“It’s a box, but thank you.”
“Hey, we use premix at the restaurant,” she joked.
“True. Sometimes it just makes sense. But I’m baking cookies and thought of something a little more intricate later.”
“I can help. I need to do something with my hands. Oh!” Klara pulled out her phone. “I figured it out.”
“Figured what out?” I asked as I pushed the sweep broom around the floor. We had a slight mishap with the flour before Hawk came in.
“I knew I’d seen that woman before. She looks different now, but her mother doesn’t,” she said as she scrolled on her phone. “I was too wound up to sleep so I was scrolling last night and remembered this fundraiser the ballet had done a few years back.”
She handed me her phone and I touched the picture so I could blow it up. At first glance it didn’t look like her, but the woman next to her did. Squinting, I looked again. “I see it. But maybe it’s not her.”
Klara swallowed down the bite she had and Mama Hen came in.
“Mama Hen, does this look familiar to you?” I asked, holding the phone up.
She grabbed the phone, then held it up, moving it away from her face. “Wait.” She squinted, moving the phone closer and further. “That sort of looks like Jeannie. That older lady certainly does.”
I gripped her arm. “That woman is Anna De Luco and that’s her daughter, Gianna.”
Mama Hen’s brows pinched. “The New York Mob family?”
Nodding, I said, “Yes, she’s not the head of the family’s wife. But she’s still one of them.”
“I don’t know much about them, but I heard Raven mention them. They weren’t someone he wanted to do business with,” she said, still looking at the phone.
“Most don’t. And rumors were circulating for years that I would be married to that family, but I never once heard my father say that. Or Niko.”
She looked up at me. “Instead, your father promised you to us.”
Klara was still picking at her muffin. “I always heard that rumor. But I also heard they were into some bad dealings. Our company owner told us to be polite because they were big contributors, but to never be caught alone with them. Which is weird, because it wasn’t unheard of for us to be encouraged to get chummy with patrons, if you get what I mean.”
“Eww, really?” I grimaced.
She shrugged. “Just another reason I didn’t stick around.”
“I met them a few times in passing at galas. But this woman is older,” I said, looking again at the phone as Mama Hen passed it back. “And her name isn’t Jeannie.”
“Oh I’ve seen enough plastic surgery. That couldabsolutely be her,” Mama Hen said, sidling up next to me.
“I’ve seen plenty,” I said.
“Smack some fake blonde on her, a boob job, and some fillers. Same woman,” Mama Hen said.
The longer I stared, the more I realized it had to be her. Same eyes, same jaw line. But Jeannie had bigger breasts and fuller lips with a slightly thinner nose and of course, blonde hair, while the woman in the picture had dark hair. She also looked younger but if she had fillers, that would help.
“I don’t understand, though,” I said out loud, mostly just pondering.
“Well honey, if I’ve learned anything in this life, it’s that anyone willing to change their appearance and their name is hiding something. Either hiding themselves from someone trying to hurt them, or hiding who they are to do something shitty. Was she reported missing?”
“No, it would have been all over the news, at least up our way,” Klara said. “They’re a prominent family. No way one of them goes missing and there’s not a huge search.”
“I want to know why,” I said, still looking at her picture.
The other women stared at me.
Lacy walked in. “How are the cookies coming?”
