Free Refracted Crystal: Diamonds and Desire by M. J. Lawless

table, or anywhere else for that matter).
    While Daniel was changing, she looked out of the window across the city. To the north west she could make out the red spans of the Golden Gate Bridge extending across the bay, while to the east another bridge ran across an island to Oakland. Although they were based in the financial district, she knew from a map that not far away lay Chinatown and Fisherman’s Wharf, and when she returned her gaze to the bay she could just make out the forbidding rocky outcrop of Alcatraz, which sent a shudder of cathartic pleasure as she thought of the prison there. Such a thrill was entirely evanescent, of course, a passing thrill of considering herself and Daniel locked away together.
    “Will Anne and Andrew be staying here as well?” she asked as Daniel came through from the bathroom, dressed in jeans and a casual shirt.
    He nodded. “If I remember the details, they should be here in two days time, as well as another guest.”
    “Someone else?” Kris was intrigued and, for some reason, slightly troubled, wondering who out of Daniel’s past would come to their wedding. Until only a few days before, she had assumed that it would be the two of them and no-one else, but now things seemed to be shifting around. “Who?” She tried to make her voice sound as casual as possible.
    Yet he knew her too well, and realised that she was still nervous at the thought of the stranger. “Don’t worry,” he told her. “There’s only one person I would want to have at this time, someone who I know has my best interests at heart. In any case, she wants to see how you’ve developed since I first sent you to be checked out by her.”
    Pursing her lips in mock reprobation, Kris stood up on tip toe and kissed him on the cheek, suddenly understanding exactly who he meant.
    “Come on then,” he said, reaching for a jacket. “Let’s go and check out Chinatown. I’m starving!”
    Daniel had been about to call for their driver automatically, but as the fog had cleared now and the warm afternoon was turning into a balmy evening Kris insisted on walking. “I want to see the city,” she reprimanded him.
    He laughed at this: “Well, you’re in luck here. I guess New York’s not so bad, but for just about everywhere else in California it’s drive or nothing. San Francisco is a little more European, I suppose.”
    As they passed colonial revival and Mediterranean-styled houses mixed with more modern and contemporary shops and housing blocks, following the undulating streets as they rose and fell towards Chinatown, Kris understood what Daniel had meant about the city appearing more European. It was not simply reflected in the architecture, which was not as heavily built up as New York—a legacy of its disastrous earthquake—and included many white walled or blue painted houses that would not have looked out of place in Lisbon, but also because there were many more Hispanics here, going about their business through the bustling streets.
    Overall that European feel did not transform itself too much when they first entered Chinatown, although within a while Kris was confronted by several ostentatiously oriental buildings. Daniel pointed out the Bank of America, with its gold dragons and columns topped by a brightly-coloured Chinese style roof, and later the Sing Chong building which almost looked like a pagoda as they approached it. Hispanics and Caucasians were also increasingly replaced by Chinese occupants, and as the work day had not yet ended the shops and sidewalks hummed with noisy activity.
    “Come on,” said Daniel after they had glutted their eyes and ears with the sights and sounds of the district. “I’m still starving. If I remember correctly, this is a great place to eat. Nanking gets all the tourists, but this is much, much better.”
    The restaurant was much less gaudy than some that Kris had seen on the way, lacking any of the most obvious signs of being Chinese at all, and she had to