"Mr Jonathan Lace?" The voice chimed from the door entrance.
Jonathan raised his eyes, slowly, like they were too heavy to lift. He saw her there, at the door, standing, waiting to be allowed in. He coughed, regained his composure, wiped his face. "Come in". He said.
The Lady at the door, 5'6, blue-eyed, elegant, in her 30's, a few strand of genetically distorted white hair, took few steps inside, and sat on the chair opposite Jonathan. She placed her bag on the table and exhaled a deep breath of ease.
"Good day Mr Jonathan Lace, nice meeting you after eventually". She stretched her hand for a shake.
"And I guess you're Miss Martha? Nice meeting you". He shook her hand, which was delicately tender and soft. He noticed.
"Well, very bad we had to meet for a bad reason. Mr Chase has been arrested and he is currently being held at the Police headquarters. With that, we can be sure the cat would be out of the box soon".
"I really can't explain this turn out of event, but what do we do now?".
"Do you want to go to jail, Mr Jonathan? Because if not, you know we only have one option now".
"Which is?".
Martha made a gesture signalled at Jonathan leaving him pale white.
"What? I thought he was your boyfriend"?
"Right now, I can't jeopardize my life and everything I've built for a fling".
"Hmmm, you sent him the job remember". Jonathan sighed. "So who do we send?".
"You" Martha chipped.
"What! You're insane right now, you know that"?
"I know, but you know we have no choice, as we can't include a third party. I'll text you the next meeting location soon"...
CAPE TOWN SPECIALIST HOSPITAL
The nurse in charge was making the last assessment before leaving the ward room. Mr Rodrygo, still had a cannula in his left hand and head. Sitting upright on the bed, he nodded to the questions the nurse asked him.
"I think I'm done here, Mr Rodrygo. You can ring the bell if you need my attention and can start eating solid foods, you'll be discharged in few days. Thank you for cooperating". The Nurse narrated fluently like she had a script.
"Thank you Nurse." Rodrygo said smiling. He looked like he had grown fond of the nurse.
The nurse left and Rodrygo was sipping out of his tea cup. The cup dropped and he was seen holding his head and breathing at a fast pace. He slumped off the bed, still struggling to hold his head. He couldn't manage to ring the bell as he continued jerking. The nurse who left quite earlier got back when she heard the noise of something breaking.
"Shit! Mr Rodrygo". She exclaimed. "Code stroke! Code stroke!!". As she pressed the emergency bell.
"Mr Rodrygo can you hear me? Can you feel what I'm doing?".
A voice came in... "what room and what's the emergency?".
"Private room 2, Top most floor. He is currently holding his head and jerking, I think he has seizure, probably from sudden memory recovery".
"Okay, administer Carbamazepine ASAP, while we send in the doctor".
"Martha, Martha.....Noooo". Rodrygo screamed.
Akomolafe Jayden sat at the end of a round table. Around the table was five men and two women, all dressed in high quality suits. Their looks gave them away as top ranked individual at high positions, business moguls, high traffic merchants, even Catholic heads. Jayden was the only young and black man among them.
A recording of Chase confession was heard playing from the miniature tape recorder on the table. The room was dead silent as they listened. When the tape ended, the fourth man on the row cleared his throat and said, "So we can confirm that Sergeant Chase was the one who pulled the trigger"?.
"Yes". Jayden responded.
"The old man who drove the car out of the school premises was Jonathan Chase?".
"Yes, he was planted to cause a distraction, so we can find a non-existent man using the forensic report".
"Hope the report you got from Jonathan's house is still with you?".
"Yes, I picked it up that night because I got info that Cinderella would be taking the report to the police headquarters the next day".
"And it was confirmed that the report was falsified"?.
"Yes, Martha was the Laboratory scientist who had made the reports".
"It was really sheer luck that Cinderella got the original report to the police, we would have had a very long trouble trying to catch and arrest them".
"Yeah, maybe Cinderella thought she was in trouble and rushed to the Lab to get the report , which happened to be the original".
"That's really mother earth smiling on us, So why did Chase use his plate number for the car that Jonathan drove out of the premise that day? Foolishness?".
"Chase said he sold the car a few times back. It happened that Mr Jonathan was the one who had bought the car. He was to change ownership of the plate number, but I don't know why he didn't. Since Mr Jonathan had 3 cars, Chase wouldn't have expected him to come with that particular car with his plate number on".
"So how do we catch Martha?".
"She's a notable woman in the field of forensics, and she has a lot of notable personnel at top ranked offices, she'll be a hard catch, but we can try".
"Gentlemen, it seemed we are all forgetting that Martha Bornfield was once a member of us, so going after her is self assault, because she knows literally everything about this organisation". A woman on the 2nd seat spoke.
Others nodded.
"We have been trying to get Martha for a long time now, because she left our organisation, which is a breach of covenant. We have tried to track her for a long time and by luck we were able to get an alibi to get her. Thanks to Jayden, who knew about Martha's plan to kill Rodrygo as a clap back".
Jayden hummed. "Thanks for the compliment".
"We are being lucky right now because Martha doesn't know we are after her yet".
