The Intimacy Experiment (The Roommate #2)(36)

Chapter Twelve


“OH NO.” ETHAN laid his head back against Naomi’s passenger seat. “I think I might be a little drunk.”

She waited until they reached a stoplight to look over at him. His eyes were half-lidded, and the smile that stretched his mouth was definitely fueled by tequila. Whoops.

A better woman would have apologized. Apparently that fifth shot had been overkill. Back at the bar, shame and guilt had threatened to choke her. Watching the bruise on his face bloom in real time, she would have done anything to make the pain go away. Since she couldn’t mount him in the middle of the bar, liquor was the less volatile option at her disposal.

Besides, Naomi liked this version of Ethan, loose and flushed. She liked time alone with him in the dark privacy of her tiny car, close enough to reach out and touch.

Not that she was going to touch him. Naomi had a strict no-groping policy. But the idea of running her hand down the inner seam of his jeans? The idea that he might want her to? Ooh, that fantasy was as delicious as it was dangerous.

“How are you feeling? Want me to lower the window?” He wasn’t the only one at risk of becoming overheated.

“I feel good,” Ethan said, his words lilting together slightly. He moaned as a bump caused the injured part of his face to thwack against the headrest. “That’s probably bad, huh?”

“Not bad so much as the aspirin doing its job,” she corrected, lowering the window just in case.

Ethan closed his eyes against the night air whipping his hair. “I love Los Angeles.”

Naomi couldn’t imagine why at the moment. This part of the freeway was hardly scenic. Traffic was moving, but the roads were clogged, even though it was past midnight on a weekday. Classic.

“Everyone hates the freeway, but it’s sort of magical, isn’t it?”

“Define magical.” All Naomi perceived was smog and impatience as far as the eye could see.

“All those lights”—he pointed unnecessarily—“coming and going, each one a person with a whole world inside their head. People don’t think about that enough. How everyone we pass on the street has just as much complexity, just as many aspirations and fear and failures, as we do.” He brought his fingers up to his face and winced. “Maybe if they did, I’d get punched less.”

“Should I be recording this for your next sermon?” Even three sheets to the wind, he found ways to be poetic. Despicable.

“Sorry,” Ethan said, eyes drooping. “I told you I couldn’t hold my alcohol.”

“You sure did.” Naomi batted away another wave of guilt. “Here, drink some more water.” She handed him a plastic bottle from her cup holder.

“I usually drink the grape juice on Shabbat.” Ethan guzzled the drink.

“Hard to resist grape juice.” Especially when it tasted better than most kosher wine anyway.

He’d tilted his head to an almost perpendicular angle on his neck.

“How are you so beautiful?”

Pleasure shot through her spine. She liked the way he said beautiful, like it was powerful instead of just aesthetically pleasing.

She took the water back before he managed to drown himself. “I didn’t realize you were a chatty drunk.”

“Everything about you is . . . more,” he continued, obviously not deterred by her attempted deflection. “You’re like . . . da Vinci.”

“Now that is a new one.” Just when she thought she’d heard every line in the book . . .

“No. Listen.” He pushed himself up from where he’d gradually slumped down in the seat. “You’re exactly the person you were born to be, and you’re not even afraid of it. Do you know how hard that is? How rare?”

“I think I’ve got an idea.” Sometimes it felt like it took all her energy just to keep her body from flying in a million directions at once.

Naomi had received a lot of compliments in her life, but never one that acknowledged the work she’d done on herself. How hard she tried to be a good person. The way she strived, even when it was exhausting, which was most of the time. She lowered her own window a crack, out of necessity. It figured that in a lifetime of compliments, the best one she’d ever received came from someone who could never make good on it.

“I’m sorry that man hurt you tonight,” Ethan said, his tone stony and quiet.

She knew he wasn’t fishing for her story, the reason she’d lost her composure. Her past, especially that past, belonged to Hannah, and she hardly ever gave it up. But . . .

Maybe it was because he was drunk, or because he’d taken a punch for her earlier tonight. Maybe it was because he was a rabbi, and lots of people dropped their problems in his lap. Maybe it was because he’d just compared her to one of the most brilliant artists who’d ever lived. In any case, telling him didn’t seem like the worst idea she’d ever had.

“Normally, I can let that stuff roll off my back. Occupational hazard, you know?”

“I hate that.” His jaw snapped on the word hate, turning the sound into the way the emotion felt.

“I try to anticipate people being terrible,” she said. “So I won’t be caught unaware again.”

Ethan tipped his head back. Naomi could feel his gaze on her, sweet and inquisitive.