Page 54 of Gabriel (Legacy of Heathens #4)

Raphael

H ospitals made me itch. Not physically—no, this was deeper.

It stretched all the way back to my mother’s long hospital stays, and to Sailor, during her recovery after the attack.

The antiseptic stench—too clean, too sharp—clung to my skin, crept under it.

It made me feel helpless all over again.

I still remembered how hard it had been to clean Sailor’s wounds and how impossible it had felt to make her whole again.

But now my brother needed me. And there was nothing—not even God himself—that would keep me from being here.

Because when Santos blood spilled, the world bent around us.

Watching Anya and Gabriel grow up had been the most rewarding—and most terrifying—part of my life. They were strong. Independent. Capable. And all I wanted was to lock them in my house and keep them safe from the world.

But I didn’t.

And now this happened.

“Don’t go all macho on me, Raphael,” Sailor said quietly, her fingers curling around mine. “They’re adults. Locking them away wouldn’t protect them. It’d only trap them, and they would resent us for that.”

She always sensed the storm building inside me before I even felt the lightning strike.

I exhaled, jaw clenched.

“I’m worried sick about them. Anya and Jet…” I hesitated, then shook my head. “Actually, no. I do know how I feel. I want to murder that psychopathic Volkov heir.”

“Raphael,” she said sharply, her tone cutting through me. “You can’t put the sins of the father on the children. We don’t know the full story yet. But that picture of Anya—smiling after she married him—that doesn’t lie.”

“That boy should’ve never done it like that,” I growled. “I was supposed to walk her down the aisle. He stole that from me. And now Gabriel’s in here, blind, because of him. His actions lead to fucking catastrophes.”

Sailor wore her calm like armor, but I knew the cracks. The tremor in her chin. The way she squeezed my hand just a little too tight. She was just as wrecked over this as I was.

“We can’t blame him,” she whispered.

But I did.

My daughter was out there alone with Jet, and Gabriel lay broken behind those doors with bandages over his eyes, shoulder torn up, the future I’d imagined for him possibly stolen.

Anya and Gabriel were the best of our family, and now one was missing and the other might never see again.

I was going to kill someone for that. I just hadn’t decided who.

The hallway door creaked open and Kian stepped in from one of the other rooms, flanked by Elira Volkov.

She walked in like she expected a fight. I stared her down, weighing my options. Maybe she should pay for her brother’s sins. To her credit, she didn’t flinch. She just lifted her chin and narrowed her eyes at me. Volkov blood through and through.

“Raphael,” Sailor muttered under her breath, elbow brushing mine. “Enough with the staring contest.”

She had that polite, unreadable smile on her face, but I could feel the tension in her body. Like me, she didn’t trust the girl.

Amara was with Gabriel inside the hospital room. She was another fire I hadn’t figured out how to extinguish.

She was a damn wildfire of a woman. Dangerous. Defiant. And apparently in love with Gabriel.

I couldn’t decide if I respected her or wanted her gone.

Maybe both.

Gabriel probably felt the same.

But when Amara dropped the bomb—the kind that rearranged the atmosphere—everything stopped.

She was pregnant. And Gabriel was the father.

Silence had followed her announcement. Kian looked like he’d been hit in the gut. Sailor went still and I forgot how to breathe.

A man like me shouldn’t be easy to shock. But that… that took the wind right out of me.

My brother had gotten his captor pregnant.

Jesus.

I needed to talk to Gabriel. Now.

The door to his private room creaked open and Amara stepped out.

I tried to read the girl, but her poker face was perfect. Too perfect. She walked out of the room like a queen descending from her throne. Technically, I guess she was mafia royalty, but who gave a damn?

“Gabriel’s ready for you,” she said calmly.

I exchanged a look with Sailor and we stepped inside.

The scent of antiseptic hit again, harder this time. So did the reality of it all.

My brother lay in the hospital bed, gauze over his eyes and his arm strapped in a sling. But he smiled. That same lopsided, infuriating smile he’d worn since I met him as a young boy.

“Hey, you two,” he greeted. “I’m assuming there are two of you—Raphael and Sailor?”

He chuckled at his own blind joke.

But all I felt was grief. And fury. And love.

Because nothing hurt worse than seeing someone you loved try to smile through hell.