Hello there. I tossed up a mix of all the title songs for Full Disclosure so far, the link to which you can find on my profile, if you're so inclined. Just a general "unpleasant business" warning for this chapter, nothing incredibly graphic. Thanks for reading.
Full Disclosure
Chapter 10: So Hard to See
As Zoro rolled out of bed and began his routine the next morning, he kept a tight grip on his phone, not wanting to let it go on the off-chance that Sanji had something to say. He had been kind enough to send Zoro a text letting him know that he was laid over in London, but that had been a while ago, and for the most part, there was radio silence.
Of course, he ended up having to put it down eventually for more important things, namely work, but that didn't mean he was happy about it. In fact, it nagged at his mind all day, even through texts from Sanji saying that he'd landed in Lyon and was headed to his hotel, and when Zoro went home that night, he couldn't shake how wrong it felt to be so far away from Sanji, in more than just the physical manner.
So after he got inside, took off his coat, and put the pot of Sanji's white chili on the stove, he checked the clock. It was a little past 6:30, which meant it'd be getting pretty late over there, but he wondered nonetheless if Sanji would still be awake.
For a few minutes, he waffled between getting yelled at for waking Sanji up, or continuing to feel the awful part of himself that already missed Sanji, and finally sent a message. 'awake?'
'uh huh. finally off work?'
'yeah. no luck, don't really want to talk about it. how was your day?'
'it was fine. i did some walking around and then got dinner. it's weird having to speak french constantly again.'
Zoro smiled down at his phone, suddenly caught up in the rather endearing mental image of Sanji fumbling out sentences for the first few hours. 'you mean it's hard trying to remember how to pick up girls in french.'
'nah. i have somebody back home.'
'your hand?'
'i'm breaking up with you!'
The phone was ringing before he'd even finished typing out his reply, and he answered it with a laugh rather than with words.
"You're an asshole!" Sanji said.
"You like it," Zoro replied, still chuckling.
"Hmph. You're lucky that I do."
"I am really lucky," Zoro agreed.
There was the sound of a lighter flicking on the other end of the phone, then of Sanji inhaling on his cigarette. "Shouldn't you be eating dinner right now?"
"It's heating up. Shouldn't you be sleeping right now?"
"Jet lag. You'd think I'd wanna sleep as soon as possible considering how late we were up and how I didn't sleep any on the flight, but apparently that's not the case."
"Want me to tell you a story until you fall asleep?" Zoro asked jokingly.
"No. If you just want to talk though, that'd be nice."
Distractedly, Zoro stirred the chili, turning the heat down a little so that the surface wasn't quite bubbling. "What do you want me to talk about?"
"I don't know. Anything."
"... I'm stirring chili right now."
"Okay, how about you tell me about something interesting?" Sanji requested, playful annoyance in his voice.
"I can't just think of something interesting off the top of my head."
"Tell me why you know all of my friends."
"They're not just your friends."
There came the soft, choked sound of laughter held back, and Sanji's voice was mockingly serious when he spoke. "They were my friends first."
Zoro hummed and slouched onto one of the barstools. "I met Ace about a year ago when he came to drop something off at the station. He just walked up to me and told me he'd seen me around and wanted to take me for a drink. We got to know each other, then he introduced me to Luffy, who introduced me to Nami, and the rest is kind of history."
"You know, they used to mention you, but I didn't really connect the dots. I should have," Sanji said through an exhale of smoke.
"You really should have. Not exactly a common name."
Sanji sighed. "I think I was just afraid to... If it was really you, then I'd have to face you eventually and I guess I wasn't ready for that."
"Even if I'd still been pissed at you, which I wasn't, it's not like I would have started shit with you," Zoro said, and it was the truth. To take it out on Sanji so many years after the fact would have been childish, and he liked to think that was one thing he wasn't, these days.
"Yeah, but I figured you had every right to," Sanji said. "After how shitty I was to you."
Zoro shrugged, even though Sanji couldn't see him. He didn't want to talk about the incident he knew Sanji was referring to, didn't even want to think about it. For the most part, he preferred to imagine that it didn't exist at all, because things were a lot different now. But he wasn't going to let Sanji know that it still bothered him. "If you thought I'd give up on you because you were shitty to me once, don't you think I'd have done that a long time ago?"
Sanji laughed. "Point. I have always been pretty shitty to you. That just seemed like the peak of shittiness."
"It was really fucking shitty, I'm not saying it wasn't. I guess it just wasn't shitty enough to make me stop caring for you," Zoro said. He got up, holding the phone between his ear, and stirred the pot again before placing the lid back down.
"And I'm really glad for that."
They went quiet for a few minutes, and Zoro wondered if Sanji had finally gotten tired enough to drift off. "Are you asleep?" he whispered, not wanting to wake Sanji up if he was.
"No," was the immediate answer.
"I wonder if you'd fall asleep if I came and put a blanket over your head or something. Like a bird."
Sanji snickered. "Maybe. Come try."
"Okay, let me just book a flight really quick," Zoro said mockingly.
"You get on that."
Zoro smiled as he sat back on the barstool. "What else do you want me to talk about?"
"I don't know. I'm kind of tired now," Sanji said.
"Do you want to go?"
"Just... sit with me a little while longer. You don't have to say anything."
"I can do that."
And so they sat on the phone in silence, listening to each other breathe, and it was almost comforting, almost close. The occasional hiss of white noise made that illusion slip, but it was enough to take the strange, stranded feeling from Zoro, at least for a little while, so he was satisfied.
At last, Sanji yawned into the phone and said, "Okay. I think I'm good."
"I'll let you go sleep then."
"Yeah. Hey."
"Hm?" Zoro asked, drawing himself out of his own descent into sleepiness.
"I miss you," Sanji said. There was an inflection in his voice that made him sound both proud of the fact and full of sorrow at the same time.
"I miss you too," Zoro replied, and let nothing be heard but the genuine fact that he did.
In the seat beside Zoro, Tashigi blinked awake and sat up with some effort. She'd napped in the passenger's seat most of the way to Amityville, which meant that Zoro had no one to tell him when he was going the wrong way. The end result was that, instead of the usual give-or-take of an hour, their drive totaled to nearly three.
But now they'd reached their destination, pulling up the driveway to a tall, narrow stone house. It was unremarkable, if you didn't count the fact that all of the shades were pulled on the windows, and that the whole place had a rather unkempt look about it, with the yard definitely not having been mown in more than a few months, and weeds and untrimmed bushes slowly overtaking the sidewalk.
"Cheery," Tashigi said.
Zoro chuckled, and they got out of the car and headed up the pathway to the front door, where he gave a few loud knocks. He rocked back on his heels as he awaited someone to come answer it, and when no one did, he leaned forward and rang the doorbell.
At last, there was the sound of footsteps inside, and the door opened to reveal a short, round man with wild blond hair sticking out at every angle. He had droopy brown eyes, with a scar over one of them, and was extremely pale, as if he hadn't been out in the sun for decades.
"Hello," said Tashigi, sticking out her hand. The man took it, looking almost confused, and shook it limply. "I'm Tashigi. The detective? We spoke on the phone?"
