Deceit’s Web

It was unclear whether the woman was attractive or not. Jason had a job to do and she was attractive enough for him to do it. It was his job to be up for it, whether with a woman or a man. What was evident was that she had been attractive at one time—and probably more clearly due the term voluptuous—probably some twenty-five years ago and that she once knew what it was like to satisfy and be satisfied, and even now wanted to be satisfied. She was paying to be satisfied. Jason was sought out for this not just because he was a young, blond, god-like American, but because he could get it up almost no matter whether the woman—or man—was attractive or not, he could keep it up for as long as required, and he could use it to the patron’s satisfaction.

Jason Jansen was bisexual and he was a male whore in an Amman, Jordan, Tallaini Street male brothel, with the reason that he was here, in this corner of the world, serving women and men alike on a whorehouse bed at the age of twenty-two, changing roles and positions depending on who asked him and when they asked, being that he become trapped here. It wasn’t that he had aspired to be here in his dreams a year ago—or even a couple of months ago.

The Arab woman was north of fifty, Jason was sure. He’d assessed her and settled on that while she was ceremoniously stripping off Parisian house clothes and handing them to Jason to fold, while Jason stood by her, in the nude, already fondled, checked out for action, and with the erection that it was his talent to produce and maintain on demand. She was treating him like the servant he’d been reduced to at this moment. She was a bit beyond voluptuous, with pendulous breasts, a thickish waist, a belly bulge that would be welcome on a belly dancer in the smoky rooms on Tallaini Street, broad hips and buttocks, and fat, puckered folds of a cunt crying out for a man’s cock—and now in the process of handling Jason’s, long, thick shaft. With a coquettish little smile, she lay on her back on the bed and spread her legs.

She had rouged the folds of her cunt; she was ready for the action she—or her husband, wanting to avoid mounting her himself—had paid for.

Saddled between her meaty thighs, Jason kneaded her breasts, nuzzling in closer to her, giving her his version of a lust-filled smile, living the woman’s fantasy with her that she was paying for, as she reached down with both hands, grasped his hard cock and pulled him inside her. Hugging his hips with her knees, she immediately began bucking against him. Leaning down, he cupped her head between his hands, lowered his lips to her bouncing jugs, kissed them, and sucked on her nipples as she arched her back and fucked herself on his shaft. All he had to do was hold there for a while. When he took over the thrusting, he pressed his forehead to hers, capturing her eyes with his.

“Kayf turid dhlk?—How do you want it?” he murmured.

“Fi al'ardaf. Fi aleumqa. Alan!—In the ass. Deep inside. Now! Come inside me. No baby, just fuck.”

Surely the woman wasn’t young enough to get pregnant, Jason thought. Maybe just the thought of what her husband would do if it happened had her in fear of it.

Jason pulled out, turned her over, belly to bed, quickly rolled the condom off his cock and dropped it on the floor at the foot of the bed, grasped and squeezed her breasts, and, as she cried out a “Nem! Nem! Alan!—Yes, yes! Now!” worked his way into her ass.

A dozen thrusting pumps and he came, deep up into her channel. A few minutes of holding there and whispering what she wanted to hear in her ear, a pat on the rump as he pulled out of her, a few minutes with her in the shower with some more fondling as they cleaned off, rubbing her down with a towel, and then she was on her way on what she’d probably told her husband was a shopping trip. Her husband would choose to believe her, relieving him of having to lie that he’d been covering a young woman himself during this time.

Jason had two hours before his next session. He used it smoking a joint, having a beer, and taking a nap. He knew the next one would be rough.

He sometimes was booked for four sessions a day, although he didn’t work every day. He was a young, blond American, and he was bisexual and versatile—man, woman, top, bottom, he could get hard for it and do it all. He was much in demand, but the brothel was smart. They didn’t own him like they did some of the others. He was premium meat that had just shown up, offering himself because he’d run out of money. As such they didn’t overuse him and they charged hefty fees to use him. He was for the private, well-heeled and high-placed patrons solely.

This wasn’t Jason’s own room. He had a small bedroom, with a bath, he could go to. And he could take any meals he wanted in the kitchen and employees’ lounge. He had free time. He’d been here for two months now, coming from here or there, a different place, depending what he wanted to tell whoever asked. He didn’t reveal much. It was unlikely this was his goal, but no one knew where he came from or where he’d been heading.

