The geometry she described was consistent with what he had observed: that much was probably the truth. But to achieve that tight a cluster from more than five hundred yards away made her an off-the-charts marksman. A phenomenon.

“OK. Axial formation. It would be a waste of manpower to station another marksman within fifty yards of you. But I also know there are at least three others spread out in the vicinity. Not to mention whoever’s on the Willmott Dixon crane … . Plus at least two others using tree cover.”

“If you say so.”

“I admire your discretion,” Janson said. “But if you’re not any use to me alive, I really can’t afford to keep you around.” He cocked the Beretta, his forefinger curling around the trigger, testing its resistance.

“OK, OK,” she blurted. “I’ll deal.”

The concession came too quickly. “Forget it, baby. There’s no trust.” He flipped back the safety once more and placed his finger on the trigger, flexing the hardened steel. “Ready for your close-up?”

“No, wait,” she said. Any vestige of bravado had evaporated. “I’ll tell you what you want to know. If I’m lying, you’ll find out and you can kill me then.”

“My game, my rules. You give me the location of the nearest sniper. We approach. If you’re wrong, you die. If the sniper repositioned himself without notifying the team, too bad. You die. If you give me away, you die. Remember, I know the systems, the protocols, and the procedures. I probably wrote half of them.”

She stood up shakily. “All right, man. Your game, your rules. First thing you gotta know is, we’re all working as singletons—camouflage requirements ruled out partners, so we’re all doing our own range finding. Second thing is, we’ve got somebody stationed on the roof over Hanover Terrace.”

He flashed on the majestic neoclassical villa facing the park, where many of England’s grandest citizens made their homes. The blue and white frieze over the architrave. The white pillars and cream-colored walls. The marksmen would have to be perched behind the balusters. True? No, another lie. He would have been dead by now.

“You’re not using your head, sport,” he said. “A sniper on the balustrade would have already taken me out. He’d also be visually exposed to the crew repairing the roofs on Cumberland Terrace. You considered the position, and rejected it.” Once more, he cuffed her hard, and she staggered back a few steps. “Two strikes. One more, I kill you.”

She lowered her head. “Can’t blame a girl for trying,” she said under her breath.

“Got anyone stationed by Park Road?”

A beat. She knew he knew; prevarication would be pointless. “Ehrenhalt’s on the minaret,” she admitted.

He nodded. “And who’s enfilading to your left?”