Cupcakes, Trinkets, and Other Deadly Magic (Dowser Series) Read Free

all the right sorts.”
    “Fine.” Yes, not only did I have an affinity for magical things, but things of magic — people specifically — were also drawn to me. It wasn’t as fun as it sounded coming from Sienna. If it wasn’t for the wards separating me from the vampire earlier, I would have assumed that was why he’d shown up at my door. “I’ll shower,” I said.
    Sienna clapped her hands together like she used to when she was younger, before her mother abandoned her after her father’s death. That was when Gran had taken her in full time. It was difficult for the magically lacking — normals, as Sienna called them — to raise those with magic, even if only a half-blood like Sienna. I wondered how long it had been since Sienna had heard from her mother, but I didn’t bring the sore subject up. No matter how free-spirited she might be, at least my mother always showed up on the important dates.
    “The trinkets don’t really match the goth look, you know.”
    “I think they go fine. And it’s deconstructed, not goth. Welcome to the second decade of the twenty-first century.”
    “That’s my sweater you deconstructed.”
    “You weren’t wearing it.”
    “At the time.”
    “Shower, please. You smell like bakery.”
    “Some people like it.”
    “Like who, Jade? Anyone you’d actually consider?”
    I turned away from Sienna’s almost mocking laugh and mounted the stairs to my suite above the bakery. Gran owned the entire block that included the bakery, which I leased from her through her corporation, Godfrey Properties. A real estate investment that had been passed down from her husband, of whom I had only vague memories. The storefronts also had apartments on the upper floors. The rents were high, but the view and the solid building upkeep made for long-term tenants.
    When I renovated the bakery, I had stairs built to connect to one of the two suites that occupied the second floor. The apartment also had an entrance from the outside that I shared with the other, currently unoccupied, suite. However, I pretty much used the back alley exit from the bakery exclusively.
    I think Sienna was currently bunking at Gran’s, being in between jobs. Which meant she was probably living full-time with Rusty, who was some sort of a stockbroker — he worked from home, keeping almost the same hours as I did. The stock exchange opened early on the West Coast.
    I walked through my sparsely furnished living room toward my second bedroom, which currently operated as a craft room of sorts, and which boasted the most amazing view of the ocean and the North Shore Mountains. Kitsilano spread up from the beach in a slow-sloping hill. Many homes managed peekaboo views from their upper floors; I had a hundred-and-eighty-degree vista. The lights of North and West Vancouver spread out along the base of the snow-peaked mountains. The ski runs of Grouse and Cypress Mountains were clearly lit tracks above the residential area, even though mid-April was late for them to be open except to hikers and, maybe higher up, snowshoers.
    I ignored the urge to open the large window and let the breeze in. It had a tiny Juliet balcony on which I’d planted chocolate cosmos and strawberries last summer. No matter the oddly warm weather we’d been having, it was still too early for the strawberries to flower.
    The room was lined with shelves. I stood before the desk by the window — I liked to look at the mountains while I worked — and trailed my hand over the trinkets on the nearest shelf. I had thousands of them … bits of magical things, rocks, ribbons, knickknacks. One set of shelves was completely devoted to jade — jewelry, unpolished rocks, and chipped figurines. Yes, my name is Jade and I collect jade. The stone held magic like a sponge. My fingers strayed down to stroke the jade knife I always wore at my hip, covered by an invisibility spell — courtesy of my grandmother, of course.  
    It had taken me a year to hone the