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Adeline walked through your Small Heath looking for work, if she was going to stay here with her new found family, she would at least be useful to them.
She almost got a job at a seamstress before her lacking skill in sewing was shown and she was practically shut the door on the face. She groaned loudly and walked on uncaring of the looks she got from people that saw her.
Turning in a corner she saw the Garrinson and thought for a second, before happily entering the pub.
Harry was cleaning like he was the first time she came in, there was no one there yet due to the early hour.
"Harry!" She exclaimed happily, catching the attention of the owner. Harry didn't responded and only raised a brow in question, she stood in front of the bar and sat in one of the chairs. "You know Harry, bartering all this by yourself must be really hard for you, so I have an offer"
"Hmm"
"What about you let me work here as a bartender? I'll be of so much help"
"No"
"Oh come on, Harry, you know you want to" the girl pleaded with a smile showing her white teeth.
"Listen, I already told you, this pub is not for girls like you" He sighed.
"I have tough skin, Harry" she in fact did not have tough skin. He snorted at the answer. "Please Harry, I will not bother you at all, I'll even try to be quiet, please"
For a moment it seemed like he was hesitating.
"You know Harry, my uncle is Ben Aston and he told me to find a job, I don't really feel like disappointing him" she whispered to him, and Harry's eyes widen. A small grin growed on Adeline's face, a little manipulation never hurt anyone.
"Fine, but I want you here early in the mornings, two breaks no more" he accepted, and Adeline made an excited noise that nearly blew Harry's eardrums.
"Thank you so much, Harry! You won't regret it I swear" She threw her arms around him in a quick hug and went to leave.
"What are you doing?" The owner questioned.
"Going home, obviously"
"No, you start today" Harry looked for something under the bar and then threw a white apron with suspicious stains of something.
"Oh, do you have it on another color or maybe a clean one" she whispered the last part, looking at the stains.
"You are funny" Harry laughed putting his cleaning rag on his shoulder "You can finish cleaning and then serve the men when they come in"
He left through the back door to the god knows what, and Adeline groaned loudly
Fuck
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After dropping a bottle and confusing various orders, Harry finally came back and send her back to the bar to clean cups, his face clearly read that he regretted his decision on giving her the job, but he couldn't exactly take it away either.
Adeline didn't expected serving alcohol to be so hard, but between yelling men and the stinking smell of alcohol everywhere- one she wasn't used to.
She finished to clean one of the cups when the doors opened and in entered Tommy attracting the attention of everyone in the room, Adeline rolled her eyes.
He saw her behind the bar and smirked as he neared her, Harry had already told her that everything that Tommy ordered was on the house, which she thought was a load of bull.
"I see you found a job" Tommy mused looking down at her.
"What would you want, Mr. Shelby?" She ignored his words and stared into his blue eyes in which she seemed to get lost every time she saw into them.
"Are you still mad at me?"
"Why would I be mad at you?"
"For not giving you a job"
"Ah, but I did managed to get a job ,didn't I? so no, I'm not mad at you" She was mad at him, but not anymore, however she decided she wanted to be mad at him a bit more.
On the other hand Tommy was freaking out, he was so stupid for not thinking she would get a job at a pub of all places, working in the pub was even worst than her working in the betting shop, all the drunk men and now he wouldn't be able to do anything.
"A bottle of whiskey" he ordered
"Don't you know what the word 'please' is" and she turned around to get one, she stopped for two seconds when Adeline finally recognized the whiskey and passed it to him. Tommy stared at the unopened bottle and cleared his throat when she got distracted on fixing her hair.
"Aren't you going to open it?" He questioned looking a the bottle and then back at her.
"Well I should not know how to open it" Adeline responded clearing the invisible dust in her apron.
Tommy sighed tiredly, how did she even got a job here? He dug into his pocket for change and put it on the bar.
"I told you is on the house"
"It's not for the whiskey, is a tip" a tip for what? He doesn't know
"Oh my god, really?" She questioned excitedly, something shining in her eye. And Tommy realized he wanted to see more of that bright light in her eyes. He nodded as a yes, but before she could take it, Harry called for her. "Excuse me"
He looked back at her and then turned to open the bottle, when he felt a presence besides him, his head turned slowly to find Freddie Thorne, his old friend of school.
