When they were gone, Dixie closed the door and turned to Lincoln. “Is it true?”
He hesitated only a second before he nodded.
She felt like she’d felt the first time she’d been thrown onto her back at the police academy. Stunned and unable to catch her breath. She flopped down on the couch. Queenie must’ve sensed that something was wrong because she got up from where she’d been sleeping on the back of the couch and jumped into Dixie’s lap. Dixie stroked her fur as she put all the pieces together.
“I should’ve known something wasn’t right when you stayed to look for Sam Sweeney when there was no evidence of a crime. Texas Rangers don’t hang around when there’s no case to solve. Nor do they take home drunk women and spend the night with them. Or buy new deadbolts for their apartments. Or waste their time training a stupid deputy who doesn’t know her butt from a hole in the ground.”
“You’re not stupid.”
She fought to keep the tears from her eyes. It was a losing battle. “Yeah, I am. I was stupid enough to think you hung around me because you liked me.”
“I do like you.”
She looked away. “Yeah, you liked me enough to lie to me.” He didn’t say anything. She didn’t expect him to. Lincoln wasn’t good with words. He was a man of action. His actions had said it all. She hadn’t meant anything to him but the means to get a promotion. And maybe a good piece of ass—or an average piece of ass. She no longer believed she’d been all that phenomenal in bed. It was just something he’d said so he wouldn’t hurt the senator’s daughter’s feelings. So she wouldn’t run to her daddy and tattle on the big bad Texas Ranger who had done her wrong. A few months ago, she would have run to Daddy.
But not now.
She lifted Queenie off her lap and got up. She opened the door and held it. “You should leave, Lincoln. You don’t have to be my bodyguard anymore. And you don’t need to worry about the promotion. I’ll make sure Daddy doesn’t ruin it for you.”
“I don’t give a fuck about the promotion.”
She finally looked at him. “Yes, you do. You love your job. I know you wouldn’t have lied to me for anything less. And you did the job of watching out for me well. So well that I thought there was more to what we had than there was.”
“Dixie, I—”
She held up a hand. “No. I don’t need your apologies. I wanted what happened to happen. I have no regrets.” She forced a smile. “We both knew it wasn’t forever. You made it clear you’re not interested in a relationship.” She paused. “And neither am I. So it’s for the best that it ends now.”
He stared at her for a long moment as if he wanted to argue with her. But there was no good argument and they both knew it. He grabbed his cowboy hat from the table and pulled it on. Before he walked out the door, he hesitated. When he looked at her, she finally saw emotion in his eyes. Frustration and pain and something she couldn’t name.
“Not everything was a lie, Dixie.”
He walked out the door.
Chapter Eighteen
Lincoln learned a long time ago that the best way to deal with pain was to focus on something else. But this time, it didn’t seem to be working. He’d spent all morning mucking out stalls, stacking hay, and raking the paddock. But no matter how hard he worked, he couldn’t stop seeing Dixie’s stunned face when her father had told her the truth. She’d turned those pretty green eyes on him and it had felt like a sharp kick in the gut. He’d read every one of her emotions: Confusion. Disbelief. Hurt. It was the hurt that almost brought him to his knees—that almost had him confessing something he had no business confessing.
He had fallen head over heels in love with Dixie Leigh Meriwether. He loved how she could talk to anyone about anything. He loved her mama’s quotes and the cute way she wrinkled her nose when she was giving something hard thought. He loved her girlie outside and her tough as nails inside. But mostly he loved the way she looked at him as if he hung the moon.
Or the way she used to look at him.
She wouldn’t look at him like that anymore. And that was a good thing. It was the reason he hadn’t confessed his feelings to her. Dixie deserved a better man than he was. She deserved someone who wasn’t emotionally handicapped by his past. Someone who not only knew how to feel love, but also knew how to show it. It was the showing love that Lincoln struggled with. That was the reason his wife had wanted the divorce. Although now he had to wonder if he’d ever really loved Mary Lou. When their marriage had ended, he’d been able to lose himself in his work. He hadn’t felt this raw. This gutted. This feeling of losing something he could never replace.
“What’s goin’ on, boy?”
He stopped raking and turned to see Chester and Lucas standing at the fence. He’d been avoiding them since he’d gotten back yesterday—and wanted to continue to avoid them. “I’m almost finished here,” he said. “And then I thought I’d patch that hole in the roof of the old shed.”
Lucas rested his arms on the gate. “Chester wasn’t talkin’ about your plans for the day. He was talkin’ about what’s goin’ on in your head. Ever since you got home yesterday, you’ve been working like a man possessed. And we want to know what’s wrong.”
Chester hooked his arms on the fence next to Lucas. They had never looked more like brothers with their cowboy hats tipped back from their sun-wrinkled faces and their aged blue
