Page 118 of The Sadist and the Brat

He did a thorough sweep of the second floor, and finding nothing else out of place, went back downstairs. He was crossing the room when the smell hit. Faint and unwelcome, he recognized it immediately.

“Oh, she wouldn’t,” he breathed, horror curling in his gut along with nausea as the scent of licorice filled his nostrils.

His phone rang, and though he knew better than to hope, his stomach dropped a bit when he saw Cade’s name on the readout. He answered on speaker. “Hey.”

“Find her yet?”

“No, but she texted Sam, said she was safe.”

“Yeah, he told me. He also said she left you a present at your place?”

“Yeah.”

“You might want to have the bomb squad sweep before you go in,” Cade said, and Jack thought he was only half joking.

“I think I found it,” he said, and began methodically sniffing all his couch cushions.

“She leave a pile of shit in your bed or something?”

“No,” he muttered, confused when the smell faded instead of getting stronger. “I’m smelling licorice.”

“Okay,” Cade said, clearly not understanding.

“I hate licorice,” Jack told him and began sniffing the pillows.

“And I take it she knows this.”

“It’s come up,” Jack said drily and moved into the kitchen. But he couldn’t smell it at all there, so he went back to the sofa.

“You think she went to a store, bought licorice, and hid it in your house?”

“I think she took the bottle of anise extract that she had in her purse and poured it on something,” he countered. “I can smell it, but it’s faint, and I can’t tell where it’s coming from.”

“Why did she have a bottle of licorice extract in her purse?”

“Long story,” Jack said. “Dammit, I can’t find it.”

“Maybe you can get a licorice-sniffing dog,” Cade suggested.

“Fuck you,” Jack said. “And call me if you hear anything.”

“Will do,” Cade said and clicked off.

Jack spent the next thirty minutes sniffing every corner of his home. The smell was undetectable on the second floor and the kitchen, and strongest in the living area, but he couldn’t find the source. He took the couch completely apart in case she’d done something like soaked cotton balls in the vile stuff and tucked them between the cushions, but he found nothing. There was nothing under the rug or in the drawers of the end tables—he even checked the lampshades.

“I know I smell it,” he muttered and considered trying to call her again. She wouldn’t answer, and though yelling at her over voicemail would make him feel better, it wouldn’t help in the long run. She was pissed and, from what Sam had said, she was hurt.

He went over what Sam had told him they’d overheard while he put his couch back together. Even with the running water obscuring part of the conversation, Jack found it hard to believe that Sadie would actually think he was planning to hand her over to Joel on a silver platter, and Sam had reluctantly agreed. “I thought it was pretty clear we’d missed something important,” he’d told Jack. “But she just wouldn’t hear it.”

Jack couldn’t understand why she hadn’t simply confronted him. He’d never seen Sadie back down from a fight, and she wasn’t afraid to cause a scene either, something she’d ably demonstrated when Olivia’s ex had attempted to talk to her at a party.

He was missing something, and he didn’t know what. But until she decided to answer her phone, he could do nothing but wait.

Frustrated that he couldn’t immediately fix the situation, he crossed to the bar. He’d pour a drink, and take it upstairs—he wanted a shower, and not to smell licorice with every damn breath—and try to figure out his next move.

He selected a crystal decanter of brandy, pulled the stopper, and was immediately assaulted by the smell of licorice. He reared back as though to avoid a blow, then brought the decanter to his nose for a careful sniff.

“Jesus, she poured it right in,” he realized, and stared at the rest of his bar. Twenty-plus bottles, and he’d bet his best flogger that she’d hit every single one of them—including the two-thousand-dollar bottle of Bunnahabhain 1980 Canasta that he’d only had a single glass out of.

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