Pride ✔️

06

Kathleen Abakwam was a fearless woman. She knew it, but she needed everyone else to know it too. By the end of the month, everyone would know her name. The investigative journalist of the year. Even bigger than Anas Aremeyaw Anas.

There was a maniacal smile on her face as she pushed her shovel into the dirt. Getting over the fence was easy enough. Now she just had to make sure she was quiet enough that she wasn't caught, because if she was wrong about her hunch, she would be labeled as a thief and she'd never get to prove that Araba and her fiancé had killed the crown prince of the Asante kingdom.

She dug and dug, destroying the beautiful flowers, until she struck gold. Well, until she struck bone. She had been right. She lifted the dull white human skull from the ground, her mouth open wide as her heartbeat furiously in her chest.

She had been right.

They were murderers! They'd killed the crown prince and buried him in their garden. They had fed him to their plants like some sick—

She never got to finish her thought, because just as the bile rose to her throat and she began to vomit onto the once beautiful garden, something hard came down on her head. She spun around just in time to see the same white face she'd seen that night.

The glance afforded her the knowledge that it had been a mask—a terrifying one, and then, her world went dark.

* * *

When Kathleen came to, her head throbbed. Her vision was blurred and double. It took a lot of blinking and steadying her neck before she could even begin to see somewhat clearly.

"Where am I?" she asked no one in particular.

"I warned you, Miss. Kathleen. I told you to leave while you had the chance. And now, now you're going to stay forever. In my garden."

The words, the kind voice, the soft tone, it shocked her back to reality. Her head snapped up to see none other than Uncle Ebo himself. Beside him sat his wife, Kukuua, a calm expression on her face and beside her, their beautiful daughter, her eyes red and swollen from crying.

"Dad, please, there has to be another way," she begged.

Her mother touched her knee softly. "There isn't. I know her type. Ambitious, driven," the woman turned to look at Kathleen with a look that shocked her, "she'll never keep her mouth shut."

"So, what? Anyone who finds out the truth, we kill? How does that make us different from him?" the young woman reasoned. Kathleen nodded frantically, agreeing with her.

"The difference is, I do what I do to protect my family. He did what he did because he's a spoiled, evil brat." Uncle Ebo spat. The venom behind his words shocked Kathleen so much that she moved closer to the wall in fear.

The man's eyes softened once he noticed. "I'm sorry, I don't mean to scare you. Hell, I don't want to kill you. But you've left me no choice. Why? Why will you fight so hard for a serial rapist? Do you know how many women's lives he's destroyed? That's who you seek justice for?"

"I-I didn't k-know—"

"Liar!" Kukuua yelled. "At least one of the girls he hurt must've told you. You pieced the story together, hadn't you? There's no way you could've thought of digging up the garden if you didn't know. Yes, you were right. The prince raped my daughter, so my husband killed him and buried him in our garden. Are you happy now?" she hissed.

"But that's not all," Uncle Ebo said, a sadistic grin spreading across his face like a mad man. "Do you think I'd let his family go scott-free? The family who raised him to feel so entiltled to women's bodies? To my daughter's body? No! No," he laughed, and Kukuua joined in. Araba continued to sob silently. "I killed an 'antelope'. But of course, there was no real antelope. The meat I sent to the Asantehene was none other," his voice dropped dangerously low, narrowed eyes burning with malice, "than his own son."

Kathleen felt the vomit climb her throat. She tried to hold it back, but it spilled out of her, searing her flesh as it went along. The mad couple laughed maniacally at the sight of her retching on the ground. It was too much. Tears stung the back of her eyes and she gasped for air.

"Sick?" Kukuua asked. "You should've seen my daughter that night. You should see the number of women he's done that to. Then you'll really be sick."

Ebo nodded thoughtfully. "We buried his skull here, as a testament to our fury. And love. You have to understand, Kathleen, that I can't leave my daughter. Not in this cruel world. Who knows who will try to hurt her again? I'm sorry, I'm so so sorry, but I can't let you go." He walked to the dining table where she'd once been welcomed and picked up a long pestle. He lifted it over his head and gave her a truly regretful look.

She closed her eyes.

"I'm sorry."

A sharp pain, and then, darkness.

***

THE END.