Chapter 3
Parker woke to an orchestral throbbing in her skull. Colors pulsed behind her eyelids like a bruise.
Her eyelids were too heavy to open, so she let her attention drift to other pressing matters as her body came back to her in pieces, such as the fact that her face felt bare. And her feet. And there was her danger sense, which was blaring like a fire alarm.
She tried to move, but every muscle felt heavy as lead. Focusing every ounce of energy into the movement, she pried her eyes open and lulled her neck to the side. She was met with a blank wall with a one-way mirror. It was supposed to be a one-way mirror, at least—Parker could see right through it. Some guy with a pig nose stood on the other side, messing with something out of view.
Details floated back to her: Rick, the explosion—a molotov cocktail?—and then someone kicking her face in. Speaking of which, ow . No wonder her head was pounding.
Her eyes trailed the mirror to the ceiling, then down to herself, strapped in a chair you’d see at the dentist. Her usual Spider-Man suit was pretty much gone—the red hoodie and the skin tight long-sleeve were nowhere in sight, leaving her in a sports bra and leggings. And where the hell were her shoes?
Metal clamps held her wrists in place. She tried to rip through them, but her brain felt disconnected with the rest of her body. Her hands merely twitched.
Don’t freak out, don’t freak out.
“You’re awake earlier than expected.”
Parker’s eyes flickered to the left. It took great effort to roll her head to the other shoulder to see who was speaking.
Doc—the lady with the bob from the garage. She was wearing a white lab coat over black jeans and a dark purple turtleneck. Her left arm was in a sling.
Parker tried to speak, but her tongue just rolled around in her mouth uselessly. Doc smiled as she stepped closer, hands going out of Parker’s view. She had to tilt her head to see the metal tray holding a full syringe and some equipment Parker recognized as blood-drawing equipment: a needle, gauze, antiseptic, an empty bag where—supposedly—her blood would go.
Nothing made sense. Her sixth sense was doing backflips against her skull. Mustering all of her strength, she fought to move her arms. This time, her wrists lifted from the armrests, but the metal clamps held them down.
Doc poured some antiseptic on a cotton ball and peered at the girl as she struggled against restraints she would have normally torn through like wet paper.
“Succinylcholine.”
Parker stopped struggling. Her chest rose and fell rapidly. This time when she tried to speak, it came out coherent. Slurred, but still coherent. “What?”
“It’s a neuromuscular blocker.” Her green eyes involuntarily flickered to the full syringe as she spoke before she turned and wiped the cold cotton ball on Parker’s exposed forearm. With a smug smirk, she explained, “In other words, you’re mostly paralyzed.”
No shit, she wanted to say. Parker wasn’t in kindergarten; she knew what a neuromuscular blocker was.
“I knew I wouldn’t be able to restrain you by brute force,” she was saying. Parker only half-listened, her attention darting to the mirror again. A large albino man stepped into view. His presence was powerful, commanding. He had to have been at least six foot five. His face was built so geometric it reminded Parker of Spookley the Square Pumpkin.
Her blood went cold as the man turned his head and stared right back at her. Like he knew she could see him.
Doc was still talking. “...used to being overpowered. This stuff was hard to come by, but the more accessible drugs like carisoprodol or cyclobenzaprine wouldn’t have been as effective…”
Parker clenched her fist. She felt her power slowly coming back. As smart as Doc thought she was, she obviously didn’t account for Parker’s enhanced metabolism; she was burning through this muscle relaxant like a lit sparkler.
Inconspicuously, Parker carefully tested the restraints again. She could feel them giving, could hear their strain.
Parker shot a quick glance to the mirror. The albino man was gone.
Doc leaned in close and inserted the needle. The second it punctured her vein, Parker headbutted the woman.
“Gah!” She stumbled back, palm against her forehead, and immediately went for the full syringe.
Parker ripped the needle out—probably a little too roughly, because blood trickled down her arm like the Nile River—and caught the wrist of the hand holding the syringe Doc thrusted towards her.
With a quick crack and a sharp cry of pain, Doc’s wrist bone broke in Parker’s grip. She caught the dropped syringe and jammed it into the older woman’s thigh.
