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Rowan turned and looked down in shame at the fact someone had just said that about her.
"You wanna say that again lad?" A deep tobacco endured voice said from the door. The golden light shone from behind casting a shadow on the ground before him. His arms were widened while his hands lay in his pockets and cigarette sat in his mouth. The peaked cap was tilted over his eyes slightly, even if it was obvious who it was.
"Tommy... it's fine. Honestly." She said walking towards him, lowering from the bar stool. Rowan stood in front of him and tried to plead as she knew that if Tommy Shelby was angered there was not much anyone could do to get him to back down. "M-Mr Shelby... my apologies Sir." The man looked over at her and swallowed, his eyes drawing and quartering Rowan like a piece of meat.
"I'm not the one you should be apologisin' to..." Tommy looked Rowan in the eye, she felt the utter coldness and held her wrist with her other hand, stroking it worriedly. Her head was tipped and body language very clearly at unease with this whole predicament. She didn't want anyone hurt on the count of a stupid throwaway comment. It was sickening but it was a sign of the times. She also didn't want to interfere with the past too much but it seemed she was already in too deep.
"Well... Tommy you know how it is-.." "No... no I don't." Tommy cut him off, removing his hat and placing it on the table where the man sat. She could hear Harry clearing men out and John just watching the standoff. "Apologise now, and I might let you leave alive... I've killed men for less." Rowans eyes widened at the threat upon on this mans life: at this point she was desperate to leave. "Tommy, honestly, let's just go." She gently touched his arm to get his attention, feeling like a mouse trying to summon someone for food. With a small tug of his coat they met eyes and she swear time itself had really stopped this time and not from just the hands of a clock. She saw the brokenness inside him and knew that anymore violence might just push him past rehabilitation. She needed this situation to be avoided right this second. Her green eyes begged for them to leave and Tommy's looked at her with some kind of apology.
He picked up his cap and turned her away before she heard the screams of the perverted man. She turned and saw his hands covering his face as blood poured from his eyes and obvious wounds. Rowan had heard of the razor blade caps and the reports were very convincing as was the evidence for them to be real. Now she knew, the method was very much real. "Now get the fuck out." He muttered and Rowan... for some reason began to sob. He may have made a horrific comment but... that man was now blind and she felt almost responsible for not being assertive enough to drag Tommy out of the pub and reason with him.
Tommy turned his attention to the blush pink dressed girl and grabbed her by the hand, only a small amount of blood on him from the expertise in the avoidance of it. He pulled her towards him and slammed her into his chest for a strange sort of hug. It wasn't intimate nor loving but it held a connotation of something unusual, that Tommy wanted to hold her for a moment and comfort her in a time when she felt a hefty amount from witnessing a trauma. "Forgive me," he said and she cried a little more "but I don't like disrespect." At that moment John knew as he watched them, that Tommy had a fascination with Rowan. So much so that he had shown her affection and kindness. He stated he didn't like 'disrespect' but John believed he didn't like 'disrespect' towards something Tommy wanted or owned. It was strange seeing his brother comfort such a woman... a gentle, romantic woman who had no taste of the real life as a Peaky Blinder but only written facts and statistics.
She may have known every key date for the Peaky Blinders but she didn't feel what it was to be associate with them. Now she would. Small Heath, Birmingham would soon be overrun with the news of the King finding someone new. A ginger haired beauty who would muse about history and would wander through gardens aimlessly. Who would read Oscar Wilde and fantasise about romance. John had learnt about her in their little conversations and knew that she was someone who wouldn't handle this life, but if Tommy wanted her too... then she would have to.
And then there was the problem of her being from the future...
