The Golden Question

Sometimes the simplest of questions require the greatest amount of preparation.

"The golden question for this week the same as for last week?"

"Yep," my boss answered.

We were sitting in the office of the chief of station, the highest-ranking CIA agent in country, in the Nicosia, Cyprus, embassy and, as usual, I was trying to see if I could see anything at all through that small, rectangular bulletproof window beside his desk. It was a shame as gorgeous as the vistas of mountains in two directions were from the American embassy in Cyprus' capital that we were stuck with these security windows, which only gave the illusion that we weren't in a secure fortress. No one laughed about it, though. An ambassador had been shot dead a couple of decades ago through a window in the old embassy building.

"What is it exactly?" I asked. Each week the station got a new shopping list of intelligence questions for that embassy's region from CIA headquarters in Langley. The question at the top of the list was known as "the golden question." You got points from the chief of station, Ted Jamison being the one here in Nicosia, for providing the answer to any of the questions. But Ted was so hardnosed that only answering the golden one would earn a pat on the back. The said getting the answers to the other questions was our job—just what we were being paid for.

"The elite Maroon Beret commando unit of Turkey's 9th Corps, currently stationed on the Iran border, is moving to either the Iraq border or here—to the northern, Turkish zone of the island. The question is, which is it?"

"The importance being?"

"They have been undergoing special training in cross-border infiltration. Presumably the training is leading up to crossing someone else's border. Any way you cut it, that's not good for U.S. policy."

"And we know that how?" I asked. ". . . that they are getting such training."

"We know it because it's our own Green Berets who have trained them for such an operation. And that training includes covert redeployment."

"And we couldn't just ask the Turks where the unit is going?"

"Oh, certainly not. The Turks are among our most valuable—and sensitive—allies. They are probably aching for us to ask so that we can get embroiled on the consenting side. Either we'd have to agree with the action, or they'd claim we did and it would somehow leak that we knew about it in advance. If the unit is going to the Iraq border, it will be messing around with the Kurds, and we couldn't approve of that in the slightest, so we don't want to officially know anything about it. In the same vein we have to prepare for it if that's what is happening. The same thing here in Cyprus in spades. We don't want to officially know about anything, but we damn well better be prepared for what we're going to do about it. What we'd much prefer is for them to stay right there on the Iranian border and harass Tehran. But indications are that they will be on the move from there."

"And why do we think they may be coming here?"

"Satellite photography shows new construction at the Turkish army base on the mountainside below St. Hilarion castle and above Kyrenia. Why are you asking, Ron? You got an answer to this one?"

"Not that I can give right now. But one I think I can get. I think I can get to some of the soldiers at the base here. If there's construction, the soldiers will have some idea what's happening."

"Using your special services?"

"Yeah."

"You know how hard it is to get to mainland Turks assigned to the military based on the other side, don't you? They're kept on a short leash. Rarely let off base. Never in fewer than groups of three—to keep each other in line."

"Yeah, I know. But I may have a way. They may be on a short leash, but Turks are well known to be randy—and to like variety. And to consider any hole as worthy to be filled." Ted was right, though. The troops on the Turkish-held northern coast of Cyprus, with the lower two-thirds a Greek republic, had proved impossible to pick off one by one for intell purposes.

"More power to you then. What do you need?"

"A few days loose from anything else. And can Logs fix up two bottles of Johnny Walker Red for me?"

"Knockout or lethal?"

"Slow-working knockout would be best—both of them. I'll be on the other side for a few days. Can I use the beach house at Karavas?"

"Sure, as long as you don't bring any men back there. Don't want it being noticed."

"Right, Ted, we wouldn't want the Agency connected with any gay activity, would we? Even to get a golden question answered."

We both laughed. The irony of homosexuality being a cause for instant dismissal laid against the Agency having a "candy" unit to use that basic preference to its advantage wasn't lost on either of us. Still it was a thin wire for anyone in that unit to walk. At any point that the Agency decided it wanted to separate you, it could be quickly accomplished.

* * * *

I had formed the idea of how to get around the short leashes on the Turkish soldiers problem while I was fucking Musa on a lounge bed beside the pool at Angie on the Rocks the previous day. The Angie of the club's name was a zaftig British expatriate prostitute who had come into some money and opened a Mediterranean-side pool bar at Lapithos on the northern Cyprus coast to the west of Karavas, which itself was to the west of the picturesque medieval harbor town of Kyrenia.

