.

XX
SUBSTITUTE

The commotion outside the bedroom caused Tommy to wake up. He grumbled and carefully rolled over in bed, begging to get back to sleep. He hadn't slept so well in months and it felt particularly strange to dream of beautiful things.

He had dreamed of Olivia. With the reunion that, sooner rather than later, he knew was going to happen. He had seen himself wrapping his arms around her, kissing the lips that he believed he had lost forever, caressing the face that he had longed for so much. He dreamed of the vigorous rays of the sun streaming through the trees of Central Park, the fresh air of the bay, the bustle of The Big Apple.

"Mrs. Thorne! I already told you. You cannot enter!" Frances' voice forced Tommy to open his eyes, knowing what was coming.

Ada kicked open the bedroom door but Tommy didn't move a bit and didn't bother to look at his sister. By the way her breathing could be heard, he knew she was furious.

"What the fuck are you thinking?!", Ada questioned, shouting. "New York?! Are you fucking mad?!"

Tommy sat up slightly and looked at Ada, unfazed. No one would be able to cloud the peace he owned, not even the traitor of his sister.

"I'm so sorry, sir". Frances walked into the bedroom almost having a nervous breakdown. "I told Mrs. Thorne that you didn't want to receive visitors but..."

"Don't worry, Frances", Tommy tried to calm the poor housekeeper down. Sometimes it seemed a miracle that she was still working there. "I'll talk to Ada", he resolved.

"Talk?" Ada had stopped shouting but now she was speaking through clenched teeth. "I didn't come here to talk. I came to stop you. You're not going to New York, and if I have to tie you up to stop you from going, I will".

Tommy took a deep breath and rose until he was sitting on the bed. He observed that, by the light that filtered through the thick curtains, it must have been almost noon. He had slept about ten hours without drinking laudanum or alcohol and that was amazing.

"What are you laughing at?" Ada caught his eye, and it was there that Tommy realized he was smiling.

"I found Olivia".

He witnessed anger leave his sister's body and her face turn papery white. Her blue eyes, so similar to his and which only a few seconds ago exhumed anger, were filled with consternation.

"Where is she?", the question was asked on an agonized exhalation.

Tommy had to let out a laugh and allowed himself to rejoice in the pleasure it gave him to hear Ada wonder the same thing he had wondered since he learned that Olivia was still alive. It was ironic and certainly satisfying that the woman who for months withheld the truth from him was now crying out for it.

"She's in New York", he answered.

"But Arthur told me..."

"Arthur told you what I told him which was, of course, a lie". Almost out of habit Tommy took the cigarette case that he always had on the night table and his body caught him rejecting the tobacco. He didn't feel like smoking. "I told him that I was going to New York because I had had enough of you all and I would run my own 'branch' of the Peaky Blinders from there. I even told him that..."

"You had made a deal with Al Capone", Ada finished the sentence for him. She didn't come out of her amazement. "Why did you lie to Arthur?", she wanted to know.

"Because I knew that he would tell you everything. He didn't like my idea, he even asked me to take him with me. He felt betrayed when I told him that I wouldn't need him in my new band". Tommy could still remember the mixture of hatred and sadness he found on his brother's face. "I knew you'd come as soon as Arthur brought you up to speed on what I had planned to do".

"God, Tom", his sister covered her face. "Wouldn't it have been easier to phone me? Or go to my house? Why the hell do you always make things so complicated?"

"If I phoned you, Polly would have been the one who was going to answer the call, not you. If I went to your house, Polly would have been the one who was going to receive me, not you". Tommy shook his head and raised his cigarette to his lips. Suddenly, the need for nicotine had returned. "You know well that I could never have communicated you what I know with Polly listening to what we talk about".

Ada sat on the bed next to him. She kept looking confused and was biting her lower lip anxiously.

"Where is she?", Ada insisted.

"I already told you. She's New York".

"Yes, but where? New York is huge, Tom", Ada hated that he didn't go into details.

"I don't know yet but I suspect she's with Michael".

Tommy watched as his sister sighed heavily and shook her head in growing concern. As they progressed in that conversation, Ada looked less convinced and he knew that she would soon oppose his plan.

"You're going to kill him", she concluded.

