Kisblle

25 - she/her - arthur morgan enthusiast - requests closed - just trying to use my english degree for something

[kisblle]

Masterlist

Last updated: 2/03/2026

MDNI 18+

Arthur Morgan

One Shots - Smut

Starved - You finally make a move on the cowboy - he doesn’t deny you. (Medium Honor)

Quenched (pairing piece to Starved) - He returns the favor. (High Honor)

Caliber Heart - Arthur teaches you to shoot among other things. (Medium Honor)

Vices & Virtues - After a series of poor communications, you can't stand Arthur Morgan. Yet, with the help of forced proximity, Arthur does his best to break down your walls. (High Honor)

In Knots - In a world where Arthur always takes control, behind closed doors he likes to be tied up. (Low Honor)

Multiple Parts - Smut

Dark Paradise - After seemingly not wanting you for more than sex, you finally have the strength to leave the cowboy. But Arthur soon finds himself becoming jealous, possessive, and bitter as he watches you move on without him. - Part I Part II Part III Part IV Part V Part VI (Low Honor)

The Chain - After years of waiting for Arthur to finally choose you, you finally give up and move on. He doesn't take kindly to this. - Part I (Low Honor)

Tethered - Separated but not yet divorced, you and Arthur navigate the fragile tension of your relationship within the Van Der Linde Gang. After years of seperation, the chance for an official divorce arises, but the journey to the small mountain town where you eloped nearly ten years ago to sign the divorce papers might just rekindle what was once lost. - Part I, Part II (Low Honor)

Fluff

An Outlaw’s Christmas - Arthur finds himself tongue tied when trying to tell you how he feels. (High Honor)

[cats1s]

Arthur is on vacation

[twola]

Chapter Six

The weary travelers find welcome in New Austin.

Arthur Morgan x fem!Reader Smut, Supernatural Elements MDNI (18+)

Taglist: @arthurmorganist, @thorst , @reddedmiller, @houseofwolves14, @blueskies664, @arthursdodobird, @honeycoyotes, @sickvictorianangel, @bloodinthebox, @heron-feathers, @honeymaltgelato, @mezzaninebeetle55

➵ AO3 Link ➵ Fic Masterlist ➵ Previous | ➵ Next

Hennigan’s Stead opens wide before you.

The land is different here. Gone are the dark conifers of West Elizabeth. Gone even is the bright, clean sky of the mountain. Here, everything seems tinged in amber. The grass grows tougher, paler, rasping under the wind. Dust lifts from the horses’ hooves in soft red-brown gusts, settling on your skirts and Arthur’s boots and the lower edge of his coat. The air smells of stone, sun-bleached grass, and horse sweat. It is not the green, soft comfort of the Heartlands. It is sharper than that. Wider. As if the world has been scraped down to dry heat and sky.

You ride beside Arthur now, not behind him, and the difference feels larger than it should.

He keeps glancing toward the horizon, measuring distance. His hat shades his face, but you can still see the set of his mouth, the faint crease between his brows. He is thinking of routes. Of camp. Of Dutch and Hosea and wagons and guards and whether the whole gang can be threaded through a hidden pass.

You are thinking of Mexico.

Not fully. Not practically. Not with maps, feed, and water stops. Not getting the whole gang there. Just the word itself, bright as a struck match in your mind.

Mexico.

A place beyond Blackwater. Beyond the Pinkertons. Beyond American law. Beyond every trap closing around the gang. You imagine sun on adobe white walls, river water flashing gold, children laughing somewhere, women hanging laundry, and men drinking coffee under the shade of a porch. You imagine the gang scattered but alive. You imagine Arthur breathing easier.

The thought makes your chest ache.

Arthur notices. Of course he does.

“You’re quiet,” he says.

You look over at him. “Am I?”

“Mm.” His eyes flick to you, then away. “Usually means you’re either schemin’ or worryin’.”

A smile tugs at your mouth. “Can’t it be a little of both?”

He huffs, soft and low. “With you? Seems likely.”

The tease warms you. It settles under your ribs, dangerous in its sweetness. You look ahead again quickly.

The figurine is in your bag on your horse.

You have not touched it since morning. You have not even thought of it, but now and then the awareness returns: stone wrapped in cloth, buried among your things, strange and crude and secret. You tell yourself it is only an odd little relic. Something to sell. Something to laugh about later.

Still, every so often, you swear you feel the echo of it.

Not heat. Not exactly.

A pulse.

A low, distant throb, gone the moment you notice it.

You shift in the saddle and push the thought away.

The sun lowers. The world turns orange from the west. Long shadows stretch from cottonwood trees, and the sky burns in wide bands of rose and gold. You are beginning to wonder where you might make camp when the road bends, and the ranch appears ahead as if it has been waiting for you all along.

MacFarlane’s Ranch sits warm in the dusk, lamplight beginning to glow. You hear it before you reach it: laughter, fiddle music, the clap of hands, the bright spill of voices rising and falling together. Smoke curls from a cook fire. Horses whicker in the paddock. Somewhere, someone hollers with the joy of a man already several drinks deep.

Arthur slows first, his hand raising slightly in an unspoken order.

You slow with him.

“Looks lively,” you say.

“Looks drunk,” Arthur mutters.

You laugh before you can stop yourself, and he glances over, mouth twitching like he didn’t mean to amuse you and is somewhat pleased that he has.

A man near the fence spots you and lifts an arm.

“Travelers!” he calls. “You folks hungry?”

Arthur’s shoulders go a little stiff.

You can see the calculation move through him: unknown people, unknown loyalties, too much attention, too much noise. But the road behind you is long, and the day has been longer, and the smell of food is suddenly unbearable in the best possible way.

You raise your hand before he can refuse.

“We wouldn’t say no,” you call back, completely ignorant of his concern.

Arthur gives you a look.

You give him one right back, sweet as honey and twice as stubborn.

The man at the fence laughs. “Come on, then! Plenty to go around.”

Arthur sighs through his nose, but he nudges Rhiannon forward.

The ranch swallows you in lamplight and human warmth. A few workers come over to help with the horses, friendly without being too curious. Someone takes your reins and tells you your mare will be watered and fed. Someone else claps Arthur on the shoulder like they’re old friends, and Arthur bears it with the faint, braced patience of a man enduring weather.

“Long way from home?” a woman asks you, pressing a tin cup into your hands.

“Feels longer than it is,” you answer.

She smiles knowingly. Her eyes flick from you to Arthur and back again. “That's how marriage goes sometimes.”

You nearly choke on the coffee.

Arthur, beside you, goes very still.

The woman does not notice. Or perhaps she notices everything and chooses mercy.

“You two eat,” she says, waving toward the tables. “Plenty of beans, cornbread, and stew. Men slaughtered a wild hog yesterday, so we’re celebratin’ like kings.”

Arthur clears his throat. “Ma’am, we ain’t-”

“Thank you,” you say quickly, bright and firm, stepping just enough in front of him that he has to stop.

The woman pats your arm and moves off before Arthur can correct anything.

For one breath, neither of you speaks.

Then Arthur turns his head slowly toward you.

You look up at him, trying very hard not to smile.

“We ain’t married,” he says under his breath.

“I know.”

“You let her think we was.”

“She seemed happy thinking it.”

“That ain’t a reason.”

“It fed us.”

He stares at you. You stare back. Then, despite himself, he gives a quiet, helpless little laugh, and the sound goes through you softer than it has any right to.

“Sly thing,” he murmurs.

You take a sip of the drink to hide your face. “Practical thing.”

The liquor inside hits you, and you cough, and suddenly Arthur’s laugh goes from quiet to loud as you suck air in through your teeth, handing the tin mug to Arthur.

The evening gathers around you and draws you into the safety of being surrounded by people who seemingly don’t want to see you hanged.

You eat at a rough plank table under strings of lanterns, shoulder to shoulder with ranch hands and hired men and two women who keep filling your plate no matter how often you insist you have enough. The stew is thick and rich. The cornbread crumbles warm between your fingers. Someone passes whiskey. Arthur takes one drink, then another when pressed, though he keeps his wits about him.

Still, the line of his shoulders eases.

You like watching it happen.

You like him here in the lamplight, with dust on his coat and firelight touching the sun-streaked gold in his hair. You like the way his eyes crinkle when someone tells a story that almost earns a laugh from him. You like the way he leans back from the table with one arm braced along the bench, boot stretched out, comfortable for once.

A fiddle starts up again near the cookfire.

The first tune is quick and bright, all elbows and stomping boots. Men clap along. A girl in a blue dress grabs one of the ranch hands and spins him so hard his hat flies off, and everyone roars. Someone shoves the hat back onto his head backward. The music rises, wild with delight.

You feel it in your feet first.

Then your hands.

Then somewhere behind your ribs.

Arthur sees the change in you and narrows his eyes.

“No,” he says.

You turn to him. “I haven’t asked anything.”

“You’re about to.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I surely do. You have that wild look in your eye that you’re about to do somethin’ reckless.”

You set your cup down. “Arthur.”

“No.”

“One dance.”

“Absolutely not.”

“You haven’t even heard my argument.”

“Don’t need to.”

You lean closer, lowering your voice as if this is a negotiation of grave importance. “They think we’re married.”

“That ain’t my fault.”

“It will look terribly rude if you refuse to dance with your wife.”

His eyes sharpen at that, but not with anger. Something more like amused. More helpless. More like he can’t tell you no. “You’re enjoyin’ this.”

“Maybe a little.”

“A little,” he repeats flatly.

You give him your hand.

Arthur looks at it like you have offered him a lit stick of dynamite.

The fiddle slips into a slower tune, still lively but less frantic, the kind of song that lets people turn under lamplight without knocking teeth loose. Couples begin to gather. Some are married. Some are pretending they might be by morning. The music softens the edges of everything.

“Come on,” you say. “No one here knows us.”

Arthur looks from your hand to your face.

For a moment, you think he will refuse again. He should, maybe. It would be sensible. You are too far from camp, too full of strange discovery, too warmed by whiskey and lamplight and being mistaken for something neither of you has dared name.

Then he takes your hand.

His palm is warm and callused, closing around yours with careful strength.

“One dance,” he says.

Your smile breaks free. “One dance.”

He lets you pull him up.

For all his grumbling, Arthur knows how to move. That surprises you, though it shouldn’t. A man who rides like part of the horse, who fights like weather coming down from the mountains, ought to know what to do with rhythm when it finds him.

He is not showy. He is not polished. But he is steady.

His hand settles at your waist, respectful and firm, and yours rests on his shoulder. The first few steps are awkward only because you are suddenly very aware of everyone watching, though perhaps no one is watching at all. Then the music catches you both properly, and the world begins to turn.

Dust rises under your boots.

Lanterns blur.

Arthur’s coat brushes your skirt, and his hand tightens just slightly when another couple spins too close. Protective. You feel it through the thin layers of your dress, and warmth blooms under his touch.

“You lied,” you say softly.

His brow furrows. “About what?”

“You said you wouldn’t dance.”

“I said one dance.”

“But you can dance.”

“That ain’t the same thing.”

“It is when you’re this good at it.”

He scoffs, but there is color high on his cheekbones now, almost hidden by the low light. “Don’t start.”

You laugh, and his eyes flick down to your mouth.

The moment changes.

Only a little. Only enough for the air between you to still. His gaze lifts again almost immediately, but you saw it. You felt it. The same charge that has been following you since that ruined place near Van Horn. The same careful not-looking. The same want pulled thin over restraint.

Arthur feels it too. You know he does.

He adjusts his hold just a fraction, giving you space, but the space does not help. Somehow, it only makes you feel the places where he is not touching you more keenly. The music slows. Or maybe your blood does. The whole ranch becomes a haze of gold and sound, and Arthur is the only clear thing in it.

“Folks are starin’,” he murmurs.

You glance around. No one seems to be. Everyone is busy laughing, drinking, dancing, living.

“No, they aren’t.”

“They might be.”

“Then let them think we’re very fond of each other.”

His mouth parts slightly, as if whatever he meant to say has vanished before it could become sound.

You do not know where your courage comes from. Maybe whiskey. Maybe the road. Maybe the impossible pass at your back and the promise of another country ahead. Maybe it is just Arthur himself, his hand at your waist, his eyes on yours, his body close enough that every turn feels like a question.

Maybe it is the fantasies you have been living in your head about him touching you.

The song ends too soon.

Applause breaks around you. Someone cheers. Someone calls for another tune.

Arthur releases you slowly, like he has to remind his hand how.

“There,” he says, rougher than before. “You got your dance.”

“I did.”

You should step back.

For one small suspended moment, you stand close together under the lanterns, breath still a little quick, your palm lingering against his sleeve. Arthur looks down at you with something unguarded in his face, something tender and bewildered and afraid.

Then someone shouts for more whiskey, and the spell breaks.

Arthur clears his throat and steps away.

The rest of the evening passes warmly. Easier, somehow. You sit beside him again, and though neither of you speaks much about the dance, it remains there between you, glowing like an ember in a dying campfire. People keep calling you “ma’am” and Arthur “sir” with that teasing reverence reserved for married strangers. You stop correcting them before you ever start.

Arthur never corrects them either.

Eventually, the hour grows late. The party thins. A few men are drunk enough to sing badly. The older woman who first greeted you points you toward a small spare room off one of the outbuildings, insisting you take it instead of sleeping rough.

“For you and your husband,” she says.

Arthur opens his mouth.

You touch his wrist.

He closes it again.

The room is plain but clean, with two narrow cots, a wash basin, and a window looking out toward the dark pasture. The walls hold the day’s heat. The air smells faintly of hay and soap. Outside, the music has softened to a distant murmur.

Arthur stands just inside the door, looking at the two cots like they might accuse him of something.

“You take whichever,” he says. “I can sleep outside if—”

“Arthur.”

He stops.

“You don’t have to sleep outside.”

His jaw works. “Just tryin’ to be proper.”

“I know.”

That is the trouble with him, you think. He is rough in all the ways the world has required, but gentle in the places no one taught him to be. It makes you ache. It makes you reckless.

You set your bag down near the cot by the window. Not the bag with the figurine. That one remains outside with the horses, tied securely among your other things, forgotten for now.

Arthur removes his hat and sets it carefully on a small chair. Without it, he looks softer. Younger, almost, though the lines of his life are still there in his face. He runs a hand through his hair and avoids your eyes again.

“You did good today,” he says.

You turn toward him.

“With the pass,” he clarifies. “Figurin’ where we was. Thinkin’ through what it might mean.” He looks at you then. “Was smart.”

Praise from Arthur is never careless. He gives it like a coin he had to earn before he could hand it over. You feel the weight of it settle in your palm.

“Thank you,” you say quietly.

He nods once, then looks away as if the room has become too small.

You move before you can lose your nerve.

It is only a few steps. Nothing at all. Yet each one feels enormous. Arthur looks back when you stop in front of him, his expression stilling.

You rise on your toes and kiss him.

It is sweet. Soft. Barely more than a press of lips against the corner of his mouth, innocent enough that no one could condemn it and intimate enough that your whole body trembles with the doing of it.

Arthur does not move.

Not away. Not toward.

For one heartbeat, he is still beneath your mouth.

Then he exhales, and the sound brings you back to reality.

You draw back before either of you can make it more than it is.

“Goodnight, Arthur,” you whisper.

His eyes are dark in the lamplight, fixed on you with an intensity that makes your pulse stumble.

“Goodnight,” he says at last, voice low and scraped raw.

You turn to your cot before you can do something foolish. Like something you’ve fantasized about these last weeks. Behind you, Arthur remains still for several seconds longer. You hear him shift eventually, hear the creak of the other cot as he sits, then the soft thud of his boots coming off one by one.

Neither of you speaks again.

Outside, the ranch settles into sleep. Lanterns are blown out. The last song dies unfinished. Horses stamp and sigh in the dark pasture.

Your travel bag hangs from the saddle where you left it, untouched beneath the wide black bowl of the sky.

Deep inside it, wrapped in cloth, the little stone woman waits.

For a long while, nothing happens.

Then, faint as a second heartbeat, the figurine begins to pulse.

Once.

Twice.

A low, secret throb of warmth moves through the stone, unseen in the dark. The horses shift uneasily, ears flicking toward the bag and away again. The night holds its breath.

Inside the small room, you sleep with your fingers near your lips, dreaming of lantern light and Arthur’s hand at your waist.

Across from you, Arthur lies awake much longer than he should, staring into the dark, one hand curled hard against his own chest as if that might steady what your kiss has stirred loose.

[kisblle]

Oh god…THIS IS TOO GOOD

[kisblle]

ARTHUR MORGAN..ARTHUR MORGAN, WHERE ARE YOU ARTHUR MORGAN (we completely drove through this town on accident but you know I made my man stop).

[shaunasrabbit]

A Taste of You | Arthur Morgan x F!Reader

Explicit. Minors DNI.

Summary: You and Arthur try something new.

Tags: No use of y/n, reader is afab and uses she/her pronouns, medium to high honor Arthur, first time ass eating, tongue-fucking, fingering, and oral sex (f!receiving and m!receiving). If I missed any tags, please let me know!

Word count: ~1.2K

Read on AO3

A/N: My first time writing for Arthur! Shout out to the anon that said "Arthur Morgan ass eating" in my inbox and nothing more. Love your mind. Lightly proofread (by that I mean I skimmed and barely so). All typos/spelling errors are on me. As always, likes/reblogs/comments are appreciated. Divider by @/saradika-graphics.

On the rare occasion that you and Arthur are able to sneak away for a night, he takes his time with you. 

First, it was the languid yet sensual touches in the bath. Hands, hidden underwater in dim candle light, roaming aimlessly. Squeezing, caressing, rubbing. You felt dizzy, almost high, from Arthur’s touch, his calloused hands deliciously exploring you like he’s trying to make a map of your body. 

Then, it was his cock in your wet, hot mouth. His hand rested gently on the back of your head, guiding you with restraint and patience. You knew he wanted to slam into the back of your throat, but he’d never let himself lose control like that out of fear of hurting you. Instead, Arthur let you take the lead, using your hand to assist where your mouth couldn’t reach. He was whispering soft praise to you as you hollowed your cheeks, sucking with determination. Eventually, he had to pull you off with a pop to stop himself from unloading in your throat. 

And now, he’s making a mess of you. With your face pressed into the mattress, Arthur is devouring you. As thoughtful as ever, he pauses to fold a limp pillow and slide it under your belly to make you more comfortable as you become weaker and weaker from his tongue working your clit. You wiggle your ass towards him, begging for him to resume. Instead of giving you what you want, he spread your pussy wide, watching it drip and pulse with need. 

“My sweetheart,” he coos behind you. Being this exposed makes your face grow hot. “Prettiest thing I’ve ever seen.”

“Please, Arthur,” you whine, pushing your hips back again to tell him exactly what you’re asking for. 

Leaning in, Arthur sucks your clit into his mouth, groaning against you. The vibration makes you feel delirious and pulls a breathy moan from you. That only encourages Arthur who lets go of your clit and drags his tongue slowly down to your opening, dipping his tongue into your entrance. You reach back, tangling your fingers in his hair that’s been getting long, nearly brushing his shoulders now. It’s the perfect length to grip and you use it to push his tongue further in you. 

Arthur snakes his hand around your plush thigh so that he can have access to your clit, rubbing tight circles on the sensitive, swollen bud as he fucks you with his tongue. The pleasure is nearly overwhelming and you let your eyes flutter shut, succumbing to the feeling. You’re beyond dazed, lost in it, that you don’t notice Arthur’s tongue leaving your core. Oh, but you notice when he makes contact with your tight ring, the one that’s never been touched by anyone before, circling it with his eager tongue.

You squeak as your eyes widen. “Arthur!”

“‘M sorry,” he slurs, resting his cheek on your ass. “I just”—he experimentally licks you again, fast this time—“wanna taste every part of you.”

Much to your surprise, you find yourself aroused at the thought of Arthur doing something so taboo to you. Something entirely new. In some way, you think it would be an act of devotion, a way of promising yourself to him and him to you. Still, there’s part of you that feels embarrassed, shy even. Maybe Arthur can sense this because he begins to leave soothing kisses on the plump cheek of your ass, the crease where it meets your thigh. 

“I don’t know, Arthur.”

“You can trust me, y’know that,” he reassures you. Sliding his thumb from your clit to your entrance, he slowly slips it inside of you and you can’t help the moan that escapes your lips. “But we don’t gotta do anything you don’t wanna do.” 

Of course you know this. Arthur has never once pushed you to do anything—sexual or otherwise. As his hot breath fans over your hole and his sweet words echo in your hazy mind, you decide you do want this. The embarrassment, the shame seems to go out the window. It’s just Arthur. Your Arthur. Hard on the outside, brutal with others, but ever so loving with you. It makes your chest tight with affection.

“Okay,” you all but whisper, voice impossibly small and timid. It’s unlike you, but this whole situation is unlike anything before. “You can…do that.”

Arthur peppers your backside with kisses, finger entirely still within you. “Are you sure?”

“I am. I-I..want to try it,” you admit sheepishly. 

Immediately, he obliges, letting a string of spit fall from his lips onto your asshole before fully committing. Arthur licks and laps at you with the ferocity of a starving man. Your whole body is tense as you try to adjust to the new sensation. With his unoccupied hand, he massages your hip. It’s like a gentle command, urging you to relax. When that fails, he replaces his thumb with his index finger and begins to fuck your cunt in earnest. The feeling of his tongue on your ass and his finger prodding at that sweet spot deep inside of you is divine. 

Bucking your hips, begging for more with your body, seems to send Arthur into a frenzy. He quickly inserts another finger and fucks you hard, dragging moans from you that interrupt your panting. A particular loud whimper earns a groan from Arthur and he tightens his grip on your hip. Reaching back, you place your hand atop of his and squeeze in encouragement. 

