━━━━━━ ༻ 004 ༺ ━━━━━━
" Take Her To Church "

          "IT'S A GOOD DEAL," Tommy sighed back into his seat on the first bench row of the chapel, watching Jackie stand up from beside him just as he did so. "Fair terms," he added while she carried his offer with her on three drags steps taking her near the metal bar fence around the altar, a barrier on which she pressed her palms and leant.

Her eyes would say much about what she thought of this offer he gave her then, so she made sure he could see nothing of them while she still dissected the options she had. Jackie travelled the attention of her sight rather absently upwards, until the ecclesiastical murals woke her up from the depth of her thoughts with an ironic smile, "Do you usually bring partners here in hopes that under God's eye they'll become subservient to your demands?"

Tommy retorted himself to merely gulping for the immediate moment which followed. Should there be complaints to the slowness of his answer — though he doubted Jackie would mind the silence while she thought over their terms and conditions —, at the very least he had the excuse of having more than just icons of Saints he hasn't prayed to in a long time to look upon and get lost. "It's a good deal," he eventually repeated through a sigh.

"I heard you the first time," Jackie rolled her eyes and dropped her gaze to the floor of the altar and to her own hands holding the fence. "No matter how many times you say it, it won't change the fact that reoccurring buyers are bad for business."

"Because you are new to the game?"

"Because people are untrustworthy," she quickly corrected him, promptly turning around. "We have a whole war attesting for it."

Tilting his head to the side, Tommy measured her only as a perfect perk to having his gaze reach hers, "Sooner or later, you will have to sell twice to the same buyer, and you will have to take that risk of both knowing and being known."

"I get it now," Jackie shook her head with a condescending puff, supposedly holding her most ironic laughter. "You brought me here to preach to me..." Yet despite her vocal disapproval, she could not deny his words were true and she certainly couldn't hide that which had already passed her judgment several times before, thus dictating just how much she cared about her buyers being the responsible sort of people, not just the money pigs that wouldn't mind dragging her family's name through mud with their stupidity too.

"Without some reoccurring clients, you would be leading your business to bankruptcy, Miss Alloways," Tommy pressured on. Words have long since lost their edge to him and the spiteful façade Jackie was hoping on weaponzing against him was at best an arousing thing to behold when he knew she was, at her core, being convinced.

"And you care why?" Jackie fired back, pushing herself away from the railing in order to begin a dragged stroll across the floor opening between the bench and the off limits altar. "Don't bullshit me with those half asses reasons of profit or expansion, because you and I both know this partnership will not be profitable to you in the first years a significant amount anyway. Pinning the dangers of the work against what you would be earning out of it leaves you on quite a loss in the first trimester. So, why do you care about how I run my business? And be honest this time." She pointed up at the cross overlooking them, "He's watching."

"Then I'll confess," Tommy nodded. "I need someone."

"Strangers?" She accentuated the word she thought would suit their status best. "Such as myself?"

Amused by her rapid retorting to his words, Tommy subdued a little chuckle before continuing. "You're a woman, alone in Birmingham with over ten thousand dollars in cash. Only you also have something else I need."

Jackie gulped, stopping her pacing right in front of the man. She turned to face him and looked down upon his eyes that told her all she needed to know of his needs — he required her connections in the world he tried to make for himself and his family. "And how does that feel?"

Surprised by her choice of words, Tommy was rendered momentarily speechless. She could have asked about what was it that he truly needed from her, but instead, she choose to dig around the emotion that fuelled his partnership seeking; she choose the raw truth over the superficial one with a wisdom which, now that he looked up at her, he found fitting to see reflected in the way the cross seemed to throne above her head like a halo. Pondering over his answer revealed a surprising bitterness. "Sad," the word rolled off his cold lips, drawing absenteeism over the light of his eyes.

The answer satisfied Jackie to a sigh, ultimately returning her to sit besides Tommy on the bench. She allowed the silence to become their blanket, respectful of his confession, for at least as long as it took her to become uncomfortable underneath the sanctity of the cross watching them. Then, and only then, she drew in a short breath and turned to her purse, rummaging it for the papers she stuff in there too. "My shipment arrives in two weeks time," she announced, unfolding one by one in her lap the documents she had brought with herself for their failed meeting at the Garrison.

Tommy lifted his elbows up on the back of the bench and watched each paper she unfolded.

"I'll give you a forty percent discount on the guns I was supposed to deliver to Dublin," she compromised on part of their deal, "as a thanks for that anonymous tip you've shared with me today." She picked up the third page from the documents she looked down upon and passed it on to Tommy. "There's the specifications of what I am shipping."

"Origin?"

"Does it matter?" His lack of an answer prompted her to continue, "Didn't think so either. It doesn't really matter who sells what as long as everyone gets what they are looking for at a decent price."

"The world is starved and trade is satiating our ravenous needs," Tommy mused, voice low and scarred by his excessive smoking.

