By Adebanke Abel
Rain poured hard outside Adé’s office in Victoria Island, turning the glass windows into moving sheets of grey. Lightning danced in the distance, casting brief flashes over the Lagos skyline. The hum of the city was muffled by the downpour, as if the world outside had taken a pause for what was about to happen. Adé sat still behind her glass desk. Her hands were clasped, her expression unreadable. Only the ticking wall clock dared to speak in the silence.
The door opened with a soft creak. Nneka Okafor didn’t just walk in—she entered, like royalty returning to reclaim a throne. Her gold jewelry sang with every step, announcing her presence before her perfume had the chance. The air shifted, soaked in the strong scent of oud and floral musk. Her gele, wide and firm, perched like a crown. She didn’t smile. Neither did Adé. Their eyes met, and something unspoken passed between them—an invisible power line, charged and tense.
“Lawyer Adé,” Nneka said, lowering herself slowly into the visitor's chair. She sat like she owned it, crossing her legs, fingers elegantly draped over her designer handbag. “They say you’re the best at destroying men. Good. My husband deserves pain.” Adé didn’t respond. She simply leaned forward, her eyes drifting toward the file Nneka dropped on the desk. The folder landed with a soft thud, but the weight it carried was anything but light. She opened it. Inside were curated pieces of a broken life: Hotel bills from Eko Hotel, each date violently marked in red ink. A photo, a young pregnant girl, mid-sob, mascara staining her cheeks. On the back was inscribed “He left me!”
Also, there were printed text messages that sounded desperate, unfiltered, and vulgar. Her husband, Ify, was begging a woman named “Temi” for sex. And then the video of a shaky recording of a girl, half-naked, sitting on their bed in the master bedroom, sobbing as she screamed, “Your husband attacked me!” Her voice cracked. Her eyes were wild. Her shame palpable. Nneka dabbed fake tears with a designer handkerchief, the cloth trembling slightly in her hand. “He beats me too, sister,” she said, revealing bruises down her arm—purple, yellowish, painful to look at. Adé’s eyes barely flicked. Her face didn’t change. Her fingers turned one more page with the same cold calm.
She had seen worse.
Men always did worse.
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15 Years Ago
Sirens howled. Lights flashed.
The whole street in Surulere had gathered. Children stood barefoot in puddles. Mothers covered their mouths in disbelief. Adé, barely twelve, clutched the rusty gate of their compound like her life depended on it. Police officers dragged her father through the gate. His agbada robe had torn at the shoulder, flapping behind him like a wounded flag. His hands were cuffed.
“I didn’t steal!” he screamed, voice raw, desperate. “They lied! I swear on my life—they lied!”
But the officers only laughed.
“Shut up, ole!”
The neighbors didn’t come closer. They whispered. They stared. Her mother, who had just woken up from her unconsciousness, fell to her knees in the rain, wailing. Her voice cracked, but no one came to her aid. Adé had burned that moment into her bones.
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Present Day
Adé closed the file gently, but inside her, the noise had returned. The screams, the laughter, the word ''ole'' still echoing.
“I’ll take your case.”
Nneka’s tears dried immediately, like water on hot steel. She leaned forward, a victorious smirk pulling at her lips. “Good. I want his money, his cars, everything. Even his stupid charity for poor children.”
Adé picked up her pen. “We’ll need more evidence. Secret bank accounts. Other women. Perhaps even a drug angle. He must pay for doing this to a woman."
Nneka’s eyes sparkled. “I already paid a girl to work in his office. She’ll say he harassed her.”
Adé nodded. Calculated. Ruthless. Men were always so foolish. And Ify Okafor? No different. Then, Nneka tilted her head slightly and said, almost like a passing thought, “I heard about your father. How men ruined him.”
Adé froze. The pen in her hand paused mid-stroke. No one has dared to touch that old wound for a very long time now. What effrontery does this fancy-looking woman have to talk about my father? Nneka leaned in, voice low and velvet-smooth. “Don’t worry. I’ll keep the press quiet about his past… if you win.”
For a moment, the office fell into a deep, almost unnatural silence. The AC hummed. The clock ticked. But in Adé’s chest—fire. She couldn't describe what she felt. She pictured her father’s grave. Unmarked. Unkept. Covered in weeds and silence. Forgotten.
“I always win,” Adé said, her voice even but bitterly cold.
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Nneka stood to leave, smoothing her skirt and fixing her gele in the mirror beside the door. Then, something slipped from the folder Adé was holding. A photo. It fluttered down like a final warning. Adé bent down to pick it up. And froze. It was a close-up of Ify Okafor. His sharp jawline. That overconfident smile. The smug sparkle in his eye. And there it was—just above his brow—a faint, familiar scar. Her heart stuttered. She knew that scar.
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Flashback
The Iroko tree in Surulere. Moonlight breaking through the leaves. Young Ify standing before her, palm in hers. “Adésuwa,” he whispered, “I’ll love you forever.” His face was young, kind. The scar above his brow was still fresh from the day he’d fought off older boys mocking her father’s arrest. “You’ll be great one day,” he had said. “And I’ll be right there, protecting you.” But he vanished a few months later without fulfilling his promise.
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Adé’s hands shook. She dropped the photo as if it burned her. Nneka turned. “Something wrong, sister?”
Adé’s voice came back colder than before. “No. I'm fine."
"Is that your husband, Ifeanyi Okafor?" She inquired.
"Yes? Who does not know him in this country? Hope there is no problem?"
"Not at all, just wanted to be sure," she replied as she immediately put on her air of authority again.
Nneka kept quiet as she left the room, after reminding her that her father might be dead, but there were still many others who would be glad to know he still had a daughter alive. Alone now, Adé stared at the photo lying facedown on the tiled floor. It couldn’t be him. But deep in her soul, she knew. Ify Okafor was the boy who once swore to protect her. And now… he was the man she was about to destroy. She was torn between several disturbing thoughts hours later about Ifeanyi --- her soul mate from ages past — his fanciful wife who does not know her boundaries and is hell bent on destroying him, her romance life with Ify years back and...
Her phone buzzed, cutting through the tension like a blade. A message from her assistant: “Madam, I found more dirt on Ify Okafor. Should I send it?” Her fingers hovered. Breathe shallow. Memories clashing with vengeance. Justice hanging by a thread. Then she typed: “Send everything.”
Watch out for episode 3
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