1 AUGUST 2020

Hector grins wide and clenches his jaw against the gasp trying to rip out of his throat, fingers dug just as deep in Simon’s hips as his fangs sit in Hector’s bare shoulder. They’ve sunk further than Hector usually prefers, but he can take it.

A groan creeps past Simon’s teeth, and Hector laughs into his short, black curls. “Easy. Fuck.”

Simon flexes his jaw, tearing Hector’s skin and shoving that stifled gasp out of him. He smooths his thumb along the base of Simon’s spine, nice and slow, a callus on the first joint dragging over each vertebra. If he’d known it would be a rough start to the day, he’d have offered to let Simon take what he wanted all the same, just maybe with a few ground rules laid out so he could still use his arms later. He wouldn’t trade those sharp little teeth for the world, but between his lip and his neck and now his shoulder, fuck if they can’t do some serious damage. Even after years of trying, Hector’s not sure how to anticipate it, whether he can, or what factors add up to good versus bad versus stellar. All he knows is he’d like to avoid nicking a bone for at least another month.

This time, Simon’s not clamped right on his clavicle, so things are looking up.

“Babe,” Hector chokes out when Simon shoves the tip of his tongue into the edges of the wounds, coaxing thick bubbles of blood up past the pearly white weapons still lodged in his artery and painting the sandy-peach canvas of his skin a deep, lurid crimson. Hector’s hands flex in place. “I said easy.”

A wet shkt and another embarrassing gasp hit Hector’s ears before he actually feels Simon’s teeth slide out of him. Simon’s mouth is on him again in an instant, cleaning the treacly mess with his tongue and muffling an irritatingly collected laugh against Hector’s shoulder while Hector leans back into his pillows with a huff.

“You’re a hypocrite.”

Hector misses when Simon’s hair was longer. The pronounced little ringlets still look good twisted around his fingers when he yanks Simon back by them, obsidian encircling pale feldspar, but it’s harder to get a solid grip when he can’t wrap it around his fist thrice over like a spool of rope. Simon yelps and his mouth falls open wide, and Hector holds him there for just a moment, marveling at the way the light from the sun lamp on the bedside table bounces off his face. Hector’s terrible for wanting to play with his food so much when it is, ostensibly, a mutual buffet where he is far more firmly on the plate, but he can’t help staring for a few more seconds at how the warm, buttery yellow draws out the soft olive hues in Simon’s dark skin, giving him a glow like…

Like when he was human.

Hector has his tongue in Simon’s mouth before he can chase that thought down the rabbit hole or Simon can snap his jaw shut, though if someone gets nicked, so be it. Not like the blood will go to waste.

The first two fingers on Simon’s right hand find new homes in the oozing pits in Hector’s shoulder, and all five on his left hand claw at Hector’s muscled back until the sting shoots electricity up his spine and he whines into Simon’s laughing mouth. It’s the laugh that winds him up, and Simon’s always saying he ought to work on his patience, but he never fucking means it and Hector’s happy to prove as much, shoving a broad hand past Simon’s waistband and dragging him closer by the ass, reveling in the stuttering breath he earns himself. They should be closer, skin-to-skin from hip to chest, and while Simon’s matching black-and-red briefs and sports bra are very cute, Hector needs them out of the way immediately. Releasing his grip on Simon’s hair, he runs his fingers down Simon’s spine, snaps the elastic around his ribs hard, and groans when Simon won’t give him another damn sound for it.

Warmth trickles from both their mouths as Hector pulls Simon back just enough to speak, tongue nearly tripping over the viscous swirl sticking them together. “Can you get this off already?”

Blood stains Simon’s full lips and square chin crimson, vivid against his skin where the light catches it and more so against his white teeth when he laughs, again, and Hector wishes he could bite the sound clean out of Simon’s mouth. “Could you learn a little patience?”

