Pronunciation of word ending with z sound followed by word starting with sh sound

Question

Here are two examples of words ending in a z sound followed by a word starting with a sh sound:

• Does she
• Always shines.

Do we pronounce the z sound or do we skip it and pronounce sh directly?

Answer 1

For both of these examples, the /z/ sound is still pronounced even when the following word starts with the "sh" sound.

English doesn't generally have strong sound changes across word-boundaries, except in more informal or quicker spoken forms.