He nodded, and said in a wheezy voice, "Of course. Please come inside."
The hallway they stepped into was nearly as dreary as the outside had been, dimly-lit and a little dusty; the air was stale, as if nothing fresh was coming inside, and the walls were white, blank and bare. The living room had a little more character, though it looked like it should have been inhabited by an elderly woman rather than a man who had been on the way to marriage.
The floral couch Zoro and Tashigi sat on sent up twin clouds of dust, and they both coughed for a few moments as the man looked at them expectantly.
"Er. So, Mr. Hildon. If it's not too much trouble, could you please tell us about the relationship your late fiancé had with Dr. Hogback?" Tashigi asked after she'd regained her composure, folding her hands primly over her knees.
"Of course. Though I'm not sure you could classify it as a relationship. He mostly just spent his time trying to get her to notice him," he said. His eyes flicked about the room dodgily, though Zoro couldn't see that he had any reason to be so shifty. "He'd send her letters and flowers, and he called a lot."
Tashigi nodded slowly, clicking her pen. "Do you still have the letters?"
"She kept them with the other fanmail she received... I believe it's still in her apartment, since her family hasn't had time to come up and clean it out yet."
"Did she ever mention feeling uncomfortable around him?"
"She didn't," Hildon said, still in his meandering, wheezy tone. "Though she was the kind of person who rarely showed it or complained when she was uncomfortable... I think he made her feel threatened."
"Why do you say that?" Zoro chipped in.
Hildon turned his sleepy-eyed gaze on Zoro. "She just always seemed to feel trapped when he was around. Even when she could barely remember who anyone was, she looked like she didn't want to be anywhere near him."
Zoro pursed his lips to the side. "Did she ever say if he acted harmfully toward her?"
"No. I worried a lot, but she said he never made any physical moves toward her. Only... she did say that he'd say strange things sometimes."
"Like what?" Tashigi asked.
"She was never specific. She just said that he'd be nice one moment, and the next he'd say very cruel things. It felt like there was nothing I could do to help her, or to stop him. I tried to make sure that once she was released from long-term care, that he wouldn't ever see her," Hildon said, a gloom overtaking him that very much matched his home. "But he'd still stop by when she was in physical therapy sometimes..."
Zoro cleared his throat. "Did he ever approach her outside of the hospital?"
"No."
"Did you know anything of Hogback outside of his interactions with your fiancé?"
"No. He made it a point of never speaking to me."
"Is there any way you could give us access to her apartment?" Tashigi asked once she was finished noting down Hildon's words.
"I suppose so..." Hildon wheezed. "You can speak with her landlord, she could probably let you into the apartment."
"Do you have her address?" Zoro asked, and Hildon nodded, bringing out an old leather-bound address book from a side table, from which he carefully copied out a Manhattan address.
Tashigi pursed her lips as she took the piece of paper from him. "Well, thank you for your time," she said. "If we have anymore questions, we'll call again."
Hildon nodded and followed after them to the door, looking almost lost as they headed down the front stoop and back to the squad car, where they slumped into their seats and let out identical sighs of frustration.
An hour and a half later, well after their shift had technically ended, they'd pulled up outside of Cindry's apartment building. Inside, they'd shown the severe-looking landlady their badges and she'd briskly led them up to the sixth floor and unlocked the door for them before heading back down, with only a reminder to lock up behind themselves when they were done.
And now they stood alone in a dead woman's apartment. It felt untouched, frozen in time. Everything was covered in a thick layer of dust, but it had every appearance of being lived in. There were coffee cups sitting in the sink, a blanket laying messily on the couch as if it had been only recently snuggled under, and photographs everywhere. It was disconcerting, and Zoro felt a keen sense of being out of place as he walked through the uninhabited rooms.
The logical place to start looking was the hallway closet, so being the more logical-minded of the two, Tashigi took that while he headed for the bedroom. It was tidy in there too; the bed was made, the curtains spread wide over the windows to let light pour in, no clothes on the floor. There were knick-knacks and a jewelry box on the dresser, and lamps on the nightstands along with a digital clock, and the most prominent feature of all: photographs of Cindry and Hildon smiling happily at the camera.
He spared only a moment to take in his surroundings as he headed straight forward to pull the closet door open. As expected, it was mostly shoes and clothes, but when he glanced up, there were shelves holding large cardboard boxes, and he stretched up just enough to pull one down. It was heavier than he'd been expecting, and he stumbled a little under the weight even despite his strength.
Sure enough, when he carried it over to the bed and opened it up, there sat rows and rows of envelopes, all addressed to Cindry with varying returns. He picked one at random, and drew out a piece of folded paper that had a crayon drawing of a small stick figure holding the hand of a larger stick figure, helpfully labeled Victoria and Risky.
"I found them," he called into the hallway.
A moment later, Tashigi shuffled in. "That's all?"
"No. There's shelves full of them," he said, pointing toward the closet.
She peeked in, and let out a drawn-out sigh. "This is gonna take a while."
"Yep."
Over the course of the next couple hours, they went through the contents of each box, skimming for those with Hogback's return address. However, it wasn't until they reached the very back of the shelving that they found those. They sat in a box all to themselves, each one addressed to Cindry in the same handwriting, with a broken wax seal, and the same return address: Dr. H. Hogback, and the hospital's address.
They checked the last couple boxes to make sure they had everything, then packed up Hogback's letters, putting away the others almost undisturbed, and left.
After dropping that box off at the station, he and Tashigi had a late dinner together at a sandwich place down the street, and he didn't end up getting home until well past ten. It was too late to call Sanji, so he went straight upstairs to get ready for bed.
At some point in the day, his phone had died, and when he plugged it in and it powered on, there was a series of messages from Sanji, several detailing his day, a few inquiring if Zoro was surviving, and a single one saying that he missed him.
It was that one that had him smiling for the final half hour he was awake, and into the next morning as he got ready for work and put the slow cooker full of spaghetti sauce on low heat. And he kept on smiling, even when it felt like he had nothing to smile about, and should in fact have been frowning, because he knew it was going to be a rough day from the second he walked into the station. Their work for the time being consisted of going through every single document with a fine-toothed comb, and it wasn't anything approaching a quick process.
They confirmed many things, such as the fact that Hogback seemed to be very full of himself, and he liked to talk about all of his achievements. He was coercive, wheedling, and persistent. And just like Zoro had originally thought, he assumed Victoria Cindry owed him something just because he existed. Hogback was cocky, but he played his cards close, and it was giving them approximately nothing to work with.
At least, not until Tashigi had frustratedly started going through the old evidence they'd taken out a week ago. And suddenly, the torn, dirty envelope with the broken seal made sense, because it matched up perfectly with the ones they had collected from Cindry's apartment.
"Time for a search warrant," Tashigi sing-songed, sounding entirely too pleased. She set about gleefully typing up an affidavit on her laptop, and Zoro leaned back in his chair, which creaked in displeasure.
