North
"You can't be serious," North boomed, lunging to his feet. He wasn't going to sit here and listen to this any longer. "I'm not leaving Sang for a year, especially not while telling her to go out and find some other boyfriend to see if she likes that better."
"But what if she does?" Silas interrupted, his voice low, his eyes dark and troubled. "What if she would prefer that, North? You and I have both had girlfriends who were only ours, but all she's ever had is all of us us."
"Because that's all she needs," he snapped back. "You're treating her like she's some little girl who doesn't know her own mind."
"We did save her," Victor said quietly, staring down at his hands. "I know she loves us, and of course we love her. But . . . maybe a little seperation would be good. Just so that we can be sure this is what we really want before we move forward with this."
North shook his head, so angry he couldn't speak for a full minute. How could they be saying this? How could any of them even think of supporting this? Worse, why had this even been brought up in the first place? Except he knew the answer to that. "You let Mr. Blackbourne get into your heads. He's the one who first brought up all of us being with Sang so we could stay together as a family, so we could keep operating as a team without fighting over her and without breaking apart some day when our lives changed. And now he comes out with this bull crap that the past two years weren't good enough to let us know we want this?"
Gabriel sent Dr. Green an uncertain look. "Has Mr. B changed his mind about us all being with Sang? Is that why he . . .?"
"No." Dr. Green spoke in a fierce tone, his eyes flashing. "Absolutely not. He just wants to make sure that every last one of us is absolutely certain of what we want."
"Sure sounds like he's doubting the plan to me," North ground out. "And rather than talking about it with us like an adult, he decided to try to manipulate us all into going along with his new plan."
Gabriel gave Dr. Green another uncertain look as Nathan and Victor frowned at him.
Dr. Green sighed. "Stop trying to twist Mr. Blackbourne's motives, North. You're as welcome to talk with him about any concerns you have as always. You—"
"Right," North snapped, spinning toward the hallway leading to the front door. "That's why he's here right now talking to us, huh? So we can express our concerns to him." He ignored Dr. Green calling out to him, striding for the front door and slamming it behind him. He almost went for his car, but he didn't want to got too far, not without knowing where Sang was and what Mr. Blackbourne was saying to her right then. He would have stormed to where they were if he'd known.
Taking out his phone, he sent her a text.
North: Where are you?
Then he kept walking, glancing down at the phone in his hand every few minutes as he walked, as though maybe he'd just missed the buzz of her incoming response. It didn't come. He frowned, a dark feeling growing in his chest as she didn't answer. Maybe she was still talking to Mr. Blackbourne and wasn't look at her phone, but . . . he didn't like this. Not right now. He needed a response.
He wasn't sure how long he walked before he was heading back toward the townhome, worry growing in his chest. He needed to see her, to talk to her, to make sure she thought Mr. Blackbourne was as full of it with this idiotic plan as he did.
When he'd reached their neighborhood he saw her walking with a duffle bag over his shoulder. Panic consumed him before something inside of him snapped. "Hey!" he yelled, lengthening his stride to catch up with her.
~.~
Sang
Sang flinched at the sound of North's voice, clutching her bag to her like a shield. She hadn't wanted to see any of them. She hadn't wanted any of them to see her. After Mr. Blackbourne talked to her, she still hadn't let herself fall apart. She was saving that for later. For now, she wasn't going to impose on them anymore than she had. She wasn't going to keep being a burden they still felt they had to care for, even with them no longer loving her. She wasn't going into that stupid program or accepting any more help from the Academy.
It wasn't like she could keep being a part of them anyway. A dog team was always her only option, with her fear of women, and her team no longer wanted her. She might have been doing better with women after all her therapy with Lily, but she still couldn't imagine being as close with other girls as being on an Academy team with them would require. The thought alone was enough to make her nauseous.
Since the guys no longer loved her but didn't even care for her enough or respect her enough to tell her, she was removing the problem by leaving, taking the bare minimum of what she needed. Because nearly everything she owned had been given to her by them. It made her feel pathetic. And still didn't make sense. Other than that she must have done something wrong. Or that she was wrong in believing they'd loved her and it somehow took them all this time to figure that out. But Mr. Blackbourne was big an living fiscally responsible, so she had some money saved up. She would make this work.
She couldn't meet North's eyes as he marched up to her, his gaze fierce. "What are you doing?" he demanded.
She didn't answer. If he knew, he would try to insist that she follow Mr. Blackbourne's plan, that she join the program. They guys might not have cared about her anymore, but they were still too responsible to just drop some girl out into the world without providing help. The thought made her heart clench, that she was being treated the same as any girl and not as their girl.
