Gabe was quiet for a long moment, leading them through the jungle in thoughtful silence. Katie felt the strange sense of something following again and moved closer to him.
“I guess you can say I ceased to fascinate her one day,” he said at last. “I was her only voluntary assassin. I traded her my soul for the life of a friend.”
“Wow, Gabe. You’re friend must’ve meant a lot to you.”
“And to you. You did the same,” he said with dark humor. “She wanted to kill the one person who always believed in me.”
“Rhyn?”
“Yes. We both saw something in him that she didn’t. He’s fortunate to have someone like you, who would give her life for him. You are exactly what he needs to balance his nature,” Gabe continued. “I ended up Death’s plaything because she pursued me. She was beautiful, and I had eternity alone ahead of me. Made sense at the time. What drew you to Rhyn?”
Katie didn’t answer for a moment, pensive. Gabe glanced back at her then slowed, as if sensing she was growing tired.
“At first, I think it was knowing he was a black sheep like me. My sister always treated me like I was a blight on the family name. She tried to help me in her own way, I guess, which was better than what Rhyn’s brothers did to him. I wanted to believe he could make it in the Immortal world, because if he could, I could, too,” she started. “And then I saw how good his heart is. He’s a train wreck, but he’s honorable and capable of such good. Kris pulled me into this world and assumed I’d do what I was told like a good little human. But when I told Rhyn I wanted to leave him, he asked for another chance. It’s like he woke up then and realized he wasn’t in Hell anymore or trapped by his brothers’ expectations.”
“He had a reason to be more than what people told him he was,” Gabe said.
“He did. He wanted to make the world safer for me, for our …” Katie’s throat tightened. She cleared it. “He realized he doesn’t have to be in the shadows anymore. And the way he looked at me that last day…” she drifted off again, this time recalling the intensity of emotion on Rhyn’s face the last time she’d seen him in the mortal realm. “I almost believed we had half a chance.”