AKILAHYEL POV
The Abuja air was crisp when the private jet finally touched down, but the transition back to the capital didn’t bring the relief I had hoped for.
The Idorenyin compound, which used to feel like a fortress of power and life, now felt like a sprawling museum dedicated to a ghost.
The General’s staff cars were gone from the driveway, his security detail had been scaled down to a standard residential guard, and the quiet inside the house was absolute.
Effiom and Asuquo were completely occupied with the legal and administrative weight of their father’s estate, leaving me to manage the immediate security and coordination of the household.
Because the family trusted me implicitly, I spent some of my evenings at the house, ensuring that the transition back to normal life didn’t leave them vulnerable to the vultures that always circle a prominent family after a loss.
And one of those vultures was already hovering.
It was three days after our return from the village.
I was in the downstairs study with Effiom, reviewing the updated residential guard rosters, when his phone buzzed on the mahogany desk.
He picked it up, his brow furrowing as he read the screen.
“Akila,” Effiom said, his voice tightening with a sudden edge of frustration.
“Ayo is calling my line now. He says he’s been trying to reach Soteria since we left Akwa Ibom, but she blocked his number again. He wants to come to the house to check on her.”
A cold, familiar hardness settled into my jaw.
The memory of seeing that man holding Soteria on the road of the village came rushing back, making my teeth grind automatically.
I had tolerated his presence there because she was breaking down, but here in Abuja, in the sanctuary of her recovery, I was not going to let him turn her grief into an opportunity to slide back into her life.
“Don’t let him come, Effiom,” I said, my voice dangerously level.
“Soteria is just beginning to find her footing with her prayers and her rest. She doesn’t need the distraction of an old relationship right now. It will only destabilize her healing.”
Effiom looked at me, a sudden, perceptive glint appearing in his eyes. He knew me too well.
He had seen the way I held her hand in the village, the way my eyes never left her frame when she was in the room.
He didn’t say a word about my feelings, but he gave a slow, understanding nod.
“I’ll handle it,” Effiom said, sliding his phone into his pocket.
“I’ll tell him the family is strictly in a closed mourning period and no visitors are allowed unless cleared by me.”
I left the study and walked upstairs toward the small lounge where the nightly Bible studies had resumed.
I needed to see her to clear the sudden irritation from my mind.
When I opened the door, the warmth of the room instantly washed over me.
Soteria was sitting on the carpet, her Bible open on the coffee table in front of her. Naya and Amara were beside her, notebooks in hand.
She looked up when I entered, and the moment her eyes met mine, that beautiful, genuine smile touched her lips, the one that always made my heart skip its steady rhythm.
“Akila, you’re just in time,” she said, her voice sounding clearer, richer than it had in days.
“We were just reading from Isaiah chapter forty-three.”
I sat down on the sofa behind her, my eyes fixed on the neat bun of her hair, the scent of her vanilla cologne filling my senses.
The jealousy and irritation I had carried up the stairs completely evaporated, replaced by a deep, quiet pride that made my chest swell.
She was not just the broken girl at the graveside.
She was a woman standing on the Rock, her light shining so brightly that the darkness didn’t stand a chance.
As her voice filled the room, steady and full of a new kind of faith, I realized that protecting her wasn’t just my duty anymore.
It was my life.
I wasn’t going to confess my feelings today, and I wasn’t going to let the shadow of her past complicate her world.
I was just going to stand as her shield, her anchor, and her Captain, guarding the peace she had fought so hard to find until the time was finally right to tell her that my heart had belonged to her since the very first tear fell.
SOTERIA POV
WEEKS LATER
My birthday has always been the loudest day in our house.
Growing up, my birthday didn’t belong to me alone; it belonged to the entire household.
It was an unwritten decree, a tradition etched into the very foundation of our family by Major General I. Idorenyin himself.
Every single year, without fail, my eyes would flutter open at exactly 06:00 AM to the sound of heavy, deliberate boots marching down the tiled hallway toward my bedroom door.
It wasn’t the stealthy approach of a father trying to surprise his daughter; it was the booming, joyous advance of a man who wanted the whole world to know his favorite girl had survived another year on earth.
He would throw the door open, his massive frame filling the frame, his uniform crisp and smelling of sandalwood and starch, and he would belt out the most out-of-tune, militaristic rendition of the birthday song anyone had ever heard.
