True Calling (Fantasy Book 2)

by Cree Storm

  “And I already told you it’s none of your business. Back the fuck off.” The dark-haired man snarled.

  “Just what do you think you’re going to do, Johnson? Hurt me? Kill me?” Carl tossed his head back laughing an evil laugh. The second he stopped laughing, Carl looked Johnson directly in the eyes, “There is nothing you or anyone here can do to me, Johnson. I would have thought you would have learned that lesson when I killed Thomas. Now stand back so I can get my answers.

  Berk could see that things were going to get ugly really fast. Thinking quickly, he shouted, “Hey Dad, I think I found the place.” Pulling out his map he shouted out, “But I think we’re too early for the feeding demonstration.”

  “Don’t even think about it, Berk! Get away from them!” Garth practically snarled in his mind.

  “I can’t let him hurt these people if I can stop it, Garth.” Berk insisted.

  Pulling up courage he didn’t know he had, Berk continued to walk forward, pretending to look at the map.

  “Well hello, Berk. I’m surprised to see you here. It isn’t time for the seal feeding for another hour.” Carl said, with a sickening sweet tone that made Berk’s skin crawl.

  “Hey, Carl. I didn’t know you’d be here... and yeah, we were looking forward to the feeding and didn’t want to miss it. I’m just didn’t realize the time.” Berk said, with a smile as fake as you could get.

  Nort came up beside Berk, “Sorry if we’re in a place we shouldn’t be, Carl. We were just really excited to see the feeding of the seals. I always wanted to attend one of those... well, that and the polar bears.”

  “Berk, get out of there.” Garth warned in a harsh tone. “He will smell that your scent has changed damn it!”

  “He was about to hurt or kill this woman and man, Garth. I don’t know what’s going on completely, but Carl admitted to killing some guy named Thomas. I couldn’t let him do the same to them.”

  “And I understand that, and we have it on tape, but he will smell the difference in your scent and then you will be the one dead, now back the fuck off!” Garth snapped.

  Instead of listening to his mate, Berk held his hand out to the dark-haired man, “Hi there. I’m Berk Carlos, and this is my father, Nort Carlson. Carl’s asked my father to open a restaurant here, and we were checking the zoo out from a visitor’s point of view.”

  The man held his hand out, shaking Berk’s, “Dean Johnson and this is my friend Sally Hendrix. Nice to meet you.”

  Carl stepped closer to Berk, but he walked towards the woman who was farthest away from Carl. “You don’t look so well. Maybe Carl should get you some water?”

  Shaking her head, Sally quickly replied, “No... no thank you. I just need to lie down for a bit. I should be alright soon enough. Pregnancy can be exhausting.”

  Berk pretended as if he didn’t know her circumstance and smiled wide. “Well, congratulations. I hear the beginning trimester can be tough. Maybe you should go ahead and lie down for a bit.” Turning to Carl, Berk asked in a faked over-sweet voice, “You’re letting her go home to lie down... right? I would hate for anything to happen to her, or her baby.”

  Carl gave Sally and then Dean a scathing glance, but smiled once more at Berk, “Of course we were just discussing that very thing just before you arrived.”

  Berk was following Dean and Sally and didn’t realize that Carl had begun to approach him once more. However, Dean’s quick inhale and hissing, “What the fuck!” had Berk stopping in his tracks. Shit, he had gotten too close and Carl had scented him.

  Grabbing his father, Berk shouted, “Go!”

  “A little help here!” Berk shouted into his mating link. “Carl scented me and he’s after us!”

  Nort and next to Berk with Dean and Sally right there with them. Dean pointed towards a building with a metal door. “Go in there! It will help hide our scent.”

  Berk went to the place Dean indicated and rushed inside. The heat took his breath away at first. Seeing a broom, Berk grabbed in and shoved it in the door handles on the inside, blocking Carl from easy access. Turning back, he saw the three standing there, looking at him. “It isn’t much, but it should buy us some time until Garth gets here with help.”

  “Garth? Who the hell is Garth and who are you?” Dean snarled.

  Berk saw the man’s eyes shift for just a second and smiled, “You’re a large cat of sorts, aren’t you?”

