The Scent of Deceit

Nate begins a case that has lasting ramifications.

It was a Sunday afternoon, and Nathaniel Cage had only just drifted off into a light, alcohol laced slumber on his aging leather couch when the knock came. Not the kind of knock that comes from a neighbor borrowing sugar. No, this was desperate. Hesitant, but sharp. Like someone who’d practiced it all the way to the door.

Groaning, Nate rubbed the sleep from his eyes and pushed himself up. The echoes of yesterday’s bourbon still sang in his skull. His apartment smelled like cold coffee, gun oil, and faint regret.

He unlocked the three dead bolts; an old habit from his days in blue, and opened the door.

And there she was.

A woman with a presence that hit him harder than a .38 to the chest. Long, black hair tumbled over her shoulders like liquid silk. Emerald eyes that seemed to pierce through years of pain and smoke. Her skin was the color of polished caramel, and she wore a trench coat over what looked like a silk emerald dress; one that matched her eyes just a little too perfectly.

But it was the perfume that got him. Spicy, floral, mysterious. Not something you'd find at a corner store. It made his throat dry.

"Nathan?" she said, her voice a smooth blend of jazz and midnight. "I need help."

He blinked, still slightly dazed. “You’ve got him. Come in.”

She stepped in, her heels clicking like a metronome counting down to trouble. Nate closed the door behind her and gestured toward the chair across from his desk. He grabbed a glass from the counter, poured her some water, and waited.

She sat with the poise of a woman used to danger. A woman who had made deals she wasn’t proud of.

"My name is Vivienne Reyes," she began. "And someone is trying to kill me."

Nate didn’t flinch. Not the first time he’d heard that line. But something in her tone, the slight quiver beneath the confidence, made it feel different.

"Start from the beginning," he said, his voice gravel wrapped in velvet.

Vivienne drew in a slow breath. “My husband... well, ex-husband now; Elliot Reyes. Wealthy. Connected. Dangerous. He’s got ties to people you don’t see in courtrooms, Nathan. And I think he killed someone. I think he killed my sister.”

That got his attention.

"Why do you think he killed her?"

"Because she found something. Something she wasn't supposed to. And now she's dead. Official story says overdose. But Lina didn't do drugs. Never touched the stuff."

He leaned back in his chair, the gears in his mind starting to turn. “And what do you want from me, Miss Reyes?”

She looked him dead in the eye. “I want you to prove it. I want you to make him pay.”

Nathan stared at her for a long moment, watching the way her fingers trembled when she thought he wasn’t looking. He’d been out of the force for two years, but the itch hadn’t left. The need to make things right.

And deep down, he knew cases like this? They never stayed clean.

“All right,” he said finally. “But if I take this on, you follow my rules. No lies, no games.”

She nodded. “Deal.”

As he jotted her name on a yellow notepad, the scent of her perfume lingered in the air.

It smelled like secrets.