Then he would scoop me up, even when I had grown too old for it, throwing me over his broad shoulder while my mother stood in the hallway laughing, shaking her head at his wildness.
But today, when the hands of the bedside clock crawled past 06:00 AM, the silence in my room was so absolute it felt like a physical weight pressing down on my chest.
I lay perfectly still beneath the white duvet, my eyes staring blankly at the ceiling beams.
The morning sun was filtering through the sheer curtains, throwing long, golden rectangles across the rug, but the room felt completely frozen.
There were no boots marching down the hallway.
There was no deep, rumbling voice shaking the walls.
There was no laughter echoing from the kitchen downstairs.
The silence was the loud, metallic proof that he was gone.
Truly, completely gone.
A tight, familiar knot formed in my throat, and before I could even stop it, a hot tear slipped from the corner of my eye, tracking slowly down my temple into my hair.
I pulled the duvet over my face, curling into a tight ball as the memories began to play in my mind like an unstoppable film reel.
It had been nearly a month since the red dirt of Akwa Ibom had swallowed him, and though I had found a way to breathe again, though the panic attacks had subsided into a quiet, dull ache.
The arrival of my 24th birthday felt like walking face-first into a sheet of glass. A lot had happened in a year.
How was I supposed to celebrate turning a year older when the man who gave me life was sleeping beneath the palm trees in the village?
I stayed under the covers for hours, ignoring the gentle buzz of my phone on the nightstand.
I knew the messages were piling up.
Naya and Amara had moved back to their respective family houses two weeks ago to let my family have some private space, but they had been blowing up my WhatsApp since midnight.
My brothers had checked on me through the door around 08:00 AM, their soft knocks hesitant, as if they knew exactly what kind of ghosts I was fighting inside the room.
I had pretended to be asleep, entirely unable to face the reality of the living room without the General sitting in his favorite leather armchair.
By 07:00 PM, the hunger in my stomach finally forced me to move.
The house was strangely quiet as I slipped out of my room, dressed in a simple, oversized black satin loungewear set, my hair tied back in a loose, messy bun. I hadn’t worn a drop of makeup, and my face still carried the pale, puffy remnants of the quiet tears I had shed throughout the afternoon.
As I descended the winding terrazzo stairs, the lower level of the mansion was completely dark.
The main chandelier was switched off, and the only light came from the dim garden lamps outside.
My heart sank a little lower.
It felt like everyone had forgotten, or perhaps, out of respect for the mourning period, they had decided to let the day pass unnoticed.
A part of me was deeply relieved. I didn’t have the emotional capacity for a crowd, but another part of me felt a cold, lonely ache.
I walked toward the small family lounge at the back of the house, intending to grab a bottle of water from the mini-fridge.
I reached out, my fingers wrapping around the brass doorknob, and pushed it open.
“SURPRISE!”
The lights flashed on instantly, blinding my eyes for a fraction of a second as a chorus of voices erupted through the room.
Confetti– bright, metallic silver pieces, rained down over my head, fluttering onto my black satin shirt and sticking to my bare skin.
I froze in the doorway, my breath catching in my throat, my hands flying up to cover my mouth as my eyes adjusted to the sudden brightness.
The room had been completely transformed.
It wasn’t the grand, state-sponsored decor of my past birthdays; it was something infinitely more beautiful, intimate, and intentional.
Fairy lights were strung across the ceiling, casting a warm, starry glow over the space.
In the center of the lounge, our Bible study table had been laid out with a simple white cloth, covered in all my favorite finger foods– puff-puff, small chops, grilled chicken, and a beautiful, single-tier red velvet cake with a single glowing candle in the middle.
Standing around the table, their faces lit up with wide, radiant smiles, were the people who had pulled me out of the dirt.
Mummy was there, wearing a soft, gray linen wrapper, her eyes crinkling with a gentle, tearful warmth as she clapped her hands.
Effiom, Ubong and Asuquo stood on either side of her, their broad shoulders relaxed, their usual rigid postures completely gone.
And right next to them, jumping up and down like small children, were Naya and Amara.
They had snuck back into the house without me hearing a single sound, their arms already open wide as they rushed toward me.
“Happy birthday, Soso!” Naya screamed, throwing her arms around my neck so hard we both stumbled back against the doorframe.
