Okay, But Try Not to Murder Anyone 5, page 1
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Chapter 1
“Oh, my god, I swear, my eyes are going to fall out of my head from reading so much,” Mary sighed as she pushed a huge book away from her and rubbed her eyes.
“I know, where’s Elaine with that food?” Laura asked, and the blonde federal agent flipped a heavy book shut and pulled another one toward her.
“Aw, come one, I thought you two were the huge nerds of the relationship,” I said as I grinned at my two sexy lovers.
The three of us were sitting in the sunny library of our new condo with piles of books and a few laptops scattered across the big, mahogany desk that had come from Laura’s penthouse. We had a lot of research to do since there were dangerous ancient artifacts being shipped across the world, and we needed to stop them from falling into the wrong hands.
Not to mention, I had a two million dollar bounty on my head.
It was really for the best if we figured out where these artifacts were, and fast. So far, we’d recovered a pair of powerful earrings here in Chicago, went all the way to New York City to recover a necklace, and now were hot on the trail of a matching ring.
I looked down at the Ke-Beech cuffs that were tattooed onto my wrists, and I reflected on how much had happened since the cuffs permanently attached themselves to my body, technically against my will, but I wasn’t complaining. Only a few short months ago, I was just a clerk at the local Copy, Post, Ship shop in my hometown, with no girlfriend or much going on outside of work.
Now, I had ancient superpowers, a sweet job at the FBI, three beautiful girlfriends who were fine with sharing me, and a brand-new condo in Chicago.
Life was looking a lot better these days.
Well, except for the whole bounty on my head, thing.
But that’s why we were holed up in the library, despite the sunny day outside.
My phone dinged, and I picked it up to see a text from Elaine, my gorgeous Israeli girlfriend. I read the text quickly and then turned to my other two lovers.
“Elaine is on the way back now,” I said.
“Oh, good, time for a lunch break, then,” Laura said, and the sexy blonde FBI agent stood and stretched.
I admired the curves of her delicious body and the way her shirt rode up her toned midriff with each movement.
“Mmmm, how much time do we have for our lunch break?” I smirked.
“Not enough for what you’re thinking, stud,” the blonde woman said as she shot me a wink.
“You still have energy after last night?” Mary asked as she dramatically threw her hands in the air. “You went like two rounds with all three of us, how could you possibly have energy for more?”
“For you ladies, I’ve got all the energy in the world.” I grinned.
“We’ll put that to the test later,” Laura said, and then she strode over to me and planted a kiss on my lips before she made her way to the door and gestured for us to follow. “Come on, let’s get everything set up for lunch.”
The three of us spent the next few minutes pulling out plates and drinks and setting the dining table up, and in that time, Elaine returned with a stack of delicious-smelling pizza boxes, and we all cheered.
“Thanks for picking these up, babe,” I said as I took the boxes from my tanned lover and leaned over for a kiss.
“No problem, babe,” Elaine said as she returned the kiss.
“There better not be any pineapple on these pizzas,” Laura said as she eyed the boxes in my hand suspiciously.
“It’s only pineapple,” Elaine deadpanned. “All of it. No cheese, no sauce, just pineapple.”
Laura made exaggerated gagging noises, while Mary pretended to be overjoyed at the prospect of pineapple on pineapple pizza, and I couldn’t help but chuckle at my girlfriends’ goofy antics.
I placed the boxes on the table and flipped the lid of the first one open to reveal a very cheesy, very pepperoni-y pizza
“Not a pineapple in sight,” I said as I tipped the box up so Laura could see it.
“Ohh, thank god.” Laura grinned.
“One day, I’m going to bring home an all pineapple pizza just to see your reaction,” Elaine teased.
“Well, I hope they chase you out of the establishment for even requesting such an abomination,” the blonde agent said as I opened the other boxes, and we all started to serve ourselves slices of pizza from different pies.
Other than the extra cheese and extra pepperoni, there was a veggie one, and a buffalo chicken one. I loaded my plate up with a couple slices of each and took a seat around the large dining table with my lovers.
Laura had a strict no shoptalk policy during meals, so we steered clear of any discussion about the artifacts or the research we’d done on them. Instead, I gestured around at the large dining room we’d recently decorated.
“Sooo, how are you ladies liking the new condo?”
“Oh, my goooood, Jonah, you have no idea!” Mary squealed as she put the slice of pizza she was about to take a bite from back on her plate and clapped her hands. Mary had only moved into the condo three days ago, since she’d had to stay with her friend back in Bellamy until the end of the month, so the excitement was still fresh for her.
“My favorite thing has to be that giant bathtub.” Laura smirked.
“Ohhh, yes, that has proven to be quite the treat.” I grinned as I remembered the night Mary moved in, when all four of us had some slippery, sudsy fun.
“But, to be honest, Jonah, I’d be happy to live in a cardboard box, as long as it was with you,” Elaine said as she looked over at me with adoration in her eyes.
“Same.” Laura smiled.
“Same, but I am glad it’s a condo and not a cardboard box, I’m not going to lie,” Mary giggled.
