Lakshmi Naidu had never seen a house this big. The syndicate safehouse sat behind high walls in a quiet city suburb, its rooms smelling of old wood, gun oil, and the faint metallic tang of money that never quite washed out of the carpets. She was twenty-two, thin from years of farm work, with long black hair she kept in a simple braid and eyes that still widened at every new thing—the flush toilets, the humming refrigerator, the way the men spoke in low, clipped voices about “shipments” and “the boss.”

She had come for the maid’s wages. Her father needed the money after the drought. The agency had said the work was simple: cook, clean, keep quiet. She did not know the men who lived here were the ones the newspapers called animals.