Purity (Pure and Tainted) (9 page)

“Where are we going?” she asked, following him out of the mess
hall.

“To work off some tension.”

Chapter Six

“Sorry about the grav setting. I like to keep it around
Colossus-normal or I don’t get a very good work out and now it seems to be
stuck.” Boone was fiddling with the gravity setting controls on the wall of the
small, ill equipped gym he’d brought her to in order to ‘work off some
tension.’ But he didn’t seem to be having much luck.

“It seems perfectly fine to me,” K lied. In fact, it felt like a
huge, heavy hand was pressing down on the top of her head, crushing her into
the plasti-mat that covered the gym floor. Add that to the fact that her gut
was churning in a most unhappy way and her muscles were beginning to feel tense
and knotted and she was anything but fine. But she wasn’t about to admit that
to Boone. A Paladin did not admit weakness.
I
fear nothing, I feel nothing.

“You’re sure?” Boone looked at her doubtfully. It was obvious he
felt completely comfortable in the crushing gravitational pull that was being
exerted on both of them. Which made sense—it was what he was used to.

“Absolutely.”
K nodded. “I’ve been to heavy-g
worlds before.” She didn’t add that her suit had compensated for her,
protecting her from the majority of the added gravity when she’d visited those
worlds.

“Have you?” He looked surprised. “All right then, darlin’. If you
really don’t mind I’ll leave it. I have to spend at least an hour a day in here
hitting the weights or I start to lose bone mass from living in light grav.”

Well that certainly explained his impressive musculature. Not that
K cared about such things. “I’d like to work out too,” she heard herself
saying, despite the way her stomach was protesting that what she really wanted
was to go lie down and let it settle. But she couldn’t just sit against the
wall and do nothing—that would be weak. She would have to work through her
bodily discomfort—it was just another obstacle to overcome and that was how she
intended to treat it.

Boone was frowning as he lifted some adjustable weights.
“You sure about that?
It’s
one
thing to be able to stand being in a heavy-g environment but it’s something
else entirely to work up a sweat in one. It tends to be hard on you littles.”

K stiffened. “I am
not
little.
For your information, I am considered quite tall on my home world.”

Boone grinned. “Take it easy, K, that’s just what we Colossians
call people from light-g worlds. The same way you call us 'giants.'”

“Oh, well…” K felt silly. She knew she wouldn’t have been so much
on the defensive if she didn’t already feel so small and weak around him.
Insecurity wasn’t an emotion she was used to feeling and, like so many of the
new feelings that were barraging her lately, she didn’t like it.

“I can tell you’re tall for a little,” Boone went on, adjusting
his weights to Purity only knew what ridiculous amount before turning to get a
pair ready for her. “It’s nice to be around someone I don’t have to stoop over
to see,” he continued, frowning as he worked with her weights. “Uh, how much do
you want?”

“How much are
you
lifting?”
K asked.

“Oh, come on now, darlin’.” Boone shook his head. “We don’t have
to turn this into a pissing contest. I’m not Loki, you know.”

“And I’m not a weak little girl you have to take care of. I can
carry my own weight. You gave me the freedom of the ship despite your
colleague’s complaints and I intend to prove I can handle it—
all
of it.”

“By proving you can beat me on my own turf? I don’t think so, K.
That’s not necessary.” Boone worked on the weights some more. “Tell you
what—I’ll give you half of what I’ve got. That should be enough to make you
break a sweat.”

K wanted to protest but just then her stomach gave another lurch—complaining
about the new and overly spicy food she’d crammed into it no doubt. It made her
wonder
if she was going to be able to keep standing
upright in the horrible, heavy environment, let alone do a full workout. Still
she lifted her chin and took the weights which Boone carefully handed to her.
I can do this. I MUST do this. I fear
nothing. I feel nothing.

She was glad at once that he hadn’t acceded to her request and
given her weights to match his own. These were heavy enough—too heavy, in fact,
especially in the heavy-g environment. But she gritted her teeth and managed to
do several reps before a cold sweat broke out on her forehead and her stomach
lurched again.

K wasn’t used to this part of her body talking to her—let alone
relaying how extremely unhappy it was. Her midsection was well toned and well
behaved, her core muscles developed to give her strength and speed. It wasn’t
her muscles she was thinking of right now, though—it was her stomach. It felt
really, really
wrong.
But she’d been
stabbed, shot, shocked, and gassed during battle and had managed to keep going
through all of it—this discomfort in her stomach should be no different.

Except it was.

With every rep she did, she could feel the alien food and liquid
sloshing around inside her. The cold sweat was breaking out all over her body
and her hands were shaking. Worse, her muscles were beginning to lock up on her.
It had been over an hour since Boone had really touched her and the damn Erian
cravings that Loki had taunted her about were obviously kicking in.

The increasing unease in her stomach and the knotting in her
muscles was a vile combination but K didn’t know what she could do about it.
Boone was lifting easily, his gaze focused inward, obviously into his work out.
He didn’t see her distress and she wasn’t about to reveal her weakness to him.

Struggling, she tried to lift the right hand weight again…only to
watch it fall from her nerveless fingers and bounce on the plasti-mat floor.
The left one followed and then K did too, her stomach heaving as her muscles
seized and her vision blurred.

“K?
K!”
Boone was with
her at once, gathering her into his arms and looking down into her face
anxiously. “Is it the touch-cravings? You need to be held?”

“Don’t need…to be contaminated,” K gritted out. It was a lie but
she was damned if she’d admit her need for him. Besides, her stomach was
actually the more pressing problem at the moment. “Wrong.” She motioned to her
midsection where the green tie he’d given her to cinch the shirt-dress now felt
much too tight. “Something’s…wrong inside.”

