Madison Fox Novella Box Set

By Rebecca Chastain

Dive into two brand-new stories featuring your favorite characters from the bestselling Madison Fox urban fantasy adventures!

A FISTFUL of GIFTS - Evil doesn't take a holiday.

Madison wants Jamie’s first Christmas to be perfect, but with a pooka around, evil’s never far behind and nothing ever goes as planned!

A POCKETFUL of TRANQUILITY - The hidden hazards of playing hooky...

When Rose takes a spontaneous day off, Brad knows something is amiss. With Jamie at her side, it’s up to Madison to figure out what’s wrong with their resident empath before Rose gets herself seriously hurt.

Add this box set to your eReader today, but don't start reading unless you're prepared to giggle out loud.

SERIES READING ORDER
A Fistful of Evil
A Fistful of Fire
A Fistful of Frost
Madison Fox Novella Box Set

(To repeat: Avoid SPOILERS—read the stories in this box set after A Fistful of Frost.)

• Language: English
• Publisher: Rebecca Chastain
• Release date: Nov 24, 2019
• ISBN: 9780999238585

Rebecca Chastain

REBECCA CHASTAIN is a feminist, animal advocate, and nature devotee. She believes empathy is a hero’s trait and love is a motive, an inside job, and a transformative energy that shapes each person’s world. She is the USA Today bestselling author of the Gargoyle Guardian Chronicles series, the Terra Haven Chronicles series that begins with DEADLINES & DRYADS, and the Madison Fox urban fantasy series.If given the opportunity, Rebecca will befriend your cat.Sign up to Rebecca's newsletter for freebies, behind-the-scenes information, and new release announcements: https://www.rebeccachastain.com/newsletter/.List of Rebecca's Books:NOVELS OF TERRA HAVEN*Gargoyle Guardian Chronicles*Magic of the GargoylesCurse of the GargoylesSecret of the GargoylesLured (newsletter exclusive)Flight of the Gargoyles*Terra Haven Chronicles*Deadlines & Dryads (prequel)Leads & LynxesHeadlines & HydrasMuckrakers & MinotaursMADISON FOX ADVENTURESA Fistful of EvilA Fistful of FireA Fistful of Flirtation (newsletter exclusive)A Fistful of FrostMadison Fox Novella Box SetSTAND ALONETiny GlitchesContact Rebecca atwww.RebeccaChastain.comor find her onFacebook: www.Facebook.com/RebeccaChastainNovelsTwitter: @Author_RebeccaInstagram: @chastain.rebecca

Book preview

Madison Fox Novella Box Set

Madison Fox Novella Box Set

Rebecca Chastain

Mind Your Muse Books

Contents

A Fistful of Gifts

Spoiler Warning

1. Be Naughty; Save Santa the Trip

2. Bah, Humbug

3. Christmas Calories Don't Count

4. Batteries Not Included

5. Being Naughty Feels So Nice

A Pocketful of Tranquility

Spoiler Warning

A Pocketful of Tranquility

Thank You!

Also by Rebecca Chastain

Sneak Peek: Magic of the Gargoyles

About the Author

Copyrights

A Fistful of Gifts

A Fistful of Gifts

Spoiler Warning

Dear Reader,

Before you tab to the next page, make sure you’re all caught up on the series. A Fistful of Gifts takes place after A Fistful of Frost, book 3 of the Madison Fox Adventures.

I hope you enjoy this holiday adventure. I wanted Jamie’s first Christmas with Madison to be perfect, but with a pooka around, evil’s never far behind and nothing ever goes as planned…

1

Be Naughty; Save Santa the Trip

Ice sinks into my bones, shivers cascading down my legs. I flee through snow-covered fields, my steps clumsy and slow, bogged down by hidden weeds. I struggle to run faster, desperate to escape the demon chasing me before it eats my soul. But the wet snow clings to me, soaking my clothing, numbing my limbs. Sharp teeth nip my back, grazing my flesh in painful pinches.

I crash through the jagged ice of a frozen lake, falling into the frigid water beneath—

I woke with a strangled gasp.

A soft, yellow glow from the light outside my window filtered through the gaps of my bedroom mini-blinds, casting a faint grid across the ceiling. The heater rattled and hummed, blasting hot air through the overhead vent. I burrowed deeper under the covers, trying to shake the dream without fully waking. I had no desire to be conscious at—I peeked at the clock on my nightstand—4:55 in the morning.

My gaze snagged on the stuffed reindeer propped beside the clock, and the last remnants of the nightmare evaporated. It wasn’t just any morning: It was Christmas!

A fizz of giddiness spiraled through my midsection. I hadn’t been awake this early on Christmas morning since I was a teen, but I wouldn’t be able to fall back to sleep now. Today was Jamie’s first Christmas, and I couldn’t wait to share it with him.

We had decorated the apartment and porch with all things red and green and merry, and presents were piled beneath the tree in the front room. My apartment didn’t have a fireplace or mantel, but we had set out socks around the TV—one each for me, Jamie, Val, Mr. Bond, and Dame Zilla. Though technically young enough, Jamie was too savvy to believe in the myth of Santa, but we both agreed it would be fun to honor the tradition of pretending a jolly plump man dropped by once a year to deliver presents. I embraced the role of Santa, and it had taken some crafty coordination with my best friend to keep the stocking stuffers a secret from Jamie and Val. The presents sat in a bag in the laundry closet, hidden behind the box of detergent. If I was sneaky, I might be able to slip out and fill the socks now before Jamie woke up.

