Page 54 of The Sugar and Spice Bookshop Bakery

He unwraps his arms, stepping away from her. She immediately misses his presence, wishes their Ghost moment could have gone on for longer, that she’d just enjoyed it whilst it lasted instead of going on about ‘Unchained Melody’ and Demi Moore and one of them being dead. She wants to go back in time, to edit the scene, to change it. She wants to make herself behave like the heroine in a romance, saying something witty perhaps. Wants Jack’s arms not to let go when he lifts his hands from the dough, but to turn her round to face him, to press his lips onto hers and—

‘Lemons,’ he says. ‘D’you have any lemons?’

‘Er, ’fraid not. I made a batch of lemon drizzle yesterday, so I need to buy more.’

‘Chocolate? Pistachios?’

She shakes her head. ‘Neither, I’m afraid.’

‘What sort of a bakery is this?’ he says, but he’s smiling. ‘Vanilla?’

‘That I do have,’ she says, reaching into the cupboard and taking out a small jar of vanilla bean paste, which she’s always preferred to the more usual essence. ‘And I have ricotta too.’

‘I’m impressed.’

‘Yeah, well, you never know when a handsome Italian is going to drop by and you’ll need to impress him with your stock of Italian cheeses.’

She means it as a joke, but Jack seems to take it seriously. ‘You have other Italian cheeses?’

‘Er, no. There might be a bit of Parmesan going mouldy in the back of the fridge upstairs, but the ricotta is probably it. I was going to make a cheesecake. But we can use it for this.’

Jack shows her how to prepare the filling, beating the soft cheese with some icing sugar and a little of the vanilla paste.

‘Here, try it.’ He holds out the spoon.

Louise leans forward and tastes. ‘That’s gorgeous. Sweet, but not too sweet.’

‘Exactly.’ He grins. ‘Nonna would approve.’

When it comes to rolling the dough, Louise makes a mess of it. Her first attempt tears. The second is too thick.

‘Relax,’ Jack says. ‘Don’t overthink it. You need a very light touch.’ He reaches for the same rolling pin she’s holding, and their fingers brush. They both pause for a second, then he laughs. ‘Sorry. Here, you do it. I’ll just… supervise. Gently now. It’s like sawing a piece of wood. You just guide the saw through the wood, you don’t push it. It doesn’t need force.’

By the fourth attempt, she’s got it. Thin enough to see light through.

‘Yes! Like that!’ He seems genuinely excited by her success.

Jack pops home, returning with a collection of metal tubes, and they work side by side, wrapping dough around them, then frying them carefully.

When the first batch is cool enough, Jack pipes ricotta into one shell and hands it to her. ‘The moment of truth.’

She bites in. The shell snaps with a satisfying crack, whilst the filling is rich and smooth.

‘How is it?’

‘Delicious,’ she says.

‘You did well for a first attempt.’ He’s watching her with something like pride in his expression.

‘Thank you, but I had a lot of help. Try it?’

She holds the remaining half of the cannoli out to him, and he takes it all in his mouth, his lips brushing her fingers.

‘Hmmm.’ His eyes half closed. ‘Nearly as good as the ones Nonna used to make.’

‘Nearly as good?’ she teases.

‘No one makes them like Nonna used to. Although I have to say, these come a pretty close second.’