CHAPTER 6 #2
“Do you know who’s haunting it?” I piped up casually. The man only turned to give me a look that said, Why the fuck would I know that? So, I crossed my arms defensively and grumbled, “Just wondering. What if it’s somebody famous or something. That would be pretty cool.”
The man scoffed, “Do you honestly believe if something came in haunted by a famous person, that we would sell it on the floor?”
I didn’t deign that with a response.
When he stopped in front of the shelf, I peered over his shoulder and saw the dishes. They matched the photo exactly.
“We’ll take them,” I told him, eager to get to browsing with Cam.
“Splendid. I will package them up for you. For an upcharge, we can include our ghost-don’t-be-gone padding. It ensures you will not lose the ghost while in transit or your money back.”
“What’s the upcharge?” I asked, then immediately waved my hand, “Nope, doesn’t matter. Yes, ghost padding please.”
The man grinned and shuffled behind the counter to gather the packaging supplies. I turned to Cam and muttered,
“If I bring her these dishes and lose the ghost haunting them, Alice will kill me and make me their ghost.”
Cam chuckled, blue eyes crinkling at the corners.
“Have a look around in the meantime,” the man told us. “It’ll be just a few minutes.”
I grabbed Cam’s hand and pulled him along toward the shelves at the back of the store.
As we browsed, nothing really caught my eye, nor Cam’s.
But it was still fun to look and read the tags on each item.
I passed an antique folding camera that claimed it would entrap those it took pictures of, but noted that film was not included.
How would one get film for a century-old camera?
Not for any particular reason, just curious.
There was a pearl necklace that would make the wearer a “beauty beyond compare,” but you could never take it off. It had a disclaimer in fine text that the side effects were unknown.
As if that wasn’t disturbing.
And then there was the brass megaphone record player without a sign. For some reason, that one creeped me out the most, and I steered us well clear of it.
Our wanderings took us up the spiral staircase, our steps echoing off the metal with our ascent.
Half of the upper level was what appeared to be a mini library, and I nearly hopped on my toes with excitement.
Then I remembered that not everything that was cursed was appropriately labeled and decided not to tempt fate.
With my luck, I would pick up a book that sucked me into a mundane world of people without magic. I shuddered at the horror.
Cam had drifted to the other side littered with more knickknacks and had come to a stop. When I peeked around him and noticed what he was looking at, my jaw dropped.
No way...
But yes way. It totally was. There was an entire shelf of BDSM paraphernalia.
What the hell? This was an antique shop. What was this kind of stuff doing here? Who would want second-hand sex toys. And why was I... kind of curious.
Chains, whips, paddles, cuffs of a... wide assortment. Ball gags, blindfolds, ropes, studded leather with an unknown purpose... It was, quite honestly, an impressive collection.
Something seemed to catch Cam’s attention, and he reached out to pick it up.
“Wait, be careful-”
But my warning came too late.
In an instant, the fluffy pink handcuffs had turned on him like a biting snake, latching one end around his left wrist. And, with the close proximity of my own hand reaching out to stop him, the other cuff clasped onto the next closest thing: my wrist.
The ratchets of the cuffs clicked as they tightened snugly around each of our arms. Too tight.
I stared down at where we were now joined in shock. Cam slowly lifted his gaze from the cuffs, expression already one full of apologetic guilt.
“Uh oh,” he said.
***
“What do you mean they don’t come with keys?” I demanded as Cam and I stood across from the man at the checkout counter. “Who the hell sells cuffs without their keys?”
“Look,” he began in an impatient tone, “I don’t know what to tell you. The sign clearly says touch at your discretion. Can’t be any clearer.”
The man placed the box of Alice’s dishes onto the counter as he began to ring us up.
“So, with the dishes and the cuffs, that’ll be...”
“Wait wait wait,” I interrupted. “Absolutely not. I’m not paying for these things.” I hefted me and Cam’s arms up and shook the metal chain between us. The fuzzy pink fur tickled my wrist. “We didn’t even touch them. They jumped us!”
Cam nodded earnestly, my silent backup.
The man gave us that bored, flat stare like he thought we were trying to pull a fast one over him. As if he had seen people use this trick to get free stuff one too many times and wasn’t falling for it.
Well fucking hell. Why would I want crappy, probably cursed, handcuffs that someone else had definitely been fucked in before?
