Pies, Palmistry, and Poison, page 1
part #3 of Cowan Bay Witches Cozy Mystery Series
PIES, PALMISTRY, AND POISON
A Cowan Bay Cozy Mystery
JESSICA LANCASTER
Copyright © 2019 Jessica Lancaster
Original text copyright © 2018
All Rights Reserved
First published in 2018 under A Slice of Revenge
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)
NON-PARANORMAL MYSTERIES
Bree’s Bakery Cozy Mysteries
A Slice of Disaster (Story 1)
A Dash of Terror (Story 2)
A Touch of Madness (Story 3)
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!
PIES, PALMISTRY, AND POISON
As Cowan Bay’s ‘Annual Winter Bake Sale’ gets underway, a death strikes the village.
Celebrity chef, Nigel Whisker is a controversial television personality, so it’s no surprise someone had it out for him… which means nobody is safe from speculation, including three-time winner Gwen Waterhouse.
Detective Hodge wants to sweep the crumbs of this death under the rug with an easy arrest, but Gwen has other plans. Pies, palmistry, and poison, oh my!
Will proof be in the pudding?
A cozy mystery set in a small English seaside village, featuring a café-owning amateur female sleuth and her cat. Written in British English. No swearing, gore, or graphic scenes.
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
ABOUT JESSICA LANCASTER
CHAPTER 1
Baking wasn’t quite an exact science, but it was unforgiving; you could always add more but you couldn’t take it away. It was my number one rule to baking, alongside clean as you go. I know people said, don’t eat the cake batter, but as a witch, I had more than several teas I could drink to flush away any mild sickness bug.
I dropped the spoon beside the bowl after tasting and a sharp ginger spice hit my tongue. Milk was a palette cleanser to spice, instantly refreshing.
August hacked at the back of his throat after licking batter from the spoon.
“August,” I groaned, yanking the spoon from the table and throwing it into the sink. “It’s not cat-friendly.”
He jumped from the counter and darted past my feet in a black blur. “Could’ve warned me,” he said, lapping water from his bowl. “You’ll kill someone with that.”
I scoffed. “As a witch’s cat, you should know better than to taste things without first smelling them.” His sense of smell was impeccable, it was unfortunate his common sense wasn’t.
He sprawled out on the floor, licking at his thick winter coat. “That’s got too much ginger in it, but I wasn’t sure if I liked it.”
“I can’t exactly take the spice out.” It’d have to do, I didn’t need it to be right today, tomorrow was the annual winter bake sale at the parish church.
“Looking for a fourth win?” he asked.
As I poured the wet batter into a tray, my thoughts fluttered to my previous winning bakes. There’d been my marzipan sponge with an almond honey glaze; a personal favourite but a nightmare to get right. My second win had been with a much more adventurous bake, although controversial with my Neapolitan cheesecake; layers of vanilla, strawberry, and chocolate. And nearly two years since my last win; inspired by my son’s love for peanut butter, it was a chocolate fudge and peanut butter cake.
My mouth salivated, thinking about those creations. Everyone loved them, but they were much too complicated to go on the café menu. I kept to popular and easy bakes for the regular menu, but I always crafted one of the kind cakes each week without fail.
“Witch post!” August hollered from the front door.
In a daze of thought, I placed the baking tin in the preheated oven.
“Bring it through,” I called out.
A cackle came from down the hall. “I’m not a dog, this isn’t fetch.”
Some days I thought it would’ve been easier to have a dog as my familiar, but as tradition went, dogs were man’s best friend, not a witch’s.
The monthly witch post, aptly titled, The Witching Hour, was the only way all the witches through the country kept in touch. We were many, but we weren’t the most organised of people, and the post kept us all in the loop without the need for a garish annual event.
I settled in the conservatory with a cup of mint tea and some biscuits.
The December newspaper was thicker than usual. The front page was one giant header wishing all the witches a happy solstice, but that was more than a week away. I flicked through pages to see them crammed with articles until landing on one page in particular, ‘Deaths’.
The world bids goodbye to Marissa Day, a witch from Cowan Bay, Cornwall. It is an unfortunate day when we say ‘goodbye’ to one of our own, especially under the circumstances we did for Marissa. She is survived by one sole heir, her twenty-one-year-old-daughter Noelia Day.
There was an image beside her small eulogy, but I couldn’t cross my eyes to look at it.
I skipped to the next page.
Warning! Witches! If you see something, say something! The Witches Council would like to remind you they are here to listen to your concerns. We here at The Witching Hour understand the excitement of getting involved in finding evil in our own back gardens, but there are professionals tasked with bringing justice to evil forces.