"Is that really sweet little Addy? I heard rumors" The old friend explained.
"Aye" was the only thing Tommy said in return, however when he took a gulp of his whiskey, Freddie shamelessly took the coin that he had left for Adeline.
"I don't think she'll need it" he whispered before Harry was the one to come back to the bar and serve Freddie a drink, paying with Adeline's tip. "Cheers Thomas, good health to you"
"The crown of a prince" Freddie said taking Tommy's hat and seeing the razor in the back. "Soon to be king, I'd bet"
"You don't bet"
"No, but these past days I've been speculating"
"About what?" Tommy finally turned to look at him.
"One of my union comrades has a sister, who works at the telegraph office at the BSA factory, she says over the past week the messages coming up from London to the brass, from Winston Churchill himself" Freddie moved closer to Tommy until they were shoulder to shoulder "Something about a robbery, a robbery of national significance"
Tommy just nodded like he already knew everything because in a way he did.
"She found a list of names left in the telegraph machine. And in that list was your name and my name together, what kind of list would have the name of a communist and the name of a bookmaker, side by side?"
"Perhaps it's a list of names who give false hope to the poor, the only difference between you and me, Freddie, is that sometimes my horses stand a chance of winning" Tommy finally answered taking another drag form his cigarette.
"You know there are days when I hear about the cuttings and beatings, that I really wished I'd let you take that bullet in France" Tommy smiled at Freddie's words.
"Believe me, there are nights I wished you had" but that was not entirely true anymore, because if he had died that day in France, he would have never met Adeline once again, he would never know if she came back after all this time.
The conversation was a stopped abruptly by the doors slamming open, Adeline jumped in her skin at the loud noise. And she screamed when the mysterious man started to break everything in his way. The bottle in her hand dropped to the floor as one of the glasses managed to cut her arm.
She ran behind the bar and sat in a corner as she hear the man screaming the same thing over and over.
"They are going to get me!" He screamed at the top of his lungs. Until she heard a thump and Tommy telling the man to breathe and that he was home.
"Danny, your home! We are all home in England. You are not in France, you are not an artillery shell, Danny you are man. You are not a whiz-bang. You are human being, Danny, you are all right" the man had finally calmed down and only something like small whimpers could be heard.
Adeline poked her head out of the bar to see that that the man had fiannly calmed down and had a sad frown on his face.
"Oh, hell, did I do it again?" The man asked.
"You did it again, Danny" Tommy declared with a hand in his shoulder. "You got to stop doing this man, it's all right"
"Oh, god! Mr. Shelby, I'm sorry"
"It's all right. You go home to your wife now, Danny. Try to get all that smoke and mud out of your head, eh?"
The man finally went home and everyone was still freaked out. Adeline stood up and she noticed a sting in her arm.
One of the glasses that the man sent flying had cut her arm, and a steady trial of blood flowed down it.
Tommy turned and looked for Adeline until she find her with a bleeding arm, his heart started going faster for some reason at the thought of her hurt, even if it was just a small cut.
He quickly walked towards her and grabbed her arm to examine it.
"I'm fine, Tommy" Adeline said.
"Clearly" Tommy scoffed. "Is it time for your break?"
"I think so, yeah"
"Good" he untied her apron, and Adeline ignored the butterflies in her stomach at his touch, he walked with a hand in her arm.
"Mr. Shelby, you have to do something about him" Harry said from behind them as they walked to the door. They stopped and Tommy turned to look at them.
"Damn right, Harry" Freddie said. "You pay the peaky blinders a lot of money for protection. You are the law around here now, Tommy, aren't you?" Adeline heard Tommy sighing tiredly "Maybe you should put a bullet in Danny Whiz-Bang's head, like they do with mad horses, maybe you'll have to put a bullet in my head someday, too"
Adeline was very confused at the moment, what the hell is happening?
Why is that guy talking about shooting someone, as if it wasn't a crime?
And why was he talking about Tommy putting a bullet in his head?
Tommy wasn't a bad man, she knew that deep in her soul. Or at least he didn't do the things he does because he wants to, but because of his family, she likes to think.
Finally Tommy put on his hat again, put his hand to the small of her back and opened the door for head, he turned once more to Harry "Bring the bill to the peaky blinders, we'll take care of it"
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She speaks!
I swore I had already uploaded this chapter