It was good, he knew, but there was just a part of it that made him uncomfortable, as if something was going to sideswipe them at just the wrong moment. Though they'd finally made progress, it seemed inevitable that something would come forth that would stop it. But he pushed that worry aside, if only because he knew there was no use fearing the worst when no matter what came, they'd have to deal with it all the same.
When Zoro got home that night (on time, for a change), he was cold and hungry, and he'd had a headache for the greater part of the day. But since sleeping and eating at the same time wasn't a possibility, he found himself turning up the heat and heading into the kitchen to check on the spaghetti sauce and to put on a pot of water to boil. He popped a couple aspirin into his mouth from the bottle sitting near the sink, then went upstairs to change into a ratty pair of jeans and a sweatshirt that were the only remains of his clean clothes, and headed back downstairs.
It had started to snow again earlier in the afternoon, and fat flakes drifted past the kitchen window as he walked by them. He found it was soothing to look at the soft white glow outside, but he felt Sanji's absence more keenly than ever when he remembered their one month anniversary, and how snowflakes had sat in Sanji's hair and eyelashes during the walk after dinner. The realization that they'd been together for over two months now was almost startling to him, and he took out his phone to send a message to Sanji, needing him to know that Zoro was thinking about him.
Of course, he couldn't exactly just come out and say that, so he sent something a little less needy, but no less true. 'spaghetti smells good.'
'it'll taste good too. family recipe,' Sanji answered after a couple minutes.
'i'm sure. i didn't wake you, did i?'
'nope. just reading.'
'do you want me to call you?'
'sure.'
Zoro took a moment to get up and toss the noodles into the now-boiling water, then hit Sanji's speed dial.
He picked up after the first ring, sounding like he was smushed into a pillow. "Hey."
"Hey," Zoro replied. He trailed into the living room, dropping down to lay on the couch. "How was your day?"
"Busy. But good. The French team won again," Sanji said.
"You should be proud then."
"Eh. I thought Germany did better."
"Hm. What else did you do?"
"We drove to Saint-Étienne," Sanji said, pronouncing it in such a way that it was almost indecipherable to Zoro. "Did a little bit of sight-seeing."
"Playing tourist in your own country?"
"You've never been to every place in Japan, or the US, so yeah, I'm allowed to play tourist here. I've pretty much only ever spent my time in Paris."
Zoro hummed in acknowledgement, then stood again to check the pasta. He popped a noodle into his mouth, promptly burning his tongue, then stuck the phone between his ear and shoulder as he drained out all the water and fixed a plate for himself. All the while, Sanji chattered away about the Bocuse d'Or, the things he'd seen on their day trip, and how tomorrow they'd be driving up to Côte-d'Or. Zoro talked back between bites of spaghetti, and it was yet again not all that hard to imagine that Sanji was here with him despite the fact that his skin felt thrumming and alive, waiting for Sanji's touch to return to it.
"Oh, I got you presents too," Sanji said, once Zoro had finished eating and put his dishes in the sink, leftovers in the fridge.
"Yeah? What'd you get me?"
"What do you think?"
"I don't know, that's why I asked," said Zoro, with some annoyance.
"It's something that you're obsessed with," hinted Sanji.
"Uh..."
"Alcohol, moss-for-brains. Alcohol!"
"Oh. Awesome," Zoro said, making his way back to the sofa. This time when he laid down, he drew the blanket over from where it had been draped across the armrest and covered himself tiredly.
"What are you doing?"
"Laying on the couch in the dark. It's snowing here."
Sanji chuckled. "Wow, you're sure having fun while I'm gone."
"Yeah. It's a regular party."
They trailed off into silence. For a few minutes, the only sound was their breathing, until Zoro realized that the patterns of Sanji's exhalations were the exact same as when he was getting off.
"Really?" he asked rhetorically.
Sanji grumbled. "I'm sorry, it's just hard..."
"I'll say," Zoro said, cracking up at his own joke.
"Shut up! It's hard being away from you!"
Zoro went quiet again, listening to Sanji steadily growing more noisy now that he had no reason to be sneaky about it. He dragged a hand over the front of his jeans, rubbing without focus at the bulge there as it started to harden beneath its confines.
"Are you touching yourself?" Sanji asked at length.
"Not really. Do you want me to be?"
"I mean, I guess I wouldn't mind."
Zoro popped the buttons on his jeans, pushed them down along with his boxers, and wrapped his hand around his cock. It was already mostly hard and starting to get slick with precome, and he stroked himself a couple times before speaking again. "Okay. My hand's on my dick, now what?"
Sanji laughed. "I don't know. Talk to me, I wanna know what you're doing."
"Can't you just imagine what I'm doing?"
"No. I'd rather you tell me."
"You should have a pretty decent imagination, considering all those years you only had your hand to keep you company," Zoro said, forcing down his laughter.
"Hey! Fuck you, ya know?" Sanji said indignantly.
"You wish."
The silence that emanated through the phone was so pointed it could have stabbed him, but Zoro just laughed loudly into the phone as he moved his fist tight and slow. "I dunno. I'm just jerking off, I don't know how else to tell you that."
"You have no concept of how to be sexy, I don't know why I'm surprised."
"Yeah, I guess some of us just don't have the time to cater to other people's whims on the standards of sex appeal," Zoro said. He bit down on his lip, rocking his hips up into his hand.
Sanji made an annoyed, wordless sound into the phone. "Stop fucking around, I have to pay for all this long distance calling. I want my money's worth."
"Okay, no more fucking around," Zoro agreed. "I'm jerking off, is that good enough for you?"
"But what are you thinking about?"
"You," Zoro said.
Sanji made yet another sound of annoyance. "What about me?"
Zoro huffed. "Fuck, anything. Everything. There's nothing you do that isn't hot as hell."
"Specifics?"
"When you take control. I like that. And when you let me fuck you, sometimes you do this thing about halfway through where you just stop talking and get this look on your face like you can't think about anything outside of that moment. I hate it when you do that," Zoro said, dragging his fist up almost agonizingly slowly.
Sanji huffed out a laugh, though it was obvious that he was getting more worked up now that Zoro was doing what he'd asked him to. "Why's that bad?"
"It's fucking hot."
"Again I say, why's that bad?"
"Because I get off on thinking about what I do to you," Zoro said.
There was silence on the other end, and Zoro tried to imagine what Sanji could be doing. Was he biting his lip, holding back any sound from escaping? Had his mouth dropped open, slack and soundless as he jerked himself off? Or was he sitting there thinking about how stupid the things that came out of Zoro's mouth were? "I don't think you can even begin to guess what you do to me," Sanji said at last.
"Tell me then."
Sanji made a low groan of what Zoro figured was embarrassment, but could have passed for arousal just as easily. "I don't know how to. I've just never felt like this before."
"Like what?" Zoro asked. He was barely even moving his hand now, much more focused on hearing what Sanji had to say than on sexual fulfilment. It was silly, but listening to Sanji try to articulate his feelings filled Zoro with more satisfaction than a mere orgasm would.
