Chapter 33
Erin makes a sound that's somewhere between a grunt and a gasp.
"I'm sorry," Mia breathes, her fist tight in Erin's hair just above the nape of her neck, squeezing hard as she tries to hold back an orgasm that's already right there.
They're in the shower, Mia wrapped around the doctor's waist, back pressed against the tile, the water streaming between them and Erin's fingers inside her. Gray eyes locked on the singer's, she moves at a relentless pace, swallowing Mia's sighs—and a little water—as she gasps against her mouth.
"I'm going to come, Erin." Her voice comes out strangled, closer to a plea than an announcement, because she doesn't want to let go this fast, but every time Erin fucks her like this, she gets so worked up she can't hold on.
"You know how much I love hearing you, honey," Erin hisses.
The doctor's voice has just as much effect as the position, and the moment Mia hears it, a violent tremor rolls through her belly and she can't hold back the full force of her orgasm, her moans swallowed up by the sound of the water pouring over them both.
"I'm so glad you said yes—I don't know if I've told you that yet," she whispers against Erin's neck, still holding on to her while she comes down from the wave of pleasure that just swept through her.
Erin smiles and kisses her shoulder.
After the gym, she'd come back to the room and spent the day with the singer without doing much of anything besides lying in bed, and when Mia started feeling better, they decided to go down to the restaurant for dinner.
"There are going to be people around us," the singer warned when Erin suggested it.
"I know."
"And you don't mind?" Mia wanted to be sure.
"If you're okay with it, so am I."
The crooked smile crossed Mia's face and her blue eyes lit up brighter than a calm sea.
"I couldn't give less of a damn what people say," she shot back, and Erin rolled her eyes.
"I've decided to accept your offer, if it still stands." Erin said it just like that, right after their first course arrived.
Mia raised her eyebrows, pushed a couple of stray strands off her face, and set her fork aside, keeping the knife in her hand.
"To keep working as my doctor?"
"Your doctor and everyone else's," Erin clarified.
Mia was elated inside, but she held it together because they were in public and she didn't want anyone photographing her jumping on the doctor.
"I figured it would take you longer to decide." Her gaze narrowed. "Are you sure, Erin? I don't want you to regret it later, or do it for us."
"I'm not doing it for us, Mia. I'm doing it for me." Erin didn't stop eating, calm in a way that had the singer genuinely surprised.
When she got back from the gym she'd seemed unsettled. She took a shower, and when she came out she had the same distant look on her face, and Mia had spent the whole time anxious, convinced she'd made a decision that was going to push them apart, or that she'd felt pressured into something.
"What's going on?" the singer asked when Erin sat down on the bed.
The doctor looked at her with those concrete-gray eyes and, without a word, picked up her phone, unlocked the screen, and held it out so Mia could read the message from her sister.
"Damn," Mia muttered, disbelieving and furious.
She locked the screen and tossed the phone aside, taking Erin's hand.
"I'm not going to tell you to ignore what she said or to forget it, because that's pointless—so I'll just say your sister is a complete bitch," she added, not holding back.
Erin glanced at her sideways, bit her lip, and then burst out laughing.
"Yeah, you might be right."
She let herself fall back and lay down beside her, and they didn't talk about it again, because there wasn't much to say about the reaction of someone that immature.
"Explain," Mia said, picking up her fork again.
"I need this change. My whole life has always been so structured that the idea of going back to the same thing suffocates me.
I think deep down I already knew it when Violette offered me the chance to come with you on tour—that's why I said yes.
I was burning out, Mia. I was in survival mode with nothing to look forward to.
" Erin paused to take a sip of water. "I can't go back to that, and I don't want to.
I love my work and I don't want to change it, but I don't need to be in a hospital to feel good about doing it. "
Mia listened carefully, because this was the second time Erin had opened up to her like this, and she felt like they were moving in the right direction.
"As for us—the fact that I'm your doctor can't mix with what we have or what we're trying to have. We'll keep separate rooms at hotels…"
"That's a waste of money, but fine," Mia said.
"I agree." Erin's soft smile undid the singer.
"But that's how it has to be. As for us"—the doctor gestured between them—"I don't want things getting blurred.
If I tell you something for your health, you do it, end of story.
You don't push back just because there's something between us and you feel like you can. "
Mia's smile curved and Erin's stomach dropped.
"Okay, what else?"
"I'll need days off. At least two a week when you're not on tour, and a couple weeks of vacation we can work around your schedule. On tour, it'll be like it is now—I stay with you the whole time."
"Damn, Dooley, you're a hell of a negotiator," the singer teased.
"I'm not done. I want full decision-making authority. I shouldn't have to negotiate with Jude every time I decide something needs to be canceled because you need rest."
"That's going to be trickier." Mia bit her lip.
"If I tell him you have authority over him, he's going to push back and he won't accept that condition.
It won't affect the job offer—if I say I want you, that's final—but Jude loves having everyone do what he says, not the other way around.
I'm only telling you because it'll probably be a tense negotiation. "
"I'm not worried about whatever conditions Jude wants to impose on me or anything he objects to. What actually worries me is the way he handles everything connected to your fainting. He doesn't prioritize your health, Mia, and that has to come before any paycheck."
Erin hadn't planned on bringing it up right then, but she didn't want to let the opening pass either.
"Noah told me you've had offers from other agents," she continued.
"There've been some, yeah, though I don't usually pay much attention when they come in."
"Why not?" Erin was genuinely curious.
"Well, he gave me a shot when nobody else would. I feel like I owe him that," she said, though she sounded uncertain.
The doctor ran a hand through her hair.
"You don't owe him anything, Mia. And even if you think you do, I'd say you've made him enough money by now for that debt to be settled."
Mia looked at her without a word, but grateful that, for the first time, someone watching her life from the outside was giving her advice based on her own wellbeing, with nothing to gain from it.
They step out of the shower and get dressed, laughing.
They're in Charlotte now; since it was a longer stretch from Washington, she and Mia, Noah, Nell, and Mia's security team had flown in the next day.
They arrived mid-afternoon, and Erin managed—after arguing with Jude—to get the singer the rest of that afternoon off and move her scheduled interview to their last day in the city.
The following day they had a costume fitting and sound check in the morning, a full run-through in the afternoon, and then a rest day before the show, which was last night and went off without a hitch.
They got back to the hotel at midnight, Mia still buzzing with adrenaline and Erin not far behind.
They fucked hard and fast on the bed, a quick release, and then sat on the floor against the couch talking until nearly three in the morning, when Mia, after finishing her joint, felt exhaustion hit her all at once and they finally went to bed.
This morning is free, and it's the first time they're going out together outside the hotel.
They're going to explore the city, and for lunch they've made plans to meet Nell and Noah at the restaurant the tour's production director suggested.
In the afternoon, there's a meeting with Jude and Violette to discuss the proposal for Erin to become Mia's full-time medical support going forward.
As expected, Jude flatly refused to let the doctor's decisions override his own without question, and when Mia told him it wasn't a request, he held her stare before saying they couldn't make a firm offer until they'd talked it over with Violette.
Mia knows he'll have pushed for a stack of ridiculous clauses designed to make Erin walk away.
What the agent doesn't know is that, for the first time since they've known each other, she has no intention of giving an inch.
"Let me," Erin says, when Mia fights with the cap she's about to put on, trying to pull her ponytail through the back opening.
The doctor helps her, adjusts the brim, winks at her, then turns and heads for the door.