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“I’m sorry.” She wished there was something better to offer than that, but she knew from experience that there simply wasn’t. “Three dates, huh?”
“When you know, you know.” He cleared his throat and pointed to the omelets. “Food’s getting cold.” They sat on the couch, side by side, eating their breakfast. “Let’s get down to it. You want me to help you figure out who Concerned Citizen is?” Allie nodded. “Then start thinking like a journalist. Who had the most to gain from you investigating that old building?”
“I don’t know. Maybe someone who didn’t want it to come down?”
“We all voted on it. The whole town. We need a new rec center. Kids need a place to play basketball. A community swimming pool. It’s best for everyone.” He set down his plate and pulled a photo album from a nearby bookshelf and handed it to her.
Allie began leafing through the pages. The album was full of pictures of the senior center. She recognized a few of the pictures that Betty Jean had given her from the Whispering Bay Gazette. “You took pictures for the Gazette, too?”
“Just a few. After Janice and I got married we moved here to live on the beach. I had some family money and was tired of traveling. Phoebe lived nearby so we thought it would be a good place to raise kids. Never had the kids but we had a good life.”
Allie lay the album down. “Mr. Van Cleave—”
“Call me Roger.”
“Okay, Roger, what do you think about your sister’s theory that the ghost is male?”
“She’s got a fifty-fifty shot at being right.” His blue eyes sharpened. “And you think she’s full of it.”
“I didn’t say that, but I don’t know how she can be so certain.”
“Are you asking me if my sister’s a fraud?”
“Well, I wouldn’t put it that way, exactly.”
He looked her over as if trying to decide how much to tell her. “After Janice died, I had trouble sleeping. Common enough, I was told, for someone who was grieving. Doc Morrison prescribed some sleeping pills…and something for depression, as well, but I didn’t want to go that route, you know?
So one night I had a couple of beers. More than a couple, to tell the truth. I must have passed out on my living room couch because I woke up in the middle of the night to, um, relieve myself. Whil
e I was washing my hands I glanced up in the bathroom mirror…and there was Janice’s reflection staring back at me. Smiling at me, just like she’d done in real life.”
Allie held her breath.
“When I turned around, she was gone. I chocked it up to those beers and tried to get back to sleep. Eventually, I did.” He stared at her hard. “I never had any problem sleeping after that.”
Roger was quiet for a few long seconds and Allie wondered if it was the end of the story. She sensed it wasn’t, but it also seemed as if he were hesitant to go any further. She laid her hand over his. She thought he might pull away, but he didn’t. “And?” she urged softly.
“And that’s when I started finding the pennies. Janice used to always use that expression, ‘penny for your thoughts.’” Roger shrugged like he was embarrassed. “I found pennies all over the place. I’d go to the Piggly Wiggly and find a penny in the parking lot next to my car. Or I’d go out and get the morning paper and there would be a penny lying on the sidewalk. I knew intellectually it was just a coincidence. People drop pennies all the time. But, a part of me wants to believe that it’s Janice. Telling me to hang in there. That I don’t need those sleeping pills because she’s watching out for me.”
Then he stood and went out to the kitchen. He returned with a large glass vase filled to the brim with pennies. He set it on the table in front of her, stuck his hand in his pocket and produced the penny he’d found in the senior center parking lot, and dropped it into the vase.
Allie stared at the pennies. Like Roger, a part of her wanted to tell him that it was a coincidence. That people found pennies all the time. Especially if they were on the lookout for them. But who was she to tell him that? If the pennies gave him solace, then they were a good thing. And on the chance that they were somehow linked to his deceased wife, then…
She tried to find a delicate way to word it. “Roger, do you think that maybe…it’s Janice who’s haunting the senior center?”
“Nah. I would know if it were her.”
Allie felt a moment’s disappointment. She shook it off and handed him back her empty cup. “Thanks for the coffee. And for being so honest. I guess I’ll never find out who wrote that email.”
“So that’s it. You’re giving up?”
“You said yourself, the whole town voted for the new rec center. If someone secretly doesn’t want the old senior center to come down it could be anyone. It’s like trying to find a needle in a haystack.”
“What about a more personal reason? Maybe Concerned Citizen doesn’t care if the building comes down or not. Maybe they just wanted you to be involved in it somehow.”
“Involved is putting it mildly. I’ve practically staked my career on this story.” Allie told him about the job opening at Florida! magazine and about Chris Dougal and his immigration piece and the competition the two of them had been forced into.
“Illegal immigration, huh?”
