Beauty in Black Part 1 Ending, Explained: Is Ina Dead?

‘Beauty in Black’ a Tyler Perry drama show, delves into the complicated lives of two women who inevitably end up crossing paths despite their drastically different lives. Kimmie, a stripper stuck in a bad situation, wants to start her life anew. However, the same becomes virtually impossible under the dangerous watch of her boss, Jules. Still, as her situation worsens, the woman attempts to take over the reins and reign in a new era for herself. Meanwhile, Mallory—who married into a wealthy family with a hair care dynasty—struggles to hold her business together in the middle of brewing family drama. Unbeknownst to the women, they have a thin thread connecting their lives, which seems to spiral out of control simultaneously.

Part 1 of season 1 builds up several plot points, bringing various characters to precarious points in their narratives. Consequently, as this chapter of the story comes to an end, it lays out a dangerous path for the protagonists. SPOILERS AHEAD!

Beauty in Black Plot Synopsis

When Kimmie was barely 18 years old, her mother kicked her out of the house on account of the latter’s predatory boyfriend. Consequently, a series of bad decisions and vulnerable situations land the young woman under Jules’ debt. The man—who runs a widespread trafficking ring by exploiting people like Kimmie—traps the woman in an impossible deal where she has to work in his strip club to pay off her never-ending debt. Furthermore, he assigns her to be the mistress of his more temperamental client, Roy, pushing Kimmie to her limits. Seeking an escape from her circumstances, the woman applies for a chance to win a scholarship at Beauty in Black’s Hair Care school.

The scholarship is a recent philanthropic stint from Mallory, who runs her father-in-law’s successful cosmetic dynasty. She has a perfect rags-to-riches love story and continues to be one of the most successful businesswomen in the game. However, behind closed doors, she only cares about maintaining her image without empathy for others. In fact, she currently has several lawsuits against her company for cancer-causing relaxers—a scandal that she’s desperately trying to contain. Similarly, her picture-perfect marriage is also a sham, and her husband, Roy, is actually a serial cheater. Coincidentally, it’s the same Roy as the one Kimmie is forced to sleep with as a part of her job.

Nonetheless, Kimmie becomes fed up with her situation and decides to set Roy up by covertly calling his wife on his phone during their night together. As a result, Mallory discovers that her husband is having an affair—worse yet, he’s sloppy about covering it up. In her fury, the businesswoman rashly drives down the private road to her mansion and accidentally runs someone over. Since she leaves the victim on the road, Roy also ends up running them over on his way home. Unlike his wife, he stuffs the body in his car’s trunk, compelling the couple to stash the evidence of their crime together.

Predictably, their attempt to get rid of the body by themselves fails, forcing Mallory to contact Jules, the family’s head of security, who is used to taking care of shady accidents. Still, before the matter can be resolved, the victim somehow ends up at the hospital. As it turns out, Mallory hit Roy’s aunt, Ina, who is still barely holding onto life. Once the body is recognized, Ina’s husband, Norman, co-owner of the Beauty in Black company and patriarch, Horace’s brother, blazes a warpath of revenge. Since he knows Ina went on a jog that evening on the private road—which is only accessible by his brother and his nephews—he swears to find the culprit and punish them.

Meanwhile, Horace goes through a unique situation of his own. The man recently learned about his prostate cancer diagnosis and has found himself feeding his curiosity about attraction to men. Consequently, he ends up at the club Kimmie works at, where he books a private dance with her to secretly stare at the club’s men’s section. Kimmie quickly spots his curiosity and offers to hook him up secretly with one of the dancers. Thus, two enter a quid-pro-quo deal. Kimmie has been going through an extra difficult time since her best friend, Rain, got roped into a shady plastic surgery deal that left her severely injured and in the hospital.

To make matters worse, the club’s management and Body—the alpha stripper—have essentially left Rain to die in the hospital. Thus, Kimmie simply asks Horace to check in on her friend since she’s banned from doing so herself. However, during their meeting, she also inadvertently learns that he’s Jules’ bigshot boss. Consequently, she assumes he’s the top dog controlling Jules’ trafficking club. Things continue to proceed, with Body and Jules making Kimmie’s life even worse. On the other hand, Mallory tries to save her company from drowning while also dodging her Uncle’s fierce suspicions as Ina’s condition worsens in the hospital.

