Clean Kill by Jack Coughlin, Donald A. Davis

sailing fast and right toward her, helping resolve the distance equation, and did not see her until one of his comrades yelled a warning. By then, Sybelle was in a combat stance with her Glock sighted center-mass on the descending parachutist. She followed his drop for a few feet, then blasted almost a full magazine into him before breaking her stance and diving back into the protection of the stairwell as a burst of machine gun fire from the uppermost skydiver stitched the rooftop and the door behind her.
    Kyle ran at an angle that kept the air-filled dark parachute of the body that Sybelle was shooting between himself and the next man in the set of paratroop assassins. Only a thin, silk wall of concealment, but better than nothing. Sybelle’s target collapsed when it touched down and the canopy lost its air, falling over the body like an instant shroud. Kyle saw that his target had drifted off to the right and was frantically working the toggles of his parachute to control the landing while simultaneously attempting to bring up an automatic rifle into a firing position. It was almost impossible to do both at the same time.
    Swanson scrambled behind a small air-conditioning unit to get a little bit of cover as higher up and some thirty meters back, the final skydiver popped off a long burst of fire that chewed around Kyle, then stopped to control his own parachute, working the nine elliptical panels of his canopy to alter the final glide path away from unexpected danger below.
    Swanson now could plainly see his target and sighted in with his Colt. Had the man been just a little farther away, the chances of hitting the falling, moving target with a pistol would have been only a fantasy, shooting on a wing and a prayer, but with the reduced distance, Kyle had him cold. The man wore a black full-face helmet and a black jumpsuit and a chest vest packed with extra magazines. Various grenades hung on his web harness. He was only ten meters away, looking across his right shoulder toward Kyle and trying to swing his rifle around but watching the big pistol tracking him, looking to be about the size of a cannon, and then Kyle opened fire.
    He squeezed the trigger and ignored a return burst of machine-gun fire, the ricocheting, zzzzzing sound of the bullets passing close and chipping concrete in order to match the movement of the skydiver who was descending about 45 degrees to his right. He got a hit in the man’s right thigh, then kept the bucking pistol tight on target and let the torso of his man fall through the target picture. The large .45 caliber bullets marched up to the head, the final shot smashing through the helmet. Kyle spun to look for the third skydiver. Not there.
     
     
    THE SPACIOUS SUITE IN which Sir Geoffrey Cornwell lay immobile on a bed occupied the entire east end of the hall on the top floor of the clinic. It included the patient’s room and an adjoining private bathroom. The sterile look of the medical area ended at the doorway, for a comfortable sitting room separated the patient’s room from a second bedroom, giving the suite a hybrid look of being both a physician’s paradise and an elegant hotel. Everything had been considered during the design process except that the room might some day be the site of a last stand during a terrorist assault.
    Jeff was a former colonel in the British SAS, but his normally sharp gray eyes were unfocused due to the light sedation and he could only see what was happening as if he were watching it underwater. Both legs were in casts and a thick bandage was wrapped around his head, a rubber tube leading from beneath the covering to drain fluid from the head injury. He had already undergone emergency surgery for internal bleeding caused by tiny fragments of stone.
    Lady Pat, her own left arm in a sling, and both eyes circled by purple-green bruises, was seated beside the bed, gently stroking her husband’s cheek and whispering to keep him calm.
    Delara Tabrizi stood just