WARNING: NSFW chapter! Sassy content +18 ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
XVIII
GENTLEMAN
June 24th, 1931
As strange as it sounds, I'm writing this entry as I walk through my room, bewildered, smiling, victim of the beautiful embarrassment that the memory of what happened today in Thomas's office causes me.
I fulfilled my promise and even now I can perceive the sensation that Thomas left in my mouth, I can still hear his deep and agonized moans; I still feel his fingers tangling with my hair and my scalp recognizes the tightness of need.
I wore the Chanel dress this morning, knowing that Thomas would be rejoining the Company today. It was hot outside but I put on a light coat since I wanted to avoid the observations and comments I had received the last time I wore a nice dress. The patent leather shoes reflected the rays of the sun on my walk to the tram stop and my racing heart was shaking under the brassier.
It would have been easier for me to go to work with Ada in her car, but my friend was the owner of an almost supernatural intuition and, obviously, she was going to notice the striking detail of the new shoes and my coat, too warm for the season. Although she knew that Thomas had given me a dress and a pair of shoes since last week she saw me leave her brother's study with two boxes that were impossible to disguise, she was unaware, I believe, that such gifts would be used for unorthodox ends within the walls of the Company. That's why I left Ada's house earlier than usual, taking advantage of the fact that she was busy feeding Beth the bottle and scolding Karl.
I considered it a real shame to have to ruin the soles of my precious shoes by balancing on a crowded tram and walking down streets smeared with horse manure, but I preferred it to giving explanations.
When I arrived at the Company, I got into the lift looking at nothing, trying not to recognize any faces so as not to be forced to establish trivial conversations that would only make me postpone my only objetive that morning. When I arrived at my floor, I made my way expressly towards Thomas's offices and when I opened the door of my secretariat, I sighed relieved and happy.
Thomas was already there and the double wooden doors were wide open, as always since I had started work. He heard me arrive and in the distance I saw him smile at me.
"Good morning, Ollie", he said.
"Good morning, Tom".
I walked into his office and locked the door behind me. Thomas noticed that as, when I turned and looked at him, I witnessed his eyes twinkling with interest.
"You put the shoes on", he observed shrewdly, as I approached his desk. "And the dress?"
I took off the coat and without paying too much attention to that accessory garment, I let it fall to the floor. Thomas raised his eyebrows, partly surprised by my determined and almost intimidating demeanor; partly because of how well that dress fit me.
"Do you like it?", I asked, stroking the silk of the sleeves.
"I love it", Thomas replied, "but I'd love to see you without it", he added and let me see a half smile.
"It would be a shame if such a pretty dress was left lying on the floor". Sliding my fingers across the surface of the desk, I approached his chair. Thomas couldn't help himself, and before I reached him, he had already reached out his arm to me.
With the knuckles, Thomas caressed the fabric around my belly and rose until he touched a breast.
"Who said anything about leaving the dress on the floor?", he questioned, narrowing his eyes and, still sitting, he brought me closer to him, taking me by the hips. "We can leave it on the desk". Thomas kissed my navel covered by the dress and corset, "or on one of the chairs". Drawing me, he sat me on his lap, just as he had done in Arrow House. "There are many chairs in this office", Thomas observed, and bit the nipple above the silk.
A shudder rose through my body and I had to hold back a groan. My appetite for Thomas was immeasurable and bordering on obscene. Ever since he provoked me in such a shameful way in his study eight days ago, I hadn't stopped wanting him for a single second. I had planned every move and decision I would make today, and my intention was to surprise and delight him.
As we kissed vehemently, he wasted no time and dodging the pink silk, he slipped between my thighs and rubbed my sex with intensity. My underwear didn't stop his caresses from making me shudder and this time, I could barely contain the gasp that threatened to leave my throat.
"Don't hold back", Thomas spoke roughly into my ear. "I want to hear you".
"Tom, someone else could hear me", I explained, almost stuttering. He kept caressing me.
"And?"
As if he was testing me and in turn punishing me, Thomas managed to slide across the edges of my undergarment and his touch found my skin. He moaned with me when he inserted two fingers into my femininity and I felt him lift the hips in a reflex action. He was more aroused than I was, and when I allowed myself to whimper out loud, he snorted and kissed my neck.
Suddenly, Thomas forced me to stand up. Dizzy and confused, I found myself with my back to Thomas and bent over his desk. My hands crumpled the papers underneath them and I felt him lift the skirt of my dress.
"Remember when I told you I wasn't going to fuck you on top of my desk like a whore?", Thomas said against my ear and my underwear slid down my legs. "Well, I'm regretting it".
