CHAPTER FOUR
Obinna stroked the soft hair on his daughter’s head lovingly as he towered over the huge bed, staring at his kids while they slept. A wave of admiration, almost worship, flowed from him to the figures on the bed, and he felt like engulfing the twins with a love and protection so strong and intense, it hurt to even envisage same. Oh yes, love. He really loved and adored them because they were what he had, all he had. They were what he had always wanted, but had been too reckless and arrogant to have. They were his flesh and blood.
His eyes suddenly narrowing at the direction his traitorous thoughts had veered; the prospect of marrying that proud, preternaturally beautiful singer, he reviewed his interactions with that proud, provocative, stubborn, fiercely-independent, twenty-eight-year-old woman. He knew with a wave of certainty that she fully intended to be as opposed to him as was humanly and physically possible. Her undisguised sarcasm, her icy indifference and contempt, her leashed anger and the basilisk flash of dislike in her luminous eyes whenever she looked at him, all pointed to it with unwavering intensity. But he fully intended to put the proud woman to heel, break down her invisible barrier, and get her to respond to him, however reluctantly.
The hand of dawn was stealing across the sky, sending in shafts of pallid sunlight to the room through the heavy curtains that curtained the windows. Obi silently crept out of the room so as not to awaken the kids_ who knew whether they were light sleepers? _ and moved hastily down the long stretch of corridor to the room that he’d installed Adamma into the previous night.
How and why she had meekly assented to deign to spend the night at his home, he would never know, but he had welcomed it because he couldn’t bear the thought of leaving her in the hands of the congested roads and night prowlers. Not that he would ever admit such a thought to her, anyway. . .
He invariably hesitated before the mahogany door, and then he gently turned the knob and walked into the vast monstrosity of a room, with its modern decor, a queen-sized bed, expensive art paintings that adorned the walls, and dark blue curtains. And there, seated cross-legged on the chaise longue in the room, was the object of his speculations. Her only item of clothing was a silk gown that barely concealed her gleaming skin, which he was sure she had no doubt borrowed from one of the numerous maids who had gushed at her all night long. Her raven hair hung loose around her shoulders, her face was utterly devoid of makeup, and she looked undeniably lovely, completely ethereal as she sat there like a frozen statue, staring at him. She was the most stunningly beautiful woman he had ever encountered in his whole life.
A lump rising in his throat at the thought of being the father of her kids, he mouthed a greeting. ‘Good morning, my dear girl.’
Instead of proffering an appropriate response, she infused a look of pure ice into her face and inclined her head backwards, appearing like a deadly snake about to strike a defenseless prey. ‘When is your mother coming down to see me?’ she questioned him in a haughty, queenly voice. She conveniently forgot to answer the greeting he’d proffered.
‘When she has summoned enough strength, she will have you ushered into her presence. Never fear.’
Alarm flooded into her luminous eyes as the supposed implications of his words sank in. ‘Energy for what?’ she burst out, leaning forward in her chair to glare at him angrily.
‘Oh,’ he replied casually, ‘when she cried and wept at the sight of her grandchildren, she was soon drained of all energy and had to retire to her room to weep in the safety of her inner sanctum. But what she does not know is the fact that you are the mother of her grandchildren; she has always been a devoted fan of your music. She will be undoubtedly and absolutely delighted when she sees you here as the mother of the rolling balls of energy that besieged her all night with an avalanche of questions. So please dispel your fears and relax your mind. She is not a monster who will eat you at the slightest opportunity she gets.’
In spite of his reassuring words, she was still adrift in a sea of fear and drowning in a cauldron of emotional chaos. She was doubly sure that, like every mother was wont to do, his mother would unquestionably be in firm support of her wayward son and probably brand her a cruel, wicked, obnoxious, conceited woman who had deliberately refrained from disclosing the paternity of her children to the father for such an outrageously long period of time. But it hadn’t been a deliberate act, she mentally defended herself.
Oh yes, it had been a deliberate act, an inner voice that could not be silenced mocked at her. She had been reading all about him, about his numerous business successes, his charity work, and about his plethora of lovers, she admitted to herself. And then her fists clenched of their own accord and a flood of unholy thoughts gushed into her mind. What about his numerous lovers? The whores who warmed his bed whenever he had an itch in his loins? she wondered to herself.
She was unaware of the fact that the object of her speculations had excused himself from the room as waves of jealousy and anger hit her with the crushing force of a sledgehammer. It clearly demonstrated how infatuated she had become with him. Now that she had agreed to chain herself down to him in matrimony, would he, in the interest of propriety, kick all his lovers away and stick solely to her?
