Page 63

The touch came too soon and not soon enough.

A gentle caress on his neck. Warm fingers gliding through his nape, drawing him forward, their noses bumping and moving in slow circles.

Kainye slid further down, till his mouth was only a hair's breadth away from Timi's.

Air escaped his mouth in a soft puff, but he remained still, seemingly content in just letting their breath mingle.

Timi, unable to stand the torture anymore, let out a groan and brought their lips together once more. Kainye responded with a sobbing sound in his throat, dragging Timi in by his collar, till he was braced above him.

Timi's hands crept underneath his head, to bring Kainye's lips further into his. He nipped insistently at Kainye's bottom lip, and when he gasped, he immediately slid his tongue in. Kainye let out a low moan, sending a full body shudder through Timi.

He sank into the sweet wet warmth, his tongue making sure to touch every minty crevice. And when they'd sucked in all the air needed to breathe, they broke apart, staring at each other in astonishment.

After an eternity of reining in laboured breaths, Kainye reached up to cradle Timi's face. “I think I like you,” he breathed. “Like really, really like you.”

Timi, a gooey mass of unbridled sensations, managed to chuckle at Kainye's late realisation and plant a kiss in the soft palm cradling his temple. “And I think I love you. Like really, really love you.”

Kainye's entire face softened so unbearably. A slight spread of lips, tenderness seeping from his eyes, chin going lax. “I want to stay like this forever. I don't want to leave here or you.”

Timi returned his smile, so sure his face had the same whipped expression. Perhaps, even worse. “Me too. We'll starve to death, but who cares, right?”

Before Kainye could reply, a blinking light appeared around the bend, leading to the narrow path they occupied. They sprang to their feet, remembering their surroundings and how late it had gotten .

Snr. Keshi, Kainye's House prefect approached, shining the torch on their faces. “What are you bastards doing here?”

“Nothing,” Timi exclaimed, rolling up the mat to hide his face. “We were just revising for biology test.”

“You're doing nothing or revising?” Senior Keshi snapped.

“Both,” Timi clarified.

Snr. Keshi stepped closer. “Are you being smart? On your knees now!”

Timi immediately dropped down, but Kainye remained on his feet, glaring at the senior. Timi yanked at his arm, hissing behind him. “Kneel. Or you'll get us in trouble.”

Snr. Keshi's chest swelled. “Are you deaf?”

Kainye, instead of complying, dragged Timi up, and pushed him behind. Timi, being slightly taller, had to bend to hide his face.

Snr. Keshi trained the bright light on Kainye's face and faltered. “Aren't you that new kid in Room 7?” Then, sneered. “You think you're better than the rest of us? You at his back, show your face!”

Kainye pushed Timi further behind him, cocked his head, and said calmly, “Isn't today Friday? Nurse Mercy isn't available to attend to you. You should stick to your usual Mondays, Thursdays and Sundays.”

While Snr. Keshi gaped at him, Kainye turned to Timi. “Go; I'll take care of the mat.” When Timi hesitated, he repeated, “Go, I'll be fine.”

Timi dumbly nodded and took off, unable to reconcile this Kainye with the trembling boy of earlier whose tongue flicked his shyly, and who moaned so devastatingly.

Back at the hostel, body strumming a euphoric melody, he dove for his journal and began to write.

A splash of icy water woke Timi the next morning.

And soon, he stood before his assembled hostel mates, the journal he forgot to keep away lay open in the house prefect's hands.

The brawny senior bared Timi's soul in a comical tone and the boys laughed.

However, when he got to the last one, he shook his head.

“This one's just too much.” He thrust the book at Timi. “Read.”

Begging didn't help, and soon Timi was reading the words from last night to everyone except the boy he'd written them for .

The beating came after. Everyone desperate to leave an imprint of their hate on his skin. Spurred on by the prefect.

“Do you want to get raped in your sleep by the faggot?”

“Nooo!”

“Tell us who you wrote it for, and we won't kill you.”

When Timi remained curled in a ball, grunting at the kicks and pounding, he barked at someone. “You! You brought this to us. Which boy is he referring to?”

No pain inflicted compared to what he felt when he heard the voice.

“I don't know, Snr Ahmad,” Bobby said. “I only saw the diary.”