“Well,” Hector drawls, rolling the single syllable along his hard palate, “no. You’re bleeding me dry, and I’m gonna fuck you before I pass out one way or another. So.” He ignores another laugh and tugs the red elastic as far as it’ll stretch, basking in the sharp crack and the hiss when it hits Simon’s skin again. “You want me to?”

“And have it go the same way as my shirt?”

Well, Simon’s fault for coming back to bed half-dressed.

“I’ll find it later.”

“Your bedroom eats everything.” Simon huffs through his nose and props himself back with a palm on Hector’s chest, no longer finger-fucking the bite wounds in his shoulder, though their tips linger dangerously close. “And you’re being dramatic about the blood.”

Hector gawks, conquest on pause even as his grip on Simon’s ass tightens. “I am not, you bit me three fucking times! Deep!”

“No deeper than usual, I promise.” Simon searches his face for a moment, then slips the hand cradling Hector’s shoulder blade up to hold the back of his skull, fingers threading through his hair, loosening the tie still tangled in his light brown waves from sleep. Hector’s lashes flutter at the change in pressure, the cool rush of nerve endings remembering they’re alive flooding his scalp, and he nearly misses Simon saying, “I can prove it, if you’d like.”

The hand on Hector’s shoulder tenses and Hector along with it, head to toe, and he only needs one look at Simon’s self-satisfied smile and twinkling eyes to know that if he doesn’t regain the upper hand he’s going to die on the spot.

“No need,” Hector wheezes, pushing his whole hand under the band of Simon’s bra and shoving it up as far as he can until Simon takes pity on him, tugging it off the rest of the way and dropping it over his side of Hector’s bed.

Fair enough; it’d get lost in the dark red duvet and black sheets just as much as the rest of the room. Hector’s paying more attention to how his small tits bounce against his rib cage anyway.

Settling back into place, Simon bats his long, thick lashes exactly twice; Hector wants to slam him into the wall and watch them flutter uncontrollably. “If you’re certain.” Then Simon frowns, head tipping slightly to one side. “You do have to let go or these are never coming off.”

It’s sort of a crime for Simon—dear Simon, who almost bit Hector’s carotid clean open three minutes ago—to pull himself back together just long enough to taunt Hector until he’s spluttering and red in the face, but Hector can’t rightly complain when Simon fixes him with those blue-grey doe eyes and hooks his thumb into his own waistband. Hector wets his lips and lets his mouth hang ajar while he considers the plane of Simon’s stomach, the line of coarse hair he wants to run his fingers through, and the denser patch he wants to tug between his teeth, just out of sight.

On second thought.

Both of Hector’s hands move reverently, gliding around and down Simon’s body, catching on his tits and molding to every muscle and curve after. “Sure,” Hector says, ghosting his fingertips along Simon’s hips and dipping beneath the wide red elastic there. “Only…one thing first.”

Simon opens his mouth to say something—a protest or a laugh, no one will ever know—and Hector digs his fingers back into their places on his hips, fit to bruise. All at once he drags Simon’s body down hard and he thunks against the mattress, another lovely gasp tearing out of his throat. The way Simon’s arms splay near his head, wrists up and elbows out, nearly tempts Hector into throwing out his plan and holding Simon in place with his body, hiking his legs up and devouring him whole. He’s not willowy like René, whose matchstick limbs feel liable to snap in a stiff breeze, but sinewy with broad shoulders for his size and a deceptively soft waist, and every day Hector’s disgustingly glad he can haul Simon around like it’s nothing anyway. Helps when Hector’s twice his size and nearly a head taller.

Staring at the display beneath him, Hector chooses to indulge just a little, smoothing his palms over Simon’s arms and shoving his wrists hard into the mattress. “Keep those there.”

