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“Let’s clarify something,” he said speculatively. “Your real name is Morning Star?”
“My passport says Starr Granger.”
“What does your birth certificate say?”
Starr grimaced in resignation. “Go ahead and laugh, get it out of your system. My mother is Moon Bright, and my father is Blue River. Of course, those aren’t their original names, just the ones they picked in their search for self-expression.”
“Moon Bright and Blue River are self-expressive?” he asked, incredulous.
She shrugged. “Don’t knock it. My mother originally wanted to be called Aurora Borealis.”
“L..uh...can see that would be awkward.”
“It was too much of a mouthful, even for my father,” Starr agreed. “They kind of evolved into relaxed ‘New Agers.’ You know, crystals and nonconventional spiritualism... that kind of thing. They were disappointed when I preferred a different life-style.”
“You can say that again. Jeez, you even got married. What a terrible blow that must have been. Don’t you know that marriage is the primary cause of divorce?”
She gave him a dirty look, equaling the one he’d given her not long before. “What do you want, Dr. Bradley?”
He clucked at her. “I’m not your doctor. You made sure of that, didn’t you?”
Starr was beginning to regret ever setting eyes on Noah Bradley. But she couldn’t regret kissing him, not completely. If she’d felt a tenth of the sizzle kissing her ex-husband as she’d felt kissing Noah, her marriage would have lasted a lot longer. Of course, she and Chase had never been together long enough in the same place to make anything last...including sizzle.
“I’m impulsive. You said so yourself,” Starr felt obliged to point out, though she didn’t expect Dr. Bradley to understand. She did plenty of rash things she later regretted. On the other hand, she’d bet Noah always had good, solid reasons for his actions. He was that kind of man.
“I think calling you impulsive is too mild,” Noah drawled. “Running into a burning house goes way beyond impulsive.”
“I didn’t run, I climbed. And it was perfectly safe. By the way, how is Kitty?”
“Kitty didn’t actually belong to us, but he’s been adopted. In less than twenty-four hours he’s ruined a silk tie, eaten a salmon fillet without permission and climbed the living room drapes.” Noah looked heavenward as though asking for divine intervention. “When I tried to get him down he catapulted off my shoulder and landed in the aquarium. Unfortunately, the top was off.”
A choking sound escaped from Starr’s throat.
He frowned. “It isn’t funny. I nearly lost my ear in the process.”
“I’ll bet the fish didn’t like it, either.” Starr laughed as she envisioned Noah Bradley in a battle of wills with “Kitty.” Boy, she wished she’d been there. It would have been priceless.
“Now that Kitty is fully aware of the aquarium, he’s spent hours in front of it, batting at the fish,” Noah concluded gloomily. “That animal splashed water and fish for ten feet, then made mincemeat out of me when I tried to rescue him.”
“I know,” Starr said, with somewhat less humor than before. She flexed her hands, which still bore the marks of Kitty’s first “rescue.” His nine lives were being rapidly depleted.
“Let me see how you’re healing,” Noah offered.
“Uh...I...” She stuttered to a halt. Her feelings toward Dr. Bradley were a peculiar mixture of curiosity and screeching alarm. “I thought you were angry at me,” she said quickly. “Because of the picture...and everything.”
“I am.” For an instant his expression turned somber. “But I’d hate for you to get an infection.”
Starr swallowed, contemplating the dangers of getting close to Noah Bradley. He was obviously an upstanding member of the establishment, yet the dark heat in his eyes tugged at her, coaxing an elemental response. No man—including her ex-husband—had ever made her feel that way.
Until now.
And that made him dangerous. How dangerous Starr didn’t want to find out. She’d learned the hard way that attraction didn’t last, and that ten seconds of fleeting pleasure wasn’t worth messing up the bed.
“Starr?”
“Okay, but you’re still not my doctor,” she said hastily. Foolishly. Becoming his patient would have been an easy way to protect herself from...him. “We’re just comparing battle scars, understand?”
His slow, reluctant smile spoke volumes, including a reminder of the kiss they’d shared. Well, hell. Even though nothing would come of it, how could he say being impulsive was so bad?
“If this is ‘show and tell,’ there are a few other places I wouldn’t mind seeing,” he suggested.
To Starr’s astonishment, she had to struggle to keep from turning red. Lord, she hadn’t blushed since she was a teenager, and never to such an obvious gambit. But then, Noah Bradley was no teenager, and a far cry from the tough newsmen she usually encountered.
“Here,” she said, holding her hands out in front of her.
