Page 57 of There I Find Trust

“Rodney’s fine with it.” A voice came from the doorway. “In fact, Rodney’s kind of relieved that you two are finally talking about this. It’s been pretty obvious to everyone in town Griff’s had a crush on you for years. And it’s that obvious to me that you finally figured out that Griff is quite a catch.”

Rodney sauntered into the kitchen, a smirk on his face, but genuine happiness in his eyes.

“All right then. Rodney’s good with it, I’m good with it, and sounds like you’re good with it too.” Griff looked down at Chi. She felt a little bad that he’d known for so much longer than she had, and she figured that there had probably been some pain involved with that. She hated the idea that she hurt someone she cared about so much.

She couldn’t change the past, couldn’t fix it either. All she could do was apologize and try to do better.

“I’m sorry it took me so long to get smarter.”

He laughed a little at that.

“But now that I finally figured things out, figured out the obvious, what everyone else always knew, I’ll try hard not to be that dumb again.”

“You weren’t being dumb. You were just looking at your past and making decisions based on that, and that’s normal.”

“But fixable,” Rodney interjected.

“I think you’ve learned something from Pastor,” Griff said, giving Rodney a playful bump on his shoulder, before grabbing him and pulling him into a sidearm hug, with Chi on one side and Rodney on the other.

“So Chi just said she’d go with us to look at the Percherons at Cord Stryker’s place in Sweet Water, North Dakota. Are you still game?”

“You bet,” Rodney said, and while he tried to seem chill about it, Chi smiled at the excitement in his tone.

“All right then. It might not be the day after Christmas, because it sounds like I might be having a wedding.”

“Really? You have a wedding that fast? Don’t you need... Time to plan?”

Griff looked at Chi, but she was already shaking her head. She knew she didn’t want all that. She just wanted Griff. “I think we have plenty of time to plan. Just a celebration with our friends here in town, and some good, easy food, and low stress, and just the people who are important to us.”

“That sounds good to me,” Griff said, and he dropped a kiss on her forehead. She closed her eyes, and couldn’t help but be amazed at how quickly her life had changed from what seemed like hopelessness, when she decided to move in with a man she wasn’t married to, to total peace and contentment with a different man, one who had character and integrity and who truly cared about her.

It was an amazing feeling, and she knew as long as she was with Griff, she would be with a man who loved his family and would be faithful to his wife.

Epilogue

The whole town had gathered to see the horses unloaded.