If I Killed Someone for You

“This place looks so shady…” Richard wiped a sweaty palm on his jeans as he gripped the steering wheel with his other hand.

“I’m not surprised, so… what now?” Adora asked impatiently.

Richard didn’t know how to answer that, he just kept staring at the suspicious looking alley they were parked in front of. It was so dark they couldn’t see in it, couldn’t tell if there was anything or anyone waiting for them inside, “I guess I should go in,” he said with a resigned sigh.

He turned off the engine and grabbed the door handle leaving the keys in the ignition. A cold evening breeze caressed his cheek when he got down, it made him shiver. He was scared to death but he couldn’t admit that to Adora, he was supposed to be her man, her protector. He turned on the flashlight on his phone and pointed it into the darkness before taking a step in.

As he walked he could hear the sound of rodents running around in the bushes at his sides. Usually that would freak him out but his nerves could only serve one master at a time.

“Off the light!” A deep male voice commanded from somewhere in front, somewhere his light wasn’t hitting.

Richard pointed the light to the ground but didn’t turn it off as the voice so forcefully demanded, “Are you with Delilah?” He yelled back, hoping to sound confident.

“Who you dey shout for? Shey you get my money?” The voice sounded a little bit closer now.

“I want to see Delilah first,” Richard said a little less loudly.

“Bro, I am Delilah,”

The voice was close now, almost in front of him. So Richard raised his light to see his contender.

“Are you mad?” He got a quick glimpse of the man before his phone was swiftly snatched away, “You think say dis na joke? You do anyhow and I go release your babe’s yansh for twitter. Now, where is my bloody money?” He said even more forcefully.

Richard felt the guy’s breath on his face now and he panicked, he began to take slow steps back.

“Bros, are you deaf?”

Richard still said nothing as he began to pick up the pace of his retreat.

“You better not run away with my money,” Delilah yelled and reached for Richard, it was a clumsy grab making them both fall over.

Richard began to struggle vigorously under the man’s unexpected body weight.

“Just give me the money…” Delilah said, using his hands to pat Richard down.

Richard tried to drag himself away but it was no use, he searched the ground for anything that would help him pull himself out from under the man. His hands came in contact with what felt like a brick. It wasn’t enough to put his weight on it so instead he grabbed it and when it came loose, swung it back with all his strength. He heard a strange thud and his assailant went limp. Richard didn’t wait to think, he just squirmed his way out from under Delilah, it was easier now that the man wasn’t holding him tight, searching his pockets. When he got to his feet he ran to the end of the alley.

“Adora, start the car! Now!”

She looked up at him shocked but did as he asked. He got in, reversed and drove as swiftly as he could, away from that alley.

Richard and Adora sat in silence for several minutes as they drove. He noticed her taking several glances at him. She probably wanted to know what happened of course but he didn’t know what to say to her. How does he explain that he failed the mission, for all he knew her nudes were being posted all over the internet right now.

Suddenly she put a gentle hand on his thigh, “Rich, what did you do?”

Richard shook his head, “I’m so sorry… I… I… couldn’t get the pictures. I tried but I couldn’t…”

She was silent for a moment before she said, “So you killed her?”

Her words shocked him so much he hit the brakes, he was lucky they were on a residential street and the road was empty, “What?”

“I know I said that you should do whatever it takes but… I didn’t mean this,”

“What?” He stared at her in confusion. She looked back at him then pointed at his hands gripping the steering wheel. They had nothing but a dim street light to illuminate the car but even with that he could see that his hands were stained with something. He turned on the car light and it gave him clarity, now he could see the red stains all over his yellow skin and the large red patch on the front of his white shirt.

He got down from the car abruptly and began to rub his hands hard, he knew the blood wasn’t going to come off but he couldn’t stop.

“Rich! Rich! Rich!”

He couldn’t hear anything but a small ringing in his ear. There was so much blood, so much… but he didn’t… he couldn’t have? Did he kill Delilah?

The loud horn from the car brought him back to reality and this time he heard Adora when she said, “Rich!”

He looked at her, “Adora, what did I do?”

“Rich, get in the car! Get in now, before someone sees you!”

He nodded slowly and got in, “Adora I think I did something bad,”

“I know…” Adora said, “You killed her,”

He looked at her, “Her? No… it was him,”

“Who was him?”

“Delilah… Delilah was a guy… he was the one threatening you,”

Adora squeezed her face into a frown, “I can’t believe it,”

“What do we do?”

Adora’s face went blank of any emotions, “Nothing, he’s dead, he got what he deserved,”

“What? How can you say—“

“He was blackmailing me baby, remember, blackmailing us.”