Noah took them and examined the healing wounds. His fingers were strong and hard, yet sensitive enough to catch the quickening rush of her pulse. “Pretty good,” he murmured. “No signs of infection. What about the scratches on your shoulder?”
“I’m hardly going to show you them, am I?” Starr asked, trying to free her hands.
Crisp, salt-laden air blew inward from the ocean, unaffected by the sunshine. Even so, Starr could feel the warmth from Noah’s body. He’d be pleasant to snuggle up with on a cold night—much better than an electric blanket.
Jeez Get a grip.
Her nose wrinkled as she scolded herself. It had to be the inactivity. She was always busy, always moving. She might work in the wilds of Africa for months at a time, then spend the next fourteen weeks rushing from airplane to airplane. Whenever her frantic life-style got stale, she came home to Astoria; a few days with her parents were guaranteed to give her wanderlust again.
But was that what she really wanted? To keep racing around the world, without belonging anywhere? Lately she’d been feeling a growing restlessness, though she didn’t quite understand why.
Starr shivered, but more from uncertainty than from cold. A moment later Noah shrugged his coat off and dropped it around her shoulders. It was a chivalrous thing to do, the kind of act he probably did without thinking.
Where did men like that come from? Or, she decided, where had men like that gone to? He certainly wasn’t like any of the hard-nosed professionals she’d encountered in her travels. She’d dealt with them all—environmentalists, poachers, State Department officials, even a tough old naturalist who hadn’t wanted to share his lions with her until he’d discovered her affinity with felines.
Noah was different. Chivalrous and old-fashioned. Though...the sensual way he watched her was anything but old-fashioned.
“What are you thinking?” he asked quietly.
She shook her head. “Nothing. That is...I’ve been wondering. That kitchen fire in Mrs. Dinsdale’s house put her out of commission for a while—I understand she’s gone to visit her sister during the cleanup. Maybe you’d consider letting me take Becky for a weekend, or maybe even a week or two. My parents have lots of room and they love children.”
Abruptly Noah stepped back, a remote expression on his face. “That’s nice of you, but I still don’t think it’s a good idea. Becky needs routine and stability.”
Starr curled her fingers in loose fists. She knew it was important for a child to have routine. Hadn’t she always wished for normal parents herself? Yet she didn’t think Noah’s motives were entirely innocent.
“Anyway,” he said, “you’re out of the country a lot. It might not be good for Becky to get too attached to you. I think it. would be best for everyone if you limited your visits to casual contact.”
“Casual?” Starr narrowed her eyes. “Amelia was my best friend. She wanted me to be her daughter’s godmother. I don’t think ‘casual’ is what she had in mind.”
“If you cared about Amelia, you would have come home more often,” Noah muttered.
“I did care. Amelia was like a sister to me.”
“Really?” Bitterness edged his voice.
Starr could almost hear the “but” hanging in the air. But..:if she’d cared so much, she would have at least attended her best friend’s funeral. She smiled tightly. “You know, it’s a shame we didn’t meet a long time ago. We could have gotten a head start on hating each other.”
For an astonished moment Noah stared at her, then he laughed. “You’re something else. I’ll bet your mouth got you into plenty of trouble when you were a kid.”
“Constantly. But never at home—Mom and Dad just considered it a form of self-expression. They’re big on self-expression.”
“Having met your parents, I can believe it. How did you ever get to know the McKittricks? I doubt they’re health food fanatics.”
She shrugged. “It’s a long story, but they became friends in college. Look, I may not be ideal mother material, but I want to have a part in Becky’s life.”
As soon as the words left Starr’s mouth, the stubbornly feminine part of her cringed...the part that wanted Noah Bradley to see her as a woman. On the other hand, she was being honest. Children had never figured into her plans for the future. She was taking an interest in Becky because she’d made a promise to Amelia.
He gave her an exasperated look. “Great. You ignored my niece for over two years, now you want to see her. After a while you’ll lose interest and go back to your life.”
For a long minute she was speechless. “I didn’t ignore her. I sent gifts and visited whenever I came home.”
“Which was practically never.”
“I have a job to do.”
“I know. And isn’t it great—they’ll never run out of wars and disasters for you to photograph!”
“You...you...” For a moment Starr’s smart mouth failed her. She wanted to hit him. She wanted to smack that scornful expression right off his handsome face.
But since violence was out, she said a Kurdish swearword she’d learned in her travels, wiggled from the confining folds of his jacket and threw it over a convenient rosebush.
“Go to hell,” she snapped and stormed away.
