Sophie’s POV

“So what are we necessarily supposed to do during the day?” I ask L.Joe as we find ourselves walking down the street again. “And do you even know where we’re going? What if we get lost?”

“We don’t get lost, I assure you, first of all,” L.Joe says as he ruffles the top of my head. “And second of all, we can do whatever we want during the day; at least I can do whatever I want.”

“What if I can’t do anything that I’m doing right now?” I worriedly ask.

“If you weren’t allowed to do it, then why did Lay bring you out here?”

“I guess you’re right,” I say sighing.

“Look, just relax,” L.Joe tells me. “We’ll be able to figure our way out of here, alright? We just have to figure out why they brought us here in the first place.”

“Do you think it’s because we know that Daehyun’s the prince?” I ask him.

“Sophie, everyone knows that Daehyun is the prince,” L.Joe says not even looking at me as the waiter places down our order.

“Right,” I mutter as I look down at the table and begin playing with my jeans pockets. “Wait, my phone,” I say suddenly realizing the emptiness there.

“They probably took it,” L.Joe says as he doesn’t blink an eye. “They took mine, too.”

Without saying a word, I keep looking at the table. I don’t know why L.Joe and I were kidnapped and it doesn’t make sense, nothing does. It doesn’t make sense that we’re here, it doesn’t make sense that they give us freedom. What exactly do these people want?

“Don’t be disheartened,” L.Joe says leaning across the table and patting my hand. “I’m sure these people aren’t anything bad.”

“But we don’t even know who took us,” I retort. “Do you really think that Lay would be able to do that? Plus, I heard their voices. It didn’t sound anything like Lay and it was more than one person.”

“That’s more than I got,” he says as he drinks some of his coffee.

“What do you mean?” I ask looking at him suspiciously.

“You at least got voices; I was out the entire time until I woke up with no one in the room.”

“You had no one in the room?” I ask. “Lay was there when I woke up. See, they’re already treating us differently.”

“Well, I guess no one knows then,” he says shrugging his shoulders.

For a little while, L.Joe and I sit there in silence until I see some people staring at me and pointing my way. At first it doesn’t really bother me until I notice that it happens to almost everyone that enters this place. They always look at me and point their fingers. Am I that interesting to them?

“Why are they staring?” I whisper to L.Joe.

“Who?” he asks looking around to catch some middle-aged women looking at me before they turn their heads. “They’re probably just looking at my good looks.”

“Of course they are,” I say rolling my eyes. “But I’m serious. What are they doing? They keep looking over here.”

“They probably recognize your face from your parent’s funeral,” he says without any emotion like he doesn’t care that these people are freaking me out.

“Right,” I say nodding my head and attempting to get my mind off of them, but it doesn’t seem to be working very well. “Actually, I think I remember something about my parents and something between Korea and China.”

“See, so then they would obviously recognize you, no problem, right?” L.Joe asks me with a smile.

“I guess so,” I say shrugging my shoulders. “I just wish that I had some answers.”

“Don’t we all,” he mutters.

“What do you mean by that?” I ask.

“Everyone wants answers, don’t they?” he asks after he takes another sip of his coffee. “In life, we always want answers about no matter what it’s about, right? Like how people want answers for a test, we want answers as to what we’re doing right now, but eventually, they’ll come out, won’t they?”

“Why are you asking me?” I ask him.

“I was just making a point,” he says sticking his tongue out at me.

Daehyun’s POV

“So let me get this straight,” I say as we sit in my room. Hyosung and Youngjae are sitting across from me and staring at me while my arm is resting on the book that I had gotten earlier to look up information on Sophie. “Sophie’s biological parents are alive? So what? What does that have to do with anything?”

“It has to do with everything,” Hyosung says showing me the paper that is thankfully translated into a language that I can understand.

“Why does it have to do with everything?” I ask looking at the two of them after I read the paper.

“Look, if Sophie has an older brother and her parents are alive, then maybe they’re looking for her,” Hyosung explains.

“Then why would they put her up for adoption?” I wonder. “If they wanted her, then why is she adopted in the first place?”

“Then why did she tell you that she’s from Korea rather than China?” Youngjae retorts.

“I don’t know,” I mutter. “Maybe she’s from Korean parents or maybe she doesn’t actually know she’s from China,” I say as I start rambling off anything that comes to my mind. It’s in a jumble right now and I don’t know what’s right and what’s wrong and with Sophie taken, things are just getting worse.  “How is this supposed to help us find her?”