That was most unlikely, she thought bitterly to herself. She was totally dispirited. The man she had agreed to chain herself down to was an independently rich, devilishly handsome and virile man whose undisguised pursuits were stunning women who thronged the TV screens_ models who were insatiable sex maniacs, actresses who were notorious for their sexual escapades_ and all of them were glamorous beauties. Her shoulders drooping with dismay, she wondered despairingly on what to do.
Thirty minutes flew by before she dared summon the nerve to get out of the room she now found stiflingly hot and walk down the long corridor in search of the living room after she had tackled her bathroom obligations. However, all her efforts proved abortive_ all the doors she threw open were the wrong ones and opened out into big, opulently-furnished rooms which were so big, she had the feeling she could park a car comfortably in any of them without being stifled for space. She had the fleeting feeling that she was lost in this opulent wilderness of monstrous rooms.
And so, Obi, strolling around the house in search of her, discovered the object of his attention standing at the far end of house, looking totally lost right in the middle of a room. Leaning on the doorframe, he drawled mockingly, ‘So you got lost, my dear girl.’
She whirled round at the sound of his voice, an exclamation of surprise dying on her lips as she beheld the towering form that stood at the door, dressed immaculately in a white shirt and blue pants, with Gucci loafers to match.
‘My dear, I did not get lost in your house,’ she lied, a bright smile turning up the corners of her lips. ‘I was merely admiring the rooms which I find to be exceedingly wonderful. It was decorated by your mother, yes? And she owns this house, yes? Anyway, is she ready to see me now?’
Unaccustomed to seeing women lie with such an astonishing consistency and match their wits against him without fear, Obi decided not to cross words with the woman because of her expertise and biting sarcasm. All he did was nod his handsome head and briskly walked out of the room, leaving her to follow him. Unlike she was, he was not apprehensive, because he had already proffered an explanation to his mother, explaining his brief sexual liaison to her, clearing the way for the stubborn woman to be relaxed.
As they walked into the living room, the singer glanced around nervously, as if she expected a hatchet-wielding woman to be lurking around the corner, waiting to attack. She rubbed damp fingers on her dress, and, seeing that the coast was clear, she held her head proudly and walked into the room.
Her nerves were aflutter with apprehension, signaling the fear that was welling up in her to erupt in a film of sweat on her face. She had to admit it herself: the prospect of meeting Hope filled her with a nameless dread. She was terrified.
‘Good morning, sweet mother,’ Helen and her twin brother sang in greeting.
Their mother forced a smile as she watched them dip into bowls of sweetened cereal and bread. She slid into a chair opposite them. ‘Did you sleep well?’ she asked.
Before they could chorus a reply as they invariably did every morning, a scream erupted from a throat and Adamma twisted around in her chair to know the reason for the scream, and then she froze into immobility. Standing beside the rich curtains, her eyes almost popping out from their sockets, was a tall, slim woman, whose face looked ageless, making an accurate guess of her age a near impossibility. Her attractive features and regal bearing readily identified her as Obi’s mother.
She bounded into the room, waving and talking at once. ‘Adamma!’ she cried out. ‘What are you doing in my house!?’
Adamma bolted up from her chair as if she had just sat on a hot stove. She dropped into a deep curtsey. ‘Madam, your son must have told you everything. He must have explained everything to you. And I am very sorry I hadn’t come here sooner.’ If she’d had her way, she would never have come here.
‘Madam and sorry be darned!’ the woman exclaimed, drawing the singer up to encircle her in an embrace. ‘Call me Hope if you must call me anything, and as for the sorry, it died years ago. There is absolutely nothing to be sorry about and there is nothing to forgive. Oh, and you were so young; I gathered your age from the newspapers so long ago and I also never knew that you were the woman my reckless son was talking about. Oh my dear, welcome!’
The woman’s transparent honesty and sincerity made Adamma to visibly relax and dispel her fears. A sigh of relief escaped through her lips as she relaxed comfortably into her chair, pouring herself a cup of tea and snatching up a slice of fresh buttered bread. She could relax, enjoy her meal, and then, afterwards, she could engage the lively woman in a serious conversation because the woman had a likeable personality.
But it seemed that Hope had other plans, for no sooner had she gulped down a cup of green tea than she plunged into conversation with the singer. ‘My dear, I am still quite shocked that you are the mother of my lovely grandchildren. And you were so ridiculously young at that time! Seventeen is such a young age for a girl to conceive but I am quite sure that your parents must have been there for you. They had supported you and cared for you. Am I right?’
