by Seth Eden
A single consultation, depending on the size of the company, brought in five thousand dollars, and if the company decided to hire the brothers to revamp their entire company, they could bring in fifty thousand dollars for two weeks of work. In less than a year, they’d replaced what was left of the Varassos dirty money with hard-earned income that supported our new mini-community twelve times over.
Stacy’s parents lived off the property but still close enough to get to us using a golf cart. Gabriel thoughtfully had their house built into a forest surrounding the property, so they were back to the more naturalistic surroundings they appreciated as opposed to the big city life they’d settled for to be near Stacy.
“Hey! Happy Mother’s Day!” Molly greeted when she noticed me approaching the pool. She ran over and ducked her head into the stroller. “Hi, Adrian! How’s Auntie’s baby doing?”
In the center of our property, Luca had a pool, a playground, an additional garden, and a greenhouse built. Tables were scattered around, and a small, outdoor kitchen and dining area allowed us to meet as a family often for meals and playtime with the kids. Anna and Antonio were already running around at the park, and Luca was messing with the dials at the pool, no doubt getting the heat turned up. May in Maine was a bit of a crapshoot—it could be warm or cold. It was a very nice day, if not a touch too cool, so the pool was heated so that we didn’t have to tell our children they couldn’t swim.
At the end of the day, we were all eating out of the palms of their hands.
Molly walked around to kiss my cheek, and I gave her one back. “Happy Mother’s Day to you.”
“You’re the first to arrive, but I just got a text from Stacy, and they’re on their way down.”
“Okay.” I strolled Adrian over to one of the lounge couches that sat outside the pool and pulled him out of his stroller. Luca was at my side a wink later, pulling him from my arms.
“Hey, there’s my favorite nephew.” He kissed his cheek and then smiled down at me. “Happy Mother’s Day, Willow.”
“Thank you!”
Everyone else arrived slowly over the course of the next fifteen minutes. Ricky and Sasha arrived at the same time as Alessandro and Alexis, with Alexis held happily in Ricky’s arms, chattering away to him. They walked over to where we were situated, and Ricky set Alexis down to go and join her older cousins at the park.
Ricky knelt down and gave me a kiss on my cheek. “Happy Mama’s Day, Willow.”
“Thank you. Did you remember to text Mom?” She was spending her Mother’s Day in Germany.
“Yeah, sounds like she’s certainly found the german beer,” he responded with a groan. “Oh, um, did we wish everyone a Happy Mother’s Day?”
I raised my eyebrow at his weird question. “Um. Yes? I said it to Molly, Kelly, and Stacy.”
Ricky put his hand around Sasha. “Did you say it to Sasha?”
I twisted my head to the right. “Sasha’s not a mom?” I looked over at her, and she raised her eyebrow, and I jumped up. “Oh my god! Really!”
Ricky and Sasha had eloped not long after all the families had returned and they were free from child duty. Despite the fact that they were both fairly flashy people, neither of them wanted a big wedding. I was pretty pissed off when I got the call from the chapel they’d chosen in Vegas, but when I saw Ricky and Sasha both beaming from ear to ear, I was just happy for them.
Sasha nodded. “I hope you’re ready to be a godmother.”
I threw my arms around her, hooking Ricky’s into the mess. “I’m so ready!”
“Okay! Everyone, gather around so I can say a few things before we get started,” Luca shouted. Everyone gathered up apart from the kids, who we left to continue playing instead of subjecting them to an adult’s boring speech. Luca wrapped his arm around Molly, still with Adrian held in his other arm. “I just wanted to say that it’s so nice to be here with all of you. I think if we learned anything last year, it’s that the women around us are forces to be reckoned with.”
Marco held up the beer he’d already cracked open. “Here, here.”
“I also wanted to say that, as of this morning, the Varasso family is dead!” He reached over and grabbed a manilla envelope. “All of our names have officially been changed to our new last name.” He looked down and smiled at me. “Moretti.”
Alessandro squeezed me close, and it was difficult to keep my emotions down. About three months after everything had settled, my family came to me to tell me that they were all changing their last names. They wanted to leave the Varasso curse behind, and they’d chosen my last name as the one they would use. Luca said I was the savior of the family.
Everyone cheered at the news, and Luca patted Ricky on his back and offered thanks for handling the paperwork. “All right. Let’s eat!”
Alessandro kissed me on my cheek as everyone started to shuffle around and get plates of the barbecue Molly had prepared. “I guess that’s our old life behind us for good,” he said.
I smiled. “I guess so. We’re Morettis now.”
Alessandro chuckled. “That makes you the head of the family now.”
“Nope,” I responded quickly. “The Morettis have no head. We’re a family, not a crime syndicate.” I grinned at my family, joyously eating and laughing with their kids and significant others. “Never again.”
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