The door slammed open. Parker’s legs gave out at just the right time. As soon as the guard swung a baton, she was going down. She crashed against the tiles and rolled to avoid a second strike. Doc’s hand reached to grab her foot, but she was weakening by the second until, finally, she couldn’t move.
The guard tackled Parker around the middle and slammed her into the wall, knocking the breath out of her lungs. She retaliated with a sharp jab to his spleen and leapt to attach her fingers to the ceiling. Dangling, she delivered a solid kick to his jaw.
Another guard ran in. He got one of those kicks, too.
Easy peasy. She crawled out of the room and booked it.
She sprinted down the ceiling of the narrow corridor, her legs shaking beneath her as the effects of the neuromuscular blocker wore off in fits and starts. The world was a haze, a blur of distorted edges, and her head swam with dizziness. She pushed on, occasionally clutching the wall for balance.
She hit the corner and froze. Another guard appeared in front of her. She dropped onto his shoulders, pulled him to the ground, and elbowed him in the back of the neck. He crumpled to the floor with a muffled grunt.
Parker didn’t wait to see if he’d get back up.
At the far end of the hall, the exit sign blinked weakly in the dim light. Part of her urged her to dig around for answers, but the smarter part of her told her to get the hell out while she still had the upper hand, before the huge guy from the other side of the mirror got involved. Whatever her danger sense picked up about him was far from good.
Her mind went to the one place she could get some help. Her mind flashed the number Frank slipped under her door last night.
She reached the door, kicked it open, and stumbled outside. The brisk afternoon air hit her like a slap, crisp and biting. She was in some rundown alleyway— again —filled with dumpsters and the sound of distant traffic. She saw the payphone across the street.
She crossed the deserted road in a quick, unsteady pace, feeling the concussion squeezing her head like a rubberband. She grabbed the receiver and slammed against her ear, eyes scouring the ground in the off chance a good samaritan left some change.
None.
“Come on,” she muttered, eyes darting to the building she just escaped. It was an unsuspecting office building with a cupcake storefront next door. She jimmied her fingers into the slot and froze when she felt something smooth and metal.
Two quarters. “Thank you, Jesus.” Her fingers were still uncooperative, her hands shaking as she slipped them in and dialed the number.
The phone rang once. Twice. Three times. Four.
On the fifth, Parker hung up the phone with a slam. Fine, whatever. Give a girl your number and don’t pick up when she calls. What a gentleman.
She stood there for a second, trying to steady her breath, trying to keep herself from collapsing. But as her fingers slid down the phone’s receiver, she saw movement in her peripheral. A jolt shot down her spine. Someone was approaching.
Parker bursted through the payphone door and ran. Her bare feet slapped painfully against the sidewalks she zig-zagged through. The sound of fast footsteps behind her alerted her to pursuers.
She passed an alley but backtracked. On the other end, the street was full of people walking around. A kid holding his mom’s hand skipped past as he ate some sort of street food on a stick. It smelled vaguely cheesy.
She shot a quick look over her shoulder—yep, definitely being chased—and ran down the alley. Her feet splashed in puddles left over from last night’s downpour.
Once on the other side, she was enveloped in crowds of tourists.
“Excuse me, sorry,” she said as she squeezed through some groups and broke out into another sprint. If anyone looked her way, nothing would seem out of the ordinary; in her sports bra and leggings, she just looked like a girl on a run. If they looked down and saw her bare feet, and if they looked close enough and saw the blood running down her arm, maybe they’d raise an eyebrow. But she was moving too fast for anyone to get a good look at her.
Webs would’ve sped things along. Unfortunately, she literally had none of her tech. She had backup webshooters—they broke far too often—so at least she wouldn’t have to start from scratch with those. Still, it would’ve been much faster to swing through the streets than to run through them.
Her sixth sense quieted down the farther she ran. After a while, she slowed to a light jog. Her legs felt like jelly as she collapsed to a city bus bench.
“What is my life,” she murmured into her hands, elbows on her knees. She ran her hands over her hair, calming her choppy locks, and leaned against the back of the bench. First course of action: Go back to the apartment and get suited up in a backup suit. She had a ton of information to work with now, but there was no way she could bring down both mobs—and some group called The Black Hand if Rick’s word was to be trusted—without her webshooters, shoes, shirt, or her mask.
