You Are Mine To Desecrate

Chapter 4 - Father's call

Ava's POV

I barely had the energy to lift my fork, let alone eat. My plate sat in front of me, cold and untouched, the grilled chicken I had ordered turning into nothing more than a sad, lifeless hunk of meat. The clock on the wall ticked slowly, as if mocking me for the weight of what was happening at Morales Tech. The numbers kept rolling in, each more disastrous than the last. Investors were pulling back, and our competitors were moving in with more aggressive tactics. I couldn’t pinpoint exactly where things had gone wrong. All I knew was that I was on the edge of a precipice, and if I didn’t figure this out soon, everything my mother had built would fall apart on my watch.

I pushed the chicken around the plate, trying to distract myself from the gnawing frustration in my chest. The report on my laptop screen didn’t make any more sense the third time I read it. The errors were piling up like some cruel joke, and every angle I turned it, the same conclusion slapped me in the face: we were failing.

I ran my fingers through my hair, digging my nails into my scalp, hoping the pain would distract me. But then—bzzz—my phone vibrated on the table. I froze. The name on the screen was unmistakable. My father. His call was the last thing I needed right now. I debated ignoring it. Just for a moment. But I couldn’t. I wasn’t a coward. Not when it came to him.

"Hello, Dad."

"Ava," my father’s voice rumbled through the phone, smooth and steady as always, but underneath it, there was something I couldn’t quite place—an edge. Something unspoken. "I need you to come home on Saturday. For dinner."

I blinked. Home. The word felt foreign, like a place I had visited once but hadn’t truly belonged to in years.

"Dad," I started, my voice a little more brittle than I wanted it to be. "I’m in the middle of a—"

"I know. The company is a mess," he interrupted, his tone hardening just slightly. "But this is important. There’s something we need to discuss."

Something we need to discuss. That phrase had a weight to it, one that I didn’t particularly like.

"Something about the company?" I asked, trying to keep the unease out of my voice.

"Something that affects more than just the company," he replied cryptically. "Be there by seven. Don’t make excuses. We’ll talk then."

I opened my mouth to argue, but the line went dead before I could get a word out. I stared at the phone, the buzzing still reverberating in my hand. It had been a long time since my father had asked me to come home for anything. We rarely spoke outside of business. And the way he’d said it... that tone, that unspoken implication, sent a shiver down my spine. What could he possibly want to discuss that was bigger than the company’s collapse? I let out a long breath and dropped my phone onto the table. My dinner still sat untouched. I stood up and walked to the window, staring out at the city below. It felt like everything I had built, everything my mother had built, was crumbling. I didn’t want to go back to my childhood home. It held too many memories, most of them suffocating. But the unease in my chest told me that whatever was coming, I couldn’t avoid it. Not this time.

The next few days dragged on like a slow, agonizing march to some unknown fate. Every time I sat down to work on the company, my mind kept drifting back to my father’s cryptic words. I didn’t know if I was ready for whatever conversation we were supposed to have on Saturday. Honestly, I wasn’t sure I’d ever be ready. But I had to face it.

Saturday came faster than I would’ve liked. By the time I walked into my childhood home, I felt like I was walking into a tomb. The walls, the furniture, everything about this place screamed nostalgia and loss. It wasn’t that I hated it here—it was just... heavy. Every inch of this house held the weight of my father’s expectations, and it felt like I was always failing to meet them.

I haven’t stepped foot in this house in almost three months, yet the moment I crossed the threshold, the scent of old wood, lemon polish, and something faintly floral hit me like a wave. God, it hadn’t changed. Not the entryway rug I tripped on a dozen times as a kid, or the creak in the floorboard right beneath the stairs that always gave away late-night kitchen raids. Everything was preserved in this eerie, time-locked state—as though the house refused to acknowledge that I’d grown up, left, and come back different.

