Luffy never told us he had a brother. It's a fact I had no right to complain about. Of what few of us there were at the time, only Ussop was eager to tell exaggerated tales of his happy, healthy childhood, while the rest of us listened on and wondered what it must have been like to be safe, and loved, and welcome.

At the time, I saw the resemblance. That was before I knew that their brotherhood was more in solidarity than biology. They did always have something similar in their look, in their mannerisms. More than anything, it was the aura that surrounded them. Luffy is bright, starlight, mystical and unfathomable. Ace was wild, firelight, burning hot and smoldering to ash.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

When Ace first arrived it was instantly familiar—a fantastic entrance ending in a smiling, freckle-faced pirate clinging to the side of our ship. It was a day like any other, and nothing had changed with his coming. I slipped into the Going Merry's tiny kitchen, put on a pot of rice, and began preparation on as many pirate box lunches we could feasibly fit in a large sack. Alabasta could be desolate, Vivi had warned us, beautiful and vast, but unforgiving.

Luffy and Usopp ate every third rice ball they formed, none of them in the perfect, triangular shape I'd instructed them. By the time my coffee had percolated, they'd given up entirely and began making onigiri snowmen.

"If you're not going to be helpful, get out."

"Sanji…" It was a little pleading cry that said nothing more than the truth: they would mess up anything to be officially excused.

Ace had laughed, a soft, snickering giggle that was so much more controlled than Luffy's. He'd let his brother run off into the morning sun, scolded like a child.

"Ace, can I interest you in a cup of coffee? They say it's the best in the East Blue, but I'm not convinced."

"That would be lovely."

I watched him from over my shoulder, blowing away the steam and taking a restrained sip. For as much as he reminded me of Luffy, there was none of that childish innocence to him. Whatever had happened in the years since he had left his home, became a pirate—it had grown him into a man. I buried my hands in the sink, washing away all of the mess his brother had left behind.

"Need a hand?"

"Oh," I'd be too startled to tell him the truth, yes. "No, you're our guest. It's me who should be asking if there's anything I can do for you."

He sat across that tiny kitchen, smiling softly, chin cupped in his palm and eyes full of stars. I hadn't noticed how tight my chest had been until then. Exhaling, a kind of nervous energy I shouldn't have felt.

"Actually, there is something I wanted to ask you, without Luffy around."

I toweled off my hands, lit a cigarette. "Ask away."

When Ace smirked, I could tell there was something giddy behind it. "You wouldn't happen to be interested in men, would you?"

I just about screamed at him, "NO!" Snapping the cigarette between my fingers clean in two. A burning ember struck the floor, leaving behind a small, black scar.

"What makes you think that? That's disgusting. I don't… I like ladies." I could feel heat rising in my chest, throat, cheeks. What a strange sensation, feeling burning hot inside while your skin is damp and cold. Feeling mortified at the thought that he could think that I was… why would he even…?

The world dropped out from under me.

I stammered. "Oh, I'm…" A bad person.

He accepted my outburst with a cool, calm stride that I instantly envied, waving off the question and apologizing.

"It's okay," He smiled, "You're beautiful, you know, and I would have never forgiven myself if I didn't ask."

Beautiful.

He took a sip of coffee, now cooled, and seemed to weigh his options.

"It's not the worst coffee in the East Blue."

If there was anything left to say, I didn't know it. I had made a fool of myself. Someone would have heard me scream, Moss Head, undoubtedly, or Nami. They would ask Ace what had happened and he would smile, kind like he did, eyes creasing, and tell all of my friends how he asked if I wanted to… if I wanted to…

I scrubbed the dishes furiously.

I don't know when he left or who had drawn his attention away, but I was eternally grateful for them. Each plate reflected a warped image of my face, cheeks burning. I buried them deep into the sink so that I couldn't see myself how he saw me, sitting across the room—gentle, admiring, hopeful.

Baka.

Vivi had not lied. Alabasta was as beautiful as it was desolate. As far as our eyes could see, glistening dunes of white sand stretched toward the horizon.

She couldn't remember the last time it had rained, but it must have been around the last time she was happy. Nothing I said turned her smile, not even the stinking, lecherous camel everyone else seemed to love so much made her pretty grin reach her eyes. Except for him.