"Yes".

"And so you'll finish destroying this family."

"Tell me, Ada, when the hell was this family not destroyed?". Tommy took a long drag, waiting for his sister to say something but all she did was close her eyes dejectedly. "First, our father abandoned us. Then, mum committed suicide. The War came and neither Arthur nor John nor I knew if we were going to return home. You married Freddie and you left. You abandoned us". Ada meant to defend herselft but Tommy didn't let her talk. "Grace was killed. John was killed. Linda appeared out of nowhere and filled Arthur's head with bullshit. Gina teamed up with Michael. And here we are, pretending there's still a fucking reason why we should stick together. I'm fed up, Ada". He shook the cigarette in the ashtray. "You fed me up. I lost too much to this fucking family and now that I have a chance to get Olivia back, I'm not going to let her go".

"Do you really think Michael is holding Olivia against her will?", the question was laden with sarcasm. Ada had been hurt by his words.

"No, but for some reason, he managed to convince her to go with him thousands of kilometres away and that's reason enough for me to shoot him in the chest".

"You still don't read the diaries", Ada came to that resolution after hearing him. "Why the hell do you keep drawing your own conclusions? I'm tired of telling you to read the fucking diaries, Thomas".

"I have no time".

"You have no time?!"

"I'm taking a ship tomorrow. I could read during the trip but..."

"You're not going anywhere until you read the diaries!". The violent clamor made his cigarette slip from his fingers and onto the bed, burning the sheets a bit. Ada had left behind the gloomy and muffled tone of voice and she was again in the grip of violence. "You can't meet Olivia until you read them!"

"Why?"

He saw his sister open and close her mouth, as if for an instant she was going to let him know what the hell was going on. Then, Ada's eyes filled with thick tears that she soon shed.

"God..." Ada sank into a silent crying.

"Ada?" Tommy frowned and tried to move closer to her sister to comfort her. When he tried to place a hand on her shoulder, she pushed him away and, standing up, turned her back on him.

Tommy knew then that it was useless to inquire. Ada would not say a word in reference to what she insisted only the diaries could tell him. He wondered if Ada avoided bringing him up to date because she believed it was the best way to clean up Olivia's reputation, or because she feared for his reaction if she told him.

Something was wrong and he was aware of it. He had been such an idiot that for a second he believed that now that he knew where Olivia was, it had all worked out for him. But things were never easy for Thomas Shelby: there was always an undertone, a hidden truth, a rugged secret. The reality that he had so far refused to accept was that Olivia had moved away from his side for some reason.

And that reason paralyzes him.

"How did you know where she is?", his sister asked once she forced herself to stop crying. She was still turning her back on him.

"I found this in the brick house", Tommy said, and from the nightstand, next to his cigarette case and ashtray, he took Olivia's book.

Ada had no choice but to turn around and with her face flushed from her crying, she took what her brother gave her. When she read the title, she instinctively shook her head, as if she couldn't believe what she was seeing. Upon noticing the author's name, she giggled.

"It this her? Beatrice?", Ada was laughing. Seeing Tommy nod, she put a hand to her mouth. "She made it. She published her collection of poems. She made it, Tom!"

"When I got home with the book yesterday, I called every bookstore I know in Birmingham and London, and none of them had this book. It is not yet sold in England", he reported.

Ada went to the last page, just as he had done, and when she found the city name underlined, she gasped.

"She..."

"Yes. She was here in Birmingham. And it must have been recently. The book was launched in New York a month and a half ago, but a trip from New York to any port in England takes fifteen days to cross the Atlantic ocean", he analyzed and straightened up in bed. "That means Olivia was in the brick house at least a month ago. Michael was there also two weeks ago. They were together".

Ada's eyes widened as she looked for something in his face that would make her aware of what he was thinking. It was obvious that she wanted to find in his expression a minimum grimace of hatred, resentment and desire for revenge but, finding none of that, she looked away uneasily.

"I don't know why they came. I don't know when they left and I don't care if she came with Michael or not. The only thing I care right now is to find her". Tommy paused, waiting for his sister to say something, but when she didn't, he continued speaking. "You told me you found out that Olivia was alive the day after she faked her death. Did Polly tell you anything else after that?"

