn’t repairable, how the hell was he going to kill daemons, avoid Niko and the other gutless Ship-lickers trying to stop him, and spy on Ship’s base?
    Now he had a civilian woman to protect. Void be damned, as if things weren’t complicated enough.
    “I’m called Adelita Louisa Eleanor Martinez.”
    Even her name was complicated. “Adelita Louisa Eleanor Martinez.”
    “Martinez,” she said, trilling the r.
    “I can’t do that with my tongue.”
    “No? What a shame.” They reached the road, where a small red transport was parked behind a bunch of larger vehicles. The wind contained a hiss of corruption. Wrongness. That meant the horde was closing in.

Chapter Four
    If Gregori was an angel, Adelita was the devil. Contrary to the opinion of her most recent ex-boyfriend, she was not the devil, she was a strong woman. Why men resented strength in a woman, she had no idea, but they did.
    Their loss.
    She didn’t know who Gregori was, but it seemed more and more likely he was an imposter. Trust a man to pretend to be angeli to get attention. It wasn’t as if