"Like... I don't know. Whenever I think of you, I just feel good. I remember good things. And it's weird, because I don't think I ever felt like that around you when we were younger. Maybe it's more like when I think of you, I remember how comfortable home was. You're like the me-shaped indent in a childhood bed, you know? It took years to make you how you are, and you'll keep changing, but I'm always going to feel so glad to fall into you at the end of the day. I don't have to second guess myself around you because there's just a part of me that knows you won't think I'm strange. You knew me when I was worse, and I'm a lot better now, and I know that you know that, and you won't use it against me. It feels good."
"I do know it, but it's not like I think of you in terms of better or worse. You're just you, always. Sometimes you're an asshole and you don't think before you speak, sometimes you're the most thoughtful person in the world. Sometimes you treat people like shit, and sometimes you treat yourself like shit just to make someone else feel better. You're cold and distant one moment, and the next you're clingy and you want attention. You have the worst temper of anyone I've ever met, but you always feel bad about letting it out. That's just who you are. Everybody contradicts themselves. I don't want you to be perfect, and I don't want you to think you need to be, or that I expect you to be. Better or worse, whatever that means, I'd still want to be with you."
Sanji breathed out loudly into the phone. "What the hell is this, mushy confession time?" he asked, obviously trying to divert attention from how embarrassed he was.
"Nobody's stopping you from getting off on it."
"It was supposed to be dirty talk, not... whatever this is."
"Okay. Talk dirty to me then," Zoro said, laughing.
"God, you're the worst at phone seduction, I guess it is all up to me."
"Go on."
"Now it's just awkward!" Sanji said.
"Fine, I'll start again. I'd really like it if you were here so we could fuck."
Sanji cackled down the phone, and Zoro laughed along. "I just miss your bed. Not even fucking in it, just how comfortable it is. I'm only getting off on the thought of laying in it right now."
Zoro laughed again. "Yeah?"
"Yeah," Sanji said. His breath hitched in a gasp, and Zoro finally started to stroke himself again.
"I miss blowing you," Zoro said.
"I've been thinking about fucking you in the airport the whole time I've been over here," Sanji confessed. "You make really nice faces when you get fucked."
Zoro was silent, equal parts embarrassed and aroused that Sanji thought that way.
But Sanji barely even skipped a beat as he continued. "You start blushing and you try to look all annoyed but it's pretty obvious you like it."
Zoro bit his lip, squeezing hard around the base of his cock to keep himself from coming. Now that Sanji was talking about it, he couldn't do anything but think about it, about how much he did like it, and how much he wouldn't mind a bit if Sanji were here right now to do it again.
"And you're so tight," Sanji said, his voice almost hoarse. "It feels so good. But I like it when you fuck me, too."
"Any time you want it, it'd be my pleasure," said Zoro.
Sanji laughed softly, and it was an intimate sound in the darkness of the room. "Who needs porn on demand when you can get fucked on demand?"
Zoro grunted in reply, back to fisting his cock.
"Are you close?" Sanji asked.
"Yeah," Zoro said, a little breathless.
"Me too."
They got distracted from keeping a coherent dialogue as they worked themselves to completion, Sanji first, then Zoro a couple minutes after, and the only soundtrack was stifled groans and frantic breathing that cut off at the apex.
"Next time we should do a video call or something," Sanji said once his breath had finally evened out.
"No way."
Sanji's laugh crackled over the phone. "What the hell is the point of technology if you can't use it to get long-distance laid?"
"We just had phone sex," Zoro pointed out. "I think you've gotten enough."
"It's not the same if I can't see you though."
"You're so fucking greedy, aren't you?" Zoro asked. He idly kicked at the blanket which had worked itself into a tangle around his sweaty legs, though it kept clinging to him instead of falling down.
"Nothing wrong with wanting to know you're there," Sanji said.
"You can hear me."
"But how do I know that you weren't doing something else? You could have been reading a book or watching TV on mute or something..."
"Wow, you're annoying. I wasn't doing anything but getting off with you."
"Maybe I'd just like it better if I could see you," Sanji said.
"Too damn bad. You can see me when you get home."
Sanji yawned loudly. "I miss you though."
"I miss you too, but you'll be back soon," said Zoro. He glanced at the clock, noting that it was only seven, and that he couldn't just go to sleep on the phone while pretending that Sanji was close.
"Not soon enough."
"You weren't obligated to go," Zoro pointed out.
"No, I wanted to go, but it's hard to fall asleep when you're not within a couple miles of me. I don't like not being able to see you whenever I want to."
Zoro felt somewhat smug about that, but he didn't let on. "Two more days. You can make it."
Sanji hummed softly in his ear, then was silent. Zoro waited and waited for him to say something, until he realized that the soft breathing he heard wasn't actually himself, but Sanji having fallen asleep.
He smiled, staying on the line for just a few minutes longer, needing the comfort of hearing Sanji, then whispered a goodnight before hanging up.
The weekend was stressful, but mostly only because it didn't seem to pass anywhere near fast enough for Zoro's liking. He and Tashigi could do nothing but work on other cases on Saturday, since the search warrant wouldn't be approved until the beginning of next week at the earliest. It seemed to drag and drag, and when Tashigi asked him if he wanted to grab dinner, he was almost rude in how quickly he turned her down.
And Sunday he became even more jittery, because Sanji would finally be back home. He was so anxious to see him that he arrived at the airport nearly an hour early, and sat crosslegged on the floor against a window to wait, watching the clock flip over until his eyes began to feel heavy.
He refused to sleep though, even if it would make the time pass more quickly, and when the clock finally showed the arrival time of 6PM, he stood up and began to pace back and forth. Five minutes passed, then ten, then half an hour, and he bit his lip, feeling far too antsy. And then people started to pour out into the terminal.
No Sanji, though, no matter where he looked. Just a lot of nameless, faceless people that he didn't care about. He tapped his foot impatiently as the trickle of people died down and resurged yet again.
Finally, Sanji's blond head bobbed out from the mass of shorter, darker-haired people, and Zoro's heart leapt from excitement. He didn't even feel annoyed at it; he could only stand in place as Sanji got closer and closer, then came to a stop in front of Zoro.
He looked almost exactly the same as he had when he'd left - eyes a little tired, clothes plainer than normal, but smiling. His hair though... Zoro wasn't sure if it had actually gotten that long over the course of five days, or if he somehow hadn't noticed how long it was getting before Sanji left, and it had only just occurred to him. He reached out and tugged on a strand. "Time to get this cut, maybe," he said.
Sanji's smile grew even wider, and he dropped his bags to fling his arms around Zoro. "Shut up. I missed you too."
Zoro wrapped his arms around Sanji's waist, holding on for dear life, and buried his face in that sweet-smelling hair. They swayed together for a minute or two, entirely content to be together again, and when they separated, Zoro wasted no time in taking up Sanji's bags and leading him out to the lane of cabs. Once they'd loaded one up with baggage and slid in, Zoro pointed the driver toward his house, and within minutes, Sanji was out cold, leaning across the seat so that his head just barely rested on Zoro's upper arm.
He almost didn't want to wake Sanji when they arrived home a while later, but he did so with a few harsh shakes until Sanji sleepily slid out of the car. Meanwhile Zoro gathered up the luggage and balanced it all under one arm, and steadied Sanji up the stairs with the other. Inside, he dropped the suitcase and carry-on, and guided Sanji down the hallway to the living room.
