Novels by Choleric_vee

“Are you always this quiet,” Catalina said, “or do you only speak to people who are worth it?”Martins didn’t lift his head right away. He finished pulling the top edges of the folder on his desk straight, precise, deliberate, stalling for time. When at last he caught her gaze, he flashed a smile that wasn’t really a smile.“You’re in my office,” he said. “That should make them all cautious.”Catalina advanced farther inside and shut the door behind her. Not gently. The click was faintly final and unmistakable.“Careful is overrated.”She didn’t sit. Instead, she rested on the edge of his desk, near enough that he could make out the subtle shimmer on her eyelids, near enough that her perfume, warm, muted, purposefully invaded his space and doubled back refusing to leave.Martins reclined in his chair. “Now, if this is in relation to the procurement files, you should have sent an email.”Her chuckle was muted, nearly warm. “You already know it’s not.”He examined her then, for real thi

“You’re telling me the system did that on its own?” Stephanie didn’t raise her voice. She didn't need to. The stillness in her tone was sharper than anger or rage.From the other end of the secure video line, the compliance officer sat up straighter in his chair. He was young, too young for the sort of anomalies blinking across her screen and it showed in the way he cleared his throat before answering."Following step the system automatically logged it,” he said. “There’s no manual override. No place where a human has entered the system that we can track.”Stephanie eased back slowly, fingers interlaced beneath her chin. The light of three monitors was reflecting in her eyes, copy and timelines running into each other.“Systems don’t hallucinate,” she said. “People do.”A pause.“Yes, ma’am.”She exhales through her nose. ‘Take me through it again. From the top. Slowly.”The officer complied. Dates. Jurisdictions. Compliance triggers Each word stacked tidily on top of the last, neat

"Do you ever discuss her?"The question came out of nowhere.Martins stopped short, her hand still on the restaurant’s back door, the night air rushing in behind them. From the kitchen came the noise and bustle of pans banging, raised voices in three languages, the hissing sound of oil frying food. Catalina was just outside, jacket slung over one shoulder, phone dark in her hand, eyes were sharp in a way that said this wasn’t casual curiosity.“Talk about who?” he asked, even though he already knew.She never smiled. “Your wife.”There it was. Clean. Direct. Catalina never circled a thing she could pierce.Martins let the door swing shut. The sudden quiet pressed in. Streetlight. Damp pavement. The faint smell of citrus cleaner and smoke.“sometimes” he said Cataline’s eyes scanned his face as if she was looking for loopholes in a document. “Sometimes isn’t an answer.”He exhaled through his nose, a sound that could have been a laugh in another life. “You ask questions like a prosec

“Something Happened at work?”Peter asked casually , the way you'd ask about traffic or weather, the way you asked when you were not trying to pin down the truth but you felt it sliding just out of your grasp, lurking in the shadows waiting to be brought into the light.Stephanie paused at the sink.The tap was running."No," she said a beat too late. Then she stretched out her hand and switched the water off, slowly, deliberately, as though the movement itself necessitated reflection. As if turning off water had been turned into something difficult. "Just tired."Peter looked not at her face but at her reflection in the kitchen window. It was a habit he’d unconsciously picked up. Observing angles more than faces, gestures more than spoken language. Eye contact in the mirror tells a different story than gaze in real life. They reveal things a person isn’t aware they are showing. The boys were in the living room, loudly bickering over which had cheated while playing the board game spl

“Run it again for me.”The analyst didn’t look up. “It’s the same result.”“Run it again,” Stephanie said. She approached. Her heels clicked once, then twice. She came to a halt at his armchair. “Change the filters. Dismiss the geographic limit.”He stopped. Then his hands flew over the keyboard.“I have no idea what you’re looking for,” he said.“Neither do I,” Stephanie said. “That’s why we keep looking.”The screen refreshed from scratch. Some row of data lines changed position. Names. Codes. Dates. It was all just noise. It was all very familiar.There was one exception.The analyst inhaled sharply. It wasn’t breathtaking. Just instinct.“There,” said he.Stephanie leaned in.And the name was sitting there as if it had always been there. No flashing alert. No bold font. It’s just present. A clean input with tags and timestamps and a note that it’s been archived.Her jaw clenched.“Open it.”He did. A new window slid in. The detail was slim. Even­tually, almost convincing in how l

"The wire transfer bounced. You have seventy-two hours."Before Catalina could respond, the line went dead.She was immobilized in her penthouse, phone at her ear, Manhattan’s pre-dawn light shining in through the windows. Two hours of sleep. Maybe less. Her Louboutin heel was poised on the marble floor, caught in that instant between balance and falling. Her reflection in the glass was that of a stranger; polished surface, fractures beneath radiating like spider webs frozen in ice.The voice had been male, calm, expensive. That kind of politeness which precludes destruction. That modulated politeness was what made it deadly, threats enrobed in velour still slice just as deep.She'd asked what he wanted. He'd been exact,  obedience, silence, and payment in full, by Friday.When she’d said impossible, he’d told her she was wrong. "Only inconvenient."The distinction seemed irrelevant now.Nearly broke.The phrase preyed on her mind like a predator on injured prey. She had based her lif

