Stuff (The Bristol Collection) (2 page)

Shaz just harrumphed, but Bex got this thoughtful look on her face. “Yeah, maybe you’re right. I mean, even if Daniel Crossman really wants to come on my face, I don’t have to let him, do I?”

“Fucking tosspot, he is,” Shaz muttered.

“Yeah, but a hot one.”

They continued to argue over just how hot this Daniel fella was all the way through the main arcade of Cabot Circus, and Mas had to stifle his sigh of relief when they’d passed out the other side and turned the corner. “Reckon I’ll be okay from here. Thanks, girls.” He handed back Shaz’s hoodie with a flourish, and kissed them both on the cheek. Bex just took it as her due, but Shaz seemed genuinely touched. “Thanks, love,” he said. “You’re a star. I know you must have been chilly without it.”

Shaz just shrugged and wouldn’t meet his eyes. It was kind of hard to tell with her dark skin, but he could have sworn she was blushing.

The walk back to Stokes Croft didn’t take long, but rather than follow the main road like he usually would, Mas turned down into St Paul’s. Not a neighbourhood he’d normally walk through on his own—not at night, anyway—but there’d be less chance of him being spotted if Walter was still prowling around. At this time of day, St Paul’s didn’t seem so bad. The hookers were still in bed, and the rundown houses looked kind of cheerful with their pastel colours glowing in the March sun. It had always reminded him of a seaside town, all these terraces of old painted houses with great big bay windows and tiny front gardens. Shame Bristol didn’t actually have a beach. He could have done with somewhere decent to sunbathe.

Especially now he didn’t have a job.

Shit. Was he even going to get a reference from Penny after the whole perfume-thieving incident?

Mas turned the corner into City Road, so absorbed in his problems he almost missed the figure standing outside his building at the other end. Good thing Walter was so big. He had a way of standing out wherever he was.

Mas ducked into a recessed shop doorway, just as Walter started to turn in his direction. Would he still be able to see him through the glass of the display window? If Mas could see him, there was a pretty good chance he could be spotted himself.

Only one thing for it. Mas pushed open the door and entered the shop.

Chapter Two

A bell tinkled, announcing Mas’s entrance.
Cabbages and Kinks
, the hand-lettered sign on the door had announced, in an elegant script. What the hell was this place? Mas peered around as his eyes adjusted to the gloom, his nose wrinkling at the musty pong of mothballs. Both windows were blocked off by high screens, and the room was stuffed right up to the high ceiling with racks and racks of dark clothing. A chandelier hung from the ornate ceiling rose, but not one of those dangly crystally jobbies like they had at Crowther’s. This one appeared to be made of antlers festooned with cobwebs, only one of the bulbs giving off a feeble glow. The shop looked like the place where clothes came to die.

But when Mas took a closer look at the clothing, expecting to find ragged tatters and the ghosts of office parties past, the garments turned out to have life in them yet. He fingered the cloth of a pair of trousers hanging over the end of one of the free-standing rails in the middle of the room. He’d expected rough and scratchy wool, but the texture was silky. He picked them up to take a closer look. They were a burgundy tweed, lined in a soft cotton with a fine pink stripe, and the only label he could find announced Matherson Bros, Tunbridge Wells.

“Never heard of them,” he muttered to himself, still examining the cloth and the stitching. The style was like something you’d see in a period drama, and from what he could see, the label had been stitched on by hand. Just how old were these clothes? And where the hell was an assistant so he could ask? “Hello? Anyone here?” He waited, hearing nothing. The shop was weirdly silent for the city, perhaps coz of all those old clothes deadening the sound. “Hello?” he called again before raising his voice and trying a few more times.

“Yes, yes, I’m coming. I knew I should have locked the place.” A face poked around a curtain in the corner of the room. The suspicious and fairly hostile expression melted away as he took Mas in, then cleared his throat and came all the way through the curtain. There was a tall, lanky body to go with the wild shock of reddish hair and a ridiculously plummy accent. “There was really no need to shout.”

“Yeah, well, I couldn’t see anyone here. You could lose trade that way, mate. Gotta greet ’em at the door. Make ’em feel welcome. First rule of customer service that is. Or was that ‘the customer is always right’? Either way, you’ve gotta admit I’m in the right.” Mas grinned to show the bloke he was only teasing, and got a slightly cross-eyed stare for his trouble.

