Taming a Texas Devil - Katie Lane Page 0,71
out from under your parents’ rule and putting you in this perfect little town.”
It was a perfect little town. And it wasn’t only the town that was so perfect, it was the people who lived there too. People who had welcomed Dixie into their hearts and homes like she was family. A day didn’t go by that she wasn’t asked to dinner or some birthday or special celebration. She usually had to work, but she had accepted a few offers. Like Luanne’s offer to join the Simple Book Club and Cheyenne’s invitation to her middle school graduation.
The thought of missing both made tears fill her eyes. “It is a perfect little town. And I’m going to miss being their deputy so much.”
“Then why did you turn in your resignation?”
“Because Simple deserves a better deputy than me.” The tears leaked out and ran down her cheeks. “A smarter deputy.”
“Smarter? No one is as smart as my baby girl.” Winona picked up the napkin from the tray and handed it to her.
Dixie blotted her cheeks. “Please don’t tell me you forgot how much I struggled in school, Mama. You wanted me to keep my dyslexia from Daddy, but you were there in the teacher’s meeting.”
Her mother’s eyes widened. “I told you to keep the secret from your daddy? I believe you were the one who cried and begged me not to tell him, Dixie Leigh. I agreed at the time because I didn’t want you throwing a fit in front of your teachers, but later I told your father everything.”
Dixie stared at her. “Daddy knew I was dyslexic? Then why would he push me to go back to law school?”
“Because he knew you could do it. You can do anything you set your mind to, Dixie Leigh. You’ve proven that time and time again. You never have let a little disability keep you from what you wanted. Which means you’re stronger and smarter than most people.”
Dixie was too stunned to speak. She just sat there as her mama continued.
“And what makes you think you’re not a good deputy? Miss Gertie certainly thinks you are. So does her niece Reba and her husband. And so does Lincoln. I guess he went on and on about what a good deputy you are to his boss.”
“Lincoln was just hoping word would get back to daddy and he’d get his promotion.”
Winona smiled. “Funny, but Lincoln didn’t strike me as a brown-noser. In fact, when he answered the door and your daddy asked him what exactly had been going on, he told him it was none of his business.” She smiled. “Just like you did. I knew the second you walked in the door that you had found yourself. I’ve always told you that you can tell a lot about a person by their walk. And you didn’t walk in the door as much as strut. A confident strut that said you were a woman who knew who she was and what she wanted.”
Dixie blew her nose in the napkin. “I thought I did.”
“And now you don’t? I never took you for a fickle female, Dixie Leigh Meriwether. Once you make up your mind about something, few things can change it. Now you’re sitting there telling me that just because a man told a little fib, you’re starting to doubt who you are and what you want?”
All the anger and hurt of the last twenty-four hours welled up inside her and gushed forth like Yellowstone’s Old Faithful. “That liar took my virginity, Mama!”
At her outburst, Queenie jumped up and leaped off the bed. But her mama didn’t even blink her long eyelash extensions. “He took it or you gave it to him?”
“I wouldn’t have given it to him if I had known the type of controlling, manipulative man he was. And I refuse to spend my life being controlled and manipulated like—” She cut off, but her mama knew what she had been about to say.
“Like me.” Winona didn’t look hurt. She just smiled sadly. “Oh, Dixie Leigh, I did you a grave injustice. My mama taught me that a lady never argues with her husband in public. Marital arguments were to be kept private.”
“You argue with daddy?”
“All the time. We get into some whopper fights. Why do you think I placed your bedroom on one side of the house and ours on the other?”
“I thought it was because you didn’t want me hearing you have sex.”
Winona laughed. “Well, that too. But mostly it was because I