There’s a twinkle in Simon’s eyes that says he’s sparing Hector something just as mortifying as his earlier impudence, which is simple enough to ignore when Hector can crush their bodies together and put his mouth to Simon’s freshly shorn jaw, then his neck, teeth barely grazing his skin. Hector knows better than to bother the scars there, but he’ll never stop thinking about how neatly his fangs would fit in those puncture marks, a tidy one-two hovering vertically above his left clavicle, like they’d been his the whole time.

Every time those hollows peek out of Simon’s shirt collar, they tempt him.

Simon’s trachea rumbles under a fourth kiss. “So did you want me naked or not?”

“I’m getting there,” Hector sing-songs, willpower under fire, “if you would give me a fucking minute.”

“This year, if you please.”

If he insists.

Hector rakes his stubby nails through the valleys of Simon’s ribs and revels in the white-hot trails of inflammation blooming in his wake. Another yelp leaves Simon, louder than when Hector yanked his hair, and when his spine arches in shock, Hector splays a hand across Simon’s stomach to press him so gently back to the bed. Hector brushes his lips just past the hinge of Simon’s jaw, beneath his ear, and exhales slowly to force a shudder down Simon’s spine.

He could always switch gears; be gentle. After all, there is but one joyous bump in the road between them and having the whole damn day to themselves, and what sort of boyfriend would Hector be if he didn’t take advantage of all those free hours to fuck Simon over, and over, and over again?

The trapped-animal jerk Simon makes against Hector’s hand erases that line of thought entirely. He tugs Simon’s thigh up around his waist to slot their hips together, and instantly laments the fabric he hasn’t ripped off either of them yet, nice thick briefs and shitty thin boxers in a direct war against Hector’s dick. He sighs and nips at Simon’s neck, incisors only. “You are so impatient.”

Simon looks at him with an unfairly level stare and parted, still-bloody lips tugging the tiniest bit upward at one corner. “You like when I pretend to be.”

If Simon hadn’t been so desperate already, Hector really would bite him open, drink him half-dry and make him woozy and pliant. But Simon’s saucer-wide pupils and laser focus on the red pooling on Hector’s chin and seeping into his beard belie the truth behind his composure. It’s not like Hector’s ever been turned—no doubt something out there could mold a vampire into something else, though he’d rather not dwell on the possibility—but he’s got the gist over the years, how it eats and eats and eats at someone if they don’t get what they need. Born vampires have it bad enough already; what exquisite agony something even worse must be, the basest parts of oneself parched and undeniable.

Those same two cold fingers from before press right back into the nearly dry punctures in Hector’s neck, pulling new life from the wounds, and Hector screws his whole face up so he doesn’t shout. Instead he drags his nails down Simon’s flanks again while he’s stuck in place and revels in the high, shocked sound that catches in Simon’s throat and the way his lashes flutter when his eyes roll back.

When Simon’s brows and mouth relax, Hector noses into his neck with a beleaguered sigh that almost sounds convincing. “Couldn’t you have kept peeling open the last bite?”

“The first one bled better.”

“Yeah.” Hector scrapes his incisors over Simon’s collarbone, ignoring the eight-and-a-half-year-old marks he wants to claim for his own as he leaves bruises all the way to Simon’s shoulder, and bravely does not break even a single layer of skin despite Simon’s torturous, deliberate silence begging Hector to make him scream. “Because you aimed better.” Then Hector looks up again, eyes narrowed. “Were the rest just to make me hurt?”

“No,” Simon says, airily, while Hector curls two fingers over the front of Simon’s briefs and rubs slow circles against the jut of his cock. His unnecessary breath stutters a few times, and every twitching muscle in his thighs sends warmth through Hector’s skin where they’re pressed together, free hand planted where it belongs on Simon’s hip, his thick waist and chest keeping Simon’s legs splayed and his body pinned down. It’s like Simon’s synapses have forgotten how to fire, which is probably true if the sudden grip he gets on Hector’s bicep is anything to go by.

Those fingers hardly fit halfway around his arm. Hector laughs, almost grabs Simon’s wrist, kindly doesn’t, and keeps his pace. “Didn’t I tell you to keep those down?”

