Never Too Late by RaeAnne Thayne

canal.”
    “What can you do?”
    “Try to help Mariah hang on until the paramedics get here. With any luck, that will be soon.”
    “She’s in better hands with you than with some frazzled paramedics.” The gruff words sounded awkward and stilted but he meant every word.
    Her eyes widened at the compliment and she gazed at him with such touched gratitude that he had to grip his hands into fists to keep from reaching for her right there, despite the circumstances.
    Before he could do something so foolish, Mariah moaned a little and Kate hurried back to her patient’s side.

    Twenty minutes later, Kate’s nerves were as tightly wound as a bowstring and she was as sweat-soaked as Mariah.
    She had never felt so inept, all fumbling hands and indecision. During her ob-gyn rotation, she had participated in dozens of deliveries but only a handful of those had presented in labor as breech. All but two of those had resulted in C-sections.
    Her total sum of experience was in the controlled environment of a sterile, well-equipped hospital with all the latest diagnostic equipment, not in a small, slightly shabby motel in Shiprock, New Mexico, where she had little but a stethoscope.
    Every decision she made here seemed life or death. Never had she felt the pressure of her oath more keenly.
    If only those blasted paramedics would get here!
    She turned back to her patient. “Okay, I need you to hold on, Mariah. Breathe, sweetheart. Try not to push.”
    “I have to push,” the woman wailed. “I can’t stop!”
    Kate drew in a ragged breath. She was afraid they were past the point of no return here. The baby was coming, ready or not.
    She would just have to make sure they were ready. A quick check told her the baby’s rump was already presenting.
    Every moment she continued to try to delay delivery increased the chance of cord prolapse, where the blood and oxygen supplies were cut off from the baby with each uterine contraction.
    Fear was a heavy weight in her stomach, but she recognized she had no choice.
    While she was considering the best course of action, she caught sight of Hunter. He had angled his chair in the connecting doorway so he had a view into both rooms. Kate couldn’t see Claudia, but Hunter held little Joey on his lap and the boy was sound asleep.
    The sight of Hunter looking so solid and big, his eyes a deep, concerned blue, gave her an odd sense of comfort. She felt a little less alone.
    She turned back to Mariah. “Okay, let’s do this.”
    The hotel staff had supplied them with every clean towel in the place. They had already stripped the bed of all its linens and covered it with a plastic sheet, also supplied by the nervous desk clerk. Now Kate spread several layers of towels under Mariah and had her scoot to the edge of the bed.
    “I want you to lie on your side. It’s going to be a little awkward to deliver that way but that position will increase blood flow to the baby. That’s important right now since we don’t have any real way of checking for fetal distress.”
    “I don’t care how hard it is. Just keep my son safe!”
    Kate settled her into position just as another contraction hit her. Mariah cried out. “I have to push.”
    “Okay. Go for it.”
    With Kate offering encouragement and positioning help, it only took two pushes for the baby’s legs and torso to slide free.
    “You’ll be happy to know your OB was right. It’s still a boy. One more push and you’ll be able to hold him. Come on, now.”
    This was the trickiest part. A dozen possible complications rattled through her mind as she supported the baby’s torso in the crook of one arm and inserted the fingers of her other hand inside the uterus to keep the cervix from contracting around the baby’s neck and strangling him.
    On one high, thin cry, Mariah pushed again and pushed out the baby’s head in a gush of blood and fluid.
    “Lots of hair on this one,” Kate said, trying to hide her fear at the baby’s blue color.