Chapter 2: The Girl from Mama’s Store

In my previous life, my marriage to Derek was something I chased down, step by step.

Aunt Lisa—my mama’s younger sister, who became the second wife in the Miller family—took me in after my mother passed. She never had children of her own, but she raised me with a love so deep it could mend bones. Sometimes she’d sneak me out for milkshakes at Leopold’s on Sunday afternoons, and for a little while, it almost felt like we were a real family.

The house staff acted polite to her face, but behind her back, they mocked her. They said she dragged in poor kin to sponge off the Millers, that just the girl from my mama’s corner store could never be truly respectable. I’d catch their voices drifting up with the scent of cornbread and dish soap, sharp as the gossip they carried.

Aunt Lisa was gentle and timid. Even after ten years as Mrs. Miller, she seemed rootless—adrift, never in charge. She didn’t have the authority to run the house and nobody to lean on. When trouble came, she’d hide away and cry in secret. Sometimes I’d find her in the pantry, eyes red and wet, dabbing her cheeks with a napkin, pretending she’d just gotten a speck of dust.

I was nothing like her. Since I was a girl, I fought for what I wanted—always competitive, never backing down. On the playground at Forsyth Park, I’d barrel into the boys’ soccer game and refuse to let them push me out. I had fire, and Aunt Lisa would shake her head, laughing, “You’re too much like your mama—headstrong and going places.”

The first time I saw Derek, my heart thumped so loud I thought everyone in the room could hear. I knew—I wanted him.

But Derek? He was the real deal—the eldest Miller son, as polished as a leather-bound book. The most admired gentleman in Savannah, cool and distant as the moon. Reserved, upright, the sort of boy who’d be valedictorian and captain of the debate team, his face on every fundraiser flyer. Always out of reach, like the best seat at the Midnight in the Garden tour.

How could someone like me—just the girl from my mama’s corner store—even dare to dream of him?

The Savannah socialites laughed at me for being shameless, for thinking I could ever belong. Everyone said I wasn’t good enough. But I kept my chin up, just like Mama taught me, and insisted on having him—even when their words stung like fire ants.

In the end, Derek married me.

At a charity gala, his rivals set him up and dosed him with something fierce. I volunteered to stay and help him through it. The chandeliers sparkled above and music drifted in from the next room, but no one else offered. Just me.

That night, he was gentle. Even fogged by the drug, he forced himself to hold back, to restrain himself. He touched me with a tenderness that surprised us both, always putting my feelings first.

When I cried out in pain, his eyes went red and he closed them, agony written all over his face, but still he managed to stop himself.

“Don’t cry, don’t cry…”

He kissed away my tears, his hands trembling, the scent of his woodsy aftershave lingering in the air between us.

I was swept away by the unfamiliar tide of passion Derek brought—a moment sweet and sharp as lemonade on a summer day. I replayed it in my mind for years.

Afterward, Derek sobered up. When he saw me, bruised and shaken, he froze. He turned away, jaw tight.

“I’ve hurt my cousin’s reputation. I’ll make this right. Tomorrow, I’ll ask the Johnson family for your hand.”

He was a gentleman, and in Savannah, reputation is everything. He wouldn’t let a scandal stick to my name.