Shifters Unbound: Mate Claimed Part 31

"Hmm," Eric said. "Not have my trackers in the room?"

"Diego's here, and he's pretty good at guarding. I'll stay, if Ca.s.s wants me to, and she might concede to have you here too. There are two doors into this room, both of which can be defended from the outside, can't they?"

Eric relaxed his stance and looked almost amused. "It will be a scandal, love. The old-guard Shifters will pa.s.s out when they learn my sister didn't have a ring of protectors two feet away when she dropped her cub."

"We can throw cold water on them," Iona said. "Please, Eric?"

Eric studied her, and Iona looked straight back at him.

"Shane, Neal, guard outside the rear door," Eric said. "Brody, Jace, Xav, the front. I'll stay in here and liaise."

Iona mouthed, Thank you. Eric returned her light kiss. "You're a radical."

"I hope so."

Eric gave her a deeper kiss, then went out the front door. The other Shifters, looking surprised but a bit relieved not to have to be in the actual birthing room, left as well. Xav paused to kiss Ca.s.sidy's cheek and clap his brother on the shoulder. "Good luck," he said to Diego.

"This is why I want you here," Ca.s.sidy said to Iona as Xav followed the others out. "The female voice of reason. That and I just feel better with you around." She stopped and sucked in a loud breath. "Oh, not long now."

Iona still felt a bit intrusive as the morning wore on, but Ca.s.sidy seemed relaxed and happy with her there. Ca.s.sidy had nowhere to lie but the table, but she didn't appear to mind. Diego pulled up a chair next to her, and their clasped hands rested on her belly as they talked to each other in low voices.

Eric returned. He held Iona in the circle of his arms on the vinyl sofa under the window, the two of them cuddling while they waited.

"Is it always like this?" Iona whispered to him. "Why won't they at least let her have a bed until it's time?"

"Shifters are allowed this room, no others," Eric said. "I've attended many births here-which is a good thing, love."

"I'll be fine," Ca.s.sidy said from across the room. Iona still wasn't used to Shifter hearing, which could pick up a whispered word at a hundred feet. "Eric and you are here, Diego's with me, and I have guards outside the door. The cub will come, and we'll go home and have another party."

"After you rest," Diego said sternly.

"Hey, I'm robust."

"Have you picked out a name?" Iona broke in.

"Amanda Kirsten," Ca.s.sidy said promptly.

"If it's a girl," Diego said. "If it's a boy, Carlos Robert, after my father and hers."

"Nice," Iona said.

"It's a girl," Ca.s.sidy said with conviction. "But I guess we're going to find out." She sucked in another deep breath, then let out a wail.

Iona was on her feet. Ca.s.sidy pushed Diego's hand away and fought to get up and turn over on her hands and knees. She wailed again.

"Call the doctor," Iona said frantically to Eric.

"No," Ca.s.sidy said. "No doctor. Not unless something's wrong."

"I'd be happier, Ca.s.s..." Diego began, his face damp with nervous perspiration.

"We've been over this, Diego. I do it myself. Eric."

"I've got you. Iona, help her undress. Diego, stand over here with me. We guard, and the females do the work."

Ca.s.sidy managed a laugh. "Isn't that typical? It's all right, Iona. I know what to do. I'll tell you, and you'll help me."

Diego did not want to leave her side. He scowled until Eric came to him, took him by the shoulders, and pulled him across the room to face the front door.

"Our job is to guard," Eric said to him. "We don't let anyone near her. You start protecting your cub now."

"The males say they turn their backs because that's the tradition," Ca.s.sidy said to Iona. "Really, it's because they're squeamish."

Iona didn't smile as she helped Ca.s.sidy out of her pants, top, and underwear. Naked, Ca.s.sidy climbed to her hands and knees again.

"Everything you need is over there," Ca.s.sidy said, gesturing at the longest of the counters.

Iona followed her direction and found a large basin, towels, and some scary-looking surgical instruments. She put everything on a cart and wheeled it over to Ca.s.sidy, feeling ineffectual.

"You really should have a doctor or a midwife," Iona said.

