Chapter 2
Aiya froze in shock and confusion, June’s words instilling many questions in her mind. “...my father..” She murmured before a pained and angered expression took over her face. “I want nothing to do with that scumbag.” She snapped, crossing her arms in a childlike way as her eyes left the taller male’s gaze. “He deserves to rot in hell and if this is his or your idea of a joke, you seriously need help.” Aiya backed up away from the two men though she knew that running wasn’t a possibility. They were bigger than her, faster than her, and even if she could escape these two, there was Tris who could swoop in and catch her. Honestly, she would rather be caught by one of these two then him. But besides the imminent danger, curiosity washed over her. What exactly did they want with her? Jin looked at June, the two seemingly reading each other’s thoughts. With a sigh, June nodded at Jin before looking back at Aiya.
“Do you like tea, Aiya?” She was caught off guard, not expecting a question as random as that to leave his lips. Even still, she slowly nodded ‘yes’ in response and watched as he left the room towards what she assumed was the kitchen. Jin saw him off before looking back towards Aiya, a gentle smile still gracing his lips.
“I know you must be confused, scared, and probably angry above all, but please give us a chance to explain.” The soft tone of his voice made it hard to argue against him and for some reason, Aiya felt that out of the three boys she had come across, she could actually trust Jin. Jin took her silence as compliance and offered out his hand towards her.
“Would you like to sit in the living room? It'll be the most comfortable for all of us.” Aiya couldn’t argue, especially since her feet were beginning to ache from standing, and so she cautiously placed her hand into his slender one. It was soft and comforting, just another feature to add to his paternal aura. Gently, he squeezed her hand, leading her to another room decorated with large, plush red couches, white walls that seemed to be throughout the whole house, and the same tiled floor as the one in the room upstairs. As they approached the couch, he slowly slid his hand out of hers, taking a seat before patting the empty space next to him. Slowly, she lowered herself down, sinking into the soft crimson fabric. There was a silence that hung in the air before Jin cleared his throat, causing Aiya’s eyes to shoot to his.
“Firstly, I want to apologize deeply for kidnapping you but you have to believe it was the only way we could contact you.” Aiya just stood silent, allowing the male to continue on with his words. “As you already know, your father is the reason why we are in contact with you.” At the mention of her father, her expression changed to one of annoyance. “I’m sure you have a lot of questions and I’m going to try to explain as much as I can.” Jin rubbed his hands against the fabric of his pants, trying to figure out where he should start.
“I’ll start off with telling you where exactly you are. This is your father’s estate, The Rabbit Hole, as the boys and I call it. Your father and us lived here together up until recently. Now, it’s just us.” Aiya was definitely confused . Her father had this estate to himself? Of course their family had always been well off but the size of this place was overly large for just him and these three guys. Thinking about it, why was her father living with three guys and what did Jin mean by ‘now it’s just us’?
“If I may cut in, who exactly is ‘us’? Do you mean the three of you guys?” Jin smiled slightly and shook his head. “No, we are included in the ‘us’ yes, but there are seven of us in total. The other boys are out running errands.”
Seven boys in one house. She wondered what the hell was going on. Now for her second question. “What did you mean when you said it was just you guys now?” At this question, his face fell from that sweet smile to an expression of sadness and guilt. “Well...” He paused, not knowing how to tell you this next part. Jin couldn’t tell how you would react to the news. It seemed like you hated your father but when it came to this, sometimes feelings like that were thrown out the window. “Your father...left us.” Aiya scoffed, rolling her eyes as she looked away. “Well, I wouldn’t be surprised. That’s what he’s good at, leaving.” Jin shook his head and realized she didn’t quite understand what he meant.
“No..Aiya..your father..” He trailed off, gazing at the female in front of him. She looked just like him from her cheekbones, to her eye shape, even to her nose. He, along with the other boys, had been so close to Ray, her father, and so it pained him to see so much of him in her. “..he’s dead, Aiya” As soon as the words left his lips, his eyes scanned her face, waiting to see any change or reaction she gave. Aiya’s face had gone blank, her mind still processing the words she had just been told. In a split second, it turned from blank, to sadness, to confusion, to anger, and then to all of them simultaneously. She was speechless and so she just sat there, looking back at Jin in disbelief. She began to hate the sadness taking over her body.
Aiya had worked so hard over the years to hate her father. He had just left his family and he didn’t deserve her sorrow. Her eyes cast down as she folded her arms once more. “I don’t care.” She whispered through deep down she knew that her words were a lie. Jin was shocked at
her words, his face scrunching into one of distaste. Unlike her, Jin held her father on a pedestal, the man had done so much for him and the other boys. To have his own flesh and blood not care about the fact that he had past made the passive boy’s blood boil. Jin sighed, standing up from his seat on the sofa.
