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Warm arms curled around Tommy's waist, and he was left feeling very, very exposed. Not like a meadow clearing, all warm and serene, beautiful beneath the pale moonlight. More like a bleeding wound, cut open and raw, still dripping red onto the bedsheets where love should lie in its place.
This has never happened before.
His bi-weekly meetings with Alfie Solomons always progressed in the same fashion. First, they would begin their meeting in the bakery, discuss business over a drink, and then amble their way back to Alfie's home once the sky grew dark. Their coats would be shed in the foyer the second the door fell shut, and they would barely make it upstairs before teeth dug into lips and hands found purchase on hard buttons and even harder cocks.
They would fuck until one or both of them found it difficult to keep their eyes open. Then, Alfie would toss a damp cloth at Tommy to clean up with while he lit up his last cigarette of the day, and after that, they would fall asleep.
In the beginning, they would make no effort to move closer or further from one another, but often woke up on opposite sides of the bed. Like some unconscious instinct kept them from getting too close.
But that invisible barrier was wearing thin. Every night they spent together saw the gap between them closing. First, it was their legs tangling together. It was easy enough to brush off with how cold the nights had grown. Who wouldn't seek out warmth when the fire in the hearth grew dim?
Then, it was their hands, searching empty sheets for any point of contact. More often than not, they found their palms still intertwined come daylight, but it was never spoken of. A soft, tired indulgence.
More recently, Tommy had risen when sunlight began to creep through the heavy drapes, with his back firmly pressed to Alfie's. Whether the older man knew or remained completely oblivious to their position that night had yet to be seen.
It was an accident. Nothing more. Nothing to stress about.
This was different, though.
It wasn't like legs and fingers twisted together, or shoulders pressed flush. It wasn't even like last week, when Alfie sought him out in the midst of slumber to tuck his head into Tommy's shoulder, a soft snore leaving his lips. He had pressed into the younger man's semi-conscious form until Tommy sighed. A resigned – if not mildly amused – curl tugged at his lips when he gave in and wrapped his arms around his… Business partner? Friend? Lover?
With a hand stroking the shaved hair at the back of Alfie's nape and one settled on the small of his back, that was a first too, but only with Alfie.
Tommy had held Grace against his chest that way almost every night when they were married. Once, he'd held Lizzie that way too, but found that she wasn't very fond of being held while she slept.
It made him feel wistful. Made his ringless finger feel too empty. Yet, the pang in his chest wasn't as sharp as it was last year. Grace's absence felt hollow, aching, but it no longer threatened to tear his heart from his ribcage.
Alfie's presence in these quiet moments was like a balm to his wounds.
But that was when he was holding Alfie.
He'd felt the man's arms around him so many times when they fucked. Bracing him against a wall, pressing him down into the sheets, pulling him closer with his legs around his hips. But it was just sex, and Tommy had never been one to put too much thought into how he was touched in the heat of a good shag.
It was just an outlet for all the pent up anger and lust swirling inside him. Relief for an animal instinct. A bargaining chip.
Lying together like this, however, with Alfie holding him like he was something precious – something to be treasured and protected… It was the most raw form of intimacy.
It was terrifying.
He was stripped bare in ways that disrobing could never compare.
Alfie had seen the worst of him. His secrets and desires. His flaws and scars. All the ugliness inside him.
He saw the way he tossed and turned at night – muttering to his ghosts as he drifted somewhere between dreams and wakefulness – and how whiskey was the first thing to pass his lips come morning.
He'd seen the cool emptiness behind his eyes when he took a life. The utter apathy he felt as the blood of his enemies dripped between cobblestones, fit only for the vultures to lap up like starved beasts.
And still, he held him.
No one should accept him this way. His late-wife certainly wouldn't have, had she seen how cruel he could truly be to those who stood against him. The way he enjoyed watching his enemies fall.
Even Polly had found it hard to accept him sometimes. His siblings too.
But Alfie did. Perhaps it’s because he isn’t all that different from Tommy, deep down. He has ugliness inside, too. His edges are rough and jagged, and the blood on his hands is as dark as the blood on Tommy's own. It stained his palms for the first time during the war and refuses to dry until he himself is buried six feet beneath the ground.
He’s wholly unpleasant to nearly everyone, between his incessant rambling and non-existent patience. He’s been scarred by his past, in body and mind, unstable in ways that complimented Tommy’s own frayed morals.
The difference is that, unlike Tommy, he wasn't afraid to show it during these moments alone, at the tender hour of midnight.
Once, he would have been wary. He used to watch Tommy from the corner of his eye like he was a wolf waiting to pounce on him the second he let his guard down and uncoiled from the sheets acting as his armor. Now, he was utterly at ease when exposing his belly and all the horrors behind his eyes, and Tommy couldn’t help but wonder when it had changed.
When had the gap between them become a bridge, and when had that bridge stitched the ground beneath them together?
Tommy exhaled shakily and the arms around him tightened, as if expecting him to run.
Maybe he would have. Maybe he still would. He wasn’t sure yet.
“Alfie,” he murmured, eyes boring into the green ones gazing down at him with a soft and unreadable glint. “What are you doing?”
“What’s it look like I’m doing?” Alfie raised a single brow, but didn’t elaborate. His fingers, rough from years of building his empire, passed through Tommy’s hair in a slow, rhythmic glide. He tugged the roots softly, smoothed down the curling tips, massaged into his temples, and then began anew.
It felt nice.
When Tommy said nothing, and his face remained guarded, Alfie chuckled.
“Wound as tightly as yarn, you are.” The hand on his waist squeezed, then pulled him flush against Alfie’s front. “Can practically see the smoke coming out of that head of yours, Tommy. Don’t worry so much. M’ not gonna stab you in your bloody sleep.”
“I know,” Tommy said, and he did. To his surprise, as much as Alfie’s, he didn’t believe for a second that Alfie would turn against him while he was sleeping. For starters, that wasn’t his style. If he chose to dispatch Tommy, he would want him to know what was coming. Part of the fun for him, he supposed.
But they had gotten too close for that.
It was dangerous territory. It left them vulnerable, to each other and anyone who found out about this little bond of theirs.
It wasn’t just weakness, though. It could be a strength. Shared power, when it was needed. A stronger tie to discourage betrayal.
Or maybe, business could stay where it belonged this time. In the bakery, in the office, even in the Garrison. Maybe here, curled together beneath the sheets, they could just… be.
“If you know, then what is it?” Alfie asked, his voice softer than it had any right to be.
“You’re holding me,” Tommy said simply.
“I am.”
The younger man’s fingers tapped idly against the mattress. A restless gesture that didn’t go unnoticed. “People don’t hold me, Alfie.”
“Well, there’s a first time for everything, yeah?” he chimed, closely studying Tommy's conflicted frown. “Do you want me to stop?”
“No,” Tommy answered, hesitating for a moment before swallowing his apprehension, and leaning in to rest his forehead against Alfie’s throat. “No, it's alright.”
“Right. Good,” Alfie nodded sagely, but couldn't deny the weight that lifted from his shoulders. He hadn't crossed a line, hadn't ruined whatever this was between them, and that knowledge was enough to have him fully relaxing into his pillow.
He figured that was that. It wouldn’t do to push too much and drive Tommy away – whether to the other side of the bed or back home to Birmingham.
Then, an arm wrapped around him, splaying a hand across his back while another pressed to his chest – a mirror of his own position only five nights ago. The warm palm settled over his heart, alongside a single kiss and an almost-pleased sigh.
Alfie buried a small smile in Tommy’s dark hair. “Good. Because I don’t want to stop.”