  Dean gave him a skeptical look, “And you’re human, so how do you know of our kind?”

  “I’m mated to a dragon shifter and live with my own zoo I call my family. My mate heard about this place and was checking it out to see if it was a fucked-up place, or if things were on the level. I guess we have our answer.” Berk said, while he still caught his breath, wanting to smack the shit out of Dean for not even drawing a sweat, let alone a much-needed breath.

  “Oh, my gods, he got my message? When I didn’t hear anything back, I thought...”

  “Yeah, Garth isn’t much on communications. I’m working on it.” Berk said, then jerked at the sound of the door being pulled hard and fast.

  “Damn, we better find a good place to hide. That broom isn’t going to hold your boss back for long.” Berk said with a huff.

  Dean nodded and they took off once again. “They’ll have blocked off the other door, but there’s a secret exit not many know about. Follow me.”

  Berk followed making sure his dad was right there with him. Sally wasn’t saying anything, but Berk could tell she was tiring quickly. This shit couldn’t be easy on her or the baby. “Are we close to this special exit?”

  Dean rushed to a large giant red cedar, pulled off his shirt and wrapped it around the thing. He grabbed Sally and placed her in front of him. “I’ll help Sally, can you and your dad climb?”

  Berk pulled his own shirt off and looked to see his father doing the same. Nort snorted, “I might be old, but I can climb a damn tree, now let’s get our asses up.”

  “Your great exit is up there?” Berk gasped, “That has to be a good two hundred feet up!”

  “You only have to hang climb for about sixty, then we can take the branches. Now let’s go!” Dean snapped, taking Sally and climbing faster than any man should be able to. Then again, he wasn’t all man, like Berk and his father.

  “Dad, you go first. I’ll come from behind.” Berk ordered, watching the door as it moved inches more each time.

  Berk was shocked when his dad started climbing the tree like he was a fucking lumberjack. There had to be a story there somewhere, and damned if he was leaving Florida until he heard it. For now, he needed to get his ass moving.

  About thirty feet in the air, Berk felt like his shoulders and arms were going to rip off. The burn was bad and getting worse. He hoped he’d be able to make it. His dad got to the first branch where Dean and Sally were waiting, and Berk started to move once more, when he heard the broom finally snap. Shit, they were coming. Well, if that wasn’t motivation, Berk didn’t know what would be.

  Within less than a minute, Berk found himself pulling and crawling onto the first branch.

  “Berk! Berk Where are you? What are you doing?” Garth’s anxious voice called out.

  Berk followed the others to the second, then the third branch, hissing, “Climbing a fucking tree. Where the hell are you guys?”

  “The council guards are coming through the zoo gates now. Bo’s taking them inside. We need to know where the hell you are. And what the fuck do you mean, climbing a fucking tree?”

  “Dean’s helping my dad and I to safety along with Sally. Carl is hot and heavy on our asses, and from my last look down... which I will never do again, because, holy fuck me, it’s high up here... Carl has at least ten men with him and some are trying to climb after us now. I think he’s calling on some of his bird men, because he’s been on the phone yelling but we’re too high up for me to make out what he’s saying.” Berk explained making it to the second to the last branch.

  The tree swayed and th
en he felt a cold breeze. Looking up, he saw that Dean had pushed one of the solar panels off and was pushing Sally to the outside of the building. He soon followed and then Berk as he was helping his father up. Berk went to the last branch and Dean was leaning down holding out his hand, “Come on!”

  Berk grabbed the offered assistance and found himself pulled onto the glassy roof. Then looked around. “Now what?”

  “I don’t know.” Dean said, placing the solar panel back into place and sealing it the best he could.

  “What the fuck do you mean you don’t know? We’re on a roof in the middle of...” Berk stopped talking when he watched as a large emerald green and red dragon flew towards them. “Holy shit!”

  Dean looked in the same direction at Berk’s outburst. “I really hope that’s your mate.”

  Berk smiled wide, “Yes, it is. Gods, he’s beautiful.”

  Garth landed on the hard part of the building’s roof, “Get on, quick!”

