THE HEIR'S REVENGE

Chapter 42

With Lily's birthday part coming up and the counter case filed, I knew I had to be extremely careful. We had to be mindful of the people that were to be invited.

It was a kids party so the children were going to come in with their parents and it would be strictly an invitation. I was still going to talk to Henry about the security and how tight I want it to be.

This birthday party was planned to be small but I knew that reporters would always be reporters. They didn't care about anyone but just themselves.

The planning started this evening after I spoke to Lily. Sue must have ran to Yemi to tell her what we concluded. She had called this meeting at the kitchen table.

Lily sat between me and Yemi with a notepad she had brought from her room.The notepad had a butterfly on the cover and was purple in colour.

She pointed at it and told us specifically that she wanted the theme of her party to be like.

My laptop was open and Yemi was looking up some things on the Internet. She said she knew most of the vendors we'll need, personally and so we didn't need to find new people.

“Let's talk about food first.” Lily said.

“Okay. What would you like your guest to have.”

“Cake.”

I and Yemi stared at each other.

"Cake is the most important food so it gets its own category," Yemi said. She seemed to get the idea faster than I could grab.

Lily considered this and wrote CAKE at the top of the page in very large letters and underlined it twice.

Lily loved cake and whenever we went out, she wouldn't stop reminding me how she loves cake and couldn't do without it.

"Blue morpho butterfly shaped," she said while she wrote. "Purple inside the cake. Not boring white inside. Purple."

I looked at Yemi. "Is purple cake possible?" I asked. I didn't know things like these so I should have asked ignorant questions.

"Food colouring," Yemi said. "Very possible."

"Good." Lily continued writing. "Also it needs to taste like vanilla. Chocolate is too messy at parties."

I had not known she had opinions about this. I mean how many birthday parties has she attended to have so much information about this.

"Where did you learn that?" I asked.

"Mia's party last year had chocolate cake and three children had it on their faces for the whole afternoon," she said seriously. "Including Mia. It didn't look good. I don't want the kids to look all messy for my birthday.”

Yemi pressed her lips together.

"Vanilla it is," I said.

We spent the next hour going through the list and the next topic was the decorations. Yemi said she knew exactly the people to talk to about decorations and Lily, in her own part, still insisted that she was going with the purple colour.

“I want balloons in purple, butterflies, and the garden will be decorated in purple as well.”

We nodded.

“The next thing on my list is activities.” Yemi looked up from her notepad. “Is there an activity you have in mind to do?” She asked him.

“Yes. Butterfly watching.” Lily said in excitement.

I didn't want to be a barrier of bad news but I had to tell her. “They won't be in season so I doubt we'll find enough butterflies.”

Lily looked at me. "Then we buy some.”

"You can't buy butterflies," I said, not a bit surprised. This was something only Lily could suggest.

"You can release butterflies," Yemi said. "There are companies that provide butterfly releases for events. You order them and they arrive in a box and you release them at the party."

I stared at her.

Lily stared at her.

How did she know things like this? Lily was more excited. She put both hands flat on the table and said: "That is the best thing anyone has ever said to me."

Yemi looked at me with quiet triumph.

I searched for companies that could offer that service and truly there were so many. We just had to find the perfect one.

I saw Yemi write down something on her notepad. I'm still surprised that she was engrossed in planning this party. It felt like she was planning a birthday party for her little niece.

“I want Mia to open the box. She has been nice to me and she has never refused to give me a pencil.”

“The next topic on my list is the guest list. Who are the people you want at your party.”

“Anyone can come.” She said,

I looked at her thinking she had something more to say. “I don't think that's a good idea, Lily.” I said and she turned to me, her eyes questioning me.

“But why not. Grandpa always lets everyone attend my party.”

“It's different, this time around, Lily. You can't invite everyone..” I couldn't find a way to say it.

“You need to tell us the exact people so we can have our invitations. If you ask everyone, how would we give out invitations?”

Yemi took over from me and she did a good job. Lily that was looking so confused earlier now seemed to understand what was happening.

Lily took back the notepad and began writing names with so much focus as someone giving the responsibility to manage something.

She wrote Mia first in letters that were larger than all the other letters. Then the rest of the class. Then she paused.

"Cole," she said.

"You want to invite Agent Cole to your birthday party?" I said.

"He is family," she said. "We have discussed this."

She wrote his name.

Then she looked at Yemi.

"You are my guest," she said simply.

Yemi smiled. The full smile. The one that she usually hid from me. The one that made her look more beautiful that made me forget that she was working for me.

Lily wrote Yemi on the list and drew a small star next to it. Then at the bottom of the list she wrote Bear. I wanted to say something but I decided against it.

We planned for a while until Lily started to yawn at the table which was a signal that our session was about to end.

I picked her and carried her to her room. After tucking her in, she smiled sleepily at me.

“Brother..”

“Yes.”

“Aunt Yemi is such a nice woman..”

I didn't know what to do with that information but I agreed regardless because it was true.