Doing this all by herself felt impossibly huge, but what were her other options? She could try to track down Daredevil, but he was extremely elusive and barely even patrolled these days; he probably had an actual life and career outside of crime-fighting. The same went for most vigilantes: Deadpool sightings had been extremely low recently, Jessica Jones was in rehab (if rumors spread by the Daily Bugle were accurate), and Parker didn’t know enough about the other vigilantes to find a way to contact them. Frank was an obvious answer, but then again, was he? His solution to the issue would probably be to just murder anyone who had a hand in the operation.
Parker slumped. She could figure the rest out later. For now, she needed to get home and put some clothes on before the sun disappeared and took all its warmth with it.
_
By the time she reached the apartment building, Parker’s skin was dimpled with goosebumps and she was far too tired to climb all the way up the side of the brick to her window. Instead, she waltzed inside, ignoring the way her feet stung, and stepped into the elevator and rode it to her floor.
As soon as the doors opened, something felt off. It didn’t feel like an immediate threat, so Parker carefully walked to her front door. She didn’t have her key on her, so she gripped the doorknob with the intention to just break in.
When it pushed open without even needing to be turned, she paused.
The doorframe was splintered by the latch.
Someone already broke in.
Whoever was there was gone, she was confident of that much. Parker toed the door wider and side-stepped in. Her stomach dropped.
It wasn’t the way her bed was flipped over, or the way all her kitchen cabinets were opened, or how all her clothes were strewn across the room that got her. It was the desk—the one she had left her laptop on.
Her laptop that was now gone.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Parker took three quick steps to the desk and frantically looked through its drawers as if she forgot she had stashed it away. Nothing. She slammed the drawer shut, but with the force she used it broke.
Parker stepped over her pillow on the ground and swept up her empty backpack and a random t-shirt that was draped over the bed to pull over her head as she made her way to the bathroom. The medicine cabinet was ransacked, too; the first aid kit laid on the edge of the tub, splayed open. Even her box of tampons was torn into.
On her knees, Parker ran her fingers over the grout between tiles. When one gave, she lifted the square tile up and released a sigh of relief at the sight of her untouched stash.
She went for the six vials of web solution and the backup webshooters first. Once those were on, Parker tucked the rest of the contents into the backpack: fifty bucks in ten- and five-dollar bills, four extra vials of web solution, and the emergency mask. It was slightly different from the mask she normally wore—whereas the last one was a red spandex mask with tinted sunglasses lenses for the eyes and black webbing, this one was far more simple in design with its black spandex and polarized lenses that weren’t quite as intensely tinted. It was the mask she first started wearing two years ago, but she quickly realized that a black mask made her seem like a bank robber and not a superhero, so she made swift adjustments. This one would do for now.
Once out of the bathroom, Parker made quick work with finding some socks to pull over her sore, blistered feet. Her only other shoes were her civilian shoes: beat-up converses that were held together by duct tape and gorilla glue.
The only thing Parker needed now was a hoodie, but the one she was wearing when she was kidnapped was the only one she had. Buying a new one was out of the question—she had to be conservative with the fifty bucks she had. Necessities only.
Next order of business: get the hell out of dodge.
Parker slipped out the front door with her backpack strung over one shoulder. She turned to head to the elevator again, but something stopped her in her tracks. She turned back around and headed to Frank’s door instead.
She knocked. “Frank. It’s me.” She knocked again, but when she did, the door cracked open. Her eyes zeroed-in on the broken hinge. Without hesitation, Parker threw the door open, letting it smack the wall, and barged in. “Frank!”
His apartment was in even worse shape than hers. Drawers were pulled open and stuff was thrown around, but this didn’t just show signs of ransacking. The window was shattered. There was a hole in the drywall. A lampshade on the ground was caved in. The couch cushion was sliced open. A trail of blood led from the bathroom.
Her heart jumped to her throat.
“Hello? Frank?” She peered into the bathroom. The mirror was cracked, and half of the porcelain sink was on the ground. Water spurted from a broken pipe. Blood splattered both the mirror and the sink.