If there’s one thing that makes their long dry spells worth it, it’s the way Simon’s thick, shapely brows pinch together and his eyes slip shut at just the right friction, all strung out and sensitive. Being freshly fed never hurts, either—Simon never seems like he’s getting enough, which is worrisome, though Hector can’t deny the heady feeling when the thing Simon can’t get enough of is him.

He could never sustain Simon on his own—not even, he thinks, if he’d been the one to create the little monster—but it’s nice to feel needed.

“You asked for it.”

The short nails in Hector’s arm hurt in the way that makes him achingly hard, and it’s truly a shame he wants to fuck Simon so badly or he’d draw this moment out forever. He props himself on his elbows, mattress depressing beneath him, and drinks in Simon’s struggle to keep his expression level while he hooks the fingers of his unaccosted arm into Simon’s waistband again, folding it over itself and tracing his newly exposed prize. Planes of muscle tense and twitch beneath Hector’s touch as the rough pads of his fingers glide from supple skin to short wiry curls and back again; Simon’s mouth follows his body’s response, pulling flat in a familiar look that is equal parts piqued and pining.

He digs his palm in low on Simon’s stomach like he’s kneading dough, a tease as much as it is a warning, and slips further down his body. “For you to be a bitch?”

“For me to—” Simon crams his own palm over his mouth, releasing Hector’s arm and robbing him of a full-volume whine, and jerks against the hand pressing him down while Hector laves his tongue over Simon’s cock, dragging soft fabric across his skin with every stroke. What he can hear is still music to his ears with the keys just beneath his fingers, palms sliding under Simon’s legs to haul them over Hector’s shoulders. Simon tenses but doesn’t squeeze around his skull, and Hector drives his thumbs into Simon’s inner thighs, feeling his way between each adductor muscle before settling on two spots that make Simon flinch and working circles into each one.

He still won’t fucking give into temptation, which is disappointing until a hand shoots down to grip Hector’s hair right at the roots instead.

A hum becomes the tease he’d form with words if his mouth weren’t busy. Those thighs twitch on either side of Hector’s head again and it takes all that worn-thin willpower not to grab Simon’s knees and shove them closed to make him shout at the sudden change in pressure. Every tiny spasm means Simon’s denying him a reaction, a squirm or a cry or a plea or any number of things Hector can’t think about too hard or he’ll want them all at once, and surely the least Hector could do is get Simon to let go.

Consider it a gift.

He presses his tongue flat to Simon’s cunt through the fabric, the tip against his hole, and Simon bucks down so fiercely with a groan caught behind his teeth that Hector considers whether it would be worth it to rip Simon’s clothes clean off and replace them later. He’s done it on accident before, bitten through fabric and felt a wash of pride and embarrassment flow over him while Simon laughed and made a home for himself alongside the shame in Hector’s chest. When Hector promised he wouldn’t do it again Simon said he wouldn’t hold his breath, and what better opportunity to prove himself a liar than the one laid out before him?

He pushes his tongue back up to Simon’s cock in time with his hands up Simon’s body, squeezing his chest and tugging at his nipples because the death grip on Hector’s hair means he can’t move his head enough to just yank Simon’s briefs down with his mouth and he needs some other outlet before he goes insane. Pulling against the hold makes Simon wind his fingers somehow tighter and Hector groans in frustration; every form of retribution he could enact would have the same effect.

“Could you please,” he starts, voice muffled by wet fabric, “let me go.”

“I could,” Simon murmurs. His lust-laden words fall heavy from his mouth, colliding with the marbles in Hector’s head and scattering them to the far edges of his skull. When the constant percussion of the ricochet stops and they fall back into place, they form a perfect arrow pointing to Simon’s femoral artery, the sluggish flow of blood beneath tepid skin. Hector grits his teeth and huffs out his nose and waits for Simon to finish the fucking thought he is clearly drawing out just because he can. All of Hector’s instincts tell him to find the right spot on Simon’s arm to grab to make his grip falter and tie him up so he stops interfering, but the chase is half the fun and he didn’t get that because Simon woke him up with slow kisses and wandering hands, for once, so the struggle in its place makes Hector’s synapses sing.

