The club was called Sarcophagus, the most sought-after late night venue in all of Cairo, a new favorite among foreign celebrities, and a place that one of Ryan’s fashionista friends had told him ‘Go or you’ll live to regret it!’ It was packed wall-to-wall with hunks and slim, gorgeous girls, who walked with watch-me grace and sideways glances. Ryan was in his element. Nash was just happy to be with Ryan. And yet he still wasn’t sure why Ryan had brought them there when things had seemed to be heading straight to the bedroom.
Was it another lingering tease?
Was it denial?
Was it fate?
Or was it—
“You ever done it with two guys at once?”
The words slipped from Ryan’s lips, floated two centimeters through the air and disappeared inside Nash’s dizzy head.
—Or was it something altogether wild and wicked?
Nash turned his face to stare straight into Ryan’s iceberg blue eyes. He was smiling seductively, and yet there was just a hint of trepidation in those pools of blue, as if even Ryan Thomas feared rejection.
He needn’t.
“No, but yes,” Nash stammered hastily—drunk, terrified, elated. “I mean no, I haven’t. But would I? If that’s what you’re asking me? Then yes. Absolutely with you. Absolutely yes.”
The fear of rejection vanished from Ryan’s gaze and his smile broadened, his perfect teeth shining like a bright white sun through the dark of the club’s thunderous cavern. “Look over there.”
Nash did as he was told, and on the other side of the bar he saw a handsome young man standing alone, smiling in their direction. “Hey, isn’t he the guy from the shoot?”
“Which guy?”
“The stagehand.”
Ryan shrugged. “I don’t know. I’ve never seen him before in my life. But he hasn’t taken his eyes off us since we got here.”
Nash peered over the heads of the crowd, but with the dim light and flickering strobe, he had trouble seeing. He pulled out his cell phone, flicked it open and held it above the crowd.
“What are you doing?”
“Taking a photo,” Nash answered, clicking a button. “So I can zoom in and see if it’s him.”
“Not cool, man.” Ryan shook his head, smiling at Nash’s indiscretion. “Is that the way you always pick people up? Take a photo to inspect them first?”
Nash ignored him. He looked at the still shot on his phone screen. “That’s weird.” The picture showed the bar and the dozens of party-goers perched around it, laughing and ordering drinks and swaying to the beat. But the stagehand was no longer there. “He must have gone,” Nash said, still looking at the screen.
“No, he’s still there,” Ryan observed over the sea of heads. “And he still hasn’t quit starin’ at us. So what do you say? Are you in?”
Nash stopped looking at his cell phone. The question he had longed for was finally on the table. It was now or never, do or die.
He snapped the phone shut, put it away, then glanced determinedly—drunkenly—from Ryan to the guy at the bar and back again. “I’m in,” he nodded.
Ryan winked. “Then let’s go have the time of our lives.” He grabbed Nash’s hand, and dragged him through the sea of people.
At that moment, Ryan could have been dragging him to hell for all Nash cared.
Chapter Three
Midnight cats darted in and out of the dark alleys of Cairo. He hadn’t noticed them before, but now as the thumping sounds of Sarcophagus faded into the night and the streetlamps grew few and far between, Nash saw that they were everywhere. Cats of all colors, all slender and lightning fast, slipping in and out of blackened nooks, shadowing Nash and Ryan past closed cafes and the padlocked doors of stores that sold rugs and brass trinkets and other tacky treasures.
Nash watched them streak across his blurred, drunken vision. He felt disoriented and lost. “Hey, where are we? Where are we going?”
“It’s not far now,” replied the stagehand.
At first they had meandered down busy streets littered with Cairo’s more colorful nightlife. They passed ney players busking for the last of the evening’s tourist dollars, the melodic tunes of their flutes conjuring up pictures in Nash’s imagination of hypnotized cobras dancing out of woven baskets. They passed men filling up small nooks that served Arabian coffee along with long, lingering puffs on shisha pipes, casting suspicious glances in Nash and Ryan’s direction while sucking on their ornate tentacles of smoky delight.
But soon the presence of others drifted away completely, voices echoing off in the distance down winding passages, until there was no sound at all apart from Nash and Ryan’s staggering, unsteady footsteps.