This must embolden him, the non-verbal praise, because he slips his tongue into your hole. 

“Oh!” you cry out, shocked by the intrusion, but not at all upset. “That feels—oh my god—so good, Arthur.”

Fucking you with his tongue and fingers, Arthur brings you closer and closer to the edge. It’s not long before he coaxes an orgasm out of you. Your pussy clenches around his fingers while your asshole tightens around his tongue. Not for a moment does he stop, working you through your orgasm until you’re squirming away from him, too overwhelmed to handle anymore. With a shameless moan, he pulls away and leaves a trail of open-mouthed kisses from your ass to your neck, burying his face there before flopping next to you.

Arthur gathers you into his arms, all loose-limbed and pliable, and kisses your temple. “Weren’t expecting you to like that so much,” he whispers. Ear pressed to his chest, you can feel the quiet rumble from his soft chuckle. “You did good for me, darlin’.”

Humming at the praise, you nuzzle your face into his solid chest that’s peppered with hair that looks golden in the candlelight. Arthur strokes your arm with the sweetest tenderness. The experience was nothing like you expected. No, it was so much more. The vulnerability has instilled a new trust between the two of you, you think. 

“Arthur?”

“Hm?” 

“Can we do that again?” you ask. 

He laughs softly, pressing a kiss to the crown of your head. “Sure we can, but I think y’need some rest after that.”

Though you don’t want to agree, you feel your eyelids grow heavy. Arthur drapes the blanket over both of you. Before you know it, you’re asleep in your outlaw’s arms.

[kisblle]

This is hot!!

[twola]

Absolute perfection by @kenobiwanx . I keep staring at their expressions and am so in love.

(Yes, there is more. Yes, I’ll post it later 😉)

[twola]

NSFW below the cut for the whole piece! @kenobiwanx 😘

[zordanna]

Nilde and Arthur doodles about morning cuddles and sweet talk that’s all🏃‍♀️✨

[kisblle]

What should I complete first?

The Chain (Part II) - 80% finished

Unnamed HH Arthur Morgan x Elizabeth Bloom modern AU - 50% complete

Tethered (Part III) - 10% complete

Voting ended onMay 29

[twola]

Dewberry Creek VII: Whiskey, My Dearest Enemy

The next morning is a headache for more than one person.

Pairing: Arthur Morgan x FemOC/Reader POV  Tags: Longfic, Slow Burn, Smut (18+), Violence, Canon-Typical Injuries taglist: @thorst, @autrytonic, @arthurmorganist, @appalachiancowboy99, @blueskies664, @ultraporcelainpig, @pinescent-and-gingerbread, @honeymaltgelato, @newest-obsession, @mrsarthurmorgan7, @arthurstinmug, @blueskies664, @v3lv3tf0x, @emerald-ranch, @redwritr, @photo1030, @kisblle, @honeycoyotes, @captainstottlemeyer, @globetrotter28, @abducted-cowz ➵ AO3 Link ➵ Fic Masterlist ➵ Previous | ➵ Next

The morning light comes in slats through the shutters of Leviticus Cornwall’s office, thin and pale, cut into stripes by the blinds. It does nothing to soften the dark room above the humming freight yard. The mahogany desk shines dark, the gilded clock on the mantel ticks. Outside, the city coughs and clatters itself awake: carriage wheels over stone, the groan of the riverboats' steam horns, the distant bark of men loading freight in the damp heat off the Lannahechee.

Cameron Spence stands before Cornwall’s desk with a folder tucked beneath his arm and the expression of a man carrying fresh meat into a lion’s den.

Cornwall does not sit at his desk. He stands at the window with his back to the room, his broad shoulders casting further shadow. His cigar burns between two fingers, but he has not bothered to smoke it. Ash clings to the end, glowing faintly.

“Well?” Cornwall spits, not turning around.

Spence clears his throat. “The attorneys have reviewed the matter again, sir.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“No, sir.” Spence adjusts his spectacles with a damp hand. “The issue remains the same. Frederick Shaw is confirmed deceased. We have that much established through witness testimony and the reports from Blackwater. However…” He hesitates.

Cornwall finally turns. The look alone is enough to make Spence wish the floor would open and swallow him neatly, paperwork and all.

“However?” Cornwall asks.

“His widow is not proven dead.”

For one small second, the office becomes terribly still.

Then Cornwall’s cigar snaps between his fingers. A scattering of ash drops onto the polished floorboards. Spence continues quickly. “Without some kind of proof of the widow Shaw’s death, or her legal consent, the deed and surrounding land interests remain tied up. The charter filings around Limpany were thorough. Shaw arranged the deed so that upon his death, his interest would pass directly to his wife. Without her signature, the land remains beyond our reach.”

Cornwall’s eyes narrow. “Do not compliment him in front of me.”

“I did not mean to, sir.”

“You said he anticipated pressure.”

“He did.”

Cornwall steps away from the window. “He was a provincial upstart playing mayor in a burned-out bend of river.”

“Legally, he was rather careful. Our research on him was that he was previously a lawyer here in Saint Denis.”

Cornwall slams his hand onto the desk. The sound cracks through the room like a gunshot. Spence stops speaking at once.

“I do not pay men like you to tell me what I can and cannot do,” Cornwall says, voice low now, worse than shouting. “I pay men like you to remove impediments.”

Spence swallows. “Yes, Mister Cornwall.”

“Leland Development is breathing down my neck. I have surveyors waiting, capital waiting, oil contracts waiting, and every week that damned land at Limpany sits idle is another week that lesser men believe they can laugh at me.”

“No one is laughing, sir.”

Cornwall’s mouth curls. “You are either lying, Spence, or you are more foolish than I thought.”

Spence lowers his gaze. He has learned, over many years, that there are moments when agreement is the safest form of survival. Especially when dealing with Leviticus Cornwall.

Cornwall moves around the desk and picks up the folder Spence had brought. He opens it, scans the first page, then tosses it back down.

“So find her.”

“We are trying.”

“Try harder.” Cornwall sneers.

“That’s why Agent Milton is here.” 

At the mention of his name, the door opens. Andrew Milton enters without apology. He removes his bowler hat and tucks it beneath one arm, his pockmarked face composed into a professional calm that Cornwall finds both useful and infuriating. Milton is a tall, sharp man, built less like a soldier and more like a blade. He gives Cornwall a reserved nod, then Spence, as he stands at attention. “Mister Cornwall.”

Cornwall points at the papers on his desk. “My vice president informs me that a dead man continues to inconvenience me through his very much missing wife.”

Milton’s expression does not shift. “That seems to be the long and short of it.”

“I assume you have something more useful to offer.”

“We have widened the search.”

“Where?” Cornwall demands.

“Blackwater first. Then Strawberry, Wallace Station, Valentine. We have men posted near stage routes, depots, post offices, and hotels. If she is traveling under her own name, we will find her.”

The magnate lets out a humorless laugh. “If she is traveling under her own name. My God, Milton, do you think she's stupid?”

“No,” Milton says. “Frightened, perhaps. Desperate. But not stupid.”

Spence glances between them. “If she has fled east, she may seek Saint Denis. She lived here before, according to records.”

Milton nods. “We have men making discreet inquiries.”

Cornwall steps closer to Milton. “Discreet. I despise that word.”

“It is sometimes the more effective approach.”

“It is a word used by men who lack the stomach to be direct.”

Milton’s eyes cool slightly. “I do not lack the stomach for anything, Mister Cornwall. But a deer being hunted tends to bolt if the dogs bark too loudly.”

Cornwall says nothing for a beat. Then he smiles, thin and ugly.

“Do not mistake yourself for my equal, Agent Milton.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it, sir.”

“No,” Cornwall says. “You would not.”

The clock ticks. Somewhere down on the street, a horse screams at another horse. The city moves on, indifferent to the little storm gathering in that room.

Milton sets his hat on the corner of the desk. “We do not believe she is dead.”

Spence stiffens, having already given that news to the magnate. Cornwall’s gaze sharpens.

“Why?” Cornwall asks.

“No body. No grave. No record of passage under her name, but also no sign of a woman matching her description among the unidentified dead after the Blackwater business.” Milton pauses. “She is alive. We have a lead coming out of Valentine that a woman that sounds like her just spent a week there, holed up at the Saints Hotel.”

Cornwall’s jaw works.

“Then where is she?”

“That,” Milton says, “is what I intend to discover.” The leather of his gloves squeals as his hand tightens over the corner of the desk.

“You said the same weeks ago.”

“And since then, sir, the West Elizabeth situation has become complicated.”

Cornwall waves this off. “Outlaws. Ferries. Dead men. I am aware.”

Milton’s gaze flicks briefly to Spence. “The van der Linde gang has drawn a great deal of heat. Most local law is occupied with that disaster. It has muddied the water.”

Cornwall turns back to the window. “Then drain the water.”

Milton’s mouth tightens. “I will find Ruth Shaw.”

“You will bring her to me.”

Milton holds his stare. “Alive is preferable, I understand. But I cannot promise what condition she will be in if she runs into rough company.”

Cornwall lifts his chin. “Don’t be poetic. It doesn’t suit you. You and your men are as rough company as any of those miscreants outside these walls.”

“Then plainly, we will find her. We do not currently believe she is under the protection of any organized outfit. No evidence suggests she has joined with criminals or crossed into Mexico. Most likely, she is hiding alone, aided by strangers, or staying with some acquaintance from her prior life.”

Spence exhales softly, almost relieved.

No one in that room knows about the dried creek bed in New Hanover. No one knows about the wagons beneath old oak roots, or Susan Grimshaw’s sharp voice, or Mary Beth’s curls bent over a book, or Arthur Morgan stalking through camp with a bruised heart and bloodied hands. No one knows that Ruth Shaw is not alone.

Cornwall presses his palm flat to the glass and looks down at the street as if he owns every soul moving upon it.

“Then pull apart her prior life,” he says. “Thread by thread. Friends. Doctors. Land agents. Hotel clerks. Priests. Shopkeepers. I want every name. Every letter. Every charitable fool who may have looked at her and seen a woman worth saving.”

Milton picks up his hat. “Understood.”

Cornwall turns from the window.

“And Agent Milton?" Milton pauses at the door.

“If you fail me in this,” Cornwall says, voice quiet as a knife drawn slowly from leather, “the widow Shaw will be the least of your concerns.”

Milton inclines his head. Then he leaves.

Spence remains where he stands, folder clutched to his chest. Cornwall reaches for a new cigar. “Well?” Cornwall says without looking at him.

Spence blinks. “Sir?”

“Get out.”

—

Cicadas shrill from the trees above like they are sawing the sun into pieces. You wake with a headache pressed behind your eyes.

Not from drink. No, that particular misery belongs to Arthur Morgan, whose silhouette you see at once across camp, bent over near his wagon with one hand braced against the wheel and the other pressed to his brow. He looks as if the morning itself has personally insulted him and intends to keep doing so.

Good. Let it.

You sit up from your bedroll and push your hair back from your face. Your curls have worked themselves wild during the night, strands sticking to your neck in the damp heat. For one foolish second, your body remembers the heat of him crowding you against the wall, the whiskey on his breath, the terrible things he said in a voice that made your own blood betray you.

Then the memory closes around your ribs. The guilt. The wedding ring hanging from your neck. Your husband, not three months gone. You reach for your boots.

Mary Beth is already awake beside you, sitting cross-legged with her hair loose down her back, tying one ribbon with the dreamy slowness of a girl not yet prepared to face the day. She watches you from under her lashes.

“You sleep at all?” she asks softly.

You pull on one boot. “Enough.”

“That don’t sound like enough.”

“It was enough.”

She presses her lips together. You can feel her wanting to ask more. She is gentle, Mary Beth, but not blind. Not stupid. She knows something happened in Rhodes, something to make you short-tempered and snap at her. But she won’t ask, won’t prod.

Across camp, Arthur straightens too quickly and immediately regrets it. He closes his eyes, jaw tight. His hat is low, but not low enough to hide the pallor beneath his tan.

Sean laughs at something near the fire, far too loud, too bright. Arthur turns his head with murderous slowness.

Sean’s laughter dies mid-note.

That almost pleases you.

Almost.

Abigail appears carrying a basket of laundry against her hip, Jack trailing after her with a stick in hand, drawing lines through the dust. She takes one look at you, one look across camp at Arthur, then gives the kind of sigh that suggests she has seen more than enough of men and women and the trouble they make when their hearts start chewing through their good sense.

“Well,” Abigail says, dropping the basket near the wash tubs. “Ain’t this morning just brimmin’ with joy.”

You stand and brush your skirt smooth. “I’ll help with washing.”

“You don’t gotta.”

“I said I’ll help.”

Abigail looks at you sharply, “Alright then.”

The two of you fall into work. Water sloshes. Soap roughens your hands. Your knuckles ache from scrubbing shirts that belong to men who never seem to notice laundry unless it is missing. 

Tilly joins after a while, then Mary Beth, and the four of you make a small ring of labor at the edge of the camp.

Arthur is impossible not to notice.

You try. You fail.

He moves around his wagon with jerky irritation, gathering cartridges, checking a saddlebag, stopping once to swallow hard like his own stomach has turned traitor. He snaps at Bill for standing too close. He tells Sean to shut his damn mouth before Sean has even opened it. When Pearson asks him if he wants coffee, Arthur says something too low for you to hear, but Pearson takes three steps back and suddenly remembers business elsewhere.

“Lord,” Tilly murmurs, wringing out a shirt. “Somebody oughta put him out of his misery.”

“Or ours,” Abigail chimes in.

Mary Beth looks at you. You keep scrubbing.

The shirt beneath your hands is already clean. You keep scrubbing anyway, dragging the fabric against the washboard until your wrists burn.

Abigail notices.

“You’re gonna scrub holes through that,” she says.

You stop. Slowly, you wring it out and stand to hang it on the line. Of course, it’s one of Arthur’s shirts. Of course it is. Your skirt brushes your ankles, damp from splashed water. Your head throbs. Your heart throbs worse.

You do not look at Arthur. You look at the shirt. At the line. At the wooden pin in your hand.

Then Arthur’s voice cuts across camp.

“Where’s my goddamn gun oil?”

The whole creek bed seems to pause.

John, seated near the fire, lifts his head like a dog hearing thunder in the distance. “How the hell would I know?”

“I seen you messin’ with that crate.”

“I didn’t touch your oil.” John snaps back, the scars on his face rippling with his scowl.

Arthur stalks toward him. “You sure?”

John rises halfway, eyes narrowing. “What’s your problem?”

“My problem is everybody in this camp touches what ain’t theirs and then looks stupid when asked about it.”

“Oh, you wanna talk stupid?”

“Don’t,” Abigail snaps from the washtub.

John looks toward her. “I ain’t started nothin’, woman.”

“You never do,” she says. “Somehow it always starts anyway.”

You hang the shirt. Your fingers tremble against the clothespin.

Arthur glances toward the women’s side at Abigail’s voice, and for one second, his eyes catch yours. It is not soft. That might have been easier.

His gaze is bloodshot and bruised with hangover, shadowed by anger and something beneath it that he refuses to name. Your own anger rises to meet it, hot and immediate, a dog straining at its chain.

You look away first and hate that you do.

Behind you, Abigail makes a small sound. Not a sigh. Not a word. Something in between, edged with pity and annoyance. Like she knows everything that has gone on between the two of you.

“Don’t,” you say quietly.

“I didn’t say nothin’.”

“You were about to.”

She wrings a union suit so hard that water rains into the tub. “Fine. I won’t.”

Mary Beth ducks her head, but her gaze keeps slipping between you and Arthur like she is reading one page, then the next, trying to understand how the story got so ugly overnight. Like one of her stories that she fawns over. 

You lift another shirt from the tub.

“Some things ain’t worth asking after,” you say, trying to backpedal on your tone previously.

Abigail gives you a sidelong look. “That so?”

“Mhm.”

“And some things rot if nobody airs ’em out.” She says, with wisdom beyond her years.

You turn to her, anger flaring again. “Some things rot whether you air them out or not.”

The words come sharper than you intend.

Mary Beth stills. Tilly looks down at the water.

Abigail’s brows rise. For a moment, you think she might snap back, and some ugly part of you almost wants her to. Wants a clean fight. A simple one. One that has nothing to do with Arthur’s hands, Arthur’s mouth, Arthur’s wounded pride, Arthur’s talent for making you feel both safe and foolish in the span of a single breath.

But Abigail only nods once.

“Alright,” she says. “Then we won’t.”

That makes you feel worse.

You drop the shirt back into the tub and turn away.

“I need more soap.”

“There’s some by Pearson,” Tilly says.

You know that, but go anyway.

Crossing camp feels like traversing open ground under fire. You feel eyes on you, or imagine them. Maybe both. Camp is too small for secrets. Grief can hide in tents and sorrow can tuck itself under shawls, but anger walks around in daylight. People notice the aura of it.

You reach Pearson’s wagon and find the soap near a stack of tin plates. Pearson himself is busy stirring the pot with a grave expression, as if the future of civilization depends upon his continued punishment of carrots.

“Missus Shaw,” he says. “You uh… need somethin’?”

“Soap.”

“Right. Right there.”

“I see it.”

You take it.

Behind you, boots scuff the ground.

You know before turning.

Arthur stands a few feet away, hat tipped low, one hand resting near his gunbelt. Up close, he looks worse. His eyes are bloodshot. Stubble shadows his jaw. His mouth is set in a grim line, but there is a faint unsteadiness to him, a man held together by spite, leather, and the last bitter fumes of whiskey from yesterday.

You should walk away. You do not.

His gaze drops to the soap in your hand. “Mornin’.”

“Ain’t a good one.” You breathe back, trying to choke back a snarl that you wish desperately to let out.

Pearson suddenly becomes fascinated by the stew.

Arthur glances past you, toward the women at the tubs. Then back. “You alright?”

You laugh once, low and sharp. “That’s what you want to ask me?”

His expression hardens. “Ain’t allowed?”

“Not after yesterday.”

The two of you stare at each other. There are things you could say. Honest things. You could tell him you barely slept. That you felt something at his drunken confession. But your pride is like a thornbush, and you are standing in the middle of it barefoot.

Arthur rubs at his brow. “Look, Ruth…”

The sound of your name in his mouth twists something in you, “No.”

His eyes narrow. “No?”

“You do not get to say my name like that after yesterday.”

His face closes. “Like what?”

“Like you’re thinking with anything other than your cock.”

That hits.

He looks away, nostrils flaring. “That ain’t fair.”

Your jaw catches as your eyes narrow. He wants to talk about fair? After yesterday? Pearson makes a very small squeak and shuffles backward from the fire.

Arthur takes half a step closer, then stops himself. His voice drops. “You wanna do this here? In front of everyone?”

You look around. Abigail is watching openly now. Mary Beth less openly. John pretends not to. Sean doesn’t even bother pretending until Charles gives him one quiet glance, and he turns away fast.

“No,” you say. “I don’t.”

“Then quit talkin’ like you do.”

Heat blooms in your throat. “Don’t give me orders.”

His face goes pale beneath the tan. Anger flashes bright, but hurt is quicker.

For one heartbeat, the whole camp falls away. There is only Arthur Morgan, hungover and furious and wounded, looking at you like you are a door he cannot open without breaking the hinges.

Your fingers tighten around the soap. Instead of going any further, you turn and walk away.

The back of your neck prickles all the way to the wash tubs. You do not look back, though every part of you feels him watching. You sit down beside Abigail, toss the soap into the water, and plunge your hands after it.

No one speaks for a while.

Then Mary Beth murmurs, very softly, “Ruth…”

“Please don’t.”

Her mouth closes.

Abigail watches you with a curiosity and reservation that nearly undoes you. “Alright.”

Across camp, Arthur’s voice rises again, harsher than before, “Marston, move your damn saddle!”

John barks back. Bill laughs. Susan shouts at them all to quit acting like a pack of rabid dogs before breakfast.

The day continues because days are cruel that way.

—

By midmorning, the camp has settled into a wary rhythm.

You keep to the wash tubs with Abigail, Mary Beth, and Tilly, working until the skin at your knuckles goes tender from soap and water. Across camp, Arthur has finally stopped barking at every man within ten feet of him, though that only means he has retreated into a silence so foul it seems to sour the air around his wagon.

You are pinning the last of the shirts to the line when hoofbeats sound from the road above camp.

Charles looks up first. Then Javier. Then Arthur, one hand drifting toward his gun out of habit before recognition stills him.

Hosea Matthews rides down into the dried creek bed with his hat low and his coat dusty from the road. Silver Dollar picks his way between roots and wagon tracks with practiced patience, the grey horse’s ears twitching toward campfire smoke and voices. Hosea looks tired, but there is a brightness in his eye that suggests he has brought back something more useful than sundries.

Dutch steps out from beneath the shade of his tent before Hosea has even swung down.

“Well?” Dutch calls, spreading his arms as if welcoming some grand performer to the stage. 

“What song does Rhodes sing, old friend?”

Hosea dismounts slowly, one hand pressed briefly to his lower back before he lets go of the reins. “An ugly one.”

Dutch smiles. “The ugly songs are often the most profitable.”

You look down at the shirt in your hands, but your ears tilt toward them despite yourself.

Hosea leads Silver Dollar to the hitching post and pats the horse’s neck before joining Dutch near the big tent. Arthur, who had been oiling a revolver at his wagon, looks up but does not move closer. Not at first.

Dutch gestures for Hosea to sit, but Hosea waves him off and pulls a folded newspaper from inside his coat.

“Rhodes is rotten straight through,” Hosea says. “Pretty little place on the surface. Clean streets. Fresh paint. Men smiling like they were born for town socials and fraud.”

Dutch’s expression warms with interest. “Go on.”