And what made it even more pathetic was the gratitude that welled up. Bobby had chosen to let him suffer alone. And Kainye would never experience this pain.

It was the last thought he had before the darkness took him.

Timi did the only thing he was good at when faced with a situation he couldn't handle. He hid. Like a coward.

Alex. Kainye. Timi. Eyi.

Where did the lies end and the truth begin?

Alex…Kainye, whoever he was, had known who Timi was, and had approached him for that reason.

How the hell was he supposed to handle that?

When Alex kept coming to the house, shouting outside his locked bedroom he would keep showing up till Timi gave him the chance to explain, Timi packed some of his clothes and escaped to Eko hotel.

It was there he began his reparation journey.

He called Eketi first .

“I had a feeling it would end like this,” she said, after Timi apologised. “I'm mad about my time being wasted, but you made sure we were all fully paid without an option of a refund. That makes up for all, I guess.”

“Agu will recover. You can still be Adena.”

Eketi scoffed. “Let me go and recover my strength in Dubai first.” Then she hesitated, before saying softly. “I'm a little jealous though. You found love. I advise you to hold on tightly. Fuck what everyone thinks.”

Timi's heart squeezed. “Thank you. And I'm sorry.”

Maxwell was also gracious after hearing Timi out. “I sat down with D'Yoyo,” he said with a sigh. “I couldn't ever be part of such rascality. I'm sorry for your pain, Timi.”

Throughout their conversation, not one fantastic! fell out of his mouth, and Timi couldn't believe he missed the word.

For Nejeere, her reply to his apology was a simple, “Let me know when you're leaving, so I can prepare the staff.”

Cold, detached, lifeless.

He finally admitted he’d missed her. “Nej, maybe we should talk.” She couldn't possibly know about him and Alex. Could she?

She stayed quiet for a while, then said softly. “What is there to talk about?”

“Like why you're not having my head for the stunt I pulled, for one.”

“Well, you had to do what you had to do,” she said. “I'm just your manager after all. I shouldn't cross any line.”

Timi's heart grew heavy. “Nej–”

“I'm glad Uncle's name is cleared. The office lines have been ringing off the hook. Is there anyone you'll like me to forward your private number to?”

Timi sighed. “No.”

“Take care, then,” she said, and hung up.

D'Yoyo came over to the hotel, and while they shared the La Romanée he brought along, he grunted, “You did well, Lawson. Thank you.”

Timi raised his glass to him, smiling at his attempt at appreciation. After a surprisingly comfortable minute of silence, Timi asked, “So, what next? ”

D'Yoyo released a deep breath. “Buck has taken what Buck had given. Now? It's all me.”

“And Agu? He must suspect you started the fire. Though, I made sure he killed any thought of striking back. But who knows?”

“Maxwell thinks he knows where my skills can be truly appreciated. I think I believe him.”

Timi nodded. “I wish you luck, man.”

D'Yoyo raised his glass. “And I, you.”

When Charles—who had been trying to reach Timi unsuccessfully after the Enugu trip—beat him into calling first, Timi didn't allow him speak before he blurted, “I made sure your job stayed intact. You don’t know anything; you can't be faulted. I'm sorry I kept you in the dark.”

Nothing came from Charles for an awkwardly long moment, before he said quietly, “Who am I to you, Timi Lawson?

Because I'm starting to believe you've never rated me. First, I hear from Nejeere you were jetting out before all this went down, then, instead of you telling me about Agu so I can help, you chose to lie and make a fool of me? I even found out about you and Alex by mistake. I’ve been calling you for days and you ignored me.

And here you go again, yapping about some fucking job like it's all there is to me.”

Remorse streaked through. “Charles, I'm sor—”

“Fuck you, man. Fuck you.”

Timi stared at his phone long after the call dropped, an oppressive weight crushing his entire being. But a part of him was relieved. Charles, unlike Nejeere, had shown his ire. He would reach out when his anger cooled and explain things properly.

Dame B also reached out before he could, and they met up in her house.

Except, she wasn't the one waiting.

Lillian sat in the same chair she'd sat during their first meeting, but this time, she wasn't smiling.

