Rest and Relaxation (Lesbian Romance)

by Rhavensfyre

  “Morning,” Dani mumbled.

  She shuffled to the table and sat down with a solid thud despite her boneless slump. The floor was cold beneath her feet so she pulled them up under her, then grabbed an apple from a bowl of fruit sitting in the middle of the table. She might have noticed her guest’s scowl or not, but she didn’t let Allyse know. It didn’t matter, it was her kitchen and her rules and feet on a chair was the least of her social transgressions over the years. She took a huge bite out of the crisp white flesh then wiped the juice from her chin while mentally running through the list of everything she needed to do today.

  Shape a new shoe for Polo.

  Shoe Polo.

  Hope Polo doesn’t go ballistic.

  That last one jogged her memory. Dani fished her cell from her jeans pocket and hit the number to her assistant trainer.

  “Ellie, did you remember to sedate him? What do you mean he only ate half? Well shit, that’s going to make for an interesting morning.” Dani hung up and rubbed her eyes in frustration, then groaned and folded her upper body across the table until her forehead met the cool grain of the wood.

  Damn horse knew something was up. He’s too smart by far, her thoughts were interrupted by the soft thunk of something being put on the table next to her nose. She opened her eyes and stared cross-eyed at her own handwriting. Mine.

  “Oh, bless you,” Dani said, gratefully peeling her head away from the table until she was upright enough to enjoy her morning caffeine. As before, it was perfect. Dani downed the hot liquid a bit too fast, ignoring the slight burn as acceptable collateral damage. She forgot all about her apple until she had downed at least half of her cup. “I so need this.”

  “Problem?” Allyse returned to her seat after refilling her own cup, then held it up in a mock salute before sipping delicately.

  “Nothing I can’t handle,” Dani replied, peeling the yellow sticky note off the mug. She wasn’t sure if the Cheshire cat smile and salute was a subtle kudos for how she had reclaimed her own beloved coffee mug or if Allyse simply liked her cup, either way, Dani had hers back. Now she just needed to figure out how to reclaim her turncoat dog. The kindle? She could take it or leave it. Right now she was more interested in Allyse’s reading choices than worrying about getting her reader back. Dani bit back an amused smile. She was very familiar with that particular title. She even had an old dog-eared copy of it somewhere in her bedroom.

  Dani glanced over at the kindle and wondered if she had made it to the next chapter. If Allyse was reading the paperback, Dani would know exactly where she was. Hell, she could probably quote the page word for word. Her memory was like that. She rarely forgot anything she read, and she enjoyed reading as much as possible. She never had to second guess what a character in a book meant to do or what they were really thinking. People weren’t as easy.

  Dani returned to her apple and smiled sweetly at Allyse before taking another bite. Would she blush or skip through the tastier bits? Inquiring minds wanted to know.

  “Do you always start your mornings so late?” Allyse asked. She sounded curious without a hint of condescension.

  Dani gave her a sharp look. Was she attempting not to be, well…so overbearingly Allyse?

  “Yes. Speaking of which, I do have to go now. I really need to get this done before the sedative wears off.”

  She stood up, downed the rest of her coffee in one shot and ran her cup under the faucet before turning to face Allyse. Dani was distracted, her focus already on Polo and the coming drama, but she felt she should say something to her guest before she left.

  “I’ll be back around lunchtime,” Dani said. She pulled on her boots then stamped a little to help her jean legs settle properly.

  “But you haven’t had any breakfast,” Allyse protested.

  “I’m on a pretty tight time line, especially if Ellie is right and Polo only ate half of the sedative she added to his feed this morning. If you feel like going out, the keys are hanging in the entryway and there are plenty of cleared paths if you want to go for a walk.”

  “Thank you, I appreciate the offer but I’ll probably just finish unpacking and then read a bit,” Allyse said. It felt strange just sitting there while Dani readied herself for work so she picked up her coffee and followed Dani out of the kitchen.

  “Sounds good to me.” Dani grabbed her cowboy hat and stuffed it over her sandy blonde hair before heading out the door. The smell of sweet hay and summer sun breezed in past her before she closed the screen door behind her.

