LEFT FOR DEAD. NO CASH. A JET PLANE. ONE HOUR. TIME IS TICKING.

The scanner crackles and for a while Les listens to the officers talking back and forth. It’s a robbery.

LEFT FOR DEAD. NO CASH. A JET PLANE. ONE HOUR. TIME IS TICKING.

LEFT FOR DEAD. NO CASH. A JET PLANE. ONE HOUR. TIME IS TICKING.

Writer of hard-boiled, ruthlessly paced crime fiction. Posting short stories every Tuesday. Photo by Florian Klauer on Unsplash.

‘What if I do? He’ll hit me first, is what’ll happen. Well, that’ll probably happen anyway. See, they usually hit me first. Sometimes I let them, sometimes they just get me.’

‘What if I do? He’ll hit me first, is what’ll happen. Well, that’ll probably happen anyway. See, they usually hit me first. Sometimes I let them, sometimes they just get me.’

There’s a ruckus coming from the house. A fact that’s concerning to Burke, because the house should be empty. He knows this, because he’s keeping a body in the garage.

There’s a ruckus coming from the house. A fact that’s concerning to Burke, because the house should be empty. He knows this, because he’s keeping a body in the garage.

I gave it a week before I gave up believing in her “ghost.” The “spirit” that had come to “visit.” The “being.” She told me it would teach m

The scanner crackles and for a while Les listens to the officers talking back and forth. It’s a robbery.

The scanner crackles and for a while Les listens to the officers talking back and forth. It’s a robbery.

It’d been a good month or two now and Bill hadn’t been caught like he knew he wouldn’t. Nobody really liked Drew. The fields were stinking from the pigs now and everyone had forgotten...

Get more from Ted Ryker on Patreon. Weekly Micro-Stories!. Support Ted Ryker and get exclusive access to their work.

Get more from Ted Ryker on Patreon. Weekly Micro-Stories!. Support Ted Ryker and get exclusive access to their work.

Detective Inspector Eastman has been looking for a missing girl for over a year and the case has gone cold. Until a seemingly mundane call about an active shooter brings him to an abandoned crack hous...

Eastman figures he’s okay with killing, but in the dark corners and hallways of a den full of the desperate, it takes a twitch to earn regret, to live with a ghost.

So now Eastman’s here. Didn’t leave. Should’ve, maybe. They could argue that. Over his grave, maybe. If he got one.

Eastman figures he’s okay with killing, but in the dark corners and hallways of a den full of the desperate, it takes a twitch to earn regret, to live with a ghost.

Eastman figures he’s okay with killing, but in the dark corners and hallways of a den full of the desperate, it takes a twitch to earn regret, to live with a ghost.

When she reaches for the gun it snags on her jacket and Teeth is up out of his chair and reaching for a hidden drawer.

When she reaches for the gun it snags on her jacket and Teeth is up out of his chair and reaching for a hidden drawer.

Writer of hard-boiled, ruthlessly paced crime fiction. New stories and posts Tuesday and Thursday every week. Photo by Florian Klauer on Unsplash.

The leading man, the shark himself, is barrel-chested, heavy-set, and broad shouldered. Tiana is glad to have a gun with plenty of bullets.

The leading man, the shark himself, is barrel-chested, heavy-set, and broad shouldered. Tiana is glad to have a gun with plenty of bullets.

Eastman looks into the Officer’s eyes. It doesn’t take long. Something only twenty years of assessing people allows him to do. Twenty years of being wrong and then right and wrong again.