EUAN: Outback Shifters #3

by Chant, Zoe

  In a way, he’d almost done it on purpose – he and Sam had been a team, and Euan had spent much of his time in the field, rarely interacting with other agents. Sam had been the only friend Euan had thought he’d needed – he’d never been an extravert, after all, and talking and making friends wasn’t something that came easily to him. After Sam had died – after the pain Euan had felt at his death – Euan had told himself he didn’t need friends.

  The shame he’d felt after losing his lion… that had played a role in it too. He’d barely been able to bring himself to admit what had happened to Robb after he’d gotten out of the hospital. That he’d lost control to such an extent – that he hadn’t been able to stop his lion from running rampant – was something he still struggled with. If he kept everyone at a distance, there was no chance they’d ask him about, and no chance he’d have to admit to them how he’d failed.

  “It’s okay,” Callan said, glancing at him. “For what it’s worth, I know how you feel. I wasn’t happy about Ella having to put herself in danger. I tried to rationalize my way out of it too, before I realized it was the only choice. None of us want to see our mates close to this kind of situation.”

  “Callan’s right,” Hector said. “I know how it feels to want to keep your mate safe. To be honest, the main thing I feel right now is relief that Myrtle’s about a thousand kilometres inland, wandering around some caves, looking at moths. Mind you, it’d be pretty fucked up if she came back and found Sydney was just a hole in the ground with a monster stomping all over it.”

  Euan found himself smiling despite himself – and despite the grim joke Hector had made.

  That won’t happen, though. We won’t let it.

  Somehow, together with Delilah, they’d find a way to stop whatever Lev and Alisa had put in motion.

  But despite the fact he knew they understood, Euan still knew he needed to apologize, and to Delilah as well, for being so pig-headed.

  “I hope Delilah understands what I…” he started to say, before trailing off doubtfully. Delilah had stopped his arguments dead in their tracks with her resolve. She was strong and brave, and determined to do whatever she had to stop this. He felt foolish now for trying to forbid her from doing pretty much anything.

  “I wouldn’t worry too much just yet.” It was Rhys who spoke up – he’d been uncharacteristically quiet until now, perhaps still processing what he’d been told about the monster at the bottom of the harbor. “From what I heard from Callan, Hec made a terrible first impression on Myrtle, and look at them now – happy as pigs in muck.”

  “Well. Thank you for that image, Rhys,” Hector said flatly, staring at his younger brother. “Didn’t realize you’d become a poet in your spare time.”

  “Probably because you’ve been spending all your spare time over the past year and a half making cow eyes at Myrtle,” Rhys shot back. “I thought we’d just gotten past that stage with Evie and Penny, and then you had to go find your mate as well. You try eating your breakfast with that kind of love-fest going on.”

  “And Euan, you’ve got to remember – having a mate’s not always just about physically protecting someone,” Callan said. “It’s also about knowing someone will be there when you need them. That’s what having a mate is really all about – knowing you can trust someone to the ends of the earth and back.”

  “I’ll try to remember that,” Euan said, meaning it. “And… thanks again.”

  “No problem,” Callan said, as Hector and Trent nodded in agreement.

  “Having said that, don’t think of the mated bond like some kind of ‘Get Out Of Jail Free’ card. You don’t want to miss out on your mate because you were acting like a fuckknuckle,” Trent said, his voice sounding a little tight. “It’s not a bond you can replace.”

  Euan hesitated. Trent’s voice sounded wistful – Almost as if he’s speaking from experience…

  He stared hard at Trent. For a moment – just the barest fraction of a second – Euan thought he saw something other than Trent’s usual happy-go-lucky humor in his eyes. But then Trent smiled, all charm once again, and it was gone.

  Euan hesitated, wanting to ask him if he was, in fact, speaking from experience. Trent had never mentioned having found his mate before – as far as he was aware, in his small section of the Agency, only Hector and Callan had been lucky enough to find their mates.