It’s a good thing Jason got some rest. It also was a good thing he was a bit high when the next patron arrived. He was a tall, Arabic man, in the sparkling white robe, known as a thawb, that men traditionally wore in the Middle East. He was perhaps in his early fifties, military of bearing, gaunt but hard muscled of body. He was a scowler, all business, demanding. He brought his own riding crop, and he used and rode Jason to the limit of what was permitted at the brothel, which, for a Westerner like Jason, was far short of what would be permitted of another Arab. Arab whores, male or female, were expendable, and it was just patrons like this one who were prone to use them up.

The bed in the room assigned to Jason in which to receive patrons was a sturdy four poster—for a reason. Restraints could be attached anywhere along the four posts and would put whore or patron in a variety of bondage positions. Activity on the bed could become so vigorous that a standard bed wouldn’t hold up to it. Nothing could be more of a cock deflator than the bed collapsing under you at the moment of climax.

The position the commanding Arab patron chose for Jason was spread-eagled, standing at the foot of the bed, naked, and stretched out, wrists bound high on the corner posts at the foot of the bed and his ankles bound low on the posts. Enough give was provided in the bindings to allow Jason to writhe—and writhe Jason did—as, stripped down himself, the mature, gaunt, hard-bodied Arab whipped—without a great deal of power behind the strikes because of the house rules he was given—the young American on the back, buttocks, and thighs. The patron used the whip until he had gone erect, which didn’t take that long and didn’t do much more than redden the young man’s skin, and when he was hard, he saddled up behind Jason, mounted and penetrated him, and fucked him. The fuck lasted longer than the whipping had. The patron was on his best behavior with this delectable young, Western blond.

Strangely, the man had said he wouldn’t lay on with the whip as long as Jason could make him believe Jason was suffering—that he required that to go hard. Jason must have done well on the acting, as the man certainly went hard.

After the man was gone, the house manager visited Jason to tell him who that had been—Mohammad al-Kasasbeh, a major regional arms merchant.

“He has bought your contract for two nights. It was your roleplaying that impressed him, and he is paying well if you can agree to roleplay with him.”

When Jason heard how much was involved, he said he certainly could play whatever role Al-Kasasbeh wanted from him. He’d rather enjoyed the whipping, as long as it didn’t get too painful. It had gotten him hard too. There wasn’t anything about Al-Kasasbeh that would prevent him going hard. In contrast to most of his Arab patrons, Al-Kasasbeh was a handsome, fit, and experienced man. Jason would not have chosen this way to replenish his resources if he didn’t enjoy being used by handsome, fit, and experienced men. He had even discovered that the rough sex propelled him into the heights of arousal.

* * * *

“You want me to do what?” Jason asked when Al-Kasasbeh had him in his compound in the wealthy Amman residential section of Dabouq, northwest of the city center. Al-Kasasbeh was briefing Jason on the visit of a man he called Hamid, who Al-Kasasbeh needed to sell his wares to. The man hadn’t said what his wares were—he hadn’t even given Jason his real name—but the brothel manager had revealed who he was and that he was an arms merchant. Jason, of course, hadn’t given his real name either. He was Jerry and Canadian for this outing. He had no interest in actually being outed.

“I want you to be a virgin—each time he takes you. That’s how he likes it.”

“But he will know. After the first time, it will be evident.”

“If you are good, he won’t know until the second time. He wants to believe while he’s fucking that it’s the guy’s first time. I’m sure he doesn’t really expect it to be true. He wants the sensation of taking a virgin each time. We will give you to him as someone we have captured just for him—just to please him and encourage him to deal with me. So, you should act like you’re frightened and cowed by it. After the first time, you should show that you have succumbed to his mastery and that he owns you. I chose you not only because he likes young, Western blonds, but also because you roleplayed well with me and the whipping. You must know that he won’t be playing, though.”

It was true. “Hamid” didn’t play around. Jason also recognized him immediately, as Jason was well-read on current events and was one to try to keep ahead of whatever was pursuing him. The man, large of body, but powerful and muscular in addition to being heavy-bodied, ugly as sin but commanding of presence, dressed in the traditional sparkling white thawb robe with Arab headdress, wasn’t really named Hamid. He was a Saudi prince, Suliman bin Saud, responsible for arming his fabulously wealthy country. It wasn’t as big a deal as it sounded; there are a whole gaggle of Saudi princes. Jason could understand why Al-Kasasbeh was prepared to do anything to get his business, though, because all Saudi princes had power and money.