"Tommy..." I caressed his face, which was resting on my shoulder.
Out of nowhere, I witnessed Thomas behind me gulp and stiffen. In his expression I identified the pain and he put a hand on the desk to steady himself.
"Tommy? What's wrong?" I asked with concern.
"The... wound...", he could only say that before he dropped into the chair, hunched over and touching the area where the bullet had grazed him.
/
Ada's hysterical laughter echoed throughout the room and possibly the entire hospital. In the mirror, Tommy watched her squirm, clutching her stomach.
"Sorry!" his sister apologized, trying in vain to refocus on the diary. "This part is so funny!"
Tommy's face was full of foam and he was sitting in front of a basin full of hot water. A disturbed Finn was sharpening the razor with which he was about to shave him.
It had been a bad idea to let Ada read that entry, but Tommy had not known that was the situation that continued in the chronological account of Olivia's memories. When he realized it, it was too late, and it was no use stopping Ada, since Finn surely imagined what it was going to happen.
"Ada, give me that notebook", Tommy demanded.
"Why?", his sister looked offended.
"Olivia won't be amused to hear that you read something so personal aloud".
Through the mirror, Tommy saw Ada's expression darkened and all traces of vivacity seemed to vanish as if it had never existed. He saw her clench the jaw and cross her arms.
"I thought we already talked about this. Are you going to look for her anyway?"
"You can't change my mind", Tommy said flatly.
"If Aunt Polly finds out..."
"I don't give a shit what Polly thinks, says, or does", Tommy interrupted his sister sharply and, with one hand, motioned for Finn to start shaving him once and for all.
It had been ten days since Ada felt sorry for him and confessed the truth about Olivia's fate. Since then, Tommy had poured all his vitality and existence into the whereabouts of the woman he loved. Although it was true that from a stretcher he had not been able to do much, his head had traveled every possibility, every scene and every place where he could find her. Tommy had dedicated all his thoughts, dreams and sleepless nights to repeating in the head, over and over again, the details that could be of any use to him.
Tommy had a plan, and the morning had finally come for him to be discharged. He would no longer have to depend on Arthur's unreliable inquiries since, although he was grateful to have at least one sibling who was loyal and understood him in his suffering, Arthur's investigations were the product of obsolete researches, and his observations were clouded by the inattention caused by cocaine abuse. Tommy knew that he could only trust his senses if he wanted to find Olivia and now he was leaving the hospital, he would no longer have to depend on anyone but himself.
"When you get out of here, you're going to go straight to the brick house, aren't you?", as if reading his mind, Ada asked that question narrowing the eyes.
"Yes". Tommy tipped his head back and let Finn run the razor across his jaw.
"Arthur was already there and he told you he didn't see or find anything, why the hell do you insist?"
"Because what for Arthur may be 'nothing' for me may be a lot, Ada", he simply replied.
"Polly's right", his sister muttered angrily. "I should never have given you these fucking diaries", she added, tapping the notebook she still had in her hand.
"And why did you do it?" Tommy asked, feigning disinterest although, in reality, he did want to know Ada's motivations, until then unknown.
"Because I always wanted to tell you the truth, you idiot". Ada seemed to get on her nerves that Tommy hadn't realized something so obvious to her.
"I tried to contact you the next morning, when they confessed that she was alive but they wouldn't let me. While I understood why they were doing it and it made sense to me," she said emphatically, "I always believed that you must know the truth. I read the diaries and saw in them the opportunity to make you aware of everything without having to tell you anything, and besides, who better than Olivia to inform you of what had happened? I should have imagined that you weren't going to limit yourself simply to reading the diaries, but that you were also going to do typical things of yourself: kill people, threaten, get into the house of a destroyed family, almost end your own life. As if I don't know you…", suddenly, Ada seemed more angry with herself than with him.
"Is she really alive?", Finn intervened in the conversation, as if he were trying to relax the atmosphere.
"Yes, Finn. She's alive and your sister hid it from me for two fucking months, even though she now wants to disengage from responsibility", Tommy snapped. Try as he might, he couldn't help but hold a grudge towards Ada because, just as he had told her, he would have expected it of anyone but her.
"I'm also your sister". Ada stood up and tossed the notebook onto his legs. "Unfortunately".
Tommy cleared his throat, got hold of the notebook, and behind him he heard Ada leave the room, furious and very distressed. He didn't care. Until now, he had not been able to assimilate that Ada had been a participant in such a betrayal and, as much as Ada insisted that Olivia's diaries contained the answer to all his questions, Tommy doubted that there was anything in them that would justify Ada's treason.
As Finn ran the razor across his face, he read again.