“How can you hate a man when you don’t even know his side of the story. I knew your father, way better than you, and I know he would never leave his family without a good explanation.” With that, he walked out the room, the edge in his voice cutting through Aiya. Jin may have been right but she was also too stubborn for her own good. When you spent your whole life with a specific mindset, you couldn’t just let go so easily. She knew that she caused a bit of a strain between her and Jin with that comment. He was the only one that she felt comfortable with and yet she had ruined their first actual conversation. Aiya was just about to get up before June walked back in, two tea cups in his hand.
“Hmm, I guess Jin left already?” She simply looked down, still feeling guilty at how she had made Jin feel. “That is most likely my fault.” Aiya said softly as the male walked over, placed both steaming cups down, and took Jin’s seat. “Hey, I doubt that he is angry with you. Is it okay if I ask what happened?” Aiya sighed, picking up one of the cups softly, taking a tiny sip out of it. “I may have said that I didn’t care about my father’s death.” She whispered, looking up into his wise eyes. June lips thinned and he nodded in understanding.
“Yeah, I see where you may have fucked up.” He murmured with a tiny chuckle, his hand reaching out to squeeze her shoulder. “Don’t worry. He’ll be fine. Jin really looked up to your father as we all do, but Jin was the first one..so they had a closer connection.” After that, June
sipped his own tea and Aiya knew that he wouldn’t be answering any questions she had on that. He softly placed the teacup back down, a soft ‘clink’ ringing in the room.
“I’m assuming your talk with Jin didn’t get too far past your father’s death so I’ll continue.” June crossed his right leg over his left, one hand running through his tousled locks. He so easily grabbed her attention because he was simply attractive. She couldn’t place her finger on it but something about him just pulled you in. She could say the same for Tris and Jin. Though it was hard to find Tris attracted with his attitude. “Everyone here in the Rabbit Hole works under Duchess, the government’s Covert Ops department. No one knows about us because we tend to deal with... the underground work.” June paused, leaning back into the sofa with a serious expression. “There are actions that Duchess can’t carry out legally and that’s where we come in. Basically, they pass us orders and we carry them out. Your father had started this side department years back and recruited all of us along the way. Jin was brought in first and our last member is Arist who you’ll meet later on. On top of that, we are also experiments if you will. We have all allowed Duchess to genetically modify us and thus, all the boys living here are what the agency calls Role Keepers.”
Aiya listened with open ears, emotions crashing against each other, thoughts racing. She had so many questions but she kept quiet. “We were on a mission about a month ago and things didn’t go so well.” June fell silent for a moment, a solemn expression flickering on his face for a second.
“We were sent to gather intel from WONDERLAND, that pharmaceutical company that has been in the media recently. Long story short, they’ve been connected to the recent deaths that have been happening but Duchess just needs some concrete information that they can’t get by
themselves. We had gone in on a task..and it didn’t end well.” His face was pained and he stopped his story, clearly he didn’t want to go any further.
“We grieved for a while and we never got his body. A week ago, we got a letter in the mail and in it was your father’s will. We never knew he had a family..never officially. You may not care, but at night he would write you these letters, letting you know what was going on in his daily life but he never sent them out. Me and Jin stumbled upon them but we never questioned him about it.”
Aiya shifted uncomfortably in her spot at hearing that. “In short words, he left his position to you and we were in charge of locating you. That brings us to where we are now. We had to make it seem like a kidnap because no one knows the Rabbit Hole exists.” Aiya cut him off for a second, looking up at his face.
“Does my mother know?” She whispered softly, not enjoying the thought of her mother being worried sick. “She can’t know..it could risk the secrecy we worked so hard for.” She shook her head.
“But I can’t have my mother worrying!” June flashed her a stern look as he stood up. “It doesn’t matter what you want. This is how it’s going to be Aiya.” With an apologetic expression now, he stood up, taking their now empty cups.
“I know this is going to be hard to get used to, but you’re our only hope to keep this organization running. That spot is bound to you and you have to take it.” With that said, June made his way towards the kitchen.
“Of course, you have to prove yourself first.” June had left before she could even ask anything. Duchess. Rabbit Hole. Genetically modified? Aiya couldn’t wrap her mind around it at
all and she hoped she would get a chance for answers. Now all she needed was to let that information sink in. “We’re back Junie!” A younger voice rang through the home as four sets of footsteps were heard.
“It took us forever to get what you needed but we finally have-” The voice stopped abruptly as four males stepped into the living room. Aiya’s eyes were as wide as theirs minus the younger one in the front who flashed her a shy smile. “Hey it’s you. Sorry if me and Tris were a bit rough on ya last night.”