150+ Best Crime Short Stories to Read Online for Free - Reedsy Prompts

Either Her … or Him

Submitted to Contest #306

May 5, 2025 “Do you still want your mother living with us?”The question my husband raised seemed to hang in the air as he gazed pensively at my mother’s picture before observing me for half a minute.“She’s too old to continue doing that. You know what happened to her last week. It’s irrational to keep your parents with you when they’re in such a state. Trust me, it’ll be best for our marriage to let her go.”“Why?” I cried out. “You know I love you both!”He looked between us once more and said, “It’s either her or me.”The words pierced like a...

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Secrets Beneath the Lake

Megan Cianfaglione

Submitted to Contest #306

My toes splashed in the water as I dangled my legs over the edge of the canoe.“Wanna hit?” I offered Colin the joint between my fingers.He took a drag, then flicked it silently into the lake. Smoke drifted past my face as I smiled, the sun warming my skin. Birds chirped in the trees, and the soft lapping of water against the canoe relaxed me.I glanced over at Colin paddling. With his spiky hair and tattoos, he looked like he belonged in a punk band—but he was one of the kindest people I knew.He caught me looking and smirked. I turned away qu...

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Delivered

David Ko

Submitted to Contest #306

TEXT MESSAGES Monday 8:47 pm Jules: hey, u home? Ben: Yeah, just got in. What's up? Jules: can i talk to u for a sec? Ben: yeah. Can you call? Jules: No, not ready for that yet. Ben: Oh, ok. Ben: So? Jules: u said something about telling me after the funeral. you didn't do that yet. Ben: ik. I froze Jules: Then tell me right now. what did you find? in his apartment. Ben: you sure you wanna know? Jules: Yes. I deserve to know. Voicemail Tuesday, 12:11 am "Hey Jules. It’s me. I didn’t want to write this, but maybe it will make everything easie...

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My Last Day at Big Toni's

Eric Jacobsen

Submitted to Contest #305

Like most days, it was long and drawn out, consisting of copying hundreds of numbers into little boxes. Except recently the days have felt especially long. It is spring now. The days are getting warmer, flowers blooming, and the accountants shuffle home after a long day of work. Tax season is in full swing now and I can feel the weight of it settling on my shoulders by the pain in my back. I let out a long yawn. Work had begun to seep into my dreams. The night before last, I dreamt I was being chased by a giant baby through office buildings...

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Claude gets out

Rebecca Buchanan

Submitted to Contest #305

Claude left the meeting with the Barone brothers with a sense of cautious relief, he wanted to get Daisy out of town before the next conversation with Lenny Barone. He was done. He hurried back to his apartment to meet Daisy. He walked into the apartment and saw his girl lounging on the couch, reading a magazine and eating an apple. “What are you up to?”“I’m resting for a while then I’ll be getting ready to go to the club this evening. Joe's got a whole band for this weekend, with that new singer I can’t remember the name of.” “I would re...

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Finishing Nail

Robin Zimmer

Submitted to Contest #305

Finishing Nail John was preoccupied. He had to work from home today, again, because his daughter was sick. His boss was sick of it. This had already happened on two other occasions this month and a deadline was looming. He reached for another file while keeping his eyes on the screen. He yanks it from the bottom of the stack and hurriedly opens it just as his full cup of coffee lands on the floor spraying him and the light grey carpet with a heavy dose of caffeine. “Shit.” He had run into the other room to check something real ...

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A brief moment of morality

Sparrow Salven

Submitted to Contest #305

“You know what. I quit.” I wanted to take it back the moment I said it. Oh gosh what have I done? What was I thinking? His gaze, initially lazing out the window, jerked towards me. “Quit.” The word wasn’t spoken. It was hissed. “What makes you think you can just… quit?” His foreboding figure filled the window, casting a shadow that consumed me. Reducing me to an ant under a looming heel. I felt like a rabbit facing the flared nostrils of a shotgun. Take it back. Plead insanity. Drop to your knees and beg forgiveness. But I couldn’t. Be it an...

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The Sheriff

Tanya Storey

Submitted to Contest #305

Nearly six months ago, as I cruised down main street, I could tell this jerkwater town needed a hero. They just didn’t know it yet. Lucky for them, I was in the market for a new town worth savin’. Hallow Ridge was the fifth town, in just as many years, that I wandered into and became sheriff. You’d think it would be hard to move into town and take over bein’ sheriff, but it’s actually real easy. First off, most people don’t want to be sheriff, it don’t pay hardly nothin’ and second, it’s basically a dead-end job. There ain’t no promotion to ...