The two Americans were now being led down the alleys and ancient roughly-laid stone streets by the handsome stagehand—yes, outside of the nightclub Nash saw it that was indeed the same man he had seen at the catwalk—who seemed to be completely sober. Nash put it down to the fact that drinking was frowned upon in Muslim societies. But then again, so was homosexuality, and that appeared to be a door that was beginning to creak wide open, given the exchanges that had taken place between Nash, Ryan, and the young man outside Sarcophagus. Nevertheless, the Americans seemed to be in the safe hands of a man who seemed to know Cairo inside-out, and this reassured Nash greatly, as did the occasional brush of Ryan’s arm against his as the two swayed and staggered down the dark, uneven roads and alleys.
“Hey, are you taking us to a hotel or something?” Ryan called ahead. “We don’t wanna work up too much of a sweat before we work up a sweat, if you know what I’m saying.”
The man in front of them answered, “We’re going to Saqqara. The City of the Dead.”
Nash felt a sense of unease settle in. “The city of the what?”
Ryan chuckled. “Relax. Where’s your sense of adventure?”
Nash pulled Ryan up and whispered, “I don’t know about this. What if he’s planning on robbing us? Or worse. We don’t know this guy. We don’t even know his name!”
Nash must have been whispering a lot louder than he realized, because up ahead the stagehand abruptly stopped, turned, and called back. “My name is Saabir.” Then he smiled, and kept walking.
Ryan gestured to him. “So now we know his name. He’s Saabir. The guy from the shoot, not some scary stranger. We’ve worked together. Hell, we’re practically family!”
“You didn’t even notice him at the shoot.”
“That’s because I was busy working. Unlike you, who was busy—”
Ryan stumbled unsteadily as he began laughing. Nash grabbed him to stop him from falling. “I think we should call it a night. Something doesn’t feel right.”
“Oh, come on, Nash. Don’t be an asshole. He’s a stagehand, for Christ’s sake! How dangerous can he be?” A sideways glance and a sly grin swept across Ryan’s devilishly handsome face. “Besides, he’s hot. And I’m horny. And you—”
Suddenly Ryan leaned in and kissed Nash full on the lips. He kissed him hard. He kissed him passionately. He forced Nash’s lips open with his tongue, and plunged it inside. It was a deep, sweet, drunken kiss, laced with alcohol and drenched in desire. With his knees buckling and his throat thick with fear and excitement, Nash kissed Ryan back, hoping the moment would last forever, praying their kiss would never, ever end.
But Ryan decided to finish his sentence. He pulled out of the kiss and whispered, “—you want this more than anything you’ve ever wanted before. Come on, let’s have some fun.”
Nash couldn’t tell Ryan he was wrong. In fact, he couldn’t say a word. He was transfixed. He was lost in those beautiful, confident, charming, drunken eyes. And for a fleeting moment, he gave in to the realization of what he had been suppressing ever since they first met.
“I think I’m in love with you. Are you in love with me?” The words were out before Nash could stop them.
Ryan’s smiling eyes looked into his, and he shook his head. “No. I’m far too in love with myself, you know that
.” But before the heartache even had a chance to set in on Nash’s face, Ryan added, “But I’ll fuck you.”
He kissed him again, and for now, for tonight, that was enough for Nash.
Then something tugged on the back of his shirt, and Nash twisted around, startled, the spell of love and lust momentarily broken.
A child had appeared from nowhere, and was standing behind him. He was no older than eight, barefoot, and filthy. His clothes were in tatters, but in his hand was a Polaroid camera that looked as new as the day it had been plucked from its box.
“Ten dollars! Ten U.S. dollars!” the grubby kid shouted through a wide grin, his teeth like keys on an old piano, some ivories big and noteworthy, some chipped and stunted, and some knocked out completely. Without any further explanation, he lifted his camera and a flash lit up the night.
Ryan and Nash both squinted, rubbed their dazed eyes, then looked down again through star-filled vision to see the kid flapping a Polaroid picture in front of them. “Ten U.S.! Ten U.S.!”
“Get outta here, you little street rat,” Ryan growled, squinting and giddy.
But the boy was insistent, giving as good as he got. “Everything come at a price, mister! Ten dollars! U.S.!”
“Are you crazy? We’re models! You should be paying us for the privilege of taking our photo.”
