Tommy Shelby stared idly into the dying embers of the fire. The amber liquid in the glass he held swirled lazily as he rolled it between his fingers. The wind blew down the chimney causing drowsy sparks to flare briefly. Waves were crashing outside and rain drops clattered against the windows. He turned to scowl half heartedly at the deep, thick blackness that was all he could see from the window. Back home in Birmingham, even at this time of night, there'd still be the glare of light bursting from doors and windows, the odd brawl. A woman's voice, singing. No, he was not used to this.

He relaxed back in the armchair he'd angled until it faced the hearth. That wasn't to say he wasn't enjoying himself. If enjoying was the right word. Perhaps not, after all he couldn't remember a time when he'd felt himself since before the Great War. But here, he had found peace. Against the odds, he admitted to himself. He'd come fully expecting to hate everything; the coast, the hideout, the very idea that he needed a break, deserved a holiday. But Aunt Pol had insisted and once she made her mind up, she was unshakeable. The Shelby streak of stubborn was a mile wide in that one. "You're losing it, Tommy" she'd warned, her voice intense and her eyes steely. "You're not sleeping, you're barely eating, the only thing you're doing with any regularity is drinking. No, it's no good you being like this Tom. We need you at the top of your game, not clinging on by your fingertips."

And so he'd pitched up here. The pub by the sea. Somewhere unpronounceable at the top of Wales; a barbaric country full of cruel winds, strange accents and a language that sounded like they'd sacrificed their vowels for the dramatic scenery that unfolded round each corner. He'd intended to stay for a long weekend, just enough time to convince Poll he'd Relaxed, he'd Rested. But somehow days and days and days had passed and he was no closer to summoning the family car that would take him back home again.

He leant forward to poke the fire, hoping to agitate it into one last blaze before he retired to bed. The heavy weight of coins in his waistcoat pocket shifted with his movement and a small smile crept across his full lips. The locals were his kind of people; not given to idle chatter or questions, they'd accepted his presence easily enough, including him in their passionate discussions on all things from the weather (a source of constant fascination for the farmers) to politics (a second Great War? Inconceivable!). That night, they'd pulled up a chair for him at their poker table. Whether they'd let him play again was another matter, he'd won of course but won honestly, for the first time in a long time. He'd forgotten how good that felt.

Stretching out his legs, he drained the whiskey from the glass. Aunt Poll needn't have worried, alcohol was not the crutch she feared it was becoming. At least, not out here, on the coast. His days had soon become full, too full to prop the bar up. The local farmer stabled geldings for breeding and kept Tommy busy with exercising them once he'd found out the Brummie could ride. In between the horse riding, he'd found himself pulling the odd pint behind the bar. The thought made him smile - if the folk back home could see him - Tommy Shelby, a barman! It had started the week before last. The pub - a smallish affair with just the one main room for men, women and children, had been packed - unusually so but there'd been a wedding followed by a funeral on the same day in the same small chapel, and the attendees of both events had wound their way down the coastal path to the Inn.

Tommy had been making his way down the stairs, from his lodgings to the bar, tousling his hair with a towel after being caught out in a shower whilst riding Diawl, the 16 hand black stallion. The crowd sounded unusually restive, unusual because Lorna, the landlady, normally had no trouble keeping her patrons happy. Long black hair that curled and waved from behind its neatly tied red ribbons, eyes as blue as the stormy seas that surrounded her pub, she had a quick wit and a too wide smile not to mention other physical assets that Tommy told himself had not caught his eye. However, as Tommy poked his head round the corner, Lorna was nowhere to be seen, despite the crowd who were braying for service.

Hearing raised voices from the small yet functional kitchen that jutted off to the left at the bottom of the stairs, Tommy went to investigate. He spied an irate looking Lorna standing, hands on shapely hips, next to a weeping Mai, the barmaid.

"I c-c-can't go back out there, Lorna. He hasn't looked at me once, I feel like such a fool!"

"Mai, how many times have I told you, steer clear of the farm hands! They don't mean what they say, especially not after they've been on the home brew ..." Futilely, Lorna began dabbing at Mai's flowing tears with a large utilitarian handkerchief.

"But he told me I was ... b-b-beautiful!" Mai fell on Lorna, causing the landlady to roll her eyes in frustration whilst patting her barmaid's back in a perfunctory manner. In the silence, Mai had continued " ... and my ... my ...monthly's late!"

