The tea was jasmine, fragrant and slightly sweet. Su Xue served it in delicate cups that seemed too thin to be real, her movements precise and graceful. Chen Wei sat across from her in the small studio, surrounded by glass birds that watched him with frozen eyes.
"My sister and I were inseparable," Su Xue began, her gaze fixed on some distant memory. "We finished each other's sentences, felt each other's pain. When she went to work for the Zhao family, I begged her not to. I had heard stories about Mrs. Zhao's temper, her cruelty. But Su Yue was ambitious. She wanted to save money, to open her own shop one day."
"What happened?"
"She discovered something. Something terrible." Su Xue's hands trembled slightly as she set down her cup. "Mrs. Zhao was selling company secrets to a competitor. Industrial espionage, worth millions. Su Yue found documents, bank records. She was going to expose them."
"And they killed her for it."
"Wu Feng drowned her in the river. The police called it suicide. Case closed." Su Xue's voice remained calm, but Chen Wei could see the pulse beating rapidly in her throat. "I was seventeen. I had no money, no power, no one who would listen. So I waited. I learned. I became someone who could not be ignored."
"You became a glassmaker."
"I studied under Master Liu for ten years. I learned to create beauty from sand and fire." She gestured to the sculptures around them. "And all the while, I watched the Zhao family. I learned their routines, their weaknesses, their secrets."
"Did you kill Mrs. Zhao?"
Su Xue met his gaze directly. "No, Detective. I did not."
"You had motive, opportunity, and means. You have the same face as your sister-you could have walked into that hotel room without raising suspicion."
"I could have. But I didn't." Su Xue reached into a drawer and withdrew a photograph, sliding it across the table. It showed Mrs. Zhao in the hotel room, alive, the timestamp reading 10:47 PM on the night of the murder. "I was there, yes. I confronted her. I told her who I was, what she had done. I wanted her to confess, to face justice."
"What did she say?"
"She laughed. She said Su Yue was a stupid girl who got what she deserved. She said no one would believe me, that I was just a bitter woman trying to extort money from a grieving family." Su Xue's voice cracked slightly. "I left her alive, Detective. I wanted her to suffer, yes. I wanted her to spend the rest of her life looking over her shoulder, wondering when I would strike. But I didn't kill her."
Chen Wei studied the photograph. The timestamp appeared genuine, the image clear. If Su Xue was telling the truth, she had left Mrs. Zhao alive at 10:47 PM. The maid had found the body at 6:00 AM.
"Someone killed her between 10:47 and 6:00," he said. "If not you, then who?"
Su Xue's expression grew thoughtful. "When I left, Mrs. Zhao was on the phone. She sounded angry, frightened. She said a name-Xiaoling. She said, 'If you do this, you'll destroy everything.'"
The daughter. Chen Wei felt the pieces of the puzzle shifting, rearranging themselves into a new pattern.
"One more question," he said. "The glass swan. The broken one."
Su Xue smiled sadly. "I made that for my sister, twenty years ago. It was her favorite. I left it there as a reminder of what Mrs. Zhao had taken from me."