  “Have a good day,” Allyse said, raising her hand until her palm almost rested on the screen. It felt awkward, and she dropped it, unsure if she was waving goodbye or attempting to entreat Dani to return. Allyse had never been much for old fashioned breakfasts, preferring a quick bagel or yogurt before shuffling the girls off to school, but she would gladly pour pancake batter and fry bacon if it meant Dani would stay a while longer.

  “You too.” Dani smiled at her from beneath the wide brim of her cowboy hat before disappearing around the corner of the house.

  Allyse stepped out onto the covered porch, pretending she wasn’t trying for one final glimpse of blonde hair and blue jeans. Cowboys had historically claimed a patent on sexiness, but Allyse had to edit that concept—the cowgirls were giving them a run for their money. At least one in particular, she thought. Allyse took a sip of her coffee and made a sour face. It was lukewarm and bitter. A whine bordering on pitiful caught her attention, and she looked down to find Callie gazing up at her, her mouth open and tongue lolling in what she could only describe as an amused doggie smile.

  “You think that’s funny, do you? Well, you and me are stuck with each other for a while so we might as well find something to do while we wait for her to come back, hmm?”

  Callie cocked her head and backed up, her tail waving in the air like a whirligig.

  “I guess you agree,” Allyse said, and headed back inside the now empty house.

  ***

  To say that Dani was not having a good day would be a huge understatement. It was days like this that she really hated uneducated horse owners and Polo was a good example of why. His feet were the product of a lazy farrier and a self-absorbed owner that had left him sitting in a field like an old tractor for a year after he had thrown someone, probably from the pain in his feet. Now the poor horse was gun shy about anyone messing with his hooves. Shoes meant pain and he had had enough of that. He was cranky and uncooperative and almost a thousand pounds of muscle and attitude, and that was the reason behind the need for a sedative. Dani was trying to teach him through new experiences that shoeing didn’t mean pain. Only after he learned that and started to trust her not to hurt him could she start trusting him not to accidently hurt her. It was a work in progress, with some days going better than others.

  Calming Polo down took longer than she had expected. By the time she had him in the crossties and ready to go, what sedative they had managed to get in him was already wearing off. Now she had a nervous horse dancing in the barn aisle while eyeballing the cross ties and her with great suspicion as she tried to keep his hoof between her thighs. He kept trying to pull his leg away and she had unclenched nails sticking out of his hoof, the sharp ends threatening to catch her every time he pulled away. It took all of her concentration to maintain her balance, remember not to let her temper loose, and shuffle between hammer, clinchers and clinch block. She was so absorbed in what she was doing that she never heard Allyse come up behind her.

  “Dani?” Allyse called out. The unexpected noise made her jump. Polo reacted instantly and freaked out. He pulled his leg out of her grip violently, then shied sideways as far as the ties would let him go. The last nail Dani had just hammered in scratched and ripped along her leather clad thighs, the heavy cowhide taking the brunt of the damage as Polo’s hoof slid down to land with a dull thud on the packed earth floor.

  “Goddamn it,” she hissed as a sudden sharp burning sensation made itself known immediately. The
sharp edge of the nail had caught her across the meat of her palm and along her thumb. The nails path had barely missed her wrist, but had left a ragged gash that was bleeding freely enough to drip down her fingers. It was damn lucky that she had on her chaps or her thigh would be just as bloody as her hand was becoming.

  “Allyse, get the hell out of here,” Dani gritted out from between clenched teeth. She managed to dig a bandanna from out of her pocket and wrapped her palm tightly with the thin fabric. It wasn’t much, but at least she could handle the horse long enough to get him back in his paddock without tearing her palm up even more.

  Dani ignored the dull throbbing pain in her hand to concentrate on Polo. She made small reassuring noises at the freaked out horse, trying to project as much calm as possible so she could convince Polo to quiet down. She didn’t look behind her to verify if Allyse had listened or not. Polo was rearing up in his crossties and Dani needed him to calm down before he hurt himself or her more.

