The next afternoon the apartment felt too quiet. Ramesh had left early for the factory, still avoiding her eyes after the previous night. Priya moved through the rooms in a simple cotton salwar-kameez, trying to pretend the marks on her body—dark fingerprints on her hips, the purple bite on her shoulder, the faint bruises circling her throat—were not there. She had covered them as best she could, but every shift of fabric reminded her.

Her phone buzzed on the kitchen counter.