Free Short Stories

Quick reads for any moment — 100 to 1000 words

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Category: Crime

A Single Vote Against Position

The autopsy report classified Farrow Delacroix’s death as accidental drowning, and it would have stayed that way permanently if forensic pathologist Dr. Wren Castellan hadn’t noticed a detail during the routine examination that made her request additional testing before signing Read more…


One Additional Test

Private Investigator Nadia Okafor had handled dozens of missing husband cases over her career, most resolving into mundane affairs or simple cold feet, but something about Priya Iyer’s description of her husband’s disappearance suggested this case would prove considerably more Read more…


The Debt Bondage Behind the Counter

Retired Detective Boone Achterberg had promised his wife exactly one thing when he left the force three years ago: that he would never again let a case follow him home. That promise lasted until his old partner, Ines Farrokh, showed Read more…


The Case That Followed Him Home

The diamond heist at Kessler & Vance Jewelers had been executed with a precision that told Detective Farrow Delacroix immediately he wasn’t dealing with amateurs, but it was the crew’s decision to leave a single, uncut stone worth considerably less Read more…


The Etched Stone

The third murder in eight weeks bore such precise resemblance to a killer already serving a life sentence that Detective Nadia Okafor spent the first twenty-four hours of the investigation convinced someone inside the prison system had made a catastrophic Read more…


The Student of Her Work

The car accident that put Priya Anand in the hospital for six weeks had all the markings of genuine misfortune, right up until Insurance Investigator Talia Brahm noticed the vehicle’s damage pattern was inconsistent with the collision speed the police Read more…


The Crumple Pattern

The credit applications had been arriving under Sana Kessler’s name for four months before she discovered any of them, and by the time she sat across from Detective Wren Castellan explaining the situation, the damage to her financial identity had Read more…


Four Months of Fraudulent Applications

The alibi was airtight, which was exactly the problem, because Detective Ines Farrokh had two separate, equally credible witnesses placing suspect Costa Reyes in two different cities at the precise moment of the warehouse arson that had killed a night Read more…


The Security Thread’s Misalignment

The art gallery heist had gone perfectly for exactly eleven hours, right up until Detective Ines Farrokh received an anonymous tip that named all four members of the crew, their exact roles, and the precise location where they planned to Read more…


No Charger, No Passport

The witness’s testimony had been the cornerstone of the entire prosecution, and it was only after the jury returned a guilty verdict that Defense Attorney Boone Achterberg discovered the detail that suggested his client, Costa Reyes, might have just been Read more…