Pent Up by Damon Suede Read Free Book Online Page B

from her knees. “No hernia.”
    Ruben swallowed and turned. In the mirror he could see Bauer’s blush.
    “Broad in the back. Arms too. Serious rugby legs, papá .” Joysann stood and jotted numbers in her little journal. She blinked at Ruben. “I’m impressed you got him outta the house.”
    In the mirror Bauer blinked, and a strange expression locked his oversquare jaw for a minute.
    Huh. File that away.
    She tipped her head and scanned Ruben’s physique. “Definitely no Italians and no Japanese. Hugo Boss, I’ll bet. Maybe Paul Smith.” She bit her slick lower lip.
    Ruben let her slide a double-breasted navy blazer onto him. He’d never even touched clothes this expensive. Light and crisp on his shoulders. He looked taller in the mirror.
    Apparently Joysann disagreed, squenching her face like a cat’s butthole. “Ugh. Those buttons. I knew the double breasted would suck.”
    Bauer agreed with her. “Slicko. Sleazo.”
    Ruben stayed mum. The fuck do I know? Florida wasn’t known for its elegance. And bodyguards didn’t wear double-breasted ’cause they made drawing a weapon near impossible. Single breasted you could get to a shoulder or hip holster. Either way, Joysann nixed it.
    She tugged the offending garment off him and rehung it, returning with another: gray polished cotton with three buttons.
    Even pushing his arms into the sleeves and letting Joysann settle the lapel, Ruben could feel the difference. “Oh my God.” The words slipped out on an exhale of the jittery splurge excitement fizzing in him. “That feels fantastic.” This one looked so good that his dick seemed bigger.
    “You like?” Joysann returned with a clacking handful of hangers and let Bauer fuss at Ruben’s back.
    He tugged at the vents; his fingers brushed over Ruben’s ass but Ruben pretended not to notice. “Color’s great, but it’s a little, I dunno, real estate agent.”
    “You must be a good friend.” She explained to Ruben, “He’s being an asshole, trying to impress you.”
    “I’m impressed.”
    “I’m crushed.” Bauer covered his heart. “Ruben is one of my oldest friends, and he doesn’t want to spend a week in New York naked.”
    Ruben grinned at her as she peeled the gray off him. “Not the whole weekend.”
    Joysann tapped her teeth with the pen, taking another look at the rack. “And this is the Boss.”
    Another summer wool, this one with a tonal pinstripe, black on black. Bauer nodded.
    On the hanger, Ruben thought it looked kind of meh . Expensive, sure, but he wasn’t going to a funeral. And then Joysann settled it on him.
    Wings. The jacket held him aloft.
    In the mirror, Ruben saw a warrior, a hitman, an archangel. He didn’t hesitate. “We’ll take it.”
    Bauer laughed loud, his white teeth glinting as he ran a firm hand down Ruben’s back right to the top of the boxer briefs. “Okay, then.” He turned to Joysann with his dimples carved hard. “We have a winner.”
    The jacket exuded the kind of calm sophistication Ruben had envied his whole life. “Joysann, I think I just died. You’re an angel,” Ruben gabbled like a teenager. He couldn’t help it. He turned to preen and gloat.
    “I wouldn’t say angel, Mr. Oso.” Joysann stared at his bunching thighs and calves.
    Oops. Yeah. Underpants. Embarrassing.
    Again, Bauer smoothed the back of the coat over Ruben’s spine slowly, brushing hard with his hand from neck to the curve of Ruben’s butt.
    She shrugged. “Hugo Boss. I had a hunch.” She made him try on two more with the same label: a slate gray and a three-piece olive check. A phone rang on the wall and she answered it.
    Bauer tugged at the vent and brushed the back. “Boss.”
    Feeling awkward, Ruben watched his own muscular legs in the mirror. “I never understood why people get so weird about clothes. Till now.” He tightened his quads and pretended he couldn’t feel the shopgirl’s frank appraisal. Pushy broads always turned his crank.
    Bauer lifted one lapel