LITMIR.BIZ

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medical bag to the wedding rehearsal?”

      “Had to come here straight from the airport. I never travel without it.” She spared a second to wonder why. Had she thought a horse might turn up in first class needing a tracheotomy?

      “Oh.” They reversed direction and he whizzed her back into the church, where she swooped down and gripped the bag without losing speed, and then they were off again toward the parking lot, racing past limousines, the florist’s van and enough BMWs to start up a dealership.

      Her shoes weren’t made for running. She was in agony. “Has it been a normal pregnancy?” she said, thinking ahead.

      “Far as I know.”

      “Full term?”

      “Apparently. The baby is coming.”

      It was clear he hadn’t taken the proper interest in his wife’s pregnancy. Maybe he’d grown up to be one of those men who only looked good. But oh, wow, did he ever look good.

      “Here she is.” He flung open the back door of a still-running luxurious gray sedan. A blast of icy air emerged along with a piercing scream.

      “Where have you been? I’m about to drop a baby all by myself onto a church parking lot from the back seat of a freaking car!”

      Together Cecily and Will leaned into the car. Cecily was shoulder to shoulder with the muscles, hip to hip with the tight buns, smelling the scent of a deliciously clean, very hot man. He turned to her with a desperate glance. They were nose to nose, eye to eye, and Eros was shooting arrows like a madman, zigzags that shot down through the center of her body. Move over, Muffy, I’m the one who needs the back seat of this car.

      She felt the heat rise to her face. It had been an inappropriate thought, and fortunately no more than a thought. Will was looking at Muffy now, oblivious to anything other than the crisis at hand.

      “Muffy.” She could tell he was trying to be firm, but his voice wasn’t totally steady. “I said let’s go to the hospital, you said it was a false alarm, you said—”

      Cecily whacked him on the elbow and, wonder of wonders, he got the message.

      “Here’s the doctor,” he said, calm now and very gentle. “She’ll take care of you.”

      Muffy raised herself up on one elbow and left off screaming long enough to puff a few times and then say, “You don’t look like a doctor. Have you ever delivered a baby?”

      “Many,” Cecily said, taking a second out to put her hand on Muffy’s flailing one, trying to make a connection with the woman before they got to the hard part. It worked with cows and horses in distress. Maybe it worked with bitches. “Keep up your breathing while I prep.”

      “Forget prep. Wash your hands and get on with it!” A long, pitiful wail emerged from a wide, carnivorous mouth as another contraction consumed her.

      Cecily glanced at her big, chunky, utilitarian watch, starting to time the contractions. “Breathe, that’s right, breathe. Puff, puff, puff…” She dived into her bag, wincing at the sight of the huge syringes, the Veterinary Purposes Only medications and the oversized forceps, got out the antibacterial wash, poured it over her hands and slid them into sterile gloves, then slid a sterile apron over her sundress. “I’m doing a quick exam. Don’t push.” In spite of herself, she’d said it pretty sharply, because Muffy was pushing like mad.

      “Are…you…insane?” Muffy’s words came out sporadically between puffs of breath. “If I don’t push, how the hell am I going to get this thing out of me?”

      Cecily reflected on the advantages of delivering calves. No cow had ever mooed at her in that tone of voice. Nor had she ever delivered a calf with the bull running around in tight little circles, clutching a cell phone to his ear. Nor had she ever lusted after the bull, but that was another story. Soothing, that was what she had to be. Calm and soothing. “If everything’s fine, I’ll tell you to push. Just hold back for a minute, okay? You,” she said to the father-to-be, “hold her hand, help her with her breathing.”

      “Yeah, sure, that will do a lot of good, him holding my hand, helping me with my breathing. He tried to smother me once. Tell him to go away. He’s making me dizzy.”

      “What do you mean if everything’s fine?” That was Will, looking for something else to worry about.

      “I want to be sure the head’s coming this way, not the hooves.”

      “The what?” Muffy rose up on her elbows.

      “A doctor joke,” Cecily said, still struggling for calm and soothing. “I meant the feet, of course.”

      A loud shriek came from Muffy. A deep moan came from Will.

      “The mother is often not herself during delivery,” Cecily murmured to Will. “Don’t take it personally.”

      “She is herself,” Will said. “Muffy’s a hater. Just deliver the baby, okay?”

      “Righto,” Cecily said, wondering if Will’s marriage might be destined to end in divorce. Probably not. Men gravitated to bitches, confident in their ability to tame them. The worst of her lust attack was over, dimmed by the harrowing excitement of the impending birth as well as awareness of the futility of lusting after Will.

      A sigh rose from deep inside her anyway. Oh, well, if she’d found Will too late to have his baby, she could sure as heck deliver it.

      She didn’t have time or the equipment to do an episiotomy. But Muffy was fully dilated and the baby was crowning, Cecily noted with great relief. “Now you can push,” she told Muffy. “That’s right, push, push, almost there. Come on, you’re a trooper, you can do it—”

      Simultaneously Muffy screamed at the top of her lungs and the baby came into the world with a healthy cry. “It’s a girl!” Cecily said, swiftly clamping and cutting the umbilical cord, hoping the navel would equal the bridesmaid’s in beauty and symmetry. And as the sound of sirens drowned out Muffy’s shuddering sobs of relief, Cecily added, “A beautiful little girl and a fire truck, a police car…no, three police cars and—oh, wonderful—here at last are the EMTs, just when we need them least.”

      Cecily examined the baby while the paramedics gently lifted Muffy onto a stretcher and carried her toward the ambulance, ignoring the blistering she was giving them for taking so long to get there. Then Cecily handed over the child, explaining the conditions of the delivery as well as giving them a verbal checklist of what she had and hadn’t done. At long last, the ambulance doors closed and blessed silence prevailed.

      Alone in the parking lot, Cecily pulled off her gloves and apron, then wiped her forehead. She hadn’t seen Will leave with Muffy, but he must have. A tear of regret dripped down her face and landed on the toe of one satin shoe, matching the splash of antiseptic on the other. Then she caught sight of another pair of shoes.

      Loafers—Gucci. No socks. Her gaze traveled upward…on Will, who lay slumped against a tire.

      She’d always heard this happened—new mother did fine and new father fainted—but she’d thought it was an amusing contemporary myth. Apparently not. She crouched down beside him. “Will. Will!” She grabbed his hands and began to massage his wrists with her thumbs, then took his pulse.

      “What happened?” He sounded groggy, but he was apparently alive.

      “The baby came.”

      “Oh. Good.”

      Cecily stifled an exasperated sound. “It’s a girl.”

      “Mmm.”

      She raised her voice. “Mother and child are doing fine.”

      “I wish I were.”

      She’d had it. “Look,” she said, thinking how wonderful it was not to need a verbal bedside manner in veterinary medicine, “your relationship with Muffy is none of my business, but

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