Player's Princess (A Royal Sports Romance)(19)

Just as I finally begin to catch up to him, something hooks my right foot and I go flying. I see the ground rushing up to meet me and know this is going to be bad.

It was going to be bad. Jason grabs me around the waist and tumbles into the grass along the sidewalk. He slides a good six feet with me on top of him. I sit up, astonished, and two things spring to mind.

One, I'm straddling him.

Two, his hands are on my breasts.

He jerks them away as though from a hot iron, not that it matters. He got a good feel. I slap him, hard, across the face.

"Ow! Is that any way to thank me?"

"I wouldn't have fallen if not for you."

"You fell because you weren't looking where you were going."

"I fell because you distracted me."

"Because you can't keep your eyes off me. Make love to me."

"You," Thorlief bellows, "unhand the princess!"

Jason puts his hands up—or rather down, resting the backs of his palms on the grass as he lies spread-eagled under me.

"Don't tase me!"

"Leave him alone," I snap at Thorlief. Bjorn strides up a moment later, panting.

I realize I'm still sitting on Jason. Straddling him, rather.

Also, his cock is as hard as a rock, and if it weren't for my tights getting in the way, we would be much more intimately acquainted.

"Sorry, baby. It's natural."

I push hard on his chest to steady myself as I stand up. I mean to hurt him, but all it does is make him laugh. It also grinds his cock against my body and sends a shiver of arousal up my spine.

When I'm on my feet, still standing over him, he looks up.

"You can just stand there all day, I'm fine with it."

"I told you to forget about me."

The guards exchange puzzled looks.

"Can a starving man forget the sweet succor of sustenance? Could he ever let go of the cool touch of a strawberry on his lips, the taste of cream in his mouth?" He sits up. "How could I forget you?"

I dart back, away from him, and give him a hard look.

Jason springs to his feet.

"Damn, now I'm hungry. So, how about breakfast?"

Thorlief steps between us and gives Jason a sharp shove to the chest, one handed. This one does move him. He glares at my bodyguard.

"Enough," I say, warning in my voice. "He meant no harm. This is the end of it."

"No it isn't," Jason insists.

"Yes it is," I say and start to turn away.

"I know a place that serves Spam!" he calls after me.

I ignore him.

"You're beautiful!"

I ignore him.

"I'm not going to forget about you, Princess."

"You should," I say, bitterly and too softly for him to hear me.





Chapter Four





Jason



Watching Anastasia walk away in those tights doesn't do anything to quell the raging erection I'm now sporting. Sweatpants were a good idea today. If I was wearing jeans I'd probably pass out from the loss of circulation in my head.

For a second there I experienced pure bliss. She had her arms and legs wrapped tightly around me, her perfect, soft breasts resting on my chest, those big eyes of hers wide with shock, and then with something more. She gave me a little grind on my dick there before she got up, I could feel it.

God, she's beautiful. No, ethereal. She's a walking storm cloud, a vision, a living mirage. I grin stupidly as I strut down the sidewalk until she's out of sight, and my shoulders slump.

Damn it, Jason.

I need to get my head in the proverbial game. Also, the actual game. There will be another game next Saturday, and I don't have time to think about princesses while I'm studying and training.

I still think about the princess for the rest of my trip up to the fourth floor of the building on the old campus that houses the history department. My academic advisor sent me an email last night, asking me to meet with her this morning on my way to class. I'm pretty sure I know what this is about.

Her office is on the very top floor. It smells like ammonia and cigarettes, though no one has smoked up here for about thirty-five years. Dr. Grandolf's office is at the far end of the hall, tucked in the corner.

When you picture Dr. Grandolf, professor of history and instructor of American Studies, you probably won't envisage the person I'm about to meet. That name conjures up a gray-bearded man with small glasses and a big pipe and tweed jacket, probably sitting in an overstuffed chair with volume seven of The Annals of America resting on his lap.

Dr. Grandolf is thirty-seven years old, though she looks like she's in her midtwenties from her exhausting workout regimen and vegan diet. She favors black blazers, and skirts and blouses that are either tight enough or open enough to show off what God gave her, which is a lot.

When I knock on her open door and step inside, she's sitting on the corner of her expansive desk, legs crossed, tight pencil skirt hiked up high over her knees. With her glossy, raven hair, pale skin, blue eyes, and horn-rimmed glasses, she looks like the runner-up in the Most Fuckable Librarian Pageant.

She smiles warmly at me and gestures for me to sit down in one of the guest chairs as she takes a seat behind her desk and hikes herself up to her computer.