Smoked

with your mouth closed while I tell you what I think.”
I smiled and nodded, all too willing to keep my mouth full of her cooking.
“Your soul has been waiting a long time. It was ready when Ms. Gallagher came into your life. Her soul was ready too.”
I looked up at her. “It isn’t like that.”
“I have eyes. I can see what you refuse to. The heart knows when the search is over. Listen to your heart, Mr. Smoke.”
“I’m too old for her.”
Ms. Wynona smiled and nodded.
I moved my empty plate, leaned forward, and rested my arms on the table. “You want to know the truth? She remembers something that never existed. When her memory comes back, she’s going to hate me just as much as she did before. Probably more.”
“Did you expect your soulmate would come into your life peacefully?” She laughed and shook her head. “No, child. Ms. Gallagher will make you question everything. She’ll make you look at your life with new eyes. She’ll make you question yourself, your beliefs. That which you’ve always been certain of, will no longer be.”
“You have that part of it right,” I mumbled.
“Oh, but the joy that comes along with it! Not everyone finds it, you know.”
I didn’t believe I had. Or maybe it was that I didn’t believe Siren had. I was certain there was someone else far better suited to her than I could ever be.
I never expected to find someone to spend my life with in the way Ms. Wynona was suggesting. More, I wasn’t looking for it, because I hadn’t ever wanted it.
I pushed back from the table, grabbed my plate, and put it in the dishwasher. “Thanks for dinner,” I muttered, stalking outside.
“I was comin’ to look for you,” said Zeke, meeting me halfway between the house and barn.
“What for?” I snarled.
“Ashford sent over a proposal.”
“Yeah? Since when do you need my help making a decision about something for the ranch? I pay you not to bother me with that kind of crap.”
Zeke turned and walked away without saying another word. He didn’t look mad, either. That’s what I liked about the guy. No bullshit. No nonsense. No flowery fucking words about soulmate shit.
I went to the opposite side of the barn, grabbed a set of keys for one of the ATVs, and took off.
I rode for a solid hour, surveying areas of the Blazing T that I thought might be vulnerable to poachers. There were literally hundreds of access points, none of which were easy terrain to navigate. They had to be coming in and carrying the calves out almost by hand, which also meant they had to be sedating them.
I turned off the ATV and placed a call to Decker.
“Hey, Smoke,” he answered. “You get my proposal?”
“I haven’t had a chance to review it with Zeke yet. You wanna give me the rundown?”
“It’s essentially the same thing we use here at King-Alexander, with a combination of stopgaps and surveillance.”
“Got anything that will electrocute them to death?”
Decker laughed. “Not that I’ll admit over a cell network.”
“As if they aren’t secure.” I knew they were. Any call made by an Invincibles team member, whether they were a partner like Deck was or a contractor like me, were more secure than what was used by the highest level of the US government.
“Anyway. Look it over, and let me know what questions you have.”
“Implementation lead time?”
“About three weeks, only because I can’t get there before that.”
“Copy that.”
“Oh, and, Smoke?”
“Yeah?”
“Rile said to tell you that you owe him an answer.”
“I’m solely freelance, Deck. Don’t know how many times I have to tell him that.”
“He told me to dangle a hefty discount for your security system as incentive.”
“What’s he got on you, anyway? You were as adamant as I am about staying independent.”
“The Invincibles team saved Mila’s life. Or helped me do it, anyway.”
Mila was Decker’s wife, and I’d heard about the op during which she was held hostage by a man who had assaulted her as a teenager. “They would’ve anyway.”
“You’re right. But it was the first time it was personal for me, Smoke. There’s a different level of gratitude that comes along with it.”
I couldn’t say I understood, since it had never been for me.
“Like I said, look over the proposal and let me know.”
“I don’t need to, Deck. Just schedule it, and let me know what you need from me.”
“You got it.”
I sent Zeke a text, letting him know I gave Deck the go-ahead, started up the ATV, and kept driving.
There was a lot of shit rolling around in my head that I needed to get a handle on. While I understood the reasoning behind Dr. Mansfield’s request that I not come clean with Siren, warning alerts reverberated in my chest. There was no question that her reaction after finding out the truth about us would be explosive.
I was about to head up one of the trails that would lead to the main house when something caught my eye. Tire tracks. Those fuckers had found a way in, and now that I knew where it was, they’d not make use of it again. I didn’t kid myself into thinking that blocking this access would deter them for good, only long enough that we could get Deck’s system in place and operational.
I sent Zeke the coordinates of where I was and asked him to bring a crew down here with him. There wasn’t much daylight left, and I was determined to get this entry blocked before nightfall.

10
Siren
It was after ten o’clock, and Smoke still hadn’t come back to the house. I was sure of it since I was sitting in the dark, waiting for him.
I wished I could understand the dreams I had about him. In almost every one, he was angry at me. Not just that; I was angry at him too. I couldn’t imagine having the heated arguments I saw in my dreams with the man who had been so gentle, so caring, with me