Even Sherlock Holmes might suggest that "waiter" versus "server" was a bit of a stretch. So, again, this wasn't suspicious.

But she couldn't deny that it was a bit troubling.

* * *

"Excuse me?" Ken asked.

"You know you heard me."

"Tell me again."

"I get to do one."

Ken felt a little sick to his stomach. Not the gut-churning sensation he'd felt when Vivian had forced him to show her the basement, but sick nevertheless.

"I thought you got that out of your system before we met."

"I did. And now I want to do it again."

"I don't think it's a good idea."

"Why?"

"You could get caught."

Vivian let out a snort of laughter. "You've got a basement full of girls in cages. I'm going to go out on a great big old limb and say that I'd be at less risk of getting caught than you."

Ken shook his head. "I don't want that."

"Then maybe you shouldn't have lied about what a deviant you are. You get your girls. I get my man. That's fair."

"I know, but..."

"But you're okay with a double standard?"

"It's different."

"How?"

Ken had no good answer for that. "I thought you said you weren't interested in that anymore."

"I wasn't. Now I am. People change. And sometimes they aren't what they pretend to be."

Damn it. This had been going so well for a while.

"Didn't you fuck them before you killed them?" Ken asked.

"Yes."

"Is that still part of the deal?"

"I haven't decided."

"Well, it's a pretty important part."

"Again, you've got eight or nine women in cages in a basement. Fucking a guy then stabbing him to death doesn't come anywhere close."

"I wasn't allowed to rape them."

"I wouldn't be raping him."

"I wasn't allowed to have consensual sex with them."

"I get that."

"So you're the one with the double standard."

"Maybe," said Vivian. "But your double standard is infinitely worse."

"I wouldn't say infinitely."

"I would."

"No. I'm not going to let you do that."

"I won't have sex with him, then. I'll lure him with the promise, but I won't go through with it."

"How far will you go?"

"I don't know."

"I need to know that."

"Let me be clear about something," said Vivian. "I didn't say that I want one of my own. I said that I get one of my own. You betrayed my trust in a big way. You put our whole family at risk. You made it so Jared could lose his father. So if it means that now I get to do something that makes you uncomfortable, well, you should have thought about that before you lived out your sickest fantasies without telling me."

"So...a random guy?"