Hidden Secrets - Thomas Shelby//Peaky Blinders

Answers and Questions

Panic gripped Tommy's chest at the sound of the gunshot.

He stood for what felt like forever, eyes staring in fear at the woman stood between him and the gun.

Finally, his brain registered that the man with the gun had been the one to fall to the ground with a spray of blood.

Sucking in a breath, Tommy's eyes scanned behind him, taking note of the smoking gun still held in John's outstretched hand.

Turning his sight back to his woman, Tommy saw the look of sudden panic on Lis' face as she looked down at the man now dead on the floor.

He's caught off guard by her repeated words of trembling alarm. 

"No, no, no, no, no. What did you do?" Lis raced to the dead man's side, shaking hands reaching to his neck to feel for a pulse. John and Arthur stepped up next to Tommy, both of them wearing confused looks that match his own. "What the fuck did you do?" Lis yells louder this time, running hands through her hair, a terror stricken look crossing her face.

Ada stepped up to join the brothers, angry confusion evident in her voice. "Are you fucking serious? John just saved your fucking life!"

The voices of the Shelby siblings filled the room, mixing together in a confused chaos.

"He was going to shoot my brother!"

"What the hell were you thinking, throwing yourself in front of me?"

"It's alright, lovey, he can't hurt you anymore."

It's the statement from Arthur that makes her look like she wants to scream, her frantic eyes becoming severe as she looked up at the four of them stood there.

"Do any of you bloody fucking Shelby's ever listen to anybody but your fucking selves?" Lis' low angry voice somehow filled the room, silencing the others. "I told you-,"she began again, before lagging off, her shoulders suddenly slumping as if any adrenaline she might've had had left her body in that moment. This time her voice is filled with a sudden hopelessness, "I told you, you don't fucking understand." Lis' chest was starting to heave in anger again by the end of the sentence.

Tommy's own anger rose with her small roller coaster tirade, but he made sure to keep his voice level when he spoke. "Then why don't you fucking spell it out for us?"

Arthur added his own reasoning, his confused anger less controlled, "We just stopped your fucking brother from murdering you--"

"He wasn't the fucking brother I'm worried about," Lis' scream cut Arthur off as she threw her arms out to the sides in frustration.

Tommy slowly approached the agitated woman, hands held up before him in a slight surrender. Reaching up to gently hold her face in his hands, making sure to show extra care to her injured side, Tommy lifted her face to look her in the eyes. They were bloodshot and showed the exhaustion she felt. A thick layer of trepidation blanketed them at his soft question. "What are you talking about, love?"

Lis shook her head slightly in his hands as if trying to stop herself from answering. Frightened tears began to fill her eyes. Her voice was barely a whisper, shame flooding her cheeks as her eyes closed.  "Roger's older brother," Lis began with a deep breath, "and therefore my half-brother- is Billy fucking Kimber." The last three words fell from her mouth in a clipped tongue.

Tommy stood there, his eyes searching Lis'. The woman held his gaze, a defiant nature taking her over, as if she's daring him to understand who she is.

She's Billy Kimber's fucking sister. All thoughts of the deals made, brokered, and soon to be broken, with Kimber rush through Tommy's head, only to be shoved aside by one main one: He doesn't even know the woman he fell in love with.