by Newbiel
���So that's it? We have nothing else?" Sarland asked with some anger in his voice. He was looking down each of his agents waiting for someone to speak up.
"I believe I have something sir." Agent Aldrin spoke up for the first time.
"Go on Aldrin, what is it?"
"I was looking through each of the testimonies and I found something interesting. Nathaniel Lyndon, the kid who hid in the room said that he heard someone speak chinese near the room and then saw a person going to the balcony and using one of the ropes to descend. I think we should interrogate him, we could find something."
"Lyndon hum? You really think that this kid could help us?"
"Maybe not but I did some investigation, he is supposedly a brilliant young man. After all, he is sixteen and he still managed to enter Columbia law school. That's not something you see often."
"Alright, call the prosecutor tomorrow and set things up." He ordered when there was a sudden knock on the door.
"Enter." He shouted.
The door swung open and the face of an agent appeared in the doorway.
"Sir, we have prosecutor Lyndon and her son in the lobby, they want to meet with you."
Hearing that, an expression of surprise appeared on the face of every agent in the room.
Chapter 75: :
Nathaniel and his mother did not have to wait long before they were given visitor badges and one agent escorted them to the 25th floor of the building. As the elevator was making its way up Nathaniel could feel a lot of people inside the building and once the elevator stopped on the 25th floor he could hear at least two times more people working on this floor than in any other floor. It was ample proof of the importance of the shootout that occured Friday night. The case had been made a priority by the FBI.
Nathaniel had heard on the news that one of the cops injured that night had died from his injuries. It was crystal clear that the public opinion wanted answers and the FBI had not given any so far. The politicians in charge were putting pressure on them to have answers while the opposition party was yelling at the first camera they could find that the fact that they had not provided any evidence so far was a sign of incompetency, saying anything to gain a few points for the poll. Political agendas were pushing along with the prejudice on the one responsible for the case.
Nathaniel shook himself off these depressive thoughts and got out of the elevator, following closely behind the agent who was escorting them ,with his mother beside him. They were directed to one of the biggest offices on the floor, the name of Tom Sarland written on the door. The fact that they were led here and not into an interrogation room was ample proof of the goodwill they were showing to them and Nathaniel nodded in an approving gesture.
The agent knocked once on the door and the voice of Tom Sarland told them to enter. At that point the agent who was escorting them just left, his assignment complete. Stepping into the office Nathaniel could see that Tom Sarland was not alone and there was a female agent in a chair here. Based on his memories the name of that agent was Aldrin.
The office of Tom Sarland was sternly furnished, as it was a federal building it was to be expected. There were a few personal items on his desk, one of which being a picture where he could see him with a cute looking woman and a boy beside them.
"Prosecutor Lyndon, glad to see you again. I believe you know agent Aldrin." He said, getting up from his desk and shaking her hand. This time Karine accepted the handshake.
Once the greetings and pleasantries were over, agent Sarland encouraged them to sit.
"So, what can we do for you prosecutor?" Sarland asked, looking at her.
"It is not me who wanted to come here but my son." Karine pointed out.
"Yes, this is true. I wanted to come here first to tell you that I'm sorry. I could have been more cooperative with you but after everything that I saw that night, I just wanted to go home." Nathaniel said.
Tom Sarland was taken aback by his apology. He had thought of many reasons as to why the prosecutor wanted to meet with him, one of whom was to press charges against him for what he did but never in a million years would he have pictured this. Seeing that the character of the young man was pretty good, he quickly responded.
"That's understandable, the emotions were high on that night and I was out of line too. My sincere apology."
"Firstly?" Agent Aldrin picked up. "There is something else?"
"Yes, there is. I don't know if you read my deposition but I heard someone talk chinese in the suite before the person excited."
"I read it. In fact I wanted to summon you here to talk about it with you tomorrow." Agent Aldrin said.
"Oh, good then. The sentence that I heard kind of stuck in my head all week end and it was driving me nuts until I found a translator who could make sense of it. The truth was it was not chinese but korean, I wrote down the translation for you." Nathaniel finished, taking a piece of paper and giving it to agent Aldrin.
"'I will kill you all Black Hand', what does that mean?" She asked.
"I don't know but I thought it could be of help to you."
"Well we thank you for your help prosecutor and you too kid. We will look into it."
"Glad to be of assistance to the FBI. We will go home now, thanks for receiving us." Karine said, getting up, quickly followed by the other persons in the room. Until Nathaniel stopped in the doorway and turned around to Sarland.
"I know that you can't tell me anything on the whereabouts of the Kim family but are they safe?" He asked.
Looking at each other, Sarland and Aldrin seem to ponder something until agent Aldrin chooses to speak.
"They are in one of our safehouses well protected by our agent. Do not worry, your friend is okay. She will get to talk to you once we are sure the threat on their life is over."
"Thank you." Nathaniel said wholeheartedly.
After that they were escorted back to the lobby and out of the building where they had to give back the badges. It was only until they were back home that the mother and son pair finally talked.
"Are you sure about this sweetie?" Karine asked anxiously.
