"If you can't have the decency to do that, then think about this." Gen leaned over, inches between their two angry faces. "You can't start moving around the way you want until you're better. These pills will help with that. Listening to the doctors will help. God forbid, listening to us peons will help. You want to stay in this bed even longer, you want to get worse, ignore them and ignore us and keep doing everything your way. Because it's all about you anyway, right?"
Noah laid his hands on her shoulders, but she shrugged him off, stabbed another finger at Lyda. "You don't care how scared we were of losing you. It never occurs to you that we hover too much because we wake up ten times a night, having a nightmare about you slumped over that goddamn steering wheel, not knowing if you were alive or dead. If any of us were going to live through it."
Lyda stared at her. She was still pale, but spots of color were high in her cheeks. Clearing his throat, Noah lifted the bottle of water from the side table. His other hand stayed on Gen's lower back, fingers stroking, sending a simple message. Easy. It's okay. She was shaking, tears thr
eatening.
Lyda pressed her lips together, then she shook her head at Noah. As he lowered the water, she lifted her unbroken arm. "Come here, fierce rabbit."
Gen wasn't sure she was in the mood, but then Lyda's eyes did that thing they hadn't done since she'd woken up. She got that Mistress look, and a million things speared through Gen, breaking her to pieces and putting her together at the same time.
"I said come here."
Gen closed the distance, stepped into that armspan. Then she was sitting on the edge of the bed, her upper body curled against Lyda's, because she'd pulled her down so Gen was lying against her breast. Lyda wrapped her arm around her back, rubbed Gen's hip. "It's okay," Lyda soothed.
Her chin brushed Gen's temple as she gestured Noah close as well. When he knelt next to the bed, laying his hand on Gen's leg, Lyda ran her knuckles along his cheek. He gripped her hand, pressed his lips to it. Lyda's eyes became suspiciously bright. "My pets," she murmured. "My friends." Her gaze shifted to Gen, back to Noah. "My family. I'm sorry. I'm very bad at this."
"Understatement," Gen said. "Selfish bitch." Her arms tightened around Lyda as she said it. Lyda pressed a kiss to the crown of her head.
"I warned you about that at the beginning, didn't I? Now, you said something about it being time to take my pills."
Gen pulled it together, though it took a couple deep breaths. Swiping at her wet cheeks, she rose and retrieved the meds. Noah unscrewed the water bottle. Lyda held out her hand for the pills, as imperious as a queen who'd demanded them all along.
Gen placed them in her palm. Lyda swallowed them, then opened her mouth wide, as if suggesting Gen would want to verify she'd taken them. Eyes narrowing, Gen made a point to bend down as if she was looking. Lyda snapped her jaw shut, gaze sparking. But Gen saw the haze of weariness take her features. Sitting up for a half hour could still wear her out, so an intense fight like that, short as it was, had drained her. Gen felt a twinge of guilt, but given that it had seemed to clear the air somewhat and her point about Noah had been received loud and clear, she couldn't really regret it.
When Lyda slid down gingerly, adjusting her body to accommodate all her aches and pains, Gen arranged the blankets around her, putting pillows where she knew it would help her to be propped.
"I snore when I'm on my back," Lyda muttered.
"Like a freight train," Gen agreed. "It keeps us from having to use a baby monitor. We can hear you in the kitchen."
Lyda shut her eyes, ignoring her. Gen glanced at Noah and stopped, catching a serious look on his face hard to decipher, but unsettling in its intensity. Before she could delve into that, he'd turned and left, headed back to the nursery. Lyda's hand settled on her arm, squeezed.
"Fierce rabbit," their Mistress said. A few moments later, she was asleep.
*
That was the turning point. Lyda improved even faster from there forward, especially when Noah planted the brilliant idea of treating her road to full recovery like workout and diet goals. Though her broken and battered body wasn't quite as willing to cooperate with Lyda's manic exercise zeal, the change in focus did give their Mistress a pseudo-sense of control of her healing process. It toned down some of her irritation.
Since their argument, Lyda had also treated Noah with such gentle courtesy Gen almost suggested she backtrack a bit into bitch territory, since she sensed it was kind of freaking him out. Or maybe that was whatever was preoccupying him since that day. She tried to get him to talk about it, but he shook his head, told her it was fine.
She wasn't Lyda. She couldn't make him talk when he didn't want to do so, and Gen had seen the dark terrain inside Noah even Lyda couldn't infiltrate. She knew Lyda wasn't yet strong enough to delve into that realm, no matter what Lyda thought. So Gen had to settle for hoping that, whatever was going on, it didn't fall in that territory.
They stayed busy enough she couldn't turn her full attention to it, regardless. In addition to Lyda's care, she and Noah were running the nursery. As she gained strength, Lyda gave them instructions on this or that from a wheelchair or crutches, but it still made for busy days. Marguerite had hired a part-time girl to cover at Tea Leaves, a Zone submissive who was a friend of Chloe's. Gen felt guilty about it only as long as it took for Marguerite to set her straight.
"Lyda and Noah need you right now. Family comes first. Your job is here, if and when you want it. Always."
If and when. Working at the nursery, Gen started to have an idea of why M had put it that way. As she did the books and she and Noah worked to cover things, it was as if she'd always worked there. She liked learning about plants. Though he'd told her of his horticulture studies, she was still surprised how much Noah knew about it, how much he'd enhanced his knowledge with Lyda's, and so she learned from him as well.
Once Lyda was strong enough to motor around in her all-terrain wheelchair, Gen particularly liked looking out the office window to see her directing Noah and her other employees in daily tasks.
As their Mistress's body started to recover fully, so did her intuition. Several times Gen caught Lyda watching Noah the same way Gen did, with pensive consideration. Or maybe she wasn't thinking about what was going on with Noah as much as with herself, because once or twice Gen had caught their Mistress looking at her that way as well. Which could be a good or not-so-good thing.
Because she wasn't sure she was ready to know which, Gen didn't push it. But she knew the day would come when it couldn't be avoided anymore. She had a feeling that wreck had been a turning point for all of them.
*
It was midafternoon. Noah and the others were out on deliveries and job sites. Gen was watering the potted plants around Lyda's patio. Lyda was at the patio table, working on some orders. Gen watched her in the corner of her eye. She now had a short crop of red hair. Still not long enough to have any style to it, but it enhanced the sculpted beauty of Lyda's face, the strong character there, the slope of cheek and piercing strength of her gaze, which rose as Gen spoke.