Free Special Relationship by Alessandra Fox Page B

I went up in the lift. Couldn't wait for it to be all over. But Nick was great, I think he sensed I was tense, but he made me feel so comfortable and he was so sort of normal that I just started relaxing and forgot everything. "
    Adrian came back with Alex's coffee. "Here you go," he said, placing the cup in front of her.
    Alex wanted straight away to discuss her reasons for asking him there, mainly because she wanted to know if there was a solution – but also because she wanted to talk alone with Kerry. She explained to him about the text messages she had received regarding Nick Hensen, unsure what Kerry had already have told him, and asked whether it was possible to trace who sent them.
    "You have two ways," he explained. "You either hack the computers of the text-sending service or you go to the police and say you are being harassed by a person or people unknown, in which case, if it's serious enough, they might go the company and demand to see which IP address the messages were sent from.
    "Neither is easy, particularly as the company is likely to be in the States. The texts, although a bit weird, are not really threatening so chances are the police won't be bothered. Even if you get them to act, there is no guarantee that they will be able to trace the sender. They might have sent them from a computer that's not theirs.
    "Even with an IP address we might not find the actual sender."
    "What's an IP address?" Kerry asked.
    Adrian explained that it was just like your home address, everyone has a unique identifier. But on the internet your address could be disguised or hidden and, unlike in your own home, posting from one address didn't actually prove that you lived there.
    "You only have to go to an internet cafe. The message can be traced back there, but the chances of proving who actually sent it would be slim."
    "So people can send anyone text messages on their phone and there is really little chance of finding out who sent it?" asked Alex.
    "The police might find out with lots of work, but they would only be bothered if someone was being really malicious, threatening to kill you or something. Telling them that someone is warning you about another person isn't going to get them running around."
    "So I have to put up with the messages?"
    "You could change your number, but then you'd have to tell Hensen's people if you want to carry on working for them, and the chances are that whoever is sending them will get your new number, since we have to assume that they have come from someone with a connection to Hensen, the company or the man.
    "You could block messages from that text-forwarding service. But do you want to. Maybe the sender is trying to warn you of something that you need to know?
    "The messages will still be sent, just you wouldn't see them."
    Alex and Kerry looked at each other.
    "Listen ladies, I'm happy to give you some free overtime, but I think you two might want to discuss things between yourselves.  Let me know if there is anything I can do tomorrow. In the meantime I'd like to join the rat race on its homeward journey through the sewers of London and catch up with my Miss Rat."
    Adrian might be the prankster and joker who dealt in computer code and numbers and not emotions, but he was perceptive enough to sense that the two of them wanted to be alone.
    "Ade, can't thank you enough. You go home and have a good evening," said Alex.
    Once he had left, the two women talked of things that Adrian didn't know about. Only Kerry knew of Alex's true history and Alex knew that she, true to her word, wouldn't have told a soul, not even her own husband. She recalled the day that she had first told her of her past, and Kerry had muttered the memorable words, to lighten the dreadful moment, "An Englishman's word is his bond."
    Despite the magnitude of what she had revealed, both of them managed a smile. And now Alex knew that Kerry's bond was as safe as Fort Knox or the Bank of England.
    The two of them spent the next