So my plan to get her nothing for V day other than a card seems inappropriate.
So what do I do? I don't think anything too romantic would be right

Romantic overtures work best when the recipient is open to them.

I really like the dinner idea. I may do that.

Well, ya gotta eat anyway.

Hell, she may have a date planned. What do I do?

Ask if the date is available.

I think if I ask her, she will say to do nothing

Of course. That's why a guy is usually better off never asking what she wants to do, but just taking the lead based on your knowledge of what she likes to do.

Here's a short lesson on "woman-speak":

He: "Honey, what would you like to do?"
She: "Nothing, baby. Really, it's OK/We can't afford it anyway/Anything you'd like to do is OK with me/Just staying home is fine/Don't go to any fuss, really.

Any of which means:

"Plan something nice and surprise me".

So, it could be dinner out, or dinner in. And chocolates, mmmm.

My history with ALL holidays is that I really like to go all out for her

Going "all out" isn't the impressive key you think it is.

As for the sex thing, it has never really been all that natural for us. It has been good (I think) for both of us but getting started has been an issue. She doesn't believe in a woman being aggressive when it comes to initiation so she hardly ever did it. I somehow developed some esteem issues along the way and found it hard to initiate so I would resort to the "test run" method of seeing if she was in the mood (i.e. try touching somewhere during back rub, etc) and that was how it usually worked... after being shut down more than a few times, I guess I got tired of the rejection and stopped.

You got into a rut, a routine where a back rub becomes associated with you wanting sex. This happened to me too. I'd start off rubbing her back, not because I wanted sex, but I'd get turned on massaging her back and would therefore desire to have sex.

After my breakup, one day when she was here packing things, I noticed she was rubbing her neck and I asked her if she'd like me to massage her neck for her. She did, and into the massage we moved over to the bed, she disrobed a bit and I continued to massage her back and just kept it in mind that this was not about having sex. I ended up giving her what she called "the best massage of her life", now that sex was out of its equation and it was purely an act of service to her, no strings attached.

Now I'm not saying I didn't get turned on, nor that I didn't want to jump her bones, but that I focused on her needs, and put mine away for the moment.

Now, that was in June of '04. We did nothing like that again. Fast forward to May of '05, we were at a photography exhibit together, and from standing and walking all day, she mentioned her feet were starting to hurt, and I simply rubbed her back slightly in an empathetic way. I mentioned that my back was starting to hurt from just standing around and she said, "Would you like me to rub your back?" I was like, duh, yeah! So she got behind me and slipped her hand under my shirt and rubbed away at the small of my back. I was floored!

What to surmise? Maybe that back rubs no longer were signals for sex, and now, without sex as a component in it, they could become venues for demonstrating care.