Aloha - Laurie Roma Page 0,2

her car when he’d gone out to his truck, he turned to glance back toward the street. Scanning the area, he could barely see her prized red Audi R8 Coupe since she had parked a good distance from her brother’s house.

Headlights lit up the area as a truck turned onto the quiet street. Kade’s attention turned back to Elle when she yanked on his hand. Considering he was almost twice her size, he wasn’t budging unless he wanted to, and he wasn’t inclined to go anywhere until she told him what she was up to.

“Who are you trying to hide from?” he asked, not bothering to hide his exasperation.

“What? I’m not hiding.” She laughed nervously. “You’re imagining things.”

Since her claim was utterly ridiculous, he didn’t bother commenting on it. Instead, he just stared at her and waited for her to spill.

“For the love of—fine, I’ll tell you what I’m doing if you just move! Why do you have to be as big as a damn house?” she hissed as she pulled him with her. “Crap! I forgot the bag!”

Tugging his hand free from her grasp, he went to retrieve the bag for her. He let out a grunt of surprise when he lifted the heavy duffle and slung the strap over his shoulder. No wonder she had been dragging the thing across the grass. He carried it back to where Elle was waiting for him in the shadows by the row of tall trees near the edge of the property.

“What do you have in here? A body?”

A startled laugh escaped before she could stop it. “You think I’d bury someone in my brother’s backyard? I can’t freak Vivi out before she actually becomes my new sister-in-law,” she teased. “We need to ease her into the craziness of my family. Not throw her into the deep end.”

“The wedding is already driving both of them crazy.”

“Planning a secret wedding isn’t easy, especially in such a short amount of time.”

Some people in town had been shocked to hear that Griffin had gotten engaged to Vivienne Bisset, an artist who had come to Ever After to paint the beautiful scenery. They’d only been dating for a short amount of time, but Kade understood that there was no set agenda when it came to finding true love.

It had taken him a single heartbeat to want Elle.

A minute to admire her.

And one night to completely fall in love with her.

It had been the same for Griffin. All it had taken was one look at Vivienne for him to fall madly in love, but she had taken a little longer to admit she felt the same. Their whirlwind romance had caused quite a stir in town. Some people were still skeptical of their relationship and continued to be watchful of Vivienne. That was to be expected since most of the residents of Ever After were very protective of the Doyles.

Besides being a hometown hero, Griffin had also become a celebrity of sorts when he’d won one of the largest lottery prizes ever awarded. That kind of money was a blessing, but it also made him and his family targets. Because of that, Kade, Cooper Novak, and Nashville Kline had moved to town in order to help protect them.

However, things hadn’t exactly gone as they had planned.

They had all become reluctant millionaires when Griffin had given them a portion of his winnings. That kind of generosity was astounding, and pride had made it difficult to accept the gift. It still made Kade uncomfortable whenever he thought about his bank accounts, though part of that was entirely his own fault.

Since he read a lot, studied trends, and was interested in new technology, his friends had dared him to invest some of their savings. Even though he was far from the financial expert everyone thought he was, he’d still made everyone a lot of money through some smart investments and lucky timing. Truthfully, he would rather spend his time doing manual labor than working on a computer, but he had enough free time to do both whenever the urge struck him.

He’d prefer not doing it at the ass crack of dawn, though.

The demo they were doing today was part of Griffin and Vivienne’s secret wedding plan. They wanted to host it in the backyard of their mansion by the water, but they hadn’t wanted to deal with the fuss that came with throwing the type of elaborate wedding that was expected of wealthy couples.

Since most of the town was already