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Tina

L J

Submitted to Contest #305

You know what? I quit. I can't stand this place. I've worked here for twenty-five years! I just worked on the biggest project of my life. Tina was working on it with me. She and I started at the company at the same time. We get along pretty well and as the years went by, ended up as friends, not colleagues. We went to lunches and she even came to some of my son's soccer games on the weekends! So, when our boss gave us the opportunity to work on this major assignment together we jumped at it! "You know this is going to take a lot of ov...

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R&D

S.L. Anderson

Submitted to Contest #305

It took a few seconds to realize I was utterly and completely lost. I cleared my throat before holding down the side button of the walkie talkie. “Uh Charlie, which way did you say I should go at the T-Section? Over.”Charlie’s voice crackled in surround sound as it echoed off the metal ventilation duct, and I covered one ear to hear him. “I didn’t, there’s no T-section.” The walkie went quiet without a sign off, yet again. I waited long enough for pain to bloom in my back, and it wasn’t just because man did not evolve to wriggle through met...

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Dan has a Plan, and a Free Gift for You

Bob Purvy

Submitted to Contest #306

Dan was helping Len Saunders, the retired accountant and father of his friend Janet, investigate an embezzlement at a little nonprofit in his Sierra town. Dan had a cunning plan. "Let's disable the bank account and see who calls Customer Service!"After some persuasion from the local police, Heather, the bank VP, agreed to do this. Next Monday afternoon, Heather called Len.“Mr. Saunders, we did have a couple calls for customer support on that account. Do you have a pencil ready?” She proceeded to give him the times and phone numbers of the ca...

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Choose

Lindley Bennett

Submitted to Contest #305

She was my boss and Jake and I had only been dating for a few months. I wasn’t entirely sure what he thought I’d do in this situation, but I don’t think it was going to go the way he thought it would. I work for a very powerful woman. It’s not Jake’s fault he didn’t know that, I couldn’t share it with him, wouldn’t really, and it just wasn’t serious enough to even bring him into the conversation about possibly opening up the allotted amount of opening I was allowed in romantic relationships. He was essentially fucked as soon as he entered t...

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Enough is enough

Miller George

Submitted to Contest #305

As the dusk settled over the city, a lone figure lay on the grass, eyes fixed on the imposing mansion that loomed in the distance. Clad in dark clothing that blended with the gathering darkness, his fingers gingerly traced the cold metal of the rifle in his hands. Although he had been in this position for an hour, his trained mind remained focused. He looked through the scope to see if his target had arrived, but the street was still empty. In the stillness of the evening, the man's mind drifted back to the events of the past seven days, whi...

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The Headlines

Gabrielle Collins

Submitted to Contest #305

Not much ever happens in our small town. We’re a small community of around 270 people. You have the old timers, the ones who have been here for years as part of the community that keeps the place alive. They are the majority of our population, the most notable of which was Captain Hughes with the police department. The old timers keep to themselves for the most part. As far as they are concerned it’s their town and the rest of us are just allowed to live in it. When I had first left for my new job the only old timer to pay much notice was T...

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Ringing True

TJ Felegie

Submitted to Contest #305

trigger warning: Mental Health, Gore “Professor?” A voice peeped from the darkness in front of me. I cleared my throat and looked around. Silhouette faces and soft coughs haunted me from a yawning dark sea. “John, you alright?” A hand touched my arm, warm and kind, with an expensive looking ring on one of the fingers. I knew this woman’s face. Brenda? No, her eyes were too soft, too gentle to be Brenda’s. Barbara, that was it. Kind woman, didn’t we work together? “John?” She repeated, and then gestured down to my hands. There was paper in...

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150+ Crime Short Stories to read

Crime Short Stories – Page 4 of 10

Either Her … or Him

Secrets Beneath the Lake

Delivered

My Last Day at Big Toni's

Claude gets out

Finishing Nail

A brief moment of morality

The Sheriff

Tina

R&D

Dan has a Plan, and a Free Gift for You

Choose

Enough is enough

The Headlines

Ringing True