Mistletoe & Matches

When Ivy Winslow, a tea-brewing witch with a stubborn streak and a Maine Coon familiar, sets up her booth at the Mistletoe Mischief Festival, she expected another cozy Hollysin Christmas. One with candles, cocoa, and the occasional tourist looking for love charms. What she doesn't expect is Theo Carter, the town's charming firefighter, single dad, and certified chaos-magnet. Or his six-year-old daughter Sophia, whose mischievous matchmaking might just out-magic any spell Ivy could cast.

Theo's used to putting out fires, not walking straight into one. But there's something about Ivy, the way she laughs, the quiet power in her eyes, and the way her shop always smells like cinnamon and secrets. That definitely pulled him in faster than he could fight it. Between festival competitions, late-night cocoa runs, and a snowstorm that traps them together in Ivy's candlelit shop, sparks fly hotter than the Yule bonfire.

As snow blankets Hollysin and Jingle Jack's radio updates turn the storm into town gossip, Ivy and Theo find themselves toeing the line between flirtation and something deeper. But Ivy's not looking for complications, and Theo's heart has already been burned once. It'll take a little magic, a lot of mistletoe, and one persistent six-year-old with a charm mouse to convince them that love, like a good flame, might be worth tending after all.

Mistletoe & Matches is part of the Tangled in Tinsel series, a collection of spicy small-town Christmas rom-com novellas set in Hollysin Town. Be sure to look for Novella Two, Merry Mischief by Melody A. Rose, and Novella Three, Decked and Frosted by Jade D. Hart.