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Chief Kletchi pulled his shoulders back and faced them.
“These men answer to me,” he said. “I pay you.”
Amaka laughed lightly.
“You used to. I increased their pay.”
There it was again. No hesitation. No guilt. Everything reduced to leverage.
Chief Kletchi saw it all at once: money, access, fear, carefully distributed loyalty. This was not a spontaneous betrayal. This had been built. Fed. Protected. Organized.
Amaka stepped closer, close enough that only he heard her next words.
“You should have stayed on that plane,” she whispered. “Now you will die quietly.”
Bissy rushed toward him, crying his name. A guard grabbed her and shoved her back. Chief Kletchi twisted, trying to reach her, but strong hands clamped onto both his arms.
“Leave her!” he shouted.
“Take him,” Amaka ordered.
The guards dragged him out into the corridor.
Bissy struggled behind them, screaming, “Sir! Sir!”
In panic and fury, Chief Kletchi turned his head and shouted the one thing he should not have shouted.
“The phone! The recordings!”
The second the words left his mouth, he knew he had made a mistake.
Amaka stopped dead.
Her head turned slowly toward Bissy.
“What recordings?”
Bissy froze.
Amaka smiled, but now it was the smile of a knife.
“Oh,” she said. “This just got interesting.”
She turned to the guards.
“Lock her in. I will deal with her later.”
Bissy screamed as she was dragged away.
Chief Kletchi fought harder now, but the guards were trained, disciplined, and fully committed. They hauled him through the hallway toward the main house while every instinct in him roared with two truths at once:
His wife was in control.
And the only person who had tried to save him had just been marked for punishment because of him.
Then, through a window, he saw headlights sweep across the compound.
A car had arrived.
The doctor.
He was dragged into the bedroom and shoved inside. The room glowed with soft luxury—white sheets, carefully arranged pillows, quiet art, drawn-back curtains, air-conditioning humming gently. It was the kind of room meant to suggest safety, wealth, comfort, marriage.
Tonight it looked like a staged execution chamber.
Amaka entered behind him and closed the door.
The lock clicked.
She leaned against the wood and crossed her arms.
No more performance.
No more wife.
Only power.
“You should sit,” she said.
Chief Kletchi remained standing.
His chest was rising fast, but his voice came out steady.
“So this is how you planned it? In our bedroom?”
She shrugged.
“It’s poetic. This is where everything began.”
There was a knock.
Then the door opened.
A middle-aged man in a white coat entered carrying a black medical bag. Neat. Quiet. Respectful. The kind of man rich families often keep near for convenience and discretion.
“Madam,” he said.
Then he saw Chief Kletchi and paused.
“Oh. Sir, you’re back.”
“Yes,” Chief Kletchi said coldly. “And I’d like to know what you are doing here.”
The doctor glanced at Amaka.
She moved toward Chief Kletchi and laid one hand lightly on his arm, performing concern with almost supernatural ease.
“My husband collapsed earlier,” she said smoothly. “Too much stress. He has been overworking. He needs something to help him sleep.”
Something strong.
The doctor nodded.
“Of course.”
He opened his bag.
Chief Kletchi watched the vial appear.
Then the syringe.
“This is murder,” he said. “You know that.”
The doctor hesitated.
“Madam said—”
“Madam is lying!”
Chief Kletchi’s voice cracked through the room with such force that even the guards shifted.
“She is planning to kill me.”
The doctor looked uncomfortable now, no longer calm.
“Sir…”
Amaka laughed softly. “I am also very generous, doctor.”
The doctor looked away.
“I’m just doing my job.”
Chief Kletchi felt rage burn through his fear.
“Your job is to save lives,” he said. “Not end them.”
The doctor swallowed.
Amaka’s smile disappeared.
“Doctor,” she said sharply. “Do what you came to do.”
The doctor approached.
Chief Kletchi stepped back.
The guards stepped in.
“Hold him,” Amaka ordered.
They seized his arms.
He fought, but they pinned him hard.
“Amaka!” he shouted. “Look at me. This will not end well.”
Her face remained cold.
“This ends tonight,” she said. “I’ve waited long enough.”
The doctor raised the syringe.
The needle caught the light.
For one brief second, Chief Kletchi closed his eyes—not to surrender, but to think. Business had trained him to search for leverage even in collapse. Somewhere in this room, there had to be a pressure point.
Then he saw it.
The doctor’s uncertainty.
His fear.
His distance from the core conspiracy.
Chief Kletchi opened his eyes and spoke calmly.
“Before you do this, ask her about the recordings.”
The doctor paused.
“What recordings?”
Amaka snapped, “Ignore him. He’s confused.”
“No,” Chief Kletchi said, forcing certainty into every syllable. “He is curious. And he should be.”
The doctor looked from one spouse to the other.
“Madam?”
Amaka’s composure cracked for the first time.
“For heaven’s sake, just inject him!”
Chief Kletchi spoke over her.
“Ask her why she changed the security passwords. Ask her about the former driver. Ask her why silence matters so much in this house.”
The doctor’s face tightened.
“Madam… what is he talking about?”
“You don’t need to know.”
“I think I do,” he said, and now fear had fully entered his voice.
Then a scream tore through the house.
A woman’s scream.
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