"Sang," he ground out, snatching her arm in an almost too tight grip. "Answer me. What are you doing?"
She pressed her lips tighter together against bursting out that she was leaving so they didn't have to pretend like they still felt anything for her, like this next year truly was about everyone deciding for sure that they all wanted to be together with Sang rather than some elaborate excuse to separate themselves from her.
She didn't want their lies that they still loved her but needed one last push to be certain this was still what everyone wanted now that they were all adults. Before today, before the last few weeks of the guys pulling away, she would have sworn that they would never lie to her like this. Of course, she also would have sworn that they loved her, so what did she know?
North's voice turned hoarse, his hand going slack. "So you want this? You want to leave us?"
Her head snapped back to look up into his haunted eyes. "Me? Leaving you? You're the ones abandoning me for some mission when I was supposed to be part of your team!" Her voice thickened, tears threatening. She swallowed, trying to keep them back, but she couldn't hold back the words that she wanted to throw at all of them. "You're the ones who aren't even man enough to tell me you don't love me anymore, so came up with some ridiculously complex plan just to get rid of me!"
And she would have to ask for the Academy's help with one more thing, though it wouldn't be from Mr. Blackbourne's team. She couldn't get a job as a ghost. Couldn't get a driver's license. Couldn't buy a house. Couldn't travel by plane. She couldn't live without help. So she would ask Dr. Roberts to help her get official records of her existence. And then she would be all done with the Academy. She could still help people without the Academy, which was exactly what she would do once she was settled. Somewhere far away from here.
North's jaw tightened before he dropped his intense gaze to her bag. "You . . . you don't plan to follow what Mr. Blackbourne wants. You're not planning on joining that program at all. You're running away."
She flushed at how he'd phrased it. "I'm leaving people who don't want me. I'm not going to force my presence on anyone who feels like they have to pretend to still care about me while making up excuses for why we can't be together in the hope that I'll decide I want someone else."
North shook his head. "That's not true. It's not like that. Mr. Blackbourne has been getting inside everyone's heads. He—" North broke off scowling, but that didn't help the pain growing inside her chest. So it was Mr. Blackbourne who didn't want her anymore. They hadn't known each other well when he'd first come up with the plan of her joining the team and being with all of them. Maybe he regretted it now that he knew her better. It was just . . . he'd let her in in so many ways. He'd done so much for her. She couldn't understand where she'd gone wrong, other than her tangled thoughts of her not being good enough, of her no longer being a damsel in distress so them not being interested in her anymore, or of her being too much of a burden. It was likely one of those things or a combination of them, wasn't it?
And if Mr. Blackbourne was so easily able to convince the others to leave her, then how much had they really wanted her in the first place? She knew how much they respected him. She'd witnessed it over and over, and she'd held the same respect for him, but . . . was love meant to be dissolved that easily? How much had they really cared about her if they gave her up because Mr. Blackbourne suggested he thought it was a good idea? She'd been so sure that they were a family, that she was part of them. Because they'd told her and showed her over and over.
"Baby," North said, his voice soft as he dropped her arm, bringing his hand to her face. She realized she was crying, but stepped back from his touch. She needed to be far away from all of them to sort this out—and because they didn't really want her. She'd known she didn't understand much about social interactions with the way she was practically raised in isolation, but the guys she'd been sure of. She'd thought she understood them and their feelings. Now she was more lost than ever.
"Sang," North said, his voice rough this time. "Where are you going?"
She shook her head. "It doesn't matter." Not to them. And she didn't know anyway. First, she needed Dr. Roberts' help for records, and then she'd figure out the rest, one step at a time.
"Sang you can't just leave like this."
"I'm not going back to people who don't want me!" she clutched her bag tighter as she yelled, panic rising in her chest. She wouldn't be able to get away from North if he insisted on dragging her back.
He stared at her for several moments before putting his hands on her shoulders. "And what about someone who does? Sang Baby, I always knew that if you left, I'd follow you. That if any of the others ran off with you, I would chase you down."
More tears spilled down her cheeks as pain and regret twisted in her chest. Was he really saying he would go with her? That he really, truly wanted her? But . . . "I can't take you from your family, North."
His eyes darkened, his hands tightening on her shoulders. "You're not the one making that decision. They've made their choice, and I've made mine. So one, I'm not leaving my family, I'm following it. Two, the others have decided to leave me, so far as I'm concerned." He gentled his voice as he pulled her closer. "So where are we going next?"
Sang dropped her bag, throwing her arms around North's waist as she buried her face in his chest.
~.~
Mr. Blackbourne
It took all of Mr. Blackbourne's self control to keep his emotions in check the next day as the remaining members of his team sat around the townhouse living room. He couldn't allow the flutter of panic in his chest or the whirling of self doubt in his mind show on his face. If he did, he risked his team breaking.
