by Kiru Taye
“Did this bitch just call me a dog?” Ada stepped across the threshold into Gloria’s face. “We’re no longer in high school, Princess. There’s no gang to protect you.”
“If you touch me, I’ll get you arrested for assault.” Gloria looked down her nose.
Lara stepped forward and grabbed Ada’s hand. “It’s okay. I can handle this.”
“You’re sure?” Ada said.
She nodded.
Ada glared at Gloria once more before stepping back. “I’m in the kitchen. If you need me to chuck out the garbage, just call me.”
With Ada gone, Lara turned back to Gloria. “What do you want?”
“I need to talk to you. Can I come in, or do you want your neighbours to know that you sleep with other people’s boyfriends?”
She raised brow as if she dared Lara to keep her outside.
Lara moved aside and waved her hand.
“You can come in, your highness,” she said sarcastically.
Gloria sniffed before walking past her into the apartment. The spoilt daughter of wealthy parents, Miss Popularity who swanked around like her father owned everything and she was a princess. Even now, she still had that nose-up-in-the-air thing as she stood surveying Lara’s flat like it was the local rubbish dump. She was very light-skinned, a reflection of the fact her mother was German. Her face was heart shaped, her nose small, her black hair long and straight. Dressed in fitted shift Burberry dress and platform shoes, she could have just stepped off the catwalk runway.
“Gloria Rawlins. To what do I owe the honour of your visit?” Lara couldn’t keep the sarcasm from her voice. She must be doing something right for Gloria to feel threatened enough to visit her.
With Gloria’s eyes conveying the whole you-are-so-beneath-me attitude and lips twisted in a sneer, Lara couldn’t help thinking the other girl had aged dramatically.
“Lara Johnson. I hear you now work for Ike. Well done.” Gloria was clapping now as she strutted around her living room like a peacock. “You’ve finally arrived.”
Lara simply watched her calmly. Although she knew Gloria was trying to raise her ire, she finally realised that even with all her finery and bad attitude, Princess Gloria couldn’t intimidate her any longer. She was financially independent and had a career ahead of her. She was making her own money, not waiting for her father to die so she could inherit his wealth, unlike the woman standing in front of her. She couldn’t help the unpleasant thoughts.
“Well, thank you, Gloria. Ike knows a good thing when he sees it.” She couldn’t resist the swipe and the haughty smile left the other girl’s face.
“And I see you are getting bolder, too. Well, let me give you some advice. Keep away from Ike,” Gloria hissed at her maliciously.
“And why would I want to do such a thing? I work with the man.” Lara crossed her arms, folded beneath her chest. A feeling of power rushed through her as she realised she was deriving pleasure in seeing Gloria so riled. Strange, because she had never been vindictive towards anyone before.
“Yes, indeed. He told me about the kind of work you do for him, spreading your legs out for him like the whore you are.” Gloria sneered at her, her face distorting spitefully.
Lara’s face heated up.
“Do you seriously think you mean anything to him?” the other girl continued. “You didn’t before, and you are never going to. No one has ever been able to get between us. Ike and I have a special relationship; that’s why we’ve lasted so long. Occasionally, I allow him to catch his fun just to keep him entertained. All men need a bit of distraction once in a while. Something to remind them of their primeval instincts. But eventually, he always comes back to me. Always has, always will. You were just an amusing interlude to him.”
Lara felt sick and she clutched her sides as she struggled to stay upright. The other girl’s words hit their mark.
“Listen. I’m a woman like you. I may appear more beautiful and wealthier but I have feelings, too, though some people think that I don’t.” Gloria paused, rubbing her arms before continuing. “Ike is like a child in a sweet shop who wants to indulge in every flavour and shape in plain view and I’m just the obliging parent. You understand that, right?”
Lara just stared at Gloria silently, not believing the nerve of the girl. She wanted her sympathy?
“Well, if you’ve overindulged him, then you alone are responsible for the consequence. Why should I care?” she said balefully. She was getting tired of this conversation. She had better things to do.
