He took off his jacket and began to unbutton his shirt, and I set my earrings down on the nightstand, one and then the other, small ordinary gestures on what I still believed was an ordinary wedding night.

And then I looked up, and the air went out of the room.

On the lower part of his left hip, just above the line of his belt, was a scar.

It was a curved scar, pale and slightly raised, shaped almost exactly like a fishhook, the barb of it turning back on itself.

I did not have to study it.

I did not have to wonder.