scholarship?”
“Yeah. The scholarship that pays tuition for community college for all Biedermann employees. ‘Cause there’s no way I could pay for college on my own. I’d have to drop out of HCCC.” “Oh. That scholarship.”
He’d read just about everything on Biedermann company policy, and he’d never heard of an employee scholarship. Which made him think Kitty was paying for this girl’s college out of her own pocket. Kitty, who’d had to sell her home and had auctioned off family heirlooms, was paying the tuition of this ill-mannered, unskilled girl.
Was Kitty … softhearted? It was easier to imagine the Dalai Lama sponsoring an Ultimate Fighting match.
But what other explanation was there?
He shoved a hand through his hair. Damn it, why did she have to be so full of contradictions? Why did she have to be fragile one moment, all bristly defenses the next? Why couldn’t she just be the manipulative witch that everyone thought she was? That would make his life so much easier.
If he ever wanted to be free of Kitty and all the complicated emotions she stirred up, he was going to have to find a way to save Biedermann’s. And save Kitty’s job.
And apparently Casey’s job, too.
“Look,” he said to Casey. “I’m trying to do the right thing here. Not just for the company, but for Kitty, too. If you help me out, if you help me understand what’s going on here, I’ll make sure you don’t lose your job. Or your scholarship.”
Even if he had to start paying the girl’s tuition himself. And wouldn’t that be just great. ‘Cause all he needed in his life was one more woman dependent on him.
Casey pursed her lips and studied him. “What do you want to know?”
“Kitty told me her father never expected her to run Biedermann’s. Do you know why?”
Casey shook her head. “No. I never met the old man, ‘cause I was hired after he died. But office gossip is he always wanted her to marry someone who’d take over as CEO. You ask me, it’s why that skeezie Marty is so mean to her.”
“You think Marty expected to be made CEO?”
She shook her head, pouring coffee into her mug now that the maker had finally stopped dripping. “Haven’t you noticed that icky way he looks at her? Like she’s his golden lottery ticket or something. I think he wanted to marry her himself.” Casey jabbed her coffee with a spoon and gave it a brisk stir. “That guy creeps me out.”
Ford felt a sucker punch of jealousy. He struggled to bury it. Kitty’s love life wasn’t his business. Or so he kept telling himself. Still, he found himself asking, “Did she and Marty ever go out?”
That was not him giving in to his curiosity. If Marty was smarting from a broken heart, that might be motivation enough for him to make things unpleasant for Kitty. He might even be leaking information about Kitty to Suzy Snark.
“Naw.” Casey waved her hand, dismissing the possibility. “Kitty wouldn’t stoop that low.” But then Casey tilted her head to the side, considering. “But Marty isn’t, you know, smart about women. And you know what Kitty’s like. Marty might have thought she was hitting on him.”
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