The Jack Hammer

by Derek Ciccone

  “You talked to him this morning?” For some reason Sam had the impression his death happened much earlier than that. But the details she recalled from her conversation with the officers were hazy at best.

  “Yes, he said he’s coming home. He will be here in a few days.”

  “Anna, Tim is dead. He died in a car crash outside of Phoenix, the police just came a few hours ago to tell me.”

  Anna started shaking. “That can’t be true. I just heard from him.”

  Sam didn’t reply—there was nothing left to say. Her face told Anna all she needed to know. They embraced in a tearful hug, holding tightly to each other until they were out of tears. It was comforting, but didn’t make it any better.

  “So what was your big news?” Sam finally asked in a detached voice.

  “Nothing, Sam, it can wait.”

  “No—its okay—please tell me.”

  Anna hesitated for a moment, then said, “My brother, Teo, defected to the United States. He’s in Florida and trying out to play baseball.”

  “That is so great,” Sam forced enthusiasm. “That your brother is here … and he’s safe.”

  She began crying again. It was actually the worst thing she could hear at this moment. The contrast was cruel. Her brother wasn’t here, or safe.

  They embraced once again. “I’m supposed to work tonight, but I don’t want you to be alone. I will go home and pick up some clothes and I’ll be right back.”

  “Oh, Anna, you don’t have to do that. It won’t change anything. Milla and I will be okay.”

  “It wasn’t a question, Sam—I’m going to stay over.”

  Chapter 41

  Anna returned to her apartment, leaving Sam alone with her thoughts. Not a good place to be at the moment. But one thing was very clear—she needed answers.

  Growing up Catholic, the priests always preached that sometimes things happen without reason, as part of God’s big game plan. That never soothed her need to seek out those answers. And Tim was no different—his whole life was dedicated to finding answers for others. Now it was time for someone to find them for him.

  She moved to the bookcase that camouflaged the door to his office, unlocked the combination lock, and then pushed it inward.

  She’d never been in Tim’s office. It was hard enough for him to have his sister and niece around 24/7, so he deserved some form of privacy.

  Tacked on a cork bulletin board behind his desk were three eight-by-ten photographs. One was of Jack Myles, a scan of the famous Sports Illustrated cover from thirty years ago. Underneath it was a notation that read: Myles: Katherine (wife), Camelot (son) Geoffrey (son).

  Right next to it was a similar tree marked Stepania with a photo that included a man who looked just like Jack Myles, holding Anna, who was but two or three at the time. Gloria (wife), Anna (daughter), Teofilo (son). The final one included a photo of what appeared to be the same man, but this time he was with a young Natasha Kushka, holding a tennis racket that was taller than she was. Kushka: Irina (wife), Natasha (daughter).

  She took a closer look at the photos. The man had changed through the years, but Sam could see why Tim and Anna might think it was the same person.

  A grease board was resting against Tim’s desk. On it was a story about a man named Alexander Kushka who was born, and supposedly died, in a small Russian town. But the compelling part was what happened to Alex during his travels in between, including a meteoric rise as Jack Myles. It would have sounded crazy … up until the point that those police officers arrived to tell her that Tim was dead.

  She looked through his file cabinet and found a folder marked Russia. It contained information on his trip, including a copy of Alexander Kushka’s death certificate and a photograph of his headstone.

  Another folder was titled Natasha. It was filled with photos, notes about her likes and dislikes, basically everything your typical stalker would want to know.

  She shut the file cabinet and moved to the desk. She picked up the remote to a twenty-year-old VCR and turned it on. She clicked play, and baseball highlights of Jack Myles appeared on a small TV that sat on the desk. Long home runs, interviews, and even some video of him holding his baby son, Cam. She recognized the tape as the twenty-year anniversary collector’s item tape of the Jack Hammer’s dream season. Come to think of it, her copy went missing not long ago. She just figured that Milla had gotten hold of it, which meant it could be anywhere.

  Just being inside Tim’s office grew too much for her. A wave of memories washed over her, and she needed to get out so she could breathe again. But before she exited, she noticed a post-it note amongst the clutter on his desk. It stuck out to her because he hated post-it notes, and it drove him crazy when she would stick reminders for him all around the apartment. On this one, Tim had scribbled: Lee Henson—FBI. Lead Investigator Myles case. Retired, along with a phone number.

  Chapter 42

  Whack … Whack … Whack … “Out!”

  Irina shook her head with disgust at another poor backhand that flew far outside the boundary. She felt a burning sensation all through her body, and it had nothing to do with the Las Vegas heat. She was hopping mad.

  After Natasha double-faulted the game away, Irina had seen enough, and went off on one of her patented tangents, “I told her … I told her. But she never listens. There is no focus today. She needs to take care of tennis first … then she can worry about everything else.”

  “Can you give it a rest?” Tatiana said with a sigh. “You’ve been on her ass since the first set, and the only thing it’s accomplishing is giving me a headache.”

  “If she had half the passion I had, she’d be the number one player in the world!”

  “If she was like you, then she’d also be a mean old bitch.”

