The Price of Pride

The receipt was real.

Ada checked it three times in the hospital corridor, standing under the humming fluorescent light while a nurse smiled at her with the kind of warmth people give to those whose debts have vanished. Thirty-eight million naira. Paid in full. Zero balance.

"Your sister can stay as long as she needs," the billing officer said. "And the specialist said the surgery can be scheduled now."

The surgery. The one Ada had stopped saying out loud, because saying it made the number real.

"Who paid?" she asked, though she knew.

"A private account. The donor asked to remain anonymous."

"Of course he did," Ada muttered.

She walked into Zainab's room and found her sister propped up against the pillows, eyes red, still in her funeral clothes. When Zainab saw her, she tried to smile.

"They told me the bill is cleared. Did you win a lottery?"

"Something like that." Ada sat on the edge of the bed and smoothed the hair back from her sister's forehead. "Sleep, Zee. I'll be back soon."

"Where are you going?"

"To ask someone a question."

* * *

Okafor Tower rose from Victoria Island like a blade pushed through glass. Forty-two floors of mirrored windows. A lobby so clean that Ada's flat shoes squeaked on the marble.

She did not have an appointment. She did not need one.

"I'm here to see Mr. Okafor," she told the receptionist. "Tell him it's Ada Bello. Tell him I read the card."

Four minutes later she was in a private lift, rising so fast that her ears popped. When the doors opened on the top floor, Tobi was already waiting.

"He's expecting you."

"I'm sure he is."

The corner office was enormous and almost bare. A desk of dark wood. A wall of glass with all of Lagos spread beneath it. And at the window, with his back to her, Damian Okafor.

"You came faster than I expected," he said, without turning. "Eleven hours before the deadline."

"I came to return your money."

"It's not refundable."

"Then I'll pay it back. Every kobo."

Now he turned, and for the first time Ada saw his face properly. Sharp cheekbones. A mouth that gave nothing away. Dark eyes that did not look at her the way a man looks at the daughter of someone he has ruined. They looked at her as though he were reading a document he already knew by heart.

"You can't," he said. "Your father's estate is insolvent. Your salary at Crestmont Audit is, forgive me, modest. And your sister's treatment will cost another sixty million over the next two years."

Ada's blood went cold. "You looked into my family."

"I looked into everything." He crossed to the desk and lifted a slim folder. "Sit, Miss Bello."

"I'd rather stand."

"Then stand."

He opened the folder and slid a document across the desk. The first line, in bold black type, was enough to stop her breath.

MARRIAGE AGREEMENT AND CONTRACT OF TERMS

She laughed. It came out sharp and unfamiliar. "You can't be serious."

"I am never anything else."

"You want to marry me."

"I want a wife for twelve months. On paper, in public, and in the eyes of every person who matters." His voice was level, almost bored. "You will live in my home. You will attend what events I require. You will sign when I ask you to sign. In return, your sister's treatment will be paid in full, and at the end of the year you will receive a settlement large enough to rebuild whatever you like."

"This is insane."

"This is a transaction."

"Why me?" The words burst out. "You could marry anyone. Models. Heiresses. Women who would be grateful."

For one second, something moved behind his eyes. It was too fast to name.

"Because they would be grateful," Damian said quietly. "And I have no use for gratitude."

"Then what do you want?"

"A woman who does not trust me. Who watches me. Who asks the right questions and does not stop until she gets the answers." His gaze held hers. "I need a wife who hates me enough to be honest."

Ada stared at him.

Somewhere deep in her chest, a cold, clear thought began to form.

He is handing me the keys to his house.

She hated him. She had hated him for three months. And here he stood, offering her a year inside his home, inside his company, inside his life, with every opportunity to search for the proof she had failed to find from the outside.

It felt like a trap.

It felt like exactly the kind of trap she would walk into with her eyes open.

"I need time," she said.

"You have until midnight."

"That's not time."

"It's what I'm offering." Damian picked up a pen and set it on the contract, parallel to the edge, precise as a man placing a chess piece. "Read it carefully, Miss Bello. Every clause matters."

She took the folder and left without another word.

It was only in the lift, halfway down to the lobby, that she realised her hands were shaking.

Not from fear.

From the fact that, for the first time in three months, she had a plan.