That question made Adamma’s head to jerk up from her cup as if she had been slapped forcefully. It was a reminder of the fact that she had no identity, and she didn’t want to shock the poor woman by delving into such depressing territory. But as her eyes fell on the sculpted Adonis who was watching her intently, waiting for her to speak, she decided to fling her reservations aside and shock their pants off them. It would be fun.
‘Oh, my parents died in a car crash when I was thirteen,’ she answered flatly, waving one manicured hand dismissively.
‘My God!’This exclamation burst forth from Hope’s mouth as she jerked bolt upright in her chair, a dazed look in her eyes, a frown marring her brows. ‘I am so terribly sorry, my dear. It must have a terrible thing to have happened to you at such a young age. But your relations must have helped you at the time, your cousins, your family. . .’
Thoroughly enjoying their discomfiture and the pity game she was playing with them, Adamma impassively expounded on her losses, smiling radiantly with forced joviality throughout her explanations. ‘When I was fifteen, my elder sister was crushed to death by a hit-and-run driver. And I have no family. When my parents were still alive, they never talked about who they were, or where they had come from, so I do not know my origins. So, I was all alone during the time of my pregnancy. Dan was my only help_ he is now my manager and the kids’ godfather.’
Obi blinked rapidly, a lump of pain rising in his throat. So that explained Adamma’s vagueness whenever she talked about her past and her heritage on the screens and in the society pages of the tabloids, he realized, noting that everything about her was shrouded in mystery. Everything. Her past life, her present life. . . Vivid images of her face as she had danced across that room more than a decade ago flashed through his mind in an instant. She had been an orphan, a lonely girl trapped in the vast wilderness of life, locked up in her own private world, a whore who battled for survival. He was horrified and appalled at how she had lived her life, but he tried to keep his features impassive and his expression cool and impersonal.
‘Oh my darling, I am so sorry about it,’ Hope murmured in a low gentle voice that trembled with emotion. ‘I just never knew about it because you never mentioned it in your interviews. But how did you manage to survive? How did you take care of yourself?’
‘Oh, I was a singer in a club_ a respectable club_ and that was where I met your son and we had our affair. That was also where I met the man who saved my life and took me away from doom,’ she added slowly, a sad smile appearing on her lips, concealing the inner pain and turmoil that was hidden beneath the surface. How would Hope react if she divulged it to her that she had been a stripper who performed to a crowd of leering men and smiling women? That her son had fucked her and impregnated her inside a nightclub?
Obi needed no magician to tell him that the doom she was talking about meant. She had indirectly revealed her life to them_ to his mother; she had introduced her humble beginning by sketching vague marks and leaving the rest to remain shrouded in total mystery. She had suffered heartbreak and surrendered to her plight, a born victim of circumstance. And yet she had plodded through the ocean of life with unwavering faith, and Obi felt a new wave of respect towards her. It was palpably obvious to him that she now wanted her life and her unsavory past to remain in the past, and he now intended to stop bringing the details of her past life to the fore and taunting her with it. Let the past remain in the past, he resolved silently to himself.
THE NEXT FEW WEEKS PASSED in a blur for Adamma. It was a buzz of activity for her as she made preparations for her marriage to one of the most eligible bachelors of Lagos society. She was not in any way ecstatic and neither was she unenthusiastic about the wedding; she had just accepted it and taken it all in stride.
To her surprise and suspicion, Obi’s attitude towards her changed dramatically. Gone was the arrogant man who took impish delight in taunting her and flooding her sensibilities with ridicule; gone was the man who wished to dominate her and have her firmly under him. He was now tender to her, and she was touched by his generosity and a trifle suspicious when he showered her with expensive gifts which were beyond her wildest dreams. He often took her out to expensive restaurants and exotic locations where the TV hounds and paparazzi were bound to notice her and ecstatically take photos of her.
Hope insisted on the presence of a family for her daughter-in-law as that was the paramount factor in her esteem of marriages, so she made suggestions about procuring a temporary family for the singer for the duration of the marriage festivities. Adamma told the older woman that she knew what she had to do, and so she consulted her closest friend, Amanda, and the latter rounded up some of her family members. But first, she demanded an audience with the singer so they could discuss certain puzzling aspects of Adamma’s hasty marriage to the well-known bachelor.
It was with a pounding heart that Adamma drove to Amanda’s residence at Ikeja to go and see her friend. A tall, attractively fleshy thirty-two-year-old woman, Amanda had scratched through life in her childhood and her youth, subsequently swimming from the pits of despair to fortune and affluence. It was a change of fortune that astounded her.