The man was cruel the first time. Jason was dumped, naked, and hands bound behind his back, in a pile of pillows in a luxuriously appointed bed chamber. The prince stood over him as Jason trembled there, pretending to be a complete innocent and a confused captive, as the prince unbuttoned his thawb from neck to hem and flared it to reveal a meaty but powerful body and a throbbing erection. Jason tried to rise, and, laughing, enjoying the game, the man beat him down. Jason rose again, with the same result. Bin Saud slapped the young man into submission. He then took a whip as Jason rolled over onto his belly, and laid into the young whore’s back and buttocks and thighs with a much more powerful snap than Al-Kasasbeh had done in the brothel.

Jason was genuinely whimpering and sobbing and totally docile as Bin Saud put an arm under his waist and raised him to his knees, with his cheek and chest pressed into the pillows. The prince nuzzled his face into the young man’s crack and ate him out, with Jason panting and whimpering, until the man had the urge to rise, cover Jason on top and from behind, mount him, penetrate him, work into him to the quick. Then, as it seemed from the response of the cowed virgin, Bin Saud took the young, subdued captive for his first supposed journey to anal deflowering.

During the night, the prince took him again and again, with, as bidden to do, Jason becoming more accommodating and yielding to it each time. Each time attendants took Jason away for an hour or more to clean him up and to allow the prince to rest and recover his virility. The last time, with the day dawning outside, Jason arrived in a thawb and knelt beside the mountain of a man, reclining in the pillows. Bin Saud’s thawb was unbuttoned and flared. He stroked his erection with one hand while unbuttoning and flaring Jason’s thawb with the other. The young man, no longer bound and on his own, gave the prince a dreamy “I am yours” look and took the prince’s erection in hand as Bin Saud took his. Each stroked the other, their eyes locked in a gaze of mutual lust. On his own, Jason moved over into the prince’s lap, facing him, held the man’s hard cock in place while he descended on it, and rose and descended on the shaft in one last giving and taking of the day, Jason surrendering totally, and now quite willingly in the game, to the mastery of the Saudi prince.

“Yes, yes, yes, you are a bull,” Jason murmured as he rose and fell on the shaft.

Al-Kasasbeh was pleased with Jason’s performance, most likely because he was pleased with whatever deal was struck with Prince Suliman bin Saud, and he sent Jason back to the brothel on nearby Tallaini Street in the Jabaiha quarter well compensated for the whip welts on the young man’s back and buttocks. Jason had rather hoped he’d done well enough to join Al-Kasasbeh’s luxurious establishment more permanently, but that didn’t come to pass.

He left relieved, though, that the prince did not expose the deceit—not to mention that the Saudi prince hadn’t whipped and fucked him to death.

“I know you were not a virgin,” Bin Saud whispered in parting, “but pretending to be helped me enjoy you immensely. Here, here is a note with an address. If you are in need, come to me there. But only come to me if you are willing to please me as you just have done.”

So, no moving up to the household of Al-Kasasbeh for Jason, but a backdoor insurance policy from a prince should he need it. The address was for a side street off Tallaini Street. Jason could easily escape to there from the brothel. Not bad wages for an act of deceit.

* * * *

They met in front of an exhibit in the Jordanian archeological museum in the Ras Al-Ein district of Amman, where Jason exhibited an interest in and more than a slight knowledge of archeology and the other man showed an equal interest and much greater knowledge of archeology. He, a mid-thirties redhead, with good facile features and a tanned, fit body, also showed an interest in Jason that went beyond the museum’s subject matter.

In response to the awe Jason exhibited in the man’s knowledge, the man identified himself as Avery Bradfield, an American and a professor at the University of Jordan in archeology. Jason chose to say he was Jordie James, also an American and a student—in archeology—at the University of Maryland, College Park. He wanted to keep the conversation going, so he feigned the archeology connection. He did, in fact, have an interest in the subject—but no real knowledge beyond his general good grasp of history. In addition, he said his father was a commercial attaché at the American embassy in Amman, and “Jordie” was visiting on a semester break and interested in volunteering on an archeological dig for extra college credits—again, anything to keep the conversation going. The professor intrigued him and activated his arousal. Jason was in the mood to hunt on his own rather than to take anyone who came through the brothel door and wanted to lay him.

