“Ow!”
I’d poked my finger with the sharp point of the seam ripper. I stuck my fingertip into my mouth and sucked, tasting iron as I bled. I raised my hand. The woman next to me shook her head, lip curled in disgust.
“What?” I mumbled around my finger. “Do we not raise our hands?”
Xiu, the ever-vigilant foreman, scanned the factory floor until her hard eyes landed on me. I grinned and waved.
“Can I be excused?” I had to shout to be heard over the whir and clack of machines.
Her expression darkened, and she stomped closer until she stood over me, shadows obscuring her sunken eyes. I’d started with the 3:00 a.m. shift, to be in the sweatshop at the same time as the same women who’d have been here when Li Fan was murdered. That meant the factory was dark again—lit only by candlesticks.
“What?” she growled.
“I’ve sustained an on-the-job injury and need to be excused to seek medical attention.” I batted my lashes. The lawyer in me knew my workers’ rights.
Xiu made a disgusted noise in the back of her throat and jerked her head to the side. “Go.”
I rose, pulled my loose linen pants out to the side in an awkward curtsey, then sped down the center aisle of the factory toward the back door. The giant looms magically worked to my right, while rows and rows of women bent their heads over their tables to my left. They were all just a little too dedicated. I’d tried striking up conversations with dozens of them, but they all just glared at me, or looked scared, or “shhh’d” me and admonished me to return to my work.
I reached the back of the room and pushed out into a dark, narrow hallway. I had my doubts that this undercover mission would yield any answers, but I certainly wasn’t going to get any from trying (and failing miserably) to sew clothing. Might as well get out and about and do some snooping.
As I cruised along the hallways, some empty, some lined with even more workers at tables, it occurred to me that, poor as I was, and stressful as never knowing where my next client would come from, I still preferred my Pet Psychic business to working in a place like this.
One might say I had trouble with authority. I didn’t like to be told what to do, or how to do it, and despite its many downfalls, running my own business, such as it was, gave me a lot of freedom. I shook my head, lost in thought as I rounded a corner. It was what I couldn’t understand about Will—he’d chosen to be beholden to Ludolf Caterwaul.
“NO!”
I stopped dead in my tracks and looked up. Down the hall to my left, two women huddled close together. On instinct, I leapt back, hiding around the corner. I dropped to a crouch and peeked around the peeling plaster wall at them.
I squinted—it was a little tough to tell in the dark, but they looked like the two women, one young, one in her fifties, that I’d seen whispering together the other day.
The younger one with bangs shook her head, arms crossed tight. “We should stop.”
The older one, with a kerchief over her hair, lifted her palms and appeared to be pleading with the younger one. “No—if anything, it means we should keep going.”
Bangs sniffled. “But… we could be next. This is dangerous.”
Well, now my curiosity was piqued. What was dangerous? Had they had something to do with Li Fan’s death?
Footsteps sounded behind me, and I jumped to my feet just in time as a couple more women, walking side by side, came up the hall. I leaned against the wall, hands shoved in my pants pockets.
I must’ve looked shifty, because they slowed, and one frowned at me. “You’re new, right?”
I nodded, holding my breath. Had they seen me spying?
The other raised a brow. “Are you lost? We’re heading to the break room if you want to follow us?”
Break room? That seemed oddly humane and progressive for a sweatshop like this.
“Oh—uh, sure. Thanks.” I fell in step with them and we strode by the two women who stood whispering together. They looked up as we passed, eyes wide.
The women I walked with exchanged glances. “Ah. That poor girl.”
I searched their faces. “Who is?”
The one closest to me lowered her voice. “Mei—the young one. She hasn’t been the same since her older sister….” They exchanged knowing looks again.
I frowned. “What happened?”
The one on the right, with sparkly eyes, leaned across her friend. “Her older sister used to work here until she was badly injured on the floor—some accident with the looms.” She shook her head. “It was terrible. Now Mei’s the only one old enough to work and support her family.”
The woman closest to me nodded. “It’s even worse now that her sister needs special medical care and potions.”
The one on the right flashed her eyes. “Rumor is Mei was very upset when Li Fan refused to pay any reparations or compensation—she said it was her sister’s own fault for getting hurt.”
I frowned. “But that’s completely false. Mei’s family is legally entitled to workers’ compensat—” I caught myself as their eyes grew wider. Oops. My old lawyer instincts were hard to lose. I shrugged. “I just mean—that’s terrible.”
The ladies nodded, and I continued walking with them to the break room. I felt for Mei and her sister, but it also gave Mei quite the motive for killing Li Fan: revenge.
The break room wasn’t quite what I’d expected. It was a closet, basically, with cement walls and a floor that smelled of mold. A large metal table sat in the middle of the room, covered in small glass vials.
The women I’d followed walked right up and plucked up a couple of them.
“Bottoms up.”
They handed
