Luca looked supremelyunconvinced at Ziggy’s confession.
“How did you do it, Ziggy?” Hudson asked him gently. “With Brady sitting right there?”
“I waited till he wasn’t looking,” Ziggy said stubbornly. “And then I—I ducked into the cloakroom and I put it in Gio’s coat pocket.”
“While Brady was still looking the other way?” Finch asked, deadpan. “Did he doze off for a few minutes?”
Brady was nodding vigorously. “Yeah, that musta been the way it happened. No other explanation. I guess maybe Iwassleeping on the job for a few, but you can’t whack me for that.”
“Can’t I?” Luca asked, and Brady drew back in his seat.
Finch was nodding. “The reason two of you count out the money is to keep an eye on each other. Soifthat’s what happened, Brady, you fucked up. Big time.”
“That’s not—that’s not what I meant,” Brady began, but Hudson cut him off.
“So, Ziggy, why did you put the money in Gio’s coat?” he asked.
Ziggy was silent, his lips trembling. Then he said, “I meant to set him up.”
“See, the thing is,” Hudson said, “For the past few months, I’ve been mistaking you for Gio when you come into the club. I couldn’t work out why. You don’t really look much alike, and there are a lot of other Italian guys who come in here that I never mistake for Gio. But tonight I figured it out. You’ve been wearing a leather coat this winter, right?”
Ziggy gave him a calculating stare. “Yes?” he said at last, more question than answer.
“It’s very similar to Gio’s.”
“So?”
“So I think you meant to put the money inyourcoat?—”
“And I mistook Gio’s for mine,” Ziggy said quickly. “Yeah.”
“So—youweren’tsetting him up?”
“No. I don’t know. What does it matter?” He looked to Luca again. “I admitted it. Let’s go, Boss. Take me outside, I’ll tell you everything.”
“He’s just gonna blamemeagain!” Brady roared.
Luca glanced to Finch, and they seemed to share a private conversation. “Hudson,” Finch said, “I think you’d better get to the fucking point P.D.Q. Was it Ziggy?”
“Of course not,” Hudson said. “Ziggy’s a stand-up guy. And he’s not dumb enough to steal from the Morellis,orto mistake his own coat for Gio’s. It was definitely Brady, and he made Ziggy comply somehow.”
“You said yourself you heard us arguing the whole damn time!” Brady shouted. “So how could I go out to the cloakroom? It doesn’t matter if you could see us or not, youheardus, that’s as good as seen!”
“Actually, it’s not, though, is it?” Hudson asked coolly. “What I heardwasn’tyou two arguing the whole time. It was one argument, repeated. That’s why it seemed strange to me. I couldn’t put my finger on it at the time, but the shouting ebbed and flowed in a repeating rhythm.”
“I don’t get it,” Dino said, frowning. “The argument was an act?”
“Not quite.” Hudson took a step forward to the middle of the room. “Brady’s a DJ.”
“Not a very good one,” Finch muttered.
“He’s used to playing around with sound, though, right?” Hudson turned to Brady and folded his arms. “I think you told Ziggy something that made him start yelling at you when you stepped into that room. You recorded that first argument with your phone and played it on repeat on the break room sound system, so itsoundedlike you were in the room when you weren’t. Then you snuck through to the cloakroom while Dino was distracted by the guy screaming about his coat, and you put the money in a leather overcoat—but you picked the wrong coat.”
“How the hell could I even know that crazy fucker was gonna come in and scream at Dino? And why wouldn’t I just put the damn money in my own coat?”
“Because you wanted plausible deniability if things went south. I think the plan, once I was blamed and you and Ziggy had walked out of here, was to meet up so he could give you the money. As for the guy in the bathroom, you knew he’d be here because youtoldhim to come. I think you found someone desperate and said all he had to do was insist on coming in here just after lock-up, make a scene to distract Dino, then slip away into the bathroom to find the drugs you’d hidden in there for him as payment. You knew he’d take them right away, wouldn’t be able to hold out.But whatever you gave that poor guy, it wasn’t clean. It was laced with something, and it killed him, causing a distraction. Andhisdeath,” Hudson finished with disgust, “you also intended to be the end of Kismet, because you knew the Boss would shut us down if drugs were getting into the club. You wanted payback because you knew Finch was letting you go.”
Dino, Gio, and even Finch were looking at Hudson with respect.
