The Shooters (Presidential Agent 4)

Castillo pushed another autodial button, then the LOUDSPEAKER key.

"I want you to listen to this one. You should know about Aloysius Francis Casey."

"What?" a thin, somewhat belligerent voice demanded over the phone's loudspeaker a moment later.

"This is Charley Castillo, Dr. Casey."

"Ah, the boy colonel. How many goddamn times do I have to tell you to call me Frank?"

"Another couple hundred times might do it."

"I hear you're headed out here. When?"

"We're leaving in a couple of minutes-we're in Chicago-and we have to make a stop in Midland, Texas. Say two hours to Midland, and another hour and forty-five minutes to get from Midland to Vegas. We should be on the ground about twenty-thirty or thereabouts."

"Who's 'we'?"

"Jake, of course, and a young Green Beanie who took a pretty bad hit in Afghanistan. And Tom McGuire-"

"He gets a pass because he's a Boston Irishman. Who else?"

"How about a pass for a Chicago cop named Mullroney? He's Irish, too."

"Who the hell is he?"

"I'll tell you when I'm there. Could you get us rooms near McCarren?"

"You'll stay with me."

"There's five of us!"

"There's room. Tell me about the Green Beanie who took the hit."

"Rocket-propelled grenade. One of his legs is titanium from the knee down."

"He need anything special?"

"No."

"He's working with you?"

"Yes."

"I've been working on stuff to set off those goddamn IEDs before they can cause anybody any harm, but those goddamn RPGs…"

"Yeah, I know."

"Okay, I'll see you when you get here."

[FIVE]

Double-Bar-C Ranch

Near Midland, Texas 1845 2 September 2005 As the Gulfstream taxied back toward the hangar, Castillo saw four women standing by a silver Jaguar XJ8. Fifty yards away, near an enormous, slowly bobbing horse-head oil pump, several horses and maybe a dozen Santa Gertrudis steers stood watching.

There had been horses and Santa Gertrudis cattle grazing on the Double-Bar-C long before the first automobile had bounced over the West Texas prairie, and long before the first well had tapped the Permian Oil Basin beneath it.

The first time Castillo had been shown the ranch-he was twelve at the time-his newly discovered grandfather, Don Fernando Castillo, had told him, "We were comfortable, Carlos, before they put the first hole down. I often think we were happier-life was certainly simpler-before they found the oil."