(no subject)

[bookmaker_boss]

Weather had put a damper on things, weather and other things in Tommy's private life, but as the sun returned and warmth came back to Darrow, he found himself calling on Mary Crawley. He knows, precisely, what it is about her that he finds vexing and fixating, though he feels a little bit a scoundrel to admit it to himself: she is every ounce of familiar femininity that he courted and seduced in Birmingham and London, as much Grace Brugess as May Carleton as Lizzie Stark. And she's none of them, as well, a handsome Earl's daughter out of York.

He may have done a bit of snooping on her, though snooping in Darrow is far from what it was back in England.

So there is a part of him that yearns for her merely because she is familiar, because she, as an object of his time, means something to him simply for that. But she also loves horses, he knows from their first meeting the laundry. But she also becomes slightly rigid when teased. Tommy misses, he thinks, the chase of their time. These careful dances of propriety that he could elude because he is a gangster and a bookmaker and a Gypsy.

So, with good weather and the knowledge that this is a terrible mistake waiting to happen, as most of his romantic endeavors tend to be, he catches Mary one day as she's coming out of their complex. He's leaned on a car he's rented, something flashy and far too low to the ground for his tastes, and he smiles slightly to see her.

"I believe I promised you horses, Miss Crawley."

Comments

[bookmaker_boss]

Tommy's quiet a moment, unwrapping his own sandwich once she's taken hers. Finally, he decides not to go the explanation of everything. Yes he is, but only because he's a windower. Yes he is, but only to care for his son. Yes he is, but not in spirit, just in memory.

"She died," he said instead of anything else. "A few months before I arrived in Darrow."

[thequitecontrary]

"I'm sorry," Mary replies, hoping that she hasn't ruined their picnic by bringing it up. "I only ask because..."

Why? Because she enjoys his company and doesn't want to allow herself to think of him as anything more than a companion if she knows that he's married? Because she'll feel a bit better about flirting with him despite the fact that he wears a ring?

"I am a widow," she says. "My husband died three years ago."

[bookmaker_boss]

Tommy offers her a small, sympathetic smile. He does, after all, understand the pain of loss. Mary's face reflects it more than he knows his does. He grabs the tea and pours it into a small mug from the basket, passing it over to her.

"He was a lucky man," he said softly. "Did you have any children before he passed?"

[thequitecontrary]

"I was a lucky woman." That's the truth. She always counted her blessings that Matthew had chosen her. Mary's life had been perfect for a few short years.

"Yes, I have a son named George," she replies, taking a sip of her tea. "He's three."

[bookmaker_boss]

"My Charlie's about two," Tommy says, a tenderness he hasn't shared with many people in Darrow. Come to think of it, he doesn't think he's talked about Grace or Charlie very much with anyone since he's arrived here months ago.

So he starts slowly, weaving the tale of his wife and his son. He does the best to leave out the more scandalous parts. But there's not a lot of ways to avoid scandal when it comes to Thomas Shelby.

"The woman who would be my wife was a spy," he says. "An Ulster, working for an agent of the crown. We met a year after the war, while she was working for the agent to follow me and my brothers. She left for America and was married for a few years to a banker from New York. They'd come back to London for a clinic to try and conceive."

He's quiet a moment, then sort of laughs. "It wasn't her fault. Her husband died shortly after our son was born, and we were married after she moved back to England."

[thequitecontrary]

Mary listens to his story, and while being moved by it, it makes her realize a few other things. Whatever Tommy does at home is not entirely on the up and up. Why else would a government spy by sent after him? Her guess is either illegal gambling, if he's a bookmaker here, or perhaps alcohol. Maybe opium or heroin. It makes her a bit uncomfortable that she's out with him, and yet, she isn't frightened of him. He's been nothing but a perfect gentleman to her.

"My husband was the heir to my father's Earldom," she says. "He was a distant cousin of mine. We had never met until we reached out to him to inform him that he was the heir. At first I quite despised him." For silly reasons. He was a middle class stranger coming in to take her home away. "But then... I fell in love with him. It took us some time to navigate everything, but I was never more happy than the day we wed. I suppose that for neither you nor I the path to love and happiness was smooth."