When Bradfield moved on to another exhibit, Jason followed him, smoothly asking the other man questions about what was on display in the new exhibit. This way, the two went through the museum together, companionably sharing bits and pieces about the exhibits and about themselves. Bradfield gave Jason that special look, which was returned, with a smile. Jason was thrilled to be courted outside of the confines of the brothel. Bradfield touched Jason a couple of times on the arm, first to direct the younger man’s attention to something, later, when he sensed Jason wouldn’t recoil, just for the connection. Jason never pulled back. Bradfield touched Jason on the buttocks and the younger man just smiled at him. The man was taking his time. This was a seduction.

Bradfield invited Jason to go to dinner with him, and Jason readily agreed. Over dinner Bradfield discussed a university course archeological dig he was directing in the nearby town of Madaba, between Amman and the Dead Sea. Jason expressed interest.

“We’re expanding the excavation of the Roman baths there,” Bradfield said.

“Fascinating. I’d love to be involved in that,” Jason answered.

Bradfield invited Jason back to his apartment to look at timed photographs of the dig at Madaba. Jason agreed, with a smile, knowing that this wasn’t really about seeing the man’s photographs, a take on “come up and see my etchings.” Bradfield’s eyes twinkled when he made the proposition, knowing that they both knew the connotation to what was on offer.

As if by accident, an art book on male nudes lay beside the album of Madaba dig photographs on the coffee table where Jason was seated while Bradfield went off for drinks. The art book wasn’t just nudes; it included art shots of older men fucking younger ones. Of course Jason looked through this before looking at the Madaba dig album and was just changing over when Bradfield returned with the drinks. Bradfield obviously saw what Jason had given priority interest to.

They spent maybe seven minutes looking at the Madaba photographs before Bradfield picked up the other album and they went through that one together. Afterward Bradfield extended a hand, Jason gave himself over to it, and Bradfield walked the young man to his fate. Jason made no effort to demur. They both knew he wouldn’t. Bradfield fucked Jason first on the sofa in his living room, a gay porn movie running on the TV screen and a couple of marijuana joints smoked, and Jason, naked, and body beautiful, bent over the arm of the sofa, knees pressed into the sofa cushions, and Bradfield crouched on top of him, fucking him in a doggy position.

Later, still with no hint of opposition or the need for negotiation, they moved to the bed in Bradfield’s bedroom to go through several athletic positions of the fuck during the evening and early night. Bradfield was impressed how professional and athletic Jason was. Jason was just glad to being fucked by a young, in shape, good-looking American.

At breakfast, Bradfield asked Jason if he would be interested in working on the Madaba dig. He mentioned a stipend. They both knew it was for the fucking not the archeological dig work. Jason happily agreed.

A week later, after Jason had worked on the dig in Madaba a couple of times, Bradfield praised him for how fast he’d learned the procedures. He wasn’t pretending. Jason had, in fact, picked up on what to do quickly, which was a surprise to Bradfield. He knew that the University of Maryland didn’t offer courses in archeology. He also knew that there was no commercial attaché at the American embassy by the name of James. The commercial attaché was a fat woman older than Bradfield was.

The lad had been deceitful with him about his past—and his current status. Bradfield had immediately identified him as an attainable rent-boy. But Jason hadn’t been deceitful about being of use on the dig at Madaba. And the way he moved around just in shorts and sandals and looking like sex on a stick—and as long as “Jordie,” or whoever, laid down for him, opened his legs for him, and let Bradfield screw him, the man didn’t give a shit what the young man’s game was. He just watched what they were digging up carefully to ensure the young man wasn’t walking off with any of it.

* * * *

“Avery’s my cousin. He wrote that he was shorthanded at the dig here this year and didn’t I need a break from my graduate studies?” Jason, who had already introduced himself around as Jordan, although he would prefer being called by his nickname, James, had looked down to see that Jasmine was reading a Jane Austen book during her break. Pride and Prejudice. Jasmine was sitting under a canvas awning, where the diggers at the Roman baths excavation at Madaba went for relief from the sun. She wasn’t wearing much more than Jason was, who was in short shorts and sandals. Of course she didn’t go bare-chested on the dig as he often did, but even when where a top, she was ogled as much as he was. His tan was magnificent. Hers wasn’t bad either. The two of them had been eyeing each other for a couple of days. Earlier today was the first time they spoke.

