Chapter Nineteen
Corvus
“The furniture’s here.” Joshua waddled into the bedroom where I was getting dressed for the day. “It’s all in boxes and needs to be put together.”
“What? I thought they put it together as part of the service.”
“Well, if they do, they didn’t.” He blew out a breath. “I guess it’s up to us.”
“Considering they were delivered from the next town, it wouldn’t be easy to get them back, I suppose…but is it wrong if I like the idea of us building the furniture together? I’m so bored, I don’t know what to do.”
“I understand.” My mate was so large, he didn’t fit behind the steering wheel of his truck and that meant he couldn’t go anywhere on his own. He was trying to be patient, but even with the due date approaching, there was not a single contraction. “It’s a little exercise too, good for both of us.”
“I knew it. You think I need to exercise. I’m so…” He glanced down. “But I can’t even see my feet, so it’s not like I can take up aerobics or anything.”
“Mate, you know the healer wanted you to do some gentle exercise, like a walk after dinner to help you digest your food. It has nothing to do with looks, although yours are perfect.”
He parted his lips, seeming inclined to argue some more when the strangest look came over his face.
“Omega!” I leapt across the few feet between us just in time to catch him when his knees buckled. “What’s wrong?”
“You need to put the furniture together right now.”
“Okay, but that’s no reason to get upset. I’ll take care of it first thing tomorrow morning.”
“No, not tomorrow. Today. Right now. I’m not going to the healing center to have this baby until their room is fully ready.”
“No need to hurry. You aren’t due for two weeks. I’ll have it all done tomorrow by lunchtime.”
“Alpha? Listen carefully. I don’t want to repeat this again. I’m not having this baby until their room is ready. I don’t want them to be born and believe that we didn’t care enough to build their crib.”
“But the baby won’t think… Omega, is there something you’re not telling me?”
He let out a moan and grabbed for my arm. “The baby is coming, and we need to build their furniture.”
It took five minutes I didn’t want to waste before he agreed to go to the birthing center.
“The baby is counting on you, mate,” I urged.
“And they want to be born safely more than having a dresser for their little T-shirts. So, I’m grabbing your bag from the front hallway and then coming back to take you out to the car.
” I eased him down onto the hard-backed chair that was the only one where he found the least bit of comfort and patted his hand. “Understood?”
“I do.” He doubled over, panting. “But I don’t think there’s time for the…for the birthing center.”
“Omega, how long have you been having these pains?”
“I’m not sure. I thought they were gas until just now. But, oh my goddess.” He gasped as a puddle formed under him. “I don’t think they were gas.”
“Omega! You’ve put yourself in danger.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to.” His eyes filled with tears. “I never wanted that to happen. What if something goes wrong? What if I hurt the baby because I didn’t realize?”
Seeing his distress, I immediately felt like the worst alpha father ever. What had our healer said to us? To me? What was my primary duty when the birthing day came?
Keep my omega calm.
And what was I doing the second things heated up?
The exact opposite.
“Joshua, you didn’t do anything wrong. And the baby will be fine. Let me call the healer and see what he suggests.”
After a call with a lot of questions, the healer agreed that Joshua was not to travel. He might very well give birth right in the car if he did. Instead, I was to get him upstairs in bed and keep him calm until the healer arrived.
“Okay, omega. Upstairs to bed. The healer will be coming to you instead of you going to him.” I guided him up the stairs and helped him undress.
Every couple of minutes, another contraction came over him, and I began to get worried.
The healer should have been here by now. What would I do if he didn’t make it?
But I couldn’t let the panic take over. I’d never been the type to do that, but watching my omega in pain? That was more than I could easily handle. I gripped my phone in one hand and my omega’s hand in the other, listening to his panting breaths, reminding him to relax.
“Joshua, you’ve got to hang on. The healer will be here any second.”
“I’d like to, really I would, but I have to push.” He shuddered. “I’m sorry, Corvus. Do you know what to do?”
Not at all. But saying that wasn’t going to help anyone. “Of course.” I had read a book on how these things worked. But I didn’t have a lot of faith in my ability to manage it on my own. I’d just have to get the faith. “No need to worry.”
When the healer came rushing in a half hour later, after a fender bender where the other party insisted on calling the police for a report, he found us on the bed, a bundle wrapped in a blanket in my omega’s arms.
“This is Denice,” Joshua said. “She was in too big a hurry to wait.”