  If Trent hasn’t mentioned it, then it’s probably because he doesn’t want to talk about it, Euan reasoned. Later, once things had calmed down and they weren’t on their way to… do whatever it was that it took to thwart Lev and Alisa, Euan would try to let Trent know he was there to talk, if he wanted it. Euan didn’t have the slightest idea what he’d actually say, but he knew that if he was ever going to grow beyond being the surly, gruff arsehole he’d become since Sam had died and he’d lost his lion, he was going to have to push himself out of his comfort zone when it came to interpersonal relations.

  Not to mention, he thought, it’s like Trent says. Just because Delilah’s my mate, it doesn’t mean we can’t have misunderstandings – or worse. I need to make sure I’m always listening to her. I need to make sure I don’t push her away or put up barriers between us.

  And he’d have to respect the fact that she was brave, determined, and not to be deterred from doing what she thought was right, even if it was dangerous.

  Like it or not, the way to stop whatever it was that was down at the bottom of Sydney Harbour, waiting to emerge, rested with Delilah, and no one else.

  “Hey,” Rhys said, breaking into his thoughts. “D’ya think I should bring this?”

  Euan turned to see Rhys pulling an enormous harpoon gun off the weapons rack.

  “I don’t really see how it could hurt,” Hector said, frowning. “But why do we even have that?”

  “Hopefully, because it’s effective against water monsters?” Rhys said, slinging the harpoon gun across his back. “You never know.”

  “I suppose not,” Hector admitted. “All right – let’s get going.”

  They met Delilah and Robb on the other side of the doors. Delilah had been given a black tactical suit to wear, which wouldn’t catch on anything or slow her down if she needed to run. Euan had to admit it looked good on her – really good – but he knew that right now, that was the last thing he should be noticing.

  Delilah looked composed but tense, and Euan didn’t blame her. They were trained agents, and he knew he at least was tense. He didn’t like going in blind – agents usually had all the information they needed when setting out on a mission. But no one knew what to do in a situation like this one.

  “I’d wish you good luck, but honestly, I don’t believe in it,” Robb said frankly. “Just go do what you need to do. The evac is… well, it’s going. But that’s not your job to think about. Just go figure out what we’re even supposed to do from here. Okay?”

  Euan nodded, as did the others. What was there to say, after all?

  “So… how’re we going to get out there?” Delilah asked him as they headed toward the lifts. “Are we really going to hijack a ferry?”

  Euan shook his head, feeling a faint smile tugging at his lips. “No – I think that’d be more trouble than it’s worth. The Agency has its own boats, after all.”

  “Oh, right, of course,” Delilah said, nodding. “I was forgetting I’d slipped into the James Bond alternate universe. Or at least, that’s what I’m going to keep telling myself until all this is over, since otherwise I think I really might go nuts this time.”

  Euan glanced down at her, feeling pain slice through his chest. “I’m sorry you got pulled into all of this, Delilah. You didn’t ask for any of this. You were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

  “Don’t be sorry.” Delilah looked up at him, giving him a small but reassuring smile. “If I hadn’t been in the wrong place at the wrong time, as you put it, we never would have met. It’s hard to feel too upset when I think about it like that.”

  She slippe
d her hand into his, giving it a squeeze – and Euan was forced to admit that, regardless of whatever might be waiting for them out there, he agreed with her.

  And I won’t let anything happen to her. Not like what I let happen to Sam. No matter what, I’ll never let that happen to anyone I love ever again.

  Euan stiffened, heart thudding, as he heard a sudden, answering growl from within him.

  That’s right. No one will touch a hair on our mate’s head.

  It was his lion. Euan knew it in an instant. The growl had been nothing more than the faintest echo within his chest, but he knew he’d heard it.

  “You okay?” Delilah asked, giving his hand another squeeze, concern in her eyes.

  “I’m fine, Delilah,” Euan said, feeling love and devotion surge within him as he looked into her dark eyes. “I’m going to be just fine.”

