SO, WHO KILLED MADAM?

Interrogation Room B. 11:47 a.m. The room smells of old air and fluorescent light. Detective Adekunle Fashola sets a thin manila folder on the table and does not open it. Not yet. ********** The Boss's Husband — Mr. Emeka Okafor. Questioned first. Fashola pulled out the chair across from him slowly. "Mr. Okafor." "Detective." Emeka folded his hands on the table. His cufflinks caught the light. Gold. Small. Tasteful. The kind a woman buys for a man she loves. "When did you last see your wife?" Emeka exhaled through his nose. "Thursday evening. Around seven. She was in the study going over the Lekki property files. I told her dinner was ready. She said she'd come down in thirty minutes." He paused. "She didn't come down." "And you?" "I ate alone. Assumed she got caught up. It wasn't unusual. Tabitha was..." He stopped. Pressed his lips together. "She was thorough. Work came first." Fashola watched him. "You assumed." "Yes." "You didn't go back upstairs to check on your wife." "I did. Around nine. The study was empty. I thought she'd gone to bed early. She'd been tired that week." "So you went to bed." "Yes." "And in the morning?" Something moved across Emeka's face. Fast. Gone before it could be named. "The gateman raised the alarm. He found her in the garden. I don't know what she was doing outside that late. I've asked myself that every hour since." Fashola nodded slowly. He had not written a single thing down. "Mr. Okafor. The Lekki property. The one she was reviewing Thursday night. Who does it belong to?" Emeka's jaw shifted. "It's a joint asset." "I didn't ask whose name is on it with her. I asked who it belongs to." A beat of silence landed between them like something dropped from a height. "Tabitha built it," Emeka said quietly. "Before we married." "And the Ikoyi one?" "Also hers." "The Victoria Island plot?" "Detective—" "Also hers?" Emeka straightened. "My wife trusted me. She involved me in managing her properties because she believed in partnership. In marriage." "In marriage," Fashola repeated, as if tasting the word. "Yes." "And now that she's gone. Who manages them?" The cufflinks caught the light again as Emeka re-folded his hands. "I imagine that's what her will is for." Fashola finally opened the manila folder. He looked at one page for a long moment. His eyes didn't move, but the corner of his mouth twitched, a ghost of a reaction that didn't reach his eyes. He closed the folder with a soft, final thud. "Thank you, Mr. Okafor. We'll talk again." Emeka stood, buttoned his jacket with practiced precision, and walked out without asking what was in the folder.Fashola watched the door close. A grieving man usually wants to know everything. This one asked nothing. *******The Gateman — Sunday. Questioned second. Sunday entered like a man who already knew the room had made up its mind about him. He sat at the edge of the chair, both hands on his knees. "Sunday." "Sah." "How long have you worked for the Okafors?" "Four year now, sah. Four year and some months." "So you knew Madam well." Sunday's eyes dropped to the table. "Madam na good woman, sah. Very good woman. Every morning she dey greet me. She go ask about my pikin dem." "How many children?" "Three, sah." "Madam knew their names?" Sunday's throat moved. "She know all their name, sah. She even dey send them something for Christmas." He rubbed one eye quickly. Just one. "Na only her dey do that kind thing." Fashola let the silence sit. "Thursday night. Tell me." Sunday shifted. "I dey my post, sah. Main gate. I no leave am." "All night?" "All night, sah." "Nobody came in. Nobody went out." "No, sah. Nobody." "Sunday." Fashola leaned forward, elbows on the table, voice low. "The security camera at the back fence stopped recording at 11:15 p.m." Sunday blinked. "Sah?" "NEPA didn't cut power that night. We checked. The whole compound had light. Only that one camera went off." Sunday's hands tightened on his knees. "I... I no know anything about camera, sah. Na oga in charge of—" "Your oga." "Yes, sah." "The same oga whose wife was found dead four hours after that camera went off." Sunday opened his mouth. Closed it. "Sah, I no kill Madam." His voice cracked on the last word. Cracked in a way that could mean grief or fear, and Fashola had been doing this long enough to know they sounded exactly the same. "I swear on my pikin, sah. I no kill am." "Then who did?" Sunday looked at the wall behind Fashola. A long, strange look, as if the answer was written there in a language he couldn't speak. Then he looked back down at the table. "I no know, sah." Barely a whisper now. "I no know anything." Fashola leaned back. He let the quiet stretch until it felt heavy enough to break. Sunday’s face crumpled into a deep, troubled frown for a split second before he forced his features back into a mask of blank terror. "So," Fashola said, more to the shadows in the corner than to the man. "Who killed Madam?" He stood, tucked the folder under his arm, and knocked twice on the heavy door. The officer outside cracked it open. Fashola peered into the hallway, his expression unreadable. "Next person in," he commanded. He didn't wait for a response before walking back to his seat, eyes already fixed on the door.

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