"Well said," Jackie lifted her eyes to his only to find him already more interested in her rather than the document she's given him. "I'll accept that your Peaky Blinders help my men protect this upcoming shipment and you'll get a five percent interest on the goods defended by you, however I am not sealing any deal beforehand for constant trade with England through you, nor am I changing the deal with Kimber for your sake. He's paying me good money for twelve purebred horses and he will get all twelve of them, because I like nothing more than taking money from stupid men. You can claim the horses as yours after the transaction is complete. After all, you are planning on overthrowing him regardless."

"You're perceptive," Tommy nodded in appreciation.

"Our perception is a blissful curse in this land of work," Jackie shrugged, looking back at the papers. "Knowing what I know about you means I cannot ever think of you as my business partner without renouncing a certain degree of intelligence, no matter how persuasive your attitude or appearance might be to a slightly drunken gaze. I have found the answer to my dilemma from the races regarding your nature, Mr. Shelby. Your virtue of loyalty is restricted to your family alone, thus I am bound to let you know I cannot know you are about to stab Kimber in the back and at the same time trust you enough to strike a long-term deal on a contract basis."

By the calm with which she explained herself, Thomas Shelby knew she wad being serious and final. He nodded along and finally glanced at the document he was given. "Then I'll buy the cigarettes, the guns... Upfront payment for the guns, without deposit. We'll be reselling the cigarettes and you'll receive forty percent of all profit on them."

"Thirty-five," Jackie negotiated in his favor. "You'll also buy one box of the export liquor. And me and my men will have your protection in Birmingham on the duration of the transaction."

"The IRA will not like being ruled out of the deal on the guns."

"I have had worse enemies since I started doing this," she shrugged.

"Undoubtedly."

Prompted by the natural finality reached by their dealing, Jackie freed her lap of the document, setting them aside before she stood up and instead prioritised turning once more to face Mr. Shelby. "Should we shake on the deal?" she offered her hand.

Once he followed her action, Tommy hesitated very little from taking her hand into his for a formal shake. "You are nothing like Kimber," he admitted out of the blue, eyes focused singularly on their handshake. Without a single need to look her in the eyes, he assumed her sudden stiffness was to blame on confusion, so he explained, "You said you cannot trust me because of how I am handling my business with him. But you're not him. He doesn't have anything I want that I cannot get on my own."

"Sellers' trust," Jackie called it by what it was. "The world is starved indeed, Mr. Shelby."

"What do you hunger for?" His gaze traversed up her arm, "I've been trying these past days since the races to figure out what you desire most in the world so you would have no choice but accept my offer for a trade, but at best, I got lucky catching word that the cops are in the loop about Americans providing guns to the IRA, simply because one drunk Irishman talked too loudly in a Dublin bar." With a sharp inhale pausing his calm and slow speech, Tommy looked Jackie in the eyes and the candle flicker of the church seemed to respond by stilling itself, holding its breath and dimming the light around them too. "You do not lack money, Miss Alloways. You hide your business under the names of your brothers, so you are safe and calculated. Yet I look into your eyes now and I can tell... nothing satisfies you. Perhaps there is something that you too miss."

"If we weren't in the house of God, I would play an unholy game on your words," Jackie's own thin voice dropped to a whisper lifted to brushing in warm breath his jaw as she drew nearer on her tip toes, "and say sacrilegious things like being haunted by your eyes' shedding their veil of numbness for even just a second comes close to what would fool me into believing I have been filled with satisfaction."

"So you want me?" He simplified her words, unafraid to seek her eyes even while she dictated a loss of personal space between them. They were close enough that both of them cool feel the other's pulse respond before either of them could. Anticipation was building up.

"If we fuck before you buy from me, the deal is off," Jackie threatened, a playful lust shimmering in her eyes.

Tommy smiled, letting go of her hand, "Alright."

Jackie lost herself to a silent pause, before reading into his unmoving eyes his choice and bursting into a fit of laughter that finally drew her two steps away from him.

"Oh," she returned to the bench to gather the documents and cram them backin her purse, all as her redirecting attempt to bury the sound of amusement back to silence. "You really don't remember me, do you? You look at me like any man looks at the new pound of flesh in town."

"If I remembered you," Tommy stuck his hands in his pockets, watching Jackie's distinguishable fret to gather her belongings faster, "I would have had one good memory from the war. But I don't."

"Ever since the races, I've been thinking about you," she halfway looked over her shoulder, but did not commit to actually stealing a glimpse at him. "The more I thought, the more I remembered. I know your scars, your inks. I've seen you bleed and I've seen you cry. I remember the sound of your breath when I was checking on my patients during the night, too afraid to light a candle and wake any of you up from a sleep you all needed—"

"Stop," Tommy commanded bluntly, not so much angered, but perhaps tugged into a wall of emotion which he too would have preferred drinking before approaching.

Jackie sniffed abruptly and wiped her eyes of tears. Her posture got corrected first, before her purse was hugged to her chest. Once more, she nodded over her shoulder without sparing Tommy a full glance. "We'll be in touch, Mr. Shelby."

Hearing the click of her heels against the wood floors demanded of him that he watched her leave, only behind his eyes and in that tension of his jaw slowly getting released was riddled not his present attention, but the knowledge that she has read, blinded by her own wants and needs, his eyes all wrong. He didn't know yet if he should count himself lucky that was the case or not.