Page 75 of Blade
“Don’t you dare!” If her father thought he was going to hurt Robert in any way, he had another thing coming. She took a brazen step forward, anger seething from every pore in her body, and pointed her finger at him. “If you try to ruin his career, I swear to God, I will bring you down.”
A look of shock replaced the heat that fueled her father. “Bring me down? Why are you always so hostile toward me? What the hell did I ever do to you?”
She grunted a few sarcastic laughs that made her shoulders jerk. Could he genuinely be oblivious to everything she’s been through? “Are you serious? How about never once giving me half the acknowledgement you give your players? Martinez scores a touchdown, and you practically give him a ticker-tape parade.” She threw her arm in the air for added drama, accompanied by her escalating voice. “I get voted one of the top 30 physical therapists under 30, and you don’t even congratulate me!”
“Of course, I did!”
“You said, ‘that’s nice.’ THAT’S NICE, IS NOT CONGRATULATIONS!” Fury made her scream like a child, but she couldn’t help it. Somehow, discussions always turned into a fight and reduced her to a petulant 13-year-old. Unable to suppress the pent-up frustration and animosity any longer, she let go. “You’ve never been proud of me! Why couldn’t you ever acknowledge any of the accomplishments I’ve made in my career?”
“I have! And I am proud of you!”
Shock made her take a step back, and she took a moment to blink at him. “Really? Because I don’t ever remember you saying those words or feeling like you were proud of me. You blacklisted me from your team. You told orthopedic surgeons not to refer your players to me for physical therapy. Did you think I wasn’t going to find out? Doctors are onmyteam. They’re not in your back pocket. Do you know how that made me feel? Like I wasn’t good enough! My own father thought I wasn’t good enough to send his precious players to me for physical therapy, but medical professionals gave me awards and accreditations!”
“That’s not the case at all!” her father yelled back. “I wanted you to do it on your own. I didn’t want anyone to say that you made it because of me.”
“I made itin spite of you!”
Her father took a deep breath, nostrils flaring, and stood taller. “Yes. You did. And no one can say otherwise. You should thank me for that.”
“Thank you?” she shouted, while her palms landed on her head from disbelief. “Oh my God. I can’t believe you. Should I thank you for what you did to Danny Lang too?”
His eyes narrowed. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
She glared back at him just as fiercely. “You know exactly what that means.”
“Wait a minute, both of you,” Amber’s mother stepped between them. “Let’s all calm down before we bring up teenage broken hearts. This conversation has turned really ugly.”
Amber folded her arms, never averting her fiery eyes from her father’s. “Well, it’s about to get uglier.”
“You were underage,” her father said, calmly. “Not even 17. You were fooling around with one of my best players. Do you know what that could’ve done to the team?”
Her head was going to explode, and she couldn’t stop from yelling. “Who cares what it would have done to the team?” She took a deep breath to calm down because she seriously wanted to punch this man. “Do you know what it did tome? We weren’t just fooling around. I was in love with him! And you broke my heart!”
“Was he in love with you?” her father taunted. “Because I don’t think he was. He was stringing you along.”
His words were a twisted knife to her heart, and her eyes filled with angry tears. “You’re a horrible person, and I hate you!”
He looked horrified and flinched, but it was her mother who reacted.
“Amber! Don’t you dare talk to your father like that. Apologize to him. Right now.”
“No,” she said, adamantly, standing tall with calm defiance.
“Do you really hate me?” he asked, sounding wounded.
The pain in her father’s voice was palpable. Amber got one second of satisfaction before guilt set in. But she still held her ground and spoke through gritted teeth. “I hate what you did to Danny. He didn’t deserve that, and I can’t believe you could stoop so fucking low.”
“He was 25,” her father replied, jaws also clenched tightly. “He’s lucky I didn’t report him to the authorities for having an affair with a teenage girl.”
“Even if that girl was your daughter?”
“Especiallysince that girl was my daughter!” he shouted.
“It still gave you no right to say the things you said to me.”
“What things?”
She remembered the harsh remarks he’d made when he found out she and Danny were seeing one another, and the words still stung, but he obviously didn’t remember any of it. It hurt twice as much now, and she wanted to make sure he knew it. “You practically called me a whore. He was my first. Do you know how that made me feel?” She leaned forward at the waist for emphasis and shouted the answer to her question. “Like a whore!”
