[i]"As long as you remain on this ship, you’re safe."[/i]

After Maddox departed, Rathe gave a slow, soft clap.  "A little fucking dramatic if you ask me, but worth the price of admission."  Inside, she hoped to Hell it wasn't just theatre and that she hadn't paid a ridiculous amount of cash for a poorly-acted dinner party mystery that would never end.  Shit, if that was the case, she off herself with that damned pistol.  Momentarily, she glanced at her pack uncertainly before shoving a hand into a small pouch at the back to retrieve another hand-rolled "cigar" and a lighter.  Rathe inhaled sharply, coaxing the smoke through the fibers, and held her breath as smoky threads drifted up from the end of the cigar.  She stole a lingering glance at the woman with the sun tattoo as she slipped her pack across her shoulder and snatched up the bottle of tequila.  Passing by the other ladies on her way around the bar toward the exit, she exhaled a long stream of hashish-laden smoke.  "A dopo."

Rathe hadn't seen where he went after leaving the living area, but how far could he have gone?  It was a damn boat, or ship, or whatever, after all.  Jørgen, or Dustin.  She shook her head, sending ropes flopping about her shoulders.  It took some poking around before she found him.  She stood in the doorway, leaning against the frame and watching, as he put on a record and, of all things, something slow and kind of sad.  It took her back for a moment, or maybe it was just her high kicking in again, to a night an eternity ago when a handsome Dutchman approached her for a dance.  It had seemed almost old fashioned, and she'd nearly brushed off the invitation, but it somehow felt familiar, like it'd happened before.  Like [i]they'd[/i] happened before.  "Yeah, it's just the fucking high,"  Rathe said to herself as she walked toward the pool table, setting down her pack and the bottle of tequila, which she only now noticed had to be the high-end shit given the ornate crystal, curved shape of the bottle, and deep golden hue of the liquor within.  

Rathe took a stick from the wall-mounted rack, glancing down its length appraisingly, and gauged its weight with her fingertips.  Satisfied, she looked down at the table before walking around it to within inches of Dustin.  She locked his gaze, her own eyes a bit glassy from the hash, then withdrew the cigar and exhaled a puff of smoke to encircle him, "Care to place a wager?"