Odds were, it wasn’t her neighbor's blood. But the sinking feeling in her gut told her otherwise.
She went from the bathroom to the bedroom, where there were still no signs of Frank. The open closet grabbed her attention, though, and she reached in and nabbed a hoodie before heading back out.
She needed a new plan. But as she left the apartment building and sped-walked through the street with no set destination, just the knowledge that she can’t go back home, she couldn’t think of the next move. Her muscles still felt weak, and her head—it still throbbed with every slight sound. And even with Frank’s hoodie, the night was cold. The cherry on top was her growling stomach.
A whistle brought Parker out of her head. She winced and turned, glancing at the college-aged man eyeing her from where he stood at the entrance of a pub.
“Hey, got plans tonight?”
She kept walking. What about her demeanor made it seem like she wanted to be approached? Parker was pretty sure she was the embodiment of “leave me alone” right now.
“Come on, I had to shoot my shot. You’re beautiful.”
She kept walking. He took a few steps after her.
“What? No smile?”
Parker turned. The grin playing on his lips faltered at her sharp glare.
“Look—” She clamped her mouth shut and squinted. “Sorry. It’s been a rough day. Can I borrow your phone for a second?”
The grin was back full-force. He dug around in his pocket and offered the device. “Sure thing, baby. After you’re done, can I buy you a drink?”
Parker quickly dialed Frank’s number and held the phone to her ear. She offered the guy a tight-lipped smile. “I’m not twenty-one, but thanks.”
“I can get you in,” he said, throwing a thumb over his shoulder towards the pub. “They don’t card everyone.”
The line rang. Parker sighed. Answer, damn it.
“Or we can skip the drink and head back to my place? It’s just around—”
Voicemail. Parker huffed in frustration and pushed the phone back into the guy’s hands. “I’m fifteen.” A lie, but whatever. She could pass.
He immediately stepped back with his palms out. “My bad, I didn’t mean—”
“You’re good.” Parker turned on her heel and continued down the street, hands buried in her pockets as her mind whirled. Obviously Frank wasn’t answering the phone because something happened. But he couldn’t have been dead, right? You can’t just kill the Punisher.
The grumbling in Parker’s stomach steered her into a warm corner diner with neon signs on the outside and black and white checkered floors on the inside. There were only a handful of customers, most of which were sitting at the bar on tall stools with upholstered red leather seats. Savory smells of juicy burgers, fresh tomatoes, toasted buns, and crispy fries made her mouth water.
She could spare a few dollars on a cheeseburger.
Parker slid into a booth that faced the large rectangular cut-out in the wall that opened to the kitchen. A cook—a bald man who looked to be in his fifties with neck tattoos and permanent crow’s feet stamped by both eyes—placed a plated sandwich on the metallic counter and dinged the bell before disappearing behind the wall. A waitress with jet black hair and thin ruby red lips delivered the plate to a guy on a barstool. Popping her gum, the woman’s eyes landed on Parker. She plucked a laminated menu from under the bar and made her way over.
“Can I get you something to drink?” she asked, slapping the menu down. Her name tag over her left breast read “Jennifer.”
Parker offered a polite smile. “Just water, please.”
When the young woman left, Parker flipped through the short menu until landing on the burgers. The options intensified the growling in her stomach: Double bacon, chipotle BBQ, garlic-three cheese. The prices listed on the right shut down every mouth-watering fantasy that bubbled to her mind.
Right. She was on a budget. Parker guided her eyes to the cheapest option, the classic American cheeseburger: a single patty on a white bun, a slice of American cheese, a tomato slice, a leaf of lettuce, and ketchup. That’ll do.
The waitress—Jennifer—set the water glass on Parker’s table and got a pen and pad of paper ready. “Ready to order?”
Parker folded the menu, handed it over as she asked for the burger, and watched her walk back to the kitchen to pin up the ticket.
While her food was being prepared, Parker headed back to the diner’s three-stall bathroom with her backpack over her shoulder. There was a single light in the ceiling that flickered when the door closed. She met her reflection’s eyes as she washed her hands under the scalding water and had to do a double-take.
