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Page 197 of The Striker (Gods of the Game 1)

“I said, open your bloody gates.” His voice deepened into an irritated grumble. “The taxi driver is getting impatient and so am I.”

I checked my home security app, which allowed me to surveil various sections of the estate from my phone. Sure enough, a black cab idled outside the gates. I could just make out my father’s scowl through the back window.

Fuck. My pulse sputtered.

My father showing up in London unannounced wasn’t on my bingo card for the night. Since he was here, I had no choice but to let him in.

I opened the gates and waited for him by the front door. Every inch of my body, from my skin to my bones, was saturated with dread.

The cab dropped him off right in front of the door and sped off.

My father walked toward me, his cane gleaming under the house lights. It’d been months since his heart attack, but according to my mother, he got winded easily, so his doctor had suggested the regular use of a walking aid.

“Dad.” I greeted him stiffly.

“Asher.” He looked a little haggard, but his stare was as piercing as ever.

We didn’t exchange another word as I led him to the living room. Tension sprouted between us like weeds through cracks in the pavement. It tangled around our ankles, making me feel like a prisoner in my own home.

This was my father’s first time visiting my house in London. He didn’t look particularly impressed even though the mansion was about fifty times bigger and more expensive than my childhood home. In fact, he looked almost annoyed by the display of wealth.

When we reached the living room, we settled on separate sofas, as far away from each other as possible.

“Where’s Mum?” I asked, breaking the silence. He wouldn’t leave Holchester without her.

“She’s at the hotel. She wanted to come, but I told her I wanted to talk to you alone first.” He sounded deceptively calm. “I didn’t want her to be here when I asked you what thebloody hell you’re doing!”

I went rigid at the sudden but not unexpected escalation in his temper. Honestly, I was surprised it’d taken him this long to march to my house and read me the riot act.

He glared at me, flaying me alive with his anger.

I glared back, my muscles taut. I’ll admit, I’d made my fair share of mistakes this year, but I wasn’t a kid anymore. I wasn’t going to let him ambush me in my own fucking house.

“I’m not in the mood, Dad,” I said, striving for calm. “If you came to yell at me for the crash or getting suspended, you’re out of luck. I already got the talk from Coach. I don’t need it from you, too.”

His face reddened further. “You think I came all this way because you gotbenched? Boy, if I wanted to yell at you about that, I could’ve called you on the phone and saved myselfthe train and hotel money. And no, I don’t give a shit that you’ve been avoiding my calls. I would’ve found a way.” His eyes flashed. “I’m here because I want you to look me in the fucking eye and tell mewhyyou’re sitting on your ass at home when you should be proving to those vultures out there”—he thrust a finger toward the entryway—“that you’re Asher fucking Donovan for a reason. Have you seen what they’re saying about you? Are you going to take it lying down?”

My jaw clenched.

The tabloids were relentless in their coverage. They were dragging Coach through the mud for suspending me, but they were howling at me too for putting myself in a position tobebenched.

It was a lose-lose situation for everyone except fucking Bocci, who’d gotten off scot-free after the “investigation” into what happened the night of the crash yielded no actionable results.

“How?” I snapped, my temper igniting. “The tabloids are uncontrollable, and Coach benched me because he thinks something isdriving my impulsiveness,whatever the hell that means. I assume he wants me to figure out why I feel compelled to race, even though I said I wouldn’t do it again. I have no desire. But how am I supposed to prove I’mnotgoing to do something?”

“By showing him why he signed you in the first place!” My father stamped his cane against the floor. “Have I taught you nothing? When life throws you obstacles, you either obliterate them or you find a way around them. You don’t bloody wait for the universe to haul them out of the way for you. You think those parasite paps sit around waiting for a photo to fall into their laps? I don’tfuckingthink so. You can’t prove you’renotgoing to do something, but you can bloody well do more than drown in self-pity!”

My hands fisted. He wasn’t wrong; Iwasdrowning in self-pity. However, I couldn’t figure out how to pull myself out of the deep end without exposing myself to worse elements—like whatever was causing me to engage in the self-destructive behavior Scarlett accused me of.

But I wasn’t going to admit any of that to my father. I was wound tight from weeks of pent-up emotion, and I was spoiling for a fight.

“You should be happy,” I said. “You don’t have to watch your son play against—instead of for—Holchester anymore. Isn’t that what you wanted?”

My father’s nostrils flared. “What Iwanted? You think Iwanta son who gets sidelined and fucking lambasted by the press because he can’t keep his emotions under control?”

“No, you want one who wins, but only if it’s for your team,” I shot back. “Tell me. Have you attended a single one of my matches since I transferred to Blackcastle? Have you ever called just totalkto me like I was your son instead of using it as an opportunity to criticize everything I did on the pitch?”

“For fuck’s sake, what do you want me to do?” he shouted. “Coddle you like you’re a fucking baby? You can’t improve if all I do is pat you on the head and saygood jobevery time you kick the bloody ball!”




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