The Tender Trap. BEVERLY BARTON

she all right?” he asked.

      “She’s been throwing up. She’s awfully sick. I took her a damp paper towel, but I swear she looks like she’s going to faint any minute now.”

      Without considering the possible consequences of his actions, Adam shoved the bathroom door completely open and brushed past the brunette. The door to the middle stall stood open. Blythe leaned over the commode, retching.

      Grabbing the wet paper towel out of her hand, Adam wiped her face with it. “Morning sickness in the evening? Dammit, Blythe, do you have to do everything backward?”

      Gulping for air, she slapped at the arm Adam had draped around her shoulder. “Leave me alone.”

      “I’m taking you home and we’re calling Dr. Meyers.”

      “I’ll be all right. The nausea is better. I don’t think I’ll throw up again.”

      “Come on, then.” Adam lifted Blythe in his arms. “You scared the devil out of me rushing off the way you did.”

      “For goodness’ sakes, put me down.” The words came out in a whisper. Blythe noticed the tall, willowy brunette smiling at them as they passed her on their way out of the ladies’ room. “Have you lost your mind!”

      Two waiters and the restaurant manager stood in the corridor.

      “Is something wrong, Mr. Wyatt?” the manager asked. “How may we be of assistance?”

      “Charge dinner to my credit card, and make sure there’s a nice tip included,” Adam said. “I’m afraid Ms. Elliott is experiencing a little upset stomach. I’m taking her home.”

      “Oh, dear me. Surely there was nothing wrong with her meal,” the manager said.

      “Not at all” The manager and both waiters followed Adam through the restaurant and out the front door. “My future wife and I are going to have a baby and she’s just suffering a little morning sickness at the wrong time of day.”

      “Oh!” All three men said in unison.

      While waiting for the parking valet to bring around Adam’s bright red Lotus, Adam held Blythe in his arms, refusing to put her on her feet despite her squirming and murmured threats.

      The fresh air felt wonderful on Blythe’s face. She took a deep breath. Dammit, this being pregnant wasn’t much fun.

      “Why did you do that?” she asked, wishing he’d put her down, infuriated at the idea that they were making spectacles of themselves in public.

      “Do what?” he asked innocently.

      “Tell the whole world that we’re having a baby. Together.”

      “We are having a baby,” he said. “Together.”

      “I know we are, but you didn’t have to announce it to the whole world, did you?”

      “Are you ashamed that you’re carrying my child?”

      “Yes! No! I’m not ashamed of anything. I’m just embarrassed that you proclaimed loud and clear that I’m pregnant, and then carried me out of the restaurant with dozens of people watching. What about our reputations that you were so damn worried about?”

      “The fact is you are pregnant, and everyone is going to know in a few months.” When the valet parked the car and opened the passenger door, Adam placed Blythe in the seat. “Besides, we didn’t want Mr. Dennison to think his delicious food had made you sick, did we? And I did tell them that you were my future wife.”

      Closing the door, Adam went around and slipped behind the wheel.

      “For your information, Adam Wyatt, there is no connect time of day to have morning sickness. It’s just a term they use to describe the nausea that can hit a pregnant woman day or night.” Blythe slapped at his hands when he double-checked her safety belt. “And I’m not your future wife! I haven’t agreed to marry you”

      “Will you stop hitting me? I’m getting sick and tired of your slapping me every time I try to help you.” Adam started the engine and spun out of the parking lot.

      “Then stop trying to be so helpful.” Blythe crossed her arms over her chest and sat there sulking. Dinner in Huntsville with Adam had been a mistake. When he’d stopped by her apartment to pick her up, she should have told him then and there that she wasn’t going to marry him. If she had, the whole fiasco with dinner never would have happened.

      Hell! Adam thought. He’d never known such a disagreeable woman. Didn’t she realize that he’d been concerned when she rushed away from the dinner table, that he was still concerned? She was sick because she was pregnant. And he was the man who’d gotten her pregnant.

      If only she’d stop resisting him and allow him to help her. Was it going to be like this the whole time she was pregnant, throughout their entire marriage? If so, things weren’t going to be easy for either of them. He wasn’t used to catering to a woman’s whims, and it was more than apparent that Blythe was unaccustomed to a man taking care of her.

      Neither of them spoke a word on the ride from the restaurant to Blythe’s home on the second floor of a neat, but not so modern, apartment building in southwestern Decatur. By the time Adam got out of the Lotus and made his way around to the passenger door, Blythe had already opened the door and stepped outside onto the sidewalk. She held her house key in her hand.

      Oh, yeah, he’d forgotten. She didn’t want him opening doors for her, or ordering for her in the restaurant, or doing anything that hinted of old-fashioned good manners.

      Blythe gasped suddenly. The night sky swam around and around her. Groaning, she clutched the car door. “Not again.”

      She hated for Adam to see her like this. Sick and weak. He’d think she was just another helpless female. And that was the last thing Blythe Elliott would ever allow herself to become. Helpless. Her mother had been totally helpless. A weak female who wouldn’t fight back when her big, macho husband ordered her around, ridiculed her and turned her into a virtual slave. Blythe couldn’t remember her mother ever standing up to her husband. What she did remember, all too well, were the nights she had lain awake for hours listening to her mother’s pitiful sobs. She had sworn to herself that no man would ever control her life.