The man had probably the most bizarre dress sense Mas had ever come across, and he had some totally colour-blind, fashion-victim friends. But this bloke wasn’t in eye-watering neon Lycra club gear. No, he did quirky in a way that was simultaneously both more far out and more traditional, if such a thing were possible. He had on an old red military jacket—the sort that was all covered in braid and shiny buttons. Add in the lightweight linen collarless shirt and black waistcoat, and he looked like he was headed out to a pirate fancy dress party. It was just a shame he didn’t have the britches and long boots. The plain black trousers looked like a nice quality, though. Wool, Mas would guess, and he liked to think he had a pretty expert eye after spending the last year working in Crowther’s menswear department.

“Arrr, me laddie. You just need an eyepatch and a parrot to finish that outfit off,” he said. “Maybe a wig too, although it would be a shame to cover up that mad hair.”

“A wig? What on earth do you mean?”

“You know, to give you a proper Jack Sparrow vibe. You are dressing up as a pirate, right?”

“Umm, no.”

“Oops. My bad.” Mas gave his best “whoops!” smile, and the man flushed. It shouldn’t have been so appealing what with him being a redhead, but instead of going beet red all over, he just got these two stripes of colour across his cheekbones. High, fine cheekbones to go with the jutting jawline and sharp nose, Mas noted with approval. Not a classically handsome face, but definitely a memorable one. But why was he blushing? Mas reviewed what he’d said. Not the Jack Sparrow crack, surely? You didn’t dress like this if you were embarrassed by comments. Oh. Unless it was all round general social awkwardness. A bit like Jasper, Mas’s sort-of ex.

A flare of interest sparked inside Mas. Mr. Cheekbones had just gone from interesting to fascinating. Fuck knew why shy guys turned him on, but there was something about blushes and stammers that was like catnip to him. Maybe it was the way other blokes underestimated them. Mas always got to feel like he was discovering a hidden treasure, and they were usually well worth the extra bit of time it took to get them into bed.

“So what’s the deal with this place?” Mas asked, trying for something less personal. Let Mr. Cheekbones relax a bit before risking embarrassing him again. “
Cabbages and Kinks
is a pretty weird name. I don’t see any cabbages around, although I’m thinking you might have a bit of a vintage clothing kink.”

Mr. Cheekbones flushed darker but gave Mas a defiant glare. “I like well-made clothes. They don’t have to be old, but they’re harder to find these days. Most garments are made of cheap fabric, shoddily stitched together by Chinese children. You get what you pay for, and the vast majority of consumers don’t want to pay a little extra for quality.”

Mas threw his hands up. “Hey, I’m not arguing with you. We’re on the same side here. Got to say, I love a man in well-put-together clothing.” He let his gaze rake up and down Mr. Cheekbones’s body, because he definitely wasn’t getting a straight vibe off this one.

But if Mr. Cheekbones was into men, he wasn’t falling for the bait. Not a problem. The shy ones were fun to flirt with, after all, and if Mas kept it up for long enough, he might get a glimmer of interest. He picked up the pair of trousers he’d been examining earlier. “So, how much are these? Couldn’t find a price tag anywhere.”

“No, I don’t tag things.” The man held out his hands, and Mas pressed the fabric into them. He watched as Mr. Cheekbones swiftly examined them with long, nimble fingers. “Oh yes. Hand-tailored. 1930s, I’d guess. For you…” And now it was Mas’s turn to be examined, although not with those deft fingers, sadly. Mr. Cheekbones stared him up and down, but not like he wanted to rip Mas’s clothes off and push him down onto his knees. Instead he felt more like a commodity being appraised for resale value, and shifted uncomfortably, wondering what value his shopworn uniform and rip-off designer bag would stamp on him.

But Mr. Cheekbones’s eyes just widened as his gaze came back to rest on Mas’s face.

“For me?” Mas prompted when the silence had thickened from uncomfortable to slightly creepy.

“Oh. Umm, yes.” Mr. Cheekbones shook his head delicately, as if shaking loose an unwanted thought. “I’d say twenty-five pounds.”