"Mph. I'm awake," Sanji muttered when Zoro laid him down on the couch.
"Go to sleep," Zoro said.
"No, I have to fix my sleeping schedule."
"You can do that later, just sleep for now."
Sanji made a grumpy noise and sat up, then began to bustle around the house, putting chili on the stove for dinner, getting his suitcase upstairs, and tossing a few necessities into the washer for the next day's wear. He managed to stay awake until ten, and there Zoro drew the line and led him up the stairs.
They were in bed, just on the verge of sleep, when Sanji rested his face on Zoro's bare shoulder. "I missed you," he mumbled. It seemed like he could hardly stop saying it, and Zoro knew the feeling.
"I missed you too. I'm glad you're back."
Sanji's lips pressed against his skin in a kiss, and even when he started to drool later on, Zoro didn't feel anything but affection.
For the next week, they saw each other almost less than they had the previous week, if that was possible. Sanji was signed on for seven days of work to make up for those he'd missed, and Zoro was spending his time preparing for every possibility as they awaited the approval of the warrant.
Even when he wasn't working, he was stuck in the mindset of constantly being ready for action. Most nights he paced the house after dinner, a habit that wasn't even broken by texts or calls from Sanji. It only calmed when the warrant got back to the station Wednesday evening, and he found himself suddenly cursing the fact that the next day was his day off. Smoker and Tashigi had assured him that they'd keep him updated, and if backup was needed, he'd be the first one they called.
But it was frustrating all the same. All this buildup, all the work he'd done, and he wasn't even going to be there to see it actually go down. It was selfish, and bloodthirsty, and the part of him that was rational condemned the idea that he could be this way, but acknowledged it existed anyway.
He was too wired by adrenaline to sleep that night, but no matter what he did, nothing took that nervous energy away. Finally, he gave in and checked the hidden compartment in his desk, making sure his gun was inside just in case he got called in and couldn't stop by the station first. And what he saw - or rather didn't see - made him pause, eyes growing wide in horror.
The most important scrap of paper that he'd ever owned was gone. It was only a name and a phone number, but that was more than enough to bring the entire operation down around their ears.
He was quick about booting his laptop up, shooting off an email as fast as his fingers could type it: 'Friday, 7AM, St. Michael's in Flushing.' There was no answer that night or the next morning, but he hadn't expected there to be.
Still, it didn't stop him from checking for one almost constantly during the birthday lunch he was treating Robin (and consequently, Franky) to. They did some catching up, a bit of talking business, updates of mutual friends, and parted ways an hour later, Zoro's wallet significantly lighter with the cost of all their meals plus all booze consumed which, when it came to them, was plentiful. And the whole time, he'd found himself thinking about all the things that were probably going wrong right at that very moment, all because he hadn't kept a tighter hold on that scrap of paper.
Too early on Friday morning, he dragged himself out to his destination. The church contained only a scattering of people, among them the man he was looking for. Black curls fell loose across his shoulders, shushing across the fabric as he tilted his head incrementally in greeting when Zoro sat down beside him. "Roronoa," he said in his deep, almost monotonous voice.
"Lucci," Zoro replied.
"Is there a reason you called me out?"
Zoro sat back, the wood of the pew uncomfortable on every surface. No matter how he positioned himself, it was awful, so he just stopped moving. "We might have to abort mission."
Lucci laughed, a menacing sound. "And why is that?"
"Your contact information is missing."
"I wouldn't worry too much if I were you," Lucci said with another low noise of amusement. "I know who took it. They've already spoken to me."
Zoro pressed his lips together tightly. "Who?"
"Like I said, I wouldn't worry about it," Lucci replied. "Oh... and I might try to keep a closer eye on what my friends are up to if I were you. Especially that boyfriend of yours."
"Was it him?" Zoro asked frantically as Lucci stood up, mind reeling at the idea that Sanji could have done this.
"No. He doesn't know we exist yet, so don't worry your little head. We've got it under control," Lucci said, brushing past Zoro into the aisle and heading for the doors.
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Zoro called after him, but he'd already disappeared.
It wasn't until that afternoon that Zoro remembered Valentine's Day was exactly a week away. He found that he had no clue where to take Sanji, and eventually he'd given up and called Sanji to stealthily fish around for an idea.
"If you're trying to figure out where to take me for next Friday, you can stop," Sanji laughed over the phone.
For a moment, Zoro had gone quiet, cringing at himself. Had he finally gone over the edge? Maybe Sanji had an aversion to Valentine's Day? It wasn't like Zoro really wanted to celebrate it himself, but he'd though Sanji would have.
"I thought I'd make dinner for us," Sanji plowed on. "That way you don't have to go through the embarrassment of taking me out for Valentine's Day."
Zoro sighed in relief. "Yeah, nothing worse than being seen with a catch like you."
"Aw, you think I'm a catch?" Sanji asked, and Zoro could almost imagine him batting his eyelashes playfully.
However, he refused to rise to Sanji's bait. "Are you sure you want to cook after work though? I don't mind if you want to go out."
"Eh. It'd be just as much work to go out as it'd be to stay in and cook. I don't mind."
"Hm, alright. You don't want like, flowers or chocolate or anything, do you?"
Sanji laughed. "Nah. Although I wouldn't say no if you wanted to bring me chocolate strawberries or something."
"I guess that can be arranged," Zoro said.
"Okay. Good. I have to go now, break's over."
"Alright. Have fun with work. I like you."
"Yeah. I like you too, asshole. Bye."
"Bye."
When Zoro got in to work on Saturday, he could immediately tell something was off. Tashigi took one look up at him when he came into the station and he knew that she would have given anything for him to have been the one to make the arrest.
"How was it?" he asked, coming to a stop by her desk.
"Disgusting," she said, face wrinkling up as if she'd smelled something bad. "The whole basement was full of dismantled corpses and organs, it was just awful."
"I would have gone for you if you'd wanted me to."
"It was gross, but it had to be done," she replied, awful look being replaced by one of determination. "So I did it. Or, well, kind of."
"Kind of?"
"There was an FBI agent there, she took care of a lot of it."
"Okay..." he said, confused over why the FBI needed to get involved with this. "Got an arrest report yet?"
"Yep. I'll make a copy for you and bring it back in a couple minutes, gotta finish something up first," Tashigi said. Her cheeks suddenly flushed, and Zoro dropped his hand from the strap of his backpack, leaning closer.
"Something?"
"It's nothing," she said, hands tightening around her phone, which chose that moment to ping with a text message.
He nodded and started to walk away, but just when Tashigi relaxed her hands on the phone, he doubled back and snatched it from her.
It was a text from Lieutenant Bellemere of all people, and he paused, confused.
Tashigi leapt for him while he was still wondering what the hell was going on, and grabbed it back, face bright red. "You asshole!" she said, smacking him on the arm.
He chuckled and patted her on the head. "Engaging with your superiors?"
She made a wild noise and smacked him again. "Go away!"