“You were right about those two families. “You were right about the Grays and Braithwaites,” Hosea says, pulling a folded newspaper from inside his coat. “Rhodes belongs to them in all but name. Sheriff is a Gray. Leigh Gray. Cousin to the family, and apparently as purchasable as any other man with a badge.”

Dutch’s eyes brighten. “And the Braithwaites?”

“Catherine Braithwaite runs that place like an old queen holding court over a ruined kingdom. There is moonshine moving somewhere between the two houses, and enough talk of buried Confederate gold to keep every drunk in Rhodes dreaming.”

Dutch laughs low. “Now there is a woman worth meeting.”

Hosea gives him a look. “Careful.”

“My dear Hosea, I am always careful.”

Arthur snorts. Dutch ignores him.

Hosea folds the newspaper again, but keeps it in his hand. “There’s bad blood between the families. Not ordinary neighborly hatred. Generations of it. Land, liquor, pride, old murders, stolen horses, burned barns. Depends who tells the story. Truth is likely buried under a few generations of lies.”

“Old feuds,” Dutch says softly. “They make men careless.”

“They also make men violent.”

“Yes, yes.” Dutch waves a hand. “Violence is the language of lesser minds. Fortunately, we speak many tongues.”

Hosea’s eyes narrow slightly. “Dutch.”

Dutch steps closer to Hosea, lowering his voice just enough that you have to strain to hear.

“So what are you suggesting?”

“Between the two families, there’s all this talk of confederate gold.”

Dutch smiles slowly. “You don’t say.”

Hosea almost smiles, wiping his brow again.

Dutch’s gaze sharpens, “Listen to what Hosea is saying. Two powerful families. Both proud. Both rich. Both hating each other so deeply that they likely cannot see the ground under their own feet. That, gentlemen, is opportunity.”

Arthur folds the rag over his revolver, finally entering the conversation. “Or a trap.”

“Everything is a trap if you walk into it blind,” Dutch says. “We won't be blind.”

Hosea tucks the newspaper back into his coat. “There’s also talk of moonshine. Lots of it. Braithwaites may be moving liquor. Grays may be trying to stop it, or steal it, or tax it. Depends who’s talking.”

Dutch’s smile widens.

“There,” he says. “Commerce.”

“Crime,” Hosea corrects.

Dutch spreads his hands. “In America, old friend, the distinction is mostly paperwork.”

That earns a tired chuckle from John near the fire. Even Javier grins into his coffee.

Arthur is not smiling. His face is hard, shadowed beneath the brim of his hat, but his gaze is fixed on Dutch and Hosea with the wary attention of a man who can already hear hoofbeats in the distance.

Hosea continues. “The Braithwaites think the Grays are beneath them. The Grays think the Braithwaites are poison. Both want to be seen as the true power in Scarlett Meadows.”

“And both will want outside hands,” Dutch says. “If those hands are useful.”

“Maybe.”

Dutch points at Arthur. “That is exactly why I need you to be subtle.”

Arthur’s expression sours. “Christ.”

Hosea looks toward him then, more serious. “Dutch is right about one thing. We need to know the ground. You take Lenny and maybe Bill into Rhodes again. Not to start anything. Just listen. Find out where the Grays drink. Where the Braithwaites send their wagons. Who hates who. Who owes money. Who’s scared. And for Christ’s sake, don’t start another bar fight. I heard that you slugged a man last night.”

“And Sean?” Dutch asks.

Hosea grimaces. “Only if you want subtlety shot dead in the street.”

Arthur gives a short laugh despite himself, though it fades quickly.

Dutch clasps his hands behind his back and looks pleased, almost serene, as if the day has offered him a shining apple and he has not yet seen the worm beneath the skin.

“Good,” he says. “Very good. This is precisely what we need. A divided kingdom.”

Dutch goes on talking, already spinning the first thread of the scheme.

The day is still hot. The creek bed still smells of clay and smoke. Arthur is still angry. And somewhere south, two old families sit behind gates and painted walls, waiting to be discovered by wolves who think themselves clever enough to prey on both.

-

By early afternoon, Arthur’s head still feels full of broken glass.

Each sound cuts. Sean’s voice cuts. Pearson’s ladle scraping the pot cuts. John’s boots in the dirt cut. Even the damn cicadas up in the trees sound like tiny saws worrying at his skull. But none of it cuts as deep as you walking away from him with that look on your face.

Arthur stalks toward his wagon because motion is easier than standing still. He finds the offending gun oil exactly where he left it.

That makes him angrier.

He snatches it from the crate and slams the lid shut. The bang sends a lance through his head. He swears, low and vicious, and presses the heel of his hand to one eye.

“Rough mornin’?”

Arthur does not turn. “Not now, Hosea.”

Naturally, Hosea comes closer.

The old man moves quietly when he wants to. Today he wants to. Arthur hears the faint crunch of dry clay beneath his boots, then the soft exhale as Hosea leans against the wagon.

“You and Missus Shaw seem cheerful.”

Arthur uncorks the oil. “Ain’t your business.”

“No,” Hosea says. “But that ain’t stopped me before.”

Arthur looks at him then. “I said not now.”

Hosea’s expression is mild, which means he is already angry. “You can snarl at me all you like. Won’t make you less a fool.”

Arthur laughs without humor. “There it is.”

“There what is?”

“You callin’ me stupid. Always gets there eventually.”

“You certainly make it easy.”

Arthur turns away, jaw clenched. He picks up a revolver and begins cleaning it with more force than necessary. The cylinder spins under his thumb. Oil glints dark in the morning light.

Hosea watches him for a moment.

“You drunk?” he asks.

“Was.”

“Hungover, then.”

Arthur says nothing.

“Explains some of it.”

“Some of what?”

Hosea’s voice hardens. “I saw the way she looked at you this morning. Then I rode into Rhodes and heard why.”

Arthur’s hand stills. His eyes flick toward the laundry tubs despite himself. The laundry is done, and the women disbanded, but Hosea knows who he is looking for.

“She’s mad,” he says.

“Course she is.”

“She got a reason to be?”

“Probably,” Arthur admits, rubbing at his temple again.

“Did you frighten her?”

Arthur’s jaw tightens.

Hosea’s voice goes quieter. “Arthur.”

“I said things.”

“That wasn’t my question.”

Arthur looks at his foster father. “You here to help or peck at me like a crow?”

“Depends whether there’s anything useful left on the carcass.”

Despite himself, Arthur almost smiles. Almost. It dies before it reaches his mouth. He sets the revolver down and drags both hands over his face. The hangover pulses behind his eyes, but beneath it is something worse. A sick, low ache. Not the easy kind that can be beaten out of a man in a fistfight or drowned under whiskey.

He thinks of you saying he gives orders. He thinks of Owanjila and the moonlight. He thinks of Valentine. Of leaving you.

“I ain’t mean to be ugly,” he says, so quietly Hosea almost does not hear.

“I know.”

“That don’t fix it.”

“No,” Hosea says. “It doesn’t.”

Arthur picks up his hat from the wagon and puts it on, tugging the brim low. “I need to get outta camp.”

“Arthur.”

“I need air.”

“You need sense.”

“Fresh out.”

Hosea steps in front of him before he can move off. The old man’s eyes are clear and tired and full of that terrible fatherly disappointment Arthur has never learned how to withstand.

Arthur exhales through his nose.

Hosea sees it all. Of course he does.

“Arthur,” he says softly. But Arthur steps around him. He does not go far, only to the far edge of camp, where the old creek bed narrows, and the roots claw out from the banks like fingers. He lights a cigarette with hands that are steadier than he feels. Smoke fills his lungs, bitter and familiar.

Behind him, camp carries on. Ahead, the road waits.

Arthur smokes half the cigarette before throwing it down and crushing it beneath his boot.

By early evening, the heat has gone coppery and mean. It sits low in the creek bed, caught between the white clay banks, trapped under the roots and wagons and canvas, pressing sweat beneath collars and sourness into every look. Supper comes and goes with little ceremony. Pearson’s stew is ladled out. Tin spoons scrape against tin bowls. Someone laughs on the far side of camp, but the sound dies quickly, as if even joy knows better than to linger too long in this fetid air.

At your end of the fire, there is mostly silence. Abigail eats with Jack tucked against her side, her eyes occasionally lifting toward you but never staying long. Mary Beth sits close enough that her skirt brushes yours, a quiet kind of comfort she does not force. Tilly picks at her food and watches the flames with a thoughtful frown.

Arthur keeps to the far side of camp.

He speaks only when spoken to. Even then, his answers are short, gruff things, half-swallowed before they can become conversation. His shoulders stay tight beneath his shirt. His hat is pulled low. 

You feel Arthur’s eyes on you more than once.

You never give him the satisfaction of meeting them.

Let him look. Let him sit over there with his wounded pride and his hangover and all those things he refuses to say. Let him stew in it the way the rest of you stew in this cursed heat.

That is what you tell yourself. It doesn’t help.

When the sky finally darkens into a deep indigo, and the first stars blink through the branches overhead, you stand without a word and carry your bowl to Pearson’s wash basin. The campfire snaps softly behind you. Somewhere near the horses, leather creaks. Dutch’s voice murmurs low from his tent. The rest of camp begins to loosen into the night, bodies drifting toward bedrolls, bottles, cigarettes, and whatever small comforts can be stolen before sleep.

You slip away to the women’s lean-to.

Mary Beth offers you a small, worried smile as you pass, but she does not follow. Abigail is already curled beside Jack, one arm thrown over him, her breathing slow and even. Tilly is a dim shape in the corner, snoring softly with her shawl bunched beneath her cheek. Susan Grimshaw is absent, likely still making some final round of camp like a general inspecting a battered army.

You are grateful for the quiet.

You crawl into your bedroll fully dressed, boots kicked off, but skirt still tangled around your legs. The canvas above you sags low, patched and stained, the pitch of the lean-to pressing down like a held breath. The night air is thick and humid, carrying the distant snorting of the horses, the hum of insects, and the occasional pop of the dying fire.

Every small sound feels too loud. A murmur near the men’s wagons. A horse blowing through its nose. A tin cup knocked softly against wood. Your own breathing.

You turn onto your back and stare up at the sagging canvas.

You are furious with him.

Furious at the way he looked at you this morning, like you were something he both wanted and resented. Furious at the way he pushes and pulls, saves and wounds, touches tenderness with one hand and reaches for cruelty with the other.

Furious that even now, hours later, your body still remembers him. The shape of his hands.

The rough scrape of his voice when he told you what he wanted to do to you.

You close your eyes tightly.

You will not do this. Not here. Not with Tilly sleeping several feet away and Abigail breathing softly beneath her blanket. Not with the camp spread around you in the dark, full of ears and gossip and ghosts. Not with anger still sitting hot beneath your ribs.

But your body is a traitorous thing.

It remembers yesterday in pieces. His weight. His breath. The way his frame caged you in, covered you, and smothered you.

You press your thighs together beneath the blanket, trying to will the ache away, but it only sharpens.

“Damn you, Arthur,” you whisper into the dark.

The words vanish into the canvas and humid night.

Your hand slides down before you can talk yourself out of it.

The fabric of your skirt bunches at your waist. Your fingers slip beneath the thin cotton of your drawers and find you already wet, shamefully so. You bite the inside of your cheek to stay silent, eyes shut so tightly that little sparks bloom in the dark behind your lids.

You think of him anyway.

Of his broad shoulders braced over you yesterday. Of the ragged scrape in his voice when anger tipped into want. Of his hands braced beside your shoulders, keeping you there without touching what he threatened to take.

You imagine those same hands between your legs instead.

Thick fingers. Calloused skin. His mouth at your ear, voice rough and low, telling you to be quiet so the whole damn camp doesn’t hear.

Your breath hitches.

You circle your swollen clit with two fingers, quick and angry, chasing the feeling. Like if you can make yourself come apart fast enough, hard enough, you can burn him out of your blood. The tension coils tight in your belly, winding higher with every stroke of your most sensitive skin. Then it hits sharp and bright. You shove your face into the crook of your arm to muffle the small, choked gasp that escapes. Pleasure flashes through you in fierce waves, pulsing outward until your thighs tremble beneath the blanket and your fingers still against your own slick heat.

For a few seconds, there is nothing but the rush of it. The relief, the heat. Then it fades.

And the anger is still there.

Worse now, somehow. Now something thin and aching.

You lie there panting quietly, fingers still pressed between your legs, the cooling slickness of your arousal making you feel suddenly exposed despite the blanket pulled over you. Your heart beats too fast against your ribs. Your eyes sting with something that might become tears if you let it.

You withdraw your hand, wipe it against the edge of your blanket, and stare up at the sagging roof of the lean-to.

The ring at your throat has slipped loose from beneath your chemise. Frederick’s ring. Cold against your damp skin.

You close your fist around it until the metal bites your palm.

The ache between your thighs fades eventually.

The rest of it does not.

[kisblle]

Can someone please recommend some angsty, yearning Arthur Morgan fics!! PLEASEE

[kuromisgh0st]

i think it’s really essential as an adult to stay silly and goofy and weird

[kisblle]

I am a Gen Z that works at a corporate office on the same floor as all the executives/VPs/ directors and I have gone to tell nearly every high level employee (including the president of my company) the same stupid joke that gets every single one of them rolling on the floor.

This is somewhat how this conversation goes (often times I phrase it differently when I told HR that a really angry employee named Joseph Mothers left a message needing to speak to someone ASAP):

*finishes conversation* “oh by the way Joe is looking for you”

“Joe?”

“JOE MOMMA”

Then the Gen Xrs usually go into a fit of laughter. These high level employees running a multi billion dollar company, rolling on the floor, tears running down their face. I have never seen a generation laugh at such a stupid joke so hard.

I just think Gen X unfortunately needs to be reminded life isn’t all that serious, and I’m glad to be one of the only Gen Z’s on that floor to be making them roll around like that.

[arthurrmorgan]

big bad outlaw wanted for $5000 btw

[bee-does-a-gaming]

I don't think I will ever not get pics from this cutscene y'all

[photo1030]

Ya know, I’m not usually a stache-only fan, but this? This works. Works quite well for me, actually 😏

[kisblle]

🫱👅🫲

[kisblle]

bean soup theory on this app is exhausting.

[kisblle]

Tethered - Part II

Pairing: Low Honor Arthur Morgan x Female Reader

Part I

MDNI 18+

Word count: 12,237

Tags: Angst, smut, established relationship, toxic

Summary: "What happened to us?" - You recall the last year of your broken marriage before the dissolution of your relationship.

Author's note: I definitely put this one down, and picked it back up a thousand times. After working on it for so long my brain was telling me it was just bad, but after taking a brief break, and coming back I just realized I needed to take a look at it with fresh eyes. This part definitely challenged me a lot, trying to make Arthur redeemable but also an asshole one would want to divorce. Either way, please enjoy the angst.

Tag list: @canofcannedsoup @liliesofth3valley @a-revolver-called-rachel @saturnknows @garbage-creature @photo1030

…

Photo Creds to cowpokingarthur on TikTok

…

What happened to us? 

Arthur’s words linger like cigarette smoke.

The warm firelight glistens against his nude body as he stares helplessly at you. A sad glint shining in his weary azure eyes, one that you couldn’t recall the last time he’d let down his walls enough to show. 

His bottom lip quivers, as if he’s waiting for an answer. As if he didn’t know -  couldn’t recall what led to the end of your marriage. 

And suddenly, deep in your bones - you feel angry. 

Couldn’t he remember? 

…

Four Years Ago (One Year Before The Separation)

"I think I'm pregnant," Abigail says casually, lifting up the bottoms of her skirt and wading ankle deep into the Montana River. 

The balmy mid-summer air clings to your skin, just enough for a sheen of sweat to coat the back of your neck as you trail in after her. Eyes scanning the riverbed with each step, cautious of any algae slicked stones. 

 “Really?” you ask, letting the response land slow. Brows rising in her direction. 

She pauses momentarily before turning around, water splashing halfway up her calves, gaze meeting yours. 

“I’m three weeks late.” 

You nearly snort as you cross your arms, letting the bottoms of your skirt plummet into the current. Chin pointing low in her direction. 

“It Marston’s?”

A crimson blush creeps up her neck as she pulls a piece of hair behind her ear, a chagrin grin curling at the corners of her mouth, “That obvious huh?”

You snort, wadding toward her, letting the cold water creep further up your legs. “Let’s just say he ain’t exactly quiet when he’s sneaking into your tent each night.” 

Her face burns red as she shakes her head slowly, letting the silence linger for a few moments but you ask the hard-hitting question next.

“He know?”

She pauses, grin dropping, swallowing the lump in her throat hard. The air thickens with each passing breath, silence clinging to the moment like stubborn grease on a cast iron pan. 

“I was gonna tell him t’night.”  

You don’t respond right away, lips tightening, letting her confession settle as you gently tip your head back and forth. 

A few silent moments pass, only the rush of the rolling river and Waxwings chirping overhead filling the heavy space. But it’s not long before she lets out a hesitant exhale, looking at you like she wasn’t too sure what to say.

“You know,” she gulps. “I don’t think a child was…necessarily in his cards…certainly not mine.” Her gaze floats back down to the water, pointer finger playing in a gentle ripple. “Least’ not right now anyway.” 

A soft sympathetic smile pulls at your outer corners as you reach for her shoulder, circling your thumb over the soft skin of her exposed collar bone. 

“Well it ain’t like he don’t know how babies are made Abigail,” you make sure to remind her. 

A gentle breeze pulls at her loose strands as she tightens her lips, letting the silence remain for a few moments. But just as she’s about to speak, a sharp screech erupts from shore. 

“What do you two think you’re doing!” 

Susan Grimshaw stands on a nearby bluff, sleeves pulled up to her elbows, hands stout on her hips, brows lowered in dismay.

“Coolin’ off,” Abigail shouts back.

Susan scowls. “You ain’t need to cool off,” she yells, voice condescending as hell but you’re used to it. “Still clothes to be mended, still dishes to be scrubbed.”

You glance back at Abigail and stick your tongue out at her. She answers with a dramatic eye roll as the two of you wade toward shore. With sand clinging to the bottoms of your feet like sugar, you both trudge up the grassy bluff where Grimshaw stands waiting, arms crossed, scowl firmly in place.

“The two of you god damn lazy,” she mumbles as she leads the both of you back into the heart of camp. “The men are out there risking their lives day in and day out to provide for us, and you two can’t keep on task for more than a god damn hour.” 

Abigail mockingly rolls her eyes again, as Susan turns to face you directly. “And I shouldn’t have to remind you Mrs. Morgan, that just because your husband donates to the box..”

“..Doesn’t mean I get a free pass.” You cut in, a sentence you’ve well memorized after ten years of being with your outlaw. “I know.”

Grimshaw grimaces, her gaze dragging from your head to toe like she’s looking at something she’s never quite approved of, but she pulls the pair of you underneath a shaded canopy anyway. Throwing a torn blouse in Abigail’s direction, and a ripped sock in yours - like you hadn’t stitched up ten already that day. 

With an annoyed huff and a roll of your eyes, you drop onto a stool, making no effort to hide your discontent. The small act proving to be the final drop in Grimshaw’s already brimming cup. And before you can even brace yourself, the palm of her right hand connects with your right cheek.

The initial sting catches you off guard, but the action itself pierces harder than the physical pain ever could 

You had never exactly seen eye to eye with Susan.

 But she had never hit you before. 

Tears well in your eyes as Grimshaw points a finger accusingly in your face, “Don’t you dare test me girl,” she yells, grasping the attention of any wandering eyes. 

“You’ve always been a disrespectful little whore and I ain’t ever seen what Arthur does in you. And if he ain’t gonna teach you lessons about respect, I will.” 

Your lip quivers, tears spilling down your cheeks as she stands up straight, an evil smirk on her face like she’d just won a prize. 

Her voice settles. Deeper, meaner, “And you best be given no more lip, cause nex’ time I hear any talk back I’m goin’ to Dutch with it and there’s nothing he hates more than a freeloader.”

Your jaw clenches tight, determined to not give her any satisfaction but your tears betray you anyway. She looks you once over, slow and mean, a wicked smirk curling at her mouth like she’s pleased with herself before tipping her chin upward and strutting away. 

For several long moments you sit in silence with Abigail. Sleeves growing damp with tears every time you try to wipe away the humiliation falling down your cheeks. Your fingers linger on a metal needle, forcing yourself to mend the sock instead but your shaking hands betray you. Piercing your fingertips every pass through the cloth. 

When Grimshaw is no longer in sight, Abigail finally opens her mouth. Leaning in your direction, whispering, “The devil is a woman, and that woman is Grimshaw.” 

You nod your head, spitting your next words sharp.“That woman has never given me a god damn day of peace since I’ve met her, I swear she’s always had it out for me.”

In some ways you felt bad complaining to Abigail, as if the black haired beauty didn’t have more problems than you in her current condition but today had felt like the tip of the iceberg. 

The past several months had been a trial for you.

Arthur had been away from camp more often than not these past few months, too caught up in Dutch’s web of debt collecting, train robberies, and guilt tripping to pay you much mind. And catching him in a good mood had started to become rarer and rarer these days. Claiming he was always too tired or too busy to give you any time of day. Too burnt out to take you out of camp for a few days, to give you your own much needed time of rest. Nothing more than a few kisses and cuddles behind tent flaps. 

You felt stir crazy.

Even though constantly outside you felt confined. No privacy, always working, a woman that’s hated your guts since day one constantly over your shoulder berating you for every little thing. And your husband? The one that was supposed to make you feel better - absent in all the ways that mattered. 

Abigail breaks you from your daze, responding quietly. “You know why she treats you like that, right?” 

You look up from your needlework, shaking your head at her. 

