Page 48 of Threadbound

Although maybe Bran had been hit in the head and just hadn’t said anything?

Jamie walked over to the chair where Bran was still sleeping and carefully began to brush through his dark hair, looking for signs of an injury—discoloration, swelling, a scab or cut. He didn’t find anything, although now he knew that Bran’s hair was both thick and surprisingly soft.

He also hadn’t so much as stirred during Jamie’s examination of his skull.

Which was even more worrying.

Attempting to determine online whether or not Bran could have a head injury without any external indications of head trauma wasn’t particularly helpful, either—especially since Jamie hadn’t seen what his attackers had done to him before Jamie had stumbled upon them.

There were other possible causes he’d found for being unable to wake someone up, including meningitis, encephalitis, narcolepsy, a stroke, and carbon monoxide poisoning. Jamie was pretty sure narcolepsy didn’t last that long, and if it had been carbon monoxide poisoning, Jamie would probably also have been unconscious.

If it was one of the other three options, Jamie had no idea what to do about it.

The timer in the kitchen went off, and Jamie muttered a curse under his breath, then went to pull the meatballs out of the oven to cool while the pasta cooked for ten minutes. Technically he probably should have been using spaghetti, but Jamie hated trying to swirl the noodles, so he always got penne. He did exactly what you were never supposed to do and stood next to the stove, staring down into the noodles as they boiled.

Or maybe it was that you weren’t supposed to watch water as you waited for it to boil? He honestly didn’t know, and was too distracted by worrying about Bran to think seriously about it.

The timer went off again, and Jamie drained the noodles and then dumped them back into the pot because he didn’t own a big enough mixing bowl to not make an enormous mess when he mixed the sauce in. Before he did that, though, he looked back over his shoulder again—Bran still hadn’t moved, although Jamie did make sure he was still breathing before pouring the tomato sauce over the pasta and stirring with a big spoon.

And then he couldn’t stall having to wake Bran any more, and he had to decide whether he was going to try or pretend everything was fine and let him keep sleeping.

Jamie was terrible at lying, even to himself.

So he went back over to Bran in the chair, put his hand on Bran’s shoulder, and shook it gently.

Nothing.

“Bran.” Jamie didn’t bother trying to keep his voice quiet, although he winced at how loud it sounded in the tiny apartment after a day filled with silence.

Still nothing.

So Jamie shook his shoulder—the uninjured one—harder and raised his voice.

“Bran!”

This time, at least the smaller man reacted, his face drawing into a slight frown, although he didn’t open his eyes or seem to really be aware of what was going on.

“Bran, wake up.” Another shake.

It didn’t get him anything more than a slightly deeper frown.

The next shake legitimately worried Jamie—it was hard enough that it should have at least jarred Bran’s broken arm. “Bran!”

He was still asleep, and Jamie couldn’t bring himself to shake the poor man any harder. He already felt guilty about the last one, because he didn’t want to cause Bran any more pain. But Jamie also really wanted Bran to wake up.

So he went into the bathroom and got a washcloth wet, then brought it back in and squeezed it out over Bran’s face—it wasn’t sopping wet, so it wasn’t like he was dumping a whole bucket on the poor man, but it was enough that he was clearly a bit damp.

Thank God or whatever, it at least worked, and Bran sucked in a breath, spluttering slightly. The frown deepened, and then his vibrant green eyes cracked open, glaring a little at Jamie—who figured he probably deserved that for having gotten Bran wet.

“Sorry,” Jamie apologized. “But I couldn’t get you to wake up. Do you—Do you feel okay?”

Bran blinked, his gaze a little unfocused and his eyes a little dull. “I—No. I—” He swallowed. “I’m… tired.”

Jamie put the back of his fingers against Bran’s forehead, but since he’d used cool water on the washcloth, he couldn’t tell if Bran was too warm or his fingers were just cold.

“Just tired?” Jamie asked him.

Bran closed his eyes, and for a few seconds, Jamie was afraid that he wasn’t going to open them again, but he did, their fractured emerald depths dark with pain or sickness or exhaustion or perhaps all three. “No,” the smaller man admitted.

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