Zoro did, but he laughed all the way back to his office, though there was no malice in it. From the very beginning, Tashigi had been something like a little sister to him (even if she was older), and he treated her in a very similar way as Kuina treated him - teasing, but also caring. Tough love, as Kuina called it, and it worked well for them. She was good to have around.
About half an hour later, Tashigi brought him the report, and he felt himself grimacing as he read it, even as strong as his stomach was. It sounded gruesome, and the photos that came with it were just as bad.
It was forty-five minutes of reading, and though there were lots of details and asides to look at, it was mostly the nauseous feeling settled in his stomach that had him stopping and starting. When he finally finished it, he understood why Tashigi had been so disgusted.
Hogback had been up to exactly what they thought he'd been up to. And lucky for them, he was so full of himself that he thought he'd never get caught, which made Zoro want to laugh considering he left so much shit laying around for them to find him with. It was almost amateur, which made little sense considering he'd been at it for at least forty years. Had no one honestly noticed this before now? Or was it a case of the higher-ups looking the other way?
He tried to ignore that nagging feeling in the pit of his stomach, because an astonishing amount of luck had come with this arrest. For all the corpses lying around Hogback's basement - including Cindry's - there was even more correspondence, specifically to a man named Gekko Moriah, who they strongly suspected to be the Shadowcutter.
And Tashigi had left him a post-it note on the final page, saying that the mystery FBI agent was taking care of the situation, and that they'd be looking more deeply into it. It was a polite way of saying that this was no longer their business, and he sighed, feeling ever more unsatisfied.
He went home feeling utterly exhausted that night, and sat down on the couch with one of the bottles of absinthe Sanji had brought back from France. And he hadn't even finished a quarter of it before he'd fallen asleep right there, and slept the whole night through, albeit fitfully.
It wasn't just that night that was bad. There were nightmares nearly every single time he fell asleep for the following week. Zoro knew why, but he didn't want to acknowledge the fact that a woman he hadn't even known was enough to bring painful memories of the worst moment of his life rushing back.
Each night he'd awoken with the lingering image of Kuina in his mind, lying still and comatose in a hospital bed. And every night he had that dream, he'd called her, and she'd been patient and kind even when he couldn't say anything, just needing the comfort of hearing her voice.
When he called yet again, early in the morning on Valentine's Day, she finally caved and asked, though it was clear that she didn't want to upset him. "Is everything alright?"
Zoro was quiet for a few more seconds before answering. "No. We had a case... this woman had a traumatic brain injury but she survived. She killed herself."
Kuina made a dismissive noise in his ear. "You know I'm fine, right? I'm good now. I lived, and if I have any say it, I'm going to keep living as long as I can. You still have to defeat me, right?"
Zoro knew she was trying to lighten the mood, but it didn't really work, not when he was like this. "Yeah. Still gotta do that."
"Listen. I know that you still worry about it, but the doctor says I'm doing great. Unless something like that happens again, I'll keep being okay. Just remember that, yeah?"
"Yeah," he said.
"Okay. I'm gonna let you go, I have class in a couple hours."
"Yeah," he repeated. "Sorry for bothering you."
"Zoro... You're not bothering me, you know? This isn't something you can help. As much as I wish you didn't have to think about this all the time, I don't think less of you for still worrying. I just want to help."
"Okay. Bye," he said, and hung up before she could even reply.
It seemed ridiculous to him. She had been the one whose life was overthrown, but she'd gotten over it. And here he was, still thinking about it, still dreaming about it, even when she was alright. It still disrupted his life, but she had moved on. He had no right, and it felt selfish to keep reminding her. But he couldn't forget, no matter how hard he worked to. The guilt was just too overpowering.
He got out of bed, and even as exhausted as his body had already been from practicing before he'd gone to bed, he went through each kata again. He made his form as perfect as he could, blades poised straight and steady, muscles strained into place, head held high. And when he was done, he collapsed on the tatami and finally slept, utterly dreamless.
Of course he awoke later on with a sore back and marks from the tatami in his skin. His mouth and eyes were both dry, and he sat up slowly, feeling around for his phone in the darkness, but it was nowhere to be found. He stood and wobbled tiredly down the hall to his bedroom, where the glow of the clock showed him that his phone was laying on the nightstand, as well as informing him that it was 5AM. He decided that he might as well stay awake, and went to take a shower before work.
It was only mildly refreshing, but feeling just that tiny bit better was good enough for him.
An hour later, he walked into work feeling like the day could be alright after all, and Tashigi smiled at him as if to encourage him. "Any plans today?" she asked politely.
"Dinner at Sanji's," he grunted.
"That sounds nice," she said. "You deserve a break after how busy you've been these past couple weeks."
"You do too," he pointed out. "You worked just as hard."
"But you're the one who isn't getting any sleep," she said, and he narrowed his eyes at her. For how clumsy and air-headed she sometimes was, she was incredibly observant at the worst of times, and in those moments, she tended to treat him exactly the way Kuina did.
He was about to snap back at her, but was interrupted by a secretary coming to a stop beside him and placing a huge vase containing a dozen red roses on Tashigi's desk.
Zoro leaned forward, demeanor taking a 180 to smug. "Who's it from?" he asked.
Tashigi felt around on her head for her glasses, though they weren't there. Zoro picked them off of the desk and handed them to her. "Thanks," she murmured as she slid them on, face already red. She removed the little envelope from the clip, pulling out the card inside, and if it were at all possible, her face became even more red.
"Who's it from?" Zoro persisted.
"Er," she said, clearing her throat. "Just a secret admirer!"
Zoro leaned over and snatched it from her hand, reading quickly.
To Tash
From B
See you tonight, cutie!
"What's so bad about that?" Zoro asked, almost disappointed that he couldn't get more dirt on her.
"It's nothing!" Tashigi said, so loudly it was nearly a shout, and she pulled it from his hand. "Go do your job!"
He moved on after a few shoves from Tashigi, and much like the rest of the office, spent the majority of his day taking it easy. Surprisingly, even Smoker wasn't working as hard as usual, and after lunch, he wandered into Zoro's office, closing the door behind himself.
Zoro glanced up from his phone, where he'd been texting with Franky, and waved off a two-fingered salute.
"The hell are you doing?" Smoker asked, sitting down on the chair in front of Zoro's desk.
"Nothing," Zoro replied.
"You're fired."
Zoro chuckled, putting his phone down. "Shouldn't it be a good thing that nothing is happening?"
Smoker grunted and kicked his feet up on the desk. "Yeah. Still feels kinda like we're just waitin' for somethin' to happen though."
"I know. Better to be on our toes though."
They sat in a companionable silence for a couple minutes before Smoker finally cleared his throat and spoke again. "Plans for tonight?"
Zoro glanced up from where he'd been eying a smudge of marker on his desk. "Uh, yeah. Dinner. Why the hell is everybody so concerned with my plans for tonight?"
Smoker scratched at the white stubble growing in on his cheeks. "Just curious."
"Do you have any plans?" Zoro asked, not really expecting any kind of answer.
Smoker got a pinched look around his face, and didn't respond.