Acknowledging that her staff might have more on her mind than a bar full of disgruntled patrons, Lorna had sent Mai home before steeling herself to return to her position. With no real desire to get involved, Tommy had watched from a distance as Lorna had thrown herself into the crowd, serving three, four customers at once as she tried to re-establish calm. However, when the door swung open revealing a dozen farriers who'd been working at the nearby stud farm, her eyes had widened and her shoulders had sunk. Tommy had taken pity on her and without fuss, he'd pulled up the hatch and taken the nearest order. Lorna had firmly tried to send him back to his bar stool where his neglected pint sat waiting for him but he'd let her protests wash over him as he'd steadily continued serving. Some women just didn't know when to accept help. And it wasn't as if he was doing it with an ulterior motive in mind; he barely saw her as a woman, he just wasn't wired that way anymore, not after France. Not after Grace. He'd squeezed behind Lorna to reach the bottles of spirits, for a second his front pressed full against her back. She'd gasped in surprise, he'd cleared his throat. It was nothing.

After that night, he'd found himself helping out on more that one occasion. Not that she ever asked for his help - in fact, each barrel changed, each log basket filled was greeted by a pointed "I can manage!" - she was like Poll in that respect, too used to doing things her way after holding her own whilst the boys were away, playing war. None of her three brothers had returned, leaving the pub in her hands. With no family left to her now other than the aged aunt she visited every other morning, she poured everything she had into the business. But Tommy had never been one for sitting idle plus some jobs just weren't fit for a woman, no matter how often the woman in question rolled her eyes at him. 'Old fashioned' she'd called him during one particular tussle over a pair of ladders (the guttering at the front needed pinning back up), call it what you want but a woman had no place up a ladder. Instead, he'd instructed her to stay at the bottom and keep the bloody things straight in this blasted wind, do the gales ever stop blowing round these parts? As he'd climbed steadily up the rungs, a wobble had come out of nowhere, causing him to hang on tightly. Looking down, he'd laughed out loud at her mischievous expression, cheeky cow had thought to scare him. "Careful, Mr. Shelby. Don't want you taking a tumble on account of this blasted wind now, do we?"

A gust of said blasted wind blew down the chimney at that second, shifting the ashes in the grate and causing Tommy Shelby to blink and wake from his thoughts. He yawned, his jaw cracking. Time for bed. He stood, stretched and reached for the fire guard. As he did so, he paused ... what was that clatter coming from the top of the stairs? He wondered if it was Lorna but shook the idea from his head, he'd heard her retire sometime ago and she was not one for clatter anyway, she moved gracefully, without fuss, not that he'd noticed. He walked to the middle of the room in time to see that the clatter did indeed originate from Lorna, but not a version he'd seen before. She was clomping down the stairs, a sense of determination and purpose etched across her face. Her hair fell over one shoulder, loosely plaited, and Tommy - who was never surprised, rarely shocked, could not help the arch of his eyebrow as he took in what she was wearing. A thin white cotton nightdress that was surely not meant to be worn alone, covering as it did so little at the top and the bottom, everywhere he looked he could see creamy curves and soft skin. An old, cracked sou'wester offered some protection from the beam of Tommy's gaze and a grin tweaked his lips when he saw what was adding the clomp to her march - his own army boots that he'd discarded at the top of the stairs so as not to trail dust and mud into his rooms.

The jerky way she was moving clicked with the incongruous way she was dressed and Tommy realised that Lorna was sleeping still. Reluctant to shout her name or grab her arm - Aunt Poll swore that this was the quickest route to a fatal heart attack - he stood back and watched to see where she was heading. He could not fail to intervene, however, when Lorna's sleepclumsy fingers began fumbling with the bolts on the door. He strode over to the oblivious landlady and gently pushed her fingers away. "Lorna? Lorna, no - there's nothing for you outside, best to stay here, in the warm" he quietly insisted. However, his words only seemed to provoke her, she gave his shoulder a rough shove, called him "Rhys" and followed it with a string of Welsh that - although incomprehensible to the Brummie - clearly gave the message he was not to get in her way. Feeling helpless, he ran his fingers through his hair as once again she went straight for the bolts, managing to slide the top one across just as the cheap glass in the windows snapped and rattled with the force of the brewing storm. The noise was enough to force his hand, this weather could not be tackled in what amounted to a underwear and a pair of boots. Sighing, he forcibly inserted himself in between her questing fingers and the still locked door. Raising his voice a little, he tried commanding "Lorna. No. Whatever's out there will wait 'til morning. Back to bed with you, come on". Perhaps unsurprisingly, his commanding did nothing to soothe the troubled woman who folded her fingers into hard fists and directed a flurry of tight punches at the barricade between her and the door, namely Tommy. He held her away as best he could, tentatively, his open hands pushing against her shoulders but still the onslaught came. A surprisingly sharp right handed jab caught the underside of his jaw, he winced and was forced to think again, forced to consider that pushing her away was not the solution but perhaps pulling her close might just be.