"I am a midwife. I've a.s.sisted in quite a few Shifter births. Now, hold me steady and don't let me fall. It's going to be tough. I wish I could shift."

"Hang in there, Ca.s.s," Eric said without turning around.

Iona took a deep breath and put her arm around Ca.s.sidy's bare back. "It's all right. I'll help." Iona knew, as soon as she said it, that she could.

"Thanks." Ca.s.sidy's smile was laced with pain. "You'll make a good alpha."

Iona gave Ca.s.sidy the barest squeeze. That remained to be seen.

Ca.s.sidy groaned again, the groan ending on another sharp cry. "I think she's coming."

Iona skimmed her hand down Ca.s.sidy's back. Ca.s.sidy had dilated quite a bit, though Iona saw nothing on its way.

"Help me," Ca.s.sidy moaned. "This stupid table is for humans, d.a.m.n it."

Iona helped Ca.s.sidy spread her knees, making sure she didn't fall off the narrow table. Iona then got towels ready and hoped she didn't have to touch the gleaming instruments.

If anything went wrong enough for Iona to have to even think about grabbing an instrument, she was getting a doctor, to h.e.l.l with Shifter tradition. Iona would not let Ca.s.sidy or her cub die on her watch.

Iona rubbed Ca.s.sidy's back and hips. "You're doing good, Ca.s.s."

"Hope so."

"I'm right here. Not going anywhere."

"Thank you."

The whisper ended in another cry of pain. Ca.s.sidy rocked her hips, her body shuddering, then suddenly, her skin became a leopard pelt, her hands, claws.

"No!" Iona shouted. "Ca.s.sidy, don't shift."

"Keep it together, Ca.s.s," Eric called, and Iona heard Diego swearing in Spanish.

Ca.s.sidy shuddered again, and then she was human. "She's coming!"

This time, Iona saw it, the head of a child coming from Ca.s.sidy's birth ca.n.a.l. Iona had never seen a baby be born, and she'd feared she'd freak out and run when Ca.s.sidy's cub actually started coming. But when Iona saw the top of the baby's head, something inside her changed.

A new life, a new beginning, a cub struggling to take its place in the world. That cub needed help, and Iona wasn't about to run away and abandon it.

"Come on, little one," she said. "You can do it."

"Do you see her?" Ca.s.sidy asked, excited.

"Yes, she's on her way." Iona wanted to cheer, to urge the cub on. Come on, girl!

Ca.s.sidy wailed again, the sound winding into a shriek. Iona spread the towels and reached for the cub as her head slid out. For some reason, Iona knew exactly what to do-not the human in her, but the Shifter.

"One more, Ca.s.s. You can do it."

Ca.s.sidy screamed. Diego cried, "f.u.c.k this!" and Iona heard his harried footfalls as he ran back to the table.

At the same time the cub, a human baby, slid into Iona's hands.

Diego's face nearly blotted out the baby Iona struggled to hold as he looked with great shock at his daughter. Then Eric was there, clearing the infant's nose. The little one inhaled her first breath and blared her unhappiness to the world.

Ca.s.sidy turned, the cord still stretching from her to the cub. "Amanda," she said.

She sounded so sure. "Yep," Iona said in a choked voice. "It's a little girl."

"See?" Ca.s.sidy said to Diego, whose dark eyes streamed tears as he touched Amanda's face. "I knew it was a girl." And Ca.s.sidy reached to gather her into her arms.

Diego came over all fierce as soon as little Amanda was cleaned up, Ca.s.sidy nursing her, and went out to bully the staff into giving Ca.s.sidy a bedroom where she could rest. Ca.s.sidy protested that she was fine to go home, but when Diego and Eric got her to the back bedroom the clinic finally allowed them to use, she drooped.

Iona and Eric left Diego and Ca.s.s to be alone with their child, and went to celebrate with the other Shifters who waited in the lobby. Jace, all smiles, kept breaking into a gyrating dance. Because he was as handsome as his father at thirty years old, the nurses at the front desk enjoyed feasting their eyes on him.

Iona's eyes were filled with tears. "That was so wonderful."

