The story so far………..
She urged me on until I sat closer to her on the bed. She said: “Frank, you know I had feelings for you since our university days. I still do. Do you have a girlfriend now? ” I remained silent. “Talk to me, Frank, do you now have a girlfriend? ”
“No, Chantal, No. I don’t,” I answered. She smiled and handed over a picture to me saying, “I took this picture from my mother’s album because the man to the right resembled you so much. I dare say he was your father. He stayed with my mother for about five years before leaving. I learnt he is now dead.
Unable to control my tears, I allowed them to flow. Chantal had unknowingly shown me my father’s picture with her mother. They seemed to be having a good time with my father putting some ice cream in her mouth like two teenagers in love. Realisation dawned on me then that Mrs. Akindele Ruby was the one who poisoned my father and took over his companies. Then I recalled what my father was trying to tell me on his death bed….”My son , if I die, try and get my ……….. umm, umm, ….my …my….doc. …”
At that point, Chantal was confused. She asked ,”have I said something wrong to upset you?” “No, Chantal, I’m OK.”
I decided to retrieve my father’s documents from Mrs. Akindele. To think that I was a security man in my own father’s company was very ironical. I knew Chantal loved me but how would she feel if I told her that her mother was responsible for my father’s demise. What about the fact that her mother took away my father’s properties including his documents?
My situation was made even more difficult by the fact that I was beginning to develop feelings for Chantal and I didn’t want to hurt her. When I remembered my father’s dying wish, I realised I had a difficult decision to make.
One day, Mrs. Akindele told me, “you strikingly resemble my ex boyfriend. Sometimes, when I see you, I can’t help but remember him.” When she made that statement, I nearly said to her “he showed you love but you paid him back by poisoning him.” But decided to say instead, “well madam, sometimes, people resemble each other. It’s just a mere coincidence.”
I realised Miss Akindele was getting very curious about me. At first, she was very subtle about it. Then she became more direct. She often asked me questions about my father, most of which I tried to evade. I knew it was time to put my plan into action.
One weekend, Chantal came into my room to ask me why her mother was very curious about me. I responded, “I don’t know. She’s your mother. Find out from her?” She laughed and said, “she’s not my mother. My parents died in a car accident some 12 years ago. I was 9 years old then. She volunteered to take care of me.”
“Does she not have her own children, then?” I asked. “Yes, two boys. They are in Canada now.”
When Chantal told me Miss Akindele was not her mother , my game plan changed. I decided to tell her the truth. I confessed to her the man she saw in the picture she took from Ruby’s album was my father. I saw her eyes widen in excitement and she said, “I knew it. When I saw that picture, I knew you were related to that man. It’s intuitive. Tell me more, Babe. ..”
I told her that her “mother” poisoned my father and took away all his properties- houses, companies, boutiques. She asked, “so what do you intend to do now?”
“I want to take back what rightfully belong to me,” I responded. It is my ………….”
Then our conversation was interrupted by Miss Akindele Ruby.
“Of course, it is your property. So you want to kill me and take back all your father’s documents, isn’t that your game plan? I knew that skirt chaser was your father. I knew it.”
I stood rooted to the spot. How on earth did Miss Akindele get to know of my plan? She would surely sack me from the house. “Good work, Chantal, “Miss Akindele praised her “daughter.” Chantal responded,” don’t thank me. You used me to get to him. If I knew that was your plan, I wouldn’t have …… ”
Miss Akindele laughed and said, “Don’t be surprised. All men have the same weakness when it come to women; they become foolish and vulnerable.”
My heart began to beat furiously against my chest. Miss Akindele had really used Chantal to outplay me big time. Somehow, I blamed Chantal for not telling me it was miss Akindele who sent her to question me. I was thrown out of the house with a stern warning never to step into the house again. I lost.
It was Friday night, around 6:30pm. I was resting in the sitting room in my mother’s house when I heard a knock on my door. I wasn’t really expecting anyone so I was a bit surprised. I opened the door and there she stood – Chantal.
Without waiting for her to say anything, I slammed the door in her face and went back to rest. I was very angry with her for betraying me. She shouted behind the door, “Frank, I’m sorry. Miss Akindele used me to get to you but I have brought you your father’s documents.”