“Although we really shouldn’t mention the relationship much,” he continued. “Avery doesn’t want to seem to favor me. So, we should just pretend that he and I aren’t related.”

“Avery does seem to favor you,” she said, her voice husky and sexy. She was, in fact, a very sexy woman—very curvy. She also was something around thirty, at least eight years older than Jason was. The age difference only enhanced Jason’s interest in her. That he was younger and a blond hunk seemed to enhance Jasmine’s interest in him. She’d been quite forthcoming with him, saying she wasn’t married, no, but she was the mistress of someone high up in the Jordanian Defense Ministry—a general. She’d rattled off his name and Jason had feigned being impressed, but he’d immediately forgotten the name. He was more interested that she had no bones about saying she was someone’s mistress. Mistress meant sex. Jason was a well-rounded guy. He wanted to have sex with her as much as he liked having sex with men.

Was the woman coming on to him? Yes, she was, Jason decided. He didn’t mind that a bit.

“I’m studying at Harvard. In the States, in Boston,” he said, sitting down beside her legs on the wicker chaise lounge she was stretched out on. “Graduate studies in English literature.”

“How interesting. Yes, I know where and what Harvard are,” she said. “How intriguing. We’ll have to talk about English literature sometime. I’ve been thinking of taking a course at the University of Jordan. I get so bored. Ahmad doesn’t pay enough attention to me. It’s why I’m working on the dig. I was interested in the director here, Avery . . . your cousin, you say. I must say there are very attractive and appealing men in your family. Alas, he seems to have his eyes only on men. I may be wasting my time here.”

“We should get together sometime,” Jason said, brushing his hand, seemingly by accident down her bare, tanned, very shapely leg. She gave a little shudder for him.

“To discuss English literature?” she asked. “Jane Austen?”

“That too,” Jason said, giving her a sly little smile. “I only wish,” he said, looking around, “that there was some nice park in this arid country where we could walk and talk—one that wasn’t crowded.”

She laughed. “You mean one where there were bushes and such that couples could lie under in private.”

“Yes, I suppose that’s what I mean.”

“There’s a nice hill near here covered with old olive tree orchards that’s private and is where I like to go to meditate . . . and such.” She paused to give him a meaningful look. She knew this game. She’d played it before, she was signaling. “It’s in a village not far from here, Al-Faisaliya. The hill is behind a very nice hotel, the Phoenix Palace Hotel.”

“You go to the hotel?”

“Sometimes.”

“But you don’t live in this village with the hill and the hotel.”

“No. I live in Amman. But sometimes I have a reason to go to the hill . . . and to the hotel.”

“A good hotel for trysting?” he asked. “You general goes there with you or, perhaps, your general doesn’t know you go there?”

Rather than answering, she gave him a sharp look, took his hand in hers, looked around to see if they were being observed, and placed his hand strategically on her body, between her thighs. “My general doesn’t own me. I go to the hotel with younger, fitter men.”

You couldn’t get more clear than this in signaling.

“I doubt I could afford this hotel,” he said.

“I’m a rich woman. And the Phoenix Palace has an ‘afternoon only’ rate.”

“You know that, do you?” Jason asked, and he laughed.

“Yes. I have a car nearby.”

Jason laughed when he saw what she was driving—a rather old Chrysler Sebring convertible, although it was polished up to look like a land cruiser. He had noticed other Sebrings in Amman, which gave him pause. He associated those good-looking mechanical clunkers with Key West, which he had visited twice. The first time he was there was off a cruise ship on which he worked and he’d noted that the island was crawling with Sebring convertibles. It apparently was the rental car of choice then. Less than a year later he was back in Key West, traveling with a professional poker player attending a tournament there. Then there wasn’t a Sebring left on Key West. It was all Volkswagen Beetle convertibles. Now he knew where they’d all gone. They’d all been sent to the Middle East to be status toys for the wealthy.

