She doesn’t like it, but tries to ignore it, which ultimately just makes her feel torn and ashamed. She also notices that he treats her better than he does the others, which conflictingly makes her feel special, too. It’s like a sort of, “well he’s nice to me, so I know he COULD BE nice to others, maybe he’ll come around.. there’s something in there” thing, even though a lot of his niceness and patience towards her is initially just manipulation and grooming tactics.

He does come to genuinely love her later but this is after years of being performative and her being loyal even when she doesn’t like or agree with everything he does. So even his affection for her is self centered. He basically shaped her into the person she is in Hagen for his own benefit, and it worked, why not keep her around atp?

He never really thought he’d commit to her long while in VDL, or be with a woman at all. Just around enough to have her raise his kid. But she really grows on him as time goes on and she does nothing but benefit him and his gang later. He is just as surprised as everyone else that he actually does love her, enough to wanna claim her with his last name, even.

Not to say he lacked feelings for her in VDL, moreso just that it wasn’t a long term priority or anything. Wasn’t exactly love yet, just some courting and mild affection. I’m sure he’d still be jealous too of other men trying to charm her because he liked having her for himself. Liking all the attention he can get from her for the time being.

But yeah, basically, she is complicit in the suffering he brings onto her friends and found family because she’d rather turn a blind eye to it. Although she’s like 15 when they meet- 16 throughout the VDL era post Blackwater -and again, a very naive victim of his grooming, so there’s like. Room for nuance there. By Hagen, she’s already spent so much time… being this way(?) that it’s just what it is atp. She doesn’t feel great about it, at least, but if she were to escape that life in his gang (note she IS basically a prisoner here, she was dragged to Hagen and isn’t allowed to leave), she’d have a lot of room to grow out of it and be a genuinely better person. She’s done evil things while in this gang, but it’s honestly nothing worse than everyone in VDL did. She’s not the one doing their dirty work, their men are. She’s mostly there as a deputy, keeping order and routine in the camp and making sure their men do their chores and go on patrols, etc etc. she’s killed people, but it’s very seldom.

I’d like to think people like Sadie and John see that, and see her more as a victim of Micah than an accomplice. Even back in VDL when it came out that she was carrying for him and that there was something going on between them, most people like Arthur are… definitely confused by her choices, but still see her as a victim of him, almost like Dutch.. there’s gotta be something more going on here, and Arthur and Abigail especially try to talk her into leaving without shaming her for her choices.

Also, last thing I will note is, although she’s obviously not blind to how rude and cruel he can be, he does attempt to stifle it when she’s around. Like, he does still say cruel or passive aggressive things to others when she’s there, usually moreso if he’s approached first by someone giving him a bit of attitude, or if he’s going on one of his “you people are pathetic!” Speeches if he truly believes it, but he won’t obnoxiously antagonize someone out of nowhere like he does when she’s gone (ah like, I’m thinking of specific camp interactions in the game he’d still do around her vs more cruel ones he’d wait for her to be away to do), nor would he like.. kick Cain around her, etc etc.
So still, not to say she’s oblivious to his behaviors, just that she might have a slightly duller idea of how he can be, too.