It was amazing how much could happen in a single moment. One moment everything was perfect: his beautiful wife, bedecked in the kind of jewels she had always deserved, smiling and looking into his eyes with beatific happiness… it was the kind of life he hadn't even dared to imagine. But before he could even appreciate it, everything was shattered. Everything he had feared since the moment he'd first seen the attractive, delicate-looking woman with fire in her eyes at the Garrison had come true. Reality had finally collided with the dream. She was hurt. She was hurt, and it was his fault, as he'd always known it would be.
Her blood was bright, alarming red, spilling over the shimmering silk of her dress. Why had he not foreseen this? Why had he left her so exposed, her pale skin barely covered by the thin fabric? She should have been wearing armor. Anyone around him should have.
His body began to move against his will. He pressed on the wound, knowing it would hurt her but hoping to staunch the bleeding. She was conscious; her breaths were shallow, her forehead clammy, but somehow she was smiling at him, holding onto him, asking him to keep her alive. He would, if it was the last thing he did. He would have spent an eternity in hell to keep her here on earth. He'd been in hell before; he knew he could manage again.
Polly and Ada were at his sides, one barking out orders, one murmuring small words of comfort, but he could comprehend neither. All he could hear were Grace's shaky breaths. He pushed her hair back from her forehead and kissed her softly, promising it would be all right.
"The ambulance is coming, Tommy," Ada said directly into his ear, her words settling in his brain and providing the smallest comfort. He turned to look at her. She was soft and safe, with sympathetic eyes and caring hands. He trusted her more than anyone else in the world right now.
"What do I do, Ada?" he asked, voice cracking with grief. "What do I do?"
"It'll be all right," she said, reaching out to caress his shoulder. "She's going to be all right."
The ambulance did come, in minutes that felt like agonizing hours. The medics loaded Grace onto a stretcher, and it was at the moment that Tommy felt completely helpless. He was back in France, watching men destroyed around him, watching stretchers disappear with men that would never return. This was the world that Grace had protected him from, the nightmare that her presence had banished. It all flooded back in a rush of panic and adrenaline that coursed through his veins like fire, threatening to burn him from the inside out.
It was Ada that pulled him back to the present. She took his arm and squeezed it. "Tommy," she said. He looked down at her, fists clenched, ready to attack, but then he saw his sister's face. Even in mania he couldn't hurt her - she was the one he'd gone to France for. It had been Ada's face that flashed in his mind when the nights were unbearable and his trigger finger itched for relief. He was not a man of any great faith, but when desperation struck, it was Ada he prayed for: that she would one day have a family, that she would grow to see womanhood. Now she stood before him, an accomplished, independent woman with a child of her own. He had survived. France was behind him, and if he had survived that, he could survive anything.
"Let's follow the ambulance," she said, starting to lead him out to the car. He clung to her the way Karl always did to the ratty stuffed bear Arthur had given him for Christmas, with a grip stronger than any grown man. She somehow held him up, which surprised him, although at this point he should have known that this was where women were much more capable than men. They could always hold more than their own weight.
Ada drove while Tommy sat in the passenger seat, smoking cigarettes with shaking hands, refusing to speak. He jumped out and ran into the hospital before the car had come to a full stop.
"My wife," he demanded of the nurse at the front desk, striding purposefully toward her. "Where is my wife?"
"Mr. Shelby," she started, taking on an infuriatingly condescending tone. She was a plump woman with frizzing gray hair and a thick Dublin accent, and she looked like someone's grandmother and spoke as such, as though she were trying to soothe him.
However, he would not be placated. "Tell me where she is," he said menacingly, placing both hands on the desk and leaning in close enough for her to detect the exact brand of his last cigarette.
"She's in surgery, Mr. Shelby. You'll have to wait here," the nurse insisted.
He thought of the way he'd been made to wait while she delivered Charles; knowing his wife was in pain but unable to do anything. Thomas Shelby, impotent and useless for the first time in his life. Now for the second.
While Tommy seethed, puffing air through his nose and pacing like a bull, Ada had approached behind him.
"How is she, Janet?" she asked the nurse.
"She's alive," the nurse said to Ada, refusing to look Tommy in the eye. "They're hopeful."
"See, Tommy?" Ada said, grabbing his arm and forcing him to look at her. "They're hopeful. Come have a seat."
"You have a seat, Ada," he replied. "I want to go in there."