Biting Simon’s thigh open would do that too, though.

“But?”

“I like you there.” The weight of Simon’s tongue does nothing to dampen his self-satisfaction and Hector yearns only to rip him to shreds.

He shoves Simon’s thighs up as hard as he can, forcing them apart and folding him in half in one quick motion, and for a second Hector thinks that might grant him the freedom he craves before Simon adjusts his hold and scrapes his nails over Hector’s scalp, yanking the strands tangled in his hair tie and fuck, if Simon would just tug that free then Hector might forgive him for the rest. He knows what he’s doing, driving Hector up a wall because he’s got Simon bent up over himself and spread open and wet and yet can’t do anything about it.

“I could be a lot more useful here,” Hector tries again, cringing at the desperation flooding his voice, “if you would fucking let go.”

“Will you keep trying to make me?”

If Hector could see Simon’s face, he’s sure he’d find knit brows, a loose jaw, and lips pulled into a mean little smile while Hector roasts over the coals of his own desire. He pictures Simon’s eyes alternately open and closed, sharp and glassy, on the verge of giving in and ready to keep this up for as long as it takes to grind Hector into a fine paste. Could he just rip out of the hold with enough effort? Simon would take at least a few chunks of hair with him—the bald spot wouldn’t be worth it and is truly the only thing keeping Hector from throwing caution to the wind—but he needs to move so badly he’d do anything to get free. “Simon,” he whines, which sounds terrible coming out of his mouth but it makes Simon’s cock twitch in Hector’s face so maybe he’s onto something. “I’ve already said please, come on—”

The pressure releases and Hector springs into action before he has a chance to think it through. Simon’s legs thud against the mattress and his briefs end up somewhere in the next post code over, and Hector slings Simon’s ankles over his shoulders and drives two fingers into him that he doesn’t remember shoving in anyone’s mouth beforehand but he must have for how blissfully easy it is. Eight sharp crescents in his back snap Hector’s mind into place again, and Simon’s moan only sweetens the pot—open mouth, closed eyes, giving in. Those scratches are going to bleed, all of Simon’s grip strength concentrated on keeping Hector close as if he could go anywhere else. Hector drops himself closer still, letting the wide lines of his body weigh Simon down, drawing his thighs taut as bowstrings under Hector’s layers of fat and muscle. Simon whimpers, but doesn’t complain, and Hector runs his tongue along Simon’s full lower lip just to get him to lunge.

Simon takes the bait and pulls Hector’s tongue into his mouth, and the image of his cock down Simon’s throat plants itself in his mind instead, the curve of Simon’s nose against leather and his lips against metal, and while Hector doesn’t have a free hand or second to make that happen he could in a minute, once he’s had his fun here. Whichever’s easiest to grab will do, a decision for later when he’s not teasing a third thick finger into Simon and watching his pretty face screw up as he tries not to groan. The heat rising off Simon’s body is intoxicating; even when he was still human, he nearly ran colder than Hector, yet no matter how much time passes Hector’s not sure he’ll ever get used to having an icicle next to him in bed.

This, though. Feeling his warmth from the inside out and knowing it’s all Hector’s doing? Acclimating to this took but one instance, exactly twenty years and one month ago.

