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Discover weekly, the best short stories

Looking for a steady supply of suspense short stories? Every week thousands of writers submit stories to our writing contest.

8800+ Suspense Short Stories to read

Submitted by writers on Reedsy Prompts to our weekly writing contest. From bizarre characters to creeping threats, this collection of suspense short stories gives you an exciting array of bone-chilling tales.

Suspense Short Stories – Page 11 of 587

Eulogy with a Vengeance.

Submitted to Contest #295

Eulogy with a Vengeance. The summer heat in Buenos Aires was suffocating, a damp veil clinging to Yuval Levy’s skin as he wove through the crowded streets of Palermo. Unshaven and hollow-eyed, he looked like a specter. His once-sharp features dulled by sleepless nights and cheap whiskey. His Mossad training kept him alive, but it couldn’t mend the void where his heart once beat. Three months earlier, a car bomb had ripped through Tel Aviv, claiming his wife, Tali, and their 16 years old daughter, Sarit. Forensics took eight days to identify ...

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Concentrate and Ask Again

Submitted to Contest #295

“Concentrate and Ask Again” My grandparents had always fascinated me. Sometimes they knew everything, and sometimes they were completely oblivious of current events. But always, the Magic 8-Ball was close by. It was a family ritual to have it on the supper table whenever we went for a visit. The goal was to ask a yes/no question and get an answer that made everyone laugh. You got bonus points if you could make milk come from someone’s nose! It stayed in the dining room, but I was permitted to play with it as long as I was “careful and put i...

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Shades of Cinderella

Submitted to Contest #295

Surrender to the light pouring in through every window, to the sun that warms my chilled skin. Spring is hot and cold, and I feel the same way as my blood is heated by the light that it cannot see. Silence is underneath everything, it holds a cold decomposing smell, like Earth is exhaling its ancient voice. It knows everything that I do, everything I have forgotten. It returns to me in death. It starts with my toes, it’s beautiful not to feel them, and reminds me of dipping them into the cerulean sea. It’s strange how nothing always reminds ...

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A Place That Waits

Submitted to Contest #295

He found the door on a Tuesday. It was late afternoon, and the basement smelled strange—wet stone and something older, like metal that had been buried too long. He’d been unpacking all day. The new house was small, quiet, and just worn enough to feel forgotten. The kind of place that held onto old sounds. The shelf in the basement had been there when he moved in. Pressed wood, warped along the edges, covered in a powdery coat of dust. He hadn't touched it before. Too many boxes. Too many other things to do. But that day, the air shifted. He ...

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The Spook Who Sleuths: Case of the Immortal Curse

Submitted to Contest #295

RAIN DRUMMED AGAINST my office window like a junkie’s fingers on a pawnshop counter. I nursed a ghostly approximation of bourbon—can’t taste the stuff anymore, but old habits haunt you just like, well, ghosts.Name’s Roxie Hart, supernatural P.I. extraordinaire. Been dead since ‘45 after I zigged when I shoulda zagged during a particularly dicey OSS operation near Berlin. Now I solve the cases that leave the living scratching their noggins.My door creaked open—I keep it that way on purpose, good for the atmosphere—and in stumbled a fella look...

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The Dream Thief of Cusco

Submitted to Contest #295

“Dreams are dangerous things to steal,” my grandmother cautioned, smelling of roasted corn and burning copal in her shop on the The Plaza de Armas. “The ancients knew dreams needed to arrive willingly, like a warm caress in the night when you’re sleeping comfortably. When you force them…” She trailed off, her eyes distant.“Not so dangerous we couldn’t steal more, and keep the best for ourselves,” I said, thinking my grandmother could do better.She grabbed my wrist, her weathered hands surprisingly strong. “Don’t be an idiot, Morfeo. Is your ...

17 likes 14 comments 14
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A way out.

Submitted to Contest #295

The plane’s engine roared endlessly in Luscious (Lucky's) ear, a sound he barely noticed anymore. Flying gave him a feeling of independence and autonomy that dealing cards simply couldn't. He was free up here, to Lucky, that was all he could ever want. Beside him, his golden retriever, Eli, slept softly, his tongue hanging from his mouth like it always did when they flew. Lucky laid back on his pilot's chair, one hand on the throttle and the other fidgeting with the brown leather pouch tied around his belt loop. The sack contained Lucky’s mo...