“Cause she likes to think she raised Arthur…John too.” Abigail says casually as she makes another pass through the blouse with her needle. “Thinks no woman is good enough for her boys,” she rolls her eyes. “Treats Molly the same way, and I’m sure when she catches on to me and John I’ll be getting that end of the stick too.” 

You scoff, rolling your eyes. “Yeah well you think after ten years she’d at least try an’ warm up' to me.” 

…

Hours pass by, and just as the stew finishes cooking Arthur trails back into camp. 

He’s exhausted. 

You can tell by the way he slouches forward when he walks, slowly dragging himself back to camp from the hitching yard as if he hadn’t slept for days. Per usual he scans camp, expression lighting up just for a moment as his gaze meets yours, flashing you a tired, handsome grin. 

He moves toward you beneath the canopy, but Grimshaw catches him halfway and pulls him aside at the edge of camp. You don’t need to hear the words, you already know they start and end with your behavior. And after a few long moments he lets out a long breath, eyes falling shut as his head dips, lips pressed tight. 

Disappointed. 

He answers her, but you’re not too sure of what he responds. Only imagining it’s along the lines of I’ll talk to her. Because it’s not the first time she’s done this, not the second, or third time she’s tried to get you in trouble with your husband. Probably the millionth. And even though deep down you know he doesn’t care, won’t berate you, and would always take your side. It still doesn’t exactly feel good. Because you know he’d rather keep the peace with her than ever stick up for you. 

He turns with a sigh, dragging himself in your direction as you sit under the canopy with your arms folded, lips formed into a pout. He stops right in front of you, looking down at you with a tired, kind smile. “Givin’ Grimshaw hell today huh?” 

You spring up from your stool, brows pointed down, lips pursed into an angry pout. “She slapped me Arthur.” 

Your husband just rolls his eyes as if you were overreacting, but he doesn’t yell, doesn’t push further. He just gently grabs at your hand, thumb caressing your dorsum as he guides you to your shared tent. 

“Arthur, didn’t you hear me?!” you ask as he pulls back the canvas flaps without a word, guiding you inside.

Once you’re hidden from the rest of camp, he steps in close, wrapping his broad frame around you from behind. His chin settling against your shoulder, his warm breath tickling the skin of your nape. He presses small, unhurried kisses along your neck, working his way slowly to the lobe of your ear.

“Ain’t you tired?” he asks, pressing a kiss to the curve of your neck line, trying to change subject.

“’Cause…”

He settles another kiss. 

“....I’m…”

His lips linger just beneath your ear.

“Spent.”

It was small moments like these that made you forget where you were and what had happened. Small cherished moments with your husband behind canvas flaps, just the two of you. And as much as he had made you smile, made you forget - even for just a moment. 

That sting of Grimshaw’s slap was unforgettable no matter how many hours it had been since she had hit you. 

“Come lay down with me,” Arthur asks tiredly, loosening his grip from your waist and backing himself towards the cot, where he sits down. Waiting for you to follow. 

You cross your arms, turning on the tip of your foot. 

“She slapped me Arthur,” you snap, not letting the conversation go, 

His face drops, sighing loud and annoyed as he props his elbows onto his knees, dragging the palms of his calloused hands across his face before shaking his head. “We still talkin’ bout this?” 

You snarl, the corner of your lip quivering upwards as your brows point down in dismay. 

You loved your husband.

You did. 

But after today you couldn’t stand one more moment of being dismissed. One more day of being stuck in this hell hole while he runs every which way in West Elizabeth. 

“Arthur I know I have already asked you probably a million times these last few months but I need to get out of camp. Need t’ get away for a couple days. Jus’ you and me. Please. I’m going stir crazy here.” 

Your husband sucks in another breath of air, a telling action he always did when he was about to disappoint. 

You already knew his answer. 

“I told you,” he says. “Ain’t exactly in the right financial situation to be going off for a few days. Gangs gettin’ bigger, ain’t a lot of good payin’ job right now. Dutch needs as much help as I can give him.” 

You look down, biting your bottom lip, tears threatening to fall down your waterline. Nearly at your tipping point. “I ain’t askin’ for no fancy hotel room or anything, just maybe a few nights campin-” 

He interrupts you. He’s tired. Exhausted. Wants to be done with the conversation you can tell. 

“Why don’t you let me take a nap for a few hours hun?” he breathes. “When I wake up we go for a ride, jus’ the two of us? Does that sound good?” His voice is soft and comforting, searching for some kind of compromise. 

One that you would accept, because you needed out of camp, needed away from Grimshaw. Even if just for a few hours. 

You gulp, shaking your head. 

He smiles, eyes wide. 

“I promise I’ll take you away for a couple nights as soon as I got the time, got the money,” he says tiredly, falling back down on the cot. “I - I just need some rest right now.”

…

Hours pass as the sun sinks below the horizon, the crickets echoing their melody across the prairie as the sky turns a grapefruit pink. You sit under that same shaded canopy from earlier, still sewing socks, making casual talk with Abigail. Stomach twisting into impossible knots. 

Arthur never found you like he had promised. 

Never took you for that ride. 

Instead he had found himself at the poker table. Laughing with John, throwing cards at Grimshaw, losing the money he claimed he didn’t have. Ignoring you for hours if he meant to or not. 

But you couldn’t help but to feel like something had shifted that night, something in your heart, something deep down. 

…

Several months pass, the warm summer’s air slowly turns crisp as the earth revolves further around the sun. It was now early November; the morning dew starting to frost over each dawn leaving everyone in a sour mood, wondering when Dutch would move the gang south for the rest of the winter.

But the men still had loose ends to tie up, and the morning frost was the least of most people’s worries. 

Abigail’s stomach had started to swell, and John Marston was having trouble coming to terms with becoming a father. If he wasn’t avoiding camp like the plague, he was avoiding Abigail herself - unable to even look her in the eye. The last several days he’d gone missing completely. 

And Arthur….

He hadn’t kept his promises. 

No trips outside of camp, no hotel room for a couple nights, no stepping in when Grimshaw got too mouthy with you either. Always too tired, or too busy to be the husband you had once fallen in love with.

Sure he would still greet you for a few minutes when he got back to camp, he’d still whisper loving words into your ear, still make promises he never intended to keep. He’d still sneak into camp late at night, pull you close behind canvas flaps and fuck you slow and quiet, making sure to wake no one. 

But that’s all it was. Quick, lust filled moments.

All your marriage had become. 

A circle of broken promises, a wife he only cared for when he felt like it. And more often than not; a burden. 

…

It’s late by the time Arthur finally marches into camp, gone nearly a week. He hops off Heimdall as rage pours out of him like wine, not even bothering to pull the alligator saddle off his irritated gelding. 

He was at his wits end.

A job gone terribly wrong. A con he’d been working for two months, one that promised good money. And then Bill Williamson had to mess it up. Picked up by law, date for a hanging already scheduled - suddenly Arthur’s problem. 

He only bothered to stop by camp to reload on ammunition, maybe convince Javier or Lenny to tag along - he could use the help. Or worse - when he’d finally break Bill out of jail, he’d need someone there to hold him back from killing the man right on the spot. 

But as soon as Arthur is three steps into camp he hears the slap of an old hand on a cheek, and suddenly he knows his visit wasn’t going to be as quick as he needed it to be. 

 …

Tears stream down your face as Grimshaw screams inches from your face, something about the stew carrots being cut too big. The third argument this week. 

Incapable. 

Lazy.

Idiot.

All names she had called you without hesitation, each one hitting just as hard as her palm does when it cracks across your cheek again.

“You goddamn old maid,” you spit back, snot mixing with tears. “You get pleasure outta torturing me?”

Her hand connects with your face again.

You don’t fight it.

You brace for more. More sharp insults, more humiliation, but her unforgiving stare shifts past you instead.

“Mr. Morgan,” she snaps.

“Do you see how your whore speaks to me?!”

Your stomach tightens, you turn.

Arthur stands looming behind you. 

You don’t know how much he has seen, don’t know how much he’s heard. All you notice is the sharp scowl on his face. Eyebrows shifted down, jaw locked tight like he’s not happy with anything he’s just witnessed. 

Good. 

Maybe finally he’d stick up for you. Put this woman in her place. 

But you’re not at all surprised when he doesn’t.

Instead Arthur grabs your forearm, tight and harsh. Dragging you across camp as if the steam coming off him was your doing.

Everyone watches, no one says a word. You notice Abigail’s lips part  as she sits under a canopy with her hand propped on her swollen stomach, her eyes widening in sympathy. The only person in the past several months that has shown you any amount of empathy when it comes to Grimshaw, but you know she has worse to worry about. 

Your gaze floats behind you as Arthur pulls harder at your arm. Grimshaw’s watching. A smug smile plastered on her face like she enjoys watching you cry, eyes rolling over you in loud judgement as she whispers something in Pearson’s direction.

And Arthur. 

You only see the back of his head as he drags you to your tent, his fingernails digging into your forearm like a dog bite. You can tell rage was flowing through his veins far before he even stepped into camp. 

He carelessly flips open the tent’s canvas flaps, stepping inside and dragging you along after him. Red creeps up his neck as the crooked look on his face refuses to fade, jaw set hard like something was lingering far before he even stepped into camp. 

You rip your arm free.

“Did you hear her?!” you shout, stepping into his space. “Do you hear the way she talks to me?” A breathless, hysterical laugh breaks from you. “I need you to take me outta here Arthur. I’m serious.” Your voice cracks. “I’m gonna lose my damn mind if I’m not out of camp before the sun sets.”

Arthur huffs, rolling his eyes as a bitter laugh escapes his lips. Like he’s in utter disbelief. 

“Jesus Christ,” he snaps, pacing once before turning back on you, pointer finger splayed accusatorily in your direction. “Can’t you just do what you’re fuckin told for once in your life?!” 

You freeze.

You and Arthur had gotten into it before; too many times to count. You’ve fought, screamed, said things you both have regretted but not once had he sworn at you. Looked at you with disgust - like you were the problem. Like you were only a menace he was forced to clean up after. But he had never sworn at you. 

You go silent, wide eyed, completely taken off guard. 

“Oh don’t look at me like that,” he seethes, pushing further. “Bill’s in jail, Dutch made it my problem. John’s gone missin’ with a child on the way, and we haven’t gotten a good score in months.” Arthur pauses, rolling his eyes, voice raising a pitch, finger splayed in your direction. “And you think you’re my fuckin’ top priority, wantin’ me to take you on some fuckin’ vacation I can’t afford so you can get out of doin chores?” He shakes his head.

His words land like poisoned arrows, cutting deep and hitting hard. You can feel your fists tighten at your sides, nails digging into your palms as you swallow. All the feelings from the past several months wash over you in that moment: anger, sorrow, and desperation for something more. 

You realize he’s never understood, never cared too. Never realized how you’d been dying inside for far too long, trapped inside this hell hole called camp. Desperate for him - your husband to stick up for you, take care of you in a way a wife should be taken care of.

You swallow hard once more, your eyes glazing over in realization. 

“Chores?” you whisper, jaw clenching hard, your body shaking in frustration.

“You think this about chores?”

He huffs nearly laughing, one eye squinting as he shakes his head. “Well it ain’t exactly hard to believe you ain’t pullin’ your share.” 

“What does that mean,” you snap back quick, 

He laughs, taking a few moments to motion around the tent that looks like it hasn’t seen care for several days. 

“Bed ain’t been made in forever,” he points out first. “Clothes hangin’ off everythin’, shoes tossed every which way like you ain’t got the sense to line em’ up straight,” he looks around. “And these damn paintings of yours,” he taps one with the tip of his boot, knocking it over. “Layin’ all over the place unfinished, cause’ you ain’t ever been the one to finish things through.”

He snorts, rolling his eyes like he doesn’t have time for this conversation. Time for you. 

“So no,” he cocks his head. “It ain’t hard to believe you ain’t been pullin’ your weight, and maybe a good hard slap from Grimshaw is just what you need to put you in your damn place for once in your god damn life.” 

Your face burns red, but that's the least of your worries. It’s rage. Boiling, incensed, rage that pools through your blood stream, all aimed at your husband. 

“I bet you think that stew you eat every night just appears,” you snap. “That your clothes wash and mend themselves like magic.”

Your chest rises fast. He rolls his eyes. 

“You think this is about chores?” you scoff. “I got a woman beatin’ me every god damn day jus’ cause she likes makin’ my life hell and I got an absent husband that won’t do shit about it.” You spit. 

Arthur rolls his eyes, scoffing like every word coming out of your mouth was pure bullshit. 

You huff, folding your arms over each other. “I never asked for no fancy vacation Arthur. Just some time to spend alone with you….as…as husband and wife. 

He responds quick and cold, “I told you, I ain’t got the money or the time to take you away-”

“Shut your goddamn mouth, Arthur.”

The words come out low. Cold. Meaner than you expected, but with tears trailing down your red cheeks you don’t care. 

“You got money to lose at poker near every night. Money to go drinkin’ with Lenny. God knows what else. Cigarettes,...whiskey… other women too for all I know too.” You step closer shaking your head, voice softening, almost if you were begging. “You got time for week long huntin’ trips with Hosea…fishin’ trips with Dutch....”

Your jaw trembles. 

No longer in anger, but as if everything you had just said out loud was enough to convince you that your relationship wasn’t worth saving any longer. That maybe this relationship wasn’t worth the pain. That you were talking yourself out of him just by bringing up your problems. 

“But you couldn’t find an hour?” you ask, quieter. Softer. “An hour to ride out with me. Just to get me outta this camp….Just to.” You swallow, shaking your head like you’re not even sure why you’re still talking. “Just to spend alone time with your wife.”

He drops his gaze to the dirt between his boots, jaw ticking like he knows he’s done wrong but doesn't want to admit it. 

“You act like you’re the only one sufferin’,” he says, voice low and cold, like blaming it all on you instead would make him feel less like an asshole. “You act like the rest of us ain’t carryin’ our own damn burdens…. difference is, we learn to deal with it.”

You bite your bottom lip as you look down in defeat, tears rushing down your face like you’re not sure what to feel. 

He rolls his eyes, grabbing ammunition off the bedside table and throwing it into his satchel like he’s got more important places to be. “God damn spoiled brat thinkin’ she needs a damn vacation,” he mumbles, making sure you hear. 

He turns and throws a few tubes of gun oil into his bag, whispering low; “Should’ve known better than to stupidly marry a spoiled rancher's daughter who thinks the damn world revolves around her.” 

You didn’t want to hear it. 

Didn’t want to hear his words anymore. You had heard enough - and now you know that you’re not as important to him as you once thought you were. 

Arthur doesn’t bother apologizing before ducking out of the tent flaps. 

…

You don’t leave the tent for the rest of the night. 

Your body doesn’t let you. 

Hours pass, hunger pains claw at your stomach, but you don't care. Nothing could get you out of that damn cot. Heart break felt like paralyzation. 

Your relationship with him was all but gone - if he knew it or not. You did. You knew the past several months had been a trial for everyone, but that didn’t give him the right to throw you away. Treat you like you were nothing but a warm body only when he wanted one, a burden when he didn’t. 

But nothing mattered anymore. 

That argument uncovered more truths than you’d wished to ever know. Maybe the problems in your relationship stemmed much further back than just the past year. That Arthur had always resented you, wished differently for himself. 

For you were just the spoiled rancher's daughter he stupidly married. 

…

It’s deep into that same night when Arthur finally pulls back the canvas flaps of the tent , surely in a better mood than he had been earlier. You lay on your side, facing away from the entrance, still awake, tears dry, lying still as he kicks off his boots. 

You hear the sharp click of his gun belt as he settles it off his hips and onto the bedside table. You hear the soft shuffles of his clothes being removed, all but his red union suit he’s worn a day too long. And before you know it, he’s in the cot next to you, chest molded to your back like a puzzle piece. 

As if the fight earlier this evening hadn’t happened. 

You only pretend to sleep. 

But it’s not long before he gives you no choice. 

Arthur drags his left hand upward, reaching for your hair nestled on the curve of your neck, brushing it behind your head with his calloused fingertips. He runs his chapped lips up your nape, his week old mustache prickling against your sensitive skin. His mouth halts at your ear, breath warm and reeking of cigarette smoke. 

 “I’m so sorry for actin’ that way,” he admits, soft and gentle. A completely different man from just hours ago. 

 “You know I hate fightin’ with you.” 

He rolls the knuckle of his left hand down your jawline, neck, then shoulder. Stopping only when he reaches the thin strap of your chemise, pulling it down your shoulder and placing gentle kisses there too. 

“You know I didn’t mean what I said,” he mumbles between pecks.

It doesn’t take a scholar to know what he’s looking for, why all of a sudden he wants to act like everything is okay. Why he’s so quick to apologize. 

Sex. 

The quiet, hushed fucking behind tent flaps, the only time he touches you. 

It had been nothing more than that for the past year. No passion, no hour long love making sessions, nothing loud, wreckless, or spontaneous. Always deep into the night, when no one was up to hear. 

You feel his erection bud beneath his union suit as he strains against your backside. 

“I’m such an idiot,” he mumbles in your ear, left hand grabbing at your breast like all was okay. 

But maybe this is what would make you feel better. 

Sex. 

The boring, non spontaneous, love making that happened behind canvas flaps once every so often. Although not what it once used to be, sex had always brought you closer to him.  Like no matter how far you could feel yourself drifting away, his body could still mold to yours like a piece of clay. Remind you how close you are. Remind you of a time when you were happy. Like a bottle you can’t quite quit. 

So against better judgement, you push your backside into his groin, giving him the okay to touch you. 

You remain on your side as he reaches for the bottom hem of your chemise, pulling it over your hips as he quickly releases himself from the confines of his union suit. He runs one of his fingers through your folds, finding you dry but that doesn’t stop him.

He crudely spits on his hand, slicking his cock down with his own saliva as a short grunt escapes the back of his throat. And before you know it, he’s thrusting inside you. Quick. Meaningless. Like a virgin man desperate for some relief. His forehead tilts against the back of your head as his left hand drags back up to your breast, grasping at it tight. 

His thrusts are lazy and awkward. Maybe they’ve always been that way - maybe you never realized until now. Maybe they're just fine, just too in your head to let yourself enjoy it. 

Maybe it’s because you’d made up your mind hours ago that you’d given up on him.

Still, you lay there. Not finding any pleasure, not finding discomfort either.

Just indifferent. 

His hand trails down from your breast to the bud of nerves between your thighs, circling your clit like he knew you had once enjoyed.  But this time - your mind was too far away to care, you felt nothing. 

His pushes become deeper, exhales weaker with every quick thrust. 

“I’m nothing without you,” he moans breathlessly in your ear. “I love you so damn much.” 

Words that were endearing once upon a time now felt like air. Nothing more than an empty hymn, no actions to ever back them up. 

“I can’t live without you,” he moans again. “You’re my everything.” 

A few thrusts later and he pulls out, finishing recklessly on the backs of your thighs, moaning long and quiet as his climax falls. 

He quickly removes himself from you, falling to his back as his jaw swings loose in pleasure. Drops of sweat cascade down his forehead, chest rising and falling with each ragged, hitched breath. He smiles ear to ear as he comes down from his high. 

But he knows something's wrong. 

You’re still laying on your side, away from him. Silent as can be. 

His mood instantly drops, brow furrowing when he realized you hadn’t said a peep, moaned into him like you enjoyed yourself too. 

“You…uhh” he clears his throat. “Finish?” 

You didn’t. 

Wasn’t in the mood. 

Couldn’t if you tried. 

“Yeah,” you lie. 

Arthur can hear the fib straight through your teeth. He’s made you finish enough times in your relationship that he knows that this time you didn’t. That he was too caught up in his own self pleasure to notice you weren’t enjoying yourself. 

And he feels guilty - especially after the argument earlier.

He props himself up on his elbows, a bead of sweat still falling down his wrinkled forehead and turns toward you. 

“You sure?” he asks again, higher pitched brows raised.  

You nod your head. 

He clears his throat again, like he knows there's tension. “Cause if you haven’t, I can eat-”  

You cut him off, firm and final. “Arthur, I want to go to bed.”

His brows furrow deep at your bluntness, at how cold you suddenly were when you were always such a breath of warm air. 

But he was too tired to argue, too tired to ask what was wrong. So he rolls his eyes at your dramatics and drops down onto his back, not taking any longer to waste into the night. 

…

The gentle morning rays light the canvas tent like an alarm. Arthur’s eyes blur as he wakes slowly, tongue clicking the top of his mouth. He slept well - always did when it was next to you. But this morning he finds himself waking up alone. 

Arthur pulls his large frame upwards, eyes adjusting slowly to the morning glow as he notices his surroundings. 

The tent had been tidied. 

He grins as he swings his feet over the cot. Noticing the welcomed changes. A basket of his clothes neatly folded and placed atop his trunk to be put away. Shoes perfectly aligned  at the exit; propped directly next to yours. Every spare coat, jacket, sock: either in a washbasket or trunk. And above all; none of those damn half-painted pictures crowding the tent like they paid rent. Everything was neat, held its own space. A welcomed change.

He couldn’t help but to think that yelling at you yesterday must have knocked something into your head; bothered you enough to knock some womanly sense into you. He hated that he had screamed at you like that, he had immediately felt guilty afterwards. But deep down he was glad he did, because maybe that's why you had woken up early, to set the tent straight. Maybe even get up earlier to finish your other chores, start the day off strong. 

He grins as he grabs a clean union suit from the top of his trunk, discarding the one he had slept in and throws it in the corner. He dresses quickly, combing his fingers through his hair as he looks at himself in his mirror. Could use a shave but he’d save it for another day. 

He exits the tent slowly, the November sky as blue as a Hydrangea in spring. The air is crisp; cold enough for his breath to visibly curl in front of him. But the sun was out. And that was more than he could ask for on a late autumn’s day. 

