After explaining to BeeBee about narrowing the search down to the two addresses in Fairfield, Landon said, “The first Clark residence that I called had three children, triplets, and didn’t know anything about a missing child. When I spoke to Agnes,” he placed a hand on Mrs. Clark’s shoulder, indicating her, “she was hesitant to answer my questions. Instead, she kept turning them back on me. I got the sense that she definitely knew something but wanted to protect her information.”
BeeBee glanced at Mrs. Clark who nodded, a sad smile. “I always feared someone would come to take Eva from me. I felt guilty for not reporting her even though I felt like it was the best situation for her.”
“I called her again. Three days in a row and each day I asked my questions but I explained a little more about myself and my goal as well. On that third day, she agreed to bring Eva here to meet you.”
Mrs. Clark patted BeeBee’s arm. “God gave me peace about it. I knew you girls needed each other.”
“Thank you!” BeeBee hugged Mrs. Clark and Landon and her sister all again.
I had a feeling she would be hugging everyone in sight for quite some time. Griff strolled in bearing plastic bags full of cartons of shrimp, crawfish, and red potatoes. I stole into the kitchen and hunted up enough leftover cookies to fill a platter. Returning to the café, I nodded my head to Sam and the door.
Following my silent request, she locked the front door and returned the sign to the closed side. Mina the mini-palm gave a little happy dance as Sam walked past. Today wasn’t a day for business. Today was for family, new and old; our wonderful, eclectic little Ooey Gooey family.
Note from the Author
Thank you so much for taking the time to read the Ooey Gooey Bakery Mysteries.
I hope that you enjoyed getting to know Piper and Sam and company. Hopefully, you were also able to take the time to learn something new about human trafficking and the many lives it impacts.
If Gladys was your favorite character, you aren’t going to want to miss out on my next cozy mystery series, Adventures of Gladys. Keep reading for a sneak preview of book 1.
For more about me or information on other books, visit www.katherinebrownbooks.com
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If you have enjoyed the books, I would really appreciate you leaving a review on Amazon, Goodreads, or BookBub as well.
Reviews are a great way to help my book reach other readers like yourself.
Thanks again!
Sincerely,
Katherine
Sneak Preview
BONBON VOYAGE
Adventures of Gladys Book 1
“Sheesh. I thought Sam was bad.” Piper stared in disbelief at the luggage in front of her.
“Hey!” Sam smacked Piper in the arm.
“How long did you say this cruise will be?” Piper hefted one of Gladys’s three large suitcases onto the portable luggage cart.
“Nine days.” Gladys twirled a bright purple umbrella above her head, flinging light drops of rain at everyone around her.
“Gladys, how could you need three full suitcases for a nine-day trip?”
“I’m sure some of it is Frédéric’s.” Sam defended.
“No. He didn’t bring much.” Gladys shrugged. “Says he plans to buy some new things during the trip.”
“Then what all is in here?”
“You know, just the essentials”
Sam and Piper shared a look. Sam raised her eyebrows at Gladys while Piper crossed her arms. “No, I’m afraid we don’t know what could fill three suitcases for nine days of travel; that would be like only three days of clothes per bag.”
“And these are big bags.” Sam tapped a high-heel clad foot on the pavement.
“I did think they would hold more.” Gladys frowned. “It seemed every time I turned around the clothes I packed had grown and I was out of room. That’s mostly all I packed.” She met the skeptical looks of her friends and sighed. “Well, plus a few supplies: pepper spray, gloves, extra shoes and swimwear, wigs.”
“Wigs?!” Piper gaped.
Sam snickered. “Please, tell me, why do you need wigs?”
“To try out new hair colors of course.” Gladys fluffed one side of her short silver-gray hair. “Your trips to the salon inspired me to try some new colors, too. Of course, I’ll try them on fake first before committing to an actual color job.”
Sam smiled. “So, what colors did you bring?” Sam spent more time getting her hair colored than some people spent eating breakfast. Somehow, no matter the color, it always turned out beautifully. This month alone it had been a deep lavender and now she was adding teal highlights soon to get the “mermaid hair” look that was so hot right now.
Gladys listed off several wig colors from blonde to black.
“Does your new hubby know you brought all of those?” Piper tilted her head, studying Gladys.
