In The Bleak Midwinter | T Shelby

TWENTY TWO - WHISKEY FOR THOUGHT

"Calvin that isn't necessary, honestly I-"

"Nope! I won't hear it. I'm on my way, I'll be at your door by eleven, darling."

Kaia squeezed her eyes closed and cursed under her breath before saying goodbye to Calvin and placing the phone down.

The pub was empty and it wasn't somewhere that Kaia had been before, though the way Tommy spoke to the bartender suggested that the two of them had met before that night.

Two glasses of whiskey were sat on the table, Tommy's had clasped around one of them as he looked up when Kaia approached, taking a seat beside him and pulling her coat tighter around her shoulders, the floorboards creaking from the draft.

"He's coming here."

"What?" Tommy raised one eyebrow and raised the glass to his lips.

Kaia sighed and threw the whiskey down her throat in one go, slamming the glass down on the table when she'd finished. Tommy just looked at her. She looked flushed, her cheeks red but her skin pale from the cold. Her eyes were fear-stricken and the way she couldn't keep her gaze fixed on anything for longer than a second told him that she was nervous.

"I told him that I felt under the weather and he's insisted on coming up here himself, he'll be here before eleven, he said."

Kaia glanced at the golden clock that hung on the wall behind the bar, the hands showing the time at just before eight.

Thomas groaned and shifted in his seat. This hadn't gone exactly how he'd imagined it would. Truthfully, he wasn't sure Kaia was going to listen to him at all, he was almost convinced that she'd step on that train and never think of him again, only she didn't.

Tommy knew how Kaia felt because he felt it too. He felt the same burning desire in his heart like the way flames leapt from one another every time he laid eyes upon her. He had the urge to protect her and care for her, to make sure she was safe and happy and out of harms way every second of the day and perhaps she was getting all of that with Calvin, but he didn't want it to come from anyone but himself.

"God," Kaia scoffed, pulling Tommy away from his train of thought, "What am I even doing?"

"You're drinking whiskey. Far too quickly." He waved over the bartender who came over and topped up their glasses with more golden liquid.

"Shut up, Tom."

"Tom," he smiled at her and she looked up to meet his gaze, "You've never called me that before."

Kaia rolled her eyes, his sweet smile making her heart flutter, only she didn't want him to know that. She thought he was beautiful when he smiled. His eyes lit up differently and his cheeks glowed a warm, happy glow. She wished he'd smile more often but then realised that it wouldn't be quite as precious a sight if he did.

"Listen, Kaia," he adjusted his chair, pulling it closed to the table as he leant his arms on the wood, "If you thought that this, you and I, was something you could forget about forever, you'd have got on that train."

"But I didn't." She said in barely a whisper.

"But you didn't," he repeated, his eyes looking down at her hand that was resting on the table. For a second, he had the urge to take hold of it, only he stopped himself and looked into her eyes once more, "You stayed, because you know in your heart that you, we, can't ignore this."

The way he chose his words made it sound all too easy for Kaia. It was as if he was offering his hand for them to disappear together and start new lives with one another and leave everything behind without a worry or a care, but that wasn't possible.