The house was blanketed in silence, an empty one signifying that no one was home. But the owner had not been gone for long, only a couple of days.
From outside, the voice of a man filtered through the locked door.
"Three... Two... One!"
There was a loud bang and the door flew open. It was yanked out of it's hinges and sent crashing into the living room.
Policemen flooded into the house, guns raised as they spread out, covering each room of the there bedroom bungalow.
"Clear." One of the officers called from the bedroom.
"Clear." Another said from the kitchen.
"Clear."
"Clear."
The same word was repeated from each room of the house, signalling that they were the only ones in the building.
It was then the Inspector walked in. Her name was Doris, she was of slim build and dressed in simple polo and jeans with the required bulletproof vest. Her badge hung around her neck as she walked in, her pistol snug in it's holster.
She was not surprised the house was empty, matter of fact, she had expected it to be so. That was because she had the owner in police custody.
John Lagbaja, the owner of the house, had been on police radar for close to a year. He was a serial killer, focusing mostly on rich men. He killed them and took their wrist watches as trophies. No one really knew why he targeted the rich, and he was yet to tell them why. He had terrorized the affluent of Lagos Island, Victoria Island and Lekki. Killing one rich man every month. Bringing his total victims to nine.
The inspector had been assigned the case. It had taken her the better part of six months, but she had cracked the case. She and her team had set a trap for the killer and that was how they arrested him.
It was after they realized just how intelligent the killer was. He made them see how the evidence they had painstakingly gathered would not be enough to send him to prison.
That had left Inspector Doris with one choice.
She got a search warrant and a team of officers.
And now, they were ripping through the house, in search of anything concrete that could link Lagbaja to the murders.
"You know what I need!" She called out to the men, "anything that looks odd, I want to be the first to see it."
As the men worked tirelessly, she turned around, trying to picture Lagbaja living in the house. The case had been a worry in one, taken too damn long. They had CCTV footages of him with the victims and eye witness reports, still they wanted more. To put the final nail in the coffin and forget about it.
She knew a smart man like Lagbaja would never leave something incriminating in his house. Unless he felt certain no one would ever find it. So it would have to be in what he considered to be a safe place.
With this in mind, she turned slowly, letting her instincts guide her. The house smelled of lavender, probably air freshener. Aside from the noise the officers were making, the house was quiet.
She turned into the master bedroom, there were two officers there. And like her, their hands were gloved. One was tearing a pillow open, the other one was going through the wardrobe. That was the thing with cops and search warrants, they invaded privacy without mercy.
"Sir." They stood at attention as they saw her.
"Give me the room for a moment." She told them, giving them space to walk out.
Alone in the bedroom, she took in a deep breath.
This place also smelled of lavender. The room looked like a typhoon had swept through it, thanks to the police. She shook her head as she smiled.
"Of course, it won't be that easy."
They were only searching the surface, like Lagbaja wanted them to. She would prove him wrong. She knew deep in her gut, something was in this room.
She looked around the room once more, the floor was covered in red rug, the bed was king sized, made of shiny oak. It's sheets were strewn about and the pillows were all over the floor. She walked to the bed, feeling around it. Then she tried to lift the mattress. It weighed a ton. She couldn't lift it alone. So she called one of the officers. "Help me with this."
Together, they lifted the mattress and put it on the floor, resting it against the wall. Next, they lifted the floor of the bed and took them out as well.
Doris stood in the middle of the empty bed, studying the rugged floor. She knelt down, feeling it's rough surface as she felt around.
"What are you looking for Sir?" The officer asked.
She ignored the question, concentrating as she kept running her hand over the rug. Then she froze, her fingers dug in and pulled back the rug.
"This is what I'm looking for." She finally replied. The break in the rug had not been obvious. In fact, it had been perfectly hidden so it could blend in with the rest of the rug, both in color and texture. And it was only a small patch , so small it had to be Lagbaja who had cut it himself.
She pulled it back to reveal a safe, built into the floor.
"Wow." The officer gasped.
"Yes. Wow indeed." She nodded, feeling triumph wash through her. "Get someone to open this up."
It took over an hour, because they couldn't afford risking the contents of the safe. But they opened it eventually.
"Well well... What have we here?" She muttered, unable to stop herself from smiling as she looked into the safe. There were nine Rolex watches, five gold and four silver. She could bet her year's pay that they belonged to the nine victims. But that wasn't what sent her heart fluttering in glee.
At the bottom of the safe, a journal lay idly,as though begging to be picked.
With her gloves hands, she took it out and flipped through it's first pages.
"It's all in here." She said happily, "the bastard wrote it all here."
The journal contained detailed account of each of the murders, from how he chose the victims to how he killed them. It was like looking into the mind of the devil himself.
"Wow." The officer said again, "you did it Sir, congratulations."
"We did it." She corrected him, "and thanks to all of you, Lagbaja would be going away for a long long time.
The End