She looked like shit. Her slightly curly, above-the-shoulder hair was unkempt and wild. The dark circles were deeper than usual, her face pale, and there was a flowering bruise a gnarly shade of purple along her cheekbone, eye socket, and temple where she was stomped. The hoodie she had grabbed from Frank’s apartment was too big for her, the sleeves swallowed her hands, and the damp fabric clung to her back, leaving her with a cold, clammy feeling. She barely recognized the reflection staring back at her.
Parker exhaled sharply, leaning her hands on the sink, eyes fixed on the mirror as she tried to breathe through the frustration and confusion that seemed to weigh heavier by the minute.
Frank was missing. Her apartment had been ransacked. It most definitely had something to do with the Carbones, the Russians, or The Black Hand. The whole situation was a headache, and she felt alone and in the dark.
She tugged at the strings of her hoodie, trying to steady her hands. "Get it together," she muttered under her breath. Her stomach rumbled again, louder this time.
After a few more seconds, Parker wiped her hands on the front of her jeans and took one last look in the mirror before walking out.
Back at her booth, her burger was waiting. She quickly discarded the backpack onto the seat and dug in with two hands.
About halfway through the delicacy, Jennifer walked by with a stack of dirty plates. Parker wiped away the ketchup on her cheek with a thumb and said, “Excuse me, do you guys have a phone I can use?”
“It’s not open to the public.”
So there was a phone. “It won’t take long, I promise.”
“I just said it’s not open to the public.” Her winged eyes narrowed in challenge.
Parker pressed her lips together, then tried, “I can—I can pay? Really, it won’t take long. How much to—”
Jennifer rolled her eyes and stomped away before she could finish. Damn, okay.
There was a prickle at the back of her neck. Parker looked up and saw the cook watching her from the kitchen window. Leaning his elbows on the counter, he said, “We got a payphone in the back you can use.”
Parker glanced where the cook gestured. Must’ve been just past the bathrooms. “Thanks, but I don’t have any coins.”
“Got a dollar bill?” Parker nodded. “Jen, get some change for a dollar from the register, will ya?”
Jennifer stepped behind the counter and fished out the coins. Parker flashed her and the cook a smile when they traded. “Thanks, I appreciate it.”
“Uh-huh,” she said before returning behind the counter.
Four quarters. That was two phone calls. If Frank didn’t answer this time, then maybe she could try again sometime tomorrow at a different payphone. The idea of tomorrow was daunting: where would she stay? Her apartment was out of the question. Maybe she could find a covered rooftop somewhere.
Parker tucked herself against the wall as she dialed Frank’s number again.
Again, no answer.
“Fuck,” she whispered, eyebrows drawn.
What if he gave me the wrong number? her mind supplied on the walk back to the booth. She set her elbows on the table and frowned at the half-eaten burger she was salivating over just minutes before.
Frank might’ve been a murderer and a pain in her ass the past few days, but he didn’t deserve to die. There was still good in him, she was sure. Why else would he have helped her that night when she passed out in his bathtub? He didn’t need to dig the bullet out or stitch her up. And why else would he have followed her the other day?
If he was dead, it was on Parker. She knew that. She carried the weight on her shoulders.
The cook was studying her from behind the counter again. Parker cleared her throat and straightened, trying to appear less haggard and distressed than she felt. She wondered how long she could stay at the diner to take advantage of the heater before they kicked her out.
As she was polishing off the rest of the burger, a voice called, “Little lady?”
She glanced up. The cook—standing at the far end of the diner by the payphone, the phone’s speaker pressed against his chest—waved her down. Parker glanced over her shoulder before returning the gaze. He waved the phone.
“It’s for you.”
Her heart leapt in her chest and she hurried across the restaurant. Her cold fingers grasped the handle and held it closed to her face. “Frank?”
“Kid.” His voice was rough and low.
“Shit. Shit , Frank, I saw your apartment, I thought…”
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine.” She raked her fingers through her hair. “I tried calling you,” she said, which was a stupid and redundant thing to say, but she was just so glad to hear his voice.
“Did they go after you too?”
