Chapter 8 - MADISON AVENUE
Monday morning on Madison Avenue was cold, bright, and crowded with people in expensive wool coats rushing past shop windows decorated for the upcoming holidays.
I stood on the sidewalk outside a four-story limestone townhouse with discreet brass lettering beside the heavy oak door:
ELENA RUSSO ATELIER — PRIVATE COUTURE & RESTORATION.
My hands trembled slightly as I smoothed down the front of my new wool skirt—a sensible gray one I had bought two days ago with a small advance from the envelope Dante had handed me.
I pushed the door open.
A small brass bell chimed gently overhead.
The interior didn't look like a clothing store. It looked like an old-world European library crossed with a master tailor’s workshop. Bolts of rich cashmere, velvet, and raw silk lined the dark mahogany shelves. In the center of the room sat three long wooden cutting tables covered in pattern paper, chalk, and spools of silk thread.
And sitting at the main desk near the window, wearing a pair of reading glasses and examining a vintage embroidered velvet evening jacket, was Elena Russo.
She didn't look up immediately when the door opened.
“You’re two minutes early,” Elena said without raising her voice. “Good. Punctuality is the only virtue that rivals good stitching.”
I walked across the polished wood floor, stopping a few feet from her desk. “Good morning, Mrs. Russo.”
Elena finally lowered her glasses and looked at me over the rims.
“Drop the 'Mrs. Russo,'” she instructed. “Around here, I am Madame Elena. And you are my new head restoration specialist.”
I blinked, my eyes widening. “Head specialist? I thought I was just—”
“Helping my incompetent new tailor?” Elena scoffed lightly. “My former tailor retired because she was sloppy with her hems. You spotted a six-stitch polyester alteration inside a custom-tailored cashmere overcoat under dim chandelier lighting from ten feet away. That isn't assistant work, Nora. That’s talent.”
She stood up, walking toward one of the cutting tables where a heavy black garment bag lay unzipped.
“Show me what you can do,” she said, gesturing toward the table.
I walked over and looked inside the bag.
Resting on the tissue paper was Dante Russo’s black overcoat. The one that had been cut open by Marco’s knife during the penthouse raid.
The lining was still torn where the GPS transmitter had been pulled out.
“Can you fix it?” Elena asked, watching me closely. “Without leaving a single trace that it was ever opened?”
I reached into my pocket, pulled out my mother’s old silver thimble—the one she had given me before the shop in Queens closed—and slipped it onto my finger.
“Give me forty minutes,” I said.
May you like
Elena’s lips curved into a rare, approving smile.
“Take an hour,” she said. “And use the silk thread from the third drawer on the left. The black one. It matches the original weave.”
