Mathias flips over a rabbit. “To understand another person—to accept them and want them to accept themselves, without changing who they are—is a rare thing to find. You are both very lucky. I was never so fortunate. But in my case, acceptance might have been too much to ask.”
He cuts into the rabbit, his gaze fixed on it. “It is too much to ask, isn’t it, Casey? I know that.”
I don’t know if I’m supposed to say something here, to tell him I’m okay with what he’s done.
“If I knew you’d done it—” I begin.
“Then you would need to tell Eric, and he would need to act. He would have to punish me, try to force me to tell him where Benjamin is, whether he wanted to or not. I understand all that. Which is why Benjamin has simply wandered off.” He looks at me. “Yes?”
I pause. Then I look him in the eye and say, “Yes.”