Jolting herself awake, she immediately took the phone on her desk. Pressing a button on the phone, the line got through instantly.
"Security."
"Prosecutor Lyndon on the phone. I initiate a complete lockdown on the thirteenth floor. We have a possible leak, I want every elevator in the building shutdown and an NYPD officer at every exit."
"Will do Prosecutor Lyndon. Lockdown initiated. Hang in there Prosecutor, Officer will be on your floor in five minutes." The man on the other side said before the line went dead.
"Phone, fax and internet is shut down on the entire floor." Karine said before taking her personal phone from her purse and dialing someone.
"Mattews." Said a gruff voice on the other side.
"Robert, it's Prosecutor Lyndon on the line."
"Hi Karine, what's going on?"
"The banking records present in my office on the Droski case have been tampered with. It's safe to say that the other file must have been as well." She explained in a flurry.
"Fu**! Any idea on who did it?" He said, sounding angry.
"No, I initiate complete lockdown on the entire floor in the DA office. I want you to take out off duty every cop who had access to the Droski files and start interrogating them."
"I'm on it. I'm sending you two agents to your office right away too. If he had someone on the inside, he could have many more. I will be more at ease with a couple of my agents guarding your six."
"Thanks Robert, I need to get going. Take care."
"You too Karine." He said before cutting off the communication.
"Who was that?" Ask Nathaniel curious.
"Robert Mattews, old friend of mine from my university days. He was a lawyer until he had a change of heart. He is now the director of the internal affairs of the NYPD. Trust me, he is like a dog with a bone and I just threw a huge bone in front of him. I'm starting to feel bad for all the cops who would be in his claws in fact." She said with a dark chuckle.
Nathaniel was going to ask something else when people started cursing outside of his mom's office. Arching an eyebrow at his mom, she nodded and exited her office followed closely by him. Assistants and paralegal were trying to find out why nothing worked anymore while other prosecutors were cursing loudly from their offices. Climbing on a chair near her door, his mom whistled loudly, gathering the attention of everyone present.
"I just initiated a complete lockdown for a possible leak in the department. I ask everyone to save their work and turn their personal phone off. You know the drill people. NYPD officers and Internal affair agents are coming as we speak. Cooperate and everything will be fine, let's try to minimize every unpleasant thing that could come our way. I invited every prosecutor to a meeting in my office right now. Thanks guys."
Her speech finished and once making sure that her order was respected, she got back to her office followed closely by her son. Sitting behind her desk, Nathaniel moved away from his chair to rest beside hers. Looking at her, he could not help to smile proudly.
"I almost forgot how badass you are mom." He said, kissing her cheek.
"That's right, your mother is amazing, sweetie. Never forget it." She said with a beautiful smile who disappeared a few moments before several people started entering her office.
At the end 6 people enter her office, five men and one woman. Their age range was thirty to fifty-five years old. Everyone wore serious expressions on their face as they knew the situation was dire. They were surprised to find a man near Karine and start looking critically at him. She was notoriously distant with the man who she was working with, even more with people outside of the service and yet here she was with a man that none of them have seen before.
"John, close the door please." Karine ask.
The man who was the closest to the door, hurriedly closed it. He was around forty years old with black hair and was 5"7 in height. He had an ordinary face and was a little overweight but seemed to belong to the kind type.
"Who is that and why he is here, Lyndon?" Ask the older one with a harsh voice.
"That's my son Bill so mind your tone." She said in a chilling voice.
"My name is William so stop calling me Bill. He needs to leave this room." He demand.
"Nope, I'm not going anywhere. Do you know it's impolite to talk about me like I'm not even here?" Nathaniel finally talked.
"I don't fucking care. You need to leave right now, you do not have the credentials to be here."
"Not going to happen, we have potentially someone in this service working with a russian mob lord. I'm staying with my mother until we leave the building." He said simply looking at the man's eyes without flinching.
"What is he talking about?" Ask the other female Prosecutor in the room, getting the conversation back on track.
"I found out that all the banking information on the Droski case were tempered with. My others evidences must have been too. Only someone from the service or from NYPD could have done it. This is serious guys. I would not have enacted lockdown without a very good reason." Said Karine, glad that someone had his priority straight.
"Are you sure?" ask John with concern. Realising the problem, everyone of them turned grim even Bob dropped the issue with Nathaniel. A problem like that could involve everyone in their case and cancel several of their trials.
"Yes, I have very concluent evidence. I summoned you to my office to warn you. You guys need to secure your files before Internals Affairs arrives. Moreover, you need to double check every evidence that you have once the lockdown is lifted. I believe this was a one time thing but we need to make sure of it. I know that you have a lot of work to do, I will not hold you back much longer." Karine said, with a last nod to them.
One by one they start making their way back to their office and briefing their team. They had stopped cursing and were back to working efficiently. At that moment, a man appeared on the doorway. He was twenty five years old with green eyes and short brown hair. He was quite handsome too.
"Everything is good here?" He asked.
"Yes Ethan, keep working. We need everything ready for IA when they arrive in the next minutes."
"Got it boss." He answered with a smile before leaving.
