Her Sugar Cookie Heart

By Sarita Leone

Willie Sharpe and Liz Klein were high school sweethearts but their plans to marry in December 1940 are put on hold when war in Europe calls him away. When he returns to the States, he brings a French wife with him.

Twenty years later, Liz has learned to live with her broken heart. The respected New York artist has moved on. The only reminder of her past are the heart shaped cookies she has the local baker snap in half.

Then Willie shows up out of nowhere looking to rekindle their romance. Will it take Christmas magic for Liz to give him a second chance at love?

• Language: Unknown
• Publisher: The Wild Rose Press
• Release date: Dec 15, 2021
• ISBN: 9781509238514

Book preview

The usual?

She held up two fingers. They shook ever-so slightly.

Ah, a two-cookie kind of day. He removed two of the bakery’s best-selling heart-shaped cookies and set them on baker’s paper on the counter. After grabbing a white bag, he took first one cookie, then the other, and snapped the frosted hearts in half before placing them in the bag and turning down the top. Just the way you like ‘em.

Thanks. She pushed two quarters across the glass countertop and took the bag from him with a forced smile. Ignoring the voice behind her didn’t mean that it disappeared. He must still be there, a few steps away and close enough to witness her discomfort. See you tomorrow.

You got it, Liz. The baker gave her a fast wave.

The moment she avoided couldn’t be put off any longer. She turned to leave and came face to face with the man who’d broken her heart as easily as Bigley snapped sugar cookies.

He stood before her an older man, but she would have recognized him anywhere. The same cornflower-blue eyes, smile that raised one edge of his upper lip higher than the other, and soul-penetrating gaze.

You haven’t changed a bit. His voice had grown deeper and held a hint of something she couldn’t put her finger on. Experience, maybe. Who could tell? Tiny wrinkles radiated from the corners of his eyes when he smiled. Still gorgeous.

Praise for Sarita Leone

This story by Sarita Leone has it all—beguiling romance, tangled hearts, desperate danger, a princess in need of rescue, and even folks who turn up out of the past. It has the feel of an old-time holiday movie.

~Laura Hartland

on A Wylder Christmas

~*~

This was a lovely book that put a smile on my face as the story was told to perfection. A great read.

~Dru Love, Dru’s Book Musings

on Tip-A-Canoe for Two

Her

Sugar Cookie Heart

by

Sarita Leone

Christmas Cookies

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental.

Her Sugar Cookie Heart

COPYRIGHT © 2021 by Sarita Leone

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author or The Wild Rose Press, Inc. except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

Contact Information: [e-mail]

Cover Art by Diana Carlile

The Wild Rose Press, Inc.

PO Box 708

Adams Basin, NY 14410-0708

Visit us at www.thewildrosepress.com

Publishing History

First Edition, 2021

Digital ISBN 978-1-5092-3851-4

Christmas Cookies

Published in the United States of America

Dedication

Always and forever for the man who will hold my heart through this lifetime…and all that follow.

Sempre per sempre, Vito.

Prologue

New York Port of Embarkation

Brooklyn, New York

December 22, 1940

Willie Sharpe reached into the inner pocket of his olive drab wool military-issue jacket and pulled out a photograph. The most precious possession he’d carry, more important even than any weapon he’d sling over his left shoulder.

His heart ached when he gazed at the beautiful face smiling up at him. How he wished she were in his arms now. He’d give anything to be back in Glens Falls, holding her close and promising to make her dreams come true.

Instead, he stood shoulder to shoulder with thousands like him. Men who left families and friends behind, walked away from hometown darlings, jobs, and lives to make the world safe for those they did not know, in places they’d have been happy to never see.

He closed his eyes. The memory of her lips pressed against his sent a wave of heat through him that brought comfort as well as longing. Memories. They were all he’d have to sustain him through whatever lay ahead. He prayed they were enough and that somehow he’d find his way home to the woman who held his heart.

She’s a beauty. Your wife? A voice near his shoulder brought him back to reality.

He shook his head and took one more look