“What about Mark?” I know that her brother also works for their father’s business. “What’s he up to?”
She lowers her gaze to her coffee cup. “Let’s just say he’s not management material.” Her lips twist, but she doesn’t elaborate.
“Can’t you hire someone to do it for you?” I ask, puzzled.
She gives me a strange look, and I can see her debating whether to tell me something. She looks away again though, across to the gardens, and doesn’t say anything.
“You can talk to me.” I’m concerned. I don’t like to think of her struggling with the workload, as well as the emotional stress of her father’s illness.
She nibbles her bottom lip. Then she gives a little sigh, as if coming to a decision, and she looks back at me.
“There’s a financial issue,” she says softly.
I lean forward, my elbows on my knees. “With the business?”
She studies her coffee cup. Then she says, “Partly.”
So that’s why hiring someone to run it is out of the question.
“What do you mean by partly?”
She thinks again. I feel that she’s choosing her words carefully, as if picking out the best flowers for a vase. “Dad’s had trouble meeting the payments on his house. The bank is threatening repossession.”
My eyebrows lift. “You mean his income has slipped because he hasn’t been working?”
“Partly.”
Another partly.
I wait for her to go on.
She looks at me then, a slightly pleading glance. “If I tell you, you must promise not to say anything.”
I frown. “Of course.”
“Not to anyone, Kingi.”
“E hine, I wouldn’t.” It means ‘dear girl’.
“Mark has a gambling addiction,” she reveals. “It started in his teens, and it got out of hand in his early twenties. Dad bailed him out then, and we got him some therapy, and we thought it was better. But recently Dad discovered he’d gotten back into it. He’s in huge debt.”
“How huge is huge?” I ask.
“He’s maxed out several credit cards and taken out a personal loan. He got hooked on some online betting apps. And… he’s borrowed from some disreputable sources.”
Loan sharks. It doesn’t get much worse than that. “How much?” I ask again.
“Forty-five thousand dollars.”
I frown. It’s a significant amount. “So Joe bailed him out again?” I ask.
“Yes. He used all his savings.”
“And then fell sick?”
She nods.
I frown. “You said he’s having trouble meeting his mortgage payments. Won’t the bank give him a payment holiday?”