“That doesn’t mean he deserved to die.”

Then her lips downturned back into frown, “Well you did it, if he didn’t deserve to die, why did you kill him?”

Richard looked down at his bloodstained hands and he shook his head, “I… I… I didn’t mean to… he just… grabbed me… I was… scared…”

“No baby, you reacted like a man and you rescued me. That’s the kind of man I want to be with,” She smiled and kissed on the lips.

“I’m going to go to prison,” He said, still in a daze.

“No you won’t, they’ll just chuck it up to a random robbery. You’ll be fine, all we need to do is just change your clothes. You still have your football jersey in the boot, abi?”

He nodded slowly.

“Good,” She gave him a bottle of water from her bag, “Wash your hands and face in that gutter there,” She pointed, “And change your shirt,”

Saul did as she asked but he didn’t feel like himself, he felt like someone else was controlling his body while his mind just watched. That’s why when Adora said, “You’re shaking,” He was shocked when he looked down to see his hands making epileptic movements.

“Give me your phone, I want to call Obinna,” She stretched her hand out to him.

Richard looked at her abruptly, “Why?” Why would she want to call her older brother right now? To report him?

“We need an alibi, I’ll just tell him that if anyone asks we spent the night in his house,” She replied calmly.

“Why would we need an alibi? You said we can’t get caught,”

“Babe relax, it’s just in case. The phone?”

He put his hand in pocket and was surprised to find it empty. He opened the glove compartment and searched.

“Rich? Where is it?”

He paused, “He took it.”

“Who?”

“Delilah.”

She shook her head then took in her breath, “Well then we have to go back.”

“N… no… I can’t,”

“You don’t have a choice. Haven’t you watched all those crime shows? Your phone is evidence that links the crime back to you. Do you want to go to prison?”

“No.”

“Then we have to go back.”

The car trip back to the alley was quick and quiet. Richard was consumed with thoughts of seeing Delilah’s dead body. When they got there, he gripped the steering wheel tight, trying not to faint.

“Rich, can you get this over with, I’m tired, I want to go home,”

He looked at her, she wanted to go home. He was in this whole mess because of her and she just wanted to go home. She cheated on him, started an internet relationship with a girl and sent her risky pictures. If the girl hadn’t started blackmailing her he would have never even found out about it.

“She was just a friend, Richie, I swear. I was never really going to do anything with her. That’s why I sent the pictures, I knew she was never going to see the real thing,” Adora had cried to him on the phone.

Well the girl turned out to be a guy. Of course it was a fake name, no Nigerian in their right mind would actually name their child Delilah for fear of damning the kid to a fate like the biblical Delilah. Now, here he was in front of a dark alley going to remove his phone from the hands of a dead man. In this moment, he hated Adora, for what she had finally turned him into. Many times in the past he wanted to end the relationship, he had many reasons but he didn’t. This blackmail situation should have been the final nail in the coffin that was their relationship, instead, here he was doing whatever she asked as usual. Except this time he had no choice because his life was at stake.

He grabbed her phone for a light and got out of the car. As he walked down the alley, every little sound made him jump, even the mosquitoes that buzzed too close. He walked faster, and didn’t stop until he saw the unmoving dark mass on the ground. He held his breath and proceeded slowly, he flashed the light on Delilah’s right hand then his left, both were empty. He was about to panic when he suddenly heard some vibrations coming from near Delilah’s legs, he turned the light there and saw it. His phone face down in between the dead man’s feet. He didn’t hesitate to grab it.

He slipped the device into his pocket and turned to leave but something made him pause. He turned back and looked at Delilah, lying face down on the floor. He didn’t know what possessed at that moment but he felt the overwhelming urge to see him, to see the face of the man he had just killed properly. He squatted near the body and used all his strength to flip him over. Then he took the light and brought it close to the man’s face.

What he saw shocked him frozen; Laying there, staring at him with empty, lifeless eyes was him, Richard himself. He was looking at his own dead body.

He shut his eyes and when opened them again he was laying down gasping for air. He looked around the dark room worried for a second that he was still in the horrid alley. Then he saw his familiar Drake poster he stuck on his ceiling when he was twelve and he knew he was home, it was all a dream.

He laid back to catch his breath. He was too afraid to go back to sleep so he picked up his phone. A text from Adora was waiting, she sent a voice note.

“Saul, I’m so scared, Delilah said she will post the pictures on Facebook and tag all my friends. My grandma is my friend on Facebook, if she sees them it will kill her. I don’t have the money that she asked for, Richie, what are we going to do?” Her voice was shaking like she had been crying.

He shook his head and took in a breath before he started his own voice note, “First of all, I think we should break up…”

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