“Oh my GOD-ness!” Nadine cried.

Eddie continued, “I’m afraid I can’t stay, as I have to take care of some pressing matters for the Bao family, but I am quite sure Mrs. Bao would enjoy your company. She doesn’t know London well, so she’s at quite a loss here.”

“Don’t worry, we’ll take good care of her!” Lorena offered charitably.

“I’m so relieved. Now, Auntie Elle, can you point me to the best spot to catch a taxi?”

“Of course,” Eleanor said, walking her nephew out of the restaurant.

While the ladies consoled Bao Shaoyen, Eddie stood outside the restaurant giving Eleanor the lowdown. “I know this is a big favor I’m asking of you. Can I count on you to keep Mrs. Bao occupied and entertained for a while? More important, can I count on your absolute discretion? We need to ensure that your friends do not ever discuss Mrs. Bao with the press, especially the Asian press. I will be in your debt.”

“Aiyah, you can trust us one hundred percent. My friends would never gossip or anything,” Eleanor insisted.

Eddie nodded solicitously, knowing full well that all the ladies would be texting the news back to Asia at warp speed the minute he was gone. Those pesky gossip columnists would be sure to mention it in their daily reports, and everyone would think Shaoyen was just in London to shop and eat.

“Now, can I count on your discretion?” Eleanor asked, looking him straight in the eye.

“I’m not sure I know what you’re talking about, Auntie Elle,” Eddie said with a smirk.

“I’m talking about my breakfast…this morning?”

“Oh, don’t worry, I already forgot about that. I took an oath of secrecy when I joined the world of private banking, and I wouldn’t dream of ever betraying it. At the Liechtenburg Group, what can we offer but discretion and trust?”

Eleanor returned to the restaurant, feeling rather relieved by this strange turn of events. She was getting to even the score with her nephew. A huge platter upon which lay the most enormous lobster over a bed of steaming hot noodles sat in the middle of the table, but no one was eating. The ladies all looked up at Eleanor with rather peculiar expressions on their faces. She figured they must be dying to know what Eddie had told her outside.

Daisy smiled brightly as Eleanor sat down and said, “Mrs. Bao was just showing us some pictures of her handsome son on her phone. She is so worried about his face, and I was just assuring her that the plastic surgeons in London are some of the best in the world.”

Daisy handed over the phone, and Eleanor’s eyes widened almost imperceptibly as she locked onto the image.

“Don’t you think he’s handsome?” Daisy asked in an almost too cheery tone.

Eleanor looked up from the phone and said, ever so nonchalantly, “Oh yes, very handsome.”

None of the other ladies said anything else about Mrs. Bao’s son for the rest of the dinner, but all of them were thinking the same thing. There was no way it could be a coincidence. Bao Shaoyen’s injured son looked just like the woman who had caused the great estrangement between Eleanor and her son, Nicholas.