“True. It is my responsibility, which is why I’m here. To rein him in before it causes any lasting damage.”
“Well, you are in the wrong place. He isn’t here. You’re his fiancée so you should know where he is.” Lara waved her hand dismissively.
Gloria laughed scornfully. “I’m in the right place. I need to cut off his sweet supply, and you are it.”
She couldn’t believe her ears, couldn’t believe Gloria. The cheek, the gall of the woman. She clenched her hands to her sides to stop herself from slapping the daylights out of the horrible girl. How she could be so vicious and still live with herself, she couldn’t understand.
“Gloria, we’re not in high school anymore. You don’t scare me.” She could barely contain her anger now. “You don’t come into my house and mouth off. This isn’t the school playground.”
Gloria reared back as if shocked by Lara’s vehement words. They both glared at each other.
“Look,” Gloria said, eventually. “I know you have a lot to lose so I’m willing to help you out. To make it worth your while.”
“Why do you want to help me?” Lara’s mouth nearly dropped to the floor. This conversation was getting ridiculous by the minute.
“Because as I said, I have feelings, too, and I’m not such a bad person. I’m willing to help find you a new job. I can arrange a position for you in my father’s company. Or better still. I can give you money to move away.”
She took out her chequebook from her bag and wrote on it, tearing out a slip. She held it up but Lara refused to touch it, though she could see the amount was obscene.
Gloria really thought she could buy her acquiescence. Did she earnestly think Lara’s feelings for Ike could be traded for money? Could be bought and sold at whim? What was it with rich people that they thought they could buy people and their emotions?
And she’d been genuinely thinking about wishing Ike well with his future. But not now. Not when Gloria had turned up at her door. It proved there was more to what was going on.
Ike had been genuinely shocked when she’d told him about what Gloria had done in the past. It was now her duty to prove to him that Gloria was nasty and didn’t deserve to be his wife.
Too much of a coincidence that whenever something bad happened to her, Gloria was always close by.
“I don’t need your money, Gloria.” She put her hands on her hips and took a gamble. “I wonder what Ike would say if he finds out that his future wife is a manipulative bitch.”
The shocked expression on Gloria’s face nearly made her laugh, and she capitalised on it.
“Does he know that you manipulated him into getting engaged with you?” she taunted.
Gloria’s face contorted and she snapped.
“I did what I had to do to get him.” Her voice was so vicious that Lara flinched. “Do you know what it felt like all those years watching him have relationships with other women? I hated it, hated every minute of it.”
Lara’s eyes widened at Gloria’s confession. She could see the hate contorting Gloria’s face. And it all clicked.
“It was you!” she accused. “You are the reason Ike split up with me.”
Gloria glared at her. “Of course it was me. From the minute you turned up at Hillcrest, you were moping at him like some puppy. I knew it was only a matter of time before he fell for your whole innocent girl act. It’s why I got Malcolm to ask you out. But he was so dumb, playing the whole caveman act on you. Of course, it
didn’t work, and I had to teach him how to act like a gentleman, which eventually worked.”
Lara felt like she was going to throw up all over the floor. She felt dizzy and sat on the arm of the sofa.
“You set me up with that psycho just so you could have Ike to yourself.” She couldn’t hide the shock in her voice.
“I did, and I’ll do it again to make sure he doesn’t leave me.” Gloria sneered.
Lara’s hand shook as she picked the phone out of her pocket. Her whole body was trembling as if she had hypothermia. The edges of her vision were starting to blur. She knew what was happening to her and she tried to prevent it. Her mind was trying to shut down again, blanking out everything.
“I’m going to tell Ike about you,” she said in an increasingly weak voice. “I may not be good enough for him, but you’re certainly the worst person he could ever marry. I’ll make sure he never marries you.”
Gloria stepped towards her, her hatred apparent. “You do that and you can be sure that what Malcolm did to you will be nothing compared to what I’ll do to you. Keep away from Ike.”
