LITMIR.BIZ

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he could tie her onto the back of a mean bucking bull and let the bull try to sling some sense into her. But he’d always gone back because the bottom line with Dixie Mae was that she was the only person who’d ever believed he could be something.

      Powerful stuff like that would make a man put up with any level of orneriness.

      The petite blonde nurse finally finished whatever she was doing to Dixie Mae and stepped away, but not before giving Lucky that sad, sympathetic look. And a stern warning. “Don’t give her any cigarettes. She’ll ask but don’t give her one.”

      Lucky had already figured that out, both the asking part and don’t-give-her-one part. He didn’t smoke, but even if he did, he wouldn’t have brought her cigarettes. A shot of tequila maybe, but that would have been to steady his own nerves, not for Dixie Mae.

      “She bribed the janitor,” the nurse added. “And she called a grocery clerk to offer him a thousand dollars to bring her a pack, but we stopped him before he could give them to her.”

      “Assholes,” Dixie Mae declared. “A woman oughta be able to smoke when she wants to smoke.”

      Lucky just sighed. It was that way of thinking that had put Dixie Mae in the hospital bed. That, and the other hard living she’d been doing for decades. And her advancing years, of course. Besides, since there was an oxygen tank nearby, it was possible the staff hadn’t simply wanted to deny her a smoke for her health’s sake but rather because they hadn’t wanted her to blow up the place.

      “Are you close to her?” the nurse asked him. According to her name tag, she was Nan Watts.

      “Nobody’s close to me,” Dixie Mae snarled. “But Lucky’s my boy. Not one of my blood, mind you, but my own blood son’s an asshole.” She added a profanity-riddled suggestion for what her son could do to himself.

      The nurse blushed, but maybe Dixie Mae’s cussing gave her some ideas because on the way to the door, Nan Watts winked at Lucky. He nearly winked back. A conditioned reflex, but he wasn’t in a winking, womanizing kind of mood right now.

      “Boy, you look lower than a fat penguin’s balls,” Dixie Mae said after the nurse left. She waggled her nicotine-yellowed fingers at him, motioning for him to come closer. “Did you bring me a cig?”

      “No.” He ignored the additional profanity she mumbled. “Why are you here in Spring Hill?” Lucky asked. “Why didn’t you go to the hospital near your house in San Antonio?”

      “I was here in town seeing somebody.”

      Since Dixie Mae had been born in Spring Hill, it was possible she had acquaintances nearby, but Lucky doubted it.

      “I’m worried about you,” Lucky admitted. He went to her, eased down on the corner of the metal table next to her bed.

      “No need. I’m just dying, that’s all. Along with having a nicotine fit. By the way, that’s a lot worse than the dying.” She had to stop, take a deep breath. “My heart’s giving out. Did the doc tell you that when he called?”

      “Yeah.” Lucky wanted to say more, but that lump in his throat sort of backed things up.

      He touched his fingers to the tat.

      “I know. It bothers you,” Dixie Mae said. Each word she spoke seemed to be a challenge, and her eyelids looked heavy, not just from the kilo of electric-blue eye shadow she had on them, either. “Have you thought maybe you’re all over the tat because you don’t want to think about the rest of this?”

      There was no maybe about it. That’s exactly what it was. It was easier to focus on something else—anything else—rather than what was happening to Dixie Mae.

      Lucky nodded. Shrugged. “But the tat really does bother me, too.”

      She waved him off. Or rather tried. Not a lot of strength in her hand. “I was shit-faced when I got it. So was the tattoo guy.”

      “P-e-i-c-e-s of my heart,” he read aloud. Complete with little heart bits that had probably once been red. They were now more the color of an old Hershey bar. And Dixie Mae’s wrinkles and saggy skin had given them some confusing shapes.

      When he had first met Dixie Mae, Lucky had spent some time guessing what the shapes actually were. Not a disassembled United States map as he’d first thought.

      But rather a broken heart.

      With the way Dixie Mae carried on, sometimes it was hard to believe she even had a heart, and she’d never gotten around to explaining exactly who’d done such a thing to her. Or if the person had survived.

      Lucky doubted it.

      “I wish there was time to get it fixed for you.” He traced the outline of the heart piece that resembled the map of Florida but then drew back his fingers when he realized it could also be a penis tat. “I wish there was time for a lot of things.”

      Like more time. This was too soon.

      “No need. Besides, it’s not even the worst of the bunch. When I was younger, I got drunk a lot. And I went to the same tattoo guy,” Dixie Mae admitted. “You should see the one on my left ass cheek. I didn’t realize he needed a dictionary for the word ass.”

      It wasn’t very manly to shudder, but Lucky just had this thing about misspelled words and didn’t want to see other examples of them, especially on her ass. Besides, there wouldn’t be many more moments with Dixie Mae, and he didn’t want to waste those moments on a discussion about the origins, shapes and locations of bad tats.

      Dixie Mae dragged in a ragged breath, one that proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that she was a two-packs-a-day smoker. Unfiltered, at that. “We’ve had a good run together, me and you. Haven’t we, boy? Made each other some money. Had some good times when I wasn’t kicking your butt or boxing your ears.”

      “We’ve made some money all right,” he agreed.

      As for the good times, Lucky would have to grade those on a curve.

      She’d started sponsoring him in bull-riding events when he was nineteen, just a couple of weeks after his folks had died. When he’d turned twenty-five, Dixie Mae had allowed him to buy into her company. Lucky was nearly thirty-three now, and they were still partners. He did indeed help her run Weatherall-McCord Stock Show and Rodeo Promotions, but he hadn’t given up bull riding, mainly because he was better at it than the business side of things.

      “I’ll miss you,” Lucky added. He cursed that lump in his throat again. Because it was true. He would miss her.

      “Awww.” She dragged in another ragged breath. “That’s monkey shit, and we both know it.”

      “No. It’s not. I will miss you.” And he meant it. He’d never thought he could love someone this much, not since his mother had passed, but he loved Dixie Mae.

      Lucky couldn’t be sure, but he thought maybe her eyes watered a bit. Then she was back to her usual self. There was something comforting about that.

      “I do have a favor to ask you,” she said. “That’s why I had the doc call you.”

      Lucky nodded. “I’m here, and I’m listening.”

      She patted his cheek. “The girls do like that pretty face of yours, but rust up your zippers a little. Or wear a bigger rodeo buckle. Might slow you down a bit so you can take time to enjoy something other than a woman’s secret place. Besides, some of those women you see don’t keep their places so secret.”

      “Neither do I,” Lucky reminded her. Then he winked. It was a good use of what might be the last wink he’d ever give her.

      “Don’t get fresh with me, boy. I don’t fall for monkey shit like that.”

      He figured she was saying that just to take away the tension in the room. But then again, it was her normal, surly mood and one of her normal, surly sayings.

      “Now,

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