Vanessa was in the hospital cafeteria reading over surgical protocol notes when the email came on a Tuesday morning.Subject: Housing Notice - Immediate Action RequiredDear Resident,The Medical Residence Hall will be closed as of Friday, March 7th, for a minimum of 6-8 weeks due to emergency repairs to the building (damage caused by a recent water pipe break) Residents must vacate by 5 p.m. on Friday. The university housing office has a handful of other options for housing. Please email housing@jhmi.edu immediately to discuss options.Vanessa read it twice, then she looked at the date once more. Tuesday. Three days.She turned on her laptop and looked up rental ads. Studio flats by campus were going for eighteen hundred a month. Sublets needed 1st month, last month & security deposit. Her severance from Elizabeth would pay for it, but barely. And most places wanted a six-month lease minimum.She shut the laptop and brought her fingers to her temples."Problem?"She looked up. Edward

The first week of lectures was like drinking from a fire hose. Vanessa was always in the front row of every class, her pen moving across the page of her notebook in tight, neat lines. Urological pathology. Surgical anatomy. Pharmacological interventions. The professors talked fast, assumed literacy, demanded expertise.She worked late in the lab, her eyes stinging as she studied slides under the microscope. Prostate tissue. Bladder biopsies. Renal cell carcinoma. She cross-referenced every slide with her textbooks, scribbled notes in the margins in three different colors, and highlighted sections until the pages resembled abstract paintings.The rest of the experts, most of them younger, just out of residency, were ganging up. They invited her once. She declined politely. They didn't ask again.By Friday her shoulders ached. Not from sitting, from tensing so tightly That I forgot to Breathe. She had a sore jaw from clenching. Her hands tied themselves in knots while she held her pen

"Passport please.”Vanessa slid her passport across the counter and didn’t look up.The immigration official barely glanced at her before turning the pages leisurely, too leisurely. Then he shifted his eyes between the photograph and her face. There were activities everywhere around her, rolling suitcases, clipped announcements, the low hum of people who had just arrived to meet someone.“Whats your purpose of visit?” he said.“To study.”“For how long?”“As long as it takes.”That earned her a final look. Not suspicion, just mild curiosity. He stamped the passport, in what seem to be in slow motion, slid it back to her, and made a hand gesture for her to go.The airport had this smell that is unique to hospitals…like disinfectant and burnt coffee, a strange blend that clung to her clothes as she followed the flow of bodies toward baggage claim. Screens blinked overhead in unrecognized codes and terminals. Voices rose and fell in accents she couldn't recognize…yet. Somewhere behind h

“You haven't been picking my calls? Travis said in a hoarse voice, his chest thrusted out, eyes gleaming from Vanessa to Franklin. They folded their arms allowing their silence stretch the room. Travis declined back, his eyes catching the strain that laid on Vanessa's veins. For every long glare, her grip on the paper tightened even more, her knuckles digging through it like she was about to tear it to pieces. “Can someone answer me? What the hell is going on here?” His eyes flushed. Vanessa pinched the bridge of her nose, squeezing her eyes tightly. “I hate suspense.” He sneered, swirling back slowly. “Attorney Franklin. Has she brought you here as a witness while she signs the surrogacy agreement?” He turned to a seat, his back pressed to the couch.No response came from them.Vanessa stepped forward, pinching her lips tight to keep them from trembling. Lifting her chin, she swallowed hard, stifling back the weakness that burned in her throat. “Travis.” She exhaled deeply. “Fo

Vanessa lurched out of the office clutching the medical records in her hand, her nails biting into her palms. The ground scraped beneath her feet as she hunched over as if choking down a sob. She lowered her head, her neck appearing to shrink. She pushed through the exit door, pinching her lips tight to keep them from trembling. How could he? She stuttered, choking for words. Her shoulders drooped as her body crumpled into itself. This isn’t the kind of marriage I gave up my career for. Her hands pressed against her breastbone as she bit her bottom lips, eyes widened as brows furrowed.When she got to the spot she had parked her car, she collapsed into the seat, slamming the door so hard that her ears stung.She sat facing the front mirror, her throat tightened making her lungs squeeze and her muscles weak. As she reached out for her phone, her limbs trembled and the tear she had fought so hard to resist finally streaked down her face. She dialed her attorney’s number and pressed t

The screeching of the tires made Vanessa's back bounce on the seat as her grip tightened around the steering wheel. “This better not be true.” She muttered,pressing her lips as she stared at the hospital's gate. Her throat burned. Was this marriage a lie even after she had forfeited her career? Was it a waste of commitment and effort?” She sucked her teeth, feeling the weight of the betrayal settle like a stone in her chest. She grabbed her bag, and unfolded the document across her lap. As she scanned through the file for the umpteenth time, her fingers hoovered around. She swallowed hard, reached for the door handle and shoved it open. The door slammed behind her. Vanessa clutched the file in her hand, her heels clicking across the parking lot and through the automatic doors. The sharp, pungent sterile scent of isopropyl alcohol mixed with antiseptic dettol and sweet acetone clung to her nostrils but she didn't flinch. Her eyes were too busy searching, scanning fo