“You thought we forgot, right? Never!” Amara laughed, squeezing me from the other side until I was completely sandwiched between my best friends.
The tears came instantly, but for the first time in a while, they weren’t tears of raw, bleeding pain.
They were tears of pure, overwhelming gratitude.
The heavy, suffocating silence that had haunted me since 06:00 AM vanished, shattered by the sound of their laughter.
“You guys,” I sobbed, laughing through the tears as I hugged them back with a desperate tightness.
“How did you... I thought you were at home!”
“Please, do you think we would let you spend your first birthday without the General alone in your room?” Effiom stepped forward, a soft smile breaking across his stern face as he reached out and tucked a strand of hair behind my ear.
He leaned down, his forehead pressing against mine for a brief, reassuring second.
“Happy birthday, baby sister. Dad is looking down, and he is very proud of how strong you are.”
Asuquo joined the embrace, his thick arms wrapping around all of us, while Mummy stood by, wiping her eyes with her handkerchief, her blessing silent but deeply felt in the room.
As the group hug loosened, my eyes instinctively wandered past my brothers’ shoulders, searching the corners of the warm, fairy-lit lounge.
And there, standing quietly near the back door that led out to the veranda, was Akila.
He was dressed in a crisp, dark navy-blue native kaftan that made his broad shoulders look even wider, his hands tucked casually into his pockets.
He hadn’t joined the loud shouting or the frantic hugging, but his eyes, deep, intensely focused, and incredibly soft, were locked on my face.
He had been watching my reaction the entire time, his jaw slightly relaxed, a small, private smile touching the corners of his lips as he saw the happiness break through my pale face.
The moment our eyes met, he gave a slow, respectful nod, a silent message passing between us in the space of a heartbeat.
The evening proceeded with a beautiful, quiet rhythm that felt exactly like our old fellowship nights.
There were no loud speakers, no political guests, no cameras tracking our movements.
It was just us.
We sat on the carpet around the coffee table, eating the small chops and sharing stories.
When it was time to cut the cake, Effiom stood up and cleared his throat.
The room grew quiet, the warm glow of the fairy lights reflecting in the tears that still lingered in our eyes.
“Before Soteria blows out the candle,” Effiom said, his voice dropping into a deep, steady tone,
“I want to say something on behalf of the men in this house. This past year has been a furnace. We lost our captain, our father, our hero. But in the middle of that fire, we watched our little sister turn into a woman of grace, faith, and undeniable strength.”
“My darling, you carried the emotional weight of this family when Asuquo, Ubong and I were drowning in protocols. You anchored Mummy. You maintained your altar with God. You are the true legacy of General Idorenyin.”
He looked over at Akila, who was sitting on the sofa near the corner, and Akila raised his glass in a silent, deeply respectful agreement.
“So today,” Effiom continued, looking back at me, “we don’t just celebrate your age. We celebrate your survival. We celebrate the light you bring into this house. Blow your candle, baby sister. The future is still yours.”
I closed my eyes, my heart swelling until it felt like it would burst against my ribs.
I whispered a prayer of thanksgiving for the family and the friends who had refused to let me drown.
I blew out the candle, and the room erupted into cheers and clapping once more.
By 11:30 PM, the exhaustion of the emotional day began to take over.
Mummy was helped upstairs by Auntie Alice, who had arrived later in the evening, and Asuquo’s wife had already retired with the baby.
Naya and Amara, after packing some cake into plastic bowls, were escorted to the guest wing downstairs by Effiom to sleep over.
The lounge slowly cleared out, leaving behind the remnants of confetti and the quiet, dimming glow of the fairy lights.
The happiness was still humming in my veins, but the air inside the house felt a little warm, a little heavy with the weight of the beautiful words that had been spoken. I needed to breathe the night air.
I slipped out through the back door, stepping onto the cool terrazzo of the veranda, and walked down the steps into the sprawling, manicured garden.
The air smelled of fresh cut grass and the sweet jasmine bushes that grew near the gazebo.
I walked down the stone pathway, my bare feet enjoying the cool dampness of the grass, until I reached the edge of the fountain.
I leaned against the low marble wall, looking up at the moon, a long, peaceful sigh finally escaping my lips.
“You should have put on your slippers,” a low, familiar voice rumbled from the darkness behind me.
I didn’t startle.
I knew the sound of his boots anywhere.
