He needed a shower and a lot more beers. He’d miss beer when it was time to return to dry, spiritless, Pakistan, it was an excellent aid in the forgetting process. He just hoped the bar in this piece of shit town was still open.

Once inside his room, Caleb removed his clothes and walked into the bathroom to take a shower. Setting the temperature of the water, he let the room steam up before he finally stepped inside to put his face under the jets. The water washed over his nakedness, scalding him slightly, but Caleb welcomed the slight pain. He would never admit it, but from time to time, he needed to feel pain as much as he needed to dole it out.

Once again, Caleb envisioned the girl, face down on the mattress, welts crisscrossing the back of her body from shoulder to ankle. It was perverse the way this particular image affected him. It made him aroused instead of sick. It was ironic.

Unable to fight it, Caleb thought of the past and of Rafiq.

***

Vladek had not always been rich and powerful. Once upon a time, the seedy Russian had been a mercenary and a trafficker of anything that would sell – drugs, guns, people, it didn’t matter. He traveled throughout Russia, India, Poland, Ukraine, Turkey, Africa, Mongolia, Afghanistan, and one fateful day, Pakistan.

Muhammad Rafiq was a young man then, a captain in the Pakistan Army under the direction of a zealous Brigadier. The war against Saddam Hussein dubbed by the Americans as Desert Storm was well under way and Rafiq had been called to assist the coalition forces on the ground.

Rafiq, whose father had just passed, preferred to remain close to home until he could make arrangements for his mother and sister, but it was not to be. The Brigadier was thirsty for rank and nothing elevated rank like a war. Rafiq’s absence was unavoidable and ultimately disastrous, for it was during his two year absence that Vladek set his eyes on Rafiq’s sister, A’noud. By the time Rafiq returned with the happy news that he had earned the rank of Lieutenant Colonel, his mother had already been murdered six months earlier and his sister was missing.

Assuming responsibility, Rafiq devoted what resources were available to him to discovering the identity of his mother’s murderer. He followed every lead, chased every rumor trying to ascertain if his sister might still be alive.

It took Rafiq three years to hear the name Vladek Rostrovich. After murdering Rafiq’s mother, he’d taken A’noud, but apparently, he’d tired of her after a short while. He had retired her to a brothel, established by him in Tehran.

Rafiq went to Tehran, but like his mother, A’noud had been dead long before he had arrived to rescue her. With his hope of finding her alive scattered like ashes in the wind, his fervor for vengeance only grew. He was going to burn the brothel to the ground, kill every patron and save the proprietor for last. If he was later court-martialed and put to death, it was a risk he was willing to take.

But then, he heard a sound, so unspeakably horrible it gave voice to his own suffering. He followed the screaming to a door that would change everything: huddled in blood and filth, darkness pulled tight around his small, shaking, angry form was a boy in desperate need of a doctor. A boy the proprietor called kéleb – dog.

Pained, disgusted, and mourning his sister, Rafiq recognized the look in the kéleb’s eyes. They were eyes that knew the anguish of being unspeakably wronged. They longed for a death that could not come too soon. Rafiq offered to purchase the boy from the proprietor who warned him the boy was likely near death and he would not offer a refund. Rafiq accepted the terms and carefully wrapped the wounded, mewling dog in linen so he could take him to the hospital.

Kéleb had been incredibly mistrusting at first, unconvinced that Rafiq did not desire from him all the things as the rest. He attacked Rafiq repeatedly, punching, scratching, and kicking wildly with no concern for how he injured himself in the process. Rafiq had felt for him, but he was also impatient and unwilling to suffer the repeated attacks of an angry teenager. Rafiq used force to calm him down, until he could be reasoned with.

It wasn’t until Rafiq offered him a taste of something he thirsted for, that Kéleb became something more than his fear. Under cover of darkness, Kéleb had learned to kill for the very first time. It was too easy, over too fast. While Rafiq stood guard at the door, Kéleb shot and killed the man who had tormented him for most of his life. He had stood over the body, admiring the large hole that was once Narweh’s face. In his hand, he held the .44 Magnum Rafiq had let him borrow for the auspicious occasion.

The gun had been given to him by an American officer as a show of gratitude for Rafiq saving his life. Rafiq said it was “Dirty Harry’s” gun, but Kéleb did not know this man. He only knew that the damn thing had thrown him backward onto the ground. He’d missed the spectacle of Narweh’s face exploding, only appreciated the damage afterward. Whoever Dirty Harry was, Kéleb admired his weaponry.

Later that evening, Rafiq had relinquished ownership of Dirty Harry’s gun to Kéleb and confided in him the story of how he’d come to find him that day in Tehran. Rafiq spoke about his mother and sister, of the futility of his search for Vladek, but mostly, his passion for revenge.

When he was finished, an alliance was formed, a pact so solid, it made everything else irrelevant. That night, after the boy confessed to having no recollection of any name butdog, Rafiq renamed the boy Caleb – the loyal disciple.

***

Caleb blinked; the water had grown cold against his skin. He stepped out of the shower, feeling as though it had been useless. It had been twelve years since that night in Tehran. Twelve years. Five, since he had last questioned why he was doing one thing or another.

In the beginning, when he’d been a young man shadowing a powerful Pakistani military officer, speculation about their relationship and Caleb’s past had run rampant. Life’s lessons came in ways that were unexpected, though, now, as a man, he knew some of them had been inevitable. Like the day Rafiq had taught Caleb to mitigate rumors by putting the loudest voice to rest – permanently. It had been harder than killing Narweh, but easier than he’d thought it would be. The men who spoke of such things were not good men and it made them easier to kill. But regardless, the hushed whispers, the condescending smiles and speculative gazes told him that there were still those whom doubted his motives and authenticity in their world.

Respect came at a very high price in the criminal world, even more so in the Middle East, and especially for a Westerner like Caleb. There could be no half way, Rafiq would remind him; it was all in, or nothing. If Caleb stood any chance of finding Vladek, he would have to venture into his world. Thus began his journey into the world of training pleasure slaves.

He tossed the towel aside, walking from the far side of his bedroom, past his bed to the large windows. He pulled the curtain aside, staring out. Stars, a dark horizon; the black veil of night and a moon unwilling to show itself.

The journey had not been an easy one. It was easier to kill guilty men than sell innocent women. It was an education in callousness and single-mindedness, and choosing a path that promised obliteration of the soul. Despite all this, Caleb had ventured forward.

He trained them with Rafiq’s help at first, then on his own. And with every slave Caleb brought to auction he gained recognition in the seedy world of sex for sale. With every wealthy, well-to-do, duplicitous business man that boasted of Caleb’s prowess, he gained more footing among the underworld elite. With every success, he delved deeper into the dark and closer, he had hoped, to finding Vladek.