He had gravely miscalculated the hurt this plan would cause Miss Sorensen. And how North would react. He should have handled things so much differently. But there was no time for regret right now, especially while standing in front of his team. Gabriel and Luke sat together on a couch, their faces pale as they stared off into space. Nathan, Kota, and Victor looked more ashen as all three of them continually checked their phones, as though Sang and North would text them any moment, but the pair had undoubtedly already tossed their phones.
If Sang had been on her own, Mr. Blackbourne could have tracked her down and brought her back and then . . . he didn't know what. Her running away had sparked so much doubt in him that he might have scrapped the entire plan regarding her. They were too late to back out of this mission, not with how it would affect all the other Academy teams who were involved, but perhaps he should have made entirely different arrangements for handling his concerns around Sang and the less romantically experienced members of his team. His fears were still valid, but how he'd chosen to handle them were now obviously less than ideal. Perhaps because he'd let his fear drive his decisions rather than thinking more rationally about all this. And now Miss Sorenson was with North who knew where, and North knew very well how to disappear. The Academy wouldn't find them if North didn't want them found.
The last two members present, Sean and Silas, sat with tight jaws, anger burning in their eyes. Probably anger at him, though Silas had yet to say or do anything to indicate that, while Sean had yelled at Mr. Blackbourne for a good portion of the previous night. They were all worried about Miss. Sorensen, but at least she was with North.
"I am well aware of how many of you are feeling regarding yesterday's events," Mr. Blackbourne began, not even saying out loud that Miss Sorenson and North had run off, as though that would somehow lessen the sting of it. Not like he had a right to be hurt when he had handled things so poorly that he'd likely given Miss Sorenson the entirely incorrect impression that he—that they—didn't want her. Why had he let this mission back him into a corner where he made such poor decisions? "But it's time to get ready for our mission."
Gabriel letted out a choked sound. "And forget about Sang? We have no idea where she is or if she's okay! We don't know—"
"She's with Mr. Taylor," Mr. Blackbourne interrupted, his voice sharp. "So we know she'll be fine."
"And none of this changes what we've already argued," Sean said, his voice despondent. Mr. Blackbourne wasn't entirely sure how much Sean cared about the plan at his point. While he was genuinely worried that they'd pushed this on Miss Sorenson and some of the others too soon, when she and they were too inexperienced, Mr. Blackbourne wasn't so certain Sean still cared about that fact, not with Sang out of their reach for now. He'd undoubtedly planned to still keep an eye on Miss Sorenson's from a distance during their mission, despite knowing that Mr. Blackbourne had already planned to. Because of course they wouldn't have just entrusted her to someone else for an entire year.
Gabriel leapt to his feet. "Are you kidding me? So Sang gets to see if she wants a one-on-one relationship with North?! That's bull crap! That's not what we talked about. Why not with me or any of the others? That's not fair. You talked like she'd have the chance to be with some random guy if she wanted to, not one of us. And then after that she would . . ."
He trailed off and Luke finished, his voice empty sounding. "And then she'd see that he—no matter who he was—wasn't as good as any of us, and she wouldn't be tempted with another guy or with dating anyone one-on-one. She'd know for sure that we're what she wants."
Sean shook his head, the dark shadows under his eyes seeming to swallow the overhead light shining down on him. "We never knew how this was going to end up. There was always a chance that she would find someone she wanted or that one of our team would."
"Maybe," Victor said bitterly, "but what were the chances? And we know she'll be happy with North, even if she misses the rest of us."
"And North's gone," Luke said quietly. "He won't come back to us without her, and we've chased her away. We lost both of them."
Guilt squirmed in Mr. Blackbourne's chest at Luke's use of the word we. Maybe the others had played their part in this by agreeing to his plan, but it was his plan. And he was the one who'd spent weeks convincing them to go along with it.
"This mission is important," Silas spoke up, his tone dark. "And we've already committed to it, but after this year is up, we'll go find Sang and North, right? That will be our first priority?"
All eyes went to Mr. Blackbourne, some of them lifting hopefully. Hope was exactly what they needed right now, but he still wanted those with less experience to at least think about exploring other options and not feel tied down by what everyone else was doing, by what any of the others wanted. And if he promised that they would immediately go find Sang after all this, they wouldn't. They would have in their minds that they were just waiting to retrieve their girlfriend to win her back rather than bothering to consider other options. "We'll see. We don't know how things might change for any of us during the next year."
Silas's eyes darkened, his hands clenching into fists in his lap. "After this mission, I'm going after her." Then he muttered almost under his breath, "If she'll still have me."