Special Relationship

by Fox, Alessandra

  After twenty minutes reading film and book reviews, she got into her shorts, trainers and, with the sun already strong, the lightest T-shirt she had.

  Soon, she was running past Spitalfields, licensed for the sale of "flesh, fowl and roots" by Charles I in the 17th century, and now a trendy mix of restaurants, antique stalls and contemporary shops. She loved wandering through the market but overcame the temptation to stop. Burn those calories from all that food and drink yesterday, she told herself.

  Even that early on a Sunday there were plenty of people around. Just half a mile away was Petticoat Lane where throughout the years Huguenots, Jews and, now, Asians have in turn sold clothes, jewellery and trinkets to London's east enders. Most of the goods sold there were what Londoners would call 'cheap and cheerful'. Not Nick Hensen's stomping ground, she thought.

  She jogged on, into Middlesex Street, Botolph Street, Mansell Street and then St Katherines Way, by the Tower of London, and, skipping past the tourists, arrived at the Dock.

  She ordered an iced coffee and walked to the riverside where she looked across the Thames to the glistening 72-storey Shard. Then, still guilty about her excesses of the previous day, she decided to jog farther, into Wapping before coming back the same route for a round journey of about six miles.

  Well done, she thought as she put the key into the front door. A quick shower and down to work.

  Draped in a white towel, with another round her head, she opened the Hensen Fund Management file and turned to the pages of what was expected of her company. She'd seen them scores of times in the last couple of weeks but was determined that nothing would go wrong.

  She also decided to get the text message out of her mind, and simply do the job as professionally as possible. For that, she needed to speak to Adrian who now was having Sunday lunch with his girlfriend.

  "Ade, I'm so sorry to trouble you again, I just wanted to check that on the data side we have everything ready for Hensen."

  "Alex, will you stop worrying. Everything is set up and whatever they want from the data that's listed in the contract can be provided straight away. We can even stream everything to them in real time and they can pick and choose what they want.

  "It's easy, I'm just surprised they are paying us so much."

  "Well, it's not that much," she said. "Just enough to get us into profit and the bank off our backs."

  "Contract winning is up to you and Kerry...I'm just the boring geek who sits in front of a computer all day and from where I am everything is all systems go."

  "You're sure?"

  "Yes, I am sure. Stop worrying."

  She could hear him ordering a pint of some old world ale that she wouldn't consider drinking herself and his partner asking him who was on the phone, so decided it was time to end the call.

  "Ade, have a good day, I'll talk to you tomorrow."

  Kerry, Kerry, Kerry...she thought and hit the speed dial on her mobile.

  "Hiya," she answered.

  "Hi hon, how's it going?"

  Kerry Turner had begun working at Anderson Financial on a pay-per-day basis three years earlier but with the workload growing she was now a full-time employee and a fifteen per cent shareholder, a stake mainly built up in lieu of unpaid work.

  She was five years younger than Alex and a bright and bubbly redhead with a big smile and a heart of gold, and one of those people for whom defeat was never an option. Even a long battle with her weight since the birth of her son she'd all but won after a series of trying every fad diet the corporate world could offer.

  Alex told her about her day at the races, of Nick Hensen, Katherine and Tavis, the Lord and Lady, and the celebration drinks in Park Lane. And then of the text message she had received in the middle of the night.

  "But how'd they get your number, babe?" she asked in her accent of a working-class, cockney Londoner, which Alex decided was the London equivalent of Brooklynese.

  "Well, I have been racking my brains. I guess anyone at the company could have it. We left them with all our contact details after the pitch.

  "Tavis is a really interesting man, and we said we'd meet up for drinks...I mean, he is married and everything and old enough to be my father, but he does work for Hensen and I really like him, only for his conversation, of course, and, well, because he was quite good fun

  "But I don't actually think it was him, even though he did seem a bit suspicious of my past. Whoever sent the message could have done so during the day, not in the middle of the night. And he just doesn't strike me as the type who would do such a thing. I mean, sending a cryptic text in the middle of the night seems a bit school boyish. He just seems...well...above all that."

  "Ah, but if not him, then who?" Kerry asked with Shakespearian rhythm.

  "There was a girl there who was quite drunk, even more than the rest of us. She used to work for Hensen but doesn't anymore, so I don't know how she would have got my number. She'd still be my prime suspect because I think something went on with her and Nick Hensen.

  "But it might not have been anyone at Hensen at all. Maybe one of our competitors, or someone who for whatever reason doesn't like us dealing with the company."

  "Bit scary for you, though, darling," Kerry said. "Do you want me to come over?"

  "No, I'm fine. It did freak me out a little, but as you know I've been through worse."

  "Oh babe, don't even go there," Kerry replied.

  "Why don't we catch a film. Luke is here, with loads of sport to watch on telly. He'll look after Ollie," she added.

  "Love to, but I want to do some work, make sure I come out flying with the Hensen stuff."

  The two of them talked for a few minutes more. Kerry made Alex promise that she would call night or day if she got another scary text. Alex agreed and they decided they'd treat themselves to a good lunch the next day.

