Bobby Ray backs up her pretense that she is a relative and the family mansion is her childhood home. She is cornered there by Kate's assistant, sent there to gather information on Melanie's background. Melanie goes to the Carmichael plantation and apologizes to Bobby Ray. The next morning, Melanie finds the signed document on her bed. Later, at a local bar, Melanie gets drunk, insults her old school friends, and outs her old childhood friend, Bobby Ray Bailey. Jake finally relents and agrees to the divorce and promises to return the signed papers the next morning. After Jake orders Melanie out of his house, Melanie empties Jake's checking account, hoping to spur him into ending the marriage. Melanie visits Jake, who has avoided signing the divorce papers. Meanwhile, Kate Hennings, Andrew's mother and the Mayor of New York City, doubts Melanie's suitability to wed her son, whom she is grooming to run for President of the United States. After wealthy Andrew Hennings proposes, Melanie returns to Alabama to announce her engagement to her parents and finalize a divorce from her husband Jake, whom she left after a miscarriage caused them to become estranged. In the present day, Melanie is a successful New York fashion designer who has adopted the surname 'Carmichael' to hide her poor Southern roots. Jake asserts that they will be married one day. On a beach in the fictional town of Pigeon Creek, Alabama, 10-year-olds Jake Perry and Melanie Smooter inspect the result of lightning striking sand.

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