The Hostage (Presidential Agent 2)

"You can pass him, Sergeant," a voice behind them said. "Not only is he the man, he's one of us."

Castillo turned to see a very short, totally bald man wearing a tweed jacket that didn't come close to fitting around his barrel chest. He was cradling a Madsen submachine gun in his arm.

"Hello, Vic," Castillo said, offering his hand to CWO- 5 Victor D'Allessando, Special Forces, USA, Retired.

"Just like old times, Charley," D'Allessando said. "You get yourself in the deep doo-doo, and McNab sends me to haul you out."

"You're running this?"

D'Allessando motioned for Torine and Charley to step over to a spot in the shadow of the Globemaster's wing where he could speak without being overheard. "Yeah, I am," he said.

"Boy, am I glad to hear that!" Castillo exclaimed. "What have you got?"

"Twenty-four shooters, mostly Delta, and a few guys from Gray Fox."

"I saw Sergeant Orson," Castillo said. "Actually, Colonel Torine saw him. Oh, hell, excuse me. Colonel, this is an old buddy of mine, Vic D'Allessando. I thought you'd know each other."

"Why do I think you're not wearing your green beret, Vic?" Torine said with a smile.

"I hung the fucker up, Colonel, after twenty-seven years. They medically retired me as a CWO-5. Now I'm a goddamn double-dipping civilian. GS-15, assimilated full fucking bird colonel."

"Who runs the stockade at Fort Bragg," Castillo said.

"I know it well," Torine said, smiling.

"Now I know who you are, Colonel," D'Allessando said. "You're the Air Commando who we used to fly our 727-"

"Almost correct," Torine replied. "Former Air Commando. When they made me a full fucking colonel, they paroled me from the stockade and put me behind a desk."

"… from which McNab rescued you when Charley was looking for that stolen 727. You went with Charley to Costa Rica and flew it back to the States after Charley and some of my guys stole it back from the bad guys."

"Guilty," Torine said.

"And he's in on this operation, Vic," Castillo said.

"Welcome aboard," D'Allessando said, smiling and offering his hand.

"What have you got going, Vic?"

"In detail? Or just the highlights?"

"In detail."

"Okay. Naylor called McNab and told him that your boss, Hall, had called him and said the President wanted either Delta or Gray Fox or both to make sure nothing else happened to the Mastersons when they got here. I almost had to tie McNab down to keep him from coming here himself."

Castillo and Torine chuckled.

"So we saddled up. Like I said, twenty-four shoo

ters, mostly Delta but with four guys from Gray Fox. We got two Black Hawks and two Little Birds from the 160th. Both Little Birds are gunships-we can move everybody on the Black Hawks, but you never know when you're going to have to pop somebody. Then we came here.

"The guy running things is Masterson's father. Big tall drink of water. The widow's father-they call him 'the ambassador,' which I guess he was-is a little guy who almost went out with a heart attack. So they're trying to keep him in the dark as much as possible.

"Masterson's father has a great big farm not far from here. No airstrip, but no problem with the choppers. They're going to bury Masterson in a cemetery on the farm, after a mass in a little Catholic church in a little dorf called De Lisle, right outside the farm property. They wanted to have a big deal with the funeral, but the old man-Masterson's father-told them no way.

"What's going to happen here, after the President does his thing, is take the body out to the farm in a hearse. Funeral's by invitation only, but they expect maybe three hundred people at the cemetery."

"Can you handle that many people?"