"Eeeeep!" I jerked and glared at him where he was currently rummaging around in my Cockadoodle Lane. "What the bloody hell do you think you think you are doing?"

"Saving our child."

That...

There wasn't really much I could say to that, was there?

Not that this was going to stop me.

"Connard avec un bâton à l'intérieur! Je vais te tuer et embrocher ton cadavre pourrissant avec le bâton susmentionné!"

Hey, don't judge me! I was a pissed off pregnant woman currently being split apart by my own spawn, with my husband's hand up my lady parts—and not in the fun way. I was not in a good mood.

"Silence! This requires concentration."

"Concentration? Do you even know what the hell you're doing?"

"Naturally. I've done this quite often."

That stumped me for a moment. Of all the jobs I had pictured Mr Rikkard Ambrose doing over the years, doctor was not one of them.

"You...have?"

"Indeed."

My eyes narrowed suspiciously. "With humans?"

Silence.

"Mr Ambrose! With humans?"

For a moment, I didn't receive an answer, until...

"No. Cows. But they can't be that different."

"You...with cows? Just wait till I get my hands on you! I'm going to show you a cow! From behind, when I ram your head up its arse! Tuhāḍē adara nū kīṛē khā jāṇa atē tuhāḍī'āṁ akhāṁ kānvāṁ du'ārā kaḍhī'āṁ jāṇa!"

From between my legs, Mr Rikkard Ambrose sent me a censorious look. "You have spent too much time with Karim."

"And you spend too much time with your hand up my bloody quim!"

"I didn't hear you complaining on the wedding night."

I opened my mouth to retort—and then shut it again. Hell! If only he weren't so good at saying stuff I had no good comeback to. I was just about to dredge up my last few active brain cells to find something, anything to say, when—

Pain!

Pure, unadulterated pain. It felt like a red hot rod of steel was rammed through a hole that was never meant for it. Little wonder, considering Mr Rikkard Ambrose had just shoved his entire arm up my private alley!

"It's time. I'm going to turn the baby now."

Oh, really? I would never have noticed!

"W-what the hell...! You could have warned me...gone slower!"

"I've heard it is best to rip off a medical plaster quickly."

My mouth dropped open.

Maybe. But what you just did isn't ripping off a friggin' plaster!

"Now, before we start..." He cocked his head, as if trying to remember something. "Do you need me to massage your udders? That always helped the other cow– ehem, patients."

My eyebrows twitched.

"I'm going to kill you, you know?" I informed him sweetly. "Once I find a nice stable full of cows, I'll stuff you with milk and hay till you choke to death! I'll...I'll..."

"...run out of foreign swear words?"

"I'm going to sic Patsy on you!"

"Now that is just uncalled for, Mrs Ambrose. Let's just proceed, shall we? Hold still."

"No, I'll run a bloody marathon!"

Mr Ambrose didn't deign to respond to that. By now, he was deep inside me—and not in the way I liked, unfortunately. His hand started to shift around and move, trying to get a grip.

"Ng! And Adaira!" I wheezed through the pain. "I'll sic her on you, too!"

No answer.

"Do you hear me? Do you hear me, you bloody bastard?!"

Still no answer. Apart from his fingers squirming around in my belly. I felt something shift deep within me, and...

Ugh! Merde!

Ah. So I hadn't run out of foreign swear words after all. Good. With the way I was feeling, I was going to need them. There were, apparently, a few things that were worse than someone sticking his entire arm into your belly. For example, someone fiddling around in said belly in a way that made you want to puke your guts out.

"I've got a grip on it now, Mrs Ambrose."

"I noticed!"

"Adequate. I shall start to turn in three...two...one...now!"

And then he really started to move. The next few minutes were a blur. A blur of pain, nausea and...a little yellow piggy in a nurse outfit?

All right, I probably imagined the last one.

"Thirty-seven...thirty eight....thirty nine..."

Was he...?

He was.

"Stop counting bloody degrees, you son of a bachelor!"

"How else am I to know when I have successfully turned the baby one hundred and eighty degrees? Forty-five, forty-six..."

"Next time I give birth, I'm going to have you locked up in a cell beforehand!"

"That would be difficult, considering the locks to most cell doors are produced by one of my companies. Fifty-one...fifty-two..."

