nothing we desired. peaky blinders

EIGHT

𝑁𝑂𝑇𝐻𝐼𝑁𝐺 𝑊𝐸 𝐷𝐸𝑆𝐼𝑅𝐸𝐷
the other changretta

In the morning, Dilara woke with a shadow on her curtains. It was a great, hulking black thing, distantly shaped like a person. When she closed her eyes, she could still see the figure of a man against the back of her eyelids, her mind giving it shape and colour, mingling between the blue eyes and pale skin of Tommy and the haunting look of Amir.

At night, the shadow merged with the blackness of night, but she could hear them. Their voices were murmurs, clenching with the howl of wind and spitting of rain, but the accents were distinct and revealing, the indents clear and telling, so much so that soon her own thoughts seemed to take on the song of their words.

Always watching.

There was a devil on her shoulder, watching her each move. Dilara could feel eyes on her even when there were none. Along the street, the windows were as good as any surveillance, the cars that tumbled by holding onlookers that would only see her. The police could make her feel safe no longer, with half of them on Tommy's payroll, and the men that escorted her across the capital began to feel less like guardians and more like prison guards, looming on her heel, the cuffs imagined but real.

It was a wonder that Tommy thought that it could work. She was little better than a prisoner, a songbird kept captive long enough that she was beginning to lose her voice and the very colour of her wings. How long ago those days seemed to be. Those days when mainland Europe was her playground and Amir her guide. On days when the solitude grew so stifling, she almost craved those times with Amir. But in the end, the truth came back to her. She'd traded one cage for another.

Ada had recognised her turmoil and tried to help, paying her visits and becoming her to the quaint townhouse she owned in London, hidden under the guise that she was prodding her for 'intel'. Dila's words would be fed back to Thomas, that much was obvious still, yet Ada's visits were welcomed.

They were all strangled by fear of the black hand. Sometimes, when she thought too hard about how she would find Changretta and draw him out, she could feel the dark stamp close around her throat. It seemed an impossible task- one that would put her in more danger than Amir ever had. These weren't singular players anymore. This was the Sicilian mob, out looking for vengeance. To be caught in their nets meant no mercy. The image took the breath from Dila's lungs.

"How are you finding London?"

Ada's voice snapped Dila from her thoughts easily enough. The question was hollow, the type of small talk that Aunt Mathilde had taught her to loathe.

"Smaller than last I saw of it."

Her eyes found Ada then, watching carefully for the quirk of the other girl's lip that would eventually come. There was understanding behind Ada's gaze, but then came the shake of her head and Dila looked away. Her hands bunched irritably in her skirts, blemishing the pale. She no longer wore black. Instead, her body was bathed in a pale red, the colour a shade away from pink.

"I hear your nights are rather fun," Ada said when Dilara said nothing more.

"Anything to pass the time. Solitude grows tedious," she said. "Especially when your days used to be spent travelling across the continent."

The conversation was as stunted as it usually was. Lorita stayed far from the topic, held at such a distance that there was no chance for Ada to ask about the other women. Something about the young, Italian girl felt homely- as if she'd been plucked fresh from the village and placed purposefully into Dila's palm.

She left Ada's townhouse with a sense of foreboding. When she looked back, Ada was in the window, arms crossed against her chess and eyebrows furrowed. It would be the last she saw of the woman for a while, and she took it as a blessing and a curse.