The Nigerian Navy armoured personnel carrier rolled through the open gates. The men got out and Ibrahim held his hand out to Amaka, but she got out by herself and the heels of her shoes sank into the gravel. The compound was large, just as the girls had described it. The building stood in the middle, as big and elegant as any mansion in Ikoyi, but this one was in the middle of the forest, closer to Ibadan than to Lagos.
Armed men were everywhere; gravel crunching beneath their heavy boots. There was no threat in the building. The front door of the house, framed by two large columns, was open and more officers stood inside, just beyond the door.
A naval officer who had waited for the vehicle to park walked up to Mshelia and presented him with a silver revolver. He took the weapon and checked it wasn’t loaded. Then he wrapped his hand around the handle, held out the gun in front of him and closed one eye to look down the barrel as if aiming into the ground. He handed the gun to Ibrahim.
‘The house is empty,’ the naval officer said. ‘We found the firearm on a desk upstairs. It looks as if everybody left in a hurry. We also found fresh tracks here; a large vehicle. They must have been tipped off.’
‘So this is it,’ Ibrahim said. He shielded his eyes with his palm to look up at the building.
‘Naomi,’ Amaka muttered. She walked towards the door. Mshelia, Ibrahim, and Alex followed, and behind them two officers from the armoured car, the only ones still holding their weapons battle-ready.
Hot-Temper stepped aside. Ibrahim looked at the blue trunk. ‘What’s inside?’ he asked.
‘We never open am,’ Hot-Temper said. Other men were standing around in the foyer, all facing the trunk from several feet away.
‘Good call,’ Mshelia said.
Amaka looked up the stairwell. She walked round the trunk and climbed the stairs. On the first floor she looked down the corridor. Doors on either side were open. She walked into the first room. There was a white poster bed in the middle; its rumpled white sheets lay half on the floor. She switched on her phone, and as she did she saw that she had missed several calls. She opened the camera app and held it up to take a picture of the bed.
Amaka walked along the white, deep pile rug to the end of the room where another door was open. It was a bathroom; three toothbrushes and a tube of toothpaste sat in a glass cup on the sink. She looked inside a wicker basket by the toilet bowl: wet condoms and their torn packets lay on top of a pile of crumpled tissues. She pointed her phone’s camera lens at the dustbin and clicked, then checked the pictures she had taken. Three of the missed calls were from Eyitayo; one from a withheld number. The phone began to vibrate. Eyitayo again, Amaka assumed, calling at Chioma’s behest. But she couldn’t deal with the Chioma situation right now. She rejected the call and scrolled through the call log; there was yet another from a withheld number. The entry showed a talk time of five seconds.
‘Amaka,’ Ibrahim called from the corridor. She stepped out of the bathroom and into the bedroom.
Ibrahim was standing in the doorway. ‘You have to see this,’ he said.
Amaka followed him and an officer up to the second floor to a large door. Ibrahim pushed it open. ‘After you,’ he said.
Amaka walked into a dim room. The only light was from shaded lamps surrounded by unlit candles on stools in each of the four corners of the room. The walls and the carpet were red, and there were no windows. The ceiling was covered in mirror tiles that reflected the black massage bed below. Open handcuffs with long chains secured around the legs of the bed lay on the leather top, and next to the bed on a trolley lay an assortment of whips, ropes, and melted candles.
Amaka walked slowly round the bed.
‘At least we know it’s the right place,’ Ibrahim said.
Amaka picked up a black horse whip and inspected it before placing it back next to other similar whips.
‘Come, there is more,’ Ibrahim said.