Corporate Secrets

Elena peeled the orange slowly, letting the citrus spray mist over her fingers as she sat alone in the luxury box overlooking the baseball stadium. Below, the players moved like insects—her daughter among them, rounding second base, safe. Elena should have been cheering. Instead, she was deleting files from her phone, evidence of three years as a corporate spy for the competition.

She'd been sleeping with Marcus from the rival firm for seven months. The sex was transactional at first, then confusingly real. This morning he'd asked her to come away with him after the final data transfer. That's when she knew: he wasn't a spy who'd fallen in love. He was someone who'd used her perfectly.

The first crack of lightning turned the sky white-purple. The stadium announcer paused. Parents scattered with their children, gathering coolers and folding chairs. Elena stayed still.

Her golden retriever, Buster, had died two weeks ago. The vet said cancer, but Elena had always suspected he'd simply tired of her long absences, the way he'd stopped waiting by the door after her third trip to Silicon Valley in as many months. She'd buried him behind the garage without a ceremony, too exhausted for ritual.

Now lightning cracked again, closer, and the baseball game abandoned itself to weather. Her daughter waved from the dugout, already soaked, grinning like storms were something to celebrate. Elena felt the orange's tartness on her tongue, sudden and sharp, and for the first time in three years, she didn't delete the file.