Chapter 9

M aisie, sitting in the back of a taxi as it whizzed through the early morning lack of traffic to Sydney Airport, was doing her best not to let what would probably be the world's biggest and most unflattering yawn break free from her mouth.

He already probably saw you napping on the couch with your mouth hanging open, she reminded herself as she looked at Rhys out of the corner of her eye. You really don't need to reveal your most unattractive facial expressions to him again.

Despite the fact she really had been basically falling asleep where she stood last night, she basically hadn't slept a wink – though not because the bed Shaz had shown her to was uncomfortable or covered in pizza boxes. In fact, it had been lovely , with a pink coverlet and lacy little doilies on the bedside table. Maisie never would have thought someone like Shaz would enjoy such a… a feminine hobby as crochet, but apparently she'd made them all herself, as well as picked out all the pale pink and white linens.

No, that definitely wasn't the issue.

What had been the issue was the… the awareness , somehow, that Rhys was only a few rooms away, probably sleeping like a baby, his face slack with sleep, his long, thick eyelashes draped over his high cheekbones, his hair all mussed, and perhaps his shirt rucked up a little over his stomach, revealing his – his –

Don't think about it!

Maisie shook her head vehemently, trying to rid herself of the forbidden, tantalizing mental image of Rhys sprawled back on a much nicer couch than the one at Michael and Shaz's, in a state of what her mother would call dishabille , and what she would call completely shirtless and about to lose the pants too.

"Everything all right?"

Maisie jumped – as if she hadn't known Rhys was sitting across the other side of the taxi seat, less than a foot and a half away from her.

"Yep!" she said, with probably just a little bit too much false cheer. "Totally. Everything's totally dandy."

Dandy. Oh my God.

She resisted the urge to bury her face in her hands and groan loudly.

What the hell was I thinking?!

She really couldn't figure it out now that the harsh glare of the morning sunrise was cresting the city skyline.

What had possessed her to invite Rhys to Burr Island with her, on the holiday she had been supposed to be taking with her now very much ex-boyfriend?

She really couldn't say, except for the fact that it had seemed like a good idea, in the moment she'd actually been saying the words.

It must have been sleep deprivation, she decided. She'd been so barely with it last night she hadn't known what she'd been saying.

Don't forget, her brain helpfully reminded her, not only is he the hottest, most incredibly attractive man you've ever seen in your life, but he can also turn into a griffin.

Maisie really hadn't been up to interrogating Rhys about that just yet, mainly because she had a feeling he'd just look at her with a look of supreme confusion and ask her what she was talking about.

It had to have been a dream… right?

That really was the only explanation. Sure, it had been a very detailed and – quokkas and cassowaries and griffins aside – realistic dream. But it couldn't actually have happened, right? She hadn't actually stroked her fingers through the soft feathers of Rhys's neck, seen him turn from a human to a half-eagle, half-lion mythical creature and then back again?

Well, she supposed, there's really only one way to find out.

The taxi driver wasn't listening – even through the plastic divider that separated him from the back seats, she could hear the sound of early morning radio hosts laughing about something completely inane. Clearly, the sound in the front had to be blaringly loud.

"Um," she began, turning to Rhys. "So… just so we're clear, you turn into a griffin, right?"

Rhys stared at her, blinking as if surprised.

Oh, Maisie thought, her heart inexplicably sinking. Had she kind of wanted him to be able to turn into a griffin? I guess I was just dreaming. Or hallucinating. Or something.

"Uh, yeah," Rhys said after a moment. "Sorry, I thought you were pretty clear about that last night. Though I guess it might take some getting used to."

He is! He is a griffin! I didn't hallucinate a thing!

"Is that… a problem for you?" Rhys asked a moment later, and Maisie realized she'd been too busy unaccountably exalting to give him any response.

"No! No, not at all," she said quickly – and really, it wasn't. Well, perhaps that was because she really didn't know what it meant. Perhaps there was some reason why it should be, and Rhys just hadn't gotten around to telling her yet.