“What if her actual family took her?” Youngjae suggests.

“What do you mean?” I ask. I don’t think my head is able to take anything else.

“Just think about it,” Youngjae begins.

“Wait,” I say interrupting. “Is this one of your crazy schemes that you got from a video game?”

“No,” he says shaking his head. “It’s a combination of movies. Anyway,” he says quickly moving on before I can interrupt him, “as I was saying, just think about it. What if Sophie was taken, like kidnapped as a child and her adoptive parents were in on it and now her biological parents realize she’s alive and then kidnapped her so they would be able to have her?”

“That’s impossible.”

“Why is it impossible?” Hyosung asks.

“Noona, don’t tell me that you actually believe him,” I say pointing at Youngjae.

“Just give it a thought,” she begins. “We’re trying to help you find Sophie.”

“Okay and I understand that, but we need to find her soon, who knows what’s happening to her out there, but Youngjae’s theory, how in the world would we find out about it?”

“So that means that you believe him?” Hyosung asks in disbelief as she points at Youngjae.

“I’m not sure what I believe anymore,” I say standing up and grabbing the book with me.

“Where are you going?” Youngjae asks.

“I’m going to read this book; Dad gave it to me to learn more about Sophie. Wait a minute, noona,” I say suddenly remembering something. “Don’t you already know about Sophie? You already knew about her when we first came here.”

I see her stare at me and she doesn’t say a word, which means that I must be right. “Daehyun,” she softly begins. “It’s not like that.”

“I just want answers,” I say as I reach my door and open it. “I’m going to go find a quiet place to start reading this to get the answers that I want. You guys can do whatever you want.”

I leave them sitting in the room and I make my way to another room in order to read the book. I’m not sure exactly what type of book he gave me or what I’m even supposed to be reading. As far as I know, he just said that there are probably going to be things about Sophie in there. What type of things are going to be in there?

Sitting down in one of the less used rooms of the palace, I sit and open the book. At first, I flip through the pages not really knowing what to look for or what I’m supposed to find in here, a lot seems like it’s history until some particular paragraphs catch my attention.

In a dark and stormy night, in the land that was reserved for the rich of China, a kind and gentle rich family vacation on the land in one of their many homes. However, one of the thieves wanted to steal the power during the stormy night that would act as his cover. That night, the storm had subsided and the thief made his way to the land and set the house on fire.

Luckily, a well-informed informant, Julian Karp, warned the family and they were able to successfully escape that night, but once the ashes and the fire were put out, the rich family discovered that one of their children were missing, the youngest. Julian Karp, along with his wife then strove to find the child, but turned up fruitless. The child is still deemed to roam around today.

Sophie’s POV

“Do you just always walk around?” I ask him.

“What else is there to do?” he asks shrugging his shoulders.

“You must be glad that we’re missing school,” I comment.

“And you’re not?” L.Joe asks in disbelief as he looks at me. Silence falls between us for a little while before he decides to speak again. “So, how long until Daehyun gets married?”

“Why are you asking that?”

“I don’t know,” he says shrugging his shoulders. “I just thought that…never mind.”

“You thought what?” I question.

“Well, you ran away to my house,” he says.

“But then I ended up calling Daehyun to come and rescue me,” I mutter.

“And then you got taken again,” he finishes. “Your life…seems complicated.”

“Well what about you?” I ask pointing at him. “Your life seems complicated, too.”

“What about it does?” he asks as he pokes me in the head. “Nothing about my life seems complicated. I simply wake up every day, go to school, and then go home. The end.”

“You don’t have friends?”

“I do, but I don’t hang out with them all of the time. Mostly, they annoy me.”

“Oh,” I say nodding my head in understanding. “But to answer your question, I don’t know. It should’ve already happened.”

I begin thinking about Daehyun’s wedding. It was weird that when they got me he didn’t mention anything about getting married again, but that’s probably because all of our focus was finding L.Joe. Now that L.Joe and I are in China, Daehyun is free to get married. There’s no me to take hold of him.

“Did you confess to him?” L.Joe asks.

“Why are you so suddenly curious in Daehyun?” I ask.

“I was just wondering,” he says as he forces his hands into his pockets. “So, that means that you confessed, right?”

