Any Way the Wind Blows (Simon Snow, #3)(30)

I lay my arm atop the arm he has wrapped around my stomach. He’s champing at my neck now, sucking. He knows he can suck hard; there isn’t enough blood in me to leave a mark. “I can’t get enough,” he says, hot behind my ear. “Baz, help me. Help me. I can’t get enough.”

“I’m right here,” I say.

“I know.” He bites hard on my ear, pulls at it. “It’s not enough.”

“Simon…” I press my head back into his face. He grinds his nose in my hair. “Simon, are you saying I’m not enough?”

“No. ” He practically shouts it into my skull.

I push his arm away, forcing him to let me turn. I push him back onto his back, onto his wings; I push his head down with my chin. I hold his wrists above his shoulders. He’s still trying to bite at me.

“I’m right here,” I say.

“I know…” He’s growling.

“Tell me what you want.”

“I don’t know.” His tail coils like a steel cord around my leg.

I’m careful with my hips. Even as he’s mauling me. (Land mines.

Permissions. Boyfriends being boyfriends, etc.) “You smell so good,” he says, burrowing his face into the neck of my T-shirt. “I don’t know how to get enough, Baz—I don’t know how I’m supposed to get enough.”

I’m holding myself over him, my hands on his wrists, my knees bracketing his hips. He works his wings around us, pulling me closer. Then he latches on to my collarbone, right through my shirt. “You smell so good, ” he says, his mouth full of me.

Simon Snow smells like my aunt’s shampoo. He smells like iodine still.

Like ham. And butter. Like PG Tips.

He smells like sleep—sour breath and too-warm skin.

He smells like blood, always. His blood. Salt and milk and something burnt. (It used to be fire, now it’s ashes.)

He smells like sex.

I can’t help knowing this. Any of it. It’s in the air I’m somehow still breathing. But I don’t know what to do with it. What he wants me to do with it, what I’m allowed to do with it, what will help … What will lead to something strong enough to lean on between us.

I let him bite me. I let myself feel his teeth. I rub my face in the chaos of curls at the top of his head. “I’m right here, love, I’m yours.”

He growls, miserably, letting go of my collarbone, mashing his face into my chest again. “I don’t know how, Baz.”

“What, Simon.”

“To get enough.”

“You don’t have to get enough.” I push his wrists down. I pin his arms with my elbows. “I’m not going anywhere.”

His head falls back onto the pillow. I think he might be crying again.

Maybe he wasn’t awake. Maybe this is all a bad dream for him.

My hair hangs in his eyes. “I’m not going anywhere, Snow.”

“Come here,” he says. His wings are winding tighter around me. I can see the spikes curling over my shoulders. My knees give out, and my hips fall on him.

“Are you awake?” I ask.

“I think so.”

“Are you crying?”

“Yeah. Baz … come here.”

“I’m here.”

“Come closer.”

“All right.” My elbows give out, too. I let go of his wrists, and he wraps his arms around my waist. Arms. Wings. Legs. Tail.

“Closer,” he says.

“I can’t.”

“Can.” He’s kissing my mouth with his teeth now, lips and tongue almost an afterthought.

I try to retract my fangs, but it’s hopeless, so I turn away and let him bite my face.

“Baz.” He’s biting my fangs through my cheek. “Baz…”

I’m awake. I’m thirsty. I’m dizzy. All the blood I have left has gone to my cock, and I’m running on fumes. On good manners and bad memories.

“Simon, ” I say, with my last measure of caution.

He’s all around me now. His heels are in my calves. His tail is around my ankle. I can feel the bones in his wings, like long fingers along my spine.

It isn’t enough.

“Simon, ” I say, taking his head in my hands.

His skin is hot. So is mine. Under the blankets with him like this for hours, I could be mistaken for a living thing.

“Simon, Simon.”

He’s biting my neck, and I’m not biting his—but I am kissing him. I’m kissing his hair, his ear. I’m pulling up his shirt. “I love you,” I say. “I’m here.”

“Baz, I need—”

“Yes.”

“I can’t—” He’s pushing too hard to kiss. He’s holding too hard to touch.

I wrench my head back. “Simon, let me—”

He won’t let me pull away. His head is still in my neck. He’s panting.

“Baz, I can’t—I need you.”

I’m kissing his cheek. My fangs are out, I can’t care. “Simon,” I slur, “my darling, my love…”

“I can’t … breathe, ” he says. “It isn’t enough—It’s too much—I can’t—”