105

Fearing the worst, Marcus raced to the living room.

When he got there, he immediately saw the open closet door, the ladder, the hatch. Kailea had already scrambled up to the roof.

“I see him,” she shouted and took off in hot pursuit.

Marcus quickly climbed the ladder and was soon sprinting to catch up, even as he radioed to Tomer and the team that they were heading east over the rooftops. They were moving too fast to open fire, but so was al-Qassab. Darting around water heaters and under clotheslines, Marcus was rapidly gaining on Kailea, and they were both closing the gap with the Syrian. Moments later, Tomer radioed to say he, too, was now on the roof. He was pushing hard to catch up and ordering Mishmar Hagvul forces near the Temple Mount to get to the roofs and start coming toward them from the east.

Up ahead, Marcus saw al-Qassab jump from one building to another, but when he hit the roof, he didn’t keep running. Instead, he dropped to one knee, swung around, and opened fire on Kailea. She immediately dove for cover, as did Marcus. Kailea was closer to the Syrian and returned fire. Marcus didn’t have a clear shot. Kailea was directly ahead of him, about ten or twelve yards, crouched behind an air-conditioning unit. Marcus could hear the bullets pinging off the metal unit.

Glancing to his right, he saw a path to another AC unit and bolted for it. The movement drew al-Qassab’s attention and his fire. Marcus could hear rounds whizzing past his head and did a Pete Rose, diving headfirst and landing on his stomach behind the unit just as the Syrian unleashed two automatic bursts.

At the same moment, Kailea leveled two bursts from her M4, then followed those up with a third. That drew al-Qassab’s focus back to her. As she popped out a spent mag and reloaded, the Syrian lit her up with everything he had in a fresh magazine.

Sensing his opportunity, Marcus gripped his M4 close to his chest, leaped to his feet, sprinted toward the building’s edge, and jumped across an alleyway. He made it, but just barely, and was fortunate to land on his feet. A row of a half-dozen large water coolers obscured al-Qassab’s view to the south. That —combined with another three bursts of return fire from Kailea —gave Marcus the time and cover he needed to arc around several air conditioners and get in position behind the Syrian.

He briefly debated shouting a warning and giving the man a chance to surrender but quickly abandoned the thought. If the man did have a suicide vest or a body cavity bomb, the warning would give him the time he needed to blow himself up. Both Marcus and Kailea were likely far enough away to survive the blast, but that wasn’t the point. As Marcus had told Tomer repeatedly, they needed this guy alive.

Just then, however, he heard Kailea radio that she’d been hit. He was about to ask how badly she was hurt when to his right he spotted a team of Israeli commandos climbing onto the roof and heading in their direction. They were at least a football field away, but Marcus worried when they got within range, they would shoot to kill, no matter what Tomer had told them.

Out of time and options, Marcus lifted the M4 carbine, trained the infrared laser sight on al-Qassab’s right shoulder, and squeezed the trigger. The .223 round spat out of the barrel at a velocity of 2,970 feet per second. A fraction of a second later, Marcus saw a puff of pink mist. He saw the man lurch forward and collapse to his left side. Then al-Qassab emitted a bloodcurdling scream that could be heard across the city.

“Tomer, al-Qassab’s down —I’m moving to him,” Marcus shouted into his headset. “Get to Kailea and make sure she’s okay.”