The Eighth Inning

Elena sat in her car outside the house she'd shared with Marcus for eleven years. The *baseball* game was on the radio—Yankees up by three in the eighth. She'd left Marcus at home watching it three hours ago. Now another car sat in her driveway.

A black sedan. Corporate, anonymous.

She'd suspected for months. The late nights. The encrypted messages on his phone. The way he'd started showering immediately after work. She'd done what anyone would do—she'd become a *spy* in her own marriage. Keylogger on his laptop. Trackers on his devices. She'd found nothing but endless meetings about proprietary technology and client acquisitions.

The encryption hadn't been about affairs. It was about industrial secrets.

Her neighbor's tabby *cat* wound around her ankles as she approached the front door. Mrs. Gable always let it roam. 'Company,' she called it, though really it was just another lonely thing in a neighborhood full of them.

Inside, Marcus's laptop was open on the dining table. A *cable* ran from it to something under the sideboard—a server she'd never seen before. He'd told her he worked in hedge fund analytics. Safe. Boring. Legal.

The email on his screen told a different story: *Project underway. Sector 7 containment. The *bull* market strategy is cover for asset transfer.*

'You weren't supposed to see that,' Marcus said from the doorway.

He didn't look like her husband anymore. He looked like a stranger.

'What are you, Marcus? A *spy*? A thief?'

'A patriot,' he said, and the way he said it—like he'd rehearsed it in front of a mirror, like he believed it—made something in her chest break open. 'Everything I did, I did for us.'

The *baseball* game crackled from the living room. The Yankees were still up by three. Some things remained constant even when your entire life turned out to be a cover story.

'Mrs. Gable's *cat* gets more company than I do,' she said, and her voice didn't sound like her own either. 'I'm leaving.'

'I can't let you do that,' he said, and for the first time in eleven years, she was afraid of the man she'd married.