Page 65 of You're My Person - For Always

"We thought you and River would like to visit your mom, " Zane added.

River met her gaze. Kenna's throat closed. For a moment, she wanted to tell them no. She wanted to remain clueless because then she wouldn't have to face the pain that she'd already lived through.

But, it was her mom.

She missed her more than she'd ever be able to verbalize. There was a hole in her heart that would always ache when she thought of her mother.

"Okay." She nodded at River.

They needed to see where her ashes were placed. They needed to say goodbye—something they should've been allowed to do when they were eleven and twelve years old.

She wrapped her arms around Kingsley and pressed tightly against his back. There were too many changes. Too many information bombs. Too many emotions beating inside her.

It took no time to get to the cemetery. The area was familiar to her, and yet she never set foot in the place before.

Gravesites were uniformly spread out over the area, but Kingsley rolled through the middle of the cemetery, beyond a small white building that looked like an old church, and stopped near a concrete wall.

River jumped off Zane's motorcycle and rushed to her. "Dad had her cremated?"

"I guess so." She frowned at the wall.

The surface was covered by small squares, row after row, at least ten deep and fifty long. Each square had a name and birth/death dates.

"I always imagined she was buried somewhere," mumbled River. "This is weird."

The heaviness in Kenna's chest increased. She, too, always imagined her mom in a casket. It physically hurt that the truth was different than what she was led to believe.

There was no funeral, no flowers, no goodbyes.

Kingsley took her hand and led her to the wall. She read names, holding her breath. Even though she wanted to find where her mom was laid to rest, she held out hope that she wasn't here. That her dad hadn't put her inside a slim wall and forgot about her.

"I don't see anything." River walked around the structure. "There's more names on this side."

Kenna followed her sister, barely reading the names. Some of the squares had flowers stuck inside a hole under the nameplate. Some of them wilted and dried like forgotten promises.

River dropped to her knees. "I think this is her."

Kenna stepped closer and read. "Louanne Carpenter?"

"The date's correct." River rubbed the pad of her thumb over the name, wiping the dust off the front. "But once again, one of our parents has a different last name than us."

"That's why we couldn't find any information about her death," muttered Kenna.

"Carpenter?" said Zane. "Are you sure?"

"It says it right here. The dates for the birth and death are right." Kenna swallowed. "There's less than three thousand people who live here. It has to be her."

"Hell," mumbled Kingsley.

Straightening, she looked at Kingsley and then Zane. "What's wrong?"

Kingsley scratched his beard. "I think we just found out why my dad owed your dad a favor."

"What do you mean?" She turned away from the memorial wall.

He cupped her face and kissed her. "We'll talk more when we get home. Take this time with your sister and see where your mom rests."

Kingsley walked back to the Harley and lit a cigarette. Zane joined him, leaving River with her. She tried to figure out what the men meant.

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