“Twenty-five?” It probably amounted to a bargain, but with the rent overdue, it was an extravagance he could do without. He fingered the fabric regretfully. “I don’t know. But they’d look hot with my black silk shirt.” If they fit the way Mas thought they would, Grant wouldn’t be able to resist jumping his bones. Not that he put up any resistance as it was, so maybe that wasn’t all that much of a selling point.

“Twenty, then? I couldn’t go much lower than that. Overheads, you know. How about you try them on? See what you think?” Mr. Cheekbones looked surprised at himself, as if he hadn’t meant to say any of that.

Mas really should have a word with him about his sales technique, not to mention his woeful merchandising, but he took pity on the bloke. And besides, he really did want to try the trousers on. “You have a changing room somewhere?” Must be behind the curtain, because there sure as hell wasn’t a cubicle in this room.

“Oh, I, erm, no. I don’t. But there’s the next room you could use. So long as you stay in there. Don’t go wandering.”

“Okay. Just through here, then?” Mas strolled over to the curtain, a heavy, dusty red-and-gold brocade complete with moth-eaten fringe at the bottom.

“Don’t take too long.”

“Don’t worry. I’ve had a lot of practise at dropping my trousers.” Mas couldn’t resist winking as he let the curtain drop back behind him, over Mr. Cheekbones’s shocked face.

The curtain swished back behind the young man with the angelic face, and Perry let his body sag with relief. What the blazes had been going on there? The chap clearly wanted something more than the trousers, but figuring out what was beyond Perry’s limited people skills. Perhaps he’d been sent by Perry’s father to check up on him.

But no, that was just paranoia talking, wasn’t it? His father wouldn’t stoop to underhand dealings like that. In fact, his father would probably come himself so he could deliver a lecture. If he even cared enough to check up on what Perry was doing with his life.

“There a mirror in here anywhere?” a voice called from the other room, rousing Perry from visions of his father lecturing him about wasting his potential and shirking his responsibilities. The customer. Right. Concentrate on him, who most definitively wasn’t anything more than a casual browser, because there was no way his father would employ someone in such cheap clothing.

“A mirror?”

The man poked his head around the curtain, surprising Perry into taking a step backwards. “A big shiny reflective thing. Most clothes shops have them to let people see how things fit. I mean, I can tell they’re comfy and they look good from this angle, but it’s next to impossible to get a good view of my arse. Believe me, I’ve tried.”

Perry couldn’t stop himself taking a quick peek at the rear in question. He was no expert on men’s posteriors. He was no expert on women’s either, but he had an inkling that the rear in question would probably fit most people’s definition of attractive. The burgundy wool pulled tight over rounded buttocks. Too tight, actually. There were pull lines running across and spoiling the overall look. “They don’t fit quite right. At the back. You’d need more fabric there.”

“Are you saying my bum looks big in this?” The young man batted his long eyelashes at Perry and thrust his rear end even farther out. He’d split a seam if he wasn’t careful.

“It does look a little too large. But not in a bad way,” Perry rushed to add.

“Don’t worry, I’m not offended. I’m just flattered you noticed.”

Perry hesitated before replying. Were they flirting? He’d never flirted with a man before—not knowingly, anyway—but it felt a little like the awkward conversations he’d had with women he was trying to pick up in the past. Back in the days before he’d decided to ditch that whole confusing part of the proceedings and go straight to a professional instead. “I noticed,” he ended up mumbling. “Maybe we could find you something else that fits better.”

“Nah, you’re all right. I shouldn’t really be buying anything right now anyway. Just lost my job, didn’t I?”

“Dreadfully sorry to hear that.”

Now the man was grinning at him with quite the widest, toothiest smile Perry had ever seen. “You’re a posh one, aren’t you? What are you doing hanging out in a dump like this?”

It didn’t feel like an insult, coming from someone with an expression of what felt like genuine interest. And while he knew he should probably take offence, Perry had to face it, the shop was a dump. In the end, he just stuck his hand out. “Peregrine Cavendish-Fiennes at your service. And I own this dump. Well, the business side of it. Not the premises, unfortunately, and at this rate, I’m never likely to. I live upstairs.” Now he was babbling, while the man with the pretty smile and the well-formed rear was holding his hand and stroking his thumb across the back of his hand. Definitely not a platonic handshake, and it sent a strange kind of shiver all the way up Perry’s arm and down his spine, ending up somewhere in his groin.