The Punisher

“That was a hard one,” she said softly.

He nodded. “That was the last one.”

She looked over his shoulder, and her face changed.

“Those are bodyguards, Frank.”

“Protocol, honey. You know that.”

She frowned.

“Look, some guys get a gold watch. I get Jake and Elmo.”

“Jake and Elmo?”

“Marquez and Dillon. They’re good guys. They know the drill. They’ll stay out of the way.”

“Hmmmphhh.” She didn’t look convinced. “Looks like you got the gold watch, too.” She pointed to his wrist.

“Yeah. Jimmy gave it to me.” He held it up so she could get a closer look. “Poor guy.”

“Why ‘poor guy’?”

Frank took a deep breath, then told her everything. How carefully the op had been set up, how disastrously it had gone wrong. How Weeks was on the hot seat because of it.

She was frowning when he finished.

“So this isn’t over,” she said. “That’s why those two—”

“No.” Castle shook his head firmly. “You know I wouldn’t be anywhere near here if it wasn’t safe. I’m retired. It’s over.”

“Okay. I believe you. Only . . .”

“What?”

“You’ll have to tell that to your son. He’s not buying it.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean he doesn’t believe me. He thinks this is just one more move. Not the last one by a long shot.”

Frank sighed. He knew that Will was having a hard time leaving Virginia, which was not a surprise. His son hadn’t liked moving the last two times, either, though he had been barely three when they’d left the D.C. area for the first time, probably just picking up on his mother’s sadness at having to leave her family and friends and move out west. And as much as he hadn’t wanted to leave Sacramento a few years after that, he’d still been relatively young then—first grade, not a lot of close friends—so as upset as Will had been, Frank had known the boy would get over it soon enough.

But this time . . .

Will was old enough to have real buddies. To have formed attachments to his teachers and this area. And he was smart enough to realize that the move to London meant leaving all those things behind for good. His son had been alternately despondent and furious about the move last time Frank was home, and, according to Maria, he hadn’t gotten any fonder of the idea in the months since.

“I’ll go talk to him,” Frank said. “Where is he?”

“You know.”

Frank nodded. He knew. His eyes went, unconsciously, to the end of the hall and the door that led out to the backyard.

“Be gentle with him, Frank.”

Castle smiled. “I’m a teddy bear, honey. You know that.”

“Yeah.” She gestured toward the boxes in the hall. “Hurry up and talk to him, Mr. Bear, all right? Then help me move those before the movers come back from lunch.”

He made a show of bowing. “Your wish is my command.”

“That’s just the way I like it.”

They shared a smile, followed by a kiss. Maria went to finish packing up the kitchen, and Frank Castle went off in search of his son.

One thing he was going to miss about this house, Castle thought. The backyard. It was one of the things that had attracted them to the property in the first place—a quarter acre of flat, treeless lawn that was going to be perfect for pickup football games, or for staking out a ball field. Frank remembered putting Will to sleep one winter night after they’d first moved in, looking out the window at the snow-covered lawn with his son, and making a promise.

“Soon as the snow melts,” he’d said to Will, who must have been all of six years old, “we’re setting up a baseball field. Complete with a pitching mound.”

“A pitching mound?” Will had smiled. “Cool.”

But Castle had gone away a week later and not come back until the following winter. And he’d never, ever built that pitching mound for his son.

Shaking his head in disgust, Frank bent down and picked a ball up from the immaculately trimmed lawn. They had a yard service that came in twice a month and cut his grass, trimmed the shrubs, raked the lawn in the fall. He’d never done any of that, either.

In the very middle of the lawn stood a Pitchback. Next to it was a small doghouse with BUCK stenciled over the door. Castle paused a moment and listened. He heard the sounds of something scrabbling around in the doghouse.

Then he gripped the ball in his right hand, reared back, and threw. The ball struck outside the yellow stripe by a good yard, and bounced back to him.

Ball one.

Castle had a sudden urge to wheel and throw the ball high up in the air, throw it as far across the lawn as he could. Buck would come bounding out of the doghouse then, streaking across the lawn in a flash, tongue wagging, and, like as not, pluck the ball right out of the air.

Except that Buck had died last summer, in the middle of July, while Castle had been busy courting Micky Duka down in Florida. His dog—but it was his wife and son who’d had to take him to the vet and put him down.

Castle blinked away tears of self-pity and focused.

This wasn’t about him right now, or even about his dog. It was about Will.

“What I miss most about Buck?” he said out loud, rearing back and throwing the ball again. Ball two, even farther outside. “He could catch a ball. No matter how hard you threw it—snap—he was right there.”

No response. Castle held the ball in his hand, studied his grip a second, positioned his hand across the seams. Then he reared back and threw once more.

Ball three. The ball bounced back to him.

“God, I miss that dog. He sure would have loved chasing those big brown rabbits they’ve got over in England.”

“I thought you said we weren’t going to have a yard.”

The voice—hesitant, barely audible—belonged to his son, Will. It seemed different than the last time he’d heard it, though, a few weeks back. Was that possible? That Will’s voice was changing?

No. It had to be his imagination.

“We don’t,” he replied. “Not really. But there’s a park nearby we get to use. They’ll have rabbits there.”

“No baseball fields, though. Right? They play that stupid cricket game there. Don’t they?”

“Will. I know you’re upset about this. I understand, believe me. When I was your age—”

“Don’t they?”

Castle sighed. “Yes. They play cricket there. But—”

“Why are we always moving?”

The voice from the doghouse was louder now. Angrier. Thick with tears, perhaps? Frank wondered how long his son had been out here, brooding.

“It’s because of my job, Will. Or it was. This is the last time—I promise.”

“You said that the last time.”

“I did?” Frank frowned. He couldn’t recall ever having spoken those words before, but he supposed it was possible. When he’d originally signed on for the FBI Undercover Task Force, one of the reasons had been that no matter where his undercover roles took him, his family could remain here and build a home. Maybe he had said that—or something like it—to Will back then.