"My work comes first," Victor says simply, though a touch curt, "and where I come from, very few women could understand the work I do." Miss Ives has been the only one he's met with such experience and he feels more of a brother to her. It does not help, of course, that there is a demon that lives in her and knows all of Victor's secrets, every one more shameful until they reach the worst of all. "Unfortunately, I am never lonely," he adds, with a ruefulness that is begotten from experience.