/
"The... wound...", he could only say that before he dropped into the chair, hunched over and touching the area where the bullet had grazed him.
I rushed to unbutton his vest and shirt, looking for a bloodstain to indicate that some stitch had given way, but, to my peace of mind, when I reached the chemise, my eyes did not detect the color red anywhere in his torso.
"It must have been a bad move", I said, stroking his cheek.
"Shit, Ollie", he cursed, apparently still feeling some pain. "I really wanted to fuck you today".
I smiled and leaned down to kiss his forehead tenderly. Thomas received the kiss but it didn't take long for him to raise his head a little and go to my lips. The need with which he was still asking for me made me understand that his body was still crying out for mine and, resting my hand on his left thigh, I began to lift my caress to see if, indeed, the excitement was still there.
Thomas jumped when I took him over the trousers and pulled away from my face to gaze at me in fascination. He wasn't expecting that.
"Are you going to torture me?", he asked provocatively, but in his voice I detected curiosity. "You know I can't do anything to you with this wound of mine"
"Easy, Tommy", I whispered, "I'll do it to you", and I saw his pupils dilate.
Just as I had been in his study a week ago, I got down on my knees in front of him. Thomas stared at me in amazement and excitement as I accommodated myself under the reduced space of the desk, which was not as wide as the one he had in the mansion, and leaning my elbows on his legs, I looked him in the eye from that perspective.
His face revealed an accumulation of identifiable emotions for me at the moment that, lasciviously, I made the gesture to unbuckle his belt: I found anxiety, expectation and some remorse, as if he had been wanting that for too long and not could promise to be a gentleman with me.
But I didn't want a gentleman. I wanted Thomas Shelby. I wanted everything from him: the bad, the good; his lights and his shadows. The most correct side of him and the one that was furthest from the path of good. I wanted him to share in his impudence, to deposit all his libido in me; for him to make me feel, once and for all, like the whore that everyone believed me to be.
"Everyone in your family is convinced I'm a whore", I told him as he fiddled with the gold belt buckle and rested my chin on his right thigh. "Even before we went to bed, they already believed that I was fucking you".
"Ignore them", Thomas said uneasily. He was not amused by the fact that I was prolonging his torture and, spreading his legs even more, he brought his erection closer to my face.
"I don't want to ignore them, Tom". I unbuckled the belt and he settled anxiously in his chair. "I want them to speak with property", I added.
I saw him widening his eyes, marveling at my attitude, and then, once he had processed my words, he gave a playful smile.
"Let's do it, then", Thomas prompted me, and as if he were suddenly the victim of an outburst of tenderness, he subtly caressed my face. "Behave like the whore my family thinks you are and I'll make you feel like one".
We sealed that strange agreement by smiling at each other and, knowing that I would receive no mercy from Thomas, I dedicated myself to releasing the buttons from his buttonholes as I witnessed his breathing become more and more agitated.
I got to the underpants and didn't hesitate for a second. With almost sickly voracity I took what I already considered mine and no one else's, and Thomas shuddered. I stroked and watched it, reveling in details that I had failed to perceive in Carleton's estate due to the dim light in the room, and then I felt Thomas grasp my neck with one hand and direct me toward his masculinity, devoid of considerations.
"You're taking too long", he growled, raising an eyebrow.
I licked the length with my eyes on his and found myself screaming inside as I witnessed Thomas Shelby succumb to my action. He'd let all the air out of his lungs in an agonized sigh and leaned back in his chair with such a languor that it seemed the soul had left his body.
I brought Thomas to my mouth and he trembled inside me. He growled again as I increased my attention, gradually, and, although I was not an expert on the subject, his deep, ragged gasps gave me to understand that I was doing things right.
"Oh God", I heard him mutter on an exhale. "Fuck!", he exclaimed through clenched teeth.
I felt Thomas slide his fingers between my hair with a kindness that did not correspond to the state in which he was so I knew that, to my chagrin, he was limiting himself, forbidding me from the wildest side of him.
I had to make a resolution: making myself brave, I dared to do what Andrew had always demanded of me and that I had never tolerated, perhaps because at that time I still possessed the typical modesty of young girls who pretend to be demure, perhaps because I was afraid of hurting myself in the process. I squeezed my eyes shut and sucked brutally, almost violently, until I managed to drive him deep down my throat.
"Ollie! God! Fuck!" The three words were uttered in a row in an outburst that almost seemed like a scream.
He buried his fingers in my scalp and I leaned toward him, seized with fierce need. Allowing himself to tug at the strands near the back of my neck a little, I heard him bring his arm over me until he reached the surface of the desk and searched among his things for the cigarette case and lighter.