“Ada!” Lara screamed, knowing she was losing time. She pulled the card out of her pocket as Gloria walked out of the room.
Ada came into the room, gripping her shoulders. “Are you okay?”
Lara swallowed and nodded. “Where’s Gloria?”
“She’s gone,” Ada replied.
She lifted her hand and shoved her phone and the card at Ada. “Call her. Her name is Jocelyn. Tell her I need her help.”
Lara was now shaking badly and she rolled into the corner of the sofa and curled up.
“Lara, you’re scaring me. What did that bitch do to you?”
“Please...” was all she could say before darkness claimed her.
Chapter Seventeen
“Mr. Bode is here to see you.”
Jane’s voice rang clear through the intercom speaker on Ike’s desk.
“Send him in,” he instructed before turning to his friend he’d been chatting with. “I’d like you to stay for this next meeting.”
Henry nodded. “Sure. What is it about?”
“I’ll brief you in a minute,” Ike said as he stood up and walked around his desk.
Jane ushered in a smartly dressed man into his office.
“It’s good to see you, Mr. Bode.” Ike extended his hand and his guest grabbed it in a firm shake. “This is my friend, Henry Coker.”
Two men shook hands as he instructed Jane to bring refreshments. She stepped out.
He directed the men to the sofas. “We all need to sit comfortably for this meeting.”
The two nodded and took their seats just as Jane brought a tray of malt and beer drinks and tall glasses and set them on the low coffee table. She left and shut the door behind her.
“Help yourselves,” Ike said.
Mr. Bode took a bottle of the malt and popped the cap with the opener. Ike and Henry did the same, ignoring the beer.
“So what do you have for me?” Ike said when they’d all had something to drink.
Mr. Bode placed his briefcase on the table and opened it. “We’ve made some progress on our enquiries. The main person you wanted us to find, Mr. Malcolm Ibeh. We found him.”
“Is this the same Malcolm Ibeh from Hillcrest?” Henry asked.
“Yes. I wanted him found to answer some questions about what happened to Lara at that Zik Hall party,” Ike said as he sat up straight. “Mr. Bode is helping to track down some of the party guests. Malcolm is top of the list.”
“Something happened to her?” Henry’s eyes widened.
“Not in a good way,” he replied and turned back to the investigator. “You said you found Malcolm?”
The man pulled out a folder and laid it on the table. “Yes, we did. He is in federal prison in the USA.”
“What?” Henry asked.
“It’s all in the folder,” the man replied. “He was convicted for abducting a minor across state lines, sexual assault, rape, possession of drugs with the intent to supply.”
Ike picked up the folder and opened it. The first thing was a copy of a mug shot of Malcolm, followed by copies of the court documents that listed what he’d been convicted off.
“He abducted a child?” Ike looked up from the papers.
“Yes. It appears he met and groomed a girl on Facebook. She lived in New York and he lived in Atlanta, Georgia. Apparently, he drove from Atlanta to New York to pick her up and drove her back to his house in Atlanta. The girl was sixteen. He claimed he thought she was eighteen. Although the girl went with him willingly, her parents reported it to the police as he needed their permission to take the girl out of the state, which amounted to abduction.
“Also, he had sex with her. His semen was found on the girl when he was arrested. The age of consent is eighteen, so it amounted to rape. He is now on the sexual offenders’ register. And it turned out he was a dealer as they found large quantities of drugs in his house.”
“Wow.”
Henry’s shocked word mirrored exactly how Ike felt. He’d known that the boy Malcolm was would definitely get into trouble with the law at some point. But he hadn’t imagined this. And he was still a little disappointed that the man was out of his reach. He wanted answers from him.
“How did you find all this out?” Ike asked.