“No. I figured it would be a little surprise. Imagine his face when he goes to bed with an old lady and wakes up with a blonde!”
“Where is Frédéric anyway? I haven’t seen him this morning.” Griff turned in a circle, shading his eyes and making a big deal of scanning the parking lot. In reality, he was probably trying to avoid the image of Gladys in bed, blonde or not. Griff Lowe was Sam’s brother and Piper’s boyfriend – but that is a story for another day.
“You barely missed him.” Gladys pointed to the gangway leading onto the gigantic cruise ship across the street from the parking lot where they all stood. “He went ahead to print our boarding passes and make sure we would be departing on time.”
“As long as the storm holds off, I’m sure everything will be fine.” Piper spoke, stepping aside for Griff to lug the last suitcase into place on the cart.
Thunder rumbled loudly overhead.
“Uh-oh.”
“Good job, Piper. You spoke too soon.”
Piper stuck her tongue out at Sam. A big fat raindrop plopped right on it.
“Come on, let’s move.” Griff steered the luggage cart between cars and to the sidewalk.
Sam whisked a pocket umbrella from her Burberry raincoat as they walked and clicked it open. Piper huddled underneath with her as they made their way to the cruise terminal.
Gladys strolled along between Griff and the girls, humming and merrily spinning her umbrella, unfazed by the downpour.
“Why didn’t y’all park in one of those covered lots?” Griff shouted to be heard.
“Frederic says he wasn’t worried about that old car getting beat up or stolen.”
“You think Chef Fabio is loaded?” Piper whispered to Sam. Chef Fabio was Frederic’s chef persona cooking name. The girls and Gladys originally met him at the O Heavenly Day Spa when they signed up for his cooking class.
“Why do you ask?”
“Doesn’t pack luggage, doesn’t care about what happens to his car while they’re gone. It just seems a bit cavalier to me.”
“But they live in Gladys’s house. I’ve never even heard her mention Frederic’s home, have you?”
“No.” Piper admitted.
They arrived in the departures line a wet, haggard bunch. Griff offered to help Gladys check her luggage while Sam and Piper waited.
Gladys returned with Frederic in tow and Griff bringing up the rear. “Look who we found.”
Frederic shook hands with the girls and greeted them in his polite, if formal, manner. They had given up on any warmth from him weeks ago, wondering if all French people were aloof.
Gladys beamed, unaware of any awkwardness. “Frederic says we’ve been upgraded to a room with a balcony.”
“That’s fantastic!” Piper clapped her hands together.
“I bet it will be gorgeous.” Sam agreed. “Take lots of pictures.”
“I will.”
A crackling voice over the intercom announced that boarding for groups one to three was open.
“We should go. Thank you all for seein
g us off.” Frederic inclined his head to Piper, Sam, and Griff, wrapping Gladys’s elbow in his hand.
“One moment, please.” Sam smiled. She unzipped the giant beach bag flung over her arm and held it open for Piper to reach inside.
“Surprise!” Piper handed a pastry box to Gladys. Visible beneath the clear window in the lid were assorted chocolate and white chocolate bonbons, all decorated to look like beach balls or sunshine wearing sunglasses.
“What better way to wish you Bon Voyage than to wish you Bonbon Voyage?” Sam grinned, kissing Gladys on the cheek.
“Bonbon Voyage – I love it!” Gladys laughed so hard her whole body shook.
“Piper came up with it.”
“Sam did the decorating though.”
“Thank you! These look better than ice in a desert.” Gladys looked up at her husband. “Aren’t these wonderful?”
“Oui, you have very special friends.”
After a few more hugs, Gladys waved goodbye to her friends as they exited the terminal. A small pang of sadness hit her at the thought of not seeing them or the bakery for a week. She felt a squeeze on her arm.
“You are ready, ma chaton?” Frederic looked down at her, question written in his dark brown eyes.
Other Books by Katherine Brown
Ooey Gooey Bakery Mystery Series:
Couches & Catastrophes (Book 3 ½ )
School is Scary Series (Children)
Kindergarten Teachers are Witches
Fingernails of First Grade
Second Grade Stinks
Third Grade’s Terrible Trip
Fourth Grade’s Fossil Fiasco
Fairy Tale Retellings
Marigold and the Bear Necessities
Cloaked
Other Children’s Books
Princess Bethani’s First Garden Party
Truly a Problem: True Information About Human Trafficking
What is it?
