Page 302 of Wild Mustang Security Firm

She had no idea how to get any of that for NATO, but she already knew, regardless of the consequences, she was going to try.

Chapter

Six

He needed to get his head out of his ass.

Lying on his back in bed, hands behind his head, Christian tried to sleep, but his brain wouldn’t let him. Like a starving dog on a meat bone, it was on Aliya. Still. Exactly as it had been every spare minute of the last five days, and no matter what he did, he couldn’t get himself to stop.

This wasn’t some half-baked Hollywood movie. Men like him didn’t get the girl. There was no such thing as falling in love or even in striking up impossible relationships, especially not with the kid sister of the man he’d gone undercover to bring to justice. He had a job to do, and by God, he would get it done if it killed him.

It might. He’d known that pretty much right from the moment Dewey Robinson recruited him out of college. There were no guarantees. It was dangerous work.

Keep your mind on what you’re supposed to be doing and off Aliya’s sobbing distress as she’d laid with her face buried in her hands, sobbing while her brother humiliated her in front of him.

He should have left the room.

And abandon her to endure that alone when it had been his fault? For all he knew, his presence in that chair had been the only thing that kept Fariq from raping her.

Maybe he already had.

Maybe Fariq would never have touched her like that at all if he hadn’t been in the room.

God, he wished he’d had the balls to stop it.

Yeah, he’d have got them both killed, but even if he hadn’t, even if by some ludicrous miracle he managed to get them both safely away from this ship, what then? Unless he had the information his bosses at NATO had been paying him for close to a decade to get, not only would they not appreciate him throwing it all away for the sake of Aliya, they’d probably put him on trial for the man’s murder. As bad as Fariq was, they wanted him alive. They wanted the notoriety bringing the world’s worst criminal to justice would win them in the eyes of every other government and every other criminal enterprise. They wanted this man and everyone associated with him shut down. How many people had died, trying to make this happen already? Fariq could bend his sister over his desk and fuck her up the ass in front of him, and they wouldn’t care. Christian’s job wasn’t to save the girl—it was to stop her brother.

All or nothing.

Once and for all.

He still wanted to put a bullet between Fariq’s eyes, yank Aliya out from under his molesting hand, and hold her so fiercely, she’d know she was safe—maybe for the first time in her life.

He’d never look at her again and see Fariq’s spoiled rotten little sister, tainted by all the awful, impotent feelings he held toward the man. He doubted he’d ever be able to look at her and not see the horrified, humiliated, terrified young woman with Fariq’s hand clasped so possessively between her legs.

Fuck it, he couldn’t sleep.

Throwing back the blanket, he rolled to sit on the edge of his bunk, dressed in just his jeans. They were unfastened, which was the only way to make sleeping in pants comfortable. Unfortunately, sleeping out of them was a good way to end up in a gunfight naked or dead while trying to get dressed. Pirates, third-world guerilla soldiers, or the Wild Mustang Security Firm—nobody honored a good old-fashioned time-out, so people could get dressed before an unexpected gunfight.

He glared at the red neon clock display. It was a quarter after two in the morning. Rubbing his face, he stood. Adjusting himself in his pants, he fastened them and tightened his belt, then pulled on a shirt, socks, and shoes. He needed a walk to clear his head.

If the guard was asleep at the security controls, he might try looping the feed long enough to sneak into Fariq’s office and hack his computer again.

The water was calm tonight, the ship mostly dark. The low lights were on, which with the brightness of the waxing moon were still plenty bright enough to see by. It would also make it difficult, although not impossible, for planes or helicopters—Mustang’s favorite method of sneak attack—to spot them. However, from everything he’d seen and heard on the radio, his sister and her friends in that troublesome company were preoccupied elsewhere. Which suited him fine. Every time they came after Fariq, it made his job harder.

Fariq suspected treachery at the drop of a hat. When one got to be as universally hated as he was, a suspicious nature came with the territory. Fariq wasn’t above going after the security firm’s members if he thought it would help him further his own agenda, and every time he did, Christian was stuck. Grin and bear it and try like hell to mitigate the damage while keeping anyone from getting killed.

Like his sister, Finn, was going to hate him when this was over, but that, while not all right, was at least understandable. Whether she knew it or not, he was doing what he had to, trying his best to keep her safe in the process. Wild Mustang was a pain in his ass, but the one thing Christian liked about those roughnecks was how hard they worked to keep their loved ones out of danger. Croft would put a bullet in him without thinking twice, but Christian was glad he and Finn were together. With a man like that watching her back, men like Fariq would never get close enough to hurt her.

Too bad the same couldn’t be said for Aliya.

Leaning on the rail, staring out over the calm seawater, Christian almost smiled. Now, there was an idea. Drop a word here, leak a name and location there… who knew? The Mustangs weren’t above a good ol’ fashioned kidnapping any more than Fariq was. Maybe he could manipulate Aliya into safety without jeopardizing his situation here too badly.

Fariq would spare nothing to get her back.

He ought to just kill the man and go home.

He rubbed his face, breathing the cool air deep into his lungs before letting it out again. He was so tired of constantly living on the knife’s edge of discovery, betrayal—death. He was tired of sleeping with his pants on and a gun always within reach.

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