Chapter Twenty Five

Dixie actually put her hand on her chest, her heart was beating so fast. The infield was dark, but for the ambient light from distant track lights and light spilling from the haulers parked close together.

Without thinking, she traced her way through the maze and ended up at Nicky’s coach, her hand wavering as she prepared to knock on his door.

It was not yet late, but she didn’t see much light and hoped he was awake – or at least ‘home’.

With a shaking hand, she knocked on the door and was about to spin on her heel and trot away when it opened, dimly illuminating Nicky in the doorway. “Dixie,” he said, sounding genuinely happy. “I figured you had long since gone to the hotel. Come in, come in,” he said, gesturing her inside.

Dixie followed him inside, closing the door behind him and noting the very dimly lit interior. “Oh my God,” she said. “I didn’t wake you up, did I?”

“No,” Nicky said, shaking his head easily. “I was just laying in bed reading.”

“Anything good?” Dixie asked, sitting primly on the overstuffed coach nearby, feeling as though they were strangers, instead of two people who had gone riding for hours together only hours ago.

“Just some Larry McMurtry, but believe me, he can keep,” Nicky said, sitting down on the other end of the coach. “Not that I’m not really happy to see you, but what are you doing here? Haven’t you missed the last bus back to the hotel for the night?”

Dixie shrugged. “I can always call a car if I need to…” she said nervously. “I, um, I stayed because I wanted to talk to you.”

“Oh,” Nicky said, looking unsure. “In a good way?”

“Well, I hope so,” Dixie said. “But I guess you can judge for yourself.”

“Okay,” Nicky said, settling against the cushions. “You want something to drink? Eat?”

“No, I’m fine,” Dixie said curtly. “Thanks.”

“You seem… you seem nervous. I’ve never really seen you nervous, and now it’s making me nervous.”

Dixie barked a laugh. “This is going great so far.”

“What is going great?” Nicky asked, trying to set her at ease. “Dix, relax. It’s just me. What’s going on?”

Dixie looked at him, studying his tousled hair and his serious brow, the happy gleam in his eye and the slight smile on his lips.

God, he made her happy, and she hoped she wasn’t about to put a monkey wrench in that.

“When we fought a few weeks ago…” Dixie began and Nicky groaned.

“I thought… I thought we were done with that,” Nicky said, suddenly nervous as to where this was going.

“I know. And we are, mostly. But something you said was true, and I came to tell you why, so we can either move forward, or, you know, not. And believe me when I tell you, I’ll respect your decision either way.”

“Are you about to reveal you’re a KGB agent or something?” Nicky asked lightly. This is all sounding pretty serious, he mused, and he’d never seen Dixie so ill at ease.

It was making him twitchy.

“Okay, okay,” Dixie said, trying again. “When we… not fought, but had our ‘discussion’, you accused me of having a fear of intimacy and a fear of rejection.”

Nicky nodded slowly, but refused to corroborate her statement.

“Mostly, I have a fear of rejection because of that intimacy,” Dixie said in a rush.

“Huh?”

Dixie rubbed her temples in frustration at herself. “I’m not putting this very well. Let me try again, and let me try and tell you a story, okay?”

Nicky nodded, then reached over and took her hand in his, squeezing it gently and giving her an encouraging smile.

Dixie sighed, and then began again. “Before Don and Dave took up motorcycle racing in AMA Supersport, another member of our family was in the series.”

Nicky waited for a beat, and then the penny dropped.

“You mean…”

“Um, yeah. From the time we were kids, all I wanted to do was race like the boys. I learned how to along with my brothers, and believe it or not, I was always the fastest, and I think the most talented, but don’t tell them that. And I loved every minute of it. I wanted nothing else in the world but to race. My parents were super supportive, and let me enter race after race as a kid, and I built up a pretty good reputation as a racer. Of course, my being a girl didn’t always go over really well, but after a while, it just wasn’t a big deal anymore.”

“I raced a few girls on my way here,” Nicky said. “Got beat by some, too.”

“You know, I was thinking about that on my way over here,” Dixie said with a small smile. “I wonder if we ever raced each other as kids without knowing it.”

“Probably,” Nicky agreed. “Its’ a pretty small world of racing out west, I bet we did cross paths. I probably didn’t like you, though. No offense.”

I’m sure I didn’t like you either,” she shot back and he grinned at her, squeezing her hand again.

