Amarachi wondered who her visitor was as she walked slowly to the visiting room, handcuffed and an officer guarding her. After Dennis had visited her that morning she
wasn't expecting anyone else to visit her.
She paused at the entrance of the visiting room and struggled to draw up the sagging prison uniform trousers. She entered into the room and her eyes with Ini's, she was dumbstruck. She was unable to move for a while as her legs didn't carry her further, she just stared at Ini who stared back also without saying anything.
"You only have ten minutes, if you like keep staring at yourself all through" a voice moved Ama back to action and she walked further inside and sat down into the seat in front of Ini.
They sat quietly, staring at and observing each other like strangers trying to remember where they've met themselves before. Ini could not do but notice the drastic change on Amarachi, it was evident she had not been feeding well. She looked like someone who had been sick and haven't been receiving medical treatment. Moulds of tears gradually began to form on Ini's face.
"How are you doing?" Ini finally asked, breaking the silence between them.
"Fine"
"Did you fall sick?"
"No, I'm perfectly fine and why do you ask? I thought you said you had no business with me"
"I've been worried about you, but I struggled not to show care because I'm still hurt... "
"You don't need to worry about me, I don't need your care" she slammed angrily"
"I..." Ini tried to talk but couldn't find words as she was deeply hurt by Ama's response
"Who used the knife I kept in my room to murder Frank?"
"What kind of question is that? How am I supposed to know?" She replied, almost in tears.
"I stay in your house, nobody else lives there"
"But I thought you claimed you were drugged, don't you think the same people who drugged both of you could have done that?"
"The person who drugged me is Kelvin, I was silly to have taken the juice after I suspected that someone else was in the house with me. The only person who could have returned to that room is you or Kelvin"
Ini couldn't believe her ears, she blamed herself for allowing Bode convince her to come there. She stood up and hurried out of the place in tears.
Amarachi watched her as she left, unmoved by display of emotions. She remembered that Dennis had told her to be careful with Ini when he came earlier, his reason was that he suspected that Ini had planned the murder, in a bid to punish her and Kelvin.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Ken boiled with anger as he answered the questions been thrown at him by the inspectors. He was in his office when some police officers had come to seize him. He pleaded that he would come on his own, in his car but they refused and didn't even allow him to take anything nor tidy the office before he left.
"Did you threaten to kill him or not?"
"Yes, I threatened to kill the fool"
"So you finally carried out your threat?" Helen continued the questioning.
"I don't even know the fool, I would have killed him if I knew him" he continued to reply stubbornly.
"Shut Up, you killed him. Everything has been exposed, we already found the knife with which you used to carry out the murder"
"Hahaha" he laughed hysterically. "Kill him with a knife? Why would I do that? If I was the one that killed the fool, you would not even find the remains of his body"
"Shut up"
"You too shut up" he shouted back at Helen and turned to Uche who was watching quietly.
"Uche, wetin be all this nao? You know me well o" he spoke in pidgin to Uche.
Helen looked at Uche in surprise, "You know him?"
"Yes, I do. I know his father very well, he's a friend to Chief Olatunbosun" he replied to Helen and walked closer to Ken. "Look here Ken, this is the law, it doesn't matter if I know you or not. The truth is that you threatened to kill someone and few days after, he died mysteriously. You have to prove to us that you didn't do it"
"Prove what?" Ken asked angrily, standing up as he banged his hand on the table. "You guys would surely pay for this, thank God Uche knows what my father can do to you"
"Shut up, your father is not above the law. If you're found guilty, you'll surely be prosecuted accordingly" Uche slammed back at him.
"Take him away" Helen commanded the junior officer with them and turned to Uche. "You never told me you knew the guy"
"Yeah, because it has nothing to do with our investigation"
"Hmmm... Well, I think we still have a lot of work to do"
"Yes, we have to consider other options"
"Yes, once we're done with the fingerprints test"
"Okay"
"Yea, so..." She was saying when her phone rang.
"Hello... Okay... Meet me in my office" she spoke to the caller and turned back to Uche. "His bail has been applied for already, go and prepare his release"
"Okay ma" he replied and they went different ways, he went to prepare Ken's release while Helen returned to her office.
Helen met Bode at the door of the office. "Good morning", she shook hands with him before she opened the door with her key and walked in.
Bode walked in after her, he removed the key and locked the door again as he entered.
"Why did you do that?" She asked sharply.
"We don't need any intruder" he replied and handed the keys to her. "I don't want to involve that other guy, Uche"
"So, what do you have to say?" She asked as she sat down.
He paused for sometime and looked at her inquisitive eyes for a while before he declared. "There was no call from Nike Adejumo"
"No call from Nike Adejumo ? What do you mean?"
"Someone else made the call and pretended to be Nike"
"How did you find out?"
Bode brought out his phone and then played his recorded conversation with the customer service representative for about ten minutes. Helen was finally convinced, she was short of words to say after listening to it.
"So, what's your next plan with this information?" He asked.
"Ermm... Don't worry, we'll work on it" she replied, without looking at his face as he had being able to prove that there was more to the call which she dared him to.
"Don't give me that at all" Bode disagreed outrightly.
"That's what you've been saying without doing anything. I want to know what you are doing about it"
"Okay" she finally found courage to look at him. "We'll work with the It department and make sure they help us find the name of the real owner of the sim from network bearer"
"Good, please do it immediately. I'll like to get a report soon"
"Okay"
"And please, don't send Uche, it would be better if you even hide this information from him"
"I'll try"
"Thanks" he stood up to take his leave. " I'll call you later" he smiled as he walked to the door.
