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NO THANK YOU FOR LETTING ME WRITE IT!! I LOVE THIS BOT SO MUCH AND IT’S MY NIGHTLY COMFORT BOT BC SOMETIMES A BITCH JUST NEEDS FLUFF😭😭😭😭

My Darling Boy

Pairing: Thomas Shelby x Irish!fem!reader

Summary: Tommy’s late night leads to you comforting him and a recount of the first time you realized you loved him.

Warnings: Panic attacks, reader faces anti-Irish sentiment from a stranger, Tommy says some questionable things about the Irish but nothing too bad💀, violence, bar fight. Let me know if I missed any!

Word Count: 2.8K

Notes: This was 100% inspired by @red-write-hand ‘s Tommy bot. My god do I love that thing and fluff it gives me. I tried keeping this as reader friendly as possible, but some details had to be added to fit the plot, such as reader being Irish.

Flashbacks are italicized!

You stared at the clock on your wall that read 2:07 AM. Tommy was supposed to be in bed three hours ago. It was your agreement. He could work as late as he wanted as long as he ate all three meals with you and came to bed at 11. The resolve had come almost a year ago when you’d finally told him you, his wife, felt like second place to his work.

But here it was. 2AM, your bed felt cold without him there, and this was the third time this week that he hadn’t come to bed on time.

You tried not to argue with him. He had enough stress with work and you didn’t want to be a source of more stress, but you had his same quick temper and you couldn’t deny that you were more than irritated that he was seemingly back to his old ways of ignoring your agreement.

You made your way down the hall and to his office, leaning against the door frame.

Tommy spoke before you could, “I know what you’re about to say.”

The exhaustion in his voice and the way he looked… defeated immediately caused a change of heart in you, though.

“My darling boy,” you said in a soft voice, making sure to use the pet name you had for him to try and avoid him thinking you were there for an argument.

“Don’t ‘my darling boy’ me,” he replied immediately with a bite in his tone, “Not when you’re here to start an argument with me. What time is it?”

You’d known Tommy since he came back from The Great War. You knew more than well enough by now to not take his words to heart when he was like this. He was taking his anger out on you, whether you deserved it or not.

You had blinded men and taken their tongues using the bladed Peaky Blinders cap for speaking to you the way Tommy was speaking to you, but Tommy was your soft spot. Somehow, you always remained calm when it came to Tommy.

You made your way over to his desk and picked up the empty whiskey glass that was next to a stack of papers that littered his desk.

“It’s 2 in the morning, my love,” you replied in a calm voice. You walked over to the fireplace where his bottle of whiskey sat and refilled the glass then placed it on the desk again.

He picked it up as soon as you set it down and took a long drink from it.

“I have work, you know that. The business doesn’t run itself.” He took another swallow of the liquid and you could see the way his breathing had picked up slightly.

It started to make sense in that moment. You knew Tommy as well as he knew you and as well as you knew yourself. You knew the signs of one of his panic attacks beginning and stepped between him and his desk.

“I know that. I’m not mad at you, darling,” you replied after a moment. You made sure to keep your voice the steady and calm tone you knew he needed at the moment as you spoke. “Can you look at me?”

Tommy took a deep breath before looking up at you and you could see the thin sheen of sweat on his forehead along with the way his eyes seemed unable to focus on you. You lifted your hand to his cheek and gently ran your thumb across it in a slow motion.

“What’s your full name?” You asked him. The questions you would ask him changed from time-to-time so he wouldn’t get too used to them. They were simple questions, enough to distract him and get him to focus on you, but not enough to send him into a further panic.

“Thomas Michael Shelby, why?” He raised the glass to his lips again, but his breathing only picked up more.

You took the glass from his hand and set it on the desk behind you then placed his hand on your chest, right where you knew he would be able to feel your heartbeat.

“Focus on my breathing and my voice. What’s John’s wife’s name?” You asked him next.

You watched as he closed his eyes and did as you said, trying to match his breathing to yours as you began taking slower and deeper breaths.

“Esme,” he answered after a moment.

“When’s our wedding anniversary?” You asked next.

”The 17th of August.”

You knew it was silly, but you couldn’t help the blush that rose to your cheeks at how quickly and easily he answered that question. It was the little things like that which reminded you that you were still his number one priority.