Simon’s leg flexes beneath him and Hector laughs, and instantly earns a sharp blow to the ribs that makes him choke on a cough. “Ow—”

In a rush, Simon wheezes, “Do something useful with your fingers or I’m going to kill you,” and when he puts it that way how can Hector possibly say no? He spreads them, curls them hard, bends his wrist to shove his palm against Simon’s cock and Simon takes the invitation without protest, finding a callus to grind into and lurching up—

Fangs slot into the marks they left over Hector’s carotid and he shouts, left hand gripping the sheets for dear life and trying not to do the same with the right hand still in Simon’s cunt. Hard to see any sort of plan through when Simon keeps trapping him in place, and it’s equally hard to keep hold of any complaints through the haze of pleasure and how the drag of Simon’s tongue over his skin shoots a trail of heat straight to his dick. He’s right where Simon wants him and the appeal is equal parts titillating and nauseating.

Giving up control is all fun and games until he can’t wrangle it back.

There’s a flash of opportunity, a sudden clench around his fingers, and Hector takes it, working Simon like clay instead of letting himself be the wheel taken for a spin, and nearly makes himself laugh at the image until Simon bites down harder at a particularly focused press against spongy tissue and they both moan, instead. If Hector could move he’d get his head back between Simon’s legs and make him come in Hector’s mouth, but the next best thing is making him come on Hector’s fingers and hoping his evil little fucking teeth unlatch eventually. Accusing Simon of wanting to bleed him dry was a joke, earlier. Funny how things work out.

Simon rakes his nails up the length of Hector’s back and grips Hector’s shoulder blades as his whole body tenses. Hector keeps his hand still save for the slow massage of his palm against Simon’s cock, pulsing with each wave of his orgasm that matches the slow magma-flow of blood from Hector’s wounds, and he just keeps drinking through it like he can’t hear or doesn’t care about Hector hissing through his teeth. Between the scratches and the bites, Hector hasn’t the faintest idea what he’s wearing later.

Whatever. It’s his party. He can go wounded if he wants. Hell, he could go naked.

Another few seconds and Simon’s jaw slackens, his fangs dislodging from Hector’s neck with a gross pop as the vacuum seal between enamel and flesh breaks. Simon’s head hits the pillow and Hector hovers over him, hair pooling around the sides of his own face where it’s fallen most of the way out of its elastic. He half expects Simon to do the honors and rip it free, gleefully putting it out of its stretched-out misery and delighting in the stroppy little ow ow ow ow that would undoubtedly flee Hector’s mouth when more than a few strands went with it, but he stares somewhere through Hector’s head with his jaw hanging open and his chest heaving on every breath. Honestly, he looks like a dream, fucked stupid and waiting for whatever comes next, but his eyes are a touch glassier than normal, unfocused, and he hardly blinks when a drop of blood hits him square in the cheek and slides toward his temple.

He usually springs back quicker. Instantly, even, a constant push and pull between them. Now the pattern’s been interrupted like a suddenly moonless tide.

“Hey.” Hector runs his thumb over Simon’s drenched lower lip and part of his chin, smearing away a slowly congealing mess of blood that’s begging to end up back on someone’s tongue. It’s easy enough for Hector to pop his thumb in his mouth and clean the whole thing off, though the taste of his own blood has always struck him as both unpleasantly earthen and too astringent, like a bad matcha latte mixed with…whatever the fuck else would make it taste sharp. If it had aspartame in, rather than sugar. Something like that.

Hector’s tongue rounds the heel of his thumb, and despite every motion he makes being right between their faces, Simon still looks through him, not at him. Surely Hector didn’t make him come that hard, although—yes, it’s been five weeks, two days, and some-odd hours, and yes Simon’s overworked and no doubt underfed, but still. Doesn’t call for a total space-out.

Hasn’t in the past, anyway. Mostly, except for—

Oh, fuck.

Hector swipes at the trail of blood on Simon’s cheek, muttering a fuck that’s more like a stage whisper when all he does is smear it around, and if he’s making a mess he may as well go all in. He presses his mouth roughly to Simon’s forehead, short beard scraping his skin, and breathes in the harsh sigh that leaves Simon’s tired lungs.