“Anyway, I eventually got the call that a team wanted to go to AMA with me, and I thought nothing better than that was ever going to happen to me, ever. So, we hit the circuit, I got sponsors, I placed well in some races, and it seemed like everything was going great, even for a girl. God, it was the best time of my life, without a doubt.”

Nicky sensed a shift change coming, but said nothing.

Dixie took a breath, and then continued. “It was the third to last race of the year, and I was battling hard for the championship, which no one thought we had a chance in hell of getting, but I was going to prove that a girl could do it. I really took seriously my role model duties, wanting to tell girls that anything boys can do, girls can do just as well. God, I was so earnest about it.”

“I can see that about you,” Nicky said softly and Dixie shot him a grateful smile.

“So, we’re racing hard, the laps are ticking down, and I’m making some good progress, when…” Dixie swallowed hard, and then continued. “Someone ahead of me blew out a tire pretty spectacularly and cut across the line of traffic I was in, knocking the rider next to me off his bike, and me off mine. And I don’t mean, boom, I fell over, I mean…”

“It was the big one.”

“Yeah. The one I hope you never have. The one that will end your career…or in the case of the other rider, his life.”

The other guy died?”

“Yeah,” Dixie swallowed thickly, remembering that awful day, the mental image of he body on the track she’ll never be able to erase. “His helmet flew off, and he just rag dolled across the track and then lay so still. It was awful. I tried to get to him, but my leg really hurt…”

She looked up at the ceiling, trying not to cry at the memory, at the phantom pain from that day. “I didn’t know what was wrong with me, just that there was something wrong with Dajo and I had to help him, but I couldn’t reach him… they put me in an ambulance and knocked me out.”

Nicky waited silently as Dixie composed herself, his heart aching for her. “I didn’t know it at the time, but the bike pretty much landed on my leg, exhaust pipes first. I had severe burns, broken bones, bruising, blood loss, you name it, I had it. I had several surgeries in those first few days, and for a while, they weren’t even sure I was going to live.”

Nicky reminded himself to keep breathing as Dixie’s soft voice continued.

“When they finally brought me out of the medically induced coma they’d put me in, my brain was as intact as it was before – which, in most people’s opinion is probably not much – but my leg… my leg was in sorry shape, and my career was over. Just like that.”

Dixie wiped away a tear, then began again.

“I cried for a long time – between the pain, the loss of my career, and then the subsequent breakup with my fiancé…”

“What, what?” Nicky interrupted. “You were engaged?”

“Yeah,” Dixie said on a shallow laugh. “He’d proposed and given me a ring, a date was tentatively set, but once he saw that I wasn’t an income generator like before, that it wasn’t cool to be with the only girl rider in AMA, when he saw…” she stopped, then continued. “When he saw my leg, he decided we were through.”

Nicky rubbed her hand with his thumb, waiting for her to continue.

“I was devastated at the time, but in hindsight, I know we wouldn’t have made it, we would have imploded within a year or two of marriage, so I guess that was one good thing that ended up coming from it.”

“I hate him,” Nicky said shortly, and Dixie laughed out loud at that.

“So,” she continued after a beat.  “After a lot of rehab and a lot of training, I got back to as normal as I was ever going to be. It took me a long time to realize I was never going to race again, so I decided I wanted to help other athletes and strong willed people get better, so I went to school for physical therapy and training, and I love it. But I miss racing. I miss racing so much, so being back here… it’s both a dream come true, and at times, a knife that cuts me to the quick, if you can understand that.”

“I can, I really can,” Nicky whispered. “I’m so sorry, Dix.”

“I was sorry for myself for a long time, but I’ve made peace with it. I have my life, my health, my strength, my family and my friends. Dajo has a plot in a cemetery.”

“True enough,” Nicky replied.

“So, when I said I had intimacy issues and a fear of rejection, I’m pretty sure that stems from the fiancé ditching me after seeing my leg. And the very few guys who have seen it since then, I know it’s not a real sexy turn on…”

“You honestly think I would judge you on something so superficial?” Nicky asked, not sure if he was hurt by that or just plain angry.

“I think it’s impossible for most guys not to judge on looks when it comes to women. You’re just wired that way. So, what I’m saying is this… I like you, Nicky, I like you so much, and I want to be with you, but if this is too much, or I’m too… damaged, I’ll totally understand. I’m just glad we’re better than we were a few weeks ago, and I mean that.”