Maybe I should have thought of this before I invited him on a holiday with me…

"Uh, no," she said again. "I guess I just… thought I'd dreamed it or something. But uh, no. No problem."

If anything, it's exciting.

She'd always known about her weakness for complicated men, even though it usually went against all her better judgment. She'd known this about herself ever since her first crush, way back at ten years of age, on the boy down the road named Norris Moreton who had collected snails and bugs and put them in a terrarium in order to ‘observe their ways'. Everyone else had thought he was capital W Weird , but Maisie had found him charming.

Well, Maisie thought, at least with Rhys she didn't have to worry about his bug collection escaping all over his bedroom.

Probably.

God. I am in so much trouble over this guy, she thought, as she watched him from the corner of her eye, the dawn light slipping through the loose, light brown curls of his hair.

But, she supposed, she'd only made her own life harder by deciding the best thing she could do was ask him to come on holidays with her. The question did remain, however: Why did he say yes?

"Which terminal do you need?" The taxi driver had turned down his morning talk radio for long enough to shout the question over his shoulder.

"Terminal Three," Rhys replied smoothly.

Well, I'm glad someone knows what's going on.

The taxi rolled to a stop and Maisie pulled out her ill-gotten credit card in a kind of daze, marveling at its sparkly gold color. She'd never had a fancy credit card before, and its shimmering surface almost seemed to scream Be profligate with me. Use me to acquire all your heart's desires.

No! she told herself hurriedly. She didn't want to get a taste for the high life that she wouldn't be able to maintain after this little fairy-tale interlude.

And this is probably not the world's most squeaky-clean card, she quickly added.

The lifestyles of the rich and famous weren't really for her, anyway. She just wanted a nice holiday. Maybe a little bit of a splurge on some fruity drinks and a kayaking trip.

… Okay, and maybe some clothes. Like, any clothes. She thought mournfully of her carefully-packed suitcase, still sitting there in her apartment. It hadn't made sense to try to get back there, given the early flight and how much sleep she'd thought she was going to get, but it did leave her in the situation she was in now, which was that she was heading into the airport in her day-old kangaroo-patterned scrubs without so much as a jacket in her possession, let alone a suitcase full of holiday essentials.

Do I stink? Oh God, I bet I stink.

She sniffed surreptitiously at her armpits as they hurried into the terminal, feeling hyper-aware of Rhys at her side, and tried to determine just how bad the situation was. There were a multitude of factors to consider.

Pro: She hadn't actually gone to work, so she didn't have to worry about being covered in a shift's worth of bodily fluids.

Con: She'd ended up covered in Rhys's bodily fluids.

Not like that!

… Sadly.

Pro: She'd gotten caught in the rain, so it was like the scrubs had gone through the wash. Kind of.

Close enough.

She decided not to interrogate herself too much further on the matter. Rhys hadn't recoiled in horror from her stench, so she was probably okay. He , of course, smelt fantastic , despite everything that had happened yesterday – just the right amount of manliness to be pleasant. Not that she was sniffing him. If she just happened to be in his general… zone, then it was hardly her fault if she could smell him, was it?

Still, it was a bit awkward all up. She was used to wandering around in public in her scrubs, but being at the airport made it weird… though the lack of any kind of luggage was what really tipped it over the edge into being unnerving. She felt almost naked, or like security were going to tackle her to the ground for suspicious behavior.

Rhys's grim silence really wasn't helping matters, either! She couldn't get a read on what he was thinking at all, and it was making her go quiet with nerves in return.

Was she really about to go on a beach holiday with the hot griffin hunk of her dreams, a tied tongue, and no clothes?

"We're here," Maisie blurted out as they got to the self check-in, and promptly silently berated herself for stating the bleeding obvious.

She poked at the screen, only misspelling her name twice, before she came to an awkward realization.

"Uh, just so you know – for the next few hours, you're officially Brent Coleman." She finally managed to bring her eyes up to meet Rhys's. "Sorry."

