Warrior's Heart: Iron Portal Series (Paranormal Romance) Read Online Free

Pacifica could never be too careful—a mantra the Taghta sisters had drilled into her when she decided to work for them on this side of the portal. Years ago, she’d planned to come over after falling in love with a beautiful Pacifican boy. After he left her, she still wanted to come, so when she got the opportunity, she took it.
    Vince.
    She felt a gnawing ache in her stomach every time she thought about the boy who broke her heart. He was everything she’d ever dreamed about…and then he wasn’t.
    She stepped into a nearby alley, uncloaked herself and put on her heels. Then she walked to the curb and hailed a taxi. Not bad for a librarian, she thought, smiling to herself. Now, if only she could get back home in time to tuck Darius into bed.
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    A few days later , Zara glanced at the clock on the wall behind the checkout desk. Mariah, if she was coming for the knife, would be here soon. Zara grabbed the last few reference books from the to-be-shelved pile and placed them on her cart.
    “Hey Christy, if Darius comes looking for me, can you let him know that I’m down in the basement? I’ll be back up in a few minutes.”
    She didn’t like to bring her son to work, but her regular sitter had cancelled and it was too late to make other arrangements. At least he was old enough to keep himself occupied for short periods of time. Thank the Fates that the university library hosted a children’s story hour each night.
    “I can put those away for you if you want to go home now,” Christy offered. The pretty college student wore her red hair in two knots on the top of her head and had a colorful sleeve tattoo on one arm.
    “Thanks, hon, but I’ve got it.”
    The elevator groaned and creaked like an old man being forced to stand after a long period of inactivity. When it got to the basement, Zara pushed the cart of books out before the doors snapped shut on her. She detested the elevators, with their unreliable cables and pulleys moving the steel cars up and down. But the fact of the matter was, she hated all small, confined spaces. If she didn’t have the cart with her, she’d have taken the stairs.
    Silence rang in her ears as she headed to the first row of books. There were probably a few students scattered among the various study carrels, but she didn’t see anyone. An overhead light flickered and dimmed, casting bizarre shadows among the stacks. The place creeped her out. Not surprising, since the building used to be an old hospital with a morgue in the basement. One of the walls of the storeroom still had little square doors that opened the individual body compartments.
    She shivered. Who could study down here?
    But this was why she met Mariah here. The place was usually dead.
    She moved among the stacks, quickly reshelving the books on the cart. All but one—a big hardcover tome with a compartment inside that held the Gideon Knife. She headed to an alcove near a seldom-used stairway and glanced at her watch. Right on time.
    Every night for a week after a heist, Zara would come here and wait for her friend. Sometimes Mariah would show on the first day and sometimes the last. It would certainly be easier to arrange their meetings if Mariah had a cell phone, but the sisterhood didn’t want to take the chance that their conversations might be monitored.
    The elevator dinged. She knew it wasn’t Mariah because the woman usually took the stairs too. Heavy footsteps echoed in the quiet. Yeah, definitely not her friend. The woman was as stealthy as a ghost.
    Zara moved away from the alcove and pretended to be examining books on a nearby shelf. The overhead light dimmed again, plunging her into shadow. Although she usually loved old things, she cursed the decrepit building with its crappy wiring and angry elevators.
    The footsteps got louder before grinding to a halt. She glanced down the row, expecting to see a student trying to find a book. She was going to ask if she could help, but the words caught in her throat