"And do what? You're not a doctor," she retorted. "You think if you stand there and look intimidating they'll do a better job? You'll only scare them, Tommy. Come sit down. Have a drink."
She brandished a flask from her coat pocket and waved it in front of his face.
"Sit," she repeated.
He did.
She handed him the flask and he took a great gulp, letting whiskey warm his chest and face. "She's going to be all right," Ada said. "You were shot in the very same place, remember? And you're terrorizing Birmingham to this day."
"Yes, but I -" he started.
"Trust me, we women can endure much more than you think you can," Ada replied, rolling her eyes. "Just wait. It won't be long now."
Tommy put his face in his hands, guilt slithering in where anger had burned. "My God, Ada," he groaned. "How could I have let this happen?"
"Nobody knew," she said, patting his back gently. "It wasn't your fault."
"It was my fault for marrying her in the first place! How selfish could I be? I should have let her stay in New York... I'm not safe."
"She didn't want him," Ada said softly. "She wanted you. She knew what that meant."
"I promised I would keep her safe," he rasped, his throat choked with agony. "I promised her."
Ada sighed, and the slow circular motions she was making on his back paused. "You don't make any sense, Tommy," she said. "If you want to keep her safe, why do you keep pushing forward like this? Why not just call it enough?"
"You don't understand," he said. "It's not as easy as that."
"Why not? You have a child now, Tommy. You have Charles. It should be that easy."
"Ada, I have certain obligations -"
"To your family," she insisted. "Those should be the only obligations."
"I'm no good to my family if I'm dead," he shot back. "There are… things…"
"What things, Tommy?"
He looked down at his hands and flexed them, watching the veins expand and contract, remembering that he was alive and strong. He could manage just one more leg of this race. One more secret that needed to be kept, and then it would all be better.
It was always just one more.
He took a breath to tell Ada that it wasn't her concern, but then a doctor in a white coat appeared. He and Ada both stood instantly, and Ada squeezed Tommy's hand. Something rose within Tommy, some sickening combination of hope and dread that weakened his knees, though he would never show it.
"Mrs. Shelby is recovering," he stated with no observable emotion. "She's very weak from blood loss, but you may go see her if you like."
Ada thanks the doctor, but Tommy had only one goal in sight. He wanted to see his wife.
She was lying in an immaculately white hospital bed, her hair splayed out around her head like a golden halo. She was awake, but her eyelids were heavy, occasionally drifting closed of their own accord. The room was as quiet as a chapel, every passing footstep seeming to echo forever. "Grace," Tommy rumbled in a low voice.
Her eyelids lifted. "Tommy," she said, managing the smallest of smiles.
He went to her side and leaned down to kiss her on the forehead. "How are you?"
"Tired," she said. "They gave me some drugs…"
"Yes," he said. "For the pain."
"They say I'll heal up nicely, though," she said, her voice weak and raspy like it always was when she first woke, in the heavenly mornings when they found sanctuary from the world in their bed.
"Grace," he said, taking her hand and kneeling by her bed. "I'm so sorry. I promised I would keep you safe and now…"
"You couldn't have known," she said, somehow still soothing him even in her state.
"Of course I could have known. I should have known. This was… inevitable. I've been so selfish."
"Tommy," she started, but he interrupted her, unable to hear anymore.
"You know what I have to do, Grace," he said, pressing his forehead to hers. "If you had been... I can't stand to see you hurt again."
"What are you talking about?" she implored, trying to sit up in bed but wincing with pain. Tommy put his hand on her good shoulder, trying to calm her.
"We talked about it before. When Charles was born. It's not safe for you to be here with me."
"Tommy," she said, becoming agitated. "What is the point of being married if we're not together?"
"Don't strain yourself," he said. "We will be together. I just need to take care of a few things first."
"You always need to take care of a few things first," she replied. The drugs were making her softer than usual; all her sharpness was replaced with sadness, and it was pulling his heart apart at the seams. "You told me one day you were going to throw your gun in the canal."
"I know what I said, Grace."
"I won't go, Thomas," she said. But even as she said it he could hear her weakening, hear her giving in. She knew he was right, though she was fighting it on principle. He clutched her hand - it was warm and soft, and he could feel a pulse through it. Whether it was his or hers he couldn't be sure. They were the same. They always had been. In order to keep himself alive, he had to keep her alive, whatever it took.
She squeezed his hand, and her eyes told him that she trusted him. They would make it through this. One more thing.