"We need to be talking about them": honoring the Eastern KY mother and daughter brutally killed at home

Their names deserve to be front and center. Their love deserves to be remembered. Kayla Blake's friends reached out to me and asked me to make their story the one in the headlines, instead of their accused killer.

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This is the story of Kayla Blake and Kennedi McWhorter, a mother and daughter whose light continues to shine through a heartbroken community.

When Amanda Music-Stepp heard the news about Kayla Blake and her daughter Kennedi, she was leaving Walmart with groceries in her car. Her best friend called with information so shocking that Amanda had to ask her to repeat it three or four times.

"I was just in total shock," Amanda recalls. Her first instinct was to reach out to her people- the tight-knit group of women who worked alongside Kayla at a women's recovery facility. "I needed to say, hey, like, I love you guys. Like, something really bad has happened, and I need to make sure that you hear it, not from the news."

Because this story- the story of 37-year-old Kayla and 13-year-old Kennedi, who were found dead in their Morehead home last month- deserves to be told by people who loved them. Not defined by the man accused of taking their lives.

"The most beautiful souls in the whole wide world"

That's how Amanda describes Kayla and Kennedi. "We all worked with Kayla, and we were a giant family."

Kayla was a registered nurse at a residential treatment facility for women. She started in early January 2022, according to Amanda, and from day one, she brought something special to the team.

"She truly, truly was just light," Amanda remembers. "She was beautiful, and she was always laughing and would meet you with a hug, and 'I love you so much.' And just always let us know how grateful she was to have us around."

Lacy Stacy, a therapist who worked with Kayla, adds, "She was so bright. You would be having a bad day, and she'd be like, 'How are you doing?' And she'd start to sing to you or dance to the office."

Even on the hardest days- and working in residential treatment meant there were plenty of those- Kayla kept everyone laughing. "You couldn't have a bad day around her," Amanda says.

Her kids were her world

If you knew Kayla, you knew about Kennedi and Ollie. Her two children. Ollie was not involved in the attack that ended Kennedi and Kayla's lives.

"Those kids are her world," Amanda says. "She's always bragging about them, always just sharing stories about them."

Lacy Stacy remembers Kayla's unwavering dedication: "Her kids were her world. She was at games, she was at tournaments. She was anything they needed. She was there. She would take off work just to go travel six hours away if she had to. She always showed up no matter what."

But Kayla didn't just show up for her own kids. Chassity Risner, a case manager at the facility, recalls how Kayla made sure no one felt alone.

"You weren't sitting in the bleachers alone at your own kids' games," Chassity says. "She would send you, like when signups were coming up, if she knew that your kid was into something, or if maybe they'd be interested, and just made sure you stayed in the loop and that you weren't sitting alone on the bleachers. She made sure that your kids were a priority in her life, just as much as her own kids were."

Kennedi: just like her mom

The last time Amanda saw Kayla was when she stopped by to borrow crutches after spraining her ankle. Kayla, Kennedi, and Kennedi's boyfriend came out to the car.

"They were just oohing and awing over my little girl, and we were just chatting and cutting up," Amanda remembers. "You know, said, I love you, see you later, and we've got to get together. And you know, all of those things that you always say to your friends, and time just gets away from you. And I cherish that memory."

For Chassity, Kennedi became part of her life through both stories and small kindnesses. "We have daughters that are close in age, but then it became like Kennedy would grow out of a size of clothes, and she would pass them down to my kid."

"Hearing stories of Kennedi, she sounded just like Kayla," Lacy says. "Full of life, always putting someone else first, always making sure everybody's needs were met, always reaching out to lend a helping hand."

Kennedi attended Rowan County Middle School and was passionate about softball. According to her obituary, she was a talented academic and athlete whose "love for softball shone through in her performances on both her school and travel teams, where she thrived on the competition and cherished the friendships she built with her teammates."

A community united in grief

The impact of these losses has rippled through Morehead and far beyond.

"It gives me chills just thinking about it," Amanda says about the community response. "It's a small town, tight-knit community. And then it really took off on social media too, of like, hey, let's make sure that we're not alone in this, and let's remind everybody that we can support each other."

Kennedi's school wore purple in her honor. So did surrounding school districts. Kennedi's softball team is putting on a tournament on the 25th and 26th. On Sunday, Rowan County Overdose Awareness Group held a walk of remembrance in honor of Kayla and Kennedi. They asked participants to wear purple and bring new toys for Ollie, Kayla's son.

"Their light is so beautiful that we have to make sure that it does not dim ever," Amanda says.

Chassity's daughter missed several days of school in the immediate aftermath. The schools brought in counselors because so many kids were and still are- grieving hard.

"Even if they didn't know her intimately, I think it's put like a fear in them, because it's so close to home," Chassity explains. "You don't ever think at that age about losing the people around you, especially so suddenly."

The community's response also speaks to something Kayla was passionate about: recovery and connection.

"That's the whole thing in recovery, is that you don't recover alone. It's support, it's connection, it's community," Amanda says. "And that's definitely what we saw, and we still see."

No warning signs

When I asked if there were any warning signs of what was to come, the answer was unanimous: No.

"I think that we were all just shocked," Amanda says. "Anytime we talked to her about it, she was just happy and she looked genuinely happy."

Kayla had even been feeling better about herself. "She was able to gain a little bit of weight, and she would talk about how happy she was," Amanda remembers.

"That's the scary thing with domestic violence," Amanda continues. "You don't know. A lot of the time, it's not what you see on Lifetime or anything like that, where everybody knows, and it's the deep, dark secret. Like it was truly not that."

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Why their names matter

When Amanda and her friends reached out to me, they had one clear message: Stop making the accused killer the headline.

"You know, he doesn't deserve our attention," Amanda says firmly. "Whenever he's the headline picture, whenever he's there and in everybody's face, like, that's what he's getting everyone's attention, and he's getting the clicks, when, in reality, we need to be talking about them."

She made an excellent point. All too often, it's easy to focus on the person at the center of the investigation- the person accused of the crime. But the victims' stories are too important to be overlooked.

"We need to be looking at them and remembering that they have lived, and that they've lived so much in such a small amount of time, and that they deserve to keep having that attention," she continues. "And as long as I'm here, I'm going to continue to speak their names and keep them here."

The tagline that's emerged from this tragedy is simple but powerful: Love like Kayla, live like Kennedi.

"As long as we're still talking about them, as long as we're putting them out there and we're showing up for them, and we're showing up for each other, they will continue to live on through us," Amanda says.

The friends told me they plan to show up to court hearings- not for the accused, but for Kayla and Kennedi.

"We don't show up for him," Amanda clarifies. "We show up for them to let him know that they are loved, and this is not going to just be forgotten."

And they're thinking of Ollie, Kayla's young son and Kennedi's little brother.

"Keeping them alive for him too, and just letting him know, and letting her immediate family just know how much we love them and how much they matter to us," Amanda says.

Lacy adds: "I think it's so important that people are sitting with their names, sitting with who they were and who they are going to continue to be through us."

The man accused of killing the mother and daughter- Joshua Cottrell- was indicted by a grand jury on October 3rd on murder charges, and tampering with physical evidence.

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