Wild Men of Alaska 03 - Dreamweaver

pretty sure she had a can of tuna fish somewhere. She hadn’t eaten since lunch, and that had been a brownie and a cup of coffee, not enough fuel for dancing with a Dreamweaver and bailing her mother out of jail.
    “According to Gage, you’d better buckle up,” Tern continued. “There’s a weather disturbance that is supposed to move in sometime in the early morning for about eighteen hours and then you’re in for a freaking ride.”
    Gemma shut the cupboard, setting the forgotten can of tuna fish on the counter and listened to Tern rave over the projection of record solar energy directed at the earth’s poles for the next week.
    “Gemma, do you think Lucky can talk to me?” Tern asked when she’d finished her solar report.
    “Uh ... I don’t know.”
    “Would you ask him?”
    Gemma swallowed and pushed the makings of her dinner aside, not hungry anymore. “Tern, you don’t sound as though you’re warning me off anymore.” If anything she sounded excited.
    “It’s Lucky. He wouldn’t hurt a fly. There was one time when we were geocaching in the Chugach Mountains, and Lucky refused to kill a spider. He’s very into his Buddhist beliefs.”
    Gemma didn’t miss the change in referring to Lucky in the present tense. “Tern, just how close were you and Lucky.” Had it just been a fling with them or more? Please not more.
    There was a pause and then the truth came at her hard. She didn’t have anyone to blame as she’d asked the question herself. Still the truth was hard to swallow.
    “If Lucky hadn’t been so much of a gambler, with a weakness for other women, and Gage hadn’t come along, I would have happily waited for him.”
    Weakness for other women?
    What the hell did that mean? Could he be playing her?
    “No,” Lucky said. “She didn’t mean it that way. Actually she might have. I do have a love for the ladies. Did. When Tern and I were together it was one of those open kind of relationships. I was free to see other women, and Tern was free to see other men.”
    Gemma held up her hand to get Lucky to stop speaking. She couldn’t comprehend it all.
    “Are you in favor of me seeing him now?” she asked Tern. One minute her soul is at stake and the next she’s being pushed to accept her Dreamweaver?
    This day had been too long already. Sleep. She had to get some sleep.
    “Yes,” Tern said. “I don’t know why or how this is possible but any chance to have Lucky back, no matter the capacity, I’ll take. He was robbed of his life. And... I owe him.”
    “Tell her she doesn’t owe me anything,” Lucky’s voic e came from her left this time.
    She jumped. “You have got to stop doing that.” The man needed to stay put and quit floating around.
    “Gemma? What’s going on? Is he there?”
    “Uh... yes. He said you don’t owe him anything.”
    “Of course he would say that. But he’s wrong. Tell him I love him, and whatever he needs from me he has it.”
    Gemma turned toward where she assumed Lucky still was and went to repeat Tern’s message.
    “I heard,” Lucky said. “Tell her thank you, but she’s wrong. My situation is nobody’s fault but my own, and the one who has already been punished.”
    She repeated what Lucky had said, wanting answers herself.
    “Oh man, I’m going to cry,” Tern said. “Gemma, promise me you’ll give him a chance. In fact, get some sleep. The unconscious mind will be open to the astral plane more so than if you are awake.”
    Right now she didn’t want to be open to the astral plane. Gemma wasn’t sure how much Lucky could hear from Tern’s side of the conversation but didn’t want to share this little gem of information. “You know this goes completely against what you and Siri have been saying from the start.”
    “Forget all that. This is Lucky. You are fated. I’ll go and let you two be together.” And then she was gone. Gemma had a strong feeling the “be together” wasn’t sharing a cup of coffee.
    Gemma put the phone down on the counter, looking around the kitchen feeling exposed.
    “Lucky?”
    “I’m here.” She felt his hand on her cheek trying not to freak out that her eyes were open and she could feel him but not see him or his outline in the harsh lighting of the kitchen.
    She took a step back, part of her weeping inside at the loss of his touch falling away.
    “Talk to me. Tell me what you’re feeling.”
    Couldn’t he read her thoughts?
    “They’re coming too fast and jumbled for me to make sense of