Chapter 3

The staff room empty, Samyukta yanked open her locker with unnecessary force. Her reflection in the small mirror showed flushed cheeks and wild eyes. She grabbed her bag, letting the locker door slam shut hard enough to rattle the adjacent ones.

Outside, the late afternoon sun baked the courtyard into shimmering waves. Students lounged under neem trees, their laughter grating against her raw nerves. One boy—Manish, tall, with the confident slouch of privilege—leered as she passed. “Madam looks hot today. Need help cooling off?” His friends snickered.

Samyukta didn’t break stride. “Tell your father his hired examinees failed spectacularly.” The boy’s smirk vanished as she strode through the gates, the guard pretending not to see her tear-streaked face.

Her phone vibrated—Jiten’s predictable “busy, talk later” text. She stared at it until the screen blurred. Somewhere behind her, a whistle cut through the air, followed by crude suggestions about what a “bold madam” might really want.

With a sharp whistle that cut through the urban din, she flagged down an autorickshaw. The driver—a wiry man with sun-cracked skin—barely glanced at her as she climbed in, too preoccupied with adjusting his rearview mirror wrapped in faded devotional beads. Samyukta barely noticed either; her fingers were already flying across her phone screen, compiling a mental list of every investigative journalist in the capital who’d salivate over this scandal. Let the bastard try burying this. She’d dig it up with her bare hands if she had to.

The rhythmic bump of the auto’s wheels over potholes faded into background noise as she scribbled contact details in her notes app. So engrossed was she in her mission that she didn’t register the growl of an engine idling too close—until the driver abruptly slowed to a crawl.

“Madamji...” His voice was taut.

Samyukta looked up just as the tinted window of the black SUV beside them slid down. The man leaning out had a beard thick enough to hide a knife and eyes that glinted like wet pavement. “Pretty lady going somewhere?” he crooned, flashing teeth yellowed by paan. “Let us give you a proper ride, na?”

Her pulse spiked. Catcalls weren’t uncommon on these streets, but this felt different. The SUV’s engine purred like a predator circling prey.

“Bhaiyya,” she hissed, gripping the auto’s side rail. “Drive. Fast.”

The driver needed no further encouragement. He wrenched the throttle, the little three-wheeler lurching forward with a metallic scream. For one fleeting moment, Samyukta thought they’d shaken them off—until the SUV effortlessly matched their speed, its bumper kissing the auto’s rattling frame.

“Oye, Miss America!” the bearded brute shouted over the wind. “Teach us some ... ecology, hah?”

Even through the adrenaline, Samyukta’s academic instincts twitched. Economics, she nearly corrected—then bit her tongue. Survival first, pedantry later.

The auto swerved around a vegetable cart; its driver’s knuckles white on the handlebars. They were losing. The SUV’s engine roared, cutting them off with a screech of brakes that sent the auto fishtailing.

“Listen carefully, rickshaw-wallah,” came a new voice—deeper, colder. “Pull over now, or I’ll ram this tin can so hard your grandchildren will limp.”

The driver’s resigned whimper told Samyukta everything. As the auto shuddered to a stop, her fingers dove into her purse, closing around cold metal. The pepper spray’s weight was reassuring—a memento from her years in Chicago, where she’d learned the hard way that academia wasn’t always ivory towers.

The car door creaked open. Out stepped a mountain of a man, his shadow swallowing the auto whole. Six and a half feet of muscle packed into a cheap suit, his knuckles scarred from brawls older than her students. He moved with the lazy confidence of someone who’d never been told no.

“Professor-ji,” he cooed, yanking the auto’s flimsy door open. “Let’s take you home.”

Samyukta’s grip tightened around the canister. “No thank you.”

The brute’s grin vanished. “You think I’m joking?” His hand shot out—

“AHHHHHHHH—!”

The scream wasn’t hers. Samyukta had twisted aside, spraying a searing arc directly into his eyes. The beast howled, clawing at his face like a bear swatting bees. She didn’t wait—bolting from the auto with her purse bouncing against her hip, the sari’s pleated fabric whipping around her legs.

Behind her, multiple car doors slammed. Footsteps pounded the asphalt. A glance back confirmed her worst fear: four figures giving chase. And in the lead—

“Aqeel?” The name tore from her throat before she could stop it. Her own student, sprinting toward her with an expression she’d never seen in seminar rooms.

Samyukta ran harder, her sandals slapping against cracked pavement. She’d been a track star at Northwestern, but saris weren’t made for sprints. The fabric tangled around her thighs, the blouse’s tight stitching restricting each gasping breath.