Page 281 of Wild Mustang Security Firm

Circling to his side of the desk, she dropped all the way to her knees beside him.

“I-I’ll only take a few minutes. I’ll come right back when you say to. Please?”

Sitting at his own small desk across the room, Christian couldn’t help the twitch of appreciation that tickled his cock as he pretended not to watch. It had been entirely too long since he’d had a young woman submit herself at his feet quite that attractively. It had been even longer since a woman had willingly done so without first needing to be paid. But then, Christian had what Fariq mockingly liked to call ‘eclectic sexual preferences.’ Women like Aliya were way above his pay grade.

“My darling.” Fariq sighed. “I’m trying to work.”

Vaulting to her feet, she stomped her foot.

“This is just like the last time, even though you said it wouldn’t be. I’m always stuck on this ship!”

Tablet dropped onto his lap, Fariq frowned. He looked first at her foot, then up at her.

“As much as I love you, right down to your naughty little feet, if you do that at me again, you’ll have those offending appendages bound and subjected to bastinado. As I recall, you didn’t care much for that the last time, but it was effective. I have a very important meeting with a very wealthy contractor. I can’t simply tell him I need to reschedule, so I can take my tediously darling sister through the local bazaar. He would not only think me less of a man, but you’re a spoiled brat. Is that what you want?”

Her whole countenance fell, the dark beauty of her eyes turning wounded.

“No, but can’t… can’t I go by myself? Just this once?” She immediately dropped to her knees again, her hands resting on Fariq’s thigh. “I’m twenty-two! I’ll be careful, I promise! I’ll wear a disguise, and no one will know who I am! Please, please, Fariq!”

“Absolutely not!” If nothing else, she’d gained her brother’s undivided attention.

“My heart is broken,” she cried melodramatically.

As beautiful as she was, it was all Christian could do not to shake his head at her antics. What she needed wasn’t a shopping trip or a new bikini. What Aliya Abdal really needed was to be turned facedown over a man’s knee and spanked until her pretty little backside was sore, and she was crying with remorse. Not that her brother would do that, but the girl was utterly clueless. She really had no idea who she was trying to cajole.

“I’m sure you’ll recover.” Fariq cast his sarcastic glance to the ceiling. “Though Allah forbid, I should be responsible for such a tragedy.” Shaking his head, Fariq cast his glance to the only other man in the room, which was how Christian found himself being dragged into the mire of his employer’s minor family argument.

“Reid,” Fariq called from across the room.

Aliya visibly startled, twisting around to look at him as if she hadn’t been aware Christian was even in the room. That annoyed him, especially since he couldn’t stop himself from becoming more and more aware ofherwith every perfumed-tainted breath he took. His cock throbbed against the inside of his thigh.

“Yes?” Christian reluctantly replied, abandoning all pretense of ignoring them.

“Kindly take my sister shopping before she expires of despair right here on the Tabriz carpet,” Fariq told them both, in a move completely opposite of his usual overprotectiveness where Aliya was involved. “You have shopping of your own to do today, anyway.”

Christian blinked. He did?

“He does?” Aliya blinked twice, then glanced at him again. For a moment, Christian thought she was about to object, but sweeping her assessing stare up and down him, she gave in to her brother. “You’re really going to let me go?”

Setting his tablet aside, Fariq leaned forward to press a kiss upon her forehead.

“Buy anything your heart desires, but you are to mind Reid. I know for a fact, he knows how to deal with naughty little girls who fail to obey. Now,please, leave me to my work. The world won’t conquer itself, you know.”

He smiled as if he was joking. Christian knew he wasn’t. Fariq was the most apolitical animal he’d ever known. He had no ideology and believed in nothing except the power of money, but he was also single-minded in his drive to get it and didn’t care who he hurt in the process.

Aliya grinned. Jumping up off the floor, she headed for the door. Just before she reached it, she twirled back to Christian. “Meet me in fifteen minutes?” she asked before clearly delegating him to servant status and dismissing him.

“He’ll be delighted,” Fariq answered for him, annoying him that much further.

The curls of her hair bounced when she spun back toward the door. The curve of her bottom bounced too, just barely covered by the thin cloth of her elegant summer dress. Christian did his best not to get caught staring at it as she flounced out. He lost himself in the minute, fantasizing how those mounds of curvy flesh would bounce under the vigorous swats of his open palm for dragging him into this mess when he had more important things to do. He doubted if there was another bottom on this planet he wanted to spank more—or he wanted to spank and do so much more to. The idea of ‘much more’ was enough to make him groan with need, but he managed to refrain. He really did have more important things to do. For as long as Fariq planned to conquer the world, Christian knew he needed to try to save it.

Shit. Fariq was watching him. The disarming smile he reserved solely for his younger sister was gone, and in its place was that old familiar, impossible to read, cold, reptilian, dead-eyed stare that never failed to make every warning flag Christian possessed fly on full alert. This was not a man to argue with or defy—or imagine himself playing spanky-games with his baby sister. Christian had a terrible habit of forgetting that fact at the worst possible times.

“Thanks,” he said sarcastically.

Almost imperceptibly, Fariq’s gaze focused on him. Christian hated it when he did that—stared at him with a dead look, only for Christian to discover Fariq wasn’t really looking at him at all, just in his direction.

Well, he was looking at him now.

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