“Can you look at me again?” You asked him once you noticed his breathing had calmed down.

Tommy looked to you, his blue eyes immediately finding your eyes and locking onto them. The corner of his mouth tilted into a small smirk and you returned it with a small smile of your own.

“I love you,” you told him as you crawled into his lap and pulled him into a hug, trying to help ground him more.

He immediately returned your hug and buried his head into your neck. Your hands instinctively rose to the back of his head and gently ran your nails across the shaved part of it.

“I love you, too. Even when I’m a mess,” he replied quietly.

“You’re not a mess,” you argued immediately, “you’re my amazing husband, an amazing business leader, an amazing member of parliament, and the strongest person I’ve ever met.”

A sigh left his lips after a long moment and his head remained buried in your neck. His breathing was no longer panicked and he had relaxed into your hold completely.

“I don’t deserve you,” he muttered into your neck.

“Funny,” you said with a chuckle, “I think the same thing of me.” You moved your head enough so you could kiss his temple. “Love you with all my heart, Thomas Shelby. You’re my darling boy.”

As soon as the pet name left your lips, he was chuckling into your neck. It was one anyone else would be maimed for calling him, but somehow you saying it had won him over.

“Love you, too,” he murmured in response.

After a couple long minutes of the two of you curled into each other, and once you were sure he wouldn’t panic speaking of it, you asked him,

“What led to it?”

He immediately knew what you were asking and shook his head in your neck,

“Nothing,” he replied in a defeated voice.

You pulled back enough to cause him to raise his head and she the quirked brow you were giving him,

“Thomas Shelby, what do you tell me every time I try to say the same thing?”

Any time you tried to belittle your problems, Tommy was the one who was telling you that if it was causing you troubles, then it wasn’t nothing and it was worth talking about.

He grumbled something under his breath about using his own words against him and then finally answered.

“The bloody Irish,” he said loud enough for you to hear.

You couldn’t stop the giggle that left your lips. You knew Tommy knew better than to think she was laughing at him or her problems; you were simply laughing at the irony of it all.

“What have my people done now?” You asked, purposefully making your accent come out as thick as possible to pick on him.

“Made an illegal shipment without our say so,” Tommy replied and you could hear the smile in his voice.

“Well… we’ve never liked to obey the English. I think my ancestors are rolling in their graves at how soft I am with you,” you teased, hoping to get at least a chuckle out of him.

It worked and you could feel the way his body shook the slightest bit as the small laugh left him,

“You’re not soft, darling, you’re just civilized,” he teased in return.

You pulled away with a look of mock offense on your face,

“Hey, now! My people are very civilized, we just know how to have fun,” you told him.

You know Tommy held no actual disdain towards you or your Irish blood. He himself was part Irish. He only spoke this way around you to get under your skin and pick on you.

“If you call bar fights being civilized then sure, darling.” The smirk on his face told you he was still only teasing you.

You scrunched up your nose as you looked at him,

“Maybe not your strongest point, love. I’ve come home with a black eye from an English bar fight where, for once, I was genuinely an innocent bystander and I had to keep you from going after half of Small Heath,” you pointed out.

Tommy’s face immediately darkened at the memory of that night and he tried to stutter out some defense of how it was different, but you shook your head no.

“You know that was the night I realized I loved you?” You told him as your own version of the memories flitted through your mind and you tried to distract him from the darker thoughts of his mind.

Your words seemed to catch him off guard and he looked up at you with surprise written on his features.

“Really?” He asked, unsure how else to reply.

You nodded in response and you felt another deep blush creep onto your cheeks. One thing you and Tommy had in common was that vulnerability didn’t come natural to you.

“Would you care to know how I remember that night?” You asked to which he nodded. “It was after a day of shopping with Ada and Esme. You and I had been together for three months at that point, and Ada and Esme were sure we were going to end up getting married, so they wanted to make sure I knew I was part of the family.”

You knew he knew all of this, but you wanted to tell him the whole story of how you had come to the realization and what had happened leading up to the fight.

”After we were done shopping, Esme had John meet us up at The Garrison so we could all have a drink.”

The three of you stumbled through the doors of the pub, giggling over something Ada had said.