I enjoyed fucking Musa. He was young, not long legal, and berry-brown, the result of a Turkish mother and Moroccan father. Nicely formed, lithe, and fully compliant. But what I enjoyed most about Musa was that others who frequented the well-fenced off pool bar enjoyed fucking Musa too and found him to be as good a listener as a lay. Angie had a great layout here. There was a nice-sized pool with a lot of terracing around it, poised on the rocks above the Mediterranean surf. Off to one side was a restaurant area under a long, covered verandah. And on the land side of that were a kitchen area and a set of small rooms, where Angie and her waiters and waitresses made extra money on their backs. The flat for Angie and her Turkish Cypriot policeman husband—the perfect spouse for a business like Angie had—was above these rooms. That the husband made extra money himself by filming the activity in the pool area below from his bedroom window and selling the videos on the streets of Istanbul was something that few knew. I knew, however, and always managed to do my fucking on lounge beds out of range of that window.

The glory for me of Musa being such a draw for others was that the pool bar was considered the exclusive domain of expatriates living in northern Cyprus and UN soldiers and the diplomatic community from Nicosia on the other side of the guarded Green Line between the Greek and Turkish zones. Diplomats could traverse this border and came here to escape the glare of the attention in Nicosia. And here they murmured of the problems of their workday as they lay on their backs and Musa rode their cocks.

Musa, one of Angie's waiters, one who specialized in taking care of the male clientele, was an asset I ran, one of my sources for information on what happened behind the scenes in Cypriot affairs and in embassies located in Cyprus. But Musa also liked the cock. And he really liked my cock, so a combination of money and attention kept Musa happy and me fed with a couple of useful reports home whenever I had a chance to go north for a swim.

On this night, Musa was comparing my cocking to that of Turkish soldiers, complementing me on taking my time and giving him as much attention as he was giving me—but, as an afterthought, saying that rough sex with a grin and no frills was nice to have occasionally too. I was agreeing with him on Turkish men in general. No one fucked with gusto and a smile like a Turkish Cypriot man did. And young Turkish Cypriot men had the bodies of gods, often pleasantly hirsute, until their late twenties, when, almost universally but not always, they quickly began to deteriorate into either a leather balloon or an emaciated bag of bones. At any age, though, they cocked with gusto and few, if any, inhibitions, all white-teeth smiles in grinning brown faces and vigorous thrusting. If you liked to be manhandled and taken hard, but not in anger, a young Turkish Cypriot man was what you wanted.

But then it hit me. He was talking about Turkish soldiers.

"You mean mainland Turkish soldiers?" I asked. Raising myself on the hands planted on either side of his chest on the lounge bed and pulling my cock up to where the bulb was lodged just inside the entrance. He was panting hard and had the heels of his feet dug into the small of my back above where my buttocks flared out.

"Oh, god, don't stop. Finish me. I almost was there," he whined, digging his fingernails into my shoulder blades.

"You mean mainland Turkish soldiers?" I asked again, more insistently. "Tell me and I'll finish you."

"Yes. Soldiers from the base on the side of the mountain below St. Hilarion."

Mainland Turkish men could be even more arousing and fulfilling than a Turkish Cypriot man if you wanted to be overpowered and taken brutally. "When were you fucked by Turkish soldiers from there? They hold their soldiers close."

"Every Tuesday afternoon. They let them out in threes occasionally. Turkish soldiers are as randy as any and they sometimes get tired of fucking each other. God, let me have the cock. I'm almost there."

"But you. How do they get to you?"

"The same three, every Tuesday. Angie has a deal with them. She supplies booze for the commander, a Colonel Erlugu, up there. He sends soldiers to pick it up. On foot. I meet them just off the road up to St. Hilarion, in a pasture. The soldiers pay me for a fuck and an extra bottle. They like Johnny Walker Red. They are tight with each other, like to talk about bodybuilding and flashy American cars while they fuck me and . . . and . . ."

"And what, Musa?"

"Oh shit, don't leave me this way. Fuck me. Oh, god, yes!"