“Yeah. I was…” Parker shot a quick glance around the restaurant and lowered her voice, cupping her hand around the receiver. “They took me, but I got out. Are you okay? Where are you?”
She listened carefully and picked up sounds from wind and cars in the background. Frank coughed—it sounded painful. “I’m headed to a friend’s, but only for a pitstop so they don’t get any bright ideas and go after her, too. How close are you to Hell’s Kitchen?”
“Not close at all,” Parker admitted. “But I can get over there soon.”
It sounded like Frank was walking up some creaky wooden stairs. “Can you make it to Pier 88 in an hour?”
“I can make it in forty-five minutes.”
“Good. I’ll be there. Don’t take any detours.”
The line went dead before Parker could say anything else. She stood there, phone pressed to her ear for a moment longer, staring at the receiver as if it might somehow give her more answers.
She gripped the phone tightly and hung it up, turning back toward her booth. She grabbed her backpack, fished out ten dollars for the table, and left the warmth of the diner.
_
Parker’s legs swung back and forth from where she sat on top of a wooden crate. She had no way to check the time, but it had definitely been over an hour since their phone call.
Despite the late hour, the city was alive; Parker had to focus to tune out the sounds of drunk New Yorkers, sirens, cars, and the constant buzzing of electricity pumping through every building. She also had to hug herself to fight off the cold that seeped through her clothes.
A footstep. Parker perked and turned. A figure in the shadows neared, his stature wide and solid. The dim moonlight revealed his face as he stepped out of the shadows. It also revealed how awful he looked, half-limping, forehead sliced open, dried blood crusted along his temple all the way down his neck, a tight, bloody bandage over one hand.
Parker hopped down from the crate and met him halfway. “I see they didn’t go easy on you.”
His eyes looked her up and down. “They go easy on you?”
“Different set of circumstances.” Circumstances which Parker still didn’t understand.
Frank’s brow furrowed and his head cocked to the side. “Is that mine?” He pointed to the hoodie Parker wore.
She opened her mouth to answer, then shut it. She shrugged sheepishly. “I was cold.”
“What, you don’t have your own clothes?”
“They took mine.” Shoving her hands deeper into her pockets, Parker rocked back and forth on her heels. “What now? Why’d we come here?”
Frank looked out across the Hudson, but it seemed like he was looking past the river and past New Jersey. He poked the inside of his cheek with his tongue before returning his gaze to Parker, his eyes searching hers.
Parker lifted her shoulders. “What?”
He shook his head. “I’ve got a safehouse. You’re going to stay there until I take out everyone involved in whatever the hell you’ve gotten yourself mixed in with.”
“By ‘take out,’ you mean kill?”
“We ain’t fighting over this again. Come on.” Frank started towards an old brick industrial building.
He walked like a stocky bulldog. Parker followed, arms crossed. She kicked a loose piece of gravel that went skittering across the asphalt. “Exitus acta probat.”
He threw a questioning glance over his shoulder.
“The outcome justifies the deed,” she translated, reaching his side and matching his pace.
He shoved a door open. “Yeah, it does.” His voice was gruff and echoed slightly as he led the way inside the dank building. “You think your way is the right way? You think wearing a mask and taking down a few goons is gonna change anything? You’re wrong.”
Parker rolled her eyes behind his back. This guy sure did like to lecture.
“They’ll just keep coming,” he continued, turning to face Parker. She looked past him and observed the room they were in: dimly lit, some barred areas that were once walls of windows but, with each window pane broken, now resembled cages, a car to the left, and some computers in the center. The far end had a kitchenette not unlike the one from her own apartment. Frank moved to block Parker’s view. They made eye-contact. “One day, you won’t be fast enough. You won’t be strong enough.”
“Doubtful,” Parker argued. “I can lift literal tons.”
Frank shook his head and turned away. As he sat at the computer chair, he muttered, “Christ, you’re just like Red.” He pulled the bottom of his shirt up to inspect what looked like a stab wound. It was cleaned and stitched, though. Parker wondered if the friend he saw earlier was some sort of nurse or if he fixed himself up.
There were only two people ‘Red’ would refer to, and only one of them had been publicly linked to the Punisher. “Daredevil?”
“You know him?”