John motioned the three of you over to the table he was sitting at, already having ordered a round of drinks for you. It was the first time you had sat outside of the private room the Shelbys had, and the last.

In the middle of the three of you telling John about the new dress Ada had bought, someone who’d had one too many drinks came stumbling over.

“I don’t get you Shelbys. You serve your country in the war then associate with some Irish scum,” he spat out, motioning from John to you.

You had met the other Shelbys while Arthur, Tommy, and John were in France. Polly had needed a bookkeeper for the betting shop and had taken you, even vouching for you when they had returned. After a year of working with them, one incident where you had been used as bait that had gone too far, and you’d been forced to defend yourself, Tommy had decided to make you an official Peaky Blinder. You may not wear your Peaky cap, but the bladed item was also on you. Offers had been made to hide blades in other women’s items of clothing, but you had denied. You had learned how to hide the cap among scarves, shawls, or in your bags and you wanted the official Peaky Blinders symbol.

John had immediately jumped to your defense that night in The Garrison.

“She’s a damn Peaky Blinder and has been for years! She can be trusted as well as any Englishman or woman.” He had defended, standing up to meet the man eye-to-eye as a warning to leave.

“Do you know who you’re talking about?” Ada said next, standing up also, “Irish or not, she’s Tommy’s girl and a Blinder.”

“I don’t give a shit if she’s Tommy’s current whore or not. She’s Irish scum and I don’t want to be in a pub with the likes of her,” the man spat back at Ada.

Esme and you both stood up at this and the rest of the pub had silenced as they watched the scene unfold. Seemingly out of thin air, a couple other Blinders that were present came to stand beside John as he told the man to leave the pub while he could still see the door.

Next thing you knew, Esme had pulled you harshly out of the way as a glass shattered against the wall behind you.

Chaos broke out immediately. Despite you trying to fight against them, a couple patrons or other members of the Peaky Blinders (you weren’t sure which) had tried to drag you, Ada, and Esme back to the office. During the mix, a blow landed on your cheek and you quickly swung back.

The fight seemed to halt immediately after. Even if the guy was brave enough to harass you for being Irish, throw a glass at your head, and fight John over everything, everyone else seemed to realize the grave mistake that had been made in that moment.

No one touched Thomas Shelby’s woman, and there she was with a bruise already evident on her cheek.

John grabbed the guy by the scruff of the neck like he was nothing more than a rabid dog, called for you to follow him, and called for Esme and Ada to be walked back to the betting shop and for all the members of the Peaky Blinders present to go there, also.

You walked with John to the canal and were told by John that you ‘could do the honors of killing the bastard’ yourself.

After the deed was done, the two of you had walked back to the betting shop and arrived at the same time as Tommy.

You remembered the worry on his face as he looked for you, the anger that took over when he spotted the black eye, him screaming at everyone to give him an answer as to what had happened and who had harmed you, and the way he had pulled you into his arms in a hug that nearly crushed you.

You remembered the feeling of safety that washed over you once you were in his arms, the feeling of home, and the way you were able to ignore the chaos around you as others explained what exactly had happened that night.

You remembered the way he wouldn’t let anyone else touch you until he had personally looked you over for any injuries.

You remembered the look he had when you told him you’d killed the man. The disappointment over not being the one to do it himself, but the pride in you standing up for yourself.

“I remember being absolutely terrified when it finally clicked in my head what I was feeling. I have never feared you, but I was terrified of ever getting my heart broken again. I knew Esme and Ada had said they were sure we would be married, but my own insecurities came into play, and I was terrified you’d realize how much of a mess I could be and you’d leave me,” you told him, leaned in and kissing him softly for a moment before continuing on, “You never left me. Even when we’ve fought, you never let me feel like you were going to leave me. I learned that no matter what happened, you’d move the earth, heavens, and hells to make sure you always came back to me.”

Tommy remained silent as you finished your story. He opened his mouth several times to speak, but it seemed you had actually managed to make the man speechless.

“I love you, Thomas Michael Shelby,” you muttered as you leaned in to kiss him again, “I meant it the first time I said those words, when I accepted your proposal, when we said them at the altar, when I say them now, and every time in between. You’re my darling boy through it all.”

His hand came up to cup your face and he rested his forehead against yours, “I’ve meant the all, too. You’re mine until the end of time.”