Double Blind. Hannah Alexander

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      Several of the staff at the Hideaway Hospital had tried to convince Blaze that he had a future in pediatrics. His favorite comment was that he preferred piglets to kidlets, though judging by his behavior with Lucy and Brittany, he would be hard-pressed to charm a baby pig with any more tenderness.

      “What’s up?” Blaze stepped up onto the deck, eyeing the glass Preston held in his hand. “That your famous Preston Black iced coffee? Got any more?”

      Preston jerked his head toward the kitchen door behind him. “Help yourself. There’s coffee and ice in the kitchen. You know where the glasses are.”

      Blaze grimaced and shook his head. “Nah. It doesn’t taste the same if I have to make it myself. Yours are always the best.”

      “Who’d ever suspect the great, hardworking Blaze Farmer would be too lazy to make his own drink?” Preston quipped.

      “Ask Cook. He’ll tell you how my cooking skills have dropped off since I started college. I can peel taters and haul groceries from the store, but once I start to work around the stove, the boys at the ranch suddenly discover they’ve got to be somewhere else for supper.”

      “I guess it’s a good thing Fawn Morrison can cook, then,” Preston teased, and was rewarded by a warm, if clueless, smile. Blaze and Fawn—both students at College of the Ozarks—had been best friends since Fawn’s arrival in Hideaway two years ago. Nearly the whole population of the town knew they were sweet on each other, except for the two of them.

      “She’s got Bertie’s black walnut waffles down to a fine art,” Blaze said. “And she’s about to improve on the recipe. I get the rundown on every ingredient change she makes, and I get to sample the results.”

      Preston didn’t pursue the subject. Those two kids would pick up on the obvious one day. Until then, let their friendship continue to develop; it was the best way to build a long-lasting marriage. But then, Preston hadn’t ever been married, so what would he know?

      Blaze frowned at him. “You got something on your mind today?”

      Preston glanced toward the door. “Why don’t I make you my special iced cappuccino.”

      “Why don’t I take the girls horseback riding as soon as they wash all the lake mud off their arms and legs,” Blaze said, giving the girls a pointed look.

      Before Preston could respond, Lucy and Brittany were racing into the house, arguing over who would be first at the sink.

      With a smile, Preston jerked his head toward the door, and led the way inside to make Blaze’s favorite coffee drink.

      Blaze followed. “Sheila get to Arizona yet?”

      Preston nodded.

      “She doing okay?”

      Preston placed ice in the blender and started adding coffee, cream, spices. “Not sure.”

      “That don’t sound good.”

      Preston gave his young friend a glance. Blaze had arrived in Hideaway as a fifteen-year-old kid with dreadlocks, an undeserved reputation as an arsonist…and a broken heart. His father, a divorced veterinarian, had raised Blaze well until the day of his death.

      That was when life for poor Blaze—whose given name was Gavin—went swiftly downhill. According to the local grapevine, Blaze’s mother had no maternal instincts, and consequently, the boy had ended up at the boys’ ranch across the lake. Dane and Cheyenne Gideon loved him like a son and were obviously proud of his scholastic accomplishments.

      Blaze was very literate, but he had a tendency toward slang, perhaps used in an effort to fit into his surroundings.

      Preston set the completed coffee drink on the counter. “One Preston Black Special, just for you.”

      “You still thinking about a road trip?” Blaze asked.

      “Thinking will do me no good. She doesn’t want me there.”

      Blaze waited, his coffee-dark eyes watchful as he sipped his drink.

      Preston had never been one to make friends easily. It didn’t take a genius to figure out the reason: no child with a mentally ill mother dared to invite friends over after school. And so he was therefore surprised by his developing friendship with this kid. Blaze had a special talent for sliding beneath a person’s defenses.

      Preston also reminded himself that Blaze had a reputation for matchmaking, earned since his arrival in Hideaway, and the kid was proud of it.

      “Since when did Sheila start telling you where you could and couldn’t go?” Blaze asked.

      Preston gave Blaze a mock glare. “I’m for sure not going down that road, pal. I want to stay friends with her, not alienate her completely.”

      Blaze took a long, slow drink of the Preston Special. “Seems to me it can’t get much worse than it already is…unless she up and renews her friendship with that man in Arizona. You got any guarantee against her doing that?”

      “There are never any guarantees about anything when it comes to women,” Preston said. “You should know that by now.”

      Blaze shook his head. “Not me. I’m just a poor student, trying to figure out how to make his own way in the world.” He set his glass down. “Of course, even busy as I am, seems I’d have time to take a trip to Arizona, if anyone were to ask me to ride shotgun.”

      The girls ran back into the room, ready to go riding with Blaze. Preston grinned at them. “Don’t be too hard on the horse.”

      “We won’t, Uncle Preston,” Lucy said, gazing up at Blaze with complete adoration.

      Blaze winked at her, then opened the door to usher the girls outside. He looked back over his shoulder at Preston. “We could call it a mission trip, you know. From what Sheila said, they could use some more medical help out there to check the kids.”

      “Aren’t you forgetting something?” Preston asked. “I’m not medical.”

      “Clinics always need willing aides, and you’re a whiz with numbers and finances. Mission schools always need a lot of that, too. If the place doesn’t need your brain, it could probably use your brawn, fixin’ things, hammerin’ nails, you know, things like that.”

      Preston nodded as Blaze walked out the door with the girls. Blaze always tended to slice to the heart of a matter. Sheila wanted space, and she was candid about the reason why.

      Neither Preston nor Sheila could deny the attraction between them—a powerful draw that often left common sense and thoughtful consideration in the dust. Though they remained chaste, their attraction still influenced their ability to make good decisions.

      At least, that was what Sheila said. Preston knew she had good reasons to go to Arizona—even more compelling reasons than Blaze’s—but Preston couldn’t help feeling that one of her unspoken motives was to get away from him so it would be easier to break things off with him for good.

      Until now, he’d been comfortable respecting her wishes. But after talking with СКАЧАТЬ