The tied-up guard chuckled again, blood on his lips.
"You really don't know, do you?"
Amadi crouched in front of him, pressing the muzzle of the Glock into his bruised forehead.
"I'm running out of reasons to let you breathe."
The man coughed. "They said you might come… said he would enjoy watching you try."
"Who?"
He grinned wider. "Colonel Boma."
Amadi froze.
No. That name didn't belong in this timeline.
"Impossible. Boma's dead."
The man laughed again. "That's what you were told. But death has a way of skipping the devils."
Colonel Boma Diri. The ghost. The monster in uniform. Once Amadi's superior during the blood-soaked days of SARS ops in the Niger Delta. A man who built his reputation on brutality, extortion, and black-bag missions that never saw the light of day. He vanished a decade ago—after a mission in Port Harcourt went sideways and Amadi left him for dead.
Now he was back—and he had Ife.
Amadi stood slowly, his mind racing through buried intel and old sins.
If Boma was alive… and running this operation… then this wasn't just revenge. This was a reckoning.
He tied the guard's wrists tighter and gagged him. He'd be useful later—for confirmation. For evidence.
Amadi swept the room. One battered file cabinet in the corner still had its lock intact. He jammed a blade between the latch and snapped it open.
Inside: documents. Routes. Payment slips. A crude map with circles drawn around northern safehouses—Kabba, Lokoja, Minna.
And a name scribbled on the edge of the page: "Project Resurrection."
He stepped back into the predawn air, the sky just beginning to bleed purple on the horizon. The Hilux was idling under the trees. Sunday looked up from the seat, bleary-eyed but alert.
"Did you find her?"
"Not yet," Amadi said. "But I found the devil who took her."
Sunday frowned. "You gonna kill him?"
Amadi looked ahead, jaw clenched.
"I'm going to do worse."
They left Ogbomoso behind, the rising sun casting long shadows on the road. Amadi drove in silence, head buzzing with old memories—SARS missions, blacklists, raids that went too far. He remembered Boma's voice in his ear back then: "We're not the good guys, Onome. We're the necessary evil."
No. He wouldn't let that man touch his daughter.
Not again.
Baba called in.
"You're not gonna like this," he said. "The number from Felix's phone—traced back to a dormant military satellite channel. Only high-clearance ghosts still use it."
"Boma."
"Yeah. Word is, he resurfaced under a private security outfit: Obsidian Shield. Registered out of Dubai. But they operate from a fortified compound just outside Abuja."
"Where in Abuja?"
"Gwagwalada. Remote. Built like a bunker. Local police don't go near it."
Amadi gripped the steering wheel tighter.
"Then I'll go through it."
He dropped Sunday off at a safe house outside Ilorin—an old friend's compound from the military days. Safe. Hidden.
"You'll be alright here," Amadi said. "I'll come back for you."
"Will you find her?" Sunday asked.
Amadi looked him straight in the eyes.
"I'll burn the country down if I have to."