Love and Lies • 𝑇𝑜𝑚𝑚𝑦 𝑆ℎ𝑒𝑙𝑏𝑦

Chapter Three

A few days later, Ann was on the search for information. She'd heard a leak of Kimber's impending visit to the Peaky Blinders for fixing a horse race without his permission.

Ann stood in an empty alley, a little ways around the bend from the Garison bar. The street was dimly lit with scarce burning metal baskets, the atmosphere dark, murky and wet. 

The Peaky Blinders used the bar as a frequent gathering place. Regardless of which territory they stood upon, at the time of midnight, the people of Birmingham bustled with drunken celebration. With the bells of signing voices ringing from the pub, the festivities seemed to have just begun.

Ann dug out a box of matches and a cigarette from the pockets of her trousers to keep herself busy. She lit a match and held the cigarette tip to the flame, inhaling her first puff of smoke when a car sped down the street. Headlights illuminated brightly against the Garison windows. It stopped abruptly in front of the Garrison, and headlights illuminated brightly against the buildings windows.

Billy Kimber and three of his Birmingham Boys filled out of the vehicle with guns at the ready and strode into the bar. 

The singing stopped, and then a few moments later a loud Bang echoed from the pub through the alley. 

Ann froze. In a split second, she ran through all the possibilities of who had been hit by the bullet: a customer, the barman, a Peaky Blinder...

Then people hurried out of the pub, running in every direction for escape, none of them branded with peaky hats. Ann stood back into the shadows of the alley until the street fell quiet again.

She threw her cigarette on the ground and hurried stealthily to the windows of the Garrison, reacting fast to her moment of chance. The windows were opaque, but she could hear voices. They yelled of the fixing horse races, spoke of the Lee Family and race bookie robberies, and suggested an alliance of hireling for the protection of goods. When the voices in the pub hushed, Ann tore away from the windows and darted to the alley, resting her back against the wall, as the ice in her veins began to thaw.

Kimber and his men walked out of the Garrison, piled into their car and drove over. Ann smiled, the Peaky Blinders had balls, she'd give them that. She entertained the idea that the Blinders war with the Lees was a planned stepping block to allying with the Birmingham Boys, but denial crept its way into her bones. From the moment she'd stepped foot in Small Heath, she'd heard stories of the Shelby's being radical hooligans who cut anyone who refused to pay their debt for protection. She would decide on her own when she finally met their leader at the Cheltenham races.