Player's Princess (A Royal Sports Romance)(76)

Why?

I loved him. No—love, present tense, which only makes my anguish deeper, the pain sharper. I still want him, even after this. Not only did he betray me, but it was with her. That vile woman that's tormented me since I first arrived here, and Jason slept with her.

Lies, a tiny voice whispers. No, screams. It's like a splinter in my mind.

I can't believe he would. I saw the pictures, I saw him walk out of that locker room with her, I read her words on the page. My head saw and my mind understood, but my heart does not believe. I clutch my chest as I weep, willing myself to turn to ice, to steel.

Is this what Mother felt when her lover was taken from her? No, she had to suffer her happiness being stolen from her. Mine was crushed into a ball and thrown away. I can't stand it. It feels like I swallowed frozen coal.

Why, Jason?

As the driver takes me away, I watch this little world I've lived in for years fade away from me. By the time we reach the highway, I'm in a strange land, the scenery half-remembered from my arrival.

I remember the airport vividly though. Our little caravan of cars drives to a locked gate and across the tarmac to a waiting private plane with the royal crest on its tail. Mother probably kept it fueled just in case she needed to whisk me home.

This was inevitable. It was going to happen no matter what.

I was a fool to fall in love.



Jason



I hand Dee’s phone back to her and walk past her. My legs feel like they're moving on their own, like someone has hooked me up to a puppeteer's strings. Then the severity of what I just saw lands in my stomach like a prizefighter's punch, and I f*cking bolt, slamming the door aside as I charge out onto the sidewalk.

I run so fast it feels like my leg muscles will burst. I run so fast I outrun my own breath. I run like the devil is on my heels. Usually, Ana's house is maybe a ten minute walk. I make it there in less than two, charge right up the steps, and start pounding on the door.

"Somebody's in there. Open up. Open the f*ck up, god damn it."

No answer, nothing.

"Open the door! Ana! Ana!"

The door quivers in the frame as I pound on it with both fists. Terror and fury mix in my stomach and burn, flames rising up through my throat into my head. I feel like I'm made out of rubber and the world is made out of paper. This can't be happening. I'm going to wake up soon.

I'm hurling myself at the door, hammering it with my shoulder as Akele runs up, only a minute or two behind. Aheahe is behind him, literally carrying Dee on his shoulder.

Akele walks up and swings his huge body, and the door cracks loose from the lock and hinges in a single blow of his massive arm. I run past him and dart inside.

The house has been cleaned out hastily. There's still some random knickknacks and junk on the floor. They left all the basic stuff, the kitchen stuff and the like, but everything is bare, empty, the walls clean of pictures, the carpet rolled up against the wall.

I've never even seen this part of the house, but it fills me with dread. I run upstairs, screaming, "Ana!" like she's still here, like maybe I'm not too late. I shove one door open and find a bare, empty study room, just a desk and chair sitting by themselves.

Across the hall, I find an empty bedroom. The dresser drawers are all on the floor, emptied of their contents, upturned or laying on their sides. The bed is bare.

Except for the guy sitting on it. It's one of Ana's guards, the big bearded one, the older of the two that always followed her from place to place.

He doesn't seem to see me at all as I walk inside the room. I stop when I notice something lying on the floor.

I gather the pieces of a ripped-up Burger King paper crown in my hands and let out a sound like my soul is being yanked out through my nose.

Only then does Big Guy notice me. He stands up and takes a long pull from a bottle of Wild Turkey.

"You," he growls.

Eep.

He comes at me faster than an old man should, more nimble than he has any right to be, and it's all I can do to grab his wrists and keep his ham hands from my throat. He's f*cking strong; I can barely stop him.

Akele steps into the room and pulls the old man back, hooking his arms under his shoulders to lift him bodily from the ground and away from me.

"Let go," he roars, "Look at what he did! You pig! I will kill you!"

"It's not what it looks like," I tell him. "I didn't do this, it's fake—"

"That picture is not fake!"

"Listen to me," I beg him. "I was set up. Grandolf followed me into the locker room, but nothing happened. I would never cheat on Ana. Grandolf has had it out for her since this started, and she's got a crazy thing about me.”

My phone rings.

Everyone in the room freezes.

I answer it. "Um?"

It's Coach. "Where in the f*ck are you? The game is starting in fifteen minutes—"

"I don't care," I tell him and stick it back in my pocket.

"Talk to me," I tell the old man. "I want to help somehow. Where is she now? What did they do to her?"

"They took her back."

"Can you help us follow her?"

He shakes his head. "Even if I would let you near my little princess, you handful of garbage, I cannot. I have been exiled by the queen herself."