"Polly told me that she was gone and that Michael would make sure she was not in danger" said Ada and fell back into silence.

"She didn't tell you where Olivia had gone?"

"No"

"Didn't you ask?"

"Of course I asked". His sister was bothered by the questioning. "But Polly told me that the more people knew Olivia's whereabouts, the more in danger she was. She swore to me that Olivia would be fine".

"Ada, what the hell happened?" Tommy narrowed his eyes. At that point, the mystery was too big to be bearable.

Ada purposely ignored him and she turned her face to the couch in front of the unlit fireplace. The box with the diaries rested on it and Tommy watched as his sister drifted to the Olivia's memories in a kind of trance.

"Which diary were you reading?", she asked.

"I was going to start reading the fourth today". Tommy answered, still waiting for Ada to drop another clue.

But what Ada did, was take the fourth diary and open it in front of her eyes. Standing, she cleared her throat, and leaving Tommy with doubtful mind and heart, she began to read.

/

June 28th, 1931.

I've finally gotten the strength to sit down and write. What I'm about to relate happened yesterday afternoon but it is not until now, at eleven thirty at night the next day, that laudanum allows me to detach myself from my pillow and take my pen.

It doesn't mean that I'm over what happened and I don't know very well how to proceed. Ada has already realized that something is wrong with me, but I have excused myself that my panic attacks increased in frequency, and in part I'm not lying. To Thomas, I can't tell this. If I tell him, he will speed up Gina's sentence, and while I'm almost as convinced now as he is that that woman must die, I don't want to be the one to dictate her fate.

Yesterday was Saturday. The work day was shorter than it is, by custom, from Monday to Friday and I left the Company much earlier. Thomas stayed, of course, as did Ada and all the directory members. After signing the attendance sheet, I started heading towards the tram stop.

It was a cloudy afternoon and the streets of Small Heath were conspicuously empty. A strange warm breeze came from the south and I could hear the birds singing on the shabby rooftops. I carried my bag on my shoulder and put my hands in the coat's pockets since, suddenly, I felt them cold. Thomas had offered to drive me to Ada's house, but I had seen Lizzie hovering near my secretary. I told myself that it wouldn't be wise to leave the building with another woman's husband in front of everyone's eyes, as much as I would have liked to accept his proposal, so I had to refuse.

I walked a couple of blocks down the bumpy sidewalk and that's when I heard a car engine behind me. It caught my attention that when looking over my shoulder, I could not see the vehicle anywhere and I tried to ignore that curious detail, until after having walked only ten meters, I heard the engine again.

That time, I was alarmed. I looked everywhere for the car whose noise was getting closer and closer and I thought I was overcome by paranoia when, crossing the street, the screeching of the tires against the cobblestone manifested itself behind me and I felt the paralysis caused by the terror to see the hood of a black car stop less than fifteen centimeters from me.

It took me a couple of seconds to take my eyes from the tin figure representing a swan adhering to the front of the car, and then direct them towards the windshield in order to recognize the driver. My heart leapt as I identified Gina Gray behind the wheel.

I couldn't move or say anything. I continued to be the victim of astonishment and bewilderment. Gina didn't have any kind of expression on her face and she got out of the car with such a calm that she didn't look like she had been about to run me over.

I heard her heels circle the vehicle and address me. Then her thin, gloved fingers gripped my neck.

"I'll be brief". Owner of an unbearable breath of alcohol, she spoke calmly, as she strangled me with a force that I never imagined she possessed. "The next time you accuse me of something I didn't do, I'll put a bullet in your fucking head, did you hear me?". She squeezed more and I took her arm, trying to free myself. "I don't hear you", she teased me. "Has your tongue worn out from rubbing it all over Thomas' cock?"

I slapped her, unsuccessfully, and then, I grabbed her face, wanting to dig my nails into it. She drew her long neck back and got rid of my hand. After all, she was taller than me.

Gina threw me on the hood of the car and I, starved of oxygen, felt the tin swan dig into my belly. She took me by the hair and intended to bang my head against the windshield but suddenly she stopped.

"That will leave a mark", I heard her laugh. "It's not convenient".

