ShiftinDirty-ElizaGayle (14 page)

Nikki and Gage exchanged looks.

“She’s a doctor?”

“Nurse. But I swear if it’s medically possible, she’s seen it. Her stories are pretty creepy and quite detailed sometimes.”

“But that’s over two hours away.” Gage looked at Nikki when he said it, who nodded her head before doubling over in pain again.

“Shit. Nikki are you okay?”

Her head reared up, pinning Gage with a vicious glare. “I’m fucking having a baby right now. What the hell do you think?”

Sienna steered her away from Gage and over to a chair. “You need to sit down and try to stay calm. I know you’re in pain but we’ve got to figure out what to do. Can you do that for me?”

She was trying to channel Marcy when she had to be firm to get through a patient’s panic. “Wait. What time is it?” She pulled her phone from her pocket and turned it on. Six thirty. “Marcy can help. She’s a nurse. She’ll come here and help.”

“I don’t think this baby is going to wait that long.” Nikki hissed through another contraction. They were practically coming one on top of the other.
 

“She is a rotating nurse for a network of hospitals. It so happens that today is Saturday and she works at St. Vincent’s on Saturday. That’s only about forty minutes from here I think.”

“Sienna, this is not a good idea. Another human is more trouble than we can handle right now.”

“Nikki is right.”

“I know she is. But right now we don’t have a choice. Do you have another shifter to call in to help her have this baby? Please tell me you have some kind of were midwife on standby.”

“Not that I know of. We had no reason to believe Simon would be unavailable and there aren’t a lot of babies being born.”

“Unavailable?” Sienna choked on the word. “He’s not unavailable. He’s been kidnapped. We were with him only a few hours ago talking about drug therapy and complicated DNA and other confusing shit then he was kidnapped and now we’ve got a pregnant woman about to give birth and no doctor. This situation is out of control.”

Gage crossed to her and gripped her biceps. “Babe. You need to pull it together for just a little while longer. We’re all Nikki’s got and she’s going to freak out if you do.”

“I am not freaking out.” Okay maybe a little but she didn’t have to admit to that. “You and I cannot deliver a baby. What if something goes wrong?”

“Then we’ll take care of it together,” Nikki said. “I’ve never left a job unfinished and I’m not about to start now.”

Sienna wondered if she realized her words were snarled instead of spoken.
 

Between the other woman’s determination and Gage’s ready to take on the world attitude, she started to feel a little better.
 

Then she remembered Marcy describing how women in the throes of labor had a tendency to transform into their worst selves while going through that level of pain. They could not be trusted to make good choices under such duress.

“Do you know how to deliver a baby?” She asked Gage.
 

“Hell no. I’ve never even been around another pregnant shifter before this.”

“Well, neither do I. And if there’s one thing you and your family have impressed on me it’s how important this baby is to your kind. So I’m calling Marcy whether you approve or not. We need her help. So either get on board or get out of my way.”

“Damn, girl. You sound more like shifter mate material than I thought. Gage, you better not let this one get away.”

He smiled down at her, his gaze heated as he watched her. “Don’t worry, Nikki. I’m not letting her go anywhere.”

Sienna rolled her eyes. They were all crazy. Every last one of them.

“If we’re done, I need to make that call.”

Gage released her arms and lifted his hands in surrender. “Go ahead,” he said.

She searched through her call history and depressed the number she needed.

On the second ring, Marcy answered. “Sienna is that you?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh thank God. Where the hell are you? Where have you been? I’ve been trying to find you for two days. I was about to call the cavalry. Well, actually I already did but they said you had to be missing for more than forty-eight hours before I could make a missing persons report.”

“Marcy, shut up for a minute and let me talk.”

Her friend halted her tirade.

“Why, what’s wrong?” she asked.

“I need your help. Are you at St. Vincent’s?”

“Yeah, I’m about to leave since my shift just ended. Why?”

“Perfect. You need to enter this address into your GPS and break every speeding law to get here as quick as you can.”

“Wait. What? Where am I going? And why?”

“I’m with a woman who’s about to have a baby.”

As if on cue, Nikki started wailing across the room as another contraction tore through her.”

“Whoa. From the sounds of it, I’d say she’s close. You need to call 911 pronto.”

“I can’t.”

“Why the hell not? You’ve got a phone in your hand.”

Sienna sighed. For a woman who was completely open minded when it came to her sexual life, she sure seemed to only see the black and white when it came to the rest of the world.

“I just can’t. You’re going to have to trust me on this.”

“Are you in some kind of trouble?”

“I can’t say. Dammit, Marcy I don’t have time for this.”
 

The silence on the other end of the line kind of unnerved her. She gave Marcy a few beats to get her mind wrapped around what she was asking before she continued. “Please, Marcy. This is important.”

Her friend let out a heavy sigh. “Fine. But when I get there and we deliver this baby, you are going to tell me exactly what is going on and where the hell you’ve been.”

Sienna crossed her fingers behind her back. “Deal.” She wasn’t exactly superstitious but she did feel guilty for dragging her best friend into potential danger.
 

“I’m headed to the parking lot now. Text me the address and I’ll be there as fast as I can. First, though, I think we better go over some basics in case I don’t make it in time.”

Chapter Fourteen

“Goddamn it. I really need to push.”
 

“No.” Sienna said. Fifty minutes had passed since she hung up the phone and so far no Marcy. “Marcy said not to push.”

“This baby isn’t waiting for your friend anymore.” Nikki grabbed her knees and tried the panting exercises they’d been using to get her through the contractions.
 