His vision scans camp. Grimshaw pours a cup of black coffee, Pearson’s already chopping mystery meat, and Hosea crushes herbs in mortar and pestle. But then Arthur’s eyes land on you. 

Hair braided neatly down your back, coat wrapped tightly around your shoulders, throwing something large and flat into the fire. 

His vision adjusts. 

Throwing one of your paintings into the fire. 

Guilt surges through his gut as he marches across camp. 

Sure - your paintings forever lingering in the tent unfinished and collecting dust annoyed him. But that didn’t mean he wanted you to throw them away - burn them. 

He watches as you grab another painting, cracking it over your knee and tossing it into the blistering fire as he hears you yell at Pearson. “You need any fire starter, feel free to use these.”

Guilt twists sharp in his stomach as he cuts across camp, just as you reach for another one.

He gets there in time, hand closing around your wrist, stopping you before you can ruin another of those little creations you love too much. 

“What’r you doin’?” he asks, his voice raising a pitch, completely appalled as you look up at him. His brows pinch downward, deeply stressed and unsettled. 

But as you stare back at him, there's something behind your eyes he can’t quite recognize. Like there was something missing.They felt emptier, lost. 

He doesn’t like it, guilt pools low in his gut as he notices that something had changed.

“It’s fine,” you responded coldly, as if your life’s work wasn’t burning to ash in front of you. 

He looks down at the already half burnt paintings tossed carelessly into the fire, the orange hues curling around the canvases like a hug. His eyes move down to the stack next to the fire, lingering like trash waiting to be burned. Worry pulls at his features, as his gaze drifts to the one in your hand, then to your face.

This is not what he meant by tidying up - not by a mile. 

“Why you doin’ this?” he asks sharply. 

You exhale softly. Slow. 

“They annoy you-” 

He cuts you off, “I didn’t mean for you to throw them away. Could’ve finished them, sold them at a market. You know you have real talent darlin.” 

“I’m out of paint,” you respond curtly. 

His brows furrow again, lip curling. “Then why ain’t you buy some more.” 

“Don’t got the money,” you remind him. 

He shakes his head, completely dumbfounded. “Why ain’t you ask me then?”

Your voice is soft, but it still stings like venom at your next words . 

“Didn’t want to trouble you.” 

His face molds into bewilderment even further.

When have you ever cared about troubling him? You were his wife - you were meant to trouble him. He liked when you troubled him, it gave his purpose as a husband. 

“Don’t matter anymore,” you say softly, lips pulling into a sad melancholic smile as you pull your wrist free from his grasp, throwing the painting in your hand into the flames. Walking away without another word.

Arthur stands there frozen, like stone. Shame resting heavy on his chest. Hazy memories of yesterday's argument still lingering. He hadn’t exactly remembered what he said in the heat of the moment, but whatever it was he surely regretted. 

He turns to face the fire, eyes gazing down at the flames eating at the canvas painting. 

His heart sinks when he stares at it - half painted, but completely recognizable. A scene from several years ago, he remembers, didn’t know you had tried painting. You’re in his arms, in a field of  Lavendar, Buttercups, and Yarrow. His nose nestles against yours, your right hand molded to his cheek. Details are missing, and the background hadn’t been quite finished but he knows what it is - what the painting was. The memory that it held. 

His eyes glaze over as he watches it turn to ash.

…

You don’t come to bed that night. 

…

Or the night after. 

…

On the third morning of your absence from his cot, Arthur finally seeks you out. Asks you where you have been. 

You apologize and tell him you’ve been falling asleep in the women’s tent, staying up late chatting with Karen, Tilly, and Mary-Beth. 

He tells you he misses you. 

…

Three long days pass without you in his bed, each night worse than the last.

By the fifth night of your absence, Arthur’s finally had enough. You're his wife, there's no reason you shouldn’t be sleeping with him. 

It’s far into the night when Arthur pulls back his tent flaps, the late November air prickling at his skin. He doesn’t bother with a lantern, the moon shines bright enough to light his way. 

From the outside, the women’s tent glows dim - lit only by the weak flicker of a half-burnt candle resting on an old produce box. But for all the women that slept inside, there isn’t a single peep. 

Arthur quietly eases the flap open, just enough to see inside.

The young, sweet Mary-Beth is dead asleep, a half-read book splayed across her chest like it put her under mid-sentence. Karen’s curled tight in her blankets, Tilly sharing a pillow beside her. A mess of limbs and long hair. 

And right there, tucked in the middle of all of it. 

You. 

Propped up, halfway buried in some romance novel, completely oblivious to the man watching you through the narrow slit of the tent flap. 

Arthur watches silently just for a moment. The way your eyes drift from line to line like a canoe with no captain. He realizes  that he doesn’t remember you ever taking up reading, but he also can’t recall the last time he cared enough to ask. 

And that disappoints him. 

Your finger slicks over the next page, turning slowly, eyes following the sentence like a hound dog on a scent. Arthur lets out a low, gentle cough - just loud enough to grasp your attention. 

Your eyes poke out from behind the book as you catch your husband peaking through the tent flap, his face is blank, but he tips his head, motioning you to follow him. 

You don’t bother making a fuss, you stand up making sure not to trip on any extra limbs as you blow out the candle. Following Arthur outside the tent.  

He’s silent for several moments, but it doesn’t take him any time to wrap his large hand around yours like if he drops it you’ll disappear. 

“You know,” he says, walking you towards the tent. “You don’t gotta stay in there if you wanna stay up late readin’.” He pauses, turning to you right before his own tent and glides the back of his hand gently down your cheek. “The light…it don’t bother me none.”

His words are soft and reassuring; but that’s what they had always been. 

Always lies. 

You tip your head down, pulling away from his hand as you duck under the tent flaps. 

Arthur’s frozen for a moment, his jaw clenched tight as he exhales and shakes his head. Knowing deep down that something was very wrong, something he didn’t know how to fix. 

He watches you settle in the cot, turning on your side. It doesn’t take long for him to follow suit, burying himself under several blankets, molding himself around your body like if he let go, he might die. 

It felt good. 

To be back in bed with his wife, to hold you in his arms like he hadn’t in days. To smell your scent, to feel your hair draped in his face, the fabric of your thin chemise against his fingertips. 

He’d always taken moments like this for granted.

These subtle moments with you. 

Arthur settles gentle kisses on your shoulder, not because he wanted sex - but just because he wanted to be close, because he missed you. 

“I’m not in the mood,” you say bluntly, nudging your shoulder out of his grasp. 

Arthur takes this by surprise, his stomach aching in discontent. But he doesn’t push. 

He gives you space, settling on his back instead. 

…

A week passes, and Dutch finally gains enough sense to move the gang somewhere warmer for the rest of the winter. A few days' journey south, where the deep forests merge into grassy plains and the lower Montana wraps around the land like a snake. With Hosea’s guidance, Dutch settles the gang on a quiet bank overlooking the river, hidden in plain sight behind a grassy hill. Just a handful of miles to the nearest town, far from any main roads, houses, or trails. 

During this time your relationship with Arthur doesn’t mend. 

You still sleep in his cot, but you don’t let him touch you; he doesn’t bother trying anyway. You wake up early, always before the crack of dawn to get started on chores. So Grimshaw couldn’t find a reason to berate you. Your days are filled with scrubbing old dishes, chopping vegetables, and sewing every torn sock one could find. And when you can’t find a single chore left to do, and the evening starts to settle, you find yourself at Abigail’s side. 

She’s heavily pregnant now, with a plump stomach, swollen ankles. She groans with every movement, prefers canned strawberries over fresh, and doesn’t do more than an hour's worth of chores a day.

No one nags her - not even Grimshaw, everyone knows she’s going through enough already. But you wouldn’t let her go through it alone. 

…

There’s angry drunks, sad drunks, stupid drunks. 

Drunks that function just fine, drunks that gamble away their days’ earnings, drunks that can stumble a mile in the pouring rain. 

But god watch over the horny drunk. 

A handful of days after settling on the riverbank, Dutch called everyone to the center of camp and made one of his grand speeches. He spoke of a new beginning; one filled with family, trust, and sacrifice. 

Nothing new. 

Nothing he hadn’t promised before. 

But then he called for a celebration, a night off for everyone. The end of a bad run, the birth of a brighter future. Two whole cases of whiskey waiting to be drunk, and three boxes of beer stolen off some poor pig farmer’s porch. 

And that’s how you ended up where you were. 

Near the provisions wagon, three drinks deep, fingers sifting through the beer crate trying to figure out which one was the coldest when in reality they were all the same temperature. 

You were never a drinker, only ever participated when you had something to celebrate or a day called for it. But Karen Jones had shoved three down your throat before the sun had even set that evening. 

And before you knew it, you were back at the provisions wagon - grabbing another. Dazed, eyes glassed over, cherry stain blushing the apples of your cheeks. Horny as one could be. Your body forever betraying you, veins carrying the alcohol from your stomach straight to your cunt. And before you could even ask yourself why, you feel yourself pulsating beneath your skirts, like a god damn bitch in heat. 

Perhaps your hormones sensed him before your eyes could. The staunch body that had joined you at the provisions cart while you fiddled with the cap of your new beer. 

Arthur. 

He doesn’t say a word, just reaches for a beer in the crate before turning to you, lips pressed awkwardly into a tight grin. Like he’s smiling at a stranger rather than the woman he lays next to every night. 

But that’s how it had been the last few weeks. Awkward, strange - like a wedge had built itself between the two of you. 

But his coldness - it still angered you. 

Everything about him did. 

The way he had stopped trying, the way he didn’t bother trying to fix it either - the way he acted like everything was fine even though you hadn’t touched him in nearly a month and a half. 

“You uhh….havin’ a good time?” he breaks the silence, his question laughable, beyond surface level. A question you would ask an acquaintance, not a spouse - certainly not one you’d been married to for ten years. 

But you’re not  sure what angered you more. His surface level small talk, or the way your cunt pulsed beneath your skirt when you looked back at him. Those damn azure eyes of his making you feel ways you hadn’t since that wedge had been built. 

You knew it was the alcohol, you’d always been like this when you were drinking. Your mind and heart begging you to walk away, but your damn body betraying every word. 

Before your brain could even catch up, you were pushing him up against the provisions cart, pulling him down towards you from the collar of his shirt, shoving your tongue down his throat. 

He tastes like whiskey, and cigarettes - but he also smells inherently like himself. Pine, dirt, and faint traces of the lavender soap you know he uses when he cares enough to bathe. His fingers are worn and calloused, and the only facial hair he bore was a few days old mustache that prickled your top lip. 

But the moment doesn’t last long. A handful of seconds later he reaches for your hips, and shifts you off him. 

He’s grinning. 

Broad like a boy that just caught a glimpse of his first pair of breasts, laughing with wide eyes as he asks, “What are you doin’ girl?” He doesn’t say it condescendingly, more like he’s just caught off guard, like he’s excited. 

Surprised and wanting more. 

Your jaw tightens as he looks back at you, your lips forming a heavy pout.

You were angry at him.

God you were angry at him.

Parts of you regretted ever marrying him. Parts of you wished he’d just disappear. But mostly, you just wished you could leave him - never see him again. Curse the man who broke your heart and won’t bother fixing it. 

But right now, all you wanted was him. 

Deep inside you. 

You wanted him to fuck you. Really fuck you. Hard, messy, wild - like he once had. Not this quiet, hushed bullshit that you were so accustomed to now. You wanted to feel him all the way to your core, you wanted it to hurt, to sting. To make you feel something - convince you that things would get better if he’d just fuck the living shit out of you for once. 

Sure you’d rather it be in some hotel somewhere, where he could pin you to the mattress and lift your legs above his shoulders. But you spent the better half of this year already begging him for just that. 

So you’d just do it here. 

Tears of frustrations prickle in your eyes as you push him behind the provisions wagon, instantly falling to your knees. 

Your hands work his belt, jaw swinging loose as Arthur turns over his shoulder. Checking if anyone had stumbled over for another beer. The old wooden cart the only thing separating the two of you from a whole fire full of people catching him with his pants down. 

He swallows hard as he looks down at you, the tips of your fingers brushing against his pubic hair as you untie his pants.

Arthur’s nearly speechless. 

You’re the most confusing woman he knows. 

You’d been avoiding him for weeks, pushing him away, wouldn’t let him touch you the way he wanted.

You’d stop talking to him, stop listening. You wouldn’t smile, laugh, even look in his direction most days. He’d miss the way you’d greet him when he came back into camp, miss the way you’d throw knowing looks his way when someone said something stupid. Miss the way you’d berate him when he was gone too long on the trail. 

You’d stopped all of it, like your marriage had just dissolved right through his fingers and he didn’t know how to stop it. 

But he didn’t want to push. If you wanted space, he’d give it to you. 

So maybe that’s why he was so damn gleeful when you pushed him against that cart, pulled down his pants, and took him into your mouth. All without warning, right there, right out in the open for anyone that wandered a little too far past the provisions wagon to see. 

The tip of his cock hits the back of your throat, rough and deep. You gag, pulling away for a moment as Arthur grips at the wagon's wheel, letting out a muffled moan. 

“Darlin’,” he gulps hesitantly. 

“What - what’r doin?” he stutters as you suck harder, his head tilted back against the wagon. Not wanting you to stop, but at the same time, not wanting anyone to catch him with his pants down, or you with his dick in your mouth. 

You don’t respond, you only take him farther down your throat. Until tears well in your eyes from the discomfort in the back of your throat that you move to his balls, sucking them into your mouth one by one. 

He moans again, louder. 

But he’s nervous. 

He wants this - wants this bad. More than he’s wanted anything in his life. Your attention, your love, your mouth on him like you needed him to breathe. 

But he wanted to finish this in the tent - not, right here. 

“Darlin’,” he breathes hard, cupping your chin into his hand, gently removing your mouth from his ball sack as he wipes away a dribble of saliva falling down your chin. “Why don’t we go finish this somewhere more private?” 

You bite your lip, staring up at him. Standing up. 

His shit grin doesn’t leave his face as he pulls up his pants, not even bothering tying the strings as he picks you up excitedly, throwing you over his shoulder, and returning quickly to the tent. 

He drops you down, tying the flaps shut without a moment wasted, and before a minute is even spared; he’s undressed. 

You drunkenly drink him in. Sure you were still angry with him, but damn was he good looking. 

He’s just so big. In every single way. His chest is broad, covered in scars and hair that trails down to his swollen cock. His arms are large and muscular, delicately crafted from years of labored work. His sandy brown hair sits an inch longer than it usually does, but you don’t mind it one bit. And his mustache - big and burley, just like his erection. 

You can’t help but to think he’s just like whiskey, burns on the way down but damn will it feel good. Always regretting it in the morning. 

It doesn’t take you more than two more seconds to push him violently onto the old cot. Realistically you didn’t have the muscle to push a man of his size over, but he’s quick to let you. Eyes glued to your body as you shimmy out of your dress, letting it fall onto the dusty ground. Your nipples perching immediately at the crisp air, pulling your bloomers down your legs. 

You don’t waste any time getting on top of him. 

Sinking down on his erected cock, not bothering to ease him into you slowly. No - you wanted it quick, wanted it painful.

Arthur moans as you roll your hips once, then twice. And before you know it you’re riding him hard, half for pleasure the other for punishment. You wanted him to fuck the feeling back into you. 

You couldn’t remember the last time you’d had him like this. Wild, and untamed. It was always slow and quiet in this tent, always begging for something more. Faking your orgasms just to make him feel good about himself, when secretly you had been begging for something like this. 

He sheaths into you as you fall back down onto his cock, his hands gripping at your hips almost painfully hard, nails sinking into your skin with every movement. Jaw clenched shut, his nose flaring out in concentration, like one wrong move and he’ll finish inside you far sooner than he’d prefer. 

You push yourself forward, resting your hands on his chest. Tears pooling in your eyes at how good it felt every time he thrusted deep into you from below, but also from every emotion drifting  through your veins. You were angry at him - done with him. You hated how it felt like he had abandoned you, stopped caring, a fucking waste of ten years. 

So as pleasure wrings tight in your stomach, anger also floods your mind and before you could stop yourself you slap him across his face, hard.

He’s taken by surprise but it doesn’t stop him from thrusting up into you. You slap him again. You beat at his face, on his chest, pounding your fists into his broad rib cage. Still riding him, still letting him fuck you like some common whore.

But by the sixth time you slam your fists into his chest he catches your hands, raising a brow at you while still sheathed into you deep. You only flare your nose, gulping at each pleasurable, drunken sensation as tears rush down your cheeks. 

Still inside you, he sits up - you continue to move your hips. 

He brushes the hair off your shoulder and places kisses down your neck - now slow. Every movement of his is meaningful like he’s trying to make up for everything he’s done, everything he hadn’t.

Arthur had never been good at apologies, never good at talking about feelings either but he knew something was wrong. But right now; he had at least wanted to make you feel cared for. Even if it was just sex.

His mustache scrapes at the sensitive skin of your neck as he wraps his arms around you, lowering you to your back. So the top of your head aligns with the foot of the cot. 

He places your legs over his shoulders, intertwining his hands with yours and thrusts into your cunt again. His eyes flash from your cherry stained face, to your heavy chest, to the patch of hair between your legs he’s been fucking mercinglessly. 

“I love you,” he says, thrusting slowly and deep, looking into your wet eyes. “My life has been meaningless without you.”

You stay silent, even though you knew he was  trying to apologize. 

But his words mean nothing when you’ve been fed empty promises for months. You couldn’t trust him any longer, and to be honest all you wanted was a good fuck. 

You didn’t want any of this mushy bull shit - all lies he’d spew to just to keep you happy. 

You wanted his dick -  that was all. And to be honest, with how angry you were at him it didn’t even have to be his dick. You were just drunk, and you were a horny drunk. And that was all. So you push your hips up into him, ignoring everything else besides the pressure between your thighs. 

He runs the fingers of his right hand through your hair, thrusting again. His thumb somehow ending up in your mouth, pulling it open from the side. 

You like it.  

He stretches your cunt deep, all the way to your core.

It hurts so good, the way he refuses to be gentle, to be quiet. How he doesn’t care if anyone hears for the first time in forever. How he hits deep, every single time, like he’s trying to fuck the emotion back into you. 

“Let me,” he moans loud, thumb in your mouth, other hand digging into your arm as he pins you down. “Let me put a fuckin’ baby n’ you.” 

You don’t know what it is. 

Maybe it was the way he’s fucking you like he used to, maybe the way he’s so blunt, kind of raunchy. But you finish right then and there, moaning loud and reckless right on his cock like you hadn’t in forever. Your eyes rolling deep into your forehead like a wave of pleasure had possessed your limbs. 

And in that drunken, orgasmic moment  you forget - just for a moment. Why you’re mad at him, why everything had been weighing so heavy, why you’d been so distant. 

But you instantly come to your senses when you feel him finishing inside you, his body shaking between your thighs. His moans  thunderous, certainly loud enough for anyone to hear. You feel his sweat slicked body glide against yours, his chest hair wet and sticky as he whines needingly into your ear with his last few thrusts. 

And suddenly there you are again, out of your body, not wanting this any longer. Not when it had first started - when the alcohol in your body told you it needed him. 

Now it only reminded you of everything he had said to you, everything you had lost. 

That he regretted marrying you, that you were a mistake. That all you had ever done was annoy him. 

Nothing but a vessel for his physical pleasure.

 Had that been what you always were to him? 

He pulls out, falling onto his back next to you. The foot of the cot now acts like the head. He wraps his biceps around you, kissing down your neck like he didn’t want this moment to end. 

“I love you,” he says into your ear. 

You don’t say it back.

…

Arthur couldn’t recall the last time he’d woken up in this good of a mood. 

You fucked him. 

You finally fucked him. 

It’d been nearly two months since you let him have you, even longer since he’s had you like that - and he’d be lying if he said he hadn’t been dying inside because of it. His right hand no match for your body, the way your tight cunt fit him like a damn puzzle piece.

He knew he should have been more worried with your silence instead of the absence of sex, but god he missed being with you physically. The way you had pulled him behind the provisions wagon just to get on your knees reignited something in him. 

He wanted more. 

A lot more. 

To be alone with you. Really alone. For days. Just you and him. 

A hotel, an abandoned house, a tent in the middle of nowhere. He just wanted to be alone with you. To talk finally. To take you away just like you had wanted these past several months. He had been stupid for telling you no time and time again, he regrets it. 

But something felt different now, he didn’t know what. 

It didn’t seem like you were as upset as you once were with him, and now he just wants to get you out of camp, spend some quality time with the woman he loved. 

He jumps out of the cot, his half-hard cock swinging around like he’s certainly ready for round two - the memories of last night arousing him.

He can’t help but to laugh - maybe Dutch was right, maybe things were looking up for once. 

He dresses quickly, just a pair of jeans and a black button up. A gambler’s hat to hide his long hair that’s an inch too long for his liking. 

He steps outside quick, immediately searching for your presence. Scanning camp like he’s hunting for prey, finding you by the river, a washboard in your hands, halfway through a basket of dirtyclothes. 

Busy like the good girl you had always been. 

But just as he’s about to walk over, ask you if you’d like to get away for the night, Dutch calls him over. 

The men are going into town, and he wants Arthur with them. To sniff out any potential leads. And even though Arthur wants to say no, that he’s got other things he needs to take care of, he doesn’t. 

He follows Dutch to the hitching yard instead.

…

Arthur and the other men don’t return until the scent of Pearson’s venison stew lingers across camp with every light breeze. It smells good, he’s starving. But Arthur’s mind had been on only one thing all day; getting back to you. 

The nearby town wasn’t anything special. One road, just an old saloon, a whorehouse, and a couple of shops - but it did have a hotel. And since his eyes had laid on it this morning - he knew that’s where he had to be with you tonight. 

