Saving You

Ep 4d: Taking the Deal

A/N: 3/7/2021

Sung

"You met her yesterday," I said finally after we all sat down again, and Tae Jung arrived to help translate if James forgot to explain what he was saying to Marla. "How was she?"

"It's a tricky situation. Dr. Kalowit's hospital has come down hard on her for some reason. From what Simon, their HR person, said, it's not personal, but the situation has them floundering a bit." James' leaned back and eyed me. He knew I wanted more. This much Ji hoon had told me.

"How did she take it?" He was going to make me spell it out. He was such a lawyer.

"Better than she could have, but she took it hard." James paused and frowned. Oh, he was unhappy with her reaction too, but why? "She is very concerned about her career."

"And our offer?" I wasn't sure why SEG wanted her to come with us on tour, I'm sure there was some secondary motivation, but I was glad for once at their machinations. It would be nice to spend more time with Dr. Kalowit.

"She is looking into it. Actually, I bet that is why she was talking with Eric Fowler. Dr. Fowler mentioned Eric had some paralegal background when I was discussing legal representation with her." James answered with the ghost of a smile. "Initially, I thought she would say no outright, but she is smart and didn't close off her options. I went ahead and called her HR representative. He seemed optimistic that it would all go through."

"Will it hurt her more to come with us?" James seemed surprised by my question. But he had to know how my fans were and how they would treat Ellie if they thought she was my girlfriend.

"Maybe, but the damage has been done in some ways. I'm not sure it will be better if she stays behind either. At least with us, we can protect her from the worst of it." James relaxed a little like he was satisfied with something.

"Are they as bad here in America?" Ji hoon asked.

"Yes and no. Here the fans are, in general, less possessive of their stars. But the paparazzi can be worse. Being famous when you don't want to be isn't comfortable anywhere," James answered.

James said something I couldn't quite catch to Marla in English. She nodded and looked through the papers in front of her and pulled one stack. James took the papers and looked at me.

"I thought you would want to look at her background search." He explained as he put the papers at the end of the table. I was tempted to grab them but looked at Ji hoon instead.

"Have you looked through it yet?"

"No," Ji hoon answered. "I have not been given them yet."

"Okay, let me know if there is anything I need to know." I wanted Ellie to tell me about her past over time. I didn't want to read about it in a stack of papers. This wasn't the first time I had thought of Dr. Kalowit as a woman instead of a problem to be solved, but it was when I realized that I wanted to think of her as a woman more often. It felt different than with Luna, and not just because SEG hadn't engineered our meeting. For all I knew, they had. They were sure enthusiastic about continuing the relationship.

"Of course," Ji hoon answered and gathered the papers. He glanced at them and looked at James. "Can you get me the information in Korean? I can read this but don't want to miss something."

"I have my people working on that now," James was looking at me with a small frown and seemed to make a decision. "Sung Jin, she is different from the other women you surround yourself with. You have to understand that."