Home > Preacher (Montana Bounty Hunters : Dead Horse, MT #2)

Preacher (Montana Bounty Hunters : Dead Horse, MT #2)
Author: Delilah Devlin

 


Preacher

 

 

Montana Bounty Hunters: Dead Horse, MT

 

 

New York Times and USA Today Bestselling Author

Delilah Devlin

 

 

Chapter 1

 

 

“Preacher, got my eyes on the back door.”

Dylan “Preacher” Priestley eyed the ground between his position, hiding behind a tree in a neighboring yard, and the front door of the property they currently surveilled. Twenty feet tops. Marti, his partner on this takedown, had already circled the house while he’d stood watch, sliding along the wood siding and popping up to peer into windows. According to her, there were three men inside playing poker around the kitchen table. One of them was their target, Jasper Quigley.

“Cage is on his way here,” Preacher said softly. “There will only be the three of us. Dagger and Lacey are still making their way back from Anaconda.” Jasper’s meek-looking mama had sent Dagger and his girlfriend on a wild-goose chase, telling them Jasper had holed up there.

Yeah, Jasper was probably feeling pretty smug right about now. He’d given them the slip twice now. Once, when a bartender in Anaconda, whom they’d promised money for a tip, had let them know he was playing cards in an illegal game in the backroom. The second they’d crashed through the door, the skinny fucker had bailed out a window and was on his bike and gone before Cage, who’d been watching the back door, could manage to get around the side of the establishment.

The second time he’d escaped had been when he’d dropped by his best friend’s house for a shower and a resupply before heading back out into the woods in Gallatin National Forest. A neighbor they’d also offered to reward for information regarding his whereabouts had called to let them know when Jasper had just rolled in. By the time they’d mustered the team, Jasper had been long gone, and according to his buddy, he was camped out in the woods where they’d never find him.

With over 2,800 square miles of territory to search in Gallatin, they’d decided to set up cameras to watch all the likely places he might return to…his mom’s, his best friend’s, his girlfriend’s. That way they wouldn’t have to rely on anyone else. And since Anaconda, Jasper’s stomping grounds, wasn’t far from Dead Horse, they could be there the second their tech guru and general flunky, Fredericka “Fig” Newton, let them know.

She’d called an hour ago, having spied a man on a bike arriving after dusk at Jasper’s best friend’s house.

While they hadn’t been certain the man was Jasper, it had been over a week since the twice-convicted felon had come in for a resupply, and the weather had cooled considerably. So, they took the chance since there were only days to go before the bounty ran out.

Footsteps crunched in the dried leaves behind him. Preacher tensed and glanced behind him, just making out a large, burly shadow moving in his direction.

His boss, Cage Morgan, lifted his chin when he got closer. “What do we have?”

“Marti’s already scoped out the place. Three men are in the kitchen playing poker. Jasper’s one of them. She sliced one of Jasper’s tires while she was at it to make sure we don’t have the same issue we had in Anaconda.”

“Knew I liked that girl.”

In his ear, he heard a soft grunt coming from Marti.

Preacher’s lips twitched. After working with her for two weeks, he was certain “the girl” had the personality of an old wooden post. “It’s a shotgun house. Going in the front, kitchen’s right past the living room on the right.”

“They armed?”

“One of them is wearing a shoulder holster. Since they were all seated, she couldn’t see what the other two are packing.” Preacher dug into a pouch on his web belt and pulled out an extra earpiece which he handed to Cage.

Cage took a moment to flick it on and insert it in his ear. “You hear me, Marti?”

“Yeah, boss.”

“Got a plan, Preach?”

Preacher shrugged. “Break down the door and kick some ass…?”

“Sounds good to me,” Marti said in his ear.

Cage grimaced. “Let’s try a little more finesse. I don’t like that we can’t be sure whether they’re going to draw weapons.” He let out a sigh. “Hey, Marti? Think you can be our Lacey tonight?”

“I wish like hell one of you two had boobs,” she muttered.

Preacher chuckled, following Cage’s thread and Marti’s disgust.

“I’m stripping,” she growled.

Cage patted his shoulder. “You get around to the back. She’s going in the front. When she’s had a chance to suss out whether they’re all armed, she’ll let us know.”

“What am I supposed to say?” Marti groused. “Hey, is that a gun in your pants or are you just glad to see me?”

Preacher grinned in the shadows. Marti’s flat tone made the snarky comment all that much funnier.

“Yeah, like that,” Cage said, his smile gleaming.

“Okay. Stashed my shit,” she said.

Preacher gave Cage a thumbs up then made his way from the tree line to the corner of the house, just in time to see Marti crouch low and edge her way along the side of the house before straightening beside the porch. It looked like she’d taken a knife to her T-shirt to cut off the arms and most of the neckline, then she’d tucked the tight shirt into her black cargo pants. Her hair was loose and fell in fluffy waves around her shoulders; her lips were glossy and red. Until the moment she stood beneath the porch light, he hadn’t realized she was actually kind of cute.

He kept moving until he was behind the house and stood in the shadowy space beside the wooden back steps.

“Here goes,” Marti muttered. “Gawd, I can’t believe I’m letting you pimp me out.”

“Suck it up, buttercup,” Cage whispered.

Preacher listened as she knocked on the door.

After what felt like forever, the front door creaked open a crack, and then made a longer creaking noise as it widened. “Can I do something for you?”

“Ooh, what a big gun you have! Wow, are you some kind of cop or something?” Marti asked, sounding like a bad actress in a porn movie with her little girl tone and slight lisp.

“Or something,” the man said, his slithery tone telling Preacher that the man liked what he saw.

“Um, I was wondering…”

Preacher imagined her twisting her hair around a finger.

“Do you have a phone I could use? My date left me on the side of the road, and my phone’s still in his damn car.”

“Now, sweetheart, that’s no way for a man to treat a pretty little thing like you.”

Pretty little thing? While just medium height, Marti had an athlete’s build.

“You really think so?”

Preacher shook his head, thinking he’d underestimated his partner’s feminine powers. She was flirting with the thug, and he was eating it up.

“Why don’t you come inside? I have a phone. You thirsty? Need a drink?”

“What do you have?”

The sound of footsteps followed.

“Lookie, boys, at what showed up on my doorstep.”

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