  Mind still muddled, she went back to the Sunday Times, now the business section. Keeping an eye on what was happening with the big players, like Hensen and his chums, might provide some worthwhile knowledge for the forthcoming meeting. While she read, she couldn't help but wonder how much she really knew about them and, more importantly, what they might know about her.

  According to the paper, the pound was falling, the yen was steady and the gold price was going up. Unemployment was rising and the Bank of England was considering more "quantitative easing".

  How does that work, she thought. The Bank prints money but who does it give it to?

  Shortly, she switched on her iPad, put 'The Best of Mozart' on repeat, and returned to the Hensen folder, full of papers that outlined what was expected of them. Nothing seemed too exacting.

  Le Nozze Di Fiagro Overture was playing in her earphones when her mobile on the desk vibrated and lit up. It was Tavis, whose number she had saved.

  She at first thought of rejecting the call but then pulled out her earphones and put the phone on speaker.

  "Hi Tavis," she answered.

  "Alex, lovely to meet you yesterday, hope you don't mind me calling, just wanting to check you got home safely after our boozy day and whether I could help you with anything?"

  "Oh, thanks. I have just been going through the files. I'm pretty sure everything is good.

  "Are you actually working for Nick on our stuff?"

  "Oh no, I'm doing work for him at present but your contract is not my department. Just wanted to know if I could provide any assistance, free of charge of course," he chuckled.

  "There was just one thing..." Alex started and then stopped herself abruptly.

  "What's that?" asked Tavis.

  "Oh, no nothing, it was just something with the numbers but I'll get someone in the office to sort them out.

  "How about you, did you get home before the sun came up, and hopefully not in trouble with Mrs Tavis?"

  He laughed. "She knows me by now. I have my weaknesses, whisky being one and the habit of staying out later than I should, but she is a gem."

  She was thinking of how she could
glean something from Tavis that might help her with the contract or the curious text message, but without asking any questions that would sound too obvious.

  "Nick must have really enjoyed the day yesterday, with his horse winning and everything."

  "Yep, like a kid in a candy store.

  "And, I can tell you in strictest confidence, that he also spoke very highly of you."

  "Oh really," Alex replied, collecting her thoughts of what to say next.

  "He wasn't at the pitch when we won the contract. Not that we expected him to be there, just that yesterday it was nice to meet the person who's paying the bills."

  "You are meeting him in the week?"

  "Yes apparently so, Katherine is going to call and arrange something."

  "Well if there is anything I can help you with beforehand, just give me a call."

  She thanked him for his offer and promised she would ring if anything came up.

  Afterwards, she began to wonder all over again about the previous day and the people she had met.

  She had known Tavis for only a day and thought it a bit soon for him to be calling her mobile. She'd received a weird text message in the middle of the night and, everyone connected with Hensen, seemed just too eager to please and too nice. She wondered whether the truly nice person might be the one warning her of Hensen, the man.

  Since moving to London, Alex had opted for self-enforced exile from serious relationships. She loved Kerry like a sister. And she dated men – she wasn't, after all, she told herself, a nun. But, physical motive apart, she had accepted her new life as an American in London, a single business person who lived alone, and who usually ate and slept alone.

  She purposely made no effort to make new lasting friendships. And, now, with the Hensen contract, it seemed, in the space of little more than a day, she was being dragged into a group of people who might expect more than she was willing to give.

  By the evening she couldn't wait for Monday to come. Kerry would be in the office, Ade would be on the computers and have his report on Nick Hensen complete, and she could at least be back in control of her, and her company's, fate. This time of day on a Sunday she found depressing.

  Couples were at home relaxing together ready for their Monday starts and preparing their kids for the school week. Meanwhile, she was looking in the freezer at a lasagne wondering whether she could be bothered to heat it.

  When she couldn't see 'microwave from frozen' instructions she put it back for more of its solitary confinement and wondered about herself suffering the same fate.

  She envied men who could visit the pub on their own, have a couple of pints while reading the paper and leave the establishment without talking a word to anyone other than the bartender.

  In London, she'd seen people dressed in frogmen suits while travelling on the subway , cyclists riding naked, old people plunging into freezing lakes in the middle of winter and seemingly regular commuters break out into song at packed railway stations. But nothing seemed to surprise people more than seeing a woman drinking alone in a bar.

  She knew too that even if she sat in a pub reading without looking up, it would be only a matter of time before she would be approached by a man who would ask: 'Are you waiting for someone?'

  So what, she thought.

  She went to the freezer, took out the lasagne and threw it in the bin. She grabbed a jacket, her phone and the newspaper and walked to The Eagle, remembering the pub's ditty as she went: "Up and down the City road, in and out The Eagle. That's the way the money goes. Pop goes the weasel..."

  During her time in her current apartment she had been there enough times to be on name terms with a couple of the staff,

  "Hi Karl, a bottle of Pinot please and two glasses."

  "Alex, how are you, haven't seen you for a while. Everything Ok?"

  "Yes, everything's great, just been busy with work."

