The Palm Reader's Last Betrayal

Maya read palms in the building's lobby between meetings, a party trick she'd turned into a corporate asset. But when Elena's hand settled in hers that Tuesday morning, Maya saw something that made her blood run cold.

"You're going to betray someone," Maya said, tracing the fragmented line that cut across Elena's palm. "And soon."

Elena pulled her hand back, laughter dying in her throat. "That's not funny."

"I wasn't trying to be."

They'd been friends for three years, since Elena had joined the company as a running coach for the executive team. Now Maya noticed the little things she'd missed: the encrypted calls during lunch breaks, the nervous glances at security cameras, the way she'd gravitated toward the R&D department's inner circle.

A corporate spy. And not a very good one.

The truth arrived in waves. Elena wasn't coaching anyone—she was mapping the company's vulnerabilities, identifying which executives could be compromised, which prototypes were worth stealing. She'd used their friendship like a pry bar, leveraging every confessional conversation, every drunken disclosure about project timelines and security protocols.

Maya spent three days running through scenarios. Turn her in? Confront her? Pretend she'd seen nothing and watch it unfold?

The answer came when she found Elena's concealed recording device in her own office.

"You read my palm," Elena said when Maya confronted her, "but you never asked what I needed the money for."

"I didn't think betrayal came with a justification clause."

Elena's face fractured. "My brother—"

"Save it. The thing about palm reading," Maya said, closing her door, "is that eventually you stop seeing the future and start seeing what people already are."