Zack had no trouble admitting to himself that the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C., was a shitty place to set up a sniper’s hide, but he was confident he’d found the absolute best location to secrete himself. He was on the roof of Gaston Hall, part of a massive neo-Gothic seven-story structure that served as the focal point of Georgetown University. From here he had a perfect vantage point for two hundred yards down the length of O Street, as well as many portions of various cross streets in a four-block area.

Eighty feet off his right shoulder was the clock tower of Healy Hall. The tower was several stories higher than his position here, and he could have made his way up there to set up his operation. It would have given him sight lines on more rooftops, street corners, and windows, and with any other target Zack would have plopped his ass right in that tower so he could have as many opportunities to see his target from distance as possible. But not today. No, right now he was hunting Sierra Six, and Six was the smartest prey Zack had ever tracked. The clock tower was an obvious place for a sniper to position himself, and Six would see it the second he arrived in the vicinity of Catherine King’s home. Six would spend as much time as he needed hiding out, using all sorts of gadgets and tactics to get a look up at the obvious hide site, and if Zack put himself in the clock tower Six would know it and Zack would be dead fucking meat.

Zack liked his chances here on the rooftop. This building was attached to Healy Hall to make an L-shaped structure the width and length of a city block. There were hundreds of square yards of territory up here, much of it steep, but there were also standing seams and walkways, far enough back from the building’s edge to allow him to avoid silhouetting himself, and there were dormers and crosses and antennae and satellite dishes and other bits of cover and concealment available to where Zack felt he was completely invisible from ground level.

Zack agreed with the assessment of Jordan Mayes: Gentry would come for Catherine King, looking to find out just who she’d spoken with and just what she knew. And at the speed Gentry’s operation had been progressing, Zack could well imagine he would make his move tonight. If that happened Zack put his chances at nearly one hundred percent that he’d see his target from this position. He knew how Gentry thought and how he moved, and he was damn certain he knew where Gentry would go, even to the point of which backyards around here he’d skulk through on his way towards his objective.

And Zack and his rifle would be ready.