Once, twice, three times I dove my cock deep inside him, twisted it with the revolving of my hips and pulled back up.

"And what, Musa?"

"And they fuck rough. They like to take turns doubling. It sometimes takes me to the next Tuesday to recover. But when you've been fucked by a Turkish soldier, you've been fucked. Oh yes, please, yes, like that. Yessss!"

I fucked him hard as he writhed and panted under me—and then fired off up my belly—forgetting, I hoped, anything but the fucking he had gotten.

"God, almost like a Turkish soldier," he murmured when we were done. I took it as a compliment.

* * * *

The afternoon after getting the "go" from Ted, I pulled up in my BMW convertible to a rambling beach house on a nearly deserted stretch of beach between Salamis and Famagusta on the east coast of Cyprus, still in the Turkish Cypriot zone. I parked next to a bright red 1959 Cadillac convertible—the one with the outrageous tail fins—that was in pristine condition. Looking out toward the Mediterranean, I saw Onur sitting at his easel, facing out to sea and painting. The multicolored caftan he was wearing, which was billowing in the wind, was more arresting in color than the paints being applied to the canvas. He wore a white turban on his head, the end of which was loose and was beating on his cheek in the air currents. He didn't seem to notice.

I took my shoes and socks off, stowed them on the trunk of my car, and then walked down the beach and stood behind him. I looked out to sea, where a large sailing yacht was bobbing up and down, and then at the canvas where the naked figure of a young man was appearing. No sign of water or a boat on the canvas. The young man was very nicely equipped, though. Onur was especially fond of nice equipment on a young man and I was always flattered when he told me I was one of his nicest young men.

"What is it you want, Ron?" he asked me in a low, bass voice. He hadn't turned around to see me either arrive in the car or walk down the beach to him, as far as I could see. "Mustafa is off in Istanbul, accompanying the prime minister. He's been gone since the last time you visited."

Ah, so he hadn't forgiven me yet for having caught me with Mustafa on the beach that night.

"I know. I just came to visit. I'm lonely for the company of crazy old men. I see that Sami is gone too." I recognized the model in Onur's painting. It was his sometimes houseboy, who easily got into a snit and went back to his boyfriend in Famagusta, only to return to Onur when he got hungry—and into a snit over something his boyfriend had or had not done.

"He's been gone a week this time."

"And you've had no one to . . . model for you since then? You know I could—"

"You'd have to take off more than those shoes and socks."

"If it will make you forget about that night on the beach. It was your fault anyway—that cheap wine."

He sketched me reclining on the low wall of the long loggia that ran across the sea side of the sand dune-hugging villa. I was leaning on a Moorish column, one leg on the wall, knee bent and my seaward side arm propped on the knee. My other leg stretching down to the tiles on the floor of the loggia, my toes reaching for the floor. My landside arm stretched loosely onto the thigh of my stretched leg, the fingers of my hand, at Onur's direction, pointing to the goods dangling between my legs. I was half hard, also at Onur's request, although I had to dredge up some pretty exotic thoughts to become that way.

"Very nice," he said after about twenty minutes. I knew he was referring to my half hard-on and I also knew he had the sketch finished then. He always was in a trance while he was painting or sketching.

I came around to his side of the easel and gave a little laugh. Everything was done in subdued, almost sketchy strokes except for my package, which was drawn in great detail. Still, it was a masterful work, something to respect as well as chuckle at. "Not too subtle," I said.

And it wasn't subtle. He wanted me to fuck him. I probably wouldn't be forgiven for Mustafa until I had done so.

"When a young man is as hung as you are," he said, "I like to focus on what is important. Now, what is it you want from me, Ron? And what else are you willing to do for me to get it?"

Onur was another one of my regular assets. The wrist he had a pulse on that was of interest to me was the man named Mustafa, who now was personal secretary to the Turkish Cypriot prime minister. Mustafa had been initiated by Onur decades before, and the man had remained close to Onur ever since. That had been a specialty of Onur's. Initiating young men. Garish and flamboyant, from a wealthy merchant family but with a genuine talent for art—especially for nudes of young men, Onur was an institution of decadence in Cyprus. He left at the first hint of a Turkish invasion and the resulting division of the island and had come back to retire quietly in one of his family's villas after an arrest and imprisonment on the Turkish mainland for debauchery and sodomy—apparently of young men in families that were too powerful with sons who were a bit too young.