“You’re a shifter and a badass. I can’t believe you’re going to let something like childbirth beat you.”

“Fuck you.”

“That potty mouth isn’t going to help unless you use it to breathe.”

“Sienna,” Gage warned.

“Hey, I get she’s in distress and in pain, but if we’re going to get through this she needs to put the claws away.”

She literally needed to. As the pain had progressed with the worsening contractions, so too had Nikki’s inability to control her body. She and the animal were at war for control.

“What is going to happen if Marcy sees her like this?”

“Then we’ll just get a witch to perform a forgetting spell and that will be that. She can go back to her little human world, with her weak human friends and forget all about the big, bad shifters.”

Sienna’s mouth dropped open at Nikki’s outburst.
 

Gage looked away.

“You’ll just do what? A forgetting spell? If there is such a thing why is this the first I’m hearing of it?”

“It’s complicated,” Gage answered.

“Then unfucking complicate it.”

“Look who has a potty mouth now,” Nikki snarled.

“Shut up and don’t you dare push,” she snapped at Nikki and then turned to Gage.

“Why was I not offered this spell?”

“God you are so damned stubborn. You’re a mate. That changes things. We need time to see how that plays out and the more time that passes the less likely a spell is to work.”

Sienna opened and closed her mouth. What was she supposed to say?

“You have to let me push.”
 

Sienna pushed away this new information and refocused on Nikki.
 

“I can’t. Marcy said your body would do what it needed to do without you having to force it along and by not pushing it could slow the process.”

“It’s not working.” Nikki yelled at her through gritted teeth. “The baby’s coming right now.”

She was right. After her refusal to move to a bed upstairs, the stubborn woman acquiesced to using one of the pool tables as a makeshift bed. Gage gathered all of the supplies Marcy rattled off and together they helped her in place after removing her clothes. Nudity among shifters was not a big deal, so she was reminded. They shifted naked so it was perfectly natural they saw each other in the buff all the time.
 

Sienna nodded her head during the explanation while inwardly cringing the whole time. No way ever would she be naked in the middle of a pack. Shift or no shift. She liked to keep some things private.

Not that privacy had been even a small consideration when Gage had made her scream out in the woods where anyone could have seen or heard.

Gage’s head swung sharply toward her, his eyes narrowing and his nose flaring. “What are you thinking about right now?” he whispered.

“No-nothing.”

“Whatever it is. Stop. It’s distracting.”

A wave of heat rolled up Sienna’s neck and into her face. This was not the time or the place.

“Okay, help her sit up and get her to the edge of the table.” She took the sheets and extra towels and made a pillow so Nikki would have a more comfortable place to rest. Then she turned and grabbed one of the chairs and pulled it close. As soon as Gage got Nikki into place, Sienna grabbed her feet and placed them on the chair as far apart as she could.

“We need more towels.”

“On it.” Gage disappeared up the stairs.

“You ready?”

Nikki nodded.
 

“Okay, good.” She glanced between the other woman’s legs. “The baby is crowning. As soon as Gage gets back here, you’re going to push on the next contraction. Understood?”

“Yes.”

She heard Gage return at the same time Nikki’s next contraction began. With her focus on the baby she did her best to ignore the claws tearing up the sheets at Nikki’s side and the throaty ear splitting yowl coming out of her mouth as the head eased free.
 

As gently as possible she cradled the baby—Shit.

“Stop pushing.”
 

Both Nikki and Gage screamed at her. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s fine. Gage be prepared to hold her if necessary.”

Nikki hissed at her. “What is wrong with my child?”
 

“It’s okay. We’re gonna handle this. The umbilical cord is wrapped around the neck.”

“What?”

“Nikki focus. I don’t have time to answer your questions, I’ve got to pay attention to what I’m doing. Gage!”

“C’mon Nik, she’s got this.”

Marcy had told her this might happen and explained what to do, but she was fucking scared. The baby didn’t appear to be breathing yet and the color…

She took a deep breath and slipped her finger gently under the cord and tried to pull it away from the infant’s neck. Too afraid, she pulled her finger free. “I don’t—I mean—”

“Sienna, relax. You got this, babe. You can do this.”

Hearing Gage’s voice directed at her gave her strength. She nodded and hooked her finger under the cord again. This time she slowly loosened it all the way around the neck until she had enough give and slipped it over the head.
 

“Oh my God. I did it. The cord’s free. Push, Nikki, push.”

Drenched in sweat and tears streaming down her face, Nikki dug deep and complied without argument. Her face contorted in agony and her screams sounded more animal than human but the baby was on the move again.

With her grip on the baby’s shoulders the door behind her crashed open. Both Nikki and Gage turned fierce, growling at the intrusion.

“What the hell?”

Marcy had finally arrived.

“Quick, Marcy I need your help.”

“But those two—”

“Shut the fuck up and get over it. I have a baby in my hands who isn’t breathing.”

That broke through Marcy’s shock and she hurried over. “Baby came quicker than I thought. Okay you’re going to stimulate breathing by rubbing your fingers along the nostrils from the corners of the eyes down. Fortunately, I grabbed a few supplies before I left.”
 

“It’s a girl?” Nikki asked. “I can’t see her.”

“Yes, it’s a girl. Give me a minute and she’ll be in your arms.”
 

While Marcy bossed everyone around Sienna followed her directions, stroking the baby’s nose. “Please breathe baby girl. Please breathe.”