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THE PRIEST

Hyperion Black Site

Outside Roanoke, Virginia

I t was after midnight when The Priest drove the truck up the gravel mining road and through the open gate of the black site. Stella was sedated in the backseat.

The cabin was large but inconspicuous—a house of dark deeds.

The Priest quite liked it. Maybe he’d buy a timber house in the Costa Rican forest. He’d initially earned the nickname Priest in the military because the insurgents or villagers or whoever he was killing tended to fall to their knees and confess.

Once he became self-employed and could buy and sell most of the people who hired him, The Priest realized the moniker suited him.

He didn’t seek a lavish lifestyle. Give him a cold beer and an ocean view, and he was happy.

The Priest killed because he enjoyed it; the money was ancillary.

The state-of-the-art security system was inconspicuous.

A decorative box concealed the digital lock and fingerprint scanner for the door, and the surrounding cameras were well concealed.

The Priest was sure other measures were in place, but he had no interest in knowing them.

He was a delivery man; once he dropped Stella at the black site, his work on this god-forsaken job was finally finished. He’d collect his fee and vanish.

The Priest hauled Stella Keen over his shoulder and stepped onto the covered front porch. He had just passed her unconscious body to a three-hundred-pound goon in fatigues when his phone buzzed.

Wishing he had smashed the thing the second he had arrived, The Priest pulled out the device and read the text.

His face never revealed his thoughts, but The Priest couldn’t control the twitch below his right eye. He wouldn’t be paid until the job was completed.

Ren Jameson was still alive. But not for long.