Correction: no need for a cell! I just won't let myself get knocked up again. The moment I'm able to stand again, I'll go get myself a pitch fork. An ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure, right?

"...sixty-seven...sixty-eight..."

I swear, if he says "sixty-nine" in the current situation, I was going to stab him with a syringe.

After he's done, a small but determined voice whispered at the back of my mind. When my baby is safe.

Slowly but inexorably, he twisted his fingers. Inch by inch, I could feel him shift the little one inside me. In response, said little one gave him a good, hard kick.

Ha! Like mother like daughter!

"Ninety-three...Ninety-four..."

Of course, Mr Rikkard Ambrose, bloody implacable stone statue that he was, didn't even seem to frigging notice the kick!

"One hundred and fifty...one hundred and fifty-one..."

Just you wait, Mister! Just you wait till I'm in top form again. I've got a kick waiting for you that you won't be able to ignore!

"One hundred and seventy-eight...one hundred and seventy-nine..."

"I-is it time?" I croaked.

"Nearly."

Oh, thank God!

"I just have to remove the umbilical cord from around the baby's neck first."

Wait, what?

"Nurse!" Mr Ambrose barked. "Box 11-B, now!"

A tremulous hand emerged from behind one of the shelves. "I-I'm afraid I d-don't know w-which..."

"Useless! I'll do it myself!"

Before I could say a single thing, his hand had disappeared from my private parts, and he was at the other end of the room. When he returned, he was carrying a...

"Is that a clamp and a pair of scissors?"

"Astute observation skills, Mrs Ambrose."

"If I survive this, I'm going to take that umbilical cord and strangle you with it!"

"I look forward to it, Mrs Ambrose. Now be silent and let me work!"

I watched, uneasily, as he cleaned and dried the instruments with deft movements, bouts of pain reminding me of what was coming.

"I-is this necessary?"

He didn't even glance up, his focus unbreakable. "Our child has a cord wrapped around its throat. Do you want to find out what happens when that cord tightens?"

Involuntarily, I shuddered.

"Is...is it going to be dangerous?"

He froze—then, looking straight into my eyes, he reached out and placed a gentle hand on my shoulder.

"No need to worry."

"R-really?"

"Indeed. This happened on the ranch a lot, as well."

"The ra...Stop comparing me to a cow, you bloody son of a bachelor! I'm not a bovine!"

"Indeed?"

"And stop trying to irritate me to prevent me from panicking!"

"It's working, is it not?"

"Gah! Once I get my hands on you, I'm going to ram that annoying rock head of yours against a wall until I've managed to beat some sense into you!"

"Indeed?"

"And when I'm done cracking that granite head of yours, I'm going to look inside to see if there's actually a brain in there!"

"Indeed?"

Deft fingers reached into my lower entrance. There was a tugging feeling, and...

"Aaagh! That hurt!"

"Indeed?"

"Stop repeating the same bloody word! Why the hell do you keep saying that?"

"Because, in my experience with pregnant females, verbose arguments rarely lead to results."

"And let me ask you...how many of these 'pregnant females' have been cows?"

There was a moment of incredibly pregnant silence, during which he ducked between my legs.

"No comment."

"You icy bastard! Come here so I can strangle you, you—aaagh!"

Once more, a sharp pain flared up in my lower belly.

"Umbilical cord is severed. Now, Mrs Ambrose..." A pair of fierce, icy eyes rose from where they had been concentrating on their work to fiercely bore into mine. "Push!"

"...you down the stairs?" I wheezed. "With pleasure!"

"We have an elevator, Mrs Ambrose."

"How unfortunate."

"Mrs Ambrose—stop procrastinating!"

Darn! He'd noticed, had he?

I tried to swallow—without much success. My mouth was dry as sandpaper and my heart was pounding like a marching drum. The breath I tried to drag in got lost somewhere on the way.

It's really time, isn't it?

I'd known this moment was coming, but...not now! Not so soon!

"Mrs Ambrose?" A gentle hand reached out to touch my cheek. Luckily, it was not the one that had just been up my vagina. "It's all right. I'm here."

Deep, dark, unfathomable eyes gazed straight into my soul. Suddenly, I could breathe again.

