“Did you meet any of her family? Old friends?”

Alan shook his head. “Said she was an only child, and that her mother had died a few months earlier. That was the reason she’d moved out here, you know, to start fresh.”

“What about her father?”

“She said he left when she was young, never really knew him. So it was just her and Emily.”

“Well, then, what about Emily’s father?”

“Sara told me he was a guy she’d gone out with a few times, but it didn’t work out. She never even told him about Emily.”

All nice and neat and packaged so that it sounded believable while being extremely difficult to disprove.

Logan handed back the note. “Thanks for letting me see this.”

Alan returned it to the bottom of the jewelry box, and put the box back into the closet. When he came out, he hesitated in the doorway. “There was something else she left.”

“What?”

Looking like he really didn’t wand to discuss it, Alan said, “It’s…in Emily’s room.”

Without another word, he headed into the hallway.

Emily’s room was near the top of the staircase. There was a dresser and a toy chest and a kid-sized bed, but the star was the walls. They had been turned into a giant mural of rolling hills and rivers and castles. There were knights on horses, a prince and princess in a carriage, and kids playing in a field. This wasn’t some amateur job done by a person with limited skill. This was a beautiful, detailed work of art.

“Sara painted it,” Alan said, as if reading the question on Logan’s mind. “Took her three months to finish.”

“It’s amazing.”

“It is, isn’t it?” For a few seconds it seemed that Alan had forgotten about everything else, and was simply enjoying what his wife had created.

To Logan it was more than just a mural on a child’s wall. It was an attempt by a mother who knew she wouldn’t be around for long to leave something lasting for her little girl.