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morning and the woman didn’t know that Carlene was Lenny’s wife. And they had a face-off right there in the showroom. Gossip says that Bridget, that’s the other woman’s name, tried to eat the red thongs.”
    â€œHoly shit!” Tansy said.
    Gigi frowned and her eyebrows shot up a notch. “I’d have shot both of them on the spot. Carlene could do it, too. She’s a fine shot. I taught her myself. I would never put up with philanderin’ and Hank Carmichael knows it.”
    Tansy jabbed a fork into a chicken-fried steak. “I’ll call both of you so you can get your black suits out of the cleaners if Alex Cordell pulls a damn stunt like that. Our poor Carlene.”
    â€œNothing is an unforgivable sin except blaspheming the Lord’s name,” Sugar said.
    Gigi went back to the buffet for a second bowl of beans.
    ***
    Carlene could determine a woman’s bra size just by looking at her, but she brought out three tape measures, strung one around her neck and tossed one to each of her cousins. It made the customers feel like they were getting their money’s worth if they got the full treatment with measurements and lots of choices.
    She’d come up with the idea of Bless My Bloomers when she couldn’t find fancy lingerie to fit her size-sixteen figure and had started making it herself. The original plan was that it would cater to plus-size women, that it would be sexy, stylish, and affordable. But it had quickly become a store for all sizes and it was sexy, sometimes downright slutty, and they took credit cards, cash, and checks to make it affordable.
    She wrapped the tape around her customer’s breasts and wrote the number down on a sticky note. “You need a 38D.”
    â€œIs that the size the woman had on that you slapped the devil out of this mornin’?” The woman’s eyes bored into Carlene’s. “I heard that you flat out put her on the ground and Lenny had to break up the fight. And then you jumped up on a Corvette and stomped holes in it and that you pulled a pistol out of your bra and waved it around. Also that Sam is so mad at Lenny that he’s making him pay for the Corvette. Is that hussy really pregnant with Lenny’s baby?”
    â€œDidn’t lay a hand on her. She did the talkin’ mostly and I just listened and I don’t own a pistol. I do have a rifle but Daddy keeps it at his house,” Carlene said. “I’ll be back in a minute. I’ll bring four different styles in for you to try on.”
    The lady snorted. “I’d have liked to have been there to see whatever went on even more than having a good fittin’ brassiere. But you know you vowed to love him for better or worse. It don’t say that you can’t make him miserable when you take him back. Lord knows, I’d get a new car out of the deal and maybe a new diamond ring, too. Sam might even give you a new car if you’d go back to Lenny. And once you settle your differences with him, we’ll all have a night of prayer for that young lady to see the error of her ways. There’s lots of good homes she can put that baby into for adoption. Did she know he was married?”
    â€œYes, ma’am, she did,” Carlene said.
    Dammit! Carlene didn’t want to talk about Lenny. She didn’t want advice. Just hearing his name made her angry yet wrung out her heart like an old rag mop. How in the hell had the news already gotten all over Grayson County? Her Mama was right when she said that gossip spread faster than the plague and did as much damage. She inhaled deeply, held her breath, and then let it out very slowly, and wished that the day would end.
    Her phone rang while she was picking 38D bras from the rack in the stockroom and she answered it without even looking at the ID.
    â€œYou over your mad spell? How about dinner at our favorite little Italian place in McKinney tonight? I’ll pick you up at