Charmed By You ((Destiny Bay Romances-The Islanders 5)) (19 page)

“Oh...” Heather glanced down at Lizzie’s foot. “Would you like me to give you a ride?”

Something hard came into Lizzie’s eyes. “No,” she said shortly. “I want to walk.”

“Then we’ll walk,” Heather answered with assumed gaiety.

They strode along silently for a moment, then Lizzie looked up. “Did you say that because of my foot?” she asked openly.

Heather hesitated, but looking into those clear eyes,
she had to tell the truth. “Yes. I thought it might be easier
for you.”

To her surprise, Lizzie grinned. “Don’t worry about me,” she said. “It doesn’t hurt or anything. I’m used to it.” She hopped over a rut in the road and Heather felt her heart twist. Why shouldn’t she try to help this child?

Lizzie was very brave, but wouldn’t it be wonderful if she could have her one defect corrected?

“You know what I would wish if a fairy godmother came and told me I had three wishes?” Lizzie asked as
they stopped to pet a skinny dog that had wandered out
to sniff at them. “First,” she went on, “I wish my mother
was never sick again. Then I wish Danny was the biggest
rock star in the world.”

Heather nodded, scratching the dog behind the ears and straightening to continue with Lizzie. “And your third wish?” she asked, though she thought she knew.

“I wish my foot was fixed,” she said firmly. “But there’s no such thing as a fairy godmother, is there?”

Heather swallowed hard to get rid of the lump in her
throat, but before she could answer the child, a shout
hailed them. “It’s Hector Gonzales,” Lizzie said, shading her eyes and staring at the boy who was running toward
them on the road.

“Is the doctor at your house, Lizzie?” he called. “Get
him quick. My mother’s having the baby.”

“Quick!” Lizzie grabbed Heather’s hand and they be
gan to run. “The Gonzalez baby!” they both called as
they rounded the corner and encountered Mitch heading
for the Jeep.

He was with them in no time. “You go on home and stay with your mother, young lady,” he told Lizzie, giv
ing her an affectionate swat on her bottom. “Heather,
you come with me.”

“With you?” She had no intention of going anywhere
else, but still she looked at him in surprise.

“Come on, we’ve got no time for chitchat.” He took
her arm and hurried her along. “Delores Gonzalez has
had four children already, and this one is bound to come
fast.”

He maneuvered her across the road and led her toward
a house painted flamingo pink. “Delores doesn’t believe
in doctors much,” he explained. “She usually has mid-
wives. But last time the placenta didn’t entirely evacuate, and she ended up hemorrhaging a week after the birth.
We nearly lost her.”

He opened the screen door of the house. “This time
we’re going to make sure everything gets done right.”

“We?” Suddenly Heather’s knees were wobbly. “You
want me to help?”

“Sure.” He went in and she trailed behind him into
the empty living room. “It’s only childbirth. Unless there
are complications, the mother does all the work.”

“But... I don’t know the first thing about childbirth!”
she wailed, truly frightened.

He turned toward her, put one hand on each side of her head, and kissed her hard on the mouth. “Then it’s
high time you learned,” he said crisply.

She wobbled, trying to recover, as he turned away
and called out to the inhabitants. She watched him, noting
the excitement that was coursing through him. He loved
what he was doing.

The boy who had called to them on the street burst
from a side room. “She’s in here,” he cried, jumping up
and down with anticipation. “She says to hurry.”

Mitch disappeared into the room, and Heather followed re
luctantly. She felt completely out of place, almost an
eavesdropper at a very private moment.

She might have saved her sense of decorum for a more
appropriate time. It was hardly needed here. Birth might
seem like a private process in her mind, but these people
obviously thought otherwise.

The bedroom was plain. The woman lay on a double
bed set beneath a huge crucifix. But the scene had none
of the stark terror Heather had imagined. There were no
hands clenching the bedpost, no wails of pain and anguish. Instead, the atmosphere was almost merry.

At least eight women and assorted children sat on chairs along the wall or played on the floor. There were calls of happy greeting all around, everyone seeming to have his own version of how labor had begun.

“Hello, Delores,” Heather heard Mitch say from some
where behind the crowd. “How close are we?”

There was a low murmur and everyone strained to
make out the words’, then a buzz filled the room as every
one asked one another what she’d said.

“Okay.” Mitch’s voice had the steel of unquestioned authority. “Everybody out.”

An underlying mutter swelled for a moment, but they
did as they were told, everyone calling to Delores in the
native language on their way out. Heather flattened her
self against the wall and waited for the room to clear. Then panic swept over her.

“Come here, Heather,” Mitch ordered unceremoniously, throwing her a sterile smock and handing her a stopwatch. “Time her contractions while I take a look at that cervix.”

The mother was a pretty woman with a round flat face. She was panting in a practiced way, her dark eyes
glazed over. Heather stared down at her, wondering how
one timed a contraction.

Mitch was pushing back the covers at the bottom of
the bed, and she didn’t dare look there. Instead, she tried
to smile in what she hoped was an encouraging way to the woman who seemed to be working so hard in front
of her.

“You’re completely effaced,” Mitch announced from the bottom of the bed. “Dilation’s at about seven cen
timeters. Any minute now.”

The panting slowed, and Delores began to smile.
“
Did
you get that one?” she asked Heather. “No? Okay, I’ll
warn you before the next one starts.”

Next what? What exactly was a contraction anyway?
Heather wished she were anywhere but in this stuffy
room.

“Don’t we need to boil water or something?” she
hissed to Mitch, but he shook his head.

“The ladies waiting in the living room are taking care of that. You just time the contractions and help Delores keep control.” He swore softly. “I forgot some things in
the Jeep. I’ll have to run out and get them.”

