"No more vending machine sandwiches for you." He crumpled the paper and tossed it on the pile spilling over the sides of the wastebasket. "Can you hold back the tide for a couple minutes so I can get us to a hotel?"

Her answer was the resounding echo of retching into the bowl.

Max leaned against the wall, then changed his mind and straightened quickly. "This place reeks."

"I am sorry I could not wait until the Ritz-Carlton," she spat, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.

He grabbed a handful of paper toweling and offered it to her, "Don't get bent out of shape. Clean off your face and we'll hit the road."

Snatching it, she hissed, "A fine way to treat a sick person!"

"Carsick is not sick. It's an annoyance, but it's not sick." He met her glare head-on. Her eyes seemed duller, and dark circles ringed them. "Oh, shit."

"What?" Her face blanched. She looked around the bathroom as if planning an alternate escape route.

"You've got some weird dog disease, don't you?" He backed away.

Her panicked expression turned to anger. "I do not have a dog disease. I am a little under the weather. Most likely from being violated by one of your kind."

Max couldn't help his grin. "So, are you talking about the Oracle now, or—"

"Go to hell!" She turned back to the toilet and groaned with a painful-sounding dry heave.

He wet a paper towel and knelt beside her to press it to her forehead. "Take it easy. Getting pissed at me will only make things worse."

"Perhaps I should not go on this trip with you," she whispered. "I will not be useful if I am vomiting and ill. I certainly cannot fight in this condition."

"Who said you'd be doing any fighting?" The thought hadn't crossed his mind. Not that he didn't believe Bella could hold her own. He'd seen her fight plenty, and been on the receiving end of her ire. But lately she seemed more fragile, far too mortal for his tastes. Before, he would have cared if she'd gotten maimed or killed. In fact, when she'd had him pinned to the floor in Nathan's bedroom, ready to drive a stake through his heart, he would have laughed his ass off at her demise.

Sex, no matter how meaningless, changed things. Who was he kidding? If she got so much as a stubbed toe on this trip, he'd call the whole damn thing off, Oracle or no.

"I am a Movement trained assassin. I will do my part in a physical skirmish." She didn't sound confident about it. Probably because of all the vomiting.

"Come on. We'll find a Motel 6 or something and call it a night."

He helped her to the car with an arm around her shoulders. For someone who'd just been squatting on the floor of a gas station bathroom, she smelled fine.