Page 46 of Flight of the Omega

XIX

JP was in a foul moodthe Saturday Amanda was supposed to visit. Jack didn’t think the omega could be blamed; he was fourteen weeks with the eggs, which was considered overdue for delivery. He had a nest. He was about as safe as he could be. Even sex and orgasm hadn’t helped. Jack had heard that was supposed to trigger labor in overdue birds, but JP stubbornly held on to his eggs.

Dr. Vogel disagreed with Jack’s stance on letting nature take its course. She frowned at JP. “No eggs?”

“No eggs,” JP confirmed.

She sighed and went back to the truck. Jack looked at JP. He seemed nervous, and Jack wanted to say there was no reason to force the issue; JP seemed well enough, and the eggs were all safe and sound.

Dr. Vogel came back with her medical bag. She made JP change into a nightshirt, then had him sit on the nest. She pulled out a long, cruel-looking needle. She told JP to turn around before she pulled it out, so he didn’t see it. Probably a good thing, because she pulled up his shirt, wiped his low back, then pushed the needle deep into his spine.

“Epidural,” she explained to Jack. Jack frowned. JP was the one she should be explaining to.

“What’s that do?” JP asked.

“Means you won’t feel what comes next,” she said. She jammed another needle into him. “That one will start labor.”

“Okay,” JP said as she stepped away. He lowered his shirt and shuffled around. “What now?”

“We wait.”

They ended up waiting a long time. They had tea. Jack went to the river to get more water, and he and Dr. Vogel went out and collected firewood. “I think it’s gonna snow,” he told her while they were out.

She looked up at the clear sky, bright blue between the dark pine boughs. “Really?”

“Yeah,” he said. “Wind’s blowing from the north. It’ll probably cloud over in a couple of hours.”

“Better bring in some extra wood,” she said. They trekked back to the truck and got the sledge she’d brought and the ax. They cut a lot more wood that way.

“Drinking water’s fine,” he told her. “We can always melt snow if we need to. It’s fresh up here, unbothered.”

JP was lying on his side, yawning when they got back. “Anything yet?” Amanda asked, and he shook his head.

“You should probably go,” Jack told her as he peered out the window. The sky had clouded over.

Instead, she went out to the truck and brought in more supplies. Then they moved the truck around the leeside of the cabin and put a tarp over it. Jack didn’t reckon it would help much, but maybe.

“Should’ve brought a snowmobile,” he told her.

“Hank will be by on one after the storm passes,” she said. Jack wondered what made her so confident in a guy she barely knew.

They had more tea, then dinner. They played cards for a while; Jack won every hand. Then Dr. Vogel gave JP another shot of the drug.

They waited until four in the morning for the drug to kick in. Jack had been napping; he and Amanda had been taking turns watching JP, both of them trying to catch some shut eye. The wind started howling down the side of the mountain, rattling their little cabin. He could hear tree branches snapping outside.

“Whew, okay,” JP was saying as the fog of sleep left Jack’s brain. “All right. Um. Ow.”

“You want me to get you some water?” Dr. Vogel asked.

“Yeah. Maybe.”

She moved across the room, the floorboards shaking under her feet. She tossed more wood on the fire, then got a bowl and came back to JP’s side. She wet a cloth and put it on his forehead. He glanced at her, then back down. “Thanks,” he murmured.

“Little bigger than the last ones you delivered, huh?”

Jack shook sleep off, sitting up. “Yeah,” JP said, “just a bit.”

Jack drew a little closer to the nest, frowning as he noticed JP was bare from the waist down, his legs wide. He was giving Amanda a good, long look at him, and Jack didn’t like the fact that someone else was looking at his mate, not even the doctor. He didn’t like that she had her hands on JP either.