  “Shhh, buddy. It’s okay,” she murmured over and over. Dani finally got him to stop dancing fretfully and lower his head to accept a reassuring stroke along his nose. When he had finally calmed down enough to let Dani pick up his hoof again she quickly finished up clenching the nails. At least one thing had gone right this morning—she had been on the last nail of the final shoe when everything went to hell.

  The initial adrenaline rush was starting to wear off, making the stinging, throbbing pain in her hand feel closer to hot pokers. Awkwardly grasping the clenching tool with her wrapped hand to finish the last nail was agony, but it had to be done. She couldn’t leave the sharp edge for Polo to cut himself on, and he might throw the shoe on top of that. It hurt like hell to grasp the clinchers but she needed to stay focused and calm so he would. “All done buddy,” she said, bribing him with the apple half she hadn’t eaten before leading him to his stall.

  Polo trotted out of his stall into his isolated paddock and headed for the far corner of the rectangular area. He ignored Dani to stare off into the distance where the rest of the herd grazed in a small huddle. He whinnied, a high and pitiful sound that was ignored by the other horses.

  “Poor boy, they don’t want you, do they?” She felt bad for the poor horse. He was scared of people and his own kind didn’t want him, either. The only one he got along with was Callie. He would actually snuffle her with his nose, blowing her long hair into odd parts while Callie tried to play with the solitary horse like he was a dog. Dani shook her head ruefully. She realized that she had acquired some very silly, very confused animals over the years. It was funny, but Callie’s high pitch bark was the one thing that didn’t send the high strung horse into a fearful frenzy. He would just snort and toss his head at her as if he was disagreeing with whatever the hyper dog was saying as she hopped and bowed around him. Now that Polo was taken care of, she could focus on her hand. The throbbing was becoming quiet insistent, a constant knocking on pain’s door that told her she couldn’t ignore the deep cut.

  “Ellie!” Dani bellowed out as she strode out of the barn.

  Her assistant trainer popped out of the nearby office door like a gopher from its hole. Dani never yelled, was never loud as a rule, so if she was making a fuss it was because it was important. “Yes?”

  “Can you clean up the tools for me? I need to go into town.” The composed request was at complete odds with how she looked. Tendrils of blood starting to escape from the bandanna to drip along her fingertips. Dani pulled off her shirt and used it to wrap around her hand, reinforcing her original bandage job and leaving her in just her jeans and a mostly white ribbed tank top.

  “Oh my God, do you need me to drive you?” Ellie asked as soon as she got close enough to see the bloody shirt wrapped around Dani’s hand.

  “I’ll take her,” Allyse said, interrupting the two women.

  Dani turned on her, ready to yell at her for creating the situation in the first place, let alone her injury.

  “I’m sorry, Dani. I left when you told me to, but I had to see if you were okay.”

  Dani stared at Allyse’s pale and frightened face and felt her anger drain away. It was useless. Allyse didn’t know any better and if there was any fault, it was Dani’s for not being more concise in her instructions.

  “I’m okay,” Dani mumbled.

  Allyse nodded at Ellie then took Dani by the arm and led her towards the house.

  ***

  Ellie stood there with her mouth hanging open and watched the two women walk away. She hadn’t formally met the strange woman staying with Dani for part of the summer but she had heard of her. Allyse De Leon. Commanding and elegant, she didn’t seem the type to accept no without a good reason. If how casually she had managed to disarm Dani and lead her away was an example, she was definitely a formidable woman.

  “Well now, isn’t that something?” she murmured, wishing Dani had let her touch her as easily as this woman had. Dani was notoriously a “no touch” type of person, which was a shame because she had quite the touchable body on her.

  Ellie bent down and retrieved the clinching tool from the short grass, then walked back to the barn to do as Dani had asked. The coals were still hot and had to be smothered as well. Ellie’s ironic smile had a history behind it. She felt a certain solidarity with the vanquished fire, having tried to stoke that fire a long time ago and failing miserably. Today she was glad she no longer entertained any ideas of competing for Dani’s attention. From the look on Ms. De Leon’s face, she had a feeling she would lose.