I sipped my tea, easing the knot of angst in my throat. I’d been one of those so-called witches putting themselves forward to finding evil in their back garden.
We would also like to wish the best of luck in retirement for the investigators settling down in the New Year. The Witches Council would also like this to serve as an advert, asking for any witches looking to pursue a new career, there’s plenty of positions opening in the council.
There were plenty of other things I would rather do before working for the Council, namely, have myself committed to an insane asylum. I knew this much, especially as my own grandmother had been an investigator for them. The Witches Council was made of the richest witches across the country and only had their best interests at heart. Not to mention, nobody had even been sent to investigate Marissa’s death or my mother’s ex-husband who’d killed himself on the verge of finding magic.
Perhaps it was because we lived at the edge of the world; living so close to the seaboard, it was like we didn’t exist.
I continued reading, stopping at a large black box in the centre of the page.
WARNING: Northern sprites have been spotted in the South.
I despised warnings. If it wasn’t about a potential threat in all block capitals inciting fear and panic, it was a warning of the actions the Council could take against any misbehaving witch. Sprites were fairly harmless, they came in a few forms; pixies, brownies, fairies, and the most they’d do is steal from the homes they lived inside, but occasionally they were helpful.
Ding. The oven timer sounded.
I folded the newspaper and sat it on the end table. I’d had plenty for one day; I thought we were bombarded enough with human newspapers screaming about the world ending, but now it was coming from the witches as well.
“Anything good?” August asked as he hissed at the oven timer.
Letting steam escape the oven before taking a cocktail stick to prod the centre, I thought for a moment on how to respond to a cat with a hate for the outside world. “The same old news,” I replied. “Witches doing what they do best.”
“Complain?” August offered with a chuckle.
“Definitely not,” I said, holding the cocktail stick to the light. A clean finish. “Familiars complain far more than any witch I’ve ever met.”
“There’s a reason for that,” he said, stretching across the counter. “I don’t have thumbs. And I’m a talking cat.”
That much was true, if he couldn’t talk, he wouldn’t be able to voice his complaints. “Don’t tempt me to take it away,” I said with a grin. “A little catnip will sort you right out.” He knew I was kidding, I only gave him it to knock him out before leaving the house.
He leapt from the counter and ran out of the kitchen.
The heavy scent of ginger warmed the air as I pulled the baking tray from the oven. It was perfectly gold and risen to the rim. My secret to keeping it moist and sticky inside was to let the bake rest in the tray until it had cooled.
While the gingerbread cake settled, I grabbed my phone and called the café.
Abi answered. “Good afternoon, this is the Crystal Café of Cowan Bay, how may I help you?” she asked.
“Oh, Abi, it’s Gwen,” I replied. “You know the village baking competition is tomorrow, well, I’m bringing some of my bake to sample and I wondered if there was any whipped cream or ice cream around. I think there might be some in the baking studio.”
“I’ll get Dannika to look,” she replied.
Dannika Thames was a new hire. She was in her late teens and had worked in Harold’s newsagents near the charity shop, but he was cutting costs and fired her, luckily I needed an extra set of hands since my son was away.
“Yep,” Abi said, “two tubs of vanilla, and there are five cartons of double cream.”
“Fantastic.” I’d need to whip the double cream but unwhipped cream was as nice on its own. “I’ll be at the café soon.”
CHAPTER 2
I waited half an hour, finishing my pot of mint tea I’d made as I read through the rest of The Witching Hour. There was a final notice on the last page.
During the Winter Solstice, we would advise all witches to ward themselves with protective amulets and spells. We would like to remind you of past experiences, the Solstice is a time when many have had bad luck and abilities have been at fault. The Witches Council doesn’t wish to have another situation like the power out of 1998.
The more I read, the more I wondered whether they were being paid by increasing their readers’ heartbeats. I remembered the blackout vividly; all magic vanished for almost a full week. An awfully drab time to have lived through. The cause was a coven on the border of England and Wales. I was still convinced my mother had a part to play, considering she lived a few miles away at the time.
“When will you be home?” August asked, weaving between my legs as I walked around the kitchen collecting pieces of a plastic box; I had numerous lids and not enough containers.
“Not sure,” I replied, forcing a square lid over a rectangle container. “It’s Friday so I have the weekly coven meeting. I’ll feed you now. You shouldn’t be hungry until I’m home.” I huffed, struggling with the puzzle of connecting boxes and lids.
“I don’t want to starve,” he said, throwing himself across the kitchen tiles.
The melodrama was strong with August, I didn’t know where he got it from.