"Now...push!"

I pushed. Sweat started pouring down my temples in a waterfall.

"Push!"

"D-do you think it will work better just because you keep ordering me around?"

"Quite possibly. Such has been the case with all my employees in the past."

"I'm your frigging wife! N-not your e-employee!"

"Which means I will not have to pay you for doing this, yes?"

"¡Voy a usar tus tripas para ligas, miserable perro!..."

"You can indulge in disembowelment all you want—after you bring my child into this world. So...push!"

I obeyed.

Gritting my teeth against the pain, I pushed. And pushed. And pushed. It hurt! It hurt so bloody much! Almost instinctively, I grabbed hold of Mr Rikkard Ambrose's hand, squeezing it tightly. And by that I mean cracking-granite-with-the-pure-force-of-my-grip tightly. If I was going to have to suffer through this, I sure as hell wasn't going to be the only one in pain.

"Push!"

I pushed.

"Push!"

And again. And again. I felt like a knight in battle, fighting against my own rebelling innards. And the worst thing...it wasn't just my own life at stake here.

Please! Please, let little Qwerty be all right.

Not that I'd ever tell Mr Ambrose that I'd called our child that.

"Push!" came my husband's ice-cold command again. Honestly, wasn't he affected by this at all? A proper father-to-be should be a blubbering mess in the waiting room, not a statue filled with stony determination that stood by his wife through every single step. He shouldn't be so bloody unaffected!

"Push!" Mr Rikkard Ambrose ordered, in blatant defiance of what reality should be.

I dragged in a shallow breath and pushed once more.

"Push!"

"I...I'm trying! I—"

"No excuses, Mrs Ambrose. Do it! Now!"

Blubbering mess in the waiting room? Yeah, right!

"Did you hear me, Mrs Ambrose? Do. It. Now!"

Right. No stalling.

Clenching my fists, I pushed again. And again. And again.

"H-how long will I have to do this?"

"Oh, not long."

Oh, thank God!

"According to statistics, just for about three hours."

"W-what?"

"Do not shout. You need to preserve your energy."

"I'm gonna wring your neck, you bloody son of a bachelor!"

"And I shall be happy to reciprocate—when this is done. Now push!"

And I did. For one hour. Two hours. Three. Or at least what felt like three.

"H-how long?" I croaked. "How long since...?"

"It's been about thirty minutes since you started."

Goddammit!

"Now," Mr Rikkard Ambrose told me in a comply-or-be-fired kind of voice, "push!"

I complied. And complied. And complied. For hours upon hours—for real, this time—I pushed and pushed until it felt like I was going to squeeze my guts out of my body. And still...nothing.

"Aaagh!"

Why? Why wasn't this working? Why—

And then, suddenly, it happened. I felt something give inside me. A moment later came a sliding sensation, just as if I were sitting on the toilet and...

All right, that was not a mental image I needed in my head right now. Not when it was already filled with maternal mortality statistics that I had made the mistake of reading some days ago, and that had been haunting my dreams ever since.

Let it be all right. Let it be all right. Please, let it be all right! If something happens to my baby...

"Mrs Ambrose? Lilly? Look at me." I blinked, trying to banish the tears of pain from my eyes, trying to see where the voice came from. Finally, I found the face of Mr Rikkard Ambrose, staring at me with indomitable strength and composure and...kindness? "Lilly? You can do this."

He squeezed my hand.

I squeezed back—and pushed!

--------------------------------------

My dear Lords and Ladies,

It does indeed sometimes happen that a baby has its umbilical cord wrapped around its neck. I am no medical professional, so please do take this with a grain of salt, but according to the information I looked up, it depends on the situation whether this is dangerous or not. Sometimes, babies are apparently born perfectly fine with the umbilical cord around their necks, while at other times, the cord needs to be removed to avoid strangulation.

And on that happy note, I wish you  a Happy New Year!

Yours Truly

Sir Rob

---------------------------------

P.S.:

Here are the translations of Lilly's exclamations in various languages:

You asshole with a stick inside! I'm going to kill you and skewer your rotting corpse with the aforementioned stick!

May your insides be eaten by worms and your eyes picked out by crows!

I'm going to use your guts for garters, you miserable dog!