"How were you able to get his hair and fingerprints to the site of the murder?" The second woman asked in awe.
"I'm a FBI AGENT, remember"?.
"Now that we have Chase, Martha, Jonathan, Rodrygo on the table, how do we get Martha, while holding the rest to keep shut forever? Because I'm sure they know too much now". Another man said.
"Well, we do it the traditional way, like always. The main project is Martha, the rest are just collateral damage".
"Hmmm, anyone against this say Nay...."
Silence.
"If none, then we are dismissed".
Each and every person in the room stood up, shook hands, some were seen having one on one discussion while some left. Akomolafe Jayden was seen arranging his bag and tools, while trying to text someone.
ASHANTÉ
Ashanté alighted out of a cab and walked into a restaurant where Orion was seen drinking a bottle of soda. She sat opposite him on the table, while Orion who just noted her presence smiled and greeted her. She responded with her face brightened up.
They sat looking at each other for some moment of comfortable silence. Ashanté's mind taking a somersault on how much she had missed seeing the renowned back bencher in the class. She would steal glances at him many times in class, also getting lost staring at him all day. She does it so stealthily, no one else noticed. Orion, in himself, couldn't believe the person in front of him. He had known Ashanté to be Indigo's best friend, he never knew she was this satisfying to look at.
'This girl is heaven's....' He swallowed.
Suddenly coming off thoughts, he gasped "Sorry for my manners, do you mind I get you a drink? What's your choice?".
"Water" She replied. Observant enough to know Orion really got lost looking at her.
"Wah... water? No no, let me get you something good...Hey waiter, come please".
"Can you stop being a gentleman and get me just water, please". She beamed.
Orion saw the beaming, saw the way her eyes lit up and he was almost moved to tears. 'Where have this angel been all these while? I was really blinded not to have noticed you in class'. He pondered.
"You're so cute, you know that Ashanté".
"You're making me feel hot in here, Orion". She replied, fanning herself with her hand.
The waiter came and dropped their orders and left.
"I saw your letter and I was moved by how delicate you write. Is that how you write your notes in classes?".
Ashante blushed.
"A heart in your hands is much safer than a cardiologist". He said.
"Okay, stop. Please, don't make me cry. Thank you. I'm happy that you liked me". Ashanté cooed.
Just right in, Orion phone rang, displayed on his screen was Indigo calling. He exhaled, scratched his head and told Ashanté, "Let me pick this call, I'll be right back".
Chase who was brought in by a prison attendant on account of a visitor waiting for him saw Jayden and protested to be taken back to his cell.
"Sergeant Chase, here I am seeing you again". Jayden voice was heard in the visitor's room at the prison.
"Of what good is your presence here?" Chase hissed.
"Well, I'm here to help you now, like I promised the last time".
Chase spat, the prison attendant gave him a warning frown.
"Well, how about we give you a job, you complete the job and you're out of here in no time, how you see that?". Jayden voiced. "Got your attention now, okay, sit and let's talk like men".
Chase sat staring intently at Jayden.
"You looked like you want to squeeze air out of my lungs right now, Chase. But don't worry, you'll have all the time to do that. For now, I just want to tell you that Martha has denied you. And for someone that I know very well, she might be on to silence you before you drop any confessions that might taint her".
Chase stared.
"From what I've got, Mr Jonathan would be the one to take you out of the picture. And he'll be coming soon. So why not be the first to act and let's use that to implicate Martha, since she's the real culprit".
Chase stared.
"Well"... Jayden passed him a chip and a note. "When you are done staring and you want to get out of here, before Jonathan kills you himself, take this chip and press it on, whenever you're ready, I'll use it to pin your location wherever you are".
"Pin my location? Will I be leaving here?" Chased asked.
"Yes, the prison attendant will give you a key whenever you're ready, the note is to tell you how to escape this place".
Jayden stood up, as Chase switched between looking at Jayden to the materials in front of him.
"Hello, this is Jayden on the line, what's the progress?".
On the other side of the line, "Sir, I have been able to know their meeting point of Martha and Jonathan. And also, I have sent Jonathan the encrypted message".
"Okay, good. Two birds in our sight of shot. May the best man win". Jayden hung up.
"I have one last person to meet today". Jonathan said adjusting his tie.
In Cape Town hospital, Mr Rodrygo was seen screaming to see Martha. Various medications have been administered to sedate him but they weren't effective.
A black Nigerian man dress in black suit was seen with Rodrygo in the ward. Seated adjacent to Rodrygo who was profusely sweaty and restless on the bed, He asked him "Who is Martha and why do you need to see her?".
"Martha is.. is my wife to be. The last thing I remembered was we were planning on getting married".... "Please help me find her, is she dead? I don't remember what happened to her, why is she not here?". Rodrygo said panting. "I need my wife here, now!".
Akomolafe Jayden laughed, took his phone and sent a message to someone.
"This man will be here for a long time, no need touching him anytime soon". He grinned while typing. "He can be very useful to us soon".
The message blue ticked, the receiver had seen it and sent a grinning sticker in response.
Akomolafe Jayden closed his phone.