Free Pocket Apocalypse: InCryptid, Book Four by Seanan McGuire Page A

attention seemed to be reserved for the empty hall ahead, and while her voice remained too cheerful to be natural, it didn’t match her posture, which was tight, controlled, and bordering on hostile. “I do hope my men won’t find anything illicit. We’ve been cracking down on smugglers recently. You could find yourself banned from our country for the rest of your natural life, and wouldn’t that put a crimp in your
honeymoon?
”
    “We’re not married, and I’d have at least called home if we were,” said Shelby mildly. She sounded almost amused by the situation. Well, that made one of us. “Come off it, all right? We’re in private now.”
    “There is no privacy in an airport,” replied the border collie woman, a hint of a snarl creeping into her formerly jovial tone. She picked up the pace, forcing me and Shelby to do the same if we wanted to keep up with her. Between the jet lag, the general exhaustion engendered by spending over a dozen hours on a plane, and my growing fear that the mice were going to put in an appearance, my nerves were more than a little frayed.
    Shelby rolled her eyes before shooting me what was probably meant to be a reassuring look. I frowned at her. I don’t appreciate being kept in the dark, and it was clear that whoever this woman was, Shelby knew and trusted her enough to let her cut us out of the main crowd. Without an introduction, I was flying blind. I didn’t like the feeling. It was really starting to sink in how isolated I was, and how isolated I was going to remain for as long as I was in Australia. Even if I needed them, my family couldn’t possibly get to me fast enough to provide backup. Not even Aunt Mary. She was dead, which usually meant she could travel great distances in the time it took to call her name, but most ghosts can’t cross saltwater, and I had the entire Pacific between me and the place where she died. I was on my own.
    I struggled to keep my face neutral as we walked. If Shelby had felt like this during her stay in the United States, it was amazing that she’d remained as steady as she had. I hadn’t been on the ground an hour, and I was already fighting panic.
    The border collie woman stopped at an unmarked door. Producing an old-fashioned key ring from her pocket, she unlocked it and waved us into a small, featureless room. Shelby went first. I followed close behind her, and the unnamed woman brought up the rear, closing the door behind herself with an ominous “click.”
    “Now,” she said. “We should have a five-minute window before anyone realizes the camera feed from this room has failed. We’ve got Gabby and one of her American schoolmates clearing customs with dummy bags—they have valid passports that match the names you flew under, so we’ll have a clear record of your entering the country, and we have someone in the department ready to stamp your
real
passport when you fly back out again, assuming that you do. They’ll be catching a cab outside the airport, Gabby’s friend will be returning to Sydney via a flight later today, and Gabby should be home by this afternoon. Cooper’s driving her. Mum and Dad are going to have your hide for bringing your boyfriend with you and making us do all of this extra work. Are there any questions?”
    “Yeah,” said Shelby. “Can I have a hug, Raina, or are you going to stand there being all pissy ‘I had to smuggle you into the country, how dare you inconvenience me so’ all day?”
    The border collie woman—whose demeanor had changed completely since the door had closed, becoming dour and faintly irritated with everything around her—sighed and reached up to peel off her riotous mop of brown-and-red curls, revealing short-cut brown hair that had been rumpled by its time under the wig. She threw the wig at me, snapped, “You’re so demanding, Shelly,” and spread her arms as she stepped toward Shelby.
    Any questions I might have had about how they knew each other were answered by that