Ken sighed. "Well, what's done is done, I guess. We obviously can't bring him back to life. We'll just have to make sure we've covered your tracks completely."

"I covered them," said Vivian. "Nobody will ever find out."

"All right. Is there anything else I should know?"

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Vivian did not answer right away.

In fact, now she was avoiding eye contact.

Ken was not happy about this. "What happened?" he asked.

"There were complications."

"What kind of complications?"

"You swore you wouldn't get mad."

"Right. I'll stick to that. Just tell me about these complications."

"Your gross friend showed up with a gross woman and I had no other choice."

Ken suddenly felt like he needed the flask of whiskey that he kept in the glove compartment. His legs went numb and for a moment he thought he might keel over right there. "Had no other choice but to do what?"

"What do you think? You can't put the pieces together?"

"Please tell me you're just messing with me."

"You're the one who rented a house with a sleaze bucket. I'm sorry I had to do it, but it's not like the world has lost a fine human being. He was a sweaty pig who brought some slut over for a lunchtime fuck session. Boo-hoo. Society will cope."

"I'm not saying that he was an upstanding citizen. I don't give a shit that he's dead. I give a shit that you murdered three people in a day! I chose my victims carefully. I spaced them out. You went on a killing spree!"

"What was I supposed to do? Tell them to ignore all of the gore; the maid would take care of it?"

"Make up an excuse! Send them away! Tell him that you found out I was renting the place and you were pissed!"

"I was covered in blood. I can't help but think they might have suspected that something was amiss."

"He's got a wife!"

"So? I'm guessing that he didn't tell her where he was going or who he was with. He was here to bang his mistress. He covered his own tracks."

Ken couldn't believe they were having this conversation. It was difficult for him to not just start smashing his head against the wall until his skull shattered. This was absolute madness.

"Shit," he said. "Shit, shit, shit."

"Why are you so upset?"

"You knew I'd done this kind of thing before."

"Yeah, and you said you'd gotten it out of your system before we met."

"Well, apparently you brought it right back. I thought you might be happy. This opens the door to us doing it together."

"You seriously thought I'd say, 'Good job, honey!' For real?"

"No," said Vivian. "But maybe we could discuss the idea that this isn't necessarily such a bad thing."