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  CUPCAKES, CRYSTALS, AND CHAOS

  Cowan Bay Witches Cozy Mystery

  JESSICA LANCASTER

  Copyright © 2019 Jessica Lancaster

  Original text copyright © 2018

  All Rights Reserved

  First published in 2018 under A Sprinkle of Chaos.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted, copied, or stored in any form or by any means without permission of the author. Your respect and support of the author is appreciated.

  All characters, events, brands, companies, and locations in this story are used fictionally and without intent of slander. Any resemblance to actual people are purely coincidental.

  NOTE: Written in British English, utilising the grammar rules of British English. Example; Mr and Mrs - instead of Mr. and Mrs.

  PARANORMAL MYSTERIES

  Cowan Bay Witches Cozy Mysteries

  Muffins, Magic, and Murder (Book 1)

  Cupcakes, Crystals, and Chaos (Book 2)

  Pies, Palmistry, and Poison (Book 3)

  Treats, Tarot, and Trouble (Book 4)

  Witchwood Cozy Mysteries

  Cryptic Curses in Witchwood (Book 1)

  Secret Spells in Witchwood (Book 2)

  Monster Magic in Witchwood (Book 3)

  Reaper Rituals in Witchwood (Book 4)

  Bad Blood in Witchwood (Book 5)

  Wicked Witches in Witchwood (Book 6)

  CO-AUTHORED BOOKS

  With Hugo James King

  Murder on Silver Lake (Book 1)

  Murder on Red Rose Drive (Book 2)

  Murder at Maple House (Book 3)

  Join Jessica’s e-mail list for new releases by signing up!

  A SPRINKLE OF CHAOS

  When a dead man is found on the Cowan Bay shores, Doctor Oscar Raymond reveals the man choked on a crystal – a witch’s crystal.

  With fingers pointed at them in all directions, the Cowan Bay coven realise the odds aren’t in their favour. Add the appearance of another witch, Gwen’s mother, and it becomes too coincidental for Detective Hodge.

  It’s a race against time to find out the truth before someone is imprisoned for a murder they didn’t commit.

  A paranormal cozy mystery set in a coastal English village. An amateur female sleuth, a coven of witches, and an anxious pet cat. Written in British English. No swearing or gore.

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  A Note from Jessica

  MORE FROM JESSICA

  COWAN BAY WITCHES SERIES

  WITCHWOOD SERIES

  SILVER LAKE SERIES

  ABOUT JESSICA LANCASTER

  CHAPTER 1

  Beating lumps from an egg, flour, and milk batter, I recalled a letter I’d received weeks ago. Impending doom, I told myself. Was anyone prepared for their mother’s arrival? I hadn’t seen my mother in a few years; the last I heard she was on an island paradise after her third—fourth divorce.

  August pawed my arm, pulling me away from the mixing bowl. “You’re mumbling again,” he said, sticking his tongue out.

  “Dread.”

  “Your mother?”

  Hunching my back and dipping my chin, I dropped the fork. “She’s never stuck around long enough for you to know who she is,” I said. “But we’re the complete opposites.” I fished the fork from the batter. “She uses her powers so haphazardly, definitely not like my grandmother taught.”

  As a child I’d lived with my grandmother while my mother travelled the country searching for crystals, she did this partly for my grandmother’s crystal shop but also for her own fascination with chasing energy.

  “And that bird,” August said, waggling his long black tail and knocking the washing-up liquid bottle into the sink. “How long are they staying?”

  “Shouldn’t be too long,” I replied. “Julian is a pain, but it’s temporary.”

  Knowing my mother, she’d arrive and leave with the rolling breeze. Perhaps she’d stick around until she grew bored and needed to move on to another project. Maybe I was her project. My stomach bubbled nervously at the thought. My mother had tried setting me up on dates before.

  After my pancake breakfast, I sat on the edge of my bed in pyjamas aimlessly staring into my closet. It was a chilly October morning and all I wanted was to wrap myself in my duvet, drink cups of tea and read my dog-eared copy of The Handmaid’s Tale. Alas, I had a busy day in the café.

  I arrived dressed in a black batwing blouse and pair of dark blue jeans at the café for 10:10 A.M. but I waited in the driver’s seat for a moment, collecting my belongings. I patted my book of shadows once for good luck before pulling it into my arms.

  Crystal Café was busy. As usual Ethel and Margery both sat by the window, their eyes on me as I walked inside lugging a bag on my forearm and my book hugged against my chest.

  “Morning,” I welcomed.

  Margery tapped her walking stick excitedly. “Oh, oh.” She waved me over. “Gwen, what’s this nonsense about having no chocolate cake?”

  I paused and turned on my feet. Margery’s eyebrows knitted with concern and her lips smacked with craving. “I’ll see what happened,” I said. “I certainly have one in the back of the bakery.”

  Her tapping ceased. “I’d like a slice then, please Gwen.”

  I left her with a smile, approaching the metal counter by the cash register. “Abi, please can you fetch the other chocolate cake from the bakery? I’m going to drop these off in the backroom,” I said, resting my bag on the counter.