  * * *

  It wasn’t until they were out on the water that Euan realized just how much he had missed this – not the heading out into the ocean to face an unknown water monster, but the fizz of adrenaline in his veins right before a mission began. Once the mission had actually begun he usually found it had dissipated entirely, washed away by the need for total concentration and focus. But the feeling of anticipation was always something he’d enjoyed, even before missions he knew were going to be dangerous.

  The large powerboat they’d taken out cut through the water as if it wasn’t there, skimming effortlessly over the small waves of the harbor as Hector steered them beneath the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Trent had stayed behind on the docks, up in the spotting tower so that he could keep an eye on the overall situation and radio them if he saw any movement.

  Delilah was sitting across from him, her fringe whipping over her face in the wind. She didn’t look very comfortable, but then, going at this speed probably wasn’t a very pleasant experience unless you were used to it.

  “Everything all right?” he asked her through the small microphone headset.

  Delilah gave him a small, watery smile. “I didn’t know I got seasick,” she said after a moment. “I don’t really go on boats – I mean, Jenny’s thirtieth birthday party was on a yacht, but that just kind of… cruised around. And I only stayed twenty minutes. Turns out the kind of people who go to parties on yachts are kind of snobby, if you can possibly believe that.”

  Euan laughed softly. “It’s okay. We don’t have much further to go.”

  Though what happens when we get there is another question entirely, Euan thought.

  They would just have to hope that Delilah was right, and nearness to the place they’d guessed was the monster’s lair would trigger some of the latent memories the man in the alley had buried in her head – and that the bond between them would help her to feel safe enough to access them.

  “Uh. Guys. I don’t want to assume anything, but it looks like you may have company.” Trent’s voice crackled in Euan’s ear, and he whipped his head around.

  Are we too late after all…?

  “Sorry – I don’t mean Godzilla’s risen up out of the ocean. I’m talking about that.”

  “What the hell is that?” Rhys said, sounding incredulous.

  Euan turned his head in the direction he was pointing, finally seeing what Trent was talking about. The most stupidly enormous white yacht he’d ever seen was steaming through the water toward him, throwing up vast sprays of foam on either side of its prow.

  “It looks like the kind of thing Jeff Bezos would own,” Hector said flatly. “And it looks like it’s coming this way.”

  “Yeah, it chucked a u-ey and came right back around, full speed ahead when it saw you,” Trent said. “Before that it was heading back to the docks. I don’t like it.”

  “I’d say we can outrun that,” Hector said, glancing over his shoulder at the towering form of the yacht. “If that’s its top speed, we can definitely go faster than that.”

  “Oh… that’s great…” Delilah said weakly, her knuckles white as she clutched her seat.

  “Let’s see if they’re really even following us,” Hector said, before he turned sharply, making Delilah go pale and close her eyes. Euan reached out, covering her hand with his own, though he knew it wasn’t likely to offer her much relief.

  Sure enough, Euan thought grimly, the yacht – with its larger, slower turning circle – slowly changed course to follow them.

  “Hm. Yeah, that doesn’t bode well. That bodes very fucking ill,” Trent said through the headset.

  “Like I said, we can outrun them,” Hector said again, gunning the engine of the powerboat.

  “We’re going to have to stop sometime, though,” Euan pointed out, squeezing Delilah’s hand. “We can’t just keep doing laps of the harbor.”

  “Who even is that?” Rhys asked – before the answer seemed to suggest itself to all of them at the same time.

  “Lev and Alisa,” Euan muttered.

  “I didn’t know being an evil alicorn paid so well,” Callan said, looking at the enormous yacht as it plowed its way through the ocean water toward them.

  “They’re alicorns with the power to read minds and control people to do whatever they want,” Hector pointed out. “Pretty sure they can just pull a fast one if they’re short of cash. That’s what Hargreaves wanted to do with Ruby, anyway – use her powers to make themselves more mon—”

  Hector’s explanation was interrupted by a sudden burst of gunfire from the yacht. It missed the powerboat, but sent a white spray up into the air along its side.

