Titi's POV
The night hung heavy like a curtain woven from fear. The estate was quiet—eerily so. Titi moved through the dimly lit hallway, guided only by the pale glow of the emergency lights. She had grown used to the rhythms of the house: the soft clink of Mama Iroko's cup at 9:00 p.m., the nurse's quiet footsteps on the polished tiles, the occasional hum of the generator when the city's power dipped. But tonight felt… wrong.
Her instincts whispered of a disturbance.
She entered Mama Iroko's private bathroom to refill the old woman's lavender-scented hand wash. But as she reached for the backup supplies hidden behind the cabinet's false panel—a place she had organized meticulously—her hand brushed against something foreign. Something that shouldn't have been there.
A small vial.
Clear.
Tightly sealed.
And filled with a liquid that shimmered faintly in the light.
Titi's heart skipped. Her fingers trembled as she unscrewed the cap, just enough to catch the scent. Acrid. Sharp. Chemical.
This wasn't medicine.
Her breath caught.
"Oh my God…"
She backed away, hand clutching the vial like it might burn through her skin. Her first thought: Mama. The old woman had been recovering—slowly, delicately. Any deviation in her medication could push her over the edge. Titi didn't wait. She raced down the hall, nearly colliding with Kenny just outside the security room.
"Something's wrong," she gasped, voice taut with panic.
Kenny's POV
Kenny had dealt with fire hazards, false alarms, and the occasional burst pipe in his time as the estate's internal operations head—but nothing compared to this. When Titi shoved the vial into his palm, he froze.
The liquid looked innocuous. But the smell—he knew it from somewhere. His days working with emergency response had exposed him to all kinds of substances. This one was a paralytic agent, he was sure. Colorless, odor-sharp, and fatal in high doses.
"Where did you find this?"
"In the cabinet—hidden. Someone planted it."
His pulse thudded in his ears. Kenny didn't wait. They rushed into the archive room where all the house's medicinal logs were stored—every delivery, dosage, and prescription tracked to the second.
They pulled out Mama Iroko's records. No anomalies. The logbook showed consistency, routine. But that's what scared Kenny even more.
"This was meant to go unnoticed."
"Until it was too late," Titi whispered.
He turned to her. "We need to call in the toxicology lab, but until then, nobody touches anything. Nobody gives Mama any medicine we haven't verified ourselves. Not even her nurse."
Suspicion
The house stirred the next morning with a cold energy. Whispers ran like fire through the corridors. Staff exchanged glances that lingered too long. Family members suddenly remembered old grudges. Even the kitchen crew was unusually quiet.
By midmorning, the rumors had taken shape: "Someone tried to poison Mama."
And like moths to flame, suspicion swarmed.
"It was her niece. That girl's been bitter ever since she was removed from the trust."
"No, no. What about the new cook? She came highly recommended, but from where exactly?"
"Don't look too far. Someone on the inside must have helped. Maybe even… one of the contenders."
Back to Titi's POV
Titi heard it all but kept her focus. She had one job: keep Mama Iroko alive and safe. Every hour, she double-checked the medication. Measured each dose. Monitored her vitals. She refused to leave her side, even for food.
But something else nagged at her.
Why now?
Just as the loyalty game had narrowed down. Just as she had gained the old woman's trust. Someone had chosen this moment to strike. This wasn't just about health—this was war.
Hidden Motives
The poison wasn't simply a murder attempt.
It was a warning.
Titi understood the message beneath the message: destabilize the household, inject fear, break the rhythm of calm. Whoever was behind this wanted chaos. And in chaos, power shifted.
She remembered what Governor Tunde had said: "This game is not just about loyalty. It's about uncovering who's capable of protecting a legacy under fire."
This was a test.
Or maybe… a trap.
The house had become a chessboard. And someone had just made a move so bold, so reckless—it demanded a response.
Meanwhile…
In the governor's private quarters, Tunde Iroko reviewed the preliminary toxicology report delivered by his private forensic team. The substance found in the vial was Chloremex-41, an outlawed neuroinhibitor. Commonly used in warfare. Extremely difficult to trace once metabolized.
He leaned back, the weight of the situation pressing hard on his chest.
Who would dare?
His sister, Motun? Always impatient, always scheming—but poisoning their mother?
His cousin, Ade? Clever, but a coward. He wouldn't dare risk being caught.
The contenders?
Each had motive. But only a few had the access and timing.
And one of them had earned his trust.
But trust… was dangerous currency now.
Titi's Resolution
Back in Mama's room, Titi sat beside the frail woman, gently adjusting her blanket. The old matriarch stirred, murmured, then fell back into sleep. Her breathing was shallow, but steady.
Titi clenched her fists.
"You survived war. You survived loss. You'll survive this too."
She didn't want to admit it aloud, but a part of her was frightened. What if they tried again? What if this time, it wasn't a test, but a final strike?
No. She wouldn't let it happen.
Titi stood, walked to the door, and looked out into the hallway—at the maze of polished wood and secrets. She was no longer just a caregiver.
She was a shield.
And if someone wanted to break into the heart of this house—they'd have to go through her first.
Kenny's Findings
Later that evening, Kenny returned with footage.
They had gone through 72 hours of surveillance. Most cameras in the estate were well-placed, but there was one blind spot: the hallway near the linen storage, adjacent to the medical cabinet.
And someone had used it.
Around 2:13 a.m. the night before, a shadowy figure appeared near that corridor. No face. No identifying feature—just a silhouette. They paused, reached toward the cabinet wall, then disappeared.
A ghost.
But Kenny noticed something else.
A slight limp. A hesitation in the left leg. The figure moved like they were recovering from an old injury.
Titi narrowed her eyes.
"That's not a ghost."
She remembered one of the aides—James. An old injury from a motorcycle accident.
"Get me his records."
The Sting of Betrayal
Hours later, Kenny returned, face pale.
James had been missing since that morning. His uniform was found abandoned in the laundry room. His ID had been wiped from the log. It was clear.
He'd run.
But the bigger question was—who helped him escape?
Titi stared at the screen replaying the footage again and again. The vial. The limp. The timing.
This wasn't James' idea.
He was a pawn.
The mastermind was still inside.
Governor Tunde's POV
Tunde stared out his window, fingers tightening around a glass of cold water.
The Loyalty Game had taken an ugly turn.
But maybe that's what it was always meant to do.
He looked down at the list of names still left in the competition. Titi's stood out. Not just because she had been the first to discover the threat—but because she hadn't flinched.
She hadn't called the media.
Hadn't stormed into his office.
She acted.
She protected.
He would watch her closely now. Not as a player.
But as a future partner in rebuilding the broken spine of his legacy.
Closing Scene
That night, as silence returned to the estate, a storm gathered above Lagos.
Thunder cracked.
But inside Mama Iroko's room, a new calm was taking root. Titi sat beside the matriarch once again, hand folded in hers, eyes watching every breath.
Outside, a predator might still be lurking.
But inside—
The shield had awakened.