Chapter 29: Eden

Chapter 29: Eden
The smell hits me first. It floats through the hall like memory—warm, slow, earthy. Weed. Not strong, not offensive, just enough to wrap around me and tug at something old. Something I used to reach for without thinking. Now I can’t. And that’s what stings the most.

I crack the screen door open. The porch is lit by moonlight and a single dim bulb above the door. The swamp buzzes in the distance. Salvatore’s there, hunched in the old rocking chair like he’s made of smoke. He doesn’t look at me. Just drags slow from a blunt, letting the embers glow against the night. His shoulders rise and fall with the weight of something I don’t have a name for. I step outside.

“You’re gonna ruin that shirt,” I say, voice scratchy from silence.

He glances down. Ash is scattered across the fabric. “It’s yours anyway.”

I don’t smile, but I sit on the porch step. Close enough to feel the warmth of the blunt. Far enough not to touch him. The air is thick. My skin feels sticky with everything I haven’t said in three days. I keep my eyes forward.

“Do you want the baby?” I ask.

He’s quiet a second too long. “Yeah. But that doesn’t matter.”

I turn my head. “Why not?”

“Because it only matters what you want.”

I study him. His profile is sharp in the moonlight—cut jaw, dark lashes, tired eyes. He means it. I look away.

“I don’t know what I want.”

“That’s okay.”

I swallow. The words taste like regret. “I feel pathetic. I hate that I can’t smoke anymore. It sounds stupid, but it helped. It made the world quiet. Now even that’s gone. I want to enjoy this. Being pregnant. But I’m not off to a great start.”

His voice is soft. “No. You’re not.”

There’s no judgment in it. Just honesty. And that makes it hurt less.

I hug my knees to my chest, toes curling against the wood. “I want to leave,” I whisper. “Not just this house. Not just Florida. I want to leave all of it. America. I want to go somewhere without memories. Somewhere that doesn’t smell like blood and lies and old perfume. Somewhere I can breathe.”

He doesn’t even pause. “I’ll make it happen.”

I look at him then. Really look.

“Words, Salvatore.”

His lips part like he might defend himself. But he doesn’t.

“I love words,” I say, turning my face to the sky. “Writing them. Reading them. Saying them out loud. They’re just sounds, but sometimes they’re weapons. Sometimes they’re spells. I could break someone with a sentence. I know how. I’ve done it.”

He shifts. “So what, you think you’re bad?”

“This isn’t about me.” My voice hardens. “It’s about you. You say things that break me. Almost everything you say does. I want you to be aware of that power.”

He stares down at his hands, the blunt dimming between his fingers.

“Leah says I should take that power away from you. But I don’t know how. If I could’ve, I would’ve done it years ago.”

He doesn’t say sorry. And thank God. I don’t want another apology. I want something real.

“I love you,” he says.

“I know. I love you too.”

“You’ll be a great mom.”

I let out a bitter laugh. “How do you know?”

“Because you’re already trying to figure out how.”

I blink. My throat tightens. It’s the first thing anyone’s said in weeks that didn’t make me feel worse. And I hate how much I needed it. I don’t say anything else. But I stay.

And that’s the beginning of everything shifting.

I wake up before the sun. My skin is still warm from the night air. But the ache inside me is different. Not sadness. Not fear.

Anger.

The kind of anger that settles in your spine. The kind that keeps you standing even when your knees want to fold. I don’t want to cry anymore. I don’t want to shake and hide and lock myself in rooms.

I want to burn the world down.

I throw on jeans, a black tee, sneakers. I tie my hair back. I don’t eat. I don’t wait. I walk straight to the garage.

They’re all there. Gio, Elio, Salvatore. Elio’s under the hood of a car. Gio’s leaning on the doorframe. Salvatore’s wiping oil off his hands.

Elio looks up first.

“I want you to teach me,” I say.

Gio raises an eyebrow. “Teach you what?”

“To fight. To shoot. To not be fucking helpless.”

Salvatore steps forward. “Eden—”

“No.” My voice is sharp enough to cut the air. “Don’t try to talk me down. I’ve made up my mind.”

Elio straightens fully. “Good.”

That catches me off guard.

“I’ve been waiting for this,” he says. “It’s about time.”

“I want to know how to kill someone,” I say.

Salvatore freezes.

“I want to know how to aim for the skull. How to disarm someone twice my size. I want to know how to take a knife from someone’s hand and drive it back into their gut.”

No one says a word.

“I want to stop being scared when a door closes behind me. I want to stop being the girl everyone protects. I want to be the one people are scared of.”

Salvatore’s face is tight. Gio exhales slowly. I don’t stop.

“I was a child,” I say. “And he ruined everything. Sergio stole my chance at happiness. He made me think I owed him love. He made me feel special just to destroy it later. And I let him.”

“No,” Salvatore growls. “You didn’t let him.”

I step closer to him. Close enough to make him flinch. Close enough to make him listen.

“If you want this baby,” I say, quiet but deadly, “you’re going to have to deal with your ego being crushed.”

His brow furrows. “What—”

“I don’t want you rescuing me every time. I’m not that girl anymore. I can’t afford to be. I’m going to be a mom now. That means I need to be able to fight for myself. For my child. You want to be a father? Then you need to start by letting the mother of your kid stand up without you carrying her every time she falls.”

He stares at me like I just hit him. I don’t care.

“This baby is going to grow up in a world where people like Sergio and Angelo exist. And I’ll be damned if I let them grow up thinking someone else has to save them.”

I feel my voice shake, but I hold my ground. “I’m going to learn. I’m going to get strong. And next time—if there is a next time—I’m walking out of the fire myself.”

There’s silence. Even Gio and Elio don’t move.

Then Gio lets out a slow, impressed whistle. “Damn.”

Elio just nods, calm. “We start today.”

Salvatore doesn’t say anything.

But his eyes never leave mine.

And I know—he heard me.