It was three flights to its roof, and he came out a little attic-like door and stood up on the tar paper roof in the cool air looking north over the chimney caps. From Eaton Square to Upper Belgrave were fourteen separate town houses that butted up against each other so tightly they looked like the same building.

Gannon hefted his bag and walked north to the first terra-cotta roof edge and quietly stepped over it and kept going.

Two minutes later, he stood near the northern edge of the last building overlooking Upper Belgrave directly across from the embassy. There was a large air-conditioning unit there about the size of a minivan and he pulled himself on top of it and unstrapped the knapsack.

Of all people, Gannon knew exactly how ballsy it was to just walk into the middle of an intel op.

But also of all people, he knew what such an op was like from the inside.

He’d been on manhunts before. All eyeballs involved were now Krazy Glued on Messerly and the embassy and whatever the hell was going on in there. The last thing any of them would be thinking about was someone coming up on their six.

He zipped open the pack and opened the first flap and began laying everything out on the metal roof of the A/C unit.

The barrel of the sniper rifle came first. Then the bolt. Then the suppressor. The lower part of the rifle was under the second flap and he lifted it out and extended its bipod. He turned on the FLIR scope that was already attached and then slapped in the magazine of ten .338 Lapua Magnum rounds and slipped in the bolt with a click.

He played with the FLIR scope’s settings until the contrast was just right, and then settled in flat on his belly.

It took only five minutes before he saw one of the white panel-like coverings on the third floor of the construction site across from the embassy on Wilton Street open up.

Someone appeared in the gap. Someone with binoculars, pointing at the embassy.

Gannon checked his watch and smiled.

“Thar she blows,” he said.

He’d guessed right. Small smartphone-powered drones had limited ranges. He’d studied the map around the embassy. The work site was the only logical place for Reyland to wait to receive it.

As he focused in the FLIR’s zoom, he saw that the figure in the work site flap wasn’t Reyland but a woman.

But that didn’t matter, Gannon knew. Reyland was up there. He’d known men like Reyland. Psychopaths. He’d met his share of them.

Reyland wouldn’t miss being front row center for the grand finale of his sick little play for all the world, Gannon knew.

Gannon tilted the rifle right and eyed the embassy.

“Shit!” he suddenly said.

His plan was to shoot the drone as it came out of one of the windows and knock it down safely behind the embassy gates.