"Yes mom, we talked about this. This was the only way to help them without hacking into their system to plant the information as you made me promise not to."
"I know, I'm a bad mother, not letting you hack into a little federal law enforcement agency." She said sarcastically.
"At least with my way, my name would not appear anywhere."
"Unless someone bust you and you finish your life in Leavenworth and guess what, we prefer our son to NOT live his life in prison for the rest of his life. Remember our arrangement, you get to help the FBI on this case just once and now that you did, it's over." Karine said sternly.
"I know mom. I know. I'm done with the case, now it's up to them to see it through it's completion. I have other things to do now."
"Are you talking about your girlfriend?" She smirked.
"No mom, I'm talking about my studies, my album and my future movie, the promotion is going to start soon and I will be plenty busy at the time. Moreover, Madison is not my girlfriend, we are just having fun I guess." He explained.
"And you are okay with that sweetie?" She asked concern.
"Mom, I'm still sixteen, I don't want to settle into a relationship so soon. Then there is my work, my studies and all of what I can do and I need to hide it from her. I don't really have the luxury to tell her everything about me when I have a whole part of my life I need to hide." He said with a bitter smile.
"I'm sorry that you do not get to have a normal life sweety." She said sadly, passing her hand through his hair.
"Come on mom, even before the accident, my life was not normal by any means. Now, this is only magnified. Don't worry, I made my peace with it, meditation helps a lot with that."
"I should perhaps give it a go." She said with an interested expression on her face.
"I'll teach you mom." He responded smiling.
Chapter 76: :
Nathaniel was leaving his class in constitutional law when he noticed that two cute looking girls were waiting for him in the doorway. They were both smart looking with a hint of the girl next door kind of look. Both of them had brown hair, were around 5"6" and had shy expressions on their face while waiting for him which made him smile. The one on the left was wearing glasses while the one on the right, the shyer of the two, was not even looking at him.
Leaving the classroom, he was quickly accosted by the two girls.
"Hi, I'm Charlotte and my friend here is Allison." The one wearing the glasses said as an introduction.
"Hi, I'm Nathaniel, glad to meet you both." He said, smiling.
"Yes, we know! I'm sorry to bother you but we are forming a study group with a few friends and we wanted to know if you were willing to join too."
"Well, I'm flattered but why me?" He asked, curious.
"That's an easy one, you are the more han… euh I mean you are the smarter student here." She corrected herself just in time, blushing a little. "That does not mean we are only going to use you to advance but it is to help each other on various topics. This is not one sided."
"That sounds good. How many people are in your study group so far?"
"So far we are four, five if you decide to join and if you decide against it, we will stay four. We do not offer just anyone to join and we are only offering because we feel that your character could fit right in with us."
"I can understand that, how many times do you meet in a week?"
"Usually monday and thursday with an additional meeting on saturday when there is an exam period. So, do you want to join?"
"I don't know ladies, what about this. Give me the time and address of your future meeting and I will come. We will see after that if we can work together." He offered.
"That would be great! To be honest, that's what I had in mind. Do you have an email address?" Charlotte asked.
"Of course, do you have a pen?"
She turned out to have one and a few minutes later the two girls were leaving with a smile and a slightly happy gait with the email of Nathaniel. Shaking his head, he was going to exit the campus as it was his last class of the day when a voice echoed behind him.
"Well well well, I see that you keep yourself busy Lyndon." An enchanting feminine voice said, making him flash a broad smile.
Turning around, he could see Madison there, with her hands on her hips, looking at him sternly but the hint of playfulness could clearly be found in her eyes and her voice. She was flanked on each side by her two sorority sisters Emma and Hayley who were smirking at him. Nathaniel did not even want to think about what Madison could have said to them to make this smirk appear.
"I'm sorry, are you lost? This building is teaching law, not marketing." He answered in the same tone, walking toward them.
When Nathaniel was at arm lengths with Madison, she suddenly smiled beautifully and put her arms on his shoulder. After that the two of them started kissing in front of everyone walking in the hallway, lost in their own little world. The kiss at one point began to deepen and they finally stopped when Emma and Hayley were coughing so hard Nathaniel was worried that they would lose a lung.
"Hi handsome." Madison said breathlessly.
"Hi little devil." He smiled, a hint of desire could be found in his blue eyes.
"You are not going to give me a hello kiss too Nathaniel?" Emma's voice chimed in.
The intervention made them both laugh subconsciously and they disentangle from each other. Nathaniel realized that even if Emma was kind of naughty she was also fun to be around. She had no filter in her speech and it was always interesting when seeing her interacting with others.
"Of course I'm going to kiss you Emma." Nathaniel said, approaching and kissing her cheek. He did the same thing to Hayley. "Hello to you too Hayley."
"Hi Nathaniel, how are you?" Hayley asked.
"I'm good, and you?"
"The same, what's up with the two cuties whom you were talking to?"
"They wanted me to join their study group, I decided to give it a try." He explained.
"I'm sure they want to study with you alright." Emma chuckled.
