Page 22 of Forbidden Daddy Mate

“I know of a safe house nearby,” I said. “We should be able to get there before nightfall.”

“That reminds me,” she said. “The two times they came before, it was during the day.”

“Cloudy days,” I pointed out. “Not a hint of sunlight peeking through. Today is perfectly sunny. They won’t be able to get out.”

She nodded. “Let’s get going, then.”

***

“Hey, Malcolm?” she asked.

“What is it? Am I going too fast?” I slowed down, looking over Freya. She hadn’t seemed badly injured beside the arm, but there could be something I hadn’t noticed. Or it was still really cold out. I knew she wasn’t great with cold, especially when outside of wolf form. Maybe she was getting too cold. She was so bundled up, though, that I didn’t know if another layer would do any good.

“No, no,” she said. She took a deep breath. “Why didn’t they try to compel you like they did me? The vampires, I mean. I vaguely remember them trying, but it didn’t register, really.”

“Happens with hypnosis,” I said.

“Is there a difference?”

“Slightly. Hypnosis is the vacant state. Compulsion is more about getting their victim to do something. They go hand in hand most of the time. But to answer your original question, the reason it didn’t work on me was because I trained myself against it. You had to when you work black ops and you would come across creatures that had that ability—not just vampires, either.”

“Oh.” She fell quiet, and I glanced at her again, wondering if something was wrong. She stared at the snow as she asked, “Would you teach me?”

I blinked. “You want me to teach you how to fight it off?”

She nodded. I couldn’t tell if the color in her cheeks was from the cold or embarrassment. “I was completely helpless against it,” she said. “I hated it. If I’d known how to fight it off—”

I stopped, reaching out to take her arm so she would look at me. “You had no way of knowing what would happen,” I said. “There was no need for you to need to know how to fight off compulsion. You can’t blame yourself. If anything, I should have recognized the signs earlier. And besides, we’re both okay. No one was hurt except for some vampires.”

“You nearly died because I couldn’t do anything,” she said, her voice tinged with barely contained emotion. “On top of that, I don’t want to be someone’s puppet. I never want to feel that pathetic or helpless again. And if they find us again, we might not get as lucky.”

I pulled her into a hug. She tensed, then relaxed, leaning her head against me.

“It’s all right,” I said. “We’re fine. They’re not going to find us.”

“Will you train me, anyway?” she asked as we broke apart.

I nodded. “I’ll do my best. The only thing I can do is teach you the techniques. It won’t be as effective as it would be if you were experiencing it firsthand again.”

She shuddered. “No thanks. But you managed it.”

We started walking again, the sound of our boots in the snow lurking beneath my words as I said, “I trained on the real thing. Some creatures who have compulsion are on good terms with shifters and the council. They came up with an agreement where we could practice against them.”

“Ah.” She paused. “You really think they won’t find us?”

“I sincerely hope so,” I said. “I’ve learned over the years not to deal in absolutes or ever be certain of anything, but the odds are low.”

She nodded, her jaw clenched and her shoulders tense. Though if that was from the cold or anxiety, I couldn’t tell. I walked over to her, wrapping my arm around her, and she leaned in. I tried not to inhale her scent.

“Come on,” I said. “We’re almost there.”

Chapter 10 - Freya

The safe house turned out to be a small, snow-blanketed cabin. It sat nestled in a cluster of trees and would have been fully obscured in summer. Even now, the skeletal trunks concealed a great deal of it.

Malcolm opened the door and ushered me inside. I glanced around, my stomach clenching.

From the outside, the cabin had seemed small. Inside, it was positively cramped. The spare kitchen contained a stove and small section of counter space. It encroached on the tiny living room with a single couch facing the fireplace. There were two doors: one to a tiny-looking bedroom and the other to a bathroom.

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