Karine did not appear affected by that man and started securing the files on her computer. Nathaniel on the contrary was. The man to anyone else looked relaxed but to Nathaniel he was not. His eyes were agitated and troubled and his legs were trembling like he was under some huge tensions. There was also sweat that was glistening on his neck. That was a sign he had succeeded to hide from everyone but Nathaniel saw through it immediately. There were other suspicious things about him too.
"Who was that mom?"
"It's my assistant, Ethan." She answered absentmindedly while looking at her computer.
"Do you know how much he makes in a year?"
"Someone like Ethan? Taking into consideration that he graduated from a small community college and he doesn't have much experience, I would say 70 thousand dollar a year, 80 with overtime. Why?" Karine said with a raised eyebrow, forgetting the screen of her computer.
"He wears three thousand dollars shoes and a brand new two thousand dollar watch." Said Nathaniel. After going through countless shops with his grandmother, he was pretty certain of the item that Ethan wore. He could even name the brand of every item of clothing on his person.
"Maybe he won some money recently?" She said, not wanting to think about her assistant for the last two years, betraying her.
"Mom, since when do you believe in coincidence?" He asks, patting her shoulder. He could easily guess what she was thinking.
"Since never sweetie." She sighed, her shoulder slumping a little. Nobody has ever seen her so fragile that she was in that moment and they would likely never will. At that moment, someone knocked on her door.
"Enter."
Two middle aged men enter her office. They were around 6" and built like people who live in the gym. They wore impassive expressions and gave off dangerous vibes. Looking at them, Nathaniel could not help but to nod his head. These guys were ex military, that much was obvious to him.
"Prosecutor Lyndon, agent Homes and Bry. Internal affairs, Director Mattews sent us." The older of the two said with a deadpan voice while both of them took out their badge.
"Badge on the desk gentleman" Said Karine with a wave of her hand. Almost like they expected it, both of them did so without saying anything. Looking with attention at both badges, she finally nods and gives them back. With people getting by more and more often with fake badges, she was very adamant to check credentials of everyone she met, things that she passed to her wife and son.
"All exits are cover ma'am. We are going to start interrogating people, do you have someone of interest in mind?" He asked.
Looking at her son, she made her decision.
"Yes. My assistant Ethan Lym. He seems to have made some money recently considering that he wore expensive shoes and watch, I will forward you his file." She sighed.
"Thanks ma'am, we are going to start grilling him right away." He said before getting his phone and looking to file on it. Finding the file of her assistant and his picture, both of them exit the office without another word.
******
Three hours later in an office above a russian restaurant, two people were meeting in the office. One of them was around 5"8 with brown hair and was thirty years old. The second who seemed to be the boss was past fifty years old with grey hair and an impressive musculature. He had grey eyes with a mouth always twisted in disdain. There was a very malvoyant gleam in his eyes when he was talking which was scaring people off.
"That fucking bitch!" He yelled, punching his desk who creaked on impact. "Are you sure that she found our mole?"
"Yes, my guys in NYPD confirmed it. Her assistant was arrested thirty minutes ago." The man named Igor responded.
He was the lieutenant of Piotr Droski for the last three years. after he had killed the previous lieutenant. Igor was a smart, devious and ruthless guy who stopped at nothing to get what he wanted. He was also very well connected with people in every department of the city that he could bribe or threaten into compliance.
"She is a fucking pain in the ass! Do you have any idea how much money she is currently costing us?" He screams.
Since the investigation had started, she was constantly putting pressure on them and thus they had to reduce their activity to a frightening degree to avoid being caught.
"Yes I do sir, I have the numbers of the last week if you want." He says, taking a file from his bag and posing them on the desk. He did not have to mention they weren't good.
"Do you have the information I requested?" Piotr glowered at him.
"Yes sir. Her parents died ten years ago and the rest of her extended family live in France. She is married to Mary Lyndon, the daughter of the giant of the music Robert Lyndon. The two have a son who exited the hospital not too long ago after four years of coma. According to my investigation she's not close to anyone in work. Her family means everything to her." Igor says, looking at his files.
"She has a son?" He said, suddenly more calm.
"Yes, named Nathaniel and sixteen years old. He still hasn't come back to school so I assume he's still in rehabilitation. You don't get out of a long time coma without physical or mental issues."
"Do you know where they live?" Piotr asks, sitting back down, his finger drumming on the desk.
"Yes, my guys finally got that information."
"Get a team together. We are going to take care of that problem once and for all." He said with a cruel smile.
"Sir, we talked about this. We can't kill her. If we do, we would not survive this." He said, tentatively.
"I know that! This is not what Ii'm talking about. Her son is her weakness. Have our men hit their home tonight and get me that kid. Once we are going to cut a few of his fingers, she will be much more agreeable with us. Moreover, since they are from a rich background, we are going to get back the money that she made us lose." He said gloating.
"They would not hand the kid easily. What are our orders for the two womens?"
"Assemble a team of 7 of our best men. If they resist, beat them up but nothing life threatening. I don't believe kidnapping a sick kid is going to be a problem." He finished.
Nodding his head, Igor started to leave, thinking that 7 men was way much more than what he needed to accomplish his mission.
If only he knew.