His eyes finally catch you at the clothes line, propped between two trees. You’re on your tippy toes, pulling union suits and socks off the line as you hold a clothes pin between your teeth in concentration. 

God you’re so beautiful. 

He doesn’t waste time, his legs are already on the move. 

He doesn’t bother announcing himself, he just wraps his arms around your waist from behind and nestles his chin into your shoulder, placing a gentle kiss on your neck. 

You pull away from him in shock. Turning around and placing your right hand over your heart.  

“Jesus Arthur,” you startle. “You scared me.” 

He just laughs, raising a flirtatious brow. 

“I been thinkin’,” he says, rather cocky. “How bout’ we go into town t’night, get a room at the hotel. Just you n’ me..” 

You’re taken by surprise, your face blank. But then your eyes move to your clothes basket. “I really ain’t got time for none that, Arthur.” 

His cocky smile folds into a scowl, utterly confused at why you’re denying him when he knows you’d been asking for him to take you away for a year now. 

You gulp, turning around awkwardly and pulling down another union suit from the line.  “Gotta finish these chores or else Grimshaw gonna be on my ass.” 

His lip curls, that’s not good enough of an excuse for him. “Well we ain’t gotta go this second.” 

You brush your hands on your skirt, sighing, rolling your eyes and taking a step back rather annoyed. “Got plans with the other women t’night,” you say.  “Karen heard there’s a couple hot springs a few miles down, we thought we ought go bathe in them after dinner.” 

Arthur takes a step closer, resting his arm around your waist, pulling your close. Whispering flirtatiously into your ear.  “Well why don’t you just let me tag along?” 

You wiggle out of his grasp again. 

“Cause It’s just gonna be us girls.” You say it like it’s final, like there's no bother in pushing.

And suddenly he recognizes that coldness again, all that heat from last night out the window like it hadn’t happened and his stomach pools with unease once again. 

Maybe things hadn’t changed. 

Maybe it was just sex.

But he still doesn’t give up.

“Well,” he says, taking a moment for thought, dragging the tip of his boot in the dirt. “Maybe you and I can take a trip there one of these days, just us.” He says it like a plea rather than a question, but you can tell he’s desperate for some alone time with you. 

Gulping, your lips move, “Maybe.”

Arthur exhales at your cold, vague response. Not bothering to hide his disappointment as he tilts his head away from you, his mouth forming into a small, shaky frown, nose flaring as he swallows again. Not in anger - but in sorrow. He settles his thumbs into the front pockets of his jeans as he shakes his head, turning around on his heels without another word. 

…

That same night you sit in the corner of the tent on a small stool, mending a worn pair of mittens for yourself. A single candle burns low, its light steady, while the voices outside the flaps wade with each passing hour into the night.

It had to have been ten, maybe eleven  when Arthur comes stumbling in. 

He’s drunk. 

The smell of whiskey and cigarettes waft off him, like he’s spent the whole damn night drinking himself stupid.

One eye squints shut as he stumbles, boots dragging across the ground before he slams into the bedside table, rattling it hard. He lingers there a few long moments, trying to steady himself, his breath rough and uneven.

Then he pushes upright.

His steadiness doesn’t last.

He sways almost immediately again, balance gone, dropping  onto his knees right in front of you. His face lands right where your thighs meet, like he meant to do it. 

You’re taken by surprise as you lift your needle and thread, setting them down next to you, letting his face roll in your thighs like he’s trying to cover himself in your phermones.  Seconds pass, and he finally tilts his head upward, his chin still resting on the caps of your knees. 

He drunk. 

Piss drunk. 

He’s got that dazed look in his eye, blood shot and blurry. One is nearly squinted shut as his bottom lip quivers. Almost pathetically. 

“Why won’t you-” He hiccups. “- Let me love you?” His voice is almost winey. Like he’s yearning for an answer you didn’t know how to give him. You only stare back. 

Knowing this wasn’t the right time or place for this conversation. 

“Let’s get you to bed Arthur,” you try to change the subject as you attempt to stand up. But even piss drunk, your husband’s strength is enough to push you back into your seat. 

He hiccups again, the bob in his throat tickling your knee caps. “I know you’re mad at me,” he hiccups again. “I” hiccup “Jus’ don’t know what to do bout’ it.” Hiccup. “Life ain’t worth livin’ when you’re mad at me like this.” Hiccup.

You sigh, his words mean nothing to you. 

Pushing upwards, you let him slip off your lap and onto the ground. “Let’s get you to bed Arthur,” you say again, as you reach for his arms to drag him back to his feet. 

He only hiccups again, as he allows you to guide him back to the cot, stumbling over a basket full of dirty clothes but eventually he falls onto the cot. Hiccuping still. 

He’s quiet as you unbutton his shirt, pull his boots off his stinky feet, and yank his jeans down his legs until he only wears his union suit. You were expecting some type of innuendo, but maybe even drunk him knows this isn’t the time for that. 

You pull a blanket over him before turning to blow out the candle, but he reaches for your wrist instead. Pulling you close to him. 

“Tell me you love me.” 

It’s not a question, nor a statement. He says it like a plea. His nails dig into your wrist as his eyes look at you like he’s searching for something deep. Something that wasn’t there - something now lost. 

You don’t say the words. 

Of course you’d always feel for him, the kind of love that no matter what happens always lingers no matter how far you drift. But now? It didn’t feel like marital love, it didn't feel right to say it. 

You only smile sad down at him, thumb caressing his jaw as you watch tears pool in his eyes. 

“Sleep well Arthur.”

…

The next morning Arthur leaves, and doesn’t bother coming home for a month. 

… 

Present Day (Four years later) 

“What happened to us”

His words linger, but so do all the memories. Ones that you couldn’t forget no matter how hard you tried, the good, the bad, the all. But the poor memories burned fresher, outweighing the good ones by a long shot. 

Had he blocked out those memories just how he had blocked out you?

Up until last night, he hadn’t even dared meet your eyes - not once in four years. What could possibly make you believe he’d remember anything about your marriage? You gave him ten years, and it felt like he’d let every last good one slip clean through his fingers.

But now, as the wind howls beyond the walls of that weather-worn cabin and the fire snaps and burns in the hearth, his mouth opens again.

“Was there someone else?” 

You swallow angrily at the accusation, the dam breaking, tears falling loose down your cheeks. Completely in disbelief he’d even ask such a question. 

You fire back without thinking, voice sharp enough to cut, “You’d rather believe I was unfaithful than admit you were an absent husband?”

His lips press into a thin line, nostrils flaring, but he says nothing. And you know, if you sit out here on that couch a second longer, you’ll only drag the two of you into another fight.

So you scoff in disbelief,  yanking the blanket tighter around your bare skin as you push yourself to your feet, intent on crossing the cabin and disappearing back into the bedroom.

But he doesn’t let you make it far.

His hand catches your wrist firm, unyielding, pulling you back before you can take another step. You stumble, breath hitching, and then you’re right back where you started, except this time it’s worse.

He has you pulled tight onto his lap. 

“No.” His voice is low, final.  His grip doesn’t loosen. “You and me we’re gonna sit right here and we're gonna finally talk like normal people for once in our goddamn lives.”

[kisblle]

Part Two is out!!

[kisblle]

Tethered - Part II is out!! (And I promise it’s angsty!)

[kisblle]

Tethered - Part II

Pairing: Low Honor Arthur Morgan x Female Reader

Part I

MDNI 18+

Word count: 12,237

Tags: Angst, smut, established relationship, toxic

Summary: "What happened to us?" - You recall the last year of your broken marriage before the dissolution of your relationship.

Author's note: I definitely put this one down, and picked it back up a thousand times. After working on it for so long my brain was telling me it was just bad, but after taking a brief break, and coming back I just realized I needed to take a look at it with fresh eyes. This part definitely challenged me a lot, trying to make Arthur redeemable but also an asshole one would want to divorce. Either way, please enjoy the angst.

Tag list: @canofcannedsoup @liliesofth3valley @a-revolver-called-rachel @saturnknows @garbage-creature @photo1030

…

Photo Creds to cowpokingarthur on TikTok

…

What happened to us? 

Arthur’s words linger like cigarette smoke.

The warm firelight glistens against his nude body as he stares helplessly at you. A sad glint shining in his weary azure eyes, one that you couldn’t recall the last time he’d let down his walls enough to show. 

His bottom lip quivers, as if he’s waiting for an answer. As if he didn’t know -  couldn’t recall what led to the end of your marriage. 

And suddenly, deep in your bones - you feel angry. 

Couldn’t he remember? 

…

Four Years Ago (One Year Before The Separation)

"I think I'm pregnant," Abigail says casually, lifting up the bottoms of her skirt and wading ankle deep into the Montana River. 

The balmy mid-summer air clings to your skin, just enough for a sheen of sweat to coat the back of your neck as you trail in after her. Eyes scanning the riverbed with each step, cautious of any algae slicked stones. 

 “Really?” you ask, letting the response land slow. Brows rising in her direction. 

She pauses momentarily before turning around, water splashing halfway up her calves, gaze meeting yours. 

“I’m three weeks late.” 

You nearly snort as you cross your arms, letting the bottoms of your skirt plummet into the current. Chin pointing low in her direction. 

“It Marston’s?”

A crimson blush creeps up her neck as she pulls a piece of hair behind her ear, a chagrin grin curling at the corners of her mouth, “That obvious huh?”

You snort, wadding toward her, letting the cold water creep further up your legs. “Let’s just say he ain’t exactly quiet when he’s sneaking into your tent each night.” 

Her face burns red as she shakes her head slowly, letting the silence linger for a few moments but you ask the hard-hitting question next.

“He know?”

She pauses, grin dropping, swallowing the lump in her throat hard. The air thickens with each passing breath, silence clinging to the moment like stubborn grease on a cast iron pan. 

“I was gonna tell him t’night.”  

You don’t respond right away, lips tightening, letting her confession settle as you gently tip your head back and forth. 

A few silent moments pass, only the rush of the rolling river and Waxwings chirping overhead filling the heavy space. But it’s not long before she lets out a hesitant exhale, looking at you like she wasn’t too sure what to say.

“You know,” she gulps. “I don’t think a child was…necessarily in his cards…certainly not mine.” Her gaze floats back down to the water, pointer finger playing in a gentle ripple. “Least’ not right now anyway.” 

A soft sympathetic smile pulls at your outer corners as you reach for her shoulder, circling your thumb over the soft skin of her exposed collar bone. 

“Well it ain’t like he don’t know how babies are made Abigail,” you make sure to remind her. 

A gentle breeze pulls at her loose strands as she tightens her lips, letting the silence remain for a few moments. But just as she’s about to speak, a sharp screech erupts from shore. 

“What do you two think you’re doing!” 

Susan Grimshaw stands on a nearby bluff, sleeves pulled up to her elbows, hands stout on her hips, brows lowered in dismay.

“Coolin’ off,” Abigail shouts back.

Susan scowls. “You ain’t need to cool off,” she yells, voice condescending as hell but you’re used to it. “Still clothes to be mended, still dishes to be scrubbed.”

You glance back at Abigail and stick your tongue out at her. She answers with a dramatic eye roll as the two of you wade toward shore. With sand clinging to the bottoms of your feet like sugar, you both trudge up the grassy bluff where Grimshaw stands waiting, arms crossed, scowl firmly in place.

“The two of you god damn lazy,” she mumbles as she leads the both of you back into the heart of camp. “The men are out there risking their lives day in and day out to provide for us, and you two can’t keep on task for more than a god damn hour.” 

Abigail mockingly rolls her eyes again, as Susan turns to face you directly. “And I shouldn’t have to remind you Mrs. Morgan, that just because your husband donates to the box..”

“..Doesn’t mean I get a free pass.” You cut in, a sentence you’ve well memorized after ten years of being with your outlaw. “I know.”

Grimshaw grimaces, her gaze dragging from your head to toe like she’s looking at something she’s never quite approved of, but she pulls the pair of you underneath a shaded canopy anyway. Throwing a torn blouse in Abigail’s direction, and a ripped sock in yours - like you hadn’t stitched up ten already that day. 

With an annoyed huff and a roll of your eyes, you drop onto a stool, making no effort to hide your discontent. The small act proving to be the final drop in Grimshaw’s already brimming cup. And before you can even brace yourself, the palm of her right hand connects with your right cheek.

The initial sting catches you off guard, but the action itself pierces harder than the physical pain ever could 

You had never exactly seen eye to eye with Susan.

 But she had never hit you before. 

Tears well in your eyes as Grimshaw points a finger accusingly in your face, “Don’t you dare test me girl,” she yells, grasping the attention of any wandering eyes. 

“You’ve always been a disrespectful little whore and I ain’t ever seen what Arthur does in you. And if he ain’t gonna teach you lessons about respect, I will.” 

Your lip quivers, tears spilling down your cheeks as she stands up straight, an evil smirk on her face like she’d just won a prize. 

Her voice settles. Deeper, meaner, “And you best be given no more lip, cause nex’ time I hear any talk back I’m goin’ to Dutch with it and there’s nothing he hates more than a freeloader.”

Your jaw clenches tight, determined to not give her any satisfaction but your tears betray you anyway. She looks you once over, slow and mean, a wicked smirk curling at her mouth like she’s pleased with herself before tipping her chin upward and strutting away. 

For several long moments you sit in silence with Abigail. Sleeves growing damp with tears every time you try to wipe away the humiliation falling down your cheeks. Your fingers linger on a metal needle, forcing yourself to mend the sock instead but your shaking hands betray you. Piercing your fingertips every pass through the cloth. 

When Grimshaw is no longer in sight, Abigail finally opens her mouth. Leaning in your direction, whispering, “The devil is a woman, and that woman is Grimshaw.” 

You nod your head, spitting your next words sharp.“That woman has never given me a god damn day of peace since I’ve met her, I swear she’s always had it out for me.”

In some ways you felt bad complaining to Abigail, as if the black haired beauty didn’t have more problems than you in her current condition but today had felt like the tip of the iceberg. 

The past several months had been a trial for you.

Arthur had been away from camp more often than not these past few months, too caught up in Dutch’s web of debt collecting, train robberies, and guilt tripping to pay you much mind. And catching him in a good mood had started to become rarer and rarer these days. Claiming he was always too tired or too busy to give you any time of day. Too burnt out to take you out of camp for a few days, to give you your own much needed time of rest. Nothing more than a few kisses and cuddles behind tent flaps. 

You felt stir crazy.

Even though constantly outside you felt confined. No privacy, always working, a woman that’s hated your guts since day one constantly over your shoulder berating you for every little thing. And your husband? The one that was supposed to make you feel better - absent in all the ways that mattered. 

Abigail breaks you from your daze, responding quietly. “You know why she treats you like that, right?” 

You look up from your needlework, shaking your head at her. 

“Cause she likes to think she raised Arthur…John too.” Abigail says casually as she makes another pass through the blouse with her needle. “Thinks no woman is good enough for her boys,” she rolls her eyes. “Treats Molly the same way, and I’m sure when she catches on to me and John I’ll be getting that end of the stick too.” 

You scoff, rolling your eyes. “Yeah well you think after ten years she’d at least try an’ warm up' to me.” 

…

Hours pass by, and just as the stew finishes cooking Arthur trails back into camp. 

He’s exhausted. 

You can tell by the way he slouches forward when he walks, slowly dragging himself back to camp from the hitching yard as if he hadn’t slept for days. Per usual he scans camp, expression lighting up just for a moment as his gaze meets yours, flashing you a tired, handsome grin. 

He moves toward you beneath the canopy, but Grimshaw catches him halfway and pulls him aside at the edge of camp. You don’t need to hear the words, you already know they start and end with your behavior. And after a few long moments he lets out a long breath, eyes falling shut as his head dips, lips pressed tight. 

Disappointed. 

He answers her, but you’re not too sure of what he responds. Only imagining it’s along the lines of I’ll talk to her. Because it’s not the first time she’s done this, not the second, or third time she’s tried to get you in trouble with your husband. Probably the millionth. And even though deep down you know he doesn’t care, won’t berate you, and would always take your side. It still doesn’t exactly feel good. Because you know he’d rather keep the peace with her than ever stick up for you. 

He turns with a sigh, dragging himself in your direction as you sit under the canopy with your arms folded, lips formed into a pout. He stops right in front of you, looking down at you with a tired, kind smile. “Givin’ Grimshaw hell today huh?” 

You spring up from your stool, brows pointed down, lips pursed into an angry pout. “She slapped me Arthur.” 

Your husband just rolls his eyes as if you were overreacting, but he doesn’t yell, doesn’t push further. He just gently grabs at your hand, thumb caressing your dorsum as he guides you to your shared tent. 

“Arthur, didn’t you hear me?!” you ask as he pulls back the canvas flaps without a word, guiding you inside.

Once you’re hidden from the rest of camp, he steps in close, wrapping his broad frame around you from behind. His chin settling against your shoulder, his warm breath tickling the skin of your nape. He presses small, unhurried kisses along your neck, working his way slowly to the lobe of your ear.

“Ain’t you tired?” he asks, pressing a kiss to the curve of your neck line, trying to change subject.

“’Cause…”

He settles another kiss. 

“....I’m…”

His lips linger just beneath your ear.

“Spent.”

It was small moments like these that made you forget where you were and what had happened. Small cherished moments with your husband behind canvas flaps, just the two of you. And as much as he had made you smile, made you forget - even for just a moment. 

That sting of Grimshaw’s slap was unforgettable no matter how many hours it had been since she had hit you. 

“Come lay down with me,” Arthur asks tiredly, loosening his grip from your waist and backing himself towards the cot, where he sits down. Waiting for you to follow. 

You cross your arms, turning on the tip of your foot. 

“She slapped me Arthur,” you snap, not letting the conversation go, 

His face drops, sighing loud and annoyed as he props his elbows onto his knees, dragging the palms of his calloused hands across his face before shaking his head. “We still talkin’ bout this?” 

You snarl, the corner of your lip quivering upwards as your brows point down in dismay. 

You loved your husband.

You did. 

But after today you couldn’t stand one more moment of being dismissed. One more day of being stuck in this hell hole while he runs every which way in West Elizabeth. 

“Arthur I know I have already asked you probably a million times these last few months but I need to get out of camp. Need t’ get away for a couple days. Jus’ you and me. Please. I’m going stir crazy here.” 

Your husband sucks in another breath of air, a telling action he always did when he was about to disappoint. 

You already knew his answer. 

“I told you,” he says. “Ain’t exactly in the right financial situation to be going off for a few days. Gangs gettin’ bigger, ain’t a lot of good payin’ job right now. Dutch needs as much help as I can give him.” 

You look down, biting your bottom lip, tears threatening to fall down your waterline. Nearly at your tipping point. “I ain’t askin’ for no fancy hotel room or anything, just maybe a few nights campin-” 

He interrupts you. He’s tired. Exhausted. Wants to be done with the conversation you can tell. 

“Why don’t you let me take a nap for a few hours hun?” he breathes. “When I wake up we go for a ride, jus’ the two of us? Does that sound good?” His voice is soft and comforting, searching for some kind of compromise. 

One that you would accept, because you needed out of camp, needed away from Grimshaw. Even if just for a few hours. 

You gulp, shaking your head. 

He smiles, eyes wide. 

“I promise I’ll take you away for a couple nights as soon as I got the time, got the money,” he says tiredly, falling back down on the cot. “I - I just need some rest right now.”

…

Hours pass as the sun sinks below the horizon, the crickets echoing their melody across the prairie as the sky turns a grapefruit pink. You sit under that same shaded canopy from earlier, still sewing socks, making casual talk with Abigail. Stomach twisting into impossible knots. 

Arthur never found you like he had promised. 

Never took you for that ride. 

Instead he had found himself at the poker table. Laughing with John, throwing cards at Grimshaw, losing the money he claimed he didn’t have. Ignoring you for hours if he meant to or not. 

But you couldn’t help but to feel like something had shifted that night, something in your heart, something deep down. 

…

Several months pass, the warm summer’s air slowly turns crisp as the earth revolves further around the sun. It was now early November; the morning dew starting to frost over each dawn leaving everyone in a sour mood, wondering when Dutch would move the gang south for the rest of the winter.

But the men still had loose ends to tie up, and the morning frost was the least of most people’s worries. 

Abigail’s stomach had started to swell, and John Marston was having trouble coming to terms with becoming a father. If he wasn’t avoiding camp like the plague, he was avoiding Abigail herself - unable to even look her in the eye. The last several days he’d gone missing completely. 

And Arthur….

He hadn’t kept his promises. 

No trips outside of camp, no hotel room for a couple nights, no stepping in when Grimshaw got too mouthy with you either. Always too tired, or too busy to be the husband you had once fallen in love with.

Sure he would still greet you for a few minutes when he got back to camp, he’d still whisper loving words into your ear, still make promises he never intended to keep. He’d still sneak into camp late at night, pull you close behind canvas flaps and fuck you slow and quiet, making sure to wake no one. 

But that’s all it was. Quick, lust filled moments.

All your marriage had become. 

A circle of broken promises, a wife he only cared for when he felt like it. And more often than not; a burden. 

…

It’s late by the time Arthur finally marches into camp, gone nearly a week. He hops off Heimdall as rage pours out of him like wine, not even bothering to pull the alligator saddle off his irritated gelding. 

He was at his wits end.

A job gone terribly wrong. A con he’d been working for two months, one that promised good money. And then Bill Williamson had to mess it up. Picked up by law, date for a hanging already scheduled - suddenly Arthur’s problem. 

He only bothered to stop by camp to reload on ammunition, maybe convince Javier or Lenny to tag along - he could use the help. Or worse - when he’d finally break Bill out of jail, he’d need someone there to hold him back from killing the man right on the spot. 

But as soon as Arthur is three steps into camp he hears the slap of an old hand on a cheek, and suddenly he knows his visit wasn’t going to be as quick as he needed it to be. 