“Not now!” Heather cried.
“
Oh,
you can’t!”

“It’ll just take a minute.” He looked up and grinned
at her. “Great, isn’t it?’

Great? It wasn’t great at all. Horrified, she watched
him leave the room, then whirled to look back down at
the woman she was supposed to be helping. “He’ll be
right back,” she said, more to reassure herself than De
lores.

“Oh!” Delores reached up and grabbed her hand, pull
ing it down onto her huge stomach. “Here it comes. Feel
it?”

Heather’s first instinct was to snatch her hand away,
but as it lay there, she felt the soft muscles that sur
rounded the baby begin to harden and pull together in a contraction, beginning the supreme effort of pushing a newborn person into the world.

“Oh, I do!” she cried, amazed. “I feel it.”

“Time it,” Delores reminded her as she began her concentrated panting.

Heather fumbled for the stopwatch and pushed the button. “Oh, oh!” Delores gasped. “The baby! It’s coming!”

“No,” Heather whispered, clutching her hands together. “Oh, no.”

“I’ve gotta push! Can I push?”

“Wait.” Some instinct told her that if Delores felt she had to ask for permission, she probably should try to hold her back. “Can you keep from pushing?”

“Not for long,” gasped Delores, but she began to blow out furiously like a small beached whale with something
in his blow hole.

“Good, good,” Heather said soothingly, not sure what in the world she was doing. “Just keep doing that until Mitch gets back.”

“I can’t!” Delores cried. “Oh, I have to push!”

“No,” Heather ordered more calmly than she felt. “Blow out again.”

To her surprise, the order seemed to be just what
Delores needed to strengthen her will to keep from push
ing. Almost immediately she was blowing, puff after puff, and then Mitch was there.

“She wants to push,” Heather told him, and he nodded.

“Don’t push yet,” he ordered, slipping into a smock. “Wait until I’ve got my gloves on.”

He gestured toward the face mask which Heather
quickly helped him don, then the gloves from a sterile
wrapping in his bag. “Hold them out for me,” he said.
“Don’t touch any more than you have to.”

She did as he told her, and he dove into them with
both hands at once, then went to Delores and examined
her condition.

“Okay,” he said at last. “You can push.”

Delores cried out in relief and immediately began to
do just that.

“Help her,” Mitch told Heather. “Support her shoul
ders.”

Heather went quickly to hold Delores’s shoulders as
she pushed. The woman seemed to gather together every
bit of strength she possessed for every push, taking it all
in and letting it out with an animal growl of effort. Heather
found herself holding her own breath every time, men
tally getting behind and adding her own muscle.

“Nice head of hair,” Mitch said. Then a moment later,
“Here’s the head; go easy.” He chuckled. “He’s smiling
already.” Another push. “The shoulders—okay—you did it, mama. You’ve got yourself a nice baby boy.”

“Oh, a boy? A boy? Let me see!”

Heather watched, spellbound, as Mitch held up the tiny
infant, whose face was wizened and angry. His head
looked misshapen and a white crust layered his body. As
she watched, he let out a tentative cry, then gathered
strength and turned it into a howl of outrage. He was
absolutely beautiful.

Mitch cut the cord and lay the baby facedown on the
mother’s stomach. Laughing, he turned to look at Heather
and she laughed back with him.

“Fantastic, isn’t it?” he whispered hoarsely. “No mat
ter how many times...”

His voice broke and his eyes filled. Heather felt tears
sting her own eyes, and she smiled at him with watery
love. Suddenly his arms were around her, holding her
close, so very close that she could hardly breathe.

Chapter Nine

When Mitch let her go, he was all business once again. He bustled about telling her how to prepare the baby, making Delores push again to rid herself of the placenta, and beginning the stitches necessary to repair a few tears
to the perineum.

Heather did as he told her, enjoying immensely sharing the feeling of having accomplished something won
derful here today. But she also kept herself a bit apart, watching Mitch with what she hoped was an objective
eye.

He was good. He was damn good, and he loved his work. How could she ever have been so blind as to think
he’d come to the island to avoid facing his own lack of
skill?

He’d come because he wanted to go where his work
would make a difference. She could see that now. If only
she’d known before... If only she’d listened.

“Thank you, nurse,” Delores said sleepily as they
prepared to leave her to rest.

“Oh, I’m not—“ Heather began to explain, but Mitch
cut her off.

“Heather says ‘You’re welcome,’” he told Delores.
“’Anytime.’”

“Why confuse her?” he said as they were leaving the house to the friends and relatives who were celebrating the arrival of the new baby. “Besides, you’re the best nurse I’ve had in a long time.” Heather helped him stow
the medical paraphernalia in the Jeep. “So good, in fact,” he went on, “that you deserve a reward. How about some
beachcombing now?”

She tilted her head to the trade winds. “Don’t you have to make more calls?”

“Nothing serious. They can wait.” His eyes were smoky
with promise. “But I can’t.”

She climbed in beside him, and they started off with a lurch. Soon they were threading their way along the shore, and Mitch was pointing out various beaches.

“There’s a different beach for every taste,” he told her. “This one is a sheller’s paradise.” She looked out
at the black lumps of reef filling the lagoon like the coils
of a lazy sea serpent. “This, on the other hand, is better for snorkelers.” They’d rounded a corner and found a sparkling lagoon with water that looked as though you could see for miles in it.

As they drove on, Mitch slowed by a long sandy beach
at the mouth of a river. “This is where the lovers from the village come,” he told her. As they crept along, two girls in their late teens appeared from the brush along the side of the road, strolling casually toward them.