Still taking me by the hair, she tossed me onto the street and my bones collided with the cold cobblestones. I felt my dress get muddy and my bag flew onto the sidewalk, away from me.

"I could run you over now but I'm not going to". With the tip of her heel, she lifted my skirt up and uncovered my legs and underwear. "Look at that horrible ass. I thought Thomas had bad taste fucking Syphilitic Lizzie, but at least she's not riddled with stretch marks like you", Gina humiliated me and, hurt, scared and weak, I couldn't help but cry.

I couldn't pronounce a word since I still didn't assimilate what was happening. The outburst made me remember my earliest childhood when, defenseless, I had to accept the blows of my classmates, these being violent and unjustified. Seeing myself being physically attacked once again, when I believed that adulthood had freed me from it, awakened denial and trauma.

Gina crouched close to my head and in a reflex act, I covered my face.

"Oswald was a jerk". Beyond my daze, I noticed she referred to Mosley by his first name. "If he had raped you and made you pregnant that day, Thomas would have dismissed you as the hobby that you are. He should have raped you. That's the only language whores like you understand".

"Gina!" The male voice came from afar and between my fingers I could see how Gina's eyes widened. She stood up immediately and ran in the direction of the voice.

"Michael! Michael! Help us!"

I recognized another couple of steps heading towards me in addition to the heels.

"Olivia?!" I uncovered my face and saw Michael pounce on me, alarmed. "What happened, Gina? Did you run her over?!"

"No, no!" Gina's eyes were full of tears. "But almost. She was going to cross and I didn't see her... Oh God! I stopped the car in time but couldn't help but touch her! She hit the hood and fell to the ground..."

"I told you you shouldn't drive like this. Fuck". Michael cursed at Gina as he grabbed me by the shoulders and tried to sit me up. "Olivia, does something hurt?"

I shook my head but actually my body was bruised and my mind was on the brink of collapse. When Michael grabbed my neck to straighten me up, I was the victim of a strange delusion: at one point, my brain related Michael's touch to the way Gina had attacked me moments ago, and the leather of Michael's gloves reminded me to Mosley's clammy, sticky tongue.

I screamed and drew back, crawling across the cobblestones of the street in a nervous breakdown. Michael stood still, stunned by my reaction, and Gina, behind him, was once again wearing an inert expression.

"Easy! Easy! Calm down..." Michael showed me the palms of his hands and leaned closer to me, trying to get me to stop screaming.

"Michael, I'm going", Gina snapped out of nowhere. "I have to go".

"Wait!". Michael stopped her. "Are you going in the car? We have to get this woman to a hospital".

"What for?" Gina had left her acting behind, and her husband seemed surprised by the drastic change in attitude. "You see that she's not hurt, just a little nervous".

"A little nervous? She's shaking!"

Gina ignored Michael and got back into the car with complete nonchalance and composure. In front of my eyes, her behavior was inhumane and placed her on the same level of wickedness as Oswald Mosley, with the difference that she lacked political influence and power.

If I had seen her like this, without her having the need to attack me, I would have thought the same. Gina had revealed herself in front of my eyes, more with her gestures and words than with her violence, and all the beauty that I had known how to admire in her had succumbed to the monstrosity of her character.

She didn't even consider the fact that her husband was still in front of the car, and when the engine started, Michael grabbed me under the armpits and dragged me with him onto the sidewalk. I saw the black tires pass in front of my feet, very closely.

"Can you stand up?", Michael finally asked me, after watching for a few seconds as the vehicle drove away from us.

I nodded and forced myself to my feet, barely accepting the help Thomas's cousin offered me.

The presence of Michael also generated distrust in me so, pushing myself to regain my strength as soon as possible and get to the tram stop, I took my bag from the ground and from it I took out the small bottle of laudanum that I had learned to take with me everywhere as if it was a questionable companion.

Michael stared me as I took a long sip of the opiate, and in his expression it seemed that he was sympathetic to me.

"It wasn't an accident, was it?" he said then and made me choke on the liquid I was drinking.

He waited patiently for me to finish coughing.

"No, it wasn't".

"Will you tell Tom?" I noticed a certain animosity in that question. Michael knew what her wife had done was reprehensible but even so, he didn't seem willing to give her up.

