Rising Tiger: A Thriller (57)

Durrani became so good at manipulating people that he didn’t even need to think about it. It had become second nature to him.

He had all the makings of a perfect intelligence operative—remorseless, adaptable, and highly intelligent. And as was so often the case in the spy business, it took one to know one.

Shortly before his eighteenth birthday, Durrani was recruited by an ISI officer working out of Pakistan’s embassy to the United States—his father’s new posting.

The older man had struck up a friendship with Durrani over the Japanese game of strategy known as Go. Since leaving Tokyo, the teen had not had anyone to play with and the ISI officer had been a fan of the game for years.

He enjoyed being challenged by the teen and used the game to teach the young man about statecraft. Durrani was a quick study.

They stayed in touch while the young man attended university and upon graduation, the ISI officer made him an offer that was too good to turn down.

Durrani went through two years of intense, specialized military and intelligence training. He was then apprenticed under the older man, who taught him everything he knew.

The young man had dark hair, brown eyes, and an olive, rather than brown, complexion—provided he took care to stay out of the sun. His features allowed for him to pass as a member of any number of ethnic groups throughout South Asia, as well as in Europe, America, and the Middle East.

Eventually, Durrani had come to be based in India. His cover was working for an international aid organization based in New Delhi.

His work colleagues at the organization were a mix of Hindus and Muslims, so his faith, including his regular attendance of worship services at a local mosque, was not seen as unusual.

Via his credentials, he was able to move in and out of places like Kashmir, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, and Nepal—not to mention all over India—with ease. He was an incredible asset to the ISI. But he also had a very disturbing shortcoming.

Technically, he had two. And clinically speaking, both were fixations.

The first, dacryphilia, was one of the most unusual sexual fixations known to mankind. It was a state of arousal brought about by the sight of tears or the sound of someone crying.

What made dacryphilia, also known as dacrylagnia, so unusual was that the scent of a woman’s tears was known to lower testosterone and sexual desire in men.

This fetish was most often present in sadists who took pleasure in seeing others humiliated or in some sort of physical or emotional pain.

His other fixation was known as acrotomophilia—sexual interest in amputees. He found stumps incredibly erotic.

Put the two fetishes together—dacryphilia and acrotomophilia—and you had one very hard itch to “scratch.” Crying, amputee sex workers didn’t exactly grow on trees. Durrani, however, was resourceful. Better stated, he was well-connected. And in the world of rare and unusual sexual delights, the game was all about being as well-connected as possible.

As was the case with many spies, Durrani got some of his best information from others in the espionage game. That was how he had found a rather unique establishment in Bucharest called the “Terrace Club.”

Because of the friendly relationship between their two countries, many Romanian officers cycled through Pakistan’s School of Military Intelligence, outside Islamabad. That was where Durrani had met Alexandru Suliman. The two had established a nice friendship—or at least that was what Suliman had thought.

Wanting to further the relationship and see what intel he could pull from him, the ISI had sent Durrani to visit Suliman the following year. That was when his Romanian colleague had introduced him to the Terrace Club.

It was a veritable garden of mild to wild pleasures. Anything could be had at the Terrace, for the right price. And if they didn’t have it, they would get it. The options were limited only by a customer’s imagination, and his or her bank account.

The club was housed in a former palace built in French Neoclassic style by a family of famous Romanian bankers in the late nineteenth century. In addition to its walled grounds and broad granite terrace, it boasted forty bedrooms—perfect for a members-only sex club coupled with a particularly high-end bordello.

The price had been right as well. Because many places in Bucharest had been built on top of Roman ruins, some buildings ended up developing structural issues. The Terrace Club was one of them. Not only were many of the doorframes inside not right, but outside, the palace was quite visibly askew. Members liked to joke that the club tilted toward the wild side, which very much applied to Durrani.

As good as he was at controlling everything else, his sexual impulses, once indulged, began to take on a life of their own. They were an absolute addiction.

He didn’t stumble into dacryphilia and acrotomophilia right away, but it didn’t take him long to get there. Like any addict, each time he partook, he craved a bigger and more intense high.

His addiction both unnerved and excited him. In a world that appeared to him mostly in shades of gray, the Terrace Club provided amazingly bright and incredibly brilliant pops of color.

The only way he could fully “control” his addiction was to make a deal with himself. He would limit the indulgence of his predilections solely to his visits to Bucharest. At the club, and nowhere else, would he allow himself to be so disinhibited.

He started visiting multiple times a year. It required both lying and stealing. He found clever ways to extract money from the ISI for nonexistent operations, while simultaneously claiming to be anywhere but Bucharest when he was there.