Nor was either of their happiness lasting, it seemed.

[bookmaker_boss]

Tommy smiles, because her story at least sounds more a love story, a conventional if slightly novelic one at that. Earldoms and distant cousins, the back and forth of love. Tommy finds he rather likes that, and what it says about Mary as well. Someone passionate and desirous of a level of justice.

"I hate to say that the marriage was for Charlie," Tommy admits, and feels the truth of it. He's never talked about it, really, with anyone. Lizzie or his brothers, certainly not the Tatiana, or even Pol. His marriage had seemed quite lovely, from the day of the wedding until Grace was shot.

"He's a good boy, and I love him dearly." He was quiet a moment, taking a bite of his sandwich. "I miss him quite a lot. As I'm sure you miss your boy, too."

[thequitecontrary]

"Do you mean to say that you didn't love Grace?" Mary asks. "Or simply that you married her because you wanted your son to have a legitimate family?" It was the noble thing to do. Mary supposes that even thieves and criminals have a code of honor.

That brings her to asking what she knows she must and she takes a deep breath before continuing. "What is it that you did in Birmingham?" Her tone is quiet, resigned. "Horses? Cards? Bootlegging? Blackmail?" Please not opium.

She isn't going to judge him or stop spending time with him, but she has to know the sort of man that she's dealing with and how violent he might be.

[bookmaker_boss]

"I did, once. Very much. And we both loved Charlie. We were more than pleased to make it work out for the best, for him, and the face of it all." But Tommy is a creature too used to freedom, and he thinks he might have loved May, as well. Not enough to abandon Grace to her New York husband to raise his son, but enough to be straight and honest with her.

For a moment, he's almost not sure how to answer. He was a Gypsy in Birmingham, and he is here. He was a gangster in Birmingham, which he is not here, but he is a card sharp, a dealer for the local casino, and he has designs for business and profit in this city. And she lists off things, and they're all things he's done, does, did.

"I did not trade in flesh and drugs," he says, definitively. "But I was a Bookmaker, and not always the most reputable one at that. My father was a bookmaker before me, and definitely disreputable. And his father before him, running penny deals from a barge. My mother's people were cutpurses and tinkers. We went to the Fairs. I grew up with horses and on locks, in the back alleys of Birmingham. And when I came back from the War, I decided that I would turn my father's business of thuggery into a legitimate business."

He sipped his tea and took a bite of his sandwich, looking at the horses assembled at the fence. "I'm a businessman, Mary Crawley. Simple as that."

[thequitecontrary]

Matthew's death hadn't stopped Mary from loving him. It's odd for her to hear Tommy say that he used to love his wife. Perhaps he's merely deflecting so that he doesn't get emotional over the loss in front of her.

"Crime being legitimized," she comments, more of a statement than a question. Mary takes a sip of her drink before speaking again. "I'm not judging you, Mr. Shelby. I needed to know, as the two of us continue to spend time together."

And now she does. Mary is glad to hear that he hasn't dabbled in drugs or prostitution, but he's still a criminal. If he's doing the same sort of things here, then he's probably dangerous. It probably means that she shouldn't be around him. Too bad she isn't going to stop.

[bookmaker_boss]

"Oh, is that what we're doing, spending time together."

Of course they are. But it isn't all they're doing, and they both know it. Tommy's quiet a moment, giving her space to think or consider or do whatever it is great ladies do when there's a beat of silence.

He's looking at the horses when, much as he did with May, he clears his throat and boldly asks, "Do you want to fuck me, Lady Crawley?"

[thequitecontrary]

Unfortunately, Mary happens to be sipping some tea when Tommy drops that bombshell of a question on her. Her eyes go wide and she puts a hand to her lips so that she doesn't spit it out in shock. After swallowing and coughing for a moment, Mary sits there, still speechless as she tries to formulate a response to that.

"I-I think it's rather soon for me to decide something like that," she stammers. Her face is flushed and she glances at him for a second before looking away. The truth is that she probably does. He's handsome and charming with a mysterious and dangerous air about him. It probably makes him bad news, but that only seems to make her want it even more.

