smoke storm. peaky blinders

𝗦𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗻

CHAPTER SEVEN

A woman could not grow to like the quietness in Small Heath. It was rare enough, to find a silence gripping the street, and rarer still to feel comfortable within it. Even Adelaide could not pass the unnerving feeling that settled within as she walked the dusty streets, the lights of streetlamps and distant, smothering factory fires the only thing to guide her through the night.

She'd expected the silence, even though she'd grown used to the nightly sounds of shouts and drunken groans that punctured the chilled air. Adelaide had learned just as well that when a Shelby asked something, they most certainly received. It was a fact that had tempted her, almost well enough, to not show at their bonfire, to test Tommy Shelby in a way that would undoubtedly frustrate him to no end. Yet she found herself walking there alone, drifting down the street with her eyes held level to the pummels of smoke that was barely visible in the close distance. There was something blatantly poetic about the burning of a pictured king, as there was with many of Tommy Shelby's choices and movements.

Watery Lane was overrun by people. The fire was large, piled with crinkled picture frames and broken glass. When the heat of the roaring flames could finally be felt against her flushed cheeks, she was only halfway across the street, hands held behind her back. Cheers rang in rings around the pit.

"Chuck 'em on boys," Tommy's voice rose above the sound of crackling wood.

Another round of pictures were chucked to the base, lighting instantly as Arthur spat his drink forward, tossing the empty glass on top. He let out another cackle- a harsh, unpleasant sound left to the drunkards.

"I hope to God you know what you're doing."

Adelaide came to stop at the very edge of the fire, opposite to where the Shelby brothers stood. Amongst the flickers of flames, her eyes met Tommy and refused to leave him again afterwards. He was a difficult man to miss, with the harsh iciness of his eyes and the strength of his hard posture. To his side, a sharp contrast, John howled out a laugh, throwing an arm around Arthur's lanky body. He ignored them easily, having spent so many years with their childish gravitation to trouble, and instead chose to walk around the fire, piercing gaze meeting her.

"Adelaide Davis," he said as he came to rest beside her, hands clasped at his front, shoulders respectfully squared.

"Knowing my name doesn't hold much weight, now that I've told you aloud," she said, catching his look with a raised glance.

"Are you here alone?"

"Yes," she said, averting her eyes from his strong gaze. It felt as if he was looking through her, reading her insides. "Grace wouldn't come."

Tommy didn't seem to care about her answer before he asked another question. "What was my brother talking about this morning?"

"You don't know," Adelaide exclaimed, lips pulling into a smooth smirk that sent Tommy glowering. "Just a bad run-in, the other night. The same night I was in your living room."

"John surprised me. I wouldn't've thought he could be so gentle."

"Neither did I."

She said it to get a rise out of him. It worked. Even Thomas Shelby's stoic nature could be irked and prodded at.

His brow rose again as he noticed the amused tilt to her lips.

"You don't look like a girl who likes gentle," he said.

For a moment, Adelaide was surprised. It must have showed on her face, as Tommy's own expression changed to mimic that of which she'd shown only moments before. He was playing with her. Playing in a way that Adelaide didn't know he could play.

Something about his notoriety, his reputation had spoke of him as if he was untouchable, a separate entity who had no want but one of the most human one of all: wealth. But the way he provoked her with a single line, shocking her image of him, spoke of another too-human quality that she had not thought to associate with the man. It was a quality every man held- some form of lust, sexual or not. Perhaps she was looking to far into it. Perhaps she was not looking far enough. But Tommy Shelby was like no other man. It felt illegal to think of him as such.

She begged the flush not to form on her face in response to her thoughts, and at the same time, she thanked the universe that the man beside her could not read her mind. The fire at their feet was a relief yet at the same time only made her feel hotter. Adelaide forced her gaze to wonder up, passing the amused smile to make contact with his eyes.

"Enjoy the fire," she said, taking her leave before her thoughts and face could betray her any more.

I'm the days after, she should have thought of the guns, of the Inspector edging closer and closer while she stayed in the same place. Those guns would be the key to new power for her family, just as they had been for the Peaky Blinders. But Harry and Robert had not yet asked for her plan so they had not yet received.

Everywhere she went, Tommy Shelby seemed to be. Even there, by the church, she'd spotted him, albeit with Grace Burgess, heads hung low as they walked down the pebbled lane. It wasn't until she was walking down Garrison Lane in a route to avoid her brother, that she saw him again atop his proud, white stallion. It was an ominous sight indeed.

"John said you have a way with horses," she called out to him, making his head turn, eyes meeting for the first time since the bonfire.

"You've been talking to my brother now," he said, eyebrows raised.

"He's gained a habit of being able to find me," she said, because it was true. "He's beautiful. Does he have a name?"

He contemplated her for a moment, drawing the horse to a slow stop. "Not yet."

When she realised he would answer with nothing else, she spoke again. "My father always said better a nameless horse. I never saw the point. Too impersonal."

She expected him to pull on the reigns then, as the quietness followed, her hand still rested on the horse's snout. But Tommy looked down at her again, eyes resting on her face.

"You like horses, then?"

She tilted her head, giving him a short shrug. "In a way."

"Maybe you'll have to take up John's offer then."

It took a moment, for the memory to register- that of John suggestion Tommy would show her their horses. For a second time, Thomas Shelby had surprised her. For a second time, it was clear on her face. In response to her reddened expression, Tommy tugged in the reigns, a smirk playing in his face as he nodded her in goodbye.

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