  When Garth lowered his wing, Berk said, “He wants us to get on.”

  Dean helped Sally on first and then Berk helped his father. Everyone moved a bit back so Berk could sit on Garth’s neck. “Hey there, handsome. Come here often?”

  Garth let out a snort and took off into the air. Berk knew he should have been freaked out, but he couldn’t drum up the feeling. He was flying on a fucking dragon! This was beyond amazing, it was beautiful.

  When Garth made a wide right, Berk heard his mate in his mind. “If you look down, you’ll see Carl is being arrested along with his goons.”

  Berk didn’t really want to look down, but he needed to make sure the fucker was truly not going to be a danger to shifters anymore. Taking the chance, he looked and smiled, “Now that’s a beautiful sight.”

  Dean looked down as did Sally. Dean hugged her close. “He’s really going away, Sally. Carl will never be a problem for any of us anymore.”

  “What are you going to do about the zoo?” Berk asked.

  “I’m going to take it over. Those that want to stay can, and those that want to leave will go with our blessing. Most of us enjoy what we do. We just didn’t like the way Carl went about things. Holding back food from the animals. Not allowing them to shift at closing without permission. Not allowing personal interaction without his okay. He never shared his earnings, saying that our food and housing were all the payment we needed. It won’t be that way anymore. From now on everyone will share in our earnings.” Dean stated firmly.

  “Tell him that when Carl goes away. I’ll make sure the council hands over the deeds to this place as well as any money or assets the bastard has.” Garth stated gruffly.

  Berk did as Garth asked and held on tight. He turned to see his father smiling wide and holding out his arms, yelling, “I’m the king of the world.”

  Berk laughed. Hell, he felt the same way. As long as he had his beautiful mate, Berk knew he was the king of the world and any other place he might be taken.

  EPILOGUE

  Garth watched as his mate decorated the chocolate cake, they would be having to celebrate Nort and Marla’s twenty-sixth wedding anniversary. They were visiting from Florida, because his mate was due to give birth any day now to their son, and Garth was still giddy at the thought of being a father for the first time. Looking down at the computer in front of him, Garth saw the Fantasy comment section blinking and wrote.

  Hello, Zotol, old friend.

  I want to thank you and your mate for the beautiful wish that you granted. I must say I wasn’t certain I was right when Bo told me who he had written to asking for a wish for me. However, after some investigation and a bit of hacking, I found I was right. My Jinn friend, you have found your true calling as I’ve found mine. I know with Xolon as your mate, you understand just what this gift means to me, and it’s one that can never be repaid. I have a mate I love, a family I adore, and a baby to complete our circle on the way. I am full and complete for the first time in my extremely long life. So, I thank you and your mate. I thank you and pray you are blessed by the gods as I have been blessed.

  Your friend,

  Garth

  Once Garth hit send, he got up, closing his laptop and walked behind his mate. Gods he had been blessed. Seeing his mate rounded with his child, Garth could no more stop himself from wrapping his arms around the man, than he could stop breathing.

  Kissing the side of Berk’s neck, Garth whispered, “Almost done?”

  Berk smiled as he changed the tip of his piping bag after making the flower decorations on the top of the cake, like he had done on the bottom of the cake. “Yes I am. Are you finished with what you needed to do?”

  Garth nibbled on his mate’s ear lobe, then traveled to his mate’s neck once more when Berk tilted his head. “Uh huh.”

  Giggling, Berk started to write something in the middle of the cake as he rasped, “Garth, I’m never going to finish with you doing that.”

  “How about you finish later. I want you now.” Garth murmured as he gently bit down on his mate’s shoulder.

  Berk moaned, “Almost done. Just... just give me a min... Oh, shit!”

  Garth pulled back, “What? Is something wrong?”

  “Either my water just broke, or I pissed myself. Please tell me I pissed myself.” Berk practically begged.

  Garth picked his mate up, shouting, “This is not a drill! Incoming!”

  Berk hissed, then gritted his teeth. “You did not just say that? I’m not a fucking missile about to attack.”

  Garth rushed the stairs at least three at a time. “No, my love, but you are about to launch and that was our code word.”