Rhys cocked his head a little, frowning. "Okay, that's fine. But who's Brent Coleman?"

Maisie bit her lip. "Um. It's… it's really not important."

Rhys's frown deepened a little, and guilt twisted its way through Maisie's gut.

"Well, I mean, it kind of was, but it's not anymore," she babbled. "He's… well, my ex. Very much my ex. In fact, if he were standing here right now, we probably wouldn't be getting on the plane because I would have decked the stupid bast— the man. That's why I have two tickets, with one free for you – we're completely, totally, absolutely broken up. For good."

Rhys's frown had slowly become a look of perplexity the longer she'd talked, and Maisie couldn't really say she blamed him.

"So… you broke up?" he asked after a moment of awkward silence.

" God yes," she said. "In fact, if your Agency has a time machine alongside all its other fancy gadgets, I'd really like to borrow it so I could go back in time and tell my self of three months ago to never go out with him in the first place."

There.

She hoped she'd made herself clear to Rhys on the subject of Brent Coleman.

"Right, so, I think I'm getting that you broke up," Rhys said, but this time his voice was tinged with a little humor. "As weird as it is to be traveling under his name, I guess I can live with it. Unless they try and check my ID. But hopefully that won't happen."

"Do you think that'll be a problem?" Maisie asked worriedly, taking the plane tickets as they popped out of the machine. That was just what they needed – getting hauled in by the feds!

"I think we'll be right," Rhys said. "Technically I could probably get Michael to whip me up a fake MyGov profile at least, but he's not going to be awake for at least another ten hours, so that's a no-go. I'll just act natural. Easy as."

"Hi there," chirped a desk attendant. "Would you like any help checking in your bags?"

"No bags," Rhys said smoothly. "But thanks."

"Oh… I see, sir."

The attendant let her eyes – rather obviously – drift down over the length of Rhys's body, clearly appreciating what they saw, before she, just as obviously, let them take in Maisie's rather rumpled, scrubs-clad form. Her smile grew a little brighter, and her immaculate blonde coif, somehow, a little shinier, as she swung her eyes back to Rhys.

Excuse me?!

"I see ," the desk attendant said again, only this time with a distinct purr in her voice. "And are you sure there's nothing else I can help you with?"

"Nah, all set for now," Rhys said, without even seeming to notice the eyes the desk attendant was making at him, or the predatory edge to her smile. "Thanks, though."

Maisie supposed, even as she stared daggers at the side of the desk attendant's face, that when you looked like Rhys, you probably didn't notice these things. He probably thought this was just normal behavior, rather than a very, very obvious flirtation attempt.

"Well… well, if you do happen to think of something, I'm just over there, at desk three," the lady said, raising a flirtatious eyebrow, even though Maisie could see she was deflating a little in the face of Rhys's obvious indifference. "I could even give you my personal mobile number, if you liked."

"Probably no need for that, but thanks," Rhys said vaguely, looking around. "Oh, but maybe there is something you could help me with?"

The lady visibly brightened. "Oh yes, of course – anything at all!"

"Is there somewhere around here we could get some breakfast? I'm starving." He glanced at Maisie. "Aren't you a little hungry too?"

Maisie nodded, and inched a little closer to Rhys's side – even though she knew full well she was behaving ridiculously, and it wasn't even as if Rhys belonged to her, or that there was anything actually between them… even though Maisie remained a little confused on that point herself.

"Yeah, ravenous," she said, as she edged as close as she dared to Rhys's side. "I definitely could eat."

"Oh… I see. Well, if you head over towards that kiosk and then head a little further, you should find some places that open early for breakfast," said the desk attendant, who, realizing she'd been thoroughly rebuffed, had apparently decided to let it go and be professional. "Have a pleasant day, sir. Ma'am."

She still couldn't quite resist swinging her hips a little as she made her departure, Maisie couldn't help but notice. She looked after her a little sourly, before giving herself a good mental shake.

C'mon, what are you? Fourteen? Stop being so weird!

