Marked

Chapter Six

The sun had long ago dipped beneath the horizon, taking with it the last of the warmth from the air. But even once it had gone she hadn't been willing to tear herself from her perch at the stern of the ship to head back to the suffocation of her cabin. Her mind was the clearest here. The most serene it had been in weeks.

Rachel rubbed her hands together, feeling the chill of the night seep deep into the bones in her fingers. A tiny cloud of condensation appeared to her left and she jumped, pushing away from the railing; she could've sworn she'd been alone.

A male form took place as her eyes adjusted, until she realized it was Gabe who stood a few feet away, his chin tipped toward the sky, his lips occupied by a cigarette.

"How long have you been standing there?" Rachel asked, forcing her heart to return to a normal pace.

"Hmm? Oh, hello, Rachel. I didn't see you standing there with all that black clothing you're wearing."

Rachel glanced down at her black sweatpants and her hoodie, pulled tightly over her red locks. He was lying or else how would he have known to call her by name when he'd acted so surprised to see someone else standing there?

"It's awfully late to be out smoking," She accused and took a few steps away from him that she hoped looked subtle.

"That tells me you've never been addicted to nicotine," He replied coolly, eyes inquisitively trained on her feet. The cigarette gleamed in the night like the eye of some disembodied devil. Rachel cleared her throat and though the muscles in her back were still pulled taut as chicken wire, she pretended to let down her guard as she leaned over the railing once more.

"What's a girl like you doing out here in this cold, anyway?" He asked.

"A girl like me? What is that supposed to mean?"

His blonde hair bore a striking resemblance to snow, made his face look as pale as a ghost's as it dusted his cheeks with every breath of the wind.

"My observation has been that most people who have tasted life in the wilderness prefer the commodities of modern technology."

"Well the opposite is true for me, really. I'd rather still be out in the wilderness if it meant I could make all of this go away."

"It must be difficult," He mused as he nodded his head. "Being the president's daughter. The assumptions that you must be exactly like him. In some way twisted...unstable...broken."

Rachel clenched and unclenched her jaw. Something in his words grated on her nerves. Maybe it was the fact that they hit so close to home. "You know what I find difficult to believe?"

He made a noncommittal noise, blew out another puff of smoke from his cigarette.

"The fact that Nicholas allowed you to head back to the bunker in the middle of an attack hosted by your own people." She knew it wasn't smart to accuse him of things that were as insubstantial as air, especially since he was Simone's boyfriend and the last thing she wanted was to push Simone even further away from her. But the details surrounding his arrival had been too mysterious not to provoke questions.

"My mission was over."

"Or you were just beginning another," She countered, narrowing her eyes at him.

"Fair enough. I suppose one could believe that, if it wasn't for the fact that I've got an entire group of soldiers that can attest to my story. We knew nothing of the attack and we were already too far away when it began to be of any help."

She had no answer to that, no way to pick over his words for lies when she didn't exactly know the whole story herself. All she knew was that she felt an unbearable fear for Simone in the middle of her chest. Fear over a man who had arrived during a moment where Nicholas could not and would not have made such a careless mistake as to let people get away when he knew a civil attack on his capital was imminent.

But what if it was just her jealousy creating stories in her mind? What if she was simply crafting sinister plots against Gabe in order to draw Simone away from him and back to her?

She sighed, letting her breath form a cloud in front of her. She didn't know what to think anymore.

"Why is it so difficult for you to trust me?" He asked, not in an accusatory tone but in a tone that invited her to pour her heart out to him. "Simone trusts me and since she is your best friend, I assume you know her better than anyone else. You think she lacks the skills necessary to properly judge my character?"

"Don't feel so special, it's not just you I don't trust; whether it involves Simone or not, I just don't trust anyone. Nowadays, it seems everyone has some secret agenda to attend to."

"Well that's no way to live—always looking over one shoulder, waiting for the knife to come down—"He shrugged. "It must get tiring."

"I'd rather be tired than dead because I trusted the wrong people."

Gabe chucked his cigarette butt down into the black and unyielding waves of the ocean below and turned to meet her eyes.

"Touché. Just stay safe out here," He murmured while he gestured to the ocean around them. "So many restless souls linger in the air, never finding peace in this treacherous nation."

"I fear the living more than I fear the dead."

"Well you're a smart girl, now aren't you?"

He left before Rachel could say anything else, leaving her feeling flustered with his confusing words and mixed signals.

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A/N: Hello, amazing reader. What do you think of Gabe? Friend or foe? Should he be thrown overboard?