I threw the plastic back into the cupboard where it came from and clicked my fingers. Two connecting pieces appeared on the counter. “Finally.” A cool sensation of relief passed over me. I tied my hair back, pulling every strand into a hair band. “If you eat all this now, you’ll go hungry before I’m back.” I reached for a pouch of wet cat food from the cupboard.
Now that the café was fully staffed, I could afford to arrive later than I usually would and leave during the day. I enjoyed work, but I also hated leaving August alone in the house. I knew my mother now only lived a couple minutes down the road, but it wasn’t worth the additional stress.
I cut the gingerbread cake into small squares and placed them in the container; there was more than enough to satisfy the regulars.
“I’m going now,” I called out by the front door as I slipped my arms into my large beige coat with a nice pillowed interior.
We were in the middle of a dry foggy winter; absolutely freezing but not a spot of rain, unlike the start of winter when it rained constantly. I carried my handbag and held my book of shadows to my chest with the cake box under an arm. I threw them all into the passenger’s seat of the car.
Now my mother was all moved into Marissa’s old house, she was completely swamped with renovations; with each time I passed the property, I slowed to crane my neck at the driveway, watching moving trucks come and go.
After her ex-husband, Victor Harrison’s passing, he’d left her a substantial sum of money and a diamond she wasn’t allowed to sell. I still waited for my mother to tell me she was off again, but she’d stuck around and integrated herself into the coven.
The Crystal Café bustled with business. I watched through the fog from the driver’s seat, warming my hands on the air conditioner blowing out hot air. The gingerbread cake I’d made was a play on the popular gingerbread men the village devoured during the festive period. We couldn’t quite compete with the spiced lattes some of the coffee chains were offering in Belsy, but I’d done my part to supply the café with flavoured syrup.
Warming my hands had been a wasted effort; once I was out of the car with all my belongings, the cold took hold of me. I shivered all the way to the café door.
Ethel and Margery were both in place with their favourite view outside, looking over the carpark and beyond toward the cobbles into the harbour.
“Oo, Gwen,” Ethel said, waving a hand at me. “What’s in there?”
Given Ethel’s age, her eyesight hadn’t faded the slightest. “A little something for you to try,” I replied. “Let me put my things away and you can have the first taste.”
Both Ethel and Margery had half-eaten slices of cake already on their plates. It wasn’t unlike them to eat slowly, after all, they spent most of their days in here and were in no rush to eat their food and leave.
I continued through the café, smiling at Abi, Dannika, and Ralph. Dannika was tall with an afro of fizzy brunette curls pushed back on her head with a headband. “Here are some tasters of my bake for tomorrow,” I said, offloading the plastic box onto the counter.
Before I could leave again, a woman turned with a wide grin on her face. Rhonda Thames, Dannika’s mother. She wore a large purple anorak raincoat, a pair of matching trousers, and green wellington boots. “Gwen! How’re you?”
“I’m great,” I said. “Is it going to rain?”
She chuckled. “Can never be too certain.” She knocked her knuckles twice on the counter. “Especially not at the allotment.”
“True, the outdoors are unpredictable. I didn’t think anything grew in the middle of winter anyway,” I replied, glancing away from her to the backroom door.
“We have greenhouses, of course, but as long as the soil doesn’t get too hard with frost, fingers crossed,” she chuckles, rasping her knuckles on the metal once again. “I’ve had many success winters with onions, garlic, carrots—”
“Sorry, Rhonda,” I said, rebalancing my book of shadows in my arms, feigning a greater weight than what it held. “Let me put my things away and I’ll be right back,” I said.
“Of course,” she replied. “And thanks again for giving my Danni a job.”
“Muuum,” Dannika groaned from across the way, turning her head to glare at her mother.
It brought the slightest chuckle to my throat, while also reminding me of something I was missing; my son. He’d only been gone since September, and I knew he’d be home soon, given his winter break was approaching.
“I’ll be right back,” I mumbled, skittering off toward the backroom.
Winter was always busy, ever since I opened. It was warm, and there was always a selection of hot beverages and fresh cakes to keep stomachs lined throughout the cold months.
I pulled my coat away and hung it on a peg by the door. I had many things to do today; foremost, I had to prepare for the competition; the deadline to have baked goods on the judging table was 12 P.M. I also had to prepare snacks for the coven meeting.
Once I left the backroom, I was greeted with many happy and smiling faces. They were already helping themselves to the free gingerbread cake samples.
Ethel swirled the cake around on a fork, collecting cream from her plate before stuffing it in her mouth. “Good job, Gwen,” her voice was muffled by the food.
