Christmas with a Rockstar (Rock Revenge Trilogy 3.50)

“You’re ready?” Margo gripped his hand and screamed.

Lila came around the other side of the bed and grabbed onto her other flailing hand. “We’re here. We’re all going to do this together.”

Nick inched his way to the door. “I should leave you guys to this.”

“Coward,” Simon called after him as he zipped out of the room and into the hall.

“I’ll just go get some hot water or something,” Nick called.

“More like a damn beer,” Simon muttered.

Margo arched up and cracked his chin with the back of her head.

“Here we go. I think we’re ready to push.”

“Push?” he asked.

“Yes, push. Get this thing out of me.”

Simon’s eyebrows shot up. Thing? Their daughter wasn’t a thing. For once, he kept his damn mouth shut. He wasn’t birthing a baby. He was exhausted already and hadn’t even done anything. So, yeah, shutting up was definitely the better part of valor today.

The brief silence allowed them to clearly hear how the storm was raging outside. Out the window, the rain seemed to be falling sideways. God, that wasn’t good.

Nothing he could do about it now.

Time slowed to a crawl. He wiped Margo’s sweat away between contractions and told h how amazing she was about a thousand times. Anything to help, when he felt so goddamn helpless.

As quickly as she seemed to have gone into active labor, she stalled out in the middle. She was sagging against him weakly and he didn’t know what the hell to do. He looked at Lil

a and found an equally tired pair of blue eyes staring back at him.

“I can’t do this,” Margo said weakly.

“Of course, you can.” Lila patted her hand. “You’re a fucking warrior, remember?”

“I can be a warrior tomorrow.”

“No, you’ll be one now.” Lila glanced at Nora. “How’s it going?”

“She and the baby are fine.” Nora peeked under the towel. “Margo?”

Margo’s hand slid out of his limply. “Nope. No Margo here. She’s home, in a birthing center with lots of drugs. This is just one of my crazy dreams.”

Simon pressed his lips to her sweaty temple. “My wife is the strongest person on this entire fucking planet. And you’re going to push…” He could feel her tensing in his arms. He shot a look at Nora who nodded. “And you’re going to push right now. Right fucking now, Margo.”

He straightened her up in his arms with the help of Lila just as the contraction washed over her. “Push, dammit.” No time to be nice right now. She could kick his ass later.

“You’re right there, Margo. One more good push.”

She bore down on him. Bones crunched together in his hand, and Lila winced in reaction as well, but goddammit, she was a damn warrior.

Nora’s face went from expectant to joyous. “There we go.”

Margo sagged back against him. “She’s not crying. Why isn’t she crying?” She sat up and winced. But then came the most beautiful song in the whole world.

Raine’s disgusted yowl broke through the tension in the room.

Lila laughed and sagged against the headboard. She pressed her forehead to Margo’s arm. “Oh, thank God.”