𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐅𝐑𝐄𝐍𝐂𝐇 𝐊𝐈𝐒𝐒𝐄𝐑𝐒
❝ They're the French Kissers,
that's what they do.
They will lure you in
and then they'll kill you
with a kiss. ❞
━ in which the leader of the french kissers
...
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Entering the gilded office at La Vie en Rose to find the Bardin brothers standing by the large window and looking down at the grim streets and the hurried people as if they owned every single one of them, as if they owned their worlds, or at least London, was not a rare occurrence, but still one exquisite enough to make anyone stop by the threshold to relish on the sight; unless they were Rose, of course, who didn't have time to admire the beauty of power as she was too busy harvesting it to her hands and making sure it stayed there. Even if her hands were currently tied, and even if Thomas Shelby owned every inch of the rope.
Ever since he had made it clear he wanted to find out everything he could about the French Kissers, her life had turned into one giant chessboard where she tiptoed around the pieces before he could move them. But it was becoming increasingly harder to prevent him from making a move, to protect her walls from his will of iron and his relentless drive to uncover every buried secret she had so carefully been building and keeping over the years.
Her empire, which had once stood as tall as a walled fortress no one dare to break through, now resembled more of a house of cards waiting for that final blow from Thomas to make it fall apart. Rose had enough skeletons in her closet to fill an entire graveyard, and the last thing she wanted was for Thomas to help dig the graves.
"Here already?" She asked after closing the door, virescent glance soaring over Nicolas' on the freshly cleaned window. But he glanced away. And he never glanced away. Not with her. "Is Churchill that much of a bore?"
"You have no idea," Jules complained, turning around with drowsy eyes and a furrowed brow before sinking down onto Rose's desk chair. There was a portrait of the Salvages, polished and delicate, on the wall behind him, and a table with a telephone and a vase of roses beneath it. "I'd rather play on a broken piano than do business again with that man. Or with anyone, really. I fucking hate business. Luckily for us, Nicolas excels at it."
"So I take it as he accepted?" Rose stopped beside Nicolas to try and catch his eyes on the glass, but to no use. Rose had never met Churchill and often wondered what he was like; she supposed he preferred to make business with men, and found it was better if he wasn't aware of her identity.
"To help us expand our business and gain the monopoly on the trade of absinthe to France in exchange for the war plans we retrieved from the Germans? Yes. He was very pleased with all the intel we provided him with. Guess the murder of the Boches wasn't so useless after all; we managed to blackmail Churchill, and be blackmailed by a Shelby in return."
