"Are you offering to French me?" I asked."Not yet!" She had a glittering sound to her voice. "Just for you, now. It messes up my perception."I lit up ...he joint, took a few deep inhales, rose and stretched (keeping the towel around me), then sat back down. "O.k., I'm ready again." Good. Go back to the same pose. You look lovely there."She was, it seemed, the consummate professional. If ever I could imagine being a model for a professional artist, in a professional setting, she was doing it. Then. It was easy to see from the frown on his face that he was unhappy with his assignment but I knew he would do the job with the thoroughness of a trained detective and it would keep him out of my hair for the rest of the day.I knew Julie was brimming over with a need to find out exactly what Raymond was doing in our office, but I was reluctant to fill her in on my Uncle’s strange request to keep my cousin out of trouble while the boys over in Internal Affairs were rooting around in our. A great big cat was sunning itself on the shelf just opposite the stones that had been our fire pit. It was a male sabre-toothed tiger.My first instinct on seeing it was to turn my Argo to the right and try and keep away from the big cat. I was able to do it, but Tilly didn't follow me. She continued into the clearing for another ten feet before slamming on the brakes. Obviously, she hadn't seen the big cat like I had. Lizzy ended up turning left. It was a total mess and it had gotten the. . then I’ll dump you on the street. Let’s see how long you last then!”Her mouth was open in astonishment.‘You’d do that? ... To your own mother?”“Damn straight. Now are you going to say yes, or do I start by getting the belt?”“Kyle ... PLEASE!”“Shut up and decide, Mother!”They both knew what her answer would be, but for different reasons. Kyle assumed that the threat of a severe whipping and being literally thrown into the street penniless would get him what he wanted.But while the whipping and.