He doesn't show. She waits in her apartment all evening, first full of hope and happiness, then with irritation that he's making her wait, then worry: the Peaky Blinders were terribly notorious for getting into trouble, what if something had happened to him? She paces all evening until the room begins to get light once more, the sunlight creeping in solemnly through the cracks of the curtains.
She leaves the next morning to wander down to Aflie's, hoping he may have heard something. When she sees him, her old friend, she asks him immediately if anything had happened with the Peaky Blinders last night. He tells her no, and she's not sure whether to be relieved or angry or disheartened. If he was alright physically, why had he not been to visit her? He'd told her he would and she knows he rarely goes back on his word.
Her mind is working at a mile a minute. What if Grace showed up and he spent his evening with her, the other love in his life, instead of coming to see Daisy, the whore? What if he had simply decided he couldn't spend more time with her? What if he still hated her for moving on with her life after his 'death'?
What if, what if, what if…
She's become the wife, she realises with horror. Wondering where the man she loves has gone for the evening, whether it's with another woman. Is this payback?, she wonders. Perhaps all the nights she took women's husbands away from them for an evening (or many evenings in some cases, or even some days) was coming around back on her and the one man she wants to settle down with, the one man she loves more than anything wants another woman. It would be ironic, she thinks. Cruel, but ironic. She wonders if she deserves such a fate. She hopes not.
Six days after she last saw him, Daisy receives a message in the form of a young, dirty-looking boy with a strong Cockney accent, telling her that Tommy and Arthur wish for her to be at a party this coming Saturday - Sabini would be there and that they were trusting her that she knew what she was doing.
"Thank you," she tells the young boy, giving him a few coins from the table by the door in thanks. He slumps away, pocketing the change and grinning a little.
He couldn't even come and see me himself, she thinks bitterly, more angry than anything else. Had they toed the line of their 'relationship' too much the day at the races a week ago? Had she rattled his perfect world? The world he's created without her, full of stone walls and cold glares and this never ending pondering she's noticed. Did the trip down memory lane force him to remember a time when he used to laugh and smile and love? Can he be that person again?
She feels like he really is treating her like a business associate rather than the woman he used to adore. Sending young boys to do his work.
Fine, she thinks resentfully. If he wants her to behave like a business associate at this party… that's exactly what she'll do.
The party is fancy, she notes as she walks into the ballroom slowly, taking in everyone and everything. The women wear jewels that she would've been astounded at when she was younger but now she barely notices them; they're just there to show everyone else how much money they have and Daisy doesn't care anymore. When she first arrived she would wonder and marvel at the women in their fancy dresses, with their hats and jewels… she found it hard to care then, too, since she was so depressed from the news of Tommy, but it still made her eyes bulge.
Now she sighs at the tediousness of this all. She thinks she's starting to outgrow parties; she knows she can't continue like this forever, especially now Tommy is in her life. She wants to have a home with him if he would ever contemplate letting her. If he chooses her.
She hopes, she prays, she wishes with everything she has that he does. But she knows she will not be broken if he does not. If he chooses Grace, or even neither of them, she knows he'll be alive. And happy. That's all she wants, even if it is not with her.
Still, it does not hurt to dream.
She clocks Sabini in the far corner, talking with other men at a table. He is naturally, at the head of it. Strange, she thinks, for a circular table. How can it have a head? And yet the men gravitate towards him, moving their chairs closer to him and leaning in, making him the centrepiece of it all.
She clocks him within the first ten seconds of walking in. But the funny thing is, he clocks her too.
He doesn't smile at her or wink like many of her other men would. He looks at her with a certain amount of curiosity, as though she is a racehorse he might bet on. She doesn't acknowledge him either, simply stares back. He doesn't intimidate her - she grew up around these people, lived with a gang, loved the most intimidating man she's ever met and had him love her. Sabini is nothing in comparison to Tommy, and his stares certainly aren't.
Some of the women in the room, gathered in their own circles, stare at her as she walks by them, turning to whisper and gossip as soon as they think she's beyond earshot.
"How dare she show her face!"
"Who does she think she is?"
"Whore!"
She hears them all. She understands their hatred, their obvious distaste for her profession. But she finds she doesn't mind or care in the slightest - these women have not known what it is to struggle, what it is to be truly cold and hungry, to be desperate enough to turn to whoring. She understands that she's renowned for stealing husbands away from them in the evenings, for occasionally making them fall in love with her rather than the women they should be loving. She doesn't try… but as she's going to prove to Tommy with Sabini, men love a challenge. Somehow, it's easy to make men fall in love when you don't care. Funny, she thinks, isn't it?
She heads to the bar to order a drink and is surprised when Tommy comes and sits next to her. She didn't think he'd be here, firstly because this was Sabini's territory and it's risky being in the same area let alone the same room, but also because he's not spoken to her since the races. He didn't come over. He didn't deliver the message himself. He's removed himself from her life almost as fast as he left it before.
