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The vision cuts out as the spark shuts Mitri out again. The memory settles back into the darkness of my mind, but the damage is done.

I open my eyes, and I’m stuck between two men in the middle of the bench seat. Ben is glancing at me from the corner of his eye with a frown, and Mitri is as still as a statue to my right. It takes me a moment to orient myself back into the present and know I’m safe. Safe being a relative term at this point.

The man I am now connected to is definitely a killer, and I don’t know how to process that. It’s one thing to see him kill a threat. It’s a whole other ball game toknow he has a kill room beneath where he sleeps. Kudos to him for keeping it so clean, but what the fuck?

Is this, hey, I just kill random people off the street? Does he have issues with his mother? If so, his wife learned the hard way. Exactly how concerned should I be here?

“Is everything ok?” Ben asks grimly without taking his eyes off the road.

Oh, Ben, how do I explain this without us all dying in a fiery car crash?

Stop thinking about being set on fire.

“I just need to think for a second,” I try to reassure him while I gasp in breaths like I just came up from drowning.

Why would he show me that?

Mitri isn’t stupid. He would have known what he was doing. He probably didn’t expect his imagery to get hijacked into one of my number one least favorite memory, but here we are. What was the purpose? Also, didhesee my memory?

“Hey, open the link,” I tell the spark. It’s hiding away from the green rope that binds us to him and does not move.

“This is why you need consent,” I chide it. This is an extreme version of why you need it, but an ace is an ace.

“Almost there,” Ben warns and begins to put his game face on.

“We need to know, open it.”

It opens the link as small as possible to be effective and then bails to hide behind the pathway leading to Ben. I guess my spark has a favorite. I approve.

“Why would you show me that?”

“I have never claimed to be a good man.”His tone is back to flat emptiness.

“That’s true.” I stop at this point and think for a moment, trying to decide what to say next.

Ben’s hand comes to rest just above my knee and squeezes while I have my next epiphany, and I realize just how messed up I truly am.

I may not be brave enough to kill someone, but Mitri and Ben are. Do I judge Ben for eating the remains? No, I don’t. Why should I treat Mitri any differently? After spending so long with Ben in the Bowels, I know he does the things he does for a reason. I may not understand it, but that lack of understanding doesn’t make him wrong for doing what he feels is necessary. How is Mitri any different?

“You don’t eat what’s left, right?”

The comment earns me an indifferent look and a “Nyet.”

“Ok, good. I don’t want to have the body parts in the fridge conversation again.”

Mitri turns away to face forward again, but his body hasn’t softened. He still seems upset at my reaction to his little torture room. Or what he saw in my memory.

I’m not sure which one has bothered him, so I do what any other idiot would do in this situation. I reach out and place my hand over the clenched fist resting on his thigh.

“Just in case, though, no body parts in the fridge. If I find one, I’m out. No talking about it, no discussion, just bye-bye, Beatrice. Agreed?”

“Da.”

The lack of hesitation in his agreement is comforting. How sad is that?

The road begins to get rougher, my first sign that we’re getting closer, and my hand clenches over Mitri’s.

“If it’s King,”I’m not sure how to finish the depressing thought. If it is this group's calm, laid-back leader, what will it do to them? What will it do to Mal?