The Red-Hot Chili Cook-Off Read Online Free PDF

joined the ladies.
    Sugar frowned at Patrice. “We ought to have a time of prayer before we even hear Carlene’s side of the story. Why did you create such a public scene? I heard you ruined a perfectly good Corvette by dancin’ on it like a low-class heathen and you screamed at him and that horrible woman in public. I know you were angry but Lenny might be sorry and straighten up. You need to pray to God for guidance in how to save your marriage.”
    â€œYes, ma’am, I surely did create a scene and even God can’t save this marriage,” Carlene said.
    Tansy popped her hands on her hips. “Sugar, we are not going to pray so get that out of your head. Prayer is not penicillin and it won’t cure everything from philanderin’ husbands to ingrown toenails. And who gives a rat’s ass if the town is talkin’. I’m proud of you, Carlene. Lenny had it comin’ if he’s been cheatin’. I wouldn’t put up with it and neither would you, Sugar, so don’t go all holier than thou on us.”
    The bell above the entrance door rang and more than a dozen women pushed their way into the store. Church ladies, gossip, and her mother all in five minutes! Carlene hadn’t even had time to process everything that had happened that morning and hell had just arrived in the form of a dozen church women.
    The first one through the doors said, “We’re here for our fittings. We brought our brown-bag special lunches with us because we only have an hour before we have to be at the church to practice for the Easter program. You know it’s less than three weeks and we have to be strapped down securely during the part when we all jump for joy. Last year I was wearin’ a button-up shirt and two buttons popped off and darlin’, the bra I was wearing did not do its job. Had to turn my back and work fast, I tell you. It was downright embarrassing. Alma Grace, I’ll go first.”
    â€œY’all can wait in the kitchen,” Carlene whispered to her mother and aunts. She’d managed to hold it together and not cry like a baby on her mother’s shoulder but it had taken a lot out of her.
    â€œHell, no! We ain’t waitin’ in no kitchen,” Tansy said. “We’ll go over to Clawdy’s and have some lunch. But we will be back and you hold your head up, girl. I mean it. Don’t you let those women talk you into changin’ your mind. I swear, I’ll kick your ass myself if you forgive that sumbitch. I knew something like this would happen. My poor bird, Dakshani, wouldn’t even eat his special treat this morning so I knew trouble was on the way.”
    â€œJesus couldn’t change my mind,” Carlene said.
    Sugar shook her finger at Carlene. “Don’t you be using the savior’s name like that.”
    â€œIt’s the truth, Aunt Sugar.”
    Her mother, Gigi, hugged her tightly and whispered, “I’ll gladly put out a contract on his sorry ass. You be thinkin’ about it.”
    Sugar kissed her on the cheek and whispered, “I’ll lift you up to Jesus in my prayers and he will help you to forgive Lenny.”
    Forgive Lenny? No way in hell. It was a black-and-white issue with no fuzzy gray edges. He cheated. No trust, no marriage.
    ***
    Tansy, Gigi, and Sugar lined up in order of birth and paraded across the street and down to the next corner. The Fannin girls had come to Cadillac and whether they thought Carlene was right or not, they’d stand by her. But of all three, Gigi was the one with smoke coming out of her ears. Her jaws ached from clamping them shut and she wanted to strangle someone just to get a little practice in for when she faced off with Lenny. If he’d abused her baby girl in addition to cheating on her, there would be more than a Corvette at the dealership with holes in it.
    Trixie was working the register at Clawdy’s that day. She and her best friends,