The Light Above Them

In the town of Santa Elena lived a fifteen-year-old girl named Yanci. She was quiet and observant, the type who strolled home from school with her thoughts drifting behind her like a shadow. One afternoon, as she passed by the church, she noticed something strange. A soft light hovered above the old woman who sold […]

Stairs

The Sixth Step

They said Delores Bishop cursed my father. I never believed it—until I heard the sixth step. We lived in a small house near the water in Benedict. My dad was a crabber, proud and stubborn. When I was twelve, we were behind on rent and groceries, so he tore down the small dock behind our […]

Cold Cases

The Peterson Disappearance

When Officer Raymond “Ray” Dalton retired from the Prince George’s County Police Department in 2002, his career was marked by dozens of solved cases and one that never let him go: the disappearance of 9-year-old Emily Peterson in 1994. She vanished from her bedroom on a quiet cul-de-sac in Waldorf. No forced entry. No signs […]

The Last Watch

December 22nd  I’ve kept this journal mostly to document medical cases, but last night wasn’t medicine, it was survival. Maybe writing it down will help me believe it happened. The village of Varedo is charming on the surface: nestled in the mountains, unreachable by road half the year, full of polite, quiet people. But something […]

Mr. Bonecraft

Bonecraft: One Bet from Eternity

They say he was once just a man. Flesh and blood. Greedy, clever, and dangerous at the card table. His name was Victor Bonecraft, a gambler who never lost, not because he was lucky, but because he was willing to risk more than anyone else. He chased fortune across every smoky backroom and broken saloon […]