The first time they fucked was under an olive tree near the summit of the hill overlooking the town of Al-Faisaliya. They were both experts—he in fucking a woman and she in fucking a young man. He was a professional but she had been a practitioner of the art for nearly a decade longer than he had been. He fucked her in a missionary, laying her on the ground on her back, her thighs squeezing his head as he brought her to a climax with his teeth and tongue in her folds and on her clit, while she buried her long fingernails in his blond curls and moaned in a deep, guttural tone. He performed the sex, but she gave the direction. She had already given him head that lasted so long and was so proficient that it was a miracle that he could go on from there, having creamed her face—but the fact that he was a young, in-shape hunk factored into Jasmine having selected him to fuck to begin with. And Jason had no illusions about who selected the other to fuck.

It was under her direction, as well, that he turned her over, mounted her, and fucked her in the ass, snaking a hand around to drive her crazy with his fingers in her cunt. He took as much time as she had in edging him while giving him head. She moaned and writhed under him, claiming he’d given her three climaxes in a fuck that never ended. Indeed, the fuck didn’t stop there. The control was completely hers when she put him on his back, straddled him, and rode him to his ejaculation.

It wasn’t until the second, third, and fourth afternoon in which they skipped working at the Mabada Roman baths digs to wrestle in bed that they accorded themselves the afternoon rate at the Phoenix Palace hotel at the base of the olive tree-covered Al-Faisaliya hill. They both were highly sexed, athletic, and inventive in their lovemaking. Jason at last felt like he might have found what he had been looking for in a sex partner and sexual experiences. It was an older, more experienced, but still voluptuous woman. Jasmine was a tigress in bed and insatiable.

It came to a screeching halt at the beginning of the fourth week when Avery Bradfield kicked Jason off the excavation site and told him never to show up there again. He did so as much out of jealousy and Jason’s failure to take care of him sexually sufficiently than because Jason was absent from the site more than there during his scheduled hours.

Jasmine disappeared from the dig at the same time. They had relied on meeting there to start their trysts. Neither had shared specific contact information—or much of anything verifiable about their past and circumstance—with the other. For a couple of weeks Jason walked the streets of where he thought he might see Jasmine, but without much hope or result. Every Sebring convertible stopped his heart and turned his head. His belief that there were just too many of them in Amman was confirmed. None of them were hers.

But then he met Ali Jamhour

* * * *

The Tallaini Street brothel Jason worked in had guest passes to several gyms in Amman’s red-light district, not that Amman officially acknowledged having a red-light district, or brothels, for that matter—certainly not male brothels. The brothel had an exercise room, but the passes were for the male whores to cruise and drum up business when the walk-in traffic at the brothel was down. Jason was one they sent on the rounds of the gyms because he was a Western blond and because his body was beautiful and well-honed. He could be counted on to bring a paying patron back to the brothel whenever he was sent out to do his exercising in a gym.

Jason wasn’t as controlled as some of the others. This was the Middle East. Some of the whores were slaves—not officially but in reality—and did as directed. Jason was more of a free spirit and was so good for business that he called the shots on where he went and who he serviced for pay. As long as he continued consistently to be one of the brothel’s most lucrative profit centers, they let him do as he pleased. So, although he always could bring a paying patron back when on a cruising spree, if he didn’t—if he didn’t come back at all for the night now and again—nothing was said other than “how much did you make and where is our share?” Jason was too smart and knowing how holding back could be punished in Amman not to shortchange his employers.

It was thus on the evening when he went to a gym just off Tallaini Street and met Ali Jamhour. Jason, just in athletic shorts, a jock, and sneakers, wasn’t the only standout on the exercise floor, which was somewhat unusual. There was a Jordanian, similarly unattired, who was in stark contrast to Jason. Where Jason was twenty-two-years young, blond, blue-eyed, smooth-skinned, all smiles, and outgoing, the Jordanian was in his early thirties, dark of hair and of skin, brown-eyed, slightly hirsute, sultry, elegantly groomed, obviously wealthy, totally in command, promising to be demanding, and pure sex. Whereas Jason could be taken as versatile, both giving and taking, Jamhour was an obvious dominant. It was evident that he went straight for what he wanted and was accustomed to getting it. On this night he went straight for Jason. Everyone else in the gym backed off, although they observed from afar.

Jason knew a mark when he saw one. Jamhour looked like money, experience, and interest. The two, as they drifted into spotting each other on the equipment, chatted, and, as opportunity arose, touched each other, clicked immediately.

“Yes, I play,” Jason said to a direct question.

“But are you easy?” Jamhour.

“No, I’m expensive,” Jason answered, cutting to the bottom line. Jamhour did not back off.

