“Don’t worry. The ladies will love it.”
“Oh no.” He squirmed in his seat, groaning. “Not the ladies, please.”
Naomi took a bit of perverse pleasure in his discomfort. “Oh, come on. I heard Rabbi Cohen was finally thinking about finding a Mrs. Rabbi.”
“Stop. Ahh.” He wrinkled his nose. “You sound like my mother.”
Welp. Guess compliment time was over.
“She keeps having her assistant email me write-ups of every eligible Jewish woman in Hollywood. And also some who I’m pretty sure are married.”
“Not above adultery?”
“I asked God not to smite her just yet.”
Naomi turned her head so he wouldn’t see her smile.
“Sometimes I think she forgets that I don’t work for her,” Ethan said, not mad but not fully joking either.
“She’s a boss bitch?” Naomi’s dad was a welder and her mom was a nurse. They both worked extremely hard, but neither of them had much appetite for management. Her career was sort of a black box for them. They weren’t disapproving, at least not to her face, but they didn’t exactly engage with her day-to-day responsibilities.
“Oh,” he said. “Yeah.” He dropped his eyes to his lap. “Have you heard of Crowne Artists’ Agency?”
Naomi let out a huff of laughter. “Uh, yeah.”
Everyone in L.A. had heard of Crowne. They were the cream of the crop, repping the town’s entire A-list. Models, actors, directors.
“My mother’s the president of the agency.”
“Your mother is... holy shit. Wait a second. Are you loaded?”
Ethan choked on a sip of water. Maybe there was a polite way to ask that question, but she didn’t know it.
“My mother has a lot of money.”
Such a rich-person response. She shook her head. What the fuck? Naomi fought to keep herself from pulling over on the shoulder of the freeway.
“If your mom is the president of Crowne, why isn’t your synagoguefull of celebrities? You don’t need me and my singles mixers and seminars. All you need is one phone call—hell, I’m sure even an email would—”
“I don’t want a community built on nepotism, and I certainly don’t want to be the shepherd of an elite institution where people care more about who they’re wearing than why they’re praying.”
Ah. She’d hit a nerve.
“I love my mother, and I’m extremely proud of what she’s accomplished, but I chose a different path for a reason.”
Well, Naomi had inadvertently found the fastest way to sober Ethan up.
“I respect that.” And she did—well, she mostly did. His good intentions didn’t change the fact that money and power were always resting at his fingertips. Connections mattered in L.A., arguably more than anywhere else. She felt even more out of sync with him than before. A former performer and a rabbi were an unlikely pair, but a former performer and a rabbi descended from Hollywood royalty were a nonstarter.
She’d been quiet too long, she realized. “Still, one date with Natalie Portman couldn’t hurt.”
“She’s married!”
“Oh shit. Tell God not to smite me either.”
He threw back his head and grinned at the roof of the car. “I’ll put in a good word.”
“Am I anywhere near your house?” She needed to get him and his smile out of here before she did something stupid. They’d been climbing these hills for at least ten minutes. It was gonna be a hell of a ride back down.