“What does it matter to you?” I ask as I begin walking faster.

“So you did,” he says as he catches up to me and swings his arm around my shoulder. “Good job.”

“What’s a good job about it?” I ask. “He’s married, isn’t he? What does it matter whether I like him or not or if he likes me back, he has someone else.”

“But that doesn’t mean that he’ll ever like the person,” L.Joe reasons. “He confessed to you, which you just admitted that you both like each other, and that’s all that matters, alright?”

“Fine,” I mumble. “Whatever. What are we doing now?”

“Beats me, we’re just spending time together,” L.Joe says with a smile. “Plus, we’re in a different country, is there something that you want to do?”

“Go home,” I tell him.

“Why, because you miss Daehyun already?” he asks.

“Ha, very funny,” I sarcastically say. As I turn to look at L.Joe, I spot some people beginning to take pictures of me. “What are they doing?” I whisper.

L.Joe turns around to look at the people and looks back at me to shrug his shoulders. “I guess we should go back where we came, right?”

“Well, I don’t want to ruin our time together,” I tell him.

“You aren’t ruining the time,” L.Joe assures me. “I just don’t want you to feel uncomfortable, okay?”

“Okay,” I say nodding my head.

L.Joe and I walk back to the house together to see Lay lounging in the living room. “You guys are back earlier than I expected,” he comments.

“People started taking pictures of me,” I tell him.

“They did what?” he asks particularly shocked and jumps off of the couch. Is that a problem? Sure it invades privacy, but he makes it seem like the world is going to end.

Daehyun’s POV

I stare at the paragraphs some more. They have to be about Sophie’s parents no doubt since her father’s name is in there, but is that just one of the missions that he worked for? Who exactly did he work for? Everything just makes it crazier. I read those two paragraphs over and over. I don’t know what the other things around it are about and I could probably tell anyone the story by now. I just want to know what it’s about and why it’s there. It bothers me.

Flipping through the rest of the book, I don’t really see anything worth reading about Sophie except for a couple of paragraphs about how her parents got together, they’re still working for the government, which government I may not know, and that they had adopted a child from Korea.

Upon reading that line, I stop and my eyes go over it again. “They didn’t adopt someone from Korea,” I say to myself as I think about Sophie’s birth certificate that was in the package. The birth certificate said that Sophie was born in China, then why does this book say that she was born in Korea? Did she move to Korea? Impossible, she was a baby. How in the world would a baby be able to move? Then again, maybe it is possible.

I close the book and glance at the clock seeing that it’s already dinnertime. I hadn’t realized that that much time has passed. I make my way downstairs to the table where Youngjae and Hyosung are also just arriving. “Noona,” I say as we all sit down at the table. “What does your boyfriend do for a living?”

“Just normal things, why?” Hyosung asks.

“Just asking,” I say. “Youngjae, could I see Sophie’s birth certificate once dinner is done?”

“Why?” Youngjae asks.

“I need to see it; I want to look at it more closely.”

Without asking another question, Youngjae just nods his head as Mom and Dad come in followed by some unexpected guests…Jieun and her family. “Hyosung, Youngjae,” Mom says getting both of their attention, “these is Lee Jieun, Daehyun’s fiancée.”

I don’t know why she’s here and frankly I’ve kind of forgotten all about the marriage thing, but here it is once again blowing up in my face right when I think that I’m starting to get somewhere. For a brief moment, Jieun and I interlock gazes, but she quickly turns away from me. Is there something wrong with her?

“Well, this is awkward,” Youngjae quietly mutters and I know that I’m supposed to hear it. In response, I simply shrug my shoulders, there’s really nothing else I can say.

“So, let’s discuss the matters,” Mom begins in the middle of dinner.

“What matters?” I ask looking up at her.

“Well you know your recent scandal with Sophie, which that girl isn’t even here right now, where is she?” Mom asks looking around. Right when I’m about to answer her, she begins speaking. “Anyway, we don’t need her, but that recent scandal is getting in the way of the wedding.”

“And I thought you said that you were going to hold off on the wedding,” I say in the kindest way possible since I don’t really want to look bad in front of Jieun’s parents. It’s not that I want to marry her, but I’m the prince and they probably have this image of me. I can’t just explode at my mother for not understanding the situation. I can only hope that dinner goes by quickly so I can get back to finding Sophie. I just hope she’s okay, time is ticking away.

