"So can someone please tell me what the hell is going on?" Efe queried as he stood in the middle of the living room. June, Grace, and Joana took their sitting positions on the only sofa in the room while Veronica sat on a wooden chair close to them.
"Guys, I think we have to tell him," Grace said as she looked at her friends. They didn't like the idea.
"Are you sure?" June asked.
"There's no point in keeping it from him now," Grace replied, glancing over to Veronica for support.
Veronica shrugged.
"Well..." Efe said with gesturing with his hands to indicate his impatience.
Grace sighed.
"This is Veronica, she is a new student in our school."
"And?"
"She invited us to a party at her place and we played a weird game where we fantasized about
the people we wanted dead and how we are going to kill them--"
"What?"
"Yeah, it was freaking creepy then but it got a whole lot creeper when they started dying for real."
Efe's eyes got wide.
"Oh my God!" Efe yelled as he started pacing around the room. "Oh my God! Was that what happened with Raymond?"
"Yes," Grace said with a little hesitation.
"Oh my God!" Efe yelled again. "Then why is she here?" He said pointing to Veronica. "She is clearly behind all of this."
"And why would I set Grace up one moment just to help her clear her name in another?"
Her question seemed to drown Efe's accusations immediately.
"How were you able to do it by the way?" June asked.
"Well, there's this thing with money and power, when you have both you can easily get what you want. All I had to do was put a call to my dad and boom, here we are."
"She's one of those spoilt rich kids isn't she?" Efe said to Joana who made an approving face.
"Hold on, so this wasn't the first time?"
"No," Grace answered. "Sylvester, Margret's mother boyfriend died too--"
"Jesus!"
"But we covered that up," Grace said almost jumping on her feet. "We don't have any problem there."
"Is that what you have to say?"
"I'm sorry but we have bigger things to worry about."
"Like what?"
"I'm next," Joanna said.
"What? Who wanted you dead?"
June raised a hand but kept her face down.
"Why does nothing here make sense? You're supposed to be her sister." Efe said with a disappointing tone.
"She didn't mean it," Joana said, placing her hand on June's.
Everyone fell silent but Efe was quick to speak again.
"We have to go back to the police--"
" No!" The girls shouted in unison.
" You girls are young and scared, I'm sure they can give a pardon or something once they uncover the truth--"
"No!" Grace yelled and got to her feet. "Brother Efe please listen to me, we can't go to the police. We are already accomplices for lying and trying to cover up the murders. Plus no one would believe us, you barely do."
"So what do you want us to do?"
"I don't know," Grace answered and slumped back to her seat.
Efe sighed and resumed his pacing.
"What about our little miss detective?" Joana said to Veronica with a beaming fake smile. "Of course you already have a way out planned."
"Oh Jo, I--"
"Don't call me that, only my friends are allowed to call me that," Joana said cutting Veronica off bluntly.
"Well, sorry JOANA, but asides from the fact that our killer somehow manages to draw everyone else away while he carries out his murders and also uses some kind of induced hypnotism to make people think they killed someone, I don't know anything else."
Veronica paused to see their reactions before she continued.
"Last night I realized that this was all my fault. I had just been playing detective and making everything worse thinking I was saving the day. I'm sorry guys."
"Great!" Joanna said. "I think this is the most honest you have ever been to us, probably even yourself."
"Is that all you have to say to us?" Grace asked almost in tears. "I trusted you... You promised me."
"I promised you that you would go to jail and that's why I came."
"And the rest of us are what?" June asked. "Puppets along the way?"
Veronica sighed.
"Still, I believe whoever is doing this is out to get me so I'm going try to solve this on my own from now."
She paused again to see if anyone had anything else to say but they just looked at her in silence.
"Bye." She said finally then got up to take her leave.
"Veronica wait," Grace called out just as she was about to walk out the door. Veronica paused. "Tell me you have a plan."
"Yes." She lied then walked out.
** ** **
After they left the hospital, Margret's mother decided to head home while she came to check on Grace, and just as Veronica was walking down the stairs, she was walking up.
"Hey, Margret. See you at school." Veronica said without waiting for a response from Margret and continued her walk down the stairs.
Margret stood for a while in awe pondering on what just happened but decided she would get a better answer when she met the girls and Efe.
"What the hell just happened with Veronica?" She asked immediately, anointing her presence as she barged into the apartment.
"Geez! Don't you girls knock anymore?" Efe nagged.
"The bitch is finally showing herself for who she is, nothing important..." Joanna replied. "How did it go at the morgue?"
Margret walked over to the wooden chair and sat down.
"I don't know, good news-bad news." She said shining her teeth nervously.
"Give us the bad news first," June said.
"They found Sylvester's body."
Fear and panic spread throughout the room in an instant.
"That's impossible!" Joanna replied. "We were there, we buried him ourselves."
"Back up a bit, you girls buried a dead body?" Efe asked with a surprised look.
"Yes," Grace answered.
"I was just gone for two weeks," Efe said putting both hands on his head then rested on the wall.
Grace chose to ignore him.
"What's the good news?" She asked.
"My mum decided she is no longer interested in chasing the case."
"Woah, so they dropped it?"
"Not really, that would happen if the DPO decides not to waste resources on a case nobody wants to be solved."
"And what if he decides that he wants to?" June asked.
"Then we're pretty much screwed... So bad news ultimately I guess."
"Na to fast and pray to be that oh." (1) Joanna added. "But wait, how did they find the body?"
"The officer said he got an anonymous call telling him about where the body was, he went there with his partner and found the body lying in the forest just like the caller described."
"Again, it all seems impossible because we buried him ourselves unless... Maybe our killer did it." Joanna said.
"You think he dug up the body, why would he?" Grace asked.
"To bring us back to square one of course," Joana exclaimed. "To make us shaky and unstable while he goes ten steps of us, just like he had always been."
"Yeah, that could be true, but the fact remains that it was just the five of us that evening." Margret pointed out. "Veronica circled the area twice to make sure."
"And so?" Joana barked. "For all, we know she could be assisting the killer or is probably the mastermind of it all."
"Okay Jo, that's enough," Grace said. "She helps us out today, give her a break."
"I know you are taking her side right now because she bailed you out but there's something off about her and you know it," Joana replied Grace.
"What did she say before leaving by the way?" Margret asked.
"She apologized for causing all of this and then mentioned something about her wanting to investigate on her own from now."
"Wow, is it something she can handle on her own? I mean we don't have enough time on our hands right now."
"It's bullshit."
Everyone turned to June immediately after she spoke.
"What do you mean Ju?" Grace asked.
"Veronica is lying, there's no plan."
"So you read people now or what?" Efe asked.
"Yeah, sometimes. Her eyelashes fluttered in the slight delay before she spoke, she's got nothing."
The mood around the room went down again.
"Damn, so what do we do now?" Margret asked.
All the while Efe was silent, he was boiling inside. All of these happened on his watch when he was supposed to be Grace's guardian. A way out...
Maybe going to the police wasn't going to solve anything, but he couldn't just wait around till things got worse before he acted. He let the thought linger for a while then decided on what to do. Just after Margret spoke, he spoke.
"That's it, Grace, we're leaving this town tonight."
_____________
Translations:
1) All that's left to do is to fast and pray.