Falling For Haneef

29.

Minutes later, I find Zakiyah's father, our lawyer and Haneef's father rushing up the stairs to his room. They're finally here. " Saleem Where's Zakiyah?" Her father asks the instant my eyes meet his. " Saleem what happened to Ameerah?"

" how is Haneef Saleem?"

" What lead to all this Saleem?" Questions upon questions, I need more strength than I have now for all this. The doctor attending to Haneef and the police officer that arrested Habeebah finally approach us and I let out a sigh of relief, I won't have to deal with this alone. " Family of Haneef Isa DanLadan?" The police officer asks. " Yes, I'm his father"

" Saleem, Where's my daughter?" Zakiyah's father asks, pulling me away from everyone. Holding back my tears, I try to find my voice to speak. " We had reached Mr Abdulmalik's house when you called.." I take a pause. " she didn't have a good feeling about witnessing all what was happening and she had an outburst when I insisted on going to check up on them. I told her to wait patiently for me in the car but she followed behind me, while Haneef was being arrested, I couldn't find her again. I thought she had driven away from the scene to be by herself since I didn't see my car on our way to the hospital but" I stop, trying to loo away from her father's teary eyes. " But what?, she was kidnapped?" He says and I instantly look at him. " How do you know?" I respond and with a heavy sigh, he answers " Habeebah threatened me" I should have expected her to be behind all this. " When?"

" In the morning before the police called me. She found out I was the mastermind behind the plan to bring her to justice and she wants me to pull some strings and clear her name"

" There's no way that's going to be possible, the government is involved"

" she threatened to kill Zakiyah if I didn't make something happen" oh my Allah. She truly is insane. " It's my fault, I honestly shouldn't have waited this long to put her behind bars. I should have reported her when I had gathered all my evidence since. I put my only child in danger, I made her live with that psycho. What in the world was I thinking" he tries to clean his tears while pacing around and I'm left speechless. Pointing fingers is the last thing we should be doing right now.

" In Sha Allah, nothing is going to happen to Zakiyah. We're going to get her back unharmed"

" Habeebah is a psycho, she can tell her men to do anything to her"

" In Sha Allah nothing will happen"

" Ameerah didn't make it?" He asks all of a sudden and I nod. " We'll have to go to Abdulmalik's house to offer our condolences, he doesn't know about Haneef's condition. Does he?"

" I don't think he does. If he did he wouldn't have allowed the wedding push through"

" That's right, Habeebah was the one that shot at Ameerah right?"

" They were struggling with the gun Habeebah possessed and Ameerah got unlucky"

" Her mother ended up killing her. It was because of her I let Habeebah into our lives but look"

" Allah knows best. We can only pray to Allah to forgive all of her shortcomings and grant her Jannah. She really needs our prayers now"

" Of courses. May he lighten her grave, she had a beautiful soul honestly"

" Yeah" I say and we sight Haneef's father walking towards us with our lawyer beside him. " Saleem, Haneef has gone completely crazy" he starts before finally breaking down. " Why did I bring Habeebah into our lives ya rabb, why, Haneef doesn't deserve this wallahi. Me ya yi DanAllah?( what did he do for Allah's sake?). He was fine months ago please, meye haka? ( what's this?). Yanzu da kyar ya dawo hankalinsa, oh Allah ka taimake mu (now, it's going to be hard for him to come back to his senses, ya Allah please help us)" he cries as I find a place for him to take his seat. " Saleem you're going to have to leave your pilot job and continue what Haneef started, ni bazan iya ba na yi tsufa (me I can't do it, I'm old)"

" Maganan nan sai dai anjuma Baba ( this discussion should be left for later Baba). Yanzu ya kamata mu je gaisuwa, Ameerah ta rasu ( now, we need to go and deliver our condolences, Ameerah passed away)"

" Allah ya gafarta mata, very beautiful girl" trying to calm ourselves down before leaving to Mr Abdulmalik's house, our lawyer informs us about the man Juwairiyah saw Haneef talking to, they'd found him. He had also managed to get footage of how he attacked Juwairiyah but this case won't go far, we can't punish an insane person. Before leaving the hospital, Haneef's father signs his transfer papers and shortly after, Haneef is walked out with cuffs around his wrists and nurses surrounding him. It really had to come to this.

Before heading back to Kaduna, we drop by Mr Abdulmalik's house to offer our condolences and say some prayers for the deceased. Things wouldn't have escalated this much if she hadn't put their relationship to a test, astagfirullah, she's gone now.

Since my car was taken by the Zakiyah's kidnappers, I, Zakiyah's father and His lawyer drove together back to Kaduna, patiently waiting for a call from Habeebah's men. " So what do you plan on doing when they calls?" I ask my father-in-law. " the only obvious thing, trace their call. We can't give in to Habeebah's demands at all"

" I'm going to inform them to tighten the security around her, escaping prison might be very easy for her to do" Our lawyer comments and I sigh heavily. " isn't she going to go through the mental stability test?"

" Yes she is"

" But she's very sneaky, getting out of being confined in an asylum is easier than breaking out of prison" Zakiyah's father says. " she stole government funds so don't worry, EFCC won't let her out of their sight easily"

" I pray so, please put Zakiyah in your prayers, if anything happens to my daughter I don't know what I'll do"

" In Sha Allah. You'd need to calm down"

" I'll try"

Zakiyah's POV

It's hard to ignore the foul stench of whatever's around me as it stings it's way into my system. Trying to move on gaining consciousness, I feel a tight restriction around my wrists, legs and eyes. Bastards.
Screaming out of panic while lying helpless on the cold floor, I feel a sound shutting slap across my face and my eyes begin to water. " If you don't shut your dirty mouth" I hear a harsh voice snap, sending chills down my spine.

My heart's pounding against my chest harder than ever and breathing suddenly seems hard. Who could have thought that I would ever kidnapped?. Even though it's getting rampant in the country, I thought I was safe.

" Sheybi make we call her papa now?" A deep voice asks in the background. " Ehn madam say make we call am a day after, them for don calm down make we hear for them" it's been a day since I've been kidnapped?.
Subhanallah, how could I possibly have been unconscious for a day?.
But hold on, a madam?
They have a madam that gave them the order to have me here?.

" oya take, call am" I hear them say again and listen carefully as they dial a number, definitely has to be daddy's. " Hello?" Daddy, it's on hands-free. " You don do waetin madam say make you do?"

" I'm processing it" Daddy answers. " We sha no go give you your pikin until our madam call us" Habeebah, it definitely has to be her. But come on, she has been arrested. How's she managing to do all these even from behind bars.
She really wasn't joking when she said I was going to regret it.