“Ease up on the poor kid,” Nash said, fumbling through his pockets. He found a bill, and the kid snatched it out of his hand before giving him the Polaroid picture and running away. Cats scattered in his wake as he disappeared into the night.
“What the hell did you give him the money for?”
Nash shrugged. “How else do you expect the poor little fella to eat.” He looked at the picture, which was very possibly the worst photo either of them had ever taken in their lives. The close-range flash had sucked the life from both their faces, washing away their tans and leaving them pale, red-eyed and stunned.
“Jesus,” Ryan murmured over Nash’s shoulder. “Make sure you destroy that before it hits the internet, would you?”
But Nash only smiled and shrugged. “I dunno. For once it’s kinda nice to look less than perfect, don’t you think?”
“No!” Ryan answered staunchly. “Now come on, before we lose Saabir.”
He grabbed Nash’s arm and dragged him onward.
Nash followed willingly, sliding the photo into his pocket for safekeeping.
* * *
The secret stone doorway slid away from the wall, and the black chasm it revealed actually exhaled, like the last breath of a dying man—or the first breath of a dead man revived.
Nash and Ryan jumped back with a fright, inches before their lips had a chance to lock.
The light and sounds of the city had long faded away as they followed Saabir through the labyrinth that made up the long forgotten corners of the City of the Dead, a maze of high walls built from ancient stones, where shadows gobbled up the light cast by the moon. And the cats—still so many of them—shot by silently out of the corners of Nash’s eyes.
Eventually they had stopped, and Saabir leaned his back against a rough stone wall. “This is the place,” he whispered.
Ryan took that to mean the place where their passions could finally be unleashed, unseen and uninterrupted. Within moments, he had one arm around Saabir’s waist and one wrapped around the back of Nash’s neck, pulling him closer and closer, lips parted, mouth watering. Nash himself let one trembling hand caress the curve of Saabir’s shoulder, while the other dared to venture down the front of Ryan’s shirt, feeling the heaving, hardened muscle and flesh beneath, twisting the buttons undone one at a time with his quivering, sweating fingertips. Meanwhile, the quiet, seductive Saabir smiled as the two Americans touched and pawed at his body, and each other’s.
To say that Nash’s cock began to stir at that point was a gross understatement; he was ready to explode. The truth was, he’d been carrying the most uncontrollable erection of his life ever since they’d entered the secluded City of the Dead. The sense of danger he had felt aroused him beyond measure. Now he could barely contain himself as the trio began to slide headlong into a tangle of desire in the darkness of Saqqara.
Then Saabir turned slightly and lifted his arm up to the wall, as though he was about to lean against it. But instead of leaning, he pushed on one of the rough, protruding stones.
There was a sudden rumble, deep and resonant, and what they thought was a wall became a door that slid open with the blood-curdling sound of stone grinding against stone.
As the air escaped the black chamber beyond, the army of stray cats—yes, it seemed nothing less than an army now—poured in through the door, unafraid and unstoppable, like a flood of stormwater gushing down a drain. The cats quickly disappeared, leaving Nash and Ryan to stare into the darkness after them, awash with disbelief and dismay.
“What the—” was all Nash could murmur.
Saabir touched his shoulder and the young model flinched. That disconcerting feeling was back.
“There’s nothing to fear here,” Saabir assured him. “Don’t you want to see what’s inside?”
“It’s pitch black in there! I can’t see a damn thing!” Nash exclaimed.
“I do,” Ryan answered. “I want to see.”
Nash slowly turned to look at him, his misgiving and mistrust replaced by utter incredulity. “Are you crazy?”
“No. I want to see.” Ryan spoke with calm determination and a hint of excitement, if not nervousness. “Nash, we’re in Egypt, in the ruins of an ancient city, standing in front of secret door! Aren’t you curious?”
“Curiosity killed the—” Nash stopped himself. He instantly felt that, given the circumstances, finishing that sentence would spark some kind of curse or bad omen. And so he simply lied, “No, I’m not curious.”
The lie was unconvincing enough to give Ryan the confidence to sway him.
Sway him with a kiss.