  Abi approached the counter with a smile pinching dimples in her cheeks. “Absolutely, I wasn’t sure if there were any and I know you don—”

  I waved a hand. “No, no, no, go ahead.”

  The backroom was my sanctuary, my second place of business. I wasn’t the greatest seer, but I could navigate my way around a tarot deck. Most clients enjoyed tarot readings, but sometimes they wanted something different.

  My regular clients were happy I’d decided to open the backroom again, even if it was only a novelty for some. Mary Cook, the owner of Fisherman’s Inn was a regular, and eager to get back into my tarot reading hot seat. She was my first client of the day.

  Preparing for Mary’s arrival, I draped a pink scarf over a lamp and scattered white candles around, but importantly I burned a rose petal incense cone. I grew to know Mary over the years, and knowing what scents and colours made her feel comfortable and relaxed were key to a good reading.

  A gentle knock pattered on the door. I quickly dusted my hands on my jeans before sitting at the circle table in the centre of the room. “Come in,” I called out.

  Mary was a short woman with a tight blonde curly perm atop her head. “Mornin’, Gwen,” she said. A large smile enveloped half her face. “Think I’m a little late. Breakfast was bedlam.”

  I twitched the wrist of my sleeve to peek at the watch. “Right on time.”

  She pulled her arms from her large fleece jacket before placing it across the back of the chair. “I might as well outsource breakfast to you, but then we wouldn’t be much of a bed and breakfast would we,” she chuckled. “It’ll save us money though.”

  My smiled matched hers as she sat across from me. “How’re you feeling today?” I asked, shuffling my tarot deck on the table.

  “As well as can be expected,” she said. “John’s going in for surgery on his elbow next week. It’s currently in a sling so he doesn’t do more damage. I told him alread
y, guests can carry their own bags, we’re not young enough to give it our all anymore.”

  I smiled and nodded. “You’re still plenty young,” I said. “Can you shuffle these?”

  She accepted the cards and gently pressed the top card of the deck to her lips. “For good luck,” she said. Shuffling allowed for energy to be transferred into the cards and let me divine answers once placed on the table.

  “You have a question?” I asked.

  Mary stared at her fingers shuffling the cards. She hummed. “Yea.”

  “Keep it in mind,” I said, holding my hand out for the cards. “I’ll do a three-card spread.”

  “Last time we did this, it was a—” she grumbled, clicking her fingers in the air. “What was the name of it?”

  “The reading?” I asked.

  “Yeah.”

  I couldn’t quite remember what type of reading she’d had last. In a three-card spread, the answers could be divined in any number of ways, a standard was past, present, and future. “What’s the question about? An event? A feeling? A person?”

  “An event,” she said with a firm nod. “No, you said last time about a situation.”

  “Oh, absolutely,” I said. “You’ve given this thought, you’ve put your energy inside this deck. From here, I’ll place down three cards from the top.” Inhaling deeply, I placed the first card on the table. “This card is your current situation.” I placed the middle card. “Your current obstacle.” Followed by the final card. “And the advice you seek.”

  Mary’s fingers itched at the cloth on the table. It was natural to be nervous about answers. Her eyes shifted over each card, wondering what could possibly be beneath them.

  I flipped the first. “The reversed Star tarot,” I said. Tarot cards held many meanings depending on their positioning, but often when a card was reversed, a look of dread crossed the client’s face and as I looked in Mary’s eyes, I saw familiarity. “You know, there’s nothing to be worried about. This is your current situation,” I said. “The Star tarot card while in reverse means many things, but I sense there’s despair and discouragement filling you currently, perhaps you’re overwhelmed with your current situation.”

  She hummed. “There is a lot going on right now.”

  I flipped the second card. “Seven of Wands.” My eyes met Mary’s from across the table. “This is your current obstacle. You see the man here, he’s being challenged or defensive. This card shows you’re holding ground but there are people who may oppose or threaten you.”

  She chuckled. “Well we’re the only bed and breakfast in Cowan Bay, not many people could threaten that, even if they open up one of those silly chains like they did in Belsy.”

  “So, this is about the business?” I asked.

  “Pfft. We’ve been at it countless years and still feel like we’re at square one.”

  I nodded, flipping the third card. “Judgement,” I said. “The advice you seek is in this card, it represents reflection and self-evaluation. You have a lot to think about, and only once you go through a period of thought and reflection will you find your answer. You may need to let go of anything holding you back because it’s keeping you from moving on.”

  Mary rested back in the chair. “It makes sense,” she said.

  “If you don’t mind me asking, what exactly was your question?”

  “It’s about the business, but I’d rather not say.”

  I rarely pried, I asked occasionally but I encouraged them not to tell me their questions, often when they told me I would stray to give them an answer they wanted rather than the answer the cards provided. “Well, I hope it helps,” I said, scooping the cards into my hand.

  Once Mary paid and left, I sat shuffling the cards and staring around the box room at all the crystals on the shelves. There were many ways to clear energy from a deck, unless you were Tana, she never let anyone touch her cards, even for the few clients she had. After pressing all the energy out, I stacked the cards and placed a clear quartz crystal on top.

  “Bless the Goddess,” I said.

