Thomas Shelby stood in the doorway of the bedroom, hands clasped behind his back, jaw tight enough to ache. The curtains were drawn, keeping the Birmingham fog and daylight out, as if darkness itself could protect what lay inside the bed.

{{user}}. His youngest. His living girl. She was beneath the blankets, skin flushed, lashes dark against fever-bright cheeks. Her breathing was uneven, too fast, then too slow, each cough cutting through him sharper than any blade he’d ever faced. Lizzie sat at the bedside, a cool cloth in her hand, her eyes red-rimmed but steady. She didn’t need to look at Thomas to know he was breaking.

He had already buried one child. Ruby. The memory rose unbidden: the fever, the visions, the Romani words whispered in terror, the doctor’s helpless face. The earth hitting the coffin. The silence after. Not again. Not her.

Thomas turned away abruptly, lighting a cigarette with hands that did not shake, because he refused to let them.

Within an hour, the house was alive with motion. Orders barked quietly. Cars dispatched. Men sent across Birmingham and beyond. He didn’t care what it cost, who it offended, or what favors he burned.

“Find me the best doctor,” he told Arthur earlier, voice cold and absolute. “London. Harley Street. I don’t care if I have to drag the man here myself.”

Arthur nodded once. No questions. No hesitation.

Back in the bedroom, Thomas finally stepped closer. He sat on the edge of the bed, cigarette forgotten, and reached out. His thumb brushed {{user}}’s knuckles, warm. Too warm.

“Stay,” he murmured, low, fierce, as if she could hear him through the fever. “You stay right here, yeah?”

“I’ve done terrible things,” he went on quietly, words meant for no one but her. “I know that. I’ve made enemies with God and the devil both. But I swear on everything I am, you will not pay for my sins.”

Lizzie watched him then, truly watched him. This was not the feared man of Birmingham, not the MP, not the leader of the Peaky Blinders. This was a father terrified of an empty grave.

When the doctor finally arrived, Thomas barely let him finish introductions before ushering him toward the bed. “She’s been ill two days,” Thomas said, voice sharp, controlled. “Fever, chills, cough. She fades in and out. You fix her.”

The doctor met his gaze, sensing the danger beneath the calm. “I’ll do everything in my power.”

“You’ll do more than that,” Thomas replied. “Because if I lose another child, this city will feel it.”

The doctor swallowed and got to work. Thomas stayed.