“We are,” Mom continues, “we’re holding off on it, but it seems like things are just getting worse.”

“Are they?” I ask. I hadn’t really taken any notice to the surrounding scandal, but I can’t help but take a quick glance to look at Hyosung and Youngjae who look like they don’t know what’s going on. I guess they didn’t really do anything this time.

“Do you not pay attention to anything?” Mom sternly asks as she looks at me. I see Jieun and her parents out of the corner of my eye and I can’t decipher their facial expressions.

“Sorry,” I apologize. “I’ve just had a lot on my mind recently.”

“That’s alright,” she says sighing and massaging her temple. “Look, we only want the best for you two, okay?”

“I understand,” I tell her, “but how is the scandal getting worse?” I wonder. I mean, how can something get worse when the other person involved right now is missing and her whereabouts are unknown?

“People saw you two coming out of a house together and now they’re assuming that you’re living together,” Jieun says, it’s the first thing that she’s said all night. She makes the sadness in her voice pretty evident.

“Oh,” is all I’m able to say as I look at her sitting across the table from me.

“We have to clear this up, now,” Mom says. “We want the royal family to have a clean reputation, that’s why you’re going to announce that it’s all lies.”

Sophie’s POV

“What’s wrong?” L.Joe asks him.

“Nothing,” Lay says quickly attempting to regain his composure and act like nothing had happened by calmly sitting back down onto the couch.

“It didn’t seem like nothing,” I mumble causing L.Joe to lightly stifle his laughter. “Why were people taking pictures of me and staring at me?” I ask loud enough for Lay to hear.

“I don’t know,” he says shrugging his shoulders, but a little too quickly.

“That just gave off a suspicious vibe,” L.Joe says pointing at him.

“Suspicious vibe?” Lay asks, I know that he knows what it means and so does L.Joe. He’s probably just beating around the bush. What does he know that we don’t know? Everything, probably.

“Anyway, we’re going to go into my room,” I say as I grab L.Joe’s arm.

“Oh, okay,” Lay says nodding his head. “I’ll tell you when dinner is ready.”

“Um…okay,” I say staring at him strangely as we both make our way to the room that I came out of this morning. “Where’s your room?” I ask L.Joe.

“Over there,” he says pointing in a general direction.

“Oh, that’s nice,” I reply as I open the door and we both go in.

“Your room looks like mine,” L.Joe comments.

“Well, they are both just rooms.”

“Or prisons, whichever one you prefer.”

I roll my eyes at L.Joe’s comment before I change the subject. “Why do you think Lay acted so weird finding out that people were staring at me and things like that?”

“How am I supposed to know, am I Lay?” L.Joe asks.

“No, you’re not,” I say shaking my head. “But…I don’t know. I just have a feeling like he knows something that we don’t.”

“He probably does, he probably knows why we’re stuck here.”

“That seems very true,” I admit. “But why won’t he tell us anything?”

“I don’t know,” L.Joe says as he begins to walk around my room. “Everything here just seems…fishy. Is that possible?”

“Possibly?” I ask. “I don’t even know.”

“Well it’s possible now,” he says shrugging his shoulders as he starts to come back to sit next to me on my bed. “So, tell me more about your relationship with Daehyun,” he says as he plops onto the bed.

“Are we really on this subject again?” I ask as I throw myself back.

“Yes we really are,” L.Joe says with a sly face. “Now tell me about your relationship.”

“There is none,” I simply say. “He’s getting married and to Jieun of all people. She’s nice, too. I think they make a good couple together.”

“But you two obviously like each other and you’ve already confessed your feelings to each other.”

“Doesn’t matter,” I simply say. “Daehyun is getting married, or rather he might already be married, I don’t know, but maybe being over here in China isn’t a bad thing.”

“Why do you suddenly say that?” L.Joe asks.

“That way Daehyun won’t disappoint anyone and I won’t be in the way,” I tell him. “And nothing has happened to me yet,” I continue, “and you’re here with me. Maybe this is the best for all of us.”

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Why were people taking pictures and staring at Sophie? Will Daehyun be able to get somewhere with the book that his father gave him? How does Daehyun's mom want Daehyun to solve the scandal with him and Sophie?

Here is Chapter 20. Hope you enjoyed :D