  Irina wanted to rip the oversized, hoop earrings right out of the bratty teenager’s ears. But she was convinced that the two girls conspired to push her buttons, and she wasn’t going to give them the pleasure.

  And she didn’t want to scare off Tatiana, who unknowingly served as one of her best assets when it came to getting her points across to Natasha. Everything she told Tatiana would go right to Natasha’s ears—she was like the media. So she continued on the tangent, trying to send another message, “Casinos until five in the morning … commercials … magazine covers.”

  Tatiana heaved another sigh. “Can you give her a break for once? She fell for some guy who blew her off. She invited him up for the weekend and he never showed. She’s depressed. Weren’t you ever in love?”

  “She will have plenty of time for boys when she wins Wimbledon and the U.S. Open.”

  “You didn’t answer my question. Haven’t you ever been in love? You couldn’t have been this ice princess your whole life.”

  Irina’s mind raced to Alex. The two of them, so young, and so hopelessly naïve. She always flashed back to that moment when they were hugging and kissing their goodbyes at the train station, as Alex was leaving for his first mission. She didn’t want to let go, but he assured her he would be back before she even knew he was gone. But days turned to months, and months to years.

  Even after a decade went by, she refused to admit to herself that he wasn’t coming back. The only other man she was with in all those years was Alex’s brother, Nikolas. It was the bond of two people who’d lost someone they deeply cared for, which turned into a brief affair. But the reality was that he could never fill the void his brother left behind, and she broke it off.

  People said she was crazy and stubborn not to put Alex in the past and find a new man—to get married while she was still young enough to bear a family. But her persistence seemed to pay off, when one day he walked back through her door. It was a miracle. They tried to pick up where they’d left off, all those years ago, but they weren’t those people anymore.

  She convinced herself that things would eventually go back to the way they were, and the same feelings would return. When Natasha was born, it seemed like they were tr
uly united once again. But everything went down from there, and then one day Alex left for a fishing trip and never returned. Despite the suicide note, Irina never believed it. And when an FBI agent from the United States showed up not long after Alex’s “death,” offering her incriminating information, she was forced to face the truth. Not only was his death a sham, but she learned that he truly was a different person from the one she’d fallen in love with—only a coward would let his daughter live with the belief that her father had killed himself, and the Alexander Kushka she’d fallen in love with was anything but a coward.

  Another bad shot by Natasha brought her back to the present, just as one of her daughter’s temper tantrums brought the crowd to life.

  “Are you blind? That’s complete bullshit!” Natasha screamed at the line judge.

  Irina groaned—it had been ingrained in her daughter that she could do no wrong. So when things did go badly, in tennis or in life, her natural reaction was to blame others. Irina knew what her daughter really needed was a strong role model. Hers was the only voice left willing to be critical, but she’d tuned her out years ago. “Oh Alex, look what you did to your daughter,” she muttered to herself. This time not wanting Tatiana to hear.

  A few painful minutes later, another Natasha shot landed in the net, and she lost in straight sets to an unranked player from Italy named Josephina Leoni. Last week at Scottsdale she was brilliant, one week later she looked like an unfocused novice. She was just one big mood swing.

  ****

  In the pressroom, the media gathered around Natasha like sharks sensing blood. “Did you take Leoni seriously enough?” came the first question.

  “I take all my opponents seriously,” Natasha snapped at the reporter.

  “Do you think you’re spending too much time on non-tennis things, such as your reported late nights in casinos?”

  “I don’t come to your house and see what time you are tucked into bed. And you write some crappy articles. Maybe you are spending too much time not working on your job!”

  “Then how do you explain such a dreadful performance today?” braved the same female reporter.

  “I’m hurt.”

  Pens started scribbling, while Irina did a slow burn. She had always taught her to never make excuses, especially injuries. If she was healthy enough to participate, then she was healthy enough to win.

  “What is your injury?” shouted a reporter in the back.

  “I have a broken heart.”

  The press corps began to laugh, but then realized she was serious. “How did you hurt your heart?” shouted one reporter.

  “Will you need heart surgery?” asked another. They were mocking her the way she often did them.

  Natasha didn’t see the humor. “His name is Tim and if you are out there Tim, I hope you die a slow, miserable death!”

  Irina couldn’t get in that hole fast enough.

  The press began pelting her with questions, all pertaining to the identity of the mysterious Tim.

  “All I’m going to say is all men are liars! Men suck!!”

  “What is Tim’s last name?” asked the female reporter who started the whole brouhaha.

  “None of your business. You suck too! I’ll bet you used to be a man!”

  With that, Natasha grabbed her bottle of High Octane, and stormed off the podium. Natasha Kushka was a lot of things—boring wasn’t one of them.

  Chapter 43

  Lewis and Carthage stood at the back with smiles on their faces. That wasn’t to say they were happy that the press briefing had ended—if Natasha had kept talking, they figured she would have led them to the murder weapon.

  They made their way through the media. Little did the slobbering reporters know that the most interesting questions today would come from the police.

  They hit a brief roadblock when they reached Natasha’s bodyguards. “Sorry, sir, you’re going to have to back off,” said the large black man with an ocean-deep voice.

