The triple-pane mirrors in the private fitting room at *Gieves & Hawkes* on Madison Avenue didn't distort the light, but they multiplied it until every seam in Elias Hawthorne’s charcoal wool trousers looked like an indictment.
The air smelled faintly of lavender starch, unrolled bolts of heavy Italian silk, and the dry, expensive vacuum dust of an establishment that had dressed three generations of men who believed that a perfectly balanced shoulder pad could conceal a fraudulent corporate balance sheet.
Elias stood on the small, velvet-topped mahogany dais, his arms extended horizontally, his palms facing down toward the floorboards. His skin felt tight, hot, and thin, as if the physical memory of the Sullivan Street basement—and the subsequent, desperate encounter in the idling sports
