They crossed the small yard under the garden lights, passed clay flowerpots and trimmed shrubs, and reached the old building near the generator house. The boys’ quarters looked abandoned by fashion and memory—cracked paint, dusty windows, a sagging frame.
Bissy pushed open the door.
Inside was darkness, then a small yellow bulb.
One wooden chair.
A broken table.
Nothing else.
Chief Kletchi leaned against the wall, and for the first time since entering the house, the shock reached him fully.
“My wife,” he said hoarsely. “Amaka wants me dead.”
Bissy said nothing.
She only stood there with her hands folded, as if she understood there are moments too brutal for comfort.
After a while, he looked up at her.
“How long have you lived with this?”
Her answer was barely above a whisper.
“Too long, sir.”
He nodded slowly.
Then, surprising even himself, he said, “I’m sorry.”
Bissy blinked.
“Sorry?”
“I should have listened. I should have seen. I was always working. Always traveling. Always trusting.”
Bissy looked away.
“She is very careful,” she said. “Very kind in public. Gentle. People love her.”
Chief Kletchi let out a short, bitter laugh.
“Yes. They call her Madame Angel at events.”
Silence gathered again.
Then something in him hardened.
No more shock.
No more collapse.
They needed a plan.
“If I disappear tonight,” he said, “she wins. If I confront her without proof, she will cry, deny everything, call powerful people, and I will become the unstable husband.”
Bissy nodded quickly. “Yes. She will act shocked. She will say you are tired. Confused. Sick.”
“And she controls the doctor,” he said.
“And some guards.”
He turned sharply. “Which guards?”
Bissy named two men.
Men he had promoted.
Men he had trusted.
“How many people know?”
“Enough,” Bissy said quietly. “Enough to be dangerous.”
Chief Kletchi took out his phone and switched it fully to silent.
“I need evidence.”
Bissy hesitated.
Then she reached into the pocket of her uniform and pulled out a small old phone, scratched and worn.
“I have this.”