 …

Tears stream down your face as Grimshaw screams inches from your face, something about the stew carrots being cut too big. The third argument this week. 

Incapable. 

Lazy.

Idiot.

All names she had called you without hesitation, each one hitting just as hard as her palm does when it cracks across your cheek again.

“You goddamn old maid,” you spit back, snot mixing with tears. “You get pleasure outta torturing me?”

Her hand connects with your face again.

You don’t fight it.

You brace for more. More sharp insults, more humiliation, but her unforgiving stare shifts past you instead.

“Mr. Morgan,” she snaps.

“Do you see how your whore speaks to me?!”

Your stomach tightens, you turn.

Arthur stands looming behind you. 

You don’t know how much he has seen, don’t know how much he’s heard. All you notice is the sharp scowl on his face. Eyebrows shifted down, jaw locked tight like he’s not happy with anything he’s just witnessed. 

Good. 

Maybe finally he’d stick up for you. Put this woman in her place. 

But you’re not at all surprised when he doesn’t.

Instead Arthur grabs your forearm, tight and harsh. Dragging you across camp as if the steam coming off him was your doing.

Everyone watches, no one says a word. You notice Abigail’s lips part  as she sits under a canopy with her hand propped on her swollen stomach, her eyes widening in sympathy. The only person in the past several months that has shown you any amount of empathy when it comes to Grimshaw, but you know she has worse to worry about. 

Your gaze floats behind you as Arthur pulls harder at your arm. Grimshaw’s watching. A smug smile plastered on her face like she enjoys watching you cry, eyes rolling over you in loud judgement as she whispers something in Pearson’s direction.

And Arthur. 

You only see the back of his head as he drags you to your tent, his fingernails digging into your forearm like a dog bite. You can tell rage was flowing through his veins far before he even stepped into camp. 

He carelessly flips open the tent’s canvas flaps, stepping inside and dragging you along after him. Red creeps up his neck as the crooked look on his face refuses to fade, jaw set hard like something was lingering far before he even stepped into camp. 

You rip your arm free.

“Did you hear her?!” you shout, stepping into his space. “Do you hear the way she talks to me?” A breathless, hysterical laugh breaks from you. “I need you to take me outta here Arthur. I’m serious.” Your voice cracks. “I’m gonna lose my damn mind if I’m not out of camp before the sun sets.”

Arthur huffs, rolling his eyes as a bitter laugh escapes his lips. Like he’s in utter disbelief. 

“Jesus Christ,” he snaps, pacing once before turning back on you, pointer finger splayed accusatorily in your direction. “Can’t you just do what you’re fuckin told for once in your life?!” 

You freeze.

You and Arthur had gotten into it before; too many times to count. You’ve fought, screamed, said things you both have regretted but not once had he sworn at you. Looked at you with disgust - like you were the problem. Like you were only a menace he was forced to clean up after. But he had never sworn at you. 

You go silent, wide eyed, completely taken off guard. 

“Oh don’t look at me like that,” he seethes, pushing further. “Bill’s in jail, Dutch made it my problem. John’s gone missin’ with a child on the way, and we haven’t gotten a good score in months.” Arthur pauses, rolling his eyes, voice raising a pitch, finger splayed in your direction. “And you think you’re my fuckin’ top priority, wantin’ me to take you on some fuckin’ vacation I can’t afford so you can get out of doin chores?” He shakes his head.

His words land like poisoned arrows, cutting deep and hitting hard. You can feel your fists tighten at your sides, nails digging into your palms as you swallow. All the feelings from the past several months wash over you in that moment: anger, sorrow, and desperation for something more. 

You realize he’s never understood, never cared too. Never realized how you’d been dying inside for far too long, trapped inside this hell hole called camp. Desperate for him - your husband to stick up for you, take care of you in a way a wife should be taken care of.

You swallow hard once more, your eyes glazing over in realization. 

“Chores?” you whisper, jaw clenching hard, your body shaking in frustration.

“You think this about chores?”

He huffs nearly laughing, one eye squinting as he shakes his head. “Well it ain’t exactly hard to believe you ain’t pullin’ your share.” 

“What does that mean,” you snap back quick, 

He laughs, taking a few moments to motion around the tent that looks like it hasn’t seen care for several days. 

“Bed ain’t been made in forever,” he points out first. “Clothes hangin’ off everythin’, shoes tossed every which way like you ain’t got the sense to line em’ up straight,” he looks around. “And these damn paintings of yours,” he taps one with the tip of his boot, knocking it over. “Layin’ all over the place unfinished, cause’ you ain’t ever been the one to finish things through.”

He snorts, rolling his eyes like he doesn’t have time for this conversation. Time for you. 

“So no,” he cocks his head. “It ain’t hard to believe you ain’t been pullin’ your weight, and maybe a good hard slap from Grimshaw is just what you need to put you in your damn place for once in your god damn life.” 

Your face burns red, but that's the least of your worries. It’s rage. Boiling, incensed, rage that pools through your blood stream, all aimed at your husband. 

“I bet you think that stew you eat every night just appears,” you snap. “That your clothes wash and mend themselves like magic.”

Your chest rises fast. He rolls his eyes. 

“You think this is about chores?” you scoff. “I got a woman beatin’ me every god damn day jus’ cause she likes makin’ my life hell and I got an absent husband that won’t do shit about it.” You spit. 

Arthur rolls his eyes, scoffing like every word coming out of your mouth was pure bullshit. 

You huff, folding your arms over each other. “I never asked for no fancy vacation Arthur. Just some time to spend alone with you….as…as husband and wife. 

He responds quick and cold, “I told you, I ain’t got the money or the time to take you away-”

“Shut your goddamn mouth, Arthur.”

The words come out low. Cold. Meaner than you expected, but with tears trailing down your red cheeks you don’t care. 

“You got money to lose at poker near every night. Money to go drinkin’ with Lenny. God knows what else. Cigarettes,...whiskey… other women too for all I know too.” You step closer shaking your head, voice softening, almost if you were begging. “You got time for week long huntin’ trips with Hosea…fishin’ trips with Dutch....”

Your jaw trembles. 

No longer in anger, but as if everything you had just said out loud was enough to convince you that your relationship wasn’t worth saving any longer. That maybe this relationship wasn’t worth the pain. That you were talking yourself out of him just by bringing up your problems. 

“But you couldn’t find an hour?” you ask, quieter. Softer. “An hour to ride out with me. Just to get me outta this camp….Just to.” You swallow, shaking your head like you’re not even sure why you’re still talking. “Just to spend alone time with your wife.”

He drops his gaze to the dirt between his boots, jaw ticking like he knows he’s done wrong but doesn't want to admit it. 

“You act like you’re the only one sufferin’,” he says, voice low and cold, like blaming it all on you instead would make him feel less like an asshole. “You act like the rest of us ain’t carryin’ our own damn burdens…. difference is, we learn to deal with it.”

You bite your bottom lip as you look down in defeat, tears rushing down your face like you’re not sure what to feel. 

He rolls his eyes, grabbing ammunition off the bedside table and throwing it into his satchel like he’s got more important places to be. “God damn spoiled brat thinkin’ she needs a damn vacation,” he mumbles, making sure you hear. 

He turns and throws a few tubes of gun oil into his bag, whispering low; “Should’ve known better than to stupidly marry a spoiled rancher's daughter who thinks the damn world revolves around her.” 

You didn’t want to hear it. 

Didn’t want to hear his words anymore. You had heard enough - and now you know that you’re not as important to him as you once thought you were. 

Arthur doesn’t bother apologizing before ducking out of the tent flaps. 

…

You don’t leave the tent for the rest of the night. 

Your body doesn’t let you. 

Hours pass, hunger pains claw at your stomach, but you don't care. Nothing could get you out of that damn cot. Heart break felt like paralyzation. 

Your relationship with him was all but gone - if he knew it or not. You did. You knew the past several months had been a trial for everyone, but that didn’t give him the right to throw you away. Treat you like you were nothing but a warm body only when he wanted one, a burden when he didn’t. 

But nothing mattered anymore. 

That argument uncovered more truths than you’d wished to ever know. Maybe the problems in your relationship stemmed much further back than just the past year. That Arthur had always resented you, wished differently for himself. 

For you were just the spoiled rancher's daughter he stupidly married. 

…

It’s deep into that same night when Arthur finally pulls back the canvas flaps of the tent , surely in a better mood than he had been earlier. You lay on your side, facing away from the entrance, still awake, tears dry, lying still as he kicks off his boots. 

You hear the sharp click of his gun belt as he settles it off his hips and onto the bedside table. You hear the soft shuffles of his clothes being removed, all but his red union suit he’s worn a day too long. And before you know it, he’s in the cot next to you, chest molded to your back like a puzzle piece. 

As if the fight earlier this evening hadn’t happened. 

You only pretend to sleep. 

But it’s not long before he gives you no choice. 

Arthur drags his left hand upward, reaching for your hair nestled on the curve of your neck, brushing it behind your head with his calloused fingertips. He runs his chapped lips up your nape, his week old mustache prickling against your sensitive skin. His mouth halts at your ear, breath warm and reeking of cigarette smoke. 

 “I’m so sorry for actin’ that way,” he admits, soft and gentle. A completely different man from just hours ago. 

 “You know I hate fightin’ with you.” 

He rolls the knuckle of his left hand down your jawline, neck, then shoulder. Stopping only when he reaches the thin strap of your chemise, pulling it down your shoulder and placing gentle kisses there too. 

“You know I didn’t mean what I said,” he mumbles between pecks.

It doesn’t take a scholar to know what he’s looking for, why all of a sudden he wants to act like everything is okay. Why he’s so quick to apologize. 

Sex. 

The quiet, hushed fucking behind tent flaps, the only time he touches you. 

It had been nothing more than that for the past year. No passion, no hour long love making sessions, nothing loud, wreckless, or spontaneous. Always deep into the night, when no one was up to hear. 

You feel his erection bud beneath his union suit as he strains against your backside. 

“I’m such an idiot,” he mumbles in your ear, left hand grabbing at your breast like all was okay. 

But maybe this is what would make you feel better. 

Sex. 

The boring, non spontaneous, love making that happened behind canvas flaps once every so often. Although not what it once used to be, sex had always brought you closer to him.  Like no matter how far you could feel yourself drifting away, his body could still mold to yours like a piece of clay. Remind you how close you are. Remind you of a time when you were happy. Like a bottle you can’t quite quit. 

So against better judgement, you push your backside into his groin, giving him the okay to touch you. 

You remain on your side as he reaches for the bottom hem of your chemise, pulling it over your hips as he quickly releases himself from the confines of his union suit. He runs one of his fingers through your folds, finding you dry but that doesn’t stop him.

He crudely spits on his hand, slicking his cock down with his own saliva as a short grunt escapes the back of his throat. And before you know it, he’s thrusting inside you. Quick. Meaningless. Like a virgin man desperate for some relief. His forehead tilts against the back of your head as his left hand drags back up to your breast, grasping at it tight. 

His thrusts are lazy and awkward. Maybe they’ve always been that way - maybe you never realized until now. Maybe they're just fine, just too in your head to let yourself enjoy it. 

Maybe it’s because you’d made up your mind hours ago that you’d given up on him.

Still, you lay there. Not finding any pleasure, not finding discomfort either.

Just indifferent. 

His hand trails down from your breast to the bud of nerves between your thighs, circling your clit like he knew you had once enjoyed.  But this time - your mind was too far away to care, you felt nothing. 

His pushes become deeper, exhales weaker with every quick thrust. 

“I’m nothing without you,” he moans breathlessly in your ear. “I love you so damn much.” 

Words that were endearing once upon a time now felt like air. Nothing more than an empty hymn, no actions to ever back them up. 

“I can’t live without you,” he moans again. “You’re my everything.” 

A few thrusts later and he pulls out, finishing recklessly on the backs of your thighs, moaning long and quiet as his climax falls. 

He quickly removes himself from you, falling to his back as his jaw swings loose in pleasure. Drops of sweat cascade down his forehead, chest rising and falling with each ragged, hitched breath. He smiles ear to ear as he comes down from his high. 

But he knows something's wrong. 

You’re still laying on your side, away from him. Silent as can be. 

His mood instantly drops, brow furrowing when he realized you hadn’t said a peep, moaned into him like you enjoyed yourself too. 

“You…uhh” he clears his throat. “Finish?” 

You didn’t. 

Wasn’t in the mood. 

Couldn’t if you tried. 

“Yeah,” you lie. 

Arthur can hear the fib straight through your teeth. He’s made you finish enough times in your relationship that he knows that this time you didn’t. That he was too caught up in his own self pleasure to notice you weren’t enjoying yourself. 

And he feels guilty - especially after the argument earlier.

He props himself up on his elbows, a bead of sweat still falling down his wrinkled forehead and turns toward you. 

“You sure?” he asks again, higher pitched brows raised.  

You nod your head. 

He clears his throat again, like he knows there's tension. “Cause if you haven’t, I can eat-”  

You cut him off, firm and final. “Arthur, I want to go to bed.”

His brows furrow deep at your bluntness, at how cold you suddenly were when you were always such a breath of warm air. 

But he was too tired to argue, too tired to ask what was wrong. So he rolls his eyes at your dramatics and drops down onto his back, not taking any longer to waste into the night. 

…

The gentle morning rays light the canvas tent like an alarm. Arthur’s eyes blur as he wakes slowly, tongue clicking the top of his mouth. He slept well - always did when it was next to you. But this morning he finds himself waking up alone. 

Arthur pulls his large frame upwards, eyes adjusting slowly to the morning glow as he notices his surroundings. 

The tent had been tidied. 

He grins as he swings his feet over the cot. Noticing the welcomed changes. A basket of his clothes neatly folded and placed atop his trunk to be put away. Shoes perfectly aligned  at the exit; propped directly next to yours. Every spare coat, jacket, sock: either in a washbasket or trunk. And above all; none of those damn half-painted pictures crowding the tent like they paid rent. Everything was neat, held its own space. A welcomed change.

He couldn’t help but to think that yelling at you yesterday must have knocked something into your head; bothered you enough to knock some womanly sense into you. He hated that he had screamed at you like that, he had immediately felt guilty afterwards. But deep down he was glad he did, because maybe that's why you had woken up early, to set the tent straight. Maybe even get up earlier to finish your other chores, start the day off strong. 

He grins as he grabs a clean union suit from the top of his trunk, discarding the one he had slept in and throws it in the corner. He dresses quickly, combing his fingers through his hair as he looks at himself in his mirror. Could use a shave but he’d save it for another day. 

He exits the tent slowly, the November sky as blue as a Hydrangea in spring. The air is crisp; cold enough for his breath to visibly curl in front of him. But the sun was out. And that was more than he could ask for on a late autumn’s day. 

His vision scans camp. Grimshaw pours a cup of black coffee, Pearson’s already chopping mystery meat, and Hosea crushes herbs in mortar and pestle. But then Arthur’s eyes land on you. 

Hair braided neatly down your back, coat wrapped tightly around your shoulders, throwing something large and flat into the fire. 

His vision adjusts. 

Throwing one of your paintings into the fire. 

Guilt surges through his gut as he marches across camp. 

Sure - your paintings forever lingering in the tent unfinished and collecting dust annoyed him. But that didn’t mean he wanted you to throw them away - burn them. 

He watches as you grab another painting, cracking it over your knee and tossing it into the blistering fire as he hears you yell at Pearson. “You need any fire starter, feel free to use these.”

Guilt twists sharp in his stomach as he cuts across camp, just as you reach for another one.

He gets there in time, hand closing around your wrist, stopping you before you can ruin another of those little creations you love too much. 

“What’r you doin’?” he asks, his voice raising a pitch, completely appalled as you look up at him. His brows pinch downward, deeply stressed and unsettled. 

But as you stare back at him, there's something behind your eyes he can’t quite recognize. Like there was something missing.They felt emptier, lost. 

He doesn’t like it, guilt pools low in his gut as he notices that something had changed.

“It’s fine,” you responded coldly, as if your life’s work wasn’t burning to ash in front of you. 

He looks down at the already half burnt paintings tossed carelessly into the fire, the orange hues curling around the canvases like a hug. His eyes move down to the stack next to the fire, lingering like trash waiting to be burned. Worry pulls at his features, as his gaze drifts to the one in your hand, then to your face.

This is not what he meant by tidying up - not by a mile. 

“Why you doin’ this?” he asks sharply. 

You exhale softly. Slow. 

“They annoy you-” 

He cuts you off, “I didn’t mean for you to throw them away. Could’ve finished them, sold them at a market. You know you have real talent darlin.” 

“I’m out of paint,” you respond curtly. 

His brows furrow again, lip curling. “Then why ain’t you buy some more.” 

“Don’t got the money,” you remind him. 

He shakes his head, completely dumbfounded. “Why ain’t you ask me then?”

Your voice is soft, but it still stings like venom at your next words . 

“Didn’t want to trouble you.” 

His face molds into bewilderment even further.

When have you ever cared about troubling him? You were his wife - you were meant to trouble him. He liked when you troubled him, it gave his purpose as a husband. 

“Don’t matter anymore,” you say softly, lips pulling into a sad melancholic smile as you pull your wrist free from his grasp, throwing the painting in your hand into the flames. Walking away without another word.

Arthur stands there frozen, like stone. Shame resting heavy on his chest. Hazy memories of yesterday's argument still lingering. He hadn’t exactly remembered what he said in the heat of the moment, but whatever it was he surely regretted. 

He turns to face the fire, eyes gazing down at the flames eating at the canvas painting. 

His heart sinks when he stares at it - half painted, but completely recognizable. A scene from several years ago, he remembers, didn’t know you had tried painting. You’re in his arms, in a field of  Lavendar, Buttercups, and Yarrow. His nose nestles against yours, your right hand molded to his cheek. Details are missing, and the background hadn’t been quite finished but he knows what it is - what the painting was. The memory that it held. 

His eyes glaze over as he watches it turn to ash.

…

You don’t come to bed that night. 

…

Or the night after. 

…

On the third morning of your absence from his cot, Arthur finally seeks you out. Asks you where you have been. 

You apologize and tell him you’ve been falling asleep in the women’s tent, staying up late chatting with Karen, Tilly, and Mary-Beth. 

He tells you he misses you. 

…

Three long days pass without you in his bed, each night worse than the last.

By the fifth night of your absence, Arthur’s finally had enough. You're his wife, there's no reason you shouldn’t be sleeping with him. 

It’s far into the night when Arthur pulls back his tent flaps, the late November air prickling at his skin. He doesn’t bother with a lantern, the moon shines bright enough to light his way. 

From the outside, the women’s tent glows dim - lit only by the weak flicker of a half-burnt candle resting on an old produce box. But for all the women that slept inside, there isn’t a single peep. 

Arthur quietly eases the flap open, just enough to see inside.

The young, sweet Mary-Beth is dead asleep, a half-read book splayed across her chest like it put her under mid-sentence. Karen’s curled tight in her blankets, Tilly sharing a pillow beside her. A mess of limbs and long hair. 

And right there, tucked in the middle of all of it. 

You. 

Propped up, halfway buried in some romance novel, completely oblivious to the man watching you through the narrow slit of the tent flap. 

Arthur watches silently just for a moment. The way your eyes drift from line to line like a canoe with no captain. He realizes  that he doesn’t remember you ever taking up reading, but he also can’t recall the last time he cared enough to ask. 

And that disappoints him. 

Your finger slicks over the next page, turning slowly, eyes following the sentence like a hound dog on a scent. Arthur lets out a low, gentle cough - just loud enough to grasp your attention. 

Your eyes poke out from behind the book as you catch your husband peaking through the tent flap, his face is blank, but he tips his head, motioning you to follow him. 

You don’t bother making a fuss, you stand up making sure not to trip on any extra limbs as you blow out the candle. Following Arthur outside the tent.  

He’s silent for several moments, but it doesn’t take him any time to wrap his large hand around yours like if he drops it you’ll disappear. 

“You know,” he says, walking you towards the tent. “You don’t gotta stay in there if you wanna stay up late readin’.” He pauses, turning to you right before his own tent and glides the back of his hand gently down your cheek. “The light…it don’t bother me none.”

His words are soft and reassuring; but that’s what they had always been. 

Always lies. 

You tip your head down, pulling away from his hand as you duck under the tent flaps. 

Arthur’s frozen for a moment, his jaw clenched tight as he exhales and shakes his head. Knowing deep down that something was very wrong, something he didn’t know how to fix. 

He watches you settle in the cot, turning on your side. It doesn’t take long for him to follow suit, burying himself under several blankets, molding himself around your body like if he let go, he might die. 

It felt good. 

To be back in bed with his wife, to hold you in his arms like he hadn’t in days. To smell your scent, to feel your hair draped in his face, the fabric of your thin chemise against his fingertips. 

He’d always taken moments like this for granted.

These subtle moments with you. 

Arthur settles gentle kisses on your shoulder, not because he wanted sex - but just because he wanted to be close, because he missed you. 

“I’m not in the mood,” you say bluntly, nudging your shoulder out of his grasp. 

Arthur takes this by surprise, his stomach aching in discontent. But he doesn’t push. 

He gives you space, settling on his back instead. 

…

A week passes, and Dutch finally gains enough sense to move the gang somewhere warmer for the rest of the winter. A few days' journey south, where the deep forests merge into grassy plains and the lower Montana wraps around the land like a snake. With Hosea’s guidance, Dutch settles the gang on a quiet bank overlooking the river, hidden in plain sight behind a grassy hill. Just a handful of miles to the nearest town, far from any main roads, houses, or trails. 

During this time your relationship with Arthur doesn’t mend. 

