Chapter 4

Confusion clouded his face, but the men weren’t budging. Their dark sunshades were joking, and the sun reflected in it.

“I hope you are joking, what sort of prank is this? Am I in any sort of trouble?” Raymond asked, confusion making his head throb.

“Of course, we can’t joke with you, Master. Your father will kill us.” One of the men said in full respect.

“My father?” Raymond asked again. He hadn’t heard someone talk about his father. He couldn’t remember his earlier days. All he could remember was Roselle saving him from a bunch of thugs then asking him for coffee. When Roselle was still Roselle.

“Yes, your father,” the man reminded him. “Mr. Kane. He thought you were dead, well until now.”

“I was dead? I truly don’t understand anything you say.” People around them took pictures that would later go to the tabloids with the heading “Missing Billionaire’s son, Raymond Kane, finally returns home”.

“Please, come into the car with us. We will take you home.”

Everything sounded like a joke to him. The only home he knew was Roselle’s house, and the new terms gave him a feeling of nostalgia. He hesitated because the news was too true to believe. “I don’t believe you.”

The man talking to Raymond whispered into another guard’s ear. “Okay, we will place a call on your father, Mr. Kane, and you will speak to him. Agreed?”

Raymond nodded and they dialed Mr. Kane’s number and waited while it rang.

“Hello?” the voice at the end of the receiver asked.

“Mr. Kane, we have found your son, Mr. Raymond Kane,” the man answered.

The man exhaled with thrill in him. “My son? Can you put him on the line?”

The man tossed the phone to Raymond which he reluctantly collected. “Hello?”

“Raymond, my boy,” his father called out with warmth in his heart. He had not seen his child for the past two years and he was there, on a phone call with him. “I’ve missed you. Please come home.”

“Are you trying to trick me? I’ve seen videos on TikTok and YouTube where people prank other people for the fun of it. If you’re doing that, quit now. I don’t have time for pranks, and I don’t encourage that you prank people.” He wanted to hang up, but Mr. Kane held him.

“Check your bank account. I sent a sum of ten billion dollars to your account. You may think I prank people, but I wouldn’t joke with my money, will I?”

Before he continued his sentence, Raymond’s phone pinged with a message. It was a message from him bank that he was just credited a sum of twelve billion naira.

“Do you believe me now?” his father asked. “I added two billion so you will know how desperately I want you home. Please, come home, son.”

He took in a breath and sighed. “Okay, I will. I have things to do, so I won’t be following your men home. I’ll come on my own volition.”

“Okay, son. I’ll see you soon.” Then, his father hung up. Immediately he hung up, he received a message with the family house address.

Shock overwhelmed him as the men left him standing in front of the bar. Few minutes ago, he was a debtor, now he discovered he was the son of a billionaire and had twelve billion dollars sitting in his bank account. He was also a billionaire.

People looked around him and took pictures of him. He didn’t care. He didn’t look like a billionaire. His beard was overgrown, his hair was unkempt, and his face had fading bruises from the robbery of that night. Those men would pay for what they did to me, he thought.

The clothes he wore didn’t spell like a man who had twelve billion dollars in his account. He bought all his clothes from a thrift store with the allowance Roselle gave him, so he was dressed in a fading T-shirt and a pair of washed jeans.

He had nowhere to go since he was kicked out of the house, so he decided to lodge in a hotel for the night, and maybe, get better clothing. He entered a cab that drove him to the biggest hotel in town.

“Take me to Juvent Hotel,” he told the driver.

“What? You work there?” the man mocked him and laughed. “You can definitely not afford the place.”

“And why do you instigate I can’t?” Fury burned inside of Raymond. He was tired of people looking down at others because they were poor. His wife’s family did that to him, and now, this cabdriver stood, insulting him.

“I mean, look at your clothes. They look like what my father would give to beggars. No offence.” He looked at the rearview mirror to see Raymond whose face was already reddened.

“Well, some taken. You think you can talk to other people because you think you are of a better status than them?”

“I know I am of a better status than you,” the man laughed.

“Let’s see about that. What I have can buy more than hundred of this cab you have here. What about that?”

The man was taken aback at what he said, but he didn’t say anything. “Man, you’re lying.” He swerved into the next turn, pausing at the red light.

“Let’s see about that.”

Raymond smirked and swiped out his phone. The screen was bad already, the edge peeling off. Now, he realized that it was that bad and would need a better one, but all he needed to do immediately was to teach the cab driver a lesson. He sent a text to the officials issuing a taxi license and in minutes, the cab driver’s phone pinged.

He parked at a corner and checked his phone, surprised that his license had just been withdrawn. “Bro, what the fuck did you do? You just cost me my job.”

Raymond smiled and opened the door. “I was just teaching you a lesson. Be kind of people next time. How much is your fare?”

“Fifty bucks,” the man muttered. His knuckled clenched the steering of the car, and they were as white as snow.

“Do you use Velma? Because I don’t have cash.” The man silently nodded.

“He made the transaction and smiled. Keep the change since you’ve lost your job already.”

He walked out of the cab and went in to the hotel that he had always wanted to go to. The fountain sprouted sparkling water, the air in the hotel smelled of money, and the architectural design couldn’t match the designs in Rome.

He walked into the hotel and walked up to the receptionist. “I would like to book a suite.”

The woman with curly, brunette hair with a long jaw and excess make-up laughed out loud, her voice echoing in the whole apartment. “You? A hotel suite?”