Crazy Cool by Tara Janzen Page B

away. Then it returned in full dazzle. “I’m Daniel,” he said, extending his hand.
    “Katya.” She took his hand in hers, felt its warm strength. “What did he just say?”
    “Superman, he tells me ‘Don’t touch,’ but—” His smile grew even broader as he gave their hands a quick glance. “We’re touching, no? Would you like a margarita or
una cerveza
? It’s on the house. Everything’s on the house for Cristo.”
    “Why is that?” she wondered aloud, gently retrieving her hand.
    “This is Mama Guadalupe’s
restaurante,
and many, many years ago, Cristo and his
amigos,
Quinn and Creed, they saved Mama Guadalupe’s life,” Daniel explained.
    She was beginning to detect a pattern here. No wonder they called him Superman. She also remembered Christian’s two friends. She’d repossessed a car with Hawkins and Creed Rivera one night, an experience as close to sneaking up in the middle of the night and stealing something as she’d ever had. It had been both exciting and terrifying, and something she still couldn’t believe she’d actually done. The other guy, Quinn Younger, she’d met one early morning when Christian had taken her to a chop shop on the north side of Denver, in an industrial area known as Commerce City. Quinn had been in the middle of dismantling a Honda Civic and none too happy about it. Hawkins had explained that they’d all gone clean, or at least tried to go clean—but sometimes old friends got into trouble and old debts came due, especially, it seemed, if the old friend was a guy named Sparky Klimaszewski. The next time she’d seen Quinn had been on a full-page photo spread in
People
magazine, his shirt unbuttoned, his pants unzipped, and a smile on his face that had made all kinds of promises. Unbelievably, the chop shop hood had become an all-American hero, an F-16 pilot shot down over some war-torn country who had lived to tell the tale and become one of
People
magazine’s Most Beautiful People.
    “The margaritas are very,
muy
good,” Daniel continued, his smile both teasing and encouraging her. “Rick is
famoso
in all of Denver for his margaritas, and for
mis amigos,
he uses only the finest
ingredientes,
only the freshest limes.”
    “Then I’ll have a margarita, thank you,” she said, just to be agreeable. It was the polite thing to do.
    “Ah, you won’t regret it,” he assured her, and signaled the bartender.
    She doubted if she would, as she had no intention of actually drinking it. What she intended to do was go home, on her own, and lock the door. To further that end, she gave Daniel a warm smile.
    “Could you call me a cab, please? Christian might be a while”—she hoped—“and I don’t really want to be waiting around very long.”
    “Absolutamente.”
Daniel grinned.
    She watched him leave and felt some relief at having finally taken back a little control.
    In retrospect, all that had really happened was a few fireworks going off—too close to the amphitheater, that was for darn sure, but still, it had only been fireworks. The biggest amount of damage had probably been to the paintings that had been on the stage. Alex, she knew, would have the complete lowdown on the Oleg Henri, and they would have to decide what to do if it was irreparably damaged—whether to write it off as a business loss, or whether it would still be considered a charitable contribution.
    The margarita arrived with a smile from the bartender, and to be polite, she took a small sip. Her hand shook just the tiniest bit, and a corner of her mouth twitched in a brief smile.
    Okay, she admitted it, she’d panicked, too. But there had been explosions, and fire, and people screaming, and she had been knocked senseless, and then Christian had come, and he’d been all over her—but she wasn’t going to think about that. Not now. Not ever.
    She took another sip of the margarita, looking over the top of the salt-rimmed glass for Daniel. He was flirting with the hostess at the front