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What The Dead Man Did

Submitted to Contest #295

“Are you sure that’s Uncle Joe?” Shelby whispered, leaning toward her brother, Barry. Her voice barely rose above the soft piano music and the low murmurs of the mourners around them.The chapel was dim, illuminated by flickering candles that painted uneven patterns on the casket's polished wood. The air was heavy with the overpowering scent of lilies, wrapping around her senses like a fog.“Of course it’s him,” Barry replied, glancing at her with a hint of irritation. “Who else would it be?”“I don’t know,” Shelby murmured, her fingers nervous...

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Eyes Wide Open

Submitted to Contest #295

The sun hung low in the sky, casting shadows over the cemetery. It was a beautiful day, for a funeral. Mourners gathered at the top of the hill, circling the open coffin to say their last goodbyes, as Donna Hermann had passed—or so they thought. Her family, dressed in black, stood closest to the coffin. Blurry shapes hovered above her.Muted voices drifted through the thick fog of her mind, distant yet familiar.Donna Hermann wanted to scream.She could see them—her children, her grandchildren, her so-called loved ones—standing around her, dres...

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The Perfect Coincidence

Submitted to Contest #295

When Maggie first found the old postcard at the bottom of her grandmother’s drawer, she thought nothing of it. It was a typical postcard—nothing spectacular. The image on the front was of a sunny beach with the words Greetings from Seabrook printed in bold letters above a view of the ocean. But the back? The back was what made Maggie freeze.Written in smudged ink, in a neat, looping script, were just two lines:“I’ll be there at 5 PM. Don’t forget the blue umbrella. It’ll be our sign.”There was no date. No name. Just a message. Magg...

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The Funeral of Evelyn Warren

Submitted to Contest #295

The chapel was too quiet. Grace sat in the front row, her hands tightly clenched in her lap. She couldn’t stop staring at the closed casket, the weight of it pressing down on her chest. Her mother—Evelyn Warren—was supposed to be in there. Gone. The whole world seemed to have shifted under her feet. But Grace couldn’t fully accept it. Not when the last time she saw her mom, she was barely clinging to life in that hospital room.The pastor spoke about Evelyn’s life, about her kindness, her strength, her love for her family. Grace barely heard ...

10 likes 2 comments 2
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Under The Kitchen Sink

Submitted to Contest #295

Spoiler, but a scare warning: MC and other characters talk about being knocked out and a near death from a spider bite. Very mild. Fictional story but based on Orthodox Christian spiritual warfare.It was a Saturday afternoon when I was thirteen. My friend Lyla and I were playing hide and go seek at her house. Lyla was my new friend, but she was fun to hang out withI also had a friend named Aiden. He was my best friend since I was little, like REALLY little. He looks the same age as me, but he always acted a lot older. He was scared about me ...

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The White Door

Submitted to Contest #295

The white door It’s been locked since the day we moved in no one can find the key anywhere. Nobody has a clue if, and what it leads to if they could access it. It’s a locked door with no key and it sits in the middle of our bedroom wall in the room I share with my younger sister, Chloe.It’s a strange plain white door with the number 13 written on the top of it, also in white. It merges in completely with our white wall. Even the door handle is white, making it blend in so well. It’s almost invisible and most people completely miss it. W...

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Witness to My Own Funeral

Submitted to Contest #295

The darkness came first, then awareness. Not the gentle awakening from sleep, but a violent snap into consciousness—like a circuit suddenly completing. I existed, suspended in perfect blackness, my mind racing while my body lay still as carved stone. Something was wrong. Terribly wrong. I couldn’t move. Yet I wasn’t suffocating. Instead, I existed in a state of suspended animation, my consciousness trapped in an immobile shell. Voices filtered through the darkness, muffled at first, then gradually clearer. A somber baritone resonated above m...

27 likes 7 comments 7
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BREE: ONEiROID

Submitted to Contest #295

The yellow spot on his otherwise clean white lab coat screams lunch was eaten on the go. Or his hand-to-mouth coordination lacks as much development as his medical knowledge.  “Drug-induced psychosis. We see it all the time. Your daughter is…” “What are you talking about? I told you, I’m not on drugs. I was attacked. You need to take these handcuffs off me, and to let me go!” I interrupt in a raspy, painful, and unrecognisable voice.  My head pounds under the bright lights, white walls, and smell of hospital-grade cleaning products...

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RBE | Illustrated Short Stories | 2024-06

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