He was a large man, thickish of waist now, but still solidly built. He once had been beautiful and had had no trouble being a pied piper to young and curious and beautiful themselves barely men. Not yet completely gray, he had a beard and mustache to be proud of and a hairy chest, arms, and calves. There was no hair on his head, though. He was bald, which was the reason that he had worn a turban for decades. He was still a man who was vain about his appearance and used deflections to take the eye away from what no longer was perfection in his body—an earring, multiple rings on his finger, and, when the caftan came off, nipple rings and a gold serpentine band encircling his cock, the tail wrapped around the base of the balls and a cobra head flaring over the bulb.

He had taken the caftan—but not the turban—off when he'd started to sketch me. He obviously hadn't been fucked—receiving now being his favored position—since Sami had wafted off in a snit. And Onur, even at sixty, was a highly sexed man. Despite his nonchalance, he was happy I had come to see him. In his own way, he was trying to seduce me. He wanted me to fuck him. This sketching of me in the nude and his disrobing with the excuse that it was hot in the loggia were foreplay.

After many an encounter such as this, we understood each other perfectly.

I wanted a favor from him, so I would fuck him. I would have fucked him just out of friendship. I was fond of him in terms that went beyond his usefulness as an intell source. Knowing what the Turkish Cypriot prime minister was thinking and doing was fine and helped pay for my usefulness in the station, but in all the time I'd been in Cyprus, we hadn't received a golden question about the Turkish Cypriot prime minister. Washington didn't seem to give two fucks about the Turkish Cypriot prime minister. The mainland Turks controlled Turkish Cyprus.

"Stop asking me what I want, Onur. Can't a man drive all the way across Cyprus just because he fancies a blow job from an old friend? Don't you realize how irresistible you are?"

Onur put his sketching pencil down and looked up at me, glowering at me from under his bushy salt-and-pepper eyebrows. He had a slight smile on his face. "Fuck you, Ron," he said. But he had that slight smile on his lips.

"No, fuck you Onur. But you really must be quick about it. This cock can go either way in a hurry. Hard or soft. Which do you want?"

I had unconsciously returned to my pose on the loggia wall after taking a look at the sketch. He came to me and knelt next to my extended leg, cupping my balls in one hand while letting the other glide up to my chest and find a nipple. His mouth took all of my cock. It would have been a chore for most men. But Onur wasn't most men. Swallowing cock whole was a specialty of his. I leaned back into the Moorish column, moved the leg that had been posed, bent on the low wall, to rest on his broad shoulder, closed my eyes, and let him take me to arousal heaven.

I fucked him on his throw pillow-strewn studio couch, taking him from behind as we lay on our sides. I held his upper leg up to give me deep penetration inside him. He particularly enjoyed deep penetration and always complimented me on being able to reach farther into him than most men. He sighed and panted lightly and purred as I stroked him slowly at first and then giving him the impression I knew he loved of losing control in the fuck pushed him over on his belly, straddled his hips, and rode him hard. He ejaculated before I did and was reduced to deep moans and expressions of pleasure as I focused on finishing myself. After I shot off, I lay close on top of him, my cock still buried inside his ass, kissed the hollow of his neck, and let my hands play in the thick hair of his forearms.

I knew he loved this attention afterward. Something, along with the inability to fuck hard, Sami had yet to master. I didn't care if Sami never learned to master it. I wanted Onur always to be happy to see me when I came to milk him for intell.

He turned his face to me, we kissed, he murmured his appreciation for the attention to an old man, and then he gave me that glower of his. "Now can you tell me what you want of me?"

"I want to borrow the Cadillac for a few days. I'll leave the BMW here. You can drive it into Famagusta and bring Sami back. He loves the BMW."

"I allow no one to drive the Cadillac. You know that."

"Which is why it needs the exercise." I knew he was just posing. For a fuck from me, he'd give or do just about anything. He always had before.

"Perhaps. Perhaps with a bit more persuading."

"You know I always give you a second one—when you give me what I want," I murmured. And, indeed, we both could tell that I was managing to go hard inside him again.