Nicotine // [michael gray / peaky blinders]

Sixteen

After my outing with Alfie, I dive headfirst into wedding planning, helping Grace write letters to less important people in her life to get them invited to the wedding. Help her get a dress made, and all while doing this, I'm going out constantly to convince Jessie Flowers to ditch her boyfriend to date Alfie, which she thinks I'm mental for doing. She loves this bloke or whatever, but she won't even hear me out about Alfie.

"Let me tell you about him. Please." I say and she glares at me. "You won't be sorry." I say and she nods.

"Go on, Walker."

"Well, Flowers, lets start off with the fact that he's fit. He's big and bulky and everything you love. Pretty sure he's hench as well, but I've never seen him with his shirt off."

"What's his name, Flo?"

"Alfie Solomons. He's a gangster down in London." Her eyebrow raises. "Remember when I showed you that mink and dress combo that I said a gangster got for me?"

"That was him and you didn't tell me sooner?" She asks and I smile.

"So you'll go out with him?"

"Absolutely. Get me a date with him, but you've got to come to the first one."

"Come on, Jess, I've got Michael."

"He can come!"

"Michael would rather die than spend a night with Alfie Solomons. Plus Michael's legal part of the business, and Alfie is illegal. They can't mix. It would look bad." I say and she nods.

"Fine. But he better take me to a club." She says and I nod.

"I'll tell him you have strict instructions." I pinch her cheek. "Alright, I'm off now. Got to get to Thomas' before Grace retires for the night." I kiss her cheek and head over to my house where Michael is waiting for me so we can head off to Tommy's.

"How is she?"

"Finally let me talk about him. She's overjoyed to meet him and I have to call him when I get to Tommy's to tell him the good news." I say and Michael laughs a bit.

"Let's get going then. It's starting to get late." He takes my hand and leads me out to our loaner car from Shelby Company Ltd.

It's a long ride to Tommy's but it never seems long to Michael and I as we share cigarettes as he's driving us there, sips of whiskey taken to keep us chatty and it's in the blink of an eye that we get to the mansion.

It's refreshing, that we can spend so much time together but all the time we spend goes by in a fleeting moment. It's lovely, though. Our love is filled with nicotine flavored kisses and whiskey breath in the morning. It's ours and it's unique.

-

"Grace." I say, shaking her slightly from where she was sitting at Tommy's desk, writing letters.

"Florence. You're here. Good. Get to work." She says, pointing to the paper.

"It's nearly one in the morning. We're going to go to bed. Both of us. I'll be here all day tomorrow. We can get to work then." I say, and she nods vaguely, standing and I help her up the stairs and to her bedroom, even though I'll need help navigating back to my room afterwards, but I know Michael is following me so, I'm sure I'll make it to bed. "Tom." I poke my boss.

"Eh?" He jumps, seeing me standing over him.

"She's exhausted. You let her sleep in tomorrow and I'll write letters to people at her bedside if it makes you fucking feel better."

"Christ, fuck off, Florence. You're being creepy." Tommy says and I slap his chest before running out of his room before he has time to react to me, and responding to the sleepy Grace sitting a the end of his bed as Michael takes me in his arms, kissing me and picking me up, taking me to our own special wing.