The chandelier still hung crooked over the foyer, one crystal always missing because Caleb knocked it off playing soccer indoors. He blamed me, of course, and Dad believed him—like always. I remember standing right there in front of that staircase, nine years old, swearing up and down that it wasn’t me. My voice cracking. My heart breaking a little. And my father? He barely looked at me. Just handed Caleb a mild warning and told me to clean up the shards. That was the first time I truly understood what it meant to be the outsider in your own home.

To the left was the sitting room where we used to gather for birthdays and holidays—the ‘formal’ room no one really used except when guests were over. The grand piano stood in the corner, dusty now. It was my mother’s once. That's what my father told me. After she died, nobody touched it. I did, once. Just once. I was eleven. Played the only song I knew—badly. My fingers trembling. I thought maybe it would bring her back, in some small, ridiculous way. All it brought was Felicia, marching in with a scowl and telling me to “quit banging on things that didn’t belong to me.”

The kitchen smelled like cinnamon rolls. Probably the maids baking again, trying to make the place feel warm. But warmth here was always artificial, piped in through scented candles and too-bright smiles.

And then there was the dining room. The room that looked more like a courtroom to me. Stiff chairs. A table longer than necessary. That godawful grandfather clock ticking in the corner like a countdown to judgment. Dad was already sitted, looming at the head, his napkin folded with military precision. Back then, I always tried to eat without being reminded how small I felt here. How invisible.

Even now, as I stood in the hallway, the ghosts of those dinners lingered. Felicia’s false laughter. Caleb’s smug jokes. Me, swallowing words that burned the back of my throat.

Home. What a beautiful lie that word was.

I walked into the dining room, my landed on father's face. He looked the same as he always did—sharp, calculating, always in control. His silver hair and dark eyes gave him an air of power that made it impossible for anyone to challenge him. I always had this image of him as a force of nature, someone who could never be toppled. But I had come to realize that the higher you climbed, the further you could fall.

"Sit down," he said without looking up, his voice smooth but edged with authority.

I did as instructed, sliding into the chair opposite him. The tension between us was thick enough to suffocate someone. I couldn’t tell if he was angry, concerned, or if he was just as unsure about what was happening with the company as I was. Either way, I didn’t like the silence that filled the space between us.

"How’s the company?" he asked, his eyes finally meeting mine.

I could feel the weight of his gaze, like he was assessing every move I made. "You know how it is," I said, my voice tight. "Struggling. We’ve got investors pulling out, competition taking advantage of our weaknesses. It’s a mess."

"More than that, Ava," he said, his voice hardening. "I’ve been hearing rumors. About the way you’re running things. People are talking."

I clenched my fists under the table, trying to keep my composure. "What are you implying?"

He leaned forward, eyes narrowed. "You’re losing control. You’re too emotional about this. You’ve always been too emotional."

I blinked, my chest tightening. "Emotional? Are you serious? What am I supposed to do? Sit back and let the company fall apart while I twiddle my thumbs?"

"Ava," he said sharply. "I’m not here to blame you. But you need help. The company needs someone who can make the hard decisions. And you’re not there yet."

I felt my blood pressure rise, my hands trembling. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?" I snapped, my voice rising in frustration.

"It means," he said coldly, "that it’s time for you to hand over the reins."

I froze. My heart stopped. "What? No. You can’t be serious.That's the only asset that belonged to mother,they only thing that is mine."

He didn’t flinch. He ignored my last sentence. "You’ve done what you could, but this isn’t your fight anymore. I’ve made arrangements. Caleb will be taking over."

I couldn’t breathe. I felt like the floor had been pulled out from under me. Caleb. My brother. The golden child. The one who never had to work a day in his life but was always the one people thought was more capable, more suited for the job. I had worked my ass off to prove myself. I wasn’t just some daughter of a businessman. I was the one who had bled for this company.

"I won’t give it to him," I said, my voice trembling despite my best efforts. "You can’t just take it away from me."

"Everything has a price, Ava," he said coldly, leaning back in his chair. "And you’re out of time."

I'm out of time? Morales Tech was just a year old in my care and it was doing just fine until three months ago. What does he mean by I've run out of time?