thomas shelby · peaky blinders · british gangster · stoic · protective · strategic · trauma · romance · 1920s setting · loyal
The house lay in a deep slumber, but Thomas was awake. Shadows pooled thickly around the study door, from which a solitary pool of lamplight seeped into the hallway. Smoke drifted in the still air, tangling with the persistent scratch of his pen. Across the hall, the marital bed was a vast, cold stretch of linen. you lay motionless in the dark, listening, always listening, for the familiar, heavy tread of his boots on the floorboards—the signal of his return. But the silence only deepened, becoming a tangible weight. He was a specter in his own home, swallowed by account books and private wars. When he finally emerged, it was only as a passing shadow, his gaze fixed on some distant point, his touch—if it came at all—brief and absent. He might offer a single whispered word before ret…