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Taking the paper back, he carefully tucked both into the bag. “Kairo…”
“Man, don’t say it! Please, I’m begging you. Don’t say it,” Kairo shouted.
Ed stuck out his bottom lip and met Kairo’s gaze as he peeked between the seats, giving his best pathetic look. “He seemed like he was in a lot of trouble. He went straight to me. He trusted me with this. I don’t want to let him down.”
“He really did seem to be in trouble,” Isidore chimed in. “I didn’t trust that other man who pretended to be his friend. It definitely felt like he was lying.”
Kairo groaned and sank into his chair, his arms folded over his stomach. “But she’s such a headache!”
“Maybe we could handle it all online. Pictures and video calls,” Ed suggested, inwardly wincing. He knew Kairo had a strained relationship with his mother, but this poor guy needed help. They couldn’t just walk away from this.
“You’re not going to let me just pop that into a box full of packing peanuts and ship it off to her, are you?” Kairo grumbled.
“Of course not!” Isidore snapped before Ed could even reply. He slowed to a stop at a red light and glared at his boyfriend. “That is a priceless object. If anything, it needs to be hand delivered to her to make sure it’s safe at all times. It also needs a security team.” Isidore clicked his tongue. “Looks to me like someone tried to hire your team. Are you really going to turn down someone in need like that?”
Ed pressed his lips together into a tight line to keep from bursting out with laughter. He hadn’t thought it possible, but Isidore was expertly handling his boyfriend and it was a beautiful sight to behold. And again, Ed was incredibly grateful that he wasn’t dating Isidore.
As if that wasn’t bad enough, Isidore went in for the kill.
“Besides, this would give you a chance to introduce me to your mom. Unless…you don’t want me to meet your mom.”
Ed sat back in his seat, grinning to himself as he only half listened to Kairo scrambling to explain that he loved Isidore completely, was insanely proud of him, and had no trouble with him meeting his mother. It was his mother that was the nightmare.
Staring at the little black bag in his hand, Ed thought of Green Eyes and the fear that had gripped him. They would take the note and scarab to Dr. Janet Jones, get some answers, and then they would find Green Eyes.
How hard could it be?
1
EDISON WALKER
“K, man, I’m sorry—” Ed said for the third time, but Kairo stopped his words with a pat on the arm and a slightly pained look.
“Don’t. It’s not your fault.”
“Is it mine?” Isidore asked in a small voice.
Kairo was out of his chair in an instant, wrapping his arms tightly around his new boyfriend and cooing a hundred gentle reassurances while peppering him with kisses. As it was, Edison had to cover his mouth with his hand to hold in the bubbles of laughter that kept rising.
No one would ever accuse Kairo Jones of being a particularly hard or cold man. He was resolutely practical, logical, and maybe a bit emotionally reserved.
But Isidore Panopoulos had turned him into a marshmallow.
A squishy, spongy, simpering marshmallow, and it was kind of fucking adorable.
After a few more kisses, Kairo turned toward his computer, his gaze instantly finding Ed. He pointed at him, his eyes narrowing. “Shut up.”
Okay, the marshmallow still had some teeth.
Ed threw up his hands in defense. “I didn’t say anything.”
“No, but you were thinking it and I could hear it,” Kairo muttered as he dropped into his chair behind his laptop. “This isn’t anyone’s fault. My mom and I don’t get along. There are a lot of kids in the world who don’t get along with their parents. It just so happens that this one time, my mom knows someone interesting.” His fingers flew across the keyboard as he pulled up the chat window and prepared to call his mother.
“If it’s too much trouble, we could always save the introductions for another time. I don’t mind,” Isidore offered.
Kairo held out his hand toward Isidore, who crossed the short distance between them to take it. “I do mind. She’s going to love you. More than she loves driving me crazy.”
With a quick squeeze, he released Isidore’s hand to grab his cell phone and switch it over to camera mode. “You got the scarab and note?”
Ed fished the small black bag from his pocket and pulled out the jeweled scarab. He placed it on the table so Kairo could take several pictures while he unfolded the piece of paper. The hieroglyphs were written so carefully in ink, each one clear even if he didn’t know what any of them meant. To him, they seemed to be written with a confident hand. As if the person who wrote them knew each symbol as well as the language he was taught from birth.
