CHAPTER THREE.

              FELICITY WOODS SOON FOUND that she hated the man more than she was afraid of him, and that surprised her more than anything.

She had made it a habit of hers to always be awake before the sun was any higher than the horizon in the sky. Due to it being the colder months, Felicity was able to sleep for a while longer than she would do earlier in the year, and for that she was glad. There wasn't much for her to do in the early hours of the morning so in November, as she shrugged on a thick cardigan over her dress, she was glad that it had already gone eight o'clock and she would only have to waste another hour or two before she would even bother looking for a job. Besides, it would give her time to clean her small home, which was something she so often tried to put off from doing.

As Felicity came down the stairs, she stifled a yawn before noticing the paper that lay in between cold metal frame of the letterbox, and as she pulled it from its steel clutches, Felicity frowned at the box that appeared to be drawn around one of the advertisements. It was for a pub, not far from her own home, and one that she had avoided ever stepping inside due to the rumour that it was that specific building that the Peaky Blinders had grown fond of.

If anything, it wasn't a rumour - Felicity had seen one of the brothers step inside the pub on many occasions, but John Shelby never seemed to stay long. She had never been there to witness either of the other brothers entering or leaving the same building, but that might be because she never stayed long enough to watch. Felicity had no business of her own to enter the Garrison, so she never did.

Later, as she pushed open the oaken door to the pub, Felicity couldn't help but notice the sense of disarray that filled the air, with the tables out of place and the dust only just beginning to settle. The man in front of her held a broom in one hand and was pushing tables back into place in an attempt to tidy the room up.

"I'm here about the job as the barmaid," Felicity called to the man who stood just a few feet away from her.

He lifted his head from his work and she felt her skin burn at the judging gaze that fell upon her. "Are you mad?" Harry scoffed, turning back to the scene.

Felicity raised a single eyebrow as she stepped further into the room. "Am I what?"

The barman narrowed his eyes at the blonde girl. "How'd you know about the job, anyway?"

"I saw an advertisement."

"Job's been filled," Harry replied flatly.

The man turned away from her and continued to try and tidy the room up, anxious to straighten the tables before the men came from the factories later and clamoured for pints of amber beer. He had taken on a new barmaid only a couple of weeks before but she had told him she had business out of town for a few days, so she requested for a couple of days away from work and he had agreed without thinking.

Harry wasn't sure why he lied to the blonde girl but from the way her blonde curls fell over her shoulder softly to the warmth in her hazel eyes, he could see that the men would come down on her as though she was nothing more than prey to their predatorial selves. As anxious as he was to have another hand to help in the Garrison, he wasn't willing to put the naïve girl in a position where she would be fending off a sea of drunken factory workers as she unscrewed the cap to a bottle of whiskey.

Felicity frowned at his blatant lies. "But it was in yesterday's paper!"

"Believe me, love," the man answered with a sigh, "I'm doing you a favour."

"Well, lucky for you, I'm not looking for favours," she returned, "I'm looking for employment."

"You're too. . . nice."

"How would you know?" Felicity spat back.

Harry raised both eyebrows at this. "And too pretty," he continued, "they would have you up against the wall, trust me."

The blonde girl refrained from saying any of the things she wanted to say, and instead shook out her curls roughly. "I have experience," she told the man, taking a carefully folded piece of paper from her pocket and holding it out to him.

Harry leaned on the broom and blinked at her. "References?"

Felicity nodded. "I worked at the Black Swan. . . before it burned down, that is," she said, "here."

He took the paper from her and his eyes scanned its contents before glancing back up at her. "Even so. . ." Harry paused briefly, "you're too pretty. They'd be taking bets on whether you'd even last a week."

The girl scowled before remembering that it wouldn't do her any good to argue in a plaintive, childish manner. "If I worked at the Black Swan, I can work here," she asserted, "I'm not like that other pretty barmaid you have, believe me."

"Can you sing?"

"Sweeter than a songbird, I've been told," she informed him.

"As can Grace," Harry countered.

"It isn't a competition," Felicity argued, "I'm in need of a job, and you're in need of a barmaid. I can pour a pint with one hand and rip off a pair of balls with the other if I had to, Harry, it isn't hard."

The man takes a breath and glances down at the letter of references once again. "So long as you make sure to do that before they have you up against the wall," he sighed.

⎯

Felicity didn't want to say that she enjoyed the job at the Garrison, because it wasn't any different to the placement that she had at the Black Swan. But as she poured pint after pint and held it out with a tight smile to each man that came to the bar, she found that serving drinks at the pub where the Peaky Blinders resided wasn't quite as frightening as her brain had made it out to be.  She often found that nothing ever was, but that didn't stop the fear from settling in her heart as often as it did.

"You took the job, I see," a voice said behind her, lilting upwards with amusement.

Felicity jumped and spun on her heel to catch the patronizing eye of Thomas Shelby watching her from the other side of the frosted window, where he stood in the private booth. He wore what appeared to be a smug smile and although Felicity wished that wasn't the case, she suspected it just might be and it dawned on her that it must have been him that posted the newspaper through her letterbox with its outlined advertisement, otherwise he wouldn't be so stupidly proud of himself.

"It isn't as though you gave me much of a choice," Felicity returned, trying to stop the cold edge from creeping into her voice as even through her incredulous disbelief at the situation, she knew of what the man did.

Thomas smiled. "I need a bottle of rum," he informed her instead, passing over the conversation and what she was implying of him being the cause for her previous unemployment.

"All. . . all right," Felicity replied, turning away towards the cupboard that she had learned to contain the spirits.

It was then that Harry came up next to her with an anxious expression upon his face, as he had seen who it was that she was serving. "Whatever it is, it's on the house," he told her sharply.

Felicity did a double take before nodding quickly. "'Course."

As she spoke to the older barman, Thomas regarded her with a sense of curiosity in his gaze. . . not that she noticed it, of course. He couldn't help but notice the way she held herself, the way she was different from Grace. . .  much more assertive, try as she might to hide it. She wasn't confident, she didn't boast of her voice or of her family relations, and she made no attempt to cover up her past or who her father was. Felicity wasn't special, he knew that as well as she did.

But what he also knew was that there was more to the girl than her blonde curls.

"White rum or dark?" Felicity spoke, glancing back at him only briefly.

"I don't care."

Felicity sighed with annoyance at his vagueness before reaching over and plucking a bottle of white rum, and taking it carefully out of the cupboard.

"Harry said it's on the house," the girl informed him, looking up and being astonished at just how blue his eyes really were when they weren't darkened by the night.

Thomas nodded and took the bottle from her hand and he backed away from her so that he was a step further into the booth, his previous amusement vanishing as he closed the frosted windows behind him. The softest murmur of conversation was all that could be heard behind them.

Felicity refrained from frowning in confusion before she turned back to the men that clamoured for her attention and for the spirits that lay beyond the bar.

AUTHOR'S NOTE
here is chapter three ! it's definitely
better than it was before i rewrote it
and i'm really sorry that this is taking
so long to write but i'm lazy asf. . . i'm
trying , i promise !! hope you enjoyed
and i love you all so much my loves