Eric held her close, kissing the top of her head. Shane and Brody fell into teasing each other and laughing, loudly, the bear brothers excited. Bringing in a cub-successfully, with mother and cub alive and well-was a cause for great celebration.

Diego came down after a time to report that Ca.s.sidy and the baby were sleeping. He looked wrung out, triumphant, radiantly happy, and exhausted. Xavier put an arm around him and declared that Diego could use a drink.

Ca.s.sidy had asked for Iona before she'd fallen asleep, and Iona gladly went back upstairs. Shane, Brody, and Jace stayed as honorary guards, while Eric said it was his task to go back to Shiftertown and spread the glad news. Neal went with him, his usually taciturn face bathed in smiles, the Guardian happily not needed today.

Upstairs, the nurses had rolled a baby bed next to Ca.s.sidy's so Ca.s.s could be near Amanda while they slept. Iona lay in an armchair, her feet over one of its arms, drowsing in the warmth of the room, the curtains pulled closed against the sunshine.

Iona didn't mean to sleep, but she jumped awake into sudden silence, knowing someone had entered the room.

Her Shifter nose told her it wasn't Diego or Eric or even another Shifter. She began to swing up from the chair, ready to fight.

Her hand contacted a human man hovering over her in the dim light, but though the man grunted in pain, Iona felt the p.r.i.c.k of a needle in her skin, and her limbs suddenly stopped working.

Iona tried to shout to Ca.s.sidy, but the floor rushed up to her, and blackness closed in. The last thing Iona saw was a man in a white mask bending over Ca.s.sidy and Amanda, and then nothing.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN.

Iona drifted to wakefulness, stiff, sore, and angry, though she didn't remember why she was angry. She also didn't remember the beds in Eric's house being so uncomfortable.

No, she seemed to be on a chair. Had she fallen asleep in the living room? But even those chairs weren't as uncomfortable as this one.

Then Iona remembered-she was at the clinic with Ca.s.sidy. She'd dozed off in an armchair while Ca.s.sidy and baby Amanda snoozed across the room. Then someone had come in...

The panther in her came wide awake, though Iona kept her eyes closed. The memory of the wrong scent, the human bending over her, then the p.r.i.c.k of a needle had her Shifter as alert as a predator spotting elusive prey.

Iona stretched her other senses without opening her eyes, not wanting to alert whoever had attacked her that she was awake again.

The scent of this room was different from Ca.s.sidy's room in the clinic. That one had borne the overlapping hospital scents of antiseptic, people, and the faint, faraway odor of urine. This room was dusty and dry, and the tickle of rust spores touched her nose.

Iona also scented Ca.s.sidy lying nearby and heard her breathing. That was a relief.

What she did not scent was the powdery, new-baby smell of Amanda.

Iona sensed no one else-not human or Shifter-and she risked opening her eyes a crack.

The only light came from a window high in the wall that showed a patch of twilit sky. The dim light revealed that she was in another hospital room, but one that looked as though it hadn't been used in a long time.

Ca.s.sidy lay on what looked like a gurney, her arms and legs unnaturally stiff. Iona saw why as her Shifter sight adjusted to the light-Ca.s.sidy's wrists and ankles were locked down with metal cuffs. A bag of clear liquid hung on a stand next to Ca.s.sidy, an IV drip snaking into her arm. Iona definitely didn't like that.

No one else seemed to be in the room or even outside it. Iona strained to listen, but her Shifter hearing picked up nothing beyond the door. Either the hallway was deserted, or the room was well soundproofed.

Iona had been tied to the metal and plastic chair on which she sat, but with ordinary rope. The rope was cheap, its p.r.i.c.kly, synthetic fibers chafing her wrists, but it was strong.

Not strong enough for a Shifter, however.

They still think I'm human. A normal human might not be able to extricate herself from the bonds, but a Shifter easily could.

The panther within her urged caution. If their captors believed Iona to be human, of minimal danger to them, she needed to let them keep on thinking that.

Iona scanned the room for webcams or other cameras or listening devices. She saw nothing, but that didn't mean they weren't cleverly hidden.

The room grew darker, night coming quickly in the winter desert. Iona contained her impatience and waited as the sun continued its descent.