mozzafiato ➝ peaky blinders

nove

Gianna had stared down the barrel of a gun for the first time when she was sixteen. 

It had been her first year living in New York, and her first year as a member of the Changretta mafioso. She had been on a job with her father and uncles. Negotiations with the enemy had gotten heated, and before she knew it, the latter had drawn his weapon and stuck it between Gia's eyes, screaming about co-operation and spraying the girl's brains on the wall. 

She remembered all sound suddenly dropping out, her vision going haywire. It was just her and the gun, and the mere seconds it would take for him to end her life.

She had been terrified.

But her face gave away no such thing. She remained cool, composed, just as her family had taught her to be.

In the years since, she had had guns pointed at her on countless occasions. Not just on jobs, either; she'd been threatened while on her way to a lecture one morning. So after a while, each instance of it happening started blending together, and the sight began to bore her.

So as she stood at the end of Arthur Shelby's Webley, she found her mouth stretching in a yawn.

That visibly unnerved some of the factory workers around them, while the eldest Shelby's brow furrowed, his gun hand wavering. 

But Tommy Shelby seemed to be rivalling her with his poker face. His eyes were empty, unreadable, and his face hard as stone.

For a moment, nobody in the room moved. 

Then, Gianna slowly raised her hands in false surrender, a close-lipped smile on her face. Just for her own amusement. 

The Shelby ringleader's face still remained stoic. His eyes hadn't budged from her since she had called after him.

The factory workers seemed to hold their breath.

Then, Tommy licked his lips stiffly, and his eyes flickered to the side, breaking his stone-like facade. 

"Back to work, the lot of you." He didn't raise his voice any more than he needed to. The men around them were already paying attention. 

"Go on," Arthur added, still aiming his gun at Gianna. His jaw was clenched, his lips twitching. She stared him down, unwavering.

Slowly at first, then all at once, the workers began to move, conversation swelling back up again as they made their way to their stations and got back to their jobs. Or pretended to, at least. 

Soon enough, the room was back to normal. Just about.

"Gianna... Changretta," Tommy said incredulously. 

She didn't move, save for letting her hands fall to her side.

"What's your mother's name?" the man before her asked suddenly.

Gianna felt her stomach clench.

"It was Mia. Mia Fanucci," she replied. Her voice was cold; she forced it to be so to cover any kind of emotion that threatened to slip out. "She died soon after I was born."

"I'm sorry to hear that." He clearly didn't mean it. "What kind of woman was she?"

She blinked. "Sorry?"

"What kind of woman was she?" he said again, his face stubbornly unforgiving of emotion.

Gianna gave him a questioning look. Arthur Shelby was still pointing his weapon at her. Tommy was stood by his side, barely acknowledging him - a general next to his soldier. 

"She was my mother. What kind of question is that?" she managed to reply. 

He stared down at her for a few moments. Gia felt a sudden chill run up her spine once again as she held eye contact with him.