The invitation arrived from Ade Senior’s office, not Kolade’s. Dinner. Thursday. Eight o’clock. Ikoyi.
The email called it an opportunity for the chairman to understand the scope and philosophy of the audit in a less formal setting. Amara read the sentence twice because language like that generally meant someone wanted to move a conversation away from records and toward influence. Kolade called five minutes later.
“You don’t have to go.”
“That is exactly why I should.”
“My father is very good at making reasonable things sound inevitable.”
“Is that a warning?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you.”
A pause.
“You’re still going.”
“Yes.”
Amara could almost hear him resign himself to it. The Adeyemi house was large without being loud about wealth. Old trees softened the compound walls. Inside, art and dark wood replaced the glass-and-steel confidence of the company headquarters. This was where the public man became private, and Amara suspected that distinction mattered more to Ade Senior than he would admit. Kolade met her near the entrance.
“You came.”
“You keep saying that as if I have a history of disappearing.”
“I’m beginning to understand that you have a history of walking directly toward uncomfortable things.”
“That is closer.”
His mouth shifted. For a second, without the conference table between them, she saw how easily he could become dangerous to her concentration. Then Ade Senior entered the room and the feeling disappeared.
“Ms. Okonkwo.”
“Good evening, sir.”
Folake sat nearby, elegant in deep green. Chanel No. 5 again. She greeted Amara warmly but gave nothing away about their corridor conversation.
Dinner began with ordinary subjects: Lagos traffic, construction costs, the economy, Amara’s career. Ade Senior asked intelligent questions and listened to the answers. He did not resemble the man Amara had constructed from the folder. That, she realised, was part of the danger. Men who did terrible things rarely spent every hour looking like men who did terrible things.
“What made you choose forensic accounting?” Ade asked.
“I like questions that leave footprints.”
He smiled. “Money.”
“Usually.”
“People lie more than money does?”
“People teach money how to lie. They are rarely as good at it as they think.”
Kolade lowered his glass to hide a smile.
Ade noticed.
So did Amara.
Later, over dessert, the questions became personal.
“Your family is in Lagos?” Ade asked.
“My parents are.”
“What do they do?”
“My father is retired. My mother still believes retirement is a character flaw.”
Folake laughed softly.
Ade smiled. “And you are their only child?”
Amara reached for her water. “Their only foster child.”
The change at the table was almost invisible.
Almost.
Ade Senior stopped moving. Folake’s hand tightened around her napkin. Kolade looked from one parent to the other. Amara noticed all of it.
“Foster?” Ade asked.
“The Okonkwos took me in when I was young.”
“How young?”
“Seven.”
Folake lowered her eyes.
Ade recovered first. “Good people?”
“The best.”
His face relaxed slightly.
Why?
Amara stored the question. After dinner, Kolade left briefly to take a call. Folake disappeared toward the kitchen. Ade Senior stood beside Amara near the terrace doors.
“You are very good at your work,” he said.
“Thank you.”
“I hope you understand that records can make old decisions look simpler than they were.”
There it was.
“The audit is not evaluating whether decisions felt complicated, sir.”
“No?”
“It is evaluating what happened.”
Ade looked toward the garden. “Sometimes what happened and why it happened cannot be separated.”
“They can be distinguished.”
He turned to her. “You are young.”
Amara smiled. “Not in accounting years.”
He almost laughed.
Then his voice lowered. “A company like ours supports thousands of families. Old allegations, handled without context, can damage people who had nothing to do with them.”
The argument was better than intimidation because some of it was true. Amara understood why Kolade had warned her.
“I don’t intend to damage innocent people,” she said.
“Good.”
“But protecting innocent people and protecting the truth are not always opposite things.”
Ade’s eyes hardened for a fraction of a second. Kolade returned before either could say more. At the door, Folake embraced Amara lightly. Her perfume lingered after she stepped back.
“Good night,” Folake said.
Then, too softly for anyone else: “Do not let him make consequences sound like innocence.”
Amara drove home with two facts she could not yet connect.
Ade Senior was afraid of the audit.
And both he and his wife had reacted to the word foster as if it belonged to them.