Beauty in Black Part 1 Ending: Does Ina Survive? Does Norman Find Her Killer?

Ina’s accident comes as a tragic surprise that threatens to upheave Mallory and her family’s business. Between Roy’s infidelity, Horace and Olivia’s divorce, their discord for their sons, and favor for their daughter-in-law, the family was plenty dysfunctional. Therefore, Horace’s tumultuous relationship with his brother only added to the family drama. Horace and Norma created the business together. However, a past dispute compelled the former to attempt to snatch the company from under his brother’s nose. Although Norman secured his shares in the court trial that followed, it set a tone of rivalry between the two brothers. Consequently, Ina’s predicament puts Norman further on edge.

Norman remains convinced that Roy or his brother, Charles, is to blame for Ina’s accident. Alternatively, he showcases a well of trust in Mallory—whose ability to maintain a perfect image serves her well. Still, Norman refuses to give up on his hunt after the culprit. As a result, Jules—who is in the trafficking business with Norman but runs security for Horace, gets caught in the middle of the family drama. He only wants stability within the family to ensure he isn’t put at risk from any side.

Jules knows that Mallory is to blame for Ina’s accident. Nevertheless, he isn’t willing to risk the family’s ruin by risking Mallory’s position. Therefore, as he gets the news of Ina’s possible recovery, he instantly shares it with Horace. In turn, Horace arranges for someone at the hospital to neutralize the threat of Ina’s recovery. In order to do so, a woman disguises herself as a nurse and administers a drug into Ina’s system. As a result, Ina becomes brain-dead, forcing Norman into a corner where he must choose between keeping his wife alive on life support or ending her life.

However, rather than worrying about that, Norman turns to his anger and convinces himself that the hospital is unsafe due to his brother’s connections with the staff. For the same reason, he prepares to move Ina from the hospital into a different establishment despite the dangers of such transportation. Ultimately, Ina dies during the ambulance ride over to the second hospital. Thus, in a way, Horace seals Ina’s fate, which Mallory and Roy previously butchered. In the aftermath, Norman is left entirely crushed. Yet, instead of grief, he turns to his anger and prepares to wage war over his brother.

Olivia had previously alluded to Norman’s dangerous side, secretly confronting him about his human trafficking business with Jules. As it turns out, she was right to fear his actions because he turned into a loose canon after Ina’s death. In fact, he shoots down every doctor and nurse in the back of the ambulance with him—paranoid about their connection to Horace. Therefore, even though he is oblivious to the specifics of Ina’s accidents, he is convinced that his brother’s family is to blame for the incident. Ultimately, Norman promises to be a grave threat, especially to Mallory, should he discover her secrets.

Is Charles Dead?

Shortly after Ina’s death, another tragedy seems to strike the Mallory’s family. So far, Olivia has been begging her son, Charles, to stay away from Norman and his vengeful path. Charles seems to naturally agitate his uncle, who seems to hate the younger man for his sexuality as an out and proud gay man. Therefore, Charles only further cements their taut relationship by constantly standing up to him. Still, he listens to his mother’s warnings and stays over at a hotel—away from their shared private lane. Nonetheless, the man soon gets agitated and itches to return to his actual house. Even his secret lover, Varney—the family attorney—can’t keep him tied down.

As a result, Charles ends up going out to the strip club to pick someone up. However, by the time his car—a distinct yellow Lamborghini—returns home, driving down the same private road where Ina died, a team of guarded men open fire at the vehicle and blow it up. It is unlikely that anyone inside the car would have survived the brutal assault. Still, there’s a chance Charles may have made it through the night alive. After he picked up one of the strippers from the club, Charles waited around late into the night for his shift to end. In fact, he had to be kicked out of the club in his inebriated state.

