Sweat, and cigarette smoke, and overly expensive cologne assaulted Bruno’s nostrils until he almost gagged.

“Oi!” Frankie yelped, jumping back with a look of horror in his eyes. “Did you just touch my arse there?”

Bruno blinked. “Sorry?”

“Did he just touch my arse?” Frankie asked the other men in the shop.

“I think he might’ve, aye, Uncle Frankie,” Paco said, the words accompanied by a little cackle of glee.

“No, I did not touch… I did not.”

Frankie’s face fell. He stepped in closer, and it felt to Bruno like the air was humming between them. When he spoke, Frankie’s voice was empty of everything human. No inflection. No emotion. Just letters and words. “Aye, you did. You just touched my arse, you dirty old fuck.”

“I—”

“If you try to tell me you didn’t, I’ll put your face through that fucking window,” Frankie warned.

His voice may have been lacking emotion, but his eyes made up for it. They were glaring twin beams of pure rage up at the shopkeeper. Had they bulged any further, they’d surely have burst in their sockets.

And then, a smile spread across the smaller man’s face. A laugh cracked out of him like a whip, making Bruno flinch.

“I’m fucking noising you up, Bruno!” he jeered. He turned to his companions. “See his fucking face there? Totally shiteing himself!”

“Classic, Uncle Frankie! Totally classic! A belter! Pure magic! Totally—”

“Alright, alright, we get the fucking point,” Frankie snapped.

He pointed to a fridge next to the counter, and the big man stopped cracking his knuckles long enough to fetch a four-pack of Stella. Frankie held eye contact with Bruno as he took an offered can, cracked the ring-pull, then slaked his thirst with four big gulps and finished with a burp so loud he’d be talking about it for days.

“Don’t mind, do you, Bruno?” he asked, giving the half-empty can a shake. “Thirsty business, this.”

Bruno shook his head. What other choice did he have? “It is fine.”

“Where are my manners? You want one yourself?” Frankie asked.

The old man shook his head. “No,” he said, but he refused to add the, “thank you.”

“All the more for me, then,” Frankie said. He was still staring at the shopkeeper, and didn’t seem to have blinked in well over a minute. “Budge there doesn’t drink on duty, and Paco’s teetotal. Doesn’t drink at all. Tell him how no’.”

“Kills brain cells,” Paco explained.

Frankie grinned. “Kills fucking brain cells. And he should know, he’s got two Highers, or fucking… O-Levels, or whatever they’re called these days. Brains of the family, so he is.” He sniffed, snorted, then spat a wad of something green and chunky onto the floor. “Don’t know where he gets it, mind, his ma’s as thick as shit.”