“If you want the dishes,” he patted his hand on the neatly packaged box before us, “then you’ll be paying for the damaged goods as well.”
I narrowed my eyes at him, jaw working.
Damaged goods, I’ll give you damaged goods, I thought as I ground my teeth.
I couldn’t leave here without these stupid dishes. I knew Alice would do something awful if I fucked this up, even if I didn’t know what it was. That woman terrified me. And I literally owed her this favor. For Cam.
With a heavy sigh cast toward the ceiling, I asked,
“You take credit cards, right?”
Five minutes later, Cam and I were sitting in my car with the box of dishes on my back seat.
I was still panting because, with our hands cuffed together, getting into the car had been a new challenge I hadn’t thought to anticipate.
And, seeing as Cam was well over six-foot and built like a brick house, I was the one who had to climb in first and crawl over the center console to get into the driver’s seat.
I hadn’t even started the engine yet. We were just sitting there in silence until Cam spoke up,
“I’m sorry, Victor.”
I shot my gaze to him. He was gazing morosely down at his feet with a gloomy, dejected expression. He very much resembled a kicked puppy, all wilted ears and droopy tail.
“No, it’s not your fault Cam,” I insisted, grabbing his hand and squeezing it for emphasis. “I’m not mad, promise. It’s honestly pretty funny. And now, you’re stuck with me. Literally.” I gave him a winning smile.
That seemed to turn his mood, because the corner of his lips quirked up in a half-smile before adding shyly,
“I like being stuck to you.”
Ack, my poor heart! I nearly clasped my chest through the palpitations.
Then, the idea struck me.
It was literally like a lightbulb had turned on in my brain.
Maybe it wasn’t such a bad thing to be cuffed to Cam.
Obviously not forever; I would figure out how to break the curse or hex or whatever was on these things eventually, but for now...
What was it? Forced proximity and all that?
It was the perfect setup for a romance novel! The infamous trope that never grew old.
Apparently, my face had broken into a disturbing smile, one that had Cam obviously confused about how any part of this situation could make me happy.
“Well, since we’re already here, we can figure these cuffs out later,” I began. “We might get some weird looks but ‘wanna go grab some coffee?”
After crawling my way back out of the car with Cam’s assistance, I led us a few buildings down to the coffee shop on the corner.
It was probably the most modern building on the street with green awnings and minimalist tables and chairs situated beneath them.
Large windows spanned the entire corner revealing the coffee bar and even more tables, booths, and sofas spaced within.
As we entered, I was surprised to see how busy the place was for a weekday at almost noon.
Among the crowd, there weren’t many open spaces that I could notice.
A few low tables had stacks of books and magazines for public use as well as board games like chess, Scrabble, Rummikub, and even one of my personal favorites, Trouble.
The walls were decorated with vintage movie posters, coffee-related decorations, and more art consisting of cats.
A lot of cats.
There were photos of cats, cats in watercolor, cartoon cats, even pillows with embroidered cats on them were displayed on some of the sofas.
The shop’s name was “The Caffeinated Cat” so... I supposed that spoke for itself.
But the shop’s unique style was one of the main things that made me adore it so much. It was eclectic, just like my place. A mosh posh of this and that of whatever the owner thought looked cool until the entire shop looked like a thrifting junkie threw up all over the place.
Mingled with a minor kitty obsession.
The second thing about this shop that I loved was, of course, the coffee. But not just because it was delicious as fuck. The owner came up with the funnest names for their drinks. They even did daily drinks with special names.
Every day.
And they never repeated a name.
Like, that took some serious effort. True commitment.
What was even better, today’s drink of the day was a movie reference. I was giddy I understood right away.
Mocha in Black, with a descriptor below reading, “Tastes like dirt, ground this morning.”
“Come on,” I urged Cam. Even though, I didn’t really have to tell him to follow me. We were chained together.
Wherever I goest he goest.
As we waited in line, I asked, “Anything sound good to you?”
He gazed up at the expansive chalkboard menu above our heads, studying it seriously.
“There are too many choices,” he admitted ruefully,
I chuckled, “Yeah, it can be overwhelming sometimes when you aren’t sure what you like. Most people that come to these types of places usually get their regular drinks. Nothing wrong with that, but I come here to try something new every time.”
He hummed thoughtfully, “I’ll get whatever you get.”