Untamed Hawaiian Heat (Rift Hunters) Read Free

where his ended and hers began.
    Their climaxes crashed over them simultaneously. Their emotion link vibrated with each convulsion of their bodies, doubling the euphoria washing over them. Mateo pulled out and shifted to lie beside Kiana as he drifted back to the real world. His mind wandered aimlessly, then focused in on the restlessness inside him as it began to build again.
    He shifted so he lay behind her, and pulled her into his arms as she finally fell asleep. She’d been working too hard of late. He wished she would allow him to help her find the answers she was looking for.
    Soon the lantern flame flickered and died. Staring into the darkness, Mateo attempted to stay awake. For some reason, he had a foreboding that when he awoke, everything would be different. Fatigue pulled at him, though, reminding him he hadn’t slept in almost forty-eight hours.
    The calm he’d experienced after their lovemaking only tempered the fierce energy pulsing in his chest. As he drifted toward sleep, he felt it rekindle, where it remained at a simmer. Waiting. But for what?
    Exhaustion finally overtook him. He heard Remi’s voice again as he sank into oblivion.
    “He’s coming.”
    * * * *
    Kiana jolted awake to the sound of an alarm blaring through the com link on her desk. It seemed like only minutes since she’d drifted off. She glanced back at Mateo and saw him stretching as he sat up. She was tempted to ignore the call and let Montgomery handle it.
    “Lieutenant Grant, we’ve got a breach in the perimeter approximately twenty clicks southeast.”
    Kiana pushed the thought of curling up next to Mateo away and got up.
    Mateo was already strapping on his gear. She smiled at the sight. He was as dedicated to stopping the Syndicate as she was, even though he wasn’t from Hawaii. He’d taken her fight as his own. It made her love him all the more.
    “Stop looking at me that way, Kiana.”
    She heard his voice whisper in her head. Kiana raised an eyebrow. “Or what?”
    He straightened from tightening a wickedly curved knife to his thigh and approached her. He pulled her close to him with one arm and brought his other hand down on her ass with a resounding smack. “Oh, I think you know what will happen, mi amante. Now come, let’s get rid of those bastardos .” With one last playful slap on her bottom, he headed for the flap over the entrance of their hale noho.
    Kiana watched Mateo as he headed for the door, her gaze lingering on his tattoo as he exited the room. She quickly finished strapping on her own gear and was heading out when she realized Mateo’s tattoo had been glowing again with a sapphire light that shimmered faintly along its lines. She made a mental note to look at it more closely after they’d dispatched the bastards who dared to approach their camp.

Chapter Two
    Earth 2013
    Tiaki breathed deeply and focused the energy seeping through his fingers, pulling more from Earth's core. He’d never had so much trouble closing a time rift before. The threads in this one were ragged and stretched. Which meant it had been open for a while. It also implied that it might have been opened by unnatural means. That troubled him.
    Although he shouldn’t be surprised. When Rift Master Cacus had informed the Ternion—which consisted of the Council of the Gods, the Kings Council, and the Rift Hunter Council—that the Obsidian Syndicate had been using the rifts to affect the history of other planets, the decision had been handed down to prohibit the use of the rifts. What they hadn’t known at the time was that Aizik Quintilius had designed a transdimensional gate that allowed him to create rifts without the use of the core magic. The only way this rift could have been opened so far from the Phoenix Galaxy had to be that gate. He needed to alert the Citadel as soon as possible.
    Tiaki forced his attention back to the task at hand when he sensed the rift begin to fluctuate. Energy spiked around its perimeter, feeding back