  ***

  Despite what Ellie thought, Allyse wasn’t as in charge of Dani as she would have liked. Allyse turned on the faucet while Dani dug around in a cabinet and produced a small first aid kit.

  “Dani, let me see,” Allyse said, using her best mom voice, the one that worked to soothe and reassure her children. She stroked Dani’s forearm in an attempt to help her relax and let her control her arm. Dani took a deep breath and released it, along with some of the tension in her arm. Allyse nodded and very carefully started removing Dani’s impromptu dressing. “This is going to hurt.”

  Dani hissed when the cold water sluiced across the open wound but didn’t pull away from Allyse’s firm grip. That looks bad, Allyse thought, carefully spreading the edges of the jagged slice to see how deep it was and to clear the last bits of debris. The water ran brownish red and then paled to pink before she stopped, casting a worried glance up at Dani’s face every so often to see how she was handling the pain.

  A clean dishtowel worked to dry the skin around the wound, then Allyse honed in on the wound itself, dabbing as gently as possible before inspecting her work. The wound continued to ooze slowly, which reassured her that Dani hadn’t hit anything major, but it was deep and nasty looking and probably needed stitches.

  Allyse felt like an idiot. Why had she gone out to the barn? The question beat at her with guilty wings. She was sure Dani was asking the same thing, along with a few other questions, including one Allyse was afraid to hear and probably included a timeline of when she was leaving.

  Allyse sucked in her lip and decided to bite the bullet. Dani hadn’t said anything to Allyse since they left the barn and she didn’t seem inclined to start a conversation now. It looked like it was going to be up to her to speak first and see where things went.

  “Are you okay?” Allyse asked very quietly, wincing in advance.

  “No. My hand is really hurting.”

  Allyse didn’t know if it was stoicism or bravado that kept her voice so level, but her pale and drawn face told another tale. It made Allyse’s heart ache. So tough on the outside.

  “I can imagine. The cut is pretty deep. I think you’re going to need stitches and maybe some antibiotics.” Allyse spoke matter-of-factly while she dressed Dani’s wound with gauze and tape from the first aid kit. “Let me get you a clean shirt and I’ll take you to the hospital.”

  “Son of a bitch,” Dani hissed. She hated the hospital. She hadn’t stepped inside one since her parents
died. Just the smell of antiseptic and bleach that never hid the other, less savory smells of sickness and death made her want to throw-up, but it was the false humor and smiles that were meant to encourage hope, that was what really bothered her.

  When Jay had refused to go to the hospital, she had breathed a secret sigh of relief. She gladly took on the role of nurse rather than have him live in a fishbowl governed by schedules and shift changes. They never turned off the lights there, not completely, and there was always noise…footsteps running down the hall like a herd of elephants charging at alarm bells. The inevitable wailing and the whispered apologies to the family members. It was worse than torture for the other patients, knowing that someone else’s number had just been pulled and death had missed them by just a few rooms.

  “I was hoping it wasn’t that bad.” Dani searched Allyse’s face for some sign that she was being overly concerned, but found none. It only confirmed what she already knew but didn’t want to admit. Sighing heavily, Dani let her shoulders droop in defeat. Her really bad day just kept getting worse. Her hand was throbbing like a bitch, and all she could do was stand in the kitchen cradling her arm and wait for Allyse to take her to the hospital. She couldn’t even drive like this, not with a stick shift, and the truck was too hard to maneuver safely with only one hand. Dani cursed again as that line of thought led her to the next one.

  Dammit…was she going to be able to ride? Dani pushed that unpleasant thought down, choosing to wait until she talked to the doctor.

  “Here.” Allyse had disappeared and returned in a flash, holding out Dani’s old sleeveless hoody. The tattered old thing was easy to pull on and instantly made Dani feel better. Had Allyse chosen the favored garment over something more appropriate for public wear? The idea made Dani feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

  “Thank you,” Dani whispered gratefully.