Page 311 of Wild Mustang Security Firm

Getting the oars in the water, Christian threw his back into rowing and reached Aliya almost as fast as her head popped back into sight. He grabbed her arm, heaving her up into the boat.

Another splash.

He looked up just as Fariq vanished below the ocean’s choppy surface.

Row away.

That thought jumped into his head and straight through his nerves, making his grip twitch on the handle of the oar. Before he could react, though, Fariq broke the surface again.

Use the oar, beat him. Drown him.Leave him for the sharks.

His grip tightened on the short handle of the oar as Fariq shook the water off his face and out of his hair. He turned in the water, orienting himself to the raft. He looked at Christian for several long seconds, then smiled as if he could read those treacherous thoughts lurking in the forefront of his mind.

In long, slow strokes, he swam toward the raft just as the flash of shark’s fin split the water not ten feet behind him.

Christian’s nerves jumped again, the instinctive warning he would have shouted for just about anyone else in the world, dying in his throat. Just as abruptly as it had appeared, however, the fin turned, and the shark vanished back into the depths once again.

Professional courtesy—one shark to another.

When Fariq reached the raft, he extended a hand, and Christian again suffered that half-second of hesitation before grasping it and pulling his nearest and dearest enemy into the relative safety of the raft. He should have left him to drown, and for just an instant, Christian could have sworn Fariq knew it. They stared at one another before a corner of Fariq’s mouth quirked up in another dark smile.

“Circle the ship.”

“Why?” Christian demanded. So, he’d be distracted and bent over the lip of the raft, playing with the fucking oar while Fariq pulled his gun and shot him in the back of the head?

Fariq’s smile only grew.

“Would you rather do all the rowing yourself?” he replied, shifting in the bottom of the raft to wrap his arm around Aliya’s shoulder, drawing her in close to his chest. She looked shell-shocked, dressed in nothing but the thin, silk nightgown that barely covered her to mid-thigh. Wet, the silk was damn near-transparent, showing the dusky hues of her nipples as well as the slightly darker pink hue of her panties. Rummaging through the supplies again, Christian ripped open the emergency blanket, unfolding the thin mylar material and wrapping it around her.

“Do you even know where we are?”

“About fifteen miles from the nearest island port. I have no idea if there was time for anyone to place a distress call, so we’re better off operating under the assumption we’re on our own.” When Christian rubbed his mouth, looking out the yawning entrance of the raft’s canopy, he added, “We might also wantto operate under the assumption the Mustang group is coming back.”

It took him a moment to realize exactly what Fariq was saying.

“We weren’t attacked by the Wild Mustangs,” Christian told him, his tone harsher than he was usually careful to keep it. “Those were pirates or Murammar’s men. The Mustangs would have hit us in a chopper, not divided us into two motorized rust-buckets.”

“Find me two survivors,” Fariq softly ordered. “Then get us to port before we’re attacked again. I want my darling sister safe in bed at our fortress in Marshan by nightfall. After that, I promise whoever did this—Wild Mustang or not—will be dealt with most severely.”

Clenching his jaw, Christian scoured the water beyond the raft.

“And if I find more than two survivors?”

Shrugging with his eyebrows, Fariq rubbing Aliya’s back to help warm her under the thin foil of the emergency blanket.

“I won’t risk having our raft being swamped by desperate mercs, who care only about saving their own skin. Also, we have limited rations.”

“We have rations enough for six for three days,” Christian dared to remind him.

“And there’s three of us here already,” Fariq returned. “Aliya should not be made to suffer.”

“I can s-s-share l-like everyone el-else,” Aliya stammered, huddled in her emergency blanket, not looking up from whatever spot in the bottom of the raft held her gaze.

“Of course, you can,” her brother soothed, but the look he gave Christian was absolute. “One ration for you, me, and two men fit to row if we can find them. Two for my darling Aliya.”

A lump, cold and ugly, sat in the pit of his churning gut. He felt sick, though there was no trace of it in his voice as he said, “Everyone else, we leave behind?”

“To be devoured alive by Great Whites? Of course not. I can’t think of a more terrifying way to die.” Rubbing Aliya’s back, Fariq kissed her on the top of the head again and with his other hand, pulled the handgun from the waistband of his pants to check how many bullets he had left.

---