Chapter 4: Burned by Beauty

My father was thrown out the back door of the governor’s mansion by the staff.

His body landed in the alley behind the kitchen, the air thick with garbage and the sour tang of bleach. No one said a word. They just looked away.

The street was bustling, but not a single person dared approach him.

Shopkeepers pretended to sweep their stoops, eyes trained on the sidewalk. Even the stray dogs kept their distance.

Because he had already been roasted black, his skin and flesh charred; wherever it split, blood and pus seeped out together.

It was like something out of a nightmare—nothing the doctors in Savannah could fix, no matter how many times they tried.

In the end, a kind-hearted neighbor, under cover of night, carted him home.

Old Mr. Darnell, who drove a rusted Chevy, pulled up long after midnight. He wrapped my father in a quilt and laid him across the back seat, eyes shining with tears and fury.

That man wept as he cursed, “It was all that Madison, all her fault…”

He spat the name like it tasted rotten. Even the porch lights seemed to dim when he spoke it aloud.

Madison—what a beautiful name.

It sounded like something from a song, all sugar and sunshine, but everyone in town knew better.

She was the newly favored girlfriend of the governor, the most beautiful woman in Savannah.

People called her a Southern belle, but her beauty was the sharp, dangerous kind—like magnolia blossoms hiding thorns.

This beauty heard of my father’s skill and asked him, “I hear you can roast lamb with not a trace of gamey smell?”

She had the soft drawl of old Savannah money, her words honeyed and sweet, but her eyes never smiled.

My father answered honestly, “Rest assured, ma’am, this lamb will not be gamey at all.”

He was nervous, but hopeful—wanting to please, wanting to prove himself worthy of her notice.

Madison suddenly stopped smiling.

The room went cold, her gaze sharpening like a knife.

She said, “Then can you make it so there’s no lamb flavor at all?”

A few nervous laughs floated around the room, but Madison’s face didn’t flicker.

My father forced a smile. “Since it’s roast whole lamb, how could there be no lamb flavor at all?”

He looked to the governor for help, but found none. His hands trembled just a little, the way they always did when he felt cornered.

Madison pinched her napkin and said coldly, “Who says there can’t be? Today I will cook, and I’ll make a roast whole lamb with no lamb flavor at all. How about that?”

She snapped her fingers, and the room seemed to contract around her. Even the kitchen staff shrank back.

She ordered her people to stuff my father’s mouth, tie him up like a lamb, and put him over the fire to roast.

The guards moved with a practiced ease, their faces blank. The scent of burning flesh chased everyone else from the kitchen.

The flames blazed, and Madison covered her mouth with her napkin and laughed: “Isn’t this just roast whole lamb with no lamb flavor?”

The sound of her laughter twisted through the room, sharp as glass.

Finally, she looked at my father, whose skin and flesh had split open from the roasting, her gaze full of resentment:

“I said I would never be a side piece—even the governor agreed. What are you, to dare call me ‘ma’am’?”

Her voice dripped venom, her words meant to wound as deeply as the fire had.