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The look in his eyes is panicked.
I’ve never seen it before.
It’s terrifying.
Regardless, I nod.
“Yes, Dante. Yes.”
“Good,” he says, relief crossing those eyes. “Stay near her, yeah? You don’t have to be on top of her, but near, yes?”
“Got it,” Marco says, and then Dante nods and asks off, leaving me more confused than ever.
* * *
About ten minutes later, a woman walks up to me in my corner where I’m trying to avoid the party, and even if I hadn’t done my research, I would know who she is.
Teresa Carluccio.
The woman who married Tony when my mother refused.
Paulie’s mother.
She’s gorgeous, of course. She has tan skin and dark hair that stops at her shoulders, a long, deep purple dress on, her makeup so perfect, I just know she had it done professionally. She barely looks 35, much less in her fifties.
“Delilah,” she says, a small smile on her lips.
“Mrs. Carluccio,” I say, and she raises an impressed eyebrow at me. “I’m well-trained.” I smile, and she laughs. “But even if I wasn’t, your son is your spitting image.”
“Ah, you’ve met my Paulie, that’s right. You’re working with Dante?”
“Yes, I am, over at Jerzy Girls. I started as a dancer, but now I’m his assistant.”
The key to lying really sits in telling the truth. You can convince people of a lot more if you weave the lies in with the honesty. Bonus if it brings your own status down, if it makes you just a bit more human.
“Dante’s done great things over there. Treats the girls great from what I hear.”
Interesting.
I wouldn’t think Mrs. Carluccio would do much more than plan dinners and go shopping with dirty money she didn’t earn.
But instead, it seems she keeps her ear to the ground.
“You look like your mother, you know,” she says, and that has me pausing.
How do I play this?
I don’t have time to make a move, though, because she keeps talking.
“But even more like your father.”
“My sister is the one who looks like my dad,” I say, the same line we’ve always used. Lola looks like Dad, and I look like Mom.
“Not Shane, darling,” she says. “Arturo.”
My tongue comes out to lick lips that suddenly feel so very dry.
“No need to stress, my girl. I knew your mother. She was a good friend to me in a time of need.”