Since Charles had been drunk at the club, he had lost a lot of his belongings, such as his phone and wallet. Therefore, it is possible that someone else—likely the man he picked up—might have also robbed him of his car keys. Furthermore, he had shared his address with the stripper. As such, the latter could have been driving over to his house to rob him blind but got caught in the trap set for Charles. Ultimately, while it is possible that Charles might have gone up in flames alongside his car—there’s also a strong possibility he may have survived the night.

Is Rain Dead or Alive? What Happened to Her?

In terms of miraculous resurrections, Mallory’s friend, Rain, remains a crucial character of interest. Rain’s demise comes for her early after she enters a precarious medical crisis. Initially, Body hadn’t even bothered to get the woman to a hospital. She—and Jules—would have preferred to cut their losses with her death. Nevertheless, Kimmie ended up getting her to a hospital in time. Still, the doctors hardly paid attention to Rain—likely as a favor to Jules—and left her to die. Therefore, Mallory had no choice but to accept her friend’s fate when she found her hospital bed empty and learned of her death from one of the patients.

The moment proved crucial for Mallory’s narrative as it caused a shift in her actions. Ever since Mallory, Angel, and Horace began their arrangement, the woman has been against her friend’s idea of robbing the rich man. Horace trusted Mallory—a rare currency in her world. For the same reason, she didn’t want to jeopardize that trust by setting him up. However, Rain’s death changed everything. Mallory had asked Horace to check in on the woman, but the man hadn’t kept his word.

Since Mallory doesn’t know that Horace is in the dark about Jules and Norman’s trafficking ring, she assumes she would only be hurting an evil man with her actions. Therefore, she agrees with Angel’s plan to rob the guy on their next meet-up. Angel arranges for a few guys to follow them to Horace’s house. However, Mallory makes a startling revelation at the second location when she receives a call from Rain. As it turns out, her best friend is still alive and has been shifted to a better hospital.

After Mallory asked Horace to check in on her friend, the older man went above and beyond to get her a VIP admission into his family’s hospital. Thus, Mallory realizes she has mistaken Horace’s character and tries to stop Angel’s plans. Still, things end up going south when a different group attacks the trio at Horace’s place. Even though Horace takes care of the situation, he also unearths Mallory and Angel’s secret plans. Although the misunderstanding isn’t quite resolved, it reveals Jules’ reality to Horace—which is bound to bring trouble for the man in the future.

On the other hand, Mallory realizes that she has been mistaken in grieving over Rain’s death since the woman is actually alive. In the aftermath, she and Angel even pay the other woman a visit despite their tense predicaments. However, the mix-up of Rain’s demise has cost Mallory greatly since it has now cemented her and Angel in Horace’s bad graces.

What Happened to Kimmie’s Sister? Why Does Body Have Her?

As Mallory’s rollercoaster of a night comes to an end, she realizes that she actually has bigger adversaries to look out for than Horace. Throughout the show, she has sported a one-sided rivalry with Body, who hates her for her disobedience. Body thinks Mallory wants to take her over as the head of the strippers at the club by constantly undermining her. For the same reason, she wants revenge on the other woman. Initially, she resorts to simply physical violence to get her point across. Nonetheless, she eventually decides to move up the game.

Body wants to hit Mallory where it hurts. Since Rain is already off the board, there are a few people left that can be used against the woman. Nonetheless, Body manages to find one. Despite being kicked out as a teenager, Mallory has remained in touch with her family—mostly to send her mother money. Therefore, she also maintains a connection with her younger sister, Sylvie, who idolizes her. The sixteen-year-old thinks her older sister is a nurse at a hospital and wants to come live with her in Chicago once she turns 18.

Consequently, Sylvie is the perfect victim for Body, who kidnaps the young girl from her house to force her into the industry. Since Body can’t hurt Mallory directly, she’s going to hurt her through her sister. Yet, once Mallory learns about the same, things come to a head. So far, she has been playing by the rules—desperate to live a normal life. However, after Body involves Sylvie in the mess, the woman sees red. Therefore, as Body’s friends drive away with Sylvie in their truck, Mallory attacks the woman—and ultimately hits her with her car. Although the attack doesn’t quite kill Body, it establishes one thing: Mallory is done playing by the rules and is ready to take matters into her own hands to save her young sister.