Fiona Harper - Italian Bachelors - Ruthless Propositions - Taming Her Italian Boss / The Uncompromising Italian / Secrets of the Playboy's Bride

After a minute or so, Max helped Sofia wind the line up again, and this time a tiny green-and-brown mottled crab was hanging from the end. It was hanging on with grim determination, as if it had decided it was his dinner on that hook and he wasn’t giving it up for anybody.

Sofia squealed. Ruby shot forward, meaning to comfort her, but she realised when she saw the little girl’s eyes shining that the noise had been one of delight, not fear. In fact, Sofia was so pleased with her catch that she reached out to grab it as Max tried to gently shake it from the line into a bucket he’d filled with canal water.

Then came another squeal. This one high-pitched and urgent. It seemed Sofia had been a little too enthusiastic, and the crab had thought her a little too tempting, because it had clutched on to her with its free pincer. Ruby quickly darted in and shook it away, but Sofia’s eyes filled with tears and she looked at her hand in horror. ‘Naughty!’ she said vehemently. ‘Bad fish!’

Ruby scooped her up and gave her a hug, then bent to kiss the red patch on her finger. The skin wasn’t broken and she was probably more surprised and offended than in real pain. She pulled back and smiled at the little girl. ‘He just liked you so much he didn’t want to let go,’ she told her.

Sofia’s eyes grew wide. ‘Fish like me?’

Ruby nodded. ‘He’s a crab, not a fish, and, yes, I think he thought you looked very tasty.’

Sofia screwed up her face and chuckled heartily. ‘Silly fish,’ she said leaning over the bucket and peering at her catch. ‘No bite Sofia. Kiss.’ And she puckered up her lips and bent over farther. Ruby caught her quickly before she got any other ideas.

‘Why don’t we see if we can find him a friend?’ And she indicated where Max was waiting with the crabbing line.

Sofia grinned. ‘Want lots and lots friends.’

So that was what they did for the next forty-five minutes—found lots and lots of friends for the little green-and-brown crab. Ruby and Max worked as a team, keeping a firm hold on Sofia when she got over-excited and tried to lean too far over the water, and dealt with crabs and bait when needed. After the first handful of attempts they settled into an easy rhythm, giving them lulls in the action while the bait dangled in the water.

Ruby took an opportunity to look around at the buildings. She wished she had her sketchpad with her—and a free hand—so she could draw them. ‘There are so many wonderful shapes to be seen in this city,’ she said, sighing. ‘What’s that called?’ She showed Max the building on the far side of the canal, where the stonework around a window curved to a point at the top.

‘It’s an inflected arch,’ he said.

‘It makes me think of far-off lands and tales of Arabian nights.’

‘It’s interesting that you say that, because a lot of Venetian architecture has Eastern influences. Merchants travelled to the Byzantine Empire and traded with the Moors and they came back and combined those shapes with the European gothic architecture to create a unique style.’

She pointed to another building. ‘And what about those ones? They’re beautiful. At first it just looks like intricate shapes, but then you can see that the fussier patterns are actually made up of intersecting circles.’

He turned to look at her and didn’t say anything for a few moments. ‘You have a good eye for shapes.’

She shrugged and then bent down to help Sofia shake another crab off her line into the bucket. ‘Thank you. I like to draw sometimes. I suppose it’s just something I’ve picked up.’

Max took the line from his niece for a moment and worked out a few tangles before giving it back to her. ‘Is that what you’ve been doing when I’ve seen you scribbling away in that notebook of yours?’

She nodded. She hadn’t realised he’d noticed. ‘It’s just a hobby. Nothing impressive, really.’

‘You haven’t thought of making a career out of it?’ He gave her a dry smile. ‘Seeing as you’ve tried everything else?’

‘Ha, ha. Very funny. Go for the easy target, why not?’ Everyone else did.

‘Seriously, if you love it so much, why don’t you do something with it?’

She tipped her head to one side. ‘You mean, like you did?’

‘I suppose so.’

She looked down at the water below them, at the way the light bounced off the surface, moving constantly. ‘I don’t think I’d be able to do what you do. It’s very structured and disciplined. When I draw, I just go with the flow. I see something that interests me and I capture it. I’m not sure you can make a career out of that.’

‘You have plenty of discipline,’ he said. ‘Look at the way you are with Sofia. And sometimes you need that creative spark to liven all that structure up.’ He let out a long sigh and stared at the buildings across the water.

‘More fish! More fish!’ Sofia shouted, jumping up and down so hard she almost toppled into the canal. Ruby kept a firm hand on her as she shook the most recent catch into the bucket to join his friends. Sofia did it so vigorously that Ruby was sure the poor thing must have a concussion.

When Sofia was happily dangling the line in the canal again, Ruby looked at Max. ‘What’s up?’ she asked. ‘Was it something I said?’

He sighed again and crouched down to look at where Sofia was pointing at some silvery fish swimming near the surface of the water. ‘No. It’s something I said.’

She waited for him to stand again.

‘It’s a commission for the Institute of Fine Art,’ he told her. ‘I’ve worked for months on a preliminary design that I’m really proud of, but the board say they’re not sure about it.’

Ruby shook her head. She couldn’t believe that. The designs she’d glimpsed were amazing. They were totally Max, of course. No frills. No fuss. Nothing ostentatious. But there was an elegance to the simplicity. A pared-back beauty. ‘Why on earth not?’

He shrugged. ‘I think the actual phrase they used is that they want more “wow factor”.’

A screech from around knee level interrupted their conversation. Ruby hadn’t noticed it while she’d been talking to Max, but the bucket was now almost full and the crabs were scrambling over each other in an attempt to climb out.

Max knelt down next to his niece. ‘It’s time to put them back now,’ he said matter of factly and tipped the bucket over to let a stream of crustaceans, legs flailing, fall back into the salty lagoon water.

‘No!’ The exclamation was loud and impassioned and followed immediately by a stream of hot tears. ‘Want friend! Want friend!’

Ruby grabbed for the bucket and righted it. Only three crabs remained in the bottom.

Sofia stopped shouting and sniffed. ‘Want take fish home.’

Ruby crouched down beside her, put an arm round her shoulders and joined her in looking into the bucket. She might be wrong, but she thought one of the three crabs left might be the little one they’d caught first. ‘We can’t take them back to Grandma’s, sweetie. They belong here in the water. It’s their home. We just picked them out to say hello for a little bit.’

Sofia let out a juddering sigh.

‘Why don’t we put the last ones back one by one and say a nice goodbye to them?’

Sofia frowned. ‘Come back ʼmorrow say hello?’

Ruby smiled. ‘If you want.’

The little girl nodded. Ruby looked inside the bucket and then up at Max. ‘How do we...?’

Quick as anything his hand plunged into the bucket and he pulled out a crab. ‘There’s a trick to it. If you hold them at the back of the shell like this, they can’t reach to pinch you.’

He held the crab up for Sofia to see. She puckered up her lips. ‘Kiss fish?’ she asked.