The Cost To Play (Slivers of Love) Read Online Free PDF Page B

street,” he told her. He made his way toward the check-out counter with a Stone Styler Stud Setting Starter Kit and stud refills. Jayne eyed his items with some interest.  “They are for a vest that I am working on,” he told her as he presented his teacher discount card at the register.  
    Jayne made a mental note. Dr. Toshi Yamaguchi was a teacher. This information she stored in her mind as she went to her car and followed behind his Mazda through the Kroger parking lot so they could reach the traffic light.  She was actually going to lunch with this man.  What are you doing Jayne?

    “ Bring your sketch pad,” Toshi told her as she climbed out of the car. How did he know she had one with her?   He followed behind her for a moment. She knew he was watching her ass, but he suddenly stopped short and checked his pockets. “Wait! I forgot my tea.”
    The liquid silver colored Mazda 3, looked exactly like something he would drive. It only took him a minute to retrieve the tea and place it in his left pocket. In his right hand he held a sketch pad and a tin of colored pencils. The walk would have been in silence if Timmy hadn’t intruded into the dead air between them.  Who knew that grumblings from a hungry stomach can serve as an ice breaker between two people. It made the possibility of spending some time with him seem, well, almost pleasurable. Despite what his mouth would fail to hold back, Jayne was pleased that Toshi was a gentleman by opening the door for her.
    Inside the restaurant Toshi quipped, “good. The fire place is going. Do you mind if we sit in front of it?”
    “Fine by me.”   She didn’t care if they sat on the floor. All she wanted was food. Lots of it and right now.  Toshi angled the table with the corner pointing toward the fire. He sat on one side of the table and she at the corner next to him.  It brought them closer together. “Let me see what you are working on Jayne.”
    It was said with such authority, that she felt she needed to do as the teacher instructed.  Slowly, she opened her sketch pad to share her work.  He eyed a few pages with interest, then opened his book and handed it to her.
    “I have an idea Jayne,” he told her as he opened the well-worn tin of colored pencils.  He laid her sketch pad flat and drew a rough outline of a man. She was instructed to do the same with a woman.  The waitress came to the table to take their orders.  Jayne kept it simple. “I want a burger with everything on it, a glass of water with lemon, and substitute the fries for a salad.”
    Toshi ordered a grilled chicken breast with rice and the vegetable of the day along with a pot of hot water for his tea.  While they waited for the food to arrive, Toshi took her sketch and began to color in the figure of the woman.  Jayne took his pad and began to work on Toshi’s sketch.  Displeased with his augmentation of the character’s breast, she reached over his arm, erased some of the fullness, and redrew in new lines, decreasing the character’s bustline from triple E’s to a manageable B cup.  He in turn erased some of the incorrect lines on the arms of the character, to redefine the pectoral muscles on the man’s chest.
    From any set of eyes, the two were completely absorbed into what they were doing.  To an untrained eye, no one would have known that this was their first time tinkering together as artist.  There was no need to explain that to a very surprised Ai, who walked into the restaurant and saw her ex, with a woman who was sketching in his favorite pad.  She knew it was his favorite pad because she had given it to him. Ai wondered what else the black woman had been doodling with!  Deep breaths were taken as Ai walked across the restaurant to the table, clearing her throat as she approached the couple.
    She would not insult the woman by speaking to him in Japanese, because he probably would only answer her in English.  “Toshi, what a surprise.”
    He looked up,