The Murdered World 22

“Who do you think? That’s the Punisher.” Christina couldn’t help her voice from going into a whisper as she said his nickname.

“The who?”

“The Punisher. Don’t you read the news?” Emma just stared at her. Christina sighed. “He’s a vigilante. The Mafia killed his family. Now he goes after them.”

“So why did he want Angel dead?” Emma’s voice came out almost as a whine, like she’d be miserable if Christina didn’t explain all of the confusing swirl the world had become.

Christina couldn’t see how she’d weathered this outpouring of traumatic events while Emma had lost herself in them. It struck her as one more instance of Emma’s weakness, a willing weakness, always trusting someone else—her, Angel, probably Frank next—to take care of her.

“Think, Em, just fucking think! Angel was a criminal. He ran the mob in Miami.”

Emma’s expression boggled. She glanced about, awash in confusion, and Christina had time to regret being so brusque with her before Emma spoke again. “And you married him?”

“It’s complicated.”

And it had been. Angel hadn’t exactly been her sugar daddy and he hadn’t exactly loved her and he hadn’t exactly seduced her. Her motives had made sense from moment to moment, but they’d shifted with each passing day until she couldn’t say that what they had become and what they had been were the same thing.

Yes, she’d married a criminal, but he’d been more than that when she got engaged to him. She’d remembered all the things she liked about him before she went through with that. And somewhere down the line, all she remembered was the money, the lifestyle.

Emma’s face grew dark. When she spoke, her words shook. Christina didn’t think it was because she was reluctant to say them. It was because she was holding them back. “And you were with Frank—the Punisher—you were working with him? You wanted him to kill Angel?”

“No!”

“You knew Angel deserved to die and you let me cozy up to him? You let him lay his hands on me?”

“I didn’t let either of you do anything,” Christina hissed. “You should’ve stayed away from Angel because he was my husband, not because he was a threat.”

“Were there others?” Emma demanded. “Did you just stand by him like some fucking enabler while he held women down—"

“Look, does it really matter right now? With everything that’s going on?”

“What is going on?” Emma demanded. “How sure are you that this Punisher isn’t pulling a hoax? All we really saw was a rocket or missile or something. Who knows if it was really nuclear?”

“Then why isn’t anyone picking up on the radio?”

“He says no one is picking up,” Emma said leadingly.

“You know how to use the radio?”

“How hard can it be? I just have to read the manual, right?”

“Okay, just…” Christina tried to think what to say. “Please consider that everything might be on the up and up? He did—you saw how he helped you.”

“I thought Angel was helping me too. I’m not trusting some man just because he looks good; not like you did.” Emma shook her head. “Do you trust him? Just because he killed Angel?”

“He…” Christina thought about it. “He was nice to me.”

“He didn’t look like he was being very nice.”

“Maybe a little niceness goes a long way with me.” Christina went to the door. She stopped with her hand on the knob, keeping it closed. Wherever Frank was, she didn’t want to worry about him hearing. “I’m sorry for what happened to you. If I had known, I would’ve at least tried to stop it. That’s why I helped Frank. Because he told me you were in trouble.”

Emma didn’t give an inch. “And you believed him? Frank?”

“What choice did I have?”

Emma ran a hand through her hair, looking agitated. It at least looked different than the anger she’d held, the anger that them spending time together always seemed to come to. The anger that was like a knife lodged in Christina’s heart.

“All you’re telling me is that you knew Angel was a monster and you could live with that. With him. What does that make you? God, I need a drink.”

Christina sucked in a deep breath of relief. She didn’t want to be alone right now; she didn’t want Emma to be alone either. And she wasn’t telling her sister where the liquor cabinet was. Not yet.

***

The kitchen was all stainless steel and tinted glass, with rubber mats over the kind of tiled floor that took well to being hosed down. When he opened a drawer at random, he found that even the rolling pins were made of some space-age polymer. Frank supposed it wasn’t meant for Angel or his guests, but some help he’d bring down to maintain him in the standard he was used to.

He found he preferred the industrialized setting to the insidious fakery of the rest of the bunker. He’d rather have the stark sterility that was really there over the illusion that this was all a big game. One more episode of Lifestyles of the Rich & Famous.

Frank tried the freezer. Unsurprisingly, it had much to offer. Sides of beef, racks of lamb, even links of sausage… the only way it could be better stocked was if they found a way to keep live cattle inside. He drew his knife—glad now that he hadn’t had to use it since it was last cleaned and sharpened—and cut into the beef loin until he’d excavated a T-bone. Holding it up to the light, he put it at around thirty ounces. That would do for him and the girls. Knowing women, they’d probably mostly go for side salad or broth. He made a note to set up some soup stock as he worked his way through the meat.

He probably didn’t need to get on their good side; if they hadn’t knifed Angel in his sleep, he doubted he had much to worry about. But Christina had seemed… grateful… and even Emma had seemed relieved to have two bullets in Angel. It would be convenient to hold onto that feeling. Six weeks would feel a lot longer if they were tiptoeing around him like unexploded ordinance.

The T-bone would need time to thaw. That would be the only problem. Frank looked through the freezer for something less time-consuming and came up with a package of raw salmon, dated two months ago. No reason to let it grow any older. He searched through the kitchen until he’d come up with olive oil, salt, and pepper, then he started on filleting the salmon. Another search netted him a skillet. He poured the oil in and set it to heating on the burner while he seasoned the salmon. Salt and some ground pepper.

Twenty minutes had passed when Christina came into the kitchen. Frank was letting the fillets roast. He kept his eye on them, good as Christina looked—they were almost golden.

He felt Christina open her mouth, have something to say… but she closed it again.

The fillets looked crisp. He flipped them and turned down the heat. “You should go get your sister,” he told Christina. “These’ll be ready soon.”

Thoughts burst from Christina like bombs going off at the end of a long drop. “I’m not sure she’s hungry. I know I’m not. God, are you?”

Frank shrugged. “I’ve been working hard.”

“It smells good,” Christina allowed.

“Your husband had an eye for quality.”

Christina flinched. “He… he wanted fresh food, as fresh as could be, for this place. We have canned food and potable water, of course, but also fruit, vegetables—you saw the, ah, the larder. Every few months, when it expired, he’d take everything out, trash it, put in new stuff.”

Frank nodded. “I can’t say you’re leading to any regret setting in.”

“I don’t intend to. I just want you to know, what he did with Emma—my sister—I didn’t know he was like that.”

“What did you know?”

“Huh?”

Frank took the skillet off the burner, shut off the gas, and transferred the fillets to a platter. “The money, the guns, the thugs—what did you think it was all for?”

Christina scowled. Her hands fisted at her sides—Frank guessed she wanted to point an angry finger at him, but worried he might think it was a weapon coming at him.

It was a common response he got.

“What do you know? You’re a vigilante, a goddamn mass murderer! You’ve probably killed as many people as Angel has!”

“Not women. Not children. Not men trying to feed their families.”

“You—” Christina bit her lip. A fisted hand bumped repeatedly against her thigh. “I’m not defending him. God knows I’m not. But—”

“But what?” Frank prompted, when her throat suddenly stopped supplying the words that had been coming so easy in her anger.

“I’m a widow now,” Christina insisted feebly.

Frank nodded. “Get a plate and some forks. You should at least be a widow on a full stomach.”