✓ | GOLDEN LIAR ↠ Thomas Shelby.

43.

CHAPTER FORTY THREE.

               A WIND WHIPPED THROUGH Small Heath, battering against the doors and shutters of each home, rattling the windows as though there was no tomorrow in sight, as though it could break down the greying bricks and blow over the terraced houses if it tried hard enough. One might think that it could, what with the city still raw from the aftereffects of the war and how it had wrecked communities with its nightmares and terrors having the ability to split families down the centre. Except only a fool would assume this ― the poverty―stricken city that Birmingham was had its ups and its downs, and it just so happened to be that its monarch stood on the blurred line between those two contrasts. Thomas Shelby, and his band of silver razor blades and peaked caps. It was his city that stood in the midst of this storm, and his city he intended to keep. And whilst it stood the tests of November wind and rain, he remained inside, in the golden haze of light that the Garrison Pub was enveloped in.

By his side sat Felicity ― the girl that held the other part of his crown in her little fist, the girl that kept him on the boundary in between good and bad.

Neither of the two had their kingdom on their minds right now; Tommy was occupied with the golden―haired angel beside him, and Felicity was just as distracted by him, although she tried harder to hide such a fact.

"You drank all the fucking whiskey, Tommy!" She soon whined as she reached across the table and plucked the bottle up by its neck, brandishing it at him with a frown. . . one that just so happened to have her lips curled upwards in an amusement that she was trying to not show to him as she looked on with faux disapproval.

Tommy laughed. "Is that a problem?"

"Yeah, I wanted some," Felicity said, her tone turning slow and mocking. "Why else would I care?"

"Well, I could tell you'd had enough, darling."

The golden―haired girl pouted. "No, I hadn't," she objected, taking to unscrewing the bottle's cap and tipping it back so that she could at least have whatever few droplets were left. "It's barely ten o'clock, anyway. I could've had plenty more."

"It's closer to eleven. . . and anyway, you get tipsy from just a single drink, believe me," Tommy countered, amused, plucking the glass from her grip and holding it out of his wife's reach. "Come on."

Felicity pursed her lips together, shook her head and rose to her feet. "I'm going out to ask Harry for another drink," she asserted.

Tommy returned the expression, but didn't stop her. "You do know you can just ask at the window, don't you?" He queried as she edged behind him, making her way towards the door.

"Of course I do, I served you for a good year, didn't I?" She smirked, tugged on the handle of the door so that it swung inwards, and disappeared behind it.

"Felicity, I'm not taking you home shit―faced!"

It wasn't long before her face popped back, with her golden curls showering her face like a curtain: one that she would briefly try to push behind her ears, before giving up completely, as she turned to her husband. "Why not? I've done it for you plenty of times."

He raised an eyebrow. "That isn't true."

Felicity pulled a face, but didn't go any further on that particular part of the matter. "Still, I'm asking Harry for another bottle. I'm in dire need of some company who aren't reeking of beer or trying to stop me from drinking my own, even for a little bit." And with that, she flashed him a wide smile before heading over towards the bar, leaving the door rocking back and forth on its hinges.