Ace hiked in front of me, blessedly not turning around for hours. He watched Luffy most of all—the way he tumbled over Usopp and Chopper, complained, laughed, flew off into the desert, and came back minutes later, stuck full of cactus needles. But for as much as he was keeping an eye on our unpredictable captain, he was inquiring about interesting rock formations glittering with gems, little lizards tucked in cavernous nooks, strange birds of prey who watched us, hopeful, from the clouds. Vivi loved every question.

The more and more she spoke about Alabasta, the more her smile became genuine. She loved her land, every rock, every lizard, every bead of quartz-ground sand. And by mid-morning, she loved Ace too.

Both she and Nami walked at his side, giggling and plucking at his clothes, cooing as he ran his heavy, scarred hands through their hair.

"Nami, it's the color of fire-forged bronze. You should be so lucky."

She tugged at the short tangle of locks and sighed, "It's uncontrollable."

I knew she wanted his fingers tangled in it.

"You want uncontrollable, look at this. It's too soft to do anything with, it just hangs there."

Vivi brushed her delicate hand against his ear. "It's so black though, just like Luffy's, like a moonless night sky."

He finally glanced over his shoulder to me and I turned away, cheeks burning. I would have never been able to touch them like that.

When they had exhausted all compliments on hair and skin and smiles, he moved onto their clothes—Nami's silken sari, Vivi's golden earrings. Nami huffed about how I had picked out her outfit and how it was too revealing. Her pale skin glowed in the desert sun.

Ace chuckled, he told me I had good taste.

I couldn't look him in the eye. Each time his face fell on mine, heat rose in me. Each time he told a joke and the girls giggled and sighed, jealousy flooded through me. They wanted him, of course they did, he was unstoppable, beautiful, gentle in all of his sea-weathered masculinity.

When we stopped for lunch, the girls braided tiny cactus flowers into his hair as he told one of his endless stories about captaining a ship in Whitebeard's Fleet. Luffy, Usopp, and Chopper clung to every word. How could they not? He was an Emperor's right hand. He was a legend.

I didn't listen to his stories, although now I wish I would have. When we had met the day before, he'd been an interesting character in my friend's life, little more. A half-stranger with a storied past, someone who would come, and go, and maybe enter into my life again—but always in passing.

But something had changed in me since then, or better yet, he had changed something in me. I didn't understand it at the time, and in many ways, I still don't now. Ace had a presence to him, like Luffy, and as much as I wanted to cower away at the knowledge that he thought I was beautiful, since then he had been all I could think about.

I watched as Nami, now satisfied that she had done all she could with Ace's hair and gotten nowhere for it, focus her attention on a small cloth pouch of fresh figs she'd purchased when we first arrived.

"Here, Ace," She plucked one between delicate fingers, and I could see that she had every intention of slipping it between his soft, curling lips. "Since Luffy ate most of your lunch anyway."

Luffy moaned, "Not fair, Nami! Whatever that is, I want it."

Ace plucked the fig from her hands and tossed it to Luffy. There was no way he could have failed to notice the sour, disappointed look in her eyes, but if he had seen the change in her, he ignored it.

Instead, he grabbed the bag of figs in his lap and smirked, "Luffy, did you ever learn how to juggle?"

Muscle flexed beneath the tanned skin of his arms and his chest as three fresh figs flew into the air, then four, and a fifth. For all of the strength it took to send them soaring into the sky in perfect arches, not a single one bruised as he caught it in a cupped palm.

His eyes met mine, dark and sparkling, and he tossed one of the soft, fleshy fruit into my hands. He waited, just until I slipped mine past my lips, to do the same. It was velvety soft and slightly salty from his skin, but when I bit down, sweet warmth flooded my mouth.

I don't remember what the others spoke about as they ate their dessert. My heart was throbbing so loud I couldn't hear.

I think I relaxed after that, as much as I could have. If I had been acting strange at all, no one pointed it out to me. It's possible they were all suffering from the same sort of spell he had woven over me, captivated by this mysterious force of power.

I at least felt myself by our first nightfall, normal enough to press my face into Zoro's and scream at him to put up the tents properly while I made dinner. Maybe there was something different about me that day because he relented quicker than usual.

Soon a fire was burning between us, sending huge roils of black smoke into the endless starlit sky. Zoro wiped sake from his chin, Nami and Vivi fawned over Chopper, half-dead from the heat, and Usopp regaled us with a tale of one of our earlier adventures that I could barely recognize from his wild retelling. Luffy howled. Ace listened to every word, true or not.