“Me, too,” I chuckled. Then I took a big bite from a piece of buffalo chicken pizza and determined it was definitely my favorite of the three pies. The tangy sauce dripped down my chin, and Elaine giggled as she reached over, wiped the sauce from my face, stuck her finger in her mouth, and then shot me a wink as she licked the sauce off.
I felt a tightening in my groin at the sight of my lover’s sensual lips wrapped around her appendage, but a piece of chicken started to slide off my pizza, so I was distracted trying to catch it before it fell.
Then we finished up our lunch and tidied up. We were like a well-oiled machine when it came to work around the house. The three women and I fell into an easy routine when we moved in, and sometimes I had to pinch myself because I couldn’t believe how lucky I’d gotten with not one, not two, but three amazing girlfriends.
Once we were finished cleaning up, we returned to the library where our books were still scattered around the large mahogany desk. Laura did a little dance and clapped her hands together when she saw the stacks of books, while the rest of us sighed.
“Oh, come on, this is the fun part!” Laura said as she took her seat and pulled a book close to her.
“The fun part is when I’m in the field with a gun in my hand,” Elaine grumbled, but she found an empty seat and grabbed a book.
“Being cozy in my library with good company and learning about rare ancient artifacts is pretty fun to me.” Laura grinned.
“It’s not the worst,” Mary agreed as she took her own seat.
I joined the women at the table and grabbed a book I hadn’t flipped through yet.
“I read that one already, nothing there,” Mary said as she eyed the book in my hand. Then the curly-haired brunette grabbed a thicker book and handed it over to me. “This one might have some information, though.”
“Gee, thanks,” I said sarcastically as I took in the size of the new book.
“Anytime,” Mary giggled.
All four of us spent the next while in silence, with just the sound of flipping pages and tapping keys to interrupt our studies. We all switched between reading thick books and scrolling through long academic articles on our laptops, and I pored over pages and pages of information about different ancient civilizations and their legacies, but it was hard to find what we needed. The artifacts were extremely powerful, it wasn’t like a book or article was just going to be like ‘oh, hey, here’s this super powerful necklace, and if you put it on, you can control others’ minds, here are the coordinates to find it.’
We’d all be long dead if the information was that easy to find.
I finished scouring the book in front of me, so I flipped it shut and pushed it away from me. Then I looked up to see Laura scribbling furiously in a thick notebook, and her eyebrows were knitted together in concentration.
“Find something interesting?” I asked.
“I think so,” Laura said as she let out a long breath.
“Great, let’s hear it,” Elaine said as she flipped her own book shut.
I didn’t mind the research much, but my Israeli lover seemed to be itching to get back in the field. It had been a couple weeks since we were out in the field in New York City, where we’d met up with her Israeli friends wh
“Okay, so, this is what I’ve got so far,” the blonde woman said as she rubbed her hands together and studied her notes, and I could tell she was about to go into full agent mode. “We’re looking at artifacts from a couple different places and civilizations, they’re not all from the same place, so they don’t all act the same. We know a bit about the Ke-Beech civilization and those artifacts.”
“Yeah, we know them pretty well.” I grinned and flexed the muscles in my forearms so the tattooed cuffs rippled, and the women all admired the movement for a moment before Laura continued.
“Ummm, right, yeah, l-like I was saying,” Laura stumbled over her words as she tore her eyes away from my wrists and back to her notebook. “Of course, Ke-Beech isn’t the actual name of the ancient civilization that existed in modern-day India. It’s just the Hindi word for ‘between,’ because very little is known about the civilization. I have found some references to a culture I think refers to Ke-Beech.”
“What sort of references?” I asked as I strained to see the words scribbled in her notebook.
“Like this one here says there was a powerful society driven by nepotism, with beautiful jewelry that only members of the family in charge were allowed to wear,” Laura said as her eyes skimmed over a passage from a book. “But there were instances in which outsiders were ‘chosen,’ so to speak, by the jewelry. It was extremely rare, and if it happened, the chosen one was considered almost god-like in the eyes of the people.”
“Sooooo, Jonah is basically a god,” Mary gasped.
“Sounds like it,” Elaine said with a twinkle in her eye. “Now it all makes sense, how he’s able to satisfy us all at once and so often. Of course he can, he’s a freaking god.”
“Oh, stop it,” I said as I waved my hand, but I had a huge smile on my face. I didn’t believe I was an actual god, but I sure liked the sound of it. Then I took a moment to ponder Laura’s words. “So, the cuffs belonged to the ruling family of the Ke-Beech civilization, but they attached themselves to me because they considered me worthy.”
“Yeah, like, they didn’t attach themselves to the guy who dropped them off, did they?” Mary asked. “He wasn’t worthy. I doubt many would be, except you, Jonah.”
“God knows why.” I shook my head. “I was nobody when I was working at CPS. I’m only somebody now because of the cuffs.”
“You were always amazing, Jonah,” Mary said firmly, and the curly-haired cutie reached out to squeeze my hand.