  Carthage let Lewis have his moment—they never had to play Rock Paper Scissors to determine who would play the bad cop. He stuck his badge right in front of the bodyguard’s nose. “We need to ask Natasha a few questions.”

  “Do you have some sort of warrant?” he replied, like he’d watched too many cop shows.

  “Listen, buddy, we can do this one of two ways. Either we can find a very private room and ask Natasha our questions, or we can do this in front of the press.”

  The request appeared to be above his pay grade, so he went and got his boss—Natasha’s mother. She looked annoyed as she approached the detectives.

  “What is this pertaining to, officers?” she asked with cool precision.

  “I’m sorry, I can’t divulge any information about the case,” Lewis replied in an official tone.

  “Is my daughter a suspect in whatever your investigation is?”

  “Like I told the guard, we can do this one of two ways …”

  Carthage, always the comedian, pulled a plastic black comb out of his back pocket and began combing his hair. “Hey, Sip, how do I look? Sounds like I’m gonna get to be on TV. My mother always said I should be on TV … and she always knows best, right?”

  “Okay, fine,” Irina said. “But I will sit in with her as her counsel. And if the questions stray to an area I don’t feel comfortable with, then I will stop the proceedings and call in her lawyers. And since they are located in New York, that may take a while.”

  Lewis gave a stern nod of approval.

  Carthage looked disappointed at losing his camera time, and put his comb back in his pocket.

  Irina instructed a girl she called Tatiana to seek out a private room. Irina didn’t seem fazed or flustered by the police presence. Carthage figured it was just another fire to put out from her arsonist daughter.

  When Irina explained the situation to Natasha, she announced, “I will not answer any questions from men. If you two are men, then I have nothing to say. In case you didn’t hear me before—men suck! If you want to talk, pull down your pants and show me proof you’re not men.”

  “Natasha!” Irina admonished.

  Carthage had done his homework on the Kushkas, and it was simple math. Teenage millionaire with no accountability, combined with oppressive stage-mom, minus suicidal Russian father, equals domestic disaster. But did it equal murder suspect?

  An empty room was secured, and all parties took a seat around a conference table. Except Tatiana, who was sent out of the room, or maybe to Siberia, by Irina. When Carthage looked around the table, it was like he accidentally walked into an anger management class. They didn’t just look pissed off, they looked like they wanted to piss on someone. Lighten up, folks—it’s only a murder investigation … not like it’s life or death.

  Not surprisingly, Natasha ran toward the center of attention. “Can I get a cigarette?” she asked Lewis.

  “You don’t smoke,” her mother reminded her.

  Lewis grabbed a pack from his pocket and handed a cigarette to Natasha.

  “I saw it in a movie—what are you gonna do, arrest me for smoking?” she said, appearing to be amused with herself.

  Carthage was glad to see an appreciation of classic movies from today’s youth. But wait … didn’t the funny partner of the serious cop played by Michael Douglas take an ice pick for the team in that one? It’s all fun and games until a hot blonde stabs you with an ice pick.

  Natasha coolly put the cigarette between her lips, and Lewis lit it with his lighter—it was like a scene from a 1950s detective movie. Irina didn’t look thrilled, but Carthage got the impression she rarely won these battles.

  Lewis began, “In your press briefing you mentioned a man named Tim, would that be Tim O’Connell?”

  She puffed on the cigarette with the comfort of a pack-a-day smoker. “Didn’t you hear what I said? I don’t want to talk about him.”

  “There are a lot of things I don’t want to do either, but sometimes in life we have to do things we don’t want
to do.”

  Natasha looked at him like he was speaking Portuguese. “Are you deaf and dumb, or just dumb? I said I’m not talking about him.”

  “Actually, you have no choice,” Lewis said.

  “And why is that?”

  “Because he’s dead. And you were the last person he was with.”

  Chapter 44

  Natasha looked stunned. She sat silent for a moment, looking a little wobbly, and then the tears came.

  “You lie,” she said, her eyes a mix of rain and fire.

  “Not about murder, I don’t,” Lewis came right back.

  “Who is this Tim O’Connell? And what does he have to do with my daughter?” Irina asked angrily. Not exactly a touching eulogy to the deceased. She pulled her chair closer to Natasha and put her arm around her. It was almost a nice moment.

  Carthage took a look at his watch, and saw that it was time for Good Cop to save the day. “I take it from your reaction that you knew Tim O’Connell.”

  “Yes.”

  “What was your relationship with him?”

  Irina butted in, “My daughter did not have a relationship with anyone named Tim O’Connell.”

  Natasha ignored her. “I was in love with him.”

  A coming-of-age story with romance, how nice, Carthage mused. But by the sickly look on her mother’s face, it seemed she saw it more along the lines of a slasher flick. She corrected her daughter again—no such relationship took place.

  Carthage shook his head. The only people who actually think parents know what their kids are up to these days are the parents themselves. “We can debate the meaning of your relationship at a later time, but first I need to know how you came in contact with Mr. O’Connell?”

  Natasha alternated between wiping tears away and sniffling. “He’d been coming to a lot of my matches. He posed as a reporter for a made up magazine called Second Serve. I figured him out, and called him on it last week in Scottsdale.”