Temilade’s phone rang later that evening.
She was standing beside the window of her apartment, watching the last of the daylight disappear behind the buildings.
“Hello?”
“Are you free?” Damilare asked.
“I’m home.”
“Good. Segun has made some progress.”
Temilade sat down.
“What did he find?”
“He went back to the information from the former landlord. You remember she said Mrs. Akinwale spent some time between a clinic in Yaba and a church after the attack?”
“Yes.”
“Segun has been trying to establish the church. He found an old reference that may point to it.”
“May?”
“He’s checking it against another record before we rely on it.”
Temilade leaned forward.
“Why does the church matter?”
“If Mrs. Akinwale stayed there or left anything there, it could give us a better idea of where she went after the attack.”
“And if she didn’t?”
“Then we’ve lost nothing except a morning.”
Temilade almost smiled.
“You’ve become very good at making this sound reasonable.”
“Occupational hazard.”
She looked towards the window again.
“When will Segun know?”
“Hopefully tonight. I’ll let you know.”
“All right.”
Damilare hesitated.
“There is something else.”
“What?”
“Chainsworth has moved up its timetable.”
Temilade’s expression changed.
“Why?”
“They want the title issue resolved sooner.”
“Because of the investors?”
“Yes. They are putting pressure on Kunle.”
Temilade thought about the meeting at the Yaba property.
“And you believe that’s all?”
A brief silence followed.
“I don’t know.”
“That answer again.”
“It’s the honest one.”
She nodded.
“Call me when Segun confirms the church.”
“I will.”
They ended the call.
Temilade remained beside the window for a moment.
Mrs.
Akinwale.
The attack.
The missing papers.
The church.
And now Chainsworth was suddenly in a hurry.
The pieces were still separate, but they no longer felt unrelated.
She turned away from the window.
For years, the questions surrounding her family had existed as fragments of conversations she had never been allowed to complete.
Now those fragments were beginning to form a pattern.
She just didn’t know what the pattern meant yet.
Across the city, Kunle Akinwale sat in a conference room in Victoria Island.
Architectural drawings covered the screen behind him.
The project was ambitious.
The numbers were large.
The expectations were larger.
Except for one problem.
The title.
One of the investors closed the folder in front of him.
“We cannot proceed with an unresolved title.”
Kunle nodded.
“I understand.”
“You said it was being handled.”
“It is.”
“Then when will it be settled?”
Kunle looked at the drawings.
“The records go back more than thirty years.”
“That is precisely the problem.”
He said nothing.
The investor leaned forward.
“We need certainty.”
Kunle nodded.
“I’ll handle it.”
The meeting continued, but his attention had already moved elsewhere.
Later, inside his car, Kunle opened the glove compartment.
An old photograph lay inside.
It was not the copy Damilare had seen.
This one had been kept by Kunle’s family for years.
The Yaba property stood behind the people in the photograph, its walls looking different from the building they had seen today.
Kunle studied the faces.
His father was among them.
So was Samuel Adebayo.
Mrs.
Akinwale was there too.
He looked at the photograph for a long moment.
He had grown up knowing that his father had once been connected to the property.
What he had never understood was why the subject had always been avoided whenever he asked about it.
His phone rang.
He answered.
“Hello?”
He listened.
“How much do they know?”
Silence.
“And the second file?”
He listened again.
Kunle’s expression hardened.
“Find out what they already have.”
He ended the call.
For a moment, he remained behind the wheel without starting the engine.
Then he placed the photograph back inside the glove compartment.
He had spent years accepting that some parts of his father’s past were simply things his father had chosen not to discuss.
Now people were asking questions about the same property.
And the questions were no longer staying in the past.
Temilade was preparing for bed when her phone vibrated.
Damilare.
She opened the message.
Segun confirmed it.
He found the church through an old reference connected to Mrs.
Akinwale’s movements after the attack.
Then:
We can go tomorrow morning.
Temilade stared at the screen.
She thought about Mrs.
Akinwale.
A woman had been attacked in 2007.
A woman who had disappeared from the ordinary trail of records.
A woman who might have carried part of the truth with her.
Then she thought about Bolanle.
She believed the people looking for the documents might eventually come looking for the child too.
Temilade typed:
Yes.
I want to know what happened to Mrs.
Akinwale after the attack.
She paused.
Then added:
And what she left behind.
She sent the message.
Damilare replied almost immediately.
I’ll pick you up in the morning.
Temilade placed the phone beside her.
The room was quiet.
But her mind wasn’t.
She thought about the old property.
Then the photograph.
Then Mrs.
Akinwale.
Then the attack.
The same question kept returning.
Why had someone gone after a woman who had been connected to events from 1995?
Twelve years had passed between the property dispute and the attack.
Whatever had happened in 1995 had not simply disappeared.
Someone had still cared enough to look for something in 2007.
And now, almost twenty years after that attack, Temilade was looking again.
She moved towards the window.
Below her, Lagos continued with its ordinary night.
Cars moved along the road.
Lights flickered from nearby buildings.
A generator started somewhere in the distance.
Everything looked normal.
But Temilade no longer trusted appearances.
She had learned that from buildings.
A wall could be repainted.
A room could be renovated.
A structure could be given a new purpose.
But the foundation remained.
The old property had led them to the documents.
The documents had led them to the people.
And the people had begun leading them back to the night everything changed.
Tomorrow, they would go to the church.
Perhaps Mrs.
Akinwale had left nothing behind.
Perhaps she had.
Either way, Temilade knew one thing now.
She was no longer willing to let silence decide what she was allowed to know.