Epilogue
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Oakley stood in the hospital and waited.
When the doctor came close and shook his head, Oakley nodded because he knew that look. “I figured as much,” he muttered, “but I was still hoping she would make it.”
“Those bullet wounds look to be a few days old. Nothing we could have done for her. It’s pretty miraculous that she actually hung on for as long as she did,” the doctor admitted.
Oakley added, “I get it. She did what she did for her son, and I can’t blame her for that.”
The doctor smiled and nodded in agreement. “And that’s often all we can ask of anybody. If she was able to take care of something so very important in the very last minutes of her life, then it’s all good. Do you know anything about the next of kin?”
“Yes.” He nodded. “Her son, a minor, too young to be told about the state she was in. It sounds like her husband was killed as well.”
“How do you want to proceed?”
“We’ll take care of the body.”
The doctor nodded. “That’s good to know. We’ll get the appropriate contact information from you, and we’ll go from there. … I’m sorry for your loss.” With all that said and done, the doctor was gone.
Oakley sat here, thinking about how this would change everybody’s life.
It would be a bit of a rough change for the boy.
Luckily he had Naomi and now Trent. As for Mason’s Aces, it meant a closed file.
Still at the hospital, he texted Mason. When Oakley’s phone rang almost immediately afterward, he updated his boss briefly on what went down from his perspective.
“You need to get the full accounting from Trent,” he noted.
“What do you know so far?” Mason asked.
“Just that Ricky’s mother showed up, gut shot and dying.
She brought guardianship papers for Naomi to sign.
Turns out the package the gunman was looking for earlier was the teddy bear the kid had taken on the boat.
That they were even there and got picked up was a mistake, as we thought.
Yet, apparently long ago, Linda had stashed codes for a certain bank account in Ricky’s teddy bear, as a contingency, I guess. ”
“Really?” Mason interjected curtly.
“A drug deal was going down involving a package that day, but the text to the person doing the drop had gone to Naomi and Ricky by mistake. The parents saw them get picked up and taken but couldn’t do anything to save them.
Since the package drop failed, the intended recipients went after the parents.
Ricky’s father had been killed instantly, and Linda had been shot but escaped.
Still, she knew she was done for. Therefore, she turned her attention to making sure Ricky would be safe.
So the bad guys missing that drug drop soon had codes to the main drug-running account, basically turning over their whole operation. ”
Mason snorted. “All’s well that ends well, I guess.”
“Not for the kid,” Oakley noted.
“Sounds to me like he’ll be better off with Naomi.”
“That much we can agree on. I’m sure Trent wants to stay for at least a week.”
“I’ll consider that option if it’s needed.”
“Oh, it’s needed,” Oakley declared, with a laugh.
“It is what it is,” Mason replied, a hint of a smile in his tone. “You, on the other hand, I need back here … in California.”
“Okay. I’ll head back as soon as I tidy up things here,” he agreed cheerfully. “Is it holiday time for me too?”
“Yeah, it would be, except—”
Oakley closed his eyes because he knew that tone. He’d been on the receiving end of that tone time and time again. “Except what?”
“Do you remember Rose McCain?”
“Rose McCain,” he repeated, trying hard to think where he had heard of that name because it sounded all too familiar. “Yeah. Isn’t she some congresswoman or something, fighting bills cutting government spending on healthcare and stuff like that? What about her?”
“A senator actually, and she’s disappeared. She was here on a trip and apparently boarded a plane, but, when the plane landed, she wasn’t on it.”
“And it didn’t make a stop?”
“No, it didn’t.”
“So?”
“So, … we’re not sure. She’s one of those young and incredibly brainy up-and-comers. She became pretty influential really quickly.”
“Young? How young?”
“Oh, early thirties, I would say. She’s a lawyer and decided to get into politics, made a very rapid climb to the top. Now she’s a dissenting vote on a lot of things—or she was, … right up until she was just gone.”
Oakley asked, “Was she being threatened? Anything like that?”
“We’re gathering all the information now. By the time you get here, we should be a little better informed. So, get yourself back here as fast as possible.”
Shaking his head, Oakley put away his phone and took a look around the hospital.
He headed to the men’s room to wash up as best he could.
Then he called Trent. “I told the hospital we would pick up the body. Mason called me back in, so I’m heading back to California.
Therefore, I’ll leave Linda’s body to you. Take care of Naomi and Ricky.”
Oakley ended the call, switching gears to the current op.
A missing senator—a young and pretty one at that. He shook his head.
Mason could really pick them.