[bookmaker_boss]

The sputter is even more than May gave him when he asked her the same question, but the answer is even more earnest than May's avoidance had been. Tommy hums vaguely, glancing over her with those sharp ice-shard eyes. Then he looks away, admiring the horses with studious conviction. If he's smirking, it's a small thing.

"But you've thought of it," he points out. "You just haven't decided one way or another. You haven't decided if you like thinking about it."

Because she shouldn't, should she? Not by their standards. Except she, like May, is a widow and a mother. If she chose to entertain someone, it would be a gossip point but eventually passed over, even as the daughter of an Earl.

They aren't at home, though. Neither of them. They can do whatever they like in Darrow.

[thequitecontrary]

Looking at the horses seems like a good idea, because then she isn't looking at him. Tommy's completely right about her line of thought though. She has thought about it. And she knows that the very nature of being here makes the answer somewhat different than it might have been back home. There isn't anyone here to judge her or gossip about them. Sleeping with him wouldn't cause a scandal. Mary could do it simply because she wanted to.

There's a moment of silence between them as Mary gathers her composure again. "Is that how you court women, Mr. Shelby? By asking such blunt questions? Or is this-" She gestures around them, to their picnic in the grass "-all your way of trying to get me into bed with you?"

[bookmaker_boss]

"Only if I don't know what they want," Tommy says, smiling a little for the pure echo. He asked not quite the same question with Grace as well, when they met up again, her married and mad at him for implying she might still be a spy, him silently resentful and furious when she told him why was was in London, though she never knew, not even when she told him of the pregnancy.

"And only if it's working. Otherwise it's a lovely afternoon with some horses and the country air."

[thequitecontrary]

"Do you want to- sleep with me?"

She turns the question back onto him, curious now what his answer is. Mary can assume that it's yes, but that's fairly standard and typical of most men. Of course they want to have sex. A better question probably would have been if he had any intentions on more than sex, or if he just wanted to bed her.

The idea of it just being sex isn't one that repels her, admittedly. They could do that here and get away with it.

[bookmaker_boss]

"I may have thought about it."

He's more than thought about it, actually, but there's no reason to make it sound like he thinks she's fast. He doesn't, after all. But he does think she's interested in him, and he's interested in her. There's a certain freedom to all of this as well, that they both understand and appreciate in their own ways.

Tommy looks at Mary, smile soft and small.

[thequitecontrary]

"Now you're going to be coy?" she asks with a sniff. That smile is cute and predatory at the same time. He's right though. She's interested in him. He's managed to draw her in, whether with gypsy wiles or not. Now she's curious and attracted to him. Perhaps it's danger or perhaps it's loneliness.

"It doesn't seem to suit you, Mr. Shelby."

[bookmaker_boss]

"Who is? Hardly." He laughs a little bit. Not coy, but cautious maybe. He's had rather terrible luck with women in his past, of finding love and then losing it through his own design or others. Well, fucking isn't love so he's not so concerned about that. But he does have a bit of an unlucky streak.

"I'm giving you something to think about." He's quiet a moment, and nods. "And it will be your decision."

[thequitecontrary]

Mary hums in her throat, looking down at her sandwich. "Certainly. Though I must say... I may be a modern woman, but I still enjoy when a man makes the first move." Her gaze turns back up to his, meeting his beautiful but icy eyes. "What if I give you some sort of sign?"

A sign that she's ready to advance what they have to the next level.

[bookmaker_boss]

Tommy's more than happy to make the first move, but there must be a move to make. Every woman is different, what she likes, what she's willing to do or deal with. Mary is a lady, some of the gentry, and Tommy thinks there might be slightly different rules afoot than there even were with May.

He hums and nods, a barely brief consideration.

"I tend to be quite good with subtlety."

[thequitecontrary]

"Good. Women are, in general, quite subtle."

Or men are quite obtuse. She thinks it's probably more the latter, but she's being kind today and not mentioning it. Maybe Tommy's bold pronunciation that he'd like to have sex with her had thrown her off a bit. Mary wouldn't be surprised.

[bookmaker_boss]

Tommy lets her have that one, because she isn't wrong. His brothers, for example, are fantastical idiots. He likes to think he isn't one, but he has been known to be swayed too far by some feminine wiles. The fact that women even have wiles probably proves that men are idiots.