Free Highland Fling by Krystal Brookes

laughed when it completely drowned her. Brodie bent down and quickly rolled up the legs He walked over to the wardrobe and brought back a belt.
    “It’s the type of belt that doesn’t have holes. It should be fine.” He placed it around her waist and she pulled it tight. “There are about twenty pairs of Wellingtons at the back door.  I’m sure there will be a pair that fit.” He tossed her a pair of socks and she stood up and twirled.
    “Sexy as hell,” he commented.
    Fiona walked into the lounge and found her phone so she could contact her father to organise for Bella to pack a bag of things for her. Her father agreed to bring over her handbag, the overnight bag, and her vet bag, which was in her car. She went over to Brodie’s desk and grabbed an elastic band to pull her hair back into a messy bun. Then they hurried down to the back door and she selected a pair of boots that fit.
    Once in the barn, Davey showed them to the pen where the cow was standing. Fiona walked around the cow and felt different parts of its stomach.
    “Get a bucket of warm soapy water, then you can go home to bed. We’ll get this,” she told Davey. He hurried to the other end of the barn and returned a minute or so later with the soapy water. Fiona removed the top half of the boiler suit and washed her arms right up to the t-shirt. She cleaned the back end of the cow, then pushed her hand inside and felt around. She had done this a few times before and had to admit that it was never as disgusting as she feared. She could feel the head and one leg of one of the calves.
    “Its leg is tucked under. It just needs moved. Go round to the head and pet the cow. Call her by name and pet her the way you would a dog if it was in pain.”
    “By name? It doesn’t have a name. It’s a cow,” Brodie scoffed.
    “Well, give it a name,” she growled back. “You’re going to sound bloody daft calling her ‘cow.’”
    “Wait till the boys hear I named one of my cows. I’ll never live it down.”
    “Don’t worry, I’ll misdirect them and tell them you used to have Spiderman swimming trunks.” She was working to push the calf back in to free its leg. It had to be a delicate operation or the cow could be badly hurt and end up needing put down.
    “There, there, Daisy,” she heard Brodie saying. “It’s OK girl. We’ll get your babies out safely.”
    She shook her head slightly. She couldn’t believe that ‘Daisy’ was the best he could come up with. But at least his talking to the animal seemed to be calming her and making her own job easier. She felt the leg ease into the correct position.
    Withdrawing her hand, Fiona stepped back and smiled to herself.
    “Everything is in the right position now. We just need to wait and see if her labour moves forward now. I’m not keen to do a C-Section.”
    “But you can do one if necessary.”
    “I can but I don’t have all the equipment. I could save the calves but I think Daisy would need to be destroyed.”
    “You see, that’s why we don’t name farm animals,” he muttered, running his hand disconsolately through his short black hair.
    “It may not come to that. In fact, I think we have a calf coming now.”
    Fiona stood behind the cow and caught the animal as it slithered out of its mother. She then lifted it up and carried it round to its mother’s head for the cow to lick her newborn clean. By the time the second calf appeared–a relatively quick and easy birth for a breach calf–the first calf was already standing on wobbly legs.
    Fiona walked to the end of the barn and washed her arms properly. The t-shirt was ruined and she took it off. She walked back to the stall with just her bra covering her top half and sank down on a bale of hay.
    “Are you trying out to be the cover girl in Farm Girls Monthly ?” Brodie raised an eyebrow at her.
    “Does such a publication exist?”
    “I don’t know but if it doesn’t, looking at you, it sure as hell should.”
    He grabbed her