Ryan’s spell was once again cast over Nash, so much so that he barely noticed Saabir begin to unbutton his own shirt and slide it from his shoulders. It fluttered to the ground, then he unbuckled his jeans and pulled them down his thick, brown legs. He was wearing nothing underneath, and Nash and Ryan broke their kiss to admire the young Egyptian’s beautiful naked body, his cock long and uncut, and hanging heavily between his thighs.
Without a second’s hesitation, Ryan followed suit, stripping the already open shirt from his shoulders to reveal his perfectly formed torso—that broad chest, the narrow waist, and that buff, beautifully-contoured stomach. As if to answer Nash’s prayers, he didn’t stop there. His jeans were unbuckled before Nash could truly savor the moment, and then, in a chest-pounding heartbeat, Ryan was suddenly naked.
Kicking off his shoes.
Freeing his legs from his stubborn, twisted jeans.
His gorgeous engorged cock slapping up and down with the jerky motions of his swift strip.
Like its owner, Ryan’s dick was perfect; long and slender, and exquisitely shaped. The head was large and hard, with soft curves sloping down from the crown to the rim of the helmet. At the base of the shaft was a mere shading of pubic hair, so efficiently trimmed it was barely there at all. His balls were high and hard and round as plums. The skin of his scrotum taut and precisely moulded around his testicles—not stretched and saggy like some men’s ball sacks.
No, this was, much to Nash’s speechless delight and relief, the perfect package. He couldn’t take his eyes off it.
Ryan noticed, and those shining teeth made an appearance once more. “Curious yet?”
To taste the pleasure of that cock in my mouth? Nash thought to himself. To tease those tight balls with my tongue? To feel that perfect dick part my beckoning ass cheeks and slide its way up my yearning, aching ass? The answer was a simple, breathy, “Yes.”
Ryan didn’t say a word. Talking seemed to be the last thing he wanted to do at that point.
Roughly, he pulled at the buttons of Nash’s shirt, so ha
rd that half of them popped off and shot into the darkness. Nash didn’t care. He wanted the shirt off as much as Ryan did. He ripped it from his shoulders, his own highly sought-after, much-photographed torso twisting and flexing to get his clothes off. His belt gave way, and Ryan slid his jeans down the length of his tanned legs as Nash’s cock throbbed and strained against the thin white cotton of his briefs, begging begging to be released.
Ryan took care of the call by literally tearing Nash’s briefs at the hips, allowing his desperate cock to burst free, thick and hard and huge. “So it’s true what they say about you southern beaus,” Ryan gasped through his grin.
Ryan seized that hefty, hard dick in his fist and laid his mouth on Nash’s quaking, hungry lips, but before his tongue could thrust its way into Nash’s hot, panting mouth, Saabir grabbed Ryan firmly by the shoulder and pulled him away.
“Not here,” he said, his own chest heaving, breath quivering and dick stiff with the heat of the moment. “Follow me. I can show you pleasure beyond your imagination.”
“A man after my own heart.” Ryan winked at Nash. “Like I said before, I don’t ask my imagination to do a damn thing. That’s what experience is for.”
Saabir turned toward the black opening in the wall and stepped inside, urging Ryan and Nash to follow him with a backward glance, just before those glimmering green eyes disappeared into the dark.
Nash hesitated, but Ryan simply took him by the hand and said, “Time to experience some pleasure. Are you coming?”
Without waiting for an answer, Ryan began to pull Nash into the darkened passage beyond the secret stone door.
His cock hard and bobbing in front of him, Nash swallowed his trepidation and let his dick lead the way.
Chapter Four
The way was dark. Nash followed the faint silhouette of Ryan, who followed the dim shape of Saabir down the narrow stone passage. Every few feet they turned a sharp corner. And sometimes they stopped, and the tight, pitch-black passage shook with the deafening sound of more stone grinding against stone as another secret door opened in front of them. Nash swallowed hard, feeling a strange mix of claustrophobia, fear, and sexual courage, well aware of the fact that his logic had been more or less completely taken over by his lust. He imagined this was what some of his clients back in Tennessee had felt—indeed it was the same feeling he himself had experienced when he first began selling his body for sex—until he put his arms around the people who paid him for his affection, and the trembling and the loneliness and the fear faded away. That’s what love could do, or at least the pretense of love.
Vampires of Cairo: Vampires of the World Page 2