"Oh holy hell, you do," Zoro said, fighting not to gape.
"It's just a test," said Smoker. "Just trying somethin' new out."
Zoro fought not to say that it was an awfully big deal that he was even trying something. It was a bigger feat to pull that man away from his job than it was to climb Mount Everest, and it probably took longer too.
"Stop lookin' at me like that," Smoker said, and when Zoro didn't, he stood and left the room, slamming the door behind himself.
Zoro laughed under his breath, shaking his head. He hoped that whatever this test was, it would work out for Smoker.
Sanji's apartment smelled like heaven, especially since Zoro had just gotten off of a subway crammed with people, some of whom didn't seem to know proper hygiene protocols. He'd spent an hour and a half riding out to Manhattan, getting chocolate-covered strawberries and an extra box of cake truffles from Godiva just for Sanji, then riding back, and he was tired, annoyed, and hungry. He had to force himself to bypass the kitchen on the way to the bedroom, where he changed out of his uniform and into a pair of jeans and a deep green, slowly-unraveling sweater that Kuina had gotten him a couple years ago.
When he was done, he stepped into the kitchen and put the box of strawberries in the fridge, and Sanji called out to him from the dining room, so he moved inside, eager to get at the food.
Then he paused.
There were lit candles on the table along with the plates, and the lights were dimmed, just barely bright enough for him to see by. Sanji was carefully arranging scalloped potatoes on each plate, and Zoro was glad to see that he wasn't dressed up either, just wearing an old pullover hoodie that Zoro must have left there at some point, and a pair of dress pants that he clearly recognized as 'work pants.'
He must have made some kind of face, because Sanji laughed as he stepped away from the plates. "Humor me, yeah?"
Zoro grunted and leaned in for a quick greeting kiss, which turned into more of an unhurried meeting of tongues that ended only when Sanji pressed a hand against his chest and stepped back.
They sat down, Zoro eyeballing all the food - bacon-wrapped filet mignon, scalloped potatoes, green beans with bacon, and rolls. To the side, there was a lowball glass with a couple fingers worth of the Chartreuse Sanji had brought back from France. He picked up his fork and knife, ready to dig in.
"Hold on," Sanji said. "Don't you have anything to say first?"
"Uh," said Zoro. "Thanks for this meal?"
"No."
"Hm... Happy Valentine's Day?"
"Nope."
"What the hell am I supposed to say?"
"You're supposed to ask me if I'll be your valentine."
"What the hell is this, kindergarten?"
"Ask me."
Zoro grumbled and griped, but finally he gave in. "Will you be my valentine?"
"No! I just wanted to hear you say it!" Sanji crowed gleefully, picking up his own knife and fork before cutting into the filet mignon.
"You're such a shithead," Zoro muttered, and dug in.
As they ate, he was more observant of Sanji than he usually was. He was worried, despite Lucci telling him not to be, and every move was analyzed to its highest degree. Still, he saw nothing that he should be suspicious of, no reason why he should have been keeping a closer eye on him like Lucci had said. Sanji was just Sanji. Nothing stood out about him except for every little thing, because that's just what Zoro looked for in him. He wanted to know him and memorize every little detail, so it all stood out equally as much.
And there was nothing in the conversation that told him anything was out of the ordinary. It was mostly a discussion of Tennessee Williams and Sanji relating a little bit more of his trip in France. All of it was so normal for them, and he was convinced that Lucci had been fucking with him.
When they finished eating, the candles were blown out and the dishes were rinsed and put in the dishwasher. Sanji collected the strawberries and a bottle of champagne from the fridge, along with two glasses, then they headed back into the bedroom, where Sanji quickly decided he wanted to take a bath.
And so that's what they did. In the bathroom, they divested themselves of clothes while water ran into the tub, and then took a few moments trying to figure out how they'd arrange themselves in it.
With a lot of pushing and shoving, Zoro finally ended up with his back to the edge of the tub, Sanji between his legs and leaned up against his chest. It was kind of uncomfortable, with both of their feet having to rest on the far edge of the tub, but Zoro kept his mouth shut, because there was no reason to complain about Sanji being this close to him.
"It's a good thing we're not doing this in your bathtub," Sanji said as he picked up the bottle of champagne and started to peel off the foil.
"My bathtub is great," Zoro protested. The clawfoot slipper tub hadn't been something he was overwhelmingly wowed by when he'd bought the house, but after spending many a night in it after work or a tiring practice, he'd decided it was one of the best things about the place.
"Yeah, it's very stylish," Sanji said. "It's just lucky we can both fit in there for a shower at the same time."
Zoro nudged his fingers into Sanji's slippery sides. "Sorry, I guess I wasn't considerate of the fact that maybe I'd want to have a party in my bathroom someday."
"Easy mistake," Sanji said, and pressed his thumb to the cork. The next thing Zoro knew, it had shot across the bath and cracked one of the tiles.
"Oops," Sanji chuckled as the champagne frothed and some of it spilled out into the bathtub.
"Good job," said Zoro sarcastically.
"Yeah, yeah. Hand me the flutes, would you?"
Zoro reached out and grabbed the glasses off the floor, placing them on the rim of the tub so Sanji could pour champagne into them.
When they were settled with a glass of champagne apiece and the box of strawberries sitting beside the half-empty bottle on the rim of the tub, Sanji finally leaned back and let his full weight fall on Zoro.
"For such a skinny bastard, you sure do weigh a lot," Zoro grunted.
"Muscle weighs more than fat."
"What muscle?"
Sanji made a noise of outrage, and sat forward only to sit immediately back again, so that the movement of his body caused a tidal wave of water to splash against Zoro's face.
Zoro sputtered. "The hell was that for?"
"For pissing me off! Don't you want me to have a good Valentine's Day?"
For a moment, Zoro had to wonder if this was the first time Sanji had actually spent Valentine's Day with someone, but that seemed so incredibly unlikely that he had to ask instead of assuming. "You've had one before though, haven't you?"
"Of course. Almost every single year of my life, what kind of loser do you think I am?" Sanji scoffed.
Zoro wrapped his arms low around Sanji's waist, fingers brushing lightly over the trail of hair leading downward from his belly button. Sometimes it seemed to him like Sanji hated being alone more than anything in the world, but he couldn't reconcile that image with the Sanji who was just as pleased to stand alone in the kitchen, peeling potatoes or baking a cake, though it wasn't like he was perfectly alone in those moments either; Zoro was always close by.
"What are you thinking about?" Sanji asked neutrally, breaking him from his thoughts. He had his glass of champagne in one hand and a half-eaten strawberry in the other, and Zoro couldn't see his expression from behind, which made him unsure of what to say.
"You."
"I'm right here," said Sanji.
"Yeah, I know."
Zoro gulped down his whole glass of champagne, then put it back on the edge of the tub. "Your birthday is soon," he said, seemingly out of the blue.
"Yup. Getting old."
"You're already old," Zoro laughed.
"Hey! I'll be the same age as you for a little while, are you saying you're old too?"
"Nope, you're the one that always calls me old."