‘Hello, Singer,’ she gushed in greeting as she hugged Adamma tightly and lovingly. ‘Thumbs up, baby. You look great and sexy. Anyway, put that aside and let us get down to business. What is the news flying around that you are about to get married to someone I do not know about?’
Adamma laughed. ‘Well, I am getting married to Obinna Obiekwe, and I know you must have heard a lot about him. He’s rich, very sexy and handsome to boot, and so, I’m going to have a wonderful time as his wife.’
Amanda inclined her head and tried to glare at her friend, but her efforts at sternness was a wasted effort. She asked slowly, her voice ringing with clarity, ‘Is this man the father of the twins? Was he the mystery man who knocked you up and then vanished into thin air?’
‘Yes.’
‘Do you love this man and wish, on the basis of that love, to become his wife?’ Amanda fired on, totally undeterred and unperturbed by the warning glare that Adamma threw at her. ‘Does this man love you and care for you?’
It was an unanswerable question that even Adamma herself did not know the answer to. It was a question she had asked herself severally but had met with a brick wall. And so she framed her reply carefully. ‘We both want the best for our kids and I also know that I am going to be very balanced in his house. We will be happy together; we may not love each other, but at least we’re compatible with each other.’
Amanda released a sigh of resignation and horror and her expressive features took on a look of horrified dismay. ‘My dear, you are stark raving bonkers! What the hell is wrong with you?’ she cried out in outrage. ‘A marriage of convenience! Is that what you want for yourself? Don’t you think that love matters more than anything else? Do you think you can stay with a man who does not love you? Would he be able to care for you? Listen to me: you need to be loved and cherished by a man who is worthy to be a companion to you. You deserve it after all you’ve been through in your life. And that man seems to be a ruthless, self-centered womanizer and arrogant bastard who care for no one other than himself. I read about him a lot.’
Adamma adopted a look of consternation before she summoned a reprimand for the meddlesome words of her friend which was an utterly cold assessment of her fiancé. ‘Oh, don’t be so silly and crazy in the head,’ she chided, waving dismissively. ‘I’m quite sure Obi is willing to change now that he’s getting married to me, one of the best screen goddesses ever encountered in this country.’
Amanda erupted into a gale of laughter and threw her head back, her long braids flying. ‘That’s a good one!’ she exclaimed excitedly, and then she mellowed instantly and became all serious once again. ‘I think the only reason why you’re getting your sorry ass chained down to that man is because of the kids_ they have the right to know who their father is and be with him. But it’s so unfair to you. My dear, please be wise and try as much as you possibly can and forge out a new world for yourself, a world where you’ll be truly happy with your decision to get married; true, lasting happiness that washes away your sorrows and brings smiles to your face whenever you wake up and realize where you are. If not with that man, then try Dan. He loves you_ has always loved you, and will always do. It shines in his eyes whenever he looks at you, and he’s a good man.’
‘I know that Dan loves me very much,’ Adamma agreed quietly, sadness swamping her senses. But she managed to shrug indifferently so as to veil the sadness she felt. ‘But he’s been around for ten years, and yet he’s never made his feelings known to me in any way. My new beaux beat him to it, so I’m sticking to Obi. Nothing can change that_ it’s too late for Dan now.’
Amanda looked stricken as she asked, ‘Are you quite sure of what you’re doing?’
Adamma drew in a deep, unsteady breath, and that action was an almost palpable reminder of her single lifestyle and spinsterhood. As from now on, she was a man’s property, and her happiness was to be dictated by a man she barely knew. ‘I want the best for my kids,’ she answered, evading the question. ‘I want them to be as happy and as secure as is physically possible. They have a father who adores them, so I’m as happy as I can ever be. Their happiness is my paramount concern.’
Her ploy wasn’t lost on Amanda, who asked, in a voice that trembled with emotion now she was aware of the fact that Adamma was hiding something, ‘Does he love you? And are you in love with him? Does he care for you?’
Adamma smiled sadly but supplied no answer to that question_ she was as much in the dark as Amanda were about Obi’s true feelings towards her, and was at a complete loss for words with which to proffer an accurate definition of the feelings of the sculpted Adonis she was getting married to. He’d most likely be cold and indifferent towards her, she reasoned. She would be a mere fly on the wall, an inconsequential article that had to be endured by his sensibilities. She believed deep in the inner recesses of her consciousness, that her fiancé’s ultimate goal was to deflate her ego, to taunt her and subject her to ridicule at every turn, to break her spirit and her independence; he wanted to control her, to foist his decisions on her and expect her to obey him just like a docile lamb.