My eyes flared as the former sensations filled my head. Crazed kisses. Pale hands. A purple tongue. None of which belonged to Thayer.
“Kroven,” His name on my tongue sent tears to my eyes. I scoured the room, needing to see him, needing for him to know that I was okay. Terror tore a field through my chest. Why wasn’t he here? Did he know about the accident? Had I ruined our chances at getting help for the blood centers? “Where’s Kroven?”
Exo and Wallace had been on their way to Piper last I could recall. Oh fuck. Had Kroven…left me here?
I sat up in bed, panic taking control of my withered body. I needed to get the fuck out of here. I needed to scream but couldn’t find the strength. I had to find out what happened to the blood center.
Most importantly, I yearned to figure out why Kroven wasn’t the first face I’d woken up to.
“Bas, calm down!” Thayer cried.
“No!” I cried. I realized I was actually crying, my tears finally finding claim to my cheeks as they slid down.
The sound of the door opening filled my ears. A gasp and the sound of something dropping to the floor followed, and I fixed my gaze on the interruption of my planned escape.
Kroven stood in a puddle of coffee, wide eyed and jaw slack with surprise. Three foam coffee cups were still rolling thanks to the kick of the air conditioning that kept the room cool and noisy. He was frozen as we locked eyes, his filled with the red that told me he’d fed semi-recently, enough that he could see the state I was in.
Before I could open my mouth, Kroven ran over to me, dragging the chair on the opposite side of the bed from where Thayer was to sit next to me. He grabbed my hands and cradled them into his, a safety blanket of touch making my earlier concern wash away like a forgotten nightmare.
“Bas,” His voice wobbled and he covered it by taking our collective hands and kissing affection between my knuckles. “I’m so sorry I wasn’t here, but you haveno ideahow happy I am that you’re awake.”
Knowing that he hadn’t left me made my heart rocket around the confines of my body. I’d been so worried, so momentarily convinced that something else had happened other than whatever had afflicted me during the riot at theblood center. Something that my heart couldn’t take. But he was here. Kroven washere.
Hearing him talk about me like that broke me, the invisible damn keeping me from losing it all over his absence unleashing out of me like an explosion. He stood up and sat on the bed, pulling me into his arms as I sobbed into his chest. Wrapping my arms around his frame, I never wanted to let go. I just wanted to touch him, to feel him, be near him.
“Oh,blomsjett,” His nickname for me just made me cry harder. “It’s okay. You’re okay.”
Kroven stirred, his head moving toward Thayer. “I would’ve been here if it wasn’t for you and your brother croaking on about coffee.” No malice was audible in his tone, but I could practically feel the nerves Thayer must have been wearing.
Which brought me out of my sobbing so I could face Thayer to ask an earlier conundrum I’d faced upon waking up. “Wait,brother?”
I’d known Thayer for the better part of ten years. Notoncehad the mention of a brother, or any other family for the matter, had come up.
Thayer ran a hand through his hair, a tell I’d come to learn over the years that meant he’d either been caught, he was nervous, or a combination of the pairing. “We can talk about Troian later.”
“Why wait?”
The buzzcut version of Thayer appeared in the doorway, the sound of the door being opened lost on me in my hazy confusion. A doctor was behind him, clearly being the one I’d heard those medical terms pouring out of when I’d been slowly coming to.
My doctor was an older man, but he had kind green eyes that made me feel at ease. That ease left when he spotted Kroven, his eyes growing in size, but he cleared his throat witha fake cough to try and hide that he’d held any reaction at all to seeing the Orb currently cradling me.
I managed to dislodge myself out of Kroven’s hold, though the last thing I wanted was to be separated from him. He took a stance next to the bed as I geared up to hear the news. Thayer’s brother, who’s name was apparently Troian, walked over to his brother and waited, still crossing his arms like he was annoyed at just being there.
“Kidding, obviously.” Troian snorted, but there wasn’t a single hint of facial movement from him.
One thing at a time. I could yell at Thayer for not sharing this news with me later. Right now, I needed to hear what the fuck had happened to me.
“What happened to me?” There it was again, the directness. My head still felt a little foggy, still trying to wrap my brain around the fact that I’d been attacked, or at least damaged enough to warrant a hospital stay. “How long have I been out?”
“A little over a week.” The doctor nodded.
“Eight days, thirteen hours, and twenty-two minutes.” Kroven clarified, reaching over to caress a pattern across my hand as we both shared a smile. “And it was agony every second.”
“Yes, well,” The doctor coughed again, clearly uncomfortable by the display of slight affection. Maybe it was because we were in an obviously more-than-friends situation or maybe it was because we were gay. It was sometimes hard to remember that we could havemultipledegrees of bigotry aimed at us at any given moment. “You suffered severe head trauma during the riot at the blood center.” Sounds of shattering glass filled my ears, but the doctor distracted me with more details. “Your co-worker says someone deliberately kicked you in the face after you were knocked to the ground and subsequently trampled once you lost consciousness.”
Fuck. I’d been out that long? I knew that what had happenedwas bad, but it didn’t seem like I should have been comatose for that long over something that appeared so little to me. Then again, I’d always handled physical pain fairly well and had never beenkicked in the faceand then stomped overrepeatedly.
Babs’ face flashed in my mind, a sweat sheen of worry coloring my face. “Is Babs okay? What about the sangamar? Did anyone…” I couldn’t say the word. Survivor’s guilt screamed through me at the thought of anyone dying from the riot.