Sanji pinched Zoro hard on the thigh, and Zoro pinched him on the back, which quickly escalated to some kicking and jabbing with elbows, and when they finally settled again, Zoro was content to stroke his fingers over Sanji's skin. There wasn't a lot of it that he could reach which wasn't covered in ink, though that was fine. He dragged his knuckles up and down Sanji's left arm, until goosebumps raised on his skin and he shivered.
"Stop that," Sanji said.
Zoro did, letting his hand come to rest on Sanji's stomach again.
They were quiet, the water steadily going lukewarm. Then Sanji turned to face Zoro with much splashing, and they were finally face-to-face.
"Hey," Zoro said.
"Hi." Sanji leaned in and slid his lips against Zoro's, a flutter of a kiss that became more aggressive with time. Zoro's hands came up to tangle in Sanji's hair, and Sanji's rested on Zoro's shoulders as he floated into Zoro's lap.
"What's up?" Zoro asked, holding back laughter as Sanji's lips pressed to the ticklish join between his shoulder and neck.
"You know. Hanging out," replied Sanji. His lips had migrated down to Zoro's chest, teeth scraping over the skin there. "Wanna fuck?"
Zoro gave in and let out a laugh, though this one was at Sanji's joking brashness. "I dunno. Do you?"
"I could go for it," Sanji said. His bright blue eyes turned up to look at Zoro, and Zoro's skimmed down his body in turn. A couple bubbles clung to his wet skin, but Zoro's main point of focus was his hardening cock.
"I can't wait until you're not a teenager with a boner problem anymore," Zoro said, reaching a hand down to wrap around Sanji's cock and giving it a few easy jerks.
"I'm not a teenager, and I don't have a boner problem. You just seem not to realize that you're not half bad to look at." Sanji shifted his legs, trying to fit his thighs in between Zoro and the bathtub, though it wasn't working at all. He moaned, stilling as his head dropping forward when Zoro's grip tightened on his cock.
"That's not even a good excuse," Zoro said. He had to admit though, having Sanji wet and rubbing up against him was definitely doing things for his own boner problem. "You wanna go get a condom and some lube?"
Sanji grunted, pushing his hips up into Zoro's hold. "In a second."
"Now."
"I don't like delayed gratification," Sanji complained as he stood up, water cascading off of him.
"If you want instant gratification, you're not going to get fucked," Zoro said, watching as Sanji leaned out of the tub and put one arm against the sink to hold himself up, rummaging inside one of the cabinets with the other. He came up a moment later with a bottle of lube and a condom, and sat back down in the bathtub.
"Here," he said, passing the condom to Zoro, as he popped open the bottle and slicked up his fingers, instantly going to work on opening himself up.
"Why the hell do you keep condoms and lube in your bathroom?"
Sanji shrugged. "They're all over the apartment if you know where to look."
"That's a little scary," said Zoro, tearing open the foil packet to roll the condom onto his cock and slick it up with a little bit of shoving Sanji out of the way.
"I've had a lot of sex in my life, Zoro," Sanji said, gripping Zoro's shoulder as he positioned himself. "You were the first one to get to me in a lot of ways, but not this one. I'm not going to apologize for that."
"I'm not going to ask you to," said Zoro, gritting his teeth as Sanji started to work himself down.
It was probably the messiest sex that Zoro had ever had, if only for the fact that every time Sanji rose and fell, more water splashed out of the tub. One wave even managed to catch both their empty champagne flutes and send them to the floor with a tinkle of glass breaking. Sanji didn't pay it any mind, but after another minute of fucking himself, he pulled up to stand and shook his head. "This isn't going to work." He took a long moment to survey the tub, and finally nudged Zoro with his foot. "Stand up."
"I'm not going to fuck you standing up in the shower," Zoro said.
"No, just stand up. I know how we can do this."
Zoro stood reluctantly and watched as Sanji went down to his knees, leaning forward to rest his arms on the upper edge of the bathtub so that he was basically on all fours. "Doggy style?" he asked dubiously.
Sanji turned his head and cut his eyes upward. "I thought I asked you to humor me tonight?"
With a sigh, Zoro conceded and sank to his knees. With a little bit of readjusting, he pressed into Sanji, and finally they could move together again.
It was less messy this way, though the water still sloshed around them, and it wasn't really a position that Zoro tended to prefer. He wasn't so sure how he felt about not being able to see Sanji's face while he fucked him; his ability to read body language was pretty much halved if he couldn't see expressions, so he had no idea what Sanji was feeling, if he was in pain or a state of neutrality or pleasure.
Still, it was... interesting. From this point, he saw an entirely different part of Sanji than he usually did when they fucked. He was used to seeing Sanji's face, his cock, his stomach muscles jumping as his body clenched. But this way, he could see the elegant nape of Sanji's neck, ripe for the marking, and the shift of his spine and shoulders while he held himself up, and best of all, his ass, which Zoro didn't really need any excuse for - he just liked to look at it. And to be entirely fair, it was kind of arousing to be able to see himself breaching Sanji's body this way.
Sanji seemed to like it as well, turning his face out of the cover of his arms and letting out a quiet moan. Zoro could finally see enough of him to realize that he definitely wasn't feeling anything but pleasure, and it was enough for him to work Sanji over harder, pushing into that tight heat with quick, even strokes as Sanji pulled at his cock.
He came easily when Zoro found the proper spot to angle himself against with each thrust, and Zoro wasn't far after, not even trying to fight the slick pull of Sanji's body.
When they came to a stop and caught their breath, Zoro stripped off the condom and tossed it into the trashcan, and Sanji pulled himself back up. "Okay, we can safely say that this water is filthy now," he muttered to himself, then closed the curtain and flipped the water back on for a shower.
It was a quick one, both of their bodies and minds starting to droop after so much physical exertion and a long day before that, so they were remarkably efficient about washing up instead of groping.
When they were done, the bathroom still needed to be cleaned though. Almost everything was waterlogged and unsalvageable at this point, and Zoro was sort of impressed at the destruction they'd caused.
"Making a fucking mess out of my bathroom floor," Sanji grumbled, pushing a towel around with his foot and drinking from the bottle of champagne as Zoro picked up all the larger pieces of broken glass from the champagne flutes, then headed out to grab the broom and dustpan from the hallway closet to get the rest of it up.
Navigating around the small bathroom together was somewhat difficult, but they finally managed to get it all tidied up and moved into the bedroom to dry themselves off. Zoro was basically done after that, tossing the towel to the floor and falling into the bed, all while Sanji made a sour face at him.
"I don't get how you can sleep naked and be comfortable," he said.
"Sleeping naked is the best," Zoro replied with a yawn.
Sanji looked dubious, but after he'd tossed his towel in the laundry basket, he stepped toward the bed instead of the dresser.
They lay together, intentionally skin to skin outside of sex like they so rarely did, and while Sanji seemed slightly uncomfortable at first, he slowly relaxed into Zoro.
And Zoro stroked his fingers down Sanji's bare side, meeting no resistance. It felt like they were being honest, in a strange way. His shoulders felt less weighted already. It had been a good day, despite everything.