Ruthless Obsession

Chapter 4— Into the Past

Chapter 4— Into the Past

The smell of gunpowder was the first thing I remembered about my childhood. Not the sweetness of birthday cakes or the fresh, clean scent of rain-soaked grass. No, it was always gunpowder—strong, acrid, and suffocating. That smell clung to the corners of my childhood home like a second skin, a constant reminder of the life we lived. Or maybe it was the life my father forced us to live.

There were no friendly tea parties with the neighbors. Or neighborhood barbecue hangouts. There were no sleepovers with non-existent female friends. I never got the opportunity to walk into any school building. I was always in a corner of our dreadful garden and terrified governesses attended to my education.

I was three when I held my first gun and five when I could uncouple and couple back any gun given to me. My father always stood by the door watching with his dead eyes. Neither showing pleasure or displeasure.

Victor Delacroix was a man who commanded attention without uttering a single word. He didn’t have to raise his voice to strike fear into me. His presence alone was enough. He moved through our cold and sterile home like a general surveying a battlefield. No clutter. No warmth. Just silence with edges sharp enough to cut yourself on.

There were no family portraits on the walls, no traces of laughter in the air. Even as a little girl, I knew better than to expect tenderness from him. Instead, I clung to the rare moments when he let his guard down, just slightly. Like the evenings when he’d sit me on his lap by the fire and read from books about war and power. His deep voice would weave stories of kings, empires, and revolutions. His lessons weren’t about bravery or love—they were about control. And I realized that a little too late.

“You see, Ava,” he’d say, his finger trailing over the lines of a map, “the world isn’t a place of fairness or kindness. It’s a chessboard, and only the clever survive. If you’re not several steps ahead, someone will always take everything from you.”

I believed him. I thought he was protecting me, giving me the tools to navigate the world. But as I grew older, I began to realize that those lessons weren’t meant to empower me. They were meant to mold me into something that fit his vision—a pawn for his grand strategy.

The last time I saw my father, I was twenty-one, and the air between us felt as cold as the marble floors of his study. He was pouring himself a glass of whiskey.

Slowly. Stalling just so that my anxiety would build up and then I would stutter and he would have something else against me.

Everything Victor Delacroix did was deliberate. He didn’t make mistakes; so far as I'd seen and he didn’t leave room for them.

“You wanted to see me?” I asked, my voice calm, careful not to reveal the unease crawling beneath my skin.

He didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he took a slow sip of his drink, letting the silence stretch long enough for me to feel like I’d already lost whatever argument we hadn’t even begun. Finally, he set the glass down and met my gaze.

“You’ve become a liability, Ava,” he said, his tone so matter-of-fact it almost felt like an observation rather than an accusation.

“A liability?” I repeated, the word foreign and heavy in my mouth.

He leaned back in his chair, his eyes as cold as I’d ever seen them. “Your emotions make you weak. Weakness has no place in this family.”

My stomach twisted, but I forced myself to hold his gaze. “I’ve done everything you’ve asked of me,” I said, trying to keep the tremor out of my voice. “I’ve followed every rule, learned every lesson. How can you—”

“Enough.” His voice sliced through mine, sharp and unyielding. “You’ve made mistakes, Ava. Mistakes that I can’t afford.”

My chest tightened. “What mistakes? What are you talking about?”

He didn’t answer right away. He just stood, smoothing the wrinkles from his suit jacket as if the conversation bored him. “It doesn’t matter. What matters is that this family cannot sustain any form of weakness. I’ve made arrangements for you to leave. You’ll have what you need to survive.”

The words hit me like a blow, knocking the air from my lungs. “You’re... sending me away?”

“It’s not personal, Ava,” he said, his tone so detached it felt like a mockery. “It’s strategic. Your departure ensures the stability of everything I’ve built.”

I couldn’t stop the tears from pooling in my eyes. “I’m your daughter,” I whispered, the words trembling due to his indifference. “How can you do this to me?”

For the first time in my life, I saw something flicker in his eyes—regret, maybe, or something that looked like it. But just as quickly, it was gone, replaced by the lifelessness that I knew.

“You’re my daughter, yes,” he said softly. “But you’re also a part of a machine. And when a part no longer functions as it should, it must be replaced.”

I couldn’t breathe. My legs felt like they would give out beneath me. “You’re throwing me away! Your only child!” I choked out.

“I’m protecting what matters most,” he said, turning away as if the conversation was over.

It wasn’t until weeks later after running for my dear life and faking my death that I pieced together the truth.

Victor hadn’t just cast me out of his life—he’d sold me out. To rivals, the members of the Russian mafia so that his other enemies, people who could use me as leverage against him would now have no leverage at all and he would still benefit from my marriage to them.

I would have been the wife of one of the most vile pigs in the mafia world. Someone with too many targets on his back which automatically made me a target.

And there was the man I called father. To protect his empire, he’d painted a target on my back and handed over the arrows.

The betrayal was worse than any lesson he’d ever taught me. Because in that moment, I realized Victor Delacroix didn’t see me as his daughter. I was just another piece on the chessboard he was willing to sacrifice to keep his king standing.

That was the night Ava Delacroix died.