The Red-Hot Chili Cook-Off by Carolyn Brown Page B

sapphires reminded me of her eyes,” Jamie said.
    â€œI believe you. Kitty is mad because Lenny isn’t getting his way and she’s out to destroy what she can. I’ll talk to Mama.”
    â€œAnd until she comes to her senses, I’ll worship at the CNC church with you. I’m not sitting in the same church with her and Kitty,” Jamie said.
    Alma Grace pushed the half-eaten bowl of cereal aside.
    Dammit!
    She didn’t even bow her head and ask for forgiveness for thinking bad words. Instead she yelled it in her mind… dammit, dammit, dammit! There went any flirting with Jack Landry or sharing a hymn book or eating cookies with him. She’d have to sit beside her father and he’d insist upon sitting as close to the front as possible.
    â€œGot to get to work. You have a good day and I’ll see you at noon at Clawdy’s,” Jamie said.
    â€œShould I bring Mama?” Alma Grace asked.
    â€œOnly if she’s repented of accusing me of something I did not do and is ready to apologize to me,” Jamie said.
    Double dammit!
    Sugar Magee had never admitted a sin in her life. Her wings didn’t have the first sign of a smudge of dirt on them and her halo was so shiny and straight that even the angels envied her. There would be a foot of snow in Cadillac right in the middle of July before Sugar apologized to Jamie. It was going to be a long spring at Bless My Bloomers.
    She fumed all the way to work that morning but when she arrived and the aroma of fresh-baked cinnamon rolls hit her, she smiled. Her mama had brought her cook so things were looking up.
    â€œMaria?” Alma Grace looked around the kitchen.
    â€œShe’s on vacation, remember? Sit down and have some cinnamon rolls. I got them over at Clawdy’s this morning. How are you holding up, darlin’? Did your daddy send me any messages?” Sugar asked.
    Her blond hair was tucked back behind her ears but the curls were fighting their way out of confinement. Her blue eyes searched Alma Grace’s face for good news.
    â€œDaddy said that you need to apologize for not trusting him. He says that the woman kissed him and he backed off from her so he didn’t do anything and that he bought you the ring because the sapphires reminded him of your pretty blue eyes.”
    â€œI’m not apologizing for a problem I didn’t create.”
    Alma Grace cut a warm cinnamon roll right out of the middle of the pan and poured a tall glass of milk. “Mama, you don’t cook. Carlene only makes what she can heat up from the frozen section of the grocery store. You hate takeout food. How long do you think you can hold out like this?”
    â€œCinnamon rolls aren’t bad, are they?” Sugar said.
    Alma Grace took a deep breath and pulled out the big guns. “Kitty finds out that you are making daddy fast in the bedroom, I bet what she’ll be taking to the house won’t be roast and potatoes.”
    â€œShe wouldn’t!” Sugar gasped.
    â€œI think that she’s proven that she would in a heartbeat,” Alma Grace said.
    ***
    The aroma of hot cinnamon slipped up the stairs, through the crack under Carlene’s door, and made its way through the feather pillow she’d crammed over her head to keep out the noise of Aunt Sugar’s snores.
    A week ago she’d packaged up a cute little bright red outfit and rang up the sale to Bridget who was going to Vegas with her sugar daddy. That little red pair of panties didn’t have a tenth of a yard of fabric in them. Hell, they didn’t have enough material in them to sag a clothesline and yet they’d turned her world, her family, and the whole town of Cadillac upside down.
    She carefully removed the pillow from her head and got an even stronger dose of the cinnamon rolls. What would the scent of cooking do for sales? Would it make the customers hungry and they’d leave without buying anything?
    She rolled out