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With an expression that clearly said he thought otherwise, the hot guy and his sandwiches retreated, along with Tristan’s hopes of maybe hooking up with him later.
A slim arm slid around Tristan’s waist. “What are you doing?”
“Offending Mr. Erskine’s relatives by mistaking them for his toyboys,” he said, leaning against Wei briefly. It wasn’t easy to do. She didn’t even come up to his shoulder. “What about you?”
Wei checked her watch. “I’m going to eat all the free food I can, then go and open the shop. Orlando wants to do a ‘Mr. Erskine is dead memorial sale’, whatever that is, so I should probably get there and put a stop to it before he does up the banners.”
“I think he’d probably have liked that.”
“Oh, I know he would.” Wei bit her lower lip, causing her piercing to dance. “But he owned the shop, did you know? And when I say he owned it, I mean he still ran it, hands-on—he took care of ordering all the stock and the bookkeeping. If Orlando sells everything, I have no idea how to order any more. Hell, I don’t even know if we’ll get paid this fortnight, because Mr. Erskine used to come around and give us actual pay envelopes—with real money in them, all crinkly and rolled up. I don’t think he ever used a computer in his life.”
“Did the money smell a little bit like Milo?”
Wei blinked at him. “Sometimes.”
Tristan thought fondly of Mr. Erskine and the way he’d settle himself in at the kitchen table every fortnight, and Tristan would make him a Bloody Mary then count out the rent money from the Milo tin. Mr. Erskine would insist that Tristan call him Jimmy, unzip a fancy pen from a fancy case he carried around with him and mark off the rent in a mysterious book. Then he’d painstakingly write out a receipt in his shaky, spidery handwriting. And they’d flirt. Tristan was going to miss it—more than he’d thought.
“I think he paid you with our rent money,” Tristan said. “I guess there’ll be some sort of probate and you’ll get paid somehow, but otherwise we’ll just raid the back rent that’s in the Milo tin and forge a receipt.”
Wei looked thoughtful. “Is that…legal?”
“I feel like Mr. Erskine would approve,” Tristan said, neatly sidestepping the question.
Wei nodded and squeezed him a little tighter before letting him go. “You’re right.”
They grabbed some finger sandwiches and napkins and moved to the side of the room. People murmured vague things at one another and stepped from conversation to conversation. Tristan saw that the divisions from the chapel still held in here. He had an idea that the stories people were swapping were very different, depending on which side of the room people stood on. The nephew was standing apart, and now that he thought about it, Tristan had a vague memory of Jimmy mentioning him, saying he was the best of the lot as far as family was concerned. Tristan felt bad now for upsetting him. He wondered if it would be tasteless to offer him an apology blow job.
“Darlings!” Miss O’Jenny announced loudly in the voice that could, and had, cut through a crowded bar on a pumping Saturday night. The buttoned-down relatives looked horrified, but that seemed to be a trait of theirs. “Ten o’clock tonight! The Palace! Drinks are on me and the girls, in honour of our darling Jimmy! Let’s put the fun back in funeral, because it’s what he would have wanted!”
Tristan smiled. He had a Bad Boyfriend gig at eight, but he’d be done by ten—it was a basic bad date—then he could go straight to the club. He could think of no better way to send off Mr. Erskine than by going to a club, getting wasted and hopefully getting laid.
Miss O’Jenny was right. It’s what he would have wanted.
Chapter Two
The Palace was a seedy-looking building on Darlinghurst Road, King’s Cross, sandwiched between a twenty-four-hour gym and a place that sold fried chicken. Maybe it had once been a nice building, but the windows had clearly been plastered over years ago, and the entire façade had been painted black. A flashing neon sign read “The Pa ace”. The L had burned out. The only light spilling out came from the narrow front door, illuminating, in rainbow strobes, the scary bouncer who stood there and glowered. As Leo Fisher watched, the bouncer stepped aside to let two glittery, sequined guys slip inside.
Leo had no idea what the hell he was doing here. It had seemed like a good idea, right up until the Uber had dropped him just down the road—because the funeral had been eye-opening. His parents and the rest of the family had always spoken about Great-Uncle Jimmy in vaguely disapproving terms, but up until being confronted by a funeral service full of drag queens, gay guys wearing body glitter and at least three butch lesbians in matching motorcycle leathers, Leo hadn’t really understood why. His parents weren’t homophobic, but they were, well, proper? Okay, they were snobby. They didn’t have a problem with Leo being gay, as long as he was the right sort of gay—unassuming and discreet—and it was obvious that Great-Uncle Jimmy had been the wrong sort of gay. The very, very wrong sort of gay.
The fun sort.
A part of Leo admired that. He wanted to know more about Uncle Jimmy, regretful that he hadn’t made more of an effort while he still could. They’d had a ‘meet three times a year at Christmas and family events’ kind of relationship, but Uncle Jimmy had always made time to talk to Leo, especially after he’d come out. From the time Leo had spent in his company, it was clear that Great-Uncle Jimmy hadn’t given a rat’s arse what anyone thought of him. Leo envied him, if he were honest. If he’d been braver, he might have asked what the secret to not caring was. Still, he was glad that Uncle Jimmy had filled his life with such an eclectic group of friends, ranging over an entire spectrum of ages, identities and genders. It seemed like he’d had an incredibly full life. Leo hoped that he’d be able to confirm that tonight.
If he ever worked up the courage to walk in the door of the place.
The street was busy even for a Wednesday night, and Leo was jostled by a group of young women with heels as high as their hemlines. They were all wearing plastic tiaras, and one of them was in a sash that proclaimed her the bride to be. She was shoving an entire hotdog in her mouth as she walked but still managed to mumble out an apology to Leo as she elbowed him on her way past.
The bouncer glared at him. This wasn’t, apparently, as hostile as Leo had assumed, because a second later he beckoned him over. “Hey, come here.”
Leo stepped forward, his heart thumping as loudly as the bass coming from inside the club.
The bouncer rolled his shoulders. The muscles in them were as big as boulders. He looked like the sort of terrifying guy that’d be the last thing an unfortunate soul would see if he failed to pay off a drug debt to a mobster. Then his face cracked with a smile. “First time?”
“Um…”
“It’s not that scary, mate,” the bouncer said. “Just a bunch of blokes dancing.”
“No, I know,” Leo said. “I’m already gay.”
