Seventh Inning Stretch

The baseball cap pulled low over Elena's face served dual purposes: shielding her eyes from the glare of the afternoon sun, and hiding her expression from the man beside her. Mark from Accounting. Mark who trusted her. Mark whose phone currently contained the proprietary algorithm she'd been hired to steal.

"Great game," he shouted over the roar of the crowd, handing her a beer. "You're fitting in perfectly with the team."

Elena forced a smile, the lie tasting like copper on her tongue. Three weeks she'd been spying on this company—three weeks of happy hours and shared lunches and careful questions asked with just the right blend of casual curiosity. She'd stopped being Elena months ago. Now she was whoever they needed her to be.

The baseball game stretched on, inning after inning, while she plotted her exit. Mark's phone sat on the small table between them, screen occasionally flickering with notifications. One sync. That's all she needed. Forty seconds with his device, using the cloned access card she'd slipped from his wallet during the seventh-inning stretch.

Her handler had been clear: get the algorithm, disappear. No attachments, no loose ends.

But Mark was talking about his daughter now, showing her photos on—that same phone. "She starts kindergarten next week. First time leaving her all day."

Something in Elena's chest twisted. She remembered the photographs she'd seen in his cubicle. The way he lit up when he mentioned Sarah's name.

"You'll do fine," she found herself saying. And meant it.

The baseball cap suddenly felt heavy, a physical weight of all the identities she'd worn and discarded. How many Marks had there been? How many people who'd trusted her with pieces of their lives while she calculated how to use them?

"Hey," Mark said, tapping her arm. "You okay? You look—"

His phone buzzed. The stadium lights flickered. In that moment, Elena made her choice.

"Fine," she said, pulling the brim of her hat lower. "Just thinking about how I need to use the restroom."

She walked away, leaving the phone untouched. Behind her, the baseball game continued, but for the first time in months, Elena wasn't playing anymore.