Page 52 of Fern's Date with Destiny
The auction must have started.Cody had no idea, he was too busy staring into the future in Fern’s eyes.
Chance cleared his throat.“Bidding stands at five hundred.Do I hear six?”
Voices rose.A woman Cody had dated years ago waved a hand, smiling too brightly.
Chance lifted his mic.“Bid stands at six-fifty, going once…”
Cody took a step closer to the crowd and found Fern’s gaze again before he said, “Wait.”
Everything hushed.
“I bid seven hundred.”
Gasps.Then a chorus of incredulous laughter.
“You can’t do that,” Chance protested, though his mouth twitched.“Can you do that?”
Cody drew a shaky breath.“I just did.So obviously, it’s possible.”He turned fully toward Fern, intensely glad that everyone was watching.“I’m buying me for someone special.She’s been trying to tell me what my heart already knew.”He let out a shaky laugh.“I’m done fighting destiny.”
For a second, no one moved.
Then Fern’s smile broke like the dawn.Bright and unstoppable.
Everything in his chest unlocked.
He was hers.He’d always been.
Every fight,every time Fern had dug in her heels and refused to settle, had led her here.To Cody, on a stage he hadn’t planned to stand on, bidding on himself in front of half the county.
For her.
Her heart didn’t lurch this time.It lifted.
I’m done fighting destiny.
The crowd erupted.Applause and delighted laughter swelled, filling every dusty corner of the hall.
Fern didn’t hear a bit of it.
She saw Cody.OnlyCody, standing there in his plain button-up and jeans, hair a little too long from neglect, mouth curved in a shaky, incredulous smile.
It wasn’t the smile of a man about to bolt.It was the look of someone who’d finally stopped running.
Her feet moved before her brain could catch up.
She stepped around Rose, who let out a choked little gasp, then carried on past the rest of the folding chairs.She reached the edge of the stage and braced her hand on the scuffed plywood riser.
She met Cody’s gaze straight on.“I believe you’re mine, cowboy.”
Cody’s eyes went wide.For a single beat, he just stared, as if he couldn’t quite believe she was real.
A ripple of laughter rolled through the audience.
Behind the mic stand, Chance gave an exaggerated sigh.“Well, that seems settled, unless any of you ladies feel like bidding higher?”
A chorus of good-natured groans and a few halfhearted “no thanks!”rose up.
“Good.”Fern swung herself onto the stage without hesitating, ignoring the hand Chance offered her.She didn’t need help.