In one smooth move, Tommy wrapped his arms around the distressed Lorna. He held her tightly against his chest, trapping her fists between them. Without thinking too hard about what he was doing, he soothed her with whispers and rocked her, slowly, side to side. Gradually the fight drained from her and she sank into him. Tommy swallowed hard, one hand still held her close, the other now rested lightly just underneath the sou'wester, on the top most curve of her backside. The cotton of the nightdress slipped over the warm softness of her skin as they moved together. He felt a twitch inside his pants. Her fists had melted away, instead her palms lay flat against his chest and he could feel the imprint of each finger, branding him. Slowly, slowly, he bent his head down, feeling her curls, the shell of her ear against his lips, as he sought the spot where defined shoulder met elegant neck. Her skin was silk into which he crushed his face, the scent of her intoxicating; the delicate aroma of sun warmed gorse was all he could liken it to. That twitch had hardened now, and he pulled her to him closer still, all the better to press himself against her.

He felt rather than heard her whimper. The fingers that had lain flat against his chest now gripped handfuls of his shirt as she stirred, woke, instinctively arched her back, an action which enfolded the steel in his pants. Through his trousers he could feel the cotton she wore shift against him but more than that, he could feel her damned heat, calling him, inviting him.

Her whisper broke the spell. "Tommy?"

With a groan he barely managed to suppress, he held up his hands and stepped back, stepped away. Immediately, he felt bereft, missing her warmth before it had really left him.

"You were sleep walking", his voice too deep, too throaty, he cleared it and tried again. "You were asleep, you wanted to, wanted to leave. I was ... preventing you." His words sounded feeble, even to himself. He felt a blush scorch its way across his cheeks. What kind of man would she take him for now, one who sought to pleasure himself with a woman who was not in her right mind?

Jamming his hands into his pockets, he ripped his eyes away from the sight of her blinking heavy, sleepy lids, her face flushed the most inviting of pinks. Before he did anything he would surely regret, he stiffly nodded good night before tripping up the stairs, two at a time.

Did she have any idea, he berated himself as he paced in the privacy of his modest suite, did she have any idea that she had rented her rooms to a monster? Taking advantage of her like that, pressing his hardness into her soft warmth when she was barely conscious. Seeking to taste her, feel her - he swore loudly, wanting to bleach his memory clean, for every time he thought of her, his treacherous cock stirred again and again. Pausing to stare out of the windows, at where the thrashing sea would be had it been light enough to see by, his reflection echoed his bitter smile. He'd thought himself so clever, so aloof. So immune to her charms. And it had ended like this. He was no better than the sorry excuse for men at home, those who lurked in the Queen's Gardens, flashing their flaccid wares at the prim young ladies. An un-man.

His mind made up, he tore open the wardrobe doors and began yanking clothes from their hangers, hurling them onto the bed. He was so engaged in the task of packing that he did not hear the creak of the door as it was pushed open. He did, however, hear her voice. He froze, keeping his back to her, unwilling to see the disgust that would surely be evident in her eyes.

"Tommy ... "

He turned. His face was carefully blank, all sharp planes and sharper eyes. His full lips were pressed thin and gave nothing away. But inside, he was reeling at the sight of her. She'd jettisoned the sou'wester and the boots, and wore simply the nightdress. Standing in the open doorway, the dim light from the corridor added a glow to her bare shoulders, bare arms. Bare legs. The bobbing of his Adam's apple was the only sign of his discomfort but it was all he could do to keep his eyes on her eyes, his hands at his side. He blinked, taking solace in the darkness for the briefest of seconds; he was convinced he could feel the heat from her body radiate towards him.

There was an electricity in the air, a tension that he'd never felt before. He - Tommy Shelby - was scared to even breath for fear it unleashed the torrent of vitriol he was sure bubbled within her.

But when she spoke, it was to surprise him ...

(Afterwards, he would chide himself for being surprised, because wasn't that what she always did, surprise him?)

... "I know you watch me. I can feel you, watching me. You're so caught up in yourself, you probably don't notice me. Watching you back.

And I know you're cursing yourself now, for not being the gentleman you pride yourself on being. The Old Fashioned Gent you present to the world. But you've never fooled me, Tommy Shelby. I've always seen what's underneath. I see the fire.

I used to wonder about your control, your discipline. Thought it had something to do with the War. But that's not right, is it? You've always had to fight to be in control, haven't you? Well, how about this ..."

And she walked towards him, taking the steps steadily in her bare feet. Stopping when she was just inches away from him. He gazed down at her, expressionless, as though her words weren't flaming arrows. He waited for her to finish, all the while breathing in her scent, basking in her warmth.

Her voice lowered, her accent lilting, she continued.

"I'm bored of your control. I want the fire."