The message hit me like a thunder strike but I reasoned she was only trying to get me to open the door for her. It took close to an hour. I opened the door. Shockingly, she was still there. I shouted at her, “what are you still doing here. Go away, you betrayer. I thought you really loved me.” She smiled and said, ” I do”
She then handed over my father’s documents to me saying, “I do love you and will always love you.” When she gave me the documents, I was surprised. I asked her, “why did you decide to hand over the documents to me now?”
She said, ” because they are rightfully yours .You deserve them. Now I have to go.”
“No, no, no, explain to me why you changed your mind.” I held her hand and pulled her inside the room. She gazed at me for a few minutes before explaining the situation to me.
Chantal saw the look of surprise on Frank’s face. She decided to explain the situation to him from the time she showed him the picture she took from her “mother’s” album. She confessed to Frank that she snooped through his belongings and saw Frank’s picture in which a man was holding his hands and that man was the same man cuddling Miss Akindele in the picture she took. She said she knew then that her intuition about Frank was true. Phillip was Frank’s father. Chantal said her “mother” Ruby, knew there was something about Frank she was not seeing. She decided to use her to unravel the mystery. She told her daughter to ask him questions about his mission and family background. That was exactly what happened. It was during the interrogation that Ruby came from her hideout saying, “Of course, it is your property. So you want to kill me and take all your father’s documents.”
Chantal claimed she followed Frank to his house secretly the day he left. When she returned home, she had time to deliberate on the issue and decided to give back to Frank what belonged to him especially in a situation where the properties were about to be shared between Miss Akindele’s two sons. Chantal knew she would not have a share in that property since she wasn’t Miss Akindele’s child by tradition.
She said she stole the documents from Ruby’s room one day when she travelled, using her master spare key. Ruby didn’t realise the documents were missing until she was on her way to return the documents to Frank. She called her on the phone and threatened to kill her if she didn’t return with the documents. Chantal also claimed Ruby said she would have poisoned her like she did to Philip if she had known Chantal would stab her in the back. Chantal said she had a record of their conversation on her phone.
I was surprised when Chantal narrated her side of the story to me. I kept asking myself, ” Did she love me that much to betray Ruby or was this another trick?”
Without hesitation, I filed a case against Miss Akindele Ruby at the police station. She was arrested on her way to the Kotoka International Airport. After two months of court proceedings, she was found guilty of poisoning my father and was given life imprisonment. Three months later, I got married to Chantal. The honeymoon was great. I still recall it as if it is happening right now.
I felt her enter the bedroom. Something tingled down my spine although at first I didn’t know what caused it. I looked up, and met her eyes. She paused for a few minutes and stared at me. I returned her stare, paralyzed with sudden desire. Then the gap between us narrowed. I closed my eyes, and a second later felt a new sensation from an unknown direction of the bedroom.
I looked, and there she was smiling at me. I asked her, “are you alright? ”
She nodded in the affirmative. Her lips were tender with lust. She took my hand and kissed my knuckle in a courtly gesture. I blushed with eagerness. She laughed and asked if she had embarrassed me. I denied embarrassment, and she complimented me in an unusual manner. I laughed very low, leaned forward and whispered to her that it was false. Her hand came up as I spoke, and rested on her shoulder, the warmth of her palm sweeping through me, sending an urgent signal to my deepest self, my inner core.
She looked at me without speaking. I told her I was feeling hot inside. For one despairing moment I thought she had misread me, but then she smiled, and her lips found mine. The thickness of the dark wig she wore cushioned her head, and the long curls brushed across her breasts where they rose from the tight bodice of her costume. My fingers traced the line, and she gasped with tension.
I used my hands to pull her hips to mine, and she swayed against me. My own hands rose to caress her neck and shoulders, and I nibbled my way along the firm line of her jaw. I asked her if she was ready for me but I hardly heard her response because it was muffled through the pounding of my own heart. I felt I could ask her anything and she would have agreed. A moment later I moved towards her hotspot and with delight realized she had granted me permission to access it without uttering the words. I looked at her with playful delight written all over me.
Above us music floated out of the open window into the night. I swayed in time with it, eager to speed the joy I knew she offered, the gateway to limitless joy. “Shhhh!” The rest is my secret.
I thank God for touching the heart of Chantal to bring back my father’s property documents. I’m a billionaire now. I have been taking care of my mother. My two siblings Ben and Rita are also working. Ben is a banker and Rita is nurse.
Chantal has given birth to our second child -a boy whom we named Jayson. My first born was named Emmanuel. I pray to God to continue blessing my family. Despite his choice of lifestyle, I still respect my father for finally coming back to his senses on his death bed.