Mary had known me the longest of all the women, but it took the longest to get with her, because her loser boyfriend kept standing in the way between us. Luckily, Raymond was no longer in the picture, plus I got to kick his ass in the end, and Mary ended up with me, so it all worked out.
“Anyway, the Ke-Beech artifacts can only be worn by certain people,” I said to get us back on track. “So that might work in our favor when we’re recovering the artifacts. Hopefully, the average kind of scum who are buying them up and trying to use them to control people won’t be able to benefit from their superpowers, because they’re not worthy enough.”
“Yeah, and if all the Ke-Beech artifacts attach themselves to you, then you’re like Super Duper God Jonah,” Mary teased.
“Uugghhh, I hope not,” I said as I recalled how it felt when I tried on the pair of earrings we’d recovered from a psycho who had used their powers to kidnap and kill women. When I put those earrings on, I’d felt pure evil, and I shuddered at the thought of not being able to take them off again. “So, I guess that means the earrings weren’t part of the Ke-Beech artifacts?”
“Apparently not,” Laura said with a shake of her head. “They’re likely from the Harappan civilization. We’ve also confirmed the necklace is from the Harappan era. These artifacts can be worn by anyone, and the wearer will automatically absorb the powers, until they take off the artifact.”
The blonde agent shuffled some papers around until she found a photo of the necklace we’d recovered in New York City, and she pushed it to the middle of the table so we could all see it, even though I could never forget it. The gold necklace with emerald-green gems was stunning as ever, and the actual artifact was currently in FBI custody being studied.
The necklace was recovered from one Avi Weinberg, who was a major criminal in Elaine’s home country of Israel, and part of the Black Market Group. The BMG was a network of wealthy, connected criminals who had tapped into the lucrative market of ancient superpowered artifacts. Most of the BMG members wanted the artifacts for nefarious reasons, and it was our job to make sure they didn’t get the chance. Weinberg had received the necklace from Richard Bannister, an American expat living in Dubai, but we’d manage to step in before Weinberg was able to use its powers.
And by stepped in, I mean we killed him, of course.
“And then, there’s the ring,” Laura said, and she shuffled some more papers until she produced a photo of a ring and placed it next to the photo of the necklace.
The two pieces of jewelry looked very similar, but I could spot the subtle differences straight away. The ring was an ornate gold band with an oblong green gem in the center of it, but the green was two or three shades darker than the green in the necklace, and the details in the ring were absent in the necklace. If anything, the details in the ring looked more similar to the details in my cuffs than anything else.
“They’re not a set,” I said.
“I don’t think so, either,” Laura said with another shake of her blonde head. “I think the ring is actually a Ke-Beech artifact.”
“Do we know what they do?” Elaine asked as she studied the two photos. “Like what the powers are?”
“Well, if the translations are right, I think the Harappan necklace here, that can be worn by anyone, it can be used to control people through fear,” the sexy blonde explained.
“Sooo, like, what, the person puts it on, and then everyone around them is afraid of them, so they just listen to whatever they tell them to do?” Mary asked with her head cocked.
“Maybe.” Laura shrugged. “We won’t really know until someone actually tries it on.”
All three women looked at me, and I sighed.
“Yes, I know, I’m the artifact guinea pig,” I said. “I’ll see what the necklace does as soon as Sammy releases it from custody. Gotta make sure it’s safe first.”
“Of course,” Laura said.
“Oh, Jonah, that’s so brave of you,” Mary said as she clutched my arm again.
“All in a day’s work.” I grinned.
“And what about the ring?” Elaine asked as she drummed her fingers on the table, and the beautiful Israeli looked like she was deep in thought.
“Well, again, if this translation is accurate, which isn’t guaranteed, it seems like the ring is the opposite from the necklace,” Laura continued. “It sounds like the ring can control people through adoration, not fear.”
“Ohh, so if you put the ring on, then everyone loves you, and they’d jump off a cliff if you told them to,” Mary said before she turned a cheeky smile on me. “I mean, I feel like Jonah doesn’t even need the ring, and people would do that for him anyway.”
“Mary, just because you would jump off a cliff for me, doesn’t mean everyone else would,” I snorted.
“I don’t know, if they knew what you were capable of, they just might,” Laura said as she eyed me up and down and grinned. “Mostly the women, of course.”
“Ohh, for sure.” Elaine smirked.
“Well, I appreciate you ladies think my sexual prowess is enough to get masses of women to throw themselves off a fiery cliff for me, but let’s focus on the artifacts,” I said.
“Hey, we never said fiery, that was all you,” Mary teased.
“If we’re embellishing, I get to have some fun.” I shrugged. “So, what else do we know about this ring?”
“Not much,” Laura sighed. “But I think I know where we can find more information. We might need to take another little trip, though. Unofficially, of course.”
“Oh?” Elaine perked up at the prospect of another field mission. “Where to?”
“Toronto,” Laura said. “Specifically, the Center for Indigenous Studies at the University of Toronto.”
“Toronto!” Mary gasped as she bounced in her seat and tapped the table with her fists excitedly. “Seriously? We’re going to Toronto?”
