North, Luke, and Nathan came walking into the kitchen just as I was pulling away from Gabriel.
"How the fuck did you guys get here so fast?"
"Very nice to see you too Gabe." Luke said in return. "We were at the diner when we got the text. Uncle had way over staffed for tonight so he let us go once we finished the current orders." Luke and North had walked over to the stove to peer into the pots on the cooktop. Nathan walked right up to me and gave me a hug.
North glanced over his shoulder "Wasn't your date tonight Gabe?"
"Yeah it fucking was, but something came up." He looked at me, was he trying to see if I was okay with him telling them what happened? I just stared back at him. I don't know if we should tell them now, we will just have to repeat everything when the others get here.
"Well are you going to fucking tell us what happened?" North turned his scowl over to me. "Are you okay Sang Baby?"
"Yes, North, I'm fine. I think it would be better to wait until the others get here though, so we don't have to repeat everything multiple times."
"Alright fine, as long as you are okay. I am sure the others will get here soon anyway."
About a half hour later Silas, Kota, and Victor walked in. Once they realized I was okay, made their comment about the date being interrupted, and being denied any insight into what the meeting was about, we all sat down for dinner.
"Shouldn't we wait for Mr. Blackbourne?" I realized he was the only one missing, but I didn't know when he would get here and everyone seemed pretty hungry.
"Don't you mean Owen, Trouble?" I shot a look at Gabe, were we going to talk about this now?
"What the fuck does that mean Gabe?" North was looking between Gabe and me.
"Trouble is allowed to call Mr. B. Owen now." He held up his hands to calm everyone down. "Before you get any ideas though, the same courtesy has not been passed on to us. We still have to call him Mr. Blackbourne. I tried and it didn't go over well."
Luke and Nathan started laughing. "You're joking Gabe. You honestly tried to call him Owen? Are you crazy?" Luke stuttered out before laughing harder. "Oh I wish I could have heard his response."
"I would have loved to see Mr. B's face when he heard Gabe say it." Nathan was laughing just as much as Luke. The other guys all had smirks on their faces too. I guess it was kind of funny to think about. I did feel bad about letting Owen's name slip out though.
"I can assure you Mr. Taylor and Mr. Griffin, you will not be laughing when I tell you the purpose of the meeting. And it is not to discuss my name, which is still Mr. Blackbourne." Owen had stepped up quietly behind everyone, I don't know how long he had been standing there. Apparently he snuck in on the others too, because they all shot up straight and stopped laughing almost immediately. "For the record, Miss Sorenson is able to call me by my first name if that is what she wants." He looked over at me for the first time since he started talking. "I would appreciate it if we could remain formal when we are at school and working as a team, to not draw unnecessary attention. However, I know it is difficult to switch back and forth, right Sang?" I am pretty sure my mouth dropped a little when he said my name in front of the guys. I wasn't the only one. Everyone was staring wide-eyed at him.
"Jesus Mr. B. You have to admit, you know how to fucking command a room." Gabriel was the first to break the spell.
"Thank you Mr. Coleman. I suggest we sit down and eat, then we can move into the Living Room for our meeting." There were a few grumbles about having to wait even longer and keeping everyone in suspense, but of course food won out.
After everything was cleaned up, we all found a spot in the Living Room. I sat on the couch between Meanie and North. Luke was on the other side of Gabriel, Silas was on the floor in front of me, leaning against the couch. Kota and Victor were sitting in the chairs and Nathan was perched on the coffee table. Owen stood in front of everyone with his hands on his hips.
"I received a call from Mr. Coleman this evening about a discovery that he and Miss Sorenson had. It might be best if Mr. Coleman filled you in on what he told me, then we can decide what to do from there." Owen gestured to Gabriel to indicate that he had the floor to talk. He angled himself off the couch and Luke and Silas both lunged for the open spot next to me. Luke ended up on top of Silas who was chuckling underneath him.
"How are you so fast for someone so big?" Luke mumbled, but he was smiling as he said it and he moved back to his original spot on the couch.
Meanie was standing next to Owen and he ran his hand through his hair before starting. "Everyone knows what I was doing for my date with Trouble. Well she seemed unsure where to start so I gave her the example of that mystery scent I have been trying to duplicate since the beginning of the summer."
"You mean the scent you smelled off some guy at Pam's salon and now you are stalking it?" Luke was leaning forward and smirking.
