by Selena Kitt
“You said we wouldn’t get there for two damn weeks,” Boone growled.
“That’s just more time for me to make sure we’re on course. More time to think over what I know.” He gave K a nasty smile and sauntered off toward the flight deck, leaving Boone to grind his teeth in frustration.
“Oh dear.” Mom looked distressed. “I take it he’s still upset over Chall.”
Boone sighed. “Well, Chall was his touch-partner. And you know Loki—if there’s anything he does better than dressing up it’s holding a grudge.” He looked down at K who was sitting silently at the table, her face blank. What was she thinking behind those strange alien eyes? “K, darlin’, come help me clean up,” he murmured, putting a hand on her shoulder.
She shrugged it off and stood up, making sure to keep her distance from him. “I can manage myself. You do not have a responsibility to take care of me.”
“Yes, I do,” Boone said evenly. “You’re here because I wanted you here—because I need your help. Therefore, I have to make sure you’re taken care of.”
“You’re doing a fine job of it so far.” She walked over to the sink where Boone had stacked the dirty pots they’d used. “How do I do this?”
“Don’t you worry about it, K honey.” Mom was suddenly there beside her. “I’ll do these. You and Boone go work things out. And don’t worry about Loki, he likes to pretend he has a secret—makes him feel important. He probably doesn’t know any more than you do about what’s going on with you.”
“Thank you.” There was genuine gratitude on K’s face as she looked down at the shorter woman.
“Yeah, thanks Mom. I’ll do the dishes next time it’s your turn to cook,” Boone said.
She made a shooing motion at him. “Go on and get out of here. Both of you.”
“All right.” Boone jerked his head at K, careful not to touch her. It was clear that even the most casual contact still set her on edge, even though she needed it. “Come on, K.”
“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 gritt
ed 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 sometime 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?”
K looked away, anger and helplessness written all over her face. Boone wondered if she had any idea what an open book she was. As someone who had never had much in the way of emotions before, she had never had to learn how to hide them either. Now whatever she felt was plain to see.
“K?” he prompted gently.
“What was I supposed to do?” She struggled to sit up in his arms and Boone let her.
“What do you mean, what were you supposed to do? You were supposed to let me know you needed to be touched. That’s the whole point of you sticking close to me in the first place,” he said with a touch of exasperation.
“You don’t understand. I’ve spent my entire life avoiding contact with other human beings. And now you want me to ask you to contaminate me?”
Boone swallowed down his frustration. “I want you to ask me to touch you. When you need it,” he said, trying to keep his voice low. “I don’t want you to be sick or feel bad, K.”
“Even though I and my squad killed two of your crew?”
“Even though,” Boone agreed. “You need me, you tell me. Or just come up to me.”
She looked disconcerted. “Are you suggesting that I should contaminate you?”
“Sure,” Boone said, grinning. “I promise I won’t mind as long as you touch me with your hand and not the business end of a pulse pistol.”
“I have given you my word not to kill you until I get my suit back,” she said stiffly.
“I know that.” He chucked her lightly under the chin. “It
’s a joke, darlin’. It’s supposed to be funny. You know—humorous?”
“I don’t understand the concept. Nor do I want to.” She struggled again. “Could you please put me down?”
“I will for now,” Boone said gravely. “But I warn you, if I see you starting to shake and seize again, I’m gonna pick you up and hold you until it stops. And since you’re too stubborn to come tell me when you need to be touched, I’ll probably err on the side of caution and hold you more than I really need to.”
“What?” K looked aghast. “Why would you do that?”
“To keep you healthy, darlin’. Or you could just tell me when you need to be held.”