My Cold-Hearted Husband Wants Me Back
Chapter 164: Apology Was Not Enough

Chapter 164: Apology Was Not Enough

Eryx stood frozen outside the door. He didn’t mean to eavesdrop. He was on his way to check on them, just a few steps, a passing thought but then he heard his name.

And in the end, he ended up hearing everything.

Lucas’s voice hadn’t sounded like that in years. Maybe never. Cracked, raw, exhausted. And it tore through him like glass.

"I was tired... I was angry... I was drowning."

"I thought I could handle it all... but I couldn’t."

Each word had hit harder than the last. And for the first time, Eryx saw clearly, not the brother who always seemed in control, not the one everyone leaned on without hesitation, but someone who had been left behind.

Left behind by him.

He stepped inside slowly, his gaze fixed on Lucas. His expression was unreadable, perhaps somewhere between guilt and quiet resolve.

Regina moved quickly, her voice gentle, trying to ease the weight in the room. "Eryx, hmm... I think there’s been a misunderstanding—"

"Mom..." Eryx cut her off softly, his eyes never leaving his brother. "It’s okay. I understand."

He took a breath, heavy but honest. "I think the reason everything happened the way it did in our family... is because we stopped talking. We just assumed things, left them to rot, and let silence do the rest."

His voice wavered slightly, but he didn’t look away. "So, Allan... I’m here now. I want to hear everything you wanted to tell me. Everything you’ve been carrying all this time."

Lucas stared at Eryx, the silence between them heavy and suffocating. His jaw clenched, not in anger, but to hold back everything rising inside him. Every word, every scream, every broken part of himself he’d buried for years.

"You understand? You’re willing to listen now?" His voice was low, sharp with restrained bitterness. "Now that everything’s already collapsed?"

Eryx didn’t speak. He stood still, his expression unreadable, but his eyes didn’t look away.

Lucas laughed, quiet and bitter. "You have no idea what it was like, Eryx. You left. You walked away when I needed you the most. I begged Grandma to wait for you to come around. I tried to keep everything together, her expectations, the company and my own damn life."

He took a step forward, eyes glinting with unshed tears. "And she—" his voice cracked, "she asked me to choose. Between her... and everything else. And I was going to fix it, I swear I was. But I was too damn late."

Regina looked between them, her mouth slightly open, but she didn’t interrupt.

Lucas let out a breath that trembled. "You weren’t there when she needed us. You weren’t there when I needed my brother."

A long pause.

Then, softer, barely audible, "And now, neither of us can go back."

The silence was thick with memories and words that had come too late.

In front of him, Eryx stood still.

"I’m sorry," he said at last, voice low. Raw. "I should’ve stayed."

Lucas flinched at the sound.

"I should’ve been there when everything fell apart," Eryx went on. "But I was a coward. I left because I thought it was easier to chase something new than to fight for something that was already breaking."

Still no reply.

"I told myself you’d be fine," Eryx admitted. "That you were stronger than me. And maybe you were. But after all I am just being selfish."

Lucas turned to him slowly. His voice was quiet, but the bitterness in it ran deep.

"What is this?" He scoffed in disbelief. "Some kind of apology tour?"

Eryx didn’t flinch. He just looked at his brother.

"No. It’s me finally admitting what I should’ve said years ago."

He paused, jaw tight.

"I ran away. I let you carry everything because I was too proud, too stubborn, too scared to be caged by her the way she caged everyone else."

Lucas laughed under his breath, but it was hollow.

"You were scared?" He shook his head. "You got to chase your dream. Build your name. You got out."

His voice cracked slightly. "And I stayed. Drowned in burden and expectations and—" He cut himself off, blinking hard. "She didn’t even ask me. She just handed it all over like it was mine to bleed for."

A heavy silence settled between them.

"I’m sorry," Eryx muttered again, his voice rough with guilt.

"Stop apologizing!" Lucas snapped. "It won’t give me my damn years back!"

His chest rose and fell sharply, fury bubbling to the surface.

"You should’ve been the one to suffer back then!" he seethed. "Tell me—how would you feel if it was your wife in the place of my girlfriend? If you had to stand there, helpless, watching everything fall apart while carrying everyone else’s weight alone?"

Eryx flinched but didn’t look away.

"How would you feel," Lucas continued, voice cracking, "if the woman you loved...trusted, slipped through your fingers, and you were too buried in someone else’s expectations to even notice she was drowning?"

Eryx lowered his head. For once, he didn’t try to explain himself.

"You had the chance to choose your life," Lucas said. "I never did. She never gave me that. You walked away—and I had to stay and pay for it."

The room felt suffocating. The air between them was thick with everything they had never said.

Eryx could only blink, speechless. Of course he couldn’t imagine it, or to be exact, he didn’t even want to imagine it.

He still remembered the first time he met Lunara. And the second time they crossed paths, all he could think was: ’This woman shouldn’t enter my life.’

Or worse, ’If I let her in, how do I protect her from it?’

That’s why, when he married her two years ago, his selfish self convinced him that leaving her by herself was a protection.

But deep down, he knew.

He hadn’t protected her.

He’d only abandoned her and left her in the dark with questions and no answers.

The same way he did to Lucas, walking away when it mattered most.

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