Husband With Benefits
Chapter 317: Anger, Worry and Guilt

Chapter 317: Anger, Worry and Guilt

"What the hell, man? We are your brothers!" Seb groaned as he barely avoided being punched in the face."

In answer, Gabe tried to punch him again but thankfully, his feet were definitely faster and he missed again.

"Ha! You need to be faster that that to get me, Gabe," Seb taunted only to miss the man’s attack as Gabe kicked him in the ankle, making him fall with an ’oof’.

"And you need to stop talking Seb!" Gabe growled before turning his attention to Lucien who was standing in the corner, panting with gloves on, still trying to recover from the previous round with Gabe.

"You bast*rd! That hurt! Are you trying to make me disabled."

"I’d have hit you a bit higher, if I wanted to do that! You expect me to play nice to you after you’ve drugged me and brought me here as a prisoner?"

"We had to make sure you didn’t do anything stupid out there. You’re ours, you know." Lucien spoke calmly.

"I’m not a child!" Gabe retorted, frustration evident in his voice. "I can take care of myself. I don’t need you all babysitting me."

"Ha! Yet here you are, unable to land a single punch!"

Angered, Gabe turned to Seb with a growl, renewing his efforts to beat the shi* out of Seb.

Seb continued to weave and dodge agilely, taunting continuously, "You’ve got to be faster than that, Gabe! You’re getting old. Your hand eye coordination is slower than eighty year old man!"

Gabe’s eyes narrowed as he lunged forward again, determined, "Just wait."

As the sparring continued, Gabe’s movements became more calculated, and Seb found himself having to put in more effort to evade the attacks. The atmosphere in the room shifted from frustration to a competitive energy, with both giving it their all and Seb playing on the offensive letting Gabe get a taste of some punches as well.

It was a long time later that Gabe and Seb both collapsed in the boxing ring, panting to catch their breath while their faces seemed to be blue and black with bruises.

Lucien winced and for the first time thanked the fate that he was the youngest and Gabe had instinctively gone easy on him. Seb and Gabe’s face looked like a vivid abstract painting.

His heart ached when Gabe grabbed Seb and hugged him before kneeling on the ground broken. The first order of priority for dealing with the grief had been to let Gabe dispel his anger.

Gabe’s love had finally come to an end. After years of loving a woman, he’d finally accepted that she was dead to him. And the man had been about to bottle all that pain inside him. Even though at this moment, their priority should have been finding Arabelle and stopping any plan she might come up with, it had been equally important that they not let Gabe fortify his walls.

The next stage would be to help him finally bury her remains. Literally and figuratively. Only then would they be able to see their brother recover.

All of them had always wished that Gabe would let go of the toxicity that was Arabelle but none of them had wanted this kind of an end. Not at the price of Gabe himself.

Lucien looked at Seb who looked back at him and the two brothers silently threw their arms around Gabe, taking him in a protective and comforting hug. They felt Gabe tremble before he took a deep breath, trying to compose himself.

Finally,Gabe, without a word, stood up, wiping the sweat from his brow and avoiding their eyes and walked out of the room, leaving behind a murmured," Thank you."

Soon, the loud crash of a door banging closed had them running outside, worried that Gabe had left the house, only to be relieved that he had walked into his own room.

Lucien looked at the closed door and then at Seb," Do you think he will be alright?"

"He’ll have to be Lucy. But its going to be a long time. And he may never be the same."

"Well, haven’t we always bee changing. We’ll help him come out of the darkness."

Inside Gabe’s room, the air hung heavy with the remnants of both physical and emotional exhaustion. He stood in the middle of the dimly lit space, his hands trembling slightly as he tried to process the storm of emotions raging within him.

His grief, anger and worry pulled him in different directions, tearing him apart from within. The woman who he had always dreamt of cherishing and protecting, he was now orchestrating the opposite. He looked at himself in the mirror and gave a miserable smile. His outer self seemed to reflect the inner self with bruises all over.

Gabe took a deep breath, attempting to steady his trembling hands and collect the shattered pieces of his composure. The memories of Arabelle that he had started to cherish, once warm and comforting, now felt like shards of glass under his skin. Gabe knew he had to face the reality, daunting as it may be.

He’d already taken the first step towards the darkness now. Letting go and acknowledging his own mistakes. He knew that all he had to do was take a step forward and his brothers would be there waiting for him with their arms spread. But how could he face them if he caused them to be hurt?

If Arabella had really been acting all along or had managed to fool him for so long and returned to her old self then it means she was upto something much more sinister than he could imagine. And he would not let his love become a pain to his brothers.

Nodding to himself, he walked out of the room with a determined expression. Without looking at Seb or Lucien, who were both staring at him, he grabbed the ice pack and put it to his face. " I need to find her before anyone else. You guys can either come with me or I can run away on my own. Either way, I am not staying under house arrest and doing nothing when there is a threat roaming outside because of me."

The source of this c𝓸ntent is fr𝒆e(w)𝒆bnovel