Don't Fall in Love in Witness Protection

Chapter 17: Max

C HA P T E R  ( 1 7 )

Charlotte was slightly buzzed. She wasn't going to lie.

Not that it took her much to get buzzed these days. She tilted her head to the side, her mind wandering off from whatever it was April was banging on about energetically in front of her. She noticed her new group of friends did this a lot, hung out together having a few drinks. They never usually went over the top but drinks usually played a big part in their weekends.

She figured smaller towns were the result of this. There wasn't much else in Winchester to do than make your own fun.

'Are you even listening to me?' April stood with her hands on her hips.

Charlotte smiled and stuck out her tongue, 'If I said no what would you do?'

'Oh I'm sorry I'm not talking about your favourite subject in the whole world.'

'If you dare say Eli, I'm going to punch you,' Charlotte giggled.

'Eli!' April squealed trying to dodge Charlotte as she leant forward, laughing too hard to actually make an impact.

'Do I even want to know?' Eli called out from the other side of the garden clearly hearing his name.

Then again Charlotte was pretty sure their neighbours two streets down would have heard his name the way April had screamed it.

Charlotte looked over at him feeling the heat rush to her cheeks, 'Uh, no!'

'Ok then,' he winked at them and turned back to Max.

'Well that was cosy,' April bumped her shoulder biting back her smile. 'I know you keep saying you're not interested and just friends and blah blah...'

'Because we are just friends,' she repeated firmly.

It was getting annoying having to defend herself to April. But she couldn't help but feel a little surge of excitement whenever April brought up the elusive Eli into their conversation. She didn't want to admit it to anyone but she loved talking about him. Dissecting him from the people who knew him longer than she did. April was a perfect source of information too, she just loved to gossip. She was just waiting for the right time to bring up Gypsy again to see if April wanted to divulge anything about her. Charlotte was positive they had some kind of relationship and she'd love to know what went on there, but at the same time didn't want to seem obvious.

She contemplated telling April about their kiss.

Their short, thrilling (for her) kiss that Eli masqueraded as an apology.

But she knew April would make a big deal about it... And it totally wasn't.

'Yeah but you want to be more than friends,' April teased. 'I don't know why because Eli is such a we-'

'Enough!' Charlotte held up her hands. 'Like you can talk you totally have a thing for Liam.'

April shrugged trying to act like she wasn't completely embarrassed. But Charlotte noticed the way she nervously glanced over her shoulder to make sure the boys weren't within hearing distance.

'Pool time!' Max yelled as he hurdled himself fully clothed across the decking and into the pool.

Charlotte laughed along with everyone else as he emerged with his clothes clinging to his body, he was even wearing a jacket which would have been ridiculously heavy in the water. She watched as Max struggled out climbing the pool ladder chuckling along with everyone else. He did a little Max-like shrug peeling off his jacket.

'So I think we should turn this little gathering into a pool gathering,' he grinned throwing his jacket on the back of a chair to dry.

Carter immediately shrugged off his shirt unbuckling his pants.