But try as she might, Maisie couldn't put it out of her mind.

"That lady was absolutely hitting on you," she informed Rhys as they made their way toward the kiosk she'd mentioned.

Rhys blinked, as if he was surprised. "Was she? I didn't notice."

"She definitely was," Maisie told him. "And she was pretty cute too, don't you think?"

"Maybe?" Rhys said, as if this was a completely new idea. "I don't really remember."

"Well, beautiful , actually," Maisie said. "You didn't think so?"

"Nope." Rhys looked around. "Oh, do you think this is the breakfast place? C'mon, I'm so hungry I could eat a horse and chase the jockey."

Maisie sighed, following him over to the counter. Clearly, the only thing on Rhys's mind right now was food, and not extremely good-looking, extremely blonde desk attendants. She was being ridiculous.

What wasn't ridiculous, however, was the gurgle her stomach let out a moment later – maybe she'd been too distracted to realize how hungry she was before, but she was definitely feeling it now.

"Sounds like you could do with a feed too," Rhys laughed, before he scanned the menu board. "Since it's on Michael, what do you say to two Breakfast of Champions?"

"Sounds perfect," Maisie told him, even though she hadn't even looked.

It was , in fact, perfect – two plates of scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, tomatoes, hash browns and mushrooms, with a mug of coffee on the side. For the moment at least, there wasn't much time to talk – just to shovel food into their mouths as fast as they could, though Maisie tapped out halfway through her plate. She might have been hungry, but she wasn't a bottomless pit – unlike Rhys apparently, who demolished his own plate and then finished off hers as well.

"That's a bit better," he said, as he sat back in his chair, sighing contentedly. "Nothing like a good feed."

"You must have metabolism like a wildfire," Maisie observed – though with all those muscles, she couldn't really say she was surprised.

Rhys looked at her a little oddly, before he said cautiously, "Yeah, tends to be the way with shifters. It takes a lot of energy – but I guess I also just like to eat."

Swallowing, Maisie looked down. Ah yes. That.

She supposed they'd have to talk about it sometime. And to be honest, she was burning with curiosity to know more.

"So… yeah. That whole thing," she said, not sure exactly how to put it – was it rude to ask shifters about these things? "Were you, um, born that way? Or did you… become a griffin later in life?"

Rhys let out a low laugh, so Maisie hoped she hadn't offended him.

"Nah – it's a family thing. Everyone in my family are griffins. My brother and sister, my parents, their parents, going back who knows how many generations. It's just a thing. There's plenty of shifters out there. You've probably met a few and never knew it."

"Well, I definitely never would have known it about you if you hadn't shown me," Maisie said. "Or Michael or Shaz, either. Well, I didn't have any clue until Michael turned into a quokka right in front of me. And Shaz turned out of a cassowary."

Rhys laughed again. "Yeah – you weren't supposed to see any of that, sorry. It was kind of the worst possible way to introduce you to the idea of shifters."

Maisie felt herself relaxing a little as she laughed. "Yeah, ‘death by enraged cassowary' was not how I'd imagined a trip to your friend's house would go! But after I got over the initial shock, it wasn't so bad. Seeing a quokka probably helped reduce the stress, too." She screwed up her nose. "Just as long as you aren't planning on springing any more surprises on me – I think finding out you're a secret agent who can turn into a griffin is enough for now."

Rhys blinked, his mouth opening, before it quickly closed again.

If Maisie didn't know better, she would have said the look that came over his face was decidedly… evasive.

Oh, God, there's not more is there?!

She didn't think she could handle another surprise right now – especially not this early in the morning.

At least let me get just one day on the beach before you spring anything else on me, like… I don't know, that that half-goat, half-man thing really was true after all.

Whatever the case, Rhys swallowed heavily, still looking at her out of the corner of his eye as if trying to make up his mind about something.

