2026-10-08 19:31:45Prologue
I had planned and prepared for that journey long in advance. I knew that the man I was going to meet had a temper that burned fiercely. So I had armed myself with every possible defense deep within my mind. If matters came to blows, I was prepared to stand my ground, though, as the saying goes, a cripple survives by wisdom, moving carefully along the walls.
The thought of going to his house made my heart sink and dragged my mind back to that year when he had played me for a fool and left my life shattered beyond repair. I had become like a wounded animal, groaning endlessly and becoming a nuisance even to those who simply crossed my path.
I pressed the intercom at his gate and said, "It's me, Admire Pamire."
Within moments, the large gate slid open. The security guard allowed it to open all the way as if I were arriving in a luxury vehicle, when in reality I was just an ordinary man traveling on foot.
He looked at me and said in borrowed English, "He is waiting for you inside. He said you may proceed once you arrive here. How are you this morning, Mr. Pamire?"
"I'm well. How are you managing with work?"
"Ah, boss, we're surviving. We're here suffering for these few coins they pay us."
Although he had nearly sounded disrespectful, his words somehow lightened my heart, and before I knew it, I was smiling.
"Keep working hard, my brother," I replied with the phrase I always used with working people.
I knocked on the door three times. It was opened by Jayden and Joyous, his nine-year-old twins. They immediately hugged me, as was their custom, and together they asked:
"Hello, Uncle! What have you brought us today?"
I pulled chocolates from my trouser pocket, and they immediately began arguing playfully, each proudly showing off the color of the wrapper on their chocolate.
"Uncle, Dad is in his study. He said you should come there when you arrive," Jayden said before dashing away at incredible speed toward his father.
The housemaid also arrived to confirm what Jayden had said before greeting me respectfully. As she walked ahead of me, I found myself staring at the sway of her hips as she moved, reminding me of a woman dancing to Baba Harare's music. My thoughts drifted to Jayden's mother—his wife—as I remembered the times I used to visit before they had formalized their marriage.
Today, however, I had come to tell the truth. I was no longer going to hide anything from Peter Gumedhe.
If anger could physically grow, Peter would have looked like a man possessed after drinking powerful traditional liquor. I hesitated briefly before entering, and he motioned for me to sit.
He called the maid, Alina.
"Please bring in two glasses and that special drink. After that, tell the driver to take you and the children out somewhere. You can have dinner outside because you won't be cooking tonight. Don't worry about me—I will be taken care of."
Alina did as instructed and returned with red wine. I sipped mine slowly, knowing exactly why I had come.
The briefcase containing my documents lay on the table. Peter Gumedhe kept glancing at it. When the sound of the departing car faded away, he finally spoke.
"Say what you came to say. And make sure you've brought everything. Admire, understand this: the man you're dealing with is no fool. If you've left anything out, now is the time to say so."
"Peter, do you have my money?" I asked. "The amount we agreed on—one hundred thousand US dollars. Count it while I watch. Once I'm satisfied, I'll hand over all the evidence. And you yourself will destroy it and free yourself from these accusations. I tied the knot, and I alone can untie it."
I stared at his face, now glistening with sweat.
He burst out laughing and replied sarcastically:
"Pamire, remember that you were dismissed from the police force for taking bribes. So how exactly are you going to arrest me? You, an ex-detective? If you loved your job so much, why didn't you keep it? I even offered you a position as my private security officer, and you refused. Now you're struggling to survive on five hundred US dollars."
He laughed.
I laughed back.
"Honourable Gumedhe," I said, "what kind of Honourable doesn't know about a citizen's arrest? Weren't you one of the people who advocated for the 2013 referendum and helped formulate our new constitution? Besides, I now own a registered private investigation company. With the evidence I've gathered about your activities, unless you stop pretending, you'll end up rotting in prison, Mr. Peter Gumedhe."
I pulled out photographs showing him meeting with his agents. I handed him a memory stick, which he inserted into his laptop. He watched footage of himself meeting with his criminal associates, alongside records of his EcoCash transactions and messages he had sent—messages filled with enough malice and criminality to ensure conviction.
I began explaining everything to him in detail.
When I had revealed only part of the truth, he interrupted me.
"Wait."
He left the room and returned carrying a suitcase. He counted out ten bundles of ten thousand US dollars each.
"Give me all the evidence so I can destroy it."
I produced additional memory sticks containing even more evidence of his corruption and cruelty—some hidden in my underwear and others concealed in secret pockets—and handed them over.
The story I had uncovered through greed, betrayal, and insatiable ambition was enough to fill a novel or make a blockbuster film.
The moment I finished speaking, Peter Gumedhe pulled a pistol from the drawer of the desk separating us. I heard the metallic click as he cocked it. My heart seemed to stop.
Grinding his teeth and glaring at me with bloodshot eyes, he spoke:
"Admire Pamire, the little detective who couldn't stop investigating. Even after I got you fired, you still kept following me, didn't you? Since you know what happened to Nommater, then you also know what happened to my sister Grace. You know how I got my Senate seat and how I stole those farms. Everything you've said proves that you still know how to do your job."
He paused, took a breath, and continued:
"I'm glad when you said that nobody else knows any of this except you. Killing you means killing the evidence. Thank you for your cooperation. We like people who voluntarily deliver themselves to us."