  She took the wine and the glasses to a corner table facing the window looking out on what has to be said was far from a salubrious view. The pub was opposite a car park which in the evening attracted youths who seemed to be there for various purposes such as drug taking, drug dealing, stealing, vandalism and what she would describe as "making out".

  But, apart from it being a cosy, welcoming hostelry, it was, she reminded herself, right next door to Shoreditch Police Station.

  She sat there drinking her wine and poured both glasses to give the impression she was not alone. But it didn't take long. A man, maybe mid-twenties, certainly very much her junior, emerged from a group of four and approached her.

  "Are you waiting for someone?"

  "No, I like to drink from two glasses at the same time," she replied, pointing to the drinks on her table.

  "I'm sorry, I didn't want to offend you. Excuse me."

  He then walked back to his friends.

  Alex was surprised. In the past, she had been verbally abused when rejecting similar gambits. But this guy was as polite as a choir boy. And he wasn't bad looking at all. She looked up and when she caught him looking back with a nervous smile she decided she'd been too hasty.

  She drank the second glass that belonged to her pretend friend and beckoned him to return back.

  "I'm sorry, I was rude, it's just that, you know single girl in a pub often gets bothered by idiots and obviously you are not one.

  "My friend might have stood me up. She is a bit hair brained."

  "James," he said, holding out his hand. "

  "Alex, pleased to meet you."

  "Do you mind if I sit down?" he asked.

  "Sure, please do."

  "You are American or Canadian?"

  "American."

  "So what brings you here?" he asked.

  Oh what had she done, she thought immediately.

  She hated small talk. She thought for a minute that she'd take James back to hers, and he'd be gone in a taxi after after an hour or two.

  Instead, he told her of his recent trip to Thailand , his hopes for a new position with a start-up tech company and how he split with his last girlfriend after she had decided to move to Paris.

  Alex looked at her phone. "James, I'm really sorry, just got a text from my my friend. She's at the wrong pub...hope to see you again some time."

  She was barely out of the door before she started feeling sorry for James and wondering how he would explain her sudden departure to his friends. On her way home she caught the mini-market as the shutters were being closed. She bought a tin of hot dogs, buns, some microwave chips, mustard and a bottle of diet coke.

  When in Rome do as you did at home, she thought, as she handed the basket to the cashier.

  She was tired now. The races and the drinks on Saturday, the running this morning, more drinks and almost a liaison with James on Sunday. Not to mention text messages in the middle of the night, working on the Hensen contract and talking tactics with two of her workmates.

  And she had a big week in front of her.

  By the time she got home she couldn't be bothered with the hot dogs. She drank some Coke straight from the bottle, and took off her clothes.

  It was gone eleven but the air was quite still, sticky and humid, so she opened her bedroom window as far as it would go and shrugged away the duvet to lay there naked watching the BBC on her iPad.

  Within minutes she was asleep. Her iPad was still playing a stand-up comedy show and even if her phone had bleeped with another strange text message she wouldn't have heard it.

  Chapter four: Men don't run to form

  At 5.30 the alarm sounded and Alex was relieved that the working week was about to start and so too her contract with Hensen. There was nothing on her email of note overnight and no text messages.

  She showered and draped herself in a towel before making coffee and switching on Sky news, sitting on the leather sofa in her lounge waiting to dry. Today she would find out whether all her weeks of planning would ensure that everything went without a hitch.

  As she sipped coffee, rolling
news included a piece on the paralympic athlete Oscar Pistorius who had been granted bail over the killing of his girlfriend the model Reeva Steenkamp. She continued to wonder why a girl intimate with the shooter would bother to lock the toilet door in the early hours of the morning if she just wanted to take a leak.

  These defence lawyers were clever and the more money the defendant had to spend the smarter they tended to be. She cast her mind back to New York years earlier.

  She put some bacon under the grill, and while it was cooking went to the bedroom to try to find something to wear.

  White T-shirt under a lilac shirt and short, black skirt. Dull but easy, she thought, and no need for a jacket. The weather bulletin promised another hot day, prompting her to leave even earlier to avoid the crush of the Underground.

  Stopping off to collect another coffee en route, she walked to Bethnal Green Station, ready for her two-stop ride to Stratford and, by London standards, the cheap office space she rented there.

  Home to the Olympics the previous year, Stratford was still not as fashionable or trendy as her local area where Campus London included all the clever people in big, coloured spectacles, working for the likes of Google.

  After she'd turned the key to enter the office with 'Anderson Financial Support' rather meagrely stated on a make-do card on the door, she looked at her watch. Not bad, she thought. She wondered whether Nick and Katherine would already be in their plush West End Office, making thousands for their clients throughout the world.

  'London, a great big money-making machine' was one description she'd read of the city she had come to love. Maybe her small cog needed some maintenance.

  Flicking on the lights and the half a dozen computers from which Ade somehow extracted the information that people like Nick Hensen were happy to pay for, she was however excited that, finally, she had a credible business that would, with some luck and yet more hard work, keep her and her and the others gainfully employed.

  She switched on the TV too, this time Bloomberg. Forewarned is forearmed and if anyone from Hensen were to call today at least she might know that the pound was plummeting, the stock markets were rallying or the prime minister had just resigned.