  Instinctively, Euan threw himself across Delilah, covering her with his body.

  “Shit,” Hector swore, swerving the boat again. He glanced over his shoulder as he pulled the powerboat in a tight circle, sweeping past the yacht. At first Euan wanted to tell him not to get so close, but then he realized Hector was doing it deliberately, trying to check out what exactly the deal was with this yacht, and how many gunmen there might be.

  “I can see… five guys with guns on this side, lower deck,” Hector said after a moment, and Euan realized he was using his griffin’s pinpoint accurate vision – the vision of a massive golden eagle – to check out what was happening on the yacht.

  “Four on the flybridge,” Rhys said. “They look like they’re carrying… shit, are those HK416s? These arseholes mean business.”

  “Oh, great,” Euan ground out. “They have henchmen now. That’s all we fucking need.”

  “Not very accurate shooters though,” Rhys said as more bullets flew into the ocean.

  “Don’t sound so disappointed,” Hector shot back.

  “They just launched a smaller boat from, like, the yacht’s boat garage,” Trent’s voice came in Euan’s ear. “Looks like a speedboat. Watch out for that.”

  Sure enough, a moment later a small speedboat came tearing around the corner of the yacht, and even with his regular eyesight Euan could tell it was bristling with guns and people – and the flash of their white hair in the afternoon sunlight told him that they must be alicorns. Perhaps Lev or Alisa themselves were on board.

  He gritted his teeth, glancing at Delilah where she sat behind him, sweaty and pale-faced. “Are you all right?”

  Delilah took a long moment to answer. “I just… oh my God…” She blanched, retching. “What a time to get seasick. I’m so sorry. I’m gonna be useless for a little bit until my stomach gets used to it…”

  Euan just shook his head. The only thing he wanted was for Delilah to be safe.

  “Don’t give them a chance to shoot,” Hector called out. “Just take out their motor to stop them from chasing us.”

  Rhys and Callan, apparently knowing Euan wouldn’t be keen on moving away from Delilah, lined up their weapons, firing almost simultaneously. Unsurprisingly, they were better shots than the alicorns on either boat – black smoke immediately spewed from the speedboat’s engine and it slowed, swaying erratically as it came to a halt. Unable or unwilling to admit defeat, they began firing back, spraying bullets into the sea. A couple of
lucky hits smacked into the powerboat’s hull, but it was too sturdy for them to penetrate it at this distance.

  “We need to get out to the hole,” Euan said, as Delilah leaned her forehead against his shoulder. “No matter what. The yacht won’t catch us up for a few minutes if we hurry. It won’t be a lot of time, but it’ll be something, at least.”

  Hector nodded. “You’re right. I’ll –”

  He cut himself off as suddenly, something bright and brilliantly white flashed through their field of vision. Euan blinked, looking around, and wondered almost if he’d imagined it – before it came again, so bright it felt as if he were looking directly into the sun.

  Shit!

  Euan raised a hand to cover his face, squinting – and found himself looking up at a massive, blindingly white winged horse, hovering in the sky above the powerboat. Its silvery wings flapped, keeping pace with them easily, its golden hooves churning the air beneath it. A long, elegant horn pointed up from its forehead.

  No. Euan heard a furious voice in his head. This time, it wasn’t his lion, however – this time, he knew it was an entirely foreign presence, and it was utterly enraged. No. You will not undo all our years of work. I will not have it. This foolishness ends now –

  Euan hissed out a pained breath, wrapping his arms around Delilah and pulling her close to his chest as the bright white light emanating from the tip of the alicorn’s horn grew brighter still – and then there was nothing.

  Chapter 16

  Euan blinked as he slowly drifted back into consciousness, but his vision remained fuzzy and distorted, as if he was looking at the world through a warped, clouded windowpane. He shook his head, trying to clear it.

  Oh, God. That was a huge mistake.

  Pain seemed to split his skull open at that moment and he stifled a groan, raising his hand to his forehead.