Wrapped Up in Christmas Joy - Janice Lynn Page 0,17
a wonderful idea to award a Quilt of Valor to Cole.”
“Me, too.” After reading his journal, she couldn’t imagine anyone more deserving or in need of one. “I’d like to make him a quilt myself.”
Everyone in the room’s eyes bore into Sophie and she fought to keep her expression casual.
“Because you feel badly for what he went through?” Carrie asked.
Sophie bit the inside of her lower lip, then nodded. “Yes. If ever a Marine needed to be wrapped in a quilt of healing, Cole Aaron does, and I want to be the one to make his quilt.”
“Well, you know what happened when I made Bodie’s quilt,” Sarah reminded with a smile.
Sophie fought bursting out laughing at Sarah’s insinuation. Bodie had come to Pine Hill to say thank you to his quiltmaker and he’d ended up falling in love with Sarah.
Forget coming to town to thank her—Cole seemed more likely to leave town to avoid her. Sophie could wrap Cole in a dozen quilts, and she doubted he’d forgive her reading his journal, much less feel gratitude and love toward her.
She’d never made a quilt with the expectation of receiving either of those. She made them because of the gratitude she felt, the love she felt, toward the military who gave and sacrificed so much for their fellow countrymen.
She made each and every quilt for her father.
She would make Cole a red, white, and blue quilt and maybe, since she might never be able to say the words, doing so would let him know he was appreciated.
Dreading the next couple of hours, Cole parked his SUV in the only vacant parking spot in front of Sophie’s quilt shop.
The store was located in a row of similar buildings that ran the length of one side of the town square. Its antique brick exterior had been painted a country blue trimmed with white, giving it a unique look. The quilt shop’s windows shone with a colorful display of red, green, and gold fabrics and a Christmas quilt was displayed over a rocking chair with a message about being thankful. The tan awning above the entrance was pristine.
Garlands festooned with lights wrapped around the windows and door and a big wreath hung on the door, matching several other businesses around the square. A bench sat out front and someone had tied big red bows on each end. Old fashioned lamp posts lined the street and were heavily decorated with snow flocked garland and ribbons of their own.
The whole place looked like something from a magazine article about small towns or like it belonged on a Christmas postcard where someone jotted a happy note about days gone by. Warm, inviting, nostalgic, festive.
A sign with a large needle with a thread looped through it was painted onto Sophie’s shop’s window front. The Threaded Needle.
Catchy. Had Sophie chosen the name or had the shop been around longer than she had? Despite its spotless refurbishing, it appeared as if it could have been a cornerstone of the square since the town had been established in the eighteen-hundreds.
A quilt shop.
Perhaps her excuse to Ben of being busy sewing made more sense than Cole first thought.
Thinking of his friends made him grimace. They’d not let up on the Sophie jokes since they’d bumped into her at the toy drive meeting on Tuesday evening. No, before that. They’d been at it since her firehall visit. Which was why he’d offered to meet Sophie at her workplace rather than his when she’d wanted to immediately start crossing off businesses on their list during her lunch break.
He worked twenty-four on, forty-eight off most of the time, so meeting her hadn’t been a problem. He didn’t have to be back at the station until the following morning.
Climbing out of his SUV, he glanced around, a cool breeze whipping at the flannel shirt he’d thrown over his T-shirt before heading out. He’d driven through the square many times, had frequented the local pawnshop located on one side for used farm equipment, had even helped put out a fire in an upstairs apartment above one of the businesses, but he paused to take in the stately courthouse that was the center of Pine Hill as he always did.
Automatically standing a little taller, full of pride, he lifted his gaze to the flag that flew high and majestic at the top of a pole out front, seeming to stand guard above the small town.
God Bless America was printed on a large wooden sign on the courthouse yard,