He smiled.
"Pamire... my friend, you've gone fishing in a clay pot."
The gun thundered.
Then darkness swallowed me.
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A Suspcted Foul Play
Chapter 6Sometimes you accept defeat and simply lie down like a hen sitting on eggs. Nomatter was gone for good. That was when, wherever I went, I seemed to hear the same song by Macheso playing:"Be careful, someone might steal me from you. Look at me now, I was stolen from you!"Sometimes I would be heading to a bar to drown my sorrows and suddenly decide to go into a nearby church instead, where everyone would be quietly listening to a gentle sermon. Then, out of nowhere, a ringtone would go off:"Be careful, someone might steal me from you. Look at me now, I was stolen from you!"It felt as if everyone and everything knew that Nomatter had been taken from me. Even phones and radios seemed to know.That was when I finally stopped thinking about love and realized that, after all, Grace was actually a beautiful woman. I had thrown her away myself. By now, Nomatter was probably sleeping in another man's arms, satisfied and content. Some things simply have to be accepted. Why your ton
The Wedding
Chapter 5 Time does not stop moving just because life is not going your way. In fact, it gallops on like horses on a racetrack. I knew that what remained for Nomatter and Peter was simply their wedding. That was when I made one last attempt to change Nomatter's mind.She had sent me pictures of myself with Grace on my phone, and I despised myself for them. I despised my own weakness, my own lack of discipline and self-control.One day, Mr. Gumedhe called me and asked me to accompany Peter to show his future wife, Nomatter, the house in Borrowdale. I respected him, so I had no way of refusing.We met in town, with Peter driving the car. Nomatter sat beside him, while I took the back seat of his double cab."Come along, Officer," Peter said. "I'm taking Madam here to see her mansion. Unlike your place in Kuwadzana, where the houses look like they belong to gorillas."At that moment, I realized Peter had arranged for his father to call me. This trip was designed to achieve his own purpo
The Engangement
Chapter 4My job was not difficult for me. I arrived at work carrying a heavy heart. You know how it is when you are still considered young and inexperienced at work, yet you are assigned to handle hardened criminals—and those experienced themselves become intimidated by you. They do not know how great the house you came from was for you to end up where they are. Besides, the luxury vehicle Grace had bought me had left my colleagues with questions they could not answer.My bosses eventually relaxed when they realized that I was genuinely good at my job. I was trained in every aspect of criminal investigation until it became second nature to me. Crime scene attendance, interviewing criminals, even interrogation techniques—all of it became part of my blood, my daily bread. I deserved to be called Detective Sergeant A. Pamire. And with the gift of a full beard that spread across my cheeks and chin like beans scattered over a threshing floor, no one doubted those who assumed I was a real
The Promotion
The days rolled by as I returned to my normal work routine. As for Grace, I had already changed my phone line and remained in Kuwadzana, where she did not know my whereabouts. Nomatter and I spoke frequently, discussing the plans her family had for us and making our own plans about how we would overcome whatever obstacles lay ahead.One day, as I was walking through town, a car suddenly stopped beside me and hooted. Inside was Grace, dressed beautifully. I looked at her and felt my heart drift away. It wasn't that I loved her enough to marry her, but the lust I felt for her made me overlook the troubles that were falling upon me, like a man who already owns a pot but still covets another."Get in, you bastard," she shouted playfully, flashing her beautiful white teeth.Even though I was attracted to her, I felt compelled to tell her the truth about our situation. I wanted to tell her that with her beauty, she could find a man much better than me—a man of her own social and financial c
The Love Triangle
I went back home with a heart that was both white and black, like a chicken's droppings. White because I was eager to see my beloved, Nomatter. Black because I had cheated on my beloved with Grace, a light-skinned beauty who had left my mind like a hyena standing at a crossroads—one path leading to goat meat, the other to sheep meat. Which way was I supposed to go? In the end, I found myself trapped in the middle.I arrived home after dark. People had just returned from their evening chores with the groceries I had bought. At home were my younger brother, Nyasha, and my two sisters, Natasha and Joanna. They were all delighted to see their brother from the city, a man who had changed. I could now afford to wear expensive clothes and even buy them the clothes they had always wanted. I had also bought Nomatter a skirt and some undergarments.That night, I couldn't sleep. I kept wishing for morning to come so I could see my Nomatter. I briefly thought about Grace and laughed to myself, sa
The journey to greener pastures
When I was growing up, we were always told that education was the key to wealth. I was the eldest child, raised by my mother because, according to what she told us, our father had been "married off" to my aunt in Harare. My mother struggled to raise us by growing vegetables and tomatoes, walking from village to village to sell them.My father was always ridiculed by my mother and my uncle, who would ask mockingly, "Have you ever seen a man who gets married by a woman?" My uncle would sometimes visit our home late at night after we had gone to bed. Mother would wake us and send us to sleep in the kitchen while they remained behind discussing matters considered too mature for children to hear.As the eldest, I would sometimes hear movements at dawn as my uncle quietly slipped away. Later, my mother gave birth to a baby girl named Joana, by which time I was already in Form Four. Seeing the hardships surrounding us, I realised that my future was crippled before it had even begun.I buried
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