They found themselves in the locker room later, probably not by accident on either of their parts, dressing. Each spent long enough in the nude to let the other get the full measure of them. They even handled themselves both to give them stretch and to make their interests self-evident. Their mutual interest in each other didn’t lag from that.

“I haven’t seen you in this gym before,” Jamhour said. “And I think I would have remembered seeing you.”

“I was given a guest pass for today,” Jason said, which was the last true thing he said about himself for the rest of the evening. “I’m a student at the Jordanian University.”

“But you aren’t Jordanian,” Jamhour said. “My name is Ali, by the way.” He didn’t give his surname.

“I’m Jacko. Some call me Jacko. No. I’m from Australia, but my family lived all over the world, for some time in Toronto, Canada. That’s where my accent comes from, I’m told. I’m studying archaeology. I came to Jordan because there are archaeology digs I can work on here.”

“And because men pay well for Western blonds,” Jamhour ventured.

“Yes, men. But women too.” Jason wasn’t backing off.

“Archaeology, you say. I know a professor in that program.”

“I’m studying with Avery Bradfield,” Jason said, and then immediately regretted having said that because of Ali’s answer.

“Ah, Avery. Yes, I know him well.” He smiled at Jason, who turned away, thinking that perhaps he’d gone too far into the disinformation. Perhaps he should just leave it at that—change and leave. But then Ali pulled it back.

“If you’re not busy now, perhaps you can stop at a café with me. My family—we’re in banking here in Amman—has sponsored some of the archaeological excavation projects around Amman. I’d like to pick your brain on likely projects. A fresh perspective by someone like you would be most useful, I think.”

“And because you want to fuck me,” Jason said.

“That too,” Ali responded without pause. “But you intrigue me beyond that. We can take our time. I’ve found it more pleasurable taking my time with a conquest.”

“I would be the conquest—not you?” Jason asked.

“I control or I walk away,” Ali answered, leaving no question how this would develop, if it did. He was reaching out and touching Jason on the arm, and, just like that, they were back into waltzing around each other on sexual possibilities. They’d already signaled and declared each other’s interest several times. The look Ali gave Jason now was quite obvious—and raw.

“I think I’d like that,” Jason answered, with a smile. Ali’s hand moved to the young man’s hip, and Jason didn’t move away from it.

The conversation at the café was free-flowing and became increasingly suggestive and intimate.

“If you have time, I would like to show you a men’s club I attend. Have you ever taken the pipe?”

“I can make time,” Jason said. He was quickly moving from how and when to broach the question of payment to not caring if he got paid at all. Ali was sexy as hell. He was older than Jason, but Jason’s mind went back to Jasmine, the older woman he recently had been with and had lost. In many ways, Ali was the male equivalent of Jasmine in the effect they had on Jason. And Jason was bisexual; it didn’t really matter how he got it. “And, yes, I’ve taken the bubble pipe.”

The small private club was luxuriously appointed and offered several small, very private rooms. Ali obviously was a regular here. They first went to a bar area and had drinks. Other men were there. They ranged from between Jason’s and Ali’s ages up to their late fifties. Some wore Western clothes, some the thawb of the Arab world. All spoke English and appeared to be wealthy and worldly. They greeted Ali as a good friend and expressed delight with meeting him. The delight of all came across to Jason as men interested in him as a possible conquest. None of the men seemed to question why Ali would be bringing a younger man to the club.

Ali took Jason into one of the private rooms, where there were a couple of pillow-covered pallets on the floor. An oriental carpet was complemented with walls draped in silk fabric. The atmosphere was one of opulence and a riot of color. The two men lay on their backs, pipes were prepared for them, and they both smoked and listened to soothing music.

The smoke was intoxicating and caused Jason to float in detached and sensual worlds. In one world he and Ali were naked and Ali was on top of him, giving Jason head while Jason gave Ali head. Later Ali was on top of Jason and inside him, languidly fucking him. Jason’s legs were raised and spread, held up by hands other than Ali’s. Later still, friends of Ali’s from the bar were, in succession and in combination, on top of Jason—or with Jason sandwiched between them—and were fucking him.

Jason didn’t care. This was what Jason did.

And that’s what Ali and his friends did with Jason. Ali had passed a wad of considerable cash to Jason before they had gone to the club—more than enough to cover more than just Ali’s desires.

