Page 114

Too many questions rattling around his head. Not enough answers. He eased up the pocked concrete stairs, poked his head up cautiously, and glanced around the hollow shell of the second floor. It was too quiet up here. Too still.

On a hunch, he descended the stairs he’d just climbed, as quiet as a panther. He raced across the littered, grafittied groundfloor toward the back of the building. He was taking a gamble by giving up the front exit. It left an escape route for the other sniper.

He emerged behind the building and spied the remains of an iron fire escape dangling precariously from a few rusty bolts in the back wall. He sure as hell wouldn’t want to try it. He estimated the thing wouldn’t take more than a couple hundred pounds max. And with the other sniper toting around a heavy rifle and gear, that didn’t leave a hell of a lot of body weight to spare.

On fast, silent feet, he moved away from the building, far enough to have an unobstructed view of the fire escape. He crouched behind a rubble pile, carefully shifting a couple basketball-sized chunks of concrete to make a hole to peer through.

Deep silence settled over the place. If the other sniper decided to head for the front exit, maybe he’d get lucky and hear the guy.

Ian waited.

And waited.

He thought he heard a noise near the top of the fire escape, but saw nothing. This mouse was patient. But not nearly patient enough. Ian had been known to wait a week in the same exact spot for the perfect shot to materialize.

The mouse got antsy after twenty more minutes. Amateur.

He watched in minor disbelief as his quarry swung lightly out onto the fire escape, half-crawling, half-shimmying down its ruined iron length. The guy was a hellatious climber, lithe and smooth, swinging from rung to rung like a gymnast.

The rifle across the sniper’s back clanged into a handrail and the guy froze. Weighing options, no doubt. The sniper opted for speed over stealth. Ian watched, impressed, as he flung himself downward, taking three and four steps at a time. Thestair trembled under the onslaught, its bolts squealing as it threatened to break free, but the sniper raced on grimly.

Ian chose his moment and pounced just before the guy hit the dirt. The other sniper’s shirt slipped through his hands as the guy lurched and vaulted the stair rail, sailing through the air, landing lightly on deeply bent knees. He was unlucky and his feet shot out from under him on the loose debris, but the sniper rolled and sprang back to his feet in one athletic motion.

Ian dived for the guy’s legs and was stunned to miss as his quarry’s jungle boots slipped through his grasp. Man, that guy was fast.

He grunted as he hit the ground and was forced to roll to his feet himself. The other sniper was getting away! He shoved upright, ignoring his stinging palms, and gave chase.

Although the mouse was quick, Ian was stronger. As the sniper scurried through the streets of the Khartoum neighborhood, Ian gradually gained on him until he was so close he heard the mouse’s labored breathing, rasping fearfully. The guy rounded a corner and slipped, almost losing his feet.

Ian put on an extra burst of speed and launched himself forward. His arms wrapped around the other sniper’s waist, his momentum carrying them both crashing to the ground in a tangle of limbs and rifles and nylon straps.

He knew the second he landed on top of his quarry.

The other guy was not a guy.

What the hell?

The sniper, a woman for Christ’s sake, thrashed beneath him, jabbing for his eyes and throat, her knee wrenching up toward his groin.

“Let…me…go,” she ground out in American-accented English between gritted teeth as she struggled.

“Not on your life,” he grunted back, straining to force her wrists away from his face.

They grappled in fierce silence. Inch by hard earned inch, he won the day, his superior strength overtaking this woman’s steely determination.

Vivid blue eyes glared up at him from a tanned strip of face covered in dirt. She yielded all of a sudden, the fight draining out of her so fast he accidentally slammed the back of her hand to the ground.

“Watch it. That’s my shooting hand,” she snapped.

“Who the hell are you, lady? And who do you work for?”