"Yeah, that fucking one Luke. And I am not stalking it, I just want to figure out what it consists of. It would be like asking you to leave something locked even though you knew you could pick it if you tried. It was too tempting not to figure it out." Gabriel waved his hands in the air. "Whatever, I don't care what you all think. I had Trouble smell the base that I have been working off of and she immediately whispered out 'jasmine'. I added a few drops of jasmine oil to the base and handed it back to Trouble. I am fucking telling you, as soon as she smelled the new mixture she went pale." He looked at Owen. "You were right Mr. B. She is a fucking scent ninja." Owen looked shocked.
"I don't know what you are referring to Mr. Coleman. Could you continue to the most important part of the story please?"
"Right, sorry. She said she had smelled this scent before, on Volto." The room erupted.
"What the fuck Gabe!" North bellowed and practically pushed me off the couch when he stood up. Silas moved me closer to him by putting his arm around me. North continued "you have a lead on Volto and just sat at the table eating dinner like nothing was going on? Why the fuck are we just having a simple meeting about this and not making a plan to get him?"
"Enough." Kota's warning was not as loud as some of the other shouts, but his authority was clear. He looked at North. "Sit down North. Obviously Gabe realizes the importance of this new lead or he wouldn't have called in the middle of his date. We may have a new lead on Volto, but we still have to figure out exactly what it means, and then we can figure out what to do next." North sat down, leaning forward and putting his elbows on his knees.
"Thank you Mr. Lee. You are correct. I think this new lead brings about a few questions regarding Volto's motivation and overall purpose. Up until now we assumed he was focused solely on Miss Sorenson, but if that was really him at Pam's salon talking to Mr. Coleman, than it is more likely that he only became interested in Miss Sorenson when he thought she might get in the way of his plan."
"What do you think his original intentions were Mr. B?" It was the first thing Victor had said since sitting down.
"It would be impossible to know that as of now Mr. Morgan. However I think we need to follow up with it, and for the time being we will go with the assumption that the gentleman that Mr. Coleman talked to at Pam's salon was in fact Volto. Mr. Coleman, I need you and Mr. Morgan to go through the camera feeds from the salon the dates surrounding your first encounter with Volto. I need a detailed drawing of his face and any other characteristics you might remember. Once we have that we can pass it around to the rest of the team to see if he has tried to get close to any more of us."
"Don't you think it would be weird for him to have shown his face to Gabe?" Luke was frowning and had his head tilted to one side as if trying to think through a few different scenarios.
"Good point Mr. Taylor. What I think though is that Volto never intended on getting so involved with us if it wasn't for Miss Sorenson. If I had to guess I would say he planned on staying in the shadows until he was ready to do whatever he had planned, so keeping his face hidden might not have been important or necessary to him. That plan changed when he realized Miss Sorenson was with us and he decided he wanted to take her away from us."
Kota spoke up this time. "That's another thing too. I still don't understand what his purpose in taking Sang was. He has never hurt her, sometimes he has even helped her." Kota looked at me. "You said before that you think Volto is just trying to help you. What did you really mean by that?"
Everyone was looking at me now. "Miss Sorenson," I looked up at Owen. "I believe now would be a good time to tell us what exactly Volto has said to you. Up until now, I have allowed you to keep that to yourself, but I think with this new information it is time that we try to figure out his real motive." I wanted to say something, but nothing was coming out. "I know you have not told us everything that he has said to you, especially during the infamous drive in my car. I let it go until you were ready to talk about it, but I would appreciate it if you would willingly share it now. You can tell us now, or I can give out the rest of the assignments and you can discuss it with me privately after the meeting, your choice."
"N-no. That's okay Mr. Blackbourne. You're right. You need to know what he was saying to me." And so I told them about the conversation in the car. I told them about all the things Volto said against them, the doubts he tried placing in my head. When I finished, my head was down and everyone was silent. I felt Owen come to stand in front of me, and then he crouched down so our heads were level. He put his hand under my chin and lifted it so we could look each other in the eyes. "I am going to ask you a question Sang, and I need for you to be honest with me. Remember, I will know if you try to hide the truth." I nodded my head, I knew what he was going to ask. "Do you trust us, or do you believe some of what he said to you? Do you have doubts about our intentions with you or with any of what we do?"