She hadn’ttoldhim that she was a shifter back in London, even though that had made sense to him at the time. He’d never felt anything like it before. When he was seeing her from afar, or even if he was standing right next to her, he couldn’t sense that she was a shifter at all. But when his skin came into contact with hers, he could tell, suddenly and definitely, that shewasa shifter. It was something he should have been able to sense even when they weren’t touching – and Trent had never been more perplexed in his life.
Maybe she’s a half-shifter?
He’d never met someone who had one shifter parent and one non-shifter parent before. Perhaps that was it?
Zina was as confusing as she was fascinating – but Trent knew that right now wasnotthe time to get into it. He’d clocked the two men watching them from beneath a Moreton Bay fig tree as soon as he’d come into the park, and Zina herself was clearly of the opinion things could get nasty at any moment. Right now, his only priority was to get Zina somewhere safe. Everything else could come later.
She’s my mate, after all, whether she knows it or not. The only thing in the world that matters is her safety.
Right now, however, his mate was staring at him with an openly suspicious expression on her face, asking him, “Is this a joke?” as he tossed the melted remains of his ice cream into a bin and grabbed her hand, leading her back through the gardens, toward Adelaide Oval.
“No,” he said, shaking his head. “Why would it be? Iamjust that nice – that’s not something to joke about.”
Behind him, he heard her sigh – a little theatrically, he thought.
“Youknowthat’s not what I meant.”
Trent glanced over his shoulder. The two men weren’t following them – yet. But they were definitely still watching. They must have at least suspected that both Trent and Zina were onto them. He had to get the both of them somewhere they could talk, and quickly.
“Well, if you don’t believe me when I say I just want to help you out of the goodness of my heart – and, I’ll admit, a bit of curiosity to know what you’ve actuallydoneto get everyone so mad at you – then there’s not much I can do about that. Why doyouthink I’m helping you, then? Why, out of all the people in the world, did you reach out to me, if you didn’t think I’d help?”
Zina bit her lip, her eyes narrowing. “Lack of other options, mainly.”
“But youdidthink I’d help you, right?”
This time she rolled her eyes, just a little bit. “You helped me out in London when I wasn’t expecting it. So I just thought…” She cut herself off, shaking her head. “Well, IthoughtI’d just offload this parcel on you and make myself scarce. I honestly didn’t think you’d offer to go on the run with me. Youdorealize what you’re doing, right?”
Of course we do. We’d do all this and more for our mate!Trent’s kangaroo spoke up, wild with fervent desire to show its mate just what lengths it would go to to make sure she was out of harm’s way – well, as much as they could, with what was soon to beeven morepeople on their tails.
“No, not really,” Trent said, as the River Torrens came into view. Another glance behind him told him that the men who’d probably tailed Zina here were finally on the move. They were following them down the path through the gardens at a fairly discreet distance – though Trent knew that depending on what kind of shifters they were, they didn’t need to be close to be able to follow them easily. “You’ll have to explain it all to me as we go. Since it seems like the line we were fed about you running off with a briefcase full of documents with plans to sell them was, let’s say, a bit of a creative writing exercise. Am I right?”
Zina’s dark eyes flashed up to his, her lips tightening. “Yes. It was. But I can’t explain everything right now.” She paused, taking a deep breath. “I’m not sure I could reallyexplainanything. At least not in words.”
Well, she just got more mysterious and more fascinating with every passing moment, Trent thought, as they crossed the footbridge that led over the river, the men still behind them.
If we can get back to the city, though –Trent thought, before his kangaroo suddenly reared its head, nose and ears jerking, all its senses on high alert.
Not this way,it told him, flanks twitching.There’s danger this way. Our mate cannot be put in danger!
As much as Trent often wished his kangaroo would just shut up, he always listened to it when it alerted him to something around him not being right. Its senses were beyond human – even if he couldn’t see a thing, he knew better than to doubt its words. Too many times it’d saved his bacon, before his human mind had even been aware there was a threat.
Thistime, however, he was able to pick out what had set the kangaroo off right away.
To most people, they probably didn’t look like much – but Trent could spot them immediately. Trent’s kangaroo could sense them – they were shifters, and they shifted into some kind of large predator, though he couldn’t tell what. That wasn’t really important, though – theyprobablyweren’t going to shift here, in front of all these people. The only thing that mattered for the moment was that they were bad news.
Even though it was a weekday morning, it was a sunny day and there was a reasonable number of people around, walking by the river, looking for a spot to sit on the grass, or waiting to travel down the river on the Popeye boat cruise or hire a paddleboat.
But still, I don’tknowthat they won’t take the risk of attacking Zina in broad daylight. It’s not like they’d need to shift to do it.
Shifters had access to all kinds of things humans couldn’t even dream existed in the first place – like poisons that only worked on other shifters, that could kill or knock someone out in moments, even with a shifter’s hardiness and fast healing abilities. Trent knew he couldn’t risk them getting close to Zina, or herding her toward where more of their friends might be waiting – he still wasn’t completely sure she evenwasa shifter, but that only made things even more dangerous for her.
Zina hadn’t seemed to notice the two shifters, but shedidnotice his sudden alertness.
“What is it?” she asked, voice soft.
“Two guys, blue shirts, just up ahead,” Trent replied, turning his head and avoiding moving his lips as much as possible, suddenly regretting that he’d gotten rid of his ice cream, even though it’d be nothing but a melted, soggy mess by now.
Zina’s eyes found them right away. “I see them.” Somehow, she still hadherice cream, and it was still even mainly intact.