Boone’s face darkened. “Fucking Loki and his fucking
helikat,
” he growled. “You’re just sick
to your stomach, darlin’. Gonna get you to the fresher in case you have to
throw up.”

“Throw…up?”
The alien concept eluded her but
Boone explained, while he rapidly carried her to the nearest fresher which
happened to be the one in his quarters. When she understood, K was horrified.

“You mean everything, all the food inside me…it can all come back
out
?” Just the thought made her feel
even sicker.

“I’m afraid so, darlin’. But maybe it won’t. We just have to be on
the safe side.” He sat her down on the fresher floor and gestured to the
toilet. “There, if you have to—”

Before he could finish K felt a sickening wave wash over her.
She thought,
he’s right.
It’s all going to come out.

And then it did.

K lost count of how many times she retched. Everything she’d
forced her stomach to accept—the pancakes, the bacon, the milk, and most of all
the horribly hot and spicy eggs—came up in a rush. The eggs burned just as much
coming up as they had going down—more, even.

Boone knelt behind her as well as he could in the cramped space
and kept her braid out of the way. Murmuring words of comfort, he rubbed
between her shoulder blades. It wasn’t the skin-to-skin contact her body craved
but it did help some—or would have if she wasn’t busy being so wretchedly sick.

At last it seemed to be over. K groaned and collapsed only to be
caught in Boone’s massive arms. “Here,” she heard him murmur. “Drink this.” She
wanted to protest that she never wanted to eat or drink anything again but it
was only water. He helped her wash out her mouth and the cool liquid felt
soothing to her burning throat.

“Thank…you,” she managed to croak. Her stomach felt more at ease
now but her muscles were still tense and knotted.

Boone seemed to know what she needed.

“We need to get this out of the way,” K heard him say. She felt
the shirt-dress being removed and then, with a little maneuvering, he took off
his own shirt as well. Then he held her to his bare chest, cradling her
carefully as though she was an infant. He draped the shirt-dress lightly over
her shivering body to hide her breasts and sex and then lifted her and took her
into his sleeping area.

K had never felt so incapacitated in her life—so
helpless.
Not even the night before when
the touch-cravings had hit her for the first time. Boone literally could have
done anything to her—anything at all—and she couldn’t have stopped him. All he
did, however, was
sit
in a strange chair that swayed
back and forth and hold her. K would have thought that the swaying motion would
make her feel wrong inside again but instead it was oddly comforting. As were
his arms around her and the soothing words he was whispering into her hair.

I’m being contaminated—I shouldn’t
like this.
Shouldn’t feel comforted or soothed by it.
But she was and there didn’t seem
to be anything she could do to stop the traitorous feelings from flowing over
her. Without knowing quite how it happened, K fell asleep.

* * * * *

Boone held her close as he sat in the rocking chair, feeling
strangely protective of her. This was
all his
fault
and he was angry at himself for letting it happen in the first place. He was
responsible for K no matter what she said. After all, he was the one who had
lured her and her squad into a trap. He was the one who had cut the damn suit
off her—it might have been poisoning her but it had also been protecting her,
in some ways.
And
he was the one
she’d imprinted on—whatever the hell that meant and damn Loki for being so
close-mouthed.

What it all amounted to was that despite the fact that K was a
cold blooded killer who claimed to feel nothing, Boone found he wanted to take
care of
her.

Well you’re doing a great job so
far. Letting her eat that damned helikat—she’d never had a single bite of food
before and then she put down enough of that damn pepper flower spice to put a
grown man in the med center. Then you take her into a heavy-g environment and
let her lift weights that are way too heavy for her. Yeah, great going
Boone—you’re a winner when it comes to taking care of females.

Of course
that
line of
thought led him back to Shayla and the ways he had failed her. The guilt was a
heavier burden than any artificial g-force but there was nothing he could do
about it now. Nothing but
try
to do a better job with
K and get his little sister back…

He was glad when K’s eyelids fluttered open some time later. It
gave him something to think about besides his self-recrimination. He frowned
when he saw them, though. Was there just a little more white around the outer
edges of her eyes than there had been before? And if so, was it normal that the
black cloud that covered her sclera seemed to be shrinking? The thoughts were
driven out of his head when she spoke, however.

“Boone?” Her voice was low and drowsy, not quite awake yet.

“Hey.” He looked down at her anxiously. “
You
feeling
okay, darlin’?”

“Feel…different.
Lighter.”

“Probably because we’re out of the
heavy-g room.
And because you’re not full anymore.”

“No. I’m…completely empty.” She closed her eyes briefly. “Purity,
but that was awful. I never want to eat again.”

“Don’t say that,” Boone said earnestly. “You just had a bad first
experience. I shouldn’t have let you eat that
helikat
Loki was daring you with. And then taking you into the gym
and letting you work out at three times the gravity you were used to—well, that
was
really
stupid of me.”

She frowned up at him, clearly confused. “You admit your errors?”

“Sure, when I make them. Don’t you?”

“We do not admit weakness or errors in judgment. We simply forge
ahead.”

“More wisdom from the best seller
How to Win Friends and Influence Purists
,
huh?”
Boone
said dryly. “That’s great, darlin’ but speaking of weakness, you weren’t just
sick at your stomach, were you?”

“I don’t know what you mean.” Her eyes were evasive but Boone
caught them
with his own
anyway and held her gaze.

“Yes you do. I could see the way your muscles were starting to
seize. If I hadn’t picked you up and touched you when I did you would have had
two problems to deal with instead of one. Am I right?”