“There we go,” Hector murmurs, each word underscored by a quiet click of his tacky lips, daubing Simon’s face with blood like anointing fluid. Appropriate; he could never tell René in as many words, but he worships Simon far more than he ever could anyone else, perfectly suited to filling each other’s gaps as they are. Choosing and being chosen in return is headier even than slotting right where someone wants him.

At an entirely glacial pace, Hector lifts his head to meet Simon’s now-clear gaze, and smiles at the second sigh that leaves him, more regulated than the first. This is reasonable, normal, acceptable, proof Hector didn’t fuck it up entirely, keeping Simon caged beneath his body. It’s a fine line, he knows, and he tells himself he’ll remember better later as he starts to pull his hand from between Simon’s legs. “Hi again. You—”

Simon fists one hand in Hector’s hair and curls the other around his wrist, dragging him down to crush their mouths together hard enough that Hector groans and forcing him to keep his fingers exactly where they are, still knuckle-deep inside Simon. Ruthless incisors roll Hector’s already bruised lip back and forth, back and forth, and if that’s what they’re playing—if the cruelty’s still on the table, if Simon simply needed a minute because Hector’s very good at what he does and not because Hector reminded him of—ah, it’s fine—then he’s game. He drops to his elbow and shoves Simon right back into the mattress with his whole body, blanketing him and then some, and when Simon whines at the renewed strain in his thighs all Hector does is laugh into his red, red mouth and sink his teeth into Simon’s lip, returning the bruise tenfold.

If he fits a fourth finger into Simon it’ll make fucking him a breeze, but he has to make sure Simon doesn’t go anywhere before he gets there. Indulgent-but-flighty isn’t really something Hector’s ever ascribed to himself as a type, let alone something he’d enjoy, but he’s got two of them carved into his bedpost in different flavors—and, after all, this one’s his favorite.

Hector pulls back sharply and takes Simon’s lip with him until he hears a gasp, then graciously lets it snap back into place. He meets Simon’s stare, eagle-eyed intensity renewed, like trying to suck Hector’s soul out of his damn mouth screwed his head the rest of the way onto his shoulders again. This close, the faint puffs of Simon’s breath hit Hector’s lips in a strict staccato, betraying his still-fragile composure.

The hand in Hector’s hair finally frees the tortured strands from their confines, black elastic clutched in Simon’s palm when it hits the duvet. Hector shakes his head, wincing at the lingering strain of his unwashed roots pulling every which way against his scalp, and again when the limp waves fall around their faces and cordon them off from the rest of the world. Just as well, considering how badly they both need a shower already, and with any luck he can leverage his admirable self-restraint in not asking for one more round to get Simon to wash his hair for him.

He just…has to get there, first, and not let the sinking feeling that Simon’s returned clarity means he’s done already win.

Surely the fingers still wrapped firmly around his wrist mean otherwise.

Hector pushes himself up a fraction and forces himself to maintain eye contact while every organ in his abdominal cavity squirms. “If I get off of you, are you gonna put your clothes back on?”

Even to his own ears, he sounds pathetic. Simon stays in place—not that he has much of a choice, with Hector weighing him down, and not that he has a reason to, given how he’s the one who smashed their mouths together this time, which only worsens the mortification—though his eyes narrow and his brows shift before his face smooths back out.

“No,” he says, simply, squeezing Hector’s wrist hard enough that his bones ache, and Hector swears he feels his heart skip a beat which is incredibly stupid when it physically fucking cannot. Simon’s tongue is deliciously heavy again, that single syllable concealing a tremendous amount of consideration. What must be going through his head, shaken around as it’s been, thoughts tossed to and fro alongside his body? Hector can’t feel terribly bad about that, not when it’s earned him such a brilliant feast this early in the—whatever time it is. Day, night, colloquial, literatim; who gives a shit.

Simon rolls his ankle and Hector scowls at the loud snap right by his ear. “My legs would like a break, though.”