Chapter 52: Fake Marriage Deepens
Anderson Estate – Grand Ballroom
Thursday, 6:45 PM (One week later)
The chandeliers floated overhead like constellations caught in crystal, their warm gold light spilling across the ballroom floor where long tables gleamed with white lace runners and deep indigo aso-oke strips. Highlife music pulsed gently from the six-piece live band—trumpets and talking drums weaving together in that perfect Lagos balance of modern and ancestral. Waiters glided between clusters of the city's elite: senators in bespoke agbadas, oil magnates nursing cognac, a Nollywood director laughing too loudly at his own jokes. The air smelled of grilled suya, fragrant jollof rice, and the faint sweetness of chilled champagne.
Outside the tall French doors, the evening sky hung heavy and humid, the kind of Lagos night that still remembered last week's storm. Inside, everything was celebration. Or at least it was trying to be.
Imani stood beside Damian at the head table, their fingers laced beneath the heavy damask cloth. The contact felt different now—deliberate, steady, the kind of touch that had started in the elevator days ago and had not stopped since. She wore a cream lace gown that skimmed her curves, the neckline edged with tiny coral beads in quiet Yoruba tradition. Damian's thumb traced slow circles on the back of her hand, the same absent rhythm he had used when they shared coffee on the balcony at dawn. For three full heartbeats the noise of two hundred guests faded.
Then Mrs. Temi Anderson's voice sliced through it all.
"Traditional elements? In my son's wedding?" Temi stood three tables away, surrounded by her inner circle of society wives, champagne flute raised like a weapon. Her emerald silk gown shimmered under the lights, her gele wrapped so perfectly it looked sculpted. "Please. We are not running a village festival. This is a merger of empires—international, sophisticated. White ceremony only. Clean lines. No barefoot yam-carrying, no alaga turning my ballroom into a market square."
A polite ripple of laughter followed. Someone clapped. Imani felt the heat crawl up her neck but kept her smile fixed, the same one she had perfected over the past weeks.
Damian's jaw flexed beside her. He leaned in, lips brushing her ear. "Hey don't mind her,She's performing for the cameras that aren't even here anymore."
She looked at him and smiled!!
Imani nodded once, but the words still landed like small stones in her stomach. Manageable. Just a difficult mother-in-law.impossible to bear,Nothing more.
Cross-cut – Anderson Estate, Private Planning Salon
Thursday, 7:20 PM
The long mahogany table was covered in fabric swatches—rich aso-oke in indigo and gold beside bolts of crisp white satin for the church aisle. Funke, the wedding planner, moved between them with the precision of a general.
"Many high-profile couples are choosing both now," she said, voice carefully neutral. "A small traditional engagement the afternoon before the white wedding. It honors heritage. The groom's family knocks at the bride's door. The bride's people present a list—kolanuts, palm wine, salt, honey, a Bible, six yards of lace, a gold watch for the father, coral beads for the mother. The alaga leads the negotiation, the money spray happens right there in the courtyard. Guests dance, the bride is carried in on a chair, the gele is tied in public. It's theater, but beautiful theater."
Temi swept into the room without knocking, two of her closest friends trailing like guards. She picked up a vibrant aso-oke gele between manicured nails, holding it at arm's length as though it might bite.
"Roots?" Her laugh was bright, brittle. "Imani dear, your mother's side already has enough roots to trip over. Let's not drag my son into folklore. The world will be watching this wedding on every platform that matters. White. Clean. No noisy market women shouting blessings while spraying dirty naira notes on my marble floors.the fact you here is enough to hear"
Imani just stared at her and didn't say a word and just returned to what she was looking at"
Imani's fingers stilled on a sample of coral beads. She thought of her mother—safe now in the hidden facility, but still,she too weak to attend,even this! She thought of the file Mr. Oko had delivered, of the faded photograph of a nineteen-year-old boy beside a casket. She forced a soft, agreeable laugh.
"Of course, Mummy. Whatever makes the day perfect for everyone."
Damian's hand settled at the small of her back, warm and steady. But his eyes lingered on his mother for five full seconds—long enough for the pause to feel deliberate—before he smiled the polished Anderson smile. "We'll discuss it privately, Mother ."
Temi tilted her head, studying them both. "Naturally." The word stretched just a fraction too long.
Cross-cut – Anderson Estate, East Wing Corridor
Thursday, 8:10 PM
Imani had slipped away under the excuse of fresh air. The corridor was cooler, quieter, the only sound the distant thump of the band. She checked her phone out of habit. No new messages. The hidden cameras were gone—Damian's team had torn them out with surgical precision—yet every shadow still felt weighted.
A soft footstep. She turned.
Segun, one of the junior planners, stood holding a small silver gift box. "For the bride-to-be. From an admirer who couldn't attend tonight."
The box was too light. She opened it anyway.
Inside lay a single perfect white rose, petals still dewy. Beneath it, a folded note in elegant handwriting:
Beauty in white. But some traditions refuse to stay buried.
No signature. The ink looked fresh.
Her pulse kicked hard once, then settled. Just a tasteless joke from some jealous guest. Manageable. She slipped the note into her clutch, smoothed her expression, and walked back toward the music.
Cross-cut – Grand Ballroom, Main Stage
Thursday, 9:15 PM
The alaga hired by Jude had taken the microphone. The woman was pure Lagos energy—bright wrapper, louder voice—leading a playful money-spray moment. Naira notes fluttered down like green confetti while guests clapped and ululated. Imani and Damian were pulled forward for photographs, the cameras flashing in bright bursts.