  Abi was swept off her feet when I joined her on the café floor. “Oh, Gwen,” she said in a gasp. “We need another pair of hands.”

  It wasn’t from my lack of trying, I’d tried hiring someone else, but there was nobody interested. It was usually those in their late teens or early twenties who’d work here, people who still lived with their families. Usually once you hit a certain age and went to university there was no returning to Cowan Bay, which meant my café was occupied with older people and fishermen.

  “Do you have any friends around who’d like to pick up a couple of hours here and there?” I asked, tying an apron around my waist.

  She hummed, pausing at the counter. “Not really, unless you want me to ask Bridget.”

  My wide eyes were enough of a statement on that matter. Bridget, the local chaplain’s daughter wasn’t the nicest of girls, well, unless you attended her church, which I wasn’t, and given the fact I was a witch didn’t help matters either. “You have younger siblings, right?” I asked.

  “A fourteen-year-old brother,” she said. “Maybe for the weekends, but he’s too obsessed with his online games.”

  I knew all about teenage boys. It was all well and good until my son, Joseph, decided to go to university, leaving me high and dry with Abi to help serve and Ralph to cook. I had Rosie’s assistance too, but she was currently helping Doctor Raymond as part-time receptionist. “Any other ideas?”

  “Actually,” Ralph said, tapping the metal spatula on the side. “A man came by yesterday looking for work, well he asked for you by name. I told him to come back but I guess he never did. It was right before I left.” He shrugged, quickly occupying himself with the metal hot plate.

  “Guess I’ll need to create a help wanted sign then.”

  Nothing terribly exciting ever happened on a chilly Tuesday morning in October. Yet I was about to be proven wrong. A shrill cry came from outside, loud enough to drive the seagulls away from the café porch.

  Within seconds the entire café clientele were gone, except for Margery who stayed seated by the window with a hand resting on her walking stick.

  “What on Earth is that racket?” Margery asked, squinting through the window.

  “I’m not sure,” Abi said, joining Margery to press her face against the glass.

  I sighed, swotting the tea towel on the metal counter. “You’d think someone famous was here.”

  “Someone famous?” Abi asked, untying her apron. “I heard they were shooting a film in Cornwall, didn’t think they’d come here.”

  My mouth pinched with excitement. “Oo, maybe we’ll get a mid-morning rush.”

  “Mind if I go have a look?” Ralph asked, scraping meat to the cold resting spot on the hotplate.

  “Be my guest,” I said. “But I want their autographs.”

  “Can—” Abi began, stepping back from the window.

  “Sure.”

  She squealed, throwing her apron over the counter before rushing outside.

  Margery guffawed, almost spitting her dentures out. “Back when I were a little ‘un, you wouldn’t see me falling at the feet of celebrities. Had no time for them then, got no time for them now.”

  “You know how the world is now though,” I said, stepping from behind the counter. “Everyone wants to be a celebrity.” I approached her, trying to peer outside. There was a direct view over the parking spots and the main road, but across the main road sat the Cowan Bay cobbled harbour docks.

  “You won’t catch me doing that,” she said.

  I glanced at her walking stick.

  “And no, it’s not because I’m lumbered with this old person stick,” she added.

  “Did Ethel go?” I asked.

  Margery shrugged, digging her fork into the toast on her plate. “Is Ralph coming back?” she asked. “I want another order of eggs.”

  “I think so.” I smiled. “I’ll put an order in for you.”

&n
bsp; It wasn’t until ten minutes later when a horde charged back into the café. I stood behind the counter, prepared for a barrage of orders with a smile. Among the chatter, a clash pinged from the window pane, a thunderous shatter followed it.

  CHAPTER 2

  An hour passed since the incident of the smashed café window and already murmurs travelled through the village. It turned out the screaming was far from a celebrity. A dead body had washed up on the cobbles of the harbour docks. The sight left a bitter taste in people’s mouths.

  I’d cleared out the café and stood by the door, my fingers pinching at my bottom lip as I stared out among the wondering faces concerned with the smashed window. I couldn’t have anyone caught in the crossfire of some teenagers throwing rocks, or worse, getting cut.

  Ralph and Abi busied themselves with the broken glass while I waited on someone from the police department. The witches had already gathered in the backroom and waited on me.

  “I can’t believe someone did this,” Abi said with a bag full of broken glass. “Think we’ve got the last of it now.”

  Ralph hummed, agreeing with Abi. “I’ll stay here and wait for the police to arrive,” he said. “You can go on back to see your friends if you want.”

  “Thank you,” I said. “I can’t believe no one’s been around yet.” It was an immediate slip of the tongue before I recalled the dead body that had the entire village chaotically running around.

  Joining the women in the backroom, I eased into the comfort of the sandalwood incense burning on the circle table. Tana sat close by, watching the plumes ascend and perfume the air. Allegra and Eva were already deep in discussion while Noelia stood idly, staring at the collection of crystals.

  “Gwen,” Eva said, slipping out of conversation. “Have they arrived yet? Do they know who did it?” Her hands curled into fists at her side.

  “My money is on Bridget,” Allegra chimed in.