I slipped a cigarette into the flames and burned it halfway down. It didn't matter. I was finally feeling myself again, that is until I sighed and leaned back from the flames and my hand didn't sink into the sand as I expected it to. It brushed against skin, warm from the heat of the fire and a day in the desert, rough from years on the sea, but soft at the same time—distinctively his.

My breath caught in my throat. Ace didn't say anything, and he didn't move his hand. I waited, each heartbeat felt like eons had passed, but I didn't pull away.

Sleep wouldn't find me. It didn't matter what I did, each time I closed my eyes his face was there—dark brows, freckled cheeks, bright crinkling eyes, and even brighter smile.

The tent was crowded full of us, everyone piled on top of each other, Luffy dangling from a cot onto the sandy floor. Ussop snored. The heat was oppressive. Each time I closed my eyes, my fingers would slide down between my thighs. I would wake them if I did.

How could I do that to myself, anyway? I tried to think of Nami, Vivi, preferably both of them. I conjured up memories from Baratie to the last time I'd been able to pull a pretty girl around the back of the restaurant. She'd hiked up her skirt, cotton panties around her ankles, and asked me what I would do if her daddy found us. She'd been so soft and slick in the heat by the sea, like honey, and I tried to conjure up the taste of her, but all I could bring back was sweat and figs and the tugging in my abdomen.

It wasn't easy stepping around Luffy. He shifted and moaned, "Sanji, breakfast…" but he didn't stifle from his slumber and I slipped out into a desert colder than I would have thought it would be.

I lit a cigarette and breathed deep. The cold air would cool me off, calm me down. I just needed to get away, sit under the stars, and… I looked up, expecting a sky glittering with gems, but it had clouded over. Even the moon was hiding her face, coyly behind a blanket of darkness, as if to tell me it was okay.

No one was watching.

No one would ever know.

"Hey," Ace's sleepy eyes seemed to glow in the darkness, fueled by that fire that burned in him. "I'm not dreaming, am I?"

I kissed him. No, not a kiss. My mouth slammed against his own, hungry and wanting, drinking him in until my head was buzzing. He had grabbed me, tangling those heavy hands in my hair and around my shoulders, and pulled me onto his cot. My chest brushed against his, bare and broad, and I palmed it eagerly. My whole body was on fire, not yet ready to breathe and break the spell.

"Sanji."

He was naked under the sheets and I was hard against him. I could feel the muscles in his abdomen tighten as the weight of me shifted and pressed down. Touch me, my mind pleaded. Please don't make me be the first.

He gently pushed me back so that I was kneeling over him. As the moon shone again, angelic blue light bathing our skin, I could see that his face was stark and serious.

"Sanji, are you sure?"

I had never been more sure of anything in my life.

His lips were impossibly soft against my throat. Kisses trailed behind each playful bite on my neck, my chest, my stomach, my thighs. When he took me, warm and sweet, inside of his mouth, I thought my heart would stop.

I tried to close my eyes, but I wanted to watch him. I wanted to feel his hair between my fingers, still full of flowers, feel the muscles in his arms twist beneath sun-kissed skin. He moaned as I touched him, eyes flickering up to meet mine.

"Fuck, Ace."

I could feel him smile around me, "Oh, I'm just getting started."

He rose quickly, one hand gripping the back of my head and brushing his fingers against my lips with the other. This was the first time I had seen him, all of him, in the light. Ribbons of flexing muscle trailing down to dark hair between his thighs. He was hard and heavy. More of a man than I was, more beautiful than I could have imagined.

This was really happening.

I parted my lips and felt him slide inside of me, tasting the salt and sand on his fingers, flecked with tiny healed scars.

He moaned, stroked himself lazily. "You're so beautiful, Sanji."

His eyes were all over me, his palm tracing circles over my nipples, my stomach, rough in places and just barely grazing me in others. White-hot heat flowed through me. I would have given all of myself to him as he knelt down again, cupping my ass, taking me in his mouth again and pressing damp fingers against me, and inside.

I winced.

He slowed.

He didn't move his hand, but he did rise again, knee beside my thigh, and kissed the corner of my eye, "Do you want to take me?"

My throat was so dry, I could barely swallow. "Is that okay?"

"It would be my honor." He chuckled softly, lips just close enough to my ear to make my heart race, "It's been a while, so we can take this slow together."

In a moment he had flipped over, pulled me on top of him, face centimeters away from my own and eyes full of stars. When he kissed me this time, it was gentle. He took my hand in his own, rubbing his thumb against my palm.

