The Hostage (Presidential Agent 2)

"Fax one to a man named Karl Gossinger at the Four Seasons."

"Who is he?"

"He works for a German newspaper called the Tages Zeitung."

And he will shamelessly paraphrase your very well-written yarn and send it off as his own.

She looked at him curiously but said only, "Consider it done."

The door to her office opened and a large and muscular young man in civilian clothing came in. His tweed jacket didn't do much to conceal the large revolver on his belt. Castillo was sure he was one of the Marine guards.

"Mr. Castillo?"

"Right."

"Sir, I've got your car anytime you're ready to go."

"I'm ready," Castillo said. He looked at Ms. Grunblatt. "Thanks."

"If you find out anything over there, you'll keep it to yourself, right?"

"You will be the second to know." The Marine led him to an embassy BMW in the embassy basement and held the rear door open for him.

"Would it be all right with you if I rode up front?" Castillo asked.

"Yes, sir. Whatever you want, sir."

Castillo walked around the front of the car and pulled the passenger door open. There was a leather toilet kit on the seat.

"There's a toilet kit on the seat," Castillo announced. "Yours?"

"No, sir. That's for you, sir."

"The ambassador thought I needed a shave?"

"It's a weapon, sir. A pistol."

"Really?"

Castillo unzipped the bag. It held a GI 9mm Beretta semiautomatic pistol.

That was a damned nice thing for Silvio to do for me.

Castillo took the pistol from the bag and pressed the magazine release button. The magazine did not slip out. He looked. There was no magazine.

"Sir, that's a Beretta Model 92 semiautomatic pistol, caliber nine millimeter."

"I'll be damned."

"Yes, sir. It will fire fifteen rounds just as fast as you can pull the trigger."

"This one won't."

"Sir?"

"There's no whatchacallems? 'Bullets'?"

"Sir, the cartridges are held in a magazine."