She's mad at him. Truly mad.
No, she's fucking furious.
They'd reached a point of maybe not forgiving each others mistakes, but they'd certainly reached a point of forgetting them for the time being, hadn't they? They'd accepted they'd both made terrible mistakes, neither worse than the others. So why had he backed off? Who does he think he is? Toying with her emotions was low… She loves him, but Christ, she thinks, I could kill him sometimes.
She doesn't even acknowledge him.
She hears him sigh and take a sip of the rum he's drinking. She can smell it from here and God, does it bring back memories.
"I didn't show."
She almost snorts at his obvious statement but she restrains herself… if she make any sound at him right now it'll be shouting, she thinks. She's brought back to the overwhelming fear that something had happened to him. After she thought he was dead… not letting her know he was alive for six days was simply cruel. And judging by the way he's struggling to know what to say, he knows it.
She won't accept anything less than an apology. And an apology is something Tommy Shelby rarely gives.
"Something happened… with Grace… I—"
He didn't show because of Grace.
She turns her head to look at him, so sharply that he stops talking, her face probably conveying her anger and her sadness, before she walks off towards Sabini's table. She finishes her drink in a few gulps on the way there, all but throwing the glass at a waiter. If there's one thing she can't hear right now it's Grace's name. The woman who had called her a whore in Tommy's room that time. The woman who was also vying for Tommy's time and affection. Why did Daisy always end up competing against other women? She misses Ada. She misses having a female companion who wasn't also a prostitute. She wants a normal female friend, someone kind and funny with whom she can sit and talk and gossip and relax. But she is a pariah in this city, and so they all seem to despise her.
She keeps her eyes on Sabini the whole way over, and almost as though he can feel them, he looks up just before she arrives.
"Dance with me?" She looks straight at him, not wavering, not even smiling. She doesn't care that she's interrupted a conversation, perhaps a business one. She doesn't care that she's not exactly playing hard to get.
All she cares about is making Tommy see her with another man so perhaps he could feel even the tiniest bit of the hurt she's feeling knowing he was with Grace when he said he'd be with her. Was it her lot in life to always be second?
She knows it's childish and silly and even dangerous playing with fire like this. One doesn't simply use Darby Sabini for such immature whims and get away with it. Tommy is quite literally making her lose her mind.
He doesn't reply, but he does look surprised. This is good, she thinks in the back of her mind. He's intrigued. He stands slowly, not bothering to excuse himself from the table before walking around and heading towards the dance floor with her wrist in his grasp. It's not a tight grip, she notes, but it's firm and unbending. She realises she was half expecting him to decline her request.
He takes her in his arms and begins to lead them both through a slower dance, one too romantic and too pure for the people at this party. She still looks at him and he looks at her. She won't speak first.
Finally, thankfully, he cracks first.
"What are you doing, little girl?"
What am I doing?
She smiles in what she hopes is a flirtatious way. "What does it look like I'm doing?"
He smiles back and it is in no way reassuring; he smiles like she imagines a tiger smiles after it has caught its prey. She swallows.
He doesn't reply for a few moments, before he spins her out and when he pulls her back in, he brings his lips right to hear ear, his harsh accent sending unpleasant shivers over her body. "I don't know what game you're playing, little girl, but I'll find out."
He makes to leave but she grabs his wrist this time and pulls him back. No one can play this game better than her, she tells herself. She can get any man to want her.
He looks at his wrist encircled in her dainty hand and he nearly smiles. She has balls.
"I don't know who you think I am, Mr Sabini, but I'm not playing any games. In my line of work, I can't afford to play games."
That's true at least, she thinks. Only this isn't work. This is her favour to Tommy, her way of easing his worry.
They continue to dance, the pace picking up but only slightly. "I've heard you can afford plenty with the amount of 'work' you do."
He's trying to embarrass her. Doesn't he know she's so far beyond that?
She laughs; it's a light, tinkling noise that makes the few couples around them turn their heads to see where it came from. They expect it least from the little redhead girl in Darby Sabini's arms, for who would ever laugh in his presence?
"I keep busy."
It's not the response he was after; he expected maybe a blush, tilting her head down, looking away, leaving… not laughter and an open admission to being a whore.
They stop dancing as he examines her face again and she continues to stare back with a smile on her lips, completely unaffected.
Once again he asks her, "Who the fuck are you?" only this time he asks her with a small grin on his face. It's equally malicious and mischievous and she's not sure she knows exactly what she's gotten herself into but she knows it's too late to back out now.
So she leans into his ear, having to rise onto her tiptoes slightly. She grasps his shoulder with one of her hands and uses the other to brashly graze her fingertips over his crotch. She feels a small wave of triumph when she hears his breath shudder. "The only game I'm playing is the one you want me to." She grazes a little harder, cringing internally that she's still doing this after all these years, demeaning herself like this to men she doesn't even like. "Good evening, Mr Sabini."
