Angel Fury (Immortal Legacy #2) - Ella Summers Page 0,43

thankful that his nudity did not extend lower than his chest. Otherwise, my blush would have spread far beyond my cheeks. My embarrassment would have scorched my entire body.

While Damiel put on his shirt and shoes, I took my time with my boots. I didn’t look at Damiel as we dressed, in case he tried to draw me into a conversation. I tried to pretend that lacing up my boots required my undivided attention.

Then we went to eat something from the breakfast buffet in the hotel’s restaurant. He had pancakes. I had tea and a plate of fruit. As we sat there, eating breakfast on a pink-and-white checkerboard tablecloth, it struck me how very normal this was—and how completely unlike our usual lives. There was even a lace doily under the water carafe. Angels didn’t get to have things like doilies and pink-and-white checkerboard tablecloths. Instead, we lived with the perks of a fire sword and an overly-inflated ego.

Damiel and I ate. We didn’t speak at all, but he was watching me the whole time. He appeared to be completely at ease. I was not. Waking up in the arms of the Legion’s Master Interrogator had unnerved me. I couldn’t imagine why.

After breakfast, we walked to the nearby sacred springs. From there, we could take a closer look at the defenses that warded the Hive fortress.

We followed a forest trail that wound around several pools of water, each one with its own waterfall. Some of the pools were small, no larger than a normal bathtub. Other pools were bigger, more majestic—and lay at the bottom of a deep plunge, a drastic vertical drop. Cascading streams slid over smooth rocks, connecting all the pools together.

“Something is bothering you,” Damiel said as we crossed over an arched bridge.

Around the wooden bridge grew bright, tropical flowers, their fragrant aroma sweetening the humid air. I heard birds singing in the woods, though I didn’t see any of them.

“What makes you think something is bothering me?” I asked Damiel. “Reading my thoughts again?”

I hoped not, especially not my thoughts about him.

“No, I’m not reading your mind,” he told me. “You have learned to block your thoughts well since I first met you.”

“Try not to sound too disappointed.”

“I’m not at all disappointed. Since I can’t read your thoughts, I get to decipher your body language.”

He said it like the opportunity was a treat.

“Bodies can lie,” I said.

His brows lifted as he watched me. He seemed very comfortable with himself. “So they can. That’s why it’s so important that I know your history. When your body language lines up with what I know about you, your thoughts are clear.”

“And what is my body telling you?” I dared ask.

His answer was unexpected. “That you aren’t sure you can trust me.”

“Of course I trust you. We’ve been through a lot together.”

“Yet you still have doubts, doubts put in your head by General Silverstar. And you always listen to your father. You let him rule your life. You act as he commands. You think as he tells you to think.”

“That’s not true.”

“Isn’t it?” Damiel challenged.

I thought about it, trying to be perfectly honest with myself. And, honestly, I had to admit that Damiel had a point. Looking back over my life, I really did always do as my father told me.

“After we worked together last week, you decided I wasn’t a threat, that I wasn’t someone who would hurt and betray you. But then you spoke to your father—and you began to doubt everything,” Damiel pointed out. “Since then, you’ve been cautious. Withdrawn. Worried that I will at any moment betray your trust.”

His blue eyes were lit up with silver and gold magic, brighter than the sky, their cerulean depths reflecting the magic shooting out of the fortress tower. The look in those eyes was intense, like he was reading right through me. Which he was, as he’d just demonstrated. I’d thought things would be easier once I learned to mask my thoughts from other angels, but Damiel didn’t need telepathy to read my mind.

“I do trust you, Damiel,” I said.

“Part of you does. Every so often, I can see the real you peeking through the facade, that part untouched by your father’s distrust. In those moments, you don’t look at me like I am a monster. And you might very well be the only person in all the realms who doesn’t.”

“I know you aren’t a monster. And I’m not the only one who knows that. Jiro does too.”

“Jiro knows