Alma's Mail Order Husband (Texas Brides Book 1) by Kate Whitsby

your
supper, folks,” she said. “You left it late enough. Come now before
it gets cold.”
    She set the plate of tortillas, the platter
of meat, and the bowl of grilled vegetables on the table.
    “We’ll need another chair,” Allegra pointed
out.
    Alma and Amelia stared at the table. “I
hadn’t thought of that,” Alma mumbled.
    “Here, Jude,” Allegra continued. “You take my
chair. I’ll get a stool from the barn to use until we can make
another chair. Don’t pay any attention to Alma. Just tell yourself
she was half out of her mind with excitement at the idea of
marrying you that she forgot just about everything else. She very
nearly forgot to pack her wedding dress in the back of the wagon
this morning.”
    “Allegra!” Alma gasped. “I told you not to
tell him!”
    “I’m trying to help you out, darling,”
Allegra shot back. “I’m trying to smooth over the fact that you
forgot to arrange for your new husband here to sit in a chair at
the supper table. Now stop complaining and eat. I’ll be back in a
minute.” She took a lit candle and stepped out into the night.
    At her command, Jude sat down in her chair.
Alma and Amelia took their usual places around the table along with
their father. Clarence intoned his usual blessing, and the family
fell to the food.
    Jude observed them without comment as they
each took a tortilla and filled it with meat and vegetables before
eating with their bare hands. He watched one person and then
another finish their first wrapped tortilla before starting
another. Only then did he reach for a tortilla of his own and fill
it from the platter and the bowl.
    No one noticed his hesitation. They munched
contentedly, occasionally making comments with their mouths full,
and pushed more food in when they finished.
    Allegra came back and helped herself. The
chewing and casual exchange of snatches of conversation filled the
little house.
    Jude took his first bite and chewed. After
the first few bites, he slowed, rolling the food over his tongue.
Cautiously, he opened his tortilla and peered into it in the light
of the lamp. He hesitated another moment. Then, he asked, “What is
this vegetable? I don’t think I’ve ever had it before.”
    The sisters glanced at each other. “It’s
prickly-pear cactus,” Allegra told him. “Oh, and green chili.”
    Now that he’d tipped his hand, the whole
family watched him chew up the mouthful he’d already taken and
waited for him to take another bite.
    “Don’t you like it?” Alma asked.
    Jude swallowed with great ceremony and took
another bite of the tortilla in his hand. “I like it alright. I’m
just not used to the taste. I’m sure I’ll get used to it.”
    A glance flew around the table, and a smile
twitched at the corners of Alma’s mouth.
    They ate silently for a while. Jude watched
the sisters help themselves to one portion of food after the other,
but he didn’t take another for himself. The stack of tortillas
shrank before his eyes.
    “Is this what you have every night?” he
asked.
    “Yep,” Alma replied. “We’ve eaten this every
night for as long as I can remember. Maybe you can ask Papa, but I
think we’ve always eaten this.”
    “Maybe Mama didn’t know how to cook anything
else,” Amelia put in.
    “I certainly don’t,” Allegra added. “This is
the only thing I ever learned how to cook. How about you, Alma? Did
Mama ever teach you how to cook anything else?”
    Alma shook her head. “She died when I was
nine. She’d just finished teaching me how to roll out the tortillas
and keep the fire going when she died. I guess none of us ever
really learned to cook properly.”
    “What about you, Jude?” Amelia asked. “What
would you eat at home in Amarillo?”
    Jude’s eyes flicked across the table toward
Clarence. “You know, meat and potatoes and some kind of greens. And
we’d almost always have some kind of pie or pudding for desert. My
mother makes good pies. She’s a very good cook.”
    “I