While this novel might be fiction, the sickening and dangerous practice of human trafficking is real, a fact of life faced by people of all ages, genders, and races. That’s correct. Human trafficking victims can be male, female, young, old, native to the U.S. or a citizen of a third-world country. Below is information I gleaned from the Department of Homeland Security website and their resources. You may review the information and research courtesy of DHS at this website: www.dhs.gov/blue-campaign/tools
Human trafficking is essentially enslavement of fellow humans. As long as there is a demand for free or cheap labor, laborers who can’t demand safer working conditions, or commercial sex there will be human trafficking. It is the rule of economics.
Traffickers use force, intimidation, threats, or lying to coerce men, women, and children into providing some type of labor or commercial sex. Traffickers prefer to exploit victims who are easily manipulated due to psychological or emotional vulnerability, dire economic circumstances (think homeless, foster runaway, orphaned, addictions and all those entail, unable to support a family), lacking a social safety net and more.
A number of reasons often prevent victims of human trafficking from receiving help or even from asking for help. Language barriers are one of the obvious reasons for not asking for help. Often, the victims fear physical retribution from the traffickers should they try to escape or talk to people about their situation. And, sadly, some victims fear being labeled as perpetrators by law enforcement. An example would be the crime of prostitution. That is a punishable offense and many of the participants are there willingly and deserving of arrest. Unfortunately, there are numerous people who themselves are actually victims of sex trafficking, unable to break free or scared to ask for help. When caught, rather than being provided victim services and a safe exit from that life, they are prosecuted.
Law enforcement is making great strides in trying to identify prostitutes who have been victims of human trafficking and forced into commercial sex so that a victim-centered approach can be taken. There are many resources becoming available to law enforcement that haven’t always been in place and human trafficking-specific training materials are being implemented.
How to identify a victim?
The DHS website also includes a helpful list of the signs of human trafficking. As we have discussed, it is often hard to identify victims but more so when we are in denial that human trafficking occurs everywhere, including where you live most likely. Several of those signs include:
- Disconnected from any family, friends, or organizations.
- Doesn’t appear at school any longer.
- Sudden or dramatic change in behavior.
- A juvenile engaged in trading sex for money or drugs or other payment.
- Persons disoriented, confused or showing signs of mental or physical abuse.
- Bruises? Breaks? Injuries in various stages of healing?
- Is the person timid or fearful?
- Does the person live in unsuitable or unsafe conditions?
- Unstable living situation and lack of personal possessions.
- A person in the control of someone else, requiring permission for where to go and who to talk to.
- Unreasonable security measures at the persons home, no freedom of movement.
NOTE: Not all of those signs are visible in every human trafficking incident, and the presence or absence of indicators does not necessarily prove human trafficking.
Who to tell?
The Department of Homeland Security would like to make it very clear that you should not at any time attempt to confront someone suspected of human trafficking or alert the victim to your suspicions. Doing either of these things could put you and the victim both in danger. Safety is key. You are urged instead to contact local law enforcement directly or to call the following tip lines as provided by DHS:
Call 1-866-DHS-2-ICE (1-866-347-2423) to report suspicious criminal activity to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Tip Line 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, every day of the year. Highly trained specialists take reports from both the public and law enforcement agencies on more than 400 laws enforced by ICE HSI, including those related to human trafficking. The Tip Line is accessible outside the United States by calling 802-872-6199. [This information is taken directly from the DHS website.]
To get help from the National Human Trafficking Hotline (NHTH), call 1-888-373-7888 or text HELP or INFO to BeFree (233733). The NHTH can help connect victims with service providers in the area and provides training, technical assistance, and other resources. The NHTH is a national, toll-free hotline available to answer calls from anywhere in the country, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, every day of the year. The NHTH is not a law enforcement or immigration authority and is operated by a nongovernmental organization funded by the Federal government. [This information is taken directly from the DHS website.]
If you or a local organization you are part of would like to receive Blue Campaign materials to use in raising awareness and educating the public about signs and indications of human trafficking, you can request them at no cost here:
https://www.dhs.gov/blue-campaign/request-materials
These materials may include posters, pamphlets, and cards for display and for information on how to report suspected trafficking.
Ooey Gooey Bakery Mystery Box Set Page 61