The pooka shifted restlessly on the bedroom floor. As always, he had opted to sleep in his Great Dane form rather than suffer through a night in pajamas as a human. A thick blanket covered the bulk of his long, black body, making it impossible to distinguish his head from his rump. Normally he slept like the dead, but tonight his soft grunts and shallow whines made me wonder if he was having a bad dream. What would a pooka nightmare look like? Did nameless monsters lurk in his dreams, too, or were his fears more immediate, like being forbidden to eat ice cream?

I snorted. Careful not to make too much noise, I reached for an upturned leg, hoping to jostle Jamie into a better dream. Icy prickles ran up my exposed arm. Frowning, I examined my hand in the dim light. I lay snuggled under a thick down comforter and fleece blanket, so why couldn’t I get warm? And why did the air feel like . . . bites?

Adrenaline pinged to my brain, and I blinked to Primordium. The muted yellow tones of the dark room flattened to gray, and an ambient metaphysical light flooded the room. Day or night, the same illumination lit Primordium, the source unclear. Only right now, it looked as if someone had thrown a dark cloth over the light, draping the room in slinking shadows.

Bracing myself on an elbow, I thrust my hair out of my face. Shadows didn’t exist in Primordium. All inanimate objects, including the walls, ceilings, carpet, and furniture, should have been a uniform, charcoal gray. Only evil, or atrum, registered as true black . . .

A vervet dropped from the oily ceiling. Ink dark, with a compact monkey body, claws to make Wolverine jealous, and a scorpion tail, the vervet was one of the more common evil pests I exterminated as part of my job as an illuminant enforcer for Roseville, California. They weren’t, however, common in my bedroom.

The vervet fell soundlessly into the seething black mound atop Jamie’s doggy bed, burrowing and clawing through the mass of formless evil to latch on to Jamie’s buried soul. The entire heap pulsed, the indistinct bodies seeming to grow as one, swelling three inches in size as I stared in shocked horror.

Holy sh— A mob of beady eyes swiveled to fixate on me, and the rest of my curse died in my throat.

I fumbled blindly with the covers, shoving them off my legs, revealing a nightmare of soul-sucking imps lining my body from my neck to my toes like grotesque ticks. My stomach somersaulted and I swallowed convulsively.

Jamie. It came out a strangled whisper when I wanted to shout. I tried again. Jamie, wake up.

The pooka squirmed in his sleep, and the mass of feasting vervet undulated. I pulsed lux lucis down my body, pushing my soul’s clean energy into the imps to disintegrate them. Five exploded into black glitter puffs of disbanded atrum—the rest clung to me, unfazed. My heart pounded harder. That maneuver should have killed every evil creature in contact with me. I lifted a bare hand to examine my soul, shocked to find the white of my lux lucis as weak as skim milk. How long had the imps been feeding on me while I slept?

Fresh imps swarmed across the bed. With their plump chinchilla bodies, round ears, and glossy eyes, they might have looked like potential pets—if not for their cavernous mouths. Mindlessly charging through the powdery remains of their exterminated comrades, they chomped down on vacant patches of my soul. Pinches of chilly pain flickered across my body, then faded.

The last imp lunged for my face, snapping me out of my horrified paralysis. I swiped a hand through the air, killing the imp before it could sink its teeth into my cheek. Not waiting for another to take its place, I sprang from the bed and grabbed the white stalk of a pothos ivy that sat atop my nightstand. Its lux lucis shot into me, and the vine’s leaves crumbled to dust. I didn’t feel even a hint of rejuvenation from the energy jolt.

Crap.

Crapcrapcrap.

Jamie, wake up! We’re under attack. I stumbled to the next plant on my dresser, swiping aside a trio of imps only to have them leap and latch on to my neck.

Jamie’s head snapped up, whirling irises springing open. He glanced from me to his belly, and his upturned legs flailed, tangling in his blanket. Barking short, deep woofs, he struggled harder, but his antics didn’t disturb the creatures attached to his soul, and they all continued to grow in size.

Stop feeding them. My words came out in breathy pants between imp exterminations, the nominal exertion of killing the softball-size imps attached to me sapping my depleted energy.

Jamie growled—at me or at the feasting minions, I wasn’t sure—and his soul went supernova. Bright-white lux lucis burst from him in a kinetic crackle, wiping out every vervet and imp attached to his soul and clearing a circular patch around him as wide as his dog bed. He rolled to his feet as shadows peeled from the walls, reshaping into imps larger than Mr. Bond.

The cats! Jamie, they need—

He lunged out the bedroom door, nails catching on the carpet as he took the sharp turn down the hallway to the front room. I smacked my hand to the next plant crammed atop my dresser, draining it to its roots in seconds. Grabbing my pet wood wand from my desk, I shoved lux lucis down its three-foot length and slashed the glowing rod through vervet clinging to the ceiling. Atrum glitter rained down from their exploded bodies. None had attempted to evade my weapon. I expected as much from the imps squeezed in between their more evolved

Reviews for Madison Fox Novella Box Set

[Alison R · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Enjoyed the 3 books and the short stories from both series. Well edited with humour, action and honest fun. Looking forward to the authors next adventure.!