"Well," he said after a moment, "well, I –"

A loud, eardrum-piercing, braying laughter filled the restaurant. Maisie flinched, ducking instinctively – though she didn't think she could be blamed for that after the past couple of days, between Rhys falling in through her window, and then a door exploding and a cassowary appearing on the other side of it.

After a moment, however, Maisie recognized the sound, from only about five hundred late night Saturday shifts.

Oh, great. Drunken yobbos.

She'd had her fair share of dealing with those, since it wasn't all that uncommon for a huge number of them to show up at the hospital after having got into a punch-up over something that probably didn't matter, and it was her job to patch them up and send them on their way.

She didn't mind as long as they weren't belligerent – but unfortunately, they usually were.

Turning, she saw all the signs: Bintang singlets. Raucous yelling. The stench of alcohol.

Great.

It was early in the morning, so maybe they'd just all got back from an overnight flight from… somewhere, or were currently transiting on their way to somewhere else, and had decided a bit of alcohol would make the flight go faster.

Whatever their deal was, there was about twenty of them all yelling and hooting at the top of their lungs, and they'd decided to take the table right next to Rhys and Maisie.

She suddenly found herself extremely irritated. She'd just been trying to have a nice conversation with Rhys and find out a little more about shifters!

"Let's get out of here," she declared, grabbing his arm before she could think twice.

Again, that electrical hum from yesterday – only yesterday?! I feel like I've known him forever – thrilled up her arm and into her body, settling into a warm glow in her stomach, but she held on, dragging him out of the café as he stumbled to keep up.

"Were those guys bothering you?" Rhys asked, glancing over his shoulder. "I could have asked them to keep it down –"

"No, no, don't worry about it," Maisie said hurriedly. For some reason, she had no doubt Rhys could take any of those guys – or all of them, if it came to it – but she'd rather avoid creating a hassle for the poor restaurant staff. "It doesn't really matter. And anyway, we need to get some stuff." Her hand still on his arm, she hauled him toward the security section. "I refuse to wear scrubs for the entirety of my trip. Our trip."

She felt her face heating up inexplicably at those last words, and after another moment she dropped his arm, ostensibly so she could empty her pockets and place their meager contents into one of the trays.

"Sure," he said, though he sounded a little breathless, which was weird. She refused to believe that a guy as built as him would get out of breath walking a hundred meters through an airport!

The security guard waved her forward, and she walked through the metal detector, trying to appear relaxed. Why did she feel like she'd committed a crime? She was literally just catching a plane that she'd bought tickets for! It wasn't her fault that someone else had illegally upgraded them without asking her!

It felt like an eternity before her phone and wallet and keys entered the X-ray scanner… and then they stopped again. Started. Stopped.

She twitched.

"Just seeing someone off, are we?" the guard asked.

Great, I got a chatty one! Since when are they ever chatty?

… Or maybe it's just that I'm acting like I just stole an entire ham and shoved it down my shirt. He's trying to lull me into a false sense of security.

Maisie forced herself to breathe more slowly, trying – and possibly succeeding – at looking like she wasn't completely crazed. "No, just heading off to lovely Burr Island!"

Her items finally came through at that moment, and she snatched them up maybe a little too quickly. The other security guard raised her eyebrow. "Traveling light, aren't we?"

Shit! Shit!

Rhys's words from earlier sprang into her mind.

Just act natural. Easy as.

She took a breath, squaring her shoulders.

Easy as.

She whipped out the sparkly credit card. "I always buy all my clothes at my destination!" she declared, waving the card around. "It's the only way to travel! One simply does not bother packing!"

Oh my God. What am I doing. What am I doing. There's a reason why I went into nursing instead of going to drama school!

Death by cassowary was starting to sound pretty damn good right now.

The guards were suddenly a lot more interested. As were a number of passers-by.

I'm going to jail.

She opened her mouth again, not sure what was going to come out.

"Well, that must be nice – make sure you have a great holiday," the first security guard said, laughing and waving her through.

