In The Bleak Midwinter | T Shelby

EIGHT - BONNIE'S NEWS

"Dad!"

Kaia sprinted outside after the rabble had calmed down, pushing past men that had spilled out into the street from the factory to see what had been going on.

"Are you alright, Kaia? You didn't get hurt did you?"

Aberama pulled his daughter into his arms, kissing the top of her head gently.

"No, I was inside, don't worry. Where's Bonnie?" Kaia looked around, frantically trying to spot her brother through the crowd of people.

Her father scoffed loudly, laughing to himself.

"Some woman came out of nowhere, shouting his name at the top of her bloody voice. No idea who she is but Bonnie sure looked pleased to see her. I think she took him to get cleaned up."

To say Kaia was shocked would have been an understatement. Bonnie hadn't ever so much as mentioned that he was seeing a woman, let alone brought her home to meet the family or even taken her out for a drink, at least not as far as his sister and father knew.

Bonnie had always been very focused on his boxing since he was a young boy, he hadn't had time for girls even if he'd wanted to. To him, boxing always came first, anything else came second. That was until he joined the Peaky Blinders. It seemed like smoking, drugs and drinking weren't the only new things in Bonnie's life.

"Mr Gold!"

Kaia and Aberama turned to their left as they heard Tommy calling his name. He walked over to them with his shoulders broad and his cap tucked into the pocket of his coat. His hair was drenched in sweat and there was dried blood on the side of his face.

"Thomas," Aberama held out his hand and Tommy shook it, nodding his head as he did so.

"I'll send Finn round tomorrow with the cash, early morning."

"Fine by me, pleasure doing business with you."

Aberama tried his best to stay out of the Peaky Blinders' business when he could, but some days he missed the rush and the thrill of running alongside them. Now Bonnie was involved, Aberama was slowly warming to the Shelby family and their men, enough to do the odd job here and there if he was ever asked.

"Oh, Tommy! Come here, look at your face."

Lizzie came rushing from behind Thomas with a damp cloth in her hand, reaching up to touch his face and clean away the blood.

"I'm alright Lizzie, don't worry."

"No, Tommy let me just-"

"I said-" he raised his voice, pushing her hand away from his face, "I'm fine. Go back inside."

Lizzie looked startled as she stood still beside the three of them, her lips moving as if she wanted to speak but didn't know what to say. She slowly nodded her head before looking up at Kaia.

"Kaia, why don't you come inside?"

"She's fine here, leave the girl be." Tommy said, not bothering to look Lizzie in the eye as he spoke.

She said nothing and headed back into the offices.

"Is that your, er-"

"No," Tommy quickly cut off Aberama before he could finish his question, "Lizzie works in the same office as Kaia, that's all."

Aberama nodded, a knowing grin on his face as he looked at Thomas. He knew all about the women Tommy had been with, whether they'd tried at a relationship or if it had been just for one night. Aberama had always thought that Thomas would've been better off settling down with a woman, somebody by his side to calm him down and perhaps knock him down a peg when he got too full of himself.

Though that didn't seem like it was going to happen anytime soon.

"How was your first day, Miss Gold?" Tommy lit a cigarette as he looked at Kaia who stood next to her father.

"Erm, fine," she cleared her throat, unsure as to why he'd referred to her as Miss Gold again, "Yeah. It was fine."

Tommy nodded and blew out smoke from his lips, "Good."

Silence fell among them for a moment until Aberama spoke up, "I'm going to go and find Bonnie."

He took off in the direction he thought Bonnie and the woman had disappeared in, leaving Kaia and Thomas alone. He held out a case of cigarettes to her, but she shook her head.

Tommy sighed loudly, crunching the gravel beneath his feet with his heels. It turned out Kaia's prediction from earlier about the storm clouds heading in their direction had been correct. Thunder rumbled in the not too far distance and the first drops of rain began to fall over Small Heath.

"If Lizzie says anything to you, you tell me, alright?"

Kaia furrowed her brows, "What do you mean? Why would she say anything to me?"

"Just do it."

"If someone's rude to me I can put them in their place myself, Mr Shelby." Kaia said, narrowing her eyes at him.

"I know you can, but you should let me handle it."

Kaia just rolled her eyes and walked away from Thomas. She gathered her things from the office and walked home in the rain. The entire journey back towards her house she was racking her brains to think about what Lizzie could possibly have against her to make Thomas think she'd say something nasty. She couldn't think of anything, but she was intrigued to see if she'd find out in the next few days.

Walking through the front door, Kaia was greeted with three people sat at the kitchen table, a woman she didn't know was sat in her seat.

She closed the door loudly, making all three of them pause their conversation to look up at her as she took off her shoes and coat.

"Kaia," Bonnie rose to his feet when he noticed his sister, awkward panic flashing across his face, "This is Emily, my girlfriend."

Kaia exchanged a glance with her father who was sat at the head of the table. He raised his eyebrows at her, telling her to be nice without saying anything out loud.

"Emily, this is my sister, Kaia."

Kaia smiled at the woman who was sat in her seat. She was a young, pretty thing with blonde hair and bright blue eyes. Kaia had always thought her brother would be into girls with a little more grit about them, but clearly the girl next door was more his type.

"I think we work together now, is that right?" Emily spoke softly with a nervous smile as Kaia sat down opposite her.

"Yes, I started today."

An awkward silence settled and it wasn't long before Bonnie announced that he and Emily were heading out for the evening for a drink.

They left quickly and Aberama and Kaia had an extensive conversation for over an hour at how neither of them had even an inkling that Bonnie had been in a relationship, laughing to themselves at how he'd managed to keep it a secret from them both for so long.

"She seems nice," Aberama said as he sipped his whiskey, "Not the type of girl I'd have thought Bonnie would've gone for, but nice nevertheless."

Kaia shrugged her shoulders. "I don't think she'd have been too happy about keeping their relationship a secret. I don't know any woman who'd be OK with that."

"Well make sure when you finally find someone brave enough to put up with you, that you bring them here straight away."

Kaia gave her father a sarcastic smile in response to his comment.

"You won't have to worry about that, I'm yet to meet any man worthy of me."

an;;;
hi!! Just wanted to say a quick thank you for the support on this story so far, I'm aware it's moving quite slowly but please stick with me, things will pick up soon!
-martials