Player's Princess (A Royal Sports Romance)(31)

Chapter Seven





Anastasia

On my way out of my last class of the day, my phone buzzes.

Jason: Ana. Call me.

Anastasia: No.

Jason: Please.

Anastasia: No.

Jason: Please!

Anastasia: No.

Jason: Pretty please with fish on top?

I snort. It takes effort to type no.

Jason: If you love me you'll come study with me.

Anastasia: I don't love you.

Jason: You lie.

Anastasia: I barely know you.

Jason: I'm a knight. You're a princess. We fell in love at first sight. It happens.

Anastasia: There is no such thing. It is childish.

Jason: I think it's the most mature thing in the world.

Anastasia: I can't be with you.

Jason: Can't be or don't want to?

I chew my lip and look at the phone.

Anastasia: Can't be. Let it be.

I start to put the phone away and it buzzes in my hand. Squeezing it, I shove it into my pocket and make it three steps before I pull it out again.

Jason: I'm going to save you.

The words sit there on the screen, burning at me. Cocking my head to the side, I drift to the wall and lean against it, trying to understand what he means. Save me?

"Princess?" Thorlief says. "Is someone bothering you?"

"No," I yelp.

I shove the phone in my pocket and head for the stairwell. Descending slowly, I mull over my options for the evening. Eat and study; study, eat, then study; study, then eat. Perhaps watch a movie.

I want to jog back to the house, but I end up walking. Slowly. I take a circuitous route that sends me walking down Main Street.

The broad avenue is lined by shops, cafés, bars, and restaurants. The Deerhead is at the far end, the public library and the McDonalds at the other. I walk that way, planning to cut across the street and walk the back way to my house.

I pass the Days of Knights, the game store. Stopping at the big picture window, I look down at the miniature figures on display, tiny knights and monsters arrayed for fantasy battles. Beyond them I see a young man, tall and skinny, with a petite girl in an oversized sweater, talking animatedly to each other about a book entitled The Temple of Elemental Evil.

Across the street at the cafe, the cast-iron tables are all peopled by small groups and couples. One such are sharing a single tall coffee, passing it from one to the other and sipping as they talk. Their fingers touch when one takes the cup from the other, and they smile and touch their feet under the table.

I hurry along before anyone notices I was staring, choking the strap of my messenger bag. All around me, pairs of students walk up and down the street, holding hands or embracing each other.

A young man and woman ride up the street on a tandem bicycle, one riding behind the other.

Oh please, is that really necessary?

More couples swarm around me and my temples begin to throb as I wait for the walk signal to cross the street. Thorlief and Bjorn walk tightly behind me as I cross, eyeing the drivers as if they expect one of them to try to run me down.

I happen to glance into the car closest to the far side of the street as I pass. The couple inside are kissing while they wait for the light to change.

My pace picks up. I turn up the street to my house, and there I find a red ribbon on the ground. I stop with it between my feet and blink. At first I thought someone dropped it or discarded it, but it's taped down, and it's running up the sidewalk.

I follow it. I'm going that way anyway.

Cautiously, I follow the red path down the sidewalk, stopping again when it takes a sharp right turn. It is taped flush to the steps leading up to my front door. It leads up the door to an enormous pink cardboard heart.

"Princess, wait here," Thorlief says, nodding to Bjorn.

Thorlief goes first, carefully walking up to the door. He sniffs the heart, literally sniffs it, before lifting it from the door, pulling it free from the tape.

Crouching, he removes the lid.

He looks at me, at the box, then at me, and then closes the lid.

Do I see a hint of a smile on his lips?

"What is it?"

"Candy."

"What?"

"Chocolates."

"It's candy."

"Yes," he says.

"Give it here."

I walk up and hold out my hand.

"Princess, we don't know where—"

I yank it from his hands and snatch off the lid. There, I find a note resting on top of the candy pieces.

"'Sweets for my sweet,'" I read. "'from Jason.'"

I glare at Thorlief.

"It could be poison."

I pluck out a cherry cordial and hand it to him. He sighs and pops it in his mouth, chews it, and swallows it.

Nothing happens. I yank the ribbon off the box and take it in the house with me, then up to my study.

When I set it on my desk, I notice something… odd. There appears to be a picture under the candy.

My eyebrow twitches. I lift up a chocolate truffle and find an eye. My eye. I eat the truffle, then start picking the rest of the candies out of the box, lining them up neatly in the lid.

Most of them. I'm hungry.

When I'm done I find a set of pictures printed on the bottom of the box. One of Jason and one of myself. The legend reads, in swooping lettering, You're Already In My Heart.