“I did an Internet search of his name and found an online newspaper mention of a man bearing his name who’d been convicted of abducting a minor across state lines. I wasn’t sure it was the same man. But we are affiliated to a PI firm in the states. We had one of them go over to Atlanta and make some enquiries. It turned out Mr. Ibeh was a well-known member of the Nigerian community in Atlanta. He lived in a big house in a nice neighbourhood. People had been shocked to find out he was a drug dealer. In fact, he has some supporters who think he was set up by the police. They say that it was the girl’s fault for not telling him her age.”
“What?” Livid, Ike chucked the file back onto the table. “How stupid can people be? How can anyone defend such a thing? He was the adult. How difficult was it to ask the girl how old she was, especially since she was living at home with her parents?”
He’d been in a similar situation when he’d met Lara for the first time, although she’d been seventeen and only a few months from her eighteenth birthday. But he’d ensured that all their interactions were platonic. He’d reserved his sexual desires for other women. It wasn’t until Lara turned up in his house when she’d turned eighteen that he’d allowed himself to think of her as a woman with sexual needs.
“I don’t even know how anybody could defend that kind of behaviour,” Henry said, picking up the file. “Unfortunately, there are people who are quick to blame the victim and not the perpetuator.”
“As much as I’m glad to see Malcolm pay for any crimes he’s committed, this news is a little disappointing. It means we don’t get the chance to question him about the party. It was his party and we all know he was with Lara that night.”
“We still have options,” Mr. Bode said. “One is to question Mr. Ibeh in prison. We can get one of the investigators in the States to pay him a visit. Of course, there’s no guarantee that he will talk, but we can certainly try.”
“Yes, I’d like you to do that,” Ike said. “What is the other option?”
“I also tracked down a man by the name of Jimoh Obalende. He works at the National Theatre, Iganmu. I’ve got contact details for him.” He reached in the briefcase and took out a sheet of paper.
Ike took the paper and pulled out his phone. He dialled the mobile phone number on the sheet. “No time like the present to contact him.”
He put the phone on speaker and the ringing sound echoed in the office before a male voice came through.
“Hello?”
“Is this Jimoh Obalende?” Ike asked.
“Yes...who am I speaking to?”
“This is Ike Thomas. I was one of your teachers at Hillcrest School.”
“Good evening, Jimoh. How are you doing?”
“I’m doing okay. It’s a surprise to hear from you today.”
“Yes, I know. I’m trying to contact some of the old students from Hillcrest for a project I’m doing and I was hoping you will help me out.”
“Of course, sir. I’m happy to help out.”
“Great. Can you meet me today?”
“Um...Sure. I’m just heading to Lagos Island to drop something off. Can we meet somewhere around there?”
“What I want to discuss is a little private, so I would rather do it here. My offices are in Victoria Island. I’m happy to reimburse you for your trouble.”
“It’s not a problem. I’ll be there probably in over an hour, considering the traffic.”
“Do you know where TI Tower is?”
“Yes. Just off Ahmadu Bello Way?”
“Great. Just ask for me when you get to the front desk. I’ll let them know you’re coming. See you soon.”
Ike cut the call. “It looks like we’ll be getting some answers tonight.”
Henry nodded.
“Do you need me to stay for your meeting with Mr. Obalende?” Mr. Bode asked.
“It’s not necessary. I can update you,” he replied.
“Okay.” Mr. Bode closed his briefcase and stood. “I’ll keep searching for the other names on the list and I’ll let you know what happens with the prison visit.”
Ike stood and extended his hand. “Thank you for coming. I look forward to more news.”
Mr. Bode nodded and waved at Henry as Ike walked him to the door. After he said goodbye to the investigator and saw him walk to the lift, he turned to Jane.
“There’s a Mr. Jimoh Obalende who is coming to see me in the next hour or so. Can you inform reception and security to expect him?”
“Yes, sir,” she replied. “Do you need me to stay on?”
“No. You can go.” It was already past working hours and most of the floor had emptied out.
He glanced in the direction of Lara’s desk and it seemed she had gone home, too. He hadn’t seen her today. Then again, he’d been in meetings most of the time so he hadn’t had time to dwell on her. But he missed not seeing her.