Read Online Player's Princess (A Royal Sports Romance) by Abigail Graham - Free Book Online

of each paragraph to myself before I move on. It takes hours, and it's well past midnight before I give up without reaching the full length of the assigned pages. I stick dog-ear the page where I left off and rest the book on my nightstand.
    I turn off the lights and I close my eyes, but it would be a gross exaggeration to call what happens next sleeping. Hours and hours I lie there in the dark, eyes pressed tightly shut, willing sleep to come. My head feels more and more like wet sand with every passing tick of the clock.
    Finally at some point I manage to drift off into a light, restless sleep only to jerk awake when my alarm clock goes off. I resist my desire to open the window and toss it out onto the back porch, and get up.
    My morning routine begins with a run. I dress in leggings and a sweatshirt—not Jason's, one that fits me. I lace up my running shoes, grab a squeeze bottle of water from the refrigerator, and start out the door.
    My two bodyguards, Thorlief and Bjorn, are right on me, scowling. They dare not reproach my royal self, but I can tell they received a tongue lashing from Mother over my latest escape. I feel a pang of guilt thinking about that, and what she'll do if she learns of Saturday night's outing.
    I put that out of my head, and I run.
    Since I was a little girl, running has been my relief. The exertion squeezes every other thought out of my head, every stride pushing me deeper into a moving meditation, my focus narrowing to my form and speed.
    "On your left," a voice yells.
    I swing to the right of the sidewalk, expecting a cyclist to pass me. Instead, Jason Powell lopes around Thorlief and holds pace with me.
    "Morning, gorgeous," he says and blows me a kiss.
    "You," Thorlief bellows, "keep your distance from the princess!"
    "What if I don't?"
    "Don't test us," Bjorn growls.
    "You'll have to catch me first," he yells before he leans into a sprint and bolts away from me so fast I'd have to struggle to keep up.
    I normally pace myself for the benefit of my guards, who must run in dress trousers and button-down shirts. They would be in full suits if I did not insist they dress down to follow me on my exercise.
    Gritting my teeth, I cant forward and run full tilt, my entire existence focused on passing Jason Powell. I stare at his back as if I could sink anchors into his bones and drag him behind me. I go all out, whipping my arms forward and back, my teeth bared, a mask of concentration.
    He wasn't challenging the guards, he was challenging me. He won't win.
    He holds his pace, and I slowly begin to overtake him, my thighs burning from running so hard. Faster, faster, faster.
    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.