Chocolate Muffins

10 - burgers and hotdogs

𝓞𝓵𝓲𝓿𝓮𝓽𝓽𝓮

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

"He was so excited when we told him, his face turned red!" Aria laughed as she told me about her son, Christian, who was a few months older than Archie.

"They are amazing, aren't they?" I smiled, looking over at the boys playing with the plastic truck, taking it in turns to run over a toy monkey.

"Yeah, you've done a great job raising him, Olive. You're a wonderful mother."

"Oh, I'm not, he's not my-"

"Oh I'm so sorry, I heard him say mama so I just assumed-"

"She is his mother." A deep voice rumbled before a familiar arm wrapped around my waist. Ezra's actions and words combined made my cheeks turn an embarrassing shade of pink.

"It is quite new to me, I'll admit, and I'm still learning, but it, just feels so, normal?" I answered, sounding not as confident as I planned at the end of my statement.

"You guys are a wonderful family, Archie is really lucky to have you, both of you." Aria smiled.

Just as she said that, her husband came up to us, a baby in his arms. "Can you take him for a second, amore, I left Enzo with the bbq and I think that might have been a mistake." Her husband, who I know as Leo , nervously glanced towards the bbq where Enzo was stamping on a flaming burger all over their patio.

Aria grabbed the baby from her husband's arms, gigglingas she looked as both Leo and another man pulled Enzo away from the bbq before taking over. Ezra kissed my forehead and walked over to the other men.

"Who's this little cutie?" I cooed.

"This is Luca, he's 9 months old tomorrow." Aria smiled. "I want to do a 9 months in, 9 months out picture tomorrow, I'll just have to persuade the rest of my family to pose for a picture as well." She laughed.

"He's so precious" I complimented her son, who seemed to have just woken up from a nap. "So calm with all the chaos that's going on right now." I laughed, nodding over to the bbq that now needed 5 men to control.

"Yep, this group certainly is a bit mental." She laughed, bobbing Luca in her arms as she spoke. "I think Ezra already knows most of the guys from their boring business deals, but you're totally in the dark with all these people, aren't you?" She joked lightheartedly.

I nodded. Ezra had told me on the drive over here that he and Leonardo Romano had built quite a few hotels together, but had never properly spoken to each other outside of business.

"Well, the man who managed to set a burger on fire is Enzo, He's married to the man who is currently blocking him from the bbq, that's Killian."

I nodded, laughing while looking at a big muscular man with a man bun block his husband from the bbq.

"Max is their son." Aria explained further. "He's six, so a year older than Archie and Christian but he's sweet as anything. And that other man is my brother, Theodore."

"I'm so glad that Ezra met you in that shop." I confessed. "Although he goes to school and stuff, I'm really glad Archie has found some new friends. He isn't having the best time in school right now." I confessed.

It was rough when Archie came home a week into school, upset that he didn't have any friends. He was being mocked because I wasn't his real mum and the fact that his dad was pretty famous made it harder for him. Ezra and I sorted it out luckily, but he was still feeling pretty insecure about the whole thing.

"Aw no, Chris had the same thing, everyone knew his dad and kept hassling him so we had to put a stop to that. I'm sure they'll be good friends now." Aria grinned