I turned around slowly, my satin lounge pants shifting in the breeze, to see Akila walking down the stone path toward me.
He had taken off his native top, now wearing just a tight fitting black singlet that accentuated the hard, cut muscles of his chest and shoulders, his hands tucked into the pockets of his trousers.
The moonlight hit the planes of his face, casting sharp, dramatic shadows across his jawline and highlighting the natural, quiet intensity that always seemed to surround him like an aura.
He stopped just a couple of feet away from me, his eyes scanning my face, checking my temperature, my breathing, the way he always did when we were alone.
“The grass is cold, Soteria,” he said softly, a gentle, protective scold in his tone.
“If you fall sick now, everyone will panic.”
I let out a soft, genuine laugh, the sound floating into the quiet night air between us.
“I’m fine, Akila. The cold feels good. My head has been hot all day.”
He stepped closer, closing the distance between us until I could feel the physical warmth radiating from his body, breaking through the chill of the midnight breeze.
He leaned his hips against the marble fountain wall right next to me, his long legs crossing at the ankles as he looked out over the dark garden.
“You had a good time tonight?” he asked, his voice dropping into that low, private register that always made my heart skip its steady rhythm.
“I had an amazing time,” I whispered, my eyes fixed on the side of his face.
“I woke up this morning feeling so empty. I thought the day would just be a reminder of everything I lost. But you, Naya, Amara... my brothers... You all reminded me of everything I still have. I don’t think I’ve laughed that hard since before the jet landed in Akwa Ibom.”
“They love you, Soteria,” Akila said, turning his head slowly to look at me, his eyes dark and intensely focused under the moonlight.
“We all do. Seeing you smile tonight... it felt like the sun finally coming out after a two-month storm. You have no idea how much this family needed to hear you laugh.”
I stared at him, the gravity of his words sinking deep into my chest.
I looked at his broad shoulders, remembering the night in the village when those exact shoulders had held me up while I was shaking with fever, remembering how his rough hand had locked around mine for hours while I cried in my sleep.
He had been our shield through the worst hours of our lives, never asking for anything in return, never stepping out of his professional boundary except to keep me from falling into the pit.
“Thank you, Akila,” I said, my voice trembling slightly with a sudden, deep emotion.
He tilted his head, his brow furrowing slightly.
“For what?”
“For everything,” I whispered, stepping a half-step closer to him, my eyes locked on his.
“For staying in that room with me in the village. For holding my hand when I couldn’t even see the light. For protecting me from... from the distractions, from Ayo, from my own thoughts. You didn’t have to do any of that. It wasn’t in your military orders. But you did it anyway.”
Akila was perfectly still.
The wind blew past us, rustling the jasmine bushes, but the space between us felt completely frozen in time.
The small, playful Captain was gone. The professional soldier had vanished.
In his place was just a man, his chest heaving with a deep, ragged breath as he looked down at me, his jaw clenching so hard I could see the muscles grinding beneath his dark skin.
“It was never about the orders, Soteria,” he murmured, his voice suddenly thick, rough, and vibrating with an intensity that made my breath catch in my throat.
He took a slow step toward me, his large frame completely blocking out the rest of the garden, towering over me in the moonlight.
He raised his hand, his long, beautiful fingers hesitating for a fraction of a second before they gently touched the side of my face.
His palm was warm, rough against my smooth skin, and an involuntary shiver ran down my spine as his thumb traced the line of my jaw, tilting my head slightly upward so I had no choice but to look directly into the raw, uncovered fire burning in his eyes.
“Akila...” I breathed, my heart pounding as loudly against my ribs I was certain he could hear it.
“Listen to me, So…,” he whispered, his face descending slowly until his breath was warm against my lips, his eyes fixed on mine with a terrifying, beautiful honesty that made the entire universe fade into black.
“I’ve spent weeks hiding behind my rank. I’ve spent months telling myself that I was just fulfilling a promise to your father, that I was just guarding a grieving girl. But the truth is…”
Hi babiessssss
Run it up to 200 likes, 70 comments and 50 restacks.
See y’all on Wednesday 🤞🤞
Know the truth, and the truth will set you free… but apparently I have to wait till Wednesday to be set free o 😭
Which kind of cliffhanger is this ehnn Madam Isabella!?!
Please nowwww, tell me this is another prank😭😭