“It matters a great deal to some people,” he says. “It matters to the kind of people you’ll meet on the way up.”
I raise my eyebrows at that. “The way up where?”
Finch laughs at that, and takes a few big gulps of his wine. He picked it from the wine list Nunzio offered us at the beginning of the meal. I didn’t even know what he was ordering, but Nunzio looked delighted at his choices for each course.
“We both know what you’re aiming at,” Finch says, once he’s swallowed down his mouthful. “And I want to help you get there.”
I raise a finger. “Let me stop you right there. There are some things we won’t ever discuss, and business is one of them. You want to help me? Keep your head down. Kick your drug habit. And don’t presume I will share anything with you about what I do. What I’m going to do. What my plans are.”
He laughs again, like I’m daring him instead of warning him, and drains the rest of his glass. “How about this,” he says, getting up from the chair. He drags it down the table until he’s sitting next to me. “How about we just start here. When you have a whole lot of silverware staring at you, most of the time you just start from the outside and work your way in. Watch what other people use if you’re not sure, and do as they do.”
Usually I’m a sponge. I love to learn, even if the person teaching me is a condescending asshole. In fact, I’ve learned a lot of very useful life lessons from one Samuel Fuscone, even if it’s just what not to do. Finch is definitely not condescending to me, and in fact from memory he has the loveliest asshole I’ve ever seen, but I want to make sure he understands his place in this marriage.
I should say something cutting, something to make him retreat, something to make him cry like I’ve made so many other men cry.
“Alright. Show me the cutlery, and later we’ll do wine.” Tino has a vast stock kept on the yacht; it’s enough to begin with, anyway.
“I’m useful in my own way,” Finch says with a grin. “Don’t worry, Eliza, we’ll fool them.”
“Eliza?”
“Doolittle. My Fair Lady?”
Nothing he’s saying makes sense to me, but I find myself not wanting to admit it. I just shrug. “What’s this one for?” I ask, picking up one of the stranger cutlery pieces.
“It’s a fish knife. You won’t see them often; they’re kind of old fashioned. Anyway, when Nunzio brings in the fish course, I’ll show you.”
“Doesn’t a normal knife do the job?” I ask, and Finch laughs like I’ve made the most hilarious joke.
“Probably,” he says. “Like that terrible suit of yours, baby. It does the job, but a real Armani would elevate you.”
I have two choices, here, and I’m not sure I like either one. I can accept that Howard Fincher Donovan the Third knows a lot of stuff I don’t, and learn from him. Or I can feel humiliated, and turn on him so hard he’ll never say a damn thing again about my clothes, and the higher-ups can go on smiling behind their hands at my shitty outfits.
I look at his jeans, or what’s left of them. They’re basically threads hanging together, but I can tell, just by looking, that they’re a name brand, even if I don’t know which brand.
But one day I will. One day soon I could know all these things that Finch knows, and I could use them to my advantage.
“When we get back to New York we’ll go shopping,” I tell him. “You can show me what to buy. How to wear it.”
He reaches out a foot under the table, stroking my calf with his bare foot, and smirking. “My life-size Ken doll. I’d rather undress you than dress you, but sure, I’d love to buy you a proper wardrobe. You Italians all look so good in suits.”
“Not a whole wardrobe. Just one suit.” I’m already calculating what I can sacrifice to afford it.
“You need at least five.”
“I can barely afford one, Finch.” The admission falls from my lips before I really know I’m going to say it, and I’m not sure why I did. But it’s true; Sam Fuscone keeps his crew’s percentages as low as he can, and his own as high as possible. I’m not the only who’s pissed off by that, but it’s not like anyone’s gone over Fuscone’s head about it. The Morelli Family Capos run their crews how they see fit.
Even Finch looks surprised at what I’ve told him. But he just shrugs. “Money won’t be a problem.”
He doesn’t understand. For him, money really does grow on trees, but he seems to have missed the fact that his tree has been chopped down.
“Shouldn’t you take your chair back down there and eat your food?” I ask, irritated at myself for letting my guard down.
He gets up, and I feel a strange twinge at the thought he’s just obeying; that he’s leaving me at one end of the table and going back to his own. But all he does is lean over to pull his plate down the table and puts it in front of his seat to my left hand. He goes back again only to choose one of the heftier knives and forks, scoop up his wine glass and napkin, and then rejoin me.
He pours us out another glass of wine and raises his glass. “To us,” he says. “This could be the start of something incredible, if you’d let it be.”
He already is something incredible, but again, I don’t want to indulge his ego. I simply raise my glass and clink it against his.
“Salut,” he says, and swallows half of it in one go.
There’s a knock at the door, and Nunzio pokes his head around it, hardly daring to come into