"Be good Emma, it's not because you are naughty that all girls are too." Nathaniel rebuked her gently, taping her nose with his finger, making her two sisters laugh.
"Do you have class now?" Madison asked.
"No, I'm done for the day. I was going back home, why?"
"So young, so inexperienced…" Emma said with a sad expression.
"You are right about that Em, I don't know what young people learn these days." Hayley continued, shaking her head.
"Okay, what is going on here?" He asked with furrowed eyebrows.
"Nathaniel, when you have time off, you need to tell Madison about it so the two of you can enjoy each other's company." Hayley supplied.
"Oh. I see what you are saying now. Sorry Madie." He said with an apologetic expression on his face.
"I don't know if I can pardon you Nath." She said shaking her head with a smile on her face.
"I think I can convince you." Nathaniel said, taking her in his arms again and kissing her.
The kiss kept increasing in intensity until finally a minute later he let her go. Madison was now quite red in the face and it was obvious to everyone that she wanted to go again.
"Am I forgiven?"
"Yes… For this time yes but I will not be so lenient in the future." Madison said coming back out of it again.
"We are not going to forgive you. You have to come with us to eat ice cream and we will hold a dating class 101 while we are at it. This kind of behavior can not be tolerated." Emma said with a righteous tone.
"Ok ok, I'll come Emma." He surrendered, trying not to laugh seeing the pleased expressions on the three girls faces. He knew it was what they wanted from the beginning and he did not have a problem with that.
"Is this a fuck**g joke?" A voice exclaimed behind him.
Chapter 77: :
Surprised by the sudden outburst, Madison and Nathaniel turned around to find out what was going on. Nathaniel had already felt four people watching him from behind and had heard them coming over, which was why he was not overly surprised to see the four guys standing there. The one who had spoken was a good looking twenty year old brown haired man. He was quite muscular and was around 6". He was flanked by what seemed to be two linebackers who were really imposing with their impressive musculature and height of around 6"2".
The fourth man present was surprisingly Ethan and he was looking like he wanted to be anywhere but here. He had a twisted grimace on his face as he knew that he was fuck** either way. If he left his quarterback he knew his future in the team would be jeopardized and if he stayed there, he knew he would have to go against Nathaniel again which he was not looking forward to. The memories of their last meeting were still fresh in his mind.
"Are you kidding Carl? Are you following me now?" Madison shouted.
"Shut up! So that's why you denied me time and time again? It was for him?" He said, pointing at Nathaniel angrily. His ego could not admit that the one he chased had chosen someone other than himself.
"No, I denied you because you are a manipulative jackass! Nathaniel had nothing to do with that." Madison answered, clearly mad.
Carl was going to answer when Nathaniel suddenly chose to speak.
"Hi Ethan, fancy meeting you here." Nathaniel smiled, completely ignoring Carl and the two linebackers.
Looking at his smile, Ethans thought that his smile was definitely ominous and his eyes were steel cold.
"Hello Nathaniel." He said with a grimace. In his mind, the same phrase was coming over and over again. 'I'm fuc***. I'm fuc***. I'm fuc***.'
The interruption surprised everyone here, Emma the most.
"Wait, you know each other?" She asked.
"Yes, we played Basketball together once, it was quite fun.
We should do it again soon." Nathaniel answered, not leaving Ethan out of his sight. Hearing that Ethans face turned pale.
"So that's why you tried to stop me from coming here?" Carl shouted, getting angrier by the second.
At that point, Ethan was in a tricky situation. Confronted by Nathaniel's cold eyes, the disapproving stare of his girlfriend and the angry expression of his quarterback, he knew his future was going to be dire. He made a decision in that moment to take a side that he hoped would be the good one.
"Yes, you are being a dic* Carl, just stop it. There are a lot of hot girls here so stop fixing on the only one who rejected you, let it go." Ethan exclaimed.
In ordinary times he would have listened to his teammate but in this moment he was so blinded by anger that he could not. He was so mad in fact that for a second he wanted to punch him. Ultimately, he decided against it and chose to turn his ire to Nathaniel.
"I will warn you just once. Leave her now and I will let you off, but if you decide to be stubborn I will make your life a living hell." He said in a seething tone.
"So let me sum things up." Nathaniel said, looking at Carl for the first time. "So first, you are stalking Madison and her friends, after that you try to bully me and as a last resort you are threatening me? Are you trying to get expelled that much?" Nathaniel said like he was talking to a particularly dumb person.
"And who will believe you? I'm a very respected starting quarterback who is the only one who can bring a trophee back to the college while you are a nobody in your first year who is just seeking attention. I think I will take my chances."
"Carl just stop it, Nathaniel has nothing to do with it!" Madison jumped to his defense, linking hands with him.
Seeing the two liking hands, the anger that he had in him finally exploded and he jumped at Nathaniel. The only thing at that point that could calm himself was to beat that blondie to death. The reality turned out to be vastly different from what he had in mind. In his mind he was already seeing the punch connect with Nathaniels jaw and breaking it. After that he would kick him until he decided it was enough.