And with that she turns away, casting one glance over her shoulder to the bar where Tommy is still stood, only he is glaring at her.
Good, she thinks petulantly. If he wants to treat her like somebody he's forced to do business with, what is the harm in progressing this business quicker than she'd planned?
He catches up with her outside as she is walking down the street, her long dress held up with one of her hands slightly so it doesn't drag in the mud.
As soon as she hears the quick footsteps she knows it is him, so when someone grabs her elbow and pushes her around to face him, she's not alarmed or scared.
"What was that?" He says harshly, bringing his face down to her level and looking intently at her, as though she were a child again and he was mad at her for making Ada late for dinner. "Hm?"
"I'm not some fucking business associate who you can send boys to deliver messages you should be delivering yourself," she spits, her silent treatment disappearing. She pushes him back slightly, not liking the closeness of him. It's clouding her mind and she can't afford to lose her senses around him anymore. "I know I'm a whore, Tommy, but I thought you of all people wouldn't treat me like one!"
He lets out an exhalation of breath: a sardonic laugh of sorts. "It's hard not to when you've got your hands all over Sabini on the dance floor." He says dance floor as though it is a disgusting place, somewhere nothing of this calibre should happen. As though he wouldn't have minded it in, say, the street.
"I'm doing my job, Thomas," she growls angrily, "you know, the one you asked me to do?"
"You fuckin' offered!"
It's her turn to let out a sarcastic laugh now, and she tilts her head to the sky in amazement. "So it would help you!"
"You embarrassin' me at a party isn't helping me, Dais."
He's turned to look away, scowling at the building over the road. Around them, drunken couples and groups of friends stumble over themselves to get to their next party. Nobody pays them any attention, thankfully.
"Is that what I am? An embarrassment?" She's angry and verging on hurt now. Fuck him.
His face twists. "No I didn't mean that and you know it."
She scoffs, turning away from him to walk down the street again. "I don't know anything with you anymore, Tommy."
Before she can leave, she hears a rough exclamation of "fuck" before she feels him grasp her hand, tug her back to him and then he slams his lips down onto hers angrily.
It is not tender, their kiss. It is not loving, gentle or magical.
It is harsh, biting, each of them taking their frustration and years-long anger and misery out on the other, on the one who caused it, on the only one who can heal it. It is familiar, she notes in the midst of her pain and pleasure - they know how the other one moves, where their mouths fit best, how to kiss the other until they're gasping and then pulling away before diving back in in desperation.
He groans the slightest amount into her mouth and she feels like she is home again.
At some point, their kiss stops being angry and harsh and slows down, their tongues becoming more languid as though they re-familiarise themselves with the other like old friends, old lovers. She reaches her hand up to lock onto his neck, loving the feel of the short cut of the back of his hair against her palm. She's missed this like she would miss air or water. She's been starved.
She doesn't know how long they stand like that in the street, reacquainting their desires but she does know that it's over all too soon.
He pulls away with another exclamation as though he can't believe he's just done that. Maybe he can't. She hates herself for doing it, but her mouth follows his as he moves back, seeking more. It takes her a second to realise he's not just getting air but is pulling away, the heat leaving his eyes and the tension creeping back into his posture.
"Don't," she whispers, not able to bear it if he regrets what just happened.
He runs his hand through his hair, messing up the top section which is longer than the rest. "Dais, that shouldn't—"
"Don't," she says again more firmly. "Don't ruin this."
He looks like he's about to argue before nodding.
"I do need to talk to you though, Daisy."
She doesn't like the tone of his voice - he sounds serious. She wishes it didn't have to be this complicated and they could laugh and joke like they used to.
No one will love me like you do.
"Okay," she says shakily, preparing herself for the worst. "Why don't we—"
"It's Grace—"
They speak at the same time and instantly her good mood evaporates. "Don't talk to me about her now, Tommy. Do not ta—"
He speaks over her and it comes out in a rush as though if he says it fast she won't hear it. But she does. And she feels her heart come to a standstill.
"—She's pregnant."
I have apologies to make: first, for the cliffhanger. Eek! Secondly, for the length of time it has taken me to update this. To cut a long story short, I've had to move home due to increasing anxiety and depression, and after dealing with my health comes my thesis (it's STILL not over!). So I cannot promise that updates will be regular; I'm very sorry, but life is... being life right now, as I'm sure you all understand.
Once again, I can't thank you enough for the lovely comments and favourites etc. It makes me so so happy to hear you like this! I'm sorry that at this time I an unable to reply to your comments (see above) but I really do appreciate them! (GetTraught, well done for guessing this plotline with Grace! I have plans for this! *insert malevolent smile here*)
Please excuse any mistakes; it's late here but I wanted to get this out ASAP.
As always, I hope you enjoyed! Thank you so much for reading x