For a moment, Maisie blinked, not sure whether or not she'd heard correctly – but then her brain caught up with her, and she realized that if she didn't move soon, she was going to miss out on the golden chance she'd just been handed by the universe, which, just this once, had decided to overlook what a complete jackass she was making of herself.

"I will!" she chirped with a smile that hurt her cheeks, trying not to make it too obvious that she was hurrying away as fast as she possibly could. She strode away without looking back until she found a handy pillar she could hide behind, and then she flopped back against it, trying to catch her breath.

I am never, ever letting anyone upgrade me illegally ever again. It's not worth the stress! I'd rather ride in the cargo hold!

She wasn't really cut out for this cloak-and-dagger spy stuff, she decided. Regular life might have been boring and frustrating, but at least it was predictable.

Then again, regular life had brought her Brent instead of Rhys, so she supposed that there were some definite upsides to the secret agent lifestyle.

"Not bad."

She almost jumped out of her skin at the voice that suddenly came out of nowhere, before realizing that it was just Rhys.

Speak of the devil .

She clutched at her chest. "Don't scare me like that! And it was bad! It was very, very bad!"

"You got through, didn't you?" He shrugged. "The key to these things is to just make sure you commit to the bit, instead of half-arsing it. Which you did. I'm sure that wasn't even the most outrageous thing those guards had heard so far today."

It was nice to hear some praise for her terrible acting, no matter how undeserving it was. Still, it wasn't something she wanted to have to repeat. She was here to relax, after all!

Rhys was still up close in front of her, his golden eyes intense. She suppressed a shiver.

"Look," she said, trying to resist the sudden, crazed urge to grab his face and kiss him silly. "We've still got some time to kill, and I really need to get something else to wear. You mind if I do some shopping?"

Rhys stared at her a moment longer, before nodding. "Sure. I'll keep watch outside."

"Keep… watch?" she stammered, though she supposed it made sense. Someone had tried to kill him yesterday, after all. "I'll be quick, I promise."

He nodded again, and the two of them walked along until they found a clothing store. It wasn't half as fancy as the luxury brands she knew were being sold in the international terminal, but it was still a definite step above what she normally wore. Now that she thought about it, she didn't even remember the last time she'd bought clothes.

"I'll be right back," she said, and she meant it.

It was the quickest shop she could remember ever doing – just grabbing the first few things that caught her eye and doing a cursory check for fit, as well as a pair of sandals. Still, they were pretty nice, and if she didn't quite feel like a new woman as she stepped out of the store in a long, flowy blue dress, bag of new clothes (and old scrubs) in hand, she at least felt like an appropriately dressed one.

Rhys was waiting near the store entrance, leaning against a wall, looking for all the world like a guy idly scrolling through his phone… but she could see how he was taking in everything around him, alert to any possible danger. Tension ran through his body, like a coiled spring ready to release at any moment.

Like a wild animal , she thought, heat running through her body. It was closer to the truth than she supposed literally any other person looking at him would know, and it only made the pooling warmth in her stomach burn a little brighter.

It was a secret only the two of them knew about – the fact that Rhys could, at any moment, turn into a massive, winged, mythological beast.

He looked up as she approached, and his eyes widened, his mouth dropping open.

"You look great," he said, then hastily added, "not that you didn't before."

Her heart soared. This whole… thing was confusing as hell, but that was a good sign, right? He thought she looked good? He'd thought she'd looked good when she'd looked like crap in her day-old scrubs?

"You're not too bad yourself," she blurted, and then immediately had to resist the urge to clap her hand over her mouth.

Still… maybe it was best to just say these things, rather than dance around the issue. Because he did look good. He looked fucking fantastic , and she wanted to climb on top of him and eat him up.

One step at a time. Just stick to complimenting his looks for now.

Rhys smiled for a moment – he quickly schooled his face back to something more neutral, but he'd definitely smiled.

I saw you! You can't fool me, you handsome man!

"Let's get to the gate," he said, and, at least, that was something she could agree on. She couldn't get to Queensland and its beaches fast enough.

Maisie nodded. "Lead the way."