"Your hands are so soft." His voice was almost breathless, genuinely impressed, so much more like Luffy than he had ever been.

"A cook doesn't fight with his hands," I smiled. "I need to take care of them."

He took two of my fingers in his mouth, soft and warm and slick. I moaned.

"Would you lend them to me for something else tonight? More delicate than fighting, but let's make it…" He laughed breathlessly, ran his tongue against me and purred, "Let's make it a little rougher than cooking."

I had no time to fantasize about what it would be like, being with Ace. Less than a day ago, we had been strangers, now we were tangled together, devouring one another, completely at ease. I had no time to imagine what it would have been like, but I remember it often now.

I took him in my mouth as my fingers slid inside—a heady rush of salt and sour and something deep and earthy and entirely his own. His body arched towards my touch.

"Fuck this feels so good."

I couldn't believe how soft he was inside. The memory of the fig flashed to the forefront of my mind, the rush of warmth in my mouth. I slid him deeper down my throat. It was hard to breathe. I didn't mind.

"Sanji," He gripped my hair, tugged me gently back. When my eyes locked with his, they were hazy, his body tense and trembling. "I won't last if you keep that up."

He took me instead, and I slid down the back of his throat with ease. I had never felt something so perfect, tight and tense, until he released me and guided me towards him, breathing just as ragged as my own.

I was gentle at first, hesitant, but he groaned and flickered that smirking half-smile, and any fear I had of hurting him faded into pure desire.

"Ace?" My voice was begging.

"I want all of you."

I gave him all of me.

My body burned with each stroke together, hips meeting again and again as I buried myself inside of that beautiful man. His name had become a prayer on my lips as our legs tangled together, a rolling, wrestling mass of limbs and hands and lips.

He flipped me over, pressed down deeper and fuller than before, purring. The weight of him brushed against me and I desperately wanted to feel him release, slick and hot, against my skin. The image blurred my mind, completely lost in the ecstasy of him.

I reached out to stroke him and he moaned, "I want you deep, Sanji."

"I want you trembling." My voice was not my own.

I was not gentle. I took him every way we turned and twisted. I held his hands, traced the muscles of his spine, the lines of tattoo, the curve of his throat. He breathed me in, body pounding and slick with sweat. Our voices a chorus of pleasure, desire, and disbelief.

"You are so beautiful."

I was close now, so close. I hauled him on top of me with ease, so receptive to my every touch. I was throbbing inside of him, words tangled in my throat, he knew I had reached my limit and he stroked himself eagerly.

"I want you," I gripped his hand. "Please, I want to feel you. I want…" I wanted him inside of me now, anywhere, everywhere, I wanted to feel that rush of warmth, sweet and salty. He knew, he must have known. He kissed me hungrily, he tangled his fingers in my hair and found his ecstasy against me, as I found mine in him.

We lay together, panting, in the cold desert night. The dampness between our bellies was more of a pleasure than I could have ever imagined. The scent of his skin, his hair, the heat that filled our tiny cot.

He did not have to ask if it was good for me, he knew. I would have given everything to him that night. I almost did.

"I want to stay." I had no idea whose words they were, leaving my lips. I want to do that again, and this time, I want you.

Ace smiled, bright white in the darkness. He chuckled. He coiled his legs with mine. "Then you'll stay."

It felt like hours that we spent together, whispering secrets and admiring one another, but it couldn't have been. As much as I wanted more of him, I was exhausted by our passionate flight and lulled to sleep by the rhythmic song of his heartbeat. Before I knew it, the first crisp light of dawn had crept inside of our bed, and Ace was coiling his fingers in my still-damp hair and whispering for me to wake. We both knew I had to leave before anyone had the chance to see us entwined.

I gathered my clothes. I kissed him. There was a kind of static in the air, strange and beautiful, and I kissed him again.

"I am so lucky to have met you, Sanji."

I will never forget the sound of his voice, those words we shared in the final moments of our passion, and the first time he smiled, across that tiny kitchen, and told me I was beautiful. Of all the lovers who have walked in and out of my life, none have stayed with me like the man I shared that final night with, none have stayed like the only one I will never see again. I am not sure if I could share what I shared that night with another man, not like I could imagine finding one worthy enough to sit beside him in that space within my memory. Maybe that's why, in that final moment before disappearing into the morning that would end in a storm of sand, I had whispered,

"You are the kind of person I could love, Ace."

He laughed, not unkind, not surprised. He knew. He must have known how many men had felt the same.