“You two are like tragic lovers,” she said. “Broken up but unable to destroy each other. I should have known you would fail just as he failed to stop you from leaving on that flight. ”

Timi stared at her. “What are you talking about? He stopped me. You know how he stopped me.”

Lillian laughed. Dark and grating. “My husband has never been rational where you're concerned.

The only reason you could best him. When he moaned about you abandoning him and the future he'd prepared with you in mind, I gave him the perfect solution. But did he have the guts?” She scoffed.

“I had to do what had to be done. You were my own perfect solution.

How couldn't I have known you'll be an utter failure like your foolish godfather?”

The world swam around a motionless Timi.

Agu hadn't slandered Uncle Jude. His wife had. So, why? Why had he made him believe he was the one?

I've never been one to pass up a good opportunity.

He'd assumed he meant twisting the existing rumour. But he'd been referring to what his wife had done.

Could his reality get worse?

The universe must have taken his question as a challenge, because as he gaped at Lillian, Dame B stepped in with two glasses of wine. She leaned over Lillian's head to drop a glass on the stool before her, then Lillian tilted up her face, and their lips met in an upside-down kiss.

The bottom of his world dropped.

Dame B smiled against Lillian's mouth, pecked her both cheeks and sank into the chair beside her.

“Timi dear,” she sang. “I thought I told you not to give anyone more trouble.”

Lillian scoffed. “Of all things to have in common with my husband, it had to be him.”

Dame B picked her hand. “He's a good boy, baby. Just…misguided.”

He should say something, but he feared it may take a trachea surgery before he could ever be capable of speech.

“Look at his face,” Lillian said. “You'll think he's never seen two women together before.”

Dame B tutted. “I told you we should ease him into this slowly.”

Timi soon realised he didn't need to say anything for the women to make the picture clearer. They'd invited him to spill, because being one of them , he needed to know how badly he'd fucked up and deserved punishment.

Chief Obaego, after losing three of his sons to a helicopter crash, and his wife to cancer, had walked in on his only daughter making out with a woman.

He'd ordered her to desist, she'd continued seeing the woman, so he locked her up in an asylum that also provided a conversion therapy service.

The woman was Dame B. And Chief Obaego had bought her off by giving her the CEO position of the useless entertainment company Agu had opened behind his back.

So sure it would be a failure. Buck had nothing to do with her name, but she made it her own and turned it into a group of companies with Agu's unobtrusive contribution.

Lillian got out, got married, and Dame B reached out again. She'd only taken the offer because she wanted to remain close. They resumed their relationship, but this time in secret. Society was never going to accept them.

With eyes everywhere, the only way they could ever meet privately without it being suspicious was at Dame B's parties.

Now, Chief had been diagnosed with a brain tumour, and they were tired of hiding. However, Dame B remaining at Buck had a clause to it. If she so much as sniffed in Lillian's direction, it was bye-bye forever. And they couldn't let that happen.

“My husband is as evil as my father,” Lillian sneered.

“Buck Group and Obaego Enterprises shouldn’t be run by a criminal.

And that studio? Does he think he can just wipe the slate clean and go legit?

” She faced Timi. “I really hoped to work with you as my husband believes you're the right person to eventually manage it.

And I know you're still standing because you must have leverage on him.

So run far away, little boy, because my husband will fall, and I don't forgive.”

“I'm sorry things didn't go as you expected,” Timi said when his voice box resumed function. “And I sympathise with how much you both have had to endure. I didn't inform Agu how I got the card, so you’re safe, I guess. I appreciate the warning, but there’s no need. I was leaving all this anyway. I wish you both luck in your endeavours.”

Halfway across the room, the door opened and Rukky stepped in.

“All you had to do was air the damn thing,” she said, as she brushed past him. “But I warned them about you. Agu's boy.”

She strode over to the women and received kisses on the cheek from both.

It was official, nothing could shock him anymore. But he thought too soon.

When he got to the door, he turned to face the three women who stood side by side, watching him.

“I have one question,” he said. “If you all were in this together, why couldn't you use the same medium you used in slandering my father?”

“And let my father cut me off totally for going after him and his golden son-in-law?” Lillian said.

“How would he know?”

“Because I am Sporax Media.”

And for the first time since he stepped out of the airport, he felt pity for Agu.