At the end of January, Julian received a phone call. The number on the screen traced back to 618 South Garden Road in Kingsward City—the address of the city’s most notorious mental institution.

A month of relentless interrogation had failed to break Rose. She endured, stubbornly clinging to her silence. But in the end, a psychiatric diagnosis sealed her fate and sent her to the asylum instead.

Rose's attending physician, Dr. Stone, was a man in his forties, ...