Somehow that evening Jason had told Ali where he could find him at the brothel, and a few days later Ali found him there. And he paid for the privilege of escorting Jason around the city and out to some of the archaeological digs Ali’s bank supported. Ali wanted to immerse Jason in the culture of Amman, and he did so. Between excursions, Ali bought time with Jason at the brothel and fucked him there. Jason’s luck held in that they didn’t run into Avery Bradfield in their excursions. Occasionally, they stopped at a café or a club and “incidentally” some of Ali’s young friends would be there too. When this occurred, the excursion would include Jason on a bed in some room with Ali and his friends using him together. Jason never objected.

After two weeks of being cultivated, wined and dined, guided, and fucked by Ali Jamhour and his friends, Jason would have followed the sexy man anywhere and done anything that Ali wanted him to do. Ali was quite generous with his attention, gifts, and money.

Ali invited Jason to his home for a small dinner party, suggesting that perhaps Jason might want to move in with Ali. Full of hope for moving into luxury, Jason readily said yes. Maybe it was time for Jason to settle in with a less congested sex life.

* * * *

Ali Jamhour lived in a lush compound in the wealthy suburb of Dabouq, not far from the Jabaiha section of the city, where the red lights of Tallaini Street were located. Jason didn’t have to make his own way there, though. Ali sent a sleek black Mercedes to pick him up and deliver him. Ali had asked Jason to arrive a couple of hours before the dinner party was to start. He took Jason up to a bedroom on the second floor of the main house in the compound and, for more than an hour and a half, worked the young American over sexually like it would be their last meeting. Jason took the session as a honeymoon of a new life in the lap of luxury with Ali Jamhour. He should have given more thought to the sensation that Ali fucked him like he would never have the opportunity to do so again.

The bedding was so intense and total that Jason spent considerable time in the bathtub recovering and came down to the table set up by the swimming pool as the last of the guests. Ali had fucked him so well that Jason’s gaze of awe went directly to the host as he approached the pool and he didn’t immediately see the other guests.

The first one he saw, though, gave him the shudders.

“You know Avery Bradfield, don’t you?” Ali said, giving Jason a smile that had something harder in attitude behind it. “But of course you do. You say he’s your teacher at the university.”

“Hello, Jordie,” Avery said, giving Jason a somewhat bemused look.

In panic, Jason looked over at Ali. He was getting a hard stare. There wasn’t much of a question that Ali understood the silly deception Jason had employed to make Ali believe he was a university student.

“And, my father-in-law,” Ali said.

Jason was already off balance, but this left him speechless. There before him stood the arms merchant Mohammad al-Kasasbeh.

“Oh, yes, I know this young man quite well,” Al-Kasasbeh said, almost with a sneer, “but I know him as a male whore named Jerry.”

“And, of course, my beautiful wife, Miriam,” Jason heard Ali say. He and the woman turned at the same time. It was the woman he knew as Jasmine, and she had a pained look on her face. Ali knew, and Jasmine knew that Ali knew. Ali had known from the beginning that his wife was fucking Jason and he’d come looking for Jason so that he could do this—expose him for his deceit.

“Tell me, Jason, does my wife give as good a fuck as I do?”

Jason didn’t know what he answered or if he’d answered at all. His games of deceit had caught up with him. His hopes of rising up into luxury here in Jordan were dashed. Unless . . .

He didn’t stay for the dinner, of course. He left on foot. He’d carried around a note that had been given to him since he’d received it, always considering it his insurance. These people would have given him a good life, but they paled in the presence of a prince. Saudi prince Suliman bin Saud had given him an address to go to if and when Jason was willing to serve a man of somewhat violent tastes. It had come to that—greater pain than he would have liked in exchange for a better life.

He stood in front of a door of a large house just off Tallaini Street. He hadn’t checked out the address the prince had given him before. He had assumed it was the prince’s Amman residence. It wasn’t. He knew this house well. It had been pointed out to him before with the admonition that it was an establishment he would want to avoid. It was yet another male brothel. But, in this case, it was one known for brutality. It was said that once a male whore entered here, he was a slave, and he wouldn’t leave here for any place other than the city morgue.

Ah, well, Jason thought, as he slowly walked away from the entrance to the brothel, in his twenty-two years on the earth, he’d been in many a country under many a different circumstance. It quite probably was time to move on. Maybe wherever he landed this time, he might try a little less creative deceit and a little more honesty.