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I splay my hand across enerous gesture because that’s his nature But it strikes me as odd that he’d never mentioned it to me all this time

“Why didn’t you tell me?” I ask

“Because it was a personal financial ecustomers receive”

It makes sense, but I wonder why Wyatt never ht before his daddy passed …

Uncertainty rests in the pit of my stomach

Soh I’m not sure what it could possibly be

“Anyway, I assu for me?” he asks

A rumble of thunder shakes the house, and a second later a flash of lightning brightens the dark sky, illu in from the west

“I was going to see if you wanted to take our walk, but it looks like it’s about to rain,” I say

“It should clear in the next couple of hours,” he says “How about we take one after dinner?”

“Sounds good” I rise fro the opportunity to sort through the rest of that boxoff the lid, I place it aside and pull out another stack of my ie filled with various ribbons, medals, and awards, and find a folder filled with articles she wrote for her school paper At the bottom of it all is a brown paper envelope, nearly the same color as the box itself

I dig it out and flip it over to open it, only to find the na that side

Heart racing, I e up with a pile of photographs I flip the top one over and find an ie Jolene The next i ridiculous faces in this one A third ireen clay facefaces

I had no idea the two of them even knew each other, let alone that they were friends

The next picture appears to be fro side by side, flanked by their dates I don’t recognize thebeside my mother, with a mouth full of braces and his hands on her hips, but theRenata is—without question—my father

I flip through the rest of the vintage i that my father and Renata were an item

The other day, when my father mentioned his first love broke his heart because she chose so to Ambrose?

Was Renata his first love?