Helen walked up to him with the key and opened the door for him to go out. Inspector Uche was just at the door as it was opened, he gave them a searching look and stared more at Bode. Bode smiled at him and also at Helen before he walked away leaving Helen and Uche who entered back into the office.
Bode smiled to himself as he walked outside the building, things worked easy that day. He didn't have to struggle so much to convince Ini to follow him after he had played the recorded conversation to prove to her that she received the phone call from a fake Nike Adejumo and show the possibility that Amarachi and Kelvin were really drugged.
He had only been outside where Ini's car was parked for about one minute when he spotted her walking out, from the way she walked, he concluded that her visit to Amarachi and Kelvin did not go well.
"Hey, how did it go?" He asked Ini who didn't answer him but walked straight to the driver's side of the car.
"What happened? Did you have a disagreement with Ama or Kelvin?"
"No, I didn't see Kelvin anymore"
"Why?" He asked with concern, as he detected that Ini had been crying from her voice
"Because I don't want to see him" she answered angrily and entered into the car. " I regret listening to you, I regret coming here with you"
He entered the car too, through the other side and snatched the car key from Ini who was about to start the car. "I'll drive you home"
"I can take myself home"
"No, I won't let you drive like this" he came out and turned to the driver's side. She came down hesitatingly and went to sit at the other side. Bode drove off immediately.
"So tell me what happened?" He asked as the car went steady on the road.
"That fool, Amarachi accused me of killing Frank and using the knife to implicate her"
"Hmm"
"Good morning Inspector Helen" Bode curtsied as he walked into her office.
"Good morning Uche, you're looking refreshed this morning" she smiled replied and complimented. "I can see that the weekend has done a lot of good to you"
"Yes, thank you" he replied, smiling back as he sat down.
"Good, so what's up this morning?"
"Nothing much, I just had to come around after hoping for sometime that you'll send for me and you didn't"
"Oh! Send for you?" She chuckled as she opened up her laptop. "Yea, I was going to do that, it wasn't just time yet"
"Uhm" he smiled briefly, "I was just thinking that we need to do everything quick. I was expecting that you'll call me to organize and take Kelvin and Amarachi for the fingerprints test"
"Oh! That?" She paused and rested her head on her hand like someone who had just remembered something. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you, I'll already sent Tom to take them there on Friday"
"You what?" He asked, unhappy with the news. "How can you do that?"
"What? How can I do what?" She took her gaze away from the laptop to him.
"I mean Tom doesn't know anything about the case, I could have handled it better"
"I explained to him all he needed to know already" she replied him, putting her focus back on the laptop.
"But you should have told me?"
"Sorry, it skipped my mind. I only wanted to make things easy for you, I noticed you were stressed out last week"
"I could have still done it if you asked me to"
"Yea, I know you would have but I wanted you to go home and rest because we'll have to do more work this week"
"Oh! I see" He replied smiling, trying to cover up the disappointment with the smile.
"Yep, so as you already know, it's takes about forty eight to seventy hours for us to get the result, so we should be expecting it anytime soon"
"Oh yea, good. I'll want us to get the report quickly so we can know the right thing to do"
"Yes, that's why I didn't wait till today to take them for the test"
"Okay, but I think we should not just wait and do nothing while we wait for the result, we need to interrogate Ini too"
"Yes, we'll do that but I think we need to be patient a little till the test result comes out, I don't want us to embarass any innocent one"
"Okay, lets wait then" he saluted and took his leave.
Helen focused on her laptop work as he left, she was trying to connect her modem to the system when her WhatsApp chat message popped up on her phone's screen.
The phone was just beside the laptop so she could see clearly who the message sender was. She wasn't used to replying messages when she was in the office, but the message was from Bode so she couldn't ignore it.
All through the weekend, they had chatted several times. Helen who wasn't used t xo chatting on online forums hesitated at first when Bode sent the first chat message to her that Friday night. His first message was about the case which she thought was annoying as he was asking her questions when she was supposed to be resting. But after struggling for sometime to reply his messages, she became more relaxed when he made a compliment about her display picture and started a less formal discussion.
"Wow , I never knew a female police officer can look so hot like you are in your dp" he had sent.
She viewed the message and read it without replying, but he sent another.
"I thought I would see a dp where you would be in your normal top and Jean or your uniform with guns on your hand"
"Kk" she replied, thinking it would end the conversation but he continued.
"You know I'm just thinking about the popular saying- dress the way you want to be addressed- and I see a lot of sense in it now"
"Hmm, could you explain further?" She replied starting to enjoy the chat.
"You know, I didn't really use to see you as a Lady because you always dress like a man"
"Oh really?"
"Yea, but your Dp shows a different side of you, you're not with your usual boring shirt, trouser, sneakers or flat shoes but you're on a mini gown and you even applied makeups"
"Yea, I dress like that sometimes when I'm going for occasions but I never dress like that when I'm on duty or at work or do you think that kind of outfit would allow me to pursue after a criminal?"
"Oh no, it won't. I understand now " he replied and added an emoticon.
"Yea, the only time I dress like that is when I'm working as an undercover"
"Okay, well you look really beautiful"
They chatted more for a long time that day, talking more on personal issues as she related with him like a friend and not a police officer. They also talked about the deceased Frank and his friendship with Kelvin and Bode. The next day, Helen was the first to send him a message.
TBC.....
