Montana Creeds: Tyler Read Online Free PDF Page B

question first,” Dylan responded, setting the dented enamel coffeepot on the stove with a thump.
    Davie scowled. With a temperament that prickly, Tyler thought with grim amusement, he should have been a Creed. “My mom’s boyfriend was in a mood,” he said, peevish even in an indefensible position. “Okay?”
    Tyler felt another pang of sympathy—and an urge tofind the boyfriend and see if he was inclined to take on a grown man instead of a skinny kid who’d probably never lifted anything heavier than a laptop computer.
    â€œOkay,” Dylan answered affably. He reached right into one of Tyler’s grocery bags, pulled out a package of chocolate cookies and tossed it to Davie. Davie caught the bag and promptly tore into it.
    â€œI ate that canned meat you had in the cupboard,” he told Tyler, spewing a few cookie crumbs in the process. “You don’t keep much food around here, do you?”
    â€œMcCullough,” Tyler said, and this time, he didn’t bother trying to hold back a grin. “I don’t think I’ve run across that name around Stillwater Springs. You new in town?”
    Clearly torn between bolting for the door, which Dylan had opened to let out some of the stove heat, and staying because he didn’t have anywhere else to go, Davie hesitated, not sure how to answer, then drew back one of the four rickety chairs at the table in the center of the cabin and plunked down to scarf up cookies in earnest.
    He’d obviously been hiding out at the lake for a while, if he’d run through the several dozen cans of congealed “ham” Tyler kept on hand for intermittent visits.
    â€œMy mom lived here a long time ago,” Davie said, after considerable cookie-noshing. “Before I was born.”
    â€œWho is your mom?” Dylan asked mildly. Mr. Subtle. Like an idiot wouldn’t know he was planning to find the woman and give her some grief for letting the boyfriend pound on her kid.
    â€œYou a social worker or something?” Davie asked suspiciously.
    â€œNo,” Dylan replied, finding mugs on the shelf, peering into them and frowning at whatever was crawling around inside. “Just trying to be neighborly, that’s all. Your mom must be pretty worried, though.”
    â€œShe’s too busy schlepping drinks out at the casino to be worried,” Davie scoffed. “Roy’s been out of work for a year, so she’s been pulling double shifts, trying to save up enough to get us our own place.”
    Another look passed between Dylan and Tyler. Neither of them spoke. Now that the kid had some sugar and preservatives under his belt, he’d turned talkative.
    â€œWe live out at the Shady Grove trailer park, with Roy’s grandma. It’s pretty crowded, especially when he’s on the peck.”
    Jake Creed had been known to throw a punch or two, when he was guzzling down a paycheck, and both Dylan and Tyler had been in Davie’s shoes more often than either of them would admit. They’d taken refuge at Cassie’s place, sleeping on her living room floor or in the teepee out in her yard. Only Logan had been immune to Jake’s temper, maybe because he’d always been the old man’s favorite—the one who might “amount to something.”
    The coffee started to perk.
    Kit Carson ambled out onto the porch and lay there letting the sun bake his bones, like an old dog ought to be allowed to do.
    â€œI’ll give you a ride back to town,” Dylan told Davie, once some time had gone by. “The new sheriff’s a friend of mine. There might be something he can do about Roy.”
    Davie’s face seized with fear, quickly controlled, butnot quickly enough. “Nothing short of a shotgun blast to the belly is going to fix what’s wrong with Roy Fifer,” he said. “Why can’t I just stay here? I can sleep outside, and I’ll work off the food I ate, chopping