Chapter 7: Sunday Table

I didn't answer him.

I took off my coat and hung it on the back of the door, the way I would on any night.

The flip phone was warm against my ribs.

"Where's the housekeeper?" I said.

"Gone home. She won't be back."

"I took her keys off the hook by the kitchen door. She didn't know."

"Annalisa." He sighed, the way he sighed at waiters. "She's worked in this house for twenty years. Of course she knew."

"If she's not in this kitchen by Monday, I don't come down tomorrow."

He looked at me with a little interest.

"You think you're negotiating."

"I think your capos are coming at one o'clock to see your wife at your table. And I think you want them to."

He was quiet for a moment.

Then he stood up, picked up the photograph from my pillow, and slid it into his shirt pocket.

"Wear the green dress," he said. "And smile. You have a lovely smile when you use it."

The housekeeper was in the kitchen at seven the next morning, red-eyed, rolling out dough for the Sunday ravioli.

She didn't say anything to me.

She pressed my hand once, with flour on her fingers.

By one o'clock the long table in the garden room was full.

Six of Renato's capos sat with their wives, and the consigliere sat at the foot.

The nephew was freshly shaved, with a cut on his knuckle he kept showing people.

Gia sat at Renato's right hand.

That was my chair.

There was a place set for me halfway down, between two wives who had stopped speaking to me the minute I sat.

I wore the green dress.

I smiled.

The ravioli came out. The wine went around.

Renato tapped his glass with his knife.

"I want to thank you all for coming," he said. "It's been a big week in this house."

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