Dandelion Dreams Read Online Free PDF Page A

always will be. Doesn’t matter where we are.”
    “At least I still have my luck with women.”
    “Yep, you found El Dorado when you got Lucy,” I say.
    Tristan grins. “I did, didn’t I?”
    “We should all be so lucky,” I mutter.
    “Luck? You call this luck?” Tristan fumes, and looks like he wants to throw a punch. He chucks his pole instead, and it splashes into the water, shattering the dream lake’s serenity. “We’re the ones that died.”
    I grimace. “Like I could ever forget.”
    Reece shakes his head. “You have one life, and you’re wasting it.”
    “I wonder what you’d do in my shoes,” I say, my own voice rising. “Would you be any different?” My gaze slides to Tristan. “You would’ve had Lucy. You would’ve had a woman to love you back to life. I don’t have that. I’ve got a bottle of bourbon, a mandolin, and the need to keep moving.”
    Tristan looks at me. “That’s what you think. Your life can change in a heartbeat.”
    “I know that,” I state.
    “You ready for it?” Reece asks.
    “Won’t matter if I am or not. What do you guys know that I don’t?”
    “Not a damn thing,” Tristan answers.

Chapter 6

    Sage

    I pressed my forehead against the cold window of the airplane. Sighing in exhaustion, I pulled the seat belt tight against my stomach and attempted to tune out the flight attendant’s chirpy voice filtering through the intercom.
    I took out the Sky Mall magazine, flipped through it, and marveled at the things people could be coerced into buying. Who wanted a Lord of the Rings chess set, a washroom for their cat, or a hideous frog fountain?
    People are deranged.
    I put the Sky Mall catalog back and took out the airline’s safety brochure. The first page I turned to had an illustration of an airplane floating in the middle of the ocean with no land in sight, complete with smiling passengers hopping into life rafts as though they had reached their destination.
    Right.
    I shut the brochure and closed my eyes, anxiety curling in my belly at the thought that I was about to cross the Atlantic Ocean in an aluminum death trap.
    “Nervous?”
    I looked over to see a middle-aged, matronly woman who reminded me very much of my mother. It suddenly hurt to breathe. I didn’t respond.
    “Is this your first time going to France?”
    “Yes,” I replied, answering both questions simultaneously. I turned my head back to the window and gazed out at the runway. In the darkening light, men in orange jumpsuits sprayed down the plane, trying to scrape off ice and snow in preparation for takeoff.
    I tugged at the collar on my thick, black sweater as a cold chill trailed down my neck.
    “Vacation?” the woman asked, attempting to pull me into a dialogue.
    “Sure.” I closed my eyes again, hoping my obvious desire to be left alone would stop the woman’s attempt at chitchat.
    It didn’t.
    “Are you going to Paris? Paris is so romantic, even in this kind of weather. French winters are more rainy than snowy, but it’s still a wonderful city.”
    I made a vague sound in the back of my throat. The flight attendant finished her safety demonstration, and the pilot announced it would be a few more minutes until takeoff.
    The woman droned on, “You look like you’re in college. Is this your Christmas break?”
    I should have been flattered that I still appeared young after all I had been through. I swore I looked like a haggard old woman at the end of my life, a crone that had seen everything. “I’m not in college.”
    “Are you from New York? I don’t know how people live there. The huge buildings, the subway—the homeless.”
    What would it take to shut her up? Her enthusiastic prattle grated on my last nerve. I thought about recounting my most horrific subway story that featured a homeless man exposing himself, wondering if it would stun her into silence. All I had hoped for after weeks of emotional upheaval was a long, quiet flight without having to engage with