Chapter Three
“Wait a minute!” A stunned Noah yanked his jacket from the rosebush and heard the fabric rip.
Terrific.
He had all the tact of a rhinoceros. What else could he do to screw things up?
“Starr, please wait.” He caught up in front of her parents’ health food store and grabbed her arm. She spun around in time for him to see pain temporarily replace the anger in her face.
“What’s wrong?”
“I’m fine.” Nevertheless, she put her hand on her left shoulder and rubbed. “It’s just the scratches.”
Noah sighed. He didn’t believe her, yet he couldn’t force her to explain. “Look, I’m sorry I got carried away...I don’t like reporters.”
“Gee, that’s a surprise. I wouldn’t have guessed.”
He sighed. Ever since Sam had died, he’d been fighting with the McKittricks. Unfortunately, since Starr was both a friend of the McKittricks and Becky’s godmother, that put her directly in the middle of the battle. “You weren’t in the country when Sam and Amelia were killed, so you don’t know what it was like.”
She nodded warily. “I was out of touch. I haven’t even had a chance to talk to Rafe. He called this morning, but I was taking a walk.”
“Well...there was a lot of publicity after the accident. The McKittricks are influential because of that chain of newspapers they own—not to mention being friends with everyone who is anyone in Oregon, including the present governor.”
“What does that have to do with it?”
“Everything.” Noah massaged the back of his neck. “They never liked Sam. They thought he was presumptuous to marry their daughter. Amelia must have told you how much they disliked him.”
“They didn’t dislike him,” she murmured. “Not exactly.”
“Really?”
“Okay, I guess they would have preferred her marrying someone else,” Starr admitted, wrinkling her nose. “Deep down they’re nice people.”
Noah decided the “deep down” part must be way deep down—like in the Marianas Trench. He took a breath, knowing it might be foolish to confide in Starr, yet also knowing his sister-in-law and brother had trusted her. “The McKittricks blame Sam for the accident. The way they see things, if he hadn’t married their daughter, she wouldn’t have been in that plane with him,” he said, bitterness tinging his voice.
Starr’s eyes widened. “I’m sorry. That isn’t fair,” she whispered.
Turning, Noah stared down at the town. Below them the Columbia River flowed to meet the ocean, a glistening silver ribbon across the western horizon. The ocean was constant, unchanging. He needed something that couldn’t change, something that couldn’t be ripped away with a single phone call. Like Sam.
He sensed compassion in Starr’s gaze, yet he couldn’t handle any more sympathy. Everybody was sorry about his brother. His friends, his co-workers, even the checker at the supermarket. Everybody “understood.” How could they understand? He’d lost the person he loved most in the world, the only family he had left except for Becky. He couldn’t endure losing anyone else.
“They aren’t too happy with me, either,” he added harshly. “Maybe it would be different if I was a wealthy, big-city specialist. But I’m not. I’m just a general practitioner who doesn’t play golf, and doesn’t plan on getting filthy rich.”
“There’s nothing wrong with that.”
“Thanks. But you’ll never convince the McKittricks I’m a proper guardian.”
Starr winced. Amelia had been raised mostly by nannies and servants—she’d wanted a different childhood for Becky. The elder McKittricks were decent in a stuffy kind of way, but they’d been lousy parents.
“All right.” She crossed her arms over her chest and looked at him squarely. “They never liked Sam, they don’t approve of you and they own a bunch of newspapers. What has that got to do with hating the news media?”
He snorted. “You have no idea what it was like——news—paper articles implying Sam was at fault, suggesting pilot error.” Noah threw out his hand angrily. “There wasn’t any error, Sam was a great pilot. Then after Becky was put in my custody, the reporters started hounding me again, questioning my fitness and harassing me about my relationship with the McKittricks.”
“Oh.”
That was all she said. A single word.
“You see, don’t you?” he appealed. “It was like being surrounded by sharks.”
“I’m a photojournalist,” Starr said quietly. “Not that kind of reporter. And I’ve spent most of my career taking nature photos, which is completely different.”
Noah hesitated, remembering his thoughts earlier that morning. Starr was a respected photographer. She wouldn’t agree with the McKittricks’ muckraking tactics, no matter how close their friendship might be.
Oh, hell. He’d been a jerk. He’d let his temper override his common sense. “L..uh...I’m sorry.”
“Never mind.” She shrugged and hooked her thumbs into the belt loops of her jeans. Noah groaned silently, because the motion reminded him how great she looked in those skin-fitting denims.
So much for a guilty conscience.
