Red On Her Hands | Tommy Shelby

Chapter Six

C h a p t e r S i x

The tyres screeched as the speeding car pulled up to a holt at the edge of the river. The headlights were turned off, leaving the industrial area in pitch darkness. A woman stepped out of the car, a hood covering her face as she scanned the area to ensure that no one would see her. She couldn't see anyone, which prompted her to grab the large jute sack sat in the passenger seat. Beside it sat two packed suitcases which were pre-prepaid for months before that night.

The hood slipped off her head revealing a mess of frizzed auburn hair, what had once been a perfectly styled hair-do at the start of the night, but had unravelled after the incident back in her apartment.

Reflective streaks were visible on Lynette's checks from tear stains which had dried as she walked through a path of moonlight. As she approached the rubble piles outside the abandoned factory, a hand was clutched to the bullet wound on her hip. The area under her palm, and down her right leg were coated in patches of blood.

The pain continued to throb but her panic to complete her task made her forget about it momentarily as she began to stuff pieces of broken bricks and cement from the rubble into the sack. Her movements were controlled and appeared planned, but in reality she was frantically thinking about anything she had missed that meant the possibility of being caught.

Grunts of struggle escaped her as she dragged the heavy sack back towards the car, her strength was starting to weaken as exhaustion from blood lost kicked in. She finally made it to the car with a sigh of relief as she straightened out her aching spine. The temporary relief turned to dread as she turned to look into the back of the car which belonged to the Bridgeton men that she worked for.

Opening the small door, she was forced to face the reality of her actions as she took in the sight of her father's corpse. It was the shock that she had killed someone, but the surrealness that she had finally escaped her biggest nightmare. She had wrapped the body in an old throw blanket that belonged on the end of her bed.

It continued to amaze her that she had even managed to get the body into the car alone, her adrenaline to survive had gave her the strength she needed. The woman took a deep breath before clutching fistfuls of the material, her teeth clenching as she began to pull the heavy object. It landed on the cold concrete with a loud thud, she recoiled from the corpse as the blanket moved to display the face of the dead man. Revealing the glazed over eyes which stared into nothingness, as well as the bloody bullet hole in the centre of his forehead.

Lynette jolted awake with a sharp intake of breath, a headache present as she thought back on the memory of the night she killed her father. At first she had thought that the nightmare had woken her, but then she noticed that it was knocking on her front door downstairs.

She sat up quickly, leaning over to grab the watch on her nightstand. Her blurred vision - as a result of her abrupt wakening - adjusted to the darkness to read over the time before she climbed from the bed.

She ignored the fact that she was only wearing her nightwear - which consisted of silky slip - as she crouched down to remove the loose floorboard under the bed. She stood with the fully loaded gun now in hand, as she made her way slowly towards the window, looking out onto the street.

She used her left hand to slowly peel back the curtains, enough so that she could peer down towards the doorway. Through the dull light of the street lamps, she could make out that a man stood outside her door. The gun fell to her side as she sighed in relief at the sight of a Peaky Blinder cap.

As she made her way downstairs, she knew that she should have been mad at him, but she couldn't find it in herself to be as she realised that he wouldn't have come to her house at such a time if it wasn't important.