Prologue
Demon, Johnny, Speeder, and Hank walked out of the cave where the Alpha Bio Project had taken place for the last twenty-two years. The handler looked at the controller, confused at the change in routine.
Each week, he'd handed out a specific allotment of drugs to each Avery Falls Motorcycle Club member. Today, they'd stopped the regimen.
Usually, the controller questioned each one of the original participants to gauge their reaction—in their case, their lack of response to the stimulus.
Nothing about today had gone like usual.
Last week, the controller had taken one of the original participants out of the program.
As the handler for the daily training and wellbeing of the participants, all he could do was watch and learn. He was not privy to the purpose of the project. He took all his orders from the controller.
He glanced behind him at the seven empty cells and set the shock wand on the table. Normally, they had five men held captive. New participants started each phase and began their training in Avery Falls before joining the community.
Only one man, who they called Four, remained behind bars.
"It's time," said the controller to himself.
The hair on the back of the handler's neck prickled. Although he was in day-to-day contact with the originals and had a hand at training each member as they rejoined society as the Avery Falls Motorcycle Club, the control had not mentioned any changes to him.
The controller faced him. "Ten minutes after I leave, I want you to let Four out."
"Uncontrolled?" His chest tightened, speculating what could happen when he was alone with the participant.
Four had failed every test they'd given him. The drugs only worked temporarily before Four reverted to his previous behaviors. Wiping his past from his mind had continually failed. He often became combative and had to be shocked into obedience. Four had escaped death so many times, the handler wondered if the Alpha Bio Project had altered the participant in ways the originals were not.
He used his finger to push his glasses up on his nose and sweat broke out underneath the white lab coat he wore.
"Yes. Let him out." The controller walked to the table in the back of the cave and closed his briefcase.
He hurried and followed his boss. "B-But he'll run out and get away from us. You sent the originals out of the cave. There's no one here who can protect me."
The controller checked his watch, picked up his briefcase, and said, "I'd suggest you figure out what you should do to protect yourself."
Fear swept through him as the controller strode toward the tunnel and disappeared into the darkness. Automatically, he checked his watch. He only had ten minutes.
Four stood rebelliously at the front of the cell. Inhaling deeply, he turned to pick up the shock wand and couldn't find it on the table where he'd set it earlier.
His heart pounded. He frantically looked around the cave, not finding the only weapon available to him.
With the originals, he could verbally control their every move. Four wasn't like the others. Four was an unmanageable killer. He was a failure to the Alpha Bio Project.
"Do it." Four hissed, gripping the bars. "Open the cell."
"Stand back, Four." He cleared his throat, knowing he must obey each order the controller gave him.
With no other option, he took the keyring to the first cell. Four refused to move, visibly shaking in his fury.
While the program had failed Four, he benefited from the enhancements given to him. He was stronger, faster, and his senses heightened beyond a human's ability.
He couldn't let him out.
But to leave him locked up and not fulfill the controller's wishes was signing his own death warrant. He understood the unspoken pledge when he signed up to work for the project.
Quickly taking one of the keys off the ring, he stepped into the cell next to the one holding Four. Once he was locked inside, he tossed the key into Four's cell.
"Let yourself out." He pulled the door shut, locking himself behind the bars where no one could get to him. "You're free."
Four scrambled for the key, fumbling to stick it into the slot until the click of unlatching the lock echoed inside the cave.
The handler backed away from the door, even though the bars kept him safe. Four was not to be trusted.
Four stepped out, looked around the room as he headed toward the tunnel. The handler swallowed, hoping there was nothing he'd missed in his observation that Four could use as a weapon.
He put his hand in the pocket of his lab coat, wrapping his fingers around the rest of the keys. If he lost them, he'd be stuck in the cell, alone in the cave, until the originals returned tomorrow evening.
Four slipped into the tunnel out of sight. He stepped forward, trying to see or hear any noise that would alert him to Four returning to the cave.
When it looked as if Four had taken the opportunity to gain his freedom, he slipped his hand between the bars and stuck the key in the lock. He pushed the door open, hesitating.
He still needed to leave through the tunnel and get to his van parked outside. Unless Four had stolen his vehicle in his escape.
Four was a killer on the loose and would want revenge on those who had hurt him.
He exhaled through a tight chest and stepped forward. Ten feet into the darkness, he held his hands out, making sure he stayed away from the rough edges of the rocky, unforgiving walls.
Halfway through the tunnel, he stopped.
A quiet ticking came from the mouth of the tunnel. He cocked his head when recognition came to him.
"Oh, shit." Urine wet the inside of his leg as he lost control of his bladder.
He burst forward. A deafening explosion pushed him to the ground, seconds before the heaviness of rocks battered his body, burying him beneath the mountain.
Chapter One
The low hum of an All-Terrain Vehicle silenced the birds. Keenan stepped into the undergrowth of the forest, keeping his gaze on the normally unused trail. After almost a year, the tourists from Avery Falls had never wandered up to the old miner's cabin on their adventures through the Bitterroot Mountains.
Ahead of him, the rider came into view. He squinted, zeroing in on the lone, slim rider, creeping over the uneven, rocky ground at a crawl. The tall grass slapped the undercarriage of the ATV as the rider gained more ground, coming closer to the cabin.
His hope that it was an original participant in the Alpha Bio Project fizzled going by the visitor's size. Weeks. Months. Fall. Winter. He'd waited, alone, not taking the chance of hiking down the mountain to make contact with his motorcycle club brothers.
The risk was too high.
If those running the Alpha Bio Project caught him, they'd put him back in the program.
For whatever reason, and without warning, they'd switched him.
It took him several days after finding himself naked in the woods, thirty-odd miles away from town, to figure out where he was. It took longer for him to gain some memory of what had happened that evening in the cave before he lost his memory of the switch.
That's how the Alpha Bio Project worked. They trained, brainwashed, and enhanced him. They'd stolen his past, wiped him of his emotions, and turned him into a killer with no awareness of taking someone's life.
If switched by the controller of the project, each participant would cease to exist.