The Hunters (Presidential Agent 3)

Major C. G. Castillo stood by a barbecue grill constructed from a fifty-five-gallon barrel, his eyes stinging from the smoke of the mesquite fire. He had a long, black cigar clamped in his teeth and was attired in khaki pants, a T-shirt printed with the legend YOU CAN ALWAYS TELL A TEXAS AGGIE, BUT NOT MUCH, battered western boots, and an even more battered Stetson hat, its brim curled.

He saw Estella, a short, massive, swarthy woman who had been helping at the ranch as long as he could remember, come out of the big house carrying a walk-around telephone and he had the unpleasant premonition that the call was going to be for him.

But then Estella gave the phone to Abuela and he saw her smile and say, “How good it is to hear your voice,” and he returned his attention to the steaks broiling on the grill.

He had just annoyed Maria, his cousin Fernando’s wife, by solemnly proclaiming that only males could be trusted to properly grill a steak and challenged her to name one world-class female chef. Or, for that matter, one world-class female orchestra leader.

Castillo didn’t believe any of this, but there was something in Maria that had always made him really like to ruffle her feathers. He thought of her as his sister-in-law, but technically that wasn’t accurate. Fernando was his cousin, not his brother. But if there was a term to describe the wife of your cousin, who was really more like your brother, he didn’t know it.

He felt a tug at his trouser leg and looked down to see Jorge Carlos Lopez, who was seven, his godchild and the fourth of the five children of Fernando and Maria. Jorge was holding up a bottle of Dos Equis beer to him.

“You have saved my life, Jorge,” Charley said solemnly, in Spanish. “You will be rewarded in heaven.”

He looked around, sa

w Fernando standing by the table set for lunch on the shaded veranda of the big house, and gave him a thumbs-up to express his appreciation for the beer.

He then surreptitiously reached in his trousers pocket and came out with a small computerized meat thermometer, which gave an almost immediate and very accurate indication of temperature.

There was nothing wrong in getting scientific confirmation of what your thumb suggested when pressed into a broiling steak, especially if no one saw you use the device and remained convinced you had an educated thumb.

He stabbed each of the steaks with the thermometer—there were eight inch-and-a-half-thick New York strips—and saw they all had interior temperatures of just over 140 degrees Fahrenheit.

He put the thermometer back in his pocket, then turned and faced the veranda.

“I proclaim these done!”

Fernando applauded, and several of the rugrats joined in.

At that point, Charley saw Abuela advancing on him holding out the walk-around telephone.

“It’s for you,” she said. “Dick.”

Shit! I knew it.

“Thank you,” he said. “Wait until I get the steaks on the platter.”

Abuela laid the telephone on the table beside the grill, then picked up the platter—a well-used, blood-grooved wooden board with horseshoe handles—and held it out for him to put the steaks on it. Then she started for the veranda.

“I’ll carry that, Abuela,” he called after her.

“I am old, tired, and decrepit, but I can still carry this,” she said.

Charley picked up the telephone.

“Why do I think I’m not going to like this?” he asked by way of greeting.

“Doña Alicia was glad to hear my voice,” Major H. Richard Miller, Jr., said. “She told me.”

“As you well know, she is too kind for her own good, especially where cripples are concerned. What’s up?”

“I think you better get back here, Charley.”

“Jesus, I haven’t been here thirty-six hours.”

And not only that, I really wanted to have a closer look at that Gulfstream.

Surprising Charley, Fernando had met him at San Antonio International Airport.