You still sleep in his cot, but you don’t let him touch you; he doesn’t bother trying anyway. You wake up early, always before the crack of dawn to get started on chores. So Grimshaw couldn’t find a reason to berate you. Your days are filled with scrubbing old dishes, chopping vegetables, and sewing every torn sock one could find. And when you can’t find a single chore left to do, and the evening starts to settle, you find yourself at Abigail’s side. 

She’s heavily pregnant now, with a plump stomach, swollen ankles. She groans with every movement, prefers canned strawberries over fresh, and doesn’t do more than an hour's worth of chores a day.

No one nags her - not even Grimshaw, everyone knows she’s going through enough already. But you wouldn’t let her go through it alone. 

…

There’s angry drunks, sad drunks, stupid drunks. 

Drunks that function just fine, drunks that gamble away their days’ earnings, drunks that can stumble a mile in the pouring rain. 

But god watch over the horny drunk. 

A handful of days after settling on the riverbank, Dutch called everyone to the center of camp and made one of his grand speeches. He spoke of a new beginning; one filled with family, trust, and sacrifice. 

Nothing new. 

Nothing he hadn’t promised before. 

But then he called for a celebration, a night off for everyone. The end of a bad run, the birth of a brighter future. Two whole cases of whiskey waiting to be drunk, and three boxes of beer stolen off some poor pig farmer’s porch. 

And that’s how you ended up where you were. 

Near the provisions wagon, three drinks deep, fingers sifting through the beer crate trying to figure out which one was the coldest when in reality they were all the same temperature. 

You were never a drinker, only ever participated when you had something to celebrate or a day called for it. But Karen Jones had shoved three down your throat before the sun had even set that evening. 

And before you knew it, you were back at the provisions wagon - grabbing another. Dazed, eyes glassed over, cherry stain blushing the apples of your cheeks. Horny as one could be. Your body forever betraying you, veins carrying the alcohol from your stomach straight to your cunt. And before you could even ask yourself why, you feel yourself pulsating beneath your skirts, like a god damn bitch in heat. 

Perhaps your hormones sensed him before your eyes could. The staunch body that had joined you at the provisions cart while you fiddled with the cap of your new beer. 

Arthur. 

He doesn’t say a word, just reaches for a beer in the crate before turning to you, lips pressed awkwardly into a tight grin. Like he’s smiling at a stranger rather than the woman he lays next to every night. 

But that’s how it had been the last few weeks. Awkward, strange - like a wedge had built itself between the two of you. 

But his coldness - it still angered you. 

Everything about him did. 

The way he had stopped trying, the way he didn’t bother trying to fix it either - the way he acted like everything was fine even though you hadn’t touched him in nearly a month and a half. 

“You uhh….havin’ a good time?” he breaks the silence, his question laughable, beyond surface level. A question you would ask an acquaintance, not a spouse - certainly not one you’d been married to for ten years. 

But you’re not  sure what angered you more. His surface level small talk, or the way your cunt pulsed beneath your skirt when you looked back at him. Those damn azure eyes of his making you feel ways you hadn’t since that wedge had been built. 

You knew it was the alcohol, you’d always been like this when you were drinking. Your mind and heart begging you to walk away, but your damn body betraying every word. 

Before your brain could even catch up, you were pushing him up against the provisions cart, pulling him down towards you from the collar of his shirt, shoving your tongue down his throat. 

He tastes like whiskey, and cigarettes - but he also smells inherently like himself. Pine, dirt, and faint traces of the lavender soap you know he uses when he cares enough to bathe. His fingers are worn and calloused, and the only facial hair he bore was a few days old mustache that prickled your top lip. 

But the moment doesn’t last long. A handful of seconds later he reaches for your hips, and shifts you off him. 

He’s grinning. 

Broad like a boy that just caught a glimpse of his first pair of breasts, laughing with wide eyes as he asks, “What are you doin’ girl?” He doesn’t say it condescendingly, more like he’s just caught off guard, like he’s excited. 

Surprised and wanting more. 

Your jaw tightens as he looks back at you, your lips forming a heavy pout.

You were angry at him.

God you were angry at him.

Parts of you regretted ever marrying him. Parts of you wished he’d just disappear. But mostly, you just wished you could leave him - never see him again. Curse the man who broke your heart and won’t bother fixing it. 

But right now, all you wanted was him. 

Deep inside you. 

You wanted him to fuck you. Really fuck you. Hard, messy, wild - like he once had. Not this quiet, hushed bullshit that you were so accustomed to now. You wanted to feel him all the way to your core, you wanted it to hurt, to sting. To make you feel something - convince you that things would get better if he’d just fuck the living shit out of you for once. 

Sure you’d rather it be in some hotel somewhere, where he could pin you to the mattress and lift your legs above his shoulders. But you spent the better half of this year already begging him for just that. 

So you’d just do it here. 

Tears of frustrations prickle in your eyes as you push him behind the provisions wagon, instantly falling to your knees. 

Your hands work his belt, jaw swinging loose as Arthur turns over his shoulder. Checking if anyone had stumbled over for another beer. The old wooden cart the only thing separating the two of you from a whole fire full of people catching him with his pants down. 

He swallows hard as he looks down at you, the tips of your fingers brushing against his pubic hair as you untie his pants.

Arthur’s nearly speechless. 

You’re the most confusing woman he knows. 

You’d been avoiding him for weeks, pushing him away, wouldn’t let him touch you the way he wanted.

You’d stop talking to him, stop listening. You wouldn’t smile, laugh, even look in his direction most days. He’d miss the way you’d greet him when he came back into camp, miss the way you’d throw knowing looks his way when someone said something stupid. Miss the way you’d berate him when he was gone too long on the trail. 

You’d stopped all of it, like your marriage had just dissolved right through his fingers and he didn’t know how to stop it. 

But he didn’t want to push. If you wanted space, he’d give it to you. 

So maybe that’s why he was so damn gleeful when you pushed him against that cart, pulled down his pants, and took him into your mouth. All without warning, right there, right out in the open for anyone that wandered a little too far past the provisions wagon to see. 

The tip of his cock hits the back of your throat, rough and deep. You gag, pulling away for a moment as Arthur grips at the wagon's wheel, letting out a muffled moan. 

“Darlin’,” he gulps hesitantly. 

“What - what’r doin?” he stutters as you suck harder, his head tilted back against the wagon. Not wanting you to stop, but at the same time, not wanting anyone to catch him with his pants down, or you with his dick in your mouth. 

You don’t respond, you only take him farther down your throat. Until tears well in your eyes from the discomfort in the back of your throat that you move to his balls, sucking them into your mouth one by one. 

He moans again, louder. 

But he’s nervous. 

He wants this - wants this bad. More than he’s wanted anything in his life. Your attention, your love, your mouth on him like you needed him to breathe. 

But he wanted to finish this in the tent - not, right here. 

“Darlin’,” he breathes hard, cupping your chin into his hand, gently removing your mouth from his ball sack as he wipes away a dribble of saliva falling down your chin. “Why don’t we go finish this somewhere more private?” 

You bite your lip, staring up at him. Standing up. 

His shit grin doesn’t leave his face as he pulls up his pants, not even bothering tying the strings as he picks you up excitedly, throwing you over his shoulder, and returning quickly to the tent. 

He drops you down, tying the flaps shut without a moment wasted, and before a minute is even spared; he’s undressed. 

You drunkenly drink him in. Sure you were still angry with him, but damn was he good looking. 

He’s just so big. In every single way. His chest is broad, covered in scars and hair that trails down to his swollen cock. His arms are large and muscular, delicately crafted from years of labored work. His sandy brown hair sits an inch longer than it usually does, but you don’t mind it one bit. And his mustache - big and burley, just like his erection. 

You can’t help but to think he’s just like whiskey, burns on the way down but damn will it feel good. Always regretting it in the morning. 

It doesn’t take you more than two more seconds to push him violently onto the old cot. Realistically you didn’t have the muscle to push a man of his size over, but he’s quick to let you. Eyes glued to your body as you shimmy out of your dress, letting it fall onto the dusty ground. Your nipples perching immediately at the crisp air, pulling your bloomers down your legs. 

You don’t waste any time getting on top of him. 

Sinking down on his erected cock, not bothering to ease him into you slowly. No - you wanted it quick, wanted it painful.

Arthur moans as you roll your hips once, then twice. And before you know it you’re riding him hard, half for pleasure the other for punishment. You wanted him to fuck the feeling back into you. 

You couldn’t remember the last time you’d had him like this. Wild, and untamed. It was always slow and quiet in this tent, always begging for something more. Faking your orgasms just to make him feel good about himself, when secretly you had been begging for something like this. 

He sheaths into you as you fall back down onto his cock, his hands gripping at your hips almost painfully hard, nails sinking into your skin with every movement. Jaw clenched shut, his nose flaring out in concentration, like one wrong move and he’ll finish inside you far sooner than he’d prefer. 

You push yourself forward, resting your hands on his chest. Tears pooling in your eyes at how good it felt every time he thrusted deep into you from below, but also from every emotion drifting  through your veins. You were angry at him - done with him. You hated how it felt like he had abandoned you, stopped caring, a fucking waste of ten years. 

So as pleasure wrings tight in your stomach, anger also floods your mind and before you could stop yourself you slap him across his face, hard.

He’s taken by surprise but it doesn’t stop him from thrusting up into you. You slap him again. You beat at his face, on his chest, pounding your fists into his broad rib cage. Still riding him, still letting him fuck you like some common whore.

But by the sixth time you slam your fists into his chest he catches your hands, raising a brow at you while still sheathed into you deep. You only flare your nose, gulping at each pleasurable, drunken sensation as tears rush down your cheeks. 

Still inside you, he sits up - you continue to move your hips. 

He brushes the hair off your shoulder and places kisses down your neck - now slow. Every movement of his is meaningful like he’s trying to make up for everything he’s done, everything he hadn’t.

Arthur had never been good at apologies, never good at talking about feelings either but he knew something was wrong. But right now; he had at least wanted to make you feel cared for. Even if it was just sex.

His mustache scrapes at the sensitive skin of your neck as he wraps his arms around you, lowering you to your back. So the top of your head aligns with the foot of the cot. 

He places your legs over his shoulders, intertwining his hands with yours and thrusts into your cunt again. His eyes flash from your cherry stained face, to your heavy chest, to the patch of hair between your legs he’s been fucking mercinglessly. 

“I love you,” he says, thrusting slowly and deep, looking into your wet eyes. “My life has been meaningless without you.”

You stay silent, even though you knew he was  trying to apologize. 

But his words mean nothing when you’ve been fed empty promises for months. You couldn’t trust him any longer, and to be honest all you wanted was a good fuck. 

You didn’t want any of this mushy bull shit - all lies he’d spew to just to keep you happy. 

You wanted his dick -  that was all. And to be honest, with how angry you were at him it didn’t even have to be his dick. You were just drunk, and you were a horny drunk. And that was all. So you push your hips up into him, ignoring everything else besides the pressure between your thighs. 

He runs the fingers of his right hand through your hair, thrusting again. His thumb somehow ending up in your mouth, pulling it open from the side. 

You like it.  

He stretches your cunt deep, all the way to your core.

It hurts so good, the way he refuses to be gentle, to be quiet. How he doesn’t care if anyone hears for the first time in forever. How he hits deep, every single time, like he’s trying to fuck the emotion back into you. 

“Let me,” he moans loud, thumb in your mouth, other hand digging into your arm as he pins you down. “Let me put a fuckin’ baby n’ you.” 

You don’t know what it is. 

Maybe it was the way he’s fucking you like he used to, maybe the way he’s so blunt, kind of raunchy. But you finish right then and there, moaning loud and reckless right on his cock like you hadn’t in forever. Your eyes rolling deep into your forehead like a wave of pleasure had possessed your limbs. 

And in that drunken, orgasmic moment  you forget - just for a moment. Why you’re mad at him, why everything had been weighing so heavy, why you’d been so distant. 

But you instantly come to your senses when you feel him finishing inside you, his body shaking between your thighs. His moans  thunderous, certainly loud enough for anyone to hear. You feel his sweat slicked body glide against yours, his chest hair wet and sticky as he whines needingly into your ear with his last few thrusts. 

And suddenly there you are again, out of your body, not wanting this any longer. Not when it had first started - when the alcohol in your body told you it needed him. 

Now it only reminded you of everything he had said to you, everything you had lost. 

That he regretted marrying you, that you were a mistake. That all you had ever done was annoy him. 

Nothing but a vessel for his physical pleasure.

 Had that been what you always were to him? 

He pulls out, falling onto his back next to you. The foot of the cot now acts like the head. He wraps his biceps around you, kissing down your neck like he didn’t want this moment to end. 

“I love you,” he says into your ear. 

You don’t say it back.

…

Arthur couldn’t recall the last time he’d woken up in this good of a mood. 

You fucked him. 

You finally fucked him. 

It’d been nearly two months since you let him have you, even longer since he’s had you like that - and he’d be lying if he said he hadn’t been dying inside because of it. His right hand no match for your body, the way your tight cunt fit him like a damn puzzle piece.

He knew he should have been more worried with your silence instead of the absence of sex, but god he missed being with you physically. The way you had pulled him behind the provisions wagon just to get on your knees reignited something in him. 

He wanted more. 

A lot more. 

To be alone with you. Really alone. For days. Just you and him. 

A hotel, an abandoned house, a tent in the middle of nowhere. He just wanted to be alone with you. To talk finally. To take you away just like you had wanted these past several months. He had been stupid for telling you no time and time again, he regrets it. 

But something felt different now, he didn’t know what. 

It didn’t seem like you were as upset as you once were with him, and now he just wants to get you out of camp, spend some quality time with the woman he loved. 

He jumps out of the cot, his half-hard cock swinging around like he’s certainly ready for round two - the memories of last night arousing him.

He can’t help but to laugh - maybe Dutch was right, maybe things were looking up for once. 

He dresses quickly, just a pair of jeans and a black button up. A gambler’s hat to hide his long hair that’s an inch too long for his liking. 

He steps outside quick, immediately searching for your presence. Scanning camp like he’s hunting for prey, finding you by the river, a washboard in your hands, halfway through a basket of dirtyclothes. 

Busy like the good girl you had always been. 

But just as he’s about to walk over, ask you if you’d like to get away for the night, Dutch calls him over. 

The men are going into town, and he wants Arthur with them. To sniff out any potential leads. And even though Arthur wants to say no, that he’s got other things he needs to take care of, he doesn’t. 

He follows Dutch to the hitching yard instead.

…

Arthur and the other men don’t return until the scent of Pearson’s venison stew lingers across camp with every light breeze. It smells good, he’s starving. But Arthur’s mind had been on only one thing all day; getting back to you. 

The nearby town wasn’t anything special. One road, just an old saloon, a whorehouse, and a couple of shops - but it did have a hotel. And since his eyes had laid on it this morning - he knew that’s where he had to be with you tonight. 

His eyes finally catch you at the clothes line, propped between two trees. You’re on your tippy toes, pulling union suits and socks off the line as you hold a clothes pin between your teeth in concentration. 

God you’re so beautiful. 

He doesn’t waste time, his legs are already on the move. 

He doesn’t bother announcing himself, he just wraps his arms around your waist from behind and nestles his chin into your shoulder, placing a gentle kiss on your neck. 

You pull away from him in shock. Turning around and placing your right hand over your heart.  

“Jesus Arthur,” you startle. “You scared me.” 

He just laughs, raising a flirtatious brow. 

“I been thinkin’,” he says, rather cocky. “How bout’ we go into town t’night, get a room at the hotel. Just you n’ me..” 

You’re taken by surprise, your face blank. But then your eyes move to your clothes basket. “I really ain’t got time for none that, Arthur.” 

His cocky smile folds into a scowl, utterly confused at why you’re denying him when he knows you’d been asking for him to take you away for a year now. 

You gulp, turning around awkwardly and pulling down another union suit from the line.  “Gotta finish these chores or else Grimshaw gonna be on my ass.” 

His lip curls, that’s not good enough of an excuse for him. “Well we ain’t gotta go this second.” 

You brush your hands on your skirt, sighing, rolling your eyes and taking a step back rather annoyed. “Got plans with the other women t’night,” you say.  “Karen heard there’s a couple hot springs a few miles down, we thought we ought go bathe in them after dinner.” 

Arthur takes a step closer, resting his arm around your waist, pulling your close. Whispering flirtatiously into your ear.  “Well why don’t you just let me tag along?” 

You wiggle out of his grasp again. 

“Cause It’s just gonna be us girls.” You say it like it’s final, like there's no bother in pushing.

And suddenly he recognizes that coldness again, all that heat from last night out the window like it hadn’t happened and his stomach pools with unease once again. 

Maybe things hadn’t changed. 

Maybe it was just sex.

But he still doesn’t give up.

“Well,” he says, taking a moment for thought, dragging the tip of his boot in the dirt. “Maybe you and I can take a trip there one of these days, just us.” He says it like a plea rather than a question, but you can tell he’s desperate for some alone time with you. 

Gulping, your lips move, “Maybe.”

Arthur exhales at your cold, vague response. Not bothering to hide his disappointment as he tilts his head away from you, his mouth forming into a small, shaky frown, nose flaring as he swallows again. Not in anger - but in sorrow. He settles his thumbs into the front pockets of his jeans as he shakes his head, turning around on his heels without another word. 

…

That same night you sit in the corner of the tent on a small stool, mending a worn pair of mittens for yourself. A single candle burns low, its light steady, while the voices outside the flaps wade with each passing hour into the night.

It had to have been ten, maybe eleven  when Arthur comes stumbling in. 

He’s drunk. 

The smell of whiskey and cigarettes waft off him, like he’s spent the whole damn night drinking himself stupid.

One eye squints shut as he stumbles, boots dragging across the ground before he slams into the bedside table, rattling it hard. He lingers there a few long moments, trying to steady himself, his breath rough and uneven.

Then he pushes upright.

His steadiness doesn’t last.

He sways almost immediately again, balance gone, dropping  onto his knees right in front of you. His face lands right where your thighs meet, like he meant to do it. 

You’re taken by surprise as you lift your needle and thread, setting them down next to you, letting his face roll in your thighs like he’s trying to cover himself in your phermones.  Seconds pass, and he finally tilts his head upward, his chin still resting on the caps of your knees. 

He drunk. 

Piss drunk. 

He’s got that dazed look in his eye, blood shot and blurry. One is nearly squinted shut as his bottom lip quivers. Almost pathetically. 

“Why won’t you-” He hiccups. “- Let me love you?” His voice is almost winey. Like he’s yearning for an answer you didn’t know how to give him. You only stare back. 

Knowing this wasn’t the right time or place for this conversation. 

“Let’s get you to bed Arthur,” you try to change the subject as you attempt to stand up. But even piss drunk, your husband’s strength is enough to push you back into your seat. 

He hiccups again, the bob in his throat tickling your knee caps. “I know you’re mad at me,” he hiccups again. “I” hiccup “Jus’ don’t know what to do bout’ it.” Hiccup. “Life ain’t worth livin’ when you’re mad at me like this.” Hiccup.

You sigh, his words mean nothing to you. 

Pushing upwards, you let him slip off your lap and onto the ground. “Let’s get you to bed Arthur,” you say again, as you reach for his arms to drag him back to his feet. 

He only hiccups again, as he allows you to guide him back to the cot, stumbling over a basket full of dirty clothes but eventually he falls onto the cot. Hiccuping still. 

He’s quiet as you unbutton his shirt, pull his boots off his stinky feet, and yank his jeans down his legs until he only wears his union suit. You were expecting some type of innuendo, but maybe even drunk him knows this isn’t the time for that. 

You pull a blanket over him before turning to blow out the candle, but he reaches for your wrist instead. Pulling you close to him. 

“Tell me you love me.” 

It’s not a question, nor a statement. He says it like a plea. His nails dig into your wrist as his eyes look at you like he’s searching for something deep. Something that wasn’t there - something now lost. 

You don’t say the words. 

Of course you’d always feel for him, the kind of love that no matter what happens always lingers no matter how far you drift. But now? It didn’t feel like marital love, it didn't feel right to say it. 

You only smile sad down at him, thumb caressing his jaw as you watch tears pool in his eyes. 

“Sleep well Arthur.”

…

The next morning Arthur leaves, and doesn’t bother coming home for a month. 

… 

Present Day (Four years later) 

“What happened to us”

His words linger, but so do all the memories. Ones that you couldn’t forget no matter how hard you tried, the good, the bad, the all. But the poor memories burned fresher, outweighing the good ones by a long shot. 

Had he blocked out those memories just how he had blocked out you?

Up until last night, he hadn’t even dared meet your eyes - not once in four years. What could possibly make you believe he’d remember anything about your marriage? You gave him ten years, and it felt like he’d let every last good one slip clean through his fingers.

But now, as the wind howls beyond the walls of that weather-worn cabin and the fire snaps and burns in the hearth, his mouth opens again.

“Was there someone else?” 

You swallow angrily at the accusation, the dam breaking, tears falling loose down your cheeks. Completely in disbelief he’d even ask such a question. 

You fire back without thinking, voice sharp enough to cut, “You’d rather believe I was unfaithful than admit you were an absent husband?”

His lips press into a thin line, nostrils flaring, but he says nothing. And you know, if you sit out here on that couch a second longer, you’ll only drag the two of you into another fight.

So you scoff in disbelief,  yanking the blanket tighter around your bare skin as you push yourself to your feet, intent on crossing the cabin and disappearing back into the bedroom.

But he doesn’t let you make it far.

His hand catches your wrist firm, unyielding, pulling you back before you can take another step. You stumble, breath hitching, and then you’re right back where you started, except this time it’s worse.

He has you pulled tight onto his lap. 

“No.” His voice is low, final.  His grip doesn’t loosen. “You and me we’re gonna sit right here and we're gonna finally talk like normal people for once in our goddamn lives.”