“You aren’t damaged, Dixie. You’ve lived. There’s a difference,” Nicky said, his tone serious and strong.

“Thank you,” she whispered to him, meaning it. “Seriously, though… no matter what happens, I want you to know that I like you for you, not for your fame or your fortune or your race tickets. I’ve had that stuff myself, I’ve lived that life, and that’s not why I’m here tonight. I’m here because I want you, just you, not your name or your hard passes or your money. I can only hope you believe that, that you believe me, because I know that’s hard for you, and I know why.”

Nicky swallowed, absorbing the strength of her words.

“In fact, I’d probably like you more if you’d retire tonight and become a sheep herder or something. It’s safer,” she said with a grin and he smiled back before it faded again.

“After what you’ve lived through, how do you keep watching races?”

“Because I love it. I’m hardwired to love it, just like you are. But I want you to always remember the fun, because once it’s not fun, I think you’re out. Promise me, no matter what, when it stops being fun, you walk away. I don’t ever want you racing halfway – I don’t ever want you to get hurt or dead by racing halfway. Promise me,” she demanded, her voice low and serious.

“I promise you,” he intoned.

Dixie shifted, not sure what do now. “I, um… in my head, I was going to have this big reveal like the Phantom of the Opera, where you would see my leg, then run screaming from the room or something.”

Nicky gave her a small laugh, then slid off the couch until he was kneeling directly in front of her, his eyes locked on hers. Slowly, she pulled up the hem of her right pant leg, looking up at the ceiling first then daring to look down to gauge Nicky’s reaction.

His face was impassive as he studied her leg. She knew how it looked – mangled and pitted, covered in burn scars and rough skin, skinny and with bumps where pins and rods had been inserted into the snapped bones. Slowly, he lifted his hand and placed it on her skin, sliding it up and down softly, though she could barely feel his touch through the scar tissue. She tried not to cry at the tenderness of his hands, but then truly did well up with tears when he leaned over and pressed his lips to the worst looking portion on her leg, kissing it softly and earnestly. He looked up at her, meeting her eyes, and said simply, “It’s you. And I’m crazy about you. I see nothing but you here. And I’m not running.”

“I trust you,” Dixie whispered.

Nicky sat at her feet for a long time, their eyes locked on one another’s before he finally broke the silence. “Let’s go to bed,” he said softly, and she nodded her assent with virtually no hesitation.

Taking her hand in his, he led her through the coach and up the stairs to the softly lit bedroom, guiding her to the large centrally located bed. She slid across the quilts laying across it, her stomach in knots with nervous, excited energy, though she was unable to wipe the wide smile from her face even in her nervousness.

She watched as Nicky shucked off his shirt, revealing his toned, smooth skin. She followed suit, losing her top and her pants in that order, leaving her clad in only bra and panties, shivering in the darkness, her skin pebbling in the cool air of the coach.

Nicky dropped his pants and shorts, and climbed nude onto the bed, completely un-self aware, his attention focused solely on her body. His lips met hers, and Dixie realized with a jolt it was their first kiss, and it was mind-blowingly perfect.

They had danced and danced around each other for all this time, but had never actually kissed until now.

Amazing.

Nicky’s hands smoothed over his skin, in turn removing her bra then panties, his hands and lips tracing over her skin, from the top of her head to the bottom of her toes, making her writhe and grab at the quilts beneath her as the pleasurable sensations built inside her under his mindful touch.

When it was time and they were both more than ready for the other, he braced himself on his elbows above her, his eyes locked on hers, his mouth capturing hers as he thrust inside her, both of them arching from the magnitude of the moment.

Together they curled into each other, their eyes locked, their skin slick against each other as they moved closer and closer to the edge before tumbling over in a tumult of sensation, emotion, ecstasy and in Dixie’s case, by taking the Lord’s name in vain several times at high volume.

They lay together for several long minutes afterwards, waiting for their breath to return to normal, their fingers intertwined, unable to stop touch each other in some way.

“So, I’m hoping I don’t need to call that car service,” Dixie finally said with a wry grin. “Mind if I crash on your couch?” she teased.

“Yeah, I mind,” he growled in reply, rolling over to meet her eyes and then kiss the tip of her nose sweetly. “You are never leaving my bed again, woman, and that’s a fact.”

A fact she could definitely live with, she decided, letting sleep gently overtake her.

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