Christmas Goose

By Zenina Masters

Tyla is a golden goose, creature of myth and legend. She gets a card in the mail and calls a transporter to get her out of her gilded cage and to the Crossroads.

Tyla has no experience with men, strangers, bright lights or loud noises. She is completely overwhelmed, and once she meets a man who is willing to make her dream of a mate come true, she comes down with a case of cold feet.

Arkenon enjoys travelling the world as one of the premier shifter tattoo artists. When he meets Tyla over a casual dinner, he is smitten with her shy looks but straightforward attitude. He enrolls at the Crossroads and pursues the woman he wants as a mate. He just has to work on defining his motives for both their sakes.

• Language: English
• Publisher: eXtasy Books Inc
• Release date: Feb 1, 2014
• ISBN: 9781771117524

Book preview

A goose escapes from her family and seeks out a mate then changes her mind and tries to back out of the Crossroads. He has other ideas.

Tyla is a golden goose, creature of myth and legend. She gets a card in the mail and calls a transporter to get her out of her gilded cage and to the Crossroads.

Tyla has no experience with men, strangers, bright lights or loud noises. She is completely overwhelmed, and once she meets a man who is willing to make her dream of a mate come true, she comes down with a case of cold feet.

Arkenon enjoys travelling the world as one of the premier shifter tattoo artists. When he meets Tyla over a casual dinner, he is smitten with her shy looks but straightforward attitude. He enrolls at the Crossroads and pursues the woman he wants as a mate. He just has to work on defining his motives for both their sakes.

The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.

Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage the electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Christmas Goose

Copyright © 2013 Zenina Masters

ISBN: 978-1-77111-752-4

Cover art by Carmen Waters

All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher.

Published by eXtasy Books

Look for us online at:

www.extasybooks.com

Smashwords Edition

Christmas Goose

Shifting Crossroads book 11

By

Zenina Masters

Chapter One

Tyla Orwell sat and watched the parade march past her family’s home. She heard the giggle of her niece a moment before she was tackled. Well, it wasn’t much of a tackle. Tora was only two feet tall.

Hello, shortcake. Tyla lifted Tora in her arms and hugged her while the parade filed past.

Tora applauded and wiggled her legs as the brightly coloured floats slowly progressed past.

The tree-trimming party was under way, and the drunken revels of the Orwells were reaching Tyla’s ears. She was on babysitting duty, so she kept Tora in her arms until the pink-cheeked cherub fell asleep.

She put Tora down in her room and opened her computer. It was time to get some work done, and since she was currently the goose that was laying the golden eggs, she needed to keep her family wealthy and on top of their social ladder.

It sucked that only one family member per generation got the knack for making money out of anything. They called it the Rumplestiltskin gene.

Her aunt Hadra had the knack before Tyla, and she had lived her life alone and surrounded by her family. Tyla was determined that that was not going to happen to her.

The holidays meant that she was surrounded at all times, but there was a way out. The moment that Tora was back with her mother, Tyla was going to make a call.

She fished the card out of her bra and looked at it. There was a name and a number, and Tyla was really hoping that it wasn’t a joke.

She put it back in the only thing that her family didn’t search when she wasn’t in her room. Being under lock and key was her life, and she was tired of it.

The moment that she decided to do it, it was like something clicked. She checked on Tora and closed the door to her room.

Drunk geese shed feathers, and she was going to be able to get all the familial samples that she needed from the main living room.

As she guessed, her family was mostly passed out, and there were feathers by the dozens. She picked up the samples she needed and left the room as quietly as she came. She saw a few pairs of open eyes, but she moved quickly, hiding the feathers behind her back. To sell her reason for being there, she put her sister into the recovery position and brought in a six-pack of water for her family’s waking moments.

It was only half of what they would need, but she was counting on them to wake in stages.

She took the feathers and added one of her own; the gold gleamed against the white and grey. She tucked the bundle of feathers under her thick blonde braid and checked on Tora. The little one was asleep with her chubby fist against her cheek. Tyla wanted a kid; she wanted a family that didn’t constantly ask her about the bottom line. She wanted to love someone who looked at her and didn’t see dollar signs. The Crossroads might just help her do that.

She would have gone that night, but with Tora depending on her for meals and supervision, there was nowhere she could go until her niece’s parents were sober and awake.

The envy she felt every time she looked at her niece was gut wrenching. It would eat her up inside after more time passed, and she didn’t want to turn into the bitter woman her aunt had been. Even the chance at normal was worth the risk.

Tyla worked through the night, keeping up with the overseas’ markets until she heard movement in the house. She scooped up Tora and went through her morning cleanup. When Tora was wearing her favourite pink jumper and little white shoes, Tyla took her to the kitchen for breakfast, breaking out the highchair and making up some oatmeal.

Feeding Tora would be faster, but it was so much more fun to watch her shove the fruity grain into the general vicinity of her mouth. The spoon got in there eventually, but usually after the oatmeal had been smeared on Tora’s chubby cheeks.

Tyla stepped in occasionally and wiped off the build-up, but Tora was having a grand time.

When breakfast was over and Tyla had had her ninth cup of coffee in three hours, she cleaned