thanh.nguyenhoang.1403@gmail.com
Stories
168
Chapters
1,512
Words
3.2 M
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Reading
11 d, 4 h
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REINA The heavy industrial zip-ties cut into my wrists, biting through the sleeves of my tactical sweater, pinning my hands behind the steel support column of a streetlamp. I stood in the freezing rain on Jefferson Avenue, the asphalt slick with sleet and the blood of a shattered illusion. The red and white lights of Ambulance 61 were already fading into the gray morning fog, flanked by the two unmarked SUVs. They had Eli. They had the ledger. Miller hadn't killed me because a dead woman with my…-
26.8 K • Completed
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ELI The state police arrived before the adrenaline left my bloodstream. Reina knelt on the frozen ground with her hands behind her head. I stayed in the heated van because my concussion made the lights fracture and my ribs made breathing a negotiated act. When an officer asked whether Reina had injured me, I answered with the full chronology. “She abducted me. She confined me. She staged the Woodward crash seven months ago. Tonight she saved my life and surrendered. None of those facts erase…
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26.8 K • Completed
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I don't bother drying my jeans. They are still stiff and damp with causeway mud, but I pull them on anyway, my hands shaking as I drag the heavy denim over my hips. From the massive cedar wardrobe in Suite 204, I grab a dry, oversized black button-down shirt—clearly one of Vale’s—and shrug it on. It smells faintly of her, that intoxicating blend of crushed vetiver and ozone. I hate that it immediately makes my chest feel tight. I hate that it feels like armor. I shove the heavy brass master key into…-
25.7 K • Completed
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The heavy silence of the mirrored cabaret stretches until it feels like a physical weight pressing against my eardrums. My chest is still heaving, my skin flushed and burning beneath the cold, damp fabric of Vale’s oversized shirt. My hand remains rigidly anchored to my pocket, my knuckles digging into the hard brass outline of the master key. I won't take you in the dark while you're desperate. Vale’s words vibrate in the humid air, a promise wrapped in a threat. She steps back, completely breaking…
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25.7 K • Completed
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The heavy mahogany door of Suite 204 slams shut behind me, the sound echoing like a gunshot in the insulated silence of the room. I throw the deadbolt. I slide the thick brass security chain into its track. My hands are shaking so violently that the metal links rattle against the wood. I back away from the door until my calves hit the edge of the mattress, and I collapse onto the emerald-green duvet. Outside, the Category Five hurricane is tearing South Beach apart. The reinforced steel shutters covering…
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25.7 K • Completed
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The aftermath of absolute surrender is a terrifying kind of silence. I lie tangled in the emerald sheets of the massive bed, the air in Suite 204 heavy with the scent of damp skin, crushed vetiver, and the sharp, metallic tang of ozone. The oversized black shirt is a discarded shadow on the carpet. My body feels entirely boneless, hollowed out by the sheer, violent intensity of what just happened between us, yet humming with a residual, electric warmth. Vale is beside me, sitting upright against the…
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25.7 K • Completed
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The heavy cedar wardrobe doors bang shut with a finality that sends a shiver down my spine. Vale Rojas is no longer the broken woman offering me absolute control on the emerald sheets of the mezzanine suite. She has put the armor back on. The matte-black tactical vest tightens over her chest as she pulls the buckles taut. She moves with a lethal, terrifying efficiency, every micro-adjustment of her gear a testament to a lifetime of violently bending the environment to her will. She turns to face me. The…
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25.7 K • Completed
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The federal tactical team breaches the suite with the precision of a guillotine. Flashbangs turn the room into a chaotic strobe of white, searing light. The air is filled with the thunderous, disorienting boom of stun grenades and the sharp, tactical shouts of agents in heavy gear. My vision is a fractured, bleeding blur as they storm the penthouse landing, their rifles leveled, their tactical lights cutting through the lingering smoke like searchlights. I don't look at the agents. I look at Vale. She…
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25.7 K • Completed
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— The Hurricane Can't Drown Her Key The rain in Miami doesn't fall; it assaults. It comes in sideways, a blinding, horizontal sheet of gray that erases the skyline and turns the MacArthur Causeway into a concrete parking lot of abandoned vehicles and panicked evacuees. The wind is already shrieking at sixty miles an hour, a low, guttural howl that rattles the marrow in my bones. Category Four, they said on the radio before the signal died. Upgraded to a Category Five as it chewed through the warm…
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25.7 K • Completed
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The rain in Miami doesn't fall; it assaults. It comes in sideways, a blinding, horizontal sheet of gray that erases the skyline and turns the MacArthur Causeway into a concrete parking lot of abandoned vehicles and panicked evacuees. The wind is already shrieking at sixty miles an hour, a low, guttural howl that rattles the marrow in my bones. Category Four, they said on the radio before the signal died. Upgraded to a Category Five as it chewed through the warm waters of the Florida Straits. I am running…
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25.7 K • Completed
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