  “Code word? Have you guys been watching those stupid James Bond movies again? Because I have to tell you I don’t like James Bond and... Son of a Bitch!” Berk shouted, then screamed out, “You heard the man! This is not a drill! Incoming! Incoming! Incoming!”

  Bo raced past Garth, shouting, “I’ve got the water to boil.”

  Micah was fast on his heels. “I’m getting the clean towels.”

  Chance smiled from the top of the stairs. “I’ve got the bed ready.”

  “And I called the doctor. He should be here in five minutes.” Trevor said.

  Garth made it into the bedroom and Berk yelled out in pain, then growled, “If you even think about leaving this room, I’m going to have Bo trip you up and Nolan bite your ass. Do you hear me, Garth? I will have him bite your ass. Now I may be pissed later, but for now it sounds like a plan.”

  Garth laid Berk on the bed and started removing his wet pants and shirt. Linus handed Garth a clean gown... a real hospital gown with the butt vent and all. “Nolan says he sees the doctor coming up the driveway now.”

  “Good. Good. See baby, you’re going to be okay. The doctor is almost here.” Garth said with a smile he knew was shaky at best. Fuck this shit was intense.

  Berk let out another scream and then cried, “I want my mom! Where’s my mom?”

  “Baby, I would love to get your mom for you, but she and your dad went to see a movie. Remember?” Garth said in the most soothing voice.

  “Fuck that and fuck you! I want my mom!” Berk began to cry, then blubbered. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that. I didn’t mean to say fuck you. I love you Garth. I’m just hurting and scared and...” Berk was cut off by another contraction as he gripped Garth’s hand so hard, he thought he might have heard a bone snap.

  “Oh, fuck me sideways.” Garth grunted.

  Berk’s eyes went into an angry “V” and if Garth didn’t know his mate was human, he would have sworn the man was a demon. Berk snarled, “There will me no fucking! None! Nada! Zip! That’s what got us here, Garth, and if you think I’m gonna... Oh my fucking god, the jaws of life are ripping my hips apart!”

  The doctor rushed inside, black bag in hand. “Oh my, I think I got here just in time.”

  “In time! In Time! I don’t care what you have to do, doc. Use a rusty fucking saw if you have to, but get this boy the fuck out of my body before
he performs a feat only seen on Alien and rips through my abdomen!” Berk shouted.

  The doctor laughed, saying, “I loved that movie and you have to admit that was a cool part in the movie. Now if you ask me, they could have done a bit more with the special effects. Then again, they did have a budget.”

  Berk huffed and panted. “Doc, I promise you that when I have my next checkup, you and I can talk all the movies you want. For now, though, can we please focus on the matter at hand. Like, pulling a watermelon from a cherry hole... hmmm?”

  The doc nodded and went to work. “Oh yes, it’s time to push, I think. Okay, on the next contraction, I want you to push, Berk. Push as hard as you can.”

  A contraction hit Berk and he bore down hard. The grunts and sounds he made were concerning and yet a bit funny. Garth shook his head. Stop thinking stupid shit and get with the program. Your mate is giving birth to your son. Focus, Garth! Focus!

  “Yes, Garth, fucking focus, or I swear the next thing I squeeze is going to be your nuts. I’m gonna squeeze them so hard they pop like balloons. That way I won’t have to worry about babies, and you won’t have to worry about getting snipped.” Berk hissed through their bond.

  Swallowing hard, Garth murmured, “I’m sorry, baby. If I could do this for you, I would. If you like I can have the next one.”

  “You can have... wait... you could have been the one going through this and you didn’t tell me? I should kick your... son of a bitch!” Berk shouted as he pushed again.

  It didn’t take long before the sounds of their son could be heard throughout the house. Linus took him from the doctor and within minutes Garth was being handed a gorgeous baby with black hair and the blues eyes Garth had only ever seen in one man... his mate. The father of his son.

  Looking down at Berk he could see his mate smiling up at him. “Maybe I can have a peek. I mean, I only carried him for the four months it took to have him, rushed to the bathroom before I peed myself...which wasn’t always successful and ate things no man would ever think to eat.”