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“Not really, except for a photo in a frame. I don’t know who it is, and it wasn’t marked.”

“A photo in a frame?” Sam frowned and shook his head. “I’ve never seen Leigh have a photo on her desk. I’d like to take a look at it.”

She retrieved the framed photo from the top of the box and placed it on his desk.

“I assume it’s family or friends,” Alli said. “It was in one of the drawers.”

He picked it up and studied it for a long while, his expression quizzical.

“I don’t have a clue who this is,” he finally replied. “She visits family in Boston a few times a year, from what I remember, so maybe this is one of her relatives. Was this the only picture you found?”

“The only one,” Alli confirmed.

“Well, Leigh didn’t talk about her trips to the East Coast much,” Sam said. “She wasn’t talkative about her private life, and I always respected that. Hell, I didn’t even know she had a significant other. I always thought she was pretty smart, not bringing her personal life into the office.”

Alli must have had a strange look on her face because he smiled at her confusion.

“My dad has a tendency to try and use personal information against people,” he explained. “He liked and respected Leigh a hell of a lot, but if he needed something, he wouldn’t have thought twice about using her family and friends to leverage it.”

“Oh.”

She wasn’t sure what else she was supposed to say.

“That’s right. Oh, just about sums it up. Now, how about the business items? Is there anything that I need to look at right away?”

“I don’t think there’s anything that needs your attention right this minute,” she replied. “But I’ll go ahead and bring in the box, if you like?”

“Thank you, Alli. I know this isn’t a dream assignment.”

It wasn’t, and she was happy that he knew it, too.

She brought him the box, and he quickly sifted through the contents. When he reached the contracts, he frowned and tapped the manila folder sitting on his desk.

“I’ll take care of everything here,” he said. “I’ll leave the personal box with you in case Leigh’s emergency contact shows up while I’m in a meeting. Is there anything else I should look at?”

“I don’t think so. To be honest, Sam, there wasn’t a lot in the desk. For someone who had worked here for so long, I would have expected it to be crammed full of stuff.”

She had a distinct memory of a researcher at the last news station she’d worked at. The woman had been there for over twenty years, and her desk overflowed with personal items plus stacks and stacks of folders. No one dared touch any of it, as she kept saying she knew where everything was. It was simply her quirky form of organization.

Sam closed the folder and slipped it into his right-hand drawer. He didn’t look happy. Right now, he looked the very definition of an uptight boss.

“You have a meeting in ten minutes,” she reminded him. “With HR about the updates to the employee handbook.”

“That means we have a meeting in ten minutes,” he replied, finally giving her a small smile. “I’d like you there to take point on this project. Are you up for it?”

“Absolutely,” she said, even though she wasn’t necessarily feeling that positive. She had a job she might not be qualified for. “Ten minutes. I’ll let Tracy know that we’ll both be in a meeting.”

She went back to the desk that didn’t really feel like her own. At least not yet. Leigh hadn’t been gone long, but the world kept on moving forward.

Maybe that’s how it was supposed to be, but damn, it seemed cold as hell.

By mid-afternoon, the office had gone quiet, and Sam managed to get some work done, though his concentration wasn’t great. Too much had happened, and he was still processing it all.

There was a soft knock on his open door, and Alli leaned in from the desk she’d taken outside his office, the one that had been Leigh’s until that morning.

“You have a visitor,” she said. “A Daniel Riggs. He says he was Leigh’s partner.”

Sam set down his pen. He hadn’t known Leigh had a partner. He hadn’t known a lot of things. Had Joel Winslow known? Sam had a feeling his father hadn’t and didn’t care.