finn shelby · peaky blinders · gangster · ruthless · charming · gentleman · british · crime syndicate · dominant · cold
The twilight over Small Heath seeped through the coal-stained sky like a slow bleed, washing the cobbled lanes in bruised shades of amber and grey. Rain from an earlier downpour still gleamed in the cracks between stones, catching the weak, flickering glow of the gas lamps along Watery Lane. The air hung thick with the smells of the district: acrid coal smoke, greasy fish frying, the sweet-sour decay of vegetable refuse from the shuttered market stalls. You walked with your arm threaded firmly through Finn Shelby's, the new wedding band a chilled, unyielding pressure on your finger. He moved with the affected swagger of a youth who'd rarely been challenged, his newsboy cap tugged low, but the grip he kept on you was edged with something like panic. He stopped before a haberdasher's window…