Page 8 of Doctor Holliday

“Fourteen.”

“Fuck.” Keaton clenched his jaw tight enough to turn coal to diamonds.

“Do you know what a contraction is?”

“No,” the girl wailed.

“It’s that pain you keep feeling.” Doctor Holliday’s voice was soothing. “That intense pain that gets bad and then eases for a minute.”

“I can’t do this.”

“You can do this,” the doctor assured her. “The next time that pain comes, you’re gonna push.”

“What do you mean?”

“Bear down and push really hard. Like when you have to go to the bathroom.”

“No.”

“Logan, sweetie.” Dr. Holliday leaned forward a bit on her knees to make eye contact with the girl. “I felt your baby’s head. This is happening. And it’s happening now.”

Sweat rolled down Keaton’s back. His neck and shoulders were so tense, they felt made of stone. The doctor looked intense but oddly relaxed.

“I need you.”

Keaton looked at the doctor with his heart in his throat. What the fuck did she need him for?

“What?” His voice came out scratchy and rough. He did not want to get involved in this. In fact, he wanted to run as fast as his blown knee and once broken ankle could carry him.

“I need you to hold her leg.” The stern command left no room for argument. “Normally, we’d have a nurse or two here. Maybe an intern. Lots of hands. Lots of help. A monitor for the contractions.”

“I’m not catching the baby.”

He would. If he had to, he would. Jesus, God, he was a compassionate person. He was adad. He would do anything to help anyone, but he didn’t want to have to catch this little girl’s baby.

“Nope,” the doctor shook her head, “you’re not. That’s what I’m here for. I just need you to hold her leg.”

Keaton squeezed his eyes closed and dragged his hands over his head again. He had never seen a fourteen-year-old girl’s naked bottom half spread eagle. Wasn’t something he ever wanted to see. But he had to help.

“Wash your hands, please,” the doctor said with a quick glance in his direction.

Glad for the tiny reprieve, he ducked into the bathroom and scrubbed his hands until they were beet red. Once dried, he chucked the used paper towels in the garbage and hung his head.

He hadn’t graced the inside of a church since last year at Christmas, when he and Ruby went to mass. But he said a quick, silent prayer that the girl in his stockroom would deliver her baby safely and that she would be safe when it was over—whatever that meant.

Logan wailed in pain again as he hurried to the back of the room to help. The doctor nodded at him as he lowered himself from a squat to kneel beside them. He knew what to do. Ruby might have been ten, but this wasn’t rocket science. He hadn’t forgotten how he and a nurse had stood beside Alyssa and held her legs as she pushed to deliver the baby.

“Logan,” the doctor said calmly. “Don’t yell. Just focus. Bear down.”

“I can’t.”

“You can. Your body is made to do this.”

“It hurts.”

“Yes, it does, I know.”

Doing his best to keep his gaze off the girl’s lower body, Keaton found himself looking at her face. Her cheeks still had a tiny bit of baby fat, though the rest of her was thin to the point of sickness. He wondered again who had done this. A fourteen-year-old girl couldn’t give consent. Someone had raped her, whether it was a boy or man old enough to know better or another dumb, snotnosed kid.

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