Read Online The Red-Hot Chili Cook-Off by Carolyn Brown - Free Book Online Page B

pissed him off pretty good when she called Bridget, but he deserves it.” Josie got up and busied herself washing up the dirty cups and saucers.
    â€œThere goes the house and everything in it.” Patrice sighed.
    â€œI don’t want anything except Granny Fannin’s candlesticks. Mama gave them to me for our first anniversary and I want those back. The rest of it he can have, long as he doesn’t try to touch Bless My Bloomers. I’ll fight with him until my dying breath before he touches a dime of our profits,” Carlene said.
    â€œSurely he wouldn’t be that stupid,” Patrice said.
    â€œI don’t know. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned or a man who’s been caught with his under-britches down around his knees,” Josie said.
    â€œAmen,” Carlene muttered.
    Alma Grace hit the table with her fist. “Or an angel who got her wings stolen. I hope Kim gets laryngitis and can’t sing a note. When they come to ask me to step in, I’m going to tell them to…”
    â€œSpit it out. Might as well say it as think it.” Josie grinned.
    Alma Grace bit her lower lip. “I will tell them to go to hell. That’s not a cuss word, it is a destination. And I’m not praying for them or their program. I hope it’s a big flop. And I’m still mad at you, Carlene.”

Chapter 4
    Alma Grace slid into the back pew of the Christian Nondenominational Church. No one called it that, but in keeping up with the current trend toward using initials for everything, it was simply the CNC church. She kept her head down and felt condemned for not going to the church where she’d gone her whole life. But the Bible said that under no circumstances was it okay to commit murder even if it was justifiable. If she had to sit in the same room that night with those so-called sanctimonious witches who’d stolen her halo and wings, she’d be sorely tempted to blow the bottom right out of the sixth commandment.
    When she was a little girl, the building where the CNC church was located had been a grocery store and her mama brought her along to do the weekly grocery shopping. When the grocery store went out of business, it was converted into a convenience store/gas station and she remembered filling up the gas tank on her little hot-pink Mustang and buying candy bars and Cokes in the store.
    Now it was a church and there she was sitting on the back pew. She’d been in the church a few months earlier for a wedding but it had been all decorated that day and had looked real pretty. Now it was bare and kind of sad looking, but peace wrapped around her like a nice warm fleecy blanket on a cold winter night.
    Surely God did not want her to attend services there? Her spiritual gift was her voice and there was no choir loft. Not even a few folding chairs back behind that hideously old pulpit that had been painted crimson red. Pews lined either side with a center aisle between them but not even one tapestry or stained glass window graced the bare walls.
    The clock behind the pulpit dinged seven times and Darla Jean took her place behind the podium. “Happy Wednesday, everyone. Let’s begin our service by opening our hymn books to page one hundred and we’ll all sing ‘I’ll Fly Away’ together.”
    Alma Grace had heard better harmonizing but there was something about the way the congregation got into the hymn that melted her heart. The woman playing the ancient upright piano must have listened to quite a bit of Floyd Cramer because she sure put a lot of his type of runs into the music.
    They were in the middle of the second song when someone touched her on the shoulder and she moved down the pew enough to let Jack Landry slide in beside her. “I’m late but I’m here,” he whispered.
    She pointed at the number on the hymnal page. Instead of reaching for his own book from the back of the pew in front of them, he nodded and