“The club. I’d like a martini.”
“The club. Coming right up.”
As they pulled away, Saint caught sight of Mike Toro, standing at the overpass. The man gave him a big thumbs-up.
Saint raised his cigar and saluted.
Eleven oh-two. He stood next to a pay phone on Canaveral Boulevard, two blocks down from the big Saint Motors sign. The Honda was running. He would wait one more minute.
The phone rang.
“Speak.”
“It’s Duka.”
“And . . .”
“Oh my God, you were right. He threw all her stuff out on the lawn, and drove off with her in the limo. She ain’t comin’ back, is my guess. Not now, not ever.”
“When was this?”
“Twenty minutes ago, maybe. Maybe more.”
“What about Glass?”
“He’s here. Rolled up in a carpet, dead as a doornail.”
“Good. Good work, Micky.”
“Right. So, ah—I was wonderin’. You know that fifty million that flew out the window last week from the Tower. You didn’t by chance—”
Castle hung up.
He drove the Honda two blocks north, past the club. The Bentley still wasn’t there, but plenty of other cars were, John Saint’s Shelby among them.
Just past the Saint Motors lot, he turned right. A block down, he stopped and parked the Honda.
Eleven thirty-six. His turn, now, to go to work.
Second declaration: Frank Castle is dead. He died with his family. Murdered, as they were, by an act of such brutality, such savagery, that civilization lacks an appropriate response. Hence,
Third declaration: In such extreme circumstances, the law is by definition inadequate. To shame its inadequacy, it is necessary to act outside the law, to pursue natural justice. This is not vengeance. Revenge is not a valid motive-it is an emotional response. Vengeance serves no larger purpose. Society does not benefit from vengeance. Violent men are not deterred by acts of vengeance. The only appropriate response to their actions is the one I have chosen to pursue: a course of purposed, intentional violence. Violence intended to instruct, as much as destruct.
A course, in a word, of punishment.
FORTY-THREE
“Okay.”
Howard Saint dropped the briefcase on the table and opened it so that everyone could see what was inside.
“Fifty thousand apiece, and fifty more to the man who kills him.”
His men—his enforcers, as he liked to think of them, Lincoln, Worowski and Gable, the Moroni brothers, a half dozen more—all took a step forward, their eyes lighting up with sudden greed.
Predictable, Saint thought. So predictable.
But that was why he loved them.
“Ah.” He held up a hand, and the men stopped moving.
“Just so we’re clear—you take this money, you’re in this until it’s over.”
“When Castle’s dead, Mr. Saint. Is that right?”
Saint nodded at Lincoln. “When Castle’s dead.”
As Saint expected, his words of warning didn’t stop anyone from coming forward. Too bad, he thought, because before this night was finished, he was sure some of them were going to regret their impulsiveness. Castle wasn’t going to go down easily.
But he was going to go down.
Saint let John hand the money out, and he took the stairs up to his office. On the way up, he passed a picture of Livia and him with the boys. He ripped it off the wall and threw it back down the stairs.
In the office, Saint poured himself a drink and sat down behind his desk. He had a lot to sort out; he realized he’d never called Rebecca back about Chadwick, and the announcement, and now he had to tell her to pull all the press about Livia, too. And he had to get some kind of story together for the cops about his wife—when was the last time he’d seen her and all that sort of thing, because her body, or what was left of it, was going to turn up sooner or later. And Glass—he needed another story there. Which struck him funny, all of a sudden, because usually it was Quentin who helped him with things like that. Quentin had a good head on his shoulders.
Saint took a deep breath then and drained his glass.
“Pop?” John was standing in the doorway.
“Hey. Come on in. You want a drink? I’m gonna have another drink.”
“No, thanks. Where were you? Where’s Quentin?”
Saint topped off his glass and sat back down.
“He’s wrapped up in something.”
“Tonight? He’s wrapped up in something tonight?”
“Yeah.” Saint couldn’t help it. He giggled. “He’s gonna be wrapped up in it awhile.”
John looked at him strangely.
“Pop? You all right?”
“Oh, yeah. I’m good.” He took a sip of his drink. Maybe John could help him with this stuff; he’d always been good at making up stories. Good at lying, anyway, when he was a kid. Or was that Bobby?
“I called home before, trying to find you. Nobody answered.”
“I was out.”
“Yeah, but . . . where’s Mom?”
“She’s . . . your mother’s gone, John.”
“What?”
“She’s gone.” He looked up at his son, and, once more, Howard Saint couldn’t help himself. Maybe it was the booze. Maybe it was the stress of everything that had happened tonight. Maybe he was just losing it. “Your mother took the train,” he said, and then he burst out laughing again.
Twelve thirty-four. He returned from the Saint Motors lot, carrying the empty duffel over his shoulder. He put it back in the trunk of the Honda and loaded the weapons bag with the detonators and the remaining charges.
He slipped on the Kevlar vest, and pulled the crossbow from the backseat.
Twelve forty-six. He returned the night-vision goggles to the bag, having completed a sweep of the block around the Saint and Sinners building. No perimeter forces whatsoever. Saint had concentrated all his men inside the building. A tactical error; the man was slipping.
Somehow, Frank Castle was not surprised by that.
Twelve fifty-two. He found the service entrance Duka had told him about, and entered the building.
“I’m gonna say something to him.” Shania Goggins— who had been born Beth Goggins but had changed her name because she looked a little bit like the singer, although she was six inches taller and, on a good day, thirty pounds heavier—pulled another scoopful of cubes out of the ice maker and dumped it in the bucket on top of the bar. Then she started in again. “Because it’s not right. Mel, it’s just not right.”
Melanie Carter looked around nervously. There was no one in earshot, thank God—the only other people in the room, in fact, were Yasmin and Gloria, who were working the other end of the bar, and, of course, Mr. Saint’s men, the men with the big guns—but still, you didn’t want to make a habit of saying anything bad about Saints and Sinners, or the folks who ran it. In her experience, bad things happened to people who did that.
“Listen, honey,” she said, shoving a bottle of Dom Perignon into the newly filled ice bucket. “Speaking as a friend? I would recommend you keep those opinions to yourself, understand?”
Shania shook her head. “No. No, I don’t understand. Mel, how do we make our money? Tips. And who is
