Bête noire → Peaky Blinders [Tommy Shelby] [ BOOK 1 ]

Sixteen.

Chapter sixteen: Hold me tighter

The night had been eventful to say the least, but Caroline's didn't end, not that she could have remembered anyway. She was used to watching men die, but it was different when she was the reason of their death. Of course, he was a bad man and needed stopped, though he hadn't necessarily caused her direct harm, so, it was pointless. He probably had a family-a wife, children, a lovely home, and she took him away from it all. How selfish could she be, to take a life to save another of a man who wasn't so innocent himself?

Collin hadn't been much help. He tried to console her even though her features remained dead like her victim's. The minute she stepped foot into the house, he automatically knew something was wrong. It was one o'clock in the morning and he'd been in bed, trying to sleep and he flew down the stairs and fell shocked at her ragged appearance. He'd joked that she looked like she'd been dragged through the wars, to which she replied, void of expression, that he didn't know the half of it and that she wanted to be left alone.

He had no more fight left in him when it came to Caroline Kimber. The brunette beauty who'd turn her nose down upon anyone who earned less than minimum wage, spiralled so sourly to a cold femme fatale who came home, battered and bruised, riddled with dismay and poverty, with the helping hand of a certain Shelby she'd grown fond for. He no longer took pleasure in the flirtatious bickering that came along with the daddy's girl, because now, she meant business-a business she was unbeknownstly apart of, one that she was willing to kill for. 

The joy had been sucked from her soul, leaving all those who touched her with frostbite for the cold woman she became so suddenly, or, was this a coldness that was long overdue? Had she always been so cruel? Was she born with poison in her veins and toxicity in her brain or had she changed on her own accord? Had Thomas Shelby been apart of this disruption?

Nevertheless, with a sigh, Collin left her alone in the living room just as she had requested, and as soon as he closed the door, her hand dived into her handbag, desperately in search for the little blue bottle that could destroy her in a matter of seconds.

When it was finally in her hands, she scanned over the white power with a heavy heart, but an even heavier weight weighing on her chest, and like a gun pressed against her temple, it shot unwanted memories into her mind of how she killed a man to save someone perhaps more dangerous. She replaced one evil with another and it wasn't right, and especially the way his comrade died in the hands of Tommy. Though, maybe he deserved it for awakening the beast which had been sleeping for so long, until arms were wrapped round his throat and make him come alive.

She wanted to come clean and get rid of all sins that were about to pollute her mind and her nostrils. She wanted to be a good role model for her brother and support him further with a sober body, but he wasn't aware of half of the things she'd done to protect him, and so, this was yet another thing he would be unaware of. Without thinking again, she emptied half of the bottle onto her palm and snorted.

Immediately, she felt as though her brain was on fire and when she pulled herself onto her feet, she nearly fell back with the force that pushed itself against her gravity. She automatically reached out for the fireplace to help keep a steady balance whilst her knees attempted to give out below her. 

She contemplated about taking another dosage that would knock her out, but she knew if she were to take so much as a gram more, Oscar would walk down in the morning and find her body laying cold, decaying with a lethal amount of cocaine in her body, and that wasn't something she wanted him to see.

Instead of walking over to the couch, a candle flickering across the road caught her eye as its shadow illuminated the dark street beyond it. Numbly, she peered between the white laced curtains that hung over the window and found a figure moving behind another; Tommy.