“Know of him.” Parker leaned a hip against the desk and scanned all the computers. “What is this place? Your secret nerd lair?”
Frank raised a brow. “No.”
“And what’s with the cages?”
He twisted his torso, then let the shirt fall back down. Dragging his attention back to the girl beside him, he said, “A friend of mine used to live here when he was hiding from the Feds.”
“Did he kill people, too?”
The breathy laugh that escaped Frank’s lips caught Parker off guard. “Hell no. He was a coder, used to work for the NSA before some shit went down. He leaked information powerful people wanted to bury.”
She nodded. Frank didn’t really seem the type to befriend a nerdy coder, but looks could be deceiving. She of all people knew that.
“You know, this place doesn’t exactly scream safehouse,” Parker remarked, her eyes drifting back to the bars in the corner. “Kinda gives off...I don’t know...hostage vibes?”
Frank stood and strode over to the kitchenette. “You’ll be safe here.”
She shot a look at a twin bed in one of the “rooms.” The blanket was ratty, and the pillow was stained. “Right.” She pursed her lips. “Are you staying here, too?”
“Planning on it.” He opened a cabinet and sorted through some cans.
Great. She went from being neighbors to the Punisher to being his roommate in a garage-like building with no solid walls. It beat sleeping outside, though. Parker walked around the bars and tossed her backpack onto the bed before depositing herself on it, too. The mattress’s springs creaked under her weight. That won’t get annoying at all.
“Hungry?”
From where she lay, flat on her back with her hands interlocked behind her head, Parker replied, “I’m good.” She could smell the canned green beans he was tucking into and was thankful for the cheeseburger from earlier. Now that she was lying down, all the stress her body took that day crashed over her like a tsunami wave. Getting kidnapped really took it out of you. Yawning, Parker turned to lay on her side. “It’s been a long day, I’m going to crash. Don’t kill anyone while I’m asleep.”
There was a soft clink as Frank set the can of green beans on the metal table. “Hold on.”
Ugh . She turned. Frank strode across the room and leaned against the doorframe with his arms crossed. Or, well, the metal bars that were kind of a door frame. His expression was unreadable. “Tell me what happened today.”
She sat up and leaned back on her hands. “Look, it’s kind of a long story, and I’d really just like to crash out for a few hours.”
“Give me the short version.”
CliffsNotes, got it. “I talked to Rick at his house, and it was actually going well until a molotov cocktail interrupted our conversation just as it was getting juicy. Some prick kicked me and knocked me out cold.” Parker gestured to the bruise on the right side of her face. “I woke up strapped to a chair, almost completely paralyzed. I could barely even open my eyes at first.”
Frank’s brow was drawn. He had this intense look in his eyes as he listened. “Then what?”
“Doc—that lady from the parking garage—she showed up and tried to take my blood for some reason, I don’t know. I burned through the paralyzing drug pretty quickly and broke free before they could get any blood. The end.”
He nodded. “Why’d they take your clothes?”
She shrugged. “I was wearing my Spider-Man suit. They probably figured it was easier to just take it off than to roll my sleeves up. And I’m not even sure how long I was out; they could’ve done some medical examinations on me for all I know.” She tucked the hair framing her face behind her ear. Frank still watched her, waiting. For what? An apology? “I can find another sweatshirt, I’m sorry I borrowed yours without asking first.”
“Don’t worry about it.” He looked away for a couple beats, then back. His eyes narrowed slightly as he asked, “That’s it?”
“That’s it.”
He nodded. Released a deep breath. “Get some sleep, kid.” He turned, leaving her with the silence of the room.
As he moved back toward the makeshift kitchen area, Parker lay back down, her mind not quite at ease; she wasn’t sure it ever was. But there was a warm sensation that enveloped her unexpectedly: a sense of safety.
It might’ve been a dingy industrial garage with a thin mattress, bars for walls, and a bathroom she could smell from where she lay, and she might’ve been on a crime syndicate’s shit list, but she had a feeling the man across the room would kill anyone who tried to touch her. Half of her resented it and was confused by it. The other half—the half that recognized she’d never once been protected by someone older than her in her life—was selfishly grateful.