"It won't be necessary", I replied and brought my body to the wall behind me. I was dizzy. "Thomas would continue to despise your wife even if she didn't attack me as he still has the conviction that she's the traitor in the band".

"I'll walk you to the tram stop". Michael changed the subject, perhaps because what I had said had bothered him greatly; perhaps, because he no longer considered his arguments in defense of Gina convincing.

"I'll go alone, Mr. Gray". Adjusting my muddy dress, I noticed a small trickle of blood coming from my left knee.

I turned my back on him and walked away without saying anything else. I know he watched me until I turned a corner and, for a second, it seemed that he was following me for a couple of metres. The latter could have been a small hallucination caused by laudanum and until now, I like to think so. If Gina did with me what she wanted, I can't imagine what Michael could have done to me.

/

Ada closed the notebook and stared blankly at Tommy, knowing, in part, the feelings that would manifest on her brother's face.

Tommy gripped the dull, gray cigarette butt between his fingers, and with his jaw set, he gritted his teeth. His body muscles were rigid and his chest was brimming with hatred. Imagining that bitch attacking Olivia had caused an almost intolerable burning sensation in the pit of his stomach.

"I should have killed her", Tommy said. "I must have killed her when I had the chance to".

"That doesn't matter anymore". Ada shrugged but Tommy noticed that, while it wasn't the first time her sister had read that entry, she was just as outraged as he was. "Gina's dead".

"But it was Michael who killed her and from what I see, I wasn't even aware of the majority of the things she did".

"There was a meeting that day that you were not summoned to", said Ada. "We were going to resolve Gina's tenure on the Directory. Arthur and I voted to expel her from it. Michael and Lizzie were against that idea, and the votes were tied. After a quite heated argument where both Arthur and I had to convince Gina that we wanted her out because of her stupid proposals regarding cinema, she attacked Lizzie using her arrogance and your wife changed her vote. Gina was enraged". Tommy noticed how his sister seemed pissed off at the mere memory of that meeting.
"She threw the tea tray away and ran to Michael's office, yelling insults and telling us that she was going to talk to Polly since, after all, she was the one who had given Gina her share. I found out the next day that Polly not only ignored her, but she told her that she was going to take her position back at the Company and that was enough to cause Gina to have a fit of anger in Michael's office. Apparently he told her what we really believed and brought her up to speed on what we had talked about at your house, how Olivia had pointed her out and everything else. Luckily, Michael was already gone when we decided to kill her. If not, the story would have been different". Ada swallowed hard and Tommy knew she meant her friend's fate.

"Gina is really dead, isn't she?" Tommy couldn't trust anyone anymore. If Gina was still alive, he wanted to know so he could end her once and for all.

"Yes, she is" Ada agreed, somewhat annoyed that he continued to doubt her word.

"Michael killed her in New York before both he and his mother motivated Olivia to fake her death". Tommy shook her head. "The more I think about it, the more premeditated I see it. He wanted to get rid of his wife to take Olivia with him".

Ada looked suddenly uncomfortable.

"He didn't do it for that, Tom, and you know it".

"Was Gina buried in New York or in Detroit, her hometown?", he brought that up in order to dig a little deeper. The word of his sister had no value and the fact she was assuring him that Gina was really dead, did not arouse any kind of reassurance in him. Ada could be lying... again.

Before his sister could say anything, Tommy was aware that until that moment, he had never inquired about Olivia's false funeral and the realization made his blood run cold: Olivia's parents believed that she was dead and, for that, some kind of funeral ceremony had to take place.

He tried to convince himself that perhaps he was exaggerating things, but it was too late.

"Gina is buried in London", Ada said.

"Why in London?"

"Because we had to put someone at Olivia's grave, Tom."

Tommy looked at his sister, sensing that he was succumbing to bewilderment. Ada kept her gaze and in her eyes, Tommy noticed the exhaustion in them, the product of her being a participant in all that ruse. The detail was at least macabre, but apparently Ada had had to agree to do such a thing if she wanted to ensure Olivia's well-being.

How many things would he have left to discover? He didn't know it yet, but just imagining all the possibilities aroused something akin to terror in his heart.