Temi stepped onto the edge of the stage uninvited, champagne still in hand. The room quieted with polite curiosity.
"Let me say a few words for my future daughter-in-law," she announced, voice carrying perfectly through the speakers. Her smile was wide, maternal, lethal. "You know, some girls arrive in a family with nothing but… ambition. Others bring complications. But we Andersons believe in elevation." Her gaze dropped to Imani's face, lingering. "Especially not secrets that should have stayed in hospital rooms where they belong."
Five long seconds of silence. The room absorbed the veiled jab. Murmurs rose like heat off asphalt. A woman in the front row coughed delicately into her napkin.
Imani's stomach tightened. She felt Damian's arm lock around her waist, protective. But the psychological weight pressed heavier now: She knows something. Or she wants everyone else to think she does.
Damian answered, voice calm but edged with steel. "Mother. Stop!,This is a celebration."
Temi raised her glass higher, smile never wavering. "Exactly. To new beginnings… and whatever they choose to hide."
The applause that followed was thinner, laced with fresh curiosity. Imani kept smiling while something cold uncurled in her chest.
Cross-cut – Anderson Estate, Garden Terrace
Thursday, 10:40 PM
The party had spilled outside. String lights glowed against the humid night air; the city skyline glittered beyond the estate walls. Imani stood at the stone balustrade, wine glass untouched, staring at the distant lights of Lagos Island. The small pressures of the evening—Temi's jabs, the mysterious rose, the public humiliation—still felt containable on the surface. Just society gossip. Just wedding nerves. Just a mother who wanted the best for her only son.
Damian joined her, slipping his jacket over her bare shoulders. The silk still carried his warmth. Their foreheads touched briefly, the way they had in every stolen moment since that first real kiss in the master suite. His voice was low, meant only for her.
"She's threatened by you. That's all."
Imani looked up at him. The question sat on her tongue—And if it's more?—but she held it. Damian didn't answer immediately. Five seconds stretched between them, thick with everything still unsaid: Victor still breathing somewhere in the shadows, Kian's warning about the bigger cake, the note now burning in her clutch.
Damian finally spoke, choosing each word. "Then we face it together. No more running into shadows alone."
She nodded, letting herself lean into him for one heartbeat. His hand found hers again, fingers intertwining. For a moment the terrace felt like their private world—until a server approached with a fresh tray.
"Compliments of the house, ma'am."
Imani accepted the glass automatically. As the server melted back into the crowd, her phone vibrated once inside her clutch—silent, insistent.
She excused herself to the powder room, heart already climbing her throat.
The marble restroom was cool and echoing. She locked the door, pulled out her phone.
Unknown number.
She mocks you tonight because she still believes the lie.
But the real bride price was paid 17years ago.and you are not the real bride!!!
Ask your future mother-in-law why she visited Room 407 three days before the storm.
Attached was a blurry but unmistakable timestamped photo: Temi Anderson, elegant in a silk headscarf and dark sunglasses, stepping out of the private hospital wing where Imani's mother had been held before the move to the hidden facility.
The glass slipped from Imani's fingers and shattered on the tiles.
Behind her, the door handle turned. A soft click as it was locked from the outside.
Temi Anderson stepped in, serene as ever, adjusting the edge of her gele in the mirror. Her reflection met Imani's eyes.
"Everything alright, my dear?" Temi's voice was honey over broken glass. "You look like you've seen a ghost."
Imani's back pressed against the cold marble counter. She forced her voice steady. " did you visit my mother?"
Temi paused—five full seconds—then smiled, slow and pitying. "Hospital visits are what family does,
Imani.
Even when the girl marrying into that family brings… history." She stepped closer, voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. "You think I don't know what your mother carried in that file fifteen years ago? The lies, the forged documents, the secretary who tried to warn the wrong man? I protected this family then. I'll protect it now. From you if I have to."
Imani's mind spun. The photo. The timing. Temi's sudden knowledge of details only Victor or Mr. Oko should have known. The small pressures of the night suddenly felt heavier, sharper.
Temi reached out and gently brushed an imaginary speck from Imani's shoulder, the gesture almost tender. "Smile for the guests, darling. The white wedding will be flawless. No village drama. No buried secrets crawling out in aso-oke and coral beads. And if you ever mention this little conversation… well. Accidents happen in hospitals all the time. Even in hidden facilities."
She turned toward the door, pausing with her hand on the lock.
"Oh, and one more thing," Temi added, not looking back. "Damian has always been mine to guide. Not yours to keep."
The door clicked shut behind her.
Imani stood alone among the shattered glass, phone still glowing in her hand with the damning photo. Her pulse roared in her ears. The celebration outside swelled—laughter, music, the bright clink of glasses—but inside the restroom the air had turned thick, suffocating.
She bent to pick up the largest shard of glass, fingers trembling. A single drop of blood welled where the edge bit her skin.
Her phone vibrated again. Same unknown number. This time it was not a text.
It was a live feed.
The camera angle showed the private underground garage beneath the estate. Damian's black Range Rover. A shadow moving low beneath the chassis, something small and metallic glinting in gloved hands.
The timestamp ticked upward in real time.
And beneath the feed, three words appeared:
Choose again, Imani.