from a shelby to a solomons

five

"He what?!" Charlotte shrieked, standing up from where she was sitting on the edge of her bed. 

"He wants to fucking marry you off to the Jew gangster of Camden Town," John repeated himself, staring at the floor.

"He wants me to marry?" Charlotte started pacing in a small circle in her room. "He won't even let me be a fucking secretary, but he wants to marry me off?" She was speaking softly and looking down at the floor as she walked. Her head was filled with confusion and questions that she didn't know how to word.

John sighed, sitting on the edge of Charlotte's bed. "I think he wants to make a deal with Solomons and wants to use you as the bridge between our family and the Jews in London. I told him I didn't like that idea."

"Yeah, no shit. I'm barely 18. He's never let me so much as touch a boy, and now he wants me to marry one in a city that's a days drive away?" Charlotte shuddered. "I thought he cared about me more than that." 

John sensed Charlotte's sadness and stood up, placing his arms around her shoulders. "I won't let him send you off, yeah? I'll go talk to him about it again. Just have to control my anger." 

"John, it's ok," Charlotte said as she shook out of her sadness. "I'm just gonna confront him and ask why he wants to marry me off."

"Yeah right, no fucking way," John spoke as he chuckled, standing up from his seated position on the bed. "You two will be screaming at each other three seconds after you start talking to him. And he told me not to tell you." John turned to Charlotte, leaning down to her level and getting right in her face. "And you will not tell him that you know about this. Or so help you God. I swear to God, Charlotte, don't breathe a fucking word of this to Tommy or anyone else." 

She raised her hands in surrender as she backed away from her older brother.  "I swear I won't say anything. Promise."

"Yeah, ok." He sighed and shoved his hands in his pockets, leaving her room. "Gonna go talk to him about it now."

"Hey John!" Charlotte called after him. He turned to face her. "Thanks for telling me. Thanks for not keeping me in the dark about family business like everyone else does." John winked in reply as he headed down the stairs and back into Tommy's office where Arthur and Tommy were still talking. 

Charlotte knew she shouldn't, but she decided to follow John down the stairs to listen in on the conversations. Luckily, the business had closed for the day so no one was in the betting shop besides the three brothers, and now Charlotte. Polly had gone to church, and Finn was with his friends galavanting around Birmingham. Finn was literally 5 years younger than Charlotte, but his brothers gave him more freedom than Charlotte. And Charlotte knew that sometimes they let him come in on family business and listen to things that were going on - even though he was only 13. She rolled her eyes as she pondering the inequality happening in the office. That was something she would have to talk to Tommy about later. Later, after the whole marrying her off business.

Charlotte crept close to Tommy's office door, staying out of the way of the small window in the door frame. She heard hushed voices and held her breath so that she could hear exactly what they were saying.

"...and that's not fucking nice, Tommy," John spoke. Charlotte could tell that he was doing his best to maintain a calm facade, something that John wasn't the best at doing. 

"John, now if you would listen to me and not scream and go storming off like you did twenty minutes ago, you would've heard everything that I wanted to say. I told Arthur." Tommy spoke, and Arthur grunted in reply. 

"It's not bad, John-boy. Listen to what Tom has to say about it." Charlotte heard a glass clink on the desk top after Arthur spoke, and there was no doubt that he finished off his glass of whiskey after he spoke.