The smell of tobacco made me reopen my watery eyes, and still focused on my task, I looked at Thomas with the spirit of questioning him. He shouldn't be smoking but there he was: enjoying that damn cigarette, tugging at my hair, exhaling smoke and moaning with his gaze on me.
"You do it so fucking good, Ollie" he said, raising the corners of his lips. "So fucking good", he emphasized. "Let me show you how well you're doing it".
Thomas took the cigarette with his lips, with both hands he clung to my hair and immobilized me using force. Then, pulling his head back, I saw the Adam's apple shake in a guttural, indecent moan, and my mouth was filled with him.
I pulled away immediately, suddenly embarrassed, and with the essence of Thomas in my mouth. I looked at him without really knowing what he expected, and he responded by taking a drag on his tobacco with narrowed eyes.
"Swallow it".
Alarmed by the order he was giving me but at the same time unsuspectedly delighted, I obeyed, and then Thomas' face lit up with satisfaction.
With stiff legs and dizzy, I managed to sit up and sat on top of Thomas, who soon put the cigarette in my mouth. This time, I hadn't had the need to snatch it away.
"Is this what causes a Chanel dress?", Thomas asked, amused. "Now I understand why so many husbands go out of their way to buy them from their wives".
"This is what a man causes when he turns a woman on to an almost intolerable point, and then he said he's feeling pain in a nearly healed wound", I snapped and proceeded to scrutinize him with my eyes. "Because it was an excuse for this to happen, wasn't it?"
Like the storm that had caught us the day we went to the Carleton estate, the pain had also been Thomas's ruse, and the laugh he let out at my observation told me I was right. Every second that passed, I became more familiar with this man and knew what he was capable of. He possessed a stone face and was extremely intelligent.
"And once again, I made it", he tried to get the cigarette but I avoided him, turning my face.
"You did it because I allowed you to, Thomas Shelby", I lashed out and, grabbing my underwear off the floor, stood up. "I also had planned this to happen; after all, you tempted me to do it in your own house".
"Will it happen again?", he asked almost enthusiastically. "Because, hell, I really enjoyed your cunt the other day but I confess that I loved your mouth". Those words made me suddenly feel unjustify embarrassement, obviously, because of what I had just done.
"It'll happen again, yes". I put on my underwear and witnessed how he tried to glimpse something when I raised the skirt of the dress, "but it'll happen when I want to", I added.
Thomas watched me raptly for a couple of seconds. I must have looked quite peculiar, fixing the garter belt in front of him, with a cigarette between my fingers, my face flushed, disheveled, and displaying a commanding attitude. It was the complete opposite of what he had seen in the estate room and both sides of me seemed to enchant him.
"As you say, madam", Thomas teased me.
/
"Are you trying to cut my throat?" Tommy caught Finn's attention after he felt the razor slip from his brother's fingers and nearly cut the skin on his neck.
"I'm sorry, Tom", Finn apologized and looking at him over his shoulders, Tommy noticed that he was noticeably nervous.
"Were you reading too?", Tommy questioned. The slowness with which his brother had proceeded to shave him, in contrast to how fast he had been the previous days, let Tommy know that Finn had been reading the diary above his head, along with him.
"No... well, yes", he finished confessing. "It's just that I can't believe she's still alive", Finn tried to justify himself.
"And what the hell does that have to do with the fact that you had the audacity to read Olivia's diary?". Tommy sighed. "Whatever, hurry up. I want to get out of here as soon as possible".
"Are you going to Small Heath?" With a towel soaked in hot water, Finn brushed away the remains of foam.
"Yes, Arthur will take me, and you'll go with Isaiah to buy me another car", Tommy communicated. He saw how his brother looked excited. "No flashy colours, did you hear me? Buy the most sober thing you can see".
"But Tom, until your fractures solidify you can't drive. You can't even shave alone. Let me buy a car for me and I promise I'll take you everywhere".
Tommy shook his head but couldn't contain the smile that crossed his face. Finn was already twenty-four years old, but having grown up far from the war and having spent his entire teenage years in wealth, made him still maintain, in a way, his innocence and good feelings. So, beyond his tantrums, Tommy wanted to keep Finn away from the Peaky Blinders: he was the young man Tommy would have liked to be.
"No", he said again and Finn snorted. "Besides, I won't need you to take me anywhere. I plan to recover pretty soon", Tommy added.
